Trump is reshaping immigration courts with help from a brutal comic book character

The Department of Homeland Security has been recruiting new immigration judges using the image of Judge Dredd, the masked, gun-carrying enforcer from the long-running British comic series, The 19th reports. One post told prospective applicants to deliver justice to criminal illegal aliens and become a deportation judge. Comic experts told the outlet the irony is that Dredd was written as dark-comedy satire of authoritarian policing rather than an aspirational figure — co-creator John Wagner said in twenty twenty-two that he was surprised people came away thinking Dredd was the good guy. The campaign lands amid heavy turnover on the immigration bench. The Justice Department counts one hundred ninety-two immigration judges hired in fiscal year twenty twenty-six, matching the totals of the previous three fiscal years combined, while the National Association of Immigration Judges says at least two hundred judges have been fired, resigned or retired since the start of President Trump's second term. The association's president says every departure pushes roughly seven hundred cases onto the judges who remain.

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