5th Circuit rejects Trump’s mandatoryimmigration detention policy

Robert Stewart, Verite
Louisiana Illuminator

In a long-anticipated decision,
the U.S. 5th Circuit
Court of Appeals in New
Orleans ruled on Thursday
that the Trump administration’s
policy of detaining
some immigrants without
providing them due process
in the form of a bond
hearing is unconstitutional.
A three-judge panel for
the court ruled that people
arrested within the country
on immigration charges
must be given a bond hearing
within 90 days.
The 71-page split decision
sided in favor of three
immigrant men living in
Texas — Ignacio Sosnava
Rodriguez, Alejandro Villegas
Angel and Miguel Angel
Gomez Alvarado — who
had each entered the U.S.
over a decade ago without
legal authorization and who
had successfully challenged
their detention in federal
district courts. The federal
government appealed those
rulings to the 5th Circuit.
The decision overturns a
recent Trump administration
policy requiring that
anyone arrested on immigration
charges, no matter
how long they have been
in the country, be held in
detention rather than given
an opportunity to post
bond. For decades prior to
the policy’s enactment last
year, immigrants who were
already living in the country
at the time of their arrest
— such as the plaintiffs
in this case — were allowed
bond hearings while those
arrested at the border were
detained.