Supreme Court sides with Trump order to block Biden-era regulation that allowed judges to halt evictions

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court declined to intervene Tuesday in a dispute over a Biden-era immigration regulation that allowed immigration judges to stay some deportation proceedings.

The high court rejected a request from Democratic-led cities, which say the rule was used to help crime victims and neglected juveniles and should be reinstated.

Texas and the Trump administration agreed to a court order blocking the regulations after the state filed a lawsuit. Texas has alleged that the practice called administrative shutdown was significantly expanded under former President Joe Biden and effectively allowed people to stay in the country indefinitely.

The cities of Baltimore, Columbus, Ohio, and New Haven, Connecticut, as well as the legal group Centro Legal de la Raza, had asked to join the case to defend the settlement. They filed an emergency appeal to the Supreme Court after a judge refused to allow them to intervene.

Represented by the group Democracy Forward, they argued that Texas and the Trump administration worked together to allow the regulations to be permanently blocked in court, bypassing a public rulemaking process.

The Justice Department had urged the justices to reject the appeal, saying the cities had no legal authority to challenge the settlement and had not shown they would suffer immediate legal harm.