Biden judge overruled on key Trump immigration policy
The Trump administration scored a major immigration win Monday after a federal appeals court revived its nationwide expedited removal policy, clearing the way for the Department of Homeland Security to resume fast-track deportations of eligible illegal immigrants.
The ruling allows federal immigration authorities to quickly remove certain migrants found anywhere in the country if they were not lawfully admitted or paroled into the U.S. and cannot show they have continuously lived in the country for at least two years.
In a 2-1 ruling, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit vacated a lower court order that had blocked the policy, concluding that challengers were unlikely to succeed on their claims that the expansion violates constitutional due process protections.
"DHS thereby exercised its discretion to apply its expedited-removal authority to the maximum extent allowed by law," Judge Justin Walker wrote for the court.
DHS praised the ruling.
"For years, DHS has arbitrarily limited expedited removal to 14 days even though it applies to illegal aliens who entered the country illegally within the last two years," DHS General Counsel James Percival said in a statement to Fox News Digital. "Today, the D.C. Circuit vindicated our decision to apply the law as written. It's not too late to take a $2,600 check and a free flight home!"
The ruling reverses a nationwide stay issued by U.S. District Judge Jia Cobb, a Biden appointee, who found the policy created a significant risk that individuals could be wrongly deported before having a meaningful opportunity to prove they were exempt from expedited removal.
The Trump administration first expanded expedited removal nationwide during Trump's first term in 2019. The Biden administration later rescinded the policy before DHS reinstated it shortly after Trump returned to office in January 2025.
The majority concluded that the Constitution requires the government to notify illegal immigrants when they are facing deportation and give them an opportunity to respond, but does not require immigration officials to explain every potential legal defense that could prevent their removal.
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"The constitutional requirement is notice of the action the government is taking and the grounds for it, plus an opportunity to respond," Walker wrote. "It is not a requirement that the government explain how the individual might prevail."
The court rejected arguments that DHS must proactively inform individuals they can avoid expedited removal by proving they have continuously lived in the United States for at least two years.
"If due process requires the government to inform individuals of the two-year continuous-presence rule, it presumably also requires informing them of every other basis for contesting expedited removal," Walker wrote. "Make the Road offers no limiting principle and identifies no authority for so expansive a requirement."
The majority also dismissed claims that examples of wrongful deportations demonstrated the policy itself was unconstitutional.
"To be sure, the record contains evidence that some aliens have been erroneously subjected to expedited removal despite having been present for more than two years," the opinion stated. "If so, that's illegal. But the cause there would be individual officers' failure to follow the law — not defects in the written directives under review."
Judge Robert Wilkins dissented, arguing that DHS's procedures do not give migrants a meaningful chance to prove they have lived in the United States for at least two years and therefore may not qualify for expedited removal.
"DHS is using procedures that do not allow a meaningful opportunity for noncitizens to demonstrate that they have been continuously present in the United States for two years," Wilkins wrote.