A federal appeals court cleared the way on Friday for Texas to act on an expansive 2023 state law that empowers state and local police officers to arrest migrants who cross illegally from Mexico, the latest development in a long-running case that could have far-reaching implications for immigration enforcement in the United States. In a 10-to-7 decision, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit ruled that the plaintiffs lacked standing to challenge the law, known as [Senate Bill 4](https://www.nytimes.com/article/texas-border-law-challenge-explainer.html), and lifted a [temporary injunction](https://www.nytimes.com/2024/02/29/us/texas-border-law-court-injunction.html) that had been in place since 2024. That year, the U.S. Supreme Court had [briefly allowed](https://www.nytimes.com/2024/03/19/us/supreme-court-texas-immigration.html) the law to go into effect and returned the case to the 5th Circuit, which quickly put the law on hold. In July 2025, a three-member panel of the 5th Circuit upheld the 2024 injunction. Texas has since continued to press its case and, on Friday, a majority of the full 5th Circuit sided with the state and removed the injunction. The court, however, did not address the underlying question of whether the law unconstitutionally infringes on the federal government’s power to set and enforce immigration law. The ruling does not take effect until May 15, and the challengers, which include civil rights and immigrants’ groups and the El Paso County government, [have indicated](https://www.aclu.org/press-releases/fifth-circuit-rules-challenge-to-extreme-texas-immigration-law-must-be-dismissed-on-procedural-grounds#:~:text=The%20full%20court%20did%20not,at%20least%20until%20that%20date.) that they intend to appeal the decision. “This fight is far from over,” said Cody Wofsy, deputy director of the Immigrants’ Rights Project at the American Civil Liberties Union, which filed the lawsuit on behalf of the plaintiffs, in a statement. Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and [log into](https://myaccount.nytimes.com/auth/login?response_type=cookie&client_id=vi&redirect_uri=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.nytimes.com%2F2026%2F04%2F25%2Fus%2Ftexas-mexico-border-arrest-deport-immigration.html&asset=opttrunc) your Times account, or [subscribe](https://www.nytimes.com/subscription?campaignId=89WYR&redirect_uri=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.nytimes.com%2F2026%2F04%2F25%2Fus%2Ftexas-mexico-border-arrest-deport-immigration.html) for all of The Times. Thank you for your patience while we verify access. Already a subscriber? [Log in](https://myaccount.nytimes.com/auth/login?response_type=cookie&client_id=vi&redirect_uri=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.nytimes.com%2F2026%2F04%2F25%2Fus%2Ftexas-mexico-border-arrest-deport-immigration.html&asset=opttrunc). Want all of The Times? [Subscribe](https://www.nytimes.com/subscription?campaignId=89WYR&redirect_uri=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.nytimes.com%2F2026%2F04%2F25%2Fus%2Ftexas-mexico-border-arrest-deport-immigration.html).

A federal judge in New York has banned US Immigration and Customs Enforcement ([ICE](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/ice-us-immigration-and-customs-enforcement)) agents from arresting immigrants in or around three federal courthouses in lower Manhattan, where vigorous confrontations have played out since the start of [Donald Trump](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/donaldtrump)’s second presidency. Under an order issued on Monday by P Kevin Castel, a US district judge, federal agents are no longer allowed to make arrests of immigrants except under exceptional circumstances at the sites where hearings are held before immigration judges. Castel’s ruling came in response to a [lawsuit](https://www.courthousenews.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/complaint-immigration-court-arrests-nyc.pdf) brought by the New York Civil Liberties Union, the American Civil Liberties Union, Make the Road NY and other groups. The ACLU’s Amy Belsher called the ruling “an enormous win for noncitizen New Yorkers seeking to safely attend their immigration court proceedings”. Castel said that his ruling applied to immigration courts at 26 Federal Plaza and two other Manhattan locations – 201 Varick Street and 290 Broadway. The ruling does not apply nationwide. In a [15-page order](https://www.courthousenews.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/05/ice-ruling-immigration-court-arrests.pdf), Castel said that while there was “a strong governmental interest in enforcing immigration laws”, there also was a serious interest in letting individuals attend removal proceedings and pursue asylum claims before a judge “without fear of arrest”. Castel also noted that federal agents still can detain individuals at locations away from immigration courts and also can make arrests at immigration courthouses when there is a serious threat to public safety. The lower Manhattan federal buildings, including 26 Federal Plaza where ICE maintains an office, have been the site of immigrants’ arrests, related protests and standoffs between agents and demonstrators which have included the detention of local elected officials. Castel said the boundaries set out in federal policy in April 2021 regarding enforcement actions inside courthouses can remain in effect. He also said that a court case before him was likely to result in a ruling that it was “arbitrary and capricious” for the second Trump administration to withdraw that policy. The judge had initially cleared the way for arrests at Manhattan immigration courts in September. But he said that government attorneys had recently reversed their position on the matter, saying they have learned that 2025 policies regarding arrests in and around courthouses set by the Trump administration did not apply to immigration courts after all. He said the government’s new position meant it was necessary to “correct a clear error and prevent a manifest injustice”. Castel wrote that federal prosecutors apologized to him in March for a “material mistaken statement of fact that the government made to the court”. The Trump administration blamed the mistake on “agency attorney error”, withdrawing “portions of four briefs” as well as “statements” made during oral argument. Castel’s ruling on Monday comes after there had been highly publicized tensions between protesters and federal immigration authorities in cities such as Los Angeles and Minneapolis. The latter city saw widespread street protests after federal agents shot the 37-year-old US citizens, Renee Good and Alex Pretti, to death in separate cases in January. In the wake of those killings, polling [revealed](https://www.maristpoll.marist.edu/polls/the-actions-of-ice-february-2026/) most Americans believed immigration agents had gone too far with their tactics. And, with midterm elections looming in the fall, the Trump administration made agency leadership changes. African Communities Together and the Door, groups involved in the legal action yielding Castel’s ruling on Monday, had argued that making arrests at federal immigration locations was a “profoundly unfair” practice that “undermined the rule of law and the integrity of immigration courts”. The Door’s Beth Baltimore said that the judge’s decision “brings us hope” and said the group “continues to work tirelessly to support … members who were terrified to go to their required court appearances”.

Attorneys for [Mahmoud Khalil](http://theguardian.com/us-news/ng-interactive/2025/sep/08/mahmoud-khalil-update-release-detention-trump), the former Columbia University student who last year became the face of the Trump administration’s crackdown on pro-Palestine speech, will ask the US supreme court to intervene after a federal appeals court opened the door for the government to once again detain and ultimately deport him. On Friday, the third circuit court of appeals upheld a [January ruling](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/jan/15/appeals-court-mahmoud-khalil-columbia-activist) by a three-judge panel, which had reversed a lower-court decision ordering Khalil’s [release on bail](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/jun/20/mahmoud-khalil-release-federal-judge) last June. The ruling marks the latest chapter in Khalil’s months-long challenge of the government’s campaign against him. The appeals court’s decision marks a significant setback for him, but his lawyers insist he cannot be deported – for now. “We hope the supreme court will recognize how dangerous the third circuit’s decision was, not just for Mahmoud but for other non-citizens the administration has its vengeful sights upon,” said Baher Azmy, legal director of the Center for Constitutional Rights and part of Khalil’s legal team. “That ruling greenlights holding someone in prolonged, brutal detention conditions without access to meaningful judicial review in order to punish them and deter others from dissenting from US foreign policy.” The third circuit judges were split on the decision – with six voting against and five in favor of Khalil’s request to reverse the earlier ruling. In a dissenting opinion, three of the judges who voted against argued that the majority’s ruling “ignores canons”, “strains precedent” and “imperils the civil liberties of \[Khalil\] and similarly situated noncitizens”. Khalil’s attorneys said that they planned to ask the court to pause the decision’s implementation so they can bring the matter to the [US supreme court](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/us-supreme-court). Khalil is also fighting the government’s attempt to remove him in a separate legal case moving through the immigration court system. Earlier this month, his legal team filed a motion asking an immigration appeals court to reopen and throw out that case after evidence emerged that the Trump administration had improperly [fast-tracked it](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/may/11/mahmoud-khalil-doj-case-fast-tracked) and tried to predetermine its outcome. Still, Friday’s ruling is a notable loss for Khalil and sets a dangerous precedent for others seeking to challenge their detention in federal court at a time when the Trump administration has politicized the immigration court system in unprecedented ways. “What the administration wants to do is litigate his removability in the immigration court process – what I call the president’s courts,” said Azmy. “It’s a total sham process that’s designed to carry out their plan to deport him.” Khalil, a US permanent resident who is married to a US citizen, was detained in his Columbia University housing in March 2025 – the first of several foreign students and scholars the administration targeted over their pro-Palestine advocacy. He had been a lead negotiator between the university and student protesters during the spring 2024 encampments. Khalil has remained defiant throughout the ordeal and since being released last year has become a far more prominent advocate. “The administration wants to arrest, detain and deport me to intimidate everyone speaking out for Palestine across this country, and they are willing to violate longstanding US rules and procedures to do it,” he said [recently](https://www.aclu.org/press-releases/after-new-evidence-of-doj-misconduct-mahmoud-khalil-calls-on-board-of-immigration-appeals-to-terminate-case). “But no lies, corruption, or ideological persecution will stop me from advocating for Palestine and for everyone’s right to free speech.” Khalil [missed the birth](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/apr/21/mahmoud-khalil-ice-noor-abdalla-birth) of his first son while in detention in an Immigrationa nd Customs Enforcement (ICE) facility in Louisiana last year. His lawyers argued that he would suffer “irreparable harm” if forced to remain in detention while his immigration case proceeded – and a federal court ultimately sided with him and found that he was likely to succeed in his claim that the government’s actions had been unconstitutional. An appeals court struck down that decision in January after it concluded that the federal judge who ordered his release did not have jurisdiction over the case, which it said needed to remain in the immigration court system. Attorneys for Khalil warn that the panel’s decision effectively blocks anyone in immigration proceedings from challenging their detention on first amendment grounds until those proceedings have run their course – “no matter how long they may take or how unconstitutional the basis for their detention”, they wrote in a recent [statement](https://ccrjustice.org/home/press-center/press-releases/mahmoud-khalil-asks-full-appeals-court-reconsider-decision-would). The judges in the dissent agreed. “The Judiciary ‘serves as an inseparable element of the constitutional system of checks and balances’ protecting civil liberties and checking legislative and executive discretion,” they wrote. “We cannot fulfill that role if we write ourselves out of relevance and leave the Executive Branch to check itself.” The Trump administration originally maintained that Khalil – as well as [other foreign scholars](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/may/17/trump-effort-deport-pro-palestinian-students) it detained over their pro-Palestine advocacy – posed a threat to the government’s foreign policy objectives in fighting antisemitism, citing a little-used immigration statute from the McCarthy era. So far, that claim has not been tested in court, with the government choosing to fight Khalil’s appeal on jurisdictional grounds instead. Government lawyers later argued that Khalil’s deportation would be justified on the grounds that he omitted details in his green card application – claims his lawyers have vehemently rejected. Courts have expressed reservations over the government’s argument and last fall, a federal judge in Boston ruled in a [blistering opinion](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/sep/30/trump-administration-immigration-palestine) in a [related case](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/jul/07/trial-trump-ideological-deportation-policy-pro-palestinian-students) that the detentions of pro-Palestinian students had been unconstitutional and designed to chill speech. During that [trial](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/jul/22/key-takeaways-trial-trump-administrations-ideological-deportation-policy), immigration officials involved in the detentions revealed that government officials had relied on dossiers compiled by far-right, pro-Israel groups to target those students. While the administration, and the president himself, called Khalil a “Radical Foreign Pro-Hamas Student” and a “terrorist sympathizer”, he has been a nuanced voice in his criticism of Israel and has repeatedly spoken out against antisemitism, saying it has “no place” in the Palestine solidarity movement. “I grew up in a community that valued human rights and valued principles beyond religion, beyond race,” he said in a recent interview with the Jewish publication [the Forward](https://forward.com/news/817276/mahmoud-khalil-hamas-zionism-antisemitism-israel/). ““I know it might sound like a very ideal utopia, but this is what we should aspire for: to get a place where there’s no more conflict, no more killing in that place and it’s open to anyone who wants to call it their home or their Holy Land.”

 Immigration courts [inside the Justice Department](https://www.npr.org/2026/03/20/nx-s1-5707535/trump-immigration-detention-appeals-board-deportation) are drastically accelerating immigrants' hearings and bunch them together with the goal of issuing more deportation orders. The new and unprecedented tactic was shared with NPR by immigration attorneys and the American Immigration Lawyers Association, a trade association that tracks trends in these courts. Immigrants are now being scheduled for massive master calendar hearings — or "mega masters" — that include 100 or more people at a time. That's up from two or three dozen people at a time that had been typical before for a first hearing. For many immigrants, this is their first appearance in court to try to make their case to be able to stay in the U.S. Attorneys say these new hearings largely target people without lawyers representing them. Those who show up late, or not at all, are receiving removal orders, further truncating the already-limited due process available to immigrants. "The major concern is that \[since\] this is going to be a group of people without attorneys, that they're not going to have gotten proper notice," said Vanessa Dojaquez-Torres, practicing policy counsel at AILA, adding that courts often lack enough seats for hearings with so many people at once. "So it's almost like they are being designed to increase" how many people get deportation orders automatically, she said. The Executive Office for Immigration Review, the agency that runs the immigration courts at DOJ, did not respond to a request for comment on this new strategy. Lawyers said the practice had started in the Chicago, Boston and Chelmsford, Mass., courts and is soon to start in the Dallas Immigration Court. The effort comes as President Trump seeks to deport a million people a year — much higher [than the 600,000 people](https://www.dhs.gov/news/2025/12/10/thanks-president-trump-and-secretary-noem-more-25-million-illegal-aliens-left-us) the administration deported in 2025. Trump has also complained about the backlogs of millions of cases inside immigration courts, pointing to courts [as an obstacle](https://www.npr.org/2025/04/29/g-s1-63187/trump-courts-immigration-judges-due-process) to rapid deportation. ### No notice, overwhelmed courthouses When someone does not appear for their scheduled hearing, even by mistake, the judge can issue an official removal order that allows immigration officers to detain and deport the person. That's been happening [a lot more often](https://www.npr.org/2025/12/22/nx-s1-5583971/trump-ice-immigration-arrests-deportation-no-shows) under this Trump administration, an NPR analysis found last year, with fewer people showing up in court for fear of being detained. Dojaquez-Torres and other immigration attorneys who spoke to NPR worry that immigrants, especially those without a lawyer, may not know that their hearing dates had been rescheduled for a sooner date, leaving them vulnerable to deportation. She added that in some cases, little to no notice is being issued by the government by mail or electronically to immigrants or their lawyers, meaning those not regularly checking their online accounts could miss any changes. These "mega masters" are made up of people whose original hearings were scheduled for 2027, 2028 or 2029. "They're anticipating that the majority will not show up and they'll just be able to say that they completed X number of cases because they'll be in absentia orders of removal," said one Texas-based immigration attorney. The attorney spoke to NPR on the condition of anonymity out of fear of reprisals for their ability to practice in Texas courts. The attorney noted that if people do show up to the massive hearings, it could overwhelm court staff and judges, and overcrowd courtrooms. In some cases, attorneys said their clients may benefit from cases getting scheduled sooner, even if it increases pressure and creates sudden legal filing deadlines. However, most people in immigration court do not have a lawyer and are unlikely to see these benefits. ### DOJ begins to staff up to take on cases This is not the first time the agency has pushed to streamline cases under Trump's second term. EOIR has also moved to quickly prioritize cases of people from specific nationalities including [Somalis](https://www.npr.org/2026/02/09/nx-s1-5707217/somali-asylum-cases-rescheduled), Syrians and Iranians. And, cases of juvenile immigrants are also being pushed up, their lawyers say. The strategy of hosting mega masters comes as the DOJ announced its largest-ever class of new immigration judges. Last week, the agency onboarded [77 judges and 5 temporary military lawyers](https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/eoir-announces-77-immigration-judges-and-5-temporary-immigration-judges) serving as judges. The agency has boasted hiring 153 immigration judges this fiscal year, [the most in any year](https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/eoir-announces-77-immigration-judges-and-5-temporary-immigration-judges). "The Trump administration is committed to reestablishing an immigration judge corps that is dedicated to restoring the rule to the law in our nation's immigration system," Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said in a statement. The rapid hirings come after EOIR lost about a quarter of its [immigration judges](https://www.npr.org/2026/02/23/g-s1-110911/trump-immigration-judges-dismissals-numbers) last year, with more than 100 of them fired. And even as more judges were hired last week, several more were fired the same day, including in courts in New York and California. An NPR analysis last year found that judges with [backgrounds in representing immigrant](https://www.npr.org/2025/11/06/g-s1-96437/trump-immigration-judges-fired) clients were more likely to be fired compared to those who only had prior experience working at the Department of Homeland Security.

An immigration judge in Charlotte, [North Carolina](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/northcarolina), recently ordered the deportation of a young man who was killed in 2024, citing his failure to appear in court. Judge Amy Lee ordered the removal of Levi Mendez-Maldonado in absentia on 21 May. Mendez-Maldonado, originally from Honduras, came to the United States as an unaccompanied minor at age 17 and was [murdered in a shooting](https://www.charlottenc.gov/cmpd/News-Information/Newsroom/Case-Update-Homicide-Investigation-in-the-Westover-Division-3) in November 2024. Becca O’Neill, a lawyer with the Carolina Migrant Network, was preparing to represent Mendez-Maldonado, a young father and mechanic, in his asylum case and deportation defense before his death. In December 2024, she received notice of a preliminary hearing for Mendez-Maldonado scheduled on 21 May 2026. Like all immigrants detained and processed at the border, he was immediately put into deportation proceedings upon arrival. This court date would have been an initial step in a process that takes years. O’Neill attended the 21 May meeting on his behalf. At the beginning of the hearing, she notified Lee of her client’s death. O’Neill presented the court with Charlotte-Mecklenburg police department (CMPD) records of Mendez-Maldonado’s death. According to O’Neill, Lee found the CMPD records to be insufficient proof of death, even though a death certificate was filed in late 2024. The Guardian has requested, but not received, a copy of the court recording. Lee’s office could not be reached for comment. The judge and the federal prosecutor continued with the hearing as planned without acknowledging the reason for Mendez-Maldonado’s absence, said O’Neill. “The whole thing probably took maybe five minutes. The attorney acted like we were talking about the weather. The judge didn’t take a moment to reorient herself after hearing he was dead.” The court order states: “Despite the written notification provided, Respondent failed to appear at the hearing, and no exceptional circumstances were shown for the failure to appear. Therefore, the immigration court conducted the hearing in absentia.” There is no mention of his death in the judge’s order, obtained by the Guardian. Flabbergasted, O’Neill did not contest the final order. “This is the banality of evil. All of this is so normalized and bizarre. Just a boilerplate order: he didn’t come to court, he didn’t demonstrate good cause. Well, he’s dead. And you know that because you saw a government website saying that he’s dead.” Stefanía Arteaga, the founder and executive director of Carolina Migrant Network, said: “It shows that even after death, you can’t escape deportation.” > It shows that even after death, you can’t escape deportation Stefanía Arteaga, Carolina Migrant Network Advocates say the judge’s decision and the omission of Mendez-Maldonado’s death in official court records further strip dignity from immigrant communities terrorized during federal authorities’ [recent](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/nov/20/charlotte-north-carolina-ice-raids) [Operation Charlotte’s Web](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/nov/17/charlotte-nc-immigration-raids-business). “The system is designed to dehumanize noncitizens, especially if the noncitizens are Black or not white. You can see what happened in Charlotte last year, the [violence](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/nov/17/charlotte-protests-arrests-immigration) [and](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/nov/18/raleigh-north-carolina-immigration-raids-ice) [active](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/nov/17/border-agents-charlotte-immigration-explainer) [targeting](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/nov/16/charlotte-north-carolina-immigration-crackdown) of these communities,” said O’Neill. “The thing is: the entire system is like that. It doesn’t have to just be \[Customs and Border Protection\] in tactical gear outside of somebody’s home. It’s happening in the courts. These judges and attorneys don’t care.” The Charlotte immigration court handles cases from North and South Carolina. In 2025, it granted legal relief in roughly 1% of cases. The court currently has a backlog of [about 129,000 pending cases](https://www.wunc.org/2026-05-11/charlotte-immigration-judges-ordered-more-than-7-000-removals-from-january-to-april), the ninth-largest in the country. “I just believe this is a numbers game,” Arteaga said. “There’s an emphasis on results rather than fully understanding the scope of the situation.” [](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/jun/03/north-carolina-judge-deport-teen-murder-victim#img-2) Protesters gather at First Ward Park at a rally to support the immigrant community in Charlotte, North Carolina, on 15 November 2025. Photograph: Anadolu/Getty Images From 2020 to 2025, Lee denied nearly 90% of her 550 asylum cases in Charlotte. Her statistics locate her somewhere in the middle of her peers in the same court, according to [Trac Immigration](https://tracreports.org/immigration/reports/judgereports/). O’Neill describes Lee as tough. Earlier this year, Lee ordered one of her clients removed to Ecuador, Guatemala or Honduras. “My client is Mexican,” she said. The government currently permits [third-country asylum agreements](https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2026/may/28/trump-deportations-asylum), [deporting](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/apr/02/uganda-receives-first-us-deportation-flight-under-third-country-agreement) [people](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/may/14/un-equatorial-guinea-us-deportees) to foreign countries with which they have few or no ties. O’Neill filed a motion to reconsider, arguing that her client had never been to any of those countries. She claimed Lee told her to “stop talking” and wouldn’t budge on her decision. “She does not indulge” any differing feedback. Paul Hunker, a Dallas-based former Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) counsel turned immigration lawyer, said that the judge could have delayed her decision. [Federal regulation 239.2](https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-8/chapter-I/subchapter-B/part-239/section-239.2) permits the cancellation of a notice to appear in immigration court for several reasons, including death. Hunker, who was chief counsel for ICE in [Texas](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/texas) from 2003 to 2024, noted that the Biden administration saw record numbers of immigrants processed at the border. But he believes that the second Trump administration gives the agencies “marching orders” to deny as many immigrants relief as possible. “The administration is putting pressure on ICE attorneys to achieve outcomes \[and\] never agree to a bond,” he said. “If a person is not a danger to the community, they should be released on a bond. Under the first Trump administration, we would reopen and desist a case. And then an immigrant can go on their merry way, and that’s great. But now ICE won’t do that.” Both O’Neill and Arteaga say they never encountered a deportation order for a deceased immigrant in more than 20 years working in North Carolina. One such case occurred in 2024 in California, when 88-year-old Jose Mario Rodriguez Grimaldi [faced](https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2025-10-07/immigration-sought-to-deport-88-year-old-but-he-already-died) deportation proceedings three years after he died. The Los Angeles Times reported that the Department of Homeland Security sent multiple notices to the residence he shared with his daughter. The publication also confirmed several similar cases with at least three more immigration lawyers. Mendez-Maldonado had gone through the appropriate channels to apply for legal status. Since he entered the country alone as a 17-year-old, he needed a US sponsor in order to be released and given a chance to apply for asylum. His older brother sponsored him and acted as his legal guardian for a year. Mendez-Maldonado entered through Texas, where his first attorney helped him apply for asylum in May 2024, after he turned 18. Then he moved to [North Carolina](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/northcarolina), where O’Neill took over his case. At the time of his death, his asylum case was still pending. O’Neill said his goals were to remain in the US and obtain a green card. > This is the banality of evil. All of this is so normalized and bizarre Becca O’Neill, Mendez-Maldonado’s lawyer The lengthy process in navigating the immigration system is even more challenging in cases with children. “Levi’s rare in that he had legal representation and free representation,” said O’Neill. Most young people do not. “I’ve had clients who enter as unaccompanied minors as young as four years old who end up with removal orders because they don’t go to court. How is a four-year-old going to know when their hearing date is? It’s up to their sponsors, who are often undocumented themselves.” O’Neill had lost contact with Mendez-Maldonado and called him for months in 2025 to share good news: his work permit had been approved. Finally, a colleague told her that he had died in a shooting. The May hearing would have been Mendez-Maldonado’s first appearance at the Charlotte immigration court, a chance to convince the US government that he deserved to stay. CMPD’s homicide unit confirmed to the Guardian that the investigation into his death is still open, but did not provide further details.

 [_Stay up to date with our Politics newsletter, sent weekly_](https://www.npr.org/newsletter/politics)_._ SAN FRANCISCO — The speedy shuttering of the main immigration courthouse in San Francisco affects over 100,000 pending immigration cases, slowing down their consideration and leaving more immigrants in limbo and at [risk of deportation](https://www.npr.org/2026/05/26/nx-s1-5830474/trump-immigration-courts-mega-masters). But it also deals a symbolic blow to a region that has long stood at the vanguard of immigration advocacy. For decades, the San Francisco immigration court was where immigrants living between California's Central Valley and central Oregon could make the case for why they shouldn't be deported. The broad jurisdiction made it one of the busiest immigration courts in the country, hearing thousands of cases a year. It was also one of the courts most likely to grant an immigrants' asylum application to stay in the U.S. Its closing comes as the Trump administration seeks to limit pathways for many foreigners to enter or stay in the country. **"**It's part of the message that the Trump administration is sending, that they're not open to asylum seekers. And one way of doing that is closing the court that has been very generous to asylum seekers," said Bill Hing, a law and migration studies professor at the University of San Francisco. "It's sending a message that the progressive cases that have come out of San Francisco are going to end." Earlier this year, [the Justice Department, which oversees immigration courts, announced](https://www.npr.org/2026/01/13/g-s1-105679/san-francisco-immigration-court-closure) it would not be renewing the lease on the building at 100 Montgomery St. — the main courthouse in San Francisco, with 21 courtrooms. The move followed the termination and resignation of nearly all the judges who worked out of that location. The closure, which was supposed to happen at the end of the year but has been accelerated, sends 100,000 cases to the Concord Immigration Court, about an hour away across the San Francisco Bay. About 17,000 cases will stay at 630 Sansome St. in San Francisco, another, smaller location with just two operating courtrooms. The DOJ cited cost saving as the reason for the closure. It didn't respond to a request for comment about concerns that the closure is related to the court's track record of asylum approvals. "Reducing the immigration court backlog remains a priority for the agency. Any immigration judge can hear any case at any time throughout the country to assist with caseloads," Kathryn Mattingly, spokesperson for the Executive Office for Immigration Review, said in a statement. That branch of the DOJ makes up immigration courts. "As EOIR continues to add new immigration judges, EOIR will continue to make scheduling adjustments to ensure all cases are handled in a timely and lawful manner." The San Francisco court, on average, denied asylum about 30% of the time in fiscal year 2025, which is half the national average. Since 2004, more than half of respondents who got a decision were approved for asylum, according to data from the [Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse](https://tracreports.org/phptools/immigration/asylum/).  Immigration attorneys worry that the Trump administration's strategy is not to add more immigration judges to the existing system to fairly decide cases. Rather, "it's to make the barriers to having your case heard so high that it becomes almost virtually impossible," Ghassan Shamieh, an immigration attorney with cases in the closing court, said, speculating about the administration's reasons. "Changing locations of the physical court is a step to further that agenda." ### San Francisco's progressive immigration history may have made it a target Hing, the law professor, remembers practicing in the San Francisco immigration court after he graduated from law school in the 1970s. He said the court was significant to the region due to San Francisco's own deep history with immigration, from those entering at [Angel Island](https://www.npr.org/2010/10/06/130380169/-googleon-index-angel-island-ellis-island-of-the-west) to the [Chinese Exclusion Act](https://www.npr.org/2024/12/01/1216400847/the-chinese-exclusion-era-shows-how-trumps-mass-deportation-plan-could-unfold). "Chinese exclusion set the groundwork for much of the litigation \[in San Francisco\] when it came to challenging deportation," Hing said, adding that for decades downtown firms provided pro bono assistance to asylum seekers and other immigrants. That included firms that specialized in immigration law during peak moments of migration, like the [rise in Central American migrants in the 1980s](https://www.npr.org/2016/01/22/463983765/a-brief-history-of-the-us-in-central-america). "Then you add to that the evolution of nonprofit organizations in the city. And it's very, very collaborative," he said. That strong legal presence resulted in several precedent-setting immigration cases reaching the U.S. Supreme Court. Some of the case law predates the modern-day immigration court system, such as immigration decisions regarding [protection from deportation](https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1942/01/06/85192709.html?pdf_redirect=true&site=true&pageNumber=1) for union [leader Harry Bridges](https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1953/06/16/110065156.html?pdf_redirect=true&site=true&pageNumber=1), [admission of visitors to the U.S. who identify as gay](https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/appellate-courts/F2/714/1470/199306/), and battles that laid the groundwork for relief from deportation for [Filipino World War II veterans](https://digital.sandiego.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1669&context=sdlr). More recent cases set some of the [legal standards for asylum](https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/ins_v._cardoza-fonseca). Over time, as the San Francisco immigration court was formally stood up, it gained a reputation for granting more relief from deportation than the national average. Immigration attorneys attribute the high success rate to San Francisco having the [second-highest representation rate](https://www.americanimmigrationcouncil.org/report/immigration-court/) in the country — meaning more immigrants with cases in the court, about 69%, had lawyers representing them, according to the American Immigration Council. Concord ranks third. In response to questions about the impact on asylum rates, EOIR spokesperson Kathryn Mattingly said the closure was due to the expiration of the lease of the building and that relocating the court's work would be "more cost effective." She did not address criticism about the impact of the closure on immigrants' access to lawyers, or on their asylum cases. ### San Francisco and Concord face the brunt of layoffs, less resources The Concord Immigration Court, which now must absorb the bulk of cases from the closure, has never been fully staffed. At the start of the year, the immigration court system nationally had [a quarter fewer immigration judges compared to the start of 2025](https://www.npr.org/2026/02/23/g-s1-110911/trump-immigration-judges-dismissals-numbers), even as the backlog in [cases is 3.5 million](https://www.justice.gov/eoir/media/1344791/dl?inline).  The shrinking [ranks particularly](https://www.npr.org/2025/11/06/g-s1-96437/trump-immigration-judges-fired) affected the Bay Area in California. San Francisco went from [21 judges](https://www.npr.org/2026/02/23/g-s1-110911/trump-immigration-judges-dismissals-numbers) to now just two, at a second location in the city; Concord was [meant to](https://www.justice.gov/d9/2024-01/eoir_to_open_concord_ic_notice_01222024.pdf) have 21 [judges but now has 4](https://www.justice.gov/eoir/concord-immigration-court), not counting the supervisor. The cases are coming to Concord as immigration judges continue to be terminated in that location, [as recently as May](https://www.npr.org/2026/05/26/nx-s1-5830474/trump-immigration-courts-mega-masters). The Trump administration has terminated over 130 immigration judges nationally; many others have resigned or retired. Although the Justice Department has [boasted of hiring](https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/eoir-announces-77-immigration-judges-and-5-temporary-immigration-judges) the most immigration judges in one year, including a record-setting class of more than 80 people in May, only one of those new judges is currently assigned to Concord. Cases at Concord are currently being scheduled for nameless "visiting judges" — without clarity on if it would be a new judge, one not yet hired, or a judge in another part of the country appearing via video conference. The lack of an assigned judge means that case could be moved on the schedule again, and attorneys said it can add challenges to fully preparing a case. In response to questions about staffing, Mattingly said any immigration judge can be assigned to adjudicate cases in any court in the nation, as needed. "Cases will be timely adjudicated either at the Concord Immigration Court or remotely," she said. "Reducing the immigration court backlog remains a priority for the agency." Jane Lee is an immigration attorney who volunteers as an "attorney of the day," providing day-of legal assistance to immigrants who come to their hearings without a lawyer. "The area that this court is going to cover is really large and there's like thousands of cases and we don't have the judges," she said of the court in Concord. The cases currently scheduled for San Francisco are expected to be heard at Concord starting in December. ### Delays mean immigrants in both courts wait longer to know if they can stay Across the Bay, Shamieh, the immigration attorney, said he has hundreds of cases still pending in the Montgomery San Francisco court, which currently has no judges and no hearings scheduled ahead of its December closure. "This uncertainty is incredibly scary," Shamieh said. "Judges had cases going till 2027, 2028." Elin, who entered the U.S. from Nicaragua in 2020 and is seeking asylum, has been hit hard by multiple delays. He has been waiting for his final hearing for several years out of San Francisco. It's been rescheduled multiple times; one delay came after the judge who was supposed to hear his case was fired. It's now slated for 2029, in San Francisco at the closed Montgomery location and with a judge that no longer works there. His case is poised to be among those moved to Concord — a commute of more than an hour; he does not have a car.   "There isn't a set date and this situation is very stressful – sometimes I am afraid to go outside," he said in an interview with NPR. He provided only his first name to NPR for fear of reprisals for his pending case. "My brother's asylum was approved and he just got his green card. So for me, I think this wait time is harmful because I am still in limbo." Elin said he has been in the U.S. since late 2020. He has a work permit, pays taxes and believes he could have a good case to stay. "It is a balance because I do want my case decided and finished — and at the same time, I also want to wait to see if a change in president \[by 2029\] could be better," he said. The volatile schedules are also affecting attorneys. Jordan Weiner, interim executive director of La Raza Centro Legal, said her nonprofit firm has stopped taking new cases because of the unpredictability of the current paused caseload while the transfer to Concord moves forward. "Even though it's sort of like a lull, that doesn't mean we can sign more clients because tomorrow we could get hearing notices for every single client for next week," Weiner said. "And so we're not able to take new clients until we know what's going to be happening with these cases." ### Resources coalesce around Concord, again unifying legal efforts There's also signs that San Francisco's storied immigration defense bar is starting to adjust to the new realities. When the Concord Immigration Court [opened in 2024](https://www.justice.gov/d9/2024-01/eoir_to_open_concord_ic_notice_01222024.pdf), advocates foresaw challenges. The building is not very close to public transportation. The courtrooms are located on the top floors of a building that has other offices, and there's minimal signage and waiting areas. Nonprofit legal and community organizations quickly jumped in to support the new court — including creating packets with lawyers' contact information, volunteers to greet people in the lobby and a fund to help cover immigrants' asylum application fees. Now, there is a coalition of about 100 volunteers who wear bright blue vests and hand out the packets and coordinate with volunteer attorneys. Legal organizations in San Francisco are seeing the development of those resources in Concord as an opportunity to create a unified legal aid system once more. Milli Atkinson, director of the Immigrant Legal Defense Program at the Bar Association of San Francisco, manages her own 100 volunteer "attorneys of the day" who provide legal aid to those in immigration court without a lawyer. Her biggest concern is immigrants, particularly those without lawyers, not knowing they are now supposed to go to a different city. She said this was also an issue in the 2024 transition. Back then, "if you were confused about when your court \[hearing\] was or where your court was, there was a little bit of grace given to respondents. A judge would understand if you missed a hearing because you just got a new notice and you were going to all your old hearings and you just didn't show up to this one," Atkinson said. Now, she worries that grace won't be extended this time as the administration looks for ways to [issue more orders of deportation](https://www.npr.org/2026/05/26/nx-s1-5830474/trump-immigration-courts-mega-masters) for those who miss their hearing. Mattingly, the EOIR spokesperson, said the agency is issuing new hearing notices to all parties whose cases are reassigned to a new location. The legal organizations in both cities are beginning to share resources. The San Francisco attorneys of the day are already training in the Concord court and preparing to serve the clients that are moved over, while juggling the two remaining courtrooms at the smaller location in San Francisco. Still, the closure of the city's larger courthouse is bittersweet for attorneys like Atkinson who have practiced there for decades. "Like Ellis Island, like Angel Island, there's a history of tragic injustice," Atkinson said. "But there is also a history of moments of people's lives being changed and people having, for the first time maybe ever, the sense that they're they're going to be safe and that there's a future and hope for them and their family."

A man in line for the elevator bank at the federal immigration court in San Antonio, [Texas](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/texas), on a morning in mid-July told the security guard that he had an attorney. “You’re special,” the guard replied, with genuine surprise. Upstairs, inside Brittany A Rodriquez’s courtroom, the young judge with stark blond highlights gave an asylum seeker a month-and-a-half to turn around an application for protection or be ordered deported. Another person who told her “I don’t have a lawyer, I only have God” was given until September to find legal representation, or the judge indicated she would move forward with the case regardless. On Rodriquez’s docket that day was a 49-year-old Cuban man who had his hearing moved up by an entire year, out of the blue; a six-year-old Mexican girl and a three-year-old Cuban boy who may have been appearing in court alone – it was not clear; a 22-year-old Venezuelan woman and her two-year-old son; and dozens of other people whose fates in the United States rested on her decisions. Rodriquez had been on the bench for only about a month, [appointed](https://www.justice.gov/eoir/media/1446596/dl?inline) after a career in immigration enforcement. She and the federal attorney whose role it was to argue against the immigrants – the role she herself had [filled](https://www.ice.gov/careers/attorney) for almost six years, up until May – quickly read through a list of people, 15 in total, who had missed their hearings. Now, they could be ordered removed from the US “in absentia”, without being physically present to find out. Suddenly, Rodriquez found five more no-shows on the list. “I didn’t even do that whole last page,” she said casually. “I think these are all ‘in absentias’, too.” [](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/aug/15/immigration-judges-deportation-hearings#img-2) A family leaves immigration court in San Antonio, Texas, on 3 June. Photograph: The Washington Post/Getty Images This quiet yet life-altering scene epitomizes the newest frontier in the second Trump administration’s deportation push, where people are being scheduled for mass hearings in immigration court at the last minute and those who don’t make it are receiving removal orders almost by default. That, in turn, sets them up for arrest and repatriation whenever they stumble into the midst of immigration agents – or, [increasingly](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/ng-interactive/2025/apr/30/trump-local-police-immigration), run into local and state law enforcement personnel from departments that are cooperating with federal immigration enforcement, during something as benign as a traffic stop. “There’s people that are walking around, going about their business, without realizing that they have a removal order on their record,” said Katie Fleming, director of public education and engagement at the Washington DC-based legal non-profit Acacia Center for Justice. > There’s people that are walking around, going about their business, without realizing they have a removal order Katie Fleming, Acacia Center for Justice Donald Trump has ranted against due process for immigrants and asylum seekers since his first presidential administration, when he repeatedly [complained](https://www.vox.com/2019/4/3/18293777/donald-trump-judges-asylum) about their right to defend themselves in immigration court and said the US needed to “get rid of judges”. “When somebody comes in, we must immediately, with no Judges or Court Cases, bring them back from where they came,” Trump [tweeted](https://x.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1010900865602019329) in 2018, [adding](https://x.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1011228265003077632) the following day: “Hiring many thousands \[sic\] of judges, and going through a long and complicated legal process, is not the way to go.” Eight years later, Trump has upended the immigration courts so completely that critics allege many thousands of people are now being denied justice. Adjudicators have taken on roles as so-called [deportation judges](https://join.justice.gov/), while their agency, the executive office for immigration review (EOIR), has become an integral part of the White House’s mass deportation strategy instead of a last defense against wrongful removal. “They abandon the real mission of the agency, which is to provide fair hearings and due process to as many people as possible, and instead sort of run it as an adjunct of DHS \[Department of Homeland Security\] enforcement, with the only real objective to be being \[able to\] enter as many removal orders as you can, as fast as you can,” said Paul Schmidt, a retired immigration judge. EOIR’s primary responsibility is, in its [own words](https://www.justice.gov/eoir), “to adjudicate immigration cases by fairly, expeditiously, and uniformly interpreting and administering the Nation’s immigration laws”. Yet it falls under the Department of Justice, not the US’s judicial branch, raising serious, chronic concerns about its independence from executive policy priorities, while its nearly 3.2m-case [backlog](https://tracreports.org/immigration/quickfacts/eoir.html#eoir_backlog) has long caused headaches for both Democratic and Republican administrations. [](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/aug/15/immigration-judges-deportation-hearings#img-3) People stand in line for immigration court in New York City on 27 July. Photograph: Seth Wenig/AP An unnamed EOIR spokesperson said: “The Executive Office for Immigration Review prioritizes the timely completion of all cases and makes scheduling adjustments as needed to ensure cases do not languish. Unnecessary delay hurts both aliens with meritorious claims and the American public who wish to see aliens with non-meritorious claims removed as quickly as possible. As it continues to add new immigration judges, EOIR will continue to make scheduling adjustments to ensure all cases are handled in a timely and lawful manner.” Now, the undermining of due process in [US immigration](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/usimmigration) courts has come not in one fell swoop, but with a series of policy changes since the start of the second Trump administration that has dramatically eroded the tenets of a fair court system – notice of hearings, transparency, judges’ discretion, meaningful appeals, the opportunity to be heard – seemingly to prioritize speed and the administration’s hard line on immigration, experts said. The result of these new practices has been to reduce people’s ability to receive individualized determinations based on the merits of their cases, cutting them off instead at earlier stages of the legal process and serving them up for deportation. “All of these different policy changes and practices and tactics are intertwined, right?” Fleming said. “They’re all part of the same story, which is instead of functioning as an independent court system where there are independent adjudicators evaluating claims one at a time, we’re seeing the courts incorporated into a much broader enforcement strategy.” Many of the second Trump administration’s policies that have hamstrung access to justice in the immigration courts are occurring at the earliest steps in a case, during what’s called a master calendar hearing. These court dates are often a person’s first few appearances and have typically been mostly administrative, with about [20 cases](https://austinkocher.substack.com/p/data-on-mega-masters-show-eoir-is) scheduled at once. Usually, the judge recounts – and an interpreter at times translates – people’s rights and responsibilities, explains the civil immigration charges against them, asks whether they want time to find a lawyer, gives them a list of free legal organizations, checks that the court has an up-to-date address for them and sometimes confirms the facts in their charging documents – where they’re from and how they entered the US, for instance. But over the last year-and-a-half, federal officials have debuted tactic after tactic that, as far as critics are concerned, have weaponized these hearings. Last summer, [ICE](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/ice-us-immigration-and-customs-enforcement) attorneys [started](https://www.americanimmigrationcouncil.org/blog/ice-attorneys-case-dismissals-immigration-court-hearings-judges-grant/) asking to dismiss thousands of cases on the spot, so they could immediately place the same people into a more fast-tracked deportation process that often [bypasses](https://www.americanimmigrationcouncil.org/fact-sheet/expedited-removal/) the judge’s role completely. By January, more streamlined efforts to quickly deny asylum applications without an individualized hearing [began](https://cgrs.uclawsf.edu/en/pretermission) to surge, too. Then, the first signs of a new tool to close as many cases at once came in March, in San Francisco, where master calendar hearings were being scheduled with little time to prepare – a test run for what was to come nationwide, researchers discovered. [](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/aug/15/immigration-judges-deportation-hearings#img-4) People arrive for immigration court hearings in New York City, on 27 July. Photograph: Seth Wenig/AP By the end of May, they started noticing master calendar hearings across the country scheduled for unusually large numbers of people, with a single judge in a single session on a single day. Notice of the hearings, if given at all, was short and sent out in English; a lot of the people didn’t have attorneys; and many of them were being ordered deported without ever going to court through removal orders in absentia, when they failed to appear. “These are kind of ways to skirt you getting a final hearing where you can actually present evidence for the relief you’re seeking in immigration court,” said Brandon Marrow, who created [bklg.org](http://bklg.org/), and who is researching what the federal government has now labeled “[mega master](https://austinkocher.substack.com/p/new-details-about-mega-masters-help)” calendar hearings. Officials have [set](https://austinkocher.substack.com/p/new-details-about-mega-masters-help) a threshold of 100-200 scheduled cases and 150 total people per session for these mega masters, while disproportionately and intentionally singling out those without lawyers. Even hearings that don’t meet the definition for mega masters have often been much larger than they were historically, and at much shorter notice for the respondent. These accelerated court dates make it harder for people to find lawyers if they don’t already have one, as their timeline shrinks from months or years to mere days. Free representation is difficult to come by, with legal clinics across the country already overwhelmed by their caseloads, while private attorneys require immigrants to have saved up for what often amounts to thousands of dollars in fees. Ironically, having a lawyer would allow for faster proceedings, Schmidt said. “If somebody came in with a lawyer, I could probably do a fair master calendar in about two minutes,” he recalled. “It actually took much longer to do hearings, masters, without lawyers if, you know, if you really wanted to give the person a fair opportunity to be heard.” For the mega masters especially, there are almost always more people scheduled than the number who ultimately attend – which usually means at least some proportion are then being ordered removed in absentia. The number of respondents who are not detained appearing for masters hearings this June rose 28.6% compared with June 2024, while the number of in absentia removal orders soared 183.6%, according to researchers at [bklg.org](http://bklg.org/). “Their case isn’t being heard on any level, and if they filed an application for relief, if they filed an asylum application, if they filed all the evidence – if they’re not in court, the court will deem that application abandoned,” Fleming said. The reasons why people aren’t attending their hearings are manifold, but two stand out: lack of notice and fear. Schmidt remembers how often mistakes cropped up when he was a judge, where addresses had the wrong street name or city, and where notices were returned to the court instead of reaching their intended recipient. [](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/aug/15/immigration-judges-deportation-hearings#img-5) An ICE agent detains a person exiting his immigration court hearing at the federal building in New York City on 16 July. Photograph: Michael M Santiago/Getty Images “The clerical staff was spread pretty thin, and filing change of address forms wasn’t one of their top priorities,” he said. “There’d be stacks of them sitting on credenzas, waiting to be filed, which told you something about the reliability of the system.” In recent months, the median potential notice period, or lead time immigrants who are not in detention have had ahead of master calendar hearings has [plummeted](https://bklg.org/blog/mega-masters-absentia/), falling to just 42 days in June. With notifications still sent through the mail, attorneys fear immigrants are not learning of their hearings until it’s too late, a concern supported by existing data. When Christopher Cusmano, an immigration judge in New York, oversaw a master calendar hearing with 73 people and a median lead time of 169 days, on 27 May, he issued seven removal orders in absentia. A month later, on 25 June, more than three-quarters of the 95 people on his docket, who had a median lead time of just 24 days, received in absentia removal orders, according to data provided by researchers at [bklg.org](http://bklg.org/). In Kansas City, Judge Jayme Salinardi [considered](https://bklg.org/blog/mega-masters-absentia/#fn:5) two dockets in early June. The first – where 93 people had a median lead time of, at most, 15 days to be alerted that their court date had changed – resulted in 56 in absentia orders. The second, where 96 people had a median lead time of 196 days, ended with just nine, research by [bklg.org](http://bklg.org/) further found. Even if people do receive sufficient notice of their hearings, many are terrified to go near an immigration courthouse after arrests there last year. Since [at least](https://assets.aila.org/files/b6c4e355-fecd-45eb-9700-70bf3fac6d0b/96093099.pdf?1697589700) 1996, both immigration judges and what is now DHS have recognized that the presence of immigration enforcement officers in the courts can have “a chilling effect on the respondent’s ability to present his or her case”. But once the second Trump administration took office, EOIR officials quickly [dismissed](https://www.justice.gov/eoir/media/1387301/dl?inline) that shared understanding as “contrary to logic”. What ensued were high-profile [mass](https://immigrantjustice.org/for-immigrants/know-your-rights/ice-at-immigration-court/) arrests, where ICE agents stalked the courts’ [hallways](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/jul/26/cuba-asylum-seeker-ice-courtroom) for their targets, whom they then hauled to detention centers across the country. A federal judge has since [blocked](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/jun/23/trump-immigration-courthouse-arrest-policy) that policy, but enough people had already been affected to sow fear and distrust among immigrants who otherwise would have likely attended their hearings. In total, judges [issued](https://bklg.org/blog/mega-masters-absentia/) 53,808 removal orders in absentia in June, constituting a majority of overall case completions for that month. More than 13,000 of those removal orders came from master calendar hearings with a hundred or more people scheduled, where the median lead time was 45 days or fewer. “These absentia numbers are completely unlike anything that’s been seen before in the immigration courts,” said Joseph Gunther, a researcher with [bklg.org](http://bklg.org/). “Certainly, compared to before, a lot of things are happening that are completely unprecedented.” Even if people attend their hearings, courts under pressure to issue removal orders are at times rushing proceedings, experts suggested. In Minnesota, Fleming recently witnessed a judge order a detained person deported because their application had not yet arrived – despite the fact it was written punctually in detention then had been misdirected in the mail. Once people are ordered deported, reversing course can be a feat, even if the reason is something as obvious as never receiving notice of their court date. Generally, immigrants would have to file what are called motions to reopen, which typically [carry](https://www.justice.gov/eoir/types-appeals-motions-and-required-fees) a $1,065 filing fee and are “challenging applications,” Fleming explained, adding: “They require evidence and legal argument.” “It can be very hard to get an attorney to drop everything and represent someone on a complex motion to reopen,” she continued. “So it puts them in a very vulnerable legal position” – one where ICE could arrest and deport them, as quickly as in a single day. Meanwhile, more than [100 immigration judges](https://www.aila.org/library/think-immigration-dismantling-the-immigration-courts-an-attack-on-due-process) have been [fired](https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/immigration-judge-says-trump-administrations-firings-and-policies-are-disheartening) or have [resigned](https://www.nbcbayarea.com/investigations/former-judges-inside-look-immigration-court-upheaval/3965734/) or [retired](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/may/09/trump-administration-immigration-judges) since Trump’s second inauguration, many of them being those with higher rates of granting relief or who had experience defending immigrants. Their replacements have increasingly been [recruited](https://www.justice.gov/eoir/media/1446596/dl?inline) by the administration, won over by [rhetoric](https://join.justice.gov/) such as: “Apply today to become a deportation judge” who will make decisions that will “define America for generations”. In June, fewer than 2% of all completed cases across all hearings [ended](https://tracreports.org/reports/776/) with an immigrant winning relief, such as asylum or another legal pathway through the court. “When you send out ads recruiting deportation judges, I think you’re probably not going to get people whose primary concern is understanding immigration law or making sure that people are fairly treated or, you know, resisting government overreach,” Schmidt said. On the same day as Rodriquez’s morning docket in San Antonio, the clerk for another judge at the courthouse, appointed under the first Trump administration, spoke quietly to her colleagues and was overheard by the Guardian saying: “We don’t have that many attorneys” for all the immigrants appearing before them. Among the lawyers who did attend, many asked for more time to work on their clients’ cases, as at least some of them hadn’t even been able to review the record yet. That judge, Rifian Newaz, reached the list of no-shows at the court that day and paused for a long time, clearly painstakingly reviewing everyone’s files. One person didn’t get proper notice of the hearing, he said. Another was just a child, whom he then moved to the docket for unaccompanied kids, to give a second chance. When the hearing concluded, he had still issued 26 new in absentia removal orders.

 MIAMI — Yerandy Gonzalez looks at the line of hundreds of people in front of him and shakes his head. He takes a step aside and lights up a cigarette. "This is crazy, man," Gonzalez says in Spanish. The line — which stretches across a few blocks on this humid Tuesday morning — is of people waiting to go inside Miami's immigration court. All of the people in line have a scheduled hearing – for many it's their first court appearance. Avene Jeanite, a 52-year-old Haitian man, is among those waiting. He was here last month accompanying a friend facing deportation. But today is his appointment. "It was not like this — you would go to the door and they'd let you in," Jeanite said. "Today is completely different."  The long lines are not a glitch. They are the result of a new Trump administration tactic, [known as "mega master" calendar hearings](https://www.npr.org/2026/05/26/nx-s1-5830474/trump-immigration-courts-mega-masters)," designed to quickly deport people. Under the old system, each judge would handle about three dozen cases per day. But now, judges more regularly have a docket of over 100 people, and they are seeing dozens of immigrant cases at once. Trump administration officials say the accelerated calendar is needed to clear a massive backlog; critics call it a tactic to unfairly speed up deportations. "It's a very unfair, but a very effective tactic," said David Wilson, the vice chair of the American Immigration Lawyers Association's immigration court committee. He said "mega masters" create chaos because the court is cramming a lot of immigrants in one docket, making it hard for the court itself to send notices in a timely manner and for the immigrant to find legal representation. "When that happens, it generates a significant no-show rate," Wilson said.  A spokesperson for the Justice Department said in a statement to NPR that "reducing the immigration court backlog remains one of the highest priorities for this administration." Meanwhile, a spokesperson for the Executive Office for Immigration Review, the agency that oversees immigration courts, said that as the agency continues to add immigration judges, it "will continue to make scheduling adjustments to ensure all cases are handled in a timely and lawful manner." Since mega master calendar hearings started, in-absentia deportation orders have spiked to a record high, [according to the legal tech platform bklg](https://bklg.org/blog/mega-masters-july-2026/). In July, more than 54,000 immigrants nationwide were ordered deported for missing their court hearing. That number was similar to the 56,000 in June. Both reflect a 60% increase over the last few months. In the Miami immigration court, the increase of in-absentia orders in July spiked from 1,383 in May to 2,886 in July — a 108% increase. ### **Crammed courtrooms, confusion and frustration** On this day, it's standing room only in courtroom 24. Recording is not allowed. But NPR saw Judge Xavier Racine call a group of some 30 people at once. He reads them their rights, and assigns them a new court hearing — a month from today. Other judges assign court hearings as quickly as in two weeks. The Miami immigration court docket has exploded for three key reasons: The Trump administration is arresting [a record monthly number of immigrants](https://www.npr.org/2026/08/26/nx-s1-5945127/immigration-arrests-record), it is moving up people's court dates that had been scheduled for 2027, and making people show up for cases that previous administrations deemed low priority because they have a high chance of being dismissed. Yeriné, a 30-year-old Venezuelan mother who asked NPR to use her first name because she fears jeopardizing her immigration case, says she's concerned about being on these massive dockets. She had an appointment for May 2027 and it got rescheduled for Tuesday.  Standing in line outside the Miami immigration court, she says she's concerned about everything. "I see this long line of people and they might not make it on time to their hearings," she said. "That scares me." Billie Botch, a court observer with the American Friends Service Committee, a social justice group founded by the Quakers, told NPR this is causing a lot of operational issues. People are also showing up late to their court appointments because they are waiting in line for hours. "You can't deny the correlation," Botch said. "You put more people into proceedings on shorter notice with less resources to go around to argue their case, You're going to end up with more removal orders."

Immigration judges across the United States have been instructed to deny some of the most vulnerable people appearing in court the time needed for their visas or green cards to arrive – putting them at imminent risk of being thrown out of the country as the [Trump administration](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/trump-administration) continues to intensify its [mass deportation](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/ng-interactive/2025/aug/29/trump-immigration-ice-cbp-data) campaign, the Guardian has learned. Among the immigrants affected are abused and abandoned children and survivors of violent crime, according to the US government’s own training materials, which were shared exclusively with the Guardian. Judges also appeared to be discouraged, under a hardline interpretation of existing policy guidance and laws, from giving people more than 10 days to find an attorney before proceeding with a case, a deadline that made critics balk. “I thought, who has time to find an attorney in 10 days?” one source familiar with the training told the Guardian this week, under the condition of anonymity to protect against feared retribution from the Trump administration. The source added: “There is no room to be kind; there is only urgency to make them leave \[the US\], one way or the other.” According to the source, hundreds of immigration judges attended a mandatory presentation in recent days about “[continuances](https://www.americanimmigrationcouncil.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/motions_for_a_continuance_practice_advisory.pdf)” – a legal tool which has historically been used to give immigrants more time to find lawyers, build their cases or wait for approval of their applications for documents at another federal immigration agency. The virtual training session was led by a veteran immigration judge, [Keith Hunsucker](https://www.justice.gov/eoir/board-of-immigration-appeals) of the board of immigration appeals, the immigration courts’ [appellate branch](https://www.justice.gov/eoir/board-of-immigration-appeals). He [denied](https://tracreports.org/immigration/reports/judge2018/denialrates.html) over 80% of asylum cases for much of the time that he was on the bench in immigration court before moving on to other roles. The visual presentation was called “Motions to Continue: Efficiently Advancing Cases to Completion”, according to images of the slides used that were shared with the Guardian. The training’s thrust was to tightly restrict continuances in favor of faster adjudications, even when granting more time would allow people to receive legal protections to remain in the US, such as a visa or green card they have qualified for or had approved and are simply awaiting. A deportation slams shut some of those pathways and yet is a much more likely outcome when continuances are denied and rulings are made abruptly. The logic presented in Judge Hunsucker’s training was to cut out inefficiencies and avoidable delays, amid a backlog of [roughly 3.2m](https://tracreports.org/immigration/quickfacts/eoir.html#eoir_backlog) pending immigration court cases nationally. “Where a party lacks diligence and ‘sleeps on their rights,’ a continuance is unwarranted,” the presentation slides read. But the development raises concerns that the crackdown will instead harm immigrants with legitimate cases. The executive office for immigration review (EOIR), which houses the immigration courts, is not part of the independent judicial branch of the federal government. It sits within the Department of Justice, where the US attorney general can make precedential decisions and otherwise exercise control. In response to the Guardian’s request for comment, an unnamed justice department spokesperson said in a statement, in part: “Reducing the immigration court backlog remains one of the highest priorities for this administration. The Justice Department is restoring integrity to our immigration system by hearing cases fairly, expeditiously, and uniformly, in accordance with the law.” An unnamed EOIR spokesperson similarly replied that the agency “prioritizes the timely completion of all cases and immigration judges are obligated to adhere to current immigration law, regulations, precedent decisions, and EOIR policies to ensure cases do not languish \[and\] are handled in a timely and lawful manner. Unnecessary delay hurts both aliens with meritorious claims and the American public who wish to see aliens with non-meritorious claims removed as quickly as possible.” Amid the Trump administration’s anti-immigration agenda, accelerated adjudications and extraordinarily large mass hearings have [become](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/aug/15/immigration-judges-deportation-hearings) fixtures of the immigration court system, with [continuances](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/aug/05/trump-immigration-children-deportation-push) fewer and farther between, and often for shorter lengths of time when granted, even for children. [skip past newsletter promotion](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/sep/04/immigration-judges-limit-time-deportations#EmailSignup-skip-link-16) Free newsletter | Around 2-3 times a day Sign up to Breaking News US Get the most important news as it breaks  after newsletter promotion The presentation slides shared with the Guardian appear to formalize that trend across immigration courts, cautioning judges that “some continuances are sought solely for the purpose of delay” and “persons illegally present in the United States who wish to remain have a substantial incentive to prolong litigation so they may avoid deportation as long as possible”. “Continuance requests solely for dilatory purposes should not be countenanced by Immigration Judges,” one slide read, even though it has long been incumbent upon judges to discern between due process and unnecessary delays. For instance, many documents are held up because of processing backlogs and tight quotas at US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), which comes under the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Such long waits are beyond the control of the applicant or the justice department. In particular, the training suggests that an approved visa petition should not delay deportation proceedings if the visa itself is not yet available because of annual quotas but would be issued to the qualified recipient at a later, albeit unspecified, date. And it explicitly targets the special immigrant juvenile (SIJ) classification for abused, abandoned or neglected youth, as well as U non-immigrant status for survivors of especially egregious crimes. The prospect of routine denials of continuances so someone can find a lawyer to represent them is also a harsh turn for immigrants pleading their cases. From 2019 to 2024, only about a quarter of people with attorneys [were](https://www.americanimmigrationcouncil.org/report/immigration-court/) ordered removed from the US, compared with over 60% who were unrepresented, according to the American Immigration Council. But with demand exceeding supply, only about a fifth of immigrants were [represented](https://tracreports.org/immigration/quickfacts/eoir.html#eoir_backlog) when they were ordered deported in June. Yet the presentation warns that despite the desperate demand, immigration attorneys risk punitive measures for accepting what are deemed too many cases. “Where a practitioner takes on more cases than he or she can responsibly and professionally handle,” the slides read, “it may be appropriate for an Immigration Judge to consider referral to EOIR disciplinary counsel for further action and possible sanction for a violation.”

 Immigrants are being told last minute about new in-person hearings at previously undisclosed [courtroom locations](https://www.npr.org/2025/08/25/nx-s1-5503595/immigration-court-new-york). That's according to five immigration attorneys who reviewed notices or observed the hearings and spoke to NPR about them. The last-minute notifications appear to be another tactic in a broader strategy from the Trump administration to short-circuit immigrants' already limited due process options to speed up arrests and deportations. NPR has learned that over the past few weeks, immigrants who were scheduled to appear in coming months for hearings out of the Hyattsville and Baltimore immigration courts in Maryland and the Sterling court in Virginia have instead been rescheduled to two other buildings: one in Washington, D.C., and another in Falls Church, Va. Neither of these buildings currently has an immigration court that's set up for in-person hearings. The D.C. location has no listed affiliation with the Justice Department. Instead, the building is listed as being occupied by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, according to one source familiar with the project who was not authorized to speak publicly. Immigrants were notified about the change in location within days of the newly scheduled appointments — or were not notified at all, in at least two cases identified by NPR. Kel White, an officer of the D.C. chapter of the American Immigration Lawyers Association, attended one such hearing this week. "The most unusual thing I've ever seen" in her more than 15 years of practicing the law is how she described having an immigrant appear in person at the unusual location before a judge and prosecutor who were remote-only. She also said the last-minute changes and lack of notice violates regulations as set by the Justice Department, which oversees all such immigration courts. "People need to receive at least ten days' notice in order for there to be a response," White said. She cited a policy manual that indicates immigrants should get [ample notice](https://www.justice.gov/eoir/policy-manual-eoir/part-VII/appendices/c) of a new hearing date. "My concern about these hidden tribunals is that essentially people are not getting notice of them or that the mail would not arrive in time for them to even know that they need to go to court," she said. The notices appeared to be targeted at immigrants who did not have legal representation at the time, the attorneys told NPR. Most immigrants who seek to argue their case to stay in the U.S. don't have a lawyer. And any immigrant who doesn't show up for a scheduled hearing, even by mistake, can be issued a so-called "[in-absentia order of removal](https://www.npr.org/2025/12/22/nx-s1-5583971/trump-ice-immigration-arrests-deportation-no-shows)," which allows immigration officers to detain and deport the person. As part of the Justice Department, the Executive Office for Immigration Review runs some 60 immigration courts and adjudication centers. A statement from EOIR said that as it "continues to add new immigration judges, EOIR will continue to make scheduling adjustments, to include opening new hearing locations as needed, to ensure all cases are handled in a timely and lawful manner." EOIR did not respond to questions about why immigrants were being told to appear at these locations and if they were new immigration courts. The Trump administration has aimed to reduce the backlog of immigration court cases — which [numbers some 3.5 million](https://www.justice.gov/eoir/media/1344791/dl?inline) cases. It also has cast doubt on the validity of those claims. Trump has pointed to such courts [as an obstacle](https://www.npr.org/2025/04/29/g-s1-63187/trump-courts-immigration-judges-due-process) to rapid deportation. In a [press release from April](https://www.whitehouse.gov/releases/2026/04/era-of-amnesty-is-over-president-trump-restores-rule-of-law-to-immigration-courts/), the White House touted an "aggressive and successful immigration enforcement overhaul" that "extends to immigration courts." ### Immigrants sent to locations not posted as in-person immigration courts Attorneys warn this latest step of scheduling hearings at previously unfamiliar locations adds to the confusion and lack of transparency in an already-complicated immigration court system. White, from the American Immigration Lawyers Association, attended a hearing on Sept. 2 at the Falls Church location in Virginia. It happened inside a government building that houses the Executive Office for Immigration Review headquarters, as well as the Board of Immigration Appeals, two bodies at the Justice Department that make up the immigration court system. However, neither location is normally a place for immigrants to attend in-person hearings. White and other attorneys who have practiced in the greater D.C. area for over a decade said the Falls Church location has previously been used as an adjudication center for some remote hearings — not as a regular courtroom. White described a waiting area with two conference rooms where an immigration judge and an attorney representing the Homeland Security Department were appearing remotely. She said the judge ordered several people to be deported because they did not appear for their hearings. The fact that the judge and the prosecutor didn't show up in person for the hearing "really reflects a lopsidedness in the system and in fairness to people who are required to show up, who don't even know about their hearings," White said. The D.C. location, which is slated to hold hearings as soon as September 9, is Federal Center Plaza at 400 C St SW, which also does not have DOJ courtrooms, nor is an EOIR facility. The General Services Administration, the U.S. agency that manages government facilities and procurement, did not respond to a request for comment on the DOJ's use of the space. There is an ongoing "surge" for GSA to acquire space for the [DOJ's immigration court agency by December](https://www.highergov.com/contract-opportunity/seeking-competitive-lease-proposals-for-office-spa-26nat02-b-k-d1528/), according to two sources familiar with the project who spoke with NPR on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive details of the public contracts. One of the sources said the GSA put out a [public request](https://www.highergov.com/contract-opportunity/seeking-competitive-lease-proposals-for-office-spa-26nat02-b-k-d1528/) for lease proposals that identifies 18 potential locations, requiring space for at least 10 courtrooms. Still, no new building or conversion of another agency's existing lease has been publicly announced, either for the D.C. location or the Falls Church one. That adds to the confusion for advocates and immigrants. ### No apparent notice in the mail: "I was nervous and scared" One individual who was scheduled to appear at one of these locations spoke to NPR on condition of anonymity for fear of jeopardizing their legal case. The person said they did not receive a notice in the mail. Instead, the app MigraConnect, which is used by some people to track their immigration court cases, flagged that a December hearing date in Virginia's Sterling Immigration court had changed to Sept. 2 in Falls Church with a two-week notice. "Thank God I had that application because without it they would have put me on a path to deportation, because I never got a notice in the mail," the person said, referring to the fact that an immigration judge can issue a final order of deportation if an immigrant does not appear for their hearing. "I was nervous, and scared; I have never missed a court date but I didn't know what would happen in that building." Typically, immigrants are assigned an immigration court closest to the address they have on file with the department. And normally, if the Justice Department decides to create a new court, it announces the move before relocating cases. Neither of those things happened with these new locations. Lawyers identified some instances where clients were asked to cross state lines to attend hearings in Virginia or D.C. that otherwise would have taken place closer to home. Lucelia Justiniano, another immigration attorney in the D.C. area, said one prospective client also did not get a mailed notice about a new location and date. The client, who lives in Maryland, was scheduled to appear in Falls Church instead of at her original court location in Hyattsville. And the hearing was moved up to Sept. 2 from a date in October. "So I called the court; I'm like, 'This has to be a mistake,'" Justiniano said. The court informed her the new center had opened on Aug. 24. "It was extremely lucky that she called us a day before and that we were able to check that because she had not gotten the notice," she said of her client. When the client arrived, they found out Judge John Rubenstein – who was originally going to hear the case — was appearing remotely on a monitor from his courtroom in Hyattsville. No explanation was given for why the hearing was not held in his courtroom. James Reyes, an immigration attorney of 15 years, also had a client whose hearings were rescheduled several times before being moved to the Falls Church location, with eight days' notice. "I honestly thought it was a glitch. I was like, there's no way," Reyes said. He said that there is one courtroom in the Falls Church building for rarely-held oral arguments at the Board of Immigration Appeals, an administrative court that hears appeals of cases. "But that is not a courtroom that is regularly used in proceedings," Reyes said. After Reyes entered himself as the lawyer in the case, it was quickly rescheduled for the Sterling court just days before the client was to appear in Fall Church. There is no new hearing date in that case. ### Another strategy to increase final removal orders Over the last year, the Trump administration has moved to quickly issue final orders of removal for immigrants who seek relief from deportation in immigration courts. The last-minute changes in location come amid other tactics the administration has used to speed up court proceedings. For example, across the country, immigration judges are being scheduled for what have been dubbed "[mega master calendar](https://www.npr.org/2026/05/26/nx-s1-5830474/trump-immigration-courts-mega-masters)" hearings. These are hearings where over 100 immigrants, many without lawyers, are scheduled to appear — and then ordered removed if they do not. Since mega master calendar hearings started, in-absentia deportation orders have spiked to a record high, [according to the legal tech platform bklg](https://bklg.org/blog/mega-masters-july-2026/). Meanwhile, approvals for asylum in immigration courts have also [hit a record low](https://www.npr.org/2026/07/30/nx-s1-5891889/trump-asylum-program-changes-charts). Immigration attorneys say the strategies have targeted immigrants who do not have lawyers — particularly when it comes to receiving notice of a new hearing date. The rates of in-absentia removals for immigrants without lawyers in Baltimore, for example, has increased from 54% in January to 73% in June, according to the group Mobile Pathways, which analyzes immigration court data. "It's just stockpiling things against respondents," Justiniano, the immigration attorney, said, referencing the last-minute notice with a change of venues. "And this just shows one more example of it."