This Week in the Circuits: Ninth Weighs Trump’s Layoffs, ‘Remain in Mexico’ Policy

Welcome to This Week in the Circuits, a look at the most significant cases up for argument on appeal.

The Trump administration will defend a pair of key administration policies this week in San Francisco, with the Ninth Circuit set to hear challenges to mass federal worker layoffs and a shift in the treatment of migrants seeking asylum in the US.

First up on Tuesday, the Justice Department will argue that a federal trial court judge wrongly ordered the Treasury Department and four other agencies to rehire thousands of probationary federal employees who were fired.

The dispute is one of several ongoing cases involving President Donald Trump’s effort to reduce the size of the federal government, including lawsuits over the executive branch’s right to cancel union agreements and efforts to close down various agencies.

The arguments will likely focus on jurisdictional issues. The Justice Department argued in its brief that the lower court ruling is based in part on a “sweeping” theory of standing by federal worker unions and others challenging the layoffs that would empower anyone who receives government services to sue over a broad range of personnel decisions. The DOJ said that even if the unions had standing, the lower court didn’t have jurisdiction because challenges to government personnel actions must go through the US Merit Systems Protection Board.

The American Federation of Government Employees and other unions disputed those jurisdictional arguments and urged the Ninth Circuit to toss the appeals over preliminary relief because they will likely soon by mooted by a final trial court ruling on the merits. Docket

On Thursday the Ninth Circuit will hear arguments in a long-running challenge to the Trump administration’s “Remain in Mexico” policy that bars asylum seekers at the Southern border from entering the country while their appeals play out.

The Immigrant Defenders Law Center argues the policy, first adopted during Trump’s first term and reinstated earlier this year, violates the First Amendment rights of asylum seekers and denies them a right to counsel. The government is appealing a lower court ruling that blocked the policy from going into effect.

Last month, the panel assigned to the case issued a split decision on a DOJ motion for a stay during the proceedings, holding that the legal group is likely to prevail in its First Amendment challenge. Judge Ryan D. Nelson dissented from that ruling, suggesting that the law center’s suit is barred under the Supreme Court’s 2024 ruling on organizational standing in FDA v. Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine. Docket

Calendar Check

Most circuits are quiet this week, with many not scheduled to hear any arguments until after Labor Day.

The Seventh Circuit will convene its annual judicial conference in Chicago. Highlights of the agenda include scheduled Monday remarks from Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett and a panel discussion previewing upcoming circuit cases of note.

The Sixth Circuit’s lone scheduled argument for the week, in a death penalty case, is set for Thursday. An Ohio man claims he received ineffective counsel after his attorney failed to call a forensic pathologist to testify on his behalf and didn’t raise his history of being a sexual abuse victim during the penalty phase following his murder conviction. Docket

Two former Alaska Airlines Inc. flight attendants head to the Ninth Circuit on Friday in a bid to revive religious bias claims. They are appealing a lower court’s finding that the airline fired them because of online posts—which took aim at the company’s support for federal legislation to add sexual orientation and gender identity as protected classes—not their religious beliefs. Docket