Easier deportations and Green Card removals: US Supreme Court advances Trump’s restrictive immigration agenda

It is now easier to remove lawful permanent residents - also known as green-card holders WASHINGTON: Since Donald Trump returned to the presidency last year promising to aggressively crack down on immigration and pursue a campaign of mass deportation, the conservative-majority U.S. Supreme Court has, for the most part, smoothed the way. In case after case, the court, which has a 6-3 conservative majority, has green-lighted the Republican president's policies targeting both legal and illegal immigration with few exceptions, while its three liberal justices have objected to most of his actions. The latest examples came this week, when the court gave Trump and his administration three victories - all in cases decided along ideological lines - that make it easier to deport people, or refuse them entry, including those who have legal status in the United States. "The Trump administration has turned the immigration system into a deportation machine," said Elora Mukherjee, director of the Immigrants' Rights Clinic at Columbia Law School in New York. "In most cases, the Supreme Court has been a rubber stamp for Trump's mass deportation agenda," Mukherjee added. The court in a 6-3 decision on Thursday let the administration strip hundreds of thousands of Haitian and Syrian immigrants of their Temporary Protected Status. This humanitarian designation under U.S. law lets migrants from nations stricken by war or catastrophe live and work in the United States while it is unsafe for them to return to their home countries. People hold placards during a rally with immigration advocates, on the day of the U.S. Supreme Court ruling allowing the Trump administration to strip Temporary Protected Status (TPS) protections from hundreds of thousands of Haitian and Syrian migrants, in New York City, U.S., June 25, 2026. REUTERS Legal experts said the practical effect is grim for immigrants now losing their status as they face a choice of staying and risking detention, or returning to countries that the U.S. State Department warns against any travel to due to widespread violence, crime, terrorism and kidnapping. "These are not conditions to which people should be returned," Tirana Hassan, CEO of the group Doctors Without Borders USA, said on Thursday, referring to Haiti. Ahilan Arulanantham, an immigration law expert at UCLA and lawyer for the Syrian plaintiffs in the TPS dispute, said, "The Supreme Court has consistently ruled against the rights of immigrant communities in important cases in the last several years, and this case fits that pattern." "The decision hands to the administration, and to the far right wing of the anti-immigrant movement, an important victory that they have been unable to obtain through Congress for a number of years," Arulanantham added. The court also on Thursday ruled 6-3 to back the government's authority to turn away asylum seekers when officials deem U.S.-Mexico border crossings overburdened, by physically blocking them from entering the United States. Trump's administration has said it may seek to revive the policy, known as "metering," after it was dropped by his Democratic predecessor Joe Biden. On Tuesday, again in a 6-3 split, the court made it easier to remove lawful permanent residents - also known as green-card holders - ruling that border agents do not need to meet the high standard of "clear and convincing evidence" that such an individual has committed a crime before refusing to allow them back into the country after a trip abroad. 'The rule of law' "These three rulings are all victories for the rule of law and common sense," said Department of Homeland Security General Counsel James Percival, adding that Temporary Protected Status "was always supposed to be temporary." "Thanks to these decisions, we now have several more important tools to continue securing our borders," Percival added. Since Trump returned to office in January 2025, the court has largely acceded to his demands to implement policies bolstering his drive to step up deportations when they have been impeded by lower courts, while legal challenges to them play out. These decisions have been issued on an emergency basis on the Supreme Court's so-called shadow docket in which the justices can make highly consequential decisions outside their regular process, without extensive briefing or oral arguments. For instance, the court has let Trump deport migrants to countries where they have no ties, carry out aggressive immigration raids that can target individuals based on their race or language, and to end humanitarian protections including TPS and another form of protection called parole for hundreds of thousands of immigrants. Immigrants' rights activists and demonstrators attend a rally outside the U.S. Supreme Court, as justices were scheduled to hear arguments on whether the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump can end the Temporary Protected Status (TPS) of Syrian and Haitian nationals, in Washington, D.C.