Trump’s deportation crackdown accelerated by potent court tool

An ICE agents detains a person after exiting immigration court in New York. Photograph: Michael M Santiago/Getty Images View image in fullscreen An ICE agents detains a person after exiting immigration court in New York. Photograph: Michael M Santiago/Getty Images Analysis Trump’s deportation crackdown accelerated by potent court tool Alexandra Villarreal in New York Mass hearings, removal orders ‘in absentia’ – judges are wrapping up immigration cases in unprecedented numbers The second Trump administration recorded its highest number of immigration arrests so far last month. One significant and alarming reason that is far less noticeable than armored, masked agents swaggering in the streets with weapons may be a sudden change in America’s immigration courts. Here, in recent months, accelerated mass hearings are giving people facing existential questions about their future little time to prepare for their cases, and judges are often ordering vulnerable immigrants deported without them even being in the courtroom. Coast to coast, many judges are swiftly wrapping up immigration cases in unprecedented numbers . More than 100,000 immigration cases were closed in June alone, driven first and foremost by courts across the US issuing orders to deport. While thousands of people received these removal orders without ever having the chance to defend themselves, others were shuttled en masse into crowded hearings that attorneys are calling “mega-masters”, nicknamed after their size and the type of court appearance known as a master calendar hearing. The results of this policy were on clear display in Chicago earlier this summer, where, for instance, a single immigration judge in the US’s third largest city oversaw as many as 185 fast-tracked cases in one sitting, a huge number compared with a more typical 20 previously. From March to June, Chicago judges’ orders green-lighting someone’s deportation have suddenly shot up by 120% . And more than 78% of completed cases last month ended in what’s called a removal order in absentia, where the judge decides an immigrant or asylum seeker should be deported because they were no-shows at their hearings. Notwithstanding that many immigrants have said they never received a letter telling them their appointments had been rescheduled, often to months or years earlier than their previous dates. Or that people are scared to attend their hearings after high-profile arrests at immigration courts across the country. Or even that the Chicago court is scheduling so many of these mass hearings with different judges around the same time that up to 611 people are being told to arrive at the courthouse at once, causing chaos. View image in fullscreen People wait in line to enter the Los Angeles immigration court. Photograph: Myung J Chun/Los Angeles Times/Getty Images Immigrants who receive absentia removal orders unbeknown to them were likely going about their days, thinking they’ve filed applications for relief and are followin