MIAMI (AP) — A U.S. Army Reserve lawyer detailed as a federal immigration judge has been fired barely a month into the job after granting asylum at a high rate out of step with the Trump administration’s mass deportation goals, The Associated Press has learned.
Christopher Day began hearing cases in late October as a temporary judge at the immigration court in Annandale, Virginia. He was fired around Dec. 2, the National Association of Immigration Judges confirmed.
It’s unclear why Day was fired. Day and the Pentagon did not comment when contacted by the AP, and a Justice Department spokeswoman declined to discuss personnel matters.
But federal data from November shows he ruled on asylum cases in ways at odds with the Trump administration’s stated goals.
Of the 11 cases he concluded in November, he granted asylum or some other type of relief allowing the migrant to remain in the United States a total of six times, according to federal data analyzed by Mobile Pathways, a San Francisco-based non profit.