Judge Holly D’Andrea

Those are the headlines.

Today on The Daily.

It was like every couple weeks we were getting mass firings of judges.

Six, seven, eight, nine, ten judges at a time.

And a lot of those judges were like walked off the bench in the middle of the day.

Hi.

Hi, good to see you too.

You don't hear from the judges who are ultimately the experts in immigration law and what's going on in the immigration system very often unless the judge is fired or happened to be the president of the National Association of Immigration Judges.

And I'm speaking today in that capacity, in that capacity only, nothing that I say.

Before becoming an immigration judge, I was a federal prosecutor.

And the reason I'd become a federal prosecutor was pretty much because I'd grown up in Oklahoma City and I was very moved by the Oklahoma City bombing and then 9-11.

And I really wanted to keep my country safe from all those who might hurt it.

And if the immigration system doesn't work well, it opens a hole in the system to allow for national security issues.

I investigated smuggling organizations.

I prosecuted people for being here illegally.

And I remember walking into the Border Patrol station one day and seeing Border Patrol sitting there with baby bottles and watching Disney movies with the kids.

And I ultimately became an immigration judge because what other job really carries the weight of the world for the favor of the United States?

You literally listen to the stories of people from all over the world to determine who will be our neighbors and who is going to be your coworker and who is not going to be able to come to the United States and who is here to harm the United States.

You know, it's both there as a national security issue and also something that defines who we are as Americans.

And I think that's a beautiful thing to be involved in, in being involved.