Daily Update | April 24, 2018
As the Supreme Court prepares to hear oral argument in litigation challenging the Trump Administration’s “Muslim ban,” the Department of Homeland Security is moving ahead with plans to establish a National Vetting Center that is supposed to establish tighter restrictions on screening foreigners. The Department of Education has shut down dozens of investigations into complaints of racial discrimination in school discipline. Thousands of Puerto Rican families displaced by Hurricane Maria have had to repeatedly face deadlines that would cut off federal assistance in providing temporary housing. The Senate Foreign Relations Committee signaled its approval of Mike Pompeo’s nomination as Secretary of State, following a late intervention by President Trump.
TRUMP: INVESTIGATIONS AND LITIGATION
Flight records show that Donald Trump spent two days in Moscow during the 2013 Miss Universe pageant, contradicting his claim to then-FBI Director James Comey that he did not spend the night, reports Venon Silver in Bloomberg.
IMMIGRATION
As the Supreme Court prepares to hear oral argument in litigation challenging the Trump Administration’s “Muslim ban,” the Department of Homeland Security is moving ahead with plans to establish a National Vetting Center that is supposed to establish tighter restrictions on screening foreigners, reports Nick Miroff in the Washington Post.
- The evidence that religious animus against Muslims motivated the travel ban is all out in the open, writes Eric Rothschild at ACS Blog.
- If the Court decides that Trump’s campaign statements can’t be used as evidence of religious animus, it would set a dangerous precedent, argues Ilya Somin in Reason.
- The Court should keep in mind the legacy of Korematsu as the Trump Administration argues that the judiciary should defer to the president in this area, argues David Cole in the New York Review of Books.
- The Court should reject the government’s “national security exceptionalism” argument, write Ingrid Brunk Wuerth and Ganesh Sitaraman in Take Care.
- The government’s claim that the president’s article II power provides the legal justification for the travel ban does not withstand scrutiny, writes Peter Margulies in Lawfare.
- The travel ban violates the separation of powers, write Thomas H. Kean, John Danforth, and Carter Phillips in the New York Times.
- The case raises important questions about the value of “global” lower-court injunctions, writes Marty Lederman in Take Care.
Under the Trump Administration, the United States is admitting far fewer Muslim refugees, and fewer Muslim immigrants overall, writes David Bier in the Cato at Liberty blog.
CIVIL RIGHTS
The Department of Education has shut down dozens of investigations into complaints of racial discrimination in school discipline, reports Annie Waldman in ProPublica.
The Justice Department has not made clear whether it will make funds available to help address wandering among people with developmental disabilities, despite the recent passage of legislation authorizing such funding, writes Hannah Lang in DisabilityScoop.
DEMOCRACY
This week, the Supreme Court will hear arguments on Texas’ appeal of a lower-court ruling that found the state discriminated against black and Hispanic voters when drawing its congressional and state house maps, writes Alexa Ura in the Texas Tribune.
Our current legal system doesn’t afford an adequate opportunity for whistleblowers to defend leaks of national security secrets on First Amendment grounds, argues David Schulz in Balkinization.
The Electronic Privacy Information Center filed a lawsuit under FOIA against the Federal Trade Commission to push for the release of biennial privacy assessments that Facebook agreed to submit pursuant to a 2011 consent agreement with the FTC (The Hill).
JUSTICE & SAFETY
Thousands of Puerto Rican families displaced by Hurricane Maria have had to repeatedly face deadlines that would cut off federal assistance in providing temporary housing, reports Molly Hennessey-Fiske in the Los Angeles Times.
A judge’s recent ruling blocking the U.S. government from transferring a dual U.S.-Saudi citizen, without his consent, from military custody in Iraq, to Saudi custody in Saudi Arabia, raises fascinating questions, writes Robert Chesney in Lawfare.
- Read the unsealed opinion here.
Recent events have demonstrated that the Trump Administration’s decision to close the Office of the Special Envoy for Guantanamo Closure at the Department of State was a poor one, argues Benjamin R. Farley in Just Security.
The recent joint American-British-French airstrikes against the Assad regime can be justified as a matter of international law as a humanitarian intervention, writes Jennifer Trahan in Opinio Juris.
- Kevin Jon Heller responds.
The United States must consider the consequences for U.S.-supported forces on the ground before deciding to withdraw from Syria, argues Nadim Houry in Just Security.
There are signs that an Obama-era program to resettle Guantanamo detainees in certain countries is beginning to break down, perhaps as a consequence of the dysfunction that has characterized the State Department under the Trump Administration (NYT).
CONFLICTS OF INTEREST
The FCC’s general counsel says that Republican commissioners did not violate federal ethics rules by attending the Conservative Political Action Conference, writes Harper Neidig in The Hill.
REGULATION
The Department of Health and Human Services has issued new rules for funding programs to prevent teenage pregnancy that favor those that promote abstinence while not requiring as rigorous evidence of effectiveness as under the Obama Administration, Pam Belluck reports in the New York Times.
The Trump Administration’s regulatory budget constraint may help improve agency cost–benefit analysis, but the long-term impact remains uncertain, writes Susan Dudley in The Regulatory Review.
The Second Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the Trump Administration cannot delay increasing the penalties under the Transportation Department’s Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) program, writes Timothy Cama in The Hill.
A new Senate report details major failures in FEMA’s contracting procedures in its response to Hurricane Maria, Peter Tyler writes in the Project on Government Oversight blog.
RULE OF LAW
The Justice Department deserves credit for maintaining consistency in resisting President Trump’s efforts to subvert the rule of law, argue Cameron Smith and Norman Eisen in USA Today.
CHECKS & BALANCES
Proposed legislation that would protect Special Counsel Robert Mueller from being fired might very well not be constitutional, writes Adam Serwer in The Atlantic.
The case of Lucia v. SEC, concerning whether administrative law judges are “officers” or “employees” of the United States, may offer a clue as to how the Supreme Court would respond to President Trump firing Mueller, argues Peter M. Shane in The Atlantic.
- Jennifer Mascott lays out the issues in the case in Notice & Comment.
- Robert Barnes summarizes the oral argument in the Washington Post.
The Senate Foreign Relations Committee signaled its approval of Mike Pompeo’s nomination as Secretary of State, following a late intervention by President Trump (NYT).
RUSSIAN INTERFERENCE
The United States signalled a willingness to soften sanctions on a Rusal, a Russian metals conglomerate, that were imposed in response to Russian interference in the 2016 election (Bloomberg).
Tags:
Immigration Rule of Law Conflicts Checks & Balances Regulation Democracy Civil Rights Justice & Safety Russian Interference