Michael Jordan’s “Jump Man” logo was reported as one of the symbols that the Trump administration links to members of the Venezuelan gang.
Officials of immigration and customs application (ICE) identified “extraterrestrial enemies” by distinguishing those who wore the “number 23” of Jordan linked to its old team, the Chicago Bulls, as potentially members of the Gang Tren of Aragua (ADD).
The “validation guide for extraterrestrial enemies”, the control list aims to indicate to ICE if the individual must be expelled under the law on extraterrestrial enemies of 1798, a rarely used statue that Trump invoked to justify mass deportations. But the lawyers repel the “unjust” criteria and urging a federal judge to extend his block on the law in wartime.
The guide identifies ADD members based on a point system. It attributes different values to certain characteristics. Tattoos or “dress known to indicate allegiance to ADD” have four points. But the guide also puts a red alert on Michael Jordan-Esque Merch, some of the best-selling outfits in the history of the NBA.
The legend of basketball was widely dragged into it after the guide reported his classic symbol – a silhouette of a man making a slam dunk on number 23, which is Jordan’s jersey number – as a suspect.
Individuals are also suspects if they put on “high -end urban street clothes”. They could “promote the Chicago Bulls basketball jersey”, Jordan Jerseys with the emblematic number “23”, or sneakers with the “Jump Man” logo.
Other warnings have been put on tattoos of AK-47 or words “real hasta the muerte”, a widely used sentence that the government translated by “until death” but is often translated by “real to death” and associated with authenticity. The other tattoos listed include trains, stars and clocks.
Ice is also looking for “sports outfits of American professional sports teams with Venezuelan nationals on them”. Anyone with eight points is “validated” as ADD members, while those with six or seven could be in the gang.
There was a repression. An intelligence document separated from the intelligence and operations center in the Customs and Border Protection El Paso noted that “Chicago Bulls hold, clocks and rose tattoos are generally linked to Venezuelan culture and not to a definitive indicator of being a member or associated ADD.”
The signifiers were also deemed unfair by the lawyers of the American Civil Liberties Union and Democracy Forward Foundation. A Friday file was carried out on behalf of five men who are in police custody and faced with expulsion. He asked the district judge James Boasberg to extend his temporary block on the Extraterrestrial Enemies Act.
Chicago immigration officials drew attention to the defective reasoning of the guide, indicating that “wearing a Chicago Bulls jersey, in particular a Michael Jordan jersey, as a TDA marker – without any doubt that the Bulls are the home team and Michael Jordan was one of the largest chicago stars.
A spokesman for the Ministry of Internal Security on Monday told Bloomberg that the agency “had in-depth intelligence assessments to determine if an individual was a member of one of these vicious gangs”.
“These terrorists are a threat to national security and security of the Americans,” said the spokesperson. “The premise that these people are not gang members are based on defective hypotheses.”
The deposit comes as the US government faces the federal judges that Trump described as “unleashing” or even “radical crazy” to block his decrees. One of the most stormy tests occurred after Trump invoked the law of 1798 on March 15 to steal alleged gang members at an El Salvador prison which holds men ‘marks as terrorists, despite Boasberg’s decision.
