The lawsuit contends that the Justice Department rammed through its changes while virtually ignoring dozens of written complaints from immigration experts that the new rules would lead to "erroneous decision-making." It also estimates that board members will have on average just 15 minutes to review a case.
The Justice Department dismisses those concerns, saying that "pure mathematical formulas are deceptive." It says the board has been streamlining immigration cases for more than a year, increasing its output from 1,800 cases a month in 2000 to more than 5,200 cases more recently under the new rules.
"I think we are still providing adequate review," one appeals board member said. "It's just that when only one person decides a case instead of three, there's a lot more potential for errors." The member did not want to be identified for fear of being removed by Ashcroft in March.
But Lory Rosenberg, who left the board in October after serving for seven years as one of its most liberal members, said the emphasis is placed on speed, not legal precision. The board's staff attorneys -- who assess the legal evidence, propose a decision and then present it to panel members for approval -- are encouraged to work fast, she said.
"What are they rewarded for?" Rosenberg asked. "Not for finding the one case in which the judge decided wrong and saving someone from being sent back to a place in which they might be killed. They're rewarded for numbers."
Judge Stephen Reinhardt of the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals said in an October speech to refugee law judges in New Zealand: "Many observers fear that judges who have been most sympathetic to the plight of refugees and immigrants will be targeted for dismissal."
Insiders say the mood inside the appeals board is somber. Two board members have recently left, one member is moving to management and four seats are open. That still leaves five members whose jobs will be cut to reach Ashcroft's goal of 11.
Daniel Kowalski, an immigration lawyer in Austin, Texas, and editor of Bender's Immigration Bulletin, said the appeals board was created in 1940 as a watchdog over immigration courts.
The proliferation of decisions without explanations, he said, "radically devalues what the Board of Immigration Appeals was designed to do, which was to provide an independent, in-depth appellate review of an immigration judge's decision. That's been converted into a rubber stamp."
*
Times staff writer Robert Patrick contributed to this report.
