Some immigration lawyers coach illegal immigrant clients on hiding their past and lying when seeking asylum, said The Department of Homeland Security.
By Catholics for Catholics
In a new directive, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) will have the power to crack down on attorneys who double-deal while seeking asylum for illegal immigrants.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has issued a new directive to ICE, empowering the agency to crack down on alleged fraudulent immigration attorneys.
According to a story by The Daily Wire, ICE has been tasked to come up with anti-fraud policies to further enforce Title 8, Section 1324c(d) of the U.S. Code, a law related to document fraud violations, DHS said in a May 26 statement.
Immigration lawyers who represent illegal immigrants “frequently coach” them to conceal their past and lie in their asylum claims, according to DHS. Now, ICE attorneys can go after immigration lawyers who file false asylum claims in immigration courts.
The issue is simple, says DHS General Counsel James Percival. He added that for many years, millions of illegal immigrants have committed fraud to take advantage of America’s immigration system.
“Protection claims like asylum are intended to cover unique and narrow circumstances, but it is standard practice for immigration attorneys representing illegal aliens to assert that virtually every illegal alien is going to be persecuted or tortured in his or her home country,” Percival said.
“Historically, ICE has depended on the discipline of immigration judges and the enforcement of criminal fraud laws to deter this conduct, but ICE has its own tools. Now, thanks to this directive, ICE attorneys have greater authority to enforce the law and stop the abuse of our asylum system by illegal aliens and attorneys.”
The data from the Department of Justice indicates there were a total of 877,711 asylum applications filed during fiscal year 2025. That year, more than 2.48 million applications remained pending.
Authorities decided on 267,670 asylum cases in total last year, out of which 26,590 applications were approved.
According to an October 2024 report from the Office of Homeland Security Statistics, the nationalities granted the highest number of asylums in 2023 were from Afghanistan, China, and Venezuela.
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