A divided D.C. Circuit panel on April 14 granted the government's second petition for a writ of mandamus in the Alien Enemies Act litigation, ordering a halt to criminal contempt proceedings over the March 2025 transfer of alleged Tren de Aragua members to Salvadoran custody, ruling that the underlying temporary restraining order lacked the clarity required to support a contempt charge.

In an opinion by Circuit Judge Rao, joined by Circuit Judge Walker, the court said "the widening gyre of the district court's investigation again calls for the extraordinary remedy of mandamus to halt the judicial 'impairment of another branch in the performance of its constitutional duties.'" Circuit Judge Childs dissented.

The district court's inquiry had targeted the government's decision to transfer detainees to El Salvador's Center for Terrorism Confinement after two planes left U.S. airspace on March 15, 2025. The government had identified then-Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem as the official responsible for the transfer decision.

Rao wrote that the temporary restraining order "said nothing at all about transferring the plaintiffs out of the custody of the United States" and that "[c]riminal contempt cannot lie for transferring custody when the TRO was entirely 'silent' as to that requirement." The TRO had enjoined the government from "removing members of [the] class (not otherwise subject to removal) pursuant to the Proclamation for 14 days or until further Order of the Court."

"In our constitutional system of government, criminal liability cannot turn on the unstated intentions (or post hoc assertions) of a district court judge," the panel wrote. The opinion said the district court's proposed hearings would "probe high-level Executive Branch deliberations about matters of national security and diplomacy."

The panel also ruled that the hearings, which would have allowed plaintiffs' counsel to participate in questioning witnesses, were improper. Rao wrote that "[e]nabling interested plaintiffs to wield the sword of coercive investigation creates opportunities for 'private interest to influence the discharge of public duty.'"

Walker wrote separately to emphasize the district court's statement at the March 15 hearing that it would "issue a minute order memorializing this so you don't have to race to write it down." In his view, that instruction "made the written order supersede the oral order," and the written order "covered only people who had not already been removed from the United States."

Childs, dissenting, wrote that "[c]ontempt of court is a public offense, and the fate of our democratic republic will depend on whether we treat it as such." She said that "[w]ithout the contempt power, the rule of law is an illusion, a theory that stands upon shifting sands," and argued that the majority had "stymied the district court's inherent and statutory powers" in a way that would "echo in future proceedings against all litigants."

The petition arose from J.G.G. v. Trump, No. 25-cv-766 (D.D.C.), where the district court had issued an Order Scheduling Hearings on December 8, 2025, directing testimony from two government attorneys, one of whom had filed a whistleblower complaint alleging misconduct by Justice Department officials.