Latest news with #Warof1812
Yahoo
5 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Courts to Trump: You can't teach old laws new tricks
It's become a familiar cycle: Donald Trump dusts off a long-settled law, reinterprets it and attempts to wield it in unprecedented, far-reaching ways. The courts slam the brakes, saying the president's creative reimagining is just plain illegal. It happened again this week — with an exclamation point — when two federal courts invalidated the central plank of Trump's economic agenda: a slate of emergency tariffs that spurred uncertainty across the globe. Both courts found that Trump severely exceeded his authority when he invoked a 1977 law as the legal basis for the tariffs. That law, the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, permits the president to impose tariffs on an emergency basis — but only in limited circumstances and for limited purposes. In the words of one judge, Trump broke with 'five decades' of practice by presidents who never claimed the power that Trump says IEEPA gives him. Both court rulings are on hold for now while the administration appeals. But they point to a broader strategy Trump has used in his effort to swiftly enact his second-term agenda: He repurposes old or obscure statutes, especially those that give presidents special powers during times of war or other national crises. Beyond the realm of tariffs, he's used the same playbook to try to supercharge his deportation program and to try to kneecap public-employee labor unions. One problem for Trump, though, is that courts are increasingly skeptical of Trump's claims about the supposed emergencies or national-security exigencies that he has claimed as justifications for deploying these seldom-used statutes. The White House insists it's the judges — not the president — who have gone rogue, routinely referring to courts that rule against the administration as activist or politically motivated. The roster of these purported wayward jurists includes judges appointed by every president since Ronald Reagan, including by Trump himself. 'There is a troubling and dangerous trend of unelected judges inserting themselves in the presidential decision-making process,' White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said during a press briefing Thursday. Others point out that the administration is relying on laws that have been used by presidents of the past — albeit in more limited ways that did pass muster in the courts. Trump's boldest attempt to exploit an old law for his own purposes is his invocation of the Alien Enemies Act of 1798. The founding generation enacted that law to help repel 'invasions' or 'predatory incursions' perpetrated by rival governments. At the time, a war with France loomed. And for more than two centuries, presidents invoked the law only three times: during the War of 1812 against British subjects, World War I against German immigrants and World War II against nationals of Japan, Germany, Italy and several other countries. Then, in March, Trump tried to wield it against alleged members of Tren de Aragua, a Venezuelan gang, so that he could deport them with little or no due process. The strategy immediately strained the definitions of 'invasion' and 'predatory incursion' envisioned by the framers. The courts noticed. 'There is nothing in the AEA that justifies a finding that refugees migrating from Venezuela, or TdA gangsters who infiltrate the migrants, are engaged in an 'invasion' or 'predatory incursion,'' U.S. District Judge Alvin Hellerstein ruled earlier this month. 'They do not seek to occupy territory, to oust American jurisdiction from any territory, or to ravage territory.' Hellerstein's ruling echoed similar decisions by judges in Colorado and Texas, who said Trump's reinterpretation of the old law exceeded his legal power. One judge, however, sided with Trump on that central question: U.S. District Judge Stephanie Haines, a Trump appointee from Pennsylvania, concluded that 'while the 'meaning' of a statute is fixed at its enactment, new 'applications' may arise in light of changes in the world.' She said the founders might have viewed foreign terrorist groups — the label Trump has given TdA — as capable of committing a 'predatory incursion.' In his bid to root out undocumented immigrants and criminalize their presence, Trump has also dusted off an 85-year-old statute aimed at requiring all immigrants in the country for more than 30 days — regardless of their legal status — to register with the federal government. The law, known as the Alien Registration Act, was passed shortly before the U.S. entered World War II. Its purpose was to discover foreigners who advocated for overthrowing the government, and it was later used against suspected communists. But it fell into disuse for decades — until Trump, in an executive order, instructed the Department of Homeland Security to issue new guidance and start enforcing the registration requirement. A federal judge in Washington, D.C. swept aside a challenge to this effort on procedural grounds. But a magistrate judge in Louisiana dismissed the first charges brought by the Trump administration under this statute, saying prosecutors had failed to show that the five targeted defendants were even aware of the requirement to register. The magistrate judge noted that the requirement, which was last reaffirmed by Congress in the 1950s, 'was essentially defunct and abandoned for the past 70 years.' The Trump administration is appealing the decision to a district court judge. Secretary of State Marco Rubio invoked yet another obscure statutory provision to target another group of immigrants: foreign-born pro-Palestinian academics at American universities. Rubio has used the provision to revoke the legal status of several prominent students and professors. The provision, adopted during a 1990 overhaul of immigration laws, gives the secretary of State the power to initiate the deportation of any immigrant if the secretary determines that the immigrant's presence could cause 'potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences.' The provision has been used just a handful of times since, and nearly always in cases that involved serious allegations of terrorism or subversive activities in the targets' home countries. Rubio, on the other hand, has deployed the provision to target campus activists who participated in anti-Israel protests. Rubio's letter revoking green cards or visas for Mahmoud Khalil, Mohsen Mahdawi, Rumeysa Ozturk and other people studying in the United States indicated that their conduct had been legal but that their continued presence and activities in the United States nevertheless 'would compromise a compelling U.S. foreign policy interest.' Federal judges who have weighed in on the effort have said Rubio's use of the provision appears to run afoul of the Constitution, punishing foreign students and academics for exercising free speech rights. The judge presiding over the case of Khalil, a recent Columbia University graduate student facing deportation, went further, noting this week that the provision used by Rubio was rooted almost entirely in concerns about people whose 'relevant conduct took place entirely abroad.' 'The legislative and enforcement history do not suggest … that removal might be sought in these circumstances,' U.S. District Judge Michael Farbiarz wrote. 'Rather, they underscore that a … removal of the kind at issue here is unprecedented.' Trump has also dredged up a rarely used power in federal labor law to try to strip most federal employees of collective-bargaining rights. The Civil Service Reform Act of 1978 gives the president the ability to exclude federal agencies from unionization rights if he determines that the agencies are primarily engaged in national-security work. Trump designated dozens of agencies and subdivisions — including the Departments of Agriculture, Health and Human Services, Justice and Veterans Affairs — as focused on national security. His directive threatens to remove collective bargaining from an estimated two-thirds of the federal workforce. U.S. District Judge Paul Friedman blocked Trump's move. 'The President's interpretation of 'national security' exceeds the scope of the meaning intended by Congress,' Friedman wrote. A panel of a federal appeals court, however, has put Friedman's ruling on hold while the administration appeals.
Politico
5 days ago
- Politics
- Politico
Courts to Trump: You can't teach old laws new tricks
It's become a familiar cycle: Donald Trump dusts off a long-settled law, reinterprets it and attempts to wield it in unprecedented, far-reaching ways. The courts slam the brakes, saying the president's creative reimagining is just plain illegal. It happened again this week — with an exclamation point — when two federal courts invalidated the central plank of Trump's economic agenda: a slate of emergency tariffs that spurred uncertainty across the globe. Both courts found that Trump severely exceeded his authority when he invoked a 1977 law as the legal basis for the tariffs. That law, the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, permits the president to impose tariffs on an emergency basis — but only in limited circumstances and for limited purposes. In the words of one judge, Trump broke with 'five decades' of practice by presidents who never claimed the power that Trump says IEEPA gives him. Both court rulings are on hold for now while the administration appeals. But they point to a broader strategy Trump has used in his effort to swiftly enact his second-term agenda: He repurposes old or obscure statutes, especially those that give presidents special powers during times of war or other national crises. Beyond the realm of tariffs, he's used the same playbook to try to supercharge his deportation program and to try to kneecap public-employee labor unions. One problem for Trump, though, is that courts are increasingly skeptical of Trump's claims about the supposed emergencies or national-security exigencies that he has claimed as justifications for deploying these seldom-used statutes. The White House insists it's the judges — not the president — who have gone rogue, routinely referring to courts that rule against the administration as activist or politically motivated. The roster of these purported wayward jurists includes judges appointed by every president since Ronald Reagan, including by Trump himself. 'There is a troubling and dangerous trend of unelected judges inserting themselves in the presidential decision-making process,' White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said during a press briefing Thursday. Others point out that the administration is relying on laws that have been used by presidents of the past — albeit in more limited ways that did pass muster in the courts. Trump's boldest attempt to exploit an old law for his own purposes is his invocation of the Alien Enemies Act of 1798. The founding generation enacted that law to help repel 'invasions' or 'predatory incursions' perpetrated by rival governments. At the time, a war with France loomed. And for more than two centuries, presidents invoked the law only three times: during the War of 1812 against British subjects, World War I against German immigrants and World War II against nationals of Japan, Germany, Italy and several other countries. Then, in March, Trump tried to wield it against alleged members of Tren de Aragua, a Venezuelan gang, so that he could deport them with little or no due process. The strategy immediately strained the definitions of 'invasion' and 'predatory incursion' envisioned by the framers. The courts noticed. 'There is nothing in the AEA that justifies a finding that refugees migrating from Venezuela, or TdA gangsters who infiltrate the migrants, are engaged in an 'invasion' or 'predatory incursion,'' U.S. District Judge Alvin Hellerstein ruled earlier this month. 'They do not seek to occupy territory, to oust American jurisdiction from any territory, or to ravage territory.' Hellerstein's ruling echoed similar decisions by judges in Colorado and Texas, who said Trump's reinterpretation of the old law exceeded his legal power. One judge, however, sided with Trump on that central question: U.S. District Judge Stephanie Haines, a Trump appointee from Pennsylvania, concluded that 'while the 'meaning' of a statute is fixed at its enactment, new 'applications' may arise in light of changes in the world.' She said the founders might have viewed foreign terrorist groups — the label Trump has given TdA — as capable of committing a 'predatory incursion.' In his bid to root out undocumented immigrants and criminalize their presence, Trump has also dusted off an 85-year-old statute aimed at requiring all immigrants in the country for more than 30 days — regardless of their legal status — to register with the federal government. The law, known as the Alien Registration Act, was passed shortly before the U.S. entered World War II. Its purpose was to discover foreigners who advocated for overthrowing the government, and it was later used against suspected communists. But it fell into disuse for decades — until Trump, in an executive order, instructed the Department of Homeland Security to issue new guidance and start enforcing the registration requirement. A federal judge in Washington, D.C. swept aside a challenge to this effort on procedural grounds. But a magistrate judge in Louisiana dismissed the first charges brought by the Trump administration under this statute, saying prosecutors had failed to show that the five targeted defendants were even aware of the requirement to register. The magistrate judge noted that the requirement, which was last reaffirmed by Congress in the 1950s, 'was essentially defunct and abandoned for the past 70 years.' The Trump administration is appealing the decision to a district court judge. Secretary of State Marco Rubio invoked yet another obscure statutory provision to target another group of immigrants: foreign-born pro-Palestinian academics at American universities. Rubio has used the provision to revoke the legal status of several prominent students and professors. The provision, adopted during a 1990 overhaul of immigration laws, gives the secretary of State the power to initiate the deportation of any immigrant if the secretary determines that the immigrant's presence could cause 'potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences.' The provision has been used just a handful of times since, and nearly always in cases that involved serious allegations of terrorism or subversive activities in the targets' home countries. Rubio, on the other hand, has deployed the provision to target campus activists who participated in anti-Israel protests. Rubio's letter revoking green cards or visas for Mahmoud Khalil, Mohsen Mahdawi, Rumeysa Ozturk and other people studying in the United States indicated that their conduct had been legal but that their continued presence and activities in the United States nevertheless 'would compromise a compelling U.S. foreign policy interest.' Federal judges who have weighed in on the effort have said Rubio's use of the provision appears to run afoul of the Constitution, punishing foreign students and academics for exercising free speech rights. The judge presiding over the case of Khalil, a recent Columbia University graduate student facing deportation, went further, noting this week that the provision used by Rubio was rooted almost entirely in concerns about people whose 'relevant conduct took place entirely abroad.' 'The legislative and enforcement history do not suggest … that removal might be sought in these circumstances,' U.S. District Judge Michael Farbiarz wrote. 'Rather, they underscore that a … removal of the kind at issue here is unprecedented.' Trump has also dredged up a rarely used power in federal labor law to try to strip most federal employees of collective-bargaining rights. The Civil Service Reform Act of 1978 gives the president the ability to exclude federal agencies from unionization rights if he determines that the agencies are primarily engaged in national-security work. Trump designated dozens of agencies and subdivisions — including the Departments of Agriculture, Health and Human Services, Justice and Veterans Affairs — as focused on national security. His directive threatens to remove collective bargaining from an estimated two-thirds of the federal workforce. U.S. District Judge Paul Friedman blocked Trump's move. 'The President's interpretation of 'national security' exceeds the scope of the meaning intended by Congress,' Friedman wrote. A panel of a federal appeals court, however, has put Friedman's ruling on hold while the administration appeals.
Yahoo
28-05-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Opinion - Keeping terrorists off Airbnb shouldn't undermine Americans' privacy
There's a certain irony in completing the financial surveillance procedures the government requires Airbnb to impose on its hosts. Right along with snapping and submitting a selfie for automatic verification against the required government-issued identification, Airbnb occasionally asks for a guest's country of citizenship, too. It is literally the United States, but is it really the United States? In so many ways, we have become a banal pseudo-security state that betrays our founding ideals. Sure, 'the land of the free and the home of the brave' has always been self-flattering and aspirational. The line was lent to our national anthem from Francis Scott Key's poem, 'Defence of Fort M'Henry,' recalling the War of 1812. That war involved actual death, destruction and threats to the territorial integrity of the United States. The English captured Washington and burned the Capitol before American victories at Baltimore and Plattsburgh set the British back. Andrew Jackson led American forces in repelling a British attack on New Orleans. If you could transport the minds and collective spirit of those Americans to this day, would they have meekly submitted their data to administrative security systems that treat them as prospective suspects in relatively pitiable crimes and wrongs? There is a lot packed into such a broad question. Let's sharpen it through the language of risk management. In true wars, the nation-state suffers existential risk, literal threats to control of its territory. How we scope conflicts has a lot to say about such things, but arguably there has not been a threat of that direct significance to the U.S. since, well, the War of 1812. The two World Wars triggered an expansive sense of our national interest, which is now on the outs. Perhaps the threat of nuclear war counted as an existential threat — global annihilation, in that case, until the Soviet Union fell. When terrorism brought itself into sharp focus a quarter century ago, we figuratively declared a figurative war on it, which, for all the incoherence of fighting a strategy, has been a substantial success. Witness the implicit downgrade terrorism has suffered through the addition of drug cartels to the ranks of 'terrorists.' Doing so keeps the category alive. Many meanings can be poured into the recently declassified word salad called the 'Strategic Implementation Plan for Countering Domestic Terrorism.' Mine is that the domestic terrorism threat is low enough that we can use it to push AmeriCorps. Financial surveillance under the Bank Secrecy Act came into existence out of concern for tax evasion through Swiss bank accounts. Because Congress delegated broad authority in that statute, bureaucratic hands have molded financial surveillance to meet every moment, including making it a part of the counterterrorism arsenal when our politics called for that. The title of this post is a risk manager's absurdity. Terrorists don't use Airbnb to gain an advantage over our society, not to an extent worth spending time and compromising America's privacy and digital security. But Airbnb is every bit a part of the financial surveillance infrastructure. Our security state has become utterly banal. With security benefits vanishingly small, the threats are somewhat sizable. Up front might be the identity fraud risk bestowed on every Airbnb host now that they have submitted key identity documents digitally to yet another database. There is the remote but plausible risk that mass financial surveillance will be turned over to the use of government control in our uncertain future. We have only to look to China's 'social credit' system to see what that looks like. There are many ways to think about all this. One is that our society has not matured into its media environment. Access to imagery from every big auto accident is available nationwide. Any urban explosion we can now see from six different angles. Those dynamics make us white-knuckled exaggerators of security risk. Our politicians and bureaucrats have every reason to indulge us and try to drive risk, impossibly, to zero. In their media environment, there is essentially no incentive to man up and put security threats in perspective. I say 'man up' in the non-gender-specific sense, of course, because it could as easily be a leading woman who calls out the absurdities and tells our nation to grow a pair. But I look forward to the day when we put aside false machismo addressed to inflated threats, cancel misdirected domestic surveillance programs and stand tall, the soil under our feet again constituting a land of the free and home of the brave. Jim Harper is a nonresident senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, focusing on privacy issues. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
The Hill
28-05-2025
- Politics
- The Hill
Keeping terrorists off Airbnb shouldn't undermine Americans' privacy
There's a certain irony in completing the financial surveillance procedures the government requires Airbnb to impose on its hosts. Right along with snapping and submitting a selfie for automatic verification against the required government-issued identification, Airbnb occasionally asks for a guest's country of citizenship, too. It is literally the United States, but is it really the United States? In so many ways, we have become a banal pseudo-security state that betrays our founding ideals. Sure, 'the land of the free and the home of the brave' has always been self-flattering and aspirational. The line was lent to our national anthem from Francis Scott Key's poem, 'Defence of Fort M'Henry,' recalling the War of 1812. That war involved actual death, destruction and threats to the territorial integrity of the United States. The English captured Washington and burned the Capitol before American victories at Baltimore and Plattsburgh set the British back. Andrew Jackson led American forces in repelling a British attack on New Orleans. If you could transport the minds and collective spirit of those Americans to this day, would they have meekly submitted their data to administrative security systems that treat them as prospective suspects in relatively pitiable crimes and wrongs? There is a lot packed into such a broad question. Let's sharpen it through the language of risk management. In true wars, the nation-state suffers existential risk, literal threats to control of its territory. How we scope conflicts has a lot to say about such things, but arguably there has not been a threat of that direct significance to the U.S. since, well, the War of 1812. The two World Wars triggered an expansive sense of our national interest, which is now on the outs. Perhaps the threat of nuclear war counted as an existential threat — global annihilation, in that case, until the Soviet Union fell. When terrorism brought itself into sharp focus a quarter century ago, we figuratively declared a figurative war on it, which, for all the incoherence of fighting a strategy, has been a substantial success. Witness the implicit downgrade terrorism has suffered through the addition of drug cartels to the ranks of 'terrorists.' Doing so keeps the category alive. Many meanings can be poured into the recently declassified word salad called the 'Strategic Implementation Plan for Countering Domestic Terrorism.' Mine is that the domestic terrorism threat is low enough that we can use it to push AmeriCorps. Financial surveillance under the Bank Secrecy Act came into existence out of concern for tax evasion through Swiss bank accounts. Because Congress delegated broad authority in that statute, bureaucratic hands have molded financial surveillance to meet every moment, including making it a part of the counterterrorism arsenal when our politics called for that. The title of this post is a risk manager's absurdity. Terrorists don't use Airbnb to gain an advantage over our society, not to an extent worth spending time and compromising America's privacy and digital security. But Airbnb is every bit a part of the financial surveillance infrastructure. Our security state has become utterly banal. With security benefits vanishingly small, the threats are somewhat sizable. Up front might be the identity fraud risk bestowed on every Airbnb host now that they have submitted key identity documents digitally to yet another database. There is the remote but plausible risk that mass financial surveillance will be turned over to the use of government control in our uncertain future. We have only to look to China's 'social credit' system to see what that looks like. There are many ways to think about all this. One is that our society has not matured into its media environment. Access to imagery from every big auto accident is available nationwide. Any urban explosion we can now see from six different angles. Those dynamics make us white-knuckled exaggerators of security risk. Our politicians and bureaucrats have every reason to indulge us and try to drive risk, impossibly, to zero. In their media environment, there is essentially no incentive to man up and put security threats in perspective. I say 'man up' in the non-gender-specific sense, of course, because it could as easily be a leading woman who calls out the absurdities and tells our nation to grow a pair. But I look forward to the day when we put aside false machismo addressed to inflated threats, cancel misdirected domestic surveillance programs and stand tall, the soil under our feet again constituting a land of the free and home of the brave. Jim Harper is a nonresident senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, focusing on privacy issues.
Yahoo
27-05-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Memorial Day: Central Texas events honor fallen service members
The Brief Communities across Central Texas held Memorial Day events The events honored fallen service members going as far back as the American Revolution AUSTIN, Texas - Communities across Central Texas honored fallen service members at various Memorial Day events. What we know In East Austin, the Thankful Hubbard Chapter of the National Society of the Daughters of the American Revolution (NSDAR) and the Patrick Henry Chapter of Sons of the American Revolution (TXSAR) held their Memorial Day Service, which has been happening every year since 2007. They honored those who gave the ultimate sacrifice, including two Revolutionary War soldiers buried at the Texas State Cemetery. The two soldiers are Lt. Robert Rankin and Sgt. Stephen Williams. Williams also fought in the War of 1812 and the Texas War of Independence. His eulogy was given by a descendant of his. Over the weekend, the groups placed 3,200 flags on all the gravesites. What they're saying "We want to have this available for the public to come out and memorialize those who have passed in battle," Joseph Howell Burton, president of the Patrick Henry chapter of TXSAR said. What we know Cook-Walden/Capital Parks Funeral Home and Cemetery in Pflugerville hosted its annual Memorial Day ceremony in the newly established Patriot Garden. What they're saying Veterans took time to connect and reflect. "The Marine Corps really changed my life big time. It taught me how to survive, discipline, and how to be a father, a son, et cetera," veteran Jim Newman said. "Memorial Day to us is just remembering veterans that have gone before us and that we survived in order to remember their names." What we know Round Rock also had a ceremony at Old Settlers Park. "Memorial Day is not just another holiday. It is a commitment. It's a commitment to remember, to reflect, and to ensure that the sacrifice of our fallen heroes and their families are never forgotten," Major General Michael McCurry with Army Futures Command said. "These were not just soldiers, sailors, airmen, marines, and coast guardsmen. They were sons and daughters, husbands and wives, fathers and mothers. They were people with plans for the future with laughter and love to share, who instead gave everything for us." Memorial Day is also a time to honor Gold Star families. "Your loss is immeasurable," McCurry said. The Source Information in this report comes from reporting/interviews by FOX 7 Austin's Angela Shen
