BOSTON (Reuters) -A federal judge on Friday blocked U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration from deporting migrants to countries with which they had no existing relationship without giving them a chance to raise claims that they would face persecution or torture if sent there.
U.S. District Judge Brian Murphy in Boston issued a nationwide temporary restraining order designed to protect people subject to final orders of removal from being swiftly deported to countries other than those that had already been identified during immigration proceedings.
Since taking office on January 20, the Trump administration has struck or expanded agreements with Mexico and Central American nations to take deportees from other countries. Earlier this month, Trump invoked a 226-year-old wartime authority to send alleged Venezuelan gang members to a high-security prison in El Salvador.
The move was blocked by a federal judge but flights carrying more than 200 deportees continued to El Salvador where the men remain detained despite objections from immigrant and civil rights groups.
Murphy’s decision came in a lawsuit filed on Sunday by a group of migrants represented by immigrant rights advocates challenging a policy U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement recently adopted that is aimed at fast-tracking the deportations of thousands of migrants who had been previously released from detention.
The February 18 directive – which Reuters reported on earlier this month – instructed officers to review all cases of individuals previously released from detention, including those who have complied with the terms of their release, for re-detention and removal to a third country.
Lawyers for the migrants argued the policy exposed an untold number of people to the risk of deportation to countries where they might face danger without providing them any notice or opportunity to present a fear-based claim.
Murphy, an appointee of Trump’s Democratic predecessor Joe Biden, noted that under the Convention Against Torture, migrants had protections against being removed to countries where they face a likelihood of torture.
“If your position today is that we don’t have to give them any notice, and we can send them to any country other than the country to which the immigration court has said no, that’s a very surprising thing to hear the government say,” he told a Justice Department attorney.
He barred the administration from deporting any individual from the United States to a country other than the one designated for removal in immigration proceedings without providing them written notice and a “meaningful opportunity” to submit a fear-based claim.
“We’re relieved the judge saw the urgency of this situation both for our named plaintiffs and other similarly situated individuals,” said Trina Realmuto, a lawyer for the migrants at the National Immigration Litigation Alliance.
Murphy’s order will remain in effect until the judge can rule on the plaintiffs’ request for a longer-term preliminary injunction. He will hear arguments on that request on April 10.
The Justice Department, U.S. Department of Homeland Security and ICE did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
(Reporting by Nate Raymond in Boston; Additional reporting by Ted Hesson in Washington; Editing by Leslie Adler and Aurora Ellis)
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