New York [US], October 29: The US Supreme Court declined to reinstate the authority of immigration judges to temporarily postpone deportation cases.
They kept in place an agreement between President Donald Trump's administration and Republican-governed Texas that bars the once-common practice.
The justices denied an emergency request by US cities including Baltimore and an immigrant legal advocacy group to halt for now the deal ending the practice, known as "administrative closure," while litigation continues in the dispute.
The Supreme Court's decision, issued as a brief, one-sentence order, did not offer any explanation, as is common when it handles emergency requests. None of the justices publicly dissented from the decision.
The administration and Texas filed the agreement in a federal court in Texas on June 22, the same day that the state sued to challenge the immigration court procedure. A federal judge swiftly approved the agreement on the same day.
Baltimore and the other litigants said the federal government improperly colluded with Texas to secure the rule's invalidation.
In a statement, the litigants and the lawyers representing them from the liberal legal group Democracy Forward expressed disappointment in Tuesday's decision.
"Eliminating these protections puts vulnerable people at greater risk of deportation and undermines public safety in communities across the country," they said in the statement.
"This dangerous abuse of the judicial process threatens the rule of law and sets a troubling precedent for dismantling federal policies without meaningful public participation or judicial scrutiny," they added.
Representatives from the Justice Department and the Texas attorney general's office did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Immigration judges relied on administrative closure for decades to clear certain deportation cases off their busy dockets, including when separate proceedings involving the same person are pending that could prevent removal, such as on a visa petition or an appeal of a criminal conviction.
Source: Fijian Broadcasting Corporation
