The U.S. Supreme Court approved the Trump administration’s request to pause a lower court injunction that had blocked deportations of individuals to third countries without prior notice.
The decision marks a near-term victory for the administration as it aims to implement its immigration crackdown swiftly.
The Court ruled 6-3 in favor of staying the injunction, with Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, and Ketanji Brown Jackson dissenting.
The case involved a group of migrants contesting their deportations to third countries—nations other than their countries of origin.
Earlier this month, lawyers representing these migrants urged the Supreme Court to uphold a ruling by U.S. District Judge Brian Murphy, who had ordered the Trump administration to keep all migrants facing deportation to third countries in U.S. custody until further review.
Murphy, based in Boston, oversaw a class-action lawsuit brought by migrants challenging deportations to countries such as South Sudan, El Salvador, Costa Rica, Guatemala, and others that the administration has reportedly considered in its ongoing deportation efforts.
Murphy ruled that migrants must stay in U.S. custody until they have the opportunity to undergo a “reasonable fear interview,” allowing them to explain to U.S. officials any fears of persecution or torture if released into the country.
Murphy emphasized that his order does not prevent Trump from “executing removal orders to third countries.” Rather, he clarified in a prior ruling that it “simply requires” the government to “comply with the law when carrying out” such removals, in accordance with the U.S. Constitution and in response to the Trump administration’s surge of last-minute removals and deportations.
In appealing the case to the Supreme Court, U.S. Solicitor General D. John Sauer argued that Murphy’s ruling had prevented the government from deporting “some of the worst of the worst illegal aliens,” including a group of migrants sent to South Sudan earlier this year without due process or prior notice.
In a separate argument, he reiterated that the migrants must remain in U.S. custody at a military base in Djibouti until each has the opportunity to undergo a “reasonable fear interview,” allowing them to explain to U.S. officials any fears of persecution or torture if released into South Sudanese custody.
U.S. judges have consistently ruled that the Trump administration violated due process by failing to notify migrants of their impending removals and denying them the opportunity to challenge their deportations in court, a stance the Supreme Court has upheld, albeit narrowly, on four separate occasions since Trump took office.
Meanwhile, White House officials have criticized so-called “activist” judges for pursuing a political agenda and have consistently rejected claims that illegal immigrants are entitled to due process protections.
As many as a dozen individuals from various countries, including Vietnam and Myanmar, were reportedly ordered deported to South Sudan, a move that lawyers for the immigrants previously contended was in “clear violation” of Murphy’s order.
“Fire up the deportation planes,” tweeted Assistant Deputy Secretary of Homeland Security Tricia McLaughlin.
“The SCOTUS ruling is a victory for the safety and security of the American people,” McLaughlin added. “The Biden Administration allowed millions of illegal aliens to flood our country, and, now, the Trump Administration can exercise its undisputed authority to remove these criminal illegal aliens and clean up this national security nightmare.”
The head of the legal group defending the illegal aliens, however, took a different view.
“The ramifications of the Supreme Court’s order will be horrifying; it strips away critical due process protections that have been protecting our class members from torture and death,” said Trina Realmuto, executive director of the National Immigration Litigation Alliance.
“We now need to move as swiftly as possible to conclude the case and restore these protections,” she added.