Casa de Maryland v. DHS, D. MD., 03-05-18, Judge Roger W. Titus
While the Administration and right-leaning media are touting this as a “smashing victory” here’s what District Judge Titus really said:
- The original Obama Administration DACA program was an exercise of prosecutorial discretion on which reasonable minds can differ as to its legality.
- The Trump Administration had discretion either to continue the DACA program or not as an exercise of prosecutorial discretion.
- The decision by the Administration to phase out DACA was subject to judicial review and the plaintiffs had standing to challenge it.
- The DHS’s decision to phase out DACA upon receiving an opinion from Attorney General Sessions that it might well be held illegal in a threatened court action was reasonable.
- The sometimes ill-advised and inflammatory statements by President Trump were not relevant to the basis for termination of DACA.
- Although Judge Titus personally would have chosen a different policy approach from that of the Administration, under Constitutional separation of powers that policy decision was vested in the Executive and Congress, not the Courts, and the Administration had acted reasonably in this case.
- The DHS is estopped from using information gathered during the DACA application process against individuals in Removal Proceedings except if “the Government needs to make use of an individual Dreamer’s information for national security or some purpose implicating public safety or public interest, the Government may petition the Court for permission to do so on a case-by-case basis with in camera review.”
Judge Titus’s decision actually more or less undermines the Administration’s frequent claims that DACA was “illegal” and that the Administration had “no choice” but to terminate it. Rather, the court held that legitimate unresolved questions had been raised about the DACA program’s legality and that in the face of those questions the Administration’s choice to proceed with a phased termination rather than trying to defend DACA in court was reasonable.
Additionally, as I had predicted, the court was unwilling to allow DHS to use DACA information against the individuals in Removal Proceedings. While this aspect of the case was :”under the radar” in most reports, it could well be another major practical/legal roadblock to the Administration’s actually removing many DACA recipients even if the injunctions against DACA termination eventually are lifted.
Here’s a “KEY QUOTE” from Judge Titus’s decision:
“The result of this case is not one that this Court would choose if it were a member of a different branch of our government. An overwhelming percentage of Americans support protections for “Dreamers,” yet it is not the province of the judiciary to provide legislative or executive actions when those entrusted with those responsibilities fail to act. As Justice Gorsuch noted during his confirmation hearing, “a judge who likes every outcome he reaches is probably a pretty bad judge, stretching for the policy results he prefers rather than those the law compels.”
This Court does not like the outcome of this case, but is constrained by its constitutionally limited role to the result that it has reached. Hopefully, the Congress and the President will finally get their job done.”
In other words, the decision to rescind DACA was “dumb but legal.” Hardly the ringing endorsement that the Trumpsters claim. What this case actually did is to vindicate their right to make bad policy decisions. Ultimately, the remedy for that type of poor governance is at the ballot box.
Here’s the full decision in Casa de Maryland v. DHS so you can judge for yourself:
PWS
03-06-18