Salvadoran police officers escort alleged members of the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua recently deported by the U.S. government to be imprisoned in the Terrorism Confinement Center (CECOT) prison, as part of an agreement with the Salvadoran government, at the El Salvador International Airport in San Luis Talpa, El Salvador, in this handout image obtained March 16, 2025. Secretaria de Prensa de la Presidencia/Handout via REUTERS/File Photo
(Reuters) -President Donald Trump's administration's response to a judicial request for more details on the deportation of hundreds of Venezuelan migrants was "woefully insufficient," a judge said on Thursday.
Washington-based U.S. District Judge James Boasberg is weighingwhether administration officials violated his order intended to temporarily block the expulsions. In an order on Thursday, the judge told officials to explain by March 25 why their failure to bring the deported migrants back to the United States did not violate his order.
Boasberg's order escalates a dispute between the judge and Trump's administration has raised concerns among Trump critics and some legal experts about a potentiallylooming constitutional crisisif his administration defies judicial decisions. Under the U.S. Constitution, the executive and the judiciary are co-equal branches of government.
Trump has said he would not defy any court orders.
Boasberg had previously said he was trying to determine whether the administration had violated his orders, but given officials the chance to provide further details about the flights.
But Thursday marked the first time the judge directly ordered officials to address whether they had violated his order by issuing what is known as an order to show cause.
(Reporting by Luc Cohen in New York and Ted Hesson in Washington, Editing by Alexia Garamfalvi, Will Dunham and Noeleen Walder)
