Professor Aldana Weighs in for Conversation, Mother Jones on Florida Plan to Make JAGs Immigration Judges

Professor Raquel Aldana wrote a July 18 piece for The Conversation about Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ plan, endorsed by President Donald Trump, to deputize the state’s National Guard Judge Advocate General’s Corps officers to become immigration judges.

JAG officers are not governed by the McCarran-Walter Act, through which Congress created a clear process for immigration removal cases, Aldana points out. They are military lawyers in a separate system overseen by the Uniform Code of Military Justice. Nor have they undergone the rigorous vetting and training required of immigration judges.

“Simply put, neither Trump nor DeSantis can create an entirely new system of immigration judges outside of the one already established by Congress,” Aldana writes.

Aldana also spoke to Mother Jones on July 9 about plans for the the JAG officers to receive as little as six weeks' training were DeSantis' larger immigration enforcement plans put into effect.

Noting that immigration law is “incredibly complex,” Aldana said that training people to adjudicate these cases so quickly --  even if they are skilled in another area of law -- “defies logic.”

Raquel E. Aldana joined UC Davis in 2017 to serve as the inaugural Associate Vice Chancellor for Academic Diversity and returned to full-time law teaching in 2020. Aldana’s research has focused on transitional justice, criminal justice reforms and sustainable development in Latin America, as well as immigrant rights. She has authored or edited five books and published over 30 law review articles or book chapters. She is a graduate of Arizona State University and Harvard Law School.