The case arose from a chaotic weekend in March 2025 when the President invoked the Alien Enemies Act against members of Tren de Aragua, a Venezuelan criminal gang designated as a foreign terrorist organization. As suspected gang members detained in Texas were being transported to planes for removal to El Salvador, five detainees' counsel filed an emergency lawsuit in D.C. federal court seeking to halt the deportations. The government ultimately transferred the deportees to Salvadoran custody after two flights had already departed and landed, leading to an escalating confrontation with the district judge over alleged contempt.
The D.C. Circuit found that the district court's temporary restraining order, which enjoined the government 'from removing members of such class (not otherwise subject to removal) pursuant to the Proclamation for 14 days,' was insufficiently clear to support criminal contempt based on custody transfers. 'Criminal contempt cannot lie for transferring custody when the TRO was entirely silent as to that requirement,' Judge Rao wrote for the court. The opinion emphasized that the ordinary meaning of 'remove' refers to territorial relocation, not custody transfers, particularly in the context of immigration law where removal means expulsion from U.S. territory.
Judge Rao delivered sharp criticism of the district court's expanding investigation, writing that the 'widening gyre of the district court's investigation again calls for the extraordinary remedy of mandamus to halt the judicial impairment of another branch in the performance of its constitutional duties.' The court was particularly concerned that the district court proposed to 'probe high-level Executive Branch deliberations about matters of national security and diplomacy' through hearings that would allow plaintiffs' counsel to question government officials—a process the court called 'a clear abuse of discretion.'
The procedural history revealed mounting tensions between the courts and the Executive Branch. After the Supreme Court vacated the district court's initial TRO in a per curiam opinion finding that habeas corpus, not the APA, was the proper vehicle for the challenge, the district court nonetheless pursued criminal contempt proceedings. This court had previously issued mandamus relief vacating the district court's first probable cause order, but the district judge continued the contempt inquiry after identifying then-Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem as the responsible official.
The majority rejected the district court's rationale for expanding its investigation beyond identifying the responsible official. Judge Rao noted that while the district court had initially said identifying the decision-maker was 'the only step left on the path to criminal contempt,' it then 'moved the goalposts' by ordering live testimony to investigate 'whether the Secretary's decision was a willful violation.' The court found this additional investigation unnecessary since 'the government has already provided the name of the responsible official, so further judicial investigation is unnecessary and therefore improper.'
The opinion highlighted significant separation of powers concerns, particularly given the national security context involving presidential decisions under the rarely-invoked Alien Enemies Act. Judge Rao emphasized that the AEA Proclamation occurred against 'broader diplomatic and military initiatives against the regime of Nicolás Maduro, in which United States forces captured Maduro and brought him to the United States to face conspiracy charges for narco-terrorism.' The court found that judicial probing into such 'high-level Executive Branch deliberations' constituted an improper 'interference with a coequal branch's ability to discharge its constitutional responsibilities.'
Circuit Judge Walker filed a concurrence focusing on a critical moment during the emergency hearing when the district court told government counsel 'I will issue a minute order memorializing this so you don't have to race to write it down.' Walker argued this statement made the subsequent written order supersede the broader oral directive, and since the government complied with both orders as written, no contempt occurred. Circuit Judge Childs dissented at length, arguing that the majority had improperly interfered with the district court's factfinding process and warning that 'any litigant can argue, based on their preferred interpretation of a court's order, that they did not commit contempt before contempt findings are even made.'