The law of 1798 used to deport migrants

More than 200 Venezuelans alleged by the White House as gang members have been deported from the United States to a notorious mega-caid in El Salvador.

Of the 261 deported people, 137 were withdrawn under the Alien enemies law, said an administration official higher than CBS News, the US BBC partner.

This large centenary law was invoked by President Donald Trump. He accused the Venezuelan gang Train of Aragua (ADD) of “perpetrating, trying and threatening an invasion or predatory incursion” in the US territory.

The measure has been criticized by rights groups and occurred despite a temporary block issued by a judge. The White House said the judge’s order itself was not legal and was issued after the group was deported.

The law of alien enemies enemies grants the president of the powers of the United States to order the detention and deportation of natives or citizens of an “enemy” nation without following the usual processes.

It was approved as part of a series of laws in 1798 when the United States believed that it would enter a war with France.

The law establishes that “whenever there is a declared war (…) or any pressed invasion or incursion will be perpetrated, tried or threatened” against the United States, all “subjects of the nation or hostile government” could be “detained, restricted, insured and eliminated, as alien enemies.”

The act has only been previously used three times, all in times of conflict that involve the United States.

He was last invoked in World War II, when people of Japanese descent, according to reports, numbered around 120,000, were imprisoned without trial. Thousands were sent to internment fields.

The people of German and Italian ancestry were also admitted during that time.

Before that, the act was used during the War of 1812 and the World War.

Although this is the first time that Trump uses the act, it is not the first time he mentions it.

In his inaugural speech in January, he said he would invoke the act to “eliminate the presence of all foreign gangs and criminal networks that bring devastating crimes to the American soil.”

In his proclamation on Saturday, Trump invoked the drafting of the law by accusing ADD of threatening an “invasion” against the United States. He declared that their members “were susceptible to being arrested, restricted, insured and eliminated as alien enemies.”

Trump’s decision has been criticized by rights groups. The American Union of Civil Liberties (ACLU) demanded to stop moving on the argument that the United States was not at war.

Speaking to BBC News on Sunday, Lee Gellnt, A ACLU lawyer, said: “There is no doubt in our mind that the law is being violated.”

A federal judge tried to stop the use of the law to carry out deportations, but the White House said this had not “had no” legal basis “, and that the removals had already taken place.

In reaction to a news article that covers the judge’s order, the president of El Salvador, Nayib Bukele, wrote on social networks: “Oopsie … too late.”

Venezuela criticized the use of Trump’s act, saying that “Venezuelan migration” and “evokes the darkest episodes in the history of humanity, from slavery to the horror of the Nazis concentration camps.”

Katherine Yon Ebright, lawyer of the Brennan Center for Justice, said in a statement that Trump’s use of the Alien Enemies Law was illegal.

“The only reason to invoke such power is to try to allow radical arrests and deportations of Venezuelans based on their ancestry, not in any gang activity that could be tested in immigration procedures,” he added.