Judges defeat Trump in test over deportation powers

The Trump administration lost its attempt to overturn a federal court’s deportation amnesty policy Tuesday, after another federal judge dismissed the Justice Department’s lawsuit, calling it a “potentially calamitous” clash between the Executive Branch and the judiciary.

At issue was the policy by the U.S. District Court in Maryland to grant an automatic two-day stay of deportation for any illegal immigrant who files a habeas petition in the court.

The Trump administration said that move stretched the power of judges, granting automatic relief to plaintiffs even before the court had given the government a chance to argue.

But Judge Thomas Cullen, a Trump appointee to the court in Virginia who was brought in to hear the case, said the Trump team missed the target in suing the entire slate of Maryland judges, so the case must be dismissed.

He repeatedly scolded the Justice Department for taking a “more confrontational” approach to judges that has led it astray.

“Indeed, over the past several months, principal officers of the Executive (and their spokespersons) have described federal district judges across the country as ’left-wing,’ ’liberal,’ ’activists,’ ’radical,’ ’politically minded,’ ’rogue,’ ’unhinged,’ ’outrageous, overzealous, [and] unconstitutional,’ ’[c]rooked,’ and worse,” he said. “Although some tension between the coordinate branches of government is a hallmark of our constitutional system, this concerted effort by the Executive to smear and impugn individual judges who rule against it is both unprecedented and unfortunate.”

Judge Cullen said the Trump administration does have some options to challenge the court’s blanket amnesty policy, including appealing each case.

But he said a frontal attack on the full court failed.

“Whatever the merits of its grievance with the judges of the United States District Court for the District of Maryland, the Executive must find a proper way to raise those concerns,” he ruled.

The lawsuit grew out of Trump officials’ frustration with federal judges who are increasingly inserting themselves into specific deportation decisions.

Judges, for their part, have suggested they’ve been railroaded or otherwise misled by the Trump administration. That includes attempts to speed up deportations or to move migrants out of a court’s jurisdiction to prevent judges from meddling.

In Maryland, Chief Judge George Russell III, an Obama appointee, issued a blanket policy granting a stay of deportation for two business days.

He cast it as a way to preserve the court’s ability to intervene without being rushed by a looming deportation deadline.

It kicks in automatically when someone files a habeas petition, a narrow but powerful legal tool to challenge an arrest and detention.

The Trump lawsuit named all of the Maryland court’s judges as defendants, forcing their recusal and leading the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which oversees Maryland, to assign Judge Cullen.

He said that what the district court was doing is not unusual, at least at the appeals court level. Indeed, he said Maryland’s two-day stay was “considerably more modest” than some appeals courts’ rules.

In dismissing the Trump case, he also said the alternative — to allow the case to proceed — could have created a “constitutional standoff into epic proportions.”

As one example, he said, if the case had proceeded, it would have meant the judges and top administration officials, such as the attorney general, could be required to sit for depositions and turn over secret communications.

“Much as the Executive fights the characterization, a lawsuit by the executive branch of government against the judicial branch for the exercise of judicial power is not ordinary,” Judge Cullen said.

Justice Department lawyers said Maryland’s system is already being abused.

They pointed to a case where a migrant who wasn’t in Maryland at the time filed a petition, earning an automatic order staying deportation nonetheless.