Former Immigration Judge Daniel Caudillo Warns of Due Process Erosion in U.S. Immigration Courts

Daniel Caudillo, a former immigration judge in Laredo, Texas, and current director of the Jim and Leah Finley Immigration Law Clinic at Texas Tech University School of Law, is raising alarm about the mounting pressures facing immigration judges and what he describes as the critical need to protect due process rights in the nation’s increasingly strained immigration court system.

Caudillo’s perspective carries particular weight given his dual experience on the bench and as an educator. During his tenure as an immigration judge in Laredo — one of the busiest border courts in the country — he witnessed firsthand the tension between the volume of cases requiring adjudication and the constitutional principles that demand each respondent receive a fair hearing. In a wide-ranging conversation with senior contributor Ted Koppel, Caudillo detailed how structural features of the immigration court system leave judges vulnerable to political pressure in ways that Article III federal judges are not. Because immigration judges are classified as Department of Justice employees rather than members of an independent judiciary, their hiring, firing, case assignments, and performance evaluations are all controlled by the Attorney General.

The implications of that structural arrangement have grown more consequential amid the Trump administration’s second-term push to accelerate removals. Since January, the administration has dismissed a significant number of sitting immigration judges, including some with decades of experience, while reinstating stricter case completion quotas that require judges to resolve a minimum number of cases per year. Immigration judge associations and legal scholars have warned that such metrics can incentivize expedited rulings at the expense of thorough evidentiary review — a particular concern in asylum cases where credibility determinations and country conditions evidence can mean the difference between safety and return to persecution.

Caudillo’s remarks arrive at a moment when the stakes for immigration due process have rarely been higher. The administration has invoked the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 to remove certain migrants with limited judicial review, a use of the statute that federal courts are currently evaluating. Meanwhile, the expansion of expedited removal nationwide, the narrowing of asylum eligibility, and reports of individuals being deported before their hearings conclude have all drawn scrutiny from legal observers. Looking ahead, Caudillo emphasized the role of law school clinics like the one he leads at Texas Tech, where students provide free representation to immigrants who would otherwise face the government’s attorneys alone — a critical gap given that, unlike in criminal proceedings, respondents in immigration court have no constitutional right to appointed counsel.