Speech #980214299

Mr. Chairman. this amendment reestablishes current law by striking three sections 121. 123. and 124 of the bill pertaining to inspection and exclusion. judicial review. and asylum adjudication procedures. As these provisions diminish the protections embodied in current law while doing nothing to restrict the flow of aliens into the country. their effect will be disproportionately felt by refugees seeking political asylum in the United States. Section 121 of the bill. which the amendment strikes. introduces a new "summary exclusion" procedure that would entitle Border Patrol officers to turn back aliens at the border who have no passports or visas. without giving them an opportunity for a hearing and judicial review. guaranteed under current law. This radically new procedure would have serious effects on refugees and may well result in serious abuses of human rights if persons are returned to a country where they face persecution. As Amnesty International and the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees have recognized. persons who flee persecution in their home countries frequently have neither the foresight nor the opportunity to obtain passports or visas. Indeed. many times they are literally running for their lives. Often they reach the United States only after a long and perilous journey. They know little about our legal system and are easily intimidated by uniformed border authorities who are reminiscent of repressive authority figures in their home countries. Even if they are aware of their right to apply for asylum. they seldom do so immediately on arrival. but rather assert such claims only after achieving more secure surroundings. While the bill expressly recognizes the complicated nature of asylum determinations. this procedure would allow Border Patrol officers to determine whether an alien seeking entry into the United States has any "reasonable basis for legal entry." Border Patrol officers. who have no special legal training. would be asked to make the same determination required of an administrative law judge. Yet the bill mandates that an administrative law judge must undergo special training in such areas as international relations before making these determinations. Allowing Border Patrol officers to make arbitrary and uninformed legal determinations is in direct violation of the U.S. international and domestic legal obligations. Section 123 of the bill. Judicial Review. could significantly change the nature and extent of judicial review for political asylum applicants. The courts have been instrumental recently in correcting the discriminatory and arbitrary detention of asylum seekers by the Immigration and Naturalization Service. as well as the ideologically motivated and overly restrictive standards that it uses to determine whether or not persons are entitled to refuge in the United States. particularly refugees from nonCommunist dictatorships like Haiti and Chile. The judicial review provisions of the bill would diminish refugees access to the courts in certain circumstances. For example. the bill limits the scope of judicial review in individual asylum cases by precluding review of whether the facts of the case are supported by substantial evidence in the record. The courts review would be restricted only to questions of application of law and constitutional questions. Current law provides for full and fair judicial review of administrative determinations. As the Judiciary Committee has noted. in its request: The facts support the position that administrative shortcomings. not judicial interference. has caused the enormous backlog in asylum cases. For this reason. existing law as it pertains to judicial review. should be maintained. Finally. section 124. which my amendment strikes. establishes a statutory asylum adjudication procedure. To approach political asylum procedures in a bill principally aimed at controlling immigration is fundamentally wrong. Grants of asylum account for only a small portion of aliens entering the United States. Moreover. the human interests at stake in asylum determinations cannot be sacrificed merely in the name of administrative efficiency. Section 124 is fraught with irregularities and ambiguities which could well cause injustice to asylum seekers. For example. the section sets restrictive limitations on the time allowed to asylum seekers in making their case. The time constraints specified in the bill are not only unrealistic. but they may well result in denial of valid asylum claims causing the return of persons to countries where they face persecution or harm. The Administrative Conference of the United States strongly recommends against statutorily mandated time constraints on agency actions. claiming that these time limits "tend to undermine an agencys ability to establish priorities and to control the course of its proceedings." Overly restrictive time limitations would encourage. at worst. defaults in making claims with disastrous human consequences. At best. they would promote inefficiency in the form of meritless applications. The effect of these three sections of the bill would be to restrict. confuse. and obscure necessary humanitarian provisions of our immigration policy. I urge adoption of my amendment to reinstate current law in these areas.