On a recent Wednesday in Judge John J. Siemietkowski’s immigration courtroom at 26 Federal Plaza, an Ecuadorian mother logged on for her immigration hearing.

The court was well prepared for remote work. Lawyers waited patiently in their Webex boxes to unmute themselves and talk. The judge periodically toggled a device to point the camera toward others in the low-ceilinged, windowless room. He led the virtual participants in a round of applause to thank a translator appearing from North Carolina.

Except the mother did not get the same flexibility. The judge told her she had to come in person.

In fear of being arrested by the U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement in the courthouse hallway, now happening commonly in New York, many immigrants have begged to do their hearings online from home. Yet even that temporary protection from deportation is now under threat. Interviews with court personnel and attorneys indicate a top-down pressure from the Trump administration toward in-person hearings, with fateful results. It’s the latest battlefront in the city’s immigration courts, which have become “the capital of immigration courthouse arrests.”

“We’ve had many clients who we’ve consulted with whose Webex motions were denied,” says Katherine Buckel, clinic supervisor for the immigration-law unit at The Legal Aid Society. “And then some were detained at the courthouses.”

One such case involved a Venezuelan family, whose request for a virtual hearing was turned down, according to Buckel. The husband was taken away when he showed up at court, leaving behind a pregnant wife and child.
Buckel runs a clinic trying to help people switch to virtual appearances for exactly this reason, but it’s not easy: Advocacy and legal groups including Legal Aid have gathered information on 39 immigration judges in the city and found that only 19 will consider allowing lawyerless people to appear online. Different judges have different policies, and in some courtrooms, lawyers may appear remotely even while their own clients are stranded in the room.

This leaves immigrants with a “horrible decision,” says Gillian Rowland-Kain of Immigrant Advocates Response Collaborative, which is........

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