A three-judge panel of the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals on Tuesday halted an effort by U.S. District Court Judge James Boasberg to hold contempt hearings after the Trump administration failed to suspend flights carrying Venezuelan men to be imprisoned in El Salvador.
The administration has already said it was former Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem who last March ordered flights to take 100 Venezuelan men to a notorious megaprison, despite an order from Boasberg ordering the flights grounded or turned around.
The sharply divided rulings put an end to additional fact-finding by Boasberg, who has faced calls for his impeachment by President Trump. While two Trump appointees to the bench sided with the president and chastised Boasberg for not being sufficiently clear in his ruling, an Obama appointee said the ruling would have grave consequences should an administration flout a judge’s orders in the future.
This rebuke from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit marks a real and decisive check on what conservatives have been been railing about since Trump took office again last year: judicial overreach by activist judges like James Boasberg. But more importantly it reinforces a core constitutional principle: judges can't retroactively reinterpret vague or incomplete orders to impose criminal liability. At the heart of the ruling is not ideology, but process as the court made clear that the rule of law depends on clarity, not on a judge’s evolving intent after the fact. Therefore, for those concerned about activist judging, this decision underscores the importance of separation of powers and draws a firm line between the judiciary’s role and executive authority--in other words, Boasberg needs to be impeached, like yesterday.
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