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Q: Why should I care about deportation issues?
A: Current deportation laws deny individuals who are not yet citizens (including immigrants and refugees who have their green cards) due process. In 1996, Congress passed the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act (AEDPA) and the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act which significantly impacted deportation laws in the following ways: • The number of deportable offenses increased through the expanded definition of what constitutes an “aggravated felony.” Individuals can now be ordered deported for a number of criminal offenses, even minor ones such as shoplifting, minor drug possessions, writing a bad check—an individual was even deported to Cambodia for urinating in public.
• The laws were made retroactive, meaning that individuals who committed their crimes many years ago, even if they have served all of their court ordered sentence, can still be ordered deported.
• Immigration judges no longer have the ability to consider individual circumstances of those being ordered deported. For example, even if an individual committed a minor crime eight years ago, has served all of their time and have since lived a law abiding life, started a family and is the primary provider for his family, immigration judges are unable to take factors such as these into consideration, and the individual can automatically be subject to deportation. Back
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