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    Trump Administration Asks Supreme Court to Allow Venezuelan Deportations to Resume

    The solicitor general contended that a group of migrants had barricaded themselves inside a Texas detention center and threatened to take hostages.The Trump administration asked the Supreme Court on Monday evening for permission to deport a group of nearly 200 Venezuelan migrants accused of being gang members and detained in Texas.In a filing to the court, the administration contended that “serious difficulties have arisen” from the detention of the group of 176 migrants, who were shielded from deportation in an emergency overnight ruling by the court in mid-April.According to a declaration by a Homeland Security Department official included in the court filing, a group of 23 migrants had barricaded themselves inside a housing unit for several hours on April 26. The group threatened to take hostages and harm immigration officers, and tried to flood the unit by clogging the toilets, according to the filing.“The government has a strong interest in promptly removing from the country” gang members “who pose a danger to ICE officers, facility staff and other detainees while in detention,” Solicitor General D. John Sauer wrote in the court filing.The details of the episode, which had not been previously reported, occurred at the Bluebonnet Detention Facility in Texas, where migrants “barricaded the entrance doors of their housing unit using bed cots, blocked the windows and covered surveillance cameras,” according to a declaration by Joshua D. Johnson, a Homeland Security official and the acting director of the U.S. Customs and Immigration Enforcement’s Dallas Field Office.The group then “threatened to take hostages” and to “injure” ICE officers and facility staff members, and “remained barricaded in the housing unit for several hours,” Mr. Johnson said in the declaration.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Courts Must ‘Check the Excesses’ of Congress and the President, Roberts Says

    The chief justice, in rare public remarks, defended judicial independence before a crowd of lawyers and judges.Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. defended the independence of the judiciary and denounced any attempt to impeach judges over disagreements with their rulings during rare public remarks on Wednesday evening.“Impeachment is not how you register disagreement with a decision,” the chief justice told a crowd of about 600 people, mainly lawyers and judges, gathered in Buffalo, his hometown.The remarks were his first since issuing a similar, though also unusual, written statement in March in response to threats by President Trump and his allies to impeach federal judges who have issued decisions against administration policies.The chief justice did not mention the president directly in his comments on Wednesday, and he did not elaborate further in his answer about threats of impeachment, which he gave in response to a direct question during an event to commemorate the 125th anniversary of the U.S. District Court for the Western District of New York.But the commentary was nevertheless notable given that justices typically avoid weighing in on political matters. His comments came less than a week after another justice, Ketanji Brown Jackson, denounced attacks on the judiciary during remarks at a conference for judges held in Puerto Rico.Justice Jackson criticized what she called “relentless attacks” on judges, as well as an environment of harassment that “ultimately risks undermining our Constitution and the rule of law.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Another Reason People Fear the Government

    Why do Americans have such deep distrust of their government?It’s a simple question with a complex answer, but here’s part of the reason: All too often, the government wrongfully inflicts profound harm on American citizens and then leaves them with no recourse. It violates the law and leaves its victims with no way to be made whole.Let me give you two recent examples, both taken from Supreme Court cases that were argued this term and have not yet been decided.In the predawn hours of Oct. 18, 2017, an F.B.I. SWAT team detonated a flash-bang grenade at a home at 3756 Denville Trace in Atlanta. A team of federal agents rushed in.The family inside was terrified. Hilliard Toi Cliatt lived there with his partner, Curtrina Martin, and her 7-year-old son, Gabe. They had no idea who had entered their house. Cliatt tried to protect Martin by grabbing her and hiding in a closet.Martin screamed, “I need to get my son.” The agents pulled Cliatt and Martin out of the closet, holding them at gunpoint as Martin fell to the floor, half-naked. When they asked Cliatt his address, “All the noise just ended.”He told them: 3756 Denville Trace. But it turned out they were supposed to be at 3741 Landau Lane, an entirely different house down the block. The agents left, raided the correct house and then returned to apologize. The lead agent gave the family his business card and left the family, according to their Supreme Court petition, in “stunned disbelief.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Attacks on Judges Undermine Democracy, Warns Ketanji Brown Jackson

    Speaking to a judicial conference, the Supreme Court justice said attacks were designed to intimidate and influence.Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, the Supreme Court’s newest member, denounced on Thursday what she described as “relentless attacks” on judges, and an environment of harassment that “ultimately risks undermining our Constitution and the rule of law.”“ Across the nation, judges are facing increased threats of not only physical violence, but also professional retaliation just for doing our jobs,” said Justice Jackson, speaking at a conference for judges held in Puerto Rico. “And the attacks are not random. They seem designed to intimidate those of us who serve in this critical capacity.”Justice Jackson did not mention President Trump by name nor cite any specific attacks against the nation’s judges. However, her remarks came as Mr. Trump and his allies have repeatedly targeted judges who have blocked key pieces of his agenda, even calling for judges who have ruled against him to be impeached.Those calls drew a rare rebuke from Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. in March, who described them as “not an appropriate response to disagreement concerning a judicial decision.”Threats of physical violence against judges have also been on the rise, with judges facing bomb threats and a rash of delivery of anonymously dispatched pizzas, a prank apparently designed to send a message that their home addresses can be found.The forceful comments by Justice Jackson were rare for the justice. Since joining the court in 2022, she has focused many of her public appearances on telling the personal story of her rise to become the first Black woman on the Supreme Court.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Timeline: How the Administration Deported Migrants Despite Judge’s Order

    <!–> [–><!–>The New York Times reconstructed how the Trump administration and President Nayib Bukele of El Salvador struck a deal that led to the deportation of more than 200 Venezuelan migrants to a Salvadoran prison.–><!–> –><!–> [–><!–> –><!–> –>The day before<!–> –><!–> [–><!–>Mr. Trump secretly signed an executive order invoking an 18th-century wartime law called […] More

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    Are Charter Schools Public or Private?

    The Supreme Court’s answer will determine whether a Catholic school in Oklahoma can become the nation’s first religious charter school.The very identity of the nation’s 8,100 charter schools is on the line on Wednesday, as the Supreme Court considers whether they are fundamentally public or private institutions.If they are public, there is little room for religious instruction, as proposed by the school at the center of the case, St. Isidore of Seville Catholic Virtual School, which seeks to open in Oklahoma as the nation’s first religious charter school.But if they are private, as St. Isidore’s lawyers will argue, banning a religious group from operating a charter school when other nonprofits are free to do so would be religious discrimination.If the Supreme Court decides charter schools are private, it would most likely allow St. Isidore to open, and potentially pave the way for religious charter schools in other states.Charter schools, which were created in the 1990s to give families more options, have long occupied a hybrid space in education.They are like traditional public schools in many ways because they are paid for by taxpayers and free to attend.But charter schools are also run by private entities, often nonprofits, and are not zoned, allowing students to attend regardless of their ZIP codes. And unlike at many public schools, their teachers typically are not unionized.Today, about 3.7 million students attend charter schools, in 44 states and Washington, D.C., representing about 7 percent of the public school sector. But in some cities, like Detroit and Philadelphia, enrollment is far greater, representing a third to half of all students.Whether they should be classified as public or private may hinge on the specifics of Oklahoma state law.Justices will most likely consider technical issues, like how charter schools are created. In Oklahoma, a state board must approve new charter schools, a fact that many in the mainstream charter school movement argue places them firmly in the public realm.“A charter school doesn’t exist unless the government gives it reason to open,” said Starlee Coleman, president of the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools, which opposes allowing religious institutions to operate charter schools.Lawyers for St. Isidore say that it was created by the Archdiocese of Oklahoma City and the Diocese of Tulsa and that it is operated by a board of private citizens. They will argue that St. Isidore is a private school with a government contract.Any ruling in favor of St. Isidore could have broad implications.Twelve Republican-leaning states filed an amicus brief in support of St. Isidore’s petition, while 18 states, mostly Democratic-leaning, opposed. More

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    Texas Judge Unseals ICE Document Detailing Deportation Notices: an English Form and at Least 12 Hours

    A declaration by an ICE official says an English-language form was “read and explained” to the detainees and that they had “no less than 12 hours” to express the intent to challenge their deportations. On April 7, the Supreme Court ruled that the government must give Venezuelan migrants notice “within a reasonable time” and the chance to legally challenge their removal before being deported to a maximum-security prison in El Salvador. Exactly how much notice the Trump administration considered appropriate in response to the Supreme Court’s edict was revealed in a document unsealed during a hearing on Thursday in Federal District Court in Brownsville, Texas.Before Saturday, when the Supreme Court issued a second order, which blocked the deportation of a group of Venezuelan migrants under the Alien Enemies Act of 1798, detainees slated for deportation were given a one-page form that stated “if you desire to make a phone call, you will be permitted to do so,” according to the unsealed document, a four-page declaration by an official from Immigration and Customs Enforcement. They then had “no less than 12 hours” to “express an intent” to challenge their detention, and another 24 hours to file a habeas corpus petition asking for a hearing before a judge, the declaration said. The form itself is written in English, but “it is read and explained to each alien in a language that alien understands.” The hearing was part of a case whose plaintiffs are three Venezuelan men being held at El Valle Detention Facility, roughly 50 miles from Brownsville.Lawyers for detainees held elsewhere, who have sued in the Northern District of Texas, have disputed the government’s claims about being given notice. They also have said that the form was not explained to detainees and that they were simply told to sign the document, which the ICE declaration identified as Form AEA-21B.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Trump Administration Continues to Defy Judge’s Orders in Abrego Garcia Case, Lawyers Say

    Continuing a pattern of stonewalling, the Justice Department has defied a judge’s order to explain what the Trump administration has done, and plans to do, to seek the release of a Maryland man who was wrongfully deported to El Salvador last month, according to court papers filed on Tuesday.In refusing to reveal much of anything about the administration’s role in improperly sending the man, Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia, to El Salvador or its subsequent efforts to seek his freedom, department lawyers repeatedly claimed that the information constituted state secrets that needed to be protected, the papers said.“The government responded to plaintiffs’ discovery requests by producing nothing of substance,” Mr. Abrego Garcia’s lawyers wrote on Tuesday morning to Judge Paula Xinis, who is handling the case in Federal District Court in Maryland.In their letter, the lawyers asked Judge Xinis to hold a hearing as early as 1 p.m. on Wednesday to discuss how to proceed with what they described as the “government’s failure to comply with this court’s orders.”The White House’s repeated resistance to court orders — not only in Mr. Abrego Garcia’s case, but in other legal proceedings as well — has edged the administration ever closer to an open showdown with the judicial branch in a way that could threaten the constitutional balance of power.Three courts — including the Supreme Court and the federal appeals court that sits over Judge Xinis — have directly told the Trump administration to “facilitate” the release of Mr. Abrego Garcia. They have instructed the administration to devise a way of handling his case as it should have been handled if the government had not erroneously flown him to El Salvador on March 15 in violation of an earlier court order.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More