Thursday, U.S. District Court Judge Emmet Sullivan, who was appointed by President Bill Clinton, threatened to hold Attorney General Jeff Sessions in contempt of court.
This came after the Trump administration on the same day attempted to deport a woman and her daughter back to their home country of El Salvador while the ACLU handled an appeal hearing on their behalf.
The woman, only referred to as Carmen by the ACLU, and 12 other migrant asylum seekers being represented by the organization had previously failed their initial “credible fear” interviews, as their claims were determined to be unfounded by the federal government.
However, the judge is now blocking the Trump Administration from following their normal procedure of removing rejected migrants from the country, because the ACLU claims that Sessions’ Department of Justice is not being fair to people seeking asylum on grounds unrelated to government persecution.
“This is pretty outrageous,” Sullivan said. “I’m not happy about this at all. This is not acceptable.”
The ACLU hailed the Clinton appointee’s actions.
“We are thrilled the stay of removal was issued,” Jennifer Chang Newell, the managing attorney of ACLU’s Immigrants’ Rights Project, who argued the case in court, said in a statement via The Hill.
“In its rush to deport as many immigrants as possible, the Trump administration is putting these women and children in grave danger of being raped, beaten, or killed,” she continued.
The ACLU tweeted earlier this week, “We’re suing Jeff Sessions for illegally denying asylum protections to immigrants. … These policies undermine the fundamental human rights of women and violate decades of settled asylum law.”
This comes days after Sessions vowed to press forward with the Trump Administration’s efforts to rescind DACA, despite another federal judge’s order.
“The judicial branch has no power to eviscerate the lawful directives of Congress—nor to enjoin the executive branch from enforcing such mandates,” Sessions admonished, via The Hill. “We have recently witnessed a number of decisions in which courts have improperly used judicial power to steer, enjoin, modify, and direct executive policy.”
Sean Ross is a staff writer for Yellowhammer News. You can follow him on Twitter @sean_yhn
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