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The Department of Justice is turning to an appeals court for relief after a Biden-appointed federal judge blocked the Trump administration from deporting illegal immigrants to countries not designated in their paperwork, arguing the judge had already twice been overruled by the Supreme Court on the issue.
DOJ lawyers urged the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 1st Circuit to quickly pause the broad order issued by Judge Brian Murphy that blocked the so-called third-country deportations, arguing Murphy’s order threatened to derail sensitive diplomatic negotiations. The DOJ said the order could affect potentially “thousands” of removals, a prospect that threatens to interfere with the Trump administration’s aggressive deportation agenda.
“The Supreme Court twice stayed the district court’s sweeping nationwide, classwide preliminary injunction,” DOJ lawyers wrote Thursday, accusing Murphy of trying to “evade” the high court’s prior rulings by issuing a new order that was “doubly misguided.”
The lawyers argued Murphy’s order created an “unworkable scheme” that “materially impairs the ability of the government to enforce the immigration laws” and would cause “massive operational disruption” in an area that often requires “tight timing and sensitive diplomatic coordination.”
The high-stakes lawsuit stemmed from several immigrants with final removal orders suing in Massachusetts, alleging the Department of Homeland Security violated immigration laws by failing to provide enough notice for the immigrants to raise claims that they feared they could be tortured in the new country they were to be deported to.
The DOJ in its appeal defended its deportation policy, which allows third-country removals based on assurances the Trump administration receives from the countries. Citing court precedent, the department said the judicial branch is “not suited to second-guess such determinations” because they were a matter of foreign policy and fell strictly under the purview of the executive branch.
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Murphy disagreed in his 81-page judgment, which the DOJ is now appealing, saying that the administration’s position that it did not need to give notice to the deportees “fails to satisfy due process for a raft of reasons, not least of which is that nobody really knows anything about these purported ‘assurances.'”
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“Whom do they cover? What do they cover? Why has the Government deemed them credible? How can anyone even know for certain that they exist? These are basic questions that the Constitution permits a person to ask before the Government takes away their last and only lifeline,” Murphy wrote.
The judge previously issued an injunction with the same findings.
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The Supreme Court stayed Murphy’s initial injunction last year without explanation in a 6-3 emergency ruling.
In a follow-up clarification, the justices found 7-2 that Murphy subsequently attempted to enforce the injunction against six detainees bound for South Sudan, which the seven justices — all six conservatives and Justice Elena Kagan — said would flout their earlier order barring him from enforcing it.
The case could once again be bound for the Supreme Court. DOJ lawyers asked the appeals court to intervene within one week and signaled that they would turn to the high court if needed.
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