Supreme Court overturns earlier ruling and allows illegal immigrant detentions to resume in LA

On Monday, the Supreme Court lifted restrictions imposed by a federal judge on detainers of illegal immigrants in the Los Angeles area, allowing immigration authorities, such as ICE, to rely on general criteria such as speaking Spanish or working in certain professions, as long as they are considered in conjunction with other elements to generate "reasonable suspicion," according to reports from The Hill.

The Trump Administration made this emergency request, describing the earlier injunction as a "straitjacket" that hampered its immigration enforcement efforts with respect to illegal immigration.

The Supreme Court decision

Judge Brett Kavanaugh (the second appointed by President Donald Trump) wrote a 10-page individual concurring opinion, arguing that the plaintiffs probably have no standing to sue and that the Administration would win the case anyway. "To conclude otherwise, this Court would likely have to overrule or significantly narrow two separate lines of precedents,” the judge wrote.

In a dissenting opinion, Judge Sonia Sotomayor, joined by Judges Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson (the other two appointed by Democratic presidents), criticized the decision as “unconscionably irreconcilable with our Nation’s constitutional guarantees.” "That decision is yet another grave misuse of our emergency docket," Sotomayor wrote. "We should not have to live in a country where the Government can seize anyone who looks Latino, speaks Spanish, and appears to work a low wage job. Rather than stand idly by while our constitutional freedoms are lost, I dissent.”