That's what Jack H. Weil, a longtime immigration judge who is responsible for training other judges, must have thought when, in a deposition in federal court in Seattle, he said, “I’ve taught immigration law literally to 3-year-olds and 4-year-olds. 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.”
Weil is not dumb. He is an assistant chief immigration judge in the Office of the Chief Immigration Judge He is responsible for coordinating the Justice Department’s training of immigration judges.
The particular case in which he made his statement was brought by the American Civil Liberties Union and immigrant rights groups to require the government to provide appointed counsel for every indigent child who cannot afford a lawyer in immigration court proceedings. Unlike in felony criminal cases in federal court, children charged with violating immigration laws have no right to appointed counsel, even though the government is represented by Department of Homeland Security attorneys.
42 percent of the more than 20,000 unaccompanied children involved in deportation proceedings completed between July 2014 and late December had no attorney.
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