Judge Rebecca Niburg

FY 2018 - 2023, Hyattsville Immigration Court

Published Oct 19, 2023

Becca Niburg was appointed as an Immigration Judge to begin hearing cases in October 2022. Judge Niburg earned a Bachelor of Arts in 2000 from the University of North Carolina – Chapel Hill, and a Juris Doctor and Master of Arts in European Studies in 2003 from Washington University in St. Louis. From 2020 to 2022, she operated her own law firm, Elpis Legal LLC, and during this time in 2021, Judge Niburg worked as Managing Attorney of Esperanza Center, an arm of Catholic Charities in Baltimore. From 2018 to 2020, she worked at Kids in Need of Defense (KIND) in Washington, D.C. From 2017 to 2018, she worked at the Greene Law Firm in Columbia, Maryland. From 2015 to 2017, she served as a supervisory immigration services officer with the Potomac Service Center, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), Department of Homeland Security (DHS). From 2008 to 2015, she served as an appeals officer with the Administrative Appeals Office, USCIS, DHS. From 2006 to 2008, she served as a trial attorney at the Office of Immigration Litigation, Civil Division, Department of Justice. From 2004 to 2006, she was an associate attorney with Tuggle Duggins in Greensboro, North Carolina. From 2003 to 2004, she clerked with the Maryland Court of Special Appeals for the Honorable Ellen Hollander. Judge Niburg is a member of the District of Columbia Bar and the Maryland State Bar.

Deciding Asylum Cases

Detailed data on decisions by Judge Niburg were examined for the period covering fiscal years 2018 through 2023. During this period, court records show that Judge Niburg decided 146 asylum claims on their merits. Of these, she granted asylum for 98, granted 2 other types of relief, and denied relief to 46. Converted to percentage terms, Niburg denied 31.5 percent and granted 68.5 percent of asylum cases (including forms of relief other than asylum).

Figure 1 provides a comparison of Judge Niburg's denial rate each fiscal year over this recent period. (Rates for years with less than 25 decisions are not shown.)

Nationwide Comparisons

Compared to Judge Niburg's denial rate of 31.5 percent, Immigration Court judges across the country denied 60.6 percent of asylum claims during this same period. Judges at the Hyattsville Immigration Court where Judge Niburg decided these cases denied asylum 28.7 percent of the time. See Figure 2.

Judge Niburg's asylum grant and denial rates are compared with other judges serving on the same court in this table. Note that when an Immigration Judge serves on more than one court during the same period, separate Immigration Judge reports are created for any Court in which the judge rendered at least 100 asylum decisions.

Why Do Denial Rates Vary Among Judges?

Although denial rates are shaped by each Judge's judicial philosophy, denial rates are also shaped by other factors, such as the types of cases on the Judge's docket, the detained status of immigrant respondents, current immigration policies, and other factors beyond an individual Judge's control. For example, TRAC has previously found that legal representation and the nationality of the asylum seeker are just two factors that appear to impact asylum decision outcomes.

The composition of cases may differ significantly between Immigration Courts in the country. Within a single Court when cases are randomly assigned to judges sitting on that Court, each Judge should have roughly a similar composition of cases given a sufficient number of asylum cases. Then variations in asylum decisions among Judges on the same Immigration Court would appear to reflect, at least in part, the judicial philosophy that the Judge brings to the bench. However, if judges within a Court are assigned to specialized dockets or hearing locations, then case compositions are likely to continue to differ and can contribute to differences in asylum denial rates.

Representation

When asylum seekers are not represented by an attorney, almost all of them (80%) are denied asylum. In contrast, a significantly higher proportion of represented asylum seekers are successful. In the case of Judge Niburg, 4.1% were not represented by an attorney. See Figure 3. For the nation as a whole, about 15.7% of asylum seekers are not represented.

Nationality

Asylum seekers are a diverse group. Over one hundred different nationalities had at least one hundred individuals claiming asylum decided during this period. As might be expected, immigration courts located in different parts of the country tend to have proportionately larger shares from some countries than from others. And, given the required legal grounds for a successful asylum claim, asylum seekers from some nations tend to be more successful than others.

The largest group of asylum seekers appearing before Judge Niburg came from El Salvador. Individuals from this country made up 43.2% of her caseload. Other nationalities in descending order of frequency appearing before Judge Niburg were: Cameroon (17.1%), Honduras (7.5%), Guatemala (6.2%), Nicaragua (6.2%). See Figure 4.

In the nation as a whole during this same period, major nationalities of asylum seekers, in descending order of frequency, were El Salvador (16.6%), Guatemala (15.1%), Honduras (13.8%), Mexico (9.2%), China (6.8%), India (5.1%), Venezuela (3.2%), Ecuador (3.1%), Cuba (2.4%), Nicaragua (2.3%), Brazil (2.0%), Colombia (1.4%), Cameroon (1.4%).