Four years after then-Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody began a legal battle with the Biden administration about immigration enforcement, state and federal officials say the fight is over.
Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier’s office and the U.S. Department of Justice on Friday filed a joint motion to dismiss an appeal filed by the federal government in 2023 after a district judge sided with the state.
The joint motion cited changes in immigration policies after President Donald Trump replaced former President Joe Biden in January.
“President Trump has since taken office and directed the Department of Homeland Security to reexamine certain immigration policies from the previous administration,” the motion filed at the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said.
The motion came after lawyers from the state and federal governments asked the Atlanta-based appeals court in June to put the appeal on hold while they tried to resolve it.
Moody filed a 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.
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 the rulings.
Before attorneys asked in June to put the case on hold, the appeals court had directed the two sides to file additional briefs and pointed to an executive order that Trump issued after taking office Jan. 20. The executive order said the 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 in calling for the additional briefs, partially quoting a legal precedent.
The state argued in the case 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.
The appeals court, however, 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.
DeSantis in January appointed Moody to the U.S. Senate to replace Marco Rubio, who became U.S. secretary of state. DeSantis subsequently appointed Uthmeier, his former chief of staff, to serve as attorney general.
The DeSantis administration has taken a series of steps designed to help Trump’s efforts to deport people in the country illegally. Those steps included opening a controversial detention center in the Everglades dubbed “Alligator Alcatraz.”
