Federal judge hears second challenge to Trump’s use of Alien Enemies Act to deport migrants

U.S. District Judge James Boasberg will hear from Trump administration lawyers and the ACLU on Wednesday evening in a second court case focused on President Donald Trump’s use of the 1789 Alien Enemies Act to deport certain migrants.

Trump officials have sought to portray Boasberg, a high-profile judge in D.C., as the face of judicial overreach and today’s hearing could put him back in their crosshairs.

Unlike the previous lawsuit heard by Boasberg in March, which sought to temporarily block Trump’s use of the Alien Enemies Act to swiftly deport certain U.S. migrants, plaintiffs are asking the court to hear a larger request for more lasting relief.

The preliminary injunction was filed as a class, and seeks to protect two classes of migrants: Detainees already removed from the U.S. to the infamous Salvadorian prison, as well as those still detained on U.S. soil at risk of imminent removal.

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Plaintiffs are seeking broader and more lasting relief for two sub-classes, or groups of individuals at risk of what they argue is “grave and irreparable harm” under the Alien Enemies Act.

For U.S. detainees who could be removed under the law, plaintiffs asked for an order blocking their removal under AEA and requiring the Trump administration to provide them with at least 30 days notice before any planned removals – notice they said would be sufficient to allow them to challenge their removals in U.S. court. 

Migrants who were already deported to CECOT could face a trickier path to relief.

Plaintiffs asked Boasberg in their amended request to order the Trump administration to not only facilitate the return of already deported migrants, but to take “all reasonable steps” to do so. 

This could include requiring the administration to request any contractors or agents in El Salvador to transfer the individuals from CECOT and into the “physical custody” of the U.S., they said. 

It’s unclear whether the Trump administration will take any steps to comply with the order, should Boasberg move to grant the injunctive relief plaintiffs are seeking. If their responses have been any indication, compliance in the near-term seems unlikely.

The hearing comes as the Trump administration has grown increasingly defiant in the face of court orders to return migrants from CECOT back to the U.S. – including two migrants who were erroneously deported to the maximum security prison in March, and ordered back to the U.S. by two separate federal judges.

The administration has refused to return them. So far, the Trump administration has not said whether it has returned any migrants deported from the U.S. to CECOT under the law.

And the identities of these individuals can be difficult to track: To date, the Trump administration has not released a list of the names of individuals it has deported to El Salvador under the Alien Enemies Act‚ and the Salvadorian government has also shielded their identities from public disclosure.

The administration’s growing recalcitrance on the issue has sparked fresh concern from Trump critics and some court observers, who have cited fears that the administration could be testing their boundaries on executive branch authorities.

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Plaintiffs also cited fears of real harm to the migrants. 

They said in their filing that, absent injunctive relief, the Trump administration “will be free to send hundreds more individuals to the notorious Salvadoran prison, where they may be held incommunicado for the rest of their lives.”