Steve Palmer [00:00:00]:

Steve Palmer here, Lawyer Talk, off the record, on the air. Today, I'm gonna tackle sort of a I'm gonna call it a political subject, but I'm not gonna talk politics because I always promise not to talk politics here. But it does have to do with Trump's use of the Alien Enemies Act for deportations. And it doesn't matter to me where you stand on this. We can I can debate this or talk about the veracity of this in in all sorts of settings, but not here? What I wanna talk about today, though, is is where the where these issues are going and and how it's happening procedurally. Because I think there's been a lot of discussion or people draw conclusions based on court decisions and either say, yes, Trump can do it, or nuh-uh, Trump can't do it, and see a judge said this or another judge said that. So here's what happened recently. A judge in Pennsylvania, a federal judge, ruled that The US can use the enemies or the Alien Enemies Act to fast track deportations of accused Venezuelan gang members.

Steve Palmer [00:00:55]:

And this is apparently, if not this is actually inconsistent with other federal jurisdictions that have ruled on the same thing. And I think we've all seen, you know, the headline the headline grabbing, information is I think there's a court in Texas and DC. Other federal courts around the country are saying, no. You can't do this. And, again, I'm not here to take a position on whether Trump can do this or not. But where does this go from here? What what does all this mean? You've got federal courts in one place, part of the country saying, yes. You can do it. Federal courts in other parts of the country saying, no.

Steve Palmer [00:01:28]:

You can't. And then people appealing. Well, here's how it goes. And this is sort of like, appellate law one zero one. What what happens is Trump tries to do something, and somebody who is impacted by, this exec or this executive order or Trump's use of the Alien Act here to deport somebody, files a lawsuit. And typically with the backing of, like, the ACLU or some other organization would file a lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of it. And they would pick a place where they could file that lawsuit. And by that, I mean, like, pick a maybe a favorable jurisdiction where they think they're gonna get a good decision.

Steve Palmer [00:02:02]:

And then a federal judge in district court, the lowest federal court, will say yes or no. Well, then the other side gets to appeal. And while they're appealing, they ask for something called a, an injunction, meaning don't let the don't let Trump's action stand while we're figuring out the decision. And then at the same time, another federal court in a different jurisdiction like this one, I think this was a Trump appointee, Actually, the judge, not suggesting that means one thing or another, but, this judge says, no. He can do it. Now that's gonna go to that circuit court of appeals. So now we've got multiple cases around the country. What does all this mean? It means that we are on a crash course for the US Supreme Court to decide this issue, probably sooner rather than later, and none of these cases carry any precedent above the other.

Steve Palmer [00:02:51]:

You've got courts of equal jurisdiction, courts of equal appellate jurisdiction, maybe reaching, different results. And then ultimately, the Supreme Court is gonna do what it does. It's gonna have to take this and resolve it. We will know once and for all, whether Trump can use Alien Enemies Act for deportations, and that'll be settled. And it'll be part of the US Supreme Court precedent, in perpetuity or at least until some other Supreme Court years from now decides that they're gonna reverse it or if they never reverse it, it is there in Supreme Court law. So agree with it or not agree with it, that's where it's going. That's the trajectory. I promised I wasn't gonna get political and comment on it, and I didn't.

Steve Palmer [00:03:27]:

I just told you the procedure. If you have questions like, about this or any other legal topic, shoot them to me at lawyer talk podcast dot com. I'll be happy to cover it right here off the record on the air.