As Trump Purges Immigration Judges, One Speaks Out

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**Michael Barbaro** (0:37)
From New York Times, I'm Michael Barbaro. This is The Daily.
Throughout his second term, President Trump has been blocked over and over by federal courts, except that is for a little known court system that oversees immigration. Today, my colleague Nicholas Nehamas brings us the inside story of how the president has systematically pressured the judges in that system to carry out his agenda and speaks with one of those judges about the fallout. It's Tuesday, June 23rd. Nick, welcome to the show.

**Nicholas Nehamas** (1:32)
Thanks for having me.

**Michael Barbaro** (1:33)
Nick, talk for a moment about why in this moment you decided to spend so much time reporting on the judges of the United States immigration court system.

**Nicholas Nehamas** (1:46)
Well, I think that when most Americans think about President Trump's immigration crackdown, they picture the shock and awe campaign that dominated the headlines for months. The images of federal agents being sent into US cities to do mass raids and arrest as many immigrants as possible.

**Michael Barbaro** (2:06)
Right. Generated a huge amount of outrage, consumed the country for weeks.

**Nicholas Nehamas** (2:11)
Exactly. But what we found is that while that was sucking up most of the attention, the administration was also engaged in a quieter, much more meticulous overhaul of a hugely consequential part of the immigration system. And that's the immigration court system.
That's basically the process that decides an immigrant's fate and can order them removed from the country.

**Michael Barbaro** (2:36)
Or decide to keep them in the country.

**Nicholas Nehamas** (2:38)
Yes, right. And our reporting shows that the Trump administration's strategy for overhauling the immigration court system has been extremely effective. And it's essentially turned the courts and immigration judges in particular into their number one tool for achieving mass deportations.

**Michael Barbaro** (2:58)
Hmm. Well, just describe the immigration court system and how it works. And how that maybe explains why the administration has been able to so fundamentally change it and turn it into an instrument of mass deportation.

**Nicholas Nehamas** (3:12)
Yeah, so first off, it's really important to understand that immigration courts work completely differently than how we think about, say, criminal courts.
If you cross the border illegally and you're detained, whether that's inside the country or at the border, you get a court date. And on that date, you have to show up to immigration court and make the case for why you should be allowed to stay in the country, why you qualify for some sort of legal protection like asylum. And you're not guaranteed a lawyer. So if you can't afford one, you're there on your own arguing your own case. And who you're arguing against is the federal government, which acts as the prosecutor trying to deport you. And there's no jury. So the person overseeing the whole process, weighing all the evidence and making the final decision about whether someone should be deported or not is the immigration judge.
And what's so unique about this system is that the courts and the judges are not part of the judicial branch. They are part of the executive branch. So although they wear robes, they're called judges, ultimately they are employees of the executive branch and they report up to the attorney general and by extension up to the president.

**Michael Barbaro** (4:42)
Which is fascinating because when we think of federal judges, we tend to think of Supreme Court judges, appeals court judges.
They are by design isolated from political pressures because they have lifetime appointments within the judicial branch and become essentially unfirable. They get appointed by the executive branch, but then they live outside of it in the judicial branch. But you're saying that's not the case with these immigration judges.

**Nicholas Nehamas** (5:15)
Totally, yeah. Immigration judges are appointed by the attorney general, and they can be fired by the attorney general. And that's just a function of how this system was initially created in the 80s. And what it also means is that immigration judges have a lot less freedom to make their decisions based just on the law.