
September 24th, 2026
On Thursday, President Donald Trump's administration asked the Supreme Court to once again clear the way for the continued quick deportation of immigrants to third countries where they have no ties.
The government sought an immediate halt to lower court orders that ruled people must be given the opportunity to object before the U.S. government deports them to countries other than their homelands.
The justices had previously allowed the deportation flights to continue temporarily when the case came before them last year.
Since then, an appeals court has upheld a Boston-based judge's final ruling that migrants must have a meaningful chance to argue that a third-country deportation would put them in danger of persecution or torture.
The ruling did not outright prohibit those deportations; it merely protracted the process.
The government contends that it has already resulted in the cancellation of a flight carrying 70 individuals with criminal convictions to three different countries.
"The government has managed to remove thousands of aliens to third countries in recent months, and thousands more are eligible for such removal," Solicitor General D. John Sauer wrote.
Trump’s Republican administration has stated that it dispatches individuals to third countries when it is unable to promptly repatriate them to their homelands.
Those third-country governments furnish assurances that people will not be subjected to persecution or torture, attorneys said.
Attorneys wrote that the legal requirements imposed by the lower courts would lead to cascading delays and could force agreements with foreign countries to be reworked.
James Percival, the general counsel for the Department of Homeland Security, said on Wednesday on X that 25,000 people in the U.S. illegally have been deported to third countries, calling those deportations “an essential public safety tool.”
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The vast majority of deportees have been sent to Mexico, but through a series of often-secret agreements, the administration has deported thousands of others to more than two dozen countries, from Liberia to Guyana.
Some have ended up in countries they had never heard of before arriving.
Others also face serious safety risks, leaving them with little choice but to return to the home countries they were fleeing.
This month, lawyers for two men deported to Equatorial Guinea said they were beaten and held at gunpoint by police in a hotel converted into a detention center, with their heads covered by bags.
In his tweet, Percival embedded a video capturing Taylor Swift, smiling and gesturing toward her wedding ring, as she celebrated a touchdown scored by her husband, the football player Travis Kelce.
"You should see the way my wife looks at me when I tell her that we have deported 25,000 illegal aliens to third nations," Percival wrote.
The case comes amid a sweeping immigration crackdown by the Trump administration, which has promised to deport millions of people living in the United States illegally.
September 24th, 2026

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