A federal judge rejected an effort by the Trump administration to throw out a lawsuit challenging the president’s new immigration policy which forcibly separates migrant children from their parents at the border.
According to Bloomberg, the Wednesday decision is “an early victory to civil rights activists who say Attorney General Jeff Sessions’s policy is unconstitutional and cruel.”
Judge Dana Sabraw cited due process as the reason why the lawsuit should go forward.
“At a minimum, the facts alleged are sufficient to show the government conduct at issue shocks the conscience and violates Plaintiffs’ constitutional right to family integrity,†Sabraw wrote, according to Bloomberg.
To get more stories like this, subscribe to our newsletter The Daily.
Another Trump lie is unraveling
One of the biggest Trump lies in the ether right now is that this is old policy and it’s up to the minority party in Congress to make it right.
In a tweet, Trump told his followers to “put pressure on Democrats” to change the “horrible” practice of separating children from “there” parents.
Put pressure on the Democrats to end the horrible law that separates children from there parents once they cross the Border into the U.S. Catch and Release, Lottery and Chain must also go with it and we MUST continue building the WALL! DEMOCRATS ARE PROTECTING MS-13 THUGS.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 26, 2018
The only problem with this assertion is that it’s just simply not true. Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced the policy change just last month.
As I wrote after Trump made his outrageous claim, “This is another Trump alternative fact – a lie – that can be debunked in a shorter amount of time than it took the president to construct the tweet.”
The plaintiffs in the case – the ACLU – pointed out the lie, according to Judge Sabraw’s decision on Wednesday, noting that “prior administrations detained migrant families, but did not have a practice of forcibly separating fit parents from their young children.”
From the beginning, this new Trump administration policy has failed the moral test. It remains to be seen whether it will fail a legal one, too.
Sean Colarossi currently resides in Cleveland, Ohio. He earned his Bachelor of Arts degree in Journalism from the University of Massachusetts Amherst and was an organizing fellow for both of President Obama’s presidential campaigns. He also worked with Planned Parenthood as an Affordable Care Act Outreach Organizer in 2014, helping northeast Ohio residents obtain health insurance coverage.
