What to know about the “State Secrets of State”: NPR

The Trump administration says it will not share any other information in response to the judge’s request about three modern deportations carrying Venezuelan immigrants because it is the secret of the state.

In one of the centers that submitted to the court on Monday, the Ministry of Justice said that it is practicing the so -called “state secrets concession” in the case because the participation of information will harm diplomatic relations and national security.

It is part of a lawsuit faced by the administration after President Trump hosted the law of foreign enemies in 1798 to deport the people who accuse him of being members of the Venezuelan prison gang to El Salvador earlier this month.

Here is what to know about the privilege of state secrets – the legal doctrine that the Ministry of Justice is now practicing.

What is the privilege of state secrets?

The concession allows the American government To block sensitive information – Like intelligence sources, methods and foreign affairs details – that it becomes general as part of the court case. The government can intervene in the event that it is not a party to excellence and practice, if you think that harmful information can appear during the procedures.

“The concession is designed or intended to move in those areas where the tectonic panels of the executive concession and a kind of judicial responsibility are collided,” said George Kroner, a older colleague who is not resident at the Foreign Policy Research Institute.

Kroner, a former lead lawyer for the National Security Agency, said he was often invoked in matters related to military security, national security and foreign affairs.

The head of the Federal Agency, which confirms that the privilege of the state’s secrets, usually signs a written declaration or certificate for the judge explains the reason for the need to withhold information. In this case, Prosecutor Bam Bondi, Foreign Minister Marco Rubio and Minister of Internal Security Christie Nayym, submitted to Judge James Boasberg.

Federal judges often refer to the executive branch in state secrets concession, but sometimes they ask for a review of evidence alone or Reject The government asks.

Ashley Dicks, a law professor at the University of Virginia, who studies lessons on national security, said that critics had historically faced a problem with no transparency allowed by legal maneuver.

She said: “There was concern about the government that calls for to hide the illegal activities or activities that may embarrass the government.”

The Constitutional Rights Center, a non -profit legal victory groupand Previously The state’s secrets allow “mainly to the executive authority to dictate the federal courts on cases that they can and cannot hear.”

The date of the legal doctrine

Two issues from the American Court put a framework for the privilege of the state secrets, according to what they mentioned Modern report By Congress Research Service.

The first date dates back to 1876 and includes the case of a union spy rented by President Abraham Lincoln to pass information about the movements of the Confederation forces during the civil war. The spy drug filed a lawsuit against the government on unpaid wages.

In this case, known as Totten against the United Statesthe The Supreme Court ruled The court cannot conduct a trial “that will inevitably lead to the disclosure of matters that the law itself is a secret” – in this case a spying contract.

Three quarters of a century, the Supreme Court distilled the reason behind the privilege of the state secrets.

In 1952, a case known as the name United States against Reynolds He went to the Supreme Court, where three civilian crew members who were killed in a US military plane crash File a lawsuit against the government To obtain an investigation report in the accident.

The Air Force argued that the issuance of the accident report would lead to a settlement of national security, because the trip was part of a task for testing secret electronic equipment.

The Supreme Court eventually ruled the government, declaring that it could obscure sensitive military information. However, the chief judge, Farid M. admitted. Vinson in Majority Such a legal doctrine can be difficult for judges, who may have to issue a ruling without seeing the hidden evidence for themselves.

“Judicial control of the evidence in the case cannot be waived to Caprice for CEOs,” Vinson wrote. “However, we will not go to the point that the court may automatically request a full statement of the judge before accepting the claim of privilege in any case.”

How to use Trump and other new presidents this privilege

In recent years, government lawyers have called during the era of Republican presidents and democrats the concession of state secrets in multiple issues related to the global war on terrorism, including lawsuits related to the program to eavesdrop on the reward of the National Security Agency and torture of the CIA – or the “augmented program” – the program.

A 2010 Law review at the University of Pennsylvania condition I found that the United States government acquired the privilege of state secrets in more than 100 cases between 2001 and 2009.

American Civil Liberties Union He said in 2007 The administration of the then President George W. Bush was using the privilege of “evading accountability for torture, silencing informants of national security, and even rejecting a lawsuit claiming racial discrimination.”

In 2009, then public lawyer Eric Holder has launched new rules within the Ministry of Justice that dictates when the government will achieve this privilege. NPR mentioned at the time that the Obama administration, which was part of Holder, was criticized by the American Civil Liberties Union to call simultaneously this privilege in continuous cases.

In 2022, the Supreme Court ruled that federalism The government can call for a preliminary concession from the CIA’s contractors from the testimony of post -September 11 torture of a prisoner named Abu Zubayda in a “black site” in Poland in a high -level case on the boundaries of the concession.

Dicks of the University of Virginia said that the Trump administration’s excellence in the Venezuelan case was noticeable because he was not a response to a request to obtain information from opposition lawyers, but rather from the judge himself. Judge Boasberg is trying to determine whether the Trump administration has violated his order to stop or overturn the deportations.

In their statements, Rubio and Nayym have argued that the launch of information on deportation trips could complicate diplomatic relations and settle law enforcement methods.

If Boasberg rejects government arguments, Kroner says he believes that the Ministry of Justice is likely to resume.

“In the end, somewhere on the road, you will see perhaps another decision from the US Supreme Court based on the standards of the state secrets in terms of the way it was invoked in this case,” he said.