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The Vassell Law Group Immigration PodCastAuthor: The Vassell Immigration Law Group
We cover various Immigration topics from the client perspective and the attorney perspective without all the hype and misinformation. Language: en Genres: Business, Government Contact email: Get it Feed URL: Get it iTunes ID: Get it |
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2026 New York Times Interview
Episode 57
Sunday, 9 August, 2026
The interview focused on the critical role of Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests in U.S. immigration practice and the serious consequences that can arise when government immigration records are missing, incomplete, or heavily redacted. Drawing on 29 years of immigration law experience, I explained that FOIA is essential for verifying a client’s immigration history and meeting attorneys’ ethical and due-diligence obligations. I highlighted two particularly troubling cases: a Canadian client who was placed in removal proceedings after her lawful entry records were missing from her FOIA file—even though the government later demonstrated through her Notice to Appear that it possessed those records—and a medical professional who has spent years trying to establish his citizenship history after government agencies were unable to locate records necessary to replace his citizenship documentation. Increasing redactions and missing documents are a serious systemic problems, and I emphasized that these issues have occurred across multiple presidential administrations and declined to attribute them specifically to the current Trump administration without supporting evidence. Overall, the interview demonstrated how failures in government recordkeeping and FOIA production can impose significant legal costs, threaten professional livelihoods, and, in some cases, contribute to individuals being unnecessarily placed in removal proceedings.
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