Fired judges more likely to have a past in immigrant defense : NPR

For 3 immigration judges, the day took an analogous flip.

Kyra Lilien, who was employed in 2023, was presiding in a courtroom in Harmony, Calif., in July when she paused the listening to of an immigrant looking for asylum to learn an e mail.

“I instructed them that we weren’t going to have a listening to as a result of I had simply been fired,” Lilien mentioned. Current within the court docket was a court docket interpreter and an legal professional for the Division of Homeland Safety. “They requested me if I used to be joking.”

Anam Petit, who was employed as an immigration choose in 2023 after a profession in immigrant protection, was sitting on the bench in her courtroom in Virginia’s Annandale Immigration Courtroom in September. It was her two-year anniversary within the place and she or he was between hearings when she obtained the e-mail.

“My voice was shaking. My arms had been shaking. My thoughts was racing. And I gave the choice and I dismissed everybody with out mentioning something,” Petit mentioned. One choice that day was to disclaim asylum, and the opposite was a partial denial, every for a distinct member of 1 immigrant household, she recalled.

Tania Nemer was employed as a choose on the Cleveland immigration court docket in 2023. She had about 30 or 40 immigrants, a DHS legal professional and workers in her court docket one morning in February. She had simply completed explaining rights and duties to the group when her door opened and her supervisor requested her to return with him. She was later escorted out of the constructing.

“I did not know in any respect why I used to be being fired on the time. And I stored asking; nobody had a motive,” Nemer mentioned.

Nemer was one of many first immigration judges fired by the Trump administration after a slew of dismissals of leaders on the Govt Workplace for Immigration Assessment (EOIR), the department of the Justice Division that homes immigration courts. Later that month, the administration fired 12 judges — a complete incoming class that had simply been skilled and was about to take the bench.

These dismissals come because the administration has ramped up mass deportations of these with out authorized standing, and sometimes pointed to judges as obstacles in that effort.

The sample has been constant. Each few months this 12 months, a new class of judges will get termination notices in the course of the day, usually whereas they’re in the course of immigration court docket proceedings. The notices usually goal those that have reached the top of their two-year probationary period, a trial interval for federal employees earlier than they’re “transformed” to everlasting workers. It was beforehand widespread for these civil servants to be transformed to everlasting workers of the DOJ.

“None of us have been given a proof, we’re in the dead of night, however we have been attempting to establish patterns,” Lilien mentioned, the previous choose in northern California. She wonders if her previous expertise representing immigrants obtained her fired, regardless that she additionally labored at DHS as an asylum officer.

Her hunch has some correlation with the information. NPR has independently recognized 70 immigration judges who obtained termination notices from the Trump administration between February and October. The variety of judges who obtained termination letters matches the tally stored by the immigration judges’ union. It additionally accords with NPR’s previous protection of the terminations.

The rely doesn’t embrace assistant chief immigration judges (ACIJ), who’re courthouse supervisors and now have their very own dockets. The union has counted 11 ACIJs terminated.

An evaluation of every of the 70 immigration judges’ skilled backgrounds discovered that judges with backgrounds defending immigrants, and no prior work historical past at DHS, made up about 44% of the firings — greater than double the share of those that had solely prior work historical past at DHS.

NPR additionally analyzed the courses of judges onboarded between February 2023 and November 2024, who would have neared the ends of their probationary intervals this 12 months or are nonetheless within the probationary interval. Of these judges, those that had prior DHS expertise, together with working as asylum officers and as attorneys for Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, made up the most important share nonetheless on the bench.

NPR reached out to the DOJ, EOIR and the White Home for a touch upon the firings and NPR’s findings. The press workers at EOIR is furloughed because of the ongoing federal authorities shutdown, in response to automated e mail replies, although immigration courts are nonetheless operational. The White Home referred inquiries to the DOJ.

“DOJ would not ‘goal’ or ‘prioritize’ immigration judges for any personnel choice by hook or by crook primarily based on prior expertise,” a DOJ spokesperson instructed NPR in an announcement. “DOJ frequently evaluates all immigration judges, no matter background, on elements akin to conduct, impartiality/bias, adherence to the regulation, productiveness/efficiency, and professionalism.”

The spokesperson added that, “pursuant to Article II of the Structure, IJs (Immigration Judges) are inferior officers who’re appointed and eliminated by the Legal professional Normal.”

The spokesperson disputed the 70 rely, saying the company has terminated fewer than 55 judges, however was unable to offer extra particulars. The company’s quantity is inconsistent with other news reports, NPR’s prior reporting and the union. NPR reached out to reconcile the numbers. The DOJ spokesperson mentioned workers have been furloughed and the Justice Division will not be in a position to verify their knowledge.

Folders containing paperwork associated to immigration circumstances are piled on a desk within the workplace of Stephen Born, Esq. on July 31, 2025 in Everett, Mass.

Meredith Nierman/NPR

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Meredith Nierman/NPR

Staff seek for causes

Fired judges have been greedy at straws to grasp why they had been fired — some have filed Freedom of Data Act requests. Others have turned to wrongful termination complaints and lawsuits. Some fear they had been focused on the idea of protected courses, akin to gender or race.

“I match the invoice,” mentioned Nemer, who had represented immigrants previous to turning into an immigration choose. Nemer listed off traits cited in a lawsuit she has filed, arguing she was fired primarily based on varied protected courses.

“It is laborious to know with out having the reasons of why judges had been fired,” mentioned Kathleen Bush-Joseph, coverage analyst on the Migration Coverage Institute, a nonpartisan group that focuses on immigration coverage. “However the best way the Trump administration is approaching immigration courts displays a extremely excessive prioritization of immigration enforcement and [the administration] has actually made deportations this whole-of-government effort.”

Immigration judges approve or deny a last order of deportation. Courtroom officers have positioned stress on judges to maneuver via their dockets sooner, including by reviewing asylum cases without hearings.

Every fired choose can depart behind 1000’s of circumstances, in response to a number of interviews with fired judges all year long. Every case is an immigrant who has possible already waited years for his or her day in court docket, to make the case for why they need to be allowed to remain within the U.S.

Many of those circumstances have now been reassigned to different judges, on the backside of their already years-long dockets. Immigrants whose circumstances had been already in progress, or set to be reviewed quickly, now have new dates as far out as 2029.

There have been 700 immigration judges in the beginning of the 12 months. Over the previous 10 months, EOIR has lost more than 125 judges to firings and voluntary resignations. Earlier this 12 months, Republicans in Congress authorized a spending invoice that allotted over $3 billion to the Justice Division for immigration-related actions, together with the hiring of extra immigration judges, to deal with the backlog of millions of cases at immigration court.

Federal brokers patrol the halls of immigration court docket on the Jacob Okay. Javitz Federal Constructing in June 2025 in New York Metropolis.

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Spencer Platt/Getty Pictures

Concern of retribution

Probationary judges aren’t the one ones who’ve been fired underneath the Trump administration. NPR tracked 12 fired judges who began previous to 2023. This implies they had been fired after their two-year probationary interval.

Some have been left questioning if their firings had been retribution for the choices they made on the bench.

Shira Levine had labored for EOIR since 2021 earlier than being fired in September. She was presiding over a listening to for an immigrant who had already waited greater than 5 years for a day in court docket when she obtained the e-mail.

“Individuals appeared stunned, however nobody appeared shocked,” Levine mentioned. “That is as a result of, sadly, this by that time had turn out to be a sample.” She mentioned she did not anticipate to be eliminated since she had handed her two-year mark. She was by no means given a motive.

Levine, like a number of others, obtained a normal e mail that they had been being terminated pursuant to Article 2 of the Structure, which supplies the chief the ability to dismiss federal workers.

Levine thought she might need been dismissed due to her response to some latest Trump administration insurance policies.

In the course of the summer season months, immigration judges had already needed to cope with an outsized enforcement presence in usually empty courtroom hallways. ICE attorneys — who argue on behalf of a authorities that an immigrant must be deported — began extra usually submitting “motions to dismiss” circumstances. When a choose granted such a movement, migrants could be detained earlier than leaving the constructing.

Levine mentioned such motions must be granted if there’s a change within the particular person migrant’s case, not a change in immigration coverage.

“I used to be not instructed it was due to my choice to disclaim the movement to dismiss that I used to be fired,” Levine mentioned. “However I handed down a choice that contravened what they apparently needed the judges to do.”

Others, like Ila Deiss or Emmett Soper, who had been immigration judges since 2017 and 2016, served as profession officers on the DOJ for almost 20 years.

Soper had been with EOIR since graduating regulation faculty in a wide range of different roles. He would not know if his firing had something to do with previous coverage work underneath the Biden administration’s EOIR director or his dealing with of circumstances as a choose.

Because the Trump administration brings in new folks to the bench, he has issues over the lack of skilled judges.

“You may have to have the ability to handle your courtroom and it’s important to make very tough, generally life-or-death selections, with the particular person whose life goes to be affected and the relations generally proper in entrance of you,” Soper mentioned.

“It isn’t one thing that you simply choose up instantly. And with all of those judges — lots of whom are very skilled — being fired, the company is shedding one thing that may take a very long time to get again, in the event that they ever can.”

Individuals wait exterior an immigration court docket and ICE discipline workplace on Oct. 24, 2025, in San Francisco.

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Minh Connors/AP

Prior political interference

The company is prioritizing different judges to rent.

The Trump administration has moved to convey again immigration judges it sees as unfairly fired by the Biden administration. The Justice Division, in a February memo, mentioned that it can’t be assured the Biden administration was moral and lawful in the way it dismissed immigration judges and different adjudicators.

A handful of judges in 2022 had not been transformed to everlasting employment, sparking GOP outrage over what lawmakers noticed as political interference.

Earlier this 12 months, Matthew O’Brien and David White, two of these judges let go underneath President Joe Biden, had been reinstated at immigration courts in Virginia. O’Brien was brought back to a managerial position, as NPR beforehand reported — although he’s now not with EOIR. White is a choose on the Falls Church court docket.

The Justice Division appointed a brand new director of EOIR, Daren Margolin, in October. Margolin has earlier expertise because the assistant chief immigration choose, or courthouse supervisor, all through a number of courts in California, and a background as a army and DHS lawyer. He had been fired from a command place at a Marine base for negligently firing a gun and had left EOIR in 2024 earlier than returning to guide the company.

Then the DOJ final month announced its first class of 2025, which included 25 momentary judges who are military lawyers.

“EOIR is restoring its integrity as a preeminent administrative adjudicatory company,” the announcement states. “These new immigration judges are becoming a member of an immigration choose corps that’s dedicated to upholding the rule of regulation.”

The incoming class of everlasting judges includes principally these with a background in federal authorities work, together with EOIR itself and the Division of Homeland Safety. Their earlier jobs included coaching Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Safety brokers, serving as asylum officers and dealing for ICE’s authorized arm.

One choose was initially going to take the bench in the beginning of the 12 months, however was among the many initial class of judges fired earlier than they might begin. Not one of the incoming judges seem to have beforehand labored within the discipline of immigrant protection primarily based on EOIR’s announcement.

Immigration judges’ backgrounds differ over time

In recent times, immigration judges’ backgrounds have various. Many got here to the place after a number of years working for ICE’s authorized department. Others turned judges after working for immigrant protection nonprofits or in non-public apply. Some haven’t any immigration regulation expertise, which was beforehand a requirement for momentary judges however not for everlasting ones.

When immigration courts had been first established, it was extra widespread for immigration judges to have an enforcement background, mentioned Dana Leigh Marks, a former immigration choose and immigration legal professional who litigated landmark immigration cases before the Supreme Court.

Marks joined the court docket in 1987, when courts had been nonetheless underneath the previous Immigration and Naturalization Service department of the DOJ.

“Frankly, I used to be one of many people who was employed to point out that it wasn’t only a profession path of prosecution that led you to be eligible to be an immigration choose,” Marks mentioned.

That push for skilled diversification carried via the Biden administration. That administration chosen as immigration judges not simply immigration attorneys, but additionally legal protection attorneys, different administrative judges throughout the federal authorities, and people with army expertise, because it sought to diversify the views of these decoding the difficult set of immigration legal guidelines.

Marks mentioned that the president and his cupboard will proceed to have an effect on personnel selections so long as these courts keep within the govt department.

“It’s normal sense that the boss of the prosecutor shouldn’t be the boss of the choose,” Marks mentioned, recalling the struggle to maintain immigration courts separate from immigration enforcement when DHS was created in 2002. Enforcement, which is primarily ICE, was separated from the DOJ.

—NPR’s Rahul Mukherjee contributed to knowledge evaluation for this story.