WASHINGTON — In another demonstration of President Trump’s tendency to disregard direct orders from a U.S. court during the early days of his second term, a federal judge expressed her growing frustration.
U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis questioned the administration’s efforts to comply with a ruling from the Supreme Court, arriving at a clear conclusion.
“To date, nothing has been done,” Xinis stated firmly to the Justice Department lawyer present in her court on Tuesday. “Nothing.”
Last week, the Supreme Court mandated the administration to “facilitate” the return of a Maryland resident, Armando Abrego Garcia, who had been deported to a notorious prison in El Salvador despite a prior court order prohibiting such action.
The administration openly disregarded that order, with President Trump and his allies expressing their lack of intention to work towards bringing Abrego Garcia back through various platforms, including cable TV, social media, and from the Oval Office.
Judge Xinis’ remarks added urgency to a pressing concern gaining traction among government officials, observers, constitutional scholars, legal experts, and the public: If the president defies court rulings, could the United States be facing a constitutional crisis?
If Trump refuses to comply with the Supreme Court, does that jeopardize the entire U.S. governance system — the separation of powers, an independent judiciary, and due process under the law?
Some experts assert that the answer is indeed affirmative — viewing the administration’s actions in the Abrego Garcia case as a significant tipping point.
“There is no assurance that President Trump will fulfill his legal and constitutional duties, and he has demonstrated a readiness to violate them repeatedly,” stated Jamal Greene, a constitutional law professor at Columbia University.
While others acknowledge the existing risks, they believe legal complexities in the Trump administration’s maneuvers could create a future where the administration complies with court directives in the Abrego Garcia case, especially as those directives become less ambiguous.
Stanford Law School professor Robert Weisberg noted that the judiciary has mechanisms to enforce its rulings if Trump and his administration continue to defy court orders, particularly those from the Supreme Court.
For instance, should a court issue an injunction declaring, “You can’t do this,” and the administration disregards it, the court could hold the administration in contempt, with the U.S. Marshals Service available to enforce that order, Weisberg explained.
“So there are mechanisms in place,” he remarked. “The Supreme Court has tools.”
A deportation with consequences for Trump
Regardless, the case brings forth serious questions in a country already weary from a continuous stream of unprecedented actions by the Trump administration and numerous lawsuits disputing them — encompassing issues from immigration enforcement to federal funding, LGBTQ+ rights, and school financing.
California Attorney General Rob Bonta’s office has filed over a dozen lawsuits against the Trump administration and has supported litigants challenging the administration in several other cases. Other Democratic-led states have aligned with California in these legal battles.
Courts have repeatedly criticized the administration for legal violations, often in egregious manners. In multiple instances, the administration has flouted court directives to reverse its actions, according to judges and litigants against the administration.
California alleges that the administration has not unblocked funding, including from the Federal Emergency Management Agency, despite court mandates to do so. Journalists from the Associated Press continued to face restrictions from White House events after a judge instructed they be permitted to attend. The Trump administration also challenged another court ruling to return deported immigrants, arguing that the plane carrying them was already in the air and beyond the court’s jurisdiction.
Nonetheless, the Abrego Garcia case, along with an Oval Office meeting involving Trump and Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele about it, has amplified concerns about a defiant Trump unafraid to contradict the courts when they attempt to challenge his policies.
Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran citizen and sheet metal worker residing in Maryland, was arrested years ago while searching for work outside a Home Depot. A judge determined in 2019 that he should not be deported to El Salvador due to the threat posed by a local gang, allowing him to remain in the U.S.
However, last month, Abrego Garcia was detained based on the administration’s claim that he is associated with the MS-13 gang, subsequently being deported along with other detainees to a notorious prison in El Salvador. His family, rejecting the gang allegations, sued, asserting that his rights had been infringed and that the administration breached the law and the previous judge’s decision.
The case moved swiftly through the court system.
‘Facilitate’ vs. ‘effectuate’?
Initially, when before Xinis, she found the evidence supporting Abrego Garcia’s alleged gang ties to be minimal — based on an informant’s tip that he wore Chicago Bulls apparel linked to the gang. She ruled that the government had wrongfully removed him from the country, subsequently ordering the Trump administration to both “facilitate” and “effectuate” his return.
The Trump administration appealed that ruling, leading to a terse unsigned decision from the Supreme Court on Thursday that directed the Trump administration to “facilitate” Abrego Garcia’s return, but not to “effectuate” it.
The Supreme Court indicated that the “intended scope of the term ‘effectuate’” was ambiguous and might exceed the district court’s authority in the matter, calling for Judge Xinis to clarify her directive “with due regard for the deference owed to the Executive Branch in the conduct of foreign affairs.”
Lawyers for Abrego Garcia considered the ruling a victory, interpreting it as a clear mandate for the administration to ensure his return to the United States. In contrast, the Trump administration also viewed it as a victory.
“As the Supreme Court correctly acknowledged, it is the exclusive prerogative of the president to conduct foreign affairs,” said a Department of Justice spokesperson. “By explicitly noting the deference owed to the executive branch, this ruling once more highlights that activist judges lack the jurisdiction to usurp the president’s authority in conducting foreign policy.”
Following the Supreme Court’s ruling, Judge Xinis issued a subsequent order, once again calling on the Trump administration to “facilitate” Abrego Garcia’s return. This led to the Oval Office meeting on Monday, during which Trump and Bukele indicated they would not facilitate Abrego Garcia’s return.
In what some legal experts found an illogical twist, officials from the Trump administration claimed they would provide a plane to return Abrego Garcia if El Salvador granted permission, while Bukele stated it would be impossible for El Salvador to send Abrego Garcia back to the U.S. as it would equate to smuggling a terrorist into an allied country.
“Of course, I’m not going to do it,” he stated. “The question is preposterous.”
During the same discussion, Trump remarked that “the homegrowns are next,” implying a desire to deport American citizens to Salvadoran prisons, blatantly contravening U.S. law.
Jennifer Vasquez Sura, the wife of Kilmar Abrego Garcia of Maryland, who was wrongly deported to El Salvador, speaks at an April 4 news conference.
(Jose Luis Magana / Associated Press)
During the Tuesday hearing before Judge Xinis, the Trump administration communicated that its interpretation of what it means to facilitate Abrego Garcia’s return was extremely narrow.
“If Abrego Garcia presents himself at a port of entry, we will facilitate his entry to the United States,” stated Drew Ensign, an attorney for the Justice Department. Ensign also provided a transcript from the Oval Office meeting, indicating the issue had indeed been “raised at the highest level.”
Judge Xinis remained unconvinced, insisting on documentation regarding the administration’s actions in the days that followed. Experts indicated her order could position her to potentially find the Trump administration in contempt of court, raising questions about the court’s ability to hold the administration accountable should it resist.
Erwin Chemerinsky, dean of UC Berkeley Law, expressed doubt that the Justice Department or the U.S. marshals would enforce any criminal or civil contempt orders against the administration or its officials.
“The concern is whether our constitutional guardrails are sufficient to endure,” Chemerinsky remarked. “‘We don’t know’ remains the only answer anyone can offer. Speculations are quite alarming.”
Should Trump receive a definitive, clear court order and publicly state that the administration would not comply, the country could find itself in a precarious situation, Chemerinsky warned.
If he were to prevail under such circumstances — not being restrained by Congress, the courts, or any other authority — “then the president could do anything,” he elaborated. He could contravene other constitutional laws and court orders and potentially “literally detain anyone, any dissenters,” without facing consequences.
“In such a scenario, the reality shifts from a democracy to a dictatorship,” Chemerinsky stated.
‘Crisis is here’
Democrats in Congress have echoed similar concerns, with some asserting that Trump has already stepped into authoritarian behavior — bringing the country close to a constitutional crisis.
Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) tweeted on Monday night: “The constitutional crisis is here.”
The post included a nearly six-minute video where Schiff, a former federal prosecutor, attempted to elucidate the complex Abrego Garcia case, the administration’s actions, and why they contribute to the ongoing crisis.
“It’s a constitutional crisis because the administration is under a court order to return this wrongfully deported man to the United States. To facilitate his return,” Schiff remarked. “And far from taking any steps to facilitate his return, at that meeting in the White House, Donald Trump essentially told the Supreme Court to pound sand.
“At no point in that entire meeting did the president of the United States request the president of El Salvador to return the individual wrongfully sent to a maximum-security prison in his country,” Schiff added. “It simply never occurred.”
Schiff contended that the president’s actions indicate “a very deliberate step toward dictatorship.”
Chemerinsky concurred, asserting that the uncertainty about whether the U.S. is in a constitutional crisis has passed.
He indicated that the U.S. is “clearly in a constitutional crisis” due to the multitude of unconstitutional actions taken by the Trump administration, highlighting Trump’s apparent disregard for constitutional law and specifically citing the administration’s severe actions and resistance in the Abrego Garcia case.
“It may worsen, but that does not lessen the reality that we are in a crisis now,” he stated.
Chemerinsky emphasized that it is unequivocally illegal under U.S. law for the administration to defy a court order and deport someone to a notorious prison in El Salvador without due process. He dismissed the administration’s assertion that it cannot return Abrego Garcia to the U.S. because he remains under the control of a foreign government, arguing that this perspective “must be incorrect” in a nation governed by laws.
“It constitutes nothing less than a claim to authority enabling the confinement of any individual in a foreign prison,” he asserted. “That poses the authority to create a gulag.”
