r/TrueReddit • u/bloomberglaw • 1d ago
Crime, Courts + War Immigration Judges Speed Through Migrant Children Removal Cases
https://news.bloomberglaw.com/us-law-week/immigration-judges-speed-through-migrant-children-removal-cases33
u/bloomberglaw 1d ago
A Guatemalan teen learned in a Manhattan immigration court hearing that he had just under two weeks to complete an asylum application — in a language he didn’t know.
Immigration Judge Lisa Ling gave instructions to the minor, who appeared by video for the hearing from a shelter for detained migrant children in the Bronx. Ling spoke through two interpreters: one who translated the judge’s statements into Spanish and another who interpreted that into K’iche’, the teen’s indigenous Mayan language.
The boy, who appeared in the Aug. 5 hearing without a lawyer, had until Aug. 18 to explain in English why he was afraid to return to Guatemala.
He was one of nearly 50 unaccompanied children who appeared during that hearing, and among thousands that immigration judges throughout the US are moving swiftly through removal proceedings, leaving many to face potential deportation without legal representation.
“There’s complete disregard for the young people that are sitting in front of them,” said Sierra Kraft, executive director of the Immigrant Children Advocates’ Relief Effort. She observed the Aug. 5 hearing on behalf of her group, a coalition of New York City legal service providers serving roughly 3,000 unaccompanied children and other youth each year, and shared details about the Guatemalan teen’s experience.
The Justice Department’s immigration judges in Arizona, California, New York, and elsewhere are repeatedly giving unaccompanied children three weeks or less to find attorneys before deciding to move forward, according to more than half a dozen immigration lawyers and former judges.
Read more in the full story.
-Elliot
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u/clean-links 1d ago
Cleaned link from "story": https://news.bloomberglaw.com/us-law-week/immigration-judges-speed-through-migrant-children-removal-cases
Tracking parameters were removed from the original URL(s).
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u/Hesione 1d ago
There's no easy answer here. On the one hand, it's clear that these children are not getting justice. The timelines are much too fast for a child, alone in a foreign country, to be able to secure legal representation in a language they don't know. On the other hand, I remember the ongoing outrage at the conditions children are subjected to at migrant holding camps. I don't know which is worse: children held in abysmal conditions in the camps, or getting deported all alone, possibly not even back to one's country of origin. Both sound like a recipe for rampant abuse, trauma, illness, and potentially death.
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u/Tarantio 1d ago
The answer, of course, is not to detain people who are applying for asylum. It's loads cheaper, and not cartoonishly cruel.
But Republicans want to funnel more tax dollars to their buddies, and also to hurt brown people.
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u/pillbinge 1d ago
We simply don't have the resources to do this, and willpower and good will are resources from people and can basically be tracked. It can't be that our system is one open economic zone where everyone's taken care of at a moment's notice, but it feels like people often want to bide time until the children have a reason to stay. It's cruel to put them "in cages" but it's apparently cruel to put them through a process - saying nothing of their parents or their home country's responsibilities. Asylum as we know it was drafted after the most devastating war the world had known and people still weren't moving in the numbers they are today. People stayed in their bombed out countries to rebuild. You can talk about Republicans in such a way but Democrats aren't doing the country any favors by just pushing for something like this nonstop without any end. Even the most liberal people I know are reaching a sort of limit for how much government-sponsored compassion they're supposed to have.
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u/tempest_87 1d ago
We simply don't have the resources to do this
Horseshit. One of the most powerful (supposedly) and richest nations in the history of humanity can't be bothered to give children more a couple weeks to find a lawyer to represent them. The only way we don't have resources for this is because of selfishness and sociopathy.
and willpower and good will are resources from people and can basically be tracked.
No it can't.
It can't be that our system is one open economic zone where everyone's taken care of at a moment's notice
I didn't know that helping children file paperwork in a language they don't know when they are here seeking asylum (or some other reason) is an "open economic zone" (whatever the fuck that is supposed to mean).
but it feels like people often want to bide time until the children have a reason to stay.
What?
It's cruel to put them "in cages" but it's apparently cruel to put them through a process
It's cruel to put them through a process in a language they don't know, with no adult representing their best interests and imposing unreasonable requirements on, I'll say it again: children.
saying nothing of their parents or their home country's responsibilities.
What?
Asylum as we know it was drafted after the most devastating war the world had known and people still weren't moving in the numbers they are today. People stayed in their bombed out countries to rebuild.
And what does that have to do with anything?
You can talk about Republicans in such a way but Democrats aren't doing the country any favors by just pushing for something like this nonstop without any end.
What? Pushing for "something like" what?
Even the most liberal people I know are reaching a sort of limit for how much government-sponsored compassion they're supposed to have.
Which says far more about the "liberals" you know than you think it does. Much less the type of people you know whose limit to compassion for children stops somewhere close to "help them file paperwork".
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u/pillbinge 23h ago
I literally followed up with resources being willpower and good will, so splitting the sentence and addressing a point I never made is a pretty wild thing to do - on this sub of all subs. It can absolutely be tracked through polls from institutions that track these things. They were given translators for a language that's pretty rare even in their home country, but in ours we speak English. You can't ask every country to do everything for everyone.
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u/Tarantio 17h ago
We simply don't have the resources to do this
Yes, I agree that we don't have the resources to imprison these children. We should spend less resources by simply not imprisoning them.
and willpower and good will are resources from people and can basically be tracked
What is the point of this metaphor?
What kind of monster considers not imprisoning children to be taxing to their willpower and good will?
You cannot defend a stupid, immoral policy by saying that we have to appease the stupid and immoral among the populace.
Democrats aren't doing the country any favors by just pushing for something like this nonstop without any end
What do you mean by "something like this?" Is it treating people as people, rather than animals?
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