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Members of Congress<\/span> expressed outrage at U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement for deceiving eight men who were recently deported to South Sudan<\/a>, as revealed earlier this week in an investigation<\/a> by The Intercept. Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., called the expulsions \u201cabhorrent.\u201d<\/p>\n Before the men boarded a plane in May, officials told them that they were being sent on a short trip from Texas to another ICE facility in Louisiana. Many hours later, the plane landed in Djibouti.<\/p>\n The men \u2014 convicted criminals who had already served significant prison sentences \u2014 were held in a shipping container for weeks, shackled at the legs, on a U.S. military base in Djibouti<\/a>. This past weekend, they were expelled\u00a0to the violence-plagued nation of South Sudan.<\/p>\n The ICE deception revealed by The Intercept highlights the lengths to which the U.S. government will go to further its anti-immigrant agenda and deport people to so-called third countries to which they have no connections.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u201cTrump\u2019s ICE treats immigrants as less than human, and this is a prime example,\u201d said Rep. Pramila\u00a0Jayapal, D-Wash., who has been a leading voice<\/a> on the expulsion of immigrants from the U.S. to third countries, and called ICE\u2019s behavior \u201cbeyond cruel.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cTrump\u2019s ICE treats immigrants as less than human, and this is a prime example.\u201d <\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/figure>\n Jayapal added: \u201cYes, any person convicted of serious crimes should be held accountable \u2014\u00a0but Trump has decided to violate due process rights and ship immigrants to South Sudan, a country so dangerous that the U.S. State Department currently has a \u2018Do Not Travel\u2019 warning for it. Third country deportations with no due process are wrong, period, and we will keep fighting these illegal actions in court.\u201d<\/p>\n Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., also called out the government for its deception. \u201cWhat ICE did to these men is a flagrant violation of international law and basic human decency,\u201d she told The Intercept. \u201cLying to people about where they\u2019re being taken and secretly deporting them to a country that is in the midst of war and they have no ties to is cruel.\u201d<\/p>\n Rep. Delia Ramirez, D-Ill., called out President Donald Trump and Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem for \u201cblatantly lying to our neighbors as they disappear them to offshore prisons\u201d and for flouting the rule of law, due process, and the Constitution. She called on Noem to resign.<\/p>\n While the eight<\/span> men\u00a0were in transit in May \u2014\u00a0thinking they were heading to Louisiana, but in fact en route to Africa \u2014\u00a0a federal judge intervened. Citing a prior nationwide injunction requiring the administration to give deportees advance notice of their destination and a \u201cmeaningful\u201d chance to object if they believed they\u2019d be in danger of harm, the eight men were not flown directly to South Sudan but were instead diverted to Djibouti<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n