It was supposed to be a triumph – a show of strength, a signal of power. But instead, the day ends for Donald Trump in a humiliating double defeat. The United States Supreme Court has rejected his request for the rapid deportation of Venezuelan migrants under an 18th-century law. A decision that is not just a legal blow, but also a symbolic slap in the face.
The Alien Enemies Act of 1798, a relic from a time when America was a young republic and Europe a smoldering powder keg, was meant to become Trump’s most powerful weapon. A legal blade, sharpened with the argument of national security, aimed at those he viewed as threats: Venezuelan migrants labeled as gang members by his administration. But now the Supreme Court has drawn a line against this game.
Two of the conservative justices, Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas, stood by Trump’s side – alone, lost in a vote that consigned their voices to irrelevance. The rest of the court made it clear: People held in the United States have the right to challenge their deportation. Even when the president brands them as enemies.
A Law as a Weapon – and a President Who Fails
Trump’s attempt to use the Alien Enemies Act as an instrument for rapid deportations fails not only due to the constitutional integrity of the justices but also because of legal reality. In lower courts, several judges had already made it clear that the law cannot be used for blanket deportations. It is a law for times of war, not for political maneuvers.
The case of the Venezuelan migrants is only part of a larger strategy that Trump has been pursuing for months: showing toughness, closing borders, pushing the power of the executive branch to its limits. But today, it became clear that even the most powerful man in the United States is subject to another law – that of the Constitution.
A Day of Symbolic Defeats
It is no coincidence that Trump’s "Black Friday" is doubly dark. For while his request before the Supreme Court failed, the facade of his power is also crumbling on another front. In Maryland, his administration faced humiliation in another case: Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a man deported to El Salvador by Trump, even though courts had ordered his return.
Judge Paula Xinis was forced to publicly ask the administration what steps it had actually taken to bring the man back. The Trump lawyers' response: fog, obfuscation, empty promises. "There are simply no details," Xinis noted. "This is basically 'Just trust us.'"
A President in Decline
For Trump, this day is more than just a legal defeat. It is a symbol. A testament that even a president encounters the limits of power when trying to bypass justice. One court after another stands against his policies – showing that the law does not belong to the will of one individual.
The "Black Friday" marks another crack in the foundation of his political myth. The myth of the strong man who can shape law and order at his whim. Today, the justices of the Supreme Court and a federal judge in Maryland have shown that the law is stronger.
And Trump? He will remember this Friday – as the day when power collided with morality and lost.
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