US judge orders Trump administration to provide bond hearings to detained migrants
By Daniel Wiessner
– A federal judge ruled Tuesday that President Donald Trump’s administration cannot impose mandatory detention on thousands of immigrants held by U.S. immigration authorities without giving them the opportunity to be released on bail.
U.S. District Judge Sunshine Sykes in Riverside, California, approved a nationwide group of people who were already living in the United States when they were detained and are legally entitled to a hearing to determine whether they can be released on bail while their deportation cases are pending.
Sykes ruled last week, like dozens of other federal judges, that the Trump administration’s policy adopted in July of denying bail hearings to immigrants detained during U.S. domestic enforcement operations was illegal. While those decisions cover individual immigrants or small groups, Sykes on Tuesday expanded his decision nationwide.
As of last week, nearly 65,000 people were in immigration detention in the United States, according to government data.
The Trump administration has argued that individuals’ differing circumstances should be examined on a case-by-case basis, but Sykes said being denied the right to a bail hearing is a common injury to the class.
“Such widespread injuries can be resolved in one fell swoop upon a determination that the new policy violates (immigrants’) due process rights,” Sykes, an appointee of Democratic President Joe Biden, wrote.
The U.S. Department of Justice and attorneys for the four immigrants who filed the lawsuit did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Under federal immigration law, those “applicants for admission” to the United States are subject to mandatory detention while their cases proceed in immigration courts.
The Trump administration, challenging its long-standing interpretation of the law, said in July that noncitizens already residing in the United States, not just those arriving at a port of entry at the border, could qualify as applicants for admission.
Sykes disagreed in his ruling last week, saying the law draws a clear distinction between existing U.S. residents and newcomers.
(Reporting by Daniel Wiessner in Albany, New York; Editing by Alexia Garamfalvi and Bill Berkrot)
