Appeals court says Trump’s asylum ban at the border is illegal, agreeing with lower court

WASHINGTON (AP) — An appeals court on Friday blocked President Donald Trump’s executive order suspending asylum access, a key pillar of the Republican president’s plan to crack down on migration at the southern border of the U.S.

A three-judge panel from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit found that immigration laws give people the right to apply for asylum at the border, and the president can’t circumvent that.

The court opinion stems from action taken by Trump on Inauguration Day 2025 when he declared that the situation at the southern border constituted an invasion of America and that he was “suspending the physical entry” of migrants and their ability to seek asylum until he decides it is over.

The panel concluded that the Immigration and Nationality Act doesn’t authorize the president to remove the plaintiffs under “procedures of his own making,” allow him to suspend plaintiffs’ right to apply for asylum or curtail procedures for adjudicating their anti-torture claims.

“The power by proclamation to temporarily suspend the entry of specified foreign individuals into the United States does not contain implicit authority to override the INA’s mandatory process to summarily remove foreign individuals,” wrote Judge J. Michelle Childs, who was nominated to the bench by Democratic President Joe Biden.

“We conclude that the INA’s text, structure, and history make clear that in supplying power to suspend entry by Presidential proclamation, Congress did not intend to grant the Executive the expansive removal authority it asserts,” the opinion said.

The administration can ask the full appeals court to reconsider the ruling or go to the Supreme Court.

The order doesn’t formally take effect until after the court considers any request to reconsider.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said she had not seen the ruling but “it’s unsurprising to me. We have liberal judges across the country who are acting against this president for political purposes. They are not acting as true litigators of the law. They are looking at these cases from a political lens.”

Leavitt, speaking at a press gaggle outside the White House, said Trump was taking actions that are “completely within his powers as commander in chief.”

She added that the judges should be thanking the president for stopping what she called a “scam” allowed during the Biden administration which let “tens of millions of illegal aliens” into the country by allowing them to “fraudulently” claim asylum.

The Department of Homeland Security didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

ACLU attorney Lee Gelernt said in a statement that the appellate ruling is “essential for those fleeing danger who have been denied even a hearing to present asylum claims under the Trump administration’s unlawful and inhumane executive order.”

Judge Justin Walker, a Trump nominee, wrote a partial dissent. He said the law gives immigrants protections against removal to countries where they would be persecuted, but the administration can issue broad denials of asylum applications.

Walker, however, agreed with the majority that the president cannot deport migrants to countries where they will be persecuted or strip them of mandatory procedures that protect against their removal.

Judge Cornelia Pillard, who was nominated by Democratic President Barack Obama, also heard the case.

In the executive order, Trump argued that the Immigration and Nationality Act gives presidents the authority to suspend entry of any group that they finds “detrimental to the interests of the United States.”

The executive order also suspended the ability of migrants to ask for asylum.

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AP reporters Gary Fields, in Washington, and Gisela Salomon, in Miami, contributed to this report.

Michael Kunzelman,Lindsay Whitehurst, The Associated Press