(WASHINGTON) — In a recent court filing, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has submitted what they believe is a document that the Trump administration uses to identify members of a Venezuelan gang and remove them under the Alien Enemies Act.
The filing is part of their request for a preliminary injunction to bar the administration from deporting migrants under the act.
The document, titled “Alien Enemy Validation Guide,” appears to be a checklist that the administration is using to identify Tren de Aragua (TdA) members with a points-based system, according to the filing.
ACLU attorney Oscar Sarabia Roman submitted a declaration, stating that the organization believes the document is used “to determine whether Venezuelan noncitizens are members of Tren de Aragua and subject to summary removal under the Alien Enemies Act.”
ABC News has reached out to the Department of Homeland Security for comment.
The checklist submitted by the ACLU is divided into six categories including “Criminal Conduct and Information,” “Self-Admission” and “Judicial Outcomes and Official Documents,” and assigns varying quantities of points to different types of evidence that can be used to score the migrants.
Migrants who score eight points and higher are “validated as members of TdA,” the document says. But the document also appears to leave a lot to the discretion of ICE officers conducting the review, stating that even migrants who only score six or seven points may still be considered members of the gang after the officer consults with a supervisor and the Office of the Principal Legal Advisor and “reviewing the totality of the facts, before making that determination.”
The document indicates that individuals who score five points or less should not be validated as a member of TdA but encourages officials to initiate removal proceedings under other existing authorities.
Communicating electronically with a known TdA member is worth six points, in other words, it appears to be enough evidence for an official to classify a person as a member of the gang.
One of the categories labeled “Symbolism” includes a section about “tattoos denoting membership/loyalty to TdA” and social media posts by the subject displaying symbols of TDA. According to the document, individuals with tattoos that are believed to be associated with TDA are worth four points.
The document informs officers to consult with supervisors before classifying migrants as TdA members or initiating removals if they score eight points or more on the “Symbolism” or “Association” categories alone.
In their motion for preliminary injunction, the ACLU also claims intel gathered across different agencies on TdA are “internally contradictory.”
One document submitted by the ACLU — that they state is from Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) — includes photos of tattoos that they say HSI considers identifiers of TdA which include tattoos of crowns, trains, stars and clocks. Additional identifiers, according to the document, include “often wear sports attire from U.S. professional sports teams with Venezuelan nationals on them” and “dressed in high-end urban street wear.”
But a separate document the ACLU alleges is from the Border Patrol’s El Paso Sector Intelligence Unit says they “determined that the Chicago Bulls attire, clocks, and rose tattoos are typically related to the Venezuelan culture” and are not indicators of being members or associates of Tren de Aragua.
The ACLU also submitted a document called the “Notice and warrant of apprehension and removal under the Alien Enemies Act” claiming the government may require each alleged TdA member to sign. They say that the five plaintiffs represented in their lawsuit did not receive the document.
“You are not entitled to a hearing, appeal, or judicial review of this notice and warrant of apprehension and removal,” the document states.
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