Minneapolis-based immigrants rights organization The Advocates for Human Rights sued the U.S. Department of Justice on Thursday over growing restrictions on public access to immigration court proceedings. The Advocates have tracked immigration removal and bond hearings at Fort Snelling Immigration Court since 2017.
In the past year, court observers have been met with locked doors to publicly scheduled hearings and blanket closures of entire case dockets, where every scheduled court hearing is made inaccessible to the public. In recent months, master and individual hearings have also been increasingly hosted remotely, with observers left in virtual waiting rooms.
On Jan. 9, Michele Garnett McKenzie, The Advocates’ executive director, sent a letter to the Executive Office for Immigration Review and Fort Snelling Assistant Chief Immigration Judge Eric Dillow requesting changes to uphold public access to courts. The letter said that observers have been denied access to court starting in March 2025, with sharp restrictions on public access beginning in October.
Amy Lange, head of the Advocates’ court observation program, said that while some of the restrictions loosened after the demand letter, other limitations have remained in place or worsened since January. She said closures of case dockets have persisted since October, in some instances for entire mornings or days, in violation of established regulations.
“There’d be really specific reasons why they closed the court with those carve-outs, and those should be explained on the record,” Lange said. “So when there’s a blanket closure, that’s just not following federal regulation.”
Beyond limiting direct access to immigration hearings, court staff also added new requirements for observers. Since October 2025, judges have made observers wear lanyards identifying themselves, which is not required under federal regulations, according to the January demand letter.
The letter also said that guards in the court lobby have frequently expelled observers, accusing them of “loitering,” and required them to stand either in the hallway or the basement cafeteria. The Advocates say that staff told observers they would come to the hallway to call them to hearings, but never actually did so.
Lange said there is no underlying policy behind these expulsions, and that observers were frequently sent to different locations day to day.
“This was not a policy as much as it was ping-pong,” she said. “Whoever decided to expel people, it felt very random.”
In past months, out-of-state judges have growingly presided over court proceedings, with virtual hearings hosted on the video conferencing platform Webex. Lange said that on some days, the full docket information for virtual hearings is unavailable, with observers left unsure of what time to log onto meetings. But even when start and end times are public, observers are unlikely to be admitted to the hearings.
“They just sit in the virtual lobby watching the numbers go up and down, and then there’s some point where it says the host has ended the meeting and then they log off,” Lange said. “But nobody speaks to them, and they never get admitted.”
Fort Snelling is just one of many immigration courts in the country facing public access restrictions, with courts in California, New York and Arizona among others experiencing similar changes since early 2025. According to Madeline Lohman, advocacy and outreach director at Tthe Advocates, the lawsuit is a tool to address restrictions nationwide.
“We felt that the way to see a change that would be lasting, and that would help people in other states, was to bring this lawsuit, because we are not the only state that has seen this happening,” Lohman said. “Other observation projects also have problems accessing the court to varying degrees.”
Since The Advocates’ lawsuit was filed in the D.C. District Court, any decisions on the case will have national implications. Lohman said a ruling in their favor would require immigration courts across the country to uphold public access.
A key issue for the lawsuit is the lack of policy guidance supporting the DOJ’s actions. Lohman said that almost all of the changes instituted since early 2025 have come without the required legal backing.
“When we have regulations in our government, the government can’t just change them on a whim and without announcement,” Lohman said. “There’s supposed to be a process where they announce an intended change, they solicit public comments, they take those comments and they incorporate them, then publish a final rule.”
The lawsuit alleges that the DOJ actions violate the First Amendment and the Administrative Procedure Act, which dictates how federal agencies make regulations. Plaintiffs also say the agency violated its own regulations by limiting public access to hearings.
Lohman said public access to the courts is a vital tool for protecting the due process of immigrants in the U.S. The Jan. 9 letter pointed to the role of the program in ensuring that vulnerable defendants feel less alone during court proceedings.
“While not required to do so, observers confirm with counsel or respondents before observing individual hearings and consistently respect respondents’ requests for hearings to remain closed to observers,” the letter said.
“For many respondents, however, our request for an observer to attend has resulted in them feeling less alone in these intimidating proceedings.”
For Lohman, beyond the public access issues at hand, the lawsuit is a matter of accountability.
“All of this happened without any announcement,” she said. “There was no process, there’s no published policy anywhere.”
