Corporate Counsel Daily, Court stays preliminary injunction against ‘third-country removals’, (Jun 24, 2025)
By Jason Albright, J.D.
“Apparently,” said Justice Sotomayor in her dissent, “the Court finds the idea that thousands will suffer violence in farflung locales more palatable than the remote possibility that a District Court exceeded its remedial powers....”
The U.S. Supreme Court has stayed a preliminary injunction, issued by a federal district court in Massachusetts, against the Trump administration’s deportation of immigrants to third-country locations, such as South Sudan, in the face of possible torture. The one-paragraph per curiam order was accompanied by an 18-page dissent by Justice Sotomayor, joined by Justices Kagan and Jackson, arguing that “[w]ithout a showing that a stay is necessary to avoid irreparable harm… this Court’s midstream intervention is inexcusable.”
Preliminary injunction below. On April 18, a federal district court in Massachusetts had granted the plaintiffs’ motion for class certification and for a preliminary injunction, holding that they had shown the government’s process for conducting third-party removals likely violated the Due Process Clause. The injunction required the government to provide noncitizens with a statutorily required written notice in advance of a third-country removal, along with a meaningful opportunity to raise a claim under the Convention Against Torture.
Government’s appeal and application for stay. The government appealed the merits of the preliminary injunction to the First Circuit, where briefing is ongoing. Pending that appeal, the Trump administration sought permission to continue its practice of conducting third-country removals without notice, and both the district court and the First Circuit denied that request. Before the Supreme Court was the administration’s application for an emergency stay of the preliminary injunction, which the Court granted.
Dissent on notice and hearing. In her dissent, Justice Sotomayor observed that, “[i]n the Government’s view, once a noncitizen has been found removable, she can effectively be removed anywhere at any time. That view would render meaningless the countless statutory and regulatory provisions providing for notice and a hearing. See, e.g., 8 U. S. C. §1229(a)(1).”
Probability of torture or killing. The Supreme Court, Sotomayor argued, “has repeatedly affirmed” that “‘the Fifth Amendment entitles aliens to due process of law’ in the context of removal proceedings.” And further, “Congress expressly provided noncitizens with the right not to be removed to a country where they are likely to be tortured or killed. See 8 U. S. C. §1231 note.”
“As this Court has explained,” she continued, the “‘right to be heard before being condemned to suffer grievous loss of any kind... is a principle basic to our society.’”
“There is no evidence in this case,” Justice Sotomayor emphasized, “that the Government ever did determine that the countries it designated (Libya, El Salvador, and South Sudan) ‘w[ould] not torture’ the plaintiffs.”
DHS press release. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) issued a press release following the Court’s order, noting “a legal victory in its efforts to remove the worst-of-the-worst illegal aliens.” According to the agency, “With this decision, DHS can finally exercise its undisputed authority to deport criminal illegal aliens–who are not wanted in their home country–to third countries that have agreed to accept them. This order comes after an activist judge caused Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents and the eight barbaric criminals to be stranded in Djibouti.”
The case is No. 24A1153.
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