Justice Department Appeals Federal Judge’s Block on Third-Country Deportations

(DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSETTS) — The Justice Department appealed a federal judge’s nationwide block of the Trump administration’s third-country deportation policy and asked the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 1st Circuit to immediately pause the order while the case continues.

The appeal challenges U.S. District Judge Brian E. Murphy’s February 25, 2026 decision, which struck down a 2025 Immigration and Customs Enforcement memo that expanded “third-country removals” and barred the policy from being used nationwide.

Third-country deportations refer to removing a noncitizen to a country other than the person’s country of nationality. Murphy’s ruling focused on how quickly those removals could occur and what process migrants receive before the government sends them to another country.

DOJ filed its appeal Thursday and urged the 1st Circuit to halt Murphy’s order within one week, arguing the injunction threatens the administration’s deportation agenda and intrudes on foreign policy.

Murphy, a Biden appointee in the District of Massachusetts, issued an 81-page final merits decision invalidating the ICE memo. The policy, as described in the ruling, allowed deportations to third countries “often with as little as six hours’ notice” and relied on executive assurances of safety.

The judge concluded the policy violates due process under the Immigration and Nationality Act because it provides “no meaningful opportunity” for migrants to contest being removed to places where they could face persecution or torture. Murphy’s ruling referenced risks “on grounds of race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group, or political opinion.”

“It is not fine, nor is it legal,” Murphy wrote.

Questions about the government’s assurances played a central role in his analysis, including the judge’s challenge to the lack of transparency around them. “Whom do they cover? What do they cover? Why has the Government deemed them credible?” Murphy wrote.

The case began as a class-action lawsuit filed last March by four migrant petitioners. They challenged rapid deportations to third countries, with the litigation referencing countries including El Salvador, Libya, and South Sudan.

Murphy’s order stays in force unless overturned, and the dispute reaches beyond the four petitioners because the injunction blocks the policy nationwide. The decision, as described in the filings, could disrupt thousands of removals, ICE charter flights from airports in Miami, Houston, and Phoenix, and diplomatic negotiations.

Alongside the nationwide injunction, Murphy built in a temporary pause to give the government time to seek emergency relief. He paused enforcement for 15 days, citing the case’s “importance and its unusual history.”

The Trump administration’s appeal frames the dispute as a clash between the courts and the executive branch’s authority over immigration enforcement and foreign policy. DOJ argued the district court’s order interferes with foreign policy, which it said courts should not second-guess.

DOJ also accused Murphy of attempting to maneuver around Supreme Court precedent. In its filings, the government said Murphy evaded Supreme Court precedent by issuing a “doubly misguided” new order after prior stays.

DHS echoed that theme and pointed to earlier emergency action by the Supreme Court in the same litigation. “The Supreme Court previously issued two separate emergency stays against Judge Brian Murphy in this case, and we are confident we will be vindicated again,” DHS said, while affirming executive authority to remove “criminal illegal aliens.”

The government also signaled it could ask the Supreme Court to step in again if the 1st Circuit declines to pause Murphy’s order. That sets up a familiar procedural path in high-stakes immigration cases, where emergency motions can move quickly while the underlying litigation continues in the lower courts.

The Supreme Court has already shaped the procedural posture that DOJ now relies on in seeking rapid relief from the U.S. Court of Appeals. Last year, the justices issued a 6-3 emergency stay on Murphy’s April 2025 preliminary injunction without explanation.

A second emergency action followed, with the Supreme Court voting 7-2 to block enforcement against six detainees bound for South Sudan. The court found that allowing those removals “would flout the prior order,” in a decision that included “all six conservatives plus Justice Elena Kagan,” according to the case history referenced by the parties.

Those emergency orders matter now because DOJ argues the district court’s latest nationwide block conflicts with the Supreme Court’s handling of earlier rulings in the same litigation. The government’s filings portray Murphy’s final merits decision as a renewed attempt to stop a deportation practice the administration says it needs to carry out removals and manage its enforcement priorities.

An emergency stay, if granted by the 1st Circuit, would pause Murphy’s nationwide block while the appeal proceeds. It would not decide the case’s merits, but it would determine whether DHS can restart third-country deportations under the challenged ICE memo during the appellate process.

Murphy’s decision, by contrast, described the dispute as one about statutory and constitutional process. The judge’s focus remained on notice and a meaningful chance to contest a transfer to a third country, particularly when removal could send someone to a country where persecution or torture may be a risk.

The policy’s defenders argue the tool helps speed removals amid backlogs, and critics argue it increases the risk of errors and harm when the timeline to contest removal can be compressed to hours. Murphy’s ruling underscored that due process concerns intensify when migrants lack time or a workable mechanism to raise fear-based claims tied to a destination country.

Beyond the courtroom, the nationwide block could change how DHS manages removal logistics. The administration has defended the policy as an efficiency measure, and the government warned in filings that losing access to third-country deportations would slow removals and disrupt operations.

The potential impacts described in the case record include a return to more bilateral negotiations and lengthier proceedings, which the government said could crowd detention centers and slow adjudications. The dispute has also “affected business travelers denied re-entry by home countries,” according to the description of the policy’s consequences cited in the case history.

Operationally, the order’s nationwide scope means the government cannot limit the ruling’s effect to a single region while the appeal proceeds. The filings tied the disputed policy to a broader removals pipeline that can involve routing and scheduling charter flights, including flights departing from Miami, Houston, and Phoenix.

For DOJ, the timing pressure remains central. The department asked the 1st Circuit to pause Murphy’s ruling within one week, arguing that every day the nationwide block stays in place impairs enforcement capacity and complicates diplomatic engagement needed to carry out removals.

The judge’s ruling, however, treated the notice and opportunity to be heard as essential legal requirements under the INA and due process, rather than optional administrative steps. Murphy’s concerns included whether migrants can realistically challenge being sent to a third country on short notice and whether the government’s safety assurances receive enough scrutiny to satisfy the law.

Murphy also questioned the opacity surrounding those assurances. “Whom do they cover? What do they cover? Why has the Government deemed them credible?” he wrote, in a passage the appeal now puts at the center of the dispute over judicial oversight and executive authority.

While the third-country deportations fight moves to the 1st Circuit, a separate federal court decision has also put a spotlight on due process in immigration procedures, this time involving appeals at the Board of Immigration Appeals.

In a separate development, U.S. District Judge Randolph D. Moss, an Obama appointee in Washington, vacated parts of a February 2026 DOJ rule that shortened Board of Immigration Appeals filing deadlines from 30 to 10 days and enabled summary dismissals.

Moss ruled those parts unlawful without notice-and-comment, a procedural requirement that can constrain how agencies change rules. The ruling came as “over 200,000 appeals are pending,” a figure cited as part of the context for pressures on the immigration system.

Advocates cast that decision as a due process safeguard for people trying to challenge immigration rulings on appeal. Laura St. John, legal director at Florence Immigrant & Refugee Rights Project, called it critical for due process.

The two cases arise in different courts and address different policies, but both disputes turn on procedural rights and the government’s authority to restructure immigration processes. In Massachusetts, Murphy’s decision focused on notice and a meaningful chance to contest third-country deportations, including claims tied to persecution or torture. In Washington, Moss’s ruling targeted a DOJ rule that changed how quickly people must act to keep an appeal alive, and when the agency can dismiss cases summarily.

DOJ now faces parallel litigation pressure points as it presses forward with enforcement priorities while defending rule changes and operational tools in federal court. For the administration, the 1st Circuit’s decision on an emergency stay in the third-country deportations case could determine whether DHS can restart the blocked policy immediately or must continue operating under Murphy’s nationwide bar as the appeal unfolds.