The Justice Department on Wednesday submitted the first application in the 30-year history of the Alien Terrorist Removal Court, a secretive tribunal Congress created in 1996 but that no administration had ever activated.

The single-page petition, posted on the court’s website, does not name the individual the government is seeking to deport. It asks the court to authorize removal of a foreign national the administration classifies as an “alien terrorist,” the statutory term for the court’s jurisdiction.

Chief Judge Joan Ericksen, a federal judge in Minnesota who leads the five-member panel, responded in a written order stating that the court held a hearing Thursday. She wrote that during the hearing the court raised “questions about the nexus that the government alleges between the actions of the respondent and the specific sections and subsections it invokes with respect to those actions.”

“The answers persuaded the Court that the Government could benefit from the opportunity for more thoughtful consideration,” Ericksen wrote.

The court was established by Congress in 1996. Until last week, it had never received a petition. The identity of the individual whose case prompted the first petition remains sealed.