Recommended Citation
Aleksandar Cuic,
The Trump Administration and Immigration Judges: Decreased Judicial Independence or Increased Efficiency?,
51 Case W. Res. J. Int'l L.
155
(2019)
Available at:
https://scholarlycommons.law.case.edu/jil/vol51/iss1/18
Abstract
Through the Attorney General, the Trump administration has changed asylum and immigration policies in several ways. In 2018, former-Attorney General Sessions used his referral power to overturn an immigration court's determination that victims of domestic violence are eligible for asylum as members of a "particular social group. " In the same year, the Attorney General issued a decision that prohibits immigration judges from administratively closing cases. Lastly, then-acting Attorney General Whitaker certified a case that raised a question as to whether membership in a family is a "particular social group" under asylum law. This article explores a question raised by these recent developments: is Trump administration's approach to immigration judges an attempt to decrease those judges' independence or merely to increase the immigration system's efficiency?