LEILA FADEL, HOST:
A federal judge says that President Trump's use of the Alien Enemies Act to deport Venezuelan immigrants is unlawful.
MICHEL MARTIN, HOST:
It's the first ruling of its kind. The decision comes from U.S. District Judge Fernando Rodriguez Jr. in south Texas. I'll note, he was appointed by President Trump, and this ruling is a blow to the president's efforts to remove migrants from the country.
FADEL: NPR's immigration correspondent Sergio Martínez-Beltrán has been following the case and joins me now. Hi, Sergio.
SERGIO MARTÍNEZ-BELTRÁN, BYLINE: Good morning.
FADEL: Good morning. So can you tell us more about this case and the ruling from Judge Rodriguez?
MARTÍNEZ-BELTRÁN: Yeah. So the men in this Texas case have been threatened with imminent removal under the Alien Enemies Act. It's never been used in the way the Trump administration has. The men are accused of being members of Tren de Aragua, a Venezuelan gang, and they're currently in detention at El Valle Detention Center in Raymondville, Texas. Now, U.S. District Judge Fernando Rodriguez Jr. wrote in his ruling that Trump's invocation of the Alien Enemies Act exceeds the scope of the statute. The government, he ruled, does not possess the lawful authority under the Alien Enemies Act to detain Venezuelan immigrants or remove them from the country.
FADEL: OK. So if the government doesn't have the authority to do it, well, they've already done it. They've used the act to remove people.
MARTÍNEZ-BELTRÁN: Right, right. I mean, Trump has used the act to remove more than 130 Venezuelan men from the U.S. and send them to a maximum security prison in El Salvador. The administration has accused all of them of being Tren de Aragua, but government officials have consided not all of the Venezuelans have criminal records. Other courts have sought to block the Trump administration from deporting individuals under the act, but this is the first time a judge has ruled that Trump's use of the act is unlawful. And it all comes down to language and also evidence.
FADEL: How does that work?
MARTÍNEZ-BELTRÁN: Well, Leila, President Trump issued a proclamation in March accusing the Tren de Aragua gang of, quote, "perpetrating, attempting and threatening an invasion or predatory incursion against the territory of the United States." Judge Rodriguez did an extensive analysis of the historical record, and he concluded the ordinary meaning of invasion or predatory inclusion when the Alien Enemies Act was enacted in 1798 required a military incursion or a hostile takeover. He found that the criminal activities of Tren de Aragua members described in Trump's proclamation, while harmful, did not amount to an invasion or predatory incursion as understood under the act. Judge Rodriguez wrote that Trump's proclamation does not suggest an armed group is trying to take over the U.S.
FADEL: So what does this mean for the men named in this lawsuit?
MARTÍNEZ-BELTRÁN: Yeah. So the lawsuit names three Venezuelan men, but they're also representatives of a bigger class action. Here's the lead counsel for the men, the ACLU's Lee Gelernt.
LEE GELERNT: This decision protects everyone who's detained in the Southern District of Texas. It means that they cannot be removed anywhere under the Alien Enemies Act, much less to a brutal Salvadoran prison.
MARTÍNEZ-BELTRÁN: And that's an important point here, Leila. This decision only applies to the Southern District of Texas, which includes Brownsville, McAllen and Houston.
FADEL: So what's next in this case?
MARTÍNEZ-BELTRÁN: Well, the Department of Homeland Security did not respond to a request for comment, but it's almost guaranteed that the Trump administration will appeal this decision. The ACLU is certainly expecting that. If they do so, the appeal would go to the Fifth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which is considered one of the country's most conservative courts.
FADEL: That's NPR's Sergio Martínez-Beltrán. Thank you.
MARTÍNEZ-BELTRÁN: You're welcome. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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