A federal judge in Denver on Tuesday ruled that the Trump administration’s effort to deport immigrants under the Alien Enemies Act “exceeds the scope” of the centuries-old wartime law and granted a preliminary injunction against any such removals of detainees held in Colorado.
The 25-page ruling from U.S. District Court Judge Charlotte Sweeney extends indefinitely a block on Alien Enemies Act removals that she had granted in a temporary restraining order last month. Sweeney also issued an order certifying the case, which was brought by lawyers for the American Civil Liberties Union on behalf of two Venezuelan nationals detained in Aurora, as a class action.
The injunction bars President Donald Trump’s administration “from detaining, transferring, or removing Petitioners and members of the certified class under the Act … from the District of Colorado.” More than 100 people detained at the Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention center in Aurora could be affected, ACLU attorneys have estimated.
GET THE MORNING HEADLINES.
SUBSCRIBE
The injunction followed similar orders by a federal judge in New York earlier on Tuesday and another in Texas last week. A wave of litigation has followed in the wake of