Supreme Court Rejects Cities' Bid to Revive Biden Deportation Postponement Rule

The Supreme Court on Tuesday refused to restore a 2024 Biden-era rule that let immigration judges postpone deportations. The unsigned order in City of Baltimore v. Texas had no noted dissents and left lower court rulings in place.

The decision keeps on hold a policy the Biden administration adopted in 2024 called "administrative closure." The rule gave immigration judges discretion to suspend deportation proceedings so that a crime victim or witness could pursue relief, such as asylum. Immigration judges work for the Justice Department, not the federal judiciary.

Who brought the case?

Texas challenged the rule in June, arguing it was part of what it called the "Biden-Harris Administration's campaign to undermine our immigration laws," as SCOTUSblog reported. President Donald Trump's Justice Department did not contest the lawsuit in court.

In August, three cities with Democrat mayors—Baltimore, New Haven, Connecticut, and Columbus, Ohio—filed an emergency motion to intervene and defend the federal policy. The immigration advocacy group Centro Legal de la Raza joined them. The mayors involved are Brandon Scott of Baltimore, Justin Elicker of New Haven and Andrew Ginther of Columbus.

Joshua Salzman of the liberal group Democracy Forward argued against permitting the consent agreement. Democracy Forward has represented dozens of lawsuits against the Trump administration; its chairman is Democrat election lawyer Marc Elias.

What did the lower courts decide?

U.S. District Judge Reed O'Connor sided with Texas and rejected the cities on standing grounds. The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals then denied their request to block the consent judgment while their appeal continued.

The practical effect is that the cities lacked a legal foothold to step into the case and defend the rule themselves.

What happens next?

On Oct. 9, the challengers made an emergency appeal to the Supreme Court. They called the policy shift "egregious collusion" between the Justice Department and Texas. The Court's rejection of that application means the lower court rulings stand and the administrative closure policy remains unavailable through this litigation path.

For now, the 2024 rule stays unenforced, and the cities' legal options narrow to continuing their appeal without interim relief.

The takeaway: the Supreme Court let stand rulings that blocked Democrat-led cities from defending a Biden deportation-postponement rule the Trump administration declined to fight for.