Concerns regarding due process continue to rise as ICE agents detain immigrants in Chicago immediately following their immigration court hearings. One woman, struggling to explain in Spanish why she did not have an attorney to the immigration judge, was obviously confused when the judge stated, “At the government’s request, your case was dismissed.”
Less than a minute later, three men in baseball caps, dark jackets, and jeans escorted her to a room where she was told she was being detained pending deportation. The woman’s sister, obviously shaken by her sibling’s disappearance, stood in the hallway, trying to understand what was happening. This scene is being played out repeatedly in Illinois immigration courts and across the nation.