The Trump Administration’s Increasing Hostility to Basic Due Process
President Donald Trump has cracked down on immigration in his second term, deporting undocumented migrants and perhaps citizens next.
In the process, members of Trump’s administration have demonstrated an overt hostility to basic rights of due process.
On March 12, agents with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) arrested Kilmar Abrego Garcia, an undocumented immigrant from El Salvador. Three days later, the government deported him back to El Salvador to be held in the Terrorism Confinement Center (CECOT), an overcrowded and dangerous mega-prison where the country’s president offered to warehouse deportees from the U.S.
There is much to oppose in that action, perhaps most of all that Abrego Garcia—who had previously been granted a reprieve from deportation—was denied any semblance of due process when government agents grabbed him up, told him his protected status had been revoked, and shuffled him out of the country, all within the span of a long weekend.
The Trump administration contends Abrego Garcia is not entitled to due process, in part because he is a member of the violent street gang MS-13. “That may be true,” wrote Cato Institute scholar David Post. “The government, however, has provided no evidence, to a grand jury or to a magistrate or to any third party, that it is true.”
Nevertheless, the government is sticking by the claim.
“To say the administration must observe ‘due process’ is to beg the question: what process is due is a function of our resources, the public interest, the status of the accused, the proposed punishment, and so many other factors,” Vice President J.D. Vance wrote in a post on X this week. “When the media and the far left obsess over an MS-13 gang member and demand that he be returned to the United States for a *third* deportation hearing, what they’re really saying is they want the vast majority of illegal aliens to stay here permanently.”
While Vance does not mention Abrego Garcia in that post by name, he alludes to the case with the details he supplied. And those details are wrong.
According to an April order by Judge Paula Xinis of the U.S. District Court of Maryland, Abrego Garcia immigrated from El Salvador to flee gang violence, settling in Maryland with his brother, a U.S. citizen. After he was arrested in 2019 and turned over to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) for deportation, he told an immigration judge he would be subject to gang retaliation if he was sent back. The judge denied his request for bond and ordered him detained “pending
Article from Reason.com
The Reason Magazine website is a go-to destination for libertarians seeking cogent analysis, investigative reporting, and thought-provoking commentary. Championing the principles of individual freedom, limited government, and free markets, the site offers a diverse range of articles, videos, and podcasts that challenge conventional wisdom and advocate for libertarian solutions. Whether you’re interested in politics, culture, or technology, Reason provides a unique lens that prioritizes liberty and rational discourse. It’s an essential resource for those who value critical thinking and nuanced debate in the pursuit of a freer society.
