Massive Courts Backlog Could Slow Trump Deportation Plan

ONDuring the campaign, Donald Trump promised to initiate the “largest deportation” in American history. But actually doing so will require billions of dollars to hire thousands of new federal workers and pay for new facilities to hold those awaiting deportation. But perhaps the most daunting of all will be another obstacle: navigating the massive backlog of immigration court cases.

Before a person in the US can be deported, US law requires that they have a final order of removal issued by an immigration court. These courts have been underfunded and understaffed for years, which leads to years of waiting for a decision.

There are currently 3.6 million pending cases before immigration judges, the largest number of pending cases in the history of the US immigration system. That’s a 44% increase from the 2.5 million pending cases a year earlier. And the problem is only getting bigger as more and more people continue to be placed in deportation proceedings.

Groups that support Trump’s efforts to reduce immigration levels also want more immigration judges on the bench. Eric Ruark, director of research for NumbersUSA, an organization that works to reduce the level of legal immigration, says Congress needs to fund the expansion of immigration courts to clear the backlog and speed up the issuance of removal orders. Congress needs to “step up” and make sure that Immigration and Customs Enforcement “has the resources, that we have the detention facilities, that we have the immigration judges that can handle these cases,” Ruark says.

Immigration courts are not part of the judicial branch. They are housed within the Department of Justice and operate out of an obscure corner of the bureaucracy called the Executive Office for Immigration and Judicial Review. That office oversees about 700 immigration judges who decide who will be deported. Given his tenure, the office was anemic in funding for decades as Congress after Congress stalled reform of the nation’s inefficient and sclerotic immigration system.

John Sandweg, who served as acting director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement during the Obama administration, says more immigration judges and support staff would be needed if Trump wants to speed up deportations. It can take years for someone to be ordered to be deported, and in the meantime, the person awaiting the decision can continue to live in the US. into American society and everything then becomes politically much more difficult for ICE to deport.”

Adding judges to deal with the backlog was part of a bipartisan deal on immigration that President Biden and Congress were preparing to pass earlier this year before Trump vetoed it. The first item listed in the $8 billion Senate version of the bill was $440 million to hire immigration judges.

When Trump takes office next month, he will inherit an agency that is already deporting people at the highest rate in a decade. Immigration officials deported 271,484 immigrants during the last fiscal year of the Biden administration, which ended on September 30. That’s the highest level of deportations since 2014 during the Obama administration, according to data released this month.

Trump’s team is preparing actions to further encourage deportations in the first weeks of his term. Republicans will control both the House and Senate, and future Trump officials want Congress to act immediately to add more border agents and immigration officials.

Stephen Miller, Trump’s incoming deputy White House chief of staff, told Fox News’ Mario Bartiromo on Dec. 8 that the bill would include funding to hire more ICE officers and border agents, and would pay both of them better. There would also be funding to increase the number of people who can be held in detention centers, Miller said. Trump also did not rule out army deployment to help with his increase in deportations, an expansion of the military’s role on American soil that would test the limits of presidential power.

The deportation system moves faster for people held in detention. The cases of those who are held in custody are put on the so-called “custodial indictment” and these cases are resolved more quickly. That’s one of the motivations for Trump advisers to want to increase the number of people in the US who are arrested and detained by immigration officials.

Currently, ICE has the resources to hold a maximum of 40,000 people in detention centers. Trump’s pick for border czar, Tom Homan, told CNN on Dec. 18 that Congress would need to approve funding for at least 100,000 detention beds, as well as more ICE agents, to increase deportations. “We want to arrest as many people as possible who are in the country illegally,” Homan told CNN.

The Biden administration has directed immigration officials to focus deportation efforts on people who pose national or public security risks. Of those deported in the previous year, about 32% had a criminal record, according to ICE data. Homan says deporting those people will also be his priority, but he intends to cast a wider net, putting into removal proceedings people who ICE finds but who do not pose an immediate threat.