WASHINGTON, D.C.—The U.S. Supreme Court, in a pair of 6-3 decision, handed President Donald J Trump’s administration significant victories Thursday, June 25, on immigration enforcement, ruling in two cases that clear the way for the termination of temporary legal protections (TPS) for hundreds of thousands of migrants and upheld stricter limits on asylum claims at the southern border.
The decisions, authored by Justice Samuel Alito, in Mullin v. Doe and Mullin v. Al Otro Lado, reversed lower court rulings that had blocked key elements of the government’s immigration and enforcement policies.
In Mullin v. Doe (No. 25-1083), the court held that federal judges cannot review or block the Department of Homeland Security’s decisions to end Temporary Protected Status, or TPS, for nationals of Haiti and Syria. The ruling allows the administration to proceed with terminating protections for approximately 350,000 Haitians and more than 6,000 Syrians. In other words, the court lacked authority in this matter and committed judicial overreach.
“In these cases, we consider whether respondents, who challenge the termination of Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for aliens from Syria and Haiti, are entitled to orders postponing the terminations during litigation. We hold that they are not. The TPS statute plainly bars consideration of respondents’ non-constitutional claims,” Justice Alito wrote in the majority opinion.
Justice Elena Kagan, writing for Justice Sotomayor and Jackson in dissent, argued that courts should be able to review whether the administration followed proper procedures.
TPS is a humanitarian program created by Congress in 1990 that allows people from countries facing armed conflict, environmental disasters or other extraordinary conditions to live and work legally in the United States on a temporary basis. The Trump administration argued that the “temporary” designations have lasted far too long and that the statute gives DHS broad, largely unreviewable discretion to terminate those in designated it.
In the companion case Mullin v. Al Otro Lado (No. 25-5), the court ruled that noncitizens stopped by U.S. officials on the Mexican side of the border have not “arrived in the United States” under the Immigration and Nationality Act. Therefore, they are not entitled to apply for asylum or require inspection by immigration officers at that stage.
“An alien standing in Mexico does not ‘arriv[e] in the United States’ by attempting, and failing, to set foot in this country. An alien ‘arrives in the United States’ only when he crosses the border. The INA thus neither entitles an alien standing in Mexico to apply for asylum nor requires an immigration officer to inspect him,” Justice Alito wrote in the majority opinion.
The decision upholds the administration’s authority to limit the number of asylum seekers processed at ports of entry reversing a lower court ruling that had found the practice unlawful. The ruling gives the Trump administration greater flexibility to manage asylum claims.
Author: Mario Lotmore
