The Trump administration passed a rule allowing the Department of Justice (DOJ) to appoint immigration judges who have no prior experience in the area, drawing criticism over the possibility of "political bias."
The DOJ claimed that the rule "will enable the Director, with the approval of the Attorney General, to staff the immigration courts with a sufficient number of well-trained and highly qualified judges to further reduce and ultimately eliminate the backlog of pending cases."
NBC News highlighted that before the change temporary immigration judges were required to have been immigration judges or other types of government judges and attorneys from other executive branches, or to have at least 10 years of legal experience in immigration law.
The change also seeks to address the large backlog of immigration cases, the government added. It follows the firing of judges since the beginning of the Trump administration, which has either laid off or forced to resign about 100 of them. There are some 3.7 million immigration cases in the backlog.
Critics who spoke to the outlet said the development is another way for the administration to conduct its immigration crackdown. "It's part of the same pattern we've seen everywhere else. They are trying to remake the federal workforce in ways that, you know, they won't receive any resistance to what the White House wants to do," Elizabeth Taufa, senior policy strategy and attorney at Immigrant Legal Resource Center, told NBC News.
"So I think we are going to see a continued erosion of due process. I think we are going to see more folks with specific political bias that are hired in this role," she added.
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