A federal judge appointed by former President Joe Biden on Wednesday blocked the Trump administration from deporting illegal immigrants to so-called “third countries” without first giving them notice and an opportunity to challenge their removal, in a high-stakes case that is likely headed to the Supreme Court.
The ruling from U.S. District Judge Brian Murphy comes months after lawyers filed a class-action lawsuit in Boston challenging the Department of Homeland Security’s process of deporting illegal immigrants in the U.S. to so-called “third countries” — countries that are not their home country and were not previously designated in their removal orders.
Murphy ultimately sided with the migrants Wednesday, ruling that DHS’ third-country removal policy is unlawful and violates due process protections under the U.S. Constitution. “This case is about whether the government may, without notice, deport a person to the wrong country, or a country where he is likely to be persecuted, or tortured, thereby depriving that person of the opportunity to seek protections to which he would be undisputedly entitled,” Murphy said.
Neither DHS nor DOJ immediately responded to Fox News Digital’s request for comment on the case or whether the administration plans to appeal the ruling.
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DHS officials have previously claimed an “undisputed authority” to deport criminal illegal aliens to third countries that have agreed to accept them. “If these activist judges had their way, aliens who are so uniquely barbaric that their own countries won’t take them back, including convicted murderers, child rapists and drug traffickers, would walk free on American streets,” former Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said in June, after the Supreme Court temporarily permitted the Trump administration to continue its deportation policy amid legal challenges.
In her June statement, McLaughlin said the Biden administration created a “national security nightmare” through lax immigration enforcement, which “allowed millions of illegal aliens to flood our country.” Her critique echoed longstanding Republican arguments that Biden’s early decisions to halt border wall construction and reverse Trump-era removal policies fueled a crisis that saw encounters peak at a record 2.4 million in 2023. While Biden eventually enacted a restrictive 2024 executive order that brought crossings down to 2020 levels, Trump campaigned on a promise of mass deportations to clear the backlog. His “third country” policy represents the front line of that effort — aimed at deporting the “worst of the worst” to any nation willing to take them — though a Biden-appointed judge now says the practice crosses a constitutional red line.
The Department of Homeland Security “has adopted a policy whereby it may take people and drop them off in parts unknown — in so-called ‘third countries,’ and, ‘as long as the Department doesn’t already know that there’s someone standing there waiting to shoot… that’s fine,’” Murphy said in his opinion Wednesday.
“It is not fine, nor is it legal.”
Murphy also rejected the Trump administration’s claim that certain migrants living in the U.S. illegally lacked due process, noting that the clause applies to all “persons” within the U.S., regardless of immigration status.
“These are our laws, and it is with profound gratitude for the unbelievable luck of being born in the United States of America that this Court affirms these and our nation’s bedrock principle: that no ‘person’ in this country may be ‘deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law,'” Murphy said.
Murphy stayed the ruling from taking force for 15 days to allow the Trump administration time to appeal the case to the First Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals, given what the judge acknowledged was the “importance” and “unusual history” of the case in question.
The ruling comes after Murphy presided for months over a class-action lawsuit filed by migrants challenging deportations to third countries, including South Sudan and El Salvador, as well as Costa Rica and Guatemala, which the administration has reportedly eyed in its ongoing wave of deportations.
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He has sparred with the Trump administration while overseeing the case, including in May, when he accused the administration of failing to comply with a court order requiring it to keep in U.S. custody six migrants who were deported to South Sudan without due process or notice.
Murphy previously ordered that the migrants remain in U.S. custody at a military base in Djibouti until each of them could be given a “reasonable fear interview,” or a chance to explain to U.S. officials any fear of persecution or torture, should they be released into South Sudanese custody.
The judge’s order is the latest attempt by federal court judges to rein in the Trump administration as it continues to deport migrants to third countries.
Murphy previously acknowledged the criminal histories in question after Trump officials blasted the individuals removed as the “worst of the worst.”
“The court recognizes that the class members at issue here have criminal histories,” Murphy wrote in an order last year.
“But that does not change due process,” he wrote. “The court treats its obligation to these principles with the seriousness that anyone committed to the rule of law should understand.”
White House officials, meanwhile, have blasted so-called “activist” judges as attempting to enact a political agenda, and have repeatedly rejected the notion that illegal immigrants are entitled to due process.
Lower court judges have repeatedly ruled that the Trump administration has violated due process by failing to notify migrants of their imminent removals, or afford them the opportunity to challenge their deportations in court — a view reiterated, albeit narrowly, by the Supreme Court four separate times since Trump took office.
The Trump administration, for its part, succeeded in a separate Supreme Court case last year that narrowed the ability of federal courts to issue so-called nationwide injunctions blocking executive orders from taking force.