That’s not the purpose usually associated with what are called “master calendar” hearings, in which judges ask some basic questions like whether people have applied for asylum and if they need more time to find a lawyer. If they do, a judge will often schedule another hearing. Eventually at such a hearing, an immigrant will be asked to admit or deny the government’s charges of being deportable, similar to an arraignment in criminal court.
Quick and perfunctory as many master calendar hearings are, people who miss them face large consequences: They typically receive a removal order “in absentia.” Some immigrant advocates believe the administration is holding mega hearings – scheduling some at short notice – in hopes many people won’t show up and will get removal orders.
Scala issued 32 such removal orders at the end of Tuesday’s hearing, according to Kayley Bebber, a Northwest Immigrant Rights Project attorney.
From the bench, Scala told the stepmother of a 15-year-old whose hearing date had been moved up a year that the court was rescheduling children’s hearings “to check on their safety.” The judge echoed that rationale in telling two children she wanted to see them three times a year, at one point referring to these summonses as “welfare checks.”
In another break from the past, Scala on Tuesday typically gave people a little over a month to find a lawyer for their next hearing. Previously, people often got six months or a year, according to Northwest Immigrant Rights Project lawyers. It seemed another instance of the court speeding up cases.
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