The U.S. Supreme Court made a significant ruling on Thursday, stating that illegal immigrants waiting on the Mexican side of the southern border cannot claim a legal right to asylum processing or border inspections until they actually cross the boundary line into the United States. This decision reverses a lower court ruling that had deemed the federal government’s border “metering” policies unlawful.
Background of the Case
The case, Mullin v. Al Otro Lado, centered on a policy introduced in 2016 under which U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials managed historic surges of migrants by limiting how many people could be processed each day at land ports of entry. To enforce the cap, border agents stood at the international boundary line, keeping excess applicants on the Mexican side.
The advocacy group Al Otro Lado and several asylum seekers sued in 2017, arguing the policy unlawfully denied migrants their right to seek asylum under the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA). Writing for the majority, Justice Samuel Alito stated that the statutory phrase “arrives in the United States” must be interpreted according to its everyday meaning.
Justice Alito wrote, “In ordinary speech, no one would say that a person ‘arrives in’ a place—for example, a house, a city, or a country—before the person enters that place.” He added that “an alien who is standing in Mexico does not ‘arriv[e] in the United States’ by attempting, and failing, to set foot in this country. An alien ‘arrives in the United States’ only when he crosses the border.”
Implications of the Ruling
The majority opinion, joined by Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Clarence Thomas, Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett, also pointed out that other areas of federal immigration law explicitly mention “attempted” entry, but the asylum and inspection provisions do not. Furthermore, the majority noted that nothing in the law suggests Congress intended for these provisions to apply outside of U.S. territory.
Justice Thomas filed a separate concurring opinion to raise concerns over the lower courts’ use of class-wide declarations, arguing they effectively bypassed federal laws that restrict courts from blocking immigration enforcement operations. Thomas also suggested that forcing the executive branch to allow foreign nationals across the border could infringe upon the president’s inherent constitutional authority to exclude aliens.
In a sharp dissent, Justice Sonia Sotomayor, joined by Justices Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson, argued that the majority’s focus on a single preposition ignored the broader purpose of the American asylum system, which was built to align with international treaties following World War II.
Original reporting: Tampa Free Press — read the source article.
