In the pantheon of American abuses of power, the Trump administration’s invocation of the Alien Enemies Act to deport scores of Venezuelan migrants will be remembered as a brazen example of how authoritarian subterfuge can masquerade as national security.
A newly declassified intelligence memo, released by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI), makes one thing crystal clear: there was no credible evidence supporting Donald Trump’s claim that the Venezuelan government was directing a violent criminal gang to infiltrate the United States.
The rationale was a fabrication—one designed to justify mass deportations and circumvent constitutional protections.
At the center of the controversy is Tren de Aragua (TDA), a dangerous and expanding criminal organization that originated in Venezuela. While its presence in the U.S. and Latin America is real, the president seized on fears surrounding TDA to wage a political campaign disguised as an immigration crackdown.
Trump claimed that the regime of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro was weaponizing TDA, directing its members into the United States as part of a broader campaign of destabilization.
Using this dubious assertion, Trump invoked the Alien Enemies Act, a relic of 18th-century wartime powers, to authorize sweeping deportations of Venezuelans, many of whom had fled persecution and economic collapse in their home country.
Now, we know that the intelligence community didn’t buy it—not then, and not now.
“While Venezuela’s permissive environment enables TDA to operate, the Maduro regime probably does not have a policy of cooperating with TDA and is not directing TDA movement to and operations in the United States,” the declassified memo states unequivocally.
The memo, requested through a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) filing by the Freedom of the Press Foundation, was released publicly on May 6.
Its findings track closely with earlier reporting by The New York Times and The Washington Post, both of which exposed the lack of evidence behind Trump’s justification and the administration’s attempts to suppress the truth through leak investigations and public disinformation.
This isn’t just another case of political spin. It’s a textbook example of executive overreach grounded in a willful misrepresentation of intelligence. And the consequences are not theoretical. Families have been torn apart. Asylum seekers have been thrown into detention centers in El Salvador—a country with its own troubling record on human rights. And a dangerous precedent has been set: that a president can label entire nationalities as enemies of the state and use emergency powers to sidestep judicial review and congressional oversight.
We’ve seen this tactic before. During Trump’s first term, he infamously relied on false intelligence and misleading pretexts to impose the Muslim Ban, terminate Temporary Protected Status for multiple communities, and authorize indefinite detention for migrants. Now, in his second term, we’re witnessing the same authoritarian playbook—only this time, more aggressive, more opaque, and more dangerous.
What makes this latest episode even more disturbing is the administration’s reaction when the truth began to emerge. Instead of correcting the record or responding to the memo’s findings, the Justice Department doubled down—launching criminal investigations into journalists who reported on the disconnect between Trump’s public statements and the intelligence consensus. This is not the behavior of a government concerned with transparency or national security. It is the hallmark of a regime that fears scrutiny, punishes dissent, and redefines truth as whatever serves its interests in the moment.
Tren de Aragua is a real threat. Like MS-13 and other transnational criminal organizations, it exploits borders, capitalizes on corruption, and preys on vulnerable populations.
But that reality does not give the federal government license to lie about foreign state sponsorship, invent conspiracies, or abuse wartime statutes to trample civil liberties. And it certainly does not give a sitting president the authority to deport people en masse without due process based on intelligence his own agencies have discredited.
Moreover, the Alien Enemies Act—enacted in 1798 and rarely invoked in modern history—was never meant to become a blank check for modern-day ethnic targeting. That the Trump administration reached for it in 2025, after already exhausting Title 42, the Remain in Mexico policy, and other deterrence measures, reveals not desperation—but design.
This wasn’t about policy effectiveness. It was about spectacle. About power. About reminding the country who holds the pen and what can be done when the presidency is used not as a shield for the people, but as a sword against them.
Even more concerning is the silence—or in some cases, complicity—of the agencies and officials who knew better. The memo was labeled a “sense of the community” document, meaning it reflected the consensus view of multiple intelligence agencies. That means this wasn’t a fringe opinion. It was the dominant assessment. And yet, for months, the administration continued to cite the TDA-Maduro connection as fact, while quietly punishing those who questioned it. This is a case study in the erosion of democratic guardrails when institutions fail to speak up—or are afraid to.
For those tempted to dismiss this as just another Trump-era controversy, consider the stakes: if a president can label any foreign population a threat and sidestep established immigration law using secret intelligence, what’s to stop that same logic from being turned inward? From being used against dissenters, journalists, or communities of color within our own borders?
If we are to defend democracy, we must defend truth as the foundation of power—not the other way around.
The public now has access to the memo. Journalists have confirmed its implications. Civil rights groups have sounded the alarm. The question is whether Congress, the courts, and the American public will act. We cannot afford to normalize executive falsehoods—especially when they serve as a gateway to detention, deportation, and disenfranchisement.
This is a time for vigilance, not complacency. The Trump administration’s misuse of intelligence to target Venezuelans under the guise of public safety is not an isolated error. It is part of a pattern—one that turns the machinery of state against the people it was meant to protect. If we let this moment pass without consequence, we risk inviting even graver abuses under the next manufactured threat.
The memo has been declassified. The facts are clear. Now it’s time for accountability.
We do know that Tren de Aragua are in our country because of Biden’s porous immigration borders.
Why are democrats protecting gang members?
Another non-denial denial by Keith
What does that mean?
It’s a journalistic term: “a statement that appears to deny that something is true but does not in fact constitute a rebuttal of the specific claim or accusation.”
#groan#
I know.
What do you mean by that in particular to this specific situation.
Keith likes to defend his guy by pointing somewhere else, I’m just calling it what it is
Show us David where you wrote articles about Obama and Biden deporting millions of immigrants without giving them due process.
Keith your claim is misleading a number of levels. It’s a non-denial denial or whataboutism—a rhetorical tactic used to deflect criticism by pointing to unrelated or tangential wrongdoing by others. It doesn’t refute the original claim; it merely tries to shift the moral spotlight.
It’s questionable logic that condemning a current injustice requires simultaneous condemnation of another to be legitimate. The moral or journalistic imperative to expose abuse stands on its own.
As for your claim: it’s misleading. While the Obama administration did deport large numbers of undocumented immigrants—over 3 million during his presidency—many of those deportations were carried out with at least some form of administrative due process, albeit deeply flawed.
There were serious due process concerns, especially in expedited removal cases and family detention, and journalists and advocacy groups did report critically on them—including The Vanguard.
But that doesn’t mean we stop reporting Trump abuses, which often involved intentional dismantling of due process protections, such as stripping away asylum hearings or arresting people in courtrooms. That goes MUCH MUCH further than anything Obama did.
From what I’m seeing, “due process” itself is not a fixed concept in regard to what that means. But would have to look up the reference again, in regard to the process to deport someone for example.
Ultimately, I suspect that it’s a lot easier to eliminate incentives to enter the country illegally. Much more so than building extremely-long physical barriers along the southern and northern borders. (Assuming we don’t annex Canada, for example.) :-)
The Due Process Clause, found in both the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution, prohibits the government from depriving any person of life, liberty, or property without due process of law
Lots of “inconvenient details” left out of that proclamation.
For example, administrative vs. court decisions. Would have to look it up again, but I don’t believe that Obama, for example, always relied upon a court decision to “approve” deportations.
And I suspect that both Trump (and Keith) are alluding to this.
Can’t help but think of that guy who said, “give me liberty (whatever that means), or “give me death”. (Family Guy reference – he gets shot in the head and dispatched, with a comment regarding “oh, that was easy, right?”).
Far Side reference: That same guy is apparently saying, “give me potatoes, or give me death” – to his wife at the dinner table.)
You main the language almost verbatim from the US constitution? I would have to write a book – some already have to elucidate this fully – but if you look at the Bill of Rights and add in the 14th which applied it to the states, it gives you a pretty good sense – 6th and 7th – trial by jury, 5th – the right against self-incrimination, 8th the right again cruel and unusual punishment, the 8th also covers excessive bail. The fourth establishes the right of the people to be safe in their homes. Notice – in the fourth through sixth – it is “no person” or “the accused” rather than a citizen that has these rights. It’s all there, do some homework if you are interested in learning about it.
It plainly shows that it’s all about politics.
When Clinton, Obama and Biden did it democrats were mostly quiet and didn’t make it a constitutional crisis. But now that it’s Trump that’s involved it’s the worst thing ever according to the left.
This is Obama’s record:
“75 percent of people removed do not see a judge before being expelled from the U.S”
https://www.aclu.org/news/immigrants-rights/speed-over-fairness-deportation-under-obama
This is what happened under Biden:
Then there was Biden:
99.1% of all cases completed as of February 1, 2022 on the Dedicated Docket in Los Angeles, resulted in deportation orders.
70.1% of those on the Docket in Los Angeles do not have attorneys.
72.4% of deportation orders were issued in absentia—i.e. the immigrant families never had their day in court.
48.4% of in absentia deportation orders were against children, two-thirds of whom were age 6 and under.
https://law.ucla.edu/news/new-report-finds-children-ordered-deported-families-without-lawyers-and-other-gross-miscarriages-justice-biden-administrations-dedicated-docket
This is my third comment, so I’m done for the day and can’t respond. Fire away David, you’ve already commented four times but I guess there’s no limit for you.
I could be wrong Keith, but it appears that you are citing liberal sources to argue that liberals did not object. When you post a quote from the ACLU, doesn’t that automatically disprove your point?
The left did protest Obama’s deportation policies. Terms like “Deporter-in-Chief” weren’t invented by conservatives—they came from immigrant rights activists furious at Obama’s use of expedited removal. Biden’s Dedicated Docket has been criticized harshly by legal scholars, advocates, and even the UCLA report you cite.
But here’s the point you keep dodging – and I guess you’ll have to wait until tomorrow (I won’t hold my breath) – Pointing out past abuses doesn’t excuse current ones. The fact that Obama or Biden fell short doesn’t let Trump off the hook for policies that were, in many ways, even more aggressive and intentionally punitive—like family separation, arresting immigrants in courthouses, and gutting asylum rights. The issue isn’t whether Trump did “the same thing”—it’s that he went further, dismantling protections and bragging about doing so. Biden and Obama were VERY BAD, Trump is historically awful. Feel better?
“The next speaker was Ms. Angela Chan, the Policy Director and Senior Staff Attorney for Criminal Justice Reform at the Asian Law Caucus. “Our criminal justice system creates a two-tier system that treats immigrants differently than other community members. As many of you know, Nan-Hui is not only being criminalized by the criminal legal system, the Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, has placed an immigration hold on Nan-Hui requesting her transfer into immigration custody.
“As federal courts found last year, these holds are unconstitutional because they are not based on probable cause and are not signed by the judge. Despite these facts, ICE continues to issue unlawful immigration holds, waste local resources, and undermine community policing. For too long ICE has been in the business of separating families, such as Nan-Hui’s family. Since the beginning of the Obama administration, ICE has deported over two million people. We must continue to push back and protect immigrants, including Nan-Hui, from an unjust immigration system and an unjust criminal system. We want to stand up here today and say, ‘Not one more.’”
https://davisvanguard.org/2015/04/supporters-of-nan-hui-jo-speak-out-on-sentencing-discuss-next-steps/
Interesting comments here: https://davisvanguard.org/2015/03/attorney-general-kamala-harris-joins-amicus-brief-supporting-immigration-reform/
It is worth noting that my biggest criticism of Obama is that he failed at his goal. Obama adopted an “enforcement-first” immigration strategy—ramping up deportations and border security—as a calculated effort to win Republican support for comprehensive immigration reform, including a path to citizenship. The idea was to show toughness on enforcement to gain credibility with conservatives, but the political compromise never materialized. Instead, his administration’s record-setting deportations alienated immigrant communities and drew criticism from advocacy groups, who saw enforcement being carried out without the promised reforms.
Again, it’s “due process” that might be in question (e.g. administrative vs. court decisions).
If you want to do some “homework”, look at all of the language when you sign up for a (supposedly-simple) online account, for example.
Language itself has its weaknesses, even if (or even “especially if”) you actually look at all of the “fine print”.
At this point, I’m pretty sure that you (or I) have approved selling our souls, at this point. And yet, you’d still find attorneys arguing that we didn’t, if you paid them enough (or if they could get paid by suing the government, for example).
In any case, I suspect that I’ll see you (and everyone else) “down under” (in not too long from now), at this point.
Show me an article where YOU David complained about Obama and Biden deporting immigrants without due process. Otherwise I think it’s all about politics.
Right. It’s almost like you don’t remember what the Vanguard used to be like in 2015.
Still waiting…
Whatever, I’ve explained to you the difference in the policies, I’ve explained the strategic error that Obama made, I’ve explained to you the changes in the Vanguard’s coverage, I do not care to engage on this anymore.