Now the migrant caravan people have taken the next step and filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration for what they say are violations of the Constitution.
From Newsweek:
The lawsuit, which targeted Trump, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen, Attorney General Jeff Sessions and the DHS itself, as well as other agencies and officials within the department, claimed that Trump’s threats were “shockingly unconstitutional,” according to the filing, which was published online by BuzzFeed News.
It was filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia in a joint effort by three separate U.S. firms: McFadden & Shoreman in Washington, D.C., Nexus Derechos Humanos Attorneys in Atlanta, and Williams Oinonen LLC in Atlanta.
“President Trump continues to abuse the law, including constitutional rights, to deter Central Americans from exercising their lawful right to seek asylum in the United States, and the fact that innocent children are involved matters none to President Trump,” the lawsuit stated.
It argued that if the Trump administration followed through on the president’s threats, it would be violating the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution, including the due process clause, which plaintiffs said applied to everyone in the U.S., including those who arrive on U.S. soil to seek asylum.
What is interesting is that these are people who are not on U.S. soil and people that Trump has taken NO ACTION against yet. How can you act unconstitutionally without acting at all?
If you read the lawsuit, it continually cites what Trump said and makes derivative conclusions about what he thinks, or what he intends. This has actually been successful in other lawsuits, but is on pretty shaky legal ground, as far as I understand it.
You can read it here:
BREAKING: Group of migrants travelling on foot from Honduras file federal lawsuit against Pres Trump and others. "Trump’s professed and enacted policy towards thousands of caravanners seeking asylum in the United States is shockingly unconstitutional." https://t.co/m79NT1Xci7
— Shannon Bream (@ShannonBream) November 2, 2018
I know that much of the right will reflexively say that non-U.S. citizens don’t have constitutional rights. I’m not sure that’s the case. At least for conservatives, we say that our rights come from God, and are recognized by the federal government. That would mean they also inhere in persons who are not U.S. citizens.
However, the second step is the tough one – even if non-citizen migrants have due process rights, those rights apply to laws that we determine for ourselves. If Trump changes the amnesty laws to change the process, then they don’t have much say in that matter.
In any case, much like the caravan in general, I think this lawsuit is just gonna piss off more people and help out Trump and Republicans in the midterms…