ICE Agents Are Camped Outside Immigration Courts to Make Arrests
Agents from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement have begun waiting outside immigration courts in federal buildings across the country to arrest people immediately after judges dismiss their immigration cases. The ICE tactic appears to be a shift aimed at increasing the pace of deportations.
At New York's Varick Immigration Court, ICE agents on Wednesday began checking the documents of everyone who left, according to a source present who spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of professional retaliation. The court is under the jurisdiction of the Department of Justice's Executive Office for Immigration Review.
'They are indeed checking individuals off lists and attempting to detain them once they leave court,' they said.
According to the source, ICE detained at least two people after they left the courtroom.
In a statement to The Intercept, ICE said it issued guidance in January permitting its officers to conduct operations near courthouses 'discreetly' and that doing so was in the interest of public safety.
'Arrests of illegal aliens in courthouses is safer for law enforcement and the general public because these criminals have gone through security and been verified as unarmed,' ICE spokesperson Marie Ferguson said in a statement to The Intercept. 'ICE will make thoughtful decisions in each case and do whatever is most likely to keep the American people safe.'
'They're basically circumventing due process.'
Camille Mackler — founder and executive director of Immigrant Arc, a group of legal advocates working on immigration issues — said she'd heard that ICE was conducting targeted operations in several jurisdictions across New York and other states, including Maryland, Arizona, California, Texas, and Illinois.
Reports began circulating on social media on Tuesday that ICE had begun efforts to get cases dismissed that had been pending for less than two years so that the agency could immediately apprehend immigrants and force them into an expedited removal process — effectively side-stepping the typical immigration court process.
'They're moving to end those cases so they can move forward with a more aggressive form of deportation without the requirement to see a judge or request asylum,' Mackler said. 'They're basically circumventing due process.'
On Tuesday, immigration advocates said they saw ICE agents at immigration courts in Los Angeles detaining people after their cases were dismissed.
'There were two ICE officers inside the courtrooms who would notify the officers sitting in the hallway when a case was dismissed,' Lindsay Toczylowski, co-founder of legal advocacy group Immigrant Defenders Law Center, wrote on BlueSky.
A day after President Donald Trump's inauguration, the Department of Homeland Security issued a guidance allowing ICE officers to conduct arrests at 'protected' areas, including courthouses. This reversed a Biden-era directive that limited arrests at sensitive locations. According to the guidance, officers must first receive approval from ICE's Office of the Principal Legal Advisor to conduct arrests at courthouses. The guidance also instructs ICE to arrest people 'discreetly' at non-public areas of the courts and to use the 'non-public entrances and exits.'
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