Trump Invokes 1798 Law To Deport Immigrants.

Donald Trump Just Invoked The Alien Enemies Act, A 1798 Law Later Used To Justify Internment Camps For Japanese-American Citizens.

Donald Trump Signs Executive Order.

On Saturday President Trump announced he was invoking the Alien Enemies Act as a means to target Tren De Aragua, a Venezuelan gang.

The Alien Enemies Act of 1798 was a wartime law giving authority to the president to detain or deport natives of an enemy nation. It permits the president to target these immigrants without a hearing and based only on their country of birth or citizenship.

Each time this law has been invoked in the past has been during a conflict, and while most notable for enabling the Japanese internment camps during World War II, it’s allowed the expulsion of multiple ethnic groups, all without due process, even if in the country legally.

Even if they’re an American citizen. Which is a scary precedent when such law is now being invoked outside of conflict.

Department Of Justice 1942 Notice Regarding Alien Enemies Act.

This follows actions from the Trump Administration considered gross violations of constitutional rights, like the deportation of Mahmoud Khalil, a legal green card holder who was picked up for protesting Israel.

Or Fabian Schmidt, a green card holder since 2008 who was detained away from his family and claims to have been stripped naked and ‘violently interrogated.’

There is also Dr. Rasha Alawieh, who had been studying and practicing medicine in the country for over 6 years, who was deported without notice despite a court order requiring 48 hour notice.

None of these people were charged with any crimes, or received due process in a court room.

It seems Trump is now trying to extend this power, with the invocation of a law that predates the civil war. Where the judicial process is being overstepped, as despite being ordered to halt this immediately by a federal judge, the Trump Administration still announced hundreds of deportations.

Such a law threatens the fabric in which our country is founded on, the liberal beliefs our democracy is to uphold, and starts us down a very scary path that our country was thought to had long put behind us.