The Supreme Court on Tuesday gave tentative permission for the Department of Homeland Security to keep carrying out deportations of migrants to third countries when their own homes won’t take them back, setting aside limits imposed by a lower court.
The justices issued a brief order accepting the case for a full review and staying that district judge’s decision while the matter is pending.
The justices said they want to hear arguments on whether the district court was right to hear the case in the first place, as well as whether the Trump administration’s third-country removal policy is legal.
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The court’s three Democratic appointees said they dissented.
DHS had warned of “chaos” in deportations if the justices didn’t intervene.
“Absent an effective third-country removal policy, the United States is forced to retain (and often release into the interior) vicious criminals who have already harmed our communities,” D. John Sauer, the solicitor general, told the court in his petition asking for a ruling.
At issue are the procedures and notices DHS must give migrants before they’re sent to third countries, and the assurances the government must have that migrants won’t face persecution or torture there.
U.S. District Judge Brian Murphy ruled that DHS’ notice was lacking. The 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals last week largely upheld that order and let the ruling take effect immediately.
This marks the third time the case has been to the high court — and the third spanking for Judge Murphy, a Biden appointee.
He has ruled that DHS must give migrants written notice of the country they’re destined for, then 10 days to challenge that country on the basis of a fear of torture, plus 15 days to try to reopen their immigration cases.
The government says those restrictions go beyond what the law requires.
Third-country removals have been part of U.S. law for decades, but the Trump administration has turned them into a core of its mass deportation campaign.
Some countries are notoriously bad about taking back their citizens, particularly those with serious criminal records.
In other cases, migrants aren’t sent to their homes because they face persecution.
Under previous Supreme Court rulings, migrants can’t be detained indefinitely on immigration charges.
That leaves DHS the choice of releasing them or finding a third country to take them.
The Trump administration has used third-country removals on “thousands” of migrants, Mr. Sauer said, and it has “thousands more” it wants to boot.
Immigrant rights groups argue that migrants are being sent to places where they have no ties, will struggle to live, and face danger — including persecution and torture.
In one of the iterations to reach the high court, Judge Murphy halted a flight of eight migrants while they were in transit to South Sudan.
The plane was forced to divert to Djibouti, also in Africa, where the migrants were held in a shipping container converted into a detention facility while the case was argued out.
The Supreme Court in July last year put that order on hold, letting the government carry out the deportations.
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