weighs

WASHINGTON  — The Trump administration urged the Supreme Court on Tuesday to rule that it may block migrants from applying for asylum at ports of entry along the southern border.

The administration’s lawyers argued that the right to asylum, which arose in response to Nazi Germany and the Holocaust, does not extend to those who are stopped just short of a border post in California, Arizona or Texas.

They pointed to part of the immigration law that says a non-citizen who “arrives in the United States … may apply for asylum.”

“You can’t arrive in the United States while you’re still standing in Mexico. That should be the end of this case,” Vivek Suri, a Justice Department attorney, told the court.

Immigration rights advocates called this claim “perverse” and illogical. They said such a rule would encourage migrants to cross the border illegally rather than present themselves legally at a border post.

The justices sounded divided and a bit uncertain over how to proceed. But the conservative majority is nonetheless likely to uphold the administration’s broad power over immigration enforcement.

Several of the justices noted, however, the Trump administration is not currently enforcing a “remain in Mexico” policy.

Liberal Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Ketanji Brown Jackson questioned why the court would make a major decision on immigration and asylum with no immediate, practical impact.

The case posed a fundamental clash between the government’s need to manage surges at the border and the moral and historic right to offer asylum to those fleeing persecution.

In 1939, more than 900 Jewish refugees who were fleeing Nazi Germany aboard the MS St. Louis were turned away by Cuba and the United States. They were forced to return to Europe and more than 250 of them died in the Holocaust.

The worldwide moral reckoning spurred many nations, including the United States, to adopt new laws which offer protection to those fleeing persecution.

In the Refugee Act of 1980, Congress said that non-citizens either “physically present in the United States” or “at a land border or port of entry” may apply for asylum.

To be eligible for asylum, a non-citizen had to demonstrate a well-founded fear of persecution in their home country due to their race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group, or political opinion.

Only a small percentage of applicants win their asylum claims, and only after years of litigation.

But faced with overwhelming surge of migrants, the Obama administration in 2016 adopted a “metering” policy that required people to wait on the Mexican side of the border.

The Trump and Biden administrations maintained such policies for a time.

Immigrant rights advocates sued, contending the metering policy was illegal. They won before a federal judge in San Diego who ruled the migrants had a right to claim asylum.

In a 2-1 decision, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals agreed in 2024.

“To ‘arrive’ means ‘to reach a destination,’” Judge Michelle Friedland wrote for the appeals court. “A person who presents herself to an official at the border has ‘arrived.’”

The Trump administration appealed.

Solicitor Gen. D. John Sauer said the “ordinary meaning of ‘arrives in’ refers to entering a specific place, not just coming close to it. An alien who is stopped in Mexico does not arrive in the United States.”

On Tuesday, the Justice Department attorney said the court should reverse the 9th Circuit and uphold the government’s broad power to block migrants approaching the border.

“I can’t predict the next border surge,” Suri said.

“For more than 45 years, Congress has guaranteed people arriving at our borders the right to seek asylum, consistent with our international treaty obligations,” said Kelsi Corkran, Supreme Court director of the Institute for Constitutional Advocacy and Protection, who argued the case. “Yet this administration believes that Congress gave it discretion to completely ignore those requirements, and turn back those who are seeking refuge from persecution at its whim.”

“The people turned away at our border are fleeing rape, torture, kidnapping, and death threats. You cannot tell families running for their lives to go back and wait in danger because their suffering is inconvenient,” said Nicole Elizabeth Ramos, border rights project directo at Al Otro Lado which was the plaintiff in the case. “We brought this case because the United States made a legal and moral commitment to protect people fleeing persecution.”

WASHINGTON, March 4 (UPI) — The Supreme Court on Wednesday considered whether the brokers who connect shippers with trucking companies can be held liable for irresponsible drivers.

The case, Montgomery vs. Caribe Transport II LLC, stems from a 2017 incident in which Shawn Montgomery, the petitioner, suffered significant injuries after a tractor-trailer hit his parked truck on the side of an Illinois highway.

A key part of the case is the interpretation of part of the Federal Aviation Administration Authorization Act of 1994. It prevents state laws “related to a price, route or service” of trucking companies or brokers that connect them to shippers.

However, the statute also provides an exception, stating that it will “not restrict the safety regulatory authority of a state with respect to motor vehicles.”

The outcome could redefine liability standards for freight brokers and impact the broader transportation industry and interstate commerce landscape.

The driver of the tractor-trailer, Yosniel Varela-Mojena, had been involved in a crash months earlier, but was still employed by Caribe Transport II, an interstate trucking company. Freight broker C.H. Robinson recruited Caribe II to deliver a cross-country shipment. After the crash, Montgomery sued the broker for negligent hiring under Illinois state laws.

During the arguments, the two sides disagreed about whether the phrase “with respect to motor vehicles” includes brokers.

“We do believe that ‘with respect to motor vehicles’ is the crucial question here,” said Theodore Boutrous Jr., Caribe II’s counsel. He argued Congress did not intend for brokers to be included.

The attorney for the United States agreed that the two different sections of the law being discussed should, in context, be taken altogether to mean that brokers are not included in the realm of “motor vehicles.”

“Paragraph one uses the phrase ‘with respect to the transportation of property,’ [and] paragraph two [says] ‘with respect to motor vehicles,'” said Sopan Joshi, assistant to the U.S. solicitor general. “That seems like a conscious choice that Congress made to parallel the language, but change the noun to a much narrower noun.”

Associate Justice Brett Kavanaugh questioned Paul Clement, Montgomery’s counsel, on how brokers would address safety concerns if the court were to rule in favor of Montgomery and say that brokers are liable for consequences of negligent hiring.

For instance, Kavanaugh suggested drivers should be proficient in English to ensure safety. In April 2025, President Donald Trump signed an executive order to enforce English-language requirements for commercial motor vehicle drivers.

“If you’re hiring drivers who can’t read the signs, that seems like a safety issue,” Kavanaugh said.

Clement said brokers could work with larger trucking companies with deeper pockets and check that they have adequate programs in place to test drivers for drug use, check on prior accidents and address other potential concerns.

“One of the reasons, I think, that you do want [brokers] to have some duty of care in these circumstances is this is a margin business,” Clement said. “If they don’t have any sort of incentive to internalize any of the cost of not asking the question, they really have no good reason to ask the question. They want the cheapest carrier.”

Associate Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson asked Joshi to explain why he thought Congress did not think brokers should share responsibility for safety given the language in the 1994 law.

“The problem, I think, with the argument in the way that you’ve set it up is that you are assuming away any responsibility that a broker might have for safety,” Jackson said.

Joshi argued that Congress did not intend for brokers to have responsibility regarding safety and could have worded the law differently if it did.

“Congress has an entire chapter, several chapters, of the U.S. Code in Title 49 that deal with safety addressing carriers, safety of motor vehicles, driver qualifications, and they’re all addressed at carriers,” Joshi said. “Not a single one is addressed at brokers.”

Joshi acknowledged that the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration is “understaffed,” “overworked” and unable to review all of the federally registered carriers. However, he said Congress has provided ways of bringing consequences against carriers who violate federal requirements and regulations.

In his closing rebuttal, Clement told the court that 94% of registered carriers on the road do not have meaningful federal safety inspections — a number derived from 2021 Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration data.

He said state tort law could provide a “backstop to the federal system.”

“This case doesn’t have to be that hard. The thing that triggers state tort liability is an 80,000-pound motor vehicle. That’s what devastatingly injured my client,” Clement said.

The court is expected to issue a ruling by summer.