The Supreme Court agreed on Friday to decide whether President Trump's Day One proclamation shutting down asylum at the southern border is lawful, taking up the administration's appeal after two lower courts ruled against it. The case is Mullin v. RAICES, named for Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin, and it will settle how much power a president has to close the asylum system on his own authority.
On January 20, 2025, his first day back in office, President Trump issued Proclamation 10888, “Guaranteeing the States Protection Against Invasion.” Invoking Section 212(f) of the Immigration and Nationality Act, it suspended the entry of migrants crossing the southern border between ports of entry and barred them from seeking asylum or other humanitarian protection, allowing quick removals without an asylum application.
Three immigrant legal service providers — RAICES, Las Americas Immigrant Advocacy Center and the Florence Immigrant & Refugee Rights Project — sued on behalf of a nationwide class of people barred from seeking protection, represented by the ACLU and partner groups. In July 2025, U.S. District Judge Randolph Moss in Washington ruled the proclamation unlawful. On April 24, 2026, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit upheld that ruling, holding the proclamation unlawful to the extent it replaces the removal procedures Congress set in law and bars people from applying for asylum. The appeals court denied rehearing in July and stayed its own mandate, so the asylum shutdown remains in effect while the Supreme Court decides.
The justices granted the government's petition limited to the first two questions it presented, starting with whether Proclamation 10888 and its implementing guidance — which suspended entry and cut off access to the provisions of law that would let migrants remain in the country, including asylum — are lawful. The administration argues for a broad, commonsense reading of the President's power to exclude aliens at the border. The challengers argue that a president may not override, by proclamation, the asylum system Congress wrote into law.
For Americans, the case is bigger than one proclamation. The ruling will draw the line between Congress's power to write immigration law and the President's power to act in what he declares an emergency at the border — the same line every future president, of either party, will govern behind. Argument is expected in spring 2027, with a decision to follow before the Court's summer recess. Until the justices rule, asylum at the southern border stays shut down.
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