WASHINGTON — The US Supreme Court has allowed President Donald Trump’s administration to continue third-country deportations, suspending a lower-court ruling that paused such removals over failure to follow due process.
On Tuesday, the conservative-dominated high court granted the administration’s emergency request to resume the so-called “third-country removals”, which involve deporting immigrants to countries they may have no connection to.
The lower court had said that people targeted with deportation must be given effective notice ahead of time about where they are being sent to allow them to raise concerns about potential persecution.
The three liberal justices on the nine-member panel said they would not have granted the Trump administration’s request.
The Trump administration has defended third-country deportations as necessary since the home nations of some of those who are targeted for removal sometimes refuse to accept them.
In a brief to the Supreme Court, opponents of lifting the restrictions argued that the lower court ruling did not fully block all third-country deportations, “it simply requires them to do so lawfully.”
Trump’s solicitor general, John Sauer, meanwhile told the court that the rapid deportation to third countries was “an essential tool to remove certain aliens, including some of the worst criminal aliens.”
The lower court ruling “created substantial logistical problems” with removals, he said.
An AFP investigation found that the US has offered multimillion-dollar deals and threatened visa restrictions in a bid to get “third countries,” especially in Africa, to take such deportees.
Source: Saudi Gazette