5. Department of Homeland Security · Notable
Use expedited removal nationwide, beyond the 100-mile border zone
Printed page 142 5. Department of Homeland Security
“To maximize the efficient use of its resources, ICE should make full use of existing Expedited Removal (ER) authorities. The agency has limited the use of ER to eligible aliens apprehended within 100 miles of the border. This is not a statutory requirement.”
What has happened
- Done
The D.C. Circuit vacated the district court's stay, holding that the written directives comply with due process and that implementation problems do not make the designation contrary to the INA. Nationwide expedited removal is back in force. The court of appeals had already declined, on 2025-11-22, to stay the district court's order except as to the credible-fear procedures, so the expansion was stopped for the ten months between the two rulings.
- Blocked
The D.D.C. stayed the January 21 designation notice and the implementing Huffman memorandum under 5 U.S.C. 705, holding the expansion likely unconstitutional as applied to people long since inside the country, and refused the government's request for even a 14-day administrative stay. The expansion could not operate.
- Done
DHS restored expedited removal "to the fullest extent authorized by Congress", rescinding the 2022 notice that had confined it to people apprehended within 100 miles of the border and within 14 days of entry. Effective 6:00 p.m. on 2025-01-21. This is exactly the ask: the 100-mile limit was a policy choice, not a statutory requirement, and it was dropped.
Research log
What was searched, and what didn’t count as evidence
Research notes
A three-step sequence: the designation, the stay, and the appellate vacatur. A stay of the whole designation is blocked, and the D.C. Circuit’s later vacatur of that stay puts the ask back in force.
- Action
- expand
- Object
- Expedited Removal authority
- ID
- 316