Ex-Immigration Judge Claims Bias in Justice Department Firing

A former immigration judge has challenged her sudden firing in what appears to be the first such lawsuit filed by an immigration judge in federal court against the Trump administration.

Tania Nemer, who was fired in February after more than a year at the Cleveland immigration court, claimed in a Monday lawsuit in Washington federal court that the government discriminated against her because of her sex and national origin, in violation of civil rights law.

Nemer is a Lebanese-American who was serving in a probationary capacity, as is typical for the first two years of service, at the time she was fired. Neither of the other probationary judges on her court, both men who aren’t Lebanese, were fired when she was, the lawsuit says.

She also claimed she was targeted because she previously ran to be a local judge on a Democratic Party ticket, in violation of her First Amendment rights.

The Justice Department’s position that it can fire federal workers without a reason, despite civil rights statutes protecting them from employment discrimination, represents “a breathtaking assault on a landmark federal statute” that would allow the president to fire workers based on their sex, race and religion “with complete impunity,” the complaint says.

“That unjust proposition is as wrong as it sounds,” the suit says.

A Justice Department spokesperson declined to comment.

The suit comes as the administration has fired dozens of immigration judges since taking office in January, who are employees of the Justice Department and not housed within an independent court system. The administration has targeted judges during or at the end of their two-year probationary periods as well as some who had sat on the bench for years.

The administration is also installing military lawyers in immigration courts, after eliminating certain requirements for temporary immigration judges.

Former immigration judges have said the firings are aggravating existing case backlogs that have clogged the immigration court system and created years-long wait times for foreign citizens to receive decisions in their cases.

Some of those let go, like other terminated employees across the federal government, have learned of their dismissals in brief notices stating the attorney general had determined, under Article II authority, that their continued employment wasn’t in the nation’s interest.

After Nemer was fired, her supervisor told her he didn’t know why she was terminated and that she was “one of his best immigration judges.” Nemer also received high ratings on her last performance evaluation, according to the suit.

An Equal Employment Opportunity office, which dismissed her April discrimination complaint after finding the executive branch is allowed to fire federal workers without cause, the suit says.

Administration efforts to terminate thousands of federal workers across the government have prompted litigation, drawing legal challenges from individual employees and against the reductions-in-force more broadly.

The case is Nemer v. Bondi, D.D.C., No. 1:25-cv-04170, 12/1/25