Inmates are seen in cells at CECOT in Tecoluca on Feb. 6, 2024 in San Vicente, El Salvador. Individuals who the U.S. says are Tren de Aragua and MS-13 gang members had been deported to El Salvador on Sunday and are set to be despatched to this jail, President Nayib Bukele stated.
Alex Peña/Getty Photographs
disguise caption
toggle caption
Alex Peña/Getty Photographs
The Trump administration deported greater than 200 individuals who it claims are members of Tren de Aragua, a Venezuelan jail gang, to El Salvador this weekend, a number of members of the administration stated on social media on Sunday.
It was not instantly clear if the deportations occurred earlier than or after a federal choose in D.C. on Saturday issued an emergency order that instructed the administration to cease utilizing wartime powers to deport individuals, and switch round any planes already within the air.
The deportations to El Salvador additionally included 2 alleged leaders of the MS-13 gang, which has its origins in El Salvador, and 21 different members of the gang, in accordance with posts from Secretary of State Marco Rubio and from El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele.
President Trump on Saturday issued a proclamation invoking the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 in opposition to Tren de Aragua. The seldom-used legislation that offers the president authority to detain or deport nationals of an enemy nation throughout wartime. It is the primary time the act has been used since World Struggle II.
“Because of the nice work of the Division of State, these heinous monsters had been extracted and eliminated to El Salvador the place they’ll not be capable to pose any risk to the American Folks,” White Home press secretary Karoline Leavitt stated in an announcement.
“Ooopsie… too late,” Bukele posted, in response to a information headline concerning the judicial order.
With the migrants now in El Salvador, it is unclear what jurisdiction U.S. courts have over them. The White Home did not instantly reply to a request for remark concerning the timing of when the planes landed, or whether or not any migrants may very well be returned to the U.S. in response to the courtroom’s order.
The Alien Enemies Act permits an expedited removing course of, which suggests these topic to the president’s declaration wouldn’t undergo the traditional immigration proceedings in courtroom, or be capable to declare asylum. The proclamation additionally leaves no time to contest the federal government’s claims that persons are members of a felony gang.
Advocates worry that invoking the act would additionally open the door for focusing on and deporting others, no matter their standing or felony information.
El Salvador accepts deportees
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio met with El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele in El Salvador on Feb. 3, 2025.
Mark Schiefelbein/Pool/AP/AFP by way of Getty Photographs
disguise caption
toggle caption
Mark Schiefelbein/Pool/AP/AFP by way of Getty Photographs
The final time a president invoked the Alien Enemies Act was WWII, throughout which 31,000 suspected enemy aliens of largely Japanese, Italian and German descent had been positioned in internment camps and army amenities. The legislation requires warfare to be formally declared, or any “invasion or predatory incursion” by a overseas nation.
Bukele, El Salvador’s president, posted a video on Sunday of what he says is 238 members of Tren de Aragua arriving in El Salvador. He stated they might be transferred to CECOT, the Terrorism Confinement Middle within the nation, for a interval of 1 12 months.
Rubio, the U.S. secretary of state, final month stated El Salvador’s president had agreed to just accept deportees from the U.S. of any nationality. Bukele’s social media posts on Sunday consult with “a really low payment” that the USA paid to El Salvador for the deportations.
“Thanks in your help and friendship, President Bukele,” Rubio stated on social media on Sunday. El Salvador agreed to carry the individuals deported “of their excellent jails at a good worth that may even save our taxpayer {dollars},” Rubio added.
The American Civil Liberties Union and Democracy Ahead in a lawsuit on Saturday sought to dam the deportations of 5 Venezuelan males for 14 days, and later broadened the request to all individuals who may very well be deported beneath Trump’s “Alien Enemies Act” proclamation. Choose James Boasberg agreed to dam the deportations of the 5 males. He later broadened the order to anybody coated by Trump’s proclamation. One other listening to within the case is ready for March 21.
The Trump administration has already appealed the choose’s rulings to the U.S. Courtroom of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.
—NPR’s Danielle Kurtzleben contributed to this story.
