The Supreme Court lifted a lower court ruling placing limits on immigration raids in Los Angeles in a ruling on Monday.
The Supreme Court decision was 6-3, with the three remaining liberal justices dissenting.
The decision gives President Donald Trump more leeway as he continues his widespread effort to deport illegal immigrants from the United States.
Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem applied for a stay of the July order by the District Court for the Central District of California for the president to stop targeting the Los Angeles region for deportations.
Chief Justice Brett Kavanaugh concurred in the grant of the application noting that the Immigration and Nationality Act authorizes
immigration officers to ‘interrogate any alien or person believed to be an alien as to his right to be or to remain in the United States.’
He further noted that illegal immigrants made up about ten percent of the population in the Los Angeles region, which was a reasonable reason why it was prioritized by immigration authorities.
‘Immigration stops based on reasonable suspicion of illegal presence have been an important component of U. S. immigration enforcement for decades, across several presidential administrations,’ he wrote.
U.S. Supreme Court justices pose for their group portrait at the Supreme Court in Washington
The U.S. Supreme Court building in Washington, DC
Kavanaugh stressed the limitations of the judiciary’s ability to set immigration policy, but rather the president of the United States.
‘Especially in an immigration case like this one, it is also important to stress the proper role of the Judiciary. The Judiciary does not set immigration policy or decide enforcement priorities,’ he wrote.
Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote the dissent arguing that the administration’s deportation effort in Los Angeles had ‘likely violated’ the Forth Amendment’s requirements for reasonable suspicion.
She cited many examples of instances where the U.S. government was aggressively targeting illegal immigrants, arguing that law enforcement was unjustly targeting individuals by their race, place of work, and location.
‘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,’ she wrote. ‘Rather than stand idly by while our constitutional freedoms are lost, I dissent.’
