Supreme Court to decide if people awaiting deportation have a right to release on bond

Reporting from Washington —  The Supreme Court agreed Monday to decide a case from Los Angeles on whether foreigners who are held for deportation are entitled to hearings that could lead to their release on bond.

The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the government must provide a bond hearing and prove by “clear and convincing evidence” that detainees would pose a flight risk if set free.

Obama administration lawyers, in a strongly worded appeal, accused the appeals court of a “radical revision” of the law that governs foreigners who are picked up trying to enter the country illegally and criminals who are being held for deportation.

“Throughout the history of U.S. immigration law, Congress has never provided bond hearings for aliens detained at the threshold of entry to the country,” U.S. Solicitor Gen. Donald Verrilli said in asking the high court to consider the case. The law says aliens who have criminal records “shall be detained” and deported, he said.

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Lawyers for the American Civil Liberties Union had won the appeals court ruling after suing in federal court in Los Angeles and arguing that people who are held for more than six months deserve a hearing. Some of the detainees have jobs and families in the United States, and a significant percentage of them are eventually spared from deportation, the ACLU argued.

Verrilli said the 9th Circuit’s ruling, if adopted nationwide, would pose a threat to public safety and put a heavy burden on the immigration system.

The high court said it would hear the case in the fall, so a final ruling may not come until after President Obama leaves office. The case is Jennings vs. Rodriguez.

In a second case from Los Angeles, the court cast doubt on whether “service advisors” who work at auto dealerships are entitled to overtime pay.

The federal law that sets minimum wages and extra pay for overtime had long included an exemption for “any salesman” who is “primarily engaged in selling or servicing automobiles.” The notion was that these employees were paid commissions on their sales, not for the hours they worked.

This exemption had also covered the more than 40,000 service advisors at car dealerships nationwide who advise customers who need work on their vehicles; they too receive commissions. But in 2011, the Labor Department announced a new rule that limited the exemption to salespeople only, not service advisors.

When service advisors at Encino Motor Cars, a Mercedes-Benz dealership, sued seeking overtime pay, a federal judge initially dismissed their claim, citing the earlier exemption. But they won before the 9th Circuit court, which relied on the Labor Department’s new policy.

The Supreme Court agreed to hear an appeal, and on Monday set aside the 9th Circuit’s decision in Encino Motor Cars v. Navarro.

Justice Anthony Kennedy said the Labor Department had failed to explain its switch in policy, and he faulted the 9th Circuit for relying on its new rule. The case now goes back to the 9th Circuit for a second look.

Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito dissented. They said they would have ruled that the law makes clear that service advisors do not qualify for overtime because they are engaged in “servicing automobiles.”

On Twitter: DavidGSavage

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