Biden policy to release illegal migrants without court dates suffers another blow as judge extends block

A federal judge has imposed a preliminary injunction on the Biden administration’s “parole with conditions” policy – which saw illegal migrants being released into the U.S. interior without a court date in an attempt to reduce overcrowding at Border Patrol facilities.

Judge T. Kent Wetherell had imposed a two-week temporary restraining order on the “parole with conditions” policy, after he accepted arguments from the state of Florida that the policy – outlined in a May 10 memo – was materially identical to a “Parole + ATD” policy that he had blocked in March.

The two-week restraining order, which the White House decried as “sabotage”, came hours before the end of the Title 42 public health order, and gave the court time to weigh arguments about whether a longer-term preliminary injunction could be imposed.

Wetherell found, in an order on Tuesday, that “Florida is entitled to a  preliminary injunction prohibiting DHS from “paroling” aliens into the country under the Parole with Conditions policy.”

He said that the order is in the public interest as it would “promote respect for the rule of law by not allowing DHS to achieve what amounts to an end run around this Court’s decision in Florida through the adoption of a functionally identical policy to the Parole + ATD invalidated in that case.”

The Biden administration had said in a filing on Monday that it had released over 6,000 migrants into the interior on Thursday. However, it has firmly denied claims that it is engaged in the “mass release” of migrants.

Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody said in a statement that the case “continues to prove what Florida has been arguing all along, that Biden willfully and intentionally destroyed our public safety immigration structures ahead of the expiration of Title 42, and now the federal government is allowing the crush of immigrants attempting to enter the country unlawfully to flood across our border.”

“I am grateful that this judge is taking swift action to prevent the federal government from violating immigration law and mass-releasing illegal immigrants into the interior of the country,” she said.
 

This is a breaking news story; check back for updates.