Bummer: Immigration Judges Only Have Seven Minutes To Make A Decision

That’s probably about 5 more than is really needed. “Are you in the United States illegally? Yes? Goodbye”. But the Washington Post is Really Concerned about this “miscarriage of justice”, that illegals aren’t getting their fair time in court, that it takes, per the headline on the front page, about the same time as taking a shower to decide

His courtroom rarely came to order, and by now the judge had decided it was a waste of time to try. Interpreters explained legalese in three languages. Adults squeezed into crowded seats while children crouched in the center aisle. A court official stood near the doorway and worried about the building’s fire code. “Por favor,” he said in halting Spanish, as another family tried to enter. “No mas.”

Judge Lawrence Burman sat quietly in front of the chaos, adjusting his reading glasses and sifting through a stack of files on his bench. He had 26 cases listed on his morning docket in Arlington Immigration Court – 26 decisions to make before lunchtime about the complicated future of undocumented immigrants in the United States.

“The rocket docket” is what lawyers had begun calling this schedule, warning clients that their future could be decided in the time it took to walk to the restroom and back.

In Burman’s courtroom, the urgent number on this January morning was smaller but just as daunting. He had an average of seven minutes per case.

Just a random thought: if we’d stop coddling illegals, if we stop them at the border, if we’d disincentivize them from coming here illegally or overstaying their visas (like make it really painful, criminally and civilly, for companies to hire them, schools to host them, etc.), stop giving them money and social services, the work load might be a whole lot less. Instead, the Political and Chattering Class do all they can to incent them to come illegally or overstay their visas.

Undocumented immigrants try to prove they deserve to remain in America by bringing their versions of America with them to court: wives carrying family photo albums; babies wrapped in American flag blankets; pastors, bosses, neighbors and community soccer teams, all of whom fill the courthouse and sometimes kneel in the hallways to chant or to pray.

“Somos Americanos,” one group said. We are Americans.

Regardless of illegality, there are some we would love to be Americans. We are a generous nation. Showing up for court being unable to speak English probably isn’t the best way to demonstrate one wants to be part of the American experience.

Of course, the WP trots out sob stories, like a family separated from the husband, who’s in jail for getting caught while driving drunk on Thanksgiving, then being kept in jail since. They have a son born in the USA. The parents are illegals, though. Yes, this is tough. But, the parents made a choice to do this. They can take the child with them. The child is welcome to come back as a natural born citizen. Choices have consequences.

Oh, and the sob story includes the father have been involved in two separate property hit and runs. Because he had no license or insurance, and was worried about being deported. BTW, why has his wife not been arrested, since she is an illegal, too?

Ed20748 in the comments wraps it all up:

Being an immigration judge seems easy enough or at least it should be. Does the individual have the legal right to stay here? If yes he stays, if no he’s deported. What’s so difficult about that?

It should be.

Crossed at Pirate’s Cove. Follow me on Twitter @WilliamTeach.

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