How the immigration courts became part of the nation's law enforcement
agency--and how to reshape them.
During the Trump administration, the immigration courts were decried as
more politicized enforcement weapon than impartial tribunal. Yet few
people are aware of a fundamental flaw in the system that has long
pre-dated that administration: The immigration courts are not really
"courts" at all but an office of the Department of Justice--the nation's
law enforcement agency.
This original and surprising diagnosis shows how paranoia sparked by
World War II and the War on Terror drove the structure of the
immigration courts. Focusing on previously unstudied decisions in the
Roosevelt and Bush administrations, the narrative laid out in this book
divulges both the human tragedy of our current immigration court system
and the human crises that led to its creation. Moving the reader from
understanding to action, Alison Peck offers a lens through which to
evaluate contemporary bills and proposals to reform our immigration
court system. Peck provides an accessible legal analysis of recent
events to make the case for independent immigration courts, proposing
that the courts be moved into an independent, Article I court system. As
long as the immigration courts remain under the authority of the
attorney general, the administration of immigration justice will remain
a game of political football--with people's very lives on the line.
