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US: judge arrested in Wisconsin, Trump-justice clash over migrants

Judge Hannah Dugan accused by the FBI of aiding an immigrant’s escape. Tension grows between Donald Trump and the US judiciary over the handling of deportations

The FBI has arrested Milwaukee judge Hannah Dugan, accused of helping an immigrant evade arrest. This was announced by the director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Kash Patel, who claimed that the magistrate intentionally diverted federal agents from an immigrant wanted by the authorities.

The episode is part of an already tense picture between the White House and the judiciary. Indeed, for weeks, President Donald Trump has been in open conflict with federal judges on the issue of deportations, claiming that he wants to exercise extraordinary powers to deport migrants without going through the courts. The controversy reached a new peak five days ago, when the Supreme Court temporarily blocked the executive branch’s use of a 1798 law, the Alien Enemies Act, to deport Venezuelan migrants detained in Texas.

According to human rights organisations, many of these migrants were generically accused of being gang members, without sufficient evidence or trial. Conservative judge Samuel Alito, dissenting from the majority, called the court’s decision “legally questionable” and adopted “in the middle of the night, without listening to the opposing side”.

The rule in question was last used during World War II to intern Japanese-American citizens. The Trump administration is now under indictment by judges, civil associations and the Democratic opposition, who denounce serious violations of constitutional rights in the accelerated attempt to deport migrants.

‘We are getting closer and closer to a constitutional crisis,’ Democratic Senator Amy Klobuchar commented to CNN, ‘Donald Trump is dragging us into the mire of an institutional crisis.’

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