‘It's un-American and I hope that the courts will find it illegal’ - legal experts on Venezuelan deportations

Record ID: 1984522

  • Title: ‘It's un-American and I hope that the courts will find it illegal’ - legal experts on Venezuelan deportations
  • Date: 17th March 2025
  • Summary: WASHINGTON, D.C., UNITED STATES (MARCH 17, 2025) (REUTERS) (SOUNDBITE) (English) COUNSEL AT THE BRENNAN CENTER FOR JUSTICE, KATHERINE YON EBRIGHT, SAYING: “The reason that the president is invoking the Alien Enemies Act is to bypass those due process protections that exist in immigration law. This wartime authority has never been interpreted to include due process protecti
  • Embargoed:
  • Keywords: Alien Enemies Act Donald Trump
  • Location: VARIOUS
  • City: VARIOUS
  • Country: US
  • Topics: North America,Government/Politics
  • Reuters ID: LVA006948017032025RP1
  • Aspect Ratio: 16:9
  • Story Text:The Trump administration deported more than 200 Venezuelans it says were members of Tren de Aragua, a Venezuelan gang that has been linked to kidnapping, extortion and contract killings, to El Salvador over the weekend, even as a judge temporarily blocked it from using a wartime law to carry out the deportations.
    Several legal experts interviewed by Reuters said the flights represented a direct challenge to the judicial branch's independence, although the White House denied that.
    Katherine Yon Ebright, counsel at the Brennan Center for Justice, said the administration could “pose a serious threat to our system of checks and balances to the rule of law in the United States” in an interview with Reuters on Monday (March 17).
    “I think the real test is whether we see continued noncompliance,” Ebright added.
    “The larger issue is the Trump administration seems invested in making this a fight. And that really does raise this huge question of what happens if the executive branch can get away with defying court orders,” Stephen Vladeck, a Professor of Law at Georgetown University, told Reuters on Monday (March 17).
    The White House asserted on Sunday (March 16) that federal courts "have no jurisdiction" over Trump's authority to expel foreign enemies under an 18th-century law historically used only in wartime, though it also said it had complied with the order.
    Trump made rare use of the Alien Enemies Act, which gives the president the wartime authority to deport non-citizens whose primary allegiance is to a foreign power, to carry out many of the deportations.
    It has been invoked just three times: during the War of 1812, World War One and most recently World War Two, when it was used to justify the mass internment of people of Japanese, German and Italian descent.
    “It's un-American and I hope that the courts will find it illegal,” Ebright said.
    (Production: Alexandra Sarabia)
  • Copyright Holder: REUTERS
  • Copyright Notice: (c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2025. Open For Restrictions - http://about.reuters.com/fulllegal.asp
  • Usage Terms/Restrictions: None
Register