President Donald Trump has won big at the U.S. Supreme Court in a dispute over the speeches of immigration judges.
The decision didn’t address the merits of the case, but instead reversed a lower court decision that went against a requirement immigration judges obtain official approval before giving speeches in their official capacities.
According to a report at Just the News it was the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals a year ago that intervened when Trump fired several agency heads responsible for hearing complaints.
The policy stems from the Executive Office for Immigration Review, which oversees hundreds of immigration judges.
It’s a victory for Trump because he’s faced judicial opposition to his immigration enforcement efforts and plans for mass deportations.
The Federalist said the unanimous decision sided with Trump regarding those judges’ “work-related speech.”
The policy in question came through the Biden administration and required immigration judges “to obtain supervisory approval for public speeches relating to their official duties.”
That was so that there would be consistency in those speeches as they “may be seen as bearing the ‘imprimatur'” of official positions.
The National Association of Immigration Judges claimed that violated members’ First and Fifth Amendment rights.
But the high court noted under the 1978 Civil Service Reform Act, Congress wanted federal employees to bring many work-related complaints first to the Merit Systems Protection Board and the Special Counsel but not to federal district court.
The gist of the opinion was that the 4th Circuit had ruled on a question that had not been raised.
A report explained, “Federal courts are not ‘roving commissions’ … licensed to ‘sally forth each day looking for wrongs to right.'”
The result was that the justices rejected a lower-court ruling allowing the case to proceed and examine whether a complaint system for federal workers still was working as intended.
The dispute arose when Trump fired some agency officails.
The immigration judges said the limits on their public speeches involved free speech, and that involved the federal courts.
Trump’s lawyers, however, said the judges must instead take their dispute to the complaint system for federal employees overseen by the Merit Systems Protection Board.”
The Supreme Court said, “After the Executive Office for Immigration Review adopted a policy regulating immigration judges’ work related speech, an association of such judges (respondent here) challenged the policy in federal district court. The district court held that respondent’s challenge must proceed through the administrative review scheme established by the Civil Service Reform Act. But the Fourth Circuit vacated and remanded based on an issue the parties had not raised. That decision violated the principle of party presentation, and we reverse.”
