Memo Re: Case Flow Processing Before Immigration Courts

I was looking through our archives this evening and I couldn’t find coverage of this April 2021 memo from the EOIR regarding case flow processing. While it’s nearly a year old, and so hardly a current event, I thought I’d make sure that our readers have seen it.

First off, clinicians, yes, I know, you’ve already seen this. You’re living it. I see you!

But pure podium profs like myself may have had this one slip past. For you all, a little background is in order: This April 2021 memo comes under Biden’s administration’s watch, but it builds off an earlier memo issued in November 2020 during the Trump Administration.

What’s this memo all about? It’s about moving from in-person hearings (think master calendar hearings) to written pleadings. Here’s how the memo describes its goals:

In order to increase docket efficiency, reducing the number of in-person hearings held to deal with purely preliminary and routine matters is an imperative that benefits both the immigration court system and the parties before it by ensuring that cases are effectively managed and those which require a trial are heard more quickly overall… EOIR encourages parties in immigration court to resolve cases through written pleadings, stipulations, and joint motions.

I could see assigning this memo as an in-class exercise in Immigration Law. One could ask students to parse it: What types of cases should be on the non-hearing path? Is there any way to get a hearing if you want one? Or, for more policy-focused discussion, one could ask: What is the goal of this memo? Who does it benefit? Who does it hurt? Why?

-KitJ