Senate Democrats raise concerns over Pentagon plan to use military
lawyers as immigration judges
[September 17, 2025]
By KONSTANTIN TOROPIN
WASHINGTON (AP) — Some Democratic senators say they are deeply concerned
that a Pentagon plan to allow military lawyers to work as temporary
immigration judges will violate a ban on using service members for law
enforcement and affect the military justice system.
The letter, sent to the military services and provided to The Associated
Press, comes two weeks after Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth approved
sending up to 600 military lawyers to the Justice Department to serve as
temporary immigration judges. It is part of the steps the Trump
administration has taken to use the military in broader ways than
previously seen, particularly in its immigration crackdown, including
sending the National Guard into American cities and deploying active
duty troops to the U.S.-Mexico border.
“These military officers would serve under the command and control of
the Attorney General and would execute administrative determinations at
the direction of the Attorney General,” according to the letter signed
by 12 Democrats on the Senate Armed Services Committee. It added that
“these actions are inherently law enforcement actions that may not be
performed by members of the armed forces.”
“We remain extremely disturbed about the impacts on readiness of using
military personnel to perform what are traditionally Department of
Justice functions,” the letter says.
The nation’s immigration courts — with a backlog of about 3.5 million
cases — have become a key focus of President Donald Trump’s hard-line
immigration enforcement efforts. Since Trump returned to office, dozens
of immigration judges have been fired, while others have resigned or
taken early retirement.
The senators' letter, sent to the offices of the top military lawyers
for the four services on Monday, is asking the Pentagon to say where the
roughly 600 lawyers will be coming from and for insight into what legal
analysis the military has conducted into whether the move would violate
the Posse Comitatus Act. That law prevents the military from conducting
law enforcement outside of extreme emergencies.
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Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth listens as President Donald Trump
speaks in the Oval Office of the White House, Monday, Sept. 15,
2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
A Pentagon memo that described the plan said the lawyers should not
be detailed for longer than half a year. The memo also showed that
Pentagon officials were cognizant of the possibility for conflict
with that law and said the Justice Department would be responsible
for ensuring that the military lawyers do not violate it.
The Democratic senators said they were “deeply concerned” that
pulling those lawyers away would have an impact on service members
who are going through the military’s judicial system.
“These reassignments come at a time only shortly after Congress
completely overhauled how the military investigates and prosecutes
serious ‘covered’ criminal offenses … by establishing the Offices of
Special Trial Counsel (OSTCs) in each of the Services,” the letter
read.
Those offices were set up by Congress in 2022 as part of an effort
to reform the military justice system by moving decisions on the
prosecution of serious military crimes, including sexual assault, to
independent military attorneys, taking that power away from victims’
commanders.
The offices began taking cases at the end of last year.
The letter asks the Pentagon what it will do to “preserve the OSTC’s
progress in building specialized trial capacity” and what the
services will do to “ensure that diversion of OSTCs, trial counsels,
and defense counsels does not create delays or diminish quality in
court-martials.” The senators say that the plan is a demonstration
of how “the Trump administration views skilled personnel as pawns to
be traded between agencies, rather than as professionals essential
to their core missions, in order to advance misguided immigration
policies."
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