Daily Update | March 19, 2018
Attorney General Jeff Sessions fired Andrew McCabe, the deputy director of the FBI. McCabe kept contemporaneous memos on his interactions with President Trump; he has given those memos to Special Counsel Robert Mueller. North Korean, South Korean, and U.S. officials will hold unofficial talks in Finland ahead of an expected U.S.-North Korean summit by the end of May. The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court of Review—the highest of the surveillance review courts—held that outside groups have a right to argue for access to sealed information from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court. President Trump made senior staff sign nondisclosure agreements meant to last beyond his presidency.
IMMIGRATION
Immigration advocates and the ACLU have accused the Trump administration of targeting activities that criticize its harsh immigration policies, writes Immigration Prof on ImmigrationProf Blog.
CIVIL RIGHTS
The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court of Review—the highest of the surveillance review courts—held that outside groups have a right to argue for access to sealed information from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (Buzzfeed).
- The per curiam opinion is available here.
The Connecticut Supreme Court is considering whether to throw out a case against Remington, a leading maker of AR-15 rifles, brought by families of Sandy Hook victims (WSJ).
DEMOCRACY
Trump campaign consultants, voter-profiling company Cambridge Analytica, harvested private information from the Facebook profiles of more than 50 million users (NYT).
- Cambridge Analytica also had dealings with Russian interests (NYT).
- After this story was published, Facebook came under harsh criticism from lawmakers in the United States and Britain (NYT).
Stormy Daniels’ effort to talk about her affair with Donald Trump is better protected by the First Amendment than by contract law, writes Mark Graber for Balkinization.
- President Trump’s legal team filed to remove the case from California state court to federal district court in Los Angeles (The Hill).
The Supreme Court’s delay in taking action on the new Pennsylvania voting map is “quite unusual,” notes Rick Hasen at Election Law Blog.
- This inaction has left Pennsylvanians—voters, state officials, and candidates—unsure about how to proceed, writes Lyle Denniston at LyleDenLawNews.
Kris Kobach, the driving force behind President Trump’s voter fraud commission, struggled to defend a Kansas voting law in court, wrote the New York Times Editorial Board.
JUSTICE & SAFETY
North Korean, South Korean, and U.S. officials will hold unofficial talks in Finland ahead of an expected U.S.-North Korean summit by the end of May (WSJ).
In a December phone call with Saudi Arabia’s King Salman, President Trump asked for $4 billion in postwar aid to hasten the U.S. exit from Syria (WaPo).
Most U.S. administrations have focused on North Korea’s nuclear danger, but the Trump administration has also stepped up pressure on North Korea’s human rights abuses—this makes sense and confronting North Korea requires calling it out on human rights, writes Andrew Yeo at Lawfare.
Chinese hackers are targeting the U.S. maritime industry, cybersecurity firm FireEye said Friday (The Hill).
REGULATION
The Trump administration seems to have it out for California; Ann Carlson, writing for LegalPlanet, asks whether Scott Pruitt will challenge California’s vehicle emissions standards.
RULE OF LAW
Attorney General Jeff Sessions fired Andrew McCabe, the deputy director of the FBI (NYT, WSJ).
- The firing took place two days before McCabe’s expected retirement, leaving McCabe’s pension benefits in doubt.
- McCabe wrote that his firing was intended to undermine Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation.
- President Trump’s lawyer, John Dowd, said that Rod Rosenstein should shut down the Mueller investigation, later clarifying that he was only speaking for himself (WaPo).
- Even if McCabe committed wrongdoing worthy of firing, he was likely fired over the Russia investigation, writes Michael Dorf at Dorf on Law.
- The president's personal intervention and public demands for McCabe to be fired taint the merits of the subsequent action against McCabe, write Quinta Jurecic and Benjamin Wittes at Lawfare.
- Sessions’ decision to fire McCabe appears to violate Sessions’ promise, made under oath before the Senate Judiciary Committee, to recuse himself from such matters, writes Ryan Goodman at Just Security.
McCabe kept contemporaneous memos on his interactions with President Trump; he has given those memos to Special Counsel Robert Mueller (NYT, WSJ, WaPo).
- Responding on Twitter to this news, President Trump called McCabe’s memos “Fake Memos” (WSJ).
On Twitter, President Trump assailed the Mueller investigation (NYT).
- This was the first time Trump mentioned Mueller by name.
- President Trump’s tweets were “error-filled,” writes Glenn Kessler for the Washington Post.
To President Trump, “Law and order” is about the preservation of a certain social order, not the rule of law, writes Chris Hayes at the New York Times.
President Trump boasted that he had invented a fact during a conversation with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau of Canada (NYT).
President Trump made senior staff sign nondisclosure agreements meant to last beyond his presidency, writes Ruth Marcus for the Washington Post.
Tags:
Immigration Rule of Law Regulation Democracy Civil Rights Justice & Safety