A former ICE attorney alleged racist remarks and a secret reference cost him an immigration judgeship
A federal court has tossed a military veteran's discrimination lawsuit alleging his supervisor torpedoed his career through a damaging reference.
On March 12, 2026, the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia dismissed all five counts with prejudice. The case, brought under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, raised pointed questions about what happens when a supervisor allegedly goes behind an employee's back to tank a job opportunity, and what it takes to prove that discrimination was the reason.
Arthur Ayo-Aghimien II, a licensed attorney, Air Force veteran, and Black, Christian male born in Nigeria, worked as an attorney at Immigration and Customs Enforcement beginning in 2007. He reported to Deputy Field Counsel Mary-Jean Lambert in ICE's Las Vegas office. According to the complaint, the trouble started when Ayo-Aghimien returned from military deployments. Lambert allegedly told him his absence had burdened the office, that she did not care to hire military types, and that a senior official had apologized for placing him in her office.
The complaint painted a picture of a workplace where Ayo-Aghimien was allegedly frozen out. Lambert reportedly denied him a personal office and made him work in the library while two colleagues — one a Vietnamese-American woman, the other a white, U.S.-born man – were given large,...
"These people are leading the country towards religious fanaticism, religious bigotry, racism, and even towards war," says the Sinhala-language caption of a Facebook graphic shared on May 2, 2026....