Warren, Markey Demand Trump Admin Explains Potential Weeding Out of Immigration Judges Based on Political Beliefs
Trump admin appears to be filtering out judges based on whether they will be supportive of the administration’s immigration agenda
“The administration must ensure that its conversion decisions are based solely on judges’ performance, not their perceived loyalty to the Trump Administration’s immigration agenda or any other criteria.”
Washington, D.C. — U.S. Senators Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Ed Markey (D-Mass.) wrote to the Department of Justice’s (DOJ) Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR) with concerns that the Trump administration’s decision not to retain certain immigration judges may be for politically motivated reasons.
Immigration judges are “non-political members of the career civil service.” They are selected through a rigorous application process and typically serve for a 2-year probationary appointment. After that period, their performance is evaluated to decide if they will be converted to a permanent position. Typically, almost all probationary immigration judges are converted to permanent immigration judges; in recent years, immigration judges have had about a 94 percent conversion rate.
In President Trump’s first term, the administration adjusted the process to “clarify” that the Deputy Attorney General and Attorney General conduct “a performance review” of probationary judges and that the AG “retains discretion” over whether to convert them. Even still, qualified judges were almost uniformly converted to become permanent judges.
However, in April, a class of 16 judges reached the end of their probationary period, and EOIR decided not to convert 8 of them, half the class, even though their supervising judges had recommended them for conversion. The judges were provided no rationale for their dismissal.
Some observers have noticed a pattern: judges with backgrounds working in immigration enforcement were converted by the Trump Administration, while many of those who previously worked in other parts of government, nonprofits, or private practice were not.
“We are concerned that EOIR may be deciding whether to convert judges... using their prior employment as an indicator of whether they will be supportive of the Administration’s immigration agenda,” said the senators.
EOIR invests significant time and energy in vetting and training each individual immigration judge. The onboarding process includes multiple rounds of interviews, an extensive background check, weeks of training, and time observing experienced judges in court. The hiring process itself often takes several months or longer.
“Allowing IJs to reach the end of this process and then simply dismissing them with no apparent rationale wastes taxpayers’ investment in each judge,” wrote the senators.
The decision to not convert judges also worsens the backlog of roughly 4 million cases pending in immigration court. Replacing these judges will likely take months, and for each month that each judge’s seat is unfilled, roughly 50 more immigration cases go unresolved.
The senators asked EOIR to provide the following information by July 27, 2025, explain the decision to not convert half of a class of immigration judges that reached the end of its probationary period this year, its plan to replace those judges, and the expected impact of the non-conversion on immigration cases across the country.
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