Victim of Asylum Roulette

Not too many stories resonate with me as much as the plight of legitimate asylum seekers whose desperate plea to find refuge in the US is ultimately decided by the questionable preference, judgment and mood of a single asylum officer (with some oversight from a regional asylum director) on one fateful day. That decision, according to numerous credible and through studies, depends largely on the location of the regional asylum center, the legal representation of the the applicant, the gender of the asylum officer just as much as the merit of the asylum case, while in fact the legitimacy of the asylum case should be the only relevant factor. This phenomenon has become so real that researchers at the Georgetown University law school have dubbed it the Refugee Roulette.

Why am I so sensitive about this subject? My most devastating tragedy of late has been the denial of my legitimate and honest application for political asylum at the Chicago Asylum Office. When I applied believing the merits of my case were sufficient to earn me a refugee status, I had known nothing about the asylum roulette I was going to be subject to. Only my recent findings on the internet opened my eyes to such a possibility. What exactly were my decent findings?

The New York Times article - Big Disparities in Judging of Asylum Cases

TRAC Immigration Report - Asylum Disparities Persist, Regardless of Court Location and Nationality

That article is based on a more comprehensive paper you can download from here:
http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=983946

As a numbers guy, I am going to show a few graph demonstrating some important points.

First, the New York Times article. The graph on the left depicts the large fluctuation in asylum grant rates amongst various regional offices. How can one explain such a large disparity between Atlanta (12%) and San Francisco (54%)? Perhaps a 10% difference can be attributed to the concentration of certain immigrant populations in some locations, or the nature of applicants, but a 42% difference is hard to overlook.

Factors Affecting This Decision::

Aside from the merits of an asylum case, these factors have been shown to affect the success or failure of an asylum case. These images were extracted from http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=983946


1) Location of Asylum Center

2) Nationality of Asylee - very legitimate; correlates with a country's freedom index and credibility of asylum application

3) Gender of Asylum Officer - female officers are much more sympathetic to the plight of asylees

4) Legal Representation - Huge factor ... by far the most decisive one

5) Inclusion of a Dependant -


6) Experience of Asylum Judge - The more experienced ones appear less sympathetic (or gullible)


So, many factors appear to influence the outcome of an asylum case. An advance knowledge of these factors could be tremendously helpful to asylum applicants. I really wish I had uncovered these stats prior to my asylum request.