A coalition of 16 states, including
California and New York, on Monday challenged President Trump in court
over his plan to use emergency powers to spend billions of dollars on
his border wall.
Read more: 16 States Sue to Stop Trump’s Use of Emergency Powers to Build Border Wall - The New York Times
The lawsuit is part
of a constitutional confrontation that Mr. Trump set off on Friday when
he declared that he would spend billions of dollars more on border
barriers than Congress had granted him. The clash raises questions over
congressional control of spending, the scope of emergency powers granted
to the president, and how far the courts are willing to go to settle
such a dispute.
The suit, filed in Federal District Court in San Francisco, argues that
the president does not have the power to divert funds for constructing a
wall along the Mexican border because it is Congress that controls
spending.
Xavier Becerra, the attorney general of California, said in an interview
that the president himself had undercut his argument that there was an
emergency on the border.
“Probably the best evidence is the president’s own words,” he said, referring to Mr. Trump’s speech on Feb. 15 announcing his plan: “I didn’t need to do this, but I’d rather do it much faster.”
The
lawsuit, California et al. v. Trump et al., says that the plaintiff
states are going to court to protect their residents, natural resources
and economic interests. “Contrary to the will of Congress, the president
has used the pretext of a manufactured ‘crisis’ of unlawful immigration
to declare a national emergency and redirect federal dollars
appropriated for drug interdiction, military construction and law
enforcement initiatives toward building a wall on the United
States-Mexico border,” the lawsuit says.
No comments:
Post a Comment