President Trump on Monday invoked the “state secrets” doctrine to block the release of any more information about controversial deportation flights that carried more than 200 Venezuelan gang suspects to El Salvador earlier this month, despite a judge’s orders to turn the planes around.
The invocation is the latest escalation in a case that’s already a simmering constitutional showdown.
Deputy Assistant Attorney General Drew Ensign said Judge James Boasberg has been stepping well beyond his reach as a federal district judge as he seeks to interfere in major foreign policy and national security decisions.
“In this case, invocation of the ‘absolute’ state secrets privilege prevents the court from colliding with the Executive,” Mr. Ensign argued in a filing with the judge.
He said the invocation shuts down the judge’s persistent inquiries about the timing of the deportation flights to El Salvador and information about who was on them.
“No more information is needed to resolve any legal issue in this case. Whether the planes carried one TdA terrorist or a thousand or whether the planes made one stop or ten simply has no bearing on any relevant legal issue,” the lawyer argued.
His filing was accompanied by declarations from Attorney General Pam Bondi, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, all affirming that they concur that serious state secrets are at stake.
Mr. Rubio said disclosing the details could upend touchy international negotiations over the deportations and Ms. Noem said it would reveal secret details about how U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the deportation agency, handles gang members.
Mr. Trump is using the Alien Enemies Act, a 1798 law, to short-circuit usually lengthy deportation cases and kick out people suspected of being members of Tren de Aragua, a notorious Venezuelan gang that infiltrated the U.S. during the Biden border surge.
Using the Alien Enemies Act, the government ousted more than 200 Venezuelans on March 15, sending them to El Salvador where the U.S. is paying to house them in a terrorist prison.
Judge Boasberg ordered a halt to the flights and said any planes in the air needed to be turned around — and hinted that he could even demand that deportees be brought back.
The Trump administration finished three flights anyway, and the two sides have been feuding ever since.
The president’s lawyers have asked an appeals court to boot Judge Boasberg from the case, have asked that his orders be blocked and are now telling him he can’t get the information he’s been seeking.
Mr. Trump himself has called for the judge to be impeached.
For his part the judge has scolded the Justice Department for “intemperate and disrespectful” arguments and expressed dismay with the answers from Mr. Ensign and his clients.
