Groups question if Trump deportation move defied court order

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump’s legal maneuver to invoke a 1798 law to deport certain alleged Venezuelan gang members in the United States raised questions about whether he defied a court order that sought to temporarily pause those removals.

Trump announced a proclamation Saturday that said the Tren de Aragua gang is “undertaking hostile actions and conducting irregular warfare against the territory of the United States” and that members age 14 and over unlawfully in the country would be apprehended and deported under the Alien Enemies Act.

The American Civil Liberties Union and Democracy Forward had filed a lawsuit on behalf of five Venezuelans that sought an emergency halt to their deportations without being given “any hearing or meaningful review” and regardless of any defenses they have for removal. The groups said some of the plaintiffs had been targeted by the gang and one was mistakenly labeled as member because of tattoos.

Judge James E. Boasberg of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia issued a temporary restraining order Saturday blocking for 14 days the removal of all noncitizens in U.S. custody targeted under Trump’s invocation of the Alien Enemies Act. And he set a quick schedule for the Trump administration to seek to lift the order.

But the Trump administration conducted the removals in a way the groups say amounted to defying a court order. As the issue was litigated in court, the U.S. government deported more than 260 migrants to El Salvador, including 137 alleged Tren de Aragua members under the 1798 law, according to media reports.

The ACLU in a court filing Monday said Boasberg at about 6:45 p.m. Saturday had “unambiguously directed the government to turn around any planes carrying individuals being removed,” and that the government “has chosen to treat this Court’s Order as applying only to individuals still on U.S. soil or on flights that had yet to clear U.S. airspace as of 7:26pm.”

“If that is how the government proceeded, it was a blatant violation of the Court’s Order,” the ACLU court filing said. “Whether or not the planes had cleared U.S. territory, the U.S. retained custody at least until the planes landed and the individuals were turned over to foreign governments.”

The groups are demanding federal officials issue sworn declarations on whether the removals happened before or after the order, and Boasberg has set a hearing later Monday on the issue.

White House Press Secretary Karoline Levitt denied the Trump administration was defying the courts. “The Administration did not ‘refuse to comply’ with a court order,” Leavitt wrote in a social media post. “The order, which had no lawful basis, was issued after terrorist (Tren de Aragua) aliens had already been removed from U.S. territory.”

Leavitt added: “A single judge in a single city cannot direct the movements of an aircraft carrying foreign alien terrorists who were physically expelled from U.S. soil.”

Attorney General Pamela Bondi released a statement that said the judge essentially sided with Venezuelan gang members at the expense of public safety, and that the order “disregards well-established authority regarding President Trump’s power, and it puts the public and law enforcement at risk.”

The ACLU lawsuit argues that the law has only ever been a power invoked in time of war and “it cannot be used here against nationals of a country — Venezuela — with whom the United States is not at war, which is not invading the United States, and which has not launched a predatory incursion into the United States.”

The law states that whenever there is “a declared war between the United States and any foreign nation or government, or any invasion or predatory incursion” is tried “by any foreign nation or government,” then non-citizens age 14 and up can be removed as “alien enemies.”

Boasberg ruled the wording in the law — “invasion” or “predatory incursion” — refers to hostile acts by foreign nations akin to war, not Trump’s application of these terms to migration or gang activity, according to an account of the hearing in The New York Times.

The Justice Department has appealed Boasberg’s order to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, arguing there was no lawful basis for Boasberg to stop the deportations in part because Trump’s use of the Alien Enemies Act is not subject to judicial review.

“And even if reviewable, the President’s action is lawful and based upon a long history of using war authorities against organizations connected to foreign states and national security judgments, which are not subject to judicial second guessing,” the Justice Department wrote in an emergency motion.

Trump’s allies aren’t signaling hesitation about the administration potentially defying the courts and instead appear willing to take on a fight that they say amounts to a judiciary seeking to keep alleged Venezuelan gang members in the United States.

El Salvador President Nayib Bukele, who accepted the deportees as part of an agreement with the United States, posted a New York Post article on the judicial order seeking to block the removals with the commentary, “Oopsie too late.” Secretary of State Marco Rubio boosted that post from his personal account.

Senate Judiciary Chairman Charles E. Grassley, R-Iowa, wrote in a social media post that the court’s actions were evidence of judicial overreach and said his panel would act.

“Another day, another judge unilaterally deciding policy for the whole country,” Grassley wrote. “This time to benefit foreign gang members If the Supreme Court or Congress doesn’t fix, we’re headed towards a constitutional crisis. Senate Judiciary Cmte taking action.”

Elon Musk, who had previously called for the impeachment of certain judges who ruled on his federal-government cutting efforts in the Department of Government Efficiency, said Congress should add another one to its list. “The very worst judges — those who repeatedly flout the law — should at least be put to an impeachment vote, whether that vote succeeds or not,” Musk wrote.

In a social media post, Rep. Brandon Gill, R-Texas, said this week he will “be filing Articles of Impeachment against activist judge James Boasberg.” It would come at a time when House Republicans are ramping up efforts to impeach judges who have ruled against the Trump administration. Currently, there are three articles of impeachment against federal judges pending in the U.S. House.