(The Center Square) – The number of cases before federal immigration judges totaled nearly 1.8 million, a record, in fiscal 2024, according to the latest analysis by Syracuse University’s Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse, a nonpartisan, independent research organization.
Federal immigration courts fall under the Department of Justice and are located in 28 states, the Northern Mariana Islands and Puerto Rico. The DOJ’s fiscal 2024 year was Oct. 1, 2023, through Sept. 30, 2024.
The record number of cases before federal immigration courts is up from a previous high of 1.4 million new cases in fiscal 2023, TRAC notes in a news release accompanying the latest data from its Immigration Court Quick Facts tool. The tool includes data related to federal immigrant detention, court cases and prosecutions, among other information.
Federal immigration courts reported receiving 1,798,964 new cases in fiscal 2024, of which 911,289 cases were completed, according to TRAC’s analysis.
Closing more than 900,000 cases is a record, the most for a single fiscal year, it says. That’s after immigration courts broke a record in fiscal 2023 reportedly closing roughly 665,000 cases.
These numbers don’t reflect the entire caseload. The backlog of pending cases before immigration courts of more than 3.7 million at the end of fiscal 2024 is nearly double the 1.9 million case backlog at the end of fiscal 2022, according to the data.
There are currently 3,716,106 active cases pending before federal immigration courts nationwide. Among them are 1,594,394 pending asylum applications, according to the data.
TRAC also found that a record number of individuals were ordered to be removed in fiscal 2024, totaling 314,773. This number only includes removal orders, not the number who were actually removed. Removal orders and those who voluntarily left the country account for 38.3% of completed cases, according to the data.
Last month, 66,582 deportation cases were completed but deportation orders were only issued for 45.8% of them. By contrast, 70.1% of those applying for asylum had their request granted last month, according to the data.
In fiscal 2024, the immigration courts with the greatest number of pending deportation cases were located in Florida, California, New York and Illinois.
The greatest number of nearly 159,000 were reported in Miami-Dade County, followed by Los Angeles County’s more than 113,000. In New York, Queens County reported more than 108,000 and Kings County more than 88,000. Cook County, Illinois, reported more than 106,000, according to the data.
The greatest number of illegal foreign nationals ordered to be deported were from Honduras, Mexico, Guatemala, Nicaragua and Colombia. Combined, they total nearly 208,000, according to the data.
The data was released as the greatest number of illegal border crossers have been reported in U.S. history under the Biden-Harris administration, The Center Square has reported. In fiscal 2024, nearly 3 million were reported nationwide, bringing the total to nearly 11 million since fiscal 2021, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection data published Tuesday. This total excludes more than 2 million who evaded capture, known as gotaways, exclusively reported on by The Center Square.
By Bethany Blankley | The Center Square contributor
