Judges Block Expulsion of Venezuelans at Core of Challenges to Use of Alien Enemies Act

Federal District Court judges in New York and Texas issued temporary restraining orders to prohibit the government from expelling the handful of Venezuelan men at the core of legal efforts challenging Donald Trump’s use of the Alien Enemies Act to expel such men from the USA to prison in a third country.

The men involved in the two cases are the five at the heart of a lawsuit originally heard by Federal District Court Judge James Boasberg, who expanded the scope of the suit and issued a TRO to block deportations (and recall any in progress) of Venezuelans accused of affiliation with the gang Tren de Aragua. The government removed the original five from three flights but sent 238 of the expanded scope to the notorious CECOT prison in El Salvador despite Boasberg’s order.

Appeals took the case to the Supreme Court, which vacated Boasberg’s ruling and said nothing about retrieving those expelled already, but said from then on each immigrant must have an opportunity to challenge removal by filing an individual habeas corpus petition in the jurisdiction where they are being held.

The original five men are doing so. The initial step has gone against the government.

Federal District Court Judge Alvin Hellerstein issued a TRO for two of the men who are being held in New York after being held for a while in Texas. The TRO prohibits the government from moving the men out of state or out of the USA.

Federal District Court Judge Fernando Rodriguez Jr. issued a similar TRO for the remaining three men, but his went farther. He barred transfer or removal from the El Valle Detention Center of the three Venezuelan men whose filing came to him, and also extended his order over all other Venezuelans being detained in the Southern District of Texas and potentially subject to expulsion under Trump’s invocation of the Alien Enemies Act. Rodriguez specifically barred moving them outside of Willacy County or adjacent Cameron County, Texas.

Rodriguez referenced the plight of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, who was mistakenly sent to CECOT despite an immigration judge’s order that he must never be sent to El Salvador. He wrote:

In the present matter, the court finds that the removal of J.A.V, J.G.G., W.G.H., or any other individual subject to the proclamation, by the United States would cause immediate and irreparable injury to the removed individuals, as they would be unable to seek habeas relief,” he wrote. “Furthermore, if the United States erroneously removed an individual to another country based on the proclamation, a substantial likelihood exists that the individual could not be returned to the United States.

These two cases in New York and Texas seek to block deportation not only for the plaintiffs, but also for any Venezuelans by Trump’s executive order. They argue that the Alien Enemies Act is only valid in specific circumstances, primarily war or invasion, which do not currently exist. Trump pinned his use of that law on the gang Tren de Aragua, which is not a state actor, and has expelled people as affiliates of the gang with no evidence to support such a claim.

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