The Supreme Court ruled on Thursday that the Biden administration properly ended a Trump-era policy forcing some U.S. asylum-seekers to wait in Mexico.
The justices' 5-4 decision for the administration came in a case about the "Remain in Mexico" policy under President Donald Trump. Chief Justice John Roberts wrote the decision and was joined by fellow conservative Justice Brett Kavanaugh as well as the court's three liberal justices: Stephen Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan.
"It's significant because it reminds us that new presidents can bring new policies in," said Kevin Johnson, dean of the UC Davis School of Law. "If they follow the rules, they can implement those new policies at the most fundamental level. It means that elections matter, the president matters, and the policies that they're able to pursue matter. And so we see time and again, and it's worth reminding us of the importance of presidential elections in their impact on policy."
President Joe Biden suspended the program on his first day in office in January 2021. But lower courts ordered it reinstated in response to a lawsuit from Republican-led Texas and Missouri. The current administration has sent far fewer people back to Mexico than did the Trump administration.
The heart of the legal fight was whether immigration authorities, with far less detention capacity than needed, had to send people to Mexico or whether they had the discretion under federal law to release asylum-seekers into the United States while they awaited their hearings.
The Supreme Court ruling comes days after at least 53 migrants — including women and children — died of intense heat inside a trailer truck while being smuggled into Texas, as desperation mounts among asylum-seekers to cross.
"For asylum-seekers that have been waiting for years in the Mexican side of the border, this means a victory," said attorney Dulce Garcia, executive director of Border Angels in San Diego.