A new constitutional crisis has broken out with the Trump Administration refusing to comply, again, with a Federal judge’s orders. In a new filing, The Trump Administration just confessed to violating a Court Order to stop Trump’s unconstitutional exercise of war powers to deport hundreds of people to El Salvador and Honduras in violation of a DC Chief Judge’s order blocking that action, and the ACLU representing Plaintiffs have filed this morning their Notice to the Court outlining that the ways in which Trump has violated the Court’s order, and demanding that the Court intervene and take action. Michael Popok breaks down what has happened in the last 48 hours, and what will happen next in court.
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00:00We've got breaking news with the Trump administration lurching towards a constitutional crisis arising out of their deportation plan, ignoring a federal judge's order, not only ignoring it, calling it out and saying the federal judge has no power over a president who has unlawfully and unconstitutionally exercised war powers to deport people, including as young as 14 years old from American soil.
00:22Despite a temporary restraining order, a court hearing, an order from the bench requiring them to do exactly that, to stop deporting people pursuant to the Aliens Enemies Act until the briefing schedule and hearing was set and is completed this week by the judge.
00:39Donald Trump's position, which has been expressed by his press secretary and others, is that until an appellate court tells him otherwise, he's going to completely ignore a federal judge's orders.
00:52They have this new phraseology that you hear over and over again. A single judge in a single district can't make a ruling against the president of the United States. That is a lie. I'll break it down for you here on the Midas Touch Network and Legal AF.
01:05We've got two competing filings, one late yesterday, one this morning, one from the Trump administration explaining basically why they violated the court's order not to deport people with 200 or more Venezuelan and other undocumented and people who are alleged to be part of a gang delivered to the quote unquote philosopher king dictator of El Salvador, President Bukele.
01:35And so all of that was going on during the hearing and after the court had already ruled, right before the court had already ruled that these people should not be deported, especially to El Salvador.
01:48They were already on their way to El Salvador, including a number of planes, according to reporting that went out after the judge had already made his order.
01:56Meaning when the judge said, turn the planes around, the planes hadn't even launched yet. They launched after. This is a constitutional crisis of epic proportion.
02:05Let me tell you first what the notice to the court was that was filed late yesterday by the Trump administration.
02:12And then I'm going to read to you from the American Civil Liberties Union and the plaintiffs in the case and what they have told the judge.
02:19There are so many holes in this notice, so many confessions and admissions of violations of the court order that the response for the ACLU was relatively straightforward.
02:31Here's the Trump administration notice signed by Pam Bondi, the attorney general, and Emil Bove and Todd Blanche and all the other former criminal defense lawyers for Donald Trump now in the Department of Justice.
02:48For the reasons, this is from the Trump filing, for the reasons explained on the record, federal defendants object to this court's assertion of jurisdiction, including over the president's exercise of powers vested in him by Article 2.
03:01I mean, that's what federal courts do for a living in the checks and balance system.
03:06They often check the power, unconstitutional exercise of power by a president pursuant to Article 2.
03:15So that is a nonsense start to this notice, but it continues.
03:19The Trump administration says, subject to that objection, the federal defendants were promptly notified of the court's temporary restraining order issued in the morning and the 7.26 p.m. minute order that temporarily enjoined any removals pursuant to the presidential proclamation.
03:36Let me unpack that.
03:38Friday, we got word that Donald Trump was going to make a presidential proclamation to invoke the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 from the Adams administration, which has never been invoked in peacetime, requires that there be an invocation of war powers after a declaration of war by Congress.
03:56That has not happened, and that got signed and issued on Saturday.
04:00The judge had already, in a prior temporary restraining order, stopped the deportation of at least five or six Venezuelans.
04:09Then when they ran into court on Saturday, they had a hearing on Saturday at 5 o'clock Eastern Time in Washington.
04:15Yes, the courts are open on Saturday.
04:17By then, the ACLU, representing the plaintiffs, had new information because we now have the actual proclamation of attempting to exercise that particular war power.
04:28So the judge expanded his injunction considerably to include no one.
04:35He certified a class, everyone subject to that particular war power exercise or attempted war power exercise, and enjoined or blocked it and ordered during a hearing that the flights, if they're in air, if the birds are in the air, turn them back around.
04:51He also acknowledged during the hearing, the judge, Judge Boasberg, that if planes had already landed, he may have lost his jurisdiction.
04:59So he's trying hard to make sure that the Trump administration isn't purposely trying to deny a federal judge jurisdiction by taking these people surreptitiously to a foreign country like El Salvador and dropping them off in their notoriously abusive jail system and detention center.
05:20So when they say, well, we didn't get word until 726 of the minute order, that's a lie.
05:27The lawyers were in court.
05:29The judge issued from the bench his order in the 6 o'clock range, and it looks like planes went out after the order.
05:37That's the point.
05:38And they sort of fudge that wallpaper over that in their filing.
05:43The Trump administration continues in its notice going forward, and in the absence of appellate relief, federal defendants will continue to protect the United States using authorities other than the proclamation.
05:55That's interesting.
05:57So they're saying that until we're just going to continue to act lawlessness in a lawless fashion, in an unconstitutional fashion, unless we're stopped by an appellate court, and we're going to ignore a federal judge.
06:10See the constitutional crisis that we are heading for and we are already in?
06:15Federal defendants further report based on information from the Department of Homeland Security, that's Kristi Noem, that some gang members subject to removal under the proclamation had already been removed from the United States territory before the issuance of the court's second order.
06:29That's a lie, apparently based on media reports.
06:32First of all, it's over 200 people, including as young as 14 years old, was turned over to the El Salvadorian regime, and it's a black ops detention center.
06:45And that was not after the second order.
06:49They were sent in violation of the second order.
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09:10Let me read to you from what the ACLU has had to say just this morning in response in a 317, March 17th filing.
09:19It's on page one.
09:23The government's own notice raises serious questions.
09:26Plaintiffs therefore respectfully request that the court seek immediate clarification from defendants
09:30in one or more sworn declarations under oath about their conduct regarding this court's order.
09:36The government's letter stated that the court's order was issued at 7.26 p.m. on Saturday, March 15th,
09:42but that was the time the written order was issued.
09:44During the Saturday hearing, between 6.45 and 6.48,
09:48this court orally and unambiguously directed the government to turn around planes
09:52carrying individuals being removed pursuant to the proclamation, this one about the Alien Enemies Act.
09:58And then they quote from the judge.
10:00And they also remind on page two everybody that the oral order of the court is binding.
10:06It doesn't have to be in writing.
10:08Second, on page two, plaintiffs remain extremely concerned that regardless of which time is used,
10:13the government may have violated the court's command.
10:17The government states that some gang members subject to removal have already been removed
10:22from United States territory under the proclamation before the issuance of the court's second order.
10:27That phrasing from the Trump administration.
10:30According to this filing by the ACLU strongly suggests that the government has chosen to treat this court's order
10:36as applying only to individuals still on U.S. soil or on flights that had yet to clear U.S. airspace at 7.26.
10:43If that is how the government proceeded, it was a blatant violation of the court's order.
10:48And they then object to the fact that they were turned over to foreign governments
10:54to try to attempt to have the court lose jurisdiction.
10:57On page three, the filing on behalf of the plaintiff says,
11:02based on publicly available information, it appears there were at least two flights that took off during the hearing
11:08but landed after this court's written order, meaning that defendants could have turned the plane around
11:13without handing over individuals subject to the proclamation in this court's temporary restraining order.
11:18And then they list a couple of flights, Global X flight 6143 and Global X flight 6145,
11:25one that landed in Honduras, the other one that landed in El Salvador.
11:29Third, the plaintiffs continue, if only the written order is relevant,
11:35and even if the court had only meant to order defendants to turn the planes around if they were still on U.S. territory,
11:41plaintiffs still have serious concerns about the government's actions.
11:44According to at least one media report, one of the planes departed the U.S. after the written order was issued.
11:50Then on page four, they talk about the role of the White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller,
11:58also a White House counselor, and the Department of Homeland Security Kristi Noem,
12:03chose not to turn the planes around, although they had the opportunity to do that,
12:07meaning they're willfully violating the court's order.
12:10They then quote from an Axios article and statements by, who else?
12:15The White House Press Secretary, Carolyn LeVette.
12:18And this is what Carolyn LeVette had to say, although she also misidentified the use of,
12:23she said an aircraft carrier was used, I think she meant an airplane.
12:26But in any event, here's what Carolyn LeVette said.
12:28The administration did not refuse to comply with the court order, the order which had no lawful basis.
12:33Oh, now we're just going to on our own use self-help and ignore federal court orders.
12:38The written order and the administration's actions do not conflict.
12:42Moreover, as the Supreme Court has repeatedly made clear, here's the great legal scholar, Carolyn LeVette.
12:48Federal courts generally have no jurisdiction over the president's conduct of foreign affairs,
12:53his authorities under the Alien Enemies Act,
12:55and his core Article II powers to remove foreign alien terrorists from U.S. soil.
13:00That's not how the Constitution works.
13:02That's not how Supreme Court and federal courts work in trying to check the unconstitutional assertion of power by a president.
13:11How does she think all the cases related to, all the precedent cases about presidential power,
13:17where does Carolyn LeVette and the administration think they came from?
13:20From federal courts making rulings about whether the Constitution has been violated or not.
13:24That is their job.
13:26She continues on page five, the secretary, the press secretary continues,
13:32a single judge in a single city cannot direct the movements of an aircraft carrier
13:36full of foreign alien terrorists who were physically expelled from U.S. soil.
13:41You're wrong on so many counts, Carolyn, including the facts.
13:44First of all, it wasn't an aircraft carrier.
13:46It was a plane or several planes.
13:49Secondly, they say it was full of foreign alien terrorists.
13:54It was certainly filled with 230 or 240 primarily men who were turned over to the El Salvadorian government,
14:02and it looks like the Honduran government,
14:04and a single judge can do that having certified the class and having issued an injunction,
14:09or issued a nationwide injunction.
14:11That's what federal judges do.
14:14We believe, according to this White House official,
14:18we believe this is a baseless legal ruling, no matter when the flights took off.
14:22Finally, some of the public comments made by the defendants and the president of El Salvador
14:28reinforce the plaintiff's concerns.
14:30I mean, even the self-proclaimed philosopher king of El Salvador,
14:36Nayib Bukele, tweeted a New York Post headline reading,
14:40Fed judge orders deportation flights carrying alleged Venezuelan gangsters to return to the U.S.,
14:46blocks Trump from invoking Alien Enemies Act,
14:49and added the comment,
14:50Oopsie, too late.
14:52Secretary of State Marco Rubio retweeted this post from his personal X account.
14:57In sum, given the careful phrasing of the government's letter, the ACLU continues,
15:02the publicly available data, the government's own statements,
15:05and the numerous media reports that the government may have chosen not to abide by the court's order.
15:10Plaintiffs request that the court immediately direct the government to submit one or more sworn declarations
15:16from individuals about the flights, and about their timing,
15:20and about the knowledge of the order, and the directions of the judge
15:25to tell everybody in the government about the order,
15:27signed by a whole series of people with the ACLU.
15:30What's going to happen next?
15:31Judge is going to either take them up and ask for declarations,
15:35or he's going to call for a court hearing.
15:37I expect that to happen sometime later today.
15:39At which time, at the same time that the Trump administration is due to file a brief,
15:46we'll see if they're going to just flout the rules and not file their brief and be in default,
15:50or they're going to file the brief that was ordered by Judge Boasberg.
15:54He set a briefing schedule very quickly this week.
15:57Monday with a filing by Donald Trump, Wednesday by a filing by the ACLU,
16:01and a hearing on Friday, while Donald Trump took his appeal to the D.C. Court of Appeals.
16:06He has not gotten a stay.
16:08He's subject to the temporary restraining orders,
16:10and he, as has been outlined in this new filing by the ACLU, is in violation of them.
16:14Next step, the ball is in the judge's court,
16:17and we're going to continue to follow it right here on the Midas Touch Network and on Legal AF.
16:22I'm Michael Popock, and I'm reporting.
16:24In collaboration with the Midas Touch Network, we just launched the Legal AF YouTube channel.
16:29Help us build this pro-democracy channel,
16:32where I'll be curating the top stories, the intersection of law and politics.
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16:41That's at Legal AF MTN.