The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Monday vacated a July 2 ruling that had required U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to provide bond hearings within 90 days to immigrants arrested inside the country, according to Mukta Joshi of Mississippi Today.
The earlier July 2 panel decision, written by three judges on the conservative court, held that unjustified detention for an indefinite period would violate the Constitution, Joshi reported.
ICE and Department of Homeland Security officials appealed that judgment and petitioned the full appeals court to rehear the case. The court has scheduled consideration of the petition for September, Joshi wrote.
More than 61,000 immigrants nationwide have filed federal habeas petitions seeking release after ICE stopped routinely providing bond hearings, Joshi reported. Only two federal appeals courts — the 5th and the 8th — have so far upheld the Trump administration’s mandatory detention policy, she added.
Joshi wrote that more than 600 of the habeas petitions come from detainees held in Mississippi, nearly all awaiting action by U.S. District Judge David Bramlette III, who has not decided any of those petitions on their merits. As a result, hundreds of detainees have been held indefinitely, some for more than a year, and Monday’s action will effectively keep them in limbo, Joshi reported.
Jon Ross Myers is the executive editor and publisher of the Mississippi News Network, Mississippi's largest digital only media company. He can be reached at editor@tippahnews.com
