WASHINGTON, D.C. – President Donald Trump on Saturday signed a proclamation invoking the Alien Enemies Act in response to already declaring that the U.S. was being invaded by criminal foreign nationals, including the violent Venezuelan prison gang, Tren De Aragua (TdA).
The proclamation states TdA members “have unlawfully infiltrated the United States and are conducting irregular warfare and undertaking hostile actions against the United States,” using warfare terminology first reported on by The Center Square.
TdA members are operating in conjunction with Cártel de los Soles, a Venezuelan-based narco-terrorism enterprise sponsored by Venezuela’s president, Nicolas Maduro, the order states. They are responsible for committing violent crimes, including “murders, kidnappings, extortions, and human, drug, and weapons trafficking,” the order states. “TdA has engaged in and continues to engage in mass illegal migration to the United States to further its objectives of harming United States citizens, undermining public safety, and supporting the Maduro regime’s goal of destabilizing democratic nations in the Americas, including the United States.”
The order details how TdA came to power over the past decade and acts as a “hybrid criminal state that is perpetrating an invasion of and predatory incursion into the United States.”
Trump invoked the AEA two months after he designated Mexican cartels, TdA, Salvadoran La Mara Salvatrucha (MS-13), and other organizations as Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTOs). He directed agency heads “to make operational preparations regarding the implementation of any decision I make to invoke the Alien Enemies Act,” arguing FTOs engage in “campaigns of violence and terror in the United States and internationally [and] are extraordinarily violent, vicious, and similarly threaten the stability of the international order in the Western Hemisphere,” presenting “an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security, foreign policy, and economy of the United States.”
In February, Secretary of State Marco Rubio formally designated eight groups as FTOs, including TdA, The Center Square reported. The Department of Defense and Department of Homeland Security began coordinated removal flights of illegal foreign nationals, including TdA gang members.
Saturday’s proclamation states that TdA “is perpetrating, attempting, and threatening an invasion or predatory incursion against the territory of the United States. TdA is undertaking hostile actions and conducting irregular warfare against the territory of the United States both directly and at the direction, clandestine or otherwise, of the Maduro regime in Venezuela.”
As a result, Trump proclaimed that all Venezuelans TdA members age 14 and older who are in the U.S. and aren’t naturalized or lawful permanent residents, “are liable to be apprehended, restrained, secured, and removed as Alien Enemies.” All TdA members “are, by virtue of their membership in that organization, chargeable with actual hostility against the United States and are therefore ineligible for the benefits of 50 U.S.C. 22” and declared “a danger to the public peace or safety of the United States.”
The order directs the attorney general to implement policies in adherence with the proclamation and distribute it to every Supreme Court Justice, to every chief judge of circuit courts of appeals, district and territorial courts, every highest-ranking judicial officer, and all governors.
The order directs the DHS secretary to “apprehend, restrain, secure, and remove every Alien Enemy” and “apprehend and remove any Alien Enemy under any separate authority.” It also directs all executive departments and agencies to collaborate with law enforcement officials, including at the local level, “to apprehend, restrain, secure, and remove Alien Enemies.”
The order prohibits all “Alien Enemies” from entering or attempting to enter the U.S. Anyone who does “shall be immediately apprehended and detained until removed from the United States.” Those already living in the interior of the U.S. “are subject to summary apprehension.” All are subject to detention and removal.
After issuing the proclamation, DHS personnel arrested nearly 300 TdA members, referring to them as “terrorists,” White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said. “Thanks to the great work of the Department of State, these heinous monsters were extracted and removed to El Salvador where they will no longer be able to pose any threat to the American People.
“President Trump will always put the safety of the American People first – and he will never allow foreign terrorist enemies to operate on American soil and endanger our people. They will be found, restrained and removed – and their networks will be destroyed.”
The orders were issued after a record more than 1 million Venezuelans illegally entered the U.S. under the Biden administration, including TdA members who expanded operations in at least 22 states, The Center Square first reported.
Under the Trump administration, Venezuelan repatriation flights began, which were paid for by the Venezuelan government, negotiated by the Trump administration, The Center Square reported.
