Arizona Representative Andy Biggs (R-AZ-05) recently sent a letter to U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland, questioning the Department of Justice’s (DOJ) seemingly unfair treatment of Trump-era immigration judges amid a historic border crisis.
“Trump Derangement Syndrome is still widespread within the Biden Administration,” Biggs said in a press release. “The DOJ’s abrupt firing of well-qualified immigration judges during an unprecedented border crisis—likely because they were appointed by President Trump—is unacceptable.”
Biggs’s letter, co-signed by 11 other Republican house members, including Arizona Rep. Paul Gosar (R-AZ-04), questions the termination of an immigration judge, Matthew O’Brien, who was appointed in 2020 and allegedly received positive mid-term and first-year evaluations. O’Brien also had past experience with immigration law, serving as a “high-level official within the U.S. Immigration and Citizenship Services (USCIS) and as Assistant Chief Counsel with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).” Moreover, the letter claims O’Brien is not the only case.
Biggs also questions why the DOJ terminated O’Brien while the nation’s immigration court backlog is growing. He ultimately calls the department’s motives “nefarious” and says the group of Republicans are “deeply concerned” that the DOJ would abruptly terminate qualified immigration judges amid the border crisis.
Biggs finishes the letter by asking the DOJ several questions, including how many Trump-appointed judges have been officially terminated, whether the department is seeking guidance from outside groups regarding hiring or termination practices, and the department’s rationale for terminating O’Brien. He requested the DOJ give a response by July 22nd.
As reported by The Washington Times, O’Brien, who also served as the former research director for the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR), was approaching the end of his two-year probationary period but the DOJ denied him a permanent judgeship position. There are allegedly six other judges hired under Trump that have been removed. O’Brien reportedly said this is part of a move to pack the courts.
“It’s an attempt to weaponize the courts along ideological lines,” O’Brien said to The Washington Times. “It’s court packing on steroids. It’s court packing by deletion and then addition, because they’re getting rid of judges and they’re replacing them with people who meet their ideological framework.”
He further said it is rare for judges to be ousted after the probationary period outside of serious job misconduct and sexual harassment.
According to data from TRAC Immigration, between the fiscal years 2016 and 2021, O’Brien made 192 asylum decisions; 96.4 percent were denials.
Furthermore, Fox News also reported on O’Brien’s ousting, which he said was the result of “a coordinated attack.”
“As soon as the Biden administration took over, we became subject to a coordinated attack campaign of filing complaints against us for all kinds of utterly baseless things,” O’Brien said.
Reportedly, O’Brien said multiple assistant chief immigration judges told him there was an orchestrated political campaign against him, which he believes is because Trump appointed him and his colleagues.
“I’m a law-and-order guy. And I never said anything other than the immigration law should be enforced as written by Congress. We are a constitutional republic. It is the responsibility of the legislature to make the immigration laws, and it is the responsibility of the executive branch to enforce them as written, not to water them down in order to pander to political constituencies,” O’Brien said.
Fox News further reported that there are currently 590 sitting immigration judges. When questioned, the DOJ did not reveal how many immigration judges were recently let go at the end of their probationary periods.
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Neil Jones is a reporter for The Arizona Sun Times and The Star News Network. Follow Neil on Twitter. Email tips to [email protected].
Photo “Rep Andy Biggs” by Rep Andy Biggs.
