Caitlin Dickerson

But there's also problems with access to legal representation with adequate food and sanitation and medical care.

So the Trump administration is very much seeing this dramatic expansion of the detention system as an important part of immigration enforcement.

That was a head-scratcher.

It was one of the only caps that existed in the entire bill.

Everything else seems to be about sort of limitless spending.

So there's been a lot of churn on the immigration court since Trump took office.

They've fired dozens of judges, mostly ones, it seems, who were granting too many requests for relief, requests to remain in the United States.

and replacing them with people who they think will be more harsh.

And you're seeing that reflected in the denial rates.

So overall, asylum denial rates were around 50% when Biden left office, and now they're up to 84%.

Immigration courts are a kind of choke point for deportations because you've got someone in custody, but if they have access to a legal remedy, then they're going to fight their case.

And sometimes those cases take years.

I think one thing that the cap on judges could reflect is that the Trump administration is trying to find ways that go around the immigration courts to remove people.

So they're trying to expand the use of something called expedited removal, which allows for people to be deported without going before a judge and trying to fight their case.

They want to be able to effectuate removals more quickly and just go around the courts entirely if they can.

So my reporting was actually done on Zoom because immigration court was being done virtually so that it could go more quickly.

It's something that started during the pandemic and that's continued into this administration as all messaging and goals and systems are being modified to effectuate deportations as quickly and efficiently as possible.

So what I saw was a judge sitting in an empty courtroom and looking into boxes on her screen, calling people up and moving incredibly quickly through their cases.

Most people in court that day were unrepresented by lawyers.

As people may or may not know, in immigration court, you don't have the right to an attorney if you can't afford one or to a jury of your peers.