Donald Trump had a list of priorities when he came into office, all related to promises he had made to his rabid fan base during the 2016 presidential campaigns. However, the Affordable Care Act wasn’t repealed “on day one,” Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama are not in prison and never will be, and Mexico hasn’t sent us a check for that wall.
Now, Trump won’t be able to sign a government-funded check for that wall, either, and the 2020 elections are just five months away.
BREAKING: A federal appeals court ruled in our case that President Trump’s attempt to transfer billions of dollars in military pay and pension funds for border wall construction is unlawful.
— ACLU (@ACLU) June 26, 2020
A federal appeals court on Friday ruled that Trump cannot legally appropriate funds that Congress approved for the Pentagon office to build a racist border wall across the southern border of the U.S., not that money was the biggest barrier to that, anyway. Since Mexico never sent that check, Trump decided to unlawfully divert funds to that wall, but has been shut down for now.
According to NBC News:
‘In a 2-1 ruling, a 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals panel found that diverting $2.5 billion Congress had appropriated for the military violated the Constitution and is unlawful.’
Breaking: Trump admin does not have authority to divert Pentagon funds to construct additional barriers on US-Mexico border, a federal appeals court ruled, days after Trump’s visit to the wall.
In 2-1 ruling, Ninth Circuit said the $2.5 billion transfer circumvented Congress.
— Jim Sciutto (@jimsciutto) June 26, 2020
While it’s more than likely that Trump will appeal once again and possibly get the case in front of the Supreme Court, it’s highly unlikely that the case would come up for review in the SCOTUS in time for the November elections. Trump was warned numerous times and by a multitude of people that a border wall was unrealistic, unnecessary, and geographically impossible. He decided to push forward anyway.
‘The executive branch “lacked independent constitutional authority to authorize the transfer of funds,” the ruling said. “These funds were appropriated for other purposes, and the transfer amounted to ‘drawing funds from the Treasury without authorization by statute and thus violating the Appropriations Clause.’ Therefore, the transfer of funds here was unlawful.”‘
Four-fifths of white evangelicals voters backed Trump in 2016, confident he would at least keep liberals out of the top U.S. court – making last week’s historic ruling all the more alarming to them https://t.co/ABwdHWbe0g
— Haaretz.com (@haaretzcom) June 25, 2020
The decision comes on the heels of two SCOTUS decisions that failed to go Trump’s way. Despite his campaign promises to be a great supporter of the LGBTQ community, he fought against Obama era workplace protections for that group, only to lose despite a conservative majority on the court. Later the same week, the SCOTUS struck down his plan to remove DACA protections for immigrants brought to the United States as children by their parents. None of this is looking good for Trump in 2020.
Trump is simultaneously trying to eliminate DACA and arguing that he is better for DACA recipients than Democrats. https://t.co/5Sxx6h1NtE
— Daniel Dale (@ddale8) June 25, 2020
Featured image screenshot via YouTube
