(Reuters) -A federal judge in Pennsylvania ruled on Tuesday that the United States can use the Alien Enemies Act to fast-track the deportation of accused Venezuelan gang members, in what appears to be the first court ruling that backs the Trump administration’s interpretation of the 1798 law.
Judge Stephanie Haines, of the U.S. District for the Western District of Pennsylvania, ruled that President Donald Trump has authority to declare the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua a foreign terrorist organization and deport its members under the Alien Enemies Act, but she criticized the administration's practice of deporting people sometimes "within a matter of hours."
Haines, appointed by Trump during his first term, ruled that the administration must give potential deportees at least 21 days' notice and the opportunity to challenge their removals, to avoid the possibility that people who are not gang members "may be errantly removed from this country."
She made the ruling in court papers in the case of a Venezuelan man identified as A.S.R. Haines did not rule whether A.S.R. was a member of the gang, but she said people like him must be given more opportunity to challenge their deportations.
Haines required the government to provide notice in Spanish and English, and to provide interpreters when necessary.
Lee Gelernt, an attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union who is representing A.S.R., said he would appeal.
"We strongly disagree with the Court's decision to allow the government to continue using this wartime authority during peacetime, and will appeal that aspect of the decision," Gelernt said.
Haines' ruling is contrary to other federal courts' decisions on the Trump administration’s interpretation of the Alien Enemies Act, which the president invoked in March as legal justification for deporting hundreds of men whom his administration accused of being Tren de Aragua members.
Federal judges in New York, Colorado and Texas have ruled against Trump's use of the law to deport Venezuelans.
Haines, in her ruling, noted that her district has jurisdiction over the petition filed by A.S.R., even though he was transferred from an Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Philipsburg, Pennsylvania, on April 15 to an ICE detention center in Texas, despite a temporary restraining order issued that day barring his transfer from the Western District of Pennsylvania.
The Trump administration has deported alleged gang members to a prison in El Salvador under an arrangement in which the United States is paying the Central American nation $6 million. It is part of Trump's hardline approach toward immigration.
The White House did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
(Reporting by Ryan Patrick Jones and Dietrich Knauth; Editing by Chris Reese, Nia Williams and Leslie Adler)
