The Trump administration’s attempt to detain nearly every immigrant in deportation proceedings has provoked widespread and growing pushback from judges nationwide, including many appointed to the bench by the president himself.

The hard-line approach, which launched through a sudden shift in Immigration and Customs Enforcement policy on July 8, has triggered a surge of emergency legal challenges following ICE arrests at job sites, courthouses, and routine immigration appointments. Many of those detained have resided in the United States without problems for years or even decades while seeking asylum or other lawful immigration status.

More than 225 judges presiding over 700 cases have determined that the administration’s new approach — which also eliminates the option for individuals to request release through immigration court — likely violates legal standards and due process protections, according to a review from Politico.

These judges represent appointments from every recent president, including 23 Trump appointees. The count of judges challenging the administration’s stance has more than doubled within the past month. By stark contrast, a mere eight judges nationwide — including just six Trump appointees — have backed the administration’s sweeping mass detention policy.

The courts have become acutely aware of the lopsided rejection of the administration’s approach and increasingly frustrated with the avalanche of litigation overwhelming their dockets. Some have attempted to tally the staggering volume of rulings against the administration.

“The Court is unable to remain current on all new case authority supporting the Court’s conclusion, given the continued onslaught of litigation being generated by [the administration’s] widespread illegal detention practices,” California-based U.S. District Judge Christina Snyder, a Clinton-era appointee, wrote in a ruling last week.

U.S. District Judge Hala Jarbou, a Michigan-based Trump appointee, reported handling more than 100 cases before another 97 detainees filed a collective lawsuit seeking release. Other judges have blasted the administration for flouting the law.

“Dozens of district courts across the nation — with more each day — have rejected DHS’s expansion of … mandatory detention,” Idaho-based U.S. District Judge Lynn Winmill, also a Clinton appointee, wrote in a November 19 ruling in which 17 people detained during an ICE raid at a racetrack the previous month were released. 

“This court joins the overwhelming majority.”

Officials with the Department of Homeland Security said that their mass detention approach would prevail at the appellate level — and potentially before the Supreme Court — while insisting that Biden-era immigration policies had left them no choice.

“President Trump and Secretary Noem are now enforcing this law as it was actually written to keep America safe,” a DHS assistant secretary, Tricia McLaughlin, said in a statement to Politico.