Judges could be sent to cut immigration court backlog
Published 9:13 am Wednesday, March 22, 2017
BLOOMINGTON — The immigration court in the Twin Cities suburb of Bloomington has a backlog of about 5,300 cases — an all-time high.
In about 150 of those cases, individuals are being held by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
According to a press release, the Justice Department’s Executive Office for Immigration Review has preliminary plans to dispatch judges to Bloomington and 11 other cities. The Bloomington court serves Minnesota, North Dakota and South Dakota.
This week immigration judges were redeployed to six detention centers mostly near the border with Mexico in an effort to put President Donald Trump’s immigration directives into effect.
There’s a nationwide backlog of about 542,000 cases, including nearly 21,000 people who are being held in custody.