After invoking The Alien Enemies Act of 1798 to detain or deport Venezuelan migrants, District Judge James Boasberg, an Obama-era appointee, issued an order “stopping the administration from using it to deport anyone, adding that the administration should turn planes already in the air around.” TFF’s administration may have defied the judge’s order and allowed multiple planes to land in El Salvador,
On Monday, TFF’s personal law firm, the Department of Justice, went before the judge but were defiant, declined to answer several of the judge’s questions, and defended the administration’s conduct after immigration authorities appear to have violated the judge’s order.
The hearing concerned U.S. District Judge James Boasberg’s verbal order Saturday that planes being used to deport people under the Alien Enemies Act, a rarely used wartime power, be immediately returned to the United States.
Monday’s Hearing:
Deputy Associate Attorney General Abhishek Kambli told Boasberg on Monday that he was not at liberty to talk about details of the controversial deportation flights in a public setting in U.S. District Court in Washington.
At the same hearing, Lee Gelernt, a lawyer for five Venezuelan men who sued to challenge their feared deportations, told Boasberg that he wanted to be careful about his language, but said, “There has been a lot of talk the last couple of weeks about a constitutional crisis.”
“I think we’re getting very close to that,” said Gelernt, who argued that two deportation flights took off from the United States after Boasberg’s oral order.
Gelernt appeared to be referring to Kambli’s refusal to answer questions by the judge about the flights, and to the Trump administration’s argument that the deportations under the Alien Enemies Act were not subject to judicial order after the flights left U.S. airspace.
“It doesn’t matter if you’re in U.S. airspace or not,” Boasberg said during Monday’s hearing.
Kambli replied, “When the planes are in the sky and it’s a matter of national security,” before being cut off by the judge, who asked why the planes were not turned around.
Boasberg suggested that the DOJ’s position was “we don’t care, we’ll do what we want.”
As the administration simultaneously seeks to appeal Boasberg’s ruling, it has looked to remove the judge from the case, saying he has employed “unusual and improper” procedures.
At the end of Monday’s hearing, the judge ordered the administration to provide information about the flight timelines, or provide justification for refusing to do so, by noon EDT on Tuesday.
“I’m going to detail this in a written order since apparently my oral orders don’t carry much weight,” the judge quipped.
