Shocking audio has captured the moment an Obama-appointed judge said ‘Nazis got better treatment’ than Venezuelan illegal immigrants deported by the Trump regime.
In a contentious appeals court hearing on Monday, Judge Patricia Millett was scathing in her assessment of the administration’s decision to send planeloads of migrants to El Salvador by invoking a wartime Alien Enemies Act.
‘Nazis got better treatment under the Alien Enemies Act than has happened here,’ Millett told lawyer Drew Ensign, representing the government.
‘There were planeloads of people… The people weren’t given notice. They weren’t told where they were going.’
Millett was referring to the rights and pathways available to people to challenge their removal from the United States.
The Trump administration maintains the 260 people it deported were members of the feared Tren de Aragua gang.
Washington judge James Boasberg had placed a temporary halt on the deportations and demanded flights already in the air turn around, but the administration did not follow the verbal order.
Ensign said: ‘We certainly dispute the Nazi analogy.’
Shocking audio has captured the moment an Obama-appointed judge said ‘Nazis got better treatment’ than Venezuelan illegal immigrants deported by the Trump regime
Millett, an appointee of Democratic President Barack Obama, is one of three judges on a panel which will make the final decision
The administration is hopeful the appeals court will reverse Boasberg’s decision to ban the use of the Alien Enemies Act for two weeks amid ongoing legal action.
If the appeals court does so, Trump will once again have the authority to remove suspected members of the gang without final removal orders from an immigration judge.
Millett, an appointee of Democratic President Barack Obama, is one of three judges on a panel which will make the final decision.
She is joined by Judge Justin Walker, who was appointed by Republican Donald Trump during his first term as president, and Judge Karen Henderson, appointed by Republican President George Bush.
Walker appeared more supportive of the government’s arguments, but the court did not say when it would rule.
Boasberg said people must be able to challenge the government’s stance that they are indeed members of Tren de Aragua before being deported.
Millett addressed this during the appeals hearing, noting: ‘If the government says, we don’t have to give process for that, then y’all could’ve picked me up on Saturday and thrown me on a plane.’
She said the administration could very easily claim she was ‘a member of [Tren De Aragua] and give me no chance to protest it.’
The Trump administration maintains the 260 people it deported were members of the feared Tren de Aragua gang
‘Nazis got better treatment under the Alien Enemies Act than has happened here,’ Millett told lawyer Drew Ensign, representing the government
Boasberg is also weighing whether the Trump administration violated his order by failing to return deportation flights after his order was issued.
The judge wrote that the administration appeared to have ‘hustled people onto those planes’ to avoid a potential court order blocking the deportations.
Prior to the Trump administration’s invocation of the 1798 act, the law had been used three times in US history, most recently to intern and remove Japanese, German and Italian immigrants during World War Two.
Family members of many of the deported Venezuelan migrants deny the alleged gang ties.
Lawyers for one of the deportees, a Venezuelan professional soccer player and youth coach, said US officials had wrongly labeled him a gang member based on a tattoo of a crown meant to reference his favorite team, Real Madrid.
The case has emerged as a major test of Trump’s sweeping assertion of executive power.
The judge wrote that the administration appeared to have ‘hustled people onto those planes’ to avoid a potential court order blocking the deportations
Family members of many of the deported Venezuelan migrants deny the alleged gang ties
With Republicans holding a majority in both the House of Representatives and Senate and largely falling in line behind the president’s agenda, federal judges have emerged as the final line of defense questioning the legality of Trump’s wave of executive actions.
And Trump has responded with fury to some of the court-imposed decisions against his administration.
He called for Boasberg to be impeached , sparking a rare statement from US Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts, who sternly noted that appeals, not impeachments, are the proper response to disagree with a judicial decision.
Still, Trump maintains that the judiciary is overreaching in efforts to slow down and hinder his administration.
