You can't make this stuff up. US Department of Justice immigration judge Jack H. Weil insists 3-year-olds can represent themselves without legal counsel at deportation hearings, as reported yesterday (3/4/16) by the Washington Post.
“I’ve taught immigration law literally to 3-year-olds and 4-year-olds,” Weil said. “It takes a lot of time. It takes a lot of patience. They get it. It’s not the most efficient, but it can be done.”
What's worse, Weil isn't just any judge. He's a senior DOJ official who trains immigration judges. He also teaches a college course, "Bias and Ethics for Administrative Law Judges."
Weil's eye-popping comment on children wasn't a casual slip. He stated it in sworn testimony in an ACLU lawsuit — and twice repeated his assertion to make clear he really meant it.
There is so much wrong here, I hardly know where to begin.
I recommend reading the entire WaPo story, but here’s a tidbit:
Legal and child psychology experts ridiculed Weil’s assertions, noting that key milestones for 3- and 4-year-olds include cooperating with other children, saying simple sentences and building towers of blocks.
“I nearly fell off my chair when I read that deposition,” said Laurence Steinberg, a psychology professor at Temple University, who is a witness for the plaintiffs in the Seattle case. “Three- and 4-year-olds do not yet have logical reasoning abilities. It’s preposterous, frankly, to think they could be taught enough about immigration law to be able to represent themselves in court.”
A DOJ spokesperson took a shot at damage control. She said:
Jack Weil was speaking in a personal capacity and his statements, therefore, do not necessarily represent the views of...the Department of Justice.
Judge Weil's statements do not necessarily represent DOJ's views. Which means actually they might, as the DOJ is admitting to us.
Further, it appears the Department of Justice lied about Judge Weil speaking in a "personal capacity."
Ahilan Arulanantham, deputy legal director at the ACLU of Southern California and the attorney who questioned Weil in the deposition, said... “This is the person in charge of training immigration judges about how to treat children? And this is the witness the government puts forward to present their views as to how this is supposed to happen? That is horrifying."
Then there's the issue of fairness. Under current rules:
...children charged with violating immigration laws have no right to appointed counsel, even though the government is represented by Department of Homeland Security attorneys.
Toddlers versus Homeland Security lawyers! As I said, you can't make this stuff up.
Perhaps the issue could be settled with a new rule: in these hearings, no government representative can be older than the child who's charged with immigration law violations. Picture it: 3-year-olds against 3-year olds!
Now that would be closer to a fair contest — something DOJ officials should have learned in kindergarten.
Meanwhile, said ACLU attorney Arulanantham,
Weil’s assertions “are going to be a significant issue in the case.”
I sure hope so.