For Immediate Release
March 15, 2025
Today President Trump issued a proclamation invoking the Alien Enemies Act to detain and deport Venezuelan immigrants deemed to be members of the criminal gang Tren de Aragua. Katherine Yon Ebright, counsel in the Liberty and National Security Program at the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU Law, had the following reaction:
“Tren de Aragua is a dangerous Venezuelan criminal gang, but immigration law already gives the president ample authority to deport Tren de Aragua members who inflict harm on our communities. The president can and should vigorously use that power. There’s no need to abuse a wartime authority when immigration and criminal law provide such powerful tools.
"The president is invoking the Alien Enemies Act to try to dispense with due process. He wants to bypass any need to provide evidence or to convince a judge that someone is actually a gang member before deporting them. The only reason to invoke such a power is to try to enable sweeping detentions and deportations of Venezuelans based on their ancestry, not on any gang activity that could be proved in immigration proceedings.
“This power grab is flagrantly illegal. The Alien Enemies Act may be used only during declared wars or armed attacks on the United States by foreign governments. The president has falsely proclaimed an invasion and predatory incursion to use a law written for wartime for peacetime immigration enforcement. The courts should shut this down.
“If the courts allow it to stand, this move could pave the way for abuses against any group of immigrants the president decides to target — not just Venezuelans — even if they are lawfully present in the U.S. and have no criminal history.
“History shows the risks. The last time a president invoked the Alien Enemies Act, tens of thousands of noncitizens of Japanese, German, and Italian descent were wrongly put into internment camps after they were deemed to be dangerous without due process and based principally on their ancestry.”
Background
The Alien Enemies Act of 1798 is the last remaining part of the notorious Alien and Sedition Acts. It lets the president detain or deport the natives and citizens of an enemy nation during wartime, without a hearing and based only on their country of birth or citizenship. The president may invoke the Alien Enemies Act in times of “declared war” or when a foreign government threatens or undertakes an “invasion” or “predatory incursion” against U.S. territory. It was last used during World War II to justify the detention and expulsion of Japanese, German, and Italian foreign nationals based on their ancestry.
Resources
- “Trump’s Doubly Flawed ‘Invasion’ Theory” (Elizabeth Goitein and Katherine Yon Ebright, Just Security, February 2025)
- “Donald Trump Plans to Exploit the Alien Enemies Act. The Courts Should Stop Him.” (Katherine Yon Ebright, Chicago Tribune, December 2024)
- The Alien Enemies Act: Unjust, Unnecessary, and Unconstitutional(Katherine Yon Ebright, Brennan Center, October 2024)
- “The Alien Enemies Act, Explained” (Katherine Yon Ebright, Brennan Center, October 2024)
- “What Should Courts Do if a Future President Invokes the Alien Enemies Act to Deport Immigrants?” (Katherine Yon Ebright, Just Security, February 2024)
