Trump's Own Judges Stop Him: 2 Defeats in 4 Hours, and More Landmark Victories Against ICE

On a single Thursday, in less than 4 hours, Donald Trump suffered 2 more courtroom defeats over his immigration policy. They were the fifth and sixth losses on the very same legal question, and what makes them remarkable is not that they happened, but whose hands delivered them.

Two federal appeals courts rejected the administration's attempt to hold immigrants in detention without a hearing and without any opportunity for release on bond, including many people who have lived in the United States for years without a criminal record. The Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago ruled 2 to 1 that the government cannot deny bond hearings to people who are already living in the United States. The court found that the administration had improperly applied a statute that was written only for people seeking admission at the border for the first time. Just hours earlier, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco also ruled 2 to 1 that the administration had twisted decades old immigration laws to justify its policy of mass detention.

This is where the real bombshell lies. The majority opinion in the Ninth Circuit was written by Judge Daniel A. Bress, a Trump appointee. In the Seventh Circuit, the opinion was written by Judge John Z. Lee, another Trump appointee. The president did not lose to the activist judges he so often warns about. He lost to 2 men he personally placed on the federal bench. Bress was joined by Judge M. Margaret McKeown, appointed by Bill Clinton, while Judge Carlos T. Bea, appointed by George W. Bush, dissented. Lee was joined by Judge Joshua P. Kolar, appointed by Joe Biden, while Judge Thomas L. Kirsch II, another Trump appointee, found himself in the minority. Anyone who wants to see a partisan conspiracy here has to explain why Trump's own judges stood in his way.

The boldness of this legal theory lies in the language itself. A person who has worked in the same city for 10 years, sends their children to school, and pays taxes is suddenly supposed to be treated under the law as someone standing at the border waiting to be admitted. The border is transformed from a physical place into a legal claim that can be attached to anyone the government no longer wants. The majorities in both the Seventh and Ninth Circuits recognized exactly what this was - an attempt to seize on a statute that was written for an entirely different situation. The law itself never changed. Only the willingness to bend it did.

The boldness of this legal theory lies in the language itself. A person who has worked in the same city for 10 years, sends their children to school, and pays taxes is suddenly supposed to be treated under the law as someone standing at the border waiting to be admitted. The border is transformed from a physical place into a legal claim that can be attached to anyone the government no longer wants. The majorities in both the Seventh and Ninth Circuits recognized exactly what this was - an attempt to seize on a statute that was written for an entirely different situation. The law itself never changed. Only the willingness to bend it did.

The Justice Department's record grows worse by the week. These two new rulings now join earlier decisions from Atlanta, New York, Colorado, and Ohio. Six federal appeals courts have now rejected the administration's position, while only two have sided with it. When federal appellate decisions become this deeply divided, the highest court is almost inevitably drawn into the fight. Because the circuits now disagree with one another, it is widely expected that the Supreme Court will take the case, since resolving exactly these kinds of conflicts is one of its central responsibilities. What is at stake is anything but procedural. If the majority view ultimately prevails, countless people being held by ICE would at least have to receive a hearing where a judge decides whether they qualify for release on bond. The government's practice of blanket detention would be significantly restricted, and thousands of pending cases would immediately be thrown into motion. It is not difficult to understand why the administration is fighting so fiercely to preserve its interpretation.

Behind every one of those numbers stands a human being who does not know whether they will wake up free tomorrow morning. A hearing is not a free pass. It is simply the opportunity to be heard before a government official decides that someone will spend months behind bars. The fact that the administration wanted to deny even that basic opportunity says more about its objective than any speech ever could.

We see it ourselves week after week in the struggle simply to gain access to detention facilities and document what is happening behind their walls. For Trump, mass detention is not merely the first step toward mass deportation. It is a goal in itself. It is racism. Detention without a hearing is not a bureaucratic mistake. It is intentional. Locking people away is meant to send a message to everyone who remains. When you take away a person's right to a hearing, you take away the first thing any constitutional democracy is supposed to guarantee - the right to be heard before freedom is taken away.

This is where a court is at its best. Not as the arm of a political party, but as the place where power is forced to stop. A judge who rules against the president who appointed him is not showing ingratitude. He is proving the exact opposite of what Trump expected from his judicial appointments. He is proving that the office can mean more than the memory of the man who handed it to him. In that quiet, uncomfortable loyalty to the law instead of the benefactor lies the entire difference between a republic and a court built around one ruler.

Nothing has been decided yet. The road to Washington is still a long one, and the Supreme Court has already allowed the president to prevail in other major cases. But for one Thursday, when 2 of Trump's own judges drew a line in less than 4 hours, one simple truth remains. Freedom does not survive only because of loud acts of resistance. It survives in the quiet places where someone with nothing to gain still chooses to stand by the law. The lawsuits continue, ours as well as those brought by others, and every step toward gaining access to these detention facilities is another battle. But something has changed. Two more rulings now stand on the books, and they do not stand with Trump.

To be continued ...