Immigration courts across the country are increasingly scheduling hearings for 100 people or more in an effort to speed up Donald Trump’s mass deportation efforts.
These so-called “mega masters” hearings — which appear designed to target immigrants who don’t have a lawyer — are clustering dozens of people before an immigration court judge, who can then swiftly decide their fate in an already-accelerated legal process under the Trump administration.
Immigration attorneys have condemned the practice as a “cattle call-style” hearing that fails to protect due process rights. If immigrants miss a hearing, or don’t respond in court, judges can issue immediate removal orders, making them vulnerable to arrest and deportation.
Immigrants without legal representation are less likely to receive proper notice of the hearings, “so it’s almost like they are being designed to increase” the number of default deportation orders, according to Vanessa Dojaquez-Torres, practicing policy counsel American Immigration Lawyers Association, which first shared news of the tactic to NPR.
“Railroading” immigrants through a court system controlled by Trump’s Department of Justice is “fundamentally wrong,” immigration attorney Rekha Sharma-Crawford wrote last week. “It is immoral and represents a betrayal of the Constitution and the ideals we once upheld as a nation,” she said.
The American Immigration Lawyers Association shared news of the tactic in its industry newsletter last week, telling members that 100 or more immigrants could be scheduled for a single time slot — and receive a deportation order “in absentia” if they don’t attend.
The policy raises “serious practical and due process concerns,” the group said.
Administration officials have frequently complained about a growing immigration court system backlog of more than 3 million active cases. Immigration and Customs Enforcement told Congress that the agency plans to deport 1 million people in 2026 and 2027 and hold at least 99,000 people on any given day in ICE detention centers.
Unlike federal district courts, immigration courts and judges operate under the Justice Department at the direction of the attorney general through the Executive Office for Immigration Review.
Last year, the Trump administration ordered immigration judges to dismiss virtually any case when immigrants show up for their court-mandated hearings — making them immediately vulnerable to arrest and removal before they’ve had a chance to appeal.
The administration has also instructed immigration court judges to deny bond to immigrants, upending decades of precedent and keeping people in detention for weeks or months no matter how long they have lived in the country or whether they have a criminal record.
Those policy shifts sparked scenes of masked agents patrolling courthouse hallways and hauling away immigrants who were then placed in fast-tracked removal proceedings in what critics called “ambush”-style arrests that violated due process protections. A federal judge has banned the practice in New York City’s immigration courts.
More than 100 immigration judges have been fired or forced out over the last year. Dozens of other judges have also retired or resigned.
At the same time, the administration is boasting about the hiring of more than 150 immigration judges within the last fiscal year.
The Justice Department recently brought on 77 immigration court judges and five temporary military lawyers to serve as immigration judges.
But the government has been firing or refusing to extend employment to judges as frequently as new hires are announced. Several judges in New York and California were fired the same week the Justice Department announced its record year for new hires.
“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 last week.
At the same time, the Justice Department has significantly lowered the bar for new “temporary” hires to fill those roles, with the administration giving its handpicked judges broad discretion to make crucial decisions for tens of thousands of people whose future in the U.S. is at risk.
Last year, the Department of Defense approved sending up to 600 military lawyers to immigration courts to “augment existing resources to help further combat a backlog of cases by presiding over immigration hearings.”
The Independent has requested comment from the Justice Department.
