Trump applies law from 1798, Supreme Court should decide

US President Donald Trump has asked the Supreme Court to stop deportation flights based on a law from 1798. In the Trump government submitted on Friday, it says: “This case raises fundamental questions about who decides how sensitive and national security operations are carried out in this country, the president or judge”.

According to Trump, there is “a clear answer: the president”. “At least” the Supreme Court must block the decision of the judge of the first instance until the case was checked in terms of content. The Supreme Court has been dominated by conservative judges since Trump’s first term.

The application deals with the question of whether Trump’s government can deport migrants based on a controversial war law from the 18th century. Around two weeks ago, the United States deported more than 200 Venezuelans to El Salvador. The US government stated that the deported are members of the criminal organization Tren de Aragua. The Venezuelan government rejected this. The Tren de Aragua is a Venezuelan gang that is involved in drug trafficking, protection and human trafficking. The US authorities recently declared the Gang to a foreign terrorist organization.

In order to justify the latest deportation, the Trump government mainly relies on a controversial and hardly used law from 1789: The “Alien Enemies Act” allows the president to have people in war or an invasion of “enemy nations” without having regular procedures.

On March 15, a federal judge prohibited deportation fees based on the so -called “Alien Enemies Act” from 1798. The White House subsequently argued that the planes were already in the air at the time of the judicial order. The migrants were taken to a notorious major prison in El Salvador. On Wednesday, the Federal Court of Appeal Washington confirmed the stop of deportation fees ordered by Federal judge James Boasberg based on the law.

In the application to the Supreme Court, Trump’s government now argues that the order of the court will keep them to deport “dangerous members of a foreign terrorist organization”, even if the United States has been given indications that certain members of Tren de Aragua were about to carry out “destabilizing or infiltrating actions”.