Latest / Bloomberg Law / Trump's Deployment of Troops Questioned

Transcript

Trump's Deployment of Troops Questioned · Bloomberg Law

0:02
Speaker 1: This is Bloomberg Law with June Grossel from Bloomberg Radio.
0:08
Speaker 2: President Donald Trump's efforts to send troops into democratic led
0:13
Speaker 2: cities is facing its biggest legal tests yet, with a
0:17
Speaker 2: trial this week over his power to deploy the National
0:20
Speaker 2: Guard to Portland, Oregon to counter protests. And of course
0:24
Speaker 2: there is the deployment to Chicago, which is in a
0:27
Speaker 2: holding mode right now before the Supreme Court. My guest
0:31
Speaker 2: is immigration law expert Leon Fresco, a partner at Holland
0:35
Speaker 2: and Knight. There are lawsuits challenging Trump's deployments in Los Angeles, Chicago, Portland,
0:42
Speaker 2: and DC making their way through the courts. Have any
0:46
Speaker 2: of them so far answered the question of whether he
0:50
Speaker 2: legally invoked Section twelve four h six of Title ten
0:56
Speaker 2: to bring state National Guard troops under federal cos well.
1:01
Speaker 1: The closest cases that have done this are the two
1:05
Speaker 1: to one panel decision in the Portland case, where the
1:10
Speaker 1: Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in favor of President Trump.
1:14
Speaker 1: And they said that the way a court analyzes this,
1:18
Speaker 1: they're allowed to analyze it. So at least they got
1:20
Speaker 1: that far. They didn't say that the courts can't analyze it,
1:24
Speaker 1: but they said they have to use a highly deferential
1:27
Speaker 1: test and that the standard of review was quote, whether
1:31
Speaker 1: there was a colorable assessment of the facts in law
1:35
Speaker 1: within a range of honest judgment, which is a highly
1:38
Speaker 1: deferential standard that basically said, if the President had any
1:42
Speaker 1: sort of decent argument for saying that the Guard needed
1:47
Speaker 1: to be deployed in order to either enforce federal law
1:52
Speaker 1: or prevent rebellion circumstances, that would be enough. The dissenting
1:57
Speaker 1: judge said, no, no, no, this is just like a normal
2:00
Speaker 1: factual question where you have a hearing or a trial
2:04
Speaker 1: and you come to the factual decision like any trial,
2:08
Speaker 1: was there a murder, yes or no, it's not any
2:11
Speaker 1: difference that's given you have a trial, and in this case,
2:15
Speaker 1: whoever wins under a preponderance of the evidence standard would win.
2:20
Speaker 1: And the dissenting judge said that there wasn't enough evidence
2:24
Speaker 1: that there was actually any sort of rebellion or other
2:28
Speaker 1: issues in Portland. And so now this two to one
2:31
Speaker 1: decision is now going to go to on bank review.
2:34
Speaker 1: The Chief Judge said for the court, without needing anybody
2:38
Speaker 1: to ask, the Chief Judge, there should be on bank review.
2:41
Speaker 1: And now there's going to be on bank review to
2:44
Speaker 1: determine whether that two to one decision would apply. In Chicago,
2:51
Speaker 1: we have a similar situation where the City of Chicago
2:56
Speaker 1: and the State of Illinois also sued, arguing that the
2:59
Speaker 1: deployment of the National Guard in the Chicago areas also
3:04
Speaker 1: violated the Statute and the Tenth Amendment and the posse
3:08
Speaker 1: comitatis law, which prevents federal troops from enforcing civil laws.
3:13
Speaker 1: And the judge in that case issued a temporary restraining order.
3:17
Speaker 1: The Seventh Circuit upheld the ruling, and the President Trump
3:22
Speaker 1: asked the Supreme Court to lift the tro And now
3:25
Speaker 1: the Supreme Court in that case has asked for additional
3:28
Speaker 1: briefing to try to determine whether these words regular forces
3:35
Speaker 1: in the Statute means military forces, and then how that
3:38
Speaker 1: interpretation affects the president's authority to federalize the Guard. And
3:44
Speaker 1: so at the moment, that's where we are on these things.
3:47
Speaker 1: We don't know exactly what the president can do, what
3:52
Speaker 1: the standard of review is, et cetera.
3:55
Speaker 2: So let's go to the Supreme Court for a second.
3:57
Speaker 2: And you know that's because the Trump administration filed an
4:00
Speaker 2: emergency petition to allow them to deploy the troops to Chicago.
4:06
Speaker 2: So nine days past before the justices issued this order
4:11
Speaker 2: requesting more information. And this has been a court that's
4:14
Speaker 2: been very quick to answer Trump's emergency requests, usually in
4:19
Speaker 2: his favor. What does it tell you that with this request,
4:23
Speaker 2: they're asking about the specific wording of the law, which
4:28
Speaker 2: says a president may deploy the guard when he is
4:31
Speaker 2: quote unable with the regular forces to execute the laws
4:35
Speaker 2: of the United States.
4:38
Speaker 1: What is interesting is they're trying to figure out because
4:42
Speaker 1: there's two different types of I would say armed personnel
4:46
Speaker 1: that's discussed. One is regular forces. So who are these
4:51
Speaker 1: regular forces that the president is allowed to use? And
4:55
Speaker 1: then when those quote unquote regular forces fail, then the
4:59
Speaker 1: president is allowed to call in federal service members and
5:03
Speaker 1: units of the National Guard of any state. So the
5:05
Speaker 1: question is does regular forces mean that the president can
5:09
Speaker 1: already send in military troops. That's a little bit complicated
5:13
Speaker 1: because of it is then who are these federal service
5:17
Speaker 1: members that the president is then allowed to send in
5:21
Speaker 1: plus the units of the National Guard of any state.
5:24
Speaker 1: So that's the question. Does it mean US military forces
5:28
Speaker 1: or does it mean people like FBI, you know, Homeland
5:32
Speaker 1: security investigation and things of that nature, so sort of
5:36
Speaker 1: federal police power force type people, but not actual US
5:41
Speaker 1: military troops. I think it would make a lot less
5:45
Speaker 1: sense if regular forces didn't just mean FBI ice HSI,
5:51
Speaker 1: that kind of thing, the sort of people who enforce
5:54
Speaker 1: the federal law, the ATF that kind of group as
5:58
Speaker 1: opposed to the military. Because of it also meant the military.
6:01
Speaker 1: Then who are these quote unquote federal service members that
6:05
Speaker 1: can be called into service if the quote unquote regular
6:09
Speaker 1: forces are not able to execute the law. So that's
6:13
Speaker 1: what I think it means, but we'll have to wait
6:15
Speaker 1: and see what the Supreme Court says. It means.
6:17
Speaker 2: They don't seem to be in a hurry to decide
6:19
Speaker 2: because the briefing schedule puts the briefings up until November seventeenth,
6:24
Speaker 2: and then they have to decide. So that means what
6:28
Speaker 2: three weeks or so where there won't be any deployment
6:31
Speaker 2: of troops, correct.
6:33
Speaker 1: I mean, this is one of the most complicated and
6:35
Speaker 1: important consequential questions probably that the Supreme Court has had
6:40
Speaker 1: in the last couple of decades, because it really does
6:44
Speaker 1: get to the heart of what a president can and
6:47
Speaker 1: can't do. With regard to using the military in the
6:51
Speaker 1: normal streets of the big cities of America. So this
6:55
Speaker 1: is not something to trivialize or to issue any kind
6:58
Speaker 1: of quick ruling on. And I think if there was
7:01
Speaker 1: an actual place in America right now that was ungovernable
7:07
Speaker 1: and where people couldn't go to work and there were
7:10
Speaker 1: barricades everywhere and nobody could go to school, maybe there
7:15
Speaker 1: would be urgency here. But that's not really the urgency
7:19
Speaker 1: anyone is talking about. There's not a city in America
7:21
Speaker 1: where no one can go to work, or go to school,
7:24
Speaker 1: or get treated in a hospital or any of those
7:27
Speaker 1: major things. At all of these cities. Sports events are
7:30
Speaker 1: still going on, Concerts are still going on, all of
7:34
Speaker 1: these things, and so it's hard to say there's an
7:37
Speaker 1: interrection going on. In a true national emergency where none
7:40
Speaker 1: of those things were going on, maybe we'd have a
7:43
Speaker 1: faster ruling. But I think the Court understands here it's
7:46
Speaker 1: better to get it right.
7:48
Speaker 2: But is a Supreme Court to look at the facts
7:51
Speaker 2: or are they going to look at the law and
7:54
Speaker 2: interpret that.
7:55
Speaker 1: Well, no, I'm saying they're looking at these facts unofficially
7:58
Speaker 1: to determine how fast they're going in the speed of
8:02
Speaker 1: the case. But I think what they're going to look
8:05
Speaker 1: at for the decision in the case is the level
8:08
Speaker 1: of defference that the President's determination gets. And then based
8:12
Speaker 1: on the level of defference, they may remand for a
8:17
Speaker 1: trial or hearing based on that level of difference, or
8:20
Speaker 1: they may decide they have enough evidence to move forward
8:24
Speaker 1: with that level of difference and decide, here's what the
8:27
Speaker 1: facts dictate. Based on the level of difference, we decide.
8:32
Speaker 1: So it could go either of those two ways, but
8:34
Speaker 1: we'll just have to wait for the Supreme Court to say.
8:37
Speaker 1: And plus that may end up being different in Chicago
8:40
Speaker 1: versus in Portland or in Los Angeles. They may decide
8:43
Speaker 1: that there is a bigger crisis in one location than
8:47
Speaker 1: in another, and so in one location they can deploy
8:51
Speaker 1: the federal troops, and in another location they cannot because
8:54
Speaker 1: it doesn't rise to whatever new standard they decided to
8:58
Speaker 1: apply in this case.
9:00
Speaker 2: Let's turned out to Greg Bavino, the chief of the
9:03
Speaker 2: Border Patrol's El Centro sector in California, who's been very
9:09
Speaker 2: high profile in the Trump Administration's crackdowns on immigration in
9:15
Speaker 2: sanctuary cities. He's been three decades with the Border Patrol,
9:20
Speaker 2: and he's emerged as the face of the Trump administration's
9:25
Speaker 2: most aggressive operations against migrants in these democratic led cities.
9:31
Speaker 1: Well, he comes from the Border Patrol, from the US
9:34
Speaker 1: Customs of Border Protection. He doesn't come from ICE, which
9:37
Speaker 1: is the Immigration and Customs Enforcement division that actually is
9:41
Speaker 1: in charge with the detention, apprehension, and removal of people
9:47
Speaker 1: who are here illegally. That's who does it. It's nice.
9:50
Speaker 1: The Border Patrol has a different mission. They have two
9:53
Speaker 1: different parts. They have one that protects the United States
9:57
Speaker 1: from people trying to cross in between ports of entry,
10:00
Speaker 1: and they have a second mission of guarding ports of
10:03
Speaker 1: entry themselves so that people don't get through the ports
10:07
Speaker 1: of entry who shouldn't get through. And this is the
10:11
Speaker 1: area of the Border Patrol where mister Baveno comes from.
10:14
Speaker 1: And this has happened in the past because what happens
10:17
Speaker 1: is that within the Department of Homeland Security they get
10:20
Speaker 1: the impression that the people who come through the Border
10:23
Speaker 1: Patrol have a more police oriented view of the world
10:29
Speaker 1: because that's what they're doing. They're actually walking around looking
10:32
Speaker 1: for crime, so to speak. If they see someone cross
10:36
Speaker 1: the border, then they're going to apprehend them the same
10:38
Speaker 1: way a police officer if they see someone robbing a store,
10:41
Speaker 1: they will apprehend them. Whereas ICE traditionally doesn't have that
10:46
Speaker 1: ethos of operating as roving cops on a beat. They
10:51
Speaker 1: have more of a here's a list of people we
10:54
Speaker 1: are passed with deporting today, and now we need to
10:58
Speaker 1: either go pick them up at work, or pick them
11:01
Speaker 1: up in the courthouse, or pick them up at home,
11:04
Speaker 1: and it's a much more targeted planned day. That's how
11:08
Speaker 1: ICE likes to operate, is within the targeted planned day
11:11
Speaker 1: for operational concerns. And this has developed over thirty years.
11:16
Speaker 1: This is not something that's happened over a day or two.
11:19
Speaker 1: Because what happens is when ICE starts operating in the
11:23
Speaker 1: same way local police would start operating, which is just
11:26
Speaker 1: look around and try to find crime, then what you're
11:31
Speaker 1: doing is looking around and trying to find people who
11:34
Speaker 1: are there illegally. So just their existence in America is
11:38
Speaker 1: the crime. And whether you like this policy or don't
11:43
Speaker 1: like the policy, I'm not even saying anything about the policy.
11:46
Speaker 1: I would just hope that the listeners of your broadcast
11:50
Speaker 1: would agree that whether you like it or not when
11:54
Speaker 1: that gets implemented. When ICE gets deployed in the same
11:58
Speaker 1: way local police would be deployed, it creates tension on
12:02
Speaker 1: both sides of the equation, where the people who don't
12:06
Speaker 1: like ICE deployed in that manner start protesting, start barricading ICE,
12:11
Speaker 1: start hiding people in their houses, and start doing everything
12:15
Speaker 1: they can to resist ICE operating in that manner. And
12:19
Speaker 1: this isn't even new either. You can find stories about
12:22
Speaker 1: this every day for the last thirty years. It's just
12:25
Speaker 1: that when you do it at a higher scale, you
12:27
Speaker 1: get more of it. Or if you don't do this,
12:31
Speaker 1: then you have the people who say, well, we're not
12:33
Speaker 1: getting enough arrests, And it's true, you're not going to
12:36
Speaker 1: get enough arrests if you don't have these roving enforcement
12:42
Speaker 1: arrests that happened where you could just grab thirty people
12:45
Speaker 1: at one place at one location just because you think
12:48
Speaker 1: it looks suspicious there. Yes, that will increase the number
12:51
Speaker 1: of arrests, but that also increases the level of tension
12:55
Speaker 1: that you're tightening in that area when you do that.
12:58
Speaker 1: And again I'm not thinking that, I mean you should
13:00
Speaker 1: do it or you shouldn't do it, but that's why
13:04
Speaker 1: the Trump administration has moved a lot of the ICE
13:09
Speaker 1: agents who are leading these various local locations out of
13:12
Speaker 1: their positions and is trying to bring in border patrol
13:15
Speaker 1: people like mister Bovino, because it's saying we need to
13:19
Speaker 1: change the ethos of ICE and turn it into a
13:23
Speaker 1: police like unit that's roving around looking for crime, so
13:28
Speaker 1: to speak. But in this case, again, the crime is
13:31
Speaker 1: just the existence of the human being in America, which
13:34
Speaker 1: is what makes it complicated. So you're not observing someone
13:38
Speaker 1: stealing something, or you're not observing someone injuring somebody. You're
13:42
Speaker 1: just observing someone standing there and you're asking yourself, is
13:47
Speaker 1: this person that's standing there standing there illegally and you
13:52
Speaker 1: don't know they might be, they might not be. But
13:55
Speaker 1: the act of asking, over and over and over again
13:59
Speaker 1: creates a level of tension that's completely different than any
14:02
Speaker 1: other kind of police operation creates. And that's why I,
14:06
Speaker 1: as I explained previously, I prefers the ethos of saying, look,
14:10
Speaker 1: I'm sorry, this person Joe Smith is on a list,
14:14
Speaker 1: they committed a crime or they were ordered deported in
14:17
Speaker 1: two thousand and eight, and they've managed to stay here
14:20
Speaker 1: seventeen years. Why do you think that you should defend
14:23
Speaker 1: this person. That's a much easier law enforcement role to defend,
14:28
Speaker 1: and that's why they like that as opposed to these
14:30
Speaker 1: roving operations.
14:32
Speaker 2: Coming up next, the governor of Illinois makes a Halloween
14:35
Speaker 2: request to ice. A group of journalists, news advocacy organizations,
14:42
Speaker 2: and protesters are suing the government, claiming that federal agents
14:47
Speaker 2: aggressive tactics in Chicago violated their rights. The case has
14:52
Speaker 2: grown into something of a referendum on the repeated use
14:56
Speaker 2: of force by federal agents in the Trump administration crackdown
15:01
Speaker 2: on illegal immigration. I've been talking to immigration lawyer Leon
15:05
Speaker 2: Fresco of Honda Night Soully on in that Chicago case.
15:11
Speaker 2: Federal Judge Sarah Ellis has issued some orders, including requiring
15:16
Speaker 2: agents to wear visible identification and issue warnings before using
15:21
Speaker 2: weapons like tear gas or pepper spray. And she's expressed
15:26
Speaker 2: alarm over videos and photographs that show the agents confronting
15:31
Speaker 2: protesters and deploying teargas at a weekend Halloween event. We've
15:37
Speaker 2: been talking about Greg Bavino, the Border Patrol chief, and
15:41
Speaker 2: she had him on the stand for about an hour
15:44
Speaker 2: the other day, asking him about the enforcement tactics, and
15:48
Speaker 2: she ordered him to come back every day to report
15:51
Speaker 2: to her. But the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals paused
15:55
Speaker 2: that order.
15:56
Speaker 1: Why well, the Seventh Circuit issued a vary shit decision
16:01
Speaker 1: putting it on hold. But we can infer from that
16:03
Speaker 1: that they agreed with the government's argument that the problem is,
16:07
Speaker 1: and you have to look at this from a practical perspective,
16:10
Speaker 1: not just from a well, what's the problem with one
16:14
Speaker 1: hour of coming in and speaking to the judge every day?
16:17
Speaker 1: But the truth is, if you're doing that, if you're
16:19
Speaker 1: speaking to the judge every day for one hour, you're
16:23
Speaker 1: legitimately preparing to give that testimony. Because no one just
16:26
Speaker 1: sends a witness in to speak to a federal judge
16:30
Speaker 1: without preparation for the testimony, giving them facts, giving them
16:34
Speaker 1: everything that's happening that day. So basically, you will have
16:37
Speaker 1: turned the head of the law enforcement operation into a
16:40
Speaker 1: professional witness. This person wouldn't actually be able to do
16:44
Speaker 1: any other work all day. Their entire day would be
16:47
Speaker 1: devoted to learning the facts that they were going to
16:51
Speaker 1: give the judge that day, preparing the testimony, and then
16:54
Speaker 1: testifying that That would be an entire day of work,
16:58
Speaker 1: and the federal government said, that's that been a thing
17:01
Speaker 1: that's ever existed where we've ever had a federal judge
17:05
Speaker 1: turn a US law enforcement official into a federal witness
17:10
Speaker 1: that has to come every day and just do that
17:13
Speaker 1: and not actually do the job they're supposed to do.
17:17
Speaker 1: And they point out the federal government correctly that even
17:21
Speaker 1: the plaintiffs didn't ask for this, This was just something
17:23
Speaker 1: the judge did out of frustration with the federal government.
17:28
Speaker 1: So the plaintiffs didn't ask for it, because I doubt
17:30
Speaker 1: they would have even imagined the world where such relief
17:33
Speaker 1: could have ever been granted. But the judge was so
17:36
Speaker 1: frustrated that the judge granted the relief. And so I
17:40
Speaker 1: do think it was very helpful to the federal government
17:42
Speaker 1: to make an argument that, hey, if the plaintiffs don't
17:45
Speaker 1: want something, why is the judge ordering it.
17:48
Speaker 2: Still in place? Is her order that Bevino wear a
17:52
Speaker 2: body camera and the government has to turn over all
17:55
Speaker 2: reports documenting when agents used force against members of the
18:00
Speaker 2: public and also the body camera video by tomorrow.
18:05
Speaker 1: So correct, all of the sort of what I would
18:07
Speaker 1: call transparency requirements and the use of force are all
18:11
Speaker 1: still in effect, and we will wait and see what
18:15
Speaker 1: both the Seventh Circuit says in principle at the end
18:18
Speaker 1: of this and maybe what the Supreme Court says, and
18:21
Speaker 1: if that is hell to be in effect, and that
18:24
Speaker 1: could be something that could actually apply to all of
18:27
Speaker 1: the ICE agents nationwide, is that they have to have
18:31
Speaker 1: this sort of use of force transparency that didn't exist previously,
18:35
Speaker 1: and they'll have to wear body cameras, they'll have to
18:38
Speaker 1: identify themselves. They can't wear masks, and that would be
18:43
Speaker 1: a dramatic change from the operating events in a lot
18:46
Speaker 1: of places right now.
18:48
Speaker 2: They all wear masks except for Bevino. He doesn't wear
18:51
Speaker 2: a mask.
18:52
Speaker 1: He seems to be very confident in this, there's no
18:55
Speaker 1: doubt about that.
18:56
Speaker 2: Apparently the Trump administration really likes him. Is there a
19:00
Speaker 2: shake up? Then? Is the Trump administration trying to rely
19:03
Speaker 2: more on the border patrol, which you know a lot
19:06
Speaker 2: of these aggressive actions that we see are border patrol,
19:12
Speaker 2: not ICE.
19:14
Speaker 1: Correct, That's what's exactly happening, is the way ICE operates. Yes,
19:18
Speaker 1: they're headquartered in DC. Yes they're part of Homeland Security. Yes,
19:22
Speaker 1: they're part of the federal government and controlled by the President,
19:25
Speaker 1: but they have all these local field offices, and in
19:28
Speaker 1: the end, each local field office basically operates as its
19:31
Speaker 1: own satellite that has its own policies, And so it matters.
19:35
Speaker 1: If you have a field office director who is much
19:39
Speaker 1: more oriented toward a aggressive enforcement posture, you're going to
19:43
Speaker 1: have more aggressive enforcement in that field office area. Then
19:47
Speaker 1: if you have a field office director who's not focused
19:50
Speaker 1: as much on an aggressive enforcement posture. And so in
19:53
Speaker 1: about six or seven cities, the administration has decided to
19:57
Speaker 1: replace the field office directors that were there from ICE,
20:01
Speaker 1: move them to DC, and replace them with people who
20:05
Speaker 1: are coming from the Border Patrol to again have this
20:08
Speaker 1: sort of focus on roving enforcement that we were talking
20:11
Speaker 1: about earlier, where instead of looking for a set number
20:15
Speaker 1: of people each day that ICE had determined based on
20:18
Speaker 1: investigations the previous day or the previous week, it would
20:22
Speaker 1: actually say, no, we're going to go to a more
20:25
Speaker 1: aggressive posture and start questioning people on the streets about
20:28
Speaker 1: whether they have a right to be in the United States.
20:31
Speaker 2: I haven't heard the answer yet, but the governor of
20:33
Speaker 2: Illinois asked ICE not to do any enforcement actions on
20:39
Speaker 2: Halloween weekend.
20:41
Speaker 1: I think that's the type of thing where the way
20:43
Speaker 1: that usually gets resolved is there isn't an answer given
20:47
Speaker 1: that capitulates to the governor's request, But it's just obviously
20:51
Speaker 1: done in a way where Ice knows that they don't
20:55
Speaker 1: want another conflagration happening during Halloween. They detain somebody who
21:01
Speaker 1: shouldn't have been detained, and now everybody's in that sort
21:04
Speaker 1: of Halloween frantic mode and riots start happening, and all
21:09
Speaker 1: kinds of craziness occurs. And so I do think you're
21:13
Speaker 1: not gonna see an answer that says, Okay, Governor Pritzker,
21:17
Speaker 1: we agree with you. We're not going to enforce the
21:20
Speaker 1: law on Halloween. All of these enforcement officers, everybody has
21:24
Speaker 1: to remember our human beings.
21:26
Speaker 2: Well, don't you think that Bevino. I mean, the point is,
21:30
Speaker 2: and why the Trump administration likes him, is to put
21:33
Speaker 2: fear into the hearts of immigrants so that they self deport.
21:37
Speaker 2: I mean, the videos are pretty brutal.
21:42
Speaker 1: Well, the point is this, at the end of the day,
21:45
Speaker 1: putting aside again any personal opinions anybody has, whoever leads
21:50
Speaker 1: the operation still relies upon people who live in those communities,
21:55
Speaker 1: who work in those communities, and an inertia gets created
21:59
Speaker 1: in all of this despite what people think, where that
22:03
Speaker 1: inertia only allows certain amounts of limitations of conduct to occur.
22:09
Speaker 1: And that's why you've seen the administration get frustrated and
22:13
Speaker 1: they say, look, we were at we wanted three thousand
22:15
Speaker 1: arrests a day, we were at two thousand. We thought
22:18
Speaker 1: we were going to get there. Now we're back at
22:20
Speaker 1: one thousand. What is happening? What's going on? And all
22:24
Speaker 1: of this ignores that all of this enforcement needs to
22:27
Speaker 1: be done by human beings who have morale issues, who,
22:31
Speaker 1: by the way, aren't getting paid right now because the
22:33
Speaker 1: government is shut down, and are worried about are they
22:36
Speaker 1: going to be able to keep their house, Are they
22:38
Speaker 1: going to be able to make their car payments? Are
22:41
Speaker 1: they going to be able to pay their medical bills?
22:43
Speaker 1: The last thing they're worried about is I want to
22:46
Speaker 1: start creating a massive riot on Halloween. I don't think
22:50
Speaker 1: that's a high priority for these poor agents who aren't
22:53
Speaker 1: getting paid right now. And so I just think, regardless
22:57
Speaker 1: of who the leaders are, and regardless even of the
23:00
Speaker 1: message given, there is a certain amount of inertia that
23:04
Speaker 1: exists there where people you can only take them so far.
23:08
Speaker 1: And yes, people want to enforce the immigration law, and
23:10
Speaker 1: the people there at Ice strongly believe in the importance
23:13
Speaker 1: of enforcing the immigration law. But there's an operational reality
23:18
Speaker 1: there that they face every day and that they've seen
23:21
Speaker 1: over the course of years that when you push things
23:24
Speaker 1: too far, they know that then it becomes very difficult
23:28
Speaker 1: to unwind that. And so they're just trying to get
23:30
Speaker 1: an equilibrium where they can enforce the law as strictly
23:33
Speaker 1: as they can while still maintaining other forms of order
23:38
Speaker 1: in the society.
23:39
Speaker 2: On another issue, Vice President JD. Vance yesterday advocated a
23:44
Speaker 2: slow down in legal immigration. We have to get the
23:48
Speaker 2: overall numbers way way down, but he didn't offer a
23:52
Speaker 2: firm number.
23:53
Speaker 1: I think people need to have a realistic understanding of this.
23:57
Speaker 1: And this is something because I teach immigration law at
23:59
Speaker 1: various law schools and that's my first class each semester.
24:03
Speaker 1: As I tell people and I explain, and I say,
24:05
Speaker 1: look in America right now, we have three hundred and
24:08
Speaker 1: fifty million people. And each year, unless it's a year
24:12
Speaker 1: like a COVID year where everything is out of control
24:15
Speaker 1: and it's not a normal year, if you are just
24:18
Speaker 1: running the course of things, you would notice each year
24:21
Speaker 1: if you go to the Department of Homeland Security immigration statistics,
24:25
Speaker 1: that one million or so. It fluctuates between about eight
24:29
Speaker 1: hundred thousand and one point two million, but let's just
24:32
Speaker 1: say one million for the purposes of this people a
24:35
Speaker 1: year are given a green card, meaning the right to
24:39
Speaker 1: permanently reside in the United States each year, and that
24:43
Speaker 1: comes from a number of places. It comes from US
24:45
Speaker 1: citizens marrying foreign nationals. That's the largest group by far,
24:50
Speaker 1: that's about four hundred thousand people per year. It comes
24:54
Speaker 1: from US citizens bringing in their parents who are foreign nationals,
24:59
Speaker 1: and that happen. Happens because when people either marry a
25:03
Speaker 1: US citizen and then they become a citizen one day,
25:06
Speaker 1: or an employer sponsors them, which is a much smaller number,
25:11
Speaker 1: but they then become a citizen one day, they can
25:13
Speaker 1: then bring their parents. So that's another group. So those
25:17
Speaker 1: parents and then any minor essentially step children. That So
25:23
Speaker 1: let's say you marry a foreign national, if you're a
25:25
Speaker 1: US citizen and that person had a child who was
25:27
Speaker 1: under eighteen, that person can qualify also for a lawful
25:31
Speaker 1: permanent resident status. So that group right there just that
25:35
Speaker 1: group each year is about six hundred thousand people per year,
25:39
Speaker 1: like clockwork, And so the question is will you get
25:42
Speaker 1: rid of any of those individuals? And then between people
25:47
Speaker 1: who come for high skilled work, which is about one
25:50
Speaker 1: hundred and twenty thousand a year, plus another group which
25:55
Speaker 1: is refugees, which the Trump administration has already zeroed out,
25:58
Speaker 1: so that's gone, but it used to be about one
26:00
Speaker 1: hundred thousand a year, and then assiles, which are people
26:04
Speaker 1: who we didn't know were coming but showed up at
26:07
Speaker 1: our doorstep. That was about one hundred thousand a year.
26:10
Speaker 1: Now that's been zero about two So the Trump administration
26:13
Speaker 1: can actually say it's cut two hundred thousand or so
26:18
Speaker 1: already from that one million that you're gonna see next
26:21
Speaker 1: year because you're not gonna have refugees or assilies. So
26:25
Speaker 1: they can say that, but then there's a debate, Okay,
26:28
Speaker 1: what about those other eight hundred thousand. Is that too
26:30
Speaker 1: much or too little? And I think that's a debate
26:33
Speaker 1: that people are having. But honestly, if you're if you
26:37
Speaker 1: unless you're gonna say that a US citizen is not
26:40
Speaker 1: allowed to marry a foreign national and live with them
26:43
Speaker 1: here in America, most of your legal immigration is still
26:46
Speaker 1: gonna be high because that number is the bulk of
26:50
Speaker 1: what our immigration is each year. Is a US citizen
26:54
Speaker 1: marrying a foreign national.
26:55
Speaker 2: And first Lady Milania Trump brought her parents into the
26:59
Speaker 2: United States from Slovenia and they were able to get
27:03
Speaker 2: US citizenship through what's known as family based immigration, something
27:08
Speaker 2: Trump himself has criticized and dubbed chain migration. So he's
27:13
Speaker 2: a pleasure. Leon, Thanks so much. That's Leon Fresco of
27:17
Speaker 2: Holland and Knight. And that's it for this edition of
27:19
Speaker 2: The Bloomberg Law Show. Remember you can always get the
27:22
Speaker 2: latest legal news on our Bloomberg Law Podcast. You can
27:25
Speaker 2: find them on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and at www dot
27:29
Speaker 2: Bloomberg dot com, slash podcast Slash Law, and remember to
27:34
Speaker 2: tune into The Bloomberg Law Show every weeknight at ten
27:37
Speaker 2: pm Wall Street Time. I'm June Grosso and you're listening
27:40
Speaker 2: to Bloomberg