The Justice Gap for Unaccompanied Children in US Immigration Court: Rurality, Resources, and Client Characteristics as Determinants of Access to Counsel

Despite their status as a formally protected group in US immigration law, unaccompanied minors are not guaranteed legal representation. Facing removal proceedings in immigration court alone places children at high risk of deportation back to danger and deprivation in their home countries. Limited funding exists for migrant-serving legal aid organizations, and indigent children’s demand for free legal services far outpaces the available supply. This article examines access to counsel among unaccompanied minors in removal proceedings in US immigration court using a newly compiled administrative dataset comprising nearly four hundred thousand cases. We contribute to access-to-justice scholarship on the “justice gap”—the difference between the number of people experiencing civil legal problems who could benefit from legal assistance and those who receive it. Past research on immigrant adults and the broader civil legal realm has focused on geographic factors and resource availability as determinants of access to counsel. We find that these are also important determinants of access to counsel among immigrant children. In addition, we show that client characteristics—namely, gender, age, nationality, and Indigeneity—that potentially shape the viability of the case in immigration court, and, thereby, attorneys’ client selection practices, also act as determinants of access to counsel.