Your point is well taken as to in personam jurisdiction reaching defendants’ conduct outside the U.S. I take the administration’s argument (if there is one) to be that returning these aliens to the U.S. (especially if it involves a new flight) is a different *type* of action that is outside the authority of an Article III court to compel.
Is there a colorable jurisdictional argument to be made along those lines? Or does this just go to the “merits” of issuing the injunction? This to me is the central question.
Your point is well taken as to in personam jurisdiction reaching defendants’ conduct outside the U.S. I take the administration’s argument (if there is one) to be that returning these aliens to the U.S. (especially if it involves a new flight) is a different *type* of action that is outside the authority of an Article III court to compel.
Is there a colorable jurisdictional argument to be made along those lines? Or does this just go to the “merits” of issuing the injunction? This to me is the central question.
Side note but I think you need to distinguish between civil and criminal contempt. Walker governs criminal contempt
… but in the civil context if the order is invalidated the contemnor os absolved. See Shuttlesworth v Birmingham.