Immigration judge Michael S. Pleters

Name: EOIR case outcomes for immigration judge Michael S. Pleters
Creator: U.S. Department of Justice, Executive Office for Immigration Review
License: https://www.usa.gov/government-copyright

EOIR records Michael S. Pleters as a serving immigration judge, code MP1, with 6,332 proceedings completed in the five fiscal years to 2025. Of the 268 asylum applications this judge decided in FY2021–2025, 28 were granted (10.4%) and 240 denied. Over the same years, the grant rate was 12.5% at the El Paso, TX court, where EOIR records this judge completing the most proceedings, and 37.3% across every immigration court in the country.

What these figures are, and what they are not

None of this measures how this judge decides. Represented and unrepresented applicants have very different outcomes and a judge’s mix of the two is not the judge’s doing; so is the share of their docket that is detained, and detention courts grant asylum at a fraction of the rate other courts do. EOIR publishes representation in a table this site has not loaded, and nothing here adjusts for either.

A grant rate is over decisions, not over applications. Applications that were abandoned, withdrawn, administratively closed, transferred or not adjudicated are counted separately below and are in neither side of the rate. Across EOIR’s whole file there are more of those than there are grants and denials together.

Proceedings, not people, and a case can carry several. The figures below count proceedings and asylum applications, which are both larger than the number of people involved. Pending is a snapshot as of September 1, 2026 and moves every month.

Cases, decisions and backlog

6,332
Proceedings completed, FY2021–2025: 0.4% decided in absentia; 94
Proceedings pending as of September 2026: 10.4%
Asylum grant rate, FY2021–2025: 28 granted of 268 decided

Context, over the same fiscal years (FY2021–2025)

Every immigration court in the country: 37.3% granted; 140,740 of 377,216 asylum applications decided
The El Paso, TX court, where EOIR records this judge completing the most proceedings: 12.5% granted; 144 of 1,153 asylum applications decided

For the reader to weigh, not a measure of this judge: everything in the box above applies to these rates as well, and a court’s docket is not any one judge’s.

Over the 5 fiscal years from 2021 to 2025, this judge granted 28 asylum applications and denied 240 — 10.4% of those decided. A further 134 ended neither way and are in neither figure.

By fiscal year

Immigration judge Michael S. Pleters completed 1,908 proceedings in FY2025, against 0 in FY2016

Proceedings EOIR records this judge completing, by federal fiscal year. A year with no column is a year in which EOIR records no proceeding completed by this judge.

U.S. Department of Justice, Executive Office for Immigration Review — EOIR immigration court outcomes by judge, court and fiscal year

The figures behind this chart

Immigration judge Michael S. Pleters completed 1,908 proceedings in FY2025, against 0 in FY2016. Proceedings EOIR records this judge completing, by federal fiscal year. A year with no column is a year in which EOIR records no proceeding completed by this judge.
Fiscal year	Completed	In absentia	Asylum granted	Asylum denied	Neither
FY2025	1,908	0	5	63	47
FY2024	1,033	9	8	80	34
FY2023	966	9	6	73	22
FY2022	1,342	10	9	19	27
FY2021	1,083	0	0	5	4
FY2020	928	20	15	42	33
FY2019	1,064	4	12	46	16
FY2018	798	0	4	61	48
FY2017	101	1	0	12	8
FY2016	0	0	0	0	0

Complete fiscal years only. A proceeding is counted in the year it completed, which is not the year it was recorded, so this table is not a record of what arrived.

Where the proceedings were

Immigration courts where Michael S. Pleters completed proceedings
Court	Proceedings completed
El Paso, TX (EPD)	8,434
Otero, NM (OTO)	2,068
El Paso, TX (ELP)	409
Houston, TX (HOU)	40
Eloy, AZ (ELO)	10
Chicago, IL (CHI)	1

The courts where EOIR records this judge completing proceedings, which is not the same as the courts they are assigned to: a judge is assigned to a median of three at once and as many as 72, and an assignment is not a posting.

Sources

EOIR immigration court outcomes by judge, court and fiscal year — U.S. Department of Justice, Executive Office for Immigration Review · retrieved September 1, 2026
EOIR immigration judges and courts

Data retrieved September 1, 2026