A federal appeals court on Tuesday breathed new life into the Department of Homeland Security’s plans to use a speedy deportation power on migrants who were paroled into the U.S., potentially giving the Trump administration a new tool to boot hundreds of thousands who were admitted by President Biden.
The U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia erased a lower court ruling that had blocked DHS from using the speedy deportation, officially known as expedited removal, on parolees.
In a 3-0 ruling, the appeals court said the groups challenging DHS lacked legal standing to sue. The judges said that’s because the groups challenged Trump administration policy but didn’t question the underlying regulation, which appears to let DHS do exactly what it says it’s doing.
“Plaintiffs cannot seek relief that changes nothing for them. The plaintiffs here tried to do just that. So we vacate the stay issued by the district court,” the judges said in an unsigned opinion.
The court withheld its mandate for the decision, presumably to give the full D.C. Circuit Court a chance to review the ruling.
Should it take effect, it could help usher out a large cross section of unauthorized migrants from the Biden era.
Parole is an exception to the usual immigration system, letting someone remain despite having entered without a legal visa.
Before the Biden administration, it was used sparingly, usually in cases where a migrant had an urgent medical need for treatment here, or where U.S. authorities wanted a migrant’s presence to help with an investigation.
Under Mr. Biden, it became a loophole to the usual border controls. He allowed in Afghans, Ukrainians, Venezuelans, Cubans, Nicaraguans and Haitians who flew into the U.S., plus a large swath of other migrants who reached the U.S.-Mexico border and pre-registered their arrival.
Andrew “Art” Arthur, a former immigration judge who is now at the Center for Immigration Studies, calculated that nearly 2.9 million migrants were admitted on parole by the Biden team.
He said that’s why the court is confronting the issue of whether it can use speedy deportation on them.
“The reason this has never come up before is because nobody ever did what Biden did with respect to parole before,” Mr. Arthur said.
Expedited removal was created by Congress in 1996. It allows illegal immigrants who have been in the U.S. for less than two years to be ousted based on a finding by immigration officers, rather than requiring a full case in immigration court.
It had previously been limited to border cases, based on policy decisions, though no such restriction is written into the law. The Trump administration has sought to expand its reach.
The appeals court, in Tuesday’s ruling, said as far back as 1997 — six months after the law was enacted — the Clinton administration wrote regulations saying expedited removal applied to people who were paroled.
In January 2025, after President Trump took over, DHS issued a memorandum directing immigration officers to explore use of expedited removal on parolees.
A month later, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement circulated an email telling officers they could use expedited removal on parolees.
The Coalition for Human Immigrant Rights led a challenge to the memo and the email.
The appeals court, though, said the group never challenged the Clinton-era regulation, so even if the email and memo were to be struck down, the administration could rely on the original regulation and get the same result.
Because of that, there’s no way for the court to redress the coalition’s legal injury. That undercut its legal standing to sue.
James Percival, DHS’s general counsel, celebrated the decision, calling it a “big win.”
He urged those without a full legal status to take DHS’s offer of self-deportation before they are found by immigration officers.
“It’s not too late to take a $2,600 check and a free flight home!” he said.
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