Some of those cases involve REAL criminal’s….
But ICE , in not doing things legally have judges working to release these people….
The piece below says ICE doesn’t even talk to the Justice Dept. lawyers appearing before the judges….
Putting Justice Dept lawyer’s on the same side as defense attorneys …
- Federal judges are dismissing criminal cases against undocumented immigrants after Immigration and Customs Enforcement takes defendants into custody during trial preparations.
- The aggressive deportation crackdown has created a collision between Trump administration immigration priorities and Department of Justice criminal prosecutions.
- Defense attorneys say the inter-agency failure is allowing criminals to escape accountability, while federal judges warn the practice is violating defendants’ constitutional rights.
Guillermo Zambrano faced at least 10 years in federal prison if convicted of working with Sinaloa cartel associates — but then ICE sought to deport him last June. Now he faces none.
Zambrano, a Venezuelan citizen in the midst of political asylum proceedings in the U.S., pleaded not guilty to charges of helping conceal drug-trafficking proceeds. For 17 months, he remained free on a $60,000 bond with an ankle monitor while awaiting trial in the Central District of California.
But amid President Trump’s immigration crackdown last summer, Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers came to Zambrano’s home, removed his ankle monitor and took him into custody. The move surprised everyone, including prosecutors. If convicted, Zambrano would have faced deportation after serving a prison sentence.
When ICE didn’t release Zambrano from custody this month, U.S. District Judge Dolly M. Gee dismissed the criminal indictment with prejudice, barring the government from refiling the same charges. Gee cited “an ongoing violation of Zambrano’s right to pretrial release.”
The dismissal underscores how the administration’s aggressive deportation push has begun to collide with federal prosecutions and exposes a clash of priorities between the Department of Homeland Security and the Department of Justice. In recent months, immigration authorities have taken undocumented defendants into custody, and in at least one case deported the accused, while criminal proceedings were underway….
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Prosecutors find themselves in unusual common front with defense attorneys
The charges against Zambrano came into question after his ICE detention on June 24. The following month, an immigration judge denied Zambrano’s request for bond.
In November, Targowski filed a motion to dismiss the charges against Zambrano, or order him released, citing the conflict between his client’s immigration and criminal proceedings and the fact that “he cannot effectively prepare for trial while in immigration detention.”
In response, prosecutors argued in a court filing opposing dismissal that the law “permits the government to simultaneously initiate removal proceedings and criminal proceedings.”
“The existence of ongoing criminal proceedings is not a basis to require ICE to release an individual from immigration custody,” the prosecutors wrote….
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Inside Trump’s purge of U.S. immigration courts
The next big phase of President Trump’s mass deportations is set to begin as “deportation judges” turn to 3.6 million backlogged cases.
Why it matters: Speeding up immigration court rulings could allow ICE to carry out more deportations, as most cases end in final removal orders.
- Trump spent much of 2025 purging the beleaguered immigration courts. 55 immigration judges were fired, and another 80 retired.
- He then went to MAGA central casting to appoint America’s new top immigration judge, retired Marine Corps Col. Daren Margolin.
Zoom in: Margolin retired from being an immigration judge in early 2024 because of his disgust with the Biden administration’s handling of the surge at the southern border.
- “Personally, I felt like a co-conspirator in treason,” Margolin told Axios in an exclusive interview.
- But now he’s back, officially taking leadership of the Executive Office of Immigration Review, the immigration court system housed within the Justice Department, in October.
The big picture: The backlog in immigration cases fell by 341,006 between Trump’s inauguration and Jan. 30, 2026, according to data shared with Axios.
- One contributor was a lack of new cases from border crossings, which have been comparatively low in Trump’s first year.
- Beyond clearing the backlog, Margolin is also pushing to limit the appeals process on removal orders, increasing the number of people who are eligible for swift deportations….
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Between the lines: Prior to EOIR, Margolin was a military lawyer and security officer at Marine Base Quantico, where he was dismissed for firing his M9 handgun into an office floor in 2013, according to a UPI report.
- A Marine spokesperson at the time said Margolin was removed because of he’d lost the confidence of leadership.
The bottom line: Margolin believes there are far more undocumented immigrants in the U.S. than official statistics reflect and is shaping the court to handle that potential case load.
- “The reality is, we will never have enough judges to handle currently 3.6-plus million cases, and I believe 25 to 30 million people who are here in the United States illegally,” he said.
- Official estimates with Census Bureau data lag from present day, but are roughly half that figure, according to the Department of Homeland Security in 2022 and the Pew Research Center in 2023….
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