Judge Rules Hundreds of Migrants Sent to El Salvador Deserve Due Process

A United States district judge has ruled that the Trump administration must provide hundreds of migrants sent to an El Salvador megaprison under the Alien Enemies Act the ability to challenge their deportation.

U.S. District Judge James Boasberg issued his ruling on Wednesday, determining that allowing those deportations to stand without recognizing migrants’ due process would not only violate their rights, but also create an unacceptable precedent. Boasberg also noted that President Donald Trump issued the order for deportations against individuals who his administration had determined were part of the Venezuelan-based Tren de Aragua gang.

An independent examination of migrants who were deported to the El Salvador CECOT prison complex on March 15 and 16 shows that there is no evidence of any criminal history for around three-quarters of those individuals. Many family members of those who have been deported there also deny that they have links to gangs.

By refusing to allow these individuals the ability to challenge their deportations, the administration “plainly deprived these individuals of their right to seek habeas relief before their summary removal from the United States,” Boasberg wrote in his ruling.

The judge’s decree does not apply to all immigrants who were deported to El Salvador, but is narrowly focused on those who were removed from the U.S. based on the Alien Enemies Act proclamation that Trump made earlier this year — individuals like Kilmar Abrego García, whose deportation is similarly questionable but was based on other rationales, are not affected by Boasberg’s ruling.

Boasberg left open the possibility that some deportations could be viewed as justifiable if the administration allowed individuals to challenge their deportations.

“Perhaps the President lawfully invoked the Alien Enemies Act. Perhaps, moreover, Defendants are correct that Plaintiffs are gang members. But — and this is the critical point — there is simply no way to know for sure, as the CECOT Plaintiffs never had any opportunity to challenge the Government’s say-so,” Boasberg wrote.

How to provide the deported migrants their due process “will be determined in future proceedings,” the judge added.

Boasberg was also mindful of the incredibly dangerous precedent that could be created by allowing the administration’s actions to remain unchallenged.

“Absent this relief” from his ruling, Boasberg said, “The Government could snatch anyone off the street, turn him over to a foreign country, and then effectively foreclose any corrective course of action.”

It’s unclear what appellate courts may do next with the case. While the Supreme Court has authorized, at least temporarily, the administration to use the Alien Enemies Act to deport migrants living in the U.S., the high court also ruled in April that those subjected to his actions must be given the ability to challenge his ability to do so.

Several legal experts praised Boasberg’s ruling.

“[This is an] important moment for the rule of law and against government lawlessness,” Ryan Goodman, co-editor-in-chief of Just Security, wrote in a Bluesky post.

Noting that “details [of the case still need] to be worked out” — chiefly, how the deported migrants may see their individual cases remedied — constitutional law professor and political commentator Harry Litman applauded Boasberg for stating in his ruling that “violations must be remedied.”

This was a “big important decision,” Litman added.

Skye Perryman, president and CEO of Democracy Forward, one of the organizations that is representing the migrants in the lawsuit, also celebrated the order by Boasberg.

“Today’s ruling affirms what every American knows: in the United States, people are entitled to due process and no one should be removed from the country without it,” Perryman said. “We will continue to oppose this administration’s attempts to re-write the Constitution.”