British tourist is detained at Tacoma’s ICE facility. What’s delaying her return home?

A tourist from the United Kingdom has reportedly been detained at Tacoma’s immigration detention center for at least 11 days after being denied entry to Canada.

Becky Burke of Wales was on a monthslong trip that began Jan. 7 and brought her from New York to Portland to Seattle, according to the BBC, which spoke with Burke and her father, Paul. Burke was in Seattle at the end of February, and she planned to travel to Vancouver, B.C., to stay with a host family.

At the northern border, Canadian officials denied Burke entry, her father told the BBC, because they were concerned she might try to work illegally. Burke reportedly works as an artist. She was then questioned by American officials, Burke told the BBC, and she was told she had violated her travel visa.

Burke was then detained at the Northwest ICE Processing Center on the Tacoma Tideflats, a privately-run detention center that holds people who are suspected of being in the country illegally or are awaiting deportation. It’s the only such detention center in the state.

A spokesperson for Immigration and Customs Enforcement confirmed Tuesday that a citizen of the United Kingdom, Rebecca Burke, 28, was detained in Tacoma related to the violation of the terms and conditions of her admission.

The woman’s travel nightmare has raised questions. Why can’t she voluntarily return home on the next flight out of Sea-Tac Airport? Is her detainment related to President Donald Trump’s promise to ramp up immigration enforcement? Or has her attempt to leave the United States been delayed by the Trump administration’s recent firings of more than two dozen immigration judges?

An immigration attorney who spoke to The News Tribune explained that her long wait to get back to the U.K. might be related to the way voluntary departure works for noncitizens who arrive in the United States at a port of entry such as a U.S.-Canadian border crossing station.

“Because she is an arriving alien, a voluntary departure is not available to her prior to the beginning of removal proceedings,” said Carlos Whetten, an immigration attorney with Jaime Barron Immigration Law Group, which has an office in Renton.

“So that means that she can’t simply request voluntary departure with Immigration and Customs Enforcement, like someone who’s been here maybe 10 years,” Whetten, 39, said.

Burke would first need to go before a judge, according to Whetten, and he said there is a “huge” backlog of immigration cases across the country. According to Syracuse University’s Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse, U.S. immigration courts have more than 3.7 million pending cases.

Whetten said there’s less of a wait time for people who are actively detained by ICE, and usually people wait a couple of weeks before going before an immigration judge.

“I’m not sure how it is right now, but you know, in the Seattle Immigration Court for someone who’s in removal proceedings, it could be three, four years before they have a hearing before an immigration judge,” Whetten said.

“The only way it would get better is if we hire more immigration judges,” he added.

About 40 immigration judges in the United States have been fired or agreed to leave their positions since Trump took office this year, according to The New York Times, and dozens more employees have accepted government payout offers to leave the Justice Department’s Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR).

It’s unclear whether any of the workforce reductions have hit the Seattle or Tacoma immigration courts. The EOIR Office of Policy did not respond to questions from The News Tribune on Tuesday morning.

Why was UK tourist detained?

A spokesperson for U.S. Customs and Border Protection, Jason Givens, couldn’t discuss Burke’s specific case due to privacy concerns, but he said anyone arriving at a U.S. port-of-entry is subject to inspection.

“In the event a foreign national is found inadmissible to the United States, CBP will provide the foreign national an opportunity to procure travel to his or her home country,” Givens said in an email. “If the foreign national is unable to do so, he or she will be turned over to the custody of ICE, Enforcement Removal Operations for repatriation.”

Burke told the BBC that she stayed with a host family in Portland during her trip, and she helped with household chores in return for accommodation, but she was not paid.

According to CBP, people who travel to the United States under the Visa Waiver Program aren’t allowed to work for any type of compensation, including work in exchange for room and board.

Whetten said Customs and Border Patrol officers could have decided to deport Burke under expedited removal, which wouldn’t have required her to go before an immigration judge, but that would have also gotten her a five-year ban on traveling to the United States. Even after those five years are up, Whetten said, a person still might not be admitted due to that previous removal order.