BORDER/IMMIGRATION/SUPREME COURT/TRUMP AS PRESIDENT/WALL: “Thirty minutes into an off-the-cuff defense of his decision to declare a national emergency to help build his border wall, President Donald Trump made an admission that may have handed ammunition to legal opponents of the move. Trump, who has long described the situation on the Southwest border as a ‘crisis’ and an ‘invasion,’ appeared to suggest his administration had all the time it needed to build the hundreds of miles of border barrier he has demanded for months…Trump’s opponents, including a number of groups and officials suing the administration over the national emergency, pounced on the president’s candid remarks and said they appeared to undermine his claims of an urgent problem on the southern border…A bevy of groups lining up to challenge Trump’s national emergency are likely to rely on the quote to suggest the ’emergency’ is a fiction. Federal courts closely studied Trump’s own words and tweets to pick apart the administration’s argument that the travel ban the president signed in early 2017 wasn’t targeted at mostly Muslim countries.But in a decision upholding the ban, the Supreme Court said it had to consider not only Trump’s statements but also ‘the authority of the presidency itself’ in reviewing his actions.”
–John Fritze and Michael Collins, “‘I didn’t need to do this.’ Critics say Trump quote undercuts national emergency for border wall,” USA Today, February 26, 2019 8:52 am