Rising Completion Times in Immigration Court Despite Record Deportations
Published Sep 11, 2026
Noncitizens in Immigration Court are waiting longer and longer for their cases to be decided. Average completion times during the Trump administration continue to rise.
This is true even though Immigration Judges are completing more cases each month and ordering removals more often. Removals generally take less time to complete than cases where judges grant relief. In July 2026, 104,028 deportation cases were completed, up from the record-high total that topped 100,000 for the first time in June. See TRAC’s earlier report.[1] Nearly four out of five (78.6%) individuals were ordered removed in July – up from two-thirds six months ago.
Despite this, the time from the issuance of the Notice to Appear (NTA) in Immigration Court to case disposition keeps rising. Those ordered removed in July, for example, had waited an average of 901 days for a decision. This is up 51 percent since the end of the last administration when the average wait time two years ago in July 2024 was 597 days.
Disposition Times Vary by State
In July, the average time Immigration Judges took to order removal varied widely by court location from 1,076 days in Indiana to 308 days in New Mexico. Other states with particularly long average times were North Carolina (1,047 days), Florida (1,031 days), Connecticut (1,026 days), and Massachusetts (1,007 days). Because schedules for hearings may change or not be initially set, the actual notice for the hearing may arrive at the last minute despite these lengthy wait times.
States with particularly shorter average times in addition to New Mexico were Nevada (470 days), Arizona (681 days) and Hawaii (732 days).
All but four states saw an increase in average case completion times when removal was ordered during the Trump administration. Table 1 provides each state’s[2] specific times in July 2024, July 2025, and July 2026.
| Immigration Court State | Average Days | Percent Change | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| July 2024 | July 2025 | July 2026 | ||
| All-Removal Orders | 597 | 676 | 901 | 51% |
| Arizona | 300 | 448 | 681 | 127% |
| California | 418 | 603 | 815 | 95% |
| Colorado | 380 | 486 | 781 | 106% |
| Connecticut | 702 | 661 | 1,026 | 46% |
| Florida | 806 | 922 | 1,031 | 28% |
| Georgia | 624 | 859 | 899 | 44% |
| Hawaii | 210 | 161 | 732 | 249% |
| Illinois | 636 | 683 | 976 | 53% |
| Indiana | 1,291 | 1,506 | 1,076 | -17% |
| Louisiana | 424 | 438 | 793 | 87% |
| Maryland | 588 | 771 | 845 | 44% |
| Massachusetts | 759 | 851 | 1,007 | 33% |
| Michigan | 388 | 508 | 779 | 101% |
| Minnesota | 447 | 613 | 891 | 99% |
| Missouri | 1,190 | 759 | 888 | -25% |
| Nebraska | 1,290 | 743 | 995 | -23% |
| Nevada | 414 | 549 | 470 | 14% |
| New Jersey | 613 | 622 | 813 | 33% |
| New Mexico | 131 | 240 | 308 | 135% |
| New York | 400 | 656 | 875 | 119% |
| North Carolina | 1,048 | 789 | 1,047 | 0% |
| Ohio | 412 | 511 | 798 | 94% |
| Oregon | 629 | 997 | 989 | 57% |
| Pennsylvania | 589 | 764 | 961 | 63% |
| Tennessee | 927 | 660 | 848 | -9% |
| Texas | 634 | 667 | 915 | 44% |
| Utah | 475 | 629 | 962 | 103% |
| Virginia | 808 | 747 | 809 | 0% |
| Washington | 652 | 567 | 818 | 25% |
Why Completion Times Are Increasing
The principal determinants of how long these cases take typically have little to do with an individual judge’s decision practices. Already “baked in” is the time cases in each Court’s backlog have already been waiting. Average disposition time thus must be longer than the time cases have already been pending.
While the Court’s overall backlog itself has been inching downward, backlog wait times have continued to grow. Two years ago in July 2024 toward the end of the Biden administration the average wait time for all pending cases was 571 days . Two years later, in July 2026 the backlogged cases have been pending for an average of 940 days – an increase of 71 percent.
With a pending case backlog of over 3 million cases, disposition times are expected to continue on average to grow.