On July 2, 2026, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit held that noncitizens subject to mandatory detention under 8 U.S.C. § 1225(b)(2) have a due process right to challenge their detention under the Fifth Amendment. The court’s ruling has enormous implications for the thousands of noncitizens the government has detained in Texas, Louisiana and Mississippi without any due process under the Trump administration’s mass deportation campaign. The decision was issued in response to the government’s appeal of three consolidated district court decisions granting habeas petitions on due process grounds.
In 2025, the Department of Homeland Security and the Department of Justice abandoned three decades of agency practice and judicial understanding by arguing that the mandatory detention provision at 8 U.S.C. § 1225(b)(2) applies to all noncitizens who entered the United States without inspection. Notably, over 400 federal district court judges from across the country, appointed by every president since Ronald Reagan, and a panel of the Seventh Circuit, have rejected the government’s new interpretation of the statute. But in Buenrostro-Mendez v. Bondi, 166 F.4th 494 (5th Cir. 2026) the Fifth Circuit embraced the government’s new reading. Thus all noncitizens who entered without inspection who are detained pending their removal proceedings within the Fifth Circuit—which includes Texas, Louisiana, and Mississippi, and is the circuit with the largest detained population—are no longer eligible as a statutory matter to a bond hearing. Nevertheless, district courts within the circuit have continued to grant habeas petitions on Fifth Amendment due process grounds.
The habeas petitioners in this case—Miguel Angel Gomez Alvarado, Ignacio Sosnava Rodriguez, and Alejandro Villegas Angel—have lived in the United States for decades after entering without inspection. None have criminal histories. All three are raising young U.S. citizen children who depend on them in myriad ways. In each case, the district court found that while Buenrostro-Mendez dictated that they were subject to mandatory detention under § 1225(b)(2), their detention without a bond hearing violated due process. The court ordered their immediate release and forbade their re-detention without a bond hearing. The government appealed all three decisions and sought expedited review. The Fifth Circuit heard oral argument in these consolidated appeals on April 29, 2026.
On July 2, 2026, the Fifth Circuit ruled in favor of the petitioners, affirming the district courts’ grants of habeas in each case. The majority of the panel held that noncitizens subject to mandatory detention under 8 U.S.C. § 1225(b)(2) have the right to meaningful due process protections and are thus entitled to bond hearings at which the government justifies their detention within 90 days without filing an individual habeas petition. On Friday, July 10, 2026, the Fifth Circuit decided to rehear the case en banc and vacated the panel’s decision pending rehearing. Briefing to the full en banc court is scheduled to be completed by September 2026.
The petitioners are represented by the American Immigration Council, the National Immigration Project, Garza & Narvaez, PLCC, and Law Offices of Stephen A. Lagana.
