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The FBI on Friday arrested a Milwaukee judge accused of helping a man evade immigration authorities, escalating a clash between the Trump administration and local authorities over the Republican president’s sweeping immigration crackdown.

Milwaukee County Circuit Court Judge Hannah Dugan is accused of escorting the man and his lawyer out of her courtroom through the jury door last week after learning that immigration authorities were seeking his arrest. The man was taken into custody outside the courthouse after agents chased him on foot.

President Donald Trump’s administration has accused state and local officials of interfering with his immigration enforcement priorities. The arrest also comes amid a growing battle between the administration and the federal judiciary over the president’s executive actions over deportations and other matters.

Democratic Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers, in a statement on the arrest, accused the Trump administration of repeatedly using “dangerous rhetoric to attack and attempt to undermine our judiciary at every level.”

“I have deep respect for the rule of law, our nation’s judiciary, the importance of judges making decisions impartially without fear or favor, and the efforts of law enforcement to hold people accountable if they commit a crime,” Evers said. “I will continue to put my faith in our justice system as this situation plays out in the court of law.”

Dugan was taken into custody by the FBI on Friday morning on the courthouse grounds, according to U.S. Marshals Service spokesperson Brady McCarron. She appeared briefly in federal court in Milwaukee later Friday before being released from custody. She faces charges of “concealing an individual to prevent his discovery and arrest” and obstructing or impeding a proceeding.

“Judge Dugan wholeheartedly regrets and protests her arrest. It was not made in the interest of public safety,” her attorney, Craig Mastantuono, said during the hearing. He declined to comment to an Associated Press reporter following her court appearance.

Court papers suggest Dugan was alerted to the presence of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in the courthouse by her clerk, who was informed by an attorney that they appeared to be in the hallway.

The FBI affidavit describes Dugan as “visibly angry” over the arrival of immigration agents in the courthouse and says that she pronounced the situation “absurd” before leaving the bench and retreating to her chambers. It says she and another judge later approached members of the arrest team inside the courthouse, displaying what witnesses described as a “confrontational, angry demeanor.”

After a back-and-forth with officers over the warrant for the man, Eduardo Flores-Ruiz, she demanded that the arrest team speak with the chief judge and led them away from the courtroom, the affidavit says.

After directing the arrest team to the chief judge’s office, investigators say, Dugan returned to the courtroom and was heard saying words to the effect of “wait, come with me” before ushering Flores-Ruiz and his lawyer through a jury door into a non-public area of the courthouse. The action was unusual, the affidavit says, because “only deputies, juries, court staff, and in-custody defendants being escorted by deputies used the back jury door. Defense attorneys and defendants who were not in custody never used the jury door.”

A sign that remained posted on Dugan’s courtroom door Friday advised that if any attorney or other court official “knows or believes that a person feels unsafe coming to the courthouse to courtroom 615,” they should notify the clerk and request an appearance via Zoom.

Attorney General Pam Bondi said the man was facing domestic violence charges and victims were sitting in the courtroom with state prosecutors when the judge helped him escape immigration arrest.

The judge “put the lives of our law enforcement officers at risk. She put the lives of citizens at risk. A street chase — it’s absurd that that had to happen,” Bondi said on Fox News Channel.

Sen. Tammy Baldwin, a Democrat who represents Wisconsin, called the arrest of a sitting judge a “gravely serious and drastic move” that “threatens to breach” the separation of power between the executive and judicial branches.

“Make no mistake, we do not have kings in this country and we are a Democracy governed by laws that everyone must abide by,” Baldwin said in an emailed statement. “By relentlessly attacking the judicial system, flouting court orders, and arresting a sitting judge, this President is putting those basic Democratic values that Wisconsinites hold dear on the line.”

The case is similar to one brought during the first Trump administration against a Massachusetts judge, who was accused of helping a man sneak out a back door of a courthouse to evade a waiting immigration enforcement agent.

That prosecution sparked outrage from many in the legal community, who slammed the case as politically motivated. Prosecutors dropped the case against Newton District Judge Shelley Joseph in 2022 under the Democratic Biden administration after she agreed to refer herself to a state agency that investigates allegations of misconduct by members of the bench.

The Justice Department had previously signaled that it was going to crack down on local officials who thwart federal immigration efforts.

The department in January ordered prosecutors to investigate for potential criminal charges any state and local officials who obstruct or impede federal functions. As potential avenues for prosecution, a memo cited a conspiracy offense as well as a law prohibiting the harboring of people in the country illegally.

Dugan was elected in 2016 to the county court Branch 31. She also has served in the court’s probate and civil divisions, according to her judicial candidate biography.

Before being elected to public office, Dugan practiced at Legal Action of Wisconsin and the Legal Aid Society. She graduated from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1981 with a bachelor of arts degree and earned her Juris Doctorate in 1987 from the school.

FBI arrests Milwaukee County judge accused of helping man evade immigration officials is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

Education Secretary Linda McMahon testifies during her Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee confirmation hearing on Feb. 13, 2025.  (Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)

A federal judge in Maryland ordered the Trump administration Thursday to pause enforcement of a new U.S. Education Department ban on diversity, equity and inclusion practices.

The order came as another federal judge in New Hampshire issued a preliminary injunction temporarily blocking the Trump administration from yanking federal funding from many schools.

The New Hampshire order, though, only applied to schools that employ members of the National Education Association — the country’s largest labor union, which brought the case challenging the ban — or the Center for Black Educator Development.

The rulings used different legal logic but arrived at the same conclusion: The administration’s ban on race-conscious practices is not valid.

In Maryland, U.S. District Judge Stephanie A. Gallagher said she ruled not on the merits of the policy, but the way the Trump administration developed it.

“This Court takes no view as to whether the policies at issue here are good or bad, prudent or foolish, fair or unfair. But this Court is constitutionally required to closely scrutinize whether the government went about creating and implementing them in the manner the law requires,” she wrote. “The government did not.”

Gallagher’s order pauses the enforcement of a Feb. 14 letter to school districts from Craig Trainor, the department’s acting assistant secretary for civil rights, that threatened to rescind federal funds for schools that use race-conscious practices in programming, admissions, scholarships and other aspects of student life.

In New Hampshire, U.S. District Judge Landya McCafferty wrote that “the loss of federal funding would cripple the operations of many educational institutions.”

McCafferty’s order has a nationwide effect, but McCafferty limited it to schools that employ NEA members, rejecting the union’s attempt to completely halt the policies outlined in the letter.

Teachers unions sued

The Feb. 14 letter drew swift legal action, and the National Education Association brought the suit in New Hampshire against the administration alongside the Center for Black Educator Development. 

The American Federation of Teachers — one of the largest teachers unions in the country — filed a complaint in February alongside its affiliate, AFT-Maryland. The American Sociological Association and a public school district in Oregon also sued over the letter.

“Today the court confirmed the importance of our job as educators to foster opportunity, dignity, and engagement,” Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, said in a statement after the Maryland ruling.

“The court agreed that this vague and clearly unconstitutional requirement is a grave attack on students, our profession, honest history, and knowledge itself,” she added. “It would hamper efforts to extend access to education, and dash the promise of equal opportunity for all, a central tenet of the United States since its founding.”

NEA also celebrated the preliminary injunction granted in its case Thursday, and the union’s president, Becky Pringle, said in a statement “today’s ruling allows educators and schools to continue to be guided by what’s best for students, not by the threat of illegal restrictions and punishment.”

The statement said President Donald Trump, billionaire head of the U.S. DOGE Service Elon Musk and Education Secretary Linda McMahon were responsible for an “attack” on public education.

“The fact is that Donald Trump, Elon Musk, and Linda McMahon are using politically motivated attacks and harmful and vague directives to stifle speech and erase critical lessons to attack public education, as they work to dismantle public schools,” Pringle said. “This is why educators, parents, and community leaders are organizing, mobilizing, and using every tool available to protect our students and their futures.”

The Education Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment Thursday.

Letter raised questions

In the February letter, Trainor offered a wide-ranging interpretation of a U.S. Supreme Court ruling in 2023 involving Harvard University and the University of North Carolina, which struck down the use of affirmative action in college admissions.

Trainor wrote that though the ruling “addressed admissions decisions, the Supreme Court’s holding applies more broadly.”

The four-page letter raised a slew of questions for schools across pre-K through college over what fell within the requirements, and the department later released a Frequently Asked Questions document on the letter in an attempt to provide more guidance.

Earlier this month, the Education Department gave state education leaders just days to certify all K-12 schools in their states were complying with the letter in order to keep receiving federal financial assistance. The department and the groups suing in the New Hampshire case later reached an agreement that paused enforcement. 

Prisoners look out of their cell as Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem tours the Terrorist Confinement Center, or CECOT, on March 26, 2025 in Tecoluca, El Salvador. (Photo by Alex Brandon-Pool/Getty Images)

U.S. Sen. Chris Van Hollen said Thursday that soldiers blocked him from entering a notorious mega-prison in El Salvador where the erroneously deported Maryland resident Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia has been held for more than a month.

The Maryland Democrat arrived in the Central American country Wednesday in an effort to help bring Abrego Garcia, whom the Justice Department admitted in court was deported in error, back to the United States, or at least check on his wellness. He met with El Salvador Vice President Félix Ulloa that day, who denied his requests to either visit or speak on the phone with Abrego Garcia.

Van Hollen told reporters Thursday afternoon that he again tried to make contact with Abrego Garcia that morning.

A U.S. immigration judge issued a protective order in 2019 finding that sending Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran citizen, back to his home country would put him in grave danger.

Accompanied by Chris Newman — the lawyer for Abrego Garcia’s wife and his mother — Van Hollen said they tried to enter Centro de Confinamiento del Terrorismo, or CECOT, but soldiers stopped them at a checkpoint about three kilometers from the prison.

“We were told by the soldiers that they’d been ordered not to allow us to proceed any further than that point,” Van Hollen said.

Van Hollen said that since Abrego Garcia was sent to CECOT, he has not spoken with anyone outside of the prison walls, and “this inability to communicate with his lawyers is a violation of international law.”

The senator pointed out that El Salvador is a party to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.

“That covenant says, and I quote, ‘A detained or imprisoned person shall be entitled to communicate and consult with his legal counsel,’” he said.

Van Hollen also said he met with the U.S. Embassy in El Salvador and they discussed “the full range of important bilateral relations between the United States and El Salvador.”

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt and other Republicans have criticized Van Hollen for making the trip, repeating the accusation that Abrego Garcia is a gang member.

Representatives for the White House and DHS did not respond to messages seeking comment Thursday.

Appeals court slams administration’s inaction

Meanwhile, Abrego Garcia’s case continues to work its way through U.S. courts as a flashpoint conflict between two branches of government that has led to the precipice of a constitutional crisis.

On Thursday, a federal appeals court panel dismantled the administration’s latest appeal, saying the government had done “essentially nothing” to attempt to return Abrego Garcia in compliance with last week’s Supreme Court order.

A three-judge panel for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit said the executive branch was due deference in conducting foreign policy, but that the administration’s inaction in seeking Abrego Garcia’s return amounted to defiance of a judicial order.

The unanimous ruling was written by Fourth Circuit Chief Judge J. Harvie Wilkinson III, who was nominated by Republican President Ronald Reagan. The other two judges, Robert Bruce King and Stephanie Thacker, were nominated by Democratic presidents Bill Clinton and Barack Obama.

“The government is asserting a right to stash away residents of this country in foreign prisons without the semblance of due process that is the foundation of our constitutional order. Further, it claims in essence that because it has rid itself of custody that there is nothing that can be done,” the panel wrote. “This should be shocking not only to judges, but to the intuitive sense of liberty that Americans far removed from courthouses still hold dear.”

The appeals ruling responded to the government’s appeal of U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis’ order this week for the Trump administration to offer evidence on how it has sought to help with Abrego Garcia’s release from CECOT.

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled last week that the Trump administration must “facilitate” — but stopped short of requiring — his return to the United States.

In unusually frank language, the Fourth Circuit panel warned Thursday the conflict between the executive and judicial branches threatened the foundation of U.S. government.

“If today the Executive claims the right to deport without due process and in disregard of court orders, what assurance will there be tomorrow that it will not deport American citizens and then disclaim responsibility to bring them home?” the court asked. “And what assurance shall there be that the Executive will not train its broad discretionary powers upon its political enemies? The threat, even if not the actuality, would always be present.”

Near the end of the order, the panel urged the administration to obey the judicial branch.

“We yet cling to the hope that it is not naïve to believe our good brethren in the Executive Branch perceive the rule of law as vital to the American ethos,” the judges wrote. “This case presents their unique chance to vindicate that value and to summon the best that is within us while there is still time.”

Neither country taking action

The Fourth Circuit panel pointed out that the leaders of both the United States and El Salvador claimed they had no power to return Abrego Garcia.

“We are told that neither government has the power to act,” they wrote. “The result will be to leave matters generally and Abrego Garcia specifically in an interminable limbo without recourse to law of any sort.”

During a White House visit this week, El Salvador President Nayib Bukele said he would not bring Abrego Garcia back to the United States.

The Trump administration has admitted in court that Abrego Garcia’s deportation stemmed from an “administrative error.” The administration continues to accuse him of being part of the gang MS-13, despite no charges or convictions of any criminal offenses against him, including gang-related crimes.

Jacob Fischler contributed to this report.

Minister of Justice and Public Security Héctor Villatoro, right, accompanies U.S. Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, center, during a tour of the Terrorist Confinement Center, or CECOT, on March 26, 2025 in Tecoluca, El Salvador. (Photo by Alex Brandon-Pool/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — Federal judges in Texas and New York Wednesday temporarily halted the Trump administration’s use of the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 in parts of those two states where Venezuelans set for deportation are incarcerated.

The American Civil Liberties Union filed cases in the Southern District of New York and the Southern District of Texas, after the U.S. Supreme Court this week deemed challenges to the wartime law must be brought in the location of those subject to President Donald Trump’s proclamation on use of the act. The cases earlier were argued in the District of Columbia.

That Monday decision from the high court lifted a lower court’s order that barred the Trump administration from invoking the wartime law to deport any Venezuelan nationals 14 or older who are suspected gang members — but the justices also said unanimously that the Venezuelans must be allowed court hearings.

Texas Judge Fernando Rodriguez Jr. issued a temporary restraining order to prevent the deportation of Venezuelans in the entire state of Texas under the Alien Enemies Act, as well as the facility where the three men who brought the case are currently detained, the El Valle Detention Center in Raymondville.

The restraining order from Rodriguez Jr. is in place until April 23. The order also states that the three Venezuelan men cannot be removed from the El Valle Detention Center, which is the same center from which the Trump administration on March 15 transferred those subject to the wartime law and placed them on a plane to a notorious mega-prison in El Salvador.

New York order

The temporary restraining order from New York Judge Alvin K. Hellerstein that he plans to sign Wednesday would cover Venezuelans in the Southern District of New York, according to The Associated Press. That would include New York City, the boroughs of Manhattan and the Bronx and Dutchess, Orange, Putnam, Rockland, Sullivan and Westchester counties.  

Two Venezuelans brought the suit in the Southern District of New York.

Hellerstein, who was appointed by former President Bill Clinton, will hold an April 22 hearing to determine if the temporary restraining order should become a preliminary injunction. The ACLU is also pushing for a class certification.

The Supreme Court said this week it will allow, for now, the Trump administration to use the Alien Enemies Act, but those subject to the proclamation must be allowed to bring a challenge in court.

The original suit against the Trump administration’s use of the Alien Enemies Act came from five men detained in Texas. The justices argued that the proper court venue should be where they were being detained in Texas rather than before the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. 

More than 238 Venezuelans have been deported to the brutal prison, Centro de Confinamiento del Terrorismo, known as CECOT.

Marylander’s case cited

Judge Rodriguez Jr., whom President Donald Trump appointed in 2017, in placing the temporary restraining order noted that anyone who is erroneously deported under the Alien Enemies Act potentially cannot be returned to the United States.

In his reasoning, he cited the Trump administration’s stance in a high-profile case that led to a Maryland man being sent to a prison in El Salvador by mistake.

The Trump administration has asked the Supreme Court to strike down a lower court’s order that officials return Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia of Beltsville, Maryland, who had a 2019 court order barring his removal to El Salvador. On Monday the Supreme Court temporarily paused the deadline until the high court could make a full decision.

“Furthermore, if the United States erroneously removed an individual to another country based on the Proclamation, a substantial likelihood exists that the individual could not be returned to the United States,” Rodriguez Jr. wrote.

A hearing in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas in the Brownsville division, is set for Friday 1:30 p.m. Central. 

Rodriguez said of the upcoming Friday hearing, “the Court will consider whether to extend the temporary restraining order or issue other forms of emergency relief.”

Prisoners look out of their cell as Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem tours the Terrorist Confinement Center, or CECOT, on March 26, 2025 in Tecoluca, El Salvador. (Photo by Alex Brandon-Pool/Getty Images)

U.S. Sen. Chris Van Hollen said Thursday that soldiers blocked him from entering a notorious mega-prison in El Salvador where the erroneously deported Maryland resident Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia has been held for more than a month.

The Maryland Democrat arrived in the Central American country Wednesday in an effort to help bring Abrego Garcia, whom the Justice Department admitted in court was deported in error, back to the United States, or at least check on his wellness. He met with El Salvador Vice President Félix Ulloa that day, who denied his requests to either visit or speak on the phone with Abrego Garcia.

Van Hollen told reporters Thursday afternoon that he again tried to make contact with Abrego Garcia that morning.

A U.S. immigration judge issued a protective order in 2019 finding that sending Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran citizen, back to his home country would put him in grave danger.

Accompanied by Chris Newman — the lawyer for Abrego Garcia’s wife and his mother — Van Hollen said they tried to enter Centro de Confinamiento del Terrorismo, or CECOT, but soldiers stopped them at a checkpoint about three kilometers from the prison.

“We were told by the soldiers that they’d been ordered not to allow us to proceed any further than that point,” Van Hollen said.

Van Hollen said that since Abrego Garcia was sent to CECOT, he has not spoken with anyone outside of the prison walls, and “this inability to communicate with his lawyers is a violation of international law.”

The senator pointed out that El Salvador is a party to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.

“That covenant says, and I quote, ‘A detained or imprisoned person shall be entitled to communicate and consult with his legal counsel,’” he said.

Van Hollen also said he met with the U.S. Embassy in El Salvador and they discussed “the full range of important bilateral relations between the United States and El Salvador.”

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt and other Republicans have criticized Van Hollen for making the trip, repeating the accusation that Abrego Garcia is a gang member.

Representatives for the White House and DHS did not respond to messages seeking comment Thursday.

Appeals court slams administration’s inaction

Meanwhile, Abrego Garcia’s case continues to work its way through U.S. courts as a flashpoint conflict between two branches of government that has led to the precipice of a constitutional crisis.

On Thursday, a federal appeals court panel dismantled the administration’s latest appeal, saying the government had done “essentially nothing” to attempt to return Abrego Garcia in compliance with last week’s Supreme Court order.

A three-judge panel for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit said the executive branch was due deference in conducting foreign policy, but that the administration’s inaction in seeking Abrego Garcia’s return amounted to defiance of a judicial order.

The unanimous ruling was written by Fourth Circuit Chief Judge J. Harvie Wilkinson III, who was nominated by Republican President Ronald Reagan. The other two judges, Robert Bruce King and Stephanie Thacker, were nominated by Democratic presidents Bill Clinton and Barack Obama.

“The government is asserting a right to stash away residents of this country in foreign prisons without the semblance of due process that is the foundation of our constitutional order. Further, it claims in essence that because it has rid itself of custody that there is nothing that can be done,” the panel wrote. “This should be shocking not only to judges, but to the intuitive sense of liberty that Americans far removed from courthouses still hold dear.”

The appeals ruling responded to the government’s appeal of U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis’ order this week for the Trump administration to offer evidence on how it has sought to help with Abrego Garcia’s release from CECOT.

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled last week that the Trump administration must “facilitate” — but stopped short of requiring — his return to the United States.

In unusually frank language, the Fourth Circuit panel warned Thursday the conflict between the executive and judicial branches threatened the foundation of U.S. government.

“If today the Executive claims the right to deport without due process and in disregard of court orders, what assurance will there be tomorrow that it will not deport American citizens and then disclaim responsibility to bring them home?” the court asked. “And what assurance shall there be that the Executive will not train its broad discretionary powers upon its political enemies? The threat, even if not the actuality, would always be present.”

Near the end of the order, the panel urged the administration to obey the judicial branch.

“We yet cling to the hope that it is not naïve to believe our good brethren in the Executive Branch perceive the rule of law as vital to the American ethos,” the judges wrote. “This case presents their unique chance to vindicate that value and to summon the best that is within us while there is still time.”

Neither country taking action

The Fourth Circuit panel pointed out that the leaders of both the United States and El Salvador claimed they had no power to return Abrego Garcia.

“We are told that neither government has the power to act,” they wrote. “The result will be to leave matters generally and Abrego Garcia specifically in an interminable limbo without recourse to law of any sort.”

During a White House visit this week, El Salvador President Nayib Bukele said he would not bring Abrego Garcia back to the United States.

The Trump administration has admitted in court that Abrego Garcia’s deportation stemmed from an “administrative error.” The administration continues to accuse him of being part of the gang MS-13, despite no charges or convictions of any criminal offenses against him, including gang-related crimes.

Jacob Fischler contributed to this report.

Minister of Justice and Public Security Héctor Villatoro, right, accompanies U.S. Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, center, during a tour of the Terrorist Confinement Center, or CECOT, on March 26, 2025 in Tecoluca, El Salvador. (Photo by Alex Brandon-Pool/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — Federal judges in Texas and New York Wednesday temporarily halted the Trump administration’s use of the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 in parts of those two states where Venezuelans set for deportation are incarcerated.

The American Civil Liberties Union filed cases in the Southern District of New York and the Southern District of Texas, after the U.S. Supreme Court this week deemed challenges to the wartime law must be brought in the location of those subject to President Donald Trump’s proclamation on use of the act. The cases earlier were argued in the District of Columbia.

That Monday decision from the high court lifted a lower court’s order that barred the Trump administration from invoking the wartime law to deport any Venezuelan nationals 14 or older who are suspected gang members — but the justices also said unanimously that the Venezuelans must be allowed court hearings.

Texas Judge Fernando Rodriguez Jr. issued a temporary restraining order to prevent the deportation of Venezuelans in the entire state of Texas under the Alien Enemies Act, as well as the facility where the three men who brought the case are currently detained, the El Valle Detention Center in Raymondville.

The restraining order from Rodriguez Jr. is in place until April 23. The order also states that the three Venezuelan men cannot be removed from the El Valle Detention Center, which is the same center from which the Trump administration on March 15 transferred those subject to the wartime law and placed them on a plane to a notorious mega-prison in El Salvador.

New York order

The temporary restraining order from New York Judge Alvin K. Hellerstein that he plans to sign Wednesday would cover Venezuelans in the Southern District of New York, according to The Associated Press. That would include New York City, the boroughs of Manhattan and the Bronx and Dutchess, Orange, Putnam, Rockland, Sullivan and Westchester counties.  

Two Venezuelans brought the suit in the Southern District of New York.

Hellerstein, who was appointed by former President Bill Clinton, will hold an April 22 hearing to determine if the temporary restraining order should become a preliminary injunction. The ACLU is also pushing for a class certification.

The Supreme Court said this week it will allow, for now, the Trump administration to use the Alien Enemies Act, but those subject to the proclamation must be allowed to bring a challenge in court.

The original suit against the Trump administration’s use of the Alien Enemies Act came from five men detained in Texas. The justices argued that the proper court venue should be where they were being detained in Texas rather than before the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. 

More than 238 Venezuelans have been deported to the brutal prison, Centro de Confinamiento del Terrorismo, known as CECOT.

Marylander’s case cited

Judge Rodriguez Jr., whom President Donald Trump appointed in 2017, in placing the temporary restraining order noted that anyone who is erroneously deported under the Alien Enemies Act potentially cannot be returned to the United States.

In his reasoning, he cited the Trump administration’s stance in a high-profile case that led to a Maryland man being sent to a prison in El Salvador by mistake.

The Trump administration has asked the Supreme Court to strike down a lower court’s order that officials return Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia of Beltsville, Maryland, who had a 2019 court order barring his removal to El Salvador. On Monday the Supreme Court temporarily paused the deadline until the high court could make a full decision.

“Furthermore, if the United States erroneously removed an individual to another country based on the Proclamation, a substantial likelihood exists that the individual could not be returned to the United States,” Rodriguez Jr. wrote.

A hearing in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas in the Brownsville division, is set for Friday 1:30 p.m. Central. 

Rodriguez said of the upcoming Friday hearing, “the Court will consider whether to extend the temporary restraining order or issue other forms of emergency relief.”