Jeffrey S. Chase, a former immigration judge who presided in New York City, told Law360 in an email that the current practices have "weaponized" immigration proceedings — which are civil rather than criminal — and opened the door for government overreach.

"I would think anyone finding themself entangled in a legal dispute would look forward to having their day in court before a fair and independent judge," he said. "How would American citizens feel if after waiting for years for the chance to have their day in court, they were instead swept away by masked federal agents, detained, and denied a court hearing?"

“A lot of times, people are coming for reasons that have to do with politics and conflict,” says Jeffrey Chase, a former immigration judge in the US.

“If you drill down deeper, the root cause of some of these issues actually results from climate change – fighting over land, or limited resources, or groups being punished by not getting aid after a natural disaster, or that sort of thing. And it won't be flagged, necessarily, as a climate change issue…What’s needed is a new way of thinking about “how climate change factors can fit into the standard asylum criteria,” says Chase.

“Immigration judges hear death-penalty cases in traffic-court conditions,” said Chase, quoting a colleague. “This is a perfect example.”

[Note: the colleague I quoted was retired Judge Dana Leigh Marks].

“industrialized countries must meet all their climate finance commitments…particularly in light of the disproportionate contribution of those countries through their decades of emissions to global climate change.” - Camila Bustos and Jeffrey S. Chase, Just Security, Nov. 14, 2022

Former New York immigration judge Jeffrey Chase said, “All moves made by this administration must be viewed as pieces in a puzzle designed to erode the independence of the immigration judges in order to allow the administration to better control case outcomes to conform with its political goals.”

“All of these pieces add up to taking away due process and speeding people through to their deportation in some sort of assembly line substitute for justice,” said Jeffrey Chase, a former immigration judge…”

Jeff Chase, a former immigration judge who…speaks regularly with others who’ve left the bench, was blunt in his characterization...“The fastest growth industry is former immigration judges,” Chase said…”Even if it doesn’t show up on the sheet, just the level of humanity, that makes a huge difference - that’s what this administration is trying to remove from the immigration judge corps,” he said.

“We possess brains and hearts, not just one or the other,' said Jeffrey Chase, a former immigration judge turned immigration lawyer…’It is sympathy that often spurs legal theories that advance the law in asylum law, civil rights, and criminal law,’ Chase said.

Morley, Chase said, was pushed off of the case “because he had the courage to exercise his independent judgment in the pursuit of a fair result.”