The following research fed into the article Week Nine of Trump/MAGA Fascism: The Fascist Freeze Gets Even Deeper. Focused on the case of the Venezuelan immigrants, it provides a concrete feel for what is going on and exposes the Trump regime’s lies in some depth.

Basic Facts

On March 15, the U.S. deported 238 Venezuelan males on three flights to El Salvador. An additional 23 Salvadoreans were also deported, bringing the total to 261.

Upon arrival the abductees “were marched into armored vehicles, had their heads shaved and were transferred into cells inside El Salvador's notorious maximum security prison, known as CECOT.” (See below for more on CECOT.)

The U.S. has released names, but notably has not released ages—it is possible that the group includes teenagers.

Hardened Criminals?

The U.S. initially claimed that the deportees were hardened criminals, but on March 18 ICE admitted that “many… do not have criminal records in the United States,” but insisted that since they were members of a criminal gang, it was only a matter of time: “[M]any of the [Tren de Aragua gang] members removed under the AEA do not have criminal records in the United States, that is because they have only been in the United States for a short period of time. The lack of a criminal record does not indicate they pose a limited threat.” (See ABC News, March 18, 2025, 'Many' alleged gang members deported by Trump didn't have criminal records in the US: ICE.)

Dangerous Gang Members?

But if they do not have criminal records, how does ICE know they are members of Tren de Aragua (TdA), which the U.S. says is a transnational criminal gang that is “invading” the U.S.? ICE claims that it carefully “vetted” all deportees to verify gang membership. But the only actual evidence they have offered are tattoos that they claim are gang tattoos. Already it has come out that many of these tattoos are not “gang tattoos.” And Venezuela’s interior minister reported that “I believe with absolute responsibility that not a single one appears on the organizational chart of the now-extinct Tren de Aragua organization, not a single one.” (See Reuters, March 21, 2025: Venezuela minister says no Tren de Aragua members among US deportees.)

Here are two of many examples where family or attorneys have come forward with evidence that their abducted family members were neither criminals nor gang members:

Jerce Reyes Barrios is a professional soccer player from Venezuela, a youth soccer coach, and has no criminal record. He participated in two protests against the government of Nicholas Maduro. Afterwards he was abducted and tortured. He fled to the U.S. and applied for political asylum but was instead detained for “investigation” for “suspicious tattoos,” which were in fact tattoos of soccer clubs. He has no criminal record in the U.S. or Venezuela. (See Ryan Grim and Sarah Hay, Drop Site News, March 20, 2025, Venezuelan Professional Goalkeeper Deported to El Salvador Prison, Stunning Family Back Home.)

Andres Guillermo Morales is a citizen of both Colombia and Venezuela and is also here seeking asylum. (His mother is Colombian; he lives in Venezuela.) He has a legal work permit and a job. He has multiple tattoos: his parents’ names, a clock, a star, a bible verse and music notes. Reuters verified that he had no criminal record in Colombia or Venezuela, and was unable to find any evidence of a criminal record in the U.S. (See Reuters, March 21, 2025, Colombian-Venezuelan migrant held in El Salvador has no ties to feared gang, wife says.)

The Center for Terrorist Confinement/Centro de Confinamiento del Terrorismo (CECOT) Prison

Originally built in late 2022 for 20,000 inmates, the current population is 40,000. Human rights groups are not allowed in to observe conditions. Government-made videos say that inmates get 30 minutes a day out of their cell, and can be kept in solitary confinement cells that are completely dark. Human Rights Watch is unaware of any prisoner ever being released from CECOT!

Since March 2022 (when a national state of emergency was declared), 350 prisoners have died in Salvadoran custody (not necessarily in CECOT). Some prisoners report being beaten by guards day after day. (Above is from Human Rights Watch declaration on prison conditions in El Salvador for the J.G.G. v. Trump case, March 20, 2025.)

According to The Guardian, March 19, 2025 (What to know about the El Salvador mega-prison where Trump sent deported Venezuelans): “The prison has no outdoor recreational space and no family visits are allowed.” Overcrowding is severe; each prisoner has on average 6.45 square feet of space.

President Nayib Bukele’s government is being paid about $6 million to hold the deportees for one year, with an option to renew each year. Speaking of CECOT inmates generally, Bukele’s justice minister has said that officials “will make sure none of those who enter the Cecot ever leave on foot.”

Legal Issues

A Criminal Act

Most of the deportees were deported under the 1798 Alien Enemies Act. It should be noted that this Act has been invoked three times in 177 years, all three during war time, AND, that it was used to incarcerate 140,000 people of Japanese descent, including many U.S. citizens, for as much as four years during and after World War 2. The criminality of this was finally recognized in the 1980s (under Reagan), an apology issued and reparations paid. But, something that is not noted in media coverage is that this criminal law was not revoked at that time.

Declared War or Invasion…

Here is the relevant language of the Act:

“Whenever there shall be a declared war between the United States and any foreign nation or government … and the President of the United States shall make public proclamation of the event, all natives, citizens, denizens, or subjects of the hostile nation or government, being males of the age of fourteen years and upwards, who shall be within the United States, and not actually naturalized, shall be liable to be apprehended, restrained, secured and removed, as alien enemies.”

The Act also can be invoked in the event of “invasion.” 

Obviously there is no “declared war” between the U.S. and Venezuela, so Trump’s¹ invocation of the Act leaned on the “invasion” language, and declared that TdA “operates in conjunction with” the Maduro government and “continues to engage in mass illegal migration to the United States to further its objectives of … supporting the Maduro regime’s goal of destabilizing democratic nations in the Americas, including the United States.” (From White House Proclamation.)

However, even this tortured shred of a justification has been exposed as a lie: the New York Times reported (March 20, 2025, Intelligence Assessment Said to Contradict Trump on Venezuelan Gang) that U.S. intelligence agencies had investigated possible ties between the Maduro government and TdA and found with “moderate” certainty that TdA “was not directed by Venezuela’s government or committing crimes in the United States on its orders, according to the officials.”

Shattering of Right to Due Process, Separation of Powers, and the Rule of Law

Due Process: The 14th Amendment guarantees that no one in the U.S. can be deprived of liberty or property without due process of law. This applies to immigrants, although it is important to note that it is somewhat of a façade for undocumented immigrants, even relative to other oppressed masses who are citizens. Still, in a nutshell, the U.S. Constitution requires that people have an opportunity to go before some judicial body and argue that the law under which they are being punished does not apply to them, or they did not do what they are accused of, etc. But in this case ICE and the regime are insisting on their “right” to abduct and deport people with no judicial review whatsoever. 

Entering Homes Without Warrants

Recently they have claimed that they can enter people’s homes without warrants, basically if some agent of the executive branch (ICE, FBI, etc.) alleges that someone in the house is an enemy alien, without any judicial review. (See New York Times, March 20, 2025, Administration Officials Believe Order Lets Immigration Agents Enter Homes Without Warrants.)

Separation of Powers (re Congress)

The Alien Enemies Act is an Act of Congress, therefore if the president invokes it, he is required to apply it based on the language of the law, not his own interpretation. As already noted, the current situation does not remotely conform to the language, intent or past usage of the law—it is essentially Trump “rewriting” the law to mean what he wants it to mean.

Separation of Powers (re Judiciary)

As a congressional act, the Alien Enemies Act and its application are subject to judicial review. But in this case, a direct judicial order to halt / return the deportation flights was disregarded, and subsequent efforts by the federal district judge, acting on very standard legal authority, to even find out what happened have been openly stonewalled and gaslighted. Meanwhile, the administration has argued that the court has no right to review the president’s decisions because it is a national security matter and that is solely the domain of the president. The argument even asserts that he has no responsibility to explain or prove WHY it is a national security matter. Additionally, Trump and others have called for the impeachment of the judge and spoken about him in a highly threatening way which in today’s “atmosphere” could easily lead to physical attacks and at any rate amounts to plain physical intimidation.

Implications

In plain language, all of this amounts to the rule of law in every sense hanging by an extremely thin thread. The “thread” is that Trump has not yet openly defied the court’s orders, though he effectively has. Also, there is the possibility that this will end up before the Supreme Court (SCOTUS) and that SCOTUS will rule against Trump. Then he could either accede or defy. Either way, this would be a major earthquake with highly unpredictable outcomes. 

Even interpreted narrowly, any foreign born person, or even a person with ties to another country, can be accused without evidence of being part of an “invading” gang, and, without review of that allegation by any judicial body, deported, including to barbaric Third World prisons, or homegrown concentration camps. And if you add in the factor that Trump insists he can claim a “national security” exemption—without any explanation—for whatever he does, then the above could apply to any person, period. Likewise, both congressional and judicial authority can be disregarded. So this actually would be as sweeping as Hitler’s Enabling Act,² should Trump succeed in fully getting away with these abductions/deportations and defiance of the court.