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I think this meets the definition of one type of constitutional crisis, i.e. "...a fight among branches of government in which neither side backs down, and there is no clear resolution within the constitutional system."

https://www.law.uchicago.edu/news/ginsburg-and-huq-how-defin...

The above is a "simple language" style definition. I am not a constitutional scholar but it seems a straightforward and useful one. There are many other such definitions on the 'net but most have similar elements.

To me we seem to have a clear fight among the executive and judicial branches, and the executive branch is doing everything in its power to ignore a Supreme Court ruling and the order of a lower court Federal judge.

For those who would argue that the US is NOT in constitutional crisis, I'm curious to hear your reasoning.

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NYT reports that the government has indicated to the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland that it will comply with the Supreme Court's order. Take from that what you will.

My understanding is that the government has not (yet?) told the District of Maryland that it will not comply with that court's orders, only that, in the government's estimation, that court hasn't given it enough time to comply. Again, take from that what you will — but in my view the government has already gotten extra time to comply on account of its petition for emergency review in SCOTUS and the Chief Justice's stay of the original order (effectively well past the original deadline).

So while a constitutional crisis is in the offing and may still come to a head, I don't think we're quite there yet.

I think this article paints a pretty different picture, which does not imply a crisis.

https://archive.is/PI5YJ

As reported in WaPo, the executive position is not refusal, but inability to comply on the requested timeline. They said they can and will provide the information on Tuesday.

This seems to be a significantly different narrative than is inferred by piecing together the broken updates provided by NYmag.

Do you consider a further 4-day delay as requested by the DOJ to be "reasonable" given the prior events in this case?

For example, in the Supreme Court ruling Justic Sotomayor included the following statement:

"The United States Government arrested Kilmar Ar-mando Abrego Garcia in Maryland and flew him to a “terrorism confinement center” in El Salvador, where he has been detained for 26 days and counting. To this day, the Government has cited no basis in law for Abrego Garcia’s warrantless arrest, his removal to El Salvador, or his confinement in a Salvadoran prison. "

So:

* Warrant-less arrest

* Government admitted it was in error

* 4 weeks in a foreign jail

And it's OK for the DOJ to say "we want 4 more days" to develop a plan that you asked us to start developing more than a week ago?

It's not just 4 days for a plan. They want 4 more days to even say where he is. They refused last session to disclose it and said they need more time to figure it out.

They don't know where his (living?) body is.

I don't know enough details about to say how long is reasonable to collect facts and develop a plan. If I had to guess, it would be possible.

It is an extraordinary and unprecedented situation, and I'm not sure what the SCOTUS decision requires because the situation is such a mix of diplomacy and DOJ actions.

Does the head of ICE just call the president of el salvador? Does the order require DJT to do it? What if Bukele says "no"?

Either way, from a constitutional perspective there is a big difference between the executive saying they can't do something and flat out refusing.

He is in a maximum security prison. There are records of his entry, and if he has by some manner left, records of that as well. If he is still inside the prison, some salvadorian guard is staring him in the eyes right now. If you listen to what was written in the court session with Judge Xinis (?), basically the US government is stalling not just how to get him out but also stalling the courts question of where he even is.

The administration, at every step, is buying time against the inevitable.

Why are they buying time? Can someone not just pay the guard $100 to find out where the fuck he is? It doesn't make sense. My conspiracy angle is they need 4 days to figure out how the hell they are going to explain the current situation, whatever that is.

Its not a US prison and the US has zero jurisdiction. The DOJ has zero jurisdiction, so this makes it a very strange situation of international diplomacy.

I agree that from a practical sense, the POTUS could (and should) just pick up the phone, call the president of el Salvador, and ask politely to send him back.

Nothing about US jurisdiction will change in 4 days.

If the US has zero jurisdiction, then what are they paying for, exactly?

They were(are?) paid to take the people, lock them up, and make an example of them . That doesn't mean US courts, government, or officials, have any legal power in el Salvador.

It is unclear if there is even a legal contract in place.

It is really all quite unpresidented.

I can think of one case where a father, who worked as a technical contractor in Iraq to support his child, was held hostage by terrorists and therefore missed his child support.

On returning to the US, he was imprisoned. Physically being unable to pay was not held to be a valid excuse to miss child support.

Somehow when it comes to holding citizens for contempt against a court order, it is no problem that the citizen was powerless to fulfill the order. But if an official does it then everything is fine.

At some point I would hope the courts see through this. Maybe El Salvador can keep the guy forever and we can't do anything about it. And then just like the hostage, the judge should be able to keep these people in jail for contempt until the guy is released, whether it ever happens or not. They owned it when they did it, too bad so sad if they cannot fix it and they're held in contempt.

I don't disagree. If you are responsible for someone and their legal rights, that does not change if you send them somewhere outside your jurisdictional control and ability to ensure they are met.

In fact, it is a reason not to do just that. This is pretty well established in law.

From https://www.democracydocket.com/opinion/if-the-marshals-go-r...:

“As Berkeley Law School Dean Erwin Chemerinsky argues, ‘the hard truth for those looking to the courts to rein in the Trump administration is that the Constitution gives judges no power to compel compliance with their rulings — it is the executive branch that ultimately enforces judicial orders.’”

This strikes me as a pretty serious omission in our Constitution. Did the Framers not consider the threat of a runaway executive? Or maybe the relative size of the government in those days made it seem like much less of a threat than it is today?

It's intentional. Federalist 78 contains the rationale.

John Adams said the Constitution is intended for a moral (or virtuous) people. It's just a piece of paper. People have to support and defend it in order for the republic, an empire of laws, to persist.

We may be out of virtue, and maybe we don't deserve Constitutional order.

Enough people voted for an untrustworthy liar and a psychopath to be president. And the consequences will continue until he's removed from office.

There is no bottom for him. And probably no bottom for this Congress. In any case, this presidency is going to be very expensive for everyone.

> Did the Framers not consider the threat of a runaway executive?

They kind of did consider this. Pretty sure that's what impeachment is for.

I suspect the framers expected all three branches to be independent of one another. Right now, Executive branch is holding Legislative on a leash. Judicial branch has no levers.

But even with impeachment, the executive is still, technically, in charge of the armed forces, etc.

Wouldn’t it make more sense for each co-equal branch to have some degree of executive autonomy? For example, marshals that report only to the judicial branch or Congress.

> Wouldn’t it make more sense for each co-equal branch to have some degree of executive autonomy? For example, marshals that report only to the judicial branch or Congress.

Your suggestion sounds good at-a-glance. But I always worry that these types of ideas have down-sides that might not be immediately obvious. I have no idea what the down-sides might be for your particular suggestion, but it seems that all systems are corruptible if people try hard enough.

I'm not trying to dismiss your suggestion--only saying that a lot of times, it's difficult to see the imperfections.

I also think it's absurd that so many people treat the framers of the Constitution as deities. They were flawed people like the rest of us--and the Constitution is not a perfect document. If it were a perfect document, we would not be in the current situation, where the Executive branch is thumbing its nose as the Judicial branch.

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