The Trump Court

Partisan Republican public officials have to stick together:

The Supreme Court on Wednesday allowed the Trump administration to bar many Central American migrants from seeking asylum in the United States. The court said the administration may enforce new rules that generally forbid asylum applications from people who had traveled through another country on their way to the United States without being denied asylum in that country.

A federal appeals court had largely blocked the new policy, but the justices, in a brief, unsigned order, allowed it to go into effect while legal challenges move forward. Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Sonia Sotomayor dissented.

In a Supreme Court brief, the solicitor general, Noel J. Francisco, representing the administration, said the new policy was needed to address “an unprecedented surge in the number of aliens who enter the country unlawfully across the southern border and, if apprehended, claim asylum and remain in the country while their claims are adjudicated.”

Under the policy, which was announced July 15, only immigrants who have been denied asylum in another country or who have been victims of “severe” human trafficking are permitted to apply in the United States. “The rule thus screens out asylum seekers who declined to request protection at the first opportunity,” Mr. Francisco wrote.

Sotomayor’s dissent summarizes the issues nicely:

I think I’m going to give Neil Gorsuch’s new “book” about the importance of respecting the design of the Constitution and the separation of powers a huge pass.

…oh and LOL:

The U.S. is facing a “civility crisis,” Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch says in his first book since being appointed by President Donald Trump to fill a vacancy that was the focus of an intensely partisan fight.

I wonder why a member of a bare 5-judge majority that wants to impose Republican policy preferences on majorities that have repeatedly voted against them is so concerned about the maintenance of “civility.”