immigration-case-law v0.1.0A

Immutable. This exact content never changes and is served at /api/v1/blob/70eecd7c4dd313c7.

---
name: immigration-case-law
description: >
  Use this skill whenever an immigration matter needs LIVE case-law or
  foreign-law research, so the agent reaches for the two bundled free MCP
  servers (CourtListener and Legal Data Hunter) instead of citing from
  memory. Triggers include "find circuit case law on", "what does the
  Ninth Circuit say about", "petition for review precedent", "find BIA
  decisions", "Matter of", "is this immigration case real", "verify this
  I&N Dec. cite", "asylum case law", "cancellation of removal precedent",
  "particular social group cases", "categorical approach case law",
  "find the federal docket", "habeas precedent", "country conditions
  law", "what is the law in [country of origin]", "is [conduct] illegal
  in [country]", "foreign statute for my asylum claim". Routes circuit /
  Supreme Court / district-court authority and federal dockets to the
  CourtListener MCP, BIA precedent (I&N Dec.) to CourtListener plus the
  EOIR Virtual Law Library as publisher of record, AAO non-precedent
  decisions to the USCIS reading room, and country-of-origin law
  (statutes, penal codes, case law of 100+ countries — often decisive in
  asylum claims) to the Legal Data Hunter MCP. Enforces never-cite-from-
  memory, the INA-vs-8-U.S.C. search trap, and the AG-certification
  check for BIA precedent. Composes with immigration-fact-check,
  circuit-petition-for-review, bia-appeals, and eoir-removal-defense.
version: 0.1.0
---

# Immigration Case-Law Research (bundled MCP servers)

> **NOT LEGAL ADVICE.** This skill retrieves and organizes legal sources as a research and
> drafting aid; it does not evaluate whether an authority is good law on the user's facts and
> does not create an attorney-client relationship. Immigration consequences are severe and
> often irreversible — pair research with review by a licensed immigration attorney or
> EOIR-accredited representative.

## Purpose

This plugin snapshots the **rules** (INA, 8 CFR, 22 CFR, FAM) verbatim, but **case law is
on-demand** — [`../../references/legal-data-apis.md`](../../references/legal-data-apis.md)
indexes the sources, and the plugin bundles two free remote MCP servers (declared in
[`../../.mcp.json`](../../.mcp.json)) to serve that layer. **Never cite a case from memory**
— every cited authority must be retrieved and read before it enters a draft.

## Forum-aware routing

| Authority | Where to get it |
|---|---|
| **Circuit courts** (petitions for review under INA § 242 / 8 U.S.C. § 1252) and the **Supreme Court** | CourtListener MCP — court IDs `ca1`–`ca11`, `cadc`, `scotus`. The Ninth Circuit (`ca9`) carries the largest immigration docket; **circuit law is not uniform**, so always scope the search to the circuit where the petition lies (or the IJ sits) |
| **BIA precedent** (*Matter of …*, cited "I&N Dec.") | CourtListener indexes many BIA decisions (court ID `bia`); the **EOIR Virtual Law Library is the publisher of record** — confirm the precedent there, and check it has not been **certified to or overruled by the Attorney General** |
| **AAO** (USCIS appeals, non-precedent + adopted decisions) | Not on CourtListener — the USCIS decision reading room per `legal-data-apis.md` |
| **District courts** (habeas, APA / mandamus delay suits) and their **dockets** | CourtListener MCP — opinions + the RECAP/PACER docket collection (find the complaint, the government's response, the order) |
| **Country-of-origin law** — penal codes, statutes criminalizing the protected ground, family/nationality law, foreign case law | Legal Data Hunter MCP — multi-jurisdictional coverage of 100+ countries; often decisive for asylum (e.g., whether the applicant's conduct or identity is criminalized at home), and for nationality / statelessness questions |

## CourtListener playbook (immigration-flavored)

- **Search both section numbers.** Opinions cite the same provision as `INA § 240` or
  `8 U.S.C. § 1229a` inconsistently — search both forms (crosswalk in
  [`../../references/immigration-statutes/README.md`](../../references/immigration-statutes/README.md));
  never compute the offset.
- **Scope by court and date.** Pre-BIA-deference-era and pre-amendment cases mislead;
  filter by date when a provision was amended (e.g., post-REAL ID Act credibility law).
- **Read before citing** — use the document-reading tools to pull the opinion text and
  quote-check the holding; restrict response fields to what you need.
- **Citation verification** — run a draft's citations through the citation-lookup tools in
  bulk; the citation network (who cites this case) is a first-pass treatment check, **not**
  Shepard's/KeyCite. For load-bearing authority, recommend a citator check before filing.
- **Link** every retrieved case with its `courtlistener.com` URL next to the reporter cite.

## Legal Data Hunter playbook (country-of-origin law)

- Discover the country's available sources and filters first, then run scoped hybrid
  search; retrieve full text before quoting and cite inline with the document link.
- Pair foreign-law findings with the U.S. legal element they support (e.g., a penal-code
  section criminalizing the protected ground → the persecution / "particular social group"
  analysis; a nationality statute → derivative-citizenship or statelessness analysis).
- Foreign law in an asylum filing is **evidence**, not binding authority — present it as a
  documented country-conditions exhibit, translated where required, alongside (not instead
  of) State Department and NGO country reports.

## Output discipline

- Inline citation to a retrieved document for every legal claim; holding vs. dicta
  distinguished; operative language quoted, not paraphrased.
- Confidence flags: **GREEN** (retrieved, read, supports), **YELLOW** (partial/arguable
  support), **RED** (could not retrieve — do not cite). Hand the finished draft to
  `immigration-fact-check` for the four-pass audit before filing.
- Repeat the NOT LEGAL ADVICE disclaimer in any deliverable this research feeds.

## If the tools are missing

Both servers need a one-time sign-in (CourtListener: free account, OAuth; Legal Data
Hunter: GitHub/Google). If their tools are absent, tell the user to run `/mcp` and
authenticate — do not fall back to memory. Hard fallbacks: the REST sources indexed in
[`../../references/legal-data-apis.md`](../../references/legal-data-apis.md) and
[`../../references/online-sources.md`](../../references/online-sources.md).

## Composition

Finds and verifies authority for `circuit-petition-for-review` (circuit scoping +
exhaustion arguments), `bia-appeals` (BIA precedent + circuit law), `eoir-removal-defense`
(relief-eligibility case law + country-of-origin evidence), and
`eoir-motions-to-reopen-reconsider` (changed-country-conditions evidence). Runs before
`immigration-fact-check`, which audits the finished draft. The matter-neutral counterpart
for non-immigration research is `case-law-research` in `claude-legal-federal-laws`.