, Helen Klein Murillo  //  4/14/17  //  Daily Update

President Trump signed into law a bill that will allow states to withhold federal funding from reproductive health organizations, in particular targeting Planned Parenthood. Analysis of President Trump’s Syria strike continues. The Government Accountability Office will investigate President Trump’s transition. British intelligence agencies intercepted communications between President Trump’s associates and Russian officials during the 2016 Election. And President Trump announced he no longer opposes the Export-Import Bank.

IMMIGRATION

Two new advisors in Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) have anti-immigration views and ties alarming to immigration advocates, explains Auditi Guha (Rewire).

• Meanwhile, President Trump’s naming of a pro-immigration economist to lead the Council of Economic Advisers has some of Trump’s more anti-immigration base concerned (ImmigrationProf Blog).

Children who have had parents detained or deported rallied in North Carolina on Wednesday to ask Governor Roy Cooper to speak out against Trump Administration policies, writes Tina Vasquez (Rewire).

An advocacy group has filed a complaint with the Department of Homeland Security alleging rising sexual assault and harassment in immigration detention facilities (ImmigrationProf Blog).

• The complaint can be found here.
• Meanwhile, the Administration is seeking to reduce protections for detainees in order to entice more local law enforcement to make their jails available as spillover detention facilities (NYT).
• Likewise, the Administration is proposing speeding the hiring process for Borden Patrol agents by forgoing some polygraph tests that have traditionally been required for all hires (NYT).

A decorated Army veteran is facing deportation due to a felony drug conviction but trying to fight it by obtaining a pardon, highlights P.S. Ruckman, Jr. (Pardon Power).

A new lawsuit challenges President Trump’s border wall on environmental grounds (ImmigrationProf Blog).

• The complaint can be found here.

Reporting around the joint North American World Cup 2026 bid might indicate some intriguing policy shifts on NAFTA and assurances around the travel ban, speculates Kit Johnson (ImmigrationProf Blog).

CIVIL RIGHTS

President Trump signed into law a bill, aimed at Planned Parenthood in particular, that allows states to deny funding to Title X clinics (NYT).

• The new law threatens to deny access to quality, affordable health care for millions, argues Christine Grimaldi (Rewire).
• ICYMI: Leah Litman analyzed possible legal challenges to the bill last week for Take Care.

DEMOCRACY

The severe income inequality that contributed to President Trump’s victory in November represents a failure of the American political system, argues Kate Andrias (ACSblog).

• Andrias’s piece is part of the ACSblog symposium, The Future of the U.S. Constitution, all of which is available here.

Justice Gorsuch’s position in voting rights cases at the Supreme Court will be especially consequential given Attorney General Jeff Sessions’s unwillingness to combat restrictive voting laws, argues Tierney Sneed (Talking Points Memo).

• Jessica Mason Pieklo likewise analyzes Justice Gorsuch’s possible impact on upcoming free speech cases (Rewire).

JUSTICE & SAFETY

Analysis of President Trump’s Syria strike continues.

• Ilya Somin examines partisan bias in the reaction to President Trump’s Syria strike (Volokh Conspiracy).
• Jens David Ohlin posits that arguments against humanitarian intervention, such as the U.S. strike in Syria, tend to ignore principles beyond reducing international armed conflict (Opinio Juris).
• Congressional silence and mixed signals on the intervention in Syria is an abdication of constitutional responsibility to weigh in, thereby contributing to meaningful limits on presidential power, argues Chris Edelson (ACSblog).
• The Trump Administration risks making a bad situation in Syria even worse if it fails to develop a strong long-term plan, notes Ammar Abdulhamid (Lawfare).

Signals that the Trump Administration may leave a global anti-corruption initiative may portend the end of U.S. involvement in many similar international agreements, argues Amelia Evans (Just Security).

Trump Administration policies that make some communities less safe in the name of “national security” invite us to rethink the concept and scope of “national security” issues, argues Shirin Sinnar (ACSblog).

CONFLICTS OF INTEREST

The Government Accountability Office will investigate President Trump’s transition, with a particular focus on spending, financial disclosure, and communications with foreign governments (Wash Post).

President Trump’s numerous conflicts hurt America’s credibility in the world, argues Andy Kroll and Russ Chuma at Mother Jones.

REGULATION

President Trump’s campaign promise to dismantle the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau may not come to fruition given the agency’s popularity, speculates Deepak Gupta and Jonathan Taylor on Take Care.

President Trump’s waffling on cost-sharing reductions for the Affordable Care Act is a deliberate and careless tactic, argues Nick Bagley and Rachel Sachs on Take Care.

• Meanwhile, the Trump Administration released a rule trying to stabilize the health insurance markets by tweaking the special enrollment periods (The Hill, LA Times).
• Democrats responded to President Trump’s threat to withhold cost-sharing reductions by saying the payments will be a main focus during spending negotiations in late April (Politico, The Hill).
• Negotiations are ongoing among Republicans to repeal the Affordable Care Act (The Atlantic).
• Ronald Brownstein, at The Atlantic, reports on opposition the Trump Administration has faced in repealing Medicaid Expansion from centrist Republicans.
• Centrist Republicans also oppose changing the Affordable Care Act’s Community Rating, a key-provision to protect persons with pre-existing health conditions (The Hill).

At the Department of Labor, non-political staffers are in “open rebellion” over the Trump Administration’s attempts to revoke the fiduciary rule, claims the Wall Street Journal Editorial Board.

President Trump announced he no longer opposes the Export-Import Bank (WSJ).

• David Graham, at The Atlantic,argues that President Trump’s changed position on the Export-Import Bank is just one example of recent changes that should call us to question his credibility.
• Politico speculates President Trump may be moving toward more business-friendly, moderate policies.
• Chris Cilizza, at CNN, believes President Trump’s changed positions are normal course of his negotiation tactics.

Scott Pruitt, Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, visited a coal mine to announce the “war on coal” was over (The Hill).

• Pruitt also announced he believes the United States should exit the Paris Climate Agreement, putting him at odds with other Administration officials (Inside Climate News).

FEDERALISM

President Trump signed a law nullifying an Obama Administration rule that will allow states to withhold federal funding from reproductive health organizations (NYT, WSJ).

RUSSIAN INTERFERENCE

British intelligence agencies intercepted communications between President Trump’s associates and Russian officials during the 2016 Election,reports CNN.

• The Guardian reports such evidence shows “specific concrete and corroborative evidence of collusion.”

Given all of the Russian connections within President Trump’s team, are there too many to be coincidental, asks Jennifer Rubin at The Washington Post.

• Senator Mark Warner, the lead Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, views the Russia investigation as the most important work of his career (Politico).

And that's our update today!  Thanks for reading.  We cover a lot of ground, so our updates are inevitably a partial selection of relevant legal commentary.  

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