In a setback to the Trump administration, an appeals court on Friday blocked President Donald Trump’s executive order suspending asylum access. The order was a key pillar of Trump’s plan to crack down on migration at the southern border of the US.
A three-judge panel from the for the District of Columbia Circuit observed that immigration laws give people the right to apply for asylum at the border, and the president can’t circumvent that, the Associated Press reported.
The court concluded that the doesn’t authorise the president to remove the plaintiffs under “procedures of his own making,” allow him to suspend plaintiffs’ right to apply for asylum or curtail procedures for adjudicating their anti-torture claims, the report added.
“The power by proclamation to temporarily suspend the entry of specified foreign individuals into the United States does not contain implicit authority to override the INA’s mandatory process to summarily remove foreign individuals,” wrote Judge J. Michelle Childs, who was nominated to the bench by Democratic President Joe Biden.
The White House didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
ACLU attorney Lee Gelernt said in a statement that the appellate ruling is “essential for those fleeing danger who have been denied even a hearing to present asylum claims under the ’s unlawful and inhumane executive order.”
Judge Justin Walker, a Trump nominee, wrote a partial dissent. He said the law gives immigrants protections against removal to countries where they would be persecuted, but the administration can issue broad denials of asylum applications.
Walker, however, agreed with the majority that the president cannot deport migrants to countries where they will be persecuted or strip them of mandatory procedures that protect against their removal.
Judge Cornelia Pillard, who was nominated by Democratic President Barack Obama, also heard the case.
(With inputs from AP)
