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by\u00a0MARGARET KADIFA<\/a><\/strong> July 15, 2025, (MissionLocal.org)<\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"A](\"https:\/\/newspack-missionlocal.s3.amazonaws.com\/mission\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/IMG_2234-780x520.jpg\")
On Tuesday morning, one asylum seeker in San Francisco made a drastic choice. He was so afraid of being detained by the immigration agents who have been routinely waiting to arrest immigrants after their court hearings that he withdrew his application for asylum. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
By the time he appeared at immigration court at 100 Montgomery St. to tell the judge overseeing his case about his decision, the man already had a plane ticket to leave the United States. His nationality was unclear. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cMy friends got detained and my family needs me,\u201d the man told Judge Arwen Swink in Spanish through an interpreter. He said he just wanted time to sell his belongings and his car before leaving. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Want the latest on the Mission and San Francisco? Sign up for our free daily newsletter<\/strong> below.Sign up<\/p>\n\n\n\n He had originally sought asylum, he told Swink, because someone threatened to kill him. But that was now a secondary fear of ending up in the custody of Immigration and Customs Enforcement. \u201cThis is not the situation that I had dreamed of,\u201d the man said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Immigration advocates have in recent months feared that the Trump administration\u2019s mass detentions and deportations are discouraging people with asylum claims from continuing with the process. Since the end of May, ICE agents have regularly<\/a> arrested people after routine court hearings or check-ins at San Francisco\u2019s immigration court or its ICE field office, at 630 Sansome St.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In court today, that fear was clear. The man who decided to withdraw his application for asylum asked Swink if he needed multiple copies of his signed order to keep ICE agents from arresting him. In the back row of the courtroom, family members of a different asylum seeker had tears streaming down their faces. <\/p>\n\n\n\n At one point, Swink asked the Department of Homeland Security attorney present whether ICE agents were waiting in the hallway. It was only when the attorney said no that some attendees in court got up and left the courtroom, when the judge called for a break midway through the morning\u2019s hearings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWe are seeing widespread fear of being detained by community members with no criminal history who have upcoming court hearings,\u201d said Milli Atkinson, an immigration specialist with the Bar Association of San Francisco. Atkinson runs the Attorney of the Day program, which coordinates attorneys to attend court hearings to give free legal advice to asylum-seekers. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWe have seen more and more individuals with strong claims for asylum choosing to abandon their applications rather than risk being held in detention for months or years while their cases are processed through the court system,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Swink did the due diligence of checking whether the asylum-seeker who asked to leave the country Tuesday was being pressured to stop the process. It is legal under international law for those who have a credible fear of persecution in their home countries to seek asylum elsewhere, including in the United States.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI just want to confirm you\u2019re under no duress or undue pressure to withdraw your application for asylum,\u201d Judge Swink said to him. <\/p>\n\n\n\n No, he responded, through the interpreter. The man had not been deported from the United States before, and had never been arrested or convicted of a crime in the United States or any other country, he said. His fear, he said, was singular: \u201cI don\u2019t want to be detained by ICE.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n Swink then granted his request for voluntary departure. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThank you for the opportunity to be in this country,\u201d the man said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cVery gracious, sir, thank you,\u201d the judge said in response. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Over the course of three and a half hours Tuesday morning, two other people told the judge they were also afraid of arrest and detention. One asylum-seeker had a final hearing date set for 2029, but said he was afraid to be deported in the interim. Swink could only coax the Department of Homeland Security attorney, Lauren Black, to say that \u201cat this moment\u201d there was no indication he would be targeted.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The mother of an adult son, who had his first asylum hearing in court that morning, said through an interpreter she was similarly \u201cvery concerned and scared,\u201d as she sat by his side in court. The DHS attorney had a similar response: \u201cAt this time, my information indicates that there are not concerns.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Swink was apologetic throughout. In response to the asylum-seeker\u2019s fears that he would be arrested before his 2029 hearing, Swink said: \u201cI wish I was a higher-up decision maker, and could affect those decisions.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Fear of arrest after court hearings has prompted some asylum-seekers to appear virtually<\/a> instead. One person did so Tuesday morning. She gave two reasons for the remote appearance: caring for a young relative, and fear of coming to court.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Black, the Homeland Security attorney, initially pushed to require the asylum-seeker to appear in person at future hearings. But Swink pushed back, citing the \u201ctemperature in court\u201d and \u201cthe terror\u201d that the court sees in respondents. <\/p>\n\n\n\n On July 8, following hearings that morning, conflict heated up between ICE agents and protesters outside of the courthouse, resulting in one protester injured and an ICE agent brandishing his rifle<\/a> at protesters and a Mission Local<\/em> journalist. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Swink appeared to refer to that in court: \u201cThere was a violent encounter,\u201d Swink said, that left court staff \u201cshaking and in tears.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Black ultimately acceded, but said the remote hearing was granted because of the asylum-seeker\u2019s caregiving responsibilities, not the fear of coming to court. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Mission Local<\/em> did not see ICE agents at court at 100 Montgomery St. on Tuesday morning, and Atkinson, who tracks arrests at San Francisco\u2019s courts, said she did not get reports of arrests either. The most recent arrests that Mission Local has confirmed at a court in San Francisco were Thursday<\/a>, outside a courtroom at the ICE field office, at 630 Sansome St. <\/p>\n\n\n\n In a separate case Tuesday, another asylum-seeker missed his court appearance after asking to attend remotely. Swink did not order him removed from the country, though he was entitled to do so. Instead, Swink gave the asylum-seeker another chance to attend, and granted him permission to appear remotely.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Immigration court staff \u2018shaking and in tears\u2019 after ICE agents drove through protesters last week by\u00a0MARGARET KADIFA July 15, 2025, (MissionLocal.org) On Tuesday morning, one asylum seeker in San Francisco made a drastic choice. He was so afraid of being detained by the immigration agents who have been routinely waiting… Continue reading ![\"Mission](\"https:\/\/newspack-missionlocal.s3.amazonaws.com\/mission\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/mission-local-logo-300x300.jpg\"){kind=logo}
<\/figure>\n\n\n\nMORE ON IMMIGRATION ENFORCEMENT<\/mark><\/a><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\nQ&A: Meet the attorney at the center of S.F.\u2019s response to ICE<\/a><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
![\"S.F.](\"https:\/\/newspack-missionlocal.s3.amazonaws.com\/mission\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/IMG_2254-1200x900.jpg\")
<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\nS.F. supervisors to cops: Come up with a policy to respond to ICE, please<\/a><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
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<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\nS.F. judge extends restraining order against ICE for immigrant activist <\/a><\/h3>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"