President Donald Trump was blocked by a federal appeals court from using an 18th-century wartime law, the Alien Enemies Act, to deport Venezuelan migrants his administration says belong to the criminal gang Tren de Aragua.
Newsweek contacted the White House for comment by email after office hours.
Why It Matters
Trump has, through executive order, invoked the Alien Enemies Act by arguing that there is an invasion of the U.S. by foreign criminal gangs that his administration has now designated as terrorist groups.
The court decision bars deportations from Texas, Louisiana and Mississippi.
What To Know
The 2-1 decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit found that there was not an “invasion or predatory incursion” by a foreign power as required by the 1798 statute to justify its invocation in the case of this group of migrants.
The Alien Enemies Act is a wartime law passed in 1798 as part of the Alien and Sedition Acts under President John Adams. It grants the U.S. president the authority to detain, restrict or deport foreign nationals from a country that is at war with the United States.
Unlike other provisions in the Alien and Sedition Acts, which expired or were repealed, the Alien Enemies Act remains in effect today.
The act was only used three times before in U.S. history, all during declared wars: in the War of 1812 and the two World Wars.
On April 19, the Supreme Court instructed the Trump administration to pause the deportation of a number of Venezuelan men in custody using the 1798 law.
The Trump administration unsuccessfully argued that courts cannot second-guess the president’s determination that Tren de Aragua was connected to Venezuela’s government and represented a danger to the United States, meriting use of the act.
In the majority were U.S. Circuit Judges Leslie Southwick, a George W. Bush appointee, and Irma Carrillo Ramirez, a Joe Biden appointee. Andrew Oldham, a Trump appointee, dissented.
“A country encouraging its residents and citizens to enter this country illegally is not the modern-day equivalent of sending an armed, organized force to occupy, to disrupt, or to otherwise harm the United States,” the judges wrote.
In a lengthy dissent, Oldham complained his two colleagues were second-guessing Trump’s conduct of foreign affairs and national security, realms where courts usually give the president great deference.
What People Are Saying
Lee Gelernt, who argued the case for the American Civil Liberties Union, was quoted by the Associated Press as saying: “The Trump administration’s use of a wartime statute during peacetime to regulate immigration was rightly shut down by the court. This is a critically important decision reining in the administration’s view that it can simply declare an emergency without any oversight by the courts.”
What Happens Next
The case appears set to return to the Supreme Court in what is shaping up to be a decisive battle over Mr. Trump’s ability to use the Alien Enemies Act, the New York Times reported.
https://www.newsweek.com/trump-legal-blow-deportation-migrants-alien-enemies-act-2123573