A federal judge Thursday blocked the Biden administration from exercising a Trump-era policy that allows the U.S. to quickly expel migrants without giving them the chance to apply for asylum.
That provision of U.S. health law, known as Title 42, was first implemented in March 2020 around the start of the coronavirus pandemic. Critics accused the Trump administration of using it as a pretext to effectively shutter the nation’s borders.
The Biden administration, however, renewed the policy last month, when the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced that the measure would stay in effect until the risk of people who aren’t U.S. citizens introducing Covid by crossing the borders with Mexico and Canada “has ceased to be a serious danger to the public health.”
But Washington-based U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan on Thursday granted a preliminary injunction halting the policy, saying the plaintiffs in the case challenging the law have “shown a likelihood of suffering irreparable harm.”
Sullivan’s order will go into effect in 14 days, to give the federal government time to consider an appeal.
The White House did not immediately respond to CNBC’s request for comment on the ruling.
“President Biden should have ended this cruel and lawless policy long ago, and the court was correct to reject it today,” said Omar Jadwat, director of the American Civil Liberties Union’s Immigrants’ Rights Project, in a press release.
