The US deported more than 250 mainly Venezuelan alleged gang members to El Salvador
despite a US judge’s ruling to halt the flights on Saturday
after Donald Trump controversially invoked the "Alien Enemies Act",
a 1798 law meant only to be used in wartime.
El Salvador’s president, Nayib Bukele, said 238 members of the Venezuelan gang "Tren de Aragua" and 23 members of the Salvadoran gang "MS-13" had arrived and were in custody as part of a deal under which the US will pay the Central American country to hold them in its 40,000-person capacity “terrorism confinement centre”.
The confirmation came hours AFTER a US federal judge expanded his ruling temporarily blocking the Trump administration from invoking the "Alien Enemies Act",
a wartime authority that allows the president broad leeway on policy and executive action to speed up mass deportations.
The US district judge #James #Boasberg had attempted to halt the deportations for all individuals deemed eligible for removal under Trump’s proclamation, which was issued on Friday.
Boasberg also ordered deportation flights already in the air to return to the US.
“Oopsie … Too late,” Bukele posted online, followed by a laughing emoji.
Soon after Bukele’s statement, the US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, thanked El Salvador’s leader.
The Alien Enemies Act has only ever been used three times before,
most recently during the second world war, when it was used to incarcerate Germans and Italians as well as for the mass internment of Japanese-American civilians.
It was originally passed by Congress in preparation for what the US believed would be an impending war with France.
It was also used during the war of 1812 and during the first world war.
The US attorney general, #Pam #Bondi, slammed Judge Boasberg’s stay on deportations.
“This order disregards well-established authority regarding President Trump’s power, and it puts the public and law enforcement at risk,” Bondi said in a statement on Saturday night.
But lawyers for the American Civil Liberties Union contend that the Trump does not have the authority to use the law against a criminal gang, rather than a recognized state.
On Sunday, the Republican senator Mike Rounds questioned
whether the deportation flights had ignored Judge Boasberg’s order to turn around.
“We’ll find out whether or not that actually occurred or not,” Rounds told CNN.
“I don’t know about the timing on it. I do know that we will follow the law.”
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/mar/16/deportation-alleged-gang-members-el-salvador?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other
“thousands of names” of students and faculty they believe to be on visas from institutions like Columbia, the University of Pennsylvania, UCLA, Syracuse University and others to representatives of the Trump administration.
