The US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ruled Friday that the court cannot review challenges to asylum interview procedures in a suit filed by migrants seeking asylum. The court said that it lacks jurisdiction.

In September 2019, 126 asylum-seekers filed suit, challenging “eleven alleged policies on how asylum officers conduct interviews in expedited-removal proceedings.” One policy requires asylum-seekers to apply for asylum in a country they pass on the way to the US. The plaintiffs alleged that the policies violate asylum-seekers’ due process rights.

On Friday, the three-judge panel explained that the court cannot review the policies because most policies are unwritten and therefore are unreviewable. An immigration enforcement law only permits the review of policy directives, guidelines, and procedures that are written.

The court further determined that the remaining claims were time-barred. A written policy that permits interviews to be conducted by border patrol agents instead of asylum officers was filed too late.

As the panel wrote in the opinion: “[T]he bar on review of ‘procedures and policies adopted’ . . . plainly extends to the alleged policies at issue here, which govern credible-fear interviews in expedited-removal proceedings.”