Speech #970142575

Mr. Speaker. of all the problems which face our Nation there are few which surpass the flow of illegal immigrants into our country. Although there has been much discussion about new methods to impede the flow of illegals into the country. there has been a relatively small amount of discussion on the equally important issue of how to reform and expedite the processes of exclusion and deportation of those aliens who have already set foot on our soil. Today I am introducing the Immigration Court and Procedure Reform Act of 1982 which is a bill designed to expedite exclusion. deportation and political asylum cases while enhancing due process for aliens and providing a judicial forum for these matters. I am pleased to report that all of my colleagues from my home State of Florida from both political parties have joined with me as original cosponsors of this bill. The act establishes under article I of the Constitution a court of record known as the U.S. Immigration Court with a trial division composed of 50 judges and an appellate division composed 7 Judges. all of whom are to be appointed by the President with the advice and consent of the Senate for terms of office of 15 years. The trial division of the court is given exclusive Jurisdiction of deportation. exclusion. and rescission of adjustment of status cases under the Immigration and Nationality Act. The appellate division has exclusive jurisdiction to hear and determine appeals from final decisions of the trial division and certain final adjudicatory decisions of the Immigra. tion and Naturalization Service as well as final decisions of asylum officers who are established in a separate provision of the act to determine claims for political asylum. An asylum officer will be an immigration officer designated by the Attorney General to carry out this specialized task. In order to get the other Federal courts out of their involvement and streamline the process of deportation. exclusion and political asylum. provision is made in this bill giving the Immigration Court exclusive jurisdiction for habeas corpus and other extraordinary writs and for all injunctive and declaratory relief with respect to deportation. exclusion. asylum. or any other matter concerning the status of an alien or his detention. Under this bill. with the exception of the Supreme Court. no Federal court utside of the Immigration Court will any longer be able to be brought into these matters. The most common tactic for delay will be eliminated. The current procedures for dealing with matters of exclusion and deportation and political asylum area. a hodgepodge of statutory and regulatory devices which have failed mhaerably under pressure of the everincreasing volume of such cases in recent years and the Intervention of U.S. district courts. It is common knowledge that in the last few years we have had thousands upon thousands of aliens entering our country without obtaining passports or visas or other documentation permitting them entry under color of law. Most of these people come from economically oppressed countries. and many have come from countries which are politically oppressive as well. The orderly process of Immigration set up under the Immigration and Nationality Act has long since broken down and nowhere has the breakdown been more evident than in the handling of deportation. exclusion. and political asylum matters. Once an undocumented alien has crossed into this country. he is subject to deportation. If. on the other hand. such an undocumented alien is apprehended at a border or port of entry or coming off a plane. he is subject to an exclusion process. In either case. the alien may seek political asylum in this country under the Refugee Relief Act of 1980 and the United Nations Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees by claiming that he Is in danger of political or religious persecution if he Is returned to the country from which he came. Determinations In such matters are made by the Attorney General or his designees or statutorily created Immigration and special inquiry officers who are employees of the Immigration and Naturalization Service under the Department of Justice. Under varying circumstances there is the involve. ment of the State Department and Federal district courts. The process is so intertwined and complex that an alien or his attorney. with a little imagination. can easily make a mockery of the system and delay the process for years. If these matters were only an occasional occurrence. the problem would not be nearly so grave. However. the magnitude of the problem can be easily seen by examining State Department statistics which show that in 1971 State was requested by tile Immigration Service to give its views on political asylum claims on 441 occasions compared to 1.616 requests in 1977. over 15.000 requests in 1980. and well in excess of 20.000 In 1981. These figures are even more startling in light of the fact that the State Department is not required to give its view in all political asylum cases and the Immigration Service says that it has not begun to scratch the surface of the number of claims lying in wait when it has the manpower and mechanisms in place to begin rounding up the thousands of aliens who are known to be here illegally. but who are not detained or in the active pipeline for being removed from the country. Another example of the gravity of this matter can be found by looking at the exclusion process involving the Haitians in my home State of Florida last summer. At one point in Miami. from June 1. 1981. to June 4. 1981. a total of 140 exclusion cases were heard by two special inquiry officers of the Immigration and Naturalization Service. Of this number. 96 received final orders to be removed from the country. but only 11 were actually returned to Haiti. Lawyers had successfully gotten a court injunction from a Federal district court on tile basis of alleged irregularities in the process. A massive effort at exclusion proceedings Is now underway again in Miami to clear the famed Krome Detention Center. and we can only hope that the extraordinary steps taken to get all the parties working together including the Federal district court will make this effort successful where the other earlier one failed. Not only must we be concerned about the processing of those undocumented aliens already in this country. but unfortunately. as was so ably pointed out during the unveiling of the Caribbean basin plan last week. we must be prepared for the possibility of waves of refugees from numerous countries in Central America and the Caribbean In the next few years. Everyone Is hopeful that the economic initiatives of the Caribbean basin plan combined with deterrents now being discussed to be placed Into immigration laws will stop the worst case migration situation from happening from this region. but It Is essential to the survival of our free society that we be prepared to cope with the problems that will arise if those initiatives do not fully succeed. The establishment of an Immigration Court and the procedures set forth under this bill are critical to that preparedness. The immediate crisis associated with the influx of the Cuban and Haitian refugees and the prominence of thi problems lying ahead for the countries of the Caribbean have heightened awareness of the difficulties of the present system for handling undocumented aliens. but the deficiency in the system has been known for some time. There have been numerous comments made recognizing the inconsist. ent functions of enforcement and ad. judication performed by the employ. ees of the Immigration and Natural. Ization Service. An inherent conflict exists between the functions of enforcIng the immigration laws bv auore. hending and removing illegal aliens and adjudicating tile claims made by these aliens in efforts to remain in our country. At the very least this has resulted in the appearance of unfairnessunderscoring the need for independence of function which can only be achieved when the adjudication of alien claims is placed in tile hands of a tribunal separate and apart not only from the Immigration and Naturalization Service but also the Department of Justice and the executive branch. There are those who argue that simply moving the adjudicatory functions out of tile Immigration and Naturalization Service and into some other branch ot the Justice Department would suffice. but there is no way that the appearance of unfairness and lack of due process can be purged short of placing these matters in the hands of a court independent of tile executive department of Government. Furthermore. under American law the only place outside the criminal system where detention is employed is in dealing with aliens. and no adjudicatory process handled by an executive department of Government can ever function expeditiously since it will always be subject to habeas corpus review by some Federal court. Only the placing of the adjudicatory and detention review functions in the hands of an arm of the judicial department will prevent the opportunity for dilatory tactics and virtually endless court reviews.