The Supreme Court on Monday granted President Donald Trump’s request to vacate a lower court’s ruling barring the administration from using a 1798 wartime immigration law to immediately deport Venezuelan nationals – including alleged members of the Tren de Aragua gang – from the U.S., marking a significant victory for the administration as it advances key immigration priorities.

Justices on the high court ruled 5-4 to grant the administration’s request to lift the stay, in a temporary victory for Trump and his allies.

At issue was the Alien Enemies Act, or the immigration law passed by Congress in 1789 to immediately remove certain migrants from U.S. soil. 

Prior to Trump’s second White House term, it had been invoked just three times in U.S. history: During the War of 1812, during World War I, and most recently, World War II.

JUDGE BOASBERG POISED TO HOLD TRUMP ADMIN IN CONTEMPT, TAKES DOWN NAMES OF DHS OFFICIALS: ‘PRETTY SKETCHY’ 

Lawyers for the Trump administration had urged the court to vacate the lower court ruling, arguing in a Supreme Court filing that the lower court orders “rebuffed” their immigration agenda, including their ability “to protect the Nation against foreign terrorist organizations and risk debilitating effects for delicate foreign negotiations.”

“Today’s a bad day to be a terrorist in the United States of America,” Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said in a video posted to X, adding that Trump “was correct in using his authority on using the Alien Enemies Act to deport terrorists out of this country.”

Meanwhile, Attorney General Pam Bondi called the “landmark” decision a “victory for the rule of law,” adding that an “activist judge” in Washington, D.C., “does not have the jurisdiction to seize control of President Trump’s authority to conduct foreign policy and keep the American people safe.”

“The Department of Justice will continue fighting in court to make America safe again,” Bondi concluded in her statement responding to the ruling.

APPEALS COURT BLOCKS TRUMP ADMIN’S DEPORTATION FLIGHTS IN ALIEN ENEMIES ACT IMMIGRATION SUIT

“This is a major loss for the lunatics and a major win for the American people,” Vice President J.D. Vance responded following the High Court’s ruling. “Onward!”

The Supreme Court’s ruling follows a temporary order from U.S. District Judge James Boasberg last month blocking the administration’s use of the 1798 law for 14 days while he considered the case on its merits – a pause upheld by a federal appeals court in a 2–1 decision.

“Nazis got better treatment” than some of the migrants deported under the law, Judge Patricia Millett, an Obama appointee, remarked during the appellate hearing.

Both Boasberg and the appellate panel sharply questioned the administration over Trump’s proclamation invoking the Alien Enemies Act to deport Venezuelan nationals – and over the three planes that removed hundreds of migrants to El Salvador the very next day.

At least 261 migrants were deported that day, including more than 100 Venezuelans removed “solely on the basis” of the 1798 statute.

The deportation flights reportedly landed around the same time Boasberg issued his temporary halt, raising questions about whether administration officials knowingly defied the order. Boasberg had issued a bench ruling requiring any flights that had already taken off to return “immediately.”

That did not happen.

JUDGE BOASBERG SHOULD ‘RECUSE’ HIMSELF FROM TRUMP DEPORTATION CASE, GOP LAWMAKER ARGUES

Boasberg said on April 3 that he was weighing whether to hold certain Trump administration officials in contempt of court for refusing to provide information, even after the court issued repeated requests regarding the deportation flights and the number of individuals sent to El Salvador.

Government lawyers cited national security concerns as the reason for refusing to comply with the court’s request for information.

But during the April 3 hearing, Deputy Assistant Attorney General Drew Ensign told Boasberg the flight information likely wasn’t classified — prompting the judge to question why the administration had declined to provide it on more than four occasions, including under a court-imposed deadline.

“Pretty sketchy,” Boasberg mused in court.

WHO IS JAMES BOASBERG, THE US JUDGE AT THE CENTER OF TRUMP’S DEPORTATION EFFORTS? 

Boasberg also pressed the government to disclose the names, locations, and agencies of individuals involved in the removals, as well as any internal conversations with officials who may have been monitoring the court proceedings.

The hearing marked the latest in a flurry of legal battles over the Trump administration’s use of the Alien Enemies Act. It followed Boasberg’s order requiring officials to explain why they failed to comply with his directive to return the deportation flights – and whether they knowingly defied the court.

CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP 

The Supreme Court ruling may not mark the end of Trump’s push to invoke the Alien Enemies Act.

Boasberg is still weighing potential contempt charges against administration officials. As of this writing, a preliminary injunction hearing is set for April 8.

President Trump took to Truth Social to react to the decision in a post: “The Supreme Court has upheld the Rule of Law in our Nation by allowing a President, whoever that may be, to be able to secure our Borders, and protect our families and our Country, itself. A GREAT DAY FOR JUSTICE IN AMERICA!”

Michael Proctor’s firing from the Massachusetts State Police over his handling of the Karen Read investigation could be a wake-up call to defense attorneys around the state whose clients have been convicted based on his work.

Proctor, a 12-year veteran, lost his job after an investigation into his handling of the case kicked off following Read’s mistrial last year. During his testimony, a series of rude and lewd text messages he sent about Read were read in court, tanking his credibility in the eyes of at least some jurors. 

The internal review found he had improperly shared “sensitive or confidential information” about the homicide investigation on top of the “derogatory texts.”

KAREN READ’S 2ND TRIAL HEADS INTO WEEKEND WITHOUT FULL JURY SEATED

“Our state police are wonderful guys and would never want to have a John O’Keefe situation in their own family,” Grace Edwards, an Essex County-based trial attorney, told Fox News Digital. “But what Michael Proctor did is he destroyed the public trust, and there’s no way that people aren’t out there saying, what else did he do, and what else are other people doing?”

If Proctor showed similar misconduct in other cases, it could be grounds to reopen them, she said. 

KAREN READ APPEALS DOUBLE JEOPARDY RULING TO US SUPREME COURT

“It caused me tremendous pause to say, should I be going back and looking at my cases with the state police?” she added. “I think that every attorney who had a case where Michael Proctor was the lead investigator should go back and take a look at it.”

The defense team for Brian Walshe, 50, is doing just that. He is charged with the murder of his 39-year-old wife, Ana, and Proctor was the lead investigator on his case, too.

Walshe’s lawyers have already demanded copies of all text messages Proctor sent about the case.

PROBE OF TOWN POLICE IN KAREN READ CASE FINDS NO SIGN OF ‘CONSPIRACY TO FRAME’ SLAIN OFFICER’S GIRLFRIEND

The Massachusetts State Police fired Proctor last month after a months-long internal investigation into lewd text messages about Read he sent while investigating O’Keefe’s death, texts that he conceded were unprofessional and that Read’s defense has seized on to illustrate alleged bias in the investigation.

Prosecutors in the Walshe case have downplayed Proctor’s involvement in their investigation as minimal and said they do not plan to call him to the stand, but the defense told the court he was present for numerous witness interviews and for evidence collection from the start of the case and onward.

GO HERE FOR FULL COVERAGE OF THE 2ND KAREN READ TRIAL

Read faces murder and other charges in connection with the death of Boston Police Officer John O’Keefe, who was her boyfriend at the time of his death. He was found dead on another officer’s front lawn the morning after a blizzard. Prosecutors allege she backed into him with her Lexus SUV and left him to die of trauma to the head and hypothermia.

Charges in a deadly hit-and-run case could bring as little as a two- to 10-year sentence under Massachusetts law, however, a conviction on the murder charge could mean life in prison.

Edwards said the heaviest charges may have been included as a scare tactic to try and persuade Read to take a plea deal.

“Just the idea of a state prison sentence is very scary, and they get scared, and they plea, and they get something lesser,” she said. “You’ve got to have attorneys out there who are willing to go toe-to-toe with the prosecutor and say, fine, we’ll go to trial.”

Read chose the latter route, and that fight is what exposed Proctor’s texts.

She has pleaded not guilty, always maintained her innocence and has suggested that she is being framed.

Jury selection is currently underway in Read’s second trial. The first ended with a hung jury.

FOLLOW THE FOX TRUE CRIME TEAM ON X

Edwards is predicting a number of surprises the second time around and that Read’s fate will hinge on how jurors respond to evidence the defense hopes will demonstrate an abundance of reasonable doubt in the case.

Special prosecutor Hank Brennan is a high-powered Massachusetts defense attorney who once represented mobster James “Whitey” Bulger in federal court. Read’s defense keeps adding new players, and her lawyers recently petitioned the Supreme Court to throw out two of the three charges against her.

Proctor declined to discuss the case himself, but family members told Fox News Digital last month that he had an “unblemished record” prior to the Read texts.

The review and a federal investigation into the fiasco both opened and closed without criminal charges against Proctor. 

CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP 

“The messages prove one thing, and that Michael is human, not corrupt, not incompetent in his role as a homicide detective, and certainly not unfit to continue to be a Massachusetts state yrooper,” his sister, Courtney Proctor, said at the time.

Monica Lewinsky has been welcomed with open arms by the Hollywood elite decades after her affair scandal with then President Bill Clinton in the ’90s.

Lewinsky, who has been in the public eye since 2017, attended George Clooney’s star-studded Broadway premiere of “Good Night, and Good Luck” in New York City on April 3.

While smiling for pictures before the event, Lewinsky wore a strapless, asymmetrical black gown that had ruffle detailing at the bottom. She paired her look with black heels and styled her hair down.

Several A-listers attended Clooney’s big Broadway premiere. Cindy Crawford attended the show with her husband, Rande Gerber, and daughter Kaia.

Hugh Jackman, Uma Thurman, Jennifer Lopez and Julianna Margulies were also photographed at the event. 

Nearly three decades ago, Lewinsky, who was a former White House intern while Clinton was president, had an affair with the former president. Clinton subsequently had an impeachment trial that came about in December 1998.

MONICA LEWINSKY SAYS SHE WAS ‘GUTTED’ AFTER BILL CLINTON LABELED HER ‘THAT WOMAN’ IN DOC: ‘I FELT ANGER’

The president was 49 at the time of the incident. Lewinsky was 22. Following the scandal, Clinton was acquitted. After a few public appearances in an attempt to reinvent herself, Lewinsky disappeared from the spotlight in the mid-2000s.

In 2017, Lewinsky emerged back into the limelight and began writing for Vanity Fair. Now, according to its website, she is a contributing editor. 

“She is an anti-bullying social activist, global public speaker, and producer with her company, Alt Ending Productions,” the outlet states. 

Her latest story for the outlet was on March 31, and before that was an article published before the 2024 presidential election.

In January, Lewinsky launched her own podcast, “Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky.” 

The synopsis of her show states, “Every week, I’ll draw from my own unique experiences (like say, surviving a global scandal at 24 years old), and delve into the personal and often messy ways people find their way back to themselves.”

Since launching, Lewinsky has had Olivia Munn, “Wicked” director Jon M. Chu and Tony Hawk on her podcast.

At the 2025 Vanity Fair Oscar party, Lewinsky posed with Munn and her husband, John Mulaney, for a photo.

MONICA LEWINSKY SHOULD BE SEEN ‘IN A DIFFERENT LIGHT’ AFTER BEING ‘SILENCED,’ ‘IMPEACHMENT’ STAR SAYS

A month after launching her own podcast, Lewinsky was a guest on the “Call Her Daddy” podcast, which was then topping the charts.

During the appearance in February, podcast host Alex Cooper asked Lewinsky how she thought the media should have covered her scandal in the ’90s.

“I think that the right way to handle a situation like that would have been to probably say it was nobody’s business and to resign, or to find a way of staying in office that was not lying and not throwing a young person who is just starting out in the world under the bus,” Lewinsky said.

Beyond her own life falling apart, Lewinsky explained how her scandal affected women everywhere.

“I think there was so much collateral damage for women of my generation to watch a young woman be pilloried on a world stage, to be torn apart for my sexuality, for my mistakes, for my everything,” Lewinsky said.

“I think there was so much collateral damage for women of my generation to watch a young woman be pilloried on a world stage, to be torn apart for my sexuality, for my mistakes, for my everything.”

— Monica Lewinsky

In 2021, Lewinsky told People magazine that she has found the courage to examine what occurred “between the most powerful man in the world and an unpaid intern less than half his age.”

LIKE WHAT YOU’RE READING? CLICK HERE FOR MORE ENTERTAINMENT NEWS

“For me, at 22, there was this combination of the awe of being at the White House, the awe of the presidency and the awe of this man who had an amazing energy and charisma was paying attention to me,” she explained. “I was enamored with him, like many others. He had a charisma to him, and it was a lethal charm, and I was intoxicated.”

“I think there are a lot of people who might find themselves in these situations,” she continued. “It might be a professor or a boss, your immediate supervisor at your job. We think we’re on his terra firma in our early 20s, and yet we’re really on this quicksand. [You think], I’m an adult now. It didn’t matter that I couldn’t get a rental car without a parental signature.”

At the time, Lewinsky was a producer of “15 Minutes of Shame” on HBO Max, which explored cancel culture. Lewinsky insisted she no longer needed an apology from Clinton.

CLICK HERE TO SIGN UP FOR THE ENTERTAINMENT NEWSLETTER

“If I had been asked five years ago, there would have been a part of me that needed something, that still wanted something,” she said. “Not any kind of relationship, but a sense of closure or maybe understanding. And I feel incredibly grateful not to need any of that.”

Lewinsky told the outlet at the time that she hoped her story would spark discussion about the dynamics between men in power and those without it.

“As we all came to see, it wasn’t just about losing a job but about the power to be believed, the power to be inoculated from the press, the power to have others smear someone’s reputation in all the ways that work, the power to understand consequence having held many important jobs where this was my first out of college,” she said.

CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP

A string of recent crimes targeting small businesses throughout the country have industry experts on high-alert as owners warn the incidents could result in rising prices. 

Instances of dining-and-dashing – when an individual orders a meal at a restaurant and leaves without paying – have become more high-profile in recent months, with thieves becoming more brazen as they target small businesses across the United States.

Last month, a local California sushi restaurant chain became an unwilling target for a serial dine-and-dasher when a man stole approximately $1,000 worth of meals from multiple locations. 

COLORADO SMALL BUSINESS OWNER WENT VIRAL AFTER FILMING HERSELF BEING DISRESPECTED BY CUSTOMER

“Every little thing has a positive or negative effect on small businesses, so this definitely has an impactRandy Musterer, founder and CEO of Sushi Confidential, told Fox News Digital. 

Musterer and his staff were on the lookout for a man who had reportedly walked out on the bill at two separate Sushi Confidential locations over the course of numerous visits. When the man returned to the restaurant’s flagship location in Campbell, workers immediately recognized him as the alleged thief. 

“I got a phone call from one of our managers saying, ‘Oh my gosh, the guy who has been dining and dashing in our Campbell location, he’s on the patio right now’,” Musterer said. 

GUN-WIELDING SUSPECT GETS BEATEN UP BY EMPLOYEES AT PIZZERIA HE TRIED TO ROB: POLICE

Musterer and his team quickly devised a plan to confirm if the man intended on stealing his meal, ultimately handing him his check as his food was dropped off and waiting for him to immediately pay. When the man got up to use the bathroom, they knew they had the dasher. 

“The minute he got up, I knew something was going to go down,” Musterer said. “Then I got a text message from the manager saying he ran out the front door.” 

Musterer called the police and, after a brief search, the suspect was arrested for allegedly committing two thefts totaling approximately $140, according to the Campbell Police Department.

The suspect is charged with three counts of defrauding an innkeeper and is scheduled to be arraigned next month, the Santa Clara District Attorney’s Office confirmed to Fox News Digital.

SEATTLE RESTAURANT SUFFERS 23RD BREAK-IN, OWNER SAYS AS HE ADMITS HE HAS ‘LOST ALL FAITH’ IN CITY LEADERSHIP

“No one likes to be taken advantage of,” Musterer said. “Whether it’s your money or someone else’s money, when you just see something like this happen you want to grab the bull by the horns and help solve the problem yourself.” 

Officials say the act of stealing from small businesses is not a victimless crime, and can have real-life repercussions for local business owners and their staff.  

“Dine-and-dash incidents create additional financial strains on restaurants that are already facing economic challenges,” Sam Toia, president of the Illinois Restaurant Association, told Fox News Digital. “I always say that before the pandemic, the restaurant industry used to be an industry of nickels and dimes. Post-pandemic, it’s turned into a business of pennies and nickels, and these dine-and-dash incidents are creating additional financial strains.” 

Incidents involving dining-and-dashing have drawn widespread attention as offenders are repeatedly stealing from the same location or posting about their crimes online.

‘MIDNIGHT SMASHERS’ SEEN RIPPING ATMS OUT OF SMALL BUSINESSES IN BRAZEN CRIME SPREE ON VIDEO

A few weeks after Musterer’s dine-and-dash incident, another group of thieves made headlines for walking out on the bill at a Chicago restaurant. 

Three women visiting the city’s Soul Vibez restaurant racked up a tab of over $200, ordering alfredo, chicken wings and multiple drinks while celebrating a birthday, Fox 32 first reported. 

After finishing their meal, the trio waited for their server to leave before ducking out of the restaurant, but not before reportedly posting a photo of their dinner on social media, tagging the restaurant and thanking them for the free food. 

Chicago police are investigating the incident and a police report has been filed, according to Fox 32. 

Soul Vibez and the Chicago Police Department did not immediately respond to Fox News Digital’s request for comment. 

TEXAS MAN CALLS 911 AFTER INJURING HIMSELF DURING ALLEGED CAR DEALERSHIP BREAK-IN

Instances involving restaurant visitors walking out on their bills have been on the rise since the pandemic, according to Toia. Those within the restaurant industry insist the uptick in dine-and-dash offenses can force businesses to offset the losses onto consumers, raising prices for those who do pay their tabs. 

“It doesn’t just hurt the restaurant owner, it also hurts the team members,” Toia said. “It hurts waitstaff, it hurts bus boys, it hurts bartenders. People come into restaurants for the food, but they come back because of the service. So if you don’t have happy waitstaff [because of] these dine-and-dash incidents, you make everyone unhappy and other customers are gonna feel it.” 

MAN ALLEGEDLY ATTEMPTS TO ROB UTAH BANK WITH NOTE ON STOLEN PAPER, CLAIMING HE HAS A BOMB: REPORT

Toia is asking communities to come together to protect small businesses and local workers while looking to the government to provide protection for owners who may not have the same amount of financial resources as more prominent chains. 

“Larger chains may be able to absorb some losses, [but] small and independent restaurants often don’t have the financial cushion to recover from the frequent theft,” Toia told Fox News Digital. “A single bad month could put an independent restaurant out of business, shutting them down for good.” 

CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP

As a restaurant owner, Musterer insists he is used to experiencing the downfalls of running a business, but the most heartbreaking part was watching how the crimes impacted his employees. 

“Unfortunately, as a small business owner, you’ve got to take your punches,” Musterer told Fox News Digital. “All these little things that happen are the cost of doing business, but when a server feels that, they’re not used to ‘running their own small business’ and having those challenges. So it definitely hurts them quite a bit.”