Sacramento immigration courts now have more than 100 cases a day. That likely means more deportations
As Sacramento Immigration Judge Susan Phan heard the identification numbers of people scheduled to appear before her Thursday morning, the number of absences quickly became apparent.
“A lot of people are not here,” Phan said aloud a courtroom inside the John Moss federal building in downtown.
The absences are becoming increasingly more common across the country as immigration courts have begun expanding the number of people scheduled for preliminary proceeding, and moving up hearing dates. The hearings, nicknamed “mega master,” can place more than 100 cases on a judge’s docket in a single day.
The federal government has argued the strategy is intended to move cases through the immigration system more quickly and reduce court backlogs. But immigration lawyers and advocates say the practice reduces opportunities for individualized review and increases the likelihood that immigrants will miss hearings, often leading to more deportation orders.
The new tactic “is dramatically undermining the fairness and the due process of the proceedings,” said Greg Chen, senior director of government relations for the American Immigration Lawyers Association.
Master calendar hearings, which have existed for decades, are generally the first time a person appears in front of an immigration judge to make their case. They typically last only a few minutes and focus on procedural issues.
Hearings have previously involved about two or three dozen cases, according to NorCal Resist, a community activist group which has tracked immigration enforcement in the region.
Those numbers have increased dramatically in recent weeks. Pham had 96 cases scheduled for Thursday. One week earlier, she had 111 cases in a single day.
NorCal Resist estimates that on average half of the people on scheduled court dockets have not shown up since the implementation of the “mega master” hearings in Sacramento immigration court earlier this month. The absences can be attributed to several factors, including address changes, fear and moved up court dates, said programs director Giselle Garcia.
“Let’s say someone was scheduled for their hearing in 2028, two years from now, they could receive a notice that they have a hearing now in two weeks,” she said.
Missing a hearing has severe consequences: In nearly all cases, a judge will issue a removal order. Even before this new practice, removal orders have skyrocketed in recent years.
The new strategy comes amid ongoing changes in President Donald Trump’s mass deportation agenda. After public opinion waned with its large-scale and publicized enforcement operations, the administration has leaned on administrative changes to clamp down on immigration.
“They are moving away from some of those types of high-profile tactics and switching to a tactic that’s less likely to become known to the public,” Sacramento immigration lawyer Brian Lopez.
The Executive Office for Immigration Review, the agency that runs the immigration courts at the Department of Justice, said it prioritizes the “timely completion of all cases” in a written statement Friday morning.
“Unnecessary delay hurts both aliens with meritorious claims and the American public who wish to see aliens with non-meritorious claims removed as quickly as possible,” the statement said. “As it continues to add new immigration judges, EOIR will continue to make scheduling adjustments to ensure all cases are handled in a timely and lawful manner.”
‘Impact that person’s rights’
Courthouse arrests became a flashpoint in the federal administration’s deportation campaign last year as ICE agents across the country arrested people who were showing up for routine hearings and check-ins.
In Sacramento, 39 people were detained after attending immigration hearings at the John Moss federal building from May 27 through late September last year, according to prior reporting from The Sacramento Bee and court documents. These arrests included incidents of people weeping as they were pulled away from family members and others thrown against walls by masked agents who did not identify themselves.
The practice largely stopped in California late last year after U.S. District Judge P. Casey Pitts in San Jose issued a stay of the courthouse arrest policy, saying it would not be enforced until its legality was decided in court. This week, Pitts issued another order to extend the ban nationwide.
On Thursday morning, the fourth floor hallway leading to courtrooms was mostly quiet. At the doorway of the lobby, where people are required to check in and wait until their hearing, a security guard welcomed families from Mexico, Central America and South America. Many clutched folders and paperwork about their case.
The immigration judge’s master calendar hearing docket — or case list — is typically split into three different time slots. At the beginning of each new slot, a security guard will guide some families into one of the building’s modest sized courtrooms filled with three rows of wooden benches that resemble church pews.
Once there, the immigrants were seated to face the judge, translator and lawyer from the Department of Homeland Security.
Phan, who is currently one of the four judges permanently assigned to Sacramento’s immigration court, began Thursday’s 10:30 a.m. session by addressing the group as a whole. After each few sentences, she paused for the Spanish-speaking translator.
“Today, I’ll be considering whether it’s appropriate to address the allegations in the notice to appear,” Phan told the group. “If I move forward today I’m considering a variety of factors.”
Chen said these “classroom” style addresses are a significant change, compared to previous hearings, in which judges took a more individualized approach to cases. In some cities, he added, judges are presiding over a hearing with more than 100 respondents at a time. Sacramento’s courtroom, which has a capacity of 36, has resulted in groups ranging from 20 to 30 people.
“The real problem with doing it en masse is that the judge won’t have the opportunity to actually go through those procedural requirements to ensure that the person understands the consequences that impact that person’s rights,” Chen said.
‘Fast track cases to a resolution’
Following her general address, Phan called up individual cases. Hearings usually last between 2 and 10 minutes. In many cases, families haven’t yet secured an attorney.
First up was a mother and teenage boy from Colombia.
Over the next three minutes, Pham asked them a series of questions including their entry date to the country and if they had any family members who were U.S. citizens. She ended the hearing by providing them with a final court date — Jan 2028. Like most people that day, the family would have 45 days to submit any paperwork.
Lopez said court dates set for years away are common given the backlog in immigration cases, though judges typically won’t schedule a final hearing if the individual hasn’t yet secured an attorney.
“I would say is a little unusual, and it goes along with what I was saying earlier — this is a way to fast track the cases to a resolution,” Lopez said.
Pham continued to call in people in large groups to hear their cases over the next few hours. Among them was Jose, a 55-year-old Mexican native who wished not to be identified because of his undocumented status. Jose had entered the country in 1989 and spent nearly three decades as a maintenance technician.
He was joined by his U.S. citizen son Apolonio who said their initial court date was set for late August. The hearing date was changed to Thursday after their scheduled judge was removed from Sacramento, Apolonio said.
The administration has removed more than 100 immigration judges across the country since January 2025 in an attempt to align courts with the president’s pledge to deport record numbers of people. Last month, the DOJ announced it had sworn in 77 new judges and was committed to “reestablishing an immigration judge corps that is dedicated to restoring the rule to the law.”
“They have incredible pressure on them to comply with the ideological perspective of the administration,” Chen said.
Phan has an asylum denial rate of 22.3% from fiscal year 2020 to 2025, according to Syracuse University’s Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse, also known as TRAC. Nationally, judges have denied 58.% percent of asylum claims during this same period.
Apolonio left the hearing hopeful for his father. The family would submit another Form I-130 — or petition for an unlawful relative — after learning at the hearing that the first submission was done incorrectly. They would return to court in September.
