I am an immigration lawyer. In April one of my court appearances in Manhattan was cancelled. It was not rescheduled, just cancelled. I spoke with the clerk of the court and was told it was on-hold indefinitely. The case was being delayed because President Trump has been moving immigration judges out of New York and sending them elsewhere in the country.
According to a new report from WNYC, at least eight of the New York judges have been sent to Texas and Louisiana. That is out of a total of 29 New York judges. With a backlog of 80,000 cases, the New York Immigration Court is the busiest in the country. It already takes two years to get a hearing date for a deportation case. The transfer of so many judges has created chaos in the courts.
Trump’s move to send judges to the southern border is part of a “surge” to move deportation resources South.
Interestingly, when WNYC contacted the Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR) the agency that runs the courts refused to give reporters any information. This is the new normal in the Trump Era: Confused impulsive actions without accountability that lead to chaos.
