The federal immigration courts based in Georgia have some of the higher denial rates in the nation – 89 percent and 98 percent – for foreigners seeking asylum in the U.S., a new government report shows.
In the fiscal year ending in September, Atlanta’s immigration judges granted asylum in 24 cases and denied 195 for an 89 percent denial rate. Their counterparts based at the Stewart Detention Center in South Georgia granted one and rejected 54, resulting in a 98 percent denial rate.
Nationwide, the denial rate was 47 percent last fiscal year, when judges approved 9,933 cases and rejected 8,823.
The figures are included in the Justice Department’s Executive Office for Immigration Review’s Fiscal Year 2013 Statistics Yearbook, which was released this week. The report does not say why the asylum-seekers were rejected or approved.
During the application process, foreigners must demonstrate they have suffered persecution in their home country or have a well-founded fear of experiencing it on account of race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group or political opinion.
Winning asylum can be a matter of life and death for refugees fleeing violence in their home countries. But fraud has been a problem. Immigration judges have said they have denied asylum applications that were copied word-for-word among foreigners.
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