Reported / Citable
Background
Juan Francisco Gamez, a Mexican citizen, entered the United States without inspection in 1995 and has resided continuously in the country since then. On May 14, 2026, ICE arrested and detained Gamez at the South Texas Immigration Processing Center in Pearsall, Texas, without providing a bond hearing. Gamez petitioned for a writ of habeas corpus, arguing that his detention violated both the Immigration and Nationality Act and his constitutional due process rights.
The government asserted that Gamez, as an “applicant for admission” under 8 U.S.C. § 1225(b), was subject to mandatory detention without a bond hearing. This position reflected a policy change adopted in July 2025 through an internal memorandum by ICE Acting Director Todd Lyons, which reversed nearly three decades of prior agency practice treating noncitizens present in the U.S. without admission or parole as eligible for bond hearings under 8 U.S.C. § 1226(a). The Board of Immigration Appeals subsequently adopted this interpretation in Matter of Yajure Hurtado (2025).
The Fifth Circuit’s February 2026 decision in Buenrostro-Mendez v. Bondi foreclosed statutory challenges to detention under the government’s Section 1225(b) interpretation. However, Buenrostro-Mendez did not address constitutional due process claims, leaving that question for district courts to decide in the first instance.
The Court’s Holding
The court granted Gamez’s habeas petition on constitutional due process grounds. The court held that even though Buenrostro-Mendez foreclosed statutory challenges to mandatory detention under Section 1225(b), noncitizens with substantial presence in the United States retain constitutional protections. The court ordered Gamez’s release by July 1, 2026, under conditions no more restrictive than those in place before his detention, and required the government to provide him with notice of release location and time at least two hours in advance.
Critically, the court distinguished Gamez’s situation from the petitioner in DHS v. Thuraissigiam (2020). That Supreme Court case had applied an “entry fiction,” treating noncitizens as if stopped at the border for purposes of due process rights. The court held that this fiction applies only to aliens at the threshold of initial entry, not to those who have established substantial presence in the country. Gamez’s 30-year residence in the U.S. qualified him as having substantial connections, triggering full Fifth Amendment due process protections. The court emphasized that constitutional protections apply to “all persons” within U.S. territory, and allowing detention without individualized assessment of flight risk and dangerousness would deprive Gamez of his liberty without due process.
Applying the Mathews v. Eldridge balancing test, the court found that all three factors supported requiring a bond hearing: (1) Gamez’s fundamental liberty interest in freedom from detention; (2) significant risk of erroneous deprivation given the mandatory detention scheme contains no individualized assessment mechanism; and (3) minimal governmental burden in providing a hearing, as immigration law long recognized that noncitizens deserve individualized hearings before detention. The court rejected the government’s circular reasoning that Section 1225(b)’s text necessarily bars due process challenges, noting that constitutional rights cannot be vitiated by statute.
Key Takeaways
- Noncitizens with substantial presence in the United States are entitled to Fifth Amendment due process protections, even if classified as “applicants for admission” under 8 U.S.C. § 1225(b).
- Thuraissigiam’s “entry fiction” applies only to aliens at the border or newly apprehended, not to those who have entered and lived in the U.S. for extended periods.
- Constitutional due process claims challenging detention remain available even after Buenrostro-Mendez foreclosed statutory challenges under the Lyons Memo interpretation of Section 1225(b).
- Mandatory detention statutes cannot constitutionally deprive noncitizens of individualized bond hearings where they have substantial U.S. presence and no prior judicial determination of flight risk or dangerousness.
Why It Matters
This decision significantly limits the government’s ability to implement its July 2025 policy shift denying bond hearings to noncitizens without inspection. Though the Fifth Circuit in Buenrostro-Mendez eliminated statutory challenges to that policy, this case demonstrates that constitutional due process challenges provide an alternative avenue for relief. The decision reflects a growing consensus among federal district courts that Thuraissigiam’s territorial limitation on due process rights applies narrowly to border cases, and that detained immigrants who have lived in the country—even illegally—for significant periods retain constitutional protections.
The case has broad implications for ICE’s detention practices affecting the substantial population of noncitizens apprehended in the interior after years of living in the U.S. It suggests that courts will evaluate detention procedures under the Mathews test rather than reflexively applying statutory language, and that individual liberty interests may prevail over purely statutory detention schemes when constitutional rights are implicated. The decision also signals judicial skepticism toward the government’s abrupt reversal of its longstanding position after nearly thirty years of treating such noncitizens as eligible for bond hearings.