The Trump administration has given the boot to eight New York City immigration judges working on cases at 26 Federal Plaza, where ICE agents have seized immigrants for months, per a new published report.
According to the New York Times, all the judges were abruptly axed from their duties on Dec. 1, which has become ground zero in New York for ICE activity and detainments as immigrants, including families, attend their legally mandated court hearings. The outlet also stated that Assistant Chief Judge Amiena A. Khan was among those let go.
“The court has been basically eviscerated,” previously fired Judge Olivia Cassin told the Times. “It feels like a Monday afternoon massacre.”
The Times story cited two Justice Department officials who spoke anonymously about the firings. The U.S. Justice Department declined to comment on that story. amNewYork reached out to the Justice Department for confirmation and is awaiting a response.
Sources inside the courthouse told amNewYork the mass firings may have resulted in little ICE activity outside court proceedings on the 12th and 14th floors of 26 Federal Plaza on Monday. Observers said they were surprised to see no masked ICE agents on either floor.
The reported firings come after amNewYork first reported that some lawyers representing immigrants stated they felt as though some judges were beginning to fear the wrath of the Trump administration.
Attorney Nneka Jackson said in early September that she felt as though judges were scared of being on the chopping block, leading them to be more sympathetic to ICE.
“I think a lot of judges are scared of being retaliated against or losing their jobs, because you’ve seen in recent cases where there are immigration judges that have high approval ratings have gotten fired, and I think a lot of judges are scared to either get fired or have retaliation, so a lot of them are just agreeing with DHS,” Jackson said. “There’s been so many cases where the judges are not even listening to attorneys’ arguments. No matter how valid the arguments are, they’re just automatically siding with DHS.”
Prior to the firings, some 90 judges had already been terminated across the United States; six of them had worked in the Big Apple.
The firings happened as ICE appears to be expanding its operations outside of 26 Federal Plaza and onto the streets of Chinatown, with several raids since mid-October.
Another attempted enforcement sweep on Saturday was seemingly called off after protesters caught wind of agents staging inside a Chinatown garage. The situation escalated into a massive brawl between local law enforcement and protesters.
