The legal fight over America's fast-track immigration fines has escalated again. On Friday, November 6, plaintiffs in the Massachusetts class action Maria L. v. Mullin filed a pair of emergency motions in the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts, accusing the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) of violating a September 30 court stay when it finalized the civil-penalties rules and then ratified roughly fifteen months of fines that the court had already frozen, Law360 reported on November 6. There has been no ruling on the motions yet, and the government response had not been reported as of Saturday, November 7.
This is a new development in a case Awaaz Punjab readers have been following: on October 26, DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin signed a Federal Register notice ratifying every final civil penalty decision issued between June 27, 2025, and October 13, 2026 — about 176,000 fines in total. The plaintiffs now argue, as Law360 described their filing, that the October 14 final rule and the October 26 ratification reach the very fines the court froze, and improperly entrench enforcement the court had paused. Law360 framed the filing as a new procedural step in the class challenge, not a court finding of contempt.
What the September 30 stay actually froze
On September 30, Judge George A. O'Toole Jr. granted a stay under Section 705 of the Administrative Procedure Act (5 U.S.C. 705), the provision that lets a court pause agency action while a challenge proceeds. His order stayed the June 2025 interim final rule “and all fines issued thereunder” until further order of the court, in the case docketed as Maria L. v. Mullin, No. 1:25-cv-13471.
Two findings drove that ruling. First, the judge concluded the interim rule likely conflicts with the Immigration and Nationality Act, because the statutes penalize only conduct shown to be willful or voluntary, and the rule and DHS's practice “effectively read the words 'voluntarily' and 'willfully' out of the relevant statutory provisions.” Second, he rejected the government's arguments that it could skip public notice-and-comment rulemaking, describing the rule's 15-day appeal window as “essentially punitive.” Those were preliminary findings on likely success, not a final decision on the merits.
The two documents issued after the stay
Two weeks after the stay, on October 14, DHS and the Justice Department published a final rule (91 FR 65390) that kept the interim penalty structure largely intact, after a comment period; Bloomberg Law reported the finalized rule included a mail-delay appeal exception. Then, on October 26, Secretary Mullin published the ratification notice (Federal Register Document 2026-21751, 91 FR 67325), covering final penalties under three provisions: willful failure to depart after a removal order (8 U.S.C. 1324d(a)(1)), failure to leave during a voluntary-departure period (8 U.S.C. 1229c(d)), and improper entry (8 U.S.C. 1325(b)). DHS said it acted “out of an abundance of caution” and that the ratification “is not a statement that the fines covered by this ratification would have been invalid absent this ratification.” The notice does not mention the Boston case or its stay at all.
DHS grounds the move in Guedes v. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, a 2019 D.C. Circuit decision holding that ratification can purge a procedural defect from an earlier action. Legal analysis of the case notes the limit of that argument: ratification after full notice-and-comment is a plausible answer to the procedural half of Judge O'Toole's ruling, but the other half is about substance — whether each person's conduct was actually willful — and re-adopting the same fines through a cleaner process does not, on its face, change that. The plaintiffs may also face a government argument that the stay binds only the interim rule, or that publishing a final rule is different from collecting stayed fines; Law360's report summarizes the parties' positions without resolving the dispute.
Separate from the court fight, anyone who believes the interim rule's shortcuts prejudiced their own case may email ICE at IFRCivilFinesReview@ice.dhs.gov on or before November 16, 2026. The subject line must include your full name, date of birth and Alien Registration Number (A-Number); the email body must include your current address, current phone number, penalty tracking number and an invoice number if you have one. DHS says claims missing any of that information will not be reviewed. This is NOT a new appeal of the fine itself, and it does not promise any fine will be cancelled or reduced. The ratification excludes fines already reversed on appeal, fines still pending on appeal, and fines DHS has already reopened and rescinded. This report is general information, not legal advice — talk to an immigration lawyer or accredited representative about your own notice.
Why this matters for immigrant and Punjabi families
These fines are not small, and they land on exactly the households this site's readers know best: people with old removal orders, missed voluntary-departure deadlines, or an improper-entry allegation from years ago, who may also have a pending or approved path to legal status that a paperwork-only review never caught. One named plaintiff in the case was fined about $1.8 million and has since become a permanent resident — the fine remains. DHS said in July, as Bloomberg Law reported, that it had issued more than 103,000 fines totalling $84 billion. For Punjabi families in the United States — including truck drivers whose licences, jobs and status all depend on staying inside the rules — whether these penalties can legally be collected is not an abstract court question.
What happens next
The open questions are whether Judge O'Toole sets a fast briefing schedule before the November 16 claims deadline, how DHS defends issuing the ratification while the stay was in place, and whether any new order reaches fines issued under the October 14 final rule as well as the frozen interim-rule fines. A First Circuit appeal, if one is filed, could also change how the stay applies. Readers holding a penalty notice should watch the public docket in case No. 1:25-cv-13471, keep copies of everything they send ICE, and not let the November 16 email deadline pass without advice — an incomplete claim gets no review at all.