San Francisco immigration judge Jeremiah Johnson, 52, learned that he had been firedwhen he got an email from Attorney General Pam Bondi on a Friday in November.
Thirty seconds later, administrators locked his email.
He became one of the 104 judges fired by the Trump administration.
No reason was given, though immigration attorneys and advocates hypothesize that the administration targeted judges because of “perceived bias.”
“It was surreal and also made me feel disappointed in the immigration system,” said the 52-year-old judge, who had been working at the downtown San Francisco immigration court for eight years, and practicing immigration law for more than 20.
Instead of feeling debilitated, he felt free to do something he had long wanted to do:
-- travel to the U.S.-Mexico border to see what it is like for immigrants coming into the United States
— the very people who would stand before him in court to plead their case for why they should be allowed to stay in America.
Johnson was also interested in the impact of border crossings on local communities.
So in late January, he flew to Tucson, Arizona, rented a car and, over the next 10 days,
hiked trails along the border, visited shelters and churches, and chatted up local residents and Border Patrol agents.
“People agree a lot more than they disagree,” Johnson said, reflecting on his trip.
And he found the border itself to be “kind of beautiful and quiet,” even as “people are continuing to die” crossing it.
For Johnson, his trip reinforced his legal philosophy that
immigrants applying for asylum are not numbers or forms,
but human beings, each with a unique story
https://missionlocal.org/2026/04/fired-judge-goes-to-the-border-searching-for-what-he-missed-on-the-bench/
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