The Wisconsin judge who was arrested on Friday morning on charges of obstructing immigration enforcement spent most of her legal career working on behalf of low-income people and marginalized groups.
Federal authorities arrested the judge, Hannah C. Dugan of the Milwaukee County Circuit Court, on suspicion that she “intentionally misdirected federal agents away from” an immigrant being pursued by federal authorities, Kash Patel, the F.B.I. director, wrote on social media. The authorities said that earlier this month, Judge Dugan directed an undocumented immigrant through a side door in her courtroom while the agents waited in a public hallway to apprehend him.
A statement issued on behalf of Judge Dugan late Friday stated that she “will defend herself vigorously and looks forward to being exonerated.” She has hired a former federal prosecutor to represent her, the statement said, and “has committed herself to the rule of law and the principles of due process for her entire career as a lawyer and a judge.”
Judge Dugan, widely known in progressive circles in Milwaukee, was elected by a wide margin in 2016, beating an incumbent appointee of Scott Walker, the Republican former governor of Wisconsin. Judge Dugan was unopposed for re-election in 2022. Her current term expires in 2028.
In 2023, she dismissed a lawsuit brought by the Republican Party of Wisconsin that argued a get-out-the-vote effort in Milwaukee violated the law.
Judge Dugan, 65, graduated from the University of Wisconsin Law School in 1987 and took a job at Legal Action of Wisconsin, a group that provides free legal services. She worked as a lawyer specializing in housing, public benefits and Social Security cases, and was the coordinator of the organization’s pro bono attorney program from 1990 to 1994, according to her LinkedIn page.
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