Court rejects ICE detention policy
- A three-judge Second Circuit panel ruled Tuesday that Immigration and Customs Enforcement cannot deny bond hearings to many immigrants arrested inside the country. - Judge Joseph Bianco wrote the policy would create the nation’s “broadest mass-detention-without-bond mandate,” and the court kept Ricardo Barbosa da Cunha eligible for bond. - The ruling splits with the Fifth and Eighth Circuits, putting Supreme Court review in clearer view. (reuters.com)
A federal appeals court in New York ruled on April 28 that Immigration and Customs Enforcement cannot treat many immigrants arrested inside the United States as automatically ineligible for bond hearings. (reuters.com) (ca2.uscourts.gov) The unanimous Second Circuit panel said the administration misread a 1996 immigration law when it argued that people who entered unlawfully years ago could still be treated as if they were newly arriving at the border. (ca2.uscourts.gov) (cbsnews.com) Judge Joseph Bianco, joined by Judges Jose Cabranes and Alison Nathan, wrote that the relevant detention law does not apply to people already living in the country who were not caught at or near the border when they entered. (ca2.uscourts.gov) (politico.com) The case centered on Ricardo Aparecido Barbosa da Cunha, a Brazilian man who the court said entered the United States around 2005, applied for asylum in 2016, received a work permit, and was arrested by the government in September 2025. (ca2.uscourts.gov) A district judge had already ruled that Barbosa da Cunha should get a bond hearing, and an immigration judge later found he was not a flight risk or a danger and released him on bond. (ca2.uscourts.gov) (reuters.com) The administration’s broader policy, announced last year and adopted by the Board of Immigration Appeals in September 2025, had pushed immigration judges nationwide to order mandatory detention without bond for many people arrested far from the border. (reuters.com) (cbsnews.com) Bianco wrote that accepting that interpretation would authorize “the broadest mass-detention-without-bond mandate in our Nation’s history for millions of noncitizens,” and said courts should avoid reading the statute in a way that raises serious constitutional questions. (ca2.uscourts.gov) The decision deepens a split among federal appeals courts because the Fifth Circuit and Eighth Circuit had already backed the administration’s position in earlier 2026 rulings. (reuters.com) (apnews.com) That split makes Supreme Court review more likely, and the administration has argued that the 1996 law allows mandatory detention for people it says are still “applicants for admission” because of how they entered the country. (reuters.com) (apnews.com) For now, the Second Circuit’s ruling covers New York, Connecticut, and Vermont, and it rejects a detention approach that judges there said Congress did not clearly authorize. (cbsnews.com) (ca2.uscourts.gov)
