Federal Immigration Judges Who Were Fired From the DOJ Speak Out

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR: Now, in the United States, the apparent politicization of immigration courts is setting off alarm bells with dozens of judges fired under President Trump’s second term. Some are raising urgent questions about judicial independence and due process. Former federal immigration judge George Pappas and Jennifer Peyton join Michel Martin to speak out about what it’s like to be suddenly dismissed and what action they’re taking.

 

MICHEL MARTIN: Thanks, Christiane. Jennifer Peyton, George Pappas, thank you both so much for speaking with us today.

 

PEYTON: Thank you. 

 

PAPPAS: Thank you

 

MARTIN: So the reason we’re speaking to you is that more than 100 immigration judges and just the last several months have been fired, reassigned, or resigned under the current administration, often without any public admin– any public explanation. And you were two of them. Yes. So, I wanted to ask Jennifer, I’m gonna start with you. You served as an immigration judge in Chicago. You later became a supervising judge. Could just explain for people. What did your role involve?

 

PEYTON: So I served as Assistant Chief Immigration Judge, and I was in that role for about three years, overall, nine years with the Department of Justice as the ACIJ, I supervised the Chicago court. The immigration judges hear a variety of different cases, including applications for asylum, where someone fears return to home country because of what happened or what might happen. They also hear other forms of relief, different types of waivers, family based applications. On a daily basis will be assigned different types of cases to hear and to adjudicate within the confines and guidance provided by the immigration laws and authorities.

 

MARTIN: Judge Pappas, you spent, as I understand it, what, a couple of decades in private immigration law before you accepted a judgeship in Massachusetts. So do you mind telling me as briefly as you can, why were you attracted to that work?

 

PAPPAS: I practiced immigration law for 20 years before I became a judge. I had my own law firm. I also had another career prior to that for another 20 years in import export. I also ran a law school for 20 years. So I brought a lot of experience to the bench. My legal experience really gave me an opportunity to hit the ground running. Remember, as an attorney for 20 years prior to being a judge I empathized with the plights and stories of immigrants. I had complete knowledge of what they were going through that gave me an empathy that’s not normally there. 

Of course, the experience I had with the USCIS agency, being in front of immigration courts, federal courts also gave me a very good background before, before I became a judge. So I basically wanted to become a judge because I really wanted to help deal with the backlog. When I was asked by my interviewers, why do you wanna become a judge? I said, guys, I’m here to help you. I’m going to give you my experience and I wanna serve. And so that’s how I got to be a judge.

 

MARTIN:  So Judge Pappas, my recollection is that you were still serving on the bench this year when you noticed that other judges around you were starting to lose their jobs. Can you just, just remind us, like, what was it like, what, what did you see?

 

PAPPAS: Michel, the analogy is a dark cloud. You know, after January 20th, the tenor and tone of the Executive Office of Immigration Review, which is part of the Department of Justice, began to change. You have to remember, right after inauguration, within hours, our complete leadership was fired. Our director of – acting director – of EOIR was fired. The Chief Immigration judge was fired. The general counsel for EOR was fired, and another leadership was fired. So we expect that there’s going to be changes from administration to administration, but this happened so quickly. So quickly we saw the tenor change. But within weeks of that, we had our first mass firing of immigration judges around February 13th. Around 13 judges were fired at the same time, nationwide. This was a huge red flag for those of us that were presiding on the bench. And it was op, it was the opening gambit. It was not the end, it was the beginning. 

 

And so as we go into April, we had another mass firing of about eight judges, of which three were in my court in Chelmsford, Massachusetts. What I noticed after that firing is that the judge that was retained was formally with the Department of Homeland Security.

 After that event morale plummeted at immigration courts, certainly at our court. We saw mass firings, people started to resign. So at this point, immigration judges started to resign or took early retirement. We probably lost another four judges because of that. The real low spot was when a navy veteran, a 20 year Navy veteran, who was a JAG judge, was fired. He was with me. He was there every day. He was a great judge. And I really couldn’t understand how they could fire a loyal veteran, after 20 years. 

 

MARTIN: When you were fired, what did they say? How did it happen?

 

PAPPAS: It came by email on a Friday afternoon around 3:30. And to basically summarize what it said, it was basically three or four sentences. And it said, you know, pursuant to article two of the Constitution, the Attorney General is not going to renew your probationary status. Your term of employment will end on a certain date. Please return your equipment at the end of the day. And that was it. And it was signed by Sirce Owen, director of EOIR. Nothing else.

 

MARTIN: Jennifer Peyton, you, you, you served longer. So you have experienced a change of administration’s before. Have you ever seen anything like this?

 

PEYTON: Oh, never. No. And I started under, I was appointed in 2016 under President Obama. I then worked under the first Trump administration, the Biden administration. With any administration change, there is upheaval. With any administration change, there is something that’s going to happen that will bring a difference that will be attention, new priorities coming in. While we knew there would be some changes, no one, no one believed that it would come with such brutalness, which, such direct impact on the leadership in our courts. And starting within hours of President Trump’s inauguration and then trickle down. 

 

MARTIN: And what about you? You were also dismissed, did they, was that, did you ever get any explanation as to why?

 

PEYTON: No. And I, I’m a little different than judge, than Judge Pappas. As I had, as you noted, almost nine years in, I was a career non-political appointee. I had excellent performance reviews, no disciplinary action. I also received an email while on vacation, three sentences citing Article two, noting the Attorney General had decided to terminate me. And that was effective immediately. No cause, no explanation, no reason.

 

MARTIN: Judge Peyton, did you notice any pattern to the judges that were being dismissed, since you never got any explanation other than the Attorney General is exercising her authority under the Constitution, and presumably the other judges received the same notice. Did you notice any pattern, whether it’s been confirmed or not?

 

PEYTON: There definitely have been patterns most notably in the judge class. That was from July, 2023. That was due to be renewed and extended in July, 2025. Most of the individual judges with backgrounds either in private practice or that seemingly had names that might indicate a different ethnicity or heritage. Definitely the prosecutors, those with former government service for ICE, those are still working. And of the 30 plus judges in that class, I believe it’s, maybe half of them were dismissed and not extended.

MARTIN: First of all the neither of you disputes that the Attorney General has the authority to make these firings, right? If she so chooses. 

 

PEYTON: Well, 

 

MARTIN: Well, go ahead. 

 

PEYTON: I, I’ll dispute that. So I’ll dispute that because I, again, I had a permanent position. I was a c– a career non-political. I have rights and Civil Service Reform Act. I have property rights in my position. So I am appealing my termination. I do not feel that the Article two authority is valid for my termination.

 

MARTIN: George Pappas. What about you? Are you also?

 

PAPPAS: I’m gonna be contesting because the termination and firing was done for reasons that have nothing to do with our job performance. They are certainly undertoned with a political bias, which we don’t have. That is a violation of our agreement under our contract with the Department of Justice. You do not fire judges because of an imputed political opinion. You don’t do that. And that is appealable.

MARTIN: We actually asked the administration about this. We asked the Department of Justice for comment on both of your dismissals and whether those actions reflect a broader shift in policy, because not none has been cited. Okay. The department declined to comment. But in other circumstances, for example, Karoline Leavitt, who is of course now, you know, a White House spokesperson, said “liberal activist judges” are “undermining our immigration system, our foreign policy, and our national security,” and went on to call one judge’s ruling on deportations to South Sudan, quote unquote, “truly despicable.” And so, I, I’m wondering how you’re hearing that?

 

PEYTON: Yeah, I’ll start. Again, I was, I’m a non-political appointed judge. I served, I was under the mission statement of EOIR, the Immigration Court Agency. I fairly, uniformly adjudicated the cases before me. I had no record of discipline. I had excellent performance reviews. There was, and I’m, I’m doing a nonpartisan job. I’m looking at the case in front of me. I’m looking at the facts, looking at the law, adjudicating that case. And nothing about – I mean, there’s, I I, I, I didn’t bring politics into my office at all. I’m, I can’t. And I didn’t because that wasn’t my job. My job was to adjudicate the cases that apply the law and make those decisions. And I did thousands of those, thousands.

 

MARTIN: George Pappas, what about you? Do you feel that she was talking about you?

 

PAPPAS: They’re imputing or implying that if I came from private practice, that somehow I’m going to have liberal bias. I did pro bono work working for nonprofits. They’re imputing that that prior work is gonna make me more liberal, more inclined to grant relief. That’s an assumption they’re making. But what’s crystal clear throughout this, Ms. Leavitt has not mentioned the productivity, the targets that we met, the efficiency that we brought to the court. None of that was measured in the past. That was measured. How well is the judge performing? How is their temperament on the court? They looked at things like that. How many cases did we close? How many motions do we rule on? These are the bread and butter productivity issues that were typically reviewed by our assistant chief immigration judge. All of that has been tossed onto the ash heap. The only thing driving, based upon my perception of what’s driving these terminations is an implied political bias. They’re just making an implied political bias and just arbitrarily removing judges that are doing a great job.

 

MARTIN: Did you ever get any instruction from the administration that suggested to you that if you did not rule in a certain way, that your job would be in line – in that your job would be in jeopardy? George, do you wanna start?

 

PAPPAS: Let me start with that, because it did happen to me. I had it both directly and indirectly. Directly I was told that I should grant what’s called a motion to dismiss. This is when we had ICE officers coming into the courthouse. And I was in very vigorous terms pressured to grant these motions because if you grant that motion, the respondent, or the immigrant will now no longer be in removal proceedings. And as soon as they leave the immigration court the ICE officers would handcuff them or arrest them and then place them into what’s called expedited removal and then ship to God knows where. South Sudan, El Salvador, or a Gulag in Russia. This is what my assistant chief judge wanted me to do. 

What the chief judge was violating here was number one, telling me how to rule in a specific case. Two, it was in contradiction of the training that we received, to be fair, to provide a fair hearing to promote due process. Well, if you’re telling me how to rule in a specific case like this, that determines whether a person stays or goes, you’re usurping due process. So that was a direct interference with my judicial neutrality. 

Indirectly, there were other ways that the Executive Office of Immigration Review was pressuring us. A more recent memo of June 27th basically said, ladies and gentlemen, to all the judges, we are here to promote fairness and due process, but we’ve seen some bad apples that are biased. We don’t like that. So if you’re a biased judge, you need to get a different career, otherwise you’ll be fired. I’m paraphrasing here. I’m paraphrasing. But that was the memo. That’s a shocking memo because I will basically tell you that that memo masquerades, masquerades as promoting due process and fairness. And what it imposes is a different level of stress on all judges ’cause now they have to self-police themselves. Am I making the right decision? Am I using the right words? Normally they wouldn’t be second guessing themselves. So it adds another level of terror and intimidation on judges. So that’s what I saw.

MARTIN: Judge Peyton, what about you? Do you – were you ever given instructions about how you were to rule in your cases? Or were you ever given instruction that you were then expected to pass on to the other judges that you supervised?

 

PEYTON: Right. So in my role as a supervisor judge for Chicago, I did receive an email on May 30th. And in that email it was guidance saying that – I will say the email contained a lot of “may” language. Immigration judges may dismiss cases. Immigration judges may make adjudications on the records. Immigration judges may, may, may. But really when I received that email, and I then forward that to my judges, we had a meeting because myself and all the other judges really believed that that may meant should, that we should dismiss, that we shouldn’t wait 10 days for a response. That we should immediately act on these motions to dismiss and not provide the required 10 day response for the individual to review that motion, perhaps seek counsel, and then provide a written response to the motions to dismiss. 

 

MARTIN: Is that legal?

 

PEYTON: Well, so the language was very careful, right? It was couched in this may, may, may. And then when we read it, we all perceive it as this should. It is – I, when I had taught judges in class, including Judge Pappas, I was part of the training crew that taught him, we emphasized to each judge in training, you make the decision on the facts in front of you, you independently review and adjudicate, and you don’t take the pressures inside your courtroom when you’re making those decisions. So to receive this email kind of flew in the face of everything we had heard and how we had completed and trained the new judges.

 

MARTIN: So, so I just have to ask you, you both, there are a lot of people who will be listening to this conversation and they’ll be saying, well, that’s a shame, but why do I care?

 

PEYTON: Right. So there are more or less 3.5, 3.8 million cases now in the immigration court of those cases, there’s maybe 2 million with pending applications for asylum or other relief. By losing, firing, terminating, making them quit over a hundred, closer to 130 judges since January, and we’re now reducing the judge’s numbers to 600, seeing this increased expansion to huge numbers in the enforcement budget, no similar increase in budgets to the, to the immigration courts, it’s showing that they don’t care about justice. The immigration judges are the ones who hear these applications. They have the authority to decide whether that respondent has met their burden to establish eligibility for relief. They are the ones. So by, by firing all these immigration judges, including those, again, non-political career appointees, like what does that mean for our country?

 

MARTIN: Judge Pappas, what about you? What, what – if, if someone were to say to you, that’s too bad, you know, that’s a shame, but why should I be concerned about this? What would you say?

 

PAPPAS: They should be concerned. Because when you dismantle due process protections for immigrants, you’re also attacking due process protections for US citizens and their civil liberties. Caught up in these raids, currently, you not only have non-US citizens who are being arrested and deported without due process, you’ve also had US citizens who have been arrested without probable cause. That’s a violation of the US Constitution. So as Jennifer Peyton has just rightly identified, we have a huge increase in supporting enforcement. And we have a destruction and an attack on the court system, on just– on judges. Which means if you have no justice and you only have enforcement, you no longer have a democracy. You have an authoritarian state. That’s why every American citizen needs to understand this is not just an immigration problem, it is a civil liberties threat. And unless they connect those dots they’re gonna pay the price later on. Everybody should be in fear right now because the civil liberties protections are under attack.

 

MARTIN: Jennifer Peyton, George Pappas. Thank you both so much for speaking with us today.

 

PEYTON: Thank you, Michel, for your time.

 

PAPPAS: Thank you, Michel. Thank you.