Daily Update | December 6, 2019
Karen Kadish // 12/6/19 //
The House begins drafting articles of impeachment. Law professors—including Versus Trump podcast guest Pam Karlan—testify before the Judiciary Committee. And the President asks the Supreme Court to prevent disclosure of his financial records.
IMPEACHMENT INQUIRY
The House of Representatives has begun drafting articles of impeachment. (NYT)
Legal interpretations of the Constitution and the standards of impeachability were examined in Congress during the testimony of four law professors. (Dorf on Law)
Phone logs in the impeachment inquiry report renew concerns about President Trump’s use of unsecured phones for sensitive communications, write Paul Sonne, Josh Dawsey, Ellen Nakashima and Greg Miller at The Washington Post.
Political lenses and biases are intertwined with the functioning of our entire legal system, not simply impeachment, suggests Michael C. Dorf on Dorf on Law.
A D.C. District Court judge held that while White House aides do not enjoy absolute immunity from Congressional subpoena, they can invoke privilege in declining to answer specific questions. (Lawfare)
Marsha Simonova at Lawfare analyzes the potential criminality of the obstruction of justice described in the House Intelligence Committee’s impeachment inquiry report.
TRUMP: INVESTIGATION AND LITIGATION
President Trump petitioned the Supreme Court asking the Court to prevent the disclosure of his financial documents to Congress. (Lawfare; SCOTUSblog; The Hill)
IMMIGRATION
A GAO Report showed that immigration-related prosecutions increased from 2017 to 2018. (ImmigrationProf Blog)
ICE bought North Carolina’s driver’s license records to track undocumented immigrants. (ImmigrationProf Blog)
President Trump’s attempted ban on admitting uninsured visa applicants violates parts of the Immigration and Nationalization Act as well as conflicts with the Affordable Care Act, writes Peter Margulies at Lawfare.
JUSTICE & SAFETY
The United States and Sudan have agreed to exchange ambassadors and upgrade diplomatic ties. (WaPo)
REMOVAL FROM OFFICE
Ambassador Gordon Sondland should be removed from his his offie based on his role in withholding military aid from Ukraine, writes Ryan Goodman at Just Security.