The Daily Fuckup

The Trump administration said on March 24, 2025, that it would invoke the state secrets privilege and withhold more information about Venezuelan deportation flights that were already at the center of a federal court fight. The filing came after U.S. District Judge James Boasberg had entered a March 15 temporary restraining order and was asking for flight timing and other details to determine whether the government had complied with it. ([apnews.com](https://apnews.com/article/31217ce8ef990c9bd6ecb49654b6bf47?utm_source=openai))

The dispute turned on chronology. Boasberg’s order temporarily blocked deportations under the Alien Enemies Act, an 18th-century wartime law the administration had used to justify removing Venezuelan nationals it said were tied to Tren de Aragua. The court was trying to establish whether planes carrying migrants had already left U.S. control before the order took effect, or whether the removals continued after the judge told the government to stop. ([apnews.com](https://apnews.com/article/31217ce8ef990c9bd6ecb49654b6bf47?utm_source=openai))

The state-secrets filing did not answer that question. It signaled that the administration would not supply additional operational details the court wanted in order to test the government’s account of what happened around the flights. That kept the legal fight focused on a narrower but crucial issue: whether the government followed the March 15 order, and if not, when it crossed the line. ([apnews.com](https://apnews.com/article/31217ce8ef990c9bd6ecb49654b6bf47?utm_source=openai))