President Trump’s restrictions on travelers from terrorist-supporting countries was thrown out by the courts. So new restrictions were drawn up that avoided the court’s objections. It too was thrown out, so now the ban is being taken up by the Supreme Court.
Once again, though, President Trump is his own worst enemy. He fired off tweets criticizing his own people for “watering down” the first executive order, which his staff revised in an effort to get his ban approved. Furthermore, the president tweeted reasoning that undercuts the arguments being made by his own Justice Department, which is trying to defend Trump’s ban before the courts.
President Donald Trump accused his own Justice Department on Monday of watering down his temporary travel ban on people from several predominantly Muslim countries, potentially hurting his case in the Supreme Court on the matter.
In a series of early morning Twitter messages, Trump returned to the issue of the travel ban that he raised immediately after an attack in London on Saturday night that killed 7 people and wounded 48.
Legal experts said Trump’s tweets could complicate his legal team’s defense of the ban, since they contradict some of the arguments the government’s lawyers are making in court. . . .
“The Justice Dept. should have stayed with the original travel ban, not the watered down, politically correct version they submitted to S.C.,” Trump tweeted, referring to the country’s highest court.
“The Justice Dept. should ask for an expedited hearing of the watered down travel ban before the Supreme Court – & seek much tougher version!”
Federal courts struck down Trump’s first temporary travel ban, an executive order he issued a week after taking office on Jan 20. To overcome the legal hurdles, he replaced it with a new order in March. The second ban was also put on hold by courts. . . .
The revised order removed language barring legal permanent residents and a clause that protected religious minorities. It also removed Iraq from the list of targeted countries.
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