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A federal judge blocked the Trump administration on Saturday from using the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 to carry out mass deportations — an unprecedented move that left many immigration lawyers scrambling to help their clients.
President Trump said he invoked the 18th-century law to expedite the removal of Tren de Aragua gang members, claiming that the Venezuelan gang was engaged in an invasion of the United States and posed a major national security threat.
The Trump administration published the president’s invocation of the Alien Enemies Act on Saturday. However, the proclamation was signed the previous evening, allowing the administration to begin enforcing the proclamation almost immediately.
Lindsay Toczylowski, president and CEO at Immigrant Defenders Law Center, took to social media to share the real-life implications of the Alien Enemies Act for her client, who disappeared Saturday morning from an ICE online detainee locator, she said.
The client, who worked in the arts community in Venezuela, came to the U.S. last year seeking asylum. Toczylowski said the client had a strong claim, but he was detained at entry because ICE alleged his tattoos were gang-related.
“He is LGBTQ. His tattoos are benign. But ICE submitted photos of his tattoos as evidence he is Tren de Aragua,” Toczylowski wrote, adding that Immigrant Defenders Law Center planned to present evidence he is not Tren de Aragua but “never got the chance.” This past Saturday, the client’s location was no longer displaying on the online detainee locator, Toczylowski said.
“Today he has been forcibly transferred, we believe, to El Salvador. We are horrified tonight thinking what might happen to him now,” Toczylowski said. “The Alien Enemies Act would allow the Trump administration to remove people from the U.S. based on an accusation alone. The accusation could be, as it is for our client, completely baseless. But they would remove them anyway, despite the dangers, despite the lack of due process.”
In response to the administration’s invocation of the Alien Enemies Act, the ACLU and Democracy Forward filed a lawsuit Saturday morning, arguing that the law should not be applied to criminal gangs instead of enemy states.
U.S. District Judge James E. Boasberg, who is overseeing the case, halted deportations for those in custody for up to 14 days. By Saturday evening, Boasberg presided over a remote hearing, during which the ACLU and Democracy Forward successfully sought preliminary class-action certification and an extension of the temporary restraining order to cover all detainees at risk of deportation under the act.
Lee Gelernt, deputy director of the ACLU’s Immigrants’ Rights Project and lead counsel for the case, presented arguments in favor of the TRO expansion. A hearing on the lawsuit’s merits is now scheduled for March 21 in the U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C.
曼哈顿仇恨犯罪下降，但针对移民案件增多
Gelernt said this “may be the administration’s most extreme measure yet, and that is saying a lot.” The Alien Enemies Act of 1798 has been used three times in U.S. history, all during wartime:
- War of 1812 (1812–1815) – The U.S. government used the law to detain and remove British nationals living in the country after war broke out between the United States and Britain. At the time, it was part of the broader Alien and Sedition Acts.
- World War I (1917–1918) – President Woodrow Wilson invoked the law to restrict and detain German nationals residing in the U.S. following America’s entry into the war. Some German immigrants were arrested and interned as potential threats.
- World War II (1941–1945) – The law was used to detain and intern individuals of German, Italian, and Japanese descent, including U.S. citizens, following the attack on Pearl Harbor. This led to the mass internment of Japanese-Americans, a policy later condemned as a civil rights violation.
Trump’s attempt to use the law against a non-state criminal gang (Tren de Aragua) is unprecedented, as the law has historically only been applied during declared wars against foreign nations.
“The United States is not at war, nor has it been invaded,” said Skye Perryman, president and CEO of Democracy Forward, following the lawsuit his organization filed alongside the ACLU against Trump. She said Trump’s invocation of wartime authority is “not needed to conduct lawful immigration enforcement operations,” and it is only “the latest step in an accelerating authoritarian playbook.”
Trump’s invocation of the Alien Enemies Act is the latest in a series of aggressive immigration policies introduced since he took office. These measures include revoking protections that previously prevented immigration arrests in sensitive locations like courthouses, schools, churches, hospitals, and events such as funerals and weddings. He also attempted to eliminate birthright citizenship and expanded deportation powers to agencies like the Drug Enforcement Administration; the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives; and the U.S. Marshals Service; thereby broadening the scope of federal agencies involved in immigration enforcement. Additionally, Trump discontinued the CBP One app, which was used to streamline certain immigration processes, and implemented daily deportation quotas for ICE offices, aiming to increase the number of deportations carried out.
