Department of Justice lawyers have told a federal judge that ICE provided wrong information about the deportation agency’s policy on arrests at immigration courthouses — information that was used by a judge in a major ruling last year.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office in Manhattan said U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement last year said its new sensitive locations policy justifying arrests at courthouses also applied to immigration courts.
But ICE last week issued a “reminder” memo saying in fact the sensitive locations policy does not apply to immigration courts.
U.S. Attorney Jay Clayton and two lawyers from his office took pains to make clear that ICE provided the wrong information.
“We deeply regret that this error has come to light at this late stage, after the parties have expended significant resources and time to litigate this case and this court has carefully considered Plaintiffs’ challenge to the 2025 ICE guidance,” they said Tuesday in a filing with U.S. District Judge Kevin Castel.
“This error, however, was not caused by a lack of diligence and care by the undersigned attorneys,” the DOJ lawyers wrote. “The undersigned were specifically informed by ICE that the 2025 ICE Guidance applied to immigration courthouse arrests. In addition, we discussed with and obtained the approval of assigned ICE counsel before filing every brief in this case and making any oral representations to the Court and Plaintiffs.”
Joining Mr. Clayton in the brief were Jeffrey Oestericher and Tomoko Onozawa. They asked Judge Castel to withdraw previous arguments they had made in court that cited the erroneous ICE information.
ICE last year revoked guidance from the Biden era restricting arrests at or near courthouses and allowed a more active — though not unlimited — presence.
In the case before Judge Castel, immigrants had complained about being arrested when they showed up for hearings in immigration courts, which are not part of the regular federal judiciary. The immigration courts are a division of the Justice Department, and their judges answer to the attorney general and aren’t confirmed by the Senate.
ICE deportation officers had been showing up at immigration hearings and arresting migrants who showed up for deportation case hearings.
Immigrant rights groups said the arrests were denying migrants their chance to make the case for relief from immigration judges.
Amy Belsher, a lawyer for the New York Civil Liberties Union Foundation, told Judge Castel in court papers on Wednesday that the ICE memo had been at the center of the case, and the judge had allowed the arrests to continue based on the arguments surrounding the memo.
“The implications of this development are far-reaching,” Ms. Belsher said.
ICE didn’t respond to an inquiry from The Washington Times.
The Department of Homeland Security defended the policy.
“We will continue to arrest illegal aliens at immigration courts following their proceedings. It is commonsense to take them into custody following the completion of their removal proceedings. Nothing prohibits arresting a lawbreaker where you find them,” the department said.
DOJ’s filing is the latest legal struggle for the Trump administration.
The chief federal judge in Minnesota earlier this year documented 97 judicial orders in 66 different cases that he said the government had violated.
ICE and DOJ have been overwhelmed with work trying to carry out — and defend in court — President Trump’s push for mass deportations. Thousands of “habeas corpus” petitions are being filed each month challenging immigrants’ detention, in addition to bigger policy battles such as the courthouse arrest policy at issue in the case before Judge Castel.
