1/14/20

By Sarah Towle

I now know what is meant by “kangaroo court.” I attended one today—under a tent of converted shipping containers on the US border in Brownsville, Texas. That’s where asylum seekers present their cases. But tent-court hearings are unique in many ways:

“Judges” appear on screen via videoconference.

“Judges” are not independent but employed by the same government that considers asylum seekers guilty and worthy of deportation before their hearings begin.

Only 4% of claimants have legal representation.

Public and press are barred by armed security guards employed to keep any surveillance on the other side of chain-link/razor-wire topped barriers that shield proceedings from scrutiny.

It’s dystopian, lacking due process, and not simply unjust, but illegal, according to the ACLU-TX.

The US government states that processing claims like this aids asylum seekers, concluding them more quickly. Critics contend it facilitates more efficient deportations. But the process can take six months or more with an average of five court visits per case and a 1.1% success rate. In 2019, for every 10K claims, only 11 were granted.

Meanwhile, future US citizens live in danger in tent-city squalor.

Tent courts have been shrouded in secrecy since they were set up in Sept 2019. I attached myself to an attorney as a “translator” to get in. She was one of just two attorneys present among the 50 asylum seekers in our courtroom. She had less than 30 minutes with her client, who expressed in sobs that in Matamoros she and her baby sons faced regular threats from the Gulf Cartel.

Her lawyer requested a non-refoulement interview. If granted, the three will be allowed to wait out their asylum case in the US. The judge granted the NFI, but then had us escorted from both courtroom and complex. No time was provided for lawyer and client to prep for this important “fear of Mexico” interview.

From what I saw, the tent court system hops—like a kangaroo—right over legal due process by depriving even represented claimants meaningful access to lawyers or interaction with judges. The whole setup is essentially a rubber stamp for deportation.

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