BIG UPDATE: Supreme Court granted a temporary stay of the 5th Circuit ruling that would have allowed the Texas immigration law to go into effect.
The temporary stay is valid until next Wednesday.
Previous reporting…
The 5th Circuit ordered a Texas immigration law to go into effect, overturning a lower court blocking it.
President Joe Biden’s DOJ immediately filed an application to SCOTUS to vacate the preliminary injunction.
Senate Bill 4 allows state law enforcement to arrest and detain illegal immigrants who cross the border outside of legal ports of entry.
On February 29, U.S. District Judge David Ezra’s preliminary injunction halted the law because it conflicts with federal law and violates the supremacy clause.
Ezra also wrote that “If allowed to proceed, SB 4 could open the door to each state passing its own version of immigration laws.”
But the 5th Circuit granted a stay on the decision. The court did not explain its reasoning.
The court also held the order for seven days to give the DOJ time to file with SCOTUS.
The DOJ wants SCOTUS to do something ASAP.
If SCOTUS does not intervene, the law goes into effect on March 10:
Absent this Court’s intervention, SB4 will go into effect at 12:01 a.m. on March 10, 2024, profoundly altering the status quo that has existed between the United States and the States in the context of immigration for almost 150 years. And despite the 114-page district court opinion detailing multiple independent reasons why the law is invalid, that disruptive change would occur without any reasoned ruling by the court of appeals. Instead, by purporting to grant an “administrative” stay but deferring action on the underlying stay motion indefinitely, the court effectively granted a stay pending appeal without engaging in the necessary consideration of likelihood of success on the merits, the balance of harms, or the public interest. Each of those factors makes clear that no stay is warranted here.
Well, maybe Biden’s administration should do something about the border. We know they have not done anything. The border patrol chief under Biden until last year never talked to Biden or “Border Czar” Kamala Harris during his time.
The Biden administration claimed the law “conflicts with federal law in multiple respects.” One reason is because it stops the country “from speaking ‘with one voice’ in matters involving foreign affairs.”
Okay…
One of the shortest paragraphs addresses harm to Texas:
Texas faces no remotely comparable harms from the preliminary injunction. Vacating the stay will merely preserve the longstanding status quo while the litigation proceeds, just as the relevant provisions of the state law in Arizona were enjoined throughout the litigation in that case. See 567 U.S. at 394. Both the law and the equities overwhelmingly favor the same result here.
That’s the reason? “Vacating the stay will merely preserve the longstanding status quo while the litigation proceeds…”
Has Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar not paid attention to the border news, especially in the last six months?
Don’t answer that. I do not expect the political elites to know anything outside their bubble.
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