Trump may or may not issue a new EO on immigration
Or perhaps a new series of EOs:
“On background: to clarify, we could take the TRO to Supreme Court,” the statement read, referring to the lower court’s temporary restraining order against Trump’s travel ban. “We are reviewing all our options in the court system and confident we will prevail on the merits of the case. Additionally, we are actively pursuing other executive orders that will keep our country safe from terrorism.”
Trump himself, meanwhile, said aboard Air Force One that he has “a lot of other options” other than a Supreme Court appeal, “including just filing a brand new order.” He would not confirm whether that was his plan.
“It could very well be. I’d like to surprise you,” he said.
Indeed, he does.
But my hunch is that a new EO is in the works. There wouldn’t be much reason to appeal the TRO, for the simple reason that such an appeal would almost certainly end in a tie in the Supreme Court at this point. There’s no rush, because Trump can simply issue a new, more carefully thought out and finely-tuned EO that is more in line with the restrictions mentioned by the 9th Circuit (such as making the green card exemption explicit).
Here’s an interesting observation:
Trump said Friday he felt “totally confident” that there would be “tremendous security for the people of the United States.” He offered the assurance despite also claiming he had learned alarming new information about threats facing the nation.
“I’ve learned tremendous things that you could only learn, frankly, if you were in a certain position, namely president, and there are tremendous threats to our country,” Trump said. “We will not allow that to happen. I can tell you that right now. We will not allow that to happen.”
Trump critics would no doubt say that he’s fear-mongering. But I recall that, long before Trump ever began to campaign for the presidency in June of 2015 (seems a long time ago, doesn’t it?), I had read many observations about how sobering it must be to be elected president and suddenly become privy to all the classified information about security threats. Trump is no different in this regard.
John Hinderaker at Power Line suggested multiple EO’s and I wholeheartedly agree. John’s reason is that it prevents the Dems from obfuscating the issues in court.
Wasn’t it just the other month that Soetoro cut off Cubans — without a murmur from the MSM ?
Barry didn’t even offer a rationale.
Interesting article by Richard Fernandez mentions the possibility that a forceful blow on Mosul could result in ISIS fighters fleeing the town for safer havens, possibly including the seven
countriesfailed staes on the list that Obama drew up . . . which countries were the subjects of President Trump’s Executive Order. I had expected President Trump to take some strong kinetic action against ISIS early in his Presidency. Maybe the EO was issued in anticipation of the consequences.Fancy that. An administration that might consider consequences . . .
This is just purely anecdotal, so take it for what it is worth, but something caught my eye a couple of weeks back:
I go regularly to a Gold’s Gym here in Oak Ridge, TN, and have done so for the last 3 and 1/2 years. Until about two or three weeks ago, in the early afternoon two Hispanic people used to do the basic cleaning chores for the entire gym- things like refilling the liquid cleaning bottles, the hand-soap dispensers, vacuuming and mopping the floors. One was young man around 30 or so years old, and the second was middle-aged woman. My impression on watching them work was that it was mother and son. At some point in the last 2-3 weeks, both were replaced by two white as white can be cleaning people.
I didn’t really think anything of it until just the last day or so- I wonder if larger employers were put on notice about employing illegal immigrants after the inauguration.
If trump does issue a new EO (or many, as suggested above), let’s hope trump has learned something.
Seems to me there are other options that probably don’t require something so showy.
Are there not additional criteria that could be implemented to make the vetting “extreme”? Might accomplish much the same thing without an explicit travel “ban”.
Longer term – House refugees in Turkey or Jordan? After all, it was obama’s acceptance of refugees that precipitated this.
Over reliance on EOs will probably be more show and show-down. Great political theater, for a blue vs red team hot debate, I suppose.
It doesn’t matter how clear the statute is, it doesn’t matter whether all the t’s are crossed and the i’s dotted in the executive order, it doesn’t matter whether the Justice Department attorney is a blend of Daniel Webster, Abraham Lincoln, and Clarence Darrow, the District Court was going to issue that stay and the 9th Circuit was going to uphold it. It says in Proverbs (21:15) “when justice is done, it is a joy to the righteous. . .” Having appeared before them several times, I can say that in the 9th Circuit, when justice is done, it is a surprise to the righteous.
President Trump’s rather calm reaction to all of this indicates to me that an order restraining the EO was well-expected by the White House. In addition to the various strategies that have been discussed, there is also possible Congressional action to remove judicial reviewability (which Congress has plenary power to do) of actions taken under 8 USC 1182(f), as reviewability has been removed under a number of other sections of the US Code, including the Immigration and Naturalization Act.
Any strategy is fine with me, as long as we don’t get to President Trump repeating Andrew Jackson’s line about the Supreme Court: John Marshall has made his decision; now let him enforce it.”
“It doesn’t matter how clear the statute is, it doesn’t matter whether all the t’s are crossed and the i’s dotted … the District Court was going to issue that stay and the 9th Circuit was going to uphold it” – RS
If this is so true and inevitable, then why the h*ll did trump issue this EO?
Ah, yes, it must be 3-D chess! Yes, that’s it, obviously! ….
“an order restraining the EO was well-expected by the White House.”
How can one know this is true?…
“President Trump’s rather calm reaction to all of this indicates (so)”
Calm? Yeah, right! More like a middle – high schooler with a bit of a temper…
https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/827867311054974976
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/trump-returns-to-criticism-of-court-system-its-so-political/article/2614233
/sk
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Couldn’t be more of a blue vs red team argument.
How about we recognize trump and all his flaws and mistakes for what they are, and hold him accountable?
And, cheer him on for the good he actually does? (Such has many of his cabinet picks, and his SCOTUS pick)
I still can’t deal whether this is a big deal. If Trump calls a mulligan and issues another EO, what’s the harm?
Of course it doesn’t look good to have botched the first EO, but it’s not as bad as blowing a billion on a hot mess of a website and telling Ameircans they will love it.
But if it sets into motion a legal trainwreck that will take months or years to undo, that’s something else.
huxley:
I think the idea is that the ruling of the 9th becomes precedent unless overruled.
@Neo – I’m no expert, but it seems from the many details you posted, that this is all in something of an “incomplete” status.
Couple that with some contradictory rulings in other states, it is a good bet that this “precedent” is a relatively weak one.
Calling the first EO a “mulligan” (clever term), and issuing a new one with a stronger / tighter legal rationale (and well within Constitutional limitation) can push forward and “negate” that “precedent”, if challenged and won (which they’d seemingly have a higher chance of, if done right).
Admitting error and lessons learned would go a long way for trump (if he were to choose to do so), and, as huxley points out, would stand in sharp contrast to obama’s handling of the obamacare rollout.