... The administration is “asserting a
right to stash away residents of this country in foreign prisons without
the semblance of due process that is the foundation of our
constitutional order,” wrote Judge J. Harvie Wilkinson in an opinion for a panel of the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals.
“Further, it claims in essence that
because it has rid itself of custody that there is nothing that can be
done,” he wrote. “This should be shocking not only to judges, but to the
intuitive sense of liberty that Americans far removed from courthouses
still hold dear.” ...
Wilkinson
and the two other judges on the 4th Circuit panel rejected the
administration’s appeal of an April 10 order from Xinis directing the
administration to “take all available steps” to facilitate Abrego
Garcia’s return to the U.S. “as soon as possible.”
Wilkinson zeroed in on the Justice Department’s admission that it had “mistakenly” deported Abrego Garcia.
“Why then should it not make what was wrong, right?” Wilkinson wrote. ...
Wilkinson warned of a dangerously
slippery slope on the horizon. “If today the Executive claims the right
to deport without due process and in disregard of court orders, what
assurance will there be tomorrow that it will not deport American
citizens and then disclaim responsibility to bring them home?” he wrote.
“And what assurance shall there be that the Executive will not train its broad discretionary powers upon its political enemies?” ...
More.
