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A federal judge had ordered agents not to make indiscriminate stops relying on factors like a person’s ethnicity or that they speak Spanish.
Sept. 8, 2025Updated 2:35 p.m. ET
The Supreme Court on Monday lifted a federal judge’s order prohibiting government agents from making indiscriminate immigration-related stops in the Los Angeles area that challengers called “blatant racial profiling.”
The court’s brief order was unsigned and gave no reasons. It is not the last word in the case, which is pending before a federal appeals court and may again reach the justices.
The court’s three liberal members dissented.
“We should not have to live in a country where the government can seize anyone who looks Latino, speaks Spanish and appears to work a low wage job,” Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote, joined by Justices Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson.
“Rather than stand idly by while our constitutional freedoms are lost, “ Justice Sotomayor added, “I dissent.”
The court’s ruling for now allows what critics say are roving patrols of masked agents routinely violating the Fourth Amendment and what supporters say is a vigorous but lawful effort to enforce the nation’s immigration laws.
The majority’s failure to provide an explanation for the ruling means that it is hard to say whether its reasoning applies nationwide or is limited to the Los Angeles area, where the administration has said that the problems flowing from illegal immigration are especially pronounced. But there is little doubt that the ruling will have the practical effect of further emboldening the administration’s uncompromising efforts to deport unauthorized immigrants around the country.
