An Obama-appointed judge ordered the Trump administration to facilitate the return to the United States of deported illegal aliens suspected of being members of the Tren de Aragua (TdA) gang.
In a decision on Thursday, U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia Chief Judge James Boasberg stated that the Trump administration needed to “remedy the wrong that it perpetrated” by deporting hundreds of Venezuelan migrants to El Salvador, according to Politico.
While Boasberg instructed the Trump administration to “pay for airfare and provide documents to facilitate travel” for those who were deported, he explained that the migrants would “be taken into custody upon arrival.”
“It is up to the Government to remedy the wrong that it perpetrated here and to provide a means for doing so,” Boasberg said. “Were it otherwise, the Government could simply remove people from the United States without providing any process and then, once they were in a foreign country, deny them any right to return for a hearing or opportunity to present their case from abroad.”
While the Trump administration “has agreed to return the men to immigration custody if they make it to a U.S. airport or border station,” attorneys for the Department of Justice (DOJ) are against “giving the men letters that would help them get on board flights to the U.S.,” according to the outlet.
In his order, Boasberg also criticized the Trump administration, stating that “this situation would never have arisen had the Government simply afforded Plaintiffs their constitutional rights before initially deporting them.”
In March 2025, President Donald Trump invoked the 1798 Alien Enemies Act as part of an effort to allow for the expedited removal of Venezuelan migrants suspected of belonging to the TdA gang.
At the time, Boasberg issued an order blocking the Trump administration from efforts to deport those Venezuelan migrants.
In April 2025, the Supreme Court in a 5-4 decision, lifted a block from Boasberg preventing the Trump administration deporting the suspected TdA gang members. The Supreme Court found that “the migrants had improperly challenged their deportations in Washington, D.C.” when they should have challenged them in Texas.
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