Judge Thwacks Trump Admin For Defying Her Order In Alien Enemies Act Case
The pattern of defiance is so familiar now that there is almost no benefit of the doubt left for federal judges to give the Trump administration.
This morning, in one of the key cases in which the U.S. government has been ordered to “facilitate” the return of a deported individual, U.S. District Judge Stephanie Gallagher of Maryland set the stage for contempt proceedings against the administration after finding that it “utterly disregarded” her order to provide a status report on the pseudonymous plaintiff “Cristian” in a closely watched Alien Enemies Act case.
Gallagher called the government’s late-filed status report on Tuesday “the functional equivalent of, ‘We haven’t done anything and don’t intend to.’” She thwacked the government for being late with the status report and ignoring the substance of what she had asked it to contain.
Cristian, a Venezuelan national, was deported to El Salvador on March 15 under the Alien Enemies Act in violation of a 2024 settlement agreement barring the removal of asylum seekers like him. Following the lead of the Abrego Garcia case, Gallagher ordered the Trump administration to facilitate Cristian’s return. After the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals last week declined the government’s request to pause her order while it appealed, Gallagher quickly ordered the Trump administration to provide her with a status report within a week on Cristian’s status and the steps it had taken and planned to take to facilitate his return to the United States.
As I noted here, the administration filed the status report after her deadline and did not substantively answer her questions. “Instead, Defendants simply reiterated their well-worn talking points on their reasons for removing Cristian and failed to provide any of the information the Court required,” Gallagher concluded in her latest order.
Gallagher pulled no punches, writing that the administration’s status report:
- “adds nothing to the underlying record”
- “reflects a lack of any effort”
- “shows zero effort to comply”
- is “patently insufficient”
- shows a “blatant lack of effort”
What happens now?
Gallagher all but urged Cristian’s counsel to initiate contempt of court proceedings against the Trump administration, inviting them to give her input on “a process to create an appropriate record on Defendants’ lack of compliance with this Court’s Orders.” In the meantime, she gave the administration until 5 p.m. ET Monday to cure its noncompliance with a more fulsome status report.
In the slow-moving, drawn-out constitutional clash in the handful of “facilitate” cases, the Cristian case is quickly catching up to the others as a flash point in whether the judicial branch will hold or be able to hold the line against a defiant executive.
