BALTIMORE—In surprise testimony in federal court Thursday, an immigration officer revealed that more than 100 asylum seekers were wrongfully deported in violation of a court-ordered settlement agreement in a long-running case that has gotten national attention.
Before today, the number of wrongfully deported asylum seekers in the case was thought to be less than a dozen. But under persistent questioning from plaintiff’s counsel, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services asylum officer Kimberly Sicard testified that in the past three to four weeks it had come to her attention that more than 100 asylum seekers covered by the settlement agreement have been removed. She put the number in the “low 100s.”
The revelation prompted an immediate reaction from U.S. District Judge Stephanie Gallagher, who has been tightly managing the case of J.O.P. v. DHS since early 2025, when the Venezuelan asylum seeker only known in court filings as “Cristian” was deported under the Alien Enemies Act in violation of the settlement agreement.
“It’s certainly news to me that there with this many removals,” Gallagher interjected. “I am very concerned having that number.”
The timing of the discovery of the additional, not-previously-disclosed removals appears to roughly line up with when Gallagher issued a Feb. 23 order setting today’s evidentiary hearing and demanding the government produce witnesses who could testify about the circumstances of the removals of eight asylum seekers and possibly a ninth.
Ironically, the day’s hearing kicked off with the revelation that two more asylum seekers were wrongfully removed in February, although the government disputes that one of them is covered by the settlement agreement. That brought the total number of wrongful deportations in the case to at most a dozen, including “Cristian.” But bigger revelations were still to come.
Sicard was deep into her testimony when the revelation spilled out. It came after Gallagher had put up numerous roadblocks to further questioning of Sicard from class counsel Michelle Mendez of the National Immigration Project, primarily because of Sicard’s limited personal knowledge of the case of the nine deported asylum seekers at issue today.
The testimony was interrupted by a long back and forth between the judge and counsel for both sides about what Sicard could meaningfully testify about, during which Mendez was visibly frustrated by the constraints Gallagher had imposed. When testimony resumed, Mendez took another shot, and Sicard made the big reveal.
Asked how the additional removals had come to her attention, Sicard said she wasn’t sure of the exact process but that officials had “queried systems.” As part of the process of notifying ICE of the wrongful removals, the matter went to the office of chief counsel at USCIS three to four weeks ago, Sicard said.
In a statement to TPM after the hearing, Mendez said: “We are concerned that these removals are just the tip of the iceberg.”
Gallagher called the revelation of the more than 100 wrongful removals “extremely troubling to the court.”
The revelation was the pinnacle of a day of frustration for Gallagher. She had listed in her order calling the hearing five topics on which she expected the Trump administration to produce witnesses “with personal knowledge” to testify. The government failed to produce such witnesses.
“We are no farther in figuring out what happened to these people than when the hearing started,” an exasperated Gallagher said toward the end of five-hour hearing after hearing from five of the approximately 11 witnesses the government expected to call.
“I am not happy with where we are,” Gallagher said more than once. At one point, she warned the government, “You might want to start preparing more witnesses for tomorrow.”
The 2024 settlement agreement in the class action case barred the removal of a subset of unaccompanied minors seeking asylum in the United States. The removal of “Cristian” last March set off a yearlong effort to enforce the settlement agreement. In a case with echoes of the wrongful deportation of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, Gallagher ordered the recalcitrant Trump administration to facilitate the return of “Cristian” and was upheld on appeal. Things did not go well for “Cristian,” whose whereabouts remain unknown.
The evidentiary hearing, which was expected to last one day, will continue tomorrow.
“There are ways to get this information,” Gallagher said at the end of the day, her voice rising to nearly a shout. “We need to know what happened to these people.”
