Supreme Court Upholds Limited Review of Expedited Removal

nationals (aliens) who lack authorization to enter the United States are subject to a streamlined “expedited removal” process, which affords fewer procedural protections to the alien than standard removal proceedings and typically results in the quicker expulsion of the alien from the United States. [...] The Court held that the statute’s restrictions on the ability of an alien in expedited removal to challenge matters other than the lawfulness of his detention did not violate the Suspension Clause. [...] But observing that habeas relief has always been available to aliens, including those stopped at the border, the court determined that Thuraissigiam could invoke the Suspension Clause to challenge the statute’s limits on the scope of habeas review. [...] But the Thuraissigiam Court observed that it had “exercised habeas jurisdiction in the finality era cases because the [then-existing] habeas statute conferred that authority, not because it was required by the Suspension Clause.” The Court also briefly considered the applicability of its decisions in Boumediene and St. [...] In Thuraissigiam, the Court did not assess the nature of those connections, beyond determining that an alien apprehended 25 yards from the border could be “treated for due process purposes as if stopped at the border.” But the Court’s decision may inform how lower courts consider ongoing constitutional challenges to the expansion of expedited removal into the interior of the United States.