Weaponizing the DOJ: Politicizing Immigration Courts and Targeting Asylum Protections
Project 2025 calls for packing the DOJ with political appointees, reissuing Trump-era anti-asylum rules, pursuing litigation to overturn the Flores Settlement Agreement, and aggressive enforcement against employers of noncitizens — all part of a strategy to dismantle due process in immigration courts and criminalize migration. This is not a proposal on paper; the NLRB quorum disruption shows the playbook is already in motion.
The DOJ section of Project 2025 lays out a blueprint to turn the Department of Justice into an enforcement arm of the administration's immigration crackdown, stripping the immigration courts of any pretense of independence. The call to "pursue through rulemaking… the promulgation of every rule related to immigration that was issued during the Trump Administration" would resurrect policies like the so-called "transit ban" (denying asylum to anyone who passed through a third country without seeking protection there) and the "public charge" rule (which deterred lawful immigration by penalizing use of public benefits). These rules were struck down or vacated by courts after the prior Trump term because they violated the Immigration and Nationality Act and the Administrative Procedure Act — reissuing them does not magically make them legal.
Most alarmingly, the text explicitly targets the Flores Settlement Agreement, a 1997 federal court decree that sets binding standards for the detention of migrant children, requiring their prompt release to family or licensed facilities and prohibiting the indefinite family detention that characterized the 2018 family separation crisis. Project 2025 instructs the DOJ to "pursue proactive litigation… for example, by pursuing the overturning of the Flores Settlement Agreement." The current administration has already implemented actions consistent with this directive: on February 6, 2025, the DOJ moved to terminate the Flores Agreement in federal court. If successful, this would remove the central legal constraint that has prevented mass indefinite detention of families — a move that would directly cause the same kind of trauma documented by pediatric medicine and developmental psychology during the 2018 separation policy.
The staffing agenda is equally consequential. Project 2025 calls for a "vast expansion of the number of appointees in every office and component" of DOJ, especially in the Civil Rights Division, FBI, and EOIR (the immigration court system). This is not a routine personnel shuffle; it is a plan to install political loyalists who will rewrite asylum eligibility, speed up deportations by eliminating continuances and due process, and prosecute immigrants and their advocates under anti-fraud pretext. When combined with the already-executed NLRB quorum disruption — which has stripped the National Labor Relations Board of its ability to protect workers organizing — the pattern is clear: the administration is systematically disabling independent agencies and courts that stand in the way of its punitive immigration and labor agenda. The alternative is simple: defend the Flores Agreement in court, respect the Refugee Act of 1980, and fund actual immigration judges and legal orientation programs instead of detention and political purges.
The humanitarian alternative
The administration should reverse course by: (1) restoring the NLRB to a full five-member board with a functioning general counsel committed to enforcing the NLRA; (2) issuing clear guidance that DOJ's civil rights division will not coordinate with ICE to target immigrant workers; (3) reinstating the DOL's worker-classification rule to ensure misclassified immigrant workers are covered by wage and hour laws; and (4) pursuing sectoral bargaining and works council models that give all workers—regardless of immigration status—a seat at the table.
Original source — excerpted
project2025 Project 2025 ch. 18: Department of Labor (pp 601-603)"— 568 — Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise correct erroneous decisions, provide clarity, and align Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR) decisions with the law. l At a minimum, pursue through rulemaking—and in partnership with the Department of Homeland Security where appropriate—the promulgation of every rule related to immigration that was issued during the Trump Administration. Such rulemakings include guidance on continuances in immigration court cases, eligibility for asylum, and other related matters. However, the DOJ should not stop there: It should continually evaluate its authorities and operational reality within the immigration court system and promulgate regulations accordingly. l Commit sufficient resources to the adjudication of cases in the immigration court system in different environments (for example, in the context of the Migrant Protection Protocols). l Pursue proactive litigation to advance the federal government’ s interests in areas where erroneous precedent curtails authorities provided by Congress (for example, by pursuing the overturning of the Flores Settlement Agreement). l Pursue aggressive enforcement of the im…"