A federal appeals court ruled Friday that U.S.
immigration officials must offer detainees "a meaningful opportunity to contest" any deportation to countries where they have no ties.The ruling by the Boston-based U.S.
Court of Appeals for the First Circuit marks a setback for the Trump administration's controversial "third-country" deportation policy, which has dropped off some migrants thousands of miles from their country of origin — in some cases sending deportees who hailed from Latin America to sub-Saharan Africa.The appellate court largely upheld a lower court order finding that policy illegal, ruling against Department of Homeland Security rules that allow federal immigration officials to send deportees to so-called "third countries" with little to no notice or opportunity to challenge their deportation.The DHS policy in question, enacted last year, gave officials the power to send migrants to a third country without giving them any notice if that nation gave the State Department blanket assurances that it would not persecute or torture the deportees.
In cases in which third countries do not make such assurances, the policy instructs officials to give detainees some notice.The appeals court affirmed, for the most part, a ruling from U.S.
District Court Judge Brian Murphy, who has repeatedly rebuked the administration's third-country deportation campaign on the basis that it has violated deportees' due process rights."An individual's right to contest removal to a country based on a fear of persecution in that country means little if one does not receive prior notice of the intended removal destination and a meaningful opportunity to contest that destination," the appeals court panel wrote.The National Immigration Litigation Alliance, one....
