Board of Immigration Appeals: New Rule

The body that runs the immigration courts and the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA), the Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR), has posted an interim final rule (IFR) for comment.

You may contact the agency directly for more information: Jamee E. Comans, Acting Assistant Director, Office of Policy, Executive Office for Immigration Review, 5107 Leesburg Pike, Suite 2500, Falls Church, VA 22041; telephone (703) 305-0289.

Make sure to leave a public comment and tell the federal government what you think about the rule. To leave a comment, go here and then type in either RIN 1125-AB37 or EOIR Docket No. EOIR-26-AB37. (At the time of writing, it was not possible to leave an electronic comment, but the feature should become available shortly).

("If you want to submit personally identifying information (such as your name, address, etc.) as part of your comment, but do not want it to be posted online, you must include the phrase “PERSONALLY IDENTIFYING INFORMATION” in the first paragraph of your comment and identify what information you want redacted.")

The new rule intends to shorten the time you have to appeal a decision of an immigration judge from the current 30 days down to 10 days (except for certain asylum cases). What's more, the new rule would make the BIA's review of cases discretionary instead of mandatory.

Under the rule, summary dismissal is the default for most appeals. A majority of BIA members, if the rule goes into effect, would have to vote to accept the case. If no vote happens, the appeal would be dismissed, and the immigration judge's decision would be the final agency decision for review before an actual Article III court.

Besides the above revisions, the rule would compress briefing into a simultaneous twenty-day period with no reply briefs accepted. Further, immigration judge review of court transcripts would be eliminated.

The rule would apply prospectively and not directly impact appeals filed before the rule would come into effect.