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Supreme Court Allows Trump's Third-Country Deportation Policy
Confirmed
In Short: The Supreme Court on Tuesday allowed the Trump administration to resume its policy of deporting illegal immigrants to third countries, a move that has been challenged in lower courts.
Lower courts had imposed additional procedural requirements before illegal immigrants could be removed to countries other than their own, arguing that these steps were necessary to protect migrants from potential persecution or torture.
The justices granted the administration's request to stay a February ruling from a federal district court in Massachusetts that had imposed these additional procedural requirements.
Attorneys challenging the policy argued that the lower court's ruling did not prevent removals but required the government to provide notice and an opportunity for illegal aliens to raise protection claims before they were sent abroad.
The court directed its clerk to establish a briefing schedule allowing the case to be argued during its December 2026 session.
Since June 2025, the Supreme Court has intervened multiple times in this dispute, first staying a preliminary injunction restricting third-country removals.
More than 25,000 migrants have been deported to at least 29 third countries under the administration's policy.
The court's decision is not a ruling on the legality of the policy but a temporary measure that allows the administration to continue deportations while the case is reviewed.
The court's three liberal members, Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, and Ketanji Brown Jackson, dissented.
The policy has been running for 15 months and has already moved thousands of detainees out of the country, with thousands more eligible to go.
The administration argues that the policy is an essential tool for removing some of the worst criminal aliens.
The court's decision paves the way for the Trump administration to continue relying on a March 2025 policy that allows officials to send deportees to third countries, without notifying them of the destination, if such nations provide the U.S. with assurances against persecution or torture.
What this adds
The Supreme Court's decision to allow the policy to continue is the third time it has intervened in favor of the Trump administration's immigration measures.
The court's decision does not address the legality of the policy but temporarily blocks the lower court judgment while the case proceeds.
The court gave no explanation for granting the stay, and the justices will hear full arguments on the policy in December.
Background
The Supreme Court, with no dissents, upheld a state court order requiring Missouri to use the 2022 election map, which favors Republicans in six of the eight districts but preserves a key seat for Democrats.
Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson criticized the court's use of emergency dockets to make quick decisions, especially in cases that could harm the public.
What's confirmed
- The Supreme Court on Tuesday handed the Trump administration an interim victory in its ongoing immigration crackdown, clearing the way for officials to continue deporting illegal aliens to third countries while the justices consider a legal challenge to the policy.
- Fort Wayne, IN Legal News, Information & Blogs The Supreme Court on Tuesday cleared the Trump administration to resume deporting migrants to countries other than their own while the justices prepare to decide whether the policy violates federal law and constitutional due process protections.
- The unsigned September 29 order puts on hold a federal court judgment that required migrants facing removal to a third country to receive meaningful notice and an opportunity to raise fears of persecution or torture before they are sent there.
- On appeal, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit largely upheld Murphy’s decision on September 18.
- John Sauer argued that the lower court ruling interfered with an important immigration enforcement tool and created logistical and diplomatic problems.
- The administration argues that the lower courts imposed procedures beyond those required by federal law and made third-country removals harder to carry out, particularly when a migrant’s home country refuses to accept the person.
- More than 25,000 migrants have been deported to at least 29 third countries under the administration’s policy, according to a tally maintained by human rights groups.
- The Supreme Court first intervened in the dispute in June 2025, when it stayed Murphy’s preliminary injunction restricting third-country removals.
- Since then, Murphy entered a final judgment, and the First Circuit largely upheld it, giving the justices an appellate ruling on the policy to review.
- The justices also agreed to hear the dispute in December, moving the case from the Court’s emergency docket into a full review of the policy’s legality.
- Tuesday’s order is not a ruling that the policy is legal.
What's still developing
- The Supreme Court delivered two significant immigration victories for President Donald Trump, allowing the administration to terminate temporary protected status for over a million migrants and restrict asylum claims at the US-Mexico border.
- The Trump administration returned to the Supreme Court last week, arguing that those requirements were interfering with its ability to carry out removals and disrupting sensitive diplomatic negotiations with countries willing to accept deportees.
- "The judgment does not require release from detention, prohibit third-country removals, or undo existing arrangements," the challengers argued in their response.
- "For the third time in 18 months, the Supreme Court has been called upon to stay the same local district judge’s campaign to halt the Trump Administration from removing illegal aliens including many of the worst-of-the-worst criminals to countries willing to receive them," White House spokeswoman Lauren Bis told Fox News Digital.
- The high court also agreed to hear the administration's challenge, treating its emergency application as a petition for review and ordering the parties to prepare for arguments during the court's December session.
- The decision gives the administration the immediate relief it sought as it presses ahead with third-country removals, even as the Supreme Court has yet to decide whether the policy remains.
- Attorney General Todd Blanche had vowed to take the case to the Supreme Court, asserting that the policy was "an entirely legal and invaluable tool to stem the tide of illegal immigration." Under the Trump administration, immigration officials have pursued a policy of deporting illegal aliens whose home countries will not accept them to third countries that will.
- The Court gave no explanation for granting the stay.
- Under the guidance, officials can carry out a third-country removal without additional procedures when the receiving government provides assurances against persecution or torture that the State Department considers credible.
- The justices, with the court’s three liberals dissenting, granted an emergency request filed by the government seeking to block an appeals court ruling that said the current process is unlawful because the affected people are not given a proper chance to raise concerns about safety risks in violation of federal immigration law.
- In the brief unsigned order, the court also said it would hear oral arguments in December and issue a definitive ruling on the legal questions raised in the litigation.
- The Supreme Court last year allowed the policy to move forward after it was blocked by lower courts at an earlier stage of the litigation.