A lawsuit accuses the Trump administration of illegally deporting five African immigrants to Ghana, making the 16-hour journey in “straitjackets,” in an attempt to avoid court orders that blocked them from going back to their home countries.
A federal judge on Saturday said it appeared the Trump administration was making an “end run” around those court orders by first sending them to Ghana — which then could send them to countries where they face torture, persecution and death.
U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan ordered the government to provide assurances that Ghana would not send the immigrants elsewhere in violation of those court orders.
One day earlier, Chutkan said the Trump administration had, “with a wink and a nod,” deported those African nationals in an apparent attempt to have Ghana prepare to send them elsewhere.
“What you’re doing, what appears to be happening, is truly disingenuous,” she said Friday.
A lawsuit filed in Washington, D.C. on Friday accuses administration officials of enlisting Ghana’s government “to do their dirty work.”
“Despite the minimal, pass-through involvement of the Ghanaian government, [the Trump administration’s] objective is clear: deport individuals who have been granted fear-based relief from being sent to their countries of origin to those countries anyway, in contravention to the rulings of U.S. immigration judges and U.S. immigration law,” according to the complaint.
Homeland Security has denied that the deportees were in straitjackets.
Lawyers for the Department of Justice argued that immigration courts had issued final orders to remove all of the deportees, and that the State Department was working with Ghana to ensure they wouldn’t be sent anywhere only to be tortured or persecuted.
But one of the plaintiffs has already been deported from Ghana to his native Gambia, where federal judges in the United States had previously determined he could not be sent, according to ACLU attorney Lee Gelernt.
Justice Department lawyer Elianis Perez argued that Judge Chutkan had no power to control how another country treats deportees.
She noted the Supreme Court this summer ruled the administration could continue sending immigrants to countries they are not from, even if they didn’t get their day in court to raise fears of torture or persecution.
Gerlent compared the latest case to that of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, who the Trump administration mistakenly deported to El Salvador despite court orders prohibiting it, and then argued it couldn’t get him back.
After orders from federal judges and the Supreme Court directed the administration to “facilitate” his return, Abrego Garcia eventually came back to the United States — only to face a human smuggling charges in Tennessee, as the Trump administration revives another attempt to deport him.
“This appears to be a specific plan to make an end run around these obligations,” Chutkan said of the administration shipping the immigrants to Ghana.
“What does the government intend to do? And please don’t tell me you don’t have any control over Ghana because I know that,” she said.
Chutkan later issued an order giving the administration until 9 p.m. Eastern time to file a declaration detailing how they were trying to ensure the other immigrants weren’t improperly sent to their home countries from Ghana.
The administration resumed a policy of deporting immigrant detainees to so-called third countries in July, starting with the tiny African nation of Eswatini.
Trump’s administration threatened to deport Abrego Garcia to four different countries within the span of less than two weeks, beginning shortly after he was released from federal custody in Tennessee only to land in an immigration detention center in Maryland a few days later.
Immigration officials outlined a plan for his removal to Costa Rica if he agreed to plead guilty to human smuggling charges. If he didn’t, he would be sent to Uganda.
Officials suggested he could be sent back to his home country of El Salvador if he successfully reopens a case for asylum in the United States. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials then said he will be sent to Eswatini.
Additional reporting by the Associated Press
