Immigration court

Chicago, IL Immigration Court

52 judges · IL

17.2%Court Approval Rate
Chicago, IL17.2%
National16.6%

EOIR data through Sep 1, 2026 · updated monthly

34,396
Granted
166,107
Denied
52
Judges

Distribution

How this court's judges compare

At Chicago, IL, 49 judges range from 0.0% to 62.6%.

Each judge's all-time EOIR decided outcomes across every court they have served in: granted ÷ (granted + denied). Judges now based at this court with at least 100 decided cases. A historical pattern — not a prediction for any case.

Snapshot answer

The 2026-09-01 snapshot shows a 17.2% historical asylum grant rate for Chicago, IL Immigration Court, based on 34,396 grants and 166,107 denials (200,503 decided outcomes).

The Chicago, IL Immigration Court has an overall asylum approval rate of 17.2% across 200,503 decided cases. The court has 52 immigration judges. Data sourced from EOIR (Executive Office for Immigration Review).

How to Interpret This Court's Data

The Chicago, IL Immigration Court has an overall asylum grant rate of 17.2% in the current AsylumTracker dataset. Court-level statistics aggregate judges and cases assigned to that court, so the court average can differ sharply from any one judge's profile.

High-volume judge profiles at this court include Vinikoor, Robert D. (36,066 total cases), Fujimoto, James R. (34,158 total cases), and Bryant, John Milo (31,133 total cases). The largest nationality groups shown for this court include Mexico (18,103 decided, 10.3% grant rate), Venezuela (13,554 decided, 7.5% grant rate), and Nicaragua (12,114 decided, 6.1% grant rate).

Asylum grant rate is calculated as granted / (granted + denied). Procedural outcomes are separated so users can distinguish merits decisions from docket-management outcomes.

This page uses public EOIR records last updated 2026-09-01. The data is informational and should not be treated as legal advice or a prediction for any individual case.

Read how EOIR data works or learn how to compare asylum approval rates.

What This Court Profile's Data Shows

Published case volume

This profile ranks #6 by published decided outcomes among 73 courts with at least 5,000 decisions (200,503 outcomes).

Comparable-court context

Its 17.2% historical rate is 7.1 percentage points above the 10.1% median for those 73 courts.

Largest nationality sample

The largest published nationality row is Mexico: 18,103 decisions and a 10.3% grant rate in the nationality subset's stated scope.

These are descriptive historical aggregates. Court mix, judge assignment, representation, case facts, procedural posture, and changes in law are not controlled here, so the comparisons cannot predict an individual case.

Areas Served by This Court

Based on the official EOIR ZIP-code assignment, the Chicago, IL Immigration Court is the assigned filing location for 2,825 ZIP codes. Main cities by state:

IL — Chicago, Peoria, Rockford, Springfield, East Saint Louis, Aurora, Joliet, Belleville, Decatur, Evanston, Naperville, Schaumburg, Bloomington, Carbondale, Champaign and 1242 more cities

IN — Fort Wayne, South Bend, Evansville, Bloomington, Terre Haute, Muncie, Lafayette, Elkhart, Goshen, Kokomo, Marion, Mishawaka, Warsaw, West Lafayette, Advance and 576 more cities

WI — Milwaukee, Madison, Green Bay, Racine, Appleton, Kenosha, Janesville, Oshkosh, Waukesha, Brookfield, Eau Claire, Fond Du Lac, La Crosse, Mequon, New Berlin and 693 more cities

Not sure which immigration court serves your address? Enter your ZIP code in the AsylumTracker app's coverage map.

Judges at This Court

JudgeApproval RateGrantedDeniedDecided
Vinikoor, Robert D. 17.5% 4,491 21,160 25,651
Fujimoto, James R. 13.0% 3,129 21,014 24,143
Bryant, John Milo 26.8% 5,775 15,734 21,509
Zerbe, Craig M. 18.9% 2,978 12,773 15,751
Brahos, O. John 20.6% 3,280 12,615 15,895
Cuevas, Carlos 26.6% 3,719 10,280 13,999
Klein, Eliza 29.2% 3,767 9,146 12,913
Chew, George T. 62.6% 6,563 3,924 10,487
Katsivalis, George P. 0.9% 110 12,273 12,383
Mckenna, Patrick M. 8.5% 748 8,027 8,775
Petrone, Anthony D., JR. 58.4% 3,310 2,360 5,670
Smith, Renetta 23.5% 1,627 5,297 6,924
Anderson, Jack L. 10.0% 505 4,548 5,053
Venci, Michelle 4.2% 262 5,950 6,212
Klosowsky, Michael 8.2% 483 5,407 5,890
Defoe, Craig A. 12.5% 716 4,996 5,712
Crites, Elizabeth 9.4% 463 4,453 4,916
Kim, Peter A. 5.6% 329 5,511 5,840
Stahl, Marc 15.5% 850 4,648 5,498
Mencini, Ana 6.4% 339 4,961 5,300
Curran, Brendan C. 5.4% 271 4,718 4,989
Reynolds, Gina 12.4% 578 4,085 4,663
Luskin, Joshua D. 14.7% 626 3,636 4,262
Dimarzio, Philip L. 15.0% 597 3,379 3,976
Owens, Robert P. 32.0% 1,310 2,778 4,088
Saltzman, Eva S. 29.8% 980 2,306 3,286
Cole, Samuel B. 23.0% 642 2,149 2,791
Naseem, Samia 15.1% 586 3,287 3,873
Mcnulty, Sheila 19.2% 633 2,672 3,305
Rosche, Robin J. 26.3% 705 1,975 2,680
Peyton, Jennifer I. 43.9% 1,113 1,423 2,536
Treacy, Elizabeth 9.9% 307 2,799 3,106
Patti, Sebastian T. 33.0% 801 1,629 2,430
Der-Yeghiayan, Samuel 9.9% 258 2,346 2,604
Salovaara, Kaarina 26.2% 565 1,589 2,154
Diaz, Irma 8.9% 213 2,183 2,396
Beese, Matthew C. 0.7% 15 2,142 2,157
Bower, Glen L. 41.5% 593 836 1,429
Espinoza, Carla 14.7% 210 1,220 1,430
Barilla, Jody 14.0% 190 1,164 1,354
Fluhr, Philip 11.5% 113 872 985
Nelson, Kristi 7.3% 84 1,064 1,148
Baldini-Potermin, Maria 21.0% 89 334 423
Abraham, Shawn J. 0.0% 0 699 699
Yokoyama, Lori 5.8% 24 389 413
Poarch, Jaime 0.5% 2 382 384
Flesch, Kenneth 1.0% 4 405 409
Vyas, Akash 6.4% 15 219 234
Perkins, Robbin 1.0% 3 289 292
Charanza, Albert 1.2% 1 82 83
Harrell, Stephen W. 1.6% 1 60 61
Petty, Aaron R. 46.2% 6 7 13

Roster entries without a usable profile denominator: Status Docket, Visiting Judge 23, IAD Judge. They are excluded from the rate table above.

Approval Rate by Nationality

NationalityApproval RateGrantedDeniedDecided
Mexico 10.3% 1,864 16,239 18,103
Venezuela 7.5% 1,022 12,532 13,554
Nicaragua 6.1% 737 11,377 12,114
Guatemala 4.6% 421 8,771 9,192
Honduras 7.2% 622 8,061 8,683
Colombia 3.5% 223 6,126 6,349
Ecuador 2.1% 95 4,504 4,599
El Salvador 20.2% 349 1,381 1,730
Russia 50.9% 848 819 1,667
India 18.3% 222 991 1,213
Haiti 3.7% 38 995 1,033
Kirghizia (Kyrgyzstan) 29.3% 266 643 909
China 48.8% 440 461 901
Nigeria 53.4% 427 372 799
Peru 3.1% 23 712 735
Turkey 31.1% 121 268 389
Cuba 22.8% 75 254 329
Moldavia (Moldova) 75.6% 232 75 307
Romania 16.4% 48 245 293
Jordan 31.3% 88 193 281
Vietnam 40.8% 113 164 277
Dominican Republic 6.1% 14 216 230
Ukraine 60.2% 112 74 186
Belize 9.9% 16 145 161
Poland 52.8% 85 76 161
Mauritania 11.9% 19 140 159
Pakistan 58.2% 89 64 153
Brazil 5.3% 8 144 152
Belarus 72.4% 105 40 145
Uzbekistan 20.7% 30 115 145
Chile 5.5% 8 137 145
Kazakhstan 40.1% 57 85 142
Somalia 24.1% 33 104 137
Mongolia 44.4% 55 69 124
Philippines 50.4% 58 57 115
Iraq 73.1% 79 29 108
Cameroon 76.4% 81 25 106
Senegal 12.4% 13 92 105
Syria 76.0% 76 24 100
Afghanistan 40.4% 40 59 99
Ghana 46.8% 44 50 94
Angola 18.4% 16 71 87
Serbia Montenegro 50.6% 40 39 79
Democratic Republic Of Congo 46.7% 35 40 75
Egypt 61.4% 43 27 70
Jamaica 23.9% 16 51 67
Stateless - Alien Unable To Name A Country 37.7% 23 38 61
Tajikistan (Tadzhik) 46.6% 27 31 58
Burma (Myanmar) 60.7% 34 22 56
Unknown Nationality 6.1% 3 46 49
Togo 60.4% 29 19 48
Sudan 46.8% 22 25 47
Kenya 46.7% 21 24 45
Georgia 38.6% 17 27 44
Bolivia 9.1% 4 40 44
Bosnia-Herzegovina 47.6% 20 22 42
Ethiopia 83.3% 35 7 42
Bulgaria 41.5% 17 24 41
Lithuania 80.5% 33 8 41
Panama 12.2% 5 36 41
Sri Lanka 37.8% 14 23 37
Laos 42.9% 15 20 35
Congo 45.5% 15 18 33
Montenegro 36.4% 12 21 33
Israel 56.2% 18 14 32
Guinea 58.6% 17 12 29
Macedonia 60.7% 17 11 28
Thailand 51.9% 14 13 27
United Kingdom 18.5% 5 22 27
Serbia 18.5% 5 22 27
Canada 8.3% 2 22 24
Costa Rica 12.5% 3 21 24
Uganda 81.8% 18 4 22
Iran 33.3% 7 14 21
Spain 4.8% 1 20 21
South Africa 45.0% 9 11 20
Albania 55.0% 11 9 20
Argentina 5.0% 1 19 20
Saudi Arabia 42.1% 8 11 19
Morocco 42.1% 8 11 19
Turkmenistan 10.5% 2 17 19
Niger 33.3% 6 12 18
Indonesia 41.2% 7 10 17
Eritrea 93.8% 15 1 16
Yemen 66.7% 10 5 15
Zimbabwe 71.4% 10 4 14
Burkina Faso 57.1% 8 6 14
Benin 9.1% 1 10 11
Gambia 50.0% 5 5 10
Libya 20.0% 2 8 10
Chad 0.0% 0 10 10
Germany 0.0% 0 10 10
Yugoslavia 66.7% 6 3 9
Palestine 100.0% 9 0 9
Nepal 33.3% 3 6 9
Rwanda 55.6% 5 4 9
Czech Republic 75.0% 6 2 8
Lebanon 50.0% 4 4 8
Algeria 50.0% 4 4 8
Azerbaijan 12.5% 1 7 8
Dominica 0.0% 0 8 8
Greece 0.0% 0 7 7
Unknown Country 50.0% 3 3 6
South Korea 0.0% 0 6 6
Ivory Coast (Cote D'Ivoire) 66.7% 4 2 6
Guadeloupe 0.0% 0 5 5
Mali 80.0% 4 1 5
Sierra Leone 0.0% 0 5 5
Ireland 25.0% 1 3 4
Liberia 25.0% 1 3 4
Bangladesh 0.0% 0 3 3
Zambia 33.3% 1 2 3
Kosovo 100.0% 1 0 1

Nationality-Specific Court Comparisons