AARP v. Trump: The Decision is Out!
The decision is a mere 8 pages long, and with those big big SCOTUS margins. Still, it’s not that simple to summarize. Let me try.
On April 17, 2025, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas denied a motion for a temporary restraining order (TRO) against summary removal of plaintiffs pursuant to the Alien Enemies Act.
HOURS later, plaintiffs were informed that they would be removed “tonight or tomorrow.” Indeed, some were transported to an airport that day, although they were later returned to the detention facility.
Plaintiffs immediately sought a TRO. When it wasn’t forthcoming, they went to the 5th Circuit for relief. And they sought a temporary injunction from SCOTUS itself.
SCOTUS intervened and enjoined plaintiffs’ removal. In the meantime, the 5th Circuit rejected the appeal as untimely–saying plaintiffs did not give the District Court enough time to respond. In the opinion today, SCOTUS disagrees, noting the district court’s nonaction had the “practical effect of refusing an injunction to detainees facing an imminent threat of severe, irreparable harm.”
SCOTUS cites its own AEA decision from earlier in April (JGG).
[I]n J. G. G., this Court explained—with all nine Justices agreeing—that “AEA detainees must receive notice . . . that they are subject to removal under the Act . . . within a reasonable time and in such a manner as will allow them to actually seek habeas relief ” before removal. 604 U. S., at ____ (slip op., at 3). In order to “actually seek habeas relief,” a detainee must have sufficient time and information to reasonably be able to contact counsel, file a petition, and pursue appropriate relief.
Without giving a timeline, SCOTUS notes that AEA claims should be adjudicated “expeditiously.” After all, the Court noted, the government has said, in other litigation, that once folks are at CECOT there is no way to get them back even if the removal was in error (citing Kilmar).
As for the plaintiffs themselves, SCOTUS writes: “notice roughly 24 hours before removal, devoid of information about how to exercise due process rights to contest that removal, surely does not pass muster.”
In the end, SCOTUS remanded to the 5th Circuit, directing the court to consider:
(1) all the normal preliminary injunction factors, including likelihood of success on the merits, as to the named plaintiffs’ underlying habeas claims that the AEA does not authorize their removal pursuant to the President’s March 14, 2025, Proclamation, and (2) the issue of what notice is due, as to the putative class’s due process claims against summary removal.
As for the government, SCOTUS enjoined them “from removing the named plaintiffs or putative class members in this action under the AEA pending order by the Fifth Circuit and disposition of the petition for a writ of certiorari, if such writ is timely sought…”
-KitJ