Name: Trump admin seeks to cancel asylum cases, deport applicants
Uploaded: 2025-12-23T17:59:34.205Z
Duration: 2 min 55 s
Description: The Trump administration is attempting to cancel thousands of asylum cases and deport applicants to third-party countries, CBS News reporting shows. Immigration reporter Camilo Montoya-Galvez has the latest.

The Trump administration is attempting to cancel thousands of asylum cases and deport applicants to third-party countries, CBS News reporting shows. Immigration reporter Camilo Montoya-Galvez has the latest.

Washington

CBS News has learned that the Trump administration is attempting to cancel thousands of asylum cases and deport applicants to third-party countries. Data shows that ICE has filed more than 8,000 requests to dismiss asylum cases in immigration court, with the administration arguing that applicants can be removed to countries that have agreed to accept non-citizens, such as Uganda, Ecuador, Guatemala, and Honduras. 

The administration is seeking to bypass legal barriers that prevent deportation of asylum seekers with pending cases by asking immigration judges to nullify these cases without hearings. Additionally, a federal judge has ruled that the deportation of Venezuelans to El Salvador under the Wartime Alien Enemies Act was illegal and has ordered the government to submit a plan to return the detainees or provide them with virtual hearings.

Trump admin seeks to cancel asylum cases, deport applicants

CBS News has learned the Trump administration is seeking to cancel thousands of asylum cases and deport the applicants to third-party countries. Data obtained by our team shows ICE has filed more than 8,000 requests to toss out asylum cases in immigration court. It's also asking judges to deport those applicants to third-party countries. For more on this, let's bring in our resident immigration and politics reporter, Camilo Montego-Galvez. Camilo, thank you for being here. So you report the U.S. is already essentially doing this, right? What is new about this? Well, just to level set, the administration has, of course, promised to oversee the largest deportation operation in American history. But one of the main barriers that the administration is facing is that a lot of the immigrants that it seeks to deport are people who are seeking asylum and have pending cases. And under U.S. law, the government cannot move to deport them until that asylum case is adjudicated and they are ordered deported because they lose their cases. And so, to bypass that, the administration is asking immigration judges across the country to basically nullify many of these asylum cases without hearing them on the merits, by arguing that the applicants can instead be deported to third countries, meaning other countries around the world who have agreed and accepted to take in people who are not their own citizens. So, for example, it has placed people in third-country deportation proceedings who are from Iran, Nicaragua and Russia, and has argued to immigration judges, Lindsey, that they can be deported to places like Uganda, Ecuador, Guatemala and Honduras, again, countries that are not their own and where they have no ties. And so they are arguing to these judges, now in thousands of cases, as you mentioned, 8,000 cases, that these applicants can instead be deported to other countries and that their asylum cases can be closed without even getting a hearing on the merits. Is this a separation of powers issue? Can the executive branch tell the judicial branch what to do? It's a great question. Immigration courts are not part of the judicial system. They are actually part of the executive branch. They are overseen by the Justice Department and the attorney general. And so they are part of the executive branch and are usually very deferential to whatever directive comes from the White House or the Justice Department. A federal judge yesterday gave the Trump administration two weeks to return or plan to return a group of Venezuelans that were sent to the notorious Secot prison, El Secot prison in El Salvador that you've been reporting on. What's going on there? Because, you know, many of the Venezuelan men sent to El Salvador and imprisoned at that notorious mega prison were deported from the U.S. under the Wartime Alien Enemies Act of 1798. A federal judge in Washington, D.C. has ruled that those deportations were illegal and that they denied the people that were subject to it due process. And now the judge said that to remedy that lack of due process for the detainees there, the government has to submit a plan to return them to the U.S. or to give them virtual hearings by January 5th of next year. OK. Camilo Montoya-Gaves, thank you.

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