It Is Happening Every Day, Every Where
Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia, who was in the U.S. legally, is now in prison in El Salvador, and federal courts have no jurisdiction to order his release, the Trump administration said in a court filing.
A military plane ferried 17 more people accused of being gang members to a prison in El Salvador. The White House said it was acting under a different legal authority than the one a judge blocked with a temporary order.
A temporary order will give some migrants a chance to convince the government that deporting them to “third countries” such as El Salvador would put them at risk.
The Venezuelan government had come under intense pressure from the Trump administration to resume accepting deportation flights.
The Venezuelan government attributed a willingness to receive the flights to the plight of Venezuelan migrants sent to notorious prisons in El Salvador with little to no due process.
President Nayib Bukele of El Salvador had previously offered to imprison convicted criminals from the United States in his country’s notorious prison facilities, for a fee.
A hearing on Friday afternoon could also include some discussion about the Justice Department’s repeated recalcitrance in responding to the judge’s demands.
Officials have said most of the people sent to the U.S. base are members of a Venezuelan gang but have not offered evidence to support that claim.
It remains unclear whether the Trump administration will apply the law in this way. But such an interpretation, experts say, would infringe on basic civil liberties.
Judge James Boasberg has asked the government to tell him what time two planes took off from U.S. soil and from where, what time they left U.S. airspace and what time they landed in El Salvador.