After questioning the effectiveness of a pandemic-related public health order that allows the government to continue summarily expelling illegal aliens from the United States, a federal appeals court unanimously ruled that the policy may continue, provided that aliens aren’t sent to places where they may be persecuted or tortured. The case deals with expulsions, as opposed to formal deportations, under which the person concerned has the right to a hearing. Critics say the government has been using the public health rationale to justify kicking out aliens without providing due process. Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas justified the public health edict in September 2021. “We are doing this out of a public health need,” Mayorkas said. “It is not an immigration policy. It is not an immigration policy that we would embrace.” The case, Huisha-Huisha v. Mayorkas, was decided (pdf) on March 4 by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the …