Donald Trump’s latest immigration power grab just went up in flames. A federal appeals court has slapped down the president’s claim that Venezuelan gangs amount to a foreign “invasion,” torpedoing his attempt to use an 18th-century wartime law to deport hundreds of migrants.
In a stunning 2-1 ruling on Tuesday, the Fifth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said Trump’s reliance on the Alien Enemies Act, a law dating back to 1798, was a reach too far. The president invoked the act in March, sending around 250 Venezuelan migrants from Texas, Louisiana, and Mississippi to El Salvador’s notorious CECOT megaprison. The move triggered a blizzard of lawsuits, and now the courts have delivered Trump a humiliating defeat.
A federal appeals court panel ruled Tuesday that President Donald Trump cannot use an 18th-century wartime law to speed the deportations of people his administration accuses of membership in a Venezuelan gang. https://t.co/XWMmfWvPex
— PBS News (@NewsHour) September 3, 2025
The Alien Enemies Act was written to let presidents “remove” citizens of countries the U.S. is at war with, or those whose governments are actively sending hostile forces across American borders. Trump argued that Venezuela, through President Nicolás Maduro and the feared Tren de Aragua cartel, had “invaded” the United States by flooding it with gang-led migration.
The problem? Even the CIA and NSA have said Trump’s claim is bogus. And while the Fifth Circuit judges politely accepted his “factual assertions” for the sake of argument, they weren’t buying the logic. Judge Leslie Southwick, writing for the majority, said that encouraging citizens to enter another country illegally does not equal tanks rolling across a border. “Attempts to weaken a country are not the same as an invasion,” he wrote, driving a dagger straight through Trump’s legal theory.
A federal appeals court has blocked the Trump administration from using an 18th century wartime law to remove people alleged to be Venezuelan gang members. https://t.co/TqOMqVdSYh
— NBC News (@NBCNews) September 3, 2025
Southwick, a George W. Bush appointee, was joined by Judge Irma Carrillo Ramirez, tapped by President Joe Biden. The lone dissenter was Judge Andrew Oldham, a Trump pick who clung to the administration’s line. The ruling blocks deportations under the Alien Enemies Act for now, handing Trump’s opponents their biggest courtroom victory yet in the fight over his aggressive immigration agenda.
Still, the case isn’t over. Trump’s team can appeal to the full Fifth Circuit or take it straight to the Supreme Court, which has danced around the act in procedural rulings but never decided whether a president can stretch it this far. Legal experts say the high court may eventually have to weigh in on a statute that’s only been invoked three times in U.S. history, most recently during World War II.
The timing couldn’t have been worse for Trump. Just hours after the ruling, the president bragged on social media that U.S. forces had blown up a Venezuelan drug boat in international waters, killing 11 people aboard. The chest-thumping post only underscored the appeals court’s finding: the U.S. isn’t at war with Venezuela, and calling a criminal cartel an “invading army” won’t make it so.
For now, deportations can continue under other federal statutes, but Trump’s dream of wielding sweeping wartime powers against migrants is in tatters. Critics call it a “humiliating loss,” one that exposes the shaky legal ground beneath his immigration stunts.
And while Trump’s loyalists insist this is just a bump on the road to the Supreme Court, the ruling lays bare a bigger truth: even a conservative-leaning appeals court isn’t willing to bless Trump’s most radical power plays. For a man who built his brand on never losing, this courtroom smackdown may sting worse than the headlines suggest.
