Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/21pdf/21-954_7l48.pdf
Page Number: 6.0

Cite as:  597 U. S. ____ (2022) 

1 

Opinion of the Court 

NOTICE:  This opinion is subject to formal revision before publication in the 
preliminary  print  of  the  United  States  Reports.  Readers  are  requested  to 
notify the Reporter of Decisions, Supreme Court of the United States, Wash-
ington, D. C. 20543, of any typographical or other formal errors, in order that 
corrections may be made before the preliminary print goes to press. 

SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES 

_________________ 

No. 21–954 
_________________ 

JOSEPH R. BIDEN, JR., PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED 
STATES, ET AL., PETITIONERS v. TEXAS, ET AL. 

ON WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF 
APPEALS FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT 

[June 30, 2022] 

CHIEF  JUSTICE  ROBERTS  delivered  the  opinion  of  the 

Court. 

In  January  2019,  the  Department  of  Homeland  Secu-
rity—under the administration of President Trump—estab-
lished the Migrant Protection Protocols.  That program pro-
vided for the return to Mexico of non-Mexican aliens who 
had  been  detained  attempting  to  enter  the  United  States
illegally from Mexico.  On Inauguration Day 2021, the new
administration of President Biden announced that the pro-
gram would be suspended the next day, and later that year
sought to terminate it.  The District Court and the Court of 
Appeals, however, held that doing so would violate the Im-
migration and Nationality Act, concluding that the return 
policy was mandatory so long as illegal entrants were being 
released  into  the  United  States.    The  District  Court  also 
held that the attempted rescission of the program was in-
adequately  explained  in  violation  of  the  Administrative
Procedure Act.  While its appeal was pending, the Govern-
ment took new action to terminate the policy with a more
detailed explanation.  But the Court of Appeals held that 
this new action was not separately reviewable final agency