Other option during nights are community servers I guess? I don't know too many of them sadly.
I play on potato.tf MvM during nights lately, but not all peoples like MvM as well as I don't know how long this event will last so it's just temporary solution.

Valve oficially put TF2 on hold since they work on other games right now.
Thus this problem won't be fixed soon.

Casual strongly depends from number of peoples playing generally, if majority on server is peoples then kicking bots isn't hard but VERY annoying. When you want hop onto casual with 3 friends during nights and rest of server is literally filled with bots then it's gg because it won't be possible to kick them.
NA during nights is cool if ping isn't annoying you, but also it's hard to get into NA servers since EU servers are prioritized while matching and welp majority of EU will have spaces on servers.

EU during day is ok but bots still annoy, EU during nights is very questionable since you need have luck to be in server with actual peoples.

It feels like Valve have given up on TF2 hackers and I gotta be honest I actually feel bad for them. These programmers making these hacking programs no the in's and out's of Valve's VAC system and they can easily get around it but Valve have no idea how they are doing it making it impossible for them to ban these players.
Then again when they do ban them, they would just make a new account and a new account and so on and so forth.

They really need to start handing out tougher punishments.

if majority of your team was bots then they could counter-kick you instead if it was you calling vote

also bots steal usernames sometimes so maybe peoples tried kick bot but they pick wrong name and kicked you instead?

also yes cheaters with ususuals and aussies DO exsist so no one give shit about items

Recently catbot cheaters have increased mostly in EU. you get a multiple cheaters that can be on your team and opposite where they also counter kick anyone vote kick's them. This been happening for the last 3 months