Trump Tweets Judges ‘Must Not’ Rule On Cases Involving Border Security
On Thanksgiving morning, while millions of Americans prepared for a large meal with last-minute prepping to their turkeys and side dishes, President Donald Trump continued to lambaste Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts.
Roberts had suggested comments made by Trump yesterday were out of line, namely that the president’s complaint of an “Obama judge” overruling his administration’s new restrictions on immigrants seeking asylum. Roberts defended judges and justices, per previous reporting from the Inquisitr, as being independent of the chief executives who appointed them.
That didn’t sit well with Trump, who chastised Roberts in tweets hours later. Taking aim at the Ninth Circuit Court specifically, which was the court where his rules on asylum were struck down, Trump disagreed with Roberts’ assertions.
“Please study the numbers, they are shocking,” Trump wrote. “We need protection and security – these rulings are making our country unsafe! Very dangerous and unwise!”
On Thursday, he continued his criticisms of Roberts and suggested in his tweets that judges “must not” rule on cases that involve national security concerns with regard to the country’s borders, or elsewhere, for that matter. Trump further implied that judges’ rulings on such issues threatened America’s safety.
“Justice Roberts can say what he wants, but the 9th Circuit is a complete & total disaster,” Trump wrote, according to reporting from NBC News.
Trump, ripping into Roberts, says judges make 'our Country unsafe' https://t.co/H584EuurZ3
— NBC News (@NBCNews) November 22, 2018
Trump went on.
“Judges must not Legislate Security and Safety at the Border, or anywhere else. They know nothing about it and are making our Country unsafe. Our great Law Enforcement professionals MUST BE ALLOWED TO DO THEIR JOB! If not there will be only bedlam, chaos, injury and death. We want the Constitution as written!”
Trump also wrote in his tweets about the Ninth Circuit Court that judges there specifically have “a horrible reputation,” where cases are “overturned more than any Circuit in the Country.”
Many fact-checking sites have in the past refuted some of the comments Trump made in his tweets. PolitiFact, for instance, pointed out last year (in comments pundit Sean Hannity made that were similar to Trump’s complaints this week) that the Ninth Circuit Court is not the circuit court that overturns the most cases. Two other circuits, the Sixth and the 11th, overturn cases presented to them at a much higher rate than the Ninth.
Trump would also appear to be wrong on his statement alleging that federal judges have no business ruling on cases involving immigration or national security, at least on the basis of precedent that has been sent. Immigrants themselves are entitled to certain rights in our government, whether they’re documented or not, according to PBS News Hour, and the courts have been recognizing those rights for well over a century.
Many took issue with Trumps’ remarks Thursday morning on Twitter. Neal Katyal, a law professor and a former Acting Solicitor General of the United States, suggested that Trump’s real beef wasn’t with the specific court that ruled against him. Trump’s goal “is to delegitimize the courts (and the Chief Justice) because they, like the media and like DOJ, are an institution that serves as a check & balance against his impulsivity and reckless disregard for the rule of law,” Katyal wrote in a tweet.
