Justices Weigh Deferring Asylum Decisions to Immigration Judges

The Supreme Court appeared open to letting courts defer to administrative officials’ decisions on whether immigrants show they face harm serious enough to qualify for asylum.

Several justices across the ideological divide on Monday questioned why such a decision wouldn’t be considered the type of factual finding that generally calls for a deferential standard of review from appeals courts.

The conservative-dominated court has shown a repeated interest in questions surrounding the issue of deference in federal courts. In 2024, the justices gutted a decades-old doctrine that said judges must defer to agencies’ interpretations of unclear laws.

The central question in Monday’s case is based on a panel of immigration judges’ decision to reject an asylum application from an El Salvador native and his family after finding their experience didn’t establish persecution or reasonable fear of persecution under the Immigration and Nationality Act.

The applicant’s lawyers argued that such a judgment is a legal question that demands review under the court’s jurisprudence. Some of the justices pushed back on that reasoning.

“We’re going to have to look at all of this evidence, all of these facts, and decide whether these threats were indeed that level of menacing,” said Justice Elena Kagan. “That sounds really factual.”

Justices Clarence Thomas and Sonia Sotomayor also questioned how the case was distinct from INS v. Elias Zacharias, a 1992 ruling that a decision by the Board of Immigration Appeals can be reversed only if the evidence presented “was so compelling that no reasonable factfinder could fail to find the requisite fear of persecution.”

The case hinges on what standard of judicial review the justices decide is required for administrative proceedings involving people applying for asylum. Immigration judges are employees of the executive branch, not the judicial branch.

The Justice Department noted in its brief that immigration courts decide roughly 200,000 asylum applications a year, which they argue largely turn on factual assessments.

The case is Urias-Orellana v. Bondi, U.S., 24-777, argument heard 12/1/25.