Mandamus decisions / District of Maryland

Veshite Gah v. U.S. Department of Homeland Security

District of MarylandJulie Rebecca RubinDecided March 18, 2026No. 1:25-cv-00898

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2,914 written decisions from 2,661 cases in the whole mandamus and agency-delay group, the group's newest decided October 30, 2026. Updated November 3, 2026 at 1:24 a.m. CT; the Passim connector counts the live collection, which can differ by the day's additions and retirements (which total to quote). Coverage: of the 1,606 public decisions since January 1, 2025 that a CourtListener and GovInfo search for mandamus and agency delay finds, Passim holds 1,371 (85%), measured November 3, 2026. Some of what that search finds are not mandamus decisions. Tell us about a decision we're missing.

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What the decision decided

Each value cites the passage it was read from. Values read by a model were checked against that passage; values read by rule come from fixed text patterns. Read the decision before relying on either.

Agency	USCIS Read by a model USCIS received Plaintiff’s asylum application on April 6, 2023.
Form or filing	I-589 (asylum) Read by a model Form I-589 Application for Asylum and Withholding of Removal.
What the suit asked for	Decide the asylum application Read by a model regarding the delay in adjudicating his2 Form I-589 Application for Asylum and Withholding of Removal.
Kind of order	A ruling on a motion or the petition Read by a model For the reasons set forth herein, by separate order, Defendants’ Motion (ECF No. 11), construed as a motion to dismiss, will be granted.
Motion decided	Motion to dismiss for lack of jurisdiction; Motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim Read by a model Defendants filed the instant Motion to dismiss Plaintiff’s Complaint for lack jurisdiction, as well as for failure to state a claim.
Whose motion	The government's motion Read by a model Pending before the court is Defendants’ Motion to Dismiss, or in the Alternative, Motion for Summary Judgment.
Disposition	Dismissed The case or every delay claim was dismissed for a reason other than mootness. Read by a model The court will therefore grant the Motion and dismiss Plaintiffs’ Complaint.
Prevailing party	Government Read by a model The court will therefore grant the Motion and dismiss Plaintiffs’ Complaint.
The delay claim	Dismissed Read by a model The court will therefore grant the Motion and dismiss Plaintiffs’ Complaint.
Months pending	35.4 months from the application to the court's decision Read by a model USCIS received Plaintiff’s asylum application on April 6, 2023.
TRAC factors	The court weighed the TRAC factors 1. Rule of reasonfavors the government 2. Congressional timetableneutral 3. Human health and welfarefavors the government 4. Competing prioritiesfavors the government 5. Interests prejudicedfavors the government 6. No impropriety neededneutral Read by a model The first factor favors Defendants.
The government's delay arguments	First-in, first-out processing accepted; Line-jumping accepted Read by a model Courts in this district (and others) have repeatedly found USCIS’s last-in, first-out policy constitutes a rule of reason when considered against the issues of its backlog in adjudicating pending asylum applications.
Threshold rulings	None Read by a model

How the case ended

Docket: No. 1:25-cv-00898
Filed: March 18, 2025
Ended: March 18, 2026
Suit's filing to its end: 365 days
How it ended: Dismissed, ground not recorded
From the record: idb disp 14 (dismissed: other)

A voluntary or stipulated dismissal is how most suits end once the agency acts; the docket rarely says why. Other suits in this court.

Supreme Court and Fourth Circuit authority

District decisions bind no one. On the questions this decision raises, the Supreme Court decisions and the circuit's published decisions listed here bind this court; a circuit disposition marked nonprecedential was not published as precedent and is persuasive only. ImmCite status as read November 3, 2026. Check the current status before relying on one.

Norton v. Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance, 542 U.S. 55

Supreme Court, June 14, 2004. Section 706(1) and mandamus reach only a discrete agency action that the agency is legally required to take, so a court cannot compel programmatic improvements or action the law leaves to agency discretion.

ImmCite: treatment available, history exists, not clearance
Gonzalez v. Cuccinelli, 985 F.3d 357

Fourth Circuit, January 14, 2021. Courts may review delay in placing U-visa petitioners on the waitlist under the TRAC factors and should not dismiss such claims at the pleading stage, but lack jurisdiction over delay in pre-waitlist work-permit requests, a point on which the Sixth Circuit disagrees.

ImmCite: caution, adverse or limiting treatment found. Rejected in the Sixth Circuit by Barrios Garcia v. U.S. Department of Homeland Security, 25 F.4th 430 (2022).
Lovo v. Miller, 107 F.4th 199

Fourth Circuit, July 3, 2024. The 'decision or action' language of § 1182(a)(9)(B)(v), which the court treated as coextensive with § 1252(a)(2)(B)(ii), does not reach USCIS inaction, so a district court may hear a claim that USCIS unreasonably delayed a provisional unlawful-presence waiver.

ImmCite: treatment available, history exists, not clearance. ImmCite has read all 5 published decisions citing this case, as of 2026-10-29; none treats it adversely. That describes those decisions; it is not a determination that the case is good law.