Trump v. Hawaii

Proclamation No. 9645 is within the President’s broad discretion Under 8 U.S.C. § 1182(f) and § 1152(a)(1)(A) to suspend entry into the United States and Respondents did not establish a likelihood of success on the merits that the Proclamation violated the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment.

In September 2017, the President issued Proclamation No. 9645 (“Proclamation”), which contained entry restrictions on foreign nationals.  The apparent purpose of the proclamation was to improve vetting procedures and information sharing processes between the United States and eight separate countries. The Department of Homeland Security developed a “baseline” for information sharing between with the United States. Any country that did not meet that baseline would be subject to entry restrictions.  After a 50-day diplomatic effort to strengthen procedures in other countries, eight countries still fell short of the baseline: “Chad, Iran, Iraq, Libya, North Korea, Syria, Venezuela, and Yemen[.]” Following the recommendation of the Acting Secretary of Homeland Security, the President issued some form of entry restrictions on every country except Iraq.  Respondents brought a lawsuit claiming the proclamation violates the Immigration and Nationality Act as well as the First Amendment.  The District Court and Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals agreed that a preliminary injunction to block the proclamation was proper, without addressing the First Amendment arguments.  On appeal, the Supreme Court found that the text of the relevant statutes conferred broad discretion to regulate entry in the United States.  The Court also noted that §1152(a)(1)(A) is not an appropriate statute to regulate § 1182(f).  Deferring to the Executive, the Court concluded that the First Amendment claims are not likely to prevail because the President has wide latitude in the area of national security and the proclamation survives rational basis review. REVERSED and REMANDED.