Question

Over 3M people were deported under Obama, most without a chance to plead their case in court.

Answer 1

The claim that “over 3 million people were deported under Obama, most without a chance to plead their case in court” is accurate, but requires clarification. According to the Department of Homeland Security, more than 3 million individuals were deported during President Obama’s two terms in office. However, the nature of those deportations is essential to understand. A significant portion occurred through expedited removal processes or reinstatement of removal, which are legal procedures that do not involve a formal hearing before an immigration judge. These processes are permitted under U.S. immigration law, particularly for individuals apprehended near the border or those who had previously been deported and reentered illegally. While these removals were lawful, they often bypassed traditional court proceedings, meaning many individuals were deported without the opportunity to plead their case before a judge. This enforcement approach was part of Obama’s broader immigration strategy, particularly in his first term, which focused heavily on border security and prioritizing deportations of recent arrivals and those with criminal records.
 

Department of Homeland Security (https://www.dhs.gov/immigration-statistics/yearbook),

Migration Policy Institute (https://www.migrationpolicy.org/article/obama-record-deportations-legacy)

TRAC Immigration (https://trac.syr.edu/phptools/immigration/remove/).

Comments

I appreciate the links to relevant laws and judicial they not only give a reason for the claims truth but they also allow a good comparison to other administrations forms of deportation enabling further conversation and granting the tools to evaluate context.

Answer 2

Factually, this is not incorrect. According to this https://ohss.dhs.gov/topics/immigration/yearbook/2016/table39 chart from the DHS.gov website regarding deportations from the years Obama was president, roughly 3,080,000 deportations were reported by the DHS. With this being said, there is no evidence in the article to prove that the courts denied the defendents their ability to defend themselves in court.

With this being said: there are stories regarding immigrants lacking proper defense attorneys, proper language translation, and general issues with the court system at large. Here is a somewhat general overview of the immigration court system, and many problems that exist within: https://www.migrationpolicy.org/research/us-immigration-courts.

Due to all of this, I think its fair to say that the information is correct, though further context is needed.

Comments

Very nice response. Great job addressing that technically this is correct but on the other hand there isn't evidence proving courts denied the defendants a fair trial. You also mentioned the stories about immigrants lacking proper defense attorneys which is great context to include. Overall great response and nice job citing your sources.

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I appreciate the nuance in your answer. The secondary claim that most people who were deported didn't get a chance to plead their case is somewhat ambiguous. It's unclear whether this means to imply they were denied due process entirely or simply could not plead their case fairly due to various other systematic issues, as you pointed out.

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Great response! You did an excellent job explaining that while technically correct, there’s no solid evidence proving the courts denied the defendants a fair trial. I also appreciated your inclusion of the context about immigrants not having proper defense attorneys—that adds valuable insight. Overall, well done, and great job citing your sources!

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Good response!! I like how you were able to provide some information on how this is true while also showing that there isn't any hard evidence of it, but there have been many stories that have circulated around this topic. It was a good note to add that the immigrants didn't have the correct defense attorney, and it would be more difficult for them to put their word in.

Answer 3

Yes, the fact that 3 million people were deported during Obama's presidency is correct according to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Yearbook of Immigration Statistics.

But the contention that most deportees were not given a chance to plead their case in court can be different. Although expediting removals were applied against border crossers and certain types of criminals, most deportations still included the legal process. Issues like poor legal representation and language barriers in immigration courts, highlighted by the Migration Policy Institute (source), cloud the character of the justice system.

Therefore, although the statistics on deportations are correct, more information is needed on the problems with the court system.

Comments

Great response! I'm glad you used another outside source too, but try to credit it next time. It's also good that you had a counterargument to the true claim. You're absolutely right about the deportation process by Obama. While the number of deportations is correct, the claim about most deportees not having a chance to plead their case in court is more complex.

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I appreciate that you mentioned legal processes like expedited removal. Still, I think your post might make it sound like most deportations involved a full trial when that wasn’t necessarily the case. According to TRAC data, many deportations were ‘administrative removals’ where the person had little to no legal defense or access to a judge. I’d love to see you dig into how often people actually got to argue their case.

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Good job with your fact check. I like how you state that the overall claim is true but there is still research to be done with this claim. you do say where you found your information but in the future I would also add links so that others can find the exact sources as well.

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Please include hyperlinks to your sources. Thanks!

Answer 4

Although this claim is accurate. The Obama administration did deport over 3 million people according to this study by the Migration Policy Institute where is shows an exact breakdown year to year, how many people were deported (https://www.migrationpolicy.org/article/obama-record-deportations-deporter-chief-or-not). 

The claim that "most" were deported without a trial is also true, as according to the American Civil Liberties Union "The numbers are staggering: in 1995, 1,400 immigrants were subject to nonjudicial removals, representing 3 percent of total deportations. By FY 2012 that number had sharply increased to 313,000 nonjudicial removals – an all-time high." (Lin, 2014).  The Obama administration favored speed over judicial removal, as they eventually deported 75% of all deported people through the "fast track system" https://www.aclu.org/news/immigrants-rights/speed-over-fairness-deportation-under-obama

Answer 5

This claim is partially true, statistics from migration policy show that there was a total of 5.2 million deportations during the 8-year Obama administration. However, this is not the most by any president and is close to half of the previous president Bush's deportations being 10.3 million. In the Clinton administration, there were 12.3 million deportations which proves claims that he deported more than any president false. On the other hand, the part of this claim with validity is that 3 million people were deported without trial. 

https://www.migrationpolicy.org/article/obama-record-deportations-deporter-chief-or-not

https://www.aclu.org/news/human-rights/ones-obama-left-behind-and-deported-without-chance-be-heard