WASHINGTON – The Supreme Court on July 3 backed the Trump administration in a dispute with a federal judge over the administration’s attempt to deport eight migrants to South Sudan.
The high court said its June 23 order overriding the judge’s requirement that a group of migrants be given a meaningful chance to show they would be harmed if removed to countries other than their homeland applies to the eight being held at a military base in Djibouti.
Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Ketanji Brown Jackson dissented.
“Today’s order clarifies only one thing: Other litigants must follow the rules, but the administration has the Supreme Court on speed dial,” Sotomayor wrote.
The administration had accused U.S. District Judge Brian Murphy in Boston of a “lawless act of defiance” when he said the Supreme Court’s order did not apply to his May 21 decision that the administration violated his ruling when it tried to fly the migrants to politically unstable South Sudan.
Murphy had said the eight men were entitled to raise fears about being tortured before being sent to South Sudan.
It’s well-established law that violations of court orders can still be acted on even if the underlying issue has been resolved, lawyers for the migrants told the Supreme Court.
“Any other conclusion would reward the government’s defiance of the district court’s orders,” they wrote.
But the administration argued that once Murphy’s April 18 order was blocked by the Supreme Court, his subsequent decisions were also voided.
“Once a tree is uprooted, its branches do not continue to thrive,” Solicitor General John Sauer told the court.
The court’s majority had not explained their June 23 decision, as is common when acting on an emergency request.
But Sotomayor, who wrote a dissent, said the administration had openly flouted Murphy’s court orders and should not be rewarded for doing so.
In the July 3 unsigned opinion, the majority said Murphy can’t “enforce an injunction that our stay rendered unenforceable.”
The majority did not agree to the administration’s request that Murphy be removed from the case.
Justice Elena Kagan said that while she opposed the court’s initial decision, she does not see how Murphy can compel the government to comply with an order that the court has blocked.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Supreme Court backs deportation of migrants to South Sudan
