Ryan Hayward,  //  4/3/17  //  Daily Update

The Attorney General and Secretary of Homeland Security have criticized the California Chief Justice for objecting to federal immigration enforcement near state courthouses. President Trump's advisors have submitted financial disclosures that raise extensive conflict of interest concerns. Trump has signed two executive orders relating to international trade. Environmental groups have challenged Trump's approval of the Keystone XL Pipeline. A federal judge has ruled that a suit against President Trump for inciting violence at a campaign rally may proceed. And there have been new developments in the investigation surrounding Russia, Trump, and Michael Flynn.

IMMIGRATION

The fate of President Obama’s Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) immigration program is uncertain, explains Leah Litman on Take Care.

• A DACA designee arrested in an Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raid last week tells his story (ACLU).

Attorney General Jeff Sessions and Secretary of Homeland Security John F. Kelly chastised California’s Chief Justice for her claim that federal immigration agents were “stalking” local courthouses (NYT, Washington Post).

• Here is the officials’ letter to the chief judge.
• The Department of Justice is seeking a greater role in immigration enforcement (Washington Post).
• Perceived legal risk is preventing California’s sheriffs from fully complying with ICE requests, report Joel Rubin and Paloma Esquivel (LA Times).
• At Volokh Conspiracy, David Post responds to readers’ arguments in an update to a post in which he had proposed rebranding “sanctuary cities” as “constitutional cities.”

A likely future of reduced immigration from Mexico makes the current debate about building a border wall “at least a decade out of date,” argues John Cassidy (New Yorker).

According to a new report, a dearth of government-funded legal assistance is making it difficult for otherwise-eligible immigrants to remain in the United States (Washington Post).

Scholars argue that immigration reform legislation passed in 1996 “paved the way” for President Trump’s deportation policy (Salon).

Fear is causing immigrants near the U.S. border to spread unsubstantiated warnings about immigration enforcement, according to Domingo Martinez (NYT).

Rudy Giuliani did not admit that President Trump’s original entry ban was a “Muslim ban,” argues David Bernstein (Washington Post).

CIVIL RIGHTS

A lawsuit seeking to prevent a transgender student from using a particular bathroom is “based on a dubious reading of Title IX,” argues Lisa Needham (Rewire).

President Trump’s proposed budget would cut tens of millions in funding for HIV research and prevention, notes Andrea Levario (Human Rights Campaign).

A lawyer who highlighted Hillary Clinton’s role in defending an accused child rapist has been tapped for a key civil rights position at the Department of Education (Washington Post).

The election of President Trump has rightfully accelerated adoption of encrypted messaging services, explains Max Read (NYT).

DEMOCRACY

Reversing the decline of American constitutional democracy requires an active “democracy agenda,” argues Daniel P. Tokaji on Take Care.

Despite President Trump’s and other Republicans’ claims of a large voter conspiracy, the evidence shows it doesn’t exist (Politico).

• A growing movement by states to require voter ID is “fundamentally flawed,” argues Joshua A. Douglas at Governing.

President Trump’s behavior is “so outrageous it appears un-American,” argues John Dean at The Verdict.

JUSTICE & SAFETY

A recent decline in incarceration rates is threatened by the Trump Administration, argues Brandon Garrett (Slate).

• At Sentencing Law and Policy, Douglas A. Berman expresses disappointment that the Slate piece “fails to directly confront the tangible increase in violent crime over the last few years.”

Wikileaks’ disclosure of CIA cyber-tools threatens to reveal the agency’s involvement in major international cyber hacking operations (Washington Post).

The EU and Attorney General Jeff Sessions have begun discussions on handling international warrants for data (The Hill).

Members of Congress are considering consolidating the Department of Homeland Security’s cybersecurity efforts into one operational agency (The Hill).

CONFLICTS OF INTEREST

Judge Curiel granted final approval to a $25 million settlement in a fraud case against President Trump for the seminars and materials offered through Trump University (NYT, WSJ, WaPo).

• Judge Curiel wrote in his opinion that the settlement was fair and represented a fair deal with an “extraordinary amount of recovery” for former students.

The Chinese government has established a back channel to the Trump administration through Jared Kushner, reports Mark Landler (NYT).

The New York Times and Washington Post published a list of highlights from financial disclosure forms of President Trump’s advisors released Friday (NYT, WaPo).

• Eric Lipton and Jesse Drucker report that experts agree Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner, whose financial disclosure form was released Friday, are facing a legal and ethical minefield of potential conflicts of interest (NYT).

• The NYT Editorial Board surveys and describes the administration officials most likely to use public office for private gain (NYT); the NYT also documents sources of wealth for Steve Bannon, Gary Cohn, and Kellyanne Conway (NYT).

• Matea Gold, Rosalind S. Helderman, and Amy Brittain document the wealth of President Trump’s top aides (WaPo).

Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin apologized to the Office of Government Ethics for promoting The Lego Batman Movie at a recent public appearance (WSJ).

• The movie was produced by a film company that Secretary Mnuchin founded and from which he promised to divest assets within four months of his confirmation.

REGULATION

President Trump signed two executive orders Friday, intended to combat what the President views as unfair trade practices that damage the U.S. economy (WSJ).

• The orders can be found here and here.

• Although Trump did not sign the executive orders at the signing ceremony (WaPo), he reportedly signed them later (WSJ).

President Trump lacks plenary power to regulate Indian Affairs, Seth Davis argues at Take Care.

Environmental groups have filed two separate suits in federal court in Montana against President Trump’s approval of the Keystone XL pipeline (Reuters).

• In one suit, groups including the Sierra Club and the Center for Biological Diversity argue that approval of construction of the pipeline violates the National Environmental Policy Act.

• In the other suit, the Indigenous Environmental Network and North Coast Rivers Alliance seeks injunctive relief to restrain TranCanada from taking any action that would harm the “physical environment in connection with the project pending a full hearing on the merits” (Reuters).

President Trump’s climate change executive order does not withdraw the U.S. from the Paris Climate Agreement, nor does it start a process to repeal the EPA’s endangerment finding on carbon emissions, notes Jeremy Carl (National Review).

The Office of the Inspector General and the Scientific Integrity Officer at the EPA are reviewing whether Administrator Scott Pruitt violated agency policy when he questioned whether carbon dioxide is a primary contributor to global warming, reports Max Greenwood (The Hill).

RULE OF LAW

At Rewire, Imani Gandy and Jessica Mason Pieklo examine whether Summer Zervos can sue President Trump in state court for defamation.

• President Trump’s lawyers have filed documents asking the New York trial court to decide whether it can hear a lawsuit filed against a sitting president.

CHECKS AND BALANCES

A federal judge has ruled President Trump’s words at a campaign rally, “get ‘em out of here,” may have incited violence against the protesters to whom he referred (WaPo).

• The opinion can be found here.
• At Lawfare, Paul Rosenzweig considers the implications of the judge’s refusal to dismiss the suit against President Trump and recommends that the President consider settling it.

• Ruthann Robson summarizes the ruling (Constitutional Law Prof Blog).

RUSSIAN INTERFERENCE

The White House is struggling to handle the Russia controversy and also push its policy agenda forward, report David Nakamura and Ashley Parker at the Washington Post.

• President Trump has continued his efforts to focus attention away from his administration’s connections with Russia and toward “leakers” (WaPo).
• Emmarie Huetteman and Matthew Rosenberg have compiled a timeline of the “Trump surveillance drama” (NYT).
• Representative Adam Schiff, the top Democrat on the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI), has accused the White House of trying to distract from a Congressional investigation into potential Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election (WaPo).
• Representative Elijah E. Cummings has called upon Chairman Nunes of the HPSCI to recuse himself from the “Russia-Trump” investigation.

• Nikki Haley, the U.S. Ambassador to the U.N., insisted she is taking a tough stance on Russia despite the ongoing controversy (WaPo, WSJ).

Michael Flynn submitted a new version of his government financial disclosure form last week, which included payments from three Russian-linked entities he did not list on his initial disclosure form in February (NYT, WSJ, WaPo).

• President Trump tweeted his support for immunizing Michael Flynn in exchange for Russia-related testimony (WSJ).
• At Politico, Phillip Carter analyzes why Michael Flynn may be seeking immunity.
• In light of Michael Flynn’s recent request, Paul Rosenzweig investigates the concept of immunity (Lawfare).
• At Just Security, Alex Whiting posits Michael Flynn’s immunity request was made because he has no good information to offer prosecutors.
• Andrew Kent argues Michael Flynn’s immunity request is based not on fear of jail time, but rather seeks to gain maximum advantage from public interest in his testimony (Lawfare).
• Devlin Barrett explains that immunity requests such as this one are rarely granted (WaPo).

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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