When the current U.S. Supreme Court terms ends it may be remembered as a moment when an otherwise subservient conservative majority finally drew a line by denying the Trump administration’s bid to end “birthright citizenship.” If that case goes as expected, the president’s outspokenly nativist policy chief, Stephen Miller, may weep bitter tears over his hopes of radically restricting legal immigration being dashed.

In the meantime, the six conservative justices are giving the administration important, if less sweeping, wins on several immigrations cases. One came earlier this week when Justice Clarence Thomas wrote for a 6-3 conservative majority in Blanche v. Lau that a mere suspicion of criminal activity by green-card holders could legitimately bar their reentry after trips overseas. And today, more succor for Team Trump came in two opinions on immigration cases written by the administration’s good friend, Justice Samuel Alito.

The first, in the case of Mullin v. Al Otro Lado, affirmed the administration’s argument that by physically barring asylum seekers from crossing the U.S.-Mexico border to plead their case, it can exclude them altogether under a statute that limits their pleas to those who have “arrived” in the United States. So what began during the final days of the Obama administration as a administrative step to regulate border-entry applications amid a surge of migrants has now become a clever tactic for closing the border whenever the federal government chooses to do so. Alito reached that result by very literally construing the word “arrive” in asylum statutes to mean physically crossing the border. Keeping that from happening cuts off the entire process.

Characteristically, Justice Thomas concurred with the decision but expressed his familiar........

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