Second judge finds Trump’s use of 18th century wartime act against gang is improper

A federal judge on Tuesday ruled that President Donald Trump is improperly using an 18th century wartime law to try to speed the deportations of people his administration labels members of a Venezuelan gang, becoming the second judge to bar the administration from removing immigrants under the act.

District Court Judge Alvin K. Hellerstein in New York found the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 cannot be used against the Tren de Aragua gang because it is not attacking the United States. “TdA may well be engaged in narcotics trafficking, but that is a criminal matter, not an invasion or predatory incursion,” Hellerstein wrote.

He is the second judge to come to that conclusion in the past week. Last week, a Trump-appointed judge in South Texas issued a similar ruling, also barring the administration from removing people from that region under the Alien Enemies Act.

Hellerstein’s ruling, which applies in New York City and surrounding areas, is the latest in a long line of judicial setbacks for the Trump administration’s effort to speed deportations of people in the country illegally. The president and his supporters have increasingly complained about having to provide due process for people they contend didn’t follow U.S. immigration laws.

In his ruling, Hellerstein, who was appointed by President Bill Clinton, also ruled that the government cannot use the Alien Enemies Act to shortcut the legal process for deportations that Congress has laid out.

A federal judge in Colorado issued a similar ruling late last month on a temporary basis, and several other judges across the country are hearing cases challenging Trump’s use of the Alien Enemies Act in their jurisdictions. None of the rulings prevent the removal of people in the country illegally under other laws or procedures.

Those follow a ruling from the U.S. Supreme Court last month that challenges to Trump’s use of the law have to occur in areas where immigrants are being detained for deportation. The high court unanimously ruled that people held under the Alien Enemies Act had the right to contest their removal in court.

That led the Supreme Court to have to weigh in a second time, in an unusual postmidnight ruling that barred the deportation of people from northern Texas who, the ACLU argued, were about to be shipped out of the country without adequate chance to appeal their designation.

The Trump administration has deported people designated as Tren de Aragua members to a notorious prison in El Salvador where it argues U.S. courts cannot order them freed. Hellerstein referred to the facility as a "notoriously evil jail."