Due Process
May 16, 2025 – Opinion by DEC Vice Chair Dan Lack
Three American citizens, who were 2, 4 and 7 years old, were abruptly deported in April shortly after their mothers appeared for routine check-ins at ICE offices. The 4-year-old was in the middle of therapy for stage IV cancer and she was forced to leave without any medication.
An American mother and her daughters in Oklahoma City were traumatized last month when unidentified federal agents broke down their front door and confiscated their life savings and possessions while being forced to stand outside in their underwear in the rain.
Kilmar Abrego Garcia was apprehended in March and deported to a notorious El Salvador prison despite a court order that should have prevented his return to that country. Garcia is still there despite a unanimous Supreme Court decision for Trump to facilitate Garcia’s return to the U.S.
Mahmoud Khalil, a Columbia University student who had engaged in peaceful protests, was arrested by federal agents who also threatened his eight-months pregnant American wife, according to his attorney.
Tufts University student Rumeysa Öztürk was grabbed off the street by plain-clothed federal agents and driven off in an unmarked SUV in March after exercising her first amendment free speech rights. Despite a federal court order to keep her in Vermont, she was flown to a facility in Louisiana where she reports inhumane and unsafe conditions.
These are just a few examples of the trampling of our Constitution by a wannabe dictator.
The Fifth Amendment states, “No person . . . shall be . . . deprived of life, liberty, or property without due process of law …” In a recent interview, Trump said he didn’t know if all people in the U.S. are entitled to due process. This is ironic, coming from a felon whose prosecutions for his anti-government schemes during his first term were delayed by due process. Ultimately the serious charges against him were dismissed when he was elected because a sitting President cannot be prosecuted.
Constitutional rights apply to everyone in the United States. If our felonious President can ignore due process for some people, then government agents can throw you on a plane to a foreign prison too.