Georgetown Law hits back at Trump-appointed prosecutor's 'attack' on First Amendment, Jesuit principles
The dean of Georgetown Law wrote in a letter today that the conservative activist whom Trump named as Washington's top federal prosecutor had launched “an attack on the University’s mission as a Jesuit and Catholic institution" by demanding explanations about Georgetown's DEI policies.
William M. Treanor, the dean and executive vice president of Georgetown Law, confirmed to NBC News that he sent a letter to interim U.S. Attorney Ed Martin, writing that a letter from Martin that arrived this week "challenges Georgetown’s ability to define our mission as an educational institution" and violated "a bedrock principle of constitutional law."
Martin, a "Stop the Steal" organizer who advocated for Jan. 6 defendants and had no prosecutorial experience before Trump appointed him on Inauguration Day, wrote in a letter first published by a right-wing media outlet that he had "begun an inquiry" into Georgetown's policies and that the U.S. attorney's office would not hire anyone affiliated with a law school or university that continued to teach diversity, equity and inclusiveness principles.
Treanor wrote in his letter to Martin that the principle that "sustained discourse among people of different faiths, cultures, and beliefs promotes intellectual, ethical, and spiritual understanding" was "a moral and educational imperative" that "defines our mission as a Catholic and Jesuit institution."
The First Amendment, Treanor wrote, "guarantees that the government cannot direct what Georgetown and its faculty teach and how to teach it," noting that the Supreme Court "has continually affirmed that among the freedoms central to a university’s First Amendment rights are its abilities to determine, on academic grounds, who may teach, what to teach, and how to teach it."
Martin, Treanor wrote, was threatening to deny students and graduates of Georgetown opportunities until Martin approved its curriculum, and he said the school looked forward to confirming that applicants for employment would receive "full and fair consideration" in the future, adding that the Constitution was clearly on Georgetown's side.
"Given the First Amendment’s protection of a university’s freedom to determine its own curriculum and how to deliver it, the constitutional violation behind this threat is clear, as is the attack on the University’s mission as a Jesuit and Catholic institution," Treanor wrote.
Elon Musk celebrates Texas governor's post about employee fired over pronouns
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott's post on X about a state employee who said he was fired after he refused to remove pronouns from his email signature drew praise from Trump adviser and tech billionaire Elon Musk today.
Abbott, a Republican, shared an Austin American-Statesman article yesterday about the employee, who had worked for the Texas Real Estate Commission, a state agency. Musk replied to Abbott’s post with two fire emojis.
Musk, who is leading the Trump administration's Department of Government Efficiency, has lambasted those who share their gender pronouns or ask others for their pronouns. He also updated X's policy to allow users to freely misgender transgender people, or use the incorrect pronouns for them.
Trump, meanwhile, has issued an executive order declaring that the U.S. government will recognize only two unchangeable sexes. That has prompted federal agencies and recipients of government funding to roll back LGBTQ-inclusive policies, including those that allow employees to share their pronouns in their email signatures.
MAGA world turns against Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett
MAGA activists have turned against one of Trump’s own appointees to the Supreme Court: Justice Amy Coney Barrett.
Appointed by Trump in 2020, Barrett is a staunch conservative who has joined major rulings in which the court has moved U.S. law to the right, including on abortion and affirmative action.
But that’s not enough for some of Trump’s most aggressive supporters, who think Barrett, a former Notre Dame Law School professor, has been a disappointment. MAGA supporters see what some call an independent streak as a sign that she isn’t sufficiently aligned with or loyal to Trump.
“She is a rattled law professor with her head up her a--,” said Mike Davis, who once clerked at the Supreme Court for Justice Neil Gorsuch and described Barrett as “weak and timid.”
‘A blatant violation of the law’: Judge blasts firing of NLRB member and orders reinstatement
A federal judge today ordered the reinstatement of a National Labor Relations Board member and had harsh words for Trump in the process.
Senior Judge Beryl Howell, of U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., said Trump lacks the power to freely fire members of the NLRB, in this case Gwynne Wilcox, the first Black woman to serve on the board.
“The President does not have the authority to terminate members of the National Labor Relations Board at will, and his attempt to fire plaintiff from her position on the Board was a blatant violation of the law,” Howell wrote.
The NLRB polices unfair labor practices and mediates worker-management disputes. The Senate confirmed Wilcox for a second five-year term in 2023.
Trump touts plans to 'let the states run the schools'
Trump, while speaking to reporters in the Oval Office, did not say when he plans to sign an executive order to dismantle the Department of Education, but reiterated his intention to do so.
"I want to just do it," Trump said. "We're starting the process. We're trying to get the schools back into the states, let the states run the schools."
Trump told reporters that the core functions of the Education Department, specifically the management of federal student loans and grants, would be absorbed by federal agencies.
“That would be brought into either Treasury, or the Small Business Administration or Commerce. We actually had that conversation today,” Trump said.
Trump says he would 'probably' extend a pause on the TikTok ban
Asked in the Oval Office whether he plans to extend users' access to TikTok if there's no deal for a U.S. company to buy the app at the end of the current 90-day extension, Trump said he would "probably" do so.
"We have a lot of interest in TikTok," the president told reporters, adding that his administration is still working on a deal to allow the app to continue operating in the U.S.
“Right now we have at least another month, so we don’t need an extension," Trump said.
The app was briefly banned in the U.S. in January due to a law that went into effect banning TikTok because it is owned by Chinese-based company ByteDance.
Just hours before he was sworn in to a second term, Trump urged U.S. companies to allow the app back online for at least 90 days while he sought to make a deal between China and a U.S. company for the sale of TikTok.
Trump on revoking legal status for Ukrainians in the U.S.: 'We don’t want to hurt people'
In response to reports that Trump planned to revoke legal status for Ukrainians who fled the war and are now living in the U.S., the president said it was something he's "looking at."
But Trump also said he wanted to minimize harm to Ukrainians, telling reporters in the Oval Office, "We're not looking to hurt anybody. We're certainly not looking to hurt them."
He added, "We don’t want to hurt people, especially Ukrainians. They’ve gone through a lot.”
Trump says he told Cabinet to 'keep good people' in the wake of mass firings
During the signing of several executive orders in the Oval Office, Trump answered questions about a meeting he hosted today in which he told members of his Cabinet that they are in charge of cutting jobs at their agencies, not Elon Musk.
"I thought it was a really good meeting. It was about cutting," the president said.
"I want the Cabinet members to keep good people. I don’t want to see a big cut where good people are cut," Trump added, telling reporters that his directive to the Cabinet was: “Keep all the people you want, all the people that you need.”
“If they don’t cut, then Elon will do the cutting," Trump said.
“When we have good people, that’s precious, that’s very important," Trump said.
The president was also asked whether he thinks Musk is moving too quickly when firing federal workers in the name of efficiency.
“No," Trump answered. "I think they’ve done an amazing job."
Trump raids will now target migrant families who entered the U.S. with their children
U.S. immigration agents are planning a new operation to arrest migrant families with children as part of a nationwide crackdown, according to three sources familiar with the planning.
The operation will target adults and minor children who entered the country together and have orders of deportation, the source said. After the families are arrested, agents will place them into detention before they are removed.
A separate operation to find children who entered the United States unaccompanied and were released without court dates is also underway, the sources added.
The sources said lawyers at Immigration and Customs Enforcement are now working to secure warrants to enter homes and conduct the arrests.
Former Trump VA secretary criticizes plan to cut thousands of VA jobs
Former Veterans Affairs Secretary David Shulkin criticized the Trump administration today for its plans to reduce staffing at the department to 2019 levels.
In an interview on CNN, Shulkin, who served as Trump's VA secretary during his first term, expressed concern with the administration's plan to cut tens of thousands of jobs at the VA. He said he also hasn't heard any proposals from the administration to improve the system, which is already bogged down by wait times, backlogs for benefits and a rise in suicide among veterans.
"We do need to take a look at how to improve the system, but I don't know any system that slashes its way to excellence," Shulkin said. "And what we haven't seen while we've heard about all the contracts being canceled, we've heard about employees that are going to be laid off, what we haven't really heard are the plans to make this system better."
Shulkin said that morale at the VA is "very low right now" and you continue to lose confidence when you're slashing the workforce and not providing an alternative to modernize the department.
"You can't cancel the amount of contracts that have been done. You can't fire 70-80,000 people who work in the health care system and still meet all the needs of the veterans who need this care and who need these benefits, unless you come alongside with it, a plan to really invest in the technology and make sure that this system is working for the veterans, and we just haven't heard that piece of it yet," he said.
The chief of staff at the department distributed a memo yesterday that outlined cuts in August to “resize and tailor the workforce to the mission.” The VA now employs 459,000 to 482,000, so these cuts could see 59,000 to 82,000 VA employees fired.