‘It’s illegal’: A Republican senator bluntly bites back at Trump’s mass deportation plan
While a majority of Republicans have expressed their support for the “ends” of Trump’s mass deportation plan, some are calling the “means” into question. Namely, the use of the United States military to pull it off.
In an interview with CBS news, Kentucky Senator Rand Paul said that while he agrees with Trump’s mass deportation plan, he draws the line at using the military to enforce it. Why? Short answer: “it’s illegal,” says Paul
“I will not support and will not vote to use the military in our cities,” Paul continued. “I think it’s a terrible image.” He’s right. Trump’s plan to use the military to enforce mass deportations is not strictly legal. Trump has pledged to use the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 in order to carry out his plans. However, it’s important to note that while this act allows for the use of military force to expel an “invasion” or “predatory incursion,” it can only be invoked if the “invaders” of are acting upon the instruction of a foreign nation or government with whom the United States is currently at war.
According to Katherine Yon Ebright of the Brennan Center at New York University, the Alien Enemies Act cannot be invoked against immigrants, as migrants are not part of a deliberate effort by a foreign nation to undermine or threaten the United States. While the act was successfully invoked during World War II against Italian, German, and Japanese immigrants (all citizens from nations with whom the United States was in a state of declared war) Ebright argues that Trump’s usage of the act would be an “abuse of a wartime authority.”
George Fishman, a former Department of Homeland Security who served in Trump’s first administration concurs with Ebright’s conclusion. When speaking about migrants, even migrants accused of committing crimes, Fishman said that the usage of the act “wouldn’t stand up in federal court, because I don’t think their actions can be attributed to those governments.”
Another wrench in Trump’s “mass deportation” gears could prove to be thrown by the very organization whose help he’s pledged to enlist: the United States military itself. Considering the uproar that followed after a high ranking military official was seen in uniform alongside Trump when the president ordered protestors tear-gassed by police while en route to a photo op, Trump’s plan to actually use the military in a domestic law enforcement capacity is sure to prove unthinkable and abhorrent to the nation’s top brass.
“In asking federal military forces to enforce immigration laws, there is going to be a strong cultural allergic reaction that’s well grounded in civil-military norms,” said Mark Nevitt, who served as a judge advocate general in the US Navy, to Business Insider. “The military has, historically, not wanted this mission.” When asked if Trump would be able to use the Insurrection Act of 1807 in order to force the National Guard to carry out the deportations, Nevitt said that such an act would constitute an “extraordinary use” of the law, one that would be “way out norms of its historic use.”
Despite Trump’s high hopes for his exorbitantly expensive and legally dubious mass deportation plan, he will likely find out the hard way that he has made nothing more than an impossible to fulfill campaign promise, one that legal organizations, state governments, and even the odd Republican senator like Rand Paul will fight him on the entire way.
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