A federal judge has reaffirmed that his order blocking the deportation of eight men to South Sudan remains in effect, even after the U.S. Supreme Court issued a stay on his broader nationwide injunction halting third-country deportations.
U.S. District Judge Brian Murphy, appointed by President Joe Biden and based in Boston, clarified on Tuesday that while his April injunction had been paused by the high court, his more targeted May 21 order—protecting the eight individuals currently stranded in Djibouti—still stands.
The Supreme Court did not provide a detailed explanation for its decision to stay the nationwide injunction, which left room for Murphy to maintain his ruling in this individual case. The men, who face possible deportation to South Sudan—a country embroiled in civil war—argued that they should not be sent to a nation with which they have no official connection.
In a brief docket entry, Murphy dismissed an emergency motion filed by the men after the Supreme Court’s decision, calling it “unnecessary.” He asserted that his May order still “remains in full force and effect.”
He supported this position by citing Justice Sonia Sotomayor’s sharp dissent from the Supreme Court’s majority ruling. Sotomayor, joined by Justices Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson, wrote that the district court’s remedial orders weren’t properly before the Supreme Court because the government had neither appealed nor sought a stay on them.
Despite Murphy’s legal argument, the Trump administration quickly pushed back, appealing to the Supreme Court on Tuesday. Solicitor General John Sauer accused Murphy of “defying” the high court and described the judge’s ruling as a “lawless act” that risks disrupting diplomatic relations and blocking lawful deportation efforts.
Sauer called on the justices to “immediately clarify” that their stay also applies to Murphy’s May 21 order and even suggested the case be reassigned to a different judge.
White House adviser Stephen Miller also weighed in on Fox News, claiming Judge Murphy was “refusing to obey the Supreme Court.” However, Murphy never said he would defy the ruling—he contends that his case-specific order wasn’t affected by the broader stay.
The eight men remain in Djibouti, in a legal limbo, as their request to return to the U.S. while their immigration cases play out has not been granted. Their fate is uncertain, unlike that of another migrant known as O.C.G., a Guatemalan man who was returned to the U.S. after being wrongfully deported to Mexico—a country he said he feared due to his sexual orientation and past mistreatment there.
At the center of these cases is a broader legal and human rights issue: whether the U.S. government can deport migrants to third countries they have no ties to—without giving them a chance to explain why such deportation might put them in danger.
Justice Sotomayor, in her dissent, warned that the Court’s decision to lift the injunction exposes “thousands to the risk of torture or death.”
“The Court finds the idea that thousands will suffer violence in far-flung locales more palatable than the remote possibility that a District Court exceeded its remedial powers,” she wrote. “That use of discretion is as incomprehensible as it is inexcusable.”
