Clinton-Appointed Judge Blocks Trump Administration's System for Fining Migrants Who Defy Deportation Orders

Another Democrat-appointed judge has stepped in front of President Trump's immigration agenda. U.S. District Judge George O'Toole Jr., a Clinton appointee in Boston, has blocked the system the Department of Homeland Security uses to fine migrants who stay in the country after final deportation orders.

Those fines can reach up to $1.8 million. DHS said in July that it had issued more than 103,000 of them, totaling about $84 billion, since the President returned to office.

The ruling came in a class-action suit brought by two migrants and the Immigrant Legal Resource Center. O'Toole found the administration likely violated the Administrative Procedure Act by rolling out new procedures without public comment, and he faulted boilerplate forms that failed to explain why individuals qualified. He also described the plaintiffs' finances as precarious and the fines as "exorbitant."

Conservatives will note what this case involves: people who were ordered removed and stayed anyway. Congress authorized these penalties in 1996, allowing a daily fine for anyone who willfully refuses to leave, now capped at $998 a day. The Biden administration suspended the policy. President Trump revived it and expanded it, and some penalties were calculated retroactively for up to five years.

The decision has clear limits. It does not eliminate the government's power to fine those who willfully defy removal orders, and it does not stop deportations. It targets the procedures, and DHS can still pursue fines through a process that complies with the law. DHS did not immediately comment.

Earlier, U.S. District Judge Jon Tigar in California blocked a $1.82 million penalty against one woman. O'Toole's order goes further, because it reaches the system itself. The fight over enforcing removal orders will continue.