Recent Supreme Court terms have produced a string of immigration decisions that touch nearly every part of the system - from who can seek asylum at the border to how much deference federal courts must give to immigration agencies. Understanding what these rulings actually say, and what they mean in practice, helps applicants and their families prepare for what comes next.
The End of Chevron Deference and What It Means for Immigration
The Court’s June 2024 decision in Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo overturned the 40-year-old Chevron doctrine, which had required federal courts to defer to federal agencies’ interpretations of ambiguous statutes. The ruling has direct consequences for immigration law, where USCIS, EOIR, and the Department of Homeland Security regularly interpret statutory language in ways that shape visa eligibility, deportation grounds, and asylum standards.
Under Chevron, courts generally upheld agency interpretations so long as they were “reasonable.” Now, federal judges are required to exercise independent judgment when a statute is ambiguous - meaning courts, not agencies, have the final word on what a law means. For immigration practitioners, this opens the door to challenges against longstanding USCIS policy memos, BIA precedent decisions, and DHS enforcement guidance that relied on deference to survive legal scrutiny.
In practical terms, an applicant denied a benefit based on a USCIS interpretation of an ambiguous statutory term now has a stronger argument in federal court that the agency got it wrong. That doesn’t automatically mean approvals will follow, but it does shift the legal battlefield. Immigration judges and the Board of Immigration Appeals are not Article III courts and are therefore not bound by Loper Bright in the same way, but federal circuit courts reviewing BIA decisions will now apply independent statutory interpretation.
The timeline for this shift to fully materialize in immigration caselaw will likely take years. Circuit courts are already grappling with which prior immigration decisions relied on Chevron deference and whether those precedents need to be revisited. The Ninth and Fourth Circuits, which handle a large share of immigration appeals, will be among the courts most closely watched in this area.
Deportation, Due Process, and the Campos-Chaves Decision
In Campos-Chaves v. Garland (2024), the Supreme Court ruled 5–4 that immigration authorities can order individuals removed in absentia - meaning without them being present - even when the initial Notice to Appear (NTA) did not include a specific date and time for the hearing. This resolved a circuit split over how to read the statutory notice requirements in 8 U.S.C. § 1229.
The decision has immediate consequences for immigrants who entered the country and received an NTA without a hearing date, which became common during periods of high border arrivals when immigration courts were severely backlogged. In those cases, USCIS or DHS would later send a separate notice with the actual hearing information. If an individual did not appear, the government argued - and the Supreme Court majority agreed - that a valid in absentia removal order could still be issued.
For individuals who have already received in absentia removal orders under these circumstances, the path to reopen their cases became significantly narrower after Campos-Chaves. A motion to reopen on the basis of lack of notice is unlikely to succeed in most circuits. However, individuals may still pursue motions to reopen on other grounds under 8 C.F.R. § 1003.23, including exceptional circumstances or lack of actual notice due to a change of address properly reported to the court.
Immigration attorneys are advising clients who received NTAs without dates to be especially vigilant about checking their case status through the EOIR online portal at acis.eoir.justice.gov and to ensure their address of record is current. An address update must be filed using Form EOIR-33 within five days of any address change, per 8 C.F.R. § 1003.15(d)(1). Failure to keep an address current remains one of the most avoidable causes of in absentia removal orders.
The dissenting justices in Campos-Chaves argued that the ruling incentivizes the government to issue incomplete NTAs and then blame immigrants for non-appearance. Regardless of one’s view of the policy debate, the practical effect is that appearing at every immigration court hearing - even when the initial paperwork appeared incomplete - is now more critical than before.
Asylum Access and the Biden v. Texas Aftermath
The “Remain in Mexico” policy, formally known as the Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP), generated multiple rounds of Supreme Court litigation. In Biden v. Texas (2022), the Court allowed the Biden administration to terminate MPP, finding that the executive branch had authority under 8 U.S.C. § 1225 to exercise discretion in returning individuals to Mexico pending immigration proceedings. That decision remains in effect, though subsequent lower court rulings have continued to contest the administration’s border management tools.
The broader question of asylum access at the southern border remained contested into 2024, with ongoing litigation over the use of Title 8 expedited removal procedures and the administration’s asylum ban for individuals who crossed between ports of entry. In Garland v. Aleman Gonzalez (2022), the Court held that federal district courts generally lack jurisdiction under 8 U.S.C. § 1252(f)(1) to issue class-wide injunctions blocking deportations - a holding that limited a significant tool used by immigration advocates to halt mass removals.
The practical effect of Aleman Gonzalez is that challenges to deportation policies must increasingly be brought as individual habeas petitions in the district where a person is detained, rather than as national class actions. This shifts the burden onto individual detainees and their counsel and makes geographic location at the time of detention a significant factor in available legal remedies.
What Applicants and Petitioners Should Know Now
These decisions collectively create a legal environment where agency authority is being recalibrated at every level. For individuals with pending or upcoming immigration court hearings, the immediate priority is maintaining correct contact information with EOIR and attending all scheduled proceedings. For those in federal court challenging agency denials, Loper Bright provides a new avenue to argue that a USCIS or BIA interpretation is legally wrong - not just unreasonable.
Congress has not passed comprehensive immigration legislation since the 1990 Immigration Act, which means courts continue to apply decades-old statutory language to current border conditions. As the Supreme Court’s composition and docket shift, additional decisions affecting immigration enforcement, visa adjudication standards, and due process protections are expected in the 2024–2025 term.
This article is general information only. Readers facing individual immigration matters should consult a licensed immigration attorney.
For individuals in removal proceedings who believe they received an inadequate NTA, Form EOIR-26 (Notice of Appeal to the BIA) must be filed within 30 days of an immigration judge’s decision.
