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The federal court system is under strain as the number of a certain type of immigration-related lawsuit is on the rise. That’s according to a new report from Syracuse University research group Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse, known as TRAC.
The data shows the rise is mainly driven by a type of civil, legal action called a mandamus lawsuit, which the report says has typically been used when the government fails to take action on a variety of immigration-related applications.
Austin Kocher with TRAC says they’re often filed by people whose applications for things like visas and work permits are stuck in processing at Citizenship and Immigration Services, known as USCIS.
"You can file a lawsuit against the government and say hey, I sent you a thing, and you haven’t taken any action on it. It doesn’t necessarily tell the government how to act, it doesn’t say, you have to approve it, it just says, you have to issue a decision," he said.
TRAC’s data shows federal civil courts received 943 immigration-related suits in February alone — a single-month record. Most were mandamus suits. The report estimates the number could reach 10,000 by the end of this fiscal year, which began last October.
Kocher says the rise points to growing frustration with processing backlogs.
"For us, I think we've viewed mandamus lawsuits as kind of a canary in the coal mine when it comes to measuring how dissatisfied people are with how USCIS and how quickly USCIS is responding to people's applications," said Kocher.
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