Due Process in Immigration Courts: Insights from Removal Proceedings

Due process concerns in U.S. immigration courts have long been a subject of scrutiny and debate, particularly regarding the procedural fairness and adequacy of legal protections for individuals facing removal proceedings. We conducted a Court Watch evaluation at Omaha’s Immigration Court between April and August 2023, in collaboration with the ACLU of Nebraska. The evaluation team trained court observers and collected data from 534 Master Calendar Hearings (MCH) to evaluate the fairness of proceedings for individuals facing removal. Using a series of statistical analyses (t-tests, chi-square tests, and logistic regression) we found that MCH were extremely brief, averaging just 3.9 minutes. Advisement of rights occurred in only 18% of cases, individuals with legal representation experienced differential treatment, and interpretation services failed 81% of the time for dialect languages. The findings highlight systemic deficiencies, emphasizing the need for policy reforms to ensure due process protections for all individuals in immigration proceedings.

Dylan Severino; Mindy Chipman; Richard Wiener, PhD/MLS – Professor of Law and Psychology, Psychology, University of Nebraska Lincoln