A lot of things happened. Here are some of the things. This is TPM\u2019s Morning Memo.\u00a0Sign up\u00a0for the email version<\/em><\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n In a new executive order<\/a>, President Trump has unleashed<\/a> his White House counsel and attorney general to conduct a wide-ranging investigation<\/a> of his predecessor and the Biden White House staff.<\/p>\n The predicate for the investigation is comical, alleging that \u201cformer President Biden\u2019s aides abused the power of Presidential signatures through the use of an autopen to conceal Biden\u2019s cognitive decline and assert Article II authority.\u201d<\/p>\n But from that launching point, the executive order is quite serious. It calls for two open-ended areas of inquiry that could, if a DOJ investigation follows, keep former Biden staffers tied up in defending themselves for months or years: <\/p>\n (i) whether Biden White House aides conspired to cover up \u201cBiden\u2019s mental and physical health\u201d; and <\/p>\n (ii) \u201cthe circumstances surrounding Biden\u2019s supposed execution of numerous executive actions during his final years in office.\u201d<\/p>\n On one level this is all laughable, but it is also an unprecedented targeting of a former president by a subsequent White House with the clear intention of delegitimizing his predecessors official acts \u2013 like presidential pardons \u2013 to clear the way for declaring them invalid and supplanting them with his own prerogatives. <\/p>\n In a first, the Trump administration has complied<\/a> with a court order to return to the United States an improperly deported foreign national. <\/p>\n The gay Guatemalan man, identified in court filings by his initials O.C.G., feared persecution in his home country. The Trump administration abruptly deported him instead to Mexico, where he claimed to have already been raped and targeted for being gay. He ultimately wound up back in Guatemala. <\/p>\n After the Trump administration retracted its initial assertions about O.C.G. in court, U.S. District Judge Brian Murphy of Massachusetts ordered the administration to facilitate his return in a case challenging the legality of third party removals done without notice or hearing. O.C.G. returned<\/a> aboard a commercial flight and was taken into custody<\/a>, his lawyer said.<\/p>\n The Trump administration\u2019s compliance with Murphy\u2019s order has implications in the handful of other cases where the executive branch is defying, stonewalling, and rejecting court orders to \u201cfacilitate\u201d wrongfully deported foreign nationals. Unlike the other deportees, O.C.G. was not in a foreign prison at the time of his return to the U.S. <\/p>\n In a significant ruling, U.S. District Judge James Boasberg of D.C. granted<\/a> a preliminary injunction, finding that the Venezuelan nationals removed to El Salvador under the Alien Enemies Act were denied the due process to which they were entitled when they were abruptly flown to the CECOT prison on March 15. Boasberg gave<\/a> the Trump administration one week to propose a plan for how to \u201cfacilitate\u201d giving the detainees a chance to pursue their habeas corpus claims.<\/p>\n Boasberg\u2019s written opinion<\/a> was complex and somewhat circular; and while it compared their fates to a scene from a Kafka novel, it was not a total victory<\/a> for the detainees. He ruled that they are not entitled to file habeas claims now because he was not convinced that they are in the \u201cconstructive custody\u201d of the United States. But he concluded that their removals without due process violated the Fifth Amendment and that the remedy for that violation is to let them file habeas claims. <\/p>\n It doesn\u2019t appear that the detainees will be freed anytime soon, as Boasberg had previously pondered aloud in court and left the door open in his order for the detainees\u2019 legal challenges to proceed while they remain in custody in El Salvador. <\/p>\n The Trump administration is likely to appeal the preliminary injunction; and this case, which is the primary vehicle for the CECOT AEA detainees, is likely headed ultimately to the Supreme Court. <\/p>\n President Trump ordered<\/a> a full travel ban on citizens from 12 countries: Afghanistan, Myanmar, Chad, Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Haiti, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen. Five of the seven countries<\/a> from Trump\u2019s original 2017 Muslim ban are on the new list. He imposed new lesser travel restrictions on citizens from Burundi, Cuba, Laos, Sierra Leone, Togo, Turkmenistan and Venezuela.<\/p>\n In the course of six hours yesterday, the Trump DOJ and Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton colluded with U.S. District Judge Reed O\u2019Connor to vitiate<\/a> a two-decade-old state law that offered undocumented residents discounted in-state college tuition. <\/p>\n In rapid succession, the Trump DOJ filed a suit challenging the law, Paxton filed a joint motion asking the judge to permanently block the law, and the judge issued the order. O\u2019Conner, sits in Wichita Falls, one of the most notorious single-judge divisions, meaning the lawsuit was assured of going to him. <\/p>\n The collusive lawsuit came after the Texas legislature failed to repeal or otherwise amend the in-state tuition law at its recent session. Steve Vladeck has more on the legal hijinks<\/a> in Texas and what he calls \u201ca stain on the federal courts.\u201d<\/p>\n 10.9 million<\/a><\/strong>: the number of people it would rob of health insurance coverage<\/p>\n $2.4 trillion<\/a><\/strong>: how much it would add to the federal budget deficit over the next 10 years<\/p>\n 18,000<\/a><\/strong>: the estimated number of preventable deaths among dual Medicare\/Medicaid enrollees who would lose their prescription drug subsidy <\/p>\n Meet the 22-year-old Trump\u2019s Team picked to lead<\/a> the DHS terrorism prevention program.<\/p>\n Since President Trump purported to fire her last week, Kim Sajet, the director of the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery, has continued to report to work and carry out her duties, the WaPo reports<\/a>. <\/p>\n Do you like Morning Memo?\u00a0<\/em><\/strong>Let us know!<\/em><\/strong><\/a><\/em><\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\nAnother Crossing The Rubicon Moment<\/h2>\n
Trump Administration Returns Improperly Deported Man<\/h2>\n
Boasberg Weighs In On Fate Of AEA Detainees At CECOT<\/h2>\n
Trump II Travel Ban: Still Heavily Muslim<\/h2>\n
Trump\u2019s Attack On Higher Ed: Ivy League Edition<\/h2>\n
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Collusive Lawlessness In Texas<\/h2>\n
Big Beautiful Bill: By The Numbers<\/h2>\n
All The Best People<\/h2>\n
Hanging Tough<\/h2>\n
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