The Supreme Court on Thursday ruled that a request by Republican officials to join litigation over asylum restrictions during the pandemic be rejected, a week after the contested border policy was struck down.
The high court’s order comes in a case brought by Republican-led states, which sought to join a legal challenge in Washington against the so-called Title 42 border policy to defend it. This policy, which ended on May 11 after more than three years in place, allows border agents to deport migrants without a hearing under a public health rationale.
In a statement accompanying the order, Justice Neil M. Gorsuch wrote that the end of the Title 42 policy was enough to convince the high court that the restrictions “are now as good as there is no longer any dispute about them no more.”
Gorsuch also lamented that the Title 42 order, issued in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, has been held up by the courts indefinitely.
“Governing by indefinite emergency order risks leaving us all with a shell of a democracy and civil liberties just as hollow,” Gorsuch wrote.
