Trump administration violated court order by deporting migrants to South Sudan: Judge
8 deportees were expelled to a 'third-party' country, defying judge's previous ruling barring deportations to non-native countries
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HOUSTON, United States
A federal judge ruled Wednesday that the Trump administration violated a previous court order by deporting eight migrants from the US state of Texas to South Sudan, a "third-party" country that is not their native home.
US District Judge Brian E. Murphy in Massachusetts said the federal government failed to comply with his March injunction, which barred migrants from being sent to a nation that was not their home country due to the possibility of persecution or torture in a "third-party" country, according to media reports.
"The department’s actions in this question are unquestionably violative of this court’s order," Murphy said in court.
The judge's ruling comes after the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) confirmed during a news conference that eight migrants from Myanmar, Laos, Vietnam, Cuba, Mexico and South Sudan were deported this week. Officials said all of the men had violent criminal convictions, but attorneys for the men said they were not given due process to a court hearing before being deported.
Government lawyers said the migrants are still in the custody of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) but declined to share the location of the plane’s final destination.
An attorney for one of the deportees said that an ICE detention center officer told her that her client was one of several from the Texas facility that were sent to South Sudan, a country known for its human rights abuses and has violent living conditions, including "crime, kidnapping and armed conflict," according to a previously issued State Department travel advisory.
Murphy said the migrants were given little notice of their deportations, as they were informed on Monday evening, then flown off to their destination Tuesday morning without due process.
"It was impossible for these people to have a meaningful opportunity to object to their transfer to South Sudan," he said, noting that the window of opportunity for the migrants to protest their deportations was only 24 hours.
Earlier this month, Murphy blocked the Trump administration’s attempt to deport a group of Asian migrants from the Philippines, Vietnam and Laos to Libya, another "third-party" country in a humanitarian crisis and known for its violent history of human rights abuses.
The Trump administration defiantly responded to the judge's ruling.
"It is absolutely absurd for a district judge to try to dictate the foreign policy and national security of the United States of America," DHS spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement. "These are monsters that the district judge is trying to protect."
Murphy said he would determine whether the government's conduct was "criminally contemptuous" at a later date.
