More Immigrants Granted Bond by Immigration Judges in September 2026

Published Oct 26, 2026

In September, Immigration Judges granted bond to 2,646 individuals. According to the latest case-by-case Immigration Court records, this is the largest monthly number of bond grants in the past two years. See Figure 1. It was also the largest number of bond hearings with just under 10,000 hearings held by Immigration Judges in September 2026. The number currently detained at the end of September was 32,622 individuals, down slightly from the 32,956 individuals who were recorded as currently detained in the Court’s backlog as of the end of August 2026.

For those granted bonds, the median bond set was $7,500. However, the bond amount varied greatly from a high of $20,000 for the median bond set in Denver, Colorado in September to a low of $1,500 in Bloomington, Minnesota.[1] These September differences weren’t exceptional. For all of FY 2026, Denver’s median bond was the same at $20,000, while Bloomington’s median bond again was among the lowest at $3,000.

The largest number of bond hearings in both Denver and Bloomington involved immigrants from Mexico. This mirrored the national picture for FY 2026. Nationwide, Immigration Judges granted bond to more immigrants from Mexico – about a quarter of all bond grants. The next largest number were from Guatemala, followed by individuals from Venezuela. Figure 2 shows the top ten nationalities granted bond by Immigration Judges during FY 2026.

Changing Patterns Over The Last Quarter Century

Immigration Judges’ grant and denial rates on bond requests have varied greatly over the last quarter century. As shown in Figure 3, twenty-five years ago grants and denials were evenly split – 50/50. During the next four years bond denial rates rose sharply and peaked at 65.4 percent in FY 2005 – closely mirroring the denial rate of 66.0 percent reached at the end of FY 2026. Between FY 2005 and FY 2016 grant rates climbed. Since then, grant rates have generally fallen. During both the first and second Trump administrations and during the intervening Biden administration, bond grant rates declined except during the Covid-19 pandemic. Then the need to protect individuals housed in close quarters from Covid’s spread increased release rates.

During this same FY 2016 – FY 2026 period, the number of individuals in the Court’s backlog who were detained also rose and fell. The number of immigrants detained peaked in FY 2020 and then fell sharply because of Covid. Detention numbers at the end of FY 2025 and FY 2026 are about the same as those recorded at the end of the first Trump administration in FY 2020.

Court-by-Court: Examine Detention and Bond Hearing Outcomes

TRAC’s Immigration Court online free web tools have been updated through September 2026. These tools let anyone drill down and compare outcomes for your local Immigration Court with national figures.

For the number of individuals currently detained, view TRAC’s backlog tool and select “custody.” For detailed figures on bond hearings, outcomes, and median bond amounts granted by Immigration Judges use TRAC’s bond tool.