A court ruling has cleared the way for extradition, but the decision now turns political – and whether the prime minister steps in to protect an Australian citizen.

The Federal Court has denied Australian citizen Dan Duggan’s appeal of former attorney general Mark Dreyfus’ 2024 decision to greenlight his extradition to the US on 2017 charges alleging he illegally trained Chinese military pilots. And while it’s understood the Trump White House has been sniffing around about getting its hands on him, our prime minister could still save the father-of-six.

Federal Court Justice James Stellios dismissed Duggan’s appeal on Thursday, 16 April 2026. Duggan’s main contention was that the 2017 District Court of Columbia grand jury indictment didn’t contain a “qualifying extradition offence”, as per section 22 of the Extradition Act 1988 (Cth), because the actions that supposedly comprised a crime in the US weren’t unlawful here at time of commission.

This involves the legal principle of ‘dual criminality’, which subsection 19(2)(c) of the Extradition Act explains, involves the conduct that a foreign country seeks to extradite an Australian over having to be considered a criminal offence here as well.

Duggan argued that the treaty governing US-Australian extradition requires dual criminality to exist at the time of the alleged offending, but the judge found this wasn’t the case.

This saga has gone on for more than 1,270 days, according to Dan’s wife Saffrine. Duggan was arrested in October 2022 and has been remanded on no local charges ever since. The first Trump administration issued the indictment, but it was progressed under the Biden administration in 2022. And Dan is now set to be extradited to the whims of the authoritarian second Trump administration.

Following the decision, Duggan’s legals said their client now has 28 days to appeal this decision, which ultimately involved appealing the 2024 decision of NSW Local Court Magistrate Daniel Reiss to permit extradition. But Duggan’s legal defence seem more focused on highlighting the potential for PM Anthony Albanese to intervene........

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