You’re fired! Trump tells top US lawyer
Yates defied Muslim travel ban
US PRESIDENT Donald Trump has fired top federal government lawyer Sally Yates after she took the extraordinarily rare step of defying the White House and refused to defend new travel restrictions targeting seven Muslim-majority nations.
It was another dramatic twist in the unusually raucous roll-out of Trump’s directive that put a 120day hold on allowing refugees into the US, an indefinite ban on refugees from Syria and a 90-day bar on citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen.
The Friday night ban prompted protests and chaos at airports at the weekend as customs officials struggled to put the order into practice.
The fallout also spread to US markets on Monday, where stocks suffered their biggest drop of the year and companies affected by the change spoke out against it.
Yates said the Justice Department would not defend the order against court challenges, as she did not believe it would be “consistent with this institution’s solemn obligation to always seek justice and stand for what is right”.
Hours later, she was fired. The White House said Yates “has betrayed the Department of Justice by refusing to enforce a legal order designed to protect the citizens of the United States” and portrayed her actions as political.
Trump has argued tougher vetting of immigrants is needed to protect America from terror attacks, but critics complain that his order unfairly singles out Muslims and defiles America’s historic reputation as a welcoming place for immigrants.
Yates, an appointee of former President Barack Obama, was days away from being replaced by Trump’s pick for the top spot at the Justice Department, Republican Senator Jeff Sessions, who is awaiting Senate confirmation.
“Ms Yates is an Obama administration appointee who is weak on borders and very weak on illegal immigration,” the White House said.
The White House said that Dana Boente, US Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, was sworn in and would be acting US attorney-general until Sessions is approved.
Boente told the Washington Post that he would enforce the immigration order.
There have been only a handful of instances in US history of top Justice Department officials publicly breaking with the White House.
The most famous was in 1973, when then-attorney-general Elliot Richardson and his deputy resigned rather than obey President Richard Nixon’s order to fire a special prosecutor investigating the Watergate scandal. The incident, which became known as the “Saturday Night Massacre,” was a public relations disaster and is seen as a turning point in Nixon’s administration.
The drama at the Justice Department is another sign of how hastily Trump’s immigration order was developed and how little it was reviewed by the agencies now grappling to implement it.
The White House said key government officials were briefed before Trump signed the order on Friday, but there was little co-ordination, resulting in confusion. Most State Department officials found out about it from media reports.
Officials from the State Department circulated a draft memo of dissent on Monday, saying Trump’s move would hurt America’s image abroad and inflame anti-American sentiment. White House spokesman Sean Spicer dismissed the memo. “These career bureaucrats have a problem? They should either get with the programme or they can go.”
An internal Homeland Security document showed 348 visa holders were kept from boarding US-bound flights this week, and more than 200 denied entry to the US. More than 735 people were questioned by US customs officers at airports, including 394 green card holders, who are legal permanent residents of the US.