Immigration courts are quietly tossing out the cases of Alien Enemies Act deportees

An immigration judge in San Diego dismissed the asylum claim of a gay makeup artist from Venezuela — one of at least 14 such dismissals to take place in recent weeks.

Before he was sent to an infamous supermax prison in El Salvador under the Alien Enemies Act, Andry Hernandez Romero was waiting for an immigration judge to decide whether he would be granted asylum in the United States.

And even after his deportation, Hernandez’s lawyers fought to keep his asylum claim open as a way of ensuring he didn’t disappear from the American legal system.

But an immigration judge in San Diego dismissed Hernandez’s asylum claim on Tuesday — one of at least 14 such dismissals in recent weeks. That has immigration attorneys concerned that the dismissals are the Trump administration’s latest tactic in evading due process to ensure those sent away have no means to return.

“It seems the government’s intention in dismissing these cases across the country is to complete the disappearance of people to El Salvador, to end their legal proceedings, and to act as though they weren’t here seeking asylum in the first place,” said Lindsay Toczylowski, executive director of Immigrant Defenders Law Center, a nonprofit representing Hernandez and seven other Venezuelans deported to El Salvador.

Hernandez, 32, is the lead plaintiff in a high-profile lawsuit brought by the American Civil Liberties Union against the Trump administration in Washington, D.C., on behalf of the hundreds of Venezuelans deported to a Salvadoran megaprison under the Alien Enemies Act. That case has been the centerpiece of a legal saga surrounding the deportations — one that some legal analysts say has brought the U.S. to the brink of a constitutional crisis.