A federal judge in Colorado ordered the Trump administration on Tuesday to provide Venezuelan migrants detained there 21 days notice before deporting them under the Alien Enemies Act.
The order only applies to migrants housed within the state but it nonetheless deals a blow to the administration, which in some cases elsewhere was providing migrants 24 hours or less notice before seeking to remove them under a law it has used to transport migrants to a prison in El Salvador.
U.S. District Court Judge Charlotte Sweeney also ordered the Trump administration to provide the notice “in a language the individual understands.”
Her ruling comes after the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), which is representing a number of Venezuelan migrants the Trump administration has sought to deport, asked the Supreme Court to leapfrog lower courts in taking up that case.
In that same filing, they pushed for 30 days notice for migrants to challenge the order, including notifying any personal attorney as well as the ACLU. They also said the government should be required to disclose migrants could be sent to a third country, noting that the Trump administration has argued it cannot seek the return of any figure once they are imprisoned in El Salvador.
“Whatever due process may require in this context, it does not allow removing a person to a possible life sentence without trial, in a prison known for torture and other abuse, a mere 24 hours after providing an English-only notice form (not provided to any attorney) that gives no information about the person’s right to seek judicial review, much less the process or timeline for doing so,” the ACLU wrote.
“Nor, critically, did the notice tell individuals that although they are Venezuelan, they may be removed to El Salvador.”
The Alien Enemies Act, which allows for the swift expulsion of citizens of an “enemy nation,” has only been used three times in U.S. history, and never to address gang violence, Trump’s basis for invoking the wartime power.
The Supreme Court over the weekend barred Trump for now from using the law to carry out its deportation flights, moving with unusual speed and issuing an order without waiting for Justice Samuel Alito’s dissent.
