Judge: Trump admin's deportations to South Sudan may have violated order
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Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem speaks during a hearing with the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs on Capitol Hill on Tuesday. Photo: Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images
A judge in a late Tuesday order said the Trump administration must "maintain custody and control" of immigrants "being removed to South Sudan or to any other third country" in case he finds such removals were unlawful.
The big picture: Immigration attorneys have accused the administration of deporting immigrants from Myanmar and Vietnam to South Sudan in violation of a court order, per a filing Tuesday that requested their "immediate return."
- The attorneys made the filing in a Boston-based federal court to U.S. District Judge Brian Murphy, who's already ruled that sending undocumented immigrants to countries they're not citizens of would "clearly violate" an earlier order against sending people to third countries.
The latest: The Biden-appointed Murphy said in his order he's leaving "the practicalities of compliance" to the Trump administration, but he expects the immigrants "will be treated humanely."
- DHS identified eight individuals ICE deported and listed crimes they were convicted of in a news release also shared on the White House's website on Wednesday.
- That list includes Cuban nationals Enrique Arias-Hierro and Jose Manuel Rodriguez-Quinones; Thongxay Nilakout, a citizen of Laos; Mexican national Jesus Munoz-Gutierrez; Dian Peter Domach, a South Sudanese citizen; Myanmar (Burma) citizens Kyaw Mya and Nyo Myint; and Tuan Thanh Phan, a Vietnamese national.
DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said in the release the men were removed "from American soil so they can never hurt another American victim."
- She called the judge's decision "absurd" and said the men "present a clear and present threat to the safety of the American people."
Driving the news: The lawyers said the man from Myanmar, identified in court documents as N.M., was delivered a notice in English without an interpreter on Monday, saying he'd be sent to South Sudan, an East African country that the State Department advises U.S. citizens not to travel to due to "continued security threats" that include crime, kidnapping and armed conflict.
- "N.M. has limited English proficiency," said a San Francisco-based attorney in a Tuesday filing that said she was told after the fact that her client had been "removed" from Texas' Port Isabel Detention Center to South Sudan.
- The emergency filing in the Massachusetts District Court said T.T.P., a national of Vietnam, "appears to have suffered the same fate as N.M." and the lawyers had "information that there were likely at least 10 other" immigrants on the deportation plane to South Sudan.
- The lawyers said this "blatantly defies" the court order prohibiting sending immigrants to third countries and requested the judge block any further such deportations.
Zoom in: Murphy told Elianis Perez, a Department of Justice lawyer, at a hearing later Tuesday that he has a "strong indication" that his preliminary injunction order "has been violated," per Reuters.
- It "seems like it may be contempt" based on what he's been told, but he's "not going to order that the plane turn around," he said, the New York Times reports.
- Perez said the Burmese immigrant had been sent to Myanmar and not South Sudan but wouldn't say where T.T.P. or the plane were, nor would she confirm its final destination because she said the information was "classified," according to the NYT.
- Joseph Mazzara, the Department of Homeland Security 's acting general counsel, said "at least one rapist and one murderer" were on the flight, citing other administration officials, per the NYT.
Go deeper: First flight leaves U.S. under Trump's $1000 "self-deport" deal
Editor's note: This article has been updated with the administration's response.<br/>
