By Jason Ankeny, Former INS/CBP Officer and Immigration Attorney
A Notice to Appear changes everything. The government has formally started the process of removing you or someone you love from the United States, and from that moment the case runs on the government’s clock, in the government’s forum, under rules most people have never seen. Jason Ankeny enforced those rules for more than 15 years as a federal officer with the U.S. Immigration & Naturalization Service and U.S. Customs & Border Protection. Removal defense at Ankeny Law starts from that insider knowledge of how the government builds its case, because that is how you take one apart.
What Removal Proceedings Are
Removal proceedings are the formal court process the government uses to deport a noncitizen. Cases are heard by immigration judges within the Executive Office for Immigration Review, the immigration court system run by the U.S. Department of Justice. The document that starts the case, the Notice to Appear, lists the government’s allegations and the legal grounds it claims make you removable. Everything that follows is a contest over those charges and over whether any form of relief lets you stay.
How a Removal Case Unfolds
1. The Notice to Appear
Read it with a lawyer, immediately. The allegations can be wrong, the charges can be defective, and the way you answer them at your first hearing shapes the entire case. Silence and delay are not strategies.
2. Master calendar hearings
These are the scheduling and pleading stages, where you admit or contest the charges and tell the court what relief you will pursue. Deadlines set here are real. Missing a hearing can end the case with a removal order issued in your absence.
3. The individual hearing
This is the trial. Evidence, testimony, cross-examination, and legal argument before the judge. Removal cases are won in the preparation, in the documents gathered, the witnesses readied, and the legal theory chosen months earlier.
4. Decision and appeal
The judge grants relief or orders removal. Either side can appeal to the Board of Immigration Appeals, and some issues can continue into the federal courts, a layer we explain in our post on the role of federal courts in immigration.
Defenses That Actually Work
Removal defense is not one argument, it is a search through every form of relief the law allows. Depending on the facts, that can mean contesting the charges themselves, adjustment of status through a qualifying family member, waivers of inadmissibility such as the I-601, the subject of our Seattle waiver practice, cancellation of removal for people with long residence and qualifying hardship, asylum and related protections, or voluntary departure when leaving on your own terms protects your future options. The current I-601 waiver form and instructions are published by USCIS. Which doors are open depends entirely on your history, which is why the case starts with a complete, honest audit of it.
Detained and Non-Detained Cases
Removal defense runs on two very different tracks. Detained cases move fast, hearings come quickly, evidence must be gathered under pressure, and the first fight is often about release on bond, where the questions are whether the person is a flight risk or a danger. Non-detained cases move slowly through crowded dockets, which punishes the unprepared and rewards families who use the time to build an overwhelming record. Knowing which track you are on, and what the judge assigned to your case expects, shapes everything from the first filing onward.
Evidence and Witnesses: Building the Record
Relief in immigration court is proven, not requested. Hardship claims need medical records, school records, financial documentation, and country condition evidence. Good moral character is established through years of tax filings, employment history, community ties, and credible witnesses who show up prepared. Testimony gets tested under cross-examination, so we prepare witnesses the way the government prepares its own, with the hard questions asked in our office first. The strongest cases walk into the individual hearing with a record so complete that the judge’s decision writes itself.
Special Situations
Not every removal runs through a courtroom. Some people are subjected to expedited removal at or near the border, a fast-track process with far fewer protections that we cover in detail in our post on expedited removal without seeing a judge. Understanding common triggers also helps families see trouble coming, and our guide to why immigration applications get denied maps the ground where many removal cases begin.
How the Government Builds Its Case, and How We Take It Apart
The government’s file in a removal case is assembled the same way every time: the record of the entry or arrest, the immigration history pulled from every prior application, any criminal record with its court documents, and the statements the person made, often without a lawyer present, at the border, in custody, or on old forms. The trial attorney’s job is to make those pieces prove the charges. Ours is to test every one of them. Was the entry characterized correctly. Do the conviction records actually match the removal ground charged, because the legal categories are narrower than they look. Were statements taken in circumstances that undermine their reliability. Does the Notice to Appear itself contain the defects that have unwound thousands of cases. That examination, done early, decides strategy: whether to fight removability itself, or to concede what cannot be contested and put every resource into relief. Fifteen years of writing and reviewing these files from the inside is precisely the experience that makes the weaknesses visible.
How Ankeny Law Defends Removal Cases
Jason Ankeny spent more than 15 years inside the agencies that bring these cases, and he brings 30 years of combined experience in U.S. immigration enforcement and international business to defending them. Ankeny Law is a Veteran-Owned Small Business, licensed in Washington State and British Columbia, with more than 1,200 cases resolved and service in English and Spanish. From offices in Seattle and Vancouver, we defend clients on both sides of the border, including cases where a removal order would separate a cross-border family or end a career.
Frequently Asked Questions
What should I do first after receiving a Notice to Appear?
Get the document to an immigration attorney before your first hearing. The charges need to be analyzed, the hearing date confirmed, and your relief options mapped while every path is still open. Never ignore the notice, and never miss the hearing.
Can I be deported without a court hearing?
In some situations, yes. Expedited removal and reinstated prior orders can bypass the immigration judge entirely, which makes acting quickly even more important if you or a family member is detained at or near the border.
Does a criminal record mean automatic removal?
No, but it raises the stakes sharply. Whether a conviction makes someone removable, and whether relief remains available, turns on precise legal classifications. This analysis should be done by counsel before anything is conceded in court.
How long do removal proceedings take?
Court backlogs mean many cases run for years. That time is an asset if it is used to build the record, gather evidence, and strengthen every available form of relief.
What should I do if a family member has been detained?
Act immediately. Locate where they are held, get counsel into the case, and start the bond process if one is available. Detained dockets move in days, not months, and early legal help preserves options that disappear quickly.
Can Ankeny Law take over a case that already has a hearing scheduled?
Yes. We regularly enter cases already in motion. The sooner we have the file, the more options we can preserve.
Removal proceedings move quickly, and an experienced immigration lawyer in Seattle can protect your rights at every hearing.
Talk to an Attorney Who Has Seen Both Sides
Your first step is a consultation where we hear the facts, identify the legal issues, and give you an honest assessment of your options. Call our Seattle office at (206) 686-1589 or our Vancouver office at (604) 314-1848, or schedule a consultation online.
