When the Trump administration's Muslim ban was moving through the courts, there was the weird debate people were having about whether it was fair to use Donald Trump's explicit statements announcing a discriminatory motive for the ban as evidence that the ban was discriminatory. The debate was weird because in any other circumstance the answer is obvious -- of course it's evidence. It's close to dispositive evidence. That's how anti-discrimination law works.
Joshua Deriso campaigned for election as chairman of the City Commission of Cordele, Georgia, by publicly stating his intent to “replace Caucasian employees with African Americans”; to lead “an entirely African American” City Commission; and to replace Roland McCarthy, the white City Manager, with a black City Manager. On social media, Deriso declared, “Structure needs to change . . . More Blacks!!!”; “The new City Manager should be Black”; and “it is time for African Americans to run our city.” Deriso won the election. The same day he and fellow commissioners took their oaths of office, the Commission voted on racial lines to fire McCarthy and to replace him with a black City Manager.
"The question," the court continued, "is whether those allegations permit the inference that the City Commission fired McCarthy because he is white." They quite reasonably answered "yes". When you publicly campaign on "I am going to racially discriminate", and then you do exactly what you promised to do, it's entirely reasonable to conclude that what you've done is engage in racial discrimination. And that inference is valid notwithstanding the fact that under normal circumstances the city council has wide discretion in hiring or terminating its city manager. This is not hard.
There's no pay off here other than to reemphasize the lawless anomaly that was Trump v. Hawaii. The pass it gave to blatant, undisguised discrimination is completely at odds with the doctrine both before and after the case. Judges fully understand how senseless Trump's rule is in other cases (especially, one must observe, in cases of "reverse discrimination"). Indeed, while Trump v. Hawaii was under consideration I observed that in any remotely analogous circumstance involving "Smallsville, Anystate" the case is an absolute dunker as a clear and obvious legal violation. It is only Donald Trump who received and continues to receive these ridiculous one-offs as the Supreme Court's special favorite.
9 comments:
This is an idiotic analogy, David. In the local town example, there really is no conceivable alternate reason for firing white employees and hiring black ones other than racial animus consistent with the public statements during the campaign. Hence, a valid inference drawn. In the national border context, however, there are numerous other nondiscriminatory reasons, some of them unspeakable but nonetheless perfectly legal and legitimate.
For example, have you considered that one effect caused by Trump's "travel ban" was that the CIA was effectively forced to cease or dramatically curtail its operations in the subject countries (Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Libya, Mali, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen)? The subject countries (coincidentally, or not) happen to be countries that were crawling with CIA operatives and laundered black money. One of the primary ways that the CIA and its associated NGOs do business is by offering asylum and visas and other benefits to potential informants and agents overseas. The offer is made, and then the informants do the dirty work, give up intel and sources. Then they reap the asylum benefit and often get a bag of cash.
When Trump instituted the travel ban, the CIA was no longer able to engage in such practices in the subject countries, at least not as easily.
And as we know, Trump was, at the time (and to this day), at war with the intelligence agencies, who had spied on his campaign and transition team, were actively spying on his national security advisor (and forced him out), were leaking classified information o the press on a daily basis, and were seeking to undermine his presidency from within.
Trump is a dealmaker. He tries to create leverage against his opposition. What better way to create leverage than by shutting down the operations of your enemy overseas?
And lo and behold, many of the "protests" against the "travel ban" were astroturf operations funded by people who are involved in CIA money laundering operations overseas who were adversely affected by the travel ban.
Don't be a simpleton, David. The world is not so black and white as you imagine. You are smarter than that.
Did I ever consider that, in lieu of "Trump said he's going to do the thing and then he did the thing, it was probably the thing!", the Muslim ban was actually some 7-dimensional chess move against the deep state?
No, I did not consider that. Because there's not enough tin foil in the world to make it come within a galaxy of being a plausible hypothesis.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/former-cia-chief-trumps-travel-ban-hurts-american-spies--and-america/2017/02/05/a5acce36-ebd9-11e6-9973-c5efb7ccfb0d_story.html
From the February 2017 article by Michael Hayden, former CIA chief:
"I’ve heard from a lot of intelligence professionals who are going to have to live with the consequences. They noted that six of the seven countries involved in the ban (Iran being somewhat an exception) are troubled, fragmented states where human sources are essential to defeating threats to the United States.
Paradoxically, they pointed out how the executive order breached faith with those very sources, many of whom they had promised to always protect with the full might of our government and our people. Sources who had risked much, if not all, to keep Americans safe."
Don't be so dismissive, David.
I have no doubt that the Muslim Ban harmed American foreign policy interests. Reckless and racist immigration and foreign policy decisions tend to do that. I just am exceptionally dubious that it was crafted with the intent of sabotaging our international intelligence operations, as opposed to the far more plausible "he did it for the exact reason he said he was going to do it."
(I also like how you cannot fathom any reason why a White employee might be fired and replaced by a Black employee other than racism. Now admittedly, in the Georgia case I'd say that the discrimination inference is overwhelmingly likely because, you know, the guy explicitly said that was his reason. But the whole point of your endeavor is to overlook the express and publicly stated rationale in favor of some hypothetical alternative hidden justification -- and once we do that, there obviously are all sorts of other reasons why the City Manager might have been fired and replaced, reasons much more normal than "to sabotage our own intelligence agencies in critical international hotspots." In both cases, the most obvious reason why those alternatives are discounted is because Trump and Deriso both told us why they were doing what they did -- to discriminate.)
If you have "no doubt" that the "travel ban" harmed the CIA's ability to operate in the subject countries, why is it so hard to believe that this was the goal? Simply because it does not jive with your preconceived notion or what the media told you? That's not a good enough reason, David.
You know, as well as I do, that Donald Trump did not craft those executive orders or pick the countries to which it would apply. It is exceedingly unlikely that Trump, out of sheer racism, would just happen to ban refugees from the very countries in which the CIA does the most business. Highly implausible.
The executive orders were crafted not by Trump but by his team of people, including Stephen Miller, who are very smart and who knew the effect it would have on the CIA's ability to operate. And the CIA reacted as you would think it would -- with astroturf outrage, by ginning up protests against it, and by howling about "racism".
I can send you other articles if you want. All of the CIA guys spoke out against these executive orders. Hayden was overt about the reason for his objections. Others were more coy about it. But obviously it had an effect.
And if you recall, the "travel ban" was one of the very first things Trump did when he took office. It was a shot across the bow to the intel folks, and they took it that way and reacted accordingly.
The world can be a much more interesting place when you are not so closed-minded, David.
It should go without saying, but I will add the following:
No President whose goal is to undermine the CIA will come right out and say it, for obvious reasons. See John F. Kennedy; Richard M. Nixon.
I continue to be very comfortable in my assessment that Trump enacted the Muslim ban he promised to enact in his campaign for the reasons he loudly and repeatedly told us were the reasons he was going to enact a Muslim ban. I might spot you the possibility (which I hadn't considered) that Trump also viewed as a positive the fact that this would aid America's enemies and damage our national security interests as a bonus knock-on effect on top of his primary motivation, which was the motivation he expressly told us was his motivation repeatedly and without qualification. But this bizarre insistence that we need to look beyond the obvious to find some 7-dimensional chess play about the CIA to "explain" a policy that Trump was extremely overt and explicit about is just weird. It's very, very weird.
So while I appreciate you giving me the latest Q drop or whatever the hell this is, I live in Portland and so already have plenty of occasions to hear wild ramblings about the CIA and deep state just by walking downtown.
Appears I'm making some headway with you. I will take it.
Query: Why do you think the travel ban included Libya, but not Morocco or Algeria, for example?
Have you thought at all about that? Moroccans and Algerians are brown-skinned too. And they are neighboring countries.
If it were motivated by racism, why not ban refugees from Senegal or Tajikistan, or any other number of countries other than those in which the CIA was heavily involved in operations?
Admitting I usually don’t read comments sections, this one paid off. Seeing Stephen Miller described as “very smart” is laugh out loud funny.
Needless to say, in addition to being a Nazi, Stephen Miller is spectacularly stupid.
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