A nearly four-year legal fight between Florida and the federal government over immigration policies could be close to ending because of changes made by President Donald Trump.
The 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals last week directed attorneys for the state and the federal government to file briefs about whether the case is moot.
Then-Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody filed the lawsuit in September 2021 as she and Gov. Ron DeSantis made a high-profile issue of criticizing the Biden administration’s handling of immigration issues. The lawsuit involved “parole” policies, which related to undocumented immigrants being released from detention after crossing the country’s southwest border.
Siding with the state, U.S. District Judge T. Kent Wetherell issued two rulings in 2023 that said policies, known as “Parole Plus Alternatives to Detention” and “Parole with Conditions,” violated federal law. But the Biden administration appealed to the Atlanta-based appeals court, where the case has remained pending.
In the order last week directing the state and federal government to file briefs, the appeals court cited an executive order that Trump issued after taking office Jan. 20. The executive order said the U.S. Department of Homeland Security should “terminate all categorical parole programs that are contrary to the policies of the United States.”
“Given the change in presidential administration and immigration policies, we must determine whether this case has become moot. … A case becomes moot when events after its commencement ‘create a situation in which the court can no longer give the plaintiff meaningful relief,”” the appeals court said, partially quoting a legal precedent.
The state argued in the lawsuit that the Biden administration violated laws through “catch-and-release” policies. The state contended that undocumented immigrants moved to Florida and created costs for such things as the education, health-care and prison systems.
While Wetherell ruled for the state, the federal appeals court questioned whether Florida had legal standing to challenge the immigration policies. That came after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that Texas and Louisiana did not have standing to challenge certain immigration policies.
Lawyers in Moody’s office argued last year that the Supreme Court case did not bar Florida’s challenge, largely because the Texas and Louisiana case focused on issues related to arresting migrants — while the Florida challenge involves paroling people who had already been detained.
“Texas (the Texas and Louisiana case) involved the executive branch’s historic discretion to enforce federal law,” a state brief said. “But here, the challenged policies are much more than a mere failure to enforce the law. They instead confer temporary legal status and other statutory benefits in the form of parole.”
But Biden administration attorneys called such a distinction “immaterial” and said both cases “concern policies vested with discretion.”
“Here, DHS’s (the Department of Homeland Security’s) parole policies reflected decisions about how to best use its limited resources to process and detain noncitizens who unlawfully entered the United States during particular periods of time,” a May 2024 Justice Department brief said.
Along with Trump replacing former President Joe Biden in January, DeSantis appointed Moody to the U.S. Senate to replace Marco Rubio, who became U.S. secretary of state.
