This summary was featured in Documented’s Early Arrival newsletter. You can subscribe to receive it in your inbox three times per week here.
The Supreme Court on Saturday issued a temporary order blocking the deportation of Venezuelan immigrants held in Texas under the Alien Enemies Act of 1798, following an emergency appeal from the ACLU. The Supreme Court decision was 7-2.
The Supreme Court ruling centers on concerns that Immigration and Customs Enforcement is using the Alien Enemies Act to deport immigrants without due process by labeling them members of the Tren de Aragua gang, a criminally designated organization.
The order — which was issued after midnight and, notably, before the Trump administration could even respond to the case — directed the administration to pause removals from the Bluebonnet Detention Center “until further order” from the court.
Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito, two of the Court’s most conservative justices, dissented. But in dissenting, Alito still wrote: “Both the Executive and the Judiciary have an obligation to follow the law. The Executive must proceed under the terms of our order … and this Court should follow established procedures.”
Alito’s dissent makes one thing clear: even under the Alien Enemies Act, the Trump administration can’t ignore due process. While Alito and Thomas criticized how the Supreme Court issued their emergency order, with Alito calling his seven colleagues’ move “premature” and “hasty,” Alito also reminded the administration that it is still bound by the Court’s earlier ruling requiring that people facing removal get notice and an opportunity to be heard.
ACLU lawyer Lee Gelernt argued in the emergency case on Friday evening that some ICE detainees were pressured to sign documents in English they couldn’t understand and were told deportations were imminent, with buses reportedly headed to airports by Friday evening.
Gelernt warned that deporting the Venezuelans at Bluebonnet Detention Facility in Texas to El Salvador could make it nearly impossible to bring them back, pointing to the administration’s ongoing refusal to repatriate Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran immigrant wrongfully deported last month.
Separately on Saturday, protests across the country reflected outrage over the government’s treatment of Garcia. Julia Fine, a Maryland resident who was protesting at the White House, said the Salvadoran prison where he’s detained reminded her of “concentration camps,” The New York Times reported.
市长参选人访华社 游民所问题成焦点
The Supreme Court ruling on the ACLU’s appeal marks the latest legal battle in the Trump administration’s aggressive immigration tactics. The Alien Enemies Act has only been used three times in U.S. history, most notably to jail Japanese Americans during World War II. Critics argue its use today sidesteps legal protections guaranteed to immigrants.
Although the Supreme Court ruled earlier this month that deportations under the act can only proceed if individuals have time and opportunity to challenge them in court, that ruling had not been enforced in the northern region of Texas covering the Bluebonnet facility. Federal judges elsewhere have issued deportation bans, but Judge James Wesley Hendrix, who was appointed by Trump, declined to block removals in northern Texas, citing ICE’s assurances that deportations hadn’t yet begun.
The ACLU warned the administration was exploiting legal loopholes by transferring detainees to regions without protective orders. The group initially argued their case with Judge James Boasberg, who halted deportations in March. Boasberg said he lacked jurisdiction this time, but moved to investigate whether the administration violated his previous ruling and was in contempt of court. The D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals soon paused his investigation.
