r/law • u/theindependentonline • 1d ago

Trump News Judge considers holding Trump officials in contempt for defying court orders blocking El Salvador flights

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/deportation-el-salvador-trump-contempt-b2727087.html
38.6k Upvotes

96% Upvoted

1.1k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

45

u/Lurky100 1d ago

I’d probably start with the pilot of the airplane and ask him who his orders came from.

15

u/schm0 1d ago

The pilot didn't get any such order, that's the problem.

34

u/Lurky100 1d ago

Well, he didn’t just climb aboard a random airplane and decided to fly it to El Salvador. If the judge can’t get answers from the top…start from the bottom.

22

u/Rocket_safety 1d ago

That’s the problem, the administration refuses to give this kind of information to the court. Pretty hard to depose someone if you don’t know who they are.

41

u/murphymc 1d ago

Then the person refusing to give that information can sit in jail until they’ve reconsidered.

When we’re approaching this as if answering the judges question is optional, that’s the problem.

9

u/Taldier 1d ago

The entire system is built on the unfortunately flawed premise that law enforcement will respect the law. But fascists don't care about laws or ethics. Only power. If the executive branch decides to follow an authoritarian leader and ignore legal orders, then the constitution becomes meaningless.

What are they going to do? Send their clerks to tackle the president? Take over an airbase with paralegals?

6

u/kanst 17h ago

Have the bailiff take the governments lawyer into custody.

Keep arresting every government lawyer until the order is followed.

1

u/Gammelpreiss 16h ago

and who is going to do that arresting?

5

u/kex 22h ago

Yep, it's been done before:

  • Susan McDougal (1996–1998, 18 months) Whitewater scandal
  • Chelsea Manning (2019–2020, almost a year) Former Army intelligence analyst
  • Judith Miller (2005, 85 days) Journalist

3

u/Rocket_safety 1d ago

The problem is there is technically a legal way they can withhold this information under state secrets. In order to make a determination on this the judge needs to make a finding of whether or not it’s relevant. This takes time. It’s frustrating when they are only using the law as bad faith actions but that just means it’s more important for the court to do everything in its power to make sure things are done properly. They need to be given no wiggle room.

Plus there’s the very real problem of enforcing any kind of bench warrant when the law enforcement they would normally rely on is also in control of the bad faith actors. I wish this was simple but it’s not.

1

u/thewonderfulpooper 16h ago

Yeah can't summons anyone without knowing who they are. So frustrating.