The Supreme Court Thursday ruled Thursday that an expedited removal process for unauthorized immigrants apprehended near the border does NOT violate the Constitution. In other words, it allows some speedy deportations with limited judicial review.
Federal law authorizes deportation of noncitizens without court review if they apprehended within two weeks of entering the U.S. and are found less than 100 miles from the border.
The case was based on a Tamil from Sri Lanka who said it was his constitutional right to habeas corpus. He wanted a constitutional right to stay here illegally.
By a 7-2 vote, the court overruled a lower court that had sided with Mr. Thuraissigiam.
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Writing for the court, Justice Samuel Alito said habeas corpus rights wouldn’t have been understood when the Constitution was adopted in the 18th century to require additional court proceedings for non-citizens claiming a right to enter the U.S.
Likewise, he wrote, noncitizens apprehended so close to entering the country had no due-process right to federal court review. Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Clarence Thomas, Neil Gorsuch, and Brett Kavanaugh joined the opinion.
That’s a big win. The left has tied the administration up in court cases. Chances are this won’t stop them, but it will slow them down on this issue.
“In 1996, when Congress enacted the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act, it crafted a system for weeding out patently meritless claims and expeditiously removing the aliens making such claims from the country,” Justice Alito wrote.
“It was Congress’s judgment that detaining all asylum seekers until the full-blown removal process is completed would place an unacceptable burden on our immigration system and that releasing them would present an undue risk that they would fail to appear for removal proceedings.”
Justices Breyer and Ginsburg agreed Mr. Thuraissigiam had no right to habeas corpus.
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