On Tuesday a federal appeals court upheld the dismissal of a lawsuit launched over the first executive action taken by President Obama to help undocumented immigrants already living in the United States. This decision could assist the president’s administration in fighting the more important lawsuit that has seen his second executive action on immigration reform temporarily put on hold all over the country.
The 5th Circuit US Court of Appeals panel, which consisted of three judges, made an unanimous ruling that the state of Mississippi and a number of immigration agents did not have the legal standing to sue over the deferred action program created by the president back in 2012. The panel ruled that the evidence suggesting that either party was harmed by the program was nothing more than speculative.
“Neither Mississippi nor the agents have alleged a sufficiently concrete and particularized injury that would give plaintiffs standing to challenge,” wrote Judge W Eugene Davis, whose opinion was shared by judges Priscilla Owen and Carolyn King. The notion of harm is one of the key tenets of the law suit launched by 26 states, led by Texas, over Obama’s most recent executive action on immigration reform and resulted in an injunction preventing the program going ahead in February.
“Mississippi submitted no evidence that any DACA-eligible immigrants resided in the state,” Davis pointed out. “Nor did Mississippi produce evidence of costs it would incur if some DACA-approved immigrants came to the state.”