Dual legal challenges to President Obama’s executive actions on immigration could go before the U.S. Supreme Court, Professor Anil Kalhan said in an article published by the Law360 news service.

The Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit is considering a challenge to Obama’s deferred deportation policies brought by Arizona Sheriff Joe Arpaio, who contends they are unconstitutional, while the Fifth Circuit is considering a U.S. Department of Justice effort to stay injunctions U.S. District Court Judge Andrew Hanen granted to 26 states that oppose the executive actions.  

Some observers said a split decision in the two cases would prompt the Supreme Court to review the matter, but Professor Anil Kalhan said the high court might take up the case, even if both circuits reach similar conclusions.

"It's the kind of case that the court might very well take in the absence of a circuit split," Kalhan said. "It's significant [and] it affects large numbers of people."

An authority on immigration law, Kalhan is the author of a forthcoming article analyzing Hanen's ruling that will appear this year in UCLA Law Review Discourse.