A federal judge appointed by former President Joe Biden on Thursday again ruled against the Trump administration’s third-country deportation policy, months after the Supreme Court blocked his earlier decision and rebuked him in a rare follow-up order.
The Supreme Court not only stayed Boston-based Judge Brian Murphy’s injunction over the same deportation policy in a 6-3 order last June, but the high court followed up with a second 7-2 order a week later admonishing the judge for flouting its decision. Murphy’s latest ruling is also likely to land before the justices, setting up a fresh test of the judge’s decisions in the high-stakes case.
Murphy, who was confirmed by the Senate along party lines, had issued a sweeping 81-page decision on Thursday finding that the Department of Homeland Security’s process for deporting migrants to third countries (countries that are not specified in the migrants’ removal orders) was unlawful because it violated the migrants’ due process by not giving them enough time to raise fears that they could be tortured in the country they are sent to.
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Murphy’s decision came after the judge last year issued a preliminary injunction that also blocked DHS from deporting migrants to third countries under the department’s current protocols. The Supreme Court’s order in June halted that decision, but, pointing to a technicality, Murphy said that a separate subsequent ruling he made on May 21 specifically addressing six migrants bound for South Sudan was still “in full force and effect” despite the high court’s stay.
The judge’s move led the Department of Justice to ask the Supreme Court for clarification, and the high court responded by issuing its follow-up 7-2 opinion saying Murphy could not block DHS from deporting the six migrants.
“Our June 23 order stayed the April 18 preliminary injunction in full. The May 21 remedial order cannot now be used to enforce an injunction that our stay rendered unenforceable,” the Supreme Court’s majority wrote.
In an unusual move, the majority also noted that if the government needed further help to stop Murphy’s interference, it could seek a writ of mandamus, a rare legal tool used by a higher court to force a lower court judge to follow the law.
The high court said it expected Murphy to “now conform [his] order to our previous stay and cease enforcing the April 18 injunction through the May 21 remedial order.”
Justice Elena Kagan, an Obama appointee who agreed with Murphy’s initial decision to block the deportations, sided with the majority in agreeing that the judge had acted defiantly.
“I do not see how a district court can compel compliance with an order that this Court has stayed,” Kagan wrote in a concurring opinion.
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The DOJ had fumed over Murphy’s attempt to block the deportation of the six migrants. Solicitor General John Sauer described it as a “lawless act of defiance” of the Supreme Court’s authority when seeking clarification from the high court.
“For over two months now, the Executive has labored under an injunction that this Court yesterday deemed unenforceable,” Sauer wrote. “This Court should immediately make clear that the district court’s enforcement order has no effect, and put a swift end to the ongoing irreparable harm to the Executive Branch and its agents, who remain under baseless threat of contempt as they are forced to house dangerous criminal aliens at a military base in the Horn of Africa that now lies on the borders of a regional conflict.”
Murphy said in his ruling Thursday that DHS’s deportation policy was “not fine nor is it legal.” During the prior administration, when Murphy was appointed to the federal bench, Biden sought to undo Trump’s strict immigration policies, leading to nearly 10 million migrant encounters at the southern border. Biden also faced criticism for lax policies that involved releasing millions of migrants into the country during his tenure while they awaited immigration hearings. Border encounters have dropped dramatically since Trump retook office.
Murphy stayed his ruling for 15 days to give the Trump administration time to appeal to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 1st Circuit, given what the judge acknowledged was the “importance” and “unusual history” of the case.
Fox News Digital’s Breanne Deppisch contributed to this report.