Immigration Court
What does "Immigration Court" mean in law?
Immigration courts are administrative tribunals within the Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR), a component of the Department of Justice, that adjudicate removal proceedings and applications for relief under INA section 240. Immigration judges (IJs) are DOJ attorneys, not Article III judges, and they conduct adversarial proceedings in which the government is represented by ICE trial attorneys and respondents may be represented by counsel at no cost to the government. Decisions of immigration judges may be appealed to the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA), and BIA decisions may be reviewed by the federal circuit courts of appeals through petitions for review under INA section 242. The structural placement of immigration courts within the executive branch -- rather than as independent Article I courts -- has been a subject of ongoing debate, as it raises concerns about decisional independence and the influence of prosecutorial priorities on adjudicatory functions, implicating principles of agency structure examined in cases like the Chevron framework for deference to agency interpretations.
Definition
Immigration courts are administrative tribunals within the Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR), a component of the Department of Justice, that adjudicate removal proceedings and applications for relief under INA section 240. Immigration judges (IJs) are DOJ attorneys, not Article III judges, and they conduct adversarial proceedings in which the government is represented by ICE trial attorneys and respondents may be represented by counsel at no cost to the government. Decisions of immigration judges may be appealed to the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA), and BIA decisions may be reviewed by the federal circuit courts of appeals through petitions for review under INA section 242. The structural placement of immigration courts within the executive branch -- rather than as independent Article I courts -- has been a subject of ongoing debate, as it raises concerns about decisional independence and the influence of prosecutorial priorities on adjudicatory functions, implicating principles of agency structure examined in cases like the Chevron framework for deference to agency interpretations.
Example
A respondent in removal proceedings appears before an immigration judge at the New York Immigration Court, where she presents her asylum claim, cross-examines the ICE trial attorney's evidence, and awaits a decision that she may appeal to the Board of Immigration Appeals.