Children Without Lawyers in Virginia Immigration Court: What Parents Can Do Now

Last Updated: August 2026

In August 2026, a seven-year-old child sat in an Annandale immigration courtroom and answered an immigration judge’s questions without a lawyer beside him.

He was one of nine children who appeared before the same judge without an attorney over those two days.

If your child has a hearing on that docket, the question in front of you is not political. It is practical, and it has a date attached to it. This article covers what the court can give you if you are not ready, which organizations actually appear on the court’s own referral list, what those organizations can realistically absorb right now, and which forms of relief exist for a child in removal proceedings.

Our attorneys at Law Group International appear in the Annandale court regularly, and our office sits a short drive from it.

What is happening in the Annandale immigration court

In August 2026, POLITICO published an account of two days of hearings on the juvenile docket in the immigration court in Annandale, Virginia, before Immigration Judge Paul McCloskey. The reporter described nine children appearing without legal representation across those two days.

One of them was seven years old. The judge explained the child’s rights, granted a continuance until September 15 so the family could find representation, and pointed them toward the court’s list of pro bono legal service providers, with a caution that those groups may be very busy.

That last detail matters. The judge warned the family that the free legal organizations on the court’s referral list might not have space to take the case. Families should understand that limitation from the beginning.

One important clarification: this is not a new rule or a change in immigration law. It reflects a court system handling more cases than local free legal services may be able to cover.

Why a child can be in deportation proceedings without their parents

Parents often assume that a family moves through immigration court as one case. But each person’s immigration case is handled separately.

Removal proceedings are handled individually, not by household. Each person placed in proceedings has their own case, hearing dates, and immigration file. In immigration court, that person is called the “respondent.” A child who is served with a Notice to Appear, which is the charging document that opens a case in immigration court, becomes a respondent even if no adult in the home has a case.

That is what happened in the case POLITICO described. The seven-year-old came to court with his mother, but because she was not in removal proceedings herself, his case moved forward separately.

If you are the parent and it is your own case that is moving, the mirror image of this question is covered in our guide to what happens to United States citizen children when a parent is deported.

The practical consequence is the one families miss: if your own case has not started, nothing about your status automatically shelters your child’s case. Your child’s hearing dates, filing deadlines and obligations run on their own track. Treat that calendar as separate from yours.

Children have no right to a government-paid lawyer in immigration court

This is the part that surprises most parents, and it is worth stating plainly rather than dramatically.

Immigration court is a civil proceeding, not a criminal one. The right to a court-appointed attorney that most people know from criminal cases comes from the Sixth Amendment, and it applies when the government prosecutes someone for a crime. Removal proceedings are not criminal prosecutions, so that guarantee does not reach them.

The statute is precise about this. Under 8 U.S.C. section 1229a(b)(4)(A), a person in removal proceedings has the privilege of being represented, at no expense to the Government, by counsel of their choosing. Congress wrote privilege, not right, and the phrase about expense is the operative part. You may bring a lawyer, and the court will give you time to find one, but no one will be assigned to your child for free.

That general rule applies regardless of age, including to young children in removal proceedings.

What the court does provide is time and a referral list. Both are real, and both have limits. The rest of this article is about using them well.

What to do if your child has a hearing and no lawyer

Ask for a continuance to find representation

A continuance is a postponement of your hearing. When a respondent appears without counsel, an immigration judge will ordinarily grant time to look for a lawyer, and that is exactly what happened in the case reported in August, where the judge set the next date for September 15.

Two things families get wrong here.

The first is silence. A continuance is something you ask for, out loud, on the record. If your child appears and no one says anything about needing time to find a lawyer, the hearing may simply proceed.

The second is treating it as unlimited. Judges are not obliged to grant continuance after continuance, and the practical expectation is that you use the time. Come back with evidence that you contacted organizations and attorneys, even the ones that turned you down.

Whatever else happens, your child must attend. Missing an immigration hearing can result in an order of removal issued in absence, and undoing that order is far harder than attending would have been. If you want to understand how a case reaches that point, our guide to what a final order of deportation means and what you can do walks through the stages.

The court’s official pro bono list, and what it can realistically absorb

The Executive Office for Immigration Review, the Justice Department agency that runs the immigration courts, publishes a List of Pro Bono Legal Service Providers for each court location. Organizations on that list have committed to providing at least fifty hours per year of free legal services before the court where they are listed.

For the Annandale court, the list includes Kids in Need of Defense (KIND), which works specifically with unaccompanied and unrepresented children and keeps a Northern Virginia field office in Fairfax; Amica Center for Immigrant Rights, formerly the Capital Area Immigrants’ Rights Coalition; Ayuda, which has served immigrant families across the Washington region for decades; and Human Rights First, which operates as a referral service for asylum seekers covering the Annandale area remotely.

Practical notes that save families a wasted trip. Most of these organizations do not accept walk-ins and ask that you call to schedule. Capacity is the real constraint, not eligibility, and a child who fits an organization’s mission perfectly can still be turned away because the caseload is full.

Call more than one, call early in the continuance period rather than the week before the hearing, and write down the date of every call and the answer you received. That record is what you bring back to the judge.

When to hire private representation

We are not going to tell you that free help is unavailable, because sometimes it comes through. We will tell you what the tradeoff looks like, because that is the decision actually in front of you.

Pro bono organizations screen for the cases where they can do the most good with limited staff. If your child’s case has a clear path to relief and matches an organization’s focus, you may get a yes. If the case is complex, if it is moving quickly, or if it falls outside a group’s mission, waiting for a yes can consume the very time the judge gave you.

If your next hearing is approaching and you still have not found representation, it may be time to consider other options. Keep records of the organizations and attorneys you contacted, and do not assume the judge will grant another continuance.

There is also a cost element that has nothing to do with attorney fees, and that families rarely see coming. Since 2025, applications that used to carry no filing fee now do. An asylum application filed for a child carries a filing fee of one hundred dollars, and a Form I-360 seeking Special Immigrant Juvenile Status carries a fee of two hundred and fifty dollars, which USCIS has decided not to waive. Budget for the filings, not only for the representation.

Relief options for a child in removal proceedings

Being in removal proceedings does not necessarily mean your child will be deported. These are the paths that come up most often for minors. Which one fits, if any, depends entirely on the facts of your child’s life, and every case is different.

Special Immigrant Juvenile Status

Special Immigrant Juvenile Status, usually shortened to SIJS, is a classification for children who cannot be reunified with one or both parents because of abuse, abandonment, neglect, or a similar basis under state law.

Its structure catches families off guard, so it is worth understanding before you start. SIJS begins in a state juvenile or family court, not in immigration court. A state court judge has to make specific findings about the child’s situation first. Only then does the child file Form I-360 with USCIS on the strength of those findings.

That two-court sequence takes time, and it interacts with the child’s age and the state court’s own jurisdictional limits, which is why starting early matters more here than almost anywhere else in immigration law.

Asylum for a child

A child may apply for asylum on their own account, using Form I-589, if they fear persecution in their home country on account of race, religion, nationality, political opinion, or membership in a particular social group.

Children’s asylum claims are not simply adult claims in miniature. The harm a child experienced or fears may look different, the way a child recounts events is different, and the evidence available is often thinner. This is the category where representation makes the most visible difference, and it is also the category where an unprepared filing can damage a case that had merit.

What happens if your child misses the hearing

If a respondent fails to appear after the written notice the law requires, an immigration judge may order removal in the person’s absence under 8 U.S.C. section 1229a(b)(5)(A). The consequences reach beyond the removal itself. Where the person was given oral notice of those consequences, section 1229a(b)(7) bars several forms of relief, including cancellation of removal and adjustment of status, for ten years.

There are routes to reopen such an order, including a motion based on lack of proper notice or on exceptional circumstances, and the deadlines differ depending on the ground. Our guide to what happens if you miss your immigration court hearing covers them in detail. They are narrower and harder than simply showing up, which is the entire reason we keep returning to attendance.

Frequently asked questions

Can my child really be deported at seven years old?

A child of any age who is in removal proceedings can be ordered removed, and there is no minimum age written into the process. That is why the hearing date and the search for representation deserve the same seriousness you would give an adult’s case. What is realistic in a specific case depends on the facts and on the relief the child may qualify for.

Can I speak for my child at the hearing?

Not as their representative. A parent is not automatically their child’s legal representative in immigration court, and only a licensed attorney or a representative accredited by the Department of Justice may represent someone in these proceedings. You can attend, you can support your child, and in practice judges handle young children’s hearings differently from adults’, but appearing with your child is not the same as representing them.

How much does a lawyer for my child’s case cost?

Fees vary by firm and by the complexity of the case, so any single figure would be misleading. What we can tell you is that government filing fees are now a separate line item that did not exist a few years ago, including a fee of one hundred dollars for an asylum application and two hundred and fifty dollars for a Form I-360 in a Special Immigrant Juvenile Status case, which cannot be waived. Ask any attorney you consult to separate their fee from the filing fees.

What is the juvenile docket?

It is a hearing calendar that immigration courts set aside for cases involving children, so that those cases are heard together rather than mixed into the general docket. Being scheduled on it does not change the law that applies to your child’s case. It changes when and alongside whom the case is heard.

My own case has not started. Does that protect my child?

No. Your child’s case runs on its own track, with its own hearing dates and deadlines, and the absence of a case against you does not pause or shield it. This is exactly the situation that put a seven-year-old in front of an immigration judge as an individual respondent.

Where to go from here

A hearing date is a hard deadline, and the weeks between now and it are the part you can still control. Contact the organizations on the court’s list early, keep a record of every answer, and treat a second continuance request as the moment to change strategy rather than repeat it.

At Law Group International, deportation defense is at the center of our practice, and our office is a short distance from the Annandale immigration court where these hearings are held. Attorneys Khalid Shekib and Daniela Lucena represent families throughout Virginia, Washington D.C., and Maryland, including parents whose children are in proceedings alone. Our guide to the master calendar hearing explains what happens at the kind of hearing your child is scheduled for.

Children in this position rarely get a second chance at a first hearing. Use the time the court gave you.

 

This article provides general information and does not constitute legal advice. Every immigration case is different, and the law may change. For guidance on your particular situation, consult a licensed immigration attorney.

 

Official sources:

• Executive Office for Immigration Review, List of Pro Bono Legal Service Providers: https://www.justice.gov/eoir/list-pro-bono-legal-service-providers
• POLITICO, reporting on the Annandale juvenile docket, August 9, 2026 (cited for the courtroom account only, not as a statement of law)
• Removal proceedings, 8 U.S.C. 1229a: https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/8/1229a
• U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, Special Immigrant Juvenile Status: https://www.uscis.gov/sijs
• U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, Form I-589, Application for Asylum: https://www.uscis.gov/i-589
• Immigrant Legal Resource Center, HR1 Fees at USCIS and EOIR, May 2026: https://www.ilrc.org

Last updated: August 2026.