Would President Donald Trump deport The Beatles? A judge asks the question ...

A judge in America has raised a provocative hypothetical during legal arguments around President Donald Trump’s use of an 18th-century wartime statute to deport Venezuelan gang members: ‘Could a president deport The Beatles?’

Jennifer Walker Elrod, chief judge of the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans, asked whether the same law could be deployed against a "British invasion" deemed to be corrupting young minds.

She described her reference to the 1960s moral panic surrounding The Beatles and other British bands as "fanciful". However, a government attorney responded unequivocally that the president possessed such power, and the courts would be unable to prevent its exercise.

“These sort of questions of foreign affairs and the security of the nation are specifically political issues,” said Drew Ensign, an assistant attorney general who was arguing the administration’s case before the full 5th Circuit Court of Appeals. Ensign said it would be up to Congress to check the president in that scenario.

The unexpected exchange came in the administration's appeal of a ruling by a three-judge panel of the 5th Circuit, one of the most conservative courts in the country, that found Trump inappropriately used the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 when he targeted the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua last year.

The act has only been invoked three other times in American history, during the War of 1812 and both world wars. A majority of the three-judge panel agreed in last year's ruling with multiple lower court judges and immigration lawyers who brought the case that it cannot be deployed against a gang rather than a belligerent foreign power.

The administration appealed to the full 5th Circuit, and all 17 judges on the court were present for the arguments in New Orleans on Thursday. “Tren de Aragua is committing ordinary crimes that are being dealt with by law enforcement,” Lee Gelernt, an attorney for the ACLU, told the judges. “The Alien Enemies Act is about wartime and it's about the military.”

Several of the judges were concerned about second-guessing the president's determination of a threat to the country. Ensign noted the law allows it to be invoked in attempts of “invasion” or “predatory incursion” and argued that courts should accept a president's declaration that that is happening.

“A predatory incursion is less than an invasion,” Ensign said, arguing that cases involving other laws have determined it happens when foreign fishing boats enter U.S. waters. He also noted that Trump alleged the gang was acting at the behest of recently ousted Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro's government — an assertion that has been challenged by some law enforcement analysts.

Source: Nicholas Riccardi/the-independent.com

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