Court Finds Trump Administration’s Third-Country Removal Policy is Unlawful, Vacates the Policy
Boston, Massachusetts – The National Immigration Litigation Alliance, the Northwest Immigrant Rights Project, and Human Rights First welcome today’s decision from the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts, declaring unlawful and setting aside the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) third country removal policy. DHS has relied on the policy to send noncitizens under final orders of removal to third countries—countries to which they were not ordered removed—without notice or opportunity to seek protection from persecution and torture. The decision granted partial summary judgment in D.V.D. v. DHS, a case in which the three organizations represent a nationwide class of individuals with certain final removal orders.
In issuing his order, Judge Murphy dryly explained, “The Department of Homeland Security has adopted a policy whereby it may take people and drop them off in parts unknown—in so-called ‘third countries’—and, ‘as long as the Department doesn’t already know that there’s someone standing there waiting to shoot . . . that’s fine.’ It is not fine, nor is it legal.”
At the time the case was filed in March 2025, DHS had no policy to ensure due process protections or the ability to raise a fear-based claim before being deported to any country other than the one identified in their removal proceedings. Following the district court’s issuance of a temporary restraining order ensuring due process protections to certain class members, DHS swiftly developed a third-country removal policy, which the district court rejected and required more robust protections in a subsequent order. After the Supreme Court ultimately stayed the district court order on June 23, 2025, DHS’ third country removal policy took effect. Since then, DHS has been aggressively moving to deport noncitizens under final orders of removal to any country that can be persuaded to take them. The people targeted by this policy include many who cannot legally be deported to their designated countries of removal (typically their countries of origin) because they are more likely than not to be subjected to persecution or torture there. They also include noncitizens whose countries of removal have refused or been slow to accept their return. Under this policy, DHS also has removed some noncitizens to third countries even though their countries of origin were willing to take them back. DHS has effectuated third-country removals with little or no notice without any meaningful opportunity to seek protection against persecution or torture, to countries including to El Salvador, South Sudan, Eswatini, Equatorial Guinea, Ghana, and Cameroon.
The district court stayed its decision for fifteen days to allow the government to seek a stay from the First Circuit pending appeal.
“Today’s decision is a forceful statement from the district court that the Trump Administration’s third country removal policy is unconstitutional and violates federal statutes,” said Trina Realmuto, executive director of the National Immigration Litigation Alliance, who argued the plaintiffs’ summary judgment motion. “Although the decision is stayed, we hope that the stay is temporary and that our class members will soon benefit from the district court’s ruling to set aside the government’s egregious third-country removal policy. Under the decision, DHS cannot simply opt out of pursuing removal to the country designated in removal proceedings and must provide meaningful notice and an opportunity to seek protection from persecution and torture prior to any third country removal.”
“DHS’s actions during this procedural roller-coaster ride have illustrated the harms the preliminary injunction in this case sought to prevent,” said Anwen Hughes, an attorney with Human Rights First. “DHS has deported non-Salvadorans to torturous conditions in El Salvador, it has attempted to deport non-Libyans to Libya, where conditions are notoriously dangerous for migrants, it has deported people to continuing arbitrary detention in South Sudan and Eswatini, and it has shipped people recognized as refugees to Ghana, Equatorial Guinea, and Cameroon, only for some of them to be sent on to their countries of persecution in violation of international law.”
“The Court’s decision confirms that the law requires the agency to comply with basic notions of decency, ensuring that the United States does not deport people to countries where they are likely to be persecuted or tortured,” said Matt Adams, legal director with Northwest Immigrant Rights Project. “The agency is not entitled to use third country removals as a weapon of intimidation and terror targeting immigrant communities.”
The decision from the District Court is available here.
A recent report from members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee detailing the costs and lack of monitoring of third-country removals is available here.
