Boom: DC Circuit Slams Brakes on Boasberg's Criminal Contempt Probe of Those AEA Flightshttps://redstate.com/smoosieq/2026/04/14/boom-dc-circuit-puts-the-kibosh-on-boasbergs-criminal-contempt-probe-of-those-aeael-salvador-flights-n2201267Judge James Boasberg, Chief Judge of the D.C. District Court, has become a bit of a household name over the past year or so — in large part because of the rather notable rulings he's made in the case arising from the now infamous flights removing suspected Tren de Aragua members to El Salvador, pursuant to the Alien Enemies Act, in March of 2025.
The J.G.G. v. Trump case has already made its way up to the Supreme Court once, and while the case is still working its way through the courts on the merits, there's been a contemporaneous contempt proceeding, in which Judge Boasberg has been assessing whether he'd hold certain members of the Trump administration in criminal contempt over its actions following his order to effectively turn the planes (already in transit to El Salvador) around.
In connection with that, the administration sought a writ of mandamus from the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals, essentially asking that Boasberg's contempt inquisition be shut down. On Tuesday, the D.C. Circuit granted the writ and halted the district court’s ongoing contempt investigation into the administration’s March deportation flights, blocking further testimony and fact-finding aimed at determining whether officials defied a temporary restraining order.
Boasberg is trying to end-around the USSC's suspending his TRO through this contempt of court shamvestigation. The D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals just blocked his end-run attempt.
This blogpost gives more info about this ruling and its historical context,
https://hotair.com/ed-morrissey/2026/04/14/intrusive-dc-appeals-court-slaps-down-president-boasberg-again-n3813896 . Boasberg has a lengthy history of anti-Trump actions, so I expect he will try to circumvent this latest slap-down.
From John Hinderaker at Power Line,
https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2026/04/boasberg-slapped-down.php :
One of the extraordinary features of the first year of President Trump’s second term has been the attempted judicial coup by Democratic Party district court judges who have, in effect, tried to take over the operation of the Executive Branch. Rogue district judges have issued one ill-founded order after another, most of which have been reversed on appeal. Perhaps the worst offender has been James Boasberg, Chief Judge of the D.C. District Court.
Judge Boasberg has been trying to hold members of the Trump administration in criminal contempt for, allegedly, disobeying one of his illegal orders. The government made a mandamus motion in the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals to stop Boasberg’s unconstitutional actions. Today, a panel of the D.C. Circuit granted the motion and ordered Boasberg to stop harassing the Trump administration. Each of the three judges on the panel authored an opinion that you can read here. I will simply quote the beginning of the majority opinion by Judge Neomi Rao. It gives you a sense of how far out of bounds Boasberg has gone in his effort to serve the interests of his political party:
The Supreme Court vacated the district court’s order because it was premised on a legal error and the plaintiffs’ suit was brought in the wrong court. Nonetheless, the district court threatened to hold government officials in criminal contempt unless they complied with the now-vacated order by, for instance, taking back custody of the plaintiffs. We issued a writ of mandamus vacating the court’s first contempt order.
Undeterred, the district court is proceeding with criminal contempt for the government’s decision to transfer the plaintiffs to the custody of El Salvador. To cooperate, the government identified then-Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem as the official responsible for the transfer decision. The district court previously said this was the only information it required to make a referral for prosecution. But the district court has now expanded its inquest and ordered hearings to extract more information from government counsel about exactly what happened last March. The government petitions for mandamus.
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.” Cheney v. U.S. Dist. Ct. for D.C.,542 U.S. 367, 390 (2004) (cleaned up). The district court proposes to probe high-level Executive Branch deliberations about matters of national security and diplomacy. These proceedings are a clear abuse of discretion, as the district court’s order said nothing about transferring custody of the plaintiffs and therefore lacks the clarity to support criminal contempt based on the transfer of custody. ...
This decision piles schadenfreude atop my schadenfreude at the spectacle of Swillwell's plummet from grace.
