Trump just got a 'warning sign' from courts on his key issue: legal analyst
MSNBC legal analyst Lisa Rubin thinks the 9th Circuit court is issuing the Trump administration a warning with their latest ruling.
“In April,” anchor Mika Brzezinski said, “transportation secretary Sean Duffy notified states they could lose funding if they did not cooperate with immigration enforcement officers, sparking lawsuits from 20 states.”
She went on to say, “But a chief district judge in Rhode Island ruled yesterday the department lacked authority to require states to cooperate to obtain the money, and that the White House provided no plausible connection to the purposes intended for the funding, which is to support highways and bridges and other projects.”
Brzezinski turned it over to Sam Stein for his thoughts.
“Well, I mean, obviously a big win for Trump,” Stein said. He then asked Rubin if the ruling was “going to be limited to transportation funding, or does the federal judge's ruling have any applicability to other federal funds?” He added, “In other words, can Trump turn around, say, okay, fine, I'll restrict some healthcare funds from a state then?”
Rubin said, “I think, you can take it as a warning sign, but one that doesn't necessarily have direct application to other agencies, especially since this is just a single decision of a district judge in Rhode Island with respect to that particular case before him involving Secretary Duffy, and the fact that these states weren't as cooperative as the administration wants them to be with ICE enforcement.”
She added, “So if I were the administration, I'd take it as a little bit of a warning sign, but not necessarily. A blanket disapproval for the larger strategy of trying to condition funding in other areas on other immigration enforcement operations."
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