A lawyer’s perspective on the case of Carlos Daniel Terán and the Tren de Aragua gang as a foreign terrorist organization

His son, 18-year-old Carlos Daniel Terán from Venezuela, had been in immigration detention centers in Texas after being arrested on Jan. 26, and accused by the U.S. government of being part of Tren de Aragua, a Venezuelan gang recently designated by the U.S. as a foreign terrorist organization.

Carlos Daniel’s case is caught up in a broader brewing battle between executive and judicial authority. The judge has repeatedly pressed the Justice Department for details on the flights to El Salvador because he believed the administration might have violated his orders.

The Trump administration had claimed that the Venezuelan migrants who had been sent to El Salvador were all criminal gang members, but the families of some of those men, as well as immigration lawyers, argued that this was not the case for all the deportees sent to El Salvadoran prisons. The individuals the administration sent there did not have much of a clue as to whom they were. There seemed to be little to no due process at play.

A source in the State Department says even within the department the administration is not sharing any evidence that supports the claims that these men are members of Tren de Aragua. The source fears that the men may never go to trial and could die in prison, because of the harsh conditions and El Salvador’s track record. The source requested anonymity fearing retribution and because they are not authorized to speak publicly.

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt was asked about this this week. She said the White House was “not going to reveal operational details about a counterterrorism operation.”

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Immigration enforcement agents who investigated migrants sent to El Salvador have evidence and indication that they are the best in the business, and they are confident in the individuals that were sent home on those flights, according to Leavitt.

But in an interview on Wednesday with conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said he has “confidence that El Salvador runs an excellent prison system. That’s why we engaged them on this process.”

She said her most shocking moment was when she saw her son’s face. “I can’t express all the suffering I saw in my son’s eyes.”

Yamarte said they don’t need to ruin the life of a young man who has never been in prison. “He’s always worked hard — I taught him that.”

The mother of the accused, who hasn’t been named, said that they imagined Trump was after someone who had killed people in the U.S. She provided NPR with an official document from Venezuela stating García does not have a criminal record.

The family was relieved, because they really believed he would be sent to Venezuela. But a month later, on Saturday, he called his mom to tell her he was about to leave the detention facility in Laredo, Texas.

There were airplanes that didn’t land in Venezuela. She later learned flights had landed in El Salvador. Her other kids have identified their brother in social media videos.

Source: Families of deported Venezuelans dispute gang claims after deportations under Alien Enemies Act

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She said we were very naive when he followed the rules. The U.S. didn’t respect human rights, so we believed they would respect his rights.

The agreement to resume the deportation flights to Venezuela coincides with the announcement by the Trump administration to end a program that allowed hundreds of thousands of people from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela to enter the US legally and work for up to two years.

Saturday’s agreement could help Mr. Trump accelerate his plans for mass deportations, one of the central promises of his campaign. He has already enlisted military planes, sent people to third countries far from their homes and invoked the wartime law to achieve that goal. Arrests inside the country are up sharply relative to those in the Biden administration, but they are well below the levels Mr. Trump and his immigration advisers want.

The president and his allies called for the judge to be impeached as a result of the judge’s order limiting deportations. The rapidly escalating spat caused Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. of the Supreme Court to weigh in with a rare statement, admonishing the calls for the judge’s impeachment. Concerns of a constitutional crisis were spurred by this.

Mr. Trump has appeared captivated by the ability to send people to the prison complexes in El Salvador, threatening on Friday that those caught vandalizing Teslas could be banished there for 20 years.