Rabat – Attorneys representing Venezuelan migrants accused of being part of the Tren de Aragua gang urged the US Supreme Court on Tuesday, April 1, to extend the temporary block on President Donald Trump’s use of the Alien Enemies Act of 1798. The administration has invoked this wartime power to deport hundreds of individuals to a prison in El Salvador without due process.
The Trump administration had requested the court to lift the block in March. However, a 514-page brief filed by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and Democracy Forward, on behalf of the migrants, argued that the injunction is the only safeguard preventing them from being sent to El Salvador’s mega-prison, “never to be seen again, without any kind of procedural protection, much less judicial review.”
According to the filing, migrants who have already been sent to Venezuela were “confined, incommunicado, in one of the world’s most brutal prisons, where torture and human rights abuses are rampant.”
Trump designated the Tren de Aragua gang as a terrorist organization in February and subsequently used the 1798 Alien Enemies Act to justify the arrest and deportation of over 130 immigrants in a single weekend in March, accusing them of gang affiliations. The wartime statute, which has not been exercised in the US since World War II, grants the president broad authority to expel foreign nationals deemed “alien enemies.”
In March, the ACLU and Democracy Forward challenged the administration’s use of the act, arguing that it was being misapplied. They stated that it “cannot be used here against nationals of a country 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.”
Although federal judge James E. Boasberg swiftly issued a 14-day restraining order preventing deportations under Trump’s directive, the administration claimed that 137 migrants had already been expelled before the order took effect.
During an April 3 court hearing, judge Boasberg stated that there was a “fair likelihood” the Trump administration had violated his order. However, he indicated he would likely wait until the following week to rule on whether the White House was in contempt of court for disregarding it—a conclusion he reached after nearly an hour of tense questioning of a Justice Department lawyer.
The Trump administration repeatedly attacked Boasberg, accusing him of exceeding his authority. Trump even called for his impeachment, while some of his top aides went so far as to publicly slander him on television, accusing him of being “out of order” simply for upholding the due process of law.
Meanwhile, in a court filing on Monday, March 31, the administration acknowledged that a migrant with protected status had been wrongfully deported to El Salvador. However, it argued that the court lacks jurisdiction to order his return from the high-security prison where he is now held.
Attorneys for the US government admitted that the individual, Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran national, was deported due to an administrative error. “Although ICE was aware of his protection from removal to El Salvador, Abrego Garcia was removed due to an administrative oversight,” the filing stated.
