The Supreme Court rejected Monday a request from the Obama administration to rehear a case concerning its executive actions on immigration, dealing another blow to the President’s attempt to put in place programs aimed at helping more than 4 million undocumented immigrants.
The programs sought to aid those undocumented immigrants to be able to come out of the shadows and apply for programs that could qualify them for work authorization and associated benefits.
Last June, the eight-member court announced it was evenly divided in the case and issued a one-sentence ruling, without comment or dissent, upholding a lower court opinion that blocked the programs from going forward.
The Obama administration asked the court this summer to rehear the case once it had nine members again, although it is unclear when that will be.
Acting Solicitor General Ian Gershengorn argued in briefs that the court “should grant rehearing to provide for a decision by the court when it has a full complement of members, rather than allow a nonprecedential affirmance by an equally divided court to leave in place a nationwide injunction of such significance.”
Without comment, the court denied the request, handing a victory to Texas and 25 other states who challenged the programs arguing they represented an unauthorized abuse of presidential power.
Although the Supreme Court will not take up the case again for now, it has been returned to the District Court Judge in Texas.
After the Supreme Court’s ruling in June, Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump tweeted that the court has “kept us safe from exec amnesty — for now,” while Hillary Clinton said it was “heartbreaking” and could “tear apart families.”
