DC Circuit Court says 17 Uighurs cannot be released into the US

The Court ruled that federal district judge Urbina had no authority to order the release into the U.S. of 17 Chinese Muslim Uighurs being held at Guantanamo on 8 october 2008. Only the political branches — the President and Congress — have the authority to decide when aliens may enter the U.S., the Circuit Court concluded by a 2-1 vote.  A third judge on the panel found that the judge’s release order was premature, but did not join in the ruling against release at this time.

The majority concluded that “it is not within the province of any court, unless expressly authorized by law, to review the determination of the political branch of the government to exclude a given alien.  With respect to these seventeen petitioners, the Executive Branch has determined not to allow them to enter the United States.”

The Circuit Court said it was not deciding at this point whether the President “may ignore the immigration laws and release [the Uighurs] into the United States without the consent of Congress.”

Circuit Judge Judith W. Rogers, while voting to overturn the judge’s release order, denounced the majority’s reasoning. She said the majority’s analysis “is not faithful” to the Supreme Court’s ruling last June in Boumediene v. Bush on detainees’ rights, and “would compromise both the Great Writ as a check on arbitrary detention and the balance of powers over exclusion and admission and release of aliens into the United States recognized by the Supreme Court to reside in the Congress, the Executive and the habeas court.”  She also said the ruling’s analysis was unnecessary because the court could not yet know whether detention was justified under immigration law.

The Circuit Court opinions against judicially-ordered release are here, and the judgment is here. More at Scotus.