Politics
JUST IN: Legal Expert Stuns ‘Morning Joe’ Hosts, Vindicates Trump In ‘Due Process’ Controversy
“Morning Joe” hosts got schooled by a guest on Tuesday who shot holes in their theory that President Donald Trump is violating the due process of illegal immigrants swept up in deportation raids.
Much of the mainstream media has reported uncritically that constitutional law binds the administration to afford full immigration court hearings to all suspected illegal immigrants, and many stories have held up the case of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, the so-called “Maryland man” deported to El Salvador in March.
But a closer reading does not bear out that premise, attorney Danny Cevallos told Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski during a roundtable segment.
“Federal law allows for broader and even speedy removal [of illegal immigrants] and has been used in the past,” he told them. “And expedited removal as you talked about allows for summary removal. That means there’s no entitlement even to a hearing, possibly within 24 hours. It hasn’t been used as broadly as say the Trump administration might want to use it, but under the status it is permissible to remove aliens who arrive at the border and even those who have been here for two years.”
A new round of handwringing was provoked after Trump on Sunday suggested to NBC News that he does not believe all illegal immigrants are entitled to constitutional protections.
“I’m going to just follow what the lawyers say,” Trump replied. “They say that we’re allowed to do that, and I’m all for it. But everything I say is subject to the laws being 100% adhered to.”
Cevallos credited Trump advisor Stephen Miller with finding an arcane interpretation of immigration law to conduct deportations without the delays of immigration legal proceedings.
“Just because it isn’t used very often doesn’t mean it’s not a part of federal law that can be used, and it will be used because it’s permitted under federal law. The Congress, in its infinite wisdom, decided that aliens who arrive at the border — and they define people who arrive at the border within two years — if they don’t have documents, if they have insufficient documents, they can be removed in an expedited fashion unless they seek asylum,” he added.
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In the case of Garcia, U.S. Justice Department officials have reported that he first arrived in the U.S. in 2014, which would place him outside the bounds of the legal interpretation offered by Cevallos. However, many of the millions who arrived at the border during the Biden administration and have since seen their legal statuses revoked are now eligible for expedited removal, according to the MSNBC guest.
The administration’s use of the Alien Enemies Act hit a snag last week when a Texas judge blocked the president’s reliance on the law to expedite deportations in the state. The case is expected to make its way to the U.S. Supreme Court in the coming months.
