Uncovering Injustice in Immigration Court
No representation, massive backlogs, no criminal convictions, and for-profit prisons.
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Over the past five years, ICE has detained hundreds of thousands of people across America—creating an unbearable weight for immigration courts to navigate. For this article, I dug into half a million detention records to uncover where the system is buckling. I identify why courts are drowning under the heaviest backlogs in history, where communities are crammed into the most overcrowded facilities, and which detention centers are profiting from this American calamity. On October 3rd, the government announced a plan to offer $2,500 to migrant children as young as 14 if they forego their court dates and voluntarily leave the country.
Southern States have Highest Numbers of ICE Detainees
ICE has detained 60,000 people in America today. 71.5% of current detainees have no criminal convictions. Texas and Louisiana have the highest number of ICE detainees - accounting for 1/3rd of the total detention population. Part of the reason these Republican-dominated states have such higher arrest numbers — particularly when measured against population — is they have a longer history of working directly with ICE, and a stronger interest in collaboration. They want to be seen as working closely with the Trump administration. Even in June when masked federal immigration agents swept through Los Angeles, California saw 3,391 undocumented immigrants arrested, only about half as many as Texas.
The IAH Secure Adult Detention Facility in Livingston, Texas has the most overcrowded ICE detention center anywhere in America. The center is 235% beyond its capacity, housing 835 detainees in a space only designed for 350. Meanwhile the Adams County Detention Facility in Natchez, Mississippi has the highest capacity of ICE detainees in America at 2,179 detainees, 197% above its capacity. 47,551 people are held across all detention facilities, but there is only capacity for 32,508. People are living in wretched, overcrowded, and stressful conditions - often sleeping on concrete benches or on the floor. This is a humanitarian crisis that the US is engineering.
Nearly 90% of people in ICE custody are held in private prisons run for profit. Two of the largest, Geo Group and CoreCivic, are working to increase their ability to meet the administration’s demand.
76% of Detainees have No Lawyer Present in Court
I think most people do not know this, but there is no right to government-funded legal representation for people facing deportation. As a result, 76.7% of people pleading their deportation cases, including those for unaccompanied minors, had no attorney present to assist in their immigration court case when a removal order was issued. 26,000 immigrant children receive government-funded legal representation, but many are representing themselves in immigration court due to a shortage of attorneys Legal representation is expensive, and people are frequently held in remote facilities far from their community. And even if they can find an attorney, they often face barriers communicating with them.
Arrests are a way to put immigrants into a criminal justice system that is stacked against them. Court dates with no defense means that there is a huge asymmetric information disadvantage in the U.S. legal system that leaves many of these asylum seekers, most of whom have no criminal convictions, facing tradeoffs that they were wholly unprepared for. Can I be granted bond? How can I request court documents? What is the deadline for appealing my case?
The Trump administration’s tactics are a direct attack on due process. The administration’s recent moves to terminate bipartisan-supported legal orientation and referrals services within detention facilities and to end legal help for immigrants with mental health conditions only exacerbate this crisis.
A Backlog of Injustice
Even with more arrests, the Trump administration is not focused on offering more court dates. They are letting the backlog run wild and just planning to expel many asylum seekers from the country or keep them in detention indefinitely.
At the end of August 2025, 3,432,519 active cases were pending before U.S. immigration courts, a 3x increase from 2019. Of that 3.4M backlog, 2.3M immigrants have already filed formal asylum applications and are now waiting for asylum hearings or decisions in Immigration Court. If the current administration, however, is holding cases - those filed applications will go unanswered for years potentially. Deportation cases fell from a high of 262,178 in December 2023, the month before President Trump took office, to 30,501 just a year and a half later. The Trump administration is keeping hundreds of thousands of people stuck without court dates or due process, effectively trapping them in the criminal justice system. Miami-Dade County, FL, has the most residents with pending Immigration Court deportation cases at 146,293.
ICE is Not Focused on Criminals, Just Creating Fear
One of the most striking data points to emerge from this entire research was that ICE is not targeting criminals or violent offenders in their raids. According to the hundreds of thousands of court records I reviewed, only 1.59% of 2025 new cases sought deportation orders based on any alleged criminal activity of the immigrant, apart from possible illegal entry. Interviews with families revealed a sense of bewilderment about why ICE decided to arrest their father or mother. There was no criminal history, they had consistently shown up to court dates and were working respectable jobs and paying taxes. The almost randomness of the attacks has been paralyzing.
But the goal is not only to arrest and deport criminals - it also to incite fear. We know that ICE is using court dates to arrest immigrants the moment right after they walk out of the courtroom. Families plead their case in front of a judge that they need asylum from the terrors and injustices they experience in Honduras, Guatemala, and El Salvador, only to be snatched up by ICE officers waiting outside the door for them when their case is quickly dismissed or rescheduled for years in the future (a common feature in a backlogged system). Then they are trapped in a new lawsuit battle over a civil immigration violation, which is based on federal immigration law, not criminal code. These charges can include being in the U.S. without legal status.
Carlos Javier Lopez Benitez is a 27-year-old immigrant from Paraguay who felt all of these injustices over the last 3 months. On July 26, he showed up for his New York City court date seeking asylum, only to have his hearing rescheduled for 2029. Carlos had crossed the southern US border in May 2023 escaping his country and was apprehended by border patrol in Arizona. He was placed in deportation proceedings and released into the United States as his case wound through the courts. He traveled to New York, where he reunited with his two sisters, who are U.S. citizens. He lived in Queens, worked in construction and did not have a criminal record, according to his family and his lawyers. Mr. Lopez Benitez showed up regularly for court dates, but on that July date, ICE was waiting for him outside. They arrested him on grounds that he was in the country illegally and they transferred him 1,600 miles away to a detention center in Houston. 2 weeks after his detention, he was transferred back to New York City and released while his deportation case proceeded.
The Path Forward
ICE is weaponizing the courts. To stop this current administration from using the justice system as a tool of control instead of a force for righteousness, here are a few things public, private, and non-profit organizations can focus on.
Increase awareness and funds for pro-bono legal representation: In March, Trump eliminated government grants that offered more than $200M in legal services to migrants. Pro bono services are desperately needed and immigrants also must understand the organizations to engage. Studies show that immigrants with attorneys are 3.5 times more likely to be granted bond (enabling release from detention) and up to 10 times more likely to establish their right to remain in the United States than those without representation. This 152 page doc from the DOJ is the most comprehensive official resource in existence.
End mass deportation: America has created this catastrophe. We need to end the raids, we need to end the family separation, we need to end the fear instilling assaults on communities, workers, and people who have come to America because they fear oppression and retaliation in their own countries and are seeking a better life here. This includes reducing local law enforcement deputization - a program known as 287(g) - and aggressive ICE-local partnerships that lead to broad, non-targeted arrests and community fear.
Improve court capacity: Justice delayed is justice denied. A backlog of 3.4M cases is unacceptable. The justice system at all levels of the courts can focus on hiring and properly training the judges needed to reduce backlog, use data-driven triage to fast-track meritorious asylum claims, expand remote hearings where appropriate, and publish clearer continuance/adjournment data.
Thanks as always for reading and leave your comments below for anything that surprised you, inspired you, or you want me to respond to.
Hi Jeremy,
Thanks for this. The goal clearly is to use fear to get people to leave the country.
I'm involved in this issue through a great organization: https://envisionfreedom.org
Envision works with attorneys whose clients have ben granted bonds as a condition of release. Those people who are granted bonds have no criminal record and are deemed not to be flight risk.
The sticking point is the bonds are set at about $10,000 that must be put up fully n cash. Envision puts up the bond money. It gets 90% plus of the bond money back once the case resolves and then recycles the money into new bonds.
The huge positive impact is that the clients are out of ICE prison.
Under Trump, efforts are being made to restrict the granting of bonds even if people fit the criteria and should be released. But those efforts are being legally challenged and the need is still very high.
Thanks for this piece. The part about ICE creating fear rather than targeting criminals is a key point that more people need to know and be aware of.