Boasberg cleared to rule on CECOT migrant deportations after appeals court decision

A federal appeals court cleared the way for U.S. District Judge James Boasberg to continue to rule on the fate of hundreds of CECOT migrants deported by the Trump administration earlier this year — dissolving an emergency stay it previously handed down, and sending the case back down to the lower court for further consideration.

The ruling from the three-judge panel for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit dissolves an emergency stay granted to the Trump administration earlier this year, citing a significantly new factual situation at play, and remanded the case back to the lower court for future proceedings.

At issue is a preliminary injunction handed down by Boasberg earlier this year. His injunction provisionally certified a class of CECOT migrants challenging their removal to CECOT under the Alien Enemies Act in March, and ordered the Trump administration to "facilitate" due process proceedings for the hundreds of migrants being detained there.

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The Trump administration immediately appealed that ruling to the higher court, which agreed to grant it an emergency administrative stay.

Judges on the three-member panel stressed in their order Thursday that they were not ruling on the order itself, or the merits of the appeal filed by the Trump administration.

Rather, the court said, their decision was due to the factual situation on the ground, after hundreds of Venezuelan migrants deported to CECOT were removed from the prison and sent to Venezuela, as part of a prisoner exchange with President Nicolás Maduro.

"While its appeal raised serious questions about a court’s power to direct the Executive’s diplomatic conduct, we do not reach those questions because of a fundamental change in circumstances," the court wrote, noting that the class members "have since been released from Salvadoran custody and transferred to Venezuela, where they are not likely to remain in custody."

"We express no opinion on what kind of class or relief, if any, may be appropriate in light of the changed circumstances," they added.

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