The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday denied the Trump Administration’s request to fast-track a decision over whether to hear its case against the Obama-era immigration policy known as DACA (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals).
“The motion to expedite consideration of the petition for a writ of certiorari is denied,” the filing said.
In other words, the Trump Administration is going to have to wait to learn if justices will even hear their case. They filed their writ of certiorari. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) attempted a rescission of DACA, but CASA de Maryland, an immigration advocacy group, sued to stop them. According to court filings, plaintiffs argued that the DACA wind-down was illegal under the Administrative Procedure Act as an “arbitrary and capricious” decision.
This fight and others made its way through the courts, and the government asked the Supreme Court to speed up their decision.
“With yet another court of appeals to have now fully considered these issues, the government respectfully submits that further percolation is unnecessary and the time for the Court to act is now,” the government argued.
As you might expect, the opposition pushed back on this. They argued that the government’s logic doesn’t make sense [citation removed]:
Petitioners’ argument for expedition is premised on their assumption that this Court will grant certiorari in Regents, NAACP, and Vidal before the end of term, and that they will need to coordinate briefing on those matters. Indeed, Petitioners’ motion is little more than a vehicle to convey to the Court that Petitioners consider the timing of such a grant to be “critical.” … But Petitioners do not explain why the Court need grant certiorari before summer recess as to any of these petitions.
U.S. District Judge John D. Bates previously criticized the government’s contention that former DHS Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen‘s memo (“The Nielsen Memo“) was sufficient to explain why judicial review of the decision to rescind DACA shouldn’t apply.
Bates said the government failed to “elaborate meaningfully on the [DHS] agency’s primary rationale for its decision: the judgment that the policy was unlawful and unconstitutional.” The judge said there was no satisfactory explanation through the citation of “statutory and constitutional authority” and ruled that “the original DACA program […] be restored in full.”
The United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit ruled mid-May that the Trump Administration’s decision to rescind the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program was unlawfully “arbitrary and capricious,” because the Administration failed to offer any plausible explanation for the determination.
Matt Naham and Jerry Lambe contributed to this report.
[Image via NICHOLAS KAMM/AFP/Getty Images]