Supreme Court finds Trump violated migrant due process rights with speedy deportations

WASHINGTON (CN) — The Supreme Court on Friday found President Donald Trump violated the due process rights of Venezuelan migrants when he tried to expedite deportations to an infamous El Salvador prison using a wartime authority.

In an apparent 7-2 ruling, the high court found the Trump administration did not give a group of Venezuelan detainees proper notice and time to appeal their removal under the Alien Enemies Act.

“Under these circumstances, notice roughly 24 hours before removal, devoid of information about how to exercise due process rights to contest that removal, surely does not pass muster,” the court wrote in a per curiam opinion.

Justices Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas dissented, arguing the Supreme Court had no authority to intervene in the litigation. In an opinion penned by Alito, a George W. Bush appointee, the justices called the ruling “doubly extraordinary.”

“Granting certiorari before a court of appeals has entered a judgment is a sharp departure from usual practice, but here neither the court of appeals nor the district court has decided any merits questions,” Alito wrote. “We have said more times than I care to remember that ‘we are a court of review, not first view.’”

Following the court’s order, Trump wrote on Truth Social: “THE SUPREME COURT WON’T ALLOW US TO GET CRIMINALS OUT OF OUR COUNTRY!” The White House did not respond to a request for comment on the ruling.

Dozens of Venezuelan men petitioned the justices to avoid being sent to El Salvador’s Centro de Confinamiento del Terrorismo, or CECOT, where a first round of deportees from March remain jailed without access to communication with attorneys or family.

Trump notified the migrants of their imminent removal, but the men’s attorneys said the notices lacked essential components required by the Supreme Court’s prior ruling.

“The government’s actions to-date, including its lightning-fast timeline, do not give members of the proposed class a realistic opportunity to contest their removal under the [Alien Enemies Act],” the men wrote. “The notices some members of the proposed class have received are in English only and do not inform proposed class members of their right to contest the designation in a federal court.”

Under the Alien Enemies Act of 1798, the president can detain and deport natives and citizens of an enemy nation. It has been used only three times in the nation’s history: during the War of 1812, World War I and World War II. President Franklin Roosevelt infamously ordered the internment of Japanese Americans under the statute.

When reviewing an order to return the first wave of migrants sent to CECOT, the Supreme Court specified that migrants facing removal under the Alien Enemies Act were entitled to due process, including adequate time to appeal their removal order.

Since then, Trump and Vice President JD Vance have openly suggested suspending due process rights. Vance characterized calls for upholding due process as an attempt to “accomplish through fake legal process what they failed to accomplish politically.”

Trump said, “We cannot give everyone a trial.”

In a rare middle-of-the-night ruling April 19, the Supreme Court prohibited the Trump administration from sending the latest round of Venezuelan men to El Salvador. Alito and Thomas dissented, objecting to their colleagues’ interference in the appeal before the lower courts had ruled.

While finding that 24 hours wasn’t enough notice, the Supreme Court didn’t say what notice the migrants were due. Instead, the justices returned to the Fifth Circuit for further proceedings.

The Supreme Court also refused to address the legality of removals under the Alien Enemies Act.

“We recognize the significance of the government’s national security interests as well as the necessity that such interests be pursued in a manner consistent with the Constitution,” the court wrote. “In light of the foregoing, lower courts should address AEA cases expeditiously.”

The American Civil Liberties Union, which represents the migrants, said unprecedented action was warranted because once the men arrive at CECOT, it’s unlikely they can leave.

Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Maryland father who the government mistakenly sent to the prison, emerged as a high-profile example of immigrant advocates’ struggles to reverse these deportations. The administration has said it doesn’t have the authority to bring him back.

Granting certiorari before judgment on an emergency appeal is exceedingly rare, but the court said exigent circumstances imposed practical constraints on the typical legal procedures.

“We had the power to issue injunctive relief to prevent irreparable harm to the applicants and to preserve our jurisdiction over the matter,” the court wrote.

Human Rights Watch says it is not aware of any detainees who have been released from the prison. El Salvador’s government has tightly controlled access to CECOT, but advocates believe the conditions inside include torture, ill-treatment, incommunicado detention and inhumane conditions, such as lack of access to adequate health care and food.

During the weekslong delay after the justices’ middle-of-the-night intervention, the Trump administration pushed the court to act expeditiously. Trump argued that after three weeks, the migrants had plenty of time to file appeals.

The migrants said the government hadn’t notified them which detainees would be removed. Lawyers must identify the detainee they wish to visit in the detention center, making it impossible to provide counsel to migrants who might later receive notice of their imminent removal.

“We are skeptical of the self-defeating notion that the right to the notice necessary to ‘actually seek habeas relief’ must itself be vindicated through individual habeas petitions, somehow by plaintiffs who have not received notice,” the court wrote.

The plaintiff in this lawsuit may not be removed under the Alien Enemies Act until the case is resolved, the court said, but the government can remove them under other lawful authorities.

Justice Brett Kavanaugh, a Trump appointee, agreed with the majority but said he wouldn’t have remanded the case.

“At this juncture, I would prefer not to remand to the lower courts and further put off this court’s final resolution of the critical legal issues,” Kavanaugh wrote in a concurring opinion.

Kavanaugh said he wanted to quickly hold oral arguments to resolve the legal issues.

Alito said the court mischaracterized the lower court proceedings, stating the migrants had no good reason to think they were in imminent danger of removal. Alito chastised the migrants’ attorneys for giving the lower court judge an ultimatum.

“‘Act on my motion on a complex matter within 42 or 133 minutes or I’ll file an appeal and divest you of jurisdiction’ represented a very stark departure from what is usually regarded as acceptable practice,” Alito wrote.

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