WASHINGTON (AP) – In an extraordinary public showdown, President Donald Trump fired the acting attorney general of the United States after she publicly questioned the constitutionality of his refugee and immigration ban and refused to defend it in court.
The clash Monday night between Trump and Sally Yates, a career prosecutor and Democratic appointee, laid bare the growing discord and dissent surrounding an executive order that halted the entire U. S. refugee program and banned all entries from seven Muslim-majority nations for 90 days. The firing, in a written statement released just hours after Yates went public with her concerns, also served as a warning to other administration officials that Trump is prepared to terminate those who refuse to carry out his orders.
Yates\u2019 refusal to defend the executive order was largely symbolic given that Sen. Jeff Sessions, Trump \u2019s pick for attorney general, will almost certainly defend the policy once he\u2019s sworn in. He\u2019s expected to be confirmed Tuesday by the Senate Judiciary Committee and could be approved within days by the full Senate.
Yet the firing reflected the mounting conflict over the executive order, as administration officials have moved to distance themselves from the policy and even some of Trump \u2019s top advisers have made clear that they were not consulted on its implementation.
As protests erupted at airports across the globe, and as legal challenges piled up in courthouses, Yates directed agency attorneys not to defend the executive order. She said in a memo Monday she was not convinced it was lawful or consistent with the agency\u2019s obligation \u201cto stand for what is right.\u201d
Trump’s press secretary, Sean Spicer , soon followed with a statement accusing Yates of having \u201cbetrayed the Department of Justice by refusing to enforce a legal order designed to protect the citizens of the United States.\u201d Trump named longtime federal prosecutor Dana Boente, the U. S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, as Yates\u2019 replacement. Boente was sworn in privately late Monday, the White House said, and rescinded Yates\u2019s directive.
The chain of events bore echoes of the Nixon-era \u201cSaturday Night Massacre,\u201d when the attorney general and deputy attorney general resigned rather than follow an order to fire a special prosecutor investigating the Watergate scandal. The prosecutor, Archibald Cox, was fired by the solicitor general.
Yates, a holdover from the Obama administration who was the top federal prosecutor in Atlanta and later became Loretta Lynch\u2019s deputy, was not alone in her misgivings.
At least three top national security officials – Defense Secretary Jim Mattis, Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly and Rex Tillerson, who is awaiting confirmation to lead the State Department – have told associates they were not aware of details of the directive until around the time Trump signed it. Leading intelligence officials were also left largely in the dark, according to U. S. officials.
Tennessee Sen. Bob Corker, the top Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said that despite White House assurances that congressional leaders were consulted, he learned about the order from the media.
Trump \u2019s order pauses America\u2019s entire refugee program for four months, indefinitely bans all those from war-ravaged Syria and temporarily freezes immigration from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. Federal judges in New York and several other states issued orders that temporarily block the government from deporting people with valid visas who arrived after Trump \u2019s travel ban took effect and found themselves in limbo.
Yates on Monday said that she had reviewed the policy and concluded that it was at odds with the Justice Department\u2019s mission. She said that though other lawyers in the department had reviewed the order, their review had not addressed whether it was \u201cwise or just.\u201d
\u201cI am responsible for ensuring that the positions we take in court remain consistent with this institution\u2019s solemn obligation to always seek justice and stand for what is right,\u201d Yates wrote in a letter.
Trump said the order had been \u201capproved\u201d by Justice Department lawyers. However, the department has said the Office of Legal Counsel review was limited to whether the order was properly drafted, but did not address broader policy questions.
White House spokesman Sean Spicer challenged those opposed to the measure to resign.
\u201cThey should either get with the program or they can go,\u201d Spicer said.
The blowback underscored Trump \u2019s tenuous relationship with his own national security advisers, many of whom he met for the first time during the transition.
Mattis, who stood next to Trump during Friday\u2019s signing ceremony, is said to be particularly incensed. A senior U. S. official said Mattis, along with Joint Chiefs Chairman Joseph Dunford, was aware of the general concept of Trump \u2019s order but not the details. Tillerson has told the president\u2019s political advisers that he was baffled over not being consulted on the substance of the order.
U. S. officials and others with knowledge of the Cabinet\u2019s thinking insisted on anonymity in order to disclose the officials\u2019 private views.
Despite his public defense of the policy, the president has privately acknowledged flaws in the rollout, according to a person with knowledge of his thinking. But he\u2019s also blamed the media – his frequent target – for what he believes are reports exaggerating the dissent and the number of people actually affected.
After a chaotic weekend during which some U. S. legal permanent residents were detained at airports, some agencies were moving swiftly to try to clean up after the White House .
Homeland Security, the agency tasked with implementing much of the refugee ban, clarified that customs and border agents should allow legal residents to enter the country. The Pentagon was trying to exempt Iraqis who worked alongside the U. S. and coalition forces from the 90-day ban on entry from the predominantly Muslim countries.
\u201cThere are a number of people in Iraq who have worked for us in a partnership role, whether fighting alongside us or working as translators, often doing so at great peril to themselves,\u201d said Navy Capt. Jeff Davis, a Pentagon spokesman.
On Capitol Hill, lawmakers in Trump’s party sought to distance themselves from the wide-ranging order.
While Spicer said \u201cappropriate committees and leadership offices\u201d on Capitol Hill were consulted, GOP lawmakers said their offices had no hand in drafting the order and no briefings from the White House on how it would work.
\u201cI think they know that it could have been done in a better way,\u201d Corker said of the White House .
___
Associated Press reporters Matthew Lee, Lolita C. Baldor, Erica Werner, Jonathan Lemire and Vivian Salama contributed to this report.
___
Follow Julie Pace at http:\/\/twitter.com\/jpaceDC
Copyright \u00a9 2017 The Washington Times, LLC.
Click to Read More
Click to Hide<\/p>\n

\n

\nSimilarity rank: 7.6\n<\/div>\n

Sentiment rank: -2.1<\/div>\n

\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n