Trump Declares National Emergency at the Southern Border

 

Fox News reports:

President Trump said Friday he is declaring a national emergency on the southern border, tapping into executive powers in a bid to divert billions toward construction of a wall even as he plans to sign a funding package that includes just $1.4 billion for border security. “We’re going to confront the national security crisis on our southern border … one way or the other, we have to do it,” Trump said in the Rose Garden.

The text of the Executive Order declaring a national emergency has been made available at Whitehouse.gov:

The current situation at the southern border presents a border security and humanitarian crisis that threatens core national security interests and constitutes a national emergency. The southern border is a major entry point for criminals, gang members, and illicit narcotics. The problem of large-scale unlawful migration through the southern border is long-standing, and despite the executive branch’s exercise of existing statutory authorities, the situation has worsened in certain respects in recent years. In particular, recent years have seen sharp increases in the number of family units entering and seeking entry to the United States and an inability to provide detention space for many of these aliens while their removal proceedings are pending. If not detained, such aliens are often released into the country and are often difficult to remove from the United States because they fail to appear for hearings, do not comply with orders of removal, or are otherwise difficult to locate. In response to the directive in my April 4, 2018, memorandum and subsequent requests for support by the Secretary of Homeland Security, the Department of Defense has provided support and resources to the Department of Homeland Security at the southern border. Because of the gravity of the current emergency situation, it is necessary for the Armed Forces to provide additional support to address the crisis.

NOW, THEREFORE, I, DONALD J. TRUMP, by the authority vested in me by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, including sections 201 and 301 of the National Emergencies Act (50 U.S.C. 1601 et seq.), hereby declare that a national emergency exists at the southern border of the United States, and that section 12302 of title 10, United States Code, is invoked and made available, according to its terms, to the Secretaries of the military departments concerned, subject to the direction of the Secretary of Defense in the case of the Secretaries of the Army, Navy, and Air Force. To provide additional authority to the Department of Defense to support the Federal Government’s response to the emergency at the southern border, I hereby declare that this emergency requires use of the Armed Forces and, in accordance with section 301 of the National Emergencies Act (50 U.S.C. 1631), that the construction authority provided in section 2808 of title 10, United States Code, is invoked and made available, according to its terms, to the Secretary of Defense and, at the discretion of the Secretary of Defense, to the Secretaries of the military departments. I hereby direct as follows:

Section 1. The Secretary of Defense, or the Secretary of each relevant military department, as appropriate and consistent with applicable law, shall order as many units or members of the Ready Reserve to active duty as the Secretary concerned, in the Secretary’s discretion, determines to be appropriate to assist and support the activities of the Secretary of Homeland Security at the southern border.

Sec. 2. The Secretary of Defense, the Secretary of the Interior, the Secretary of Homeland Security, and, subject to the discretion of the Secretary of Defense, the Secretaries of the military departments, shall take all appropriate actions, consistent with applicable law, to use or support the use of the authorities herein invoked, including, if necessary, the transfer and acceptance of jurisdiction over border lands.

Sec. 3. This proclamation is not intended to, and does not, create any right or benefit, substantive or procedural, enforceable at law or in equity by any party against the United States, its departments, agencies, or entities, its officers, employees, or agents, or any other person.

IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this fifteenth day of February, in the year of our Lord two thousand nineteen, and of the Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and forty-third.

DONALD J. TRUMP

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  1. Max Ledoux Coolidge
    Max Ledoux
    @Max

    Trump has already declared 3 national emergencies, so this is his 4th declaration. No one cared about the previous ones. Yet some people are saying Trump is setting a dangerous precedent with this declaration. That’s complete nonsense. In fact, Trump is following precedent. Trump also last year (July 27, 2018) renewed a national emergency declaration first issued by George W. Bush in 2007, which states it’s in the national interest of the United States to protect the national sovereignty (I.E. borders) of Lebanon.

    • #1
  2. DonG Coolidge
    DonG
    @DonG

    The Title 10 Section 284 powers are stronger than the Emergency powers he has available to him.  Maybe he is getting bad advice.  Maybe he is selling out the working class.  My advice is to figure out how to join the ruling elite, because everyone else is not represented by our three branches of govt.

    • #2
  3. Manny Coolidge
    Manny
    @Manny

    I’m completely on board.  It is a national emergency.  

    • #3
  4. Sweezle Inactive
    Sweezle
    @Sweezle

    Trump’s news conferences (?) generally confuse me on more than one point. This one leaves me wondering why he is talking about Congress giving him too much money & not mentioning or being asked about signing the Border Wall Funding Bill. Did I miss something? He is one complicated slick dude. 

     

    • #4
  5. D.A. Venters Inactive
    D.A. Venters
    @DAVenters

    Max Ledoux (View Comment):

    Trump has already declared 3 national emergencies, so this is his 4th declaration. No one cared about the previous ones. Yet some people are saying Trump is setting a dangerous precedent with this declaration. That’s complete nonsense. In fact, Trump is following precedent. Trump also last year (July 27, 2018) renewed a national emergency declaration first issued by George W. Bush in 2007, which states it’s in the national interest of the United States to protect the national sovereignty (I.E. borders) of Lebanon.

    No one is saying the president can’t use the power at all, or hasn’t before.  But how many of the previous declarations were obvious end-runs around Congress involving a decades old, very divisive, political dispute, where nothing particularly new or emergent has occurred?  Using an emergency declaration under those circumstances absolutely does set a new precedent.

    Everyone knows this is an attempt to use a specious interpretation of a statute, to use it in a way it was not meant to be used, to get something the president could not get through ordinary channels.  To say otherwise is just denying the obvious or gaslighting.

    The president is doing exactly what the Democrats want him to do here.  He’s getting something of little actual value policy-wise, nothing that will actually do much to prevent illegal immigration Democrats like, dividing his own party, and setting precedent they will enjoy when they eventually get back in the white house.

    • #5
  6. Fred Cole Inactive
    Fred Cole
    @FredCole

    Max Ledoux (View Comment):
    No one cared about the previous ones.

    Were the three previous ones contentious?

    Did he issue the three previous ones to be able to spend money on something Congress had just specifically denied him funds for?

    • #6
  7. Fred Cole Inactive
    Fred Cole
    @FredCole

    Manny (View Comment):

    I’m completely on board. It is a national emergency.

    If this is such an emergency, why wait until now?

    • #7
  8. Unsk Member
    Unsk
    @Unsk

    The workings of the Republican Leadership in Congress have left Trump no choice.  The Republican Leadership colluded with the Anti-American Democrats to declare war on the American People. Trump should not sign this latest budget deal. It is a disastrous sell out. Here are some of it’s nifty provisions courtesy of Mark Krikorian at National Review:

    “[T]he news that the Dems agreed to $1.375 billion for the construction of “primary pedestrian fencing” (i.e., high barriers, not the low ones intended simply to stop vehicles, in places where there’s none now) seemed like a win.

    It’s not. That’s because the bill allows the fencing to be built only in the Rio Grande Valley Sector in South Texas. It’s surely needed there, but real barriers are also needed elsewhere, such as the parts of the Arizona or New Mexico borders where there’s only vehicle fencing.

    But the Democrats had a reason for this limitation. The bill states:

    [paraphrase: Fencing can only be built with the permission of local mayors]

    In other words, local governments would have an effective veto over whether barriers would be constructed. And which party controls all local government in South Texas? Go ahead, look it up, I’ll wait. Rio Grande City is the least Democratic community in the area, and even there voters supported Hillary Clinton in 2016 by more than three to one.”

    and then there is this:

    “The second poison pill is even worse. Section 224 states:

    None of the funds provided by this act…may be used by the Secretary of Homeland Security to place in detention, remove, refer for a decision whether to initiate removal proceedings, or initiate removal proceedings against a sponsor, potential sponsor, or member of a household of a sponsor or potential sponsor of an unaccompanied alien child.

    In other words, this would mean that ICE cannot detain or remove anyone who has effectively any relationship with an “unaccompanied” minor — either because they’re sponsors, in the same household as sponsors, or even just “potential sponsors” (or in the household of potential sponsors!) of such a child.”

    Every Republican connected to this sellout should be loudly hounded  out of office immediately and we are talking a bunch including at the top Mitch McConnell of course. 

    • #8
  9. Locke On Member
    Locke On
    @LockeOn

    The President is the Commander in Chief, and the border situation is definitely a matter of national security, a lot more so than other notional threats that have us deploying hundreds to thousands of troops and/or spending billions.  I’m not versed enough in the various ’emergency powers’ to judge whether this is the best form for it to take, but since I’d have long since ordered the Army Corps of Engineers to the border, I’ll take it, grudgingly.  The Ds really are willing to sell us all to protect their illegals.

    • #9
  10. DonG Coolidge
    DonG
    @DonG

    Locke On (View Comment):
    The President is the Commander in Chief, and the border situation is definitely a matter of national security, a lot more so than other notional threats that have us deploying hundreds to thousands of troops and/or spending billions.

    Yep.  It needs to be tried.  We (the taxpayers) need to know if our govt. is for us or against us.  Do we have open borders or not?  Do we want to import 50 million people with socialist leanings or not? 

     

    • #10
  11. Max Ledoux Coolidge
    Max Ledoux
    @Max

    Sweezle (View Comment):

    Trump’s news conferences (?) generally confuse me on more than one point. This one leaves me wondering why he is talking about Congress giving him too much money & not mentioning or being asked about signing the Border Wall Funding Bill. Did I miss something? He is one complicated slick dude.

     

    Yeah, I got confused too because he didn’t mention the spending bill initially and only referenced it during Q&A.

    • #11
  12. Max Ledoux Coolidge
    Max Ledoux
    @Max

    D.A. Venters (View Comment):
    Everyone knows this is an attempt to use a specious interpretation of a statute, to use it in a way it was not meant to be used, to get something the president could not get through ordinary channels. To say otherwise is just denying the obvious or gaslighting.

    Uh, no, that’s just, like, your opinion, man. 

    • #12
  13. Max Ledoux Coolidge
    Max Ledoux
    @Max

    Fred Cole (View Comment):

    Max Ledoux (View Comment):
    No one cared about the previous ones.

    Were the three previous ones contentious?

    Did he issue the three previous ones to be able to spend money on something Congress had just specifically denied him funds for?

    Actually, I think Congress just overwhelmingly voted to authorize the president to spend $1.4B on a border barrier/fence/wall.

    • #13
  14. Fred Cole Inactive
    Fred Cole
    @FredCole

    Max Ledoux (View Comment):

    Fred Cole (View Comment):

    Max Ledoux (View Comment):
    No one cared about the previous ones.

    Were the three previous ones contentious?

    Did he issue the three previous ones to be able to spend money on something Congress had just specifically denied him funds for?

    Actually, I think Congress just overwhelmingly voted to authorize the president to spend $1.4B on a border barrier/fence/wall.

    Then why does he need to do this?

    • #14
  15. James Gawron Inactive
    James Gawron
    @JamesGawron

    EDs,

    Trump’s got guts. They whined when he dropped the Paris accords. They’ll whine and chew the carpet on this. I think it will work for the USA and Trump and maybe even an undeserving Republican Party.

    I’m glad he did it.

    Regards,

    Jim

    • #15
  16. Aaron Miller Inactive
    Aaron Miller
    @AaronMiller

    Securing the border is a national security concern. But it is an old concern and a regular concern. By no stretch of the imagination is it an emergency. Even lawyers can only stretch language so far. 

    The President is abusing his “emergency” powers only as past presidents have done. But it’s a shame to see this action cheered by Trump fans. Rule of law further dissolves. 

    • #16
  17. Valiuth Member
    Valiuth
    @Valiuth

    Max Ledoux (View Comment):

    Fred Cole (View Comment):

    Max Ledoux (View Comment):
    No one cared about the previous ones.

    Were the three previous ones contentious?

    Did he issue the three previous ones to be able to spend money on something Congress had just specifically denied him funds for?

    Actually, I think Congress just overwhelmingly voted to authorize the president to spend $1.4B on a border barrier/fence/wall.

    And they didn’t authorize him to cannibalize the Defense budget to get more money for it. He has been given 1.4B to build his artistic steel slat fence where he thinks it will do the most good. But he wanted more and so is stealing it from other departments. If one looks at past emergencies none of them are used to move money from one executive department to another to help fulfill a presidents political ego. Most are used to sanction bad guy states, or in response to natural disasters to release FEMA money allocated to be spent on relief efforts to those disasters. This is a complete end run around Constitutional separation of powers just like Obama’s DACA EO was. But Trumpists I guess are just fair weather Constitutionalists.

    I just hope you won’t complain when President Beto uses Army funds on some Solar Power boondoggle because Congress won’t give him the money for it.

    • #17
  18. Manny Coolidge
    Manny
    @Manny

    Valiuth (View Comment):
    And they didn’t authorize him to cannibalize the Defense budget to get more money for it.

    The defense budget if I remember correctly is around $700 billion dollars per year.  The $8 billion, even if spent in one year, is pennies on the dollar.  It’s probably over several years, so it’s less than pennies on the dollar.

    • #18
  19. DrewInWisconsin Member
    DrewInWisconsin
    @DrewInWisconsin

    Fred Cole (View Comment):

    Max Ledoux (View Comment):
    No one cared about the previous ones.

    Were the three previous ones contentious?

    Is it contentious because the media says it’s contentious?

    Is that like the media declaring “controversial” things that aren’t at all controversial, while always avoiding that label when talking about the latest leftist idea?

     

    • #19
  20. Fred Cole Inactive
    Fred Cole
    @FredCole

    DrewInWisconsin (View Comment):

    Fred Cole (View Comment):

    Max Ledoux (View Comment):
    No one cared about the previous ones.

    Were the three previous ones contentious?

    Is it contentious because the media says it’s contentious?

    Is that like the media declaring “controversial” things that aren’t at all controversial, while always avoiding that label when talking about the latest leftist idea?

     

    So you don’t think this is contentious at all?  It’s all just a media trick?

    • #20
  21. Barfly Member
    Barfly
    @Barfly

    Fred Cole (View Comment):

    Manny (View Comment):

    I’m completely on board. It is a national emergency.

    If this is such an emergency, why wait until now?

    My naive response: good question. As a matter of what factually transpired, it is a national emergency because the usual political process has failed to produce an outcome (as viewed by many, me included) that’s both necessary and urgent for the health of the nation. But set the value judgement aside; your question makes it evident that this is both a practical and a political emergency.

    Personally I agree with the national emergency declaration in both senses – practical and political.

    (I need a better word than practical. What is the word for the real-world manifest physical tangible impact of something? This is a recurring vocabulary fault for me. Send donations.)

     

    • #21
  22. carcat74 Member
    carcat74
    @carcat74

    D.A. Venters (View Comment):

    Max Ledoux (View Comment):

    Trump has already declared 3 national emergencies, so this is his 4th declaration. No one cared about the previous ones. Yet some people are saying Trump is setting a dangerous precedent with this declaration. That’s complete nonsense. In fact, Trump is following precedent. Trump also last year (July 27, 2018) renewed a national emergency declaration first issued by George W. Bush in 2007, which states it’s in the national interest of the United States to protect the national sovereignty (I.E. borders) of Lebanon.

    No one is saying the president can’t use the power at all, or hasn’t before. But how many of the previous declarations were obvious end-runs around Congress involving a decades old, very divisive, political dispute, where nothing particularly new or emergent has occurred? Using an emergency declaration under those circumstances absolutely does set a new precedent.

    Everyone knows this is an attempt to use a specious interpretation of a statute, to use it in a way it was not meant to be used, to get something the president could not get through ordinary channels. To say otherwise is just denying the obvious or gaslighting.

    The president is doing exactly what the Democrats want him to do here. He’s getting something of little actual value policy-wise, nothing that will actually do much to prevent illegal immigration Democrats like, dividing his own party, and setting precedent they will enjoy when they eventually get back in the white house.

    An end run around Congress?  Congress gave the President expanded powers to do this, I think, signed into law by Carter?  Please check me on this….   So, why didn’t everyone scream when Obama declared a national emergency in Flint, MI, during their lead-contaminated water situation?  Bad as that is/was, it only affected Flint (and surrounding areas), not the entire country!  Also, Trump has extended emergency declarations done by other presidents.  I think this is his first declaration on his own.  Am I wrong?

    • #22
  23. Fred Cole Inactive
    Fred Cole
    @FredCole

    Barfly (View Comment):

    Fred Cole (View Comment):

    If this is such an emergency, why wait until now?

    My naive response: good question. As a matter of what factually transpired, it is a national emergency because the usual political process has failed to produce an outcome (as viewed by many, me included) that’s both necessary and urgent for the health of the nation.

    Okay, so when President Harris declares a national emergency because the usual political process has failed to produce an outcome that’s both necessary and urgent for the health of the planet, so she can impose a green new deal, will that be okay?

    • #23
  24. Valiuth Member
    Valiuth
    @Valiuth

    Manny (View Comment):

    Valiuth (View Comment):
    And they didn’t authorize him to cannibalize the Defense budget to get more money for it.

    The defense budget if I remember correctly is around $700 billion dollars per year. The $8 billion, even if spent in one year, is pennies on the dollar. It’s probably over several years, so it’s less than pennies on the dollar.

    Right, so when President High Cheekbones decides to take 8 billion for her own pet project you will also claim it is less than pennies on the dollar. 

    You know let me make the following compromise with the Trump faction here. Let us all just agree that it is both constitutional and proper that presidents can do the following things. Declare a National Emergency about whatever they want for whatever reason they want (purely arbitrary criteria). As part of that power they can I guess appropriate money from various departments they control to deal with that problem as they see fit.  Is there something I’m missing here? Let just all agree on this. And then we won’t even need Congress anymore so long as the president can declare a National Emergency and just take money out of the directly, maybe they can order the National Mint to print a 1 trillion dollar bill and then spend that! It’s an emergency! After all. 

    Just admit that you don’t want to live by our constitutional order, that you want to be ruled by an all powerful executive, and stop pretending you want anything else. 

     

    • #24
  25. Fred Cole Inactive
    Fred Cole
    @FredCole

    carcat74 (View Comment):
    An end run around Congress? Congress gave the President expanded powers to do this,

    No.  An end-run around Congress, who just denied him the funds to do this.

    Donald Trump is doing this now, today, because he just suffered a crushing defeat over the budget.

    Congress clearly refused this budgetary request, so now Trump is declaring it a national emergency to do an end run around Congress.

    • #25
  26. Sweezle Inactive
    Sweezle
    @Sweezle

    Max Ledoux (View Comment):

    Sweezle (View Comment):

    Trump’s news conferences (?) generally confuse me on more than one point. This one leaves me wondering why he is talking about Congress giving him too much money & not mentioning or being asked about signing the Border Wall Funding Bill. Did I miss something? He is one complicated slick dude.

     

    Yeah, I got confused too because he didn’t mention the spending bill initially and only referenced it during Q&A.

    TY. I went to Sarah Sanders Twitter account and saw the B&W photo of Trump signing the bill with no fanfare or audience. Interesting photo taken before the press conference not posted on Trump’s twitter account or his Presidential account. Trump may use simple to understand one syllable words but he spins so many layers of thoughts I always feel like I just missed 80%. I did understand his legal explanation about what will happen while the lower court blocks him and SCOTUS eventually allows him to proceed.

    https://twitter.com/PressSec

    • #26
  27. carcat74 Member
    carcat74
    @carcat74

    Fred Cole (View Comment):

    carcat74 (View Comment):
    An end run around Congress? Congress gave the President expanded powers to do this,

    No. An end-run around Congress, who just denied him the funds to do this.

    Donald Trump is doing this now, today, because he just suffered a crushing defeat over the budget.

    Congress clearly refused this budgetary request, so now Trump is declaring it a national emergency to do an end run around Congress.

    And this bill authorized 3.1B for health issues in OTHER countries! WHAT ABOUT OUR COUNTRY?

    • #27
  28. Ryan Renfro Inactive
    Ryan Renfro
    @RyanRenfro

    So it turns out that both pens and phones are commonly available items.  #AnotherSlipDownTheSlope

    • #28
  29. Fred Cole Inactive
    Fred Cole
    @FredCole

    Ryan Renfro (View Comment):

    So it turns out that both pens and phones are commonly available items. #AnotherSlipDownTheSlope

    #ItsOnlyExecutiveOverreachWhenDemocratsDoIt

    • #29
  30. D.A. Venters Inactive
    D.A. Venters
    @DAVenters

    carcat74 (View Comment):

    D.A. Venters (View Comment):

    No one is saying the president can’t use the power at all, or hasn’t before. But how many of the previous declarations were obvious end-runs around Congress involving a decades old, very divisive, political dispute, where nothing particularly new or emergent has occurred? Using an emergency declaration under those circumstances absolutely does set a new precedent.

    Everyone knows this is an attempt to use a specious interpretation of a statute, to use it in a way it was not meant to be used, to get something the president could not get through ordinary channels. To say otherwise is just denying the obvious or gaslighting.

    The president is doing exactly what the Democrats want him to do here. He’s getting something of little actual value policy-wise, nothing that will actually do much to prevent illegal immigration Democrats like, dividing his own party, and setting precedent they will enjoy when they eventually get back in the white house.

    An end run around Congress? Congress gave the President expanded powers to do this, I think, signed into law by Carter? Please check me on this…. So, why didn’t everyone scream when Obama declared a national emergency in Flint, MI, during their lead-contaminated water situation? Bad as that is/was, it only affected Flint (and surrounding areas), not the entire country! Also, Trump has extended emergency declarations done by other presidents. I think this is his first declaration on his own. Am I wrong?

    You are correct that Congress granted the president expanded powers when there is an emergency.  But there is a natural limitation on that power in using the term “emergency” rather than “issue of serious concern” or “issue of great importance,” or “longstanding debate.”   In conjunction with the statute authorizing the use of Defense funds when an emergency is declared, the obvious meaning is that the president is authorized to use DoD funds to do things like – build a bridge to help military trucks get to flood victims, or build a road to help fight a wildfire, etc… In other words where there is an immediate dire need brought on by a sudden unexpected condition, when there is no time for the ordinary process – something that meets the true definition of an emergency.  With respect to the emergency trade powers – you can certainly see where Congress might need to give the President additional power where there is an unexpected coup, or Americans are in harm’s way because of some international incident – again, actual emergencies with no time for Congress to act.

    Congress definitely did not give the president power to up and declare an emergency when he is not getting his way in a debate that is decades old – even if the issue is very important.

     

    • #30
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