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U.S. military personnel escort alleged members of the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua and the MS-13 gang recently deported by the U.S. government to be imprisoned in the Terrorism Confinement Center (CECOT) prison, as part of an agreement with the Salvadoran government, in San Luis Talpa, El Salvador, on March 30, 2025. Secretaria de Prensa de la Presidencia/Handout via Reuters
A federal appeals court ruled on Sept. 2 that President Donald Trump had unlawfully invoked the Alien Enemies Act to deport Venezuelan illegal immigrants who were suspected of being part of a criminal gang.
In a 2–1 decision, the Fifth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals issued a preliminary injunction blocking the Trump administration from using the wartime law for deportations of suspected Tren de Aragua (TdA) gang members, holding that it found “no invasion or predatory incursion” by the criminal gang Trump cited in a proclamation invoking the law.
Trump signed the proclamation on March 15, invoking the Alien Enemies Act, which allows the removal of noncitizens without legal process during wartime or invasion.
In his proclamation, Trump stated that TdA gang members invaded the United States and used “drug trafficking as a weapon” against U.S. citizens. He also accused TdA of backing Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro’s regime in its alleged efforts to destabilize democratic nations in the Americas.
However, the court said the case did not warrant invoking the wartime law, noting that a country encouraging its citizens to enter the United States illegally is not equivalent to sending “an armed, organized force to occupy, to disrupt, or to otherwise harm the United States.”
“There is no finding that this mass immigration was an armed, organized force or forces,” it stated. “It is an action that would have been possible when the AEA [Alien Enemies Act] was written, and the AEA would not have covered it. The AEA does not apply today either.”
The court stated that its injunction only bars removals under the Alien Enemies Act and that the government may still deport alleged members of criminal gangs under other legal authorities.
“We declare, as did the Supreme Court, that our injunction solely applies to the use of the war-related federal statute and does not impede use of any other statutory authority for removing foreign terrorists,” the court stated.
Circuit Judge Andrew Oldham dissented, saying that “every president of every political party has enjoyed the same broad powers to repel threats to [the] Nation under the Alien Enemies Act” over the past decades.
The case stems from a petition filed in April by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) on behalf of two Venezuelan nationals who were held at the Bluebonnet Detention Facility in Anson, Texas. Both men were accused of being members of the TdA gang, which they denied, and sought to block their removals, according to the court filing.
The decision from the Fifth Circuit is expected to be appealed to the Supreme Court.
In an emailed statement to The Epoch Times, White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson defended Trump’s use of the Alien Enemies Act to deport TdA gang members from the country.
“The authority to conduct national security operations in defense of the United States and to remove terrorists from the United States rests solely with the President,” Jackson said.
“Judge Oldham’s dissent provides a careful review of this authority, and we expect to be vindicated on the merits in this case.”
ACLU did not return a request for comment by publication time.
