BBC News, London and Washington DC
The White House denied an accusation of rights defense groups which he flouted a regular procedure by defying the ordinance of a judge while carrying out deportations this weekend.
A group of 238 alleged members of Venezuelan gangs, plus 23 alleged members of the International MS-13 gang, was sent from the United States to a Salvador prison. Some have been removed from the country under a law not invoked since the Second World War.
This decision came despite a temporary block issued by a judge. The White House said that the judge’s ordinance itself was not legal and was issued after the group’s expulsion.
Neither the US government nor El Salvador have identified the prisoners or provided details on their alleged crime or their membership in a gang.
Announcing the move on Saturday, the day after his signature, Trump accused the Gang Tren of Aragua (ADD) of “perpetrating, trying and threatening an invasion or a predatory foray against the territory of the United States”.
He cited the law on extraterrestrial enemies – legislation which dates from 1798, which was designed to allow non -citizens to be expelled in wartime or invasion. The activists questioned Trump justification.
The law was used to treat 137 out of the total of 261 people expelled, the White House said on Monday.
The base on which the other deportees have been removed from the United States remain clear and the group’s details as a whole have not been disclosed.
Several parents of men are among the group told New York Times that their relatives had no gang ties.
The White House, for its part, insisted that the authorities are “safe” that the prisoners were gang members, based on intelligence.
The case raises constitutional questions since, under the American check system and counterweight, government agencies should comply with the decision of a federal judge.
An audience to determine more information on the use by the Trump administration of the Extraterrestrial Enemies Act takes place on Monday afternoon.
The order to stop deportations came from the American district judge James Boasberg on Saturday evening, which required a break of 14 days pending other legal arguments.
After the lawyers told him that planes with deportees had already taken off, the judge would have given a verbal order for the flights to turn around, although this directive is not part of his written decision.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt refused that the court decision has been broken.
“The administration has not” refused to comply “to a court order,” she said. “The ordinance, which had no lawful basis, was issued after the TDD Terrorist extraterrestrials (Tren of Aragua) had already been removed from the American territory.”
The Ministry of Justice echoes Leavitt, saying that the deportees had already left before the judge’s decision – against whom she had appealed.
But a calendar of events reported by the American media suggests that the Trump administration seems to have had the opportunity to stop at least some of the deportations.
A calendar reported deportations of March 15
- 5:25 pm HAE: A first flight which should transport deportees leaves Texas, according to data from the Flightradar24 follow -up site. Takeoff occurs while an audience run by judge Boasberg is interrupted. Earlier in the afternoon, the White House declared that Trump invoked the Extraterrestrial Enemies Act
- 5:44 pm HAE: A second flight which should transport deportees left Texas, according to Flightradar24
- 6:05 pm ESP: Boasberg’s hearing resumes and the government refuses to say if the deportations are underway, according to ABC News
- 18:46 EDT: Boasberg orders the government to overthrow the two planes if they transport non-citizens, according to ABC
- 19:26 EDT: Boasberg makes his written order for a temporary prohibition order, according to ABC
- 19:36 EDT: a third flight which should transport deportees left Texas, according to Flightradar24
The Tsar on Trump’s border Tom Homan told the White House journalists on Monday that Trump had “exactly the right thing”.
“The plane was already on international waters with an airplane full of terrorists and major public security threats,” he said. “We have removed terrorists. It should be celebrated in this country.”
The president of El Salvador, Nayib Bukele, confirmed the arrival of the deportees. “Oopsy … too late,” he said about the judge’s order, writing on social networks. His team also published images of some of the men inside one of his mega-cottages.
According to the White House, the government of El Salvador received $ 6 million (4.62 million pounds sterling) to take the detainees, which, according to Leavitt, “is cents on the dollar” compared to the cost of their confinement in American prisons.
Rights defense groups have accused Trump of having used a 227 -year law to bypass the regular procedure.
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) questioned the use by Trump of a war authority which allows accelerated deportations. “I think we are in a very dangerous territory here in the United States with the invocation of this law,” said Lee Genernt of the organization.
The Act respecting extraterrestrial enemies only authorized evictions when the United States was in a war declared with this foreign government, or were invaded, said Genernt. “A gang is not advancing,” he told BBC News.
The act was used for the last time during the Second World War to intervene in Japanese-American civilians.
The worst thing was that “the administration says that no one can review what they are doing,” added Mr. Genernt.
Meanwhile, Amnesty International USA said that the deportations were “yet another example of the racist targeting of the Trump administration” of the Venezuelans “on the basis of radical gang affiliation claims”.
Venezuela himself criticized Trump, saying that he “unjustly criminalizes Venezuelan migration”.
The latest deportations of Trump’s second term are part of the president’s long -term campaign against illegal immigration.
The American president also moved to strengthen links with El Salvador.
The two targeted gangs with the weekend deportations were declared “foreign terrorist organizations” by Trump after returning to the White House in January.
