Story Highlights
- The D.C. Circuit ruled 2-1 on June 23 to allow nationwide expansion of “expedited removal,” reversing a district court block from August 2025
- The policy allows deportation without a hearing before an immigration judge for anyone who cannot prove continuous U.S. presence of at least two years
- Judges Justin Walker and Neomi Rao, both Trump appointees, formed the majority; Judge Robert Wilkins, an Obama appointee, dissented
- The ruling means ICE is not constitutionally required to inform individuals of the two-year continuous-presence exemption that could shield them from expedited removal
What Happened
The case, formally titled Make the Road New York v. Mullin, centers on a long-standing immigration enforcement tool called expedited removal, which Congress created in 1996 to allow rapid deportation without a hearing before an immigration judge. For nearly three decades, the tool was used almost exclusively near the border, applying to people apprehended within 100 miles of a land crossing and within 14 days of entry. On January 21, 2025, in one of the earliest actions of his second term, President Trump signed a directive expanding expedited removal to its full statutory limit, covering any undocumented immigrant anywhere in the United States who cannot demonstrate continuous physical presence in the country for at least two years.
Immigrant rights organization Make the Road New York, represented by the American Civil Liberties Union, sued to block the expansion, arguing it violated constitutional due process protections by failing to give individuals meaningful notice of the two-year exemption that could protect them from removal, and that implementation had produced widespread errors including wrongful deportations of people who had actually lived in the country longer than two years. U.S. District Judge Jia Cobb agreed, issuing a stay in August 2025 that found the expansion “likely violated due process” and blocked it from taking effect nationwide.
On June 23, 2026, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit reversed that block in a 2-1 decision. Judge Justin Walker, a Trump appointee writing for the majority, concluded that the written policy directives governing expedited removal satisfy due process on their face because individuals are informed they are being placed in removal proceedings and given a chance to respond, including by demonstrating two years of continuous presence. Walker wrote that the evidence of implementation problems presented by Make the Road — including referral errors, rushed interviews, and communication barriers — did not establish that the underlying policy directives themselves violated the law, even if individual officers made mistakes in applying them.
Judge Neomi Rao, also a Trump appointee, concurred in the judgment but wrote separately to argue the case should have been dismissed entirely at the threshold, contending that Congress had given the executive branch unreviewable discretion over expedited removal policy and had barred broad judicial remedies altogether. Judge Robert Wilkins, an Obama appointee, dissented sharply, writing that “due process does not wait for a final removal order to be issued before it is owed.” Wilkins specifically challenged the majority’s reasoning that the government has no obligation to inform individuals about the two-year exemption, warning that immigration officers’ ability to accurately determine how long someone has lived in the country during a rushed expedited screening is inherently unreliable, with potentially life-altering consequences for people wrongly removed.
Why It Matters
This ruling reaches the heart of one of the Constitution’s most basic guarantees: that the government cannot deprive a person of liberty without due process of law. The central legal question was not whether Congress can authorize expedited removal — it plainly can and has for decades — but whether the specific way the Trump administration implemented its nationwide expansion provides individuals a constitutionally adequate opportunity to be heard before being removed from the country, potentially permanently separating them from homes, jobs, and families built over years.
The court’s holding that due process does not require the government to inform people of an exemption that could protect them is significant and, as Judge Wilkins’s dissent makes clear, contested even among federal judges. There is a meaningful difference between a process that is technically available on paper and one that functions reliably in practice. If immigration officers conducting rushed field interviews are not required to ask how long someone has lived in the country, and individuals are not informed they could qualify for protection by proving residency, the practical opportunity to be heard may exist in name only for many people facing removal.
This case also illustrates how quickly the composition of the federal judiciary can determine outcomes in cases testing the limits of executive power. The same set of facts and legal arguments produced opposite conclusions from Trump-appointed and Obama-appointed judges on the same panel, underscoring how consequential judicial appointments have become in shaping the practical scope of constitutional protections for due process, regardless of one’s views on immigration enforcement policy itself.
For the rule of law more broadly, this ruling will likely be cited in future cases testing the boundaries of executive authority over immigration enforcement, and it sets a significant precedent regarding how much factual or implementation evidence is sufficient to overturn a facially neutral government policy on due process grounds.
Economic and Global Context
The practical scale of this ruling is considerable. Expedited removal can now be applied to any of the millions of undocumented immigrants living throughout the United States, not merely those apprehended near the border, representing one of the most significant operational expansions of immigration enforcement authority in decades. Labor economists have noted in related research that large-scale immigration enforcement actions historically produce measurable disruptions to local economies in affected communities, including reduced economic activity, decreased workforce participation, and effects extending to U.S.-born workers in addition to the immigrants directly targeted.
The ruling also arrives amid an administration push, including a hiring surge of new immigration judges following the removal of more than 100 sitting judges, reportedly including some who resisted pressure to support mass deportation outcomes. This judicial reshuffling, combined with expanded expedited removal authority that bypasses immigration courts altogether for many cases, represents a broader structural shift in how immigration enforcement decisions are made and reviewed across the federal system.
Internationally, the policy intersects with ongoing diplomatic relationships between the United States and countries of origin for many affected individuals, as expanded deportation flows require coordination on documentation, repatriation logistics, and, in some cases, strained bilateral relations when receiving countries resist large-scale returns.
Implications
Make the Road New York has indicated it is exploring next legal steps, which could include seeking an emergency stay from the Supreme Court or pursuing further appeals, meaning this ruling, while significant, may not be the final word on the policy’s constitutionality.
For immigrant communities nationwide, the immediate practical effect is that expedited removal proceedings without a hearing before an immigration judge are now legally available against any undocumented individual who cannot immediately demonstrate two years of continuous U.S. presence, regardless of where in the country they are encountered.
For civil rights organizations and immigration attorneys, the ruling will likely intensify efforts to document implementation failures in real time, building a factual record that could support future legal challenges even within the legal framework the D.C. Circuit has now upheld.
For policymakers in Congress, this case underscores the broader, unresolved question of how much constitutional process is required before the government can deprive someone of liberty through deportation — a question with significant implications for how Congress might choose to legislate more specific procedural protections going forward, should it choose to act.
Sources
“D.C. Appeals Court Greenlights Trump’s Expedited Deportations”
