Supreme Court Makes It Harder for Immigrants to Challenge Deportations

The Supreme Court just defined the tight window under which noncitizens can challenge their deportation for fear of torture.

The case of Riley v. Bondi began long before Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown. In January 2021, an immigration judge blocked the final administrative review order, or FARO, to remove Pierre Riley, a Jamaican immigrant who overstayed a tourist visa, on the grounds that he feared gang violence in Jamaica.

That judge then sent Riley to what’s known as a “withholding-only” proceeding, where the only issue is whether a noncitizen can be removed from the United States. At this proceeding, Riley’s removal was deferred under the U.N. Convention Against Torture, or CAT, which prevents immigrants from being removed to countries where they may be subjected to physical harm or imprisonment.

The DHS then appealed to the Board of Immigration Appeals, or BIA, which decided he could be removed and to enforce the FARO for his removal. Three days later, Riley filed a petition to appeal the FARO with the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals, but the court found that he had failed to do so within the 30-day deadline after the FARO was first issued, dismissing his petition and claiming that the deadline was “jurisdictional,” meaning that it must be strictly enforced.

The Supreme Court was charged with determining whether Riley’s challenge came too late, and whether the deadline was “jurisdictional.”

In a 5–4 decision Thursday, the high court found that Riley had in fact missed his window to challenge his removal. In his majority opinion, Justice Samuel Alito held “that a BIA order in a withholding-only proceeding is not a ‘final order of removal,’ and therefore the 30-day filing deadline cannot be satisfied by filing a petition for review within 30 days of the BIA’s withholding-only order.”

The “FARO is the final order of removal in this case, and withholding-only proceedings do not disturb the finality of an otherwise final order of removal,” Alito wrote. He was joined in full by Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Clarence Thomas, Amy Coney Barrett, and Brett Kavanaugh.

In a dissenting opinion, Justice Sonia Sotomayor, who was joined by fellow liberal Justices Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson, challenged the majority’s logic, finding that the removal order only became final when the board denied his appeal under CAT.

“Should Riley have appealed the Board’s order denying deferral of removal before the Board issued it? The answer ought to be easy. Yet the majority today renders the statute incoherent, holding that Riley should have appealed the order one year and three months before the Board entered it,” she wrote.

“One should not be required to appeal an order before it exists,” she wrote. “Incomprehensibly, the Court disagrees.”

“Time will tell whether the Court will extend its illogic beyond politically disfavored noncitizens,” Sotomayor wrote, adding later, “Today’s decision is the rare holding that benefits no one.”

Conservative Justice Neil Gorsuch also joined the dissent, except for one section outlining the “untold damage to basic principles of finality and judicial review.”

The court also determined that the 30-day filing deadline was merely a mandatory claims-processing rule, not “jurisdictional,” and vacated the Fourth Circuit’s ruling and remanded it back to the lower court.

Thursday’s ruling could come in handy to Trump, who has worked to deport as many people as possible as fast as he can—regardless of what circumstances await them in their destination.

The GOP’s new Homeland Security funding bill would require “all non-detained migrants” to wear GPS tracking devices, a demoralizing “alternative to detention” that is part of the Trump administration’s continuing immigration crackdown, according to Migrant Insider.

“Non-detained” includes asylum-seekers and even students. Tracking millions of innocent people like endangered animals will be a tall task, a challenge that will likely go to another seedy private surveillance corporation.

This is not the first time DHS and ICE have used tracking devices on nondetained immigrants. Last year, ICE issued 3,000 wrist-worn “Veri-Watches” to keep constant tabs on asylum-seekers.

“These wrist-worn GPS monitoring devices would supplement existing [alternative-to-detention] capabilities for noncitizens who qualify for the non-detained docket in a less obtrusive manner, increasing compliance for participants moving through the immigration process,” ICE Enforcement and Removal Operations executive associate director Corey Price said in 2023 when announcing the tracking program.

Those wrist-worn trackers resembled smart watches without any personal use capabilities. ICE agents could perform live location monitoring, facial recognition, and messaging. It’s likely that this most recent development will use similar technologies, if not the same.

This draconian, dehumanizing invasion of privacy isn’t the only alarming development in this funding cycle. The appropriations bill will also include yet another ban on diversity, equity, and inclusion funding at DHS and $4.4 billion for ICE custody operations, and it bans local law enforcement from decreasing their 287(g) agreements with ICE. This bill is a dream come true for the likes of White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller and border czar Tom Homan. It is expected to pass through the House and the Senate.

Just eight days out from the Senate GOP’s self-imposed (read: Donald Trump–imposed) July 4 deadline to pass the president’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act, the Senate parliamentarian has dealt a blow to the sweeping plan, which cuts taxes for corporations and the rich and pays for it with massive slashes to entitlement programs, most notably Medicaid.

As Parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough gives the proposed budget reconciliation a “Byrd bath”—so called because it winnows out nonbudgetary provisions, under what’s known as the Byrd Rule—she has scrubbed the bill of some of its grime.

According to a Thursday morning press release from the Senate Budget Committee ranking member and Democratic Senator Jeff Merkley, the Senate parliamentarian has spiked numerous provisions, which will now have to surmount a 60-vote hurdle in order to remain in the bill as written—something that has zero chance of happening.

These nixed provisions would have significantly restricted health care access for individuals who are not citizens and limited states’ ability to administer Medicaid. They included bans on federal funding for Medicaid for certain groups—such as for those whose citizenship status was not immediately verified and people seeking gender-affirming care. Others would have limited states’ ability to tax health care providers to fund Medicaid and revoked Medicare eligibility for refugees, asylum-seekers, and people with temporary protected status.

With these provisions and others having gotten the chopping block—and more potentially on the way—Republican lawmakers are none too pleased.

“How is it that an unelected swamp bureaucrat, who was appointed by Harry Reid over a decade ago, gets to decide what can and cannot go in President Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill?” tweeted Representative Greg Steube, who advocated for Vice President JD Vance to overrule MacDonough in a message retweeted by fellow GOP Representative Andy Biggs. Alabama Senator Tommy Tuberville decried “the WOKE Senate Parliamentarian” along similar lines.

Yesterday, Republican Representative Jeff Van Drew, lamenting that MacDonough “has already blocked major parts of House Republicans’ One Big Beautiful Bill,” tweeted, “It doesn’t have to be this way. The Republicans senators are not required to adhere to anything she says.”

Democrats, on the other hand, are applauding the setback to Trump’s agenda. “Republicans are scrambling to rewrite parts of this bill to continue advancing their families lose, and billionaires win agenda,” said Merkley, “but Democrats stand ready to fully scrutinize any changes and ensure the Byrd Rule is enforced.”

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on Thursday continued his massive public meltdown about the leaked Pentagon report that undermined Donald Trump’s claims about the strikes on Iran.

Hegseth opened the press conference by accusing reporters of “hunting for scandals,” causing them to “miss historic moments.”

“How many stories have been written about how hard it is to, I don’t know, fly a plane for 36 hours? Has MSNBC done that story? Has Fox?” Hegseth demanded.

He later sniped at reporters that “it’s like in your DNA and in your blood to cheer against Trump.” “Let’s take half-truths, spun information, leaked information, and then spin it, spin it in every way we can to try to cause doubt and manipulate the public mind,” he ranted.

While taking questions, Hegseth snapped at Fox News’s Jennifer Griffin while struggling to dodge a question about Fordo, one of Iran’s most important nuclear enrichment sites, which Hegseth claimed had been completely destroyed by the U.S. strike last week.

“Do you have certainty that all of the highly enriched uranium was inside the Fordo mountain?” asked Griffin. “Because there were satellite photos that showed more than a dozen trucks there two days in advance. Are you certain that none of the highly enriched uranium was moved?”

CNN reported that two sources familiar with the Defense Intelligence Agency’s early assessment said that Iran’s stockpile of enriched uranium had not been destroyed, and another source said that it had been moved out of the sites ahead of the U.S. strikes.

“Of course we’re watching every single aspect,” Hegseth said. “But Jennifer, you’ve been about the worst. The one who misrepresents the most intentionally.”

Griffin, who is Fox’s chief national security correspondent at the Pentagon, looked taken aback. She explained that she’d been at the Pentagon Saturday night, where she’d accurately reported on the B-2 bombers and the ventilation shaft, which had been likely an entrance for a “bunker buster” bomb at Fordo.

“So I take issue with that,” Griffin concluded.

Hegseth attacked another reporter who asked about CIA Director John Ratcliffe’s statement Wednesday that “new intelligence from a historically reliable and accurate source/method that several key Iranian nuclear facilities were destroyed and would have to be rebuilt over the course of years.”

“Don’t you think we need to see that?” asked the second reporter.

“Do you have a top secret clearance, sir?” Hegseth snipped.

“Eventually, the American public is going to want to see it,” the reporter replied.

Hegseth practically begged reporters to stop covering the leaked assessment, arguing that there were more patriotic things to be doing.

“We’re urging caution about premising entire stories on biased leaks to biased publications trying to make something look bad. How about we take a beat? Recognize first the success of our warriors, hold them up, tell their stories, celebrate that. Wave an American flag. Be proud of what we accomplished,” he said.

Trump applauded Hegseth in a post on Truth Social. “One of the greatest, most professional, and most ‘confirming’ News Conferences I have ever seen! The Fake News should fire everyone involved in this Witch Hunt, and apologize to our great warriors, and everyone else!” Trump wrote.

The U.S. president is calling for the end of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s corruption trial.

In a rambling, 349-word Truth Social post Wednesday night, Donald Trump claimed that the Israeli leader shouldn’t have to face the music for alleged bribery, fraud, and breach of trust, since “there is nobody in Israel’s History that fought harder or more competently” than Netanyahu. Instead, he wrote, the trial should be “CANCELLED, IMMEDIATELY.”

“I was shocked to hear that the State of Israel, which has just had one of its Greatest Moments in History, and is strongly led by Bibi Netanyahu, is continuing its ridiculous Witch Hunt against their Great War Time Prime Minister!” Trump wrote, referring to Netanyahu as a “warrior.” “Bibi and I just went through HELL together, fighting a very tough and brilliant longtime enemy of Israel, Iran, and Bibi could not have been better, sharper, or stronger in his LOVE for the incredible Holy Land.”

Trump used the space to accuse Iran of being on the brink of nuclear armament, claiming that Netanyahu had conducted “a complete elimination of potentially one of the biggest and most powerful Nuclear Weapons anywhere in the World, and it was going to happen, SOON!”

“Despite all of this, I just learned that Bibi has been summoned to Court on Monday for the continuation of this long running, (He has been going through this ‘Horror Show’ since May of 2020—Unheard of! This is the first time a sitting Israeli Prime Minister has ever been on trial.), politically motivated case, ‘concerning cigars, a Bugs Bunny doll, and numerous other unfair charges’ in order to do him great harm,” Trump continued. “Such a WITCH HUNT, for a man who has given so much, is unthinkable to me.”

Netanyahu appeared to appreciate the sentiment, thanking Trump in a separate post “for your moving support for me and your tremendous support for Israel.” But other Israeli politicians didn’t take kindly to the intervention: Opposition leader Yair Lapid said that Trump should not “intervene in a legal process of an independent state”.

Trump’s casual disregard for the rule of law should come as no surprise considering his own history facing the court system. Trump has been sued countless times, but has grabbed the national spotlight over the last few years when he was found liable for sexually abusing writer E. Jean Carroll, when he was convicted as a felon for falsifying records to hide hush money payments to porn star Stormy Daniels, when he was ordered to pay out hundreds of millions for defrauding U.S. banks, and when he was charged in connection to two separate conspiracies to unroot the result of the 2020 presidential election.

Those all dramatically came to a close when Trump was inaugurated on January 20, in light of a law preventing sitting presidents from being charged with a crime.

Donald Trump’s administration is interested in placing the blame for a leaked Pentagon report about Iran on anyone but themselves. Now, they’ve started pointing fingers at members of Congress, and even threatening them, too.

Fox News’s Laura Ingraham asked Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche Wednesday night what would happen if it turned out that a lawmaker had leaked an early assessment from the Defense Intelligence Agency that determined that Iran’s nuclear capabilities hadn’t actually been destroyed—undermining Trump’s claim that they’d been “completely and fully obliterated.”

“Well, I mean you tell me Laura. If a member of Congress, very few of whom are shared this very sensitive information, based on the reporting, shortly after information was sent to members of Congress, this leaked, if it was a member of Congress himself or herself who leaked this, are they immune from criminal liability for putting the safety of the United States of America at risk? Nowhere that I read,” a tongue-tied Blanche replied.

“So you would say that that would not be covered under the immunity clause of the Constitution? That behavior?” Ingraham pressed.

“I’m not aware of an immunity clause that protected anybody in this country from disclosing classified, top secret information, or even higher information to The New York Times. If such a statute exists, it has not been presented to me,” Blanche said.

Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth spent much of Wednesday downplaying the results of the report and raging at members of the press, instead of taking any accountability for the lies and the leaks. At no point did they mention that the report had been sent to Congress. Now, it seems they’ve set eyes on a new scapegoat.

On Thursday, Hegseth, and other top national security officials are expected to give their first briefing to senators on the U.S. strike on three Iranian nuclear facilities.

This isn’t the first time that the Trump administration has threatened legal action against members of Congress. The government previously said it was open to arresting lawmakers who participated in anti-ICE demonstrations—it’ll just keep baselessly claiming that they assaulted immigration officers.

MAGA Republican groups are calling for the deportation of New York City Democratic mayoral nominee Zohran Mamdani.

On Wednesday, the day after the 33-year-old democratic socialist handily secured his party’s nomination, the New York Young Republican Club, or NYYRC, took to X, begging Trump immigration advisers Stephen Miller and Tom Homan to revoke Mamdani’s U.S. citizenship and deport him.

“The radical Zohran Mamdani cannot be allowed to destroy our beloved city of New York,” the NYYRC’s post states. “The Communist Control Act lets President Trump revoke @ZohranKMamdani’s citizenship and promptly deport him. The time for action is now—@StephenM and @RealTomHoman, New York is counting on you.”

In the replies, the X account for the Republicans for National Renewal tweeted, “We fully support this initiative. Communist radical Zohran Mamdani should be remigrated as soon as possible,” and the John Birch Society approvingly posted a “100” emoji.

The message was reposted by the accounts of numerous conservative figures, including Gavin Wax, who was formerly the NYYRC president as well as the chief of staff for recently departed Federal Communications Commissioner Nathan Simington, who has recommended Wax as his successor.

Also floating the vile idea was the Notre Dame College Republicans group, which urged “DHS to deport (Mamdani) entirely,” as well as Justin Lee of the conservative religious journal First Things and self-ascribed “wartime conservative” Will Chamberlain, among other MAGA social media users.

Mamdani has been on the receiving end of such odious and absurd attacks before. Earlier this month, Republican New York City Councilwoman Vickie Paladino called for Mamdani to be deported during a tirade in which she cited an NYYRC post that said he “shouldn’t have been allowed into the United States in the first place” and called to “remigrate him.”

At the time, Mamdani responded by calling Paladino’s remarks “hateful rhetoric” and a “reflection” of Trump’s “authoritarian administration,” according to the New York Daily News.

“But let me be clear,” Mamdani continued. “New York belongs to all of us. The MAGA extremists may try to divide us, but the movement we’ve built is proof of the enduring promise of this city. And we’re not going anywhere.”

New York City’s plutocrats are coalescing around defamed Mayor Eric Adams in a frantic, last-ditch effort to stop recently victorious Democratic nominee Zohran Mamdani from taking office.

Semafor has reported that the city’s wealthiest citizens are throwing their money and support behind Adams after Mamdani thoroughly trounced their first vessel of centrist neoliberalism, former Governor Andrew Cuomo.

Kathy Wylde, CEO of Partnership for New York City, noted that all of these rich guys are unsurprisingly “struggling to understand the implications of Mamdani’s victory,” because he accurately touched on “the financial insecurity young people feel and their anger that the established political class has done nothing to fix it. It’s not an endorsement of socialism but rather a rejection of the status quo, which threatens to bring on the kind of political instability that business hates.”

Now these businessmen are casting Adams as their last hope. Last month his popularity was at 20 percent, an all-time low.

“There is going to be overwhelming support in the business community to rally around Adams,” said Richard Farley, a partner at Kramer Levin Naftalis & Frankel LLP who said he’s organizing a fundraiser for the mayor and has been speaking with some of Cuomo’s biggest donors. “This will be a street fight all the way to November.”

Trump-supporting billionaire Bill Ackman (who wasted $500,000 on Cuomo’s campaign) also joined in on the Mamdani derangement syndrome, ominously positing that he found someone to challenge in the general election.

“I have a great idea on NYC. I will share it as soon as I can. I was a bit depressed when I woke up this morning, but I am now optimistic. We are looking into legal issues,” Ackman wrote on X the morning after Mamdani’s victory. “Legal issues concerning the potential for another candidate to run now. Not me.” The New York Post reports that Ackman will line up behind Adams, but the billionaire says it’s fake news and he’s still undecided.

While predictable, it’s troubling that the ultrarich, from Bloomberg aides to Bill Ackman, are more opposed to a young, charismatic candidate who identifies as a democratic socialist than they are to two candidates who are embroiled in shameful scandals, with Cuomo having countless sexual assault allegations and ethics violations, and Adams being federally indicted on charges of bribery, wire fraud, and soliciting political donations from a number of foreign nationals connected to the Turkish government. Expect more libel and Islamophobia all the way to November.

Trump has fired off his first two social media posts about Zohran Mamdani, the newly elected Democratic nominee for mayor of New York City. Until Wednesday afternoon, the president had been mum on Mamdani, who won the Democratic primary handily Tuesday evening against front-runner and former Mayor Andrew Cuomo.

On the campaign trail, the 33-year-old progressive proudly styled himself as “Donald Trump’s worst nightmare, as a progressive, Muslim immigrant who actually fights for the things that I believe in.” During his victory speech, Mamdani vowed, if elected, to use his power to “reject Donald Trump’s fascism, to stop ICE agents from deporting our neighbors, and to govern our city as a model for the Democratic Party.”

Though the president has in the past been known to concoct catchy epithets and lines of attack against his opponents, Trump’s reaction to Mamdani fell flat—amounting to stale red-baiting and an absurd attempt to argue that Mamdani is not the sharp, telegenic candidate that even many of his ideological foes have recognized him to be.

“It’s finally happened,” Trump posted on Truth Social Wednesday afternoon, “the Democrats have crossed the line.”

Calling the democratic socialist candidate “a 100% Communist Lunatic,” Trump wrote, “We’ve had Radical Lefties before, but this is getting a little ridiculous,” before fixating on Mamdani’s style, writing, quite unconvincingly, “He looks TERRIBLE, his voice is grating, he’s not very smart.” (One odd part about this line of attack is that Mamdani, like Trump, is rarely pictured not wearing a suit.)

Trump also tried to lump Mamdani in with some of MAGA’s bêtes noires—noting that he is endorsed by Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and other progressive lawmakers. Trump added that Senator Chuck Schumer is “groveling over him.” (On Wednesday, Schumer congratulated but stopped short of officially endorsing Mamdani.)

Moments later, Trump shared a follow-up post, in which he daydreamed about a future Democratic presidential ticket headed by progressive Representatives Jasmine Crockett and Ocasio-Cortez. And Mamdani was there too—“Added together with our future Communist Mayor of New York City, Zohran Mamdani, and our Country is really SCREWED!” Trump wrote.

Prior to Trump’s social media posts, the most notable reaction to Mamdani’s victory from the White House had been that of Trump adviser Stephen Miller, who accounted for Mamdami’s victory and vast popularity by invoking the white nationalist “great replacement theory.”