‘Border czar’ Tom Homan says the Trump administration’s mass deportations will not stop — even after a federal judge blocked the president from invoking the 18th-century Alien Enemies Act to deport alleged Venezuelan gang members without a hearing.
The Trump administration flew roughly 250 alleged migrant gangbangers to El Salvador’s mega prison Saturday, defying US District Judge James Boasberg order to turn the planes around.
But Homan told Fox News Monday morning the Trump administration isn’t going to follow the order.
3 Homan told Fox News Monday that the Trump administration won’t be deterred by the judge’s order on deportations. AP
“They’re not gonna stop us. We made a promise to the American people, President Trump has made a promise to the American people, we’re gonna make this country safe again,” said a stone-faced Homan.
“We’re not stopping. I don’t care what the judges think, I don’t care what the left thinks, we’re coming,” he added.
The flights transported 238 members of the Venezuelan prison gang Tren de Aragua, along with 21 MS-13 gangbangers, Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele revealed Sunday morning.
Among the deportees were migrants accused of kidnapping, sexual abuse of a child, aggravated assault, prostitution and aggravated assault of a cop, a senior administration official told The Post.
However, officials did not provide names for any of the detainees.
Once in El Salvador, the suspected gangbangers were handed over to dozens of armed commandos who swiftly moved them to the Terrorism Confinement Center (CECOT) with their heads down and hands and ankles in shackles, according to dramatic video posted by Bukele.
3 Salvadoran police officers escort shackled alleged Tren de Aragua gangbangers deported from the US. via REUTERS
Boasberg ordered the administration to immediately halt deportations made under the 1798 Alien Enemies Act, which was last used during World War II to hold Japanese, German and Italian immigrants in internment camps.
“Any plane containing these folks that is going to take off or is in the air needs to be returned to the United States however that is accomplished,” Boasberg wrote, according to the Washington Post.
“Make sure it’s complied with immediately.”
3 Boasberg ordered the deportation flights bound for El Salvador to turn around, but the Trump admin argued they were already overseas at that point. Bloomberg via Getty Images
However, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt argued in an X post Monday that the administration didn’t ‘refuse to comply’ with Boasberg’s order, arguing that the judge “had no lawful basis” since the “terrorist TdA aliens” had already been deported.
“The written order and the Administration’s actions do not conflict. Moreover, as the Supreme Court has repeatedly made clear — federal courts generally have no jurisdiction over the President’s conduct of foreign affairs, his authorities under the Alien Enemies Act, and his core Article II powers to remove foreign alien terrorists from U.S. soil and repel a declared invasion,” said Leavitt.
“A single judge in a single city cannot direct the movements of an aircraft carrying foreign alien terrorists who were physically expelled from U.S. soil,” she said.
Trump signed an executive order in January classifying Tren de Aragua as a foreign terrorist organization, making it easier for the feds to arrest and deport the gangbangers roaming the US.
The president’s mass deportation effort has already yielded more than 32,000 arrests — 70% of them either facing charges or convicted of crimes, senior Homeland Security officials said last week.
The Department of Homeland Security has yet to disclose how many migrants have been deported since the sweeps commenced.