Sponsors
The bill expands and standardizes immigrants' ability to challenge ineffective counsel—improving fairness and access to relief—while shifting more cases and costs onto federal immigration courts and agencies and reducing some state-level oversight of attorneys.
Immigrants (noncitizens in removal proceedings and those with past cases) gain a clearer, enforceable ability to challenge ineffective assistance of counsel and to seek reopening or relief in past and pending cases, increasing access to fair outcomes.
Ineffective-assistance claims will be evaluated under a standardized Strickland-based federal standard instead of a mandatory state-bar-complaint prerequisite, reducing procedural barriers and aligning immigration review with other federal contexts.
Clearer standards and reduced chilling effects for immigration attorneys may increase willingness to represent indigent clients and improve quality and availability of counsel for respondents.
Immigration courts and agencies (DHS/EOIR/DOJ) will likely face substantially increased caseloads and administrative burdens from new and reopened ineffective-assistance claims, which could delay other immigration proceedings.
Taxpayers and federal agencies (DHS, DOJ) may incur significant additional costs to process, litigate, and adjudicate the surge of ineffective-assistance claims and reopened cases.
State governments and bar authorities may lose a gatekeeping role over attorney misconduct complaints, reducing local oversight options and shifting more review to federal immigration forums.
Based on analysis of 3 sections of legislative text.
Creates a statutory avenue to raise ineffective-assistance-of-counsel claims in any immigration matter using a performance-and-prejudice standard.
Introduced March 31, 2025 by Christopher Murphy · Last progress March 31, 2025
Creates a statutory right for noncitizens to challenge ineffective assistance of counsel in any immigration matter by proving (1) counsel’s performance was deficient and (2) that the deficiency prejudiced the proceeding. It defines key terms, applies this standard to all removal/exclusion and related immigration matters (including past, pending, and future cases), and directs adjudicators to evaluate claims under this performance-and-prejudice test.