A federal appeals court ruled on Tuesday that US president Donald Trump cannot invoke an 18th-century wartime law to accelerate the deportation of individuals accused of belonging to a Venezuelan gang. The three-judge panel of the 5th US Circuit Court of Appeals, one of the nation’s most conservative appellate courts, blocked a major administration policy that could now head to the Supreme Court.It agreed with immigrant rights lawyers and lower court judges who said the 1798 Alien Enemies Act was never meant to target gangs like Tren de Aragua, the group Trump sought to punish in March.“A country’s encouraging its residents and citizens to enter this country illegally is not the modern-day equivalent of sending an armed, organized force to occupy, to disrupt, or to otherwise harm the United States,” wrote the judges as cited by AP. The majority included US Circuit Judges Leslie Southwick, appointed by George W Bush, and Irma Carrillo Ramirez, appointed by Joe Biden, while Trump appointee Andrew Oldham filed a dissenting opinion.In a 2-1 ruling, the judges said they approved the plaintiffs’ request for a preliminary injunction because they “found no invasion or predatory incursion” in this case.Under an agreement announced in July, over 250 of the deported migrants were sent back to Venezuela.The Trump administration sent people labeled as Tren de Aragua members to a notorious prison in El Salvador, arguing that US courts did not have any power to intervene on their behalf. The majority opinion in the court stated that Trump’s claims regarding Tren de Aragua do not rise to the level of national conflict that Congress originally intended the act to address.The Alien Enemies Act of 1798 is a federal law granting the president wartime authority to deport non-US citizens from countries considered enemies. Under the law, the government can arrest and deport individuals aged 14 or older solely based on their citizenship or country of birth, without providing a court hearing.The act has been invoked only three times in the history of the country, all during declared wars, the war of 1812, and the two world wars. The Trump administration argued that courts should not question the president’s judgment that Tren de Aragua was linked to the Venezuelan government and posed a threat to the United States, justifying the law’s use.Meanwhile, Trump announced on Wednesday that US forces killed 11 “narcoterrorists” in a strike against a drug-smuggling vessel tied to Venezuelan gangs, claiming the group was under the control of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro. He alleged that there were “lots of drugs in that boat.” The comments come amid a major US military buildup in the Caribbean. Maduro called it “the greatest threat that has been seen on our continent in the last 100 years” and claimed US ships carried “1,200 missiles” targeting Venezuela. He added that deportation flights from the US would continue as part of a “bilateral relationship that has gone well.”