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Expert: Laken Riley Act Could Shift Power From Congress to Courts

January 16, 2025 (1 min read)

Nicole Narea, Vox, Jan. 16, 2025

"One of the first bills that could be sent to President Donald Trump after he is inaugurated Monday would vastly expand immigration detention and make it easier for states to influence immigration policy. And it has already passed one house of Congress with support from a significant number of Democrats. ... “The federal government will never have enough money or manpower to deport every undocumented noncitizen,” said Stephen Yale-Loehr, an immigration law professor at Cornell Law School. “Courts are not equipped to delve into the details of who to prioritize for deportation.” The Laken Riley Act would essentially upend those enforcement priorities, requiring that a much larger population of undocumented immigrants be detained. ... If the bill becomes law and survives legal scrutiny, the “result is that courts would become the final arbiters of immigration policy,” Yale-Loehr said."