Nineteen of the 137 Venezuelans whom the Trump administration deported to El Salvador's CECOT megaprison under the Alien Enemies Act — the same men the government called terrorists, gang members, and enemies of the state — are now asking to be flown back to the United States to challenge those designations in court. They understand they will be detained the moment they arrive. That's not what guilty people do.

According to a filing made today in Sanchez v. Trump (Case No. 1:25-cv-00766-JEB), the ACLU reported that 19 plaintiffs have now come forward — some willing to travel independently to a U.S. port of entry, others requesting the government fly them from third countries where they've been living since escaping Venezuela. Details were filed under seal.

These men were ripped out of the country while a federal judge was literally on the bench ordering the planes turned around. They were shipped to a Salvadoran megaprison where multiple detainees reported being tortured. Many had no criminal record whatsoever — their "gang membership" was determined by tattoos of sports teams, autism awareness ribbons, and hometown holidays. They were eventually sent back to Venezuela in a prisoner swap last July, and some fled to third countries.

And now 19 of them are saying: fine. Detain me. I want my day in court.

That's not what guilty people do.

Judge Boasberg ordered on February 12 that the government must facilitate the return of any plaintiff who wants to come back, including paying for flights from third countries. His reasoning was straightforward: the government created this situation by deporting them without due process, so the government bears the cost of fixing it. The government's response to his earlier proposals had, in Boasberg's words, "essentially told the Court to pound sand."

The administration insists these men are foreign terrorists. If that's true, proving it in a courtroom should be easy. The fact that the government has fought this hard to avoid giving them hearings tells you everything you need to know about how strong that evidence actually is.

Nineteen men are insisting their constitutional rights are real, not imagined—and they're willing to be locked up again to prove it.