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Lawyers for some of the eight migrants deported Tuesday said they were told they were being sent to South Sudan. People familiar with the plane said it had landed for now in Djibouti.
May 21, 2025Updated 3:28 p.m. ET
A federal judge in Boston said on Wednesday that the Trump administration had violated an order he issued last month barring officials from deporting people to countries not their own without first giving them sufficient time to object.
The finding by the judge, Brian E. Murphy, was one of the strongest judicial rebukes the administration has faced so far in a series of contentious cases arising from its sprawling deportation agenda.
It was not immediately clear what punishment, if any, Judge Murphy intended to mete out against the administration or those who took part in the operation, but he asked for a list of names of everyone involved so he can notify them that they might all face criminal contempt penalties.
The judge’s decision came at a hearing in Federal District Court in Boston to consider an emergency motion filed by lawyers for a group of men who they said were deported after being told they were being sent to South Sudan.
As the hearing began, officials from the Homeland Security Department in Washington disclosed that eight immigrants had been deported Tuesday on a flight to a third country, but they refused to say where the men were going.
While much of the discussion at the court hearing took place under seal, Judge Murphy said that the government had given the deported men little more than 24 hours’ notice that they were being removed from the United States — a time frame that he described as “plainly insufficient.”
