WEBVTT - Conservatives Step Up Attack on Affirmative Action 0:00:00.480 --> 0:00:05.680 You're listening to Bloomberg Law with June Grasso from Bloomberg Radio. 0:00:06.519 --> 0:00:15.440 No No. On the streets, the US is embroiled in 0:00:15.520 --> 0:00:19.279 its fiercest struggle over race since the nineteen sixties, but 0:00:19.360 --> 0:00:22.479 in the courtrooms, conservatives are seeing their best shot in 0:00:22.600 --> 0:00:25.919 decades to get rid of race in college admissions. Some 0:00:26.040 --> 0:00:29.760 of the nation's most prestigious universities are fighting a raft 0:00:29.800 --> 0:00:34.080 of legal challenges accusing them of unfairly waiting the admissions 0:00:34.120 --> 0:00:38.760 process through affirmative action. The multiple efforts to defeat race 0:00:38.800 --> 0:00:43.159 conscious admissions on several levels, including by Trump's Justice Department, 0:00:43.440 --> 0:00:47.120 are intended to get an increasingly conservative Supreme Court to 0:00:47.280 --> 0:00:51.760 rethink its decisions on affirmative action. My guest is Audrey Anderson, 0:00:51.800 --> 0:00:55.360 who heads the education practice at Bass Barian Sims. She 0:00:55.520 --> 0:00:59.120 was the former General counsel of Vanderbilt University. Audrey says, 0:00:59.160 --> 0:01:03.120 it seems sort incongruous that this legal fight to reverse 0:01:03.160 --> 0:01:07.039 affirmative action is picking up while the country is in 0:01:07.120 --> 0:01:11.160 this epic struggle over race. Well, this is a little 0:01:11.160 --> 0:01:17.479 bit penundrums of where the legal principles are with affirmative accents. 0:01:18.280 --> 0:01:21.600 The marketing in the streets and Our protests are about 0:01:21.959 --> 0:01:27.440 unjust treatment of people based on race. The legal constructs 0:01:27.640 --> 0:01:31.880 for affirmative action at a college or university are not 0:01:32.040 --> 0:01:36.959 justified on evening out the inequitable treatment based on race. 0:01:37.160 --> 0:01:41.640 It's not to remedy past discrimination. So when we as 0:01:41.680 --> 0:01:45.080 lawyers are thinking about this, the only reason that the 0:01:45.160 --> 0:01:52.160 Supreme Court has approved consideration of race in university admissions 0:01:52.280 --> 0:01:55.840 is in order to build a student body that has 0:01:55.920 --> 0:02:00.440 a certain level of diversity to improve the educational period. 0:02:01.000 --> 0:02:05.200 They are not allowed to use race and admissions in 0:02:05.400 --> 0:02:09.640 order to make up for the hundreds of years of 0:02:09.720 --> 0:02:14.240 discrimination against black and brown people in the United States. 0:02:14.680 --> 0:02:18.200 So from a legal perspective, we're almost operating in two 0:02:18.280 --> 0:02:21.760 different universes, and that's a really hard thing for people 0:02:21.800 --> 0:02:25.359 to wrap their heads around. Behind the three major suits 0:02:25.400 --> 0:02:29.440 against Harvard, the University of North Carolina, and the University 0:02:29.480 --> 0:02:33.720 of Texas is the activists Edward Blum who founded Students 0:02:33.760 --> 0:02:37.320 for Fair Admissions. Are they saying that these universities are 0:02:37.360 --> 0:02:40.560 not complying with established law or are they saying more 0:02:40.600 --> 0:02:44.000 than that? Well, Jude, I think they're really saying two things. 0:02:44.120 --> 0:02:47.920 They are saying that Harvard is not complying with the 0:02:47.960 --> 0:02:51.400 Supreme Court law that says, if you are going to 0:02:51.520 --> 0:02:55.400 use race in university admissions, you have to do it 0:02:55.440 --> 0:03:00.000 in a way that is narrowly colored. And Edward Blum 0:03:00.040 --> 0:03:03.680 says that Harvard is not using race in a way 0:03:03.720 --> 0:03:07.200 that is narrowly tailored. But make no mistake. In each 0:03:07.200 --> 0:03:11.320 one of these cases, they are also arguing that actually 0:03:11.440 --> 0:03:15.400 the Supreme Court precedents from the University of Michigan cases 0:03:15.760 --> 0:03:19.120 are wrong, and that actually the proper way to read 0:03:19.160 --> 0:03:22.560 the Constitution is to say that it does not allow 0:03:22.760 --> 0:03:26.800 university to be conscious of a race to use race 0:03:27.040 --> 0:03:30.680 as any kind of a factor in admission. In every 0:03:30.680 --> 0:03:33.680 one of their briefs they drop a footnote that says, 0:03:33.880 --> 0:03:37.680 lower Court, we know you can't consider this argument because 0:03:37.680 --> 0:03:40.440 it's only for the Supreme Court. But by the way, 0:03:40.520 --> 0:03:43.520 we think the Supreme Court decisions in the University of 0:03:43.520 --> 0:03:48.120 Michigan cases are wrong. So Blum's ultimate goal is to 0:03:48.160 --> 0:03:51.800 get the University of Michigan case overruled by the Supreme Court. 0:03:51.960 --> 0:03:55.840 That's his ultimate goal in the Harvard case, which is 0:03:56.040 --> 0:04:00.160 now at the Federal Appeals Court. Asians account for sent 0:04:00.280 --> 0:04:03.760 of the admitted class at Harvard the plaintiffs said, if 0:04:03.840 --> 0:04:08.200 judged purely on academics, they would make up of the 0:04:08.240 --> 0:04:12.200 admitted class. So do the plaintiffs want everyone to be 0:04:12.320 --> 0:04:15.800 judged purely on academics, So then Harvard would have a 0:04:15.880 --> 0:04:21.360 class with Asian Americans. Well, that's one of the problems. 0:04:21.680 --> 0:04:26.479 We're looking at it this way. Harvard and Yale and 0:04:26.520 --> 0:04:32.000 Columbia and Stanford, they could completely fill their class a 0:04:32.160 --> 0:04:36.240 number of times over with students with purple puff boys 0:04:36.480 --> 0:04:40.240 and a purple cl So it's really just fillingness to 0:04:40.400 --> 0:04:43.680 say that we're only going to judge students on the 0:04:43.720 --> 0:04:48.279 basis of their quote unquote academic merit. What these schools 0:04:48.320 --> 0:04:51.040 are trying to do, and what the Supreme Court has 0:04:51.040 --> 0:04:53.880 said they have a First Amendment right to do, is 0:04:53.960 --> 0:04:59.320 to choose students that they believe are best suited for 0:04:59.720 --> 0:05:02.839 the institution, and that does not have to be death 0:05:02.920 --> 0:05:06.400 based on academic merit. But f f f A and 0:05:06.520 --> 0:05:09.200 other groups to like them keep trying to say, well, 0:05:09.640 --> 0:05:12.039 all you should look at is academic merit, because that 0:05:12.240 --> 0:05:15.960 is quote unquote objective, and any time you put a 0:05:16.120 --> 0:05:21.480 subjective component into your admissions criteria, you might be discriminating 0:05:21.480 --> 0:05:25.000 against someone what is the Justice Department's role here? So, 0:05:25.279 --> 0:05:29.680 in general, the Justice Department has the responsibility to enforce 0:05:29.839 --> 0:05:33.520 a federal law that we call Title six. Title six 0:05:33.560 --> 0:05:37.919 of the Civil Rights Act requires that institutions that receive 0:05:38.040 --> 0:05:41.640 federal funds cannot discriminate on the basis of rights. So 0:05:41.680 --> 0:05:45.600 the Department of Justice is in charge of enforcing that law, 0:05:46.000 --> 0:05:49.880 and it always has been since Trump has been in power. 0:05:50.560 --> 0:05:53.359 The way that the Department of Justice has decided it 0:05:53.400 --> 0:05:57.120 needs to enforce Titles fox is to make sure that 0:05:57.279 --> 0:06:01.280 affirmative action is not being used to discriminate against whites 0:06:01.320 --> 0:06:05.560 and Asians. Now, the Justice Department sent Yale University a 0:06:05.680 --> 0:06:10.799 letter threatening to sue unless Yale agrees to stop considering race. 0:06:11.600 --> 0:06:16.000 The government said that quote unlawfully dividing Americans into racial 0:06:16.040 --> 0:06:21.040 and ethnic blocks fosters stereotypes, bitterness and division. Was this 0:06:21.160 --> 0:06:24.600 letter unusual in any way? So the government, when it's 0:06:24.600 --> 0:06:27.760 in fourth Entitle six can bring an accent in federal 0:06:27.800 --> 0:06:32.000 courts to sue an institution to force it to comply 0:06:32.120 --> 0:06:35.120 with the law. What they're supposed to do before bert 0:06:35.400 --> 0:06:38.800 suit is work in good space with the institution to 0:06:38.880 --> 0:06:42.720 negotiate to get the institution to comply with federal law. 0:06:43.200 --> 0:06:46.240 So the unusual thing about this letter to Yale was 0:06:46.320 --> 0:06:49.680 that it didn't go into much detail about exactly how 0:06:49.800 --> 0:06:53.440 Yale was in violation of the law, what Yale could 0:06:53.520 --> 0:06:57.160 do to come into compliance short of this not having 0:06:57.160 --> 0:07:00.640 affirmative action and have kind of a timetabe for Yale 0:07:00.640 --> 0:07:04.159 to come into compliance. Rather than just saying, you know, 0:07:04.240 --> 0:07:07.400 if you don't stop using your affirmative action program in 0:07:07.440 --> 0:07:10.640 the matter of weeks, we will sue you. Usually they 0:07:10.640 --> 0:07:14.440 would say you need to consider applications in this way 0:07:14.800 --> 0:07:16.800 rather than that way, and we'd like to see you 0:07:17.480 --> 0:07:22.120 institute that change over the next admission cycle, and then 0:07:22.160 --> 0:07:24.480 we'll take another look at your data, and then we'll 0:07:24.520 --> 0:07:26.920 talk to you again, and then we'll determine whether we're 0:07:26.960 --> 0:07:29.120 going to sue. So that's the way the Department of 0:07:29.200 --> 0:07:32.800 Justice usually works with institutions. So that was one of 0:07:32.800 --> 0:07:35.400 the things that was surprising about that letter to Yale. 0:07:35.880 --> 0:07:38.080 So then, does this indicate a step up in the 0:07:38.120 --> 0:07:42.600 Trump administration's overlooked of the use of affirmative action in 0:07:42.680 --> 0:07:46.880 college admissions. Yes, it's a stump up and it's very aggressive. 0:07:47.120 --> 0:07:49.840 As I was saying that the very short timing. They've 0:07:49.840 --> 0:07:52.640 been Yale to say we're going to sue to me. 0:07:52.760 --> 0:07:55.720 That sets off alarm belt because they're doing it. I 0:07:55.800 --> 0:07:59.200 think the file suit before the election in case Trump 0:07:59.280 --> 0:08:01.960 is not elected, and they'll already have that lawsuit going 0:08:02.040 --> 0:08:05.360 and on the books, and a new bid administration will 0:08:05.360 --> 0:08:08.120 have to deal with it with a lawsuit taking a 0:08:08.160 --> 0:08:11.040 position that a BigMan decision probably won't want to take, 0:08:11.400 --> 0:08:15.400 and they can change their position, but it's just administratively 0:08:15.520 --> 0:08:19.000 and politically awkward. So the goal seems to be to 0:08:19.040 --> 0:08:22.000 get this to the Supreme Court. Are they any closer 0:08:22.040 --> 0:08:25.920 that goal? Absolutely? I think that the students for Fare 0:08:25.920 --> 0:08:28.760 Admission has been strategic in the way that they are 0:08:28.800 --> 0:08:33.480 pursuing this litigation. So the best way to get an 0:08:33.520 --> 0:08:36.400 issue before the Supreme Court of the United States is 0:08:36.400 --> 0:08:39.920 to generate what we call a conflict among the circuits. 0:08:39.920 --> 0:08:42.600 So right now, the Harvard cases before the first Circuit 0:08:42.760 --> 0:08:46.320 Court of Appeals, they will issue a decision right now, 0:08:46.320 --> 0:08:48.880 are s f A is going to have a trial 0:08:49.160 --> 0:08:52.640 happened in the Middle District of North Carolina for the 0:08:52.720 --> 0:08:56.320 University of North Carolina. Whatever happens with that suit, it 0:08:56.360 --> 0:08:59.679 will be appealed to the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals. 0:09:00.040 --> 0:09:02.560 Ever loses in the First Circuit with the Harvard case, 0:09:02.640 --> 0:09:05.200 they will ask the Supreme Court to review it. Supreme 0:09:05.240 --> 0:09:08.080 Court may review it, they may not. But then we 0:09:08.160 --> 0:09:11.160 go to the North Carolina case. Whatever happens at trial, 0:09:11.200 --> 0:09:13.720 they'll appeal it to the Fourth Circuit. Whatever happens at 0:09:13.720 --> 0:09:16.880 the Fourth Circuit, whoever loses will go to the Supreme Court, 0:09:17.280 --> 0:09:19.719 and at that point there will be a decision from 0:09:19.720 --> 0:09:23.320 the First Circuit. If the Fourth Circuit disagrees with the 0:09:23.360 --> 0:09:26.760 First Circuit, that's when the Supreme Court should be stepping in. 0:09:27.200 --> 0:09:29.640 And then the Texas case is in yet another circuit, 0:09:29.760 --> 0:09:34.360 in the Fifth Circuit. So Blomb, by kicking these schools 0:09:34.400 --> 0:09:38.280 in different parts of the country, is trying to set up, 0:09:38.640 --> 0:09:42.560 I think, a conflict amongst the circuits, which makes it 0:09:42.640 --> 0:09:46.280 more likely that the Supreme Court will step in. If 0:09:46.280 --> 0:09:49.960 the Supreme Court steps in, it will be a court 0:09:50.040 --> 0:09:53.560 with a new conservative majority on it. Is there a 0:09:53.600 --> 0:09:57.960 concern that the Court might reverse the Michigan decision. Yes, 0:09:58.080 --> 0:10:01.280 I think there is a concern at will be overruled, 0:10:01.640 --> 0:10:04.520 or they may don't even have to overrule it. You 0:10:04.640 --> 0:10:08.720 might remember that in Rudder. The controlling opinion by Justice 0:10:08.800 --> 0:10:12.160 O'Connor had language in it that I would call Getta 0:10:12.559 --> 0:10:15.199 not important to the holding, not part of the holding. 0:10:15.600 --> 0:10:18.719 But there's language in it that says, we don't expect 0:10:18.760 --> 0:10:22.160 the need for affirmative action to go on forever. In 0:10:22.240 --> 0:10:25.400 twenty five years, we won't need it anymore. That was 0:10:25.440 --> 0:10:29.000 in two thousand and three. So I think that the 0:10:29.160 --> 0:10:32.280 Supreme Court justice could even try to say, well, we're 0:10:32.320 --> 0:10:37.040 not even overruling that precedent. We're just said, as Justice 0:10:37.040 --> 0:10:41.319 O'Connor presisted, that the need for infirmative action is gone. Now, 0:10:41.320 --> 0:10:46.040 when somebody says that, I think then the public will say, 0:10:46.240 --> 0:10:48.720 we'll look at what's been happening in the streets the 0:10:48.840 --> 0:10:52.720 summer and say, really, I'm not quite sure how you 0:10:52.760 --> 0:10:55.800 can say the need for affirmative action is gone. Thanks 0:10:55.800 --> 0:10:58.920 for being the Bloomberg Laws show. Audrey, that's Audrey Anderson 0:10:58.960 --> 0:11:04.480 of Bass Variance MS. The clash over undocumented immigrants and 0:11:04.480 --> 0:11:08.160 the Census is back at the Supreme Court. President Trump 0:11:08.280 --> 0:11:10.800 lost the fight to add a citizenship question to the 0:11:10.840 --> 0:11:14.239 census at the Court. His Plan B is an executive 0:11:14.320 --> 0:11:17.600 order for federal agencies to hand over existing data on 0:11:17.760 --> 0:11:21.520 undocumented immigrants to the Census Bureau so it can exclude 0:11:21.559 --> 0:11:24.200 them from its count. Today, I'm here to say we 0:11:24.280 --> 0:11:27.000 are not backing down on our reffort to determine the 0:11:27.040 --> 0:11:33.080 citizenship status of the United States population. The problem is 0:11:33.120 --> 0:11:36.040 that a three judge panel rule the President doesn't have 0:11:36.120 --> 0:11:39.280 the authority to do that. So now Trump is back 0:11:39.320 --> 0:11:42.080 at the Supreme Court to appeal that decision, and the 0:11:42.160 --> 0:11:45.640 justices have decided to expedite his appeal. My guest is 0:11:45.720 --> 0:11:49.520 Leon Fresco, a partner at Hollandon Knight. Trump has asked 0:11:49.640 --> 0:11:54.320 the Supreme Court to let the President exclude undocumented immigrants 0:11:54.360 --> 0:11:57.559 from the census count. Now, most people thinking about this 0:11:57.679 --> 0:12:01.320 will say, well, wasn't this settled by the Supreme Court 0:12:01.559 --> 0:12:05.120 when the court ruled that the administration couldn't ad a 0:12:05.120 --> 0:12:09.240 citizenship question to the census. Well, that was a different case. 0:12:09.520 --> 0:12:14.880 Impact The citizenship question was decided on a procedural issue 0:12:15.040 --> 0:12:18.600 rather than the substantive decision of whether you could ask 0:12:18.640 --> 0:12:22.120 about citizenship in the census. It was decided on the 0:12:22.160 --> 0:12:25.880 fact that the Bourbon of Commerce the Census Bureau didn't 0:12:25.920 --> 0:12:29.320 follow the correct procedures in order to add that question 0:12:29.640 --> 0:12:33.080 so late in the process about citizenship, and that the 0:12:33.200 --> 0:12:36.680 reasons that the government gave for adding that citizenship question 0:12:36.760 --> 0:12:40.400 were pretextual because there had been some comments in the 0:12:40.480 --> 0:12:44.520 record about wanting to add this for purposes of trying 0:12:44.600 --> 0:12:49.320 to discount non citizen people from the census. And so 0:12:49.440 --> 0:12:51.840 one could say, well, maybe that it covers it, but 0:12:51.920 --> 0:12:55.800 it doesn't exactly cover it, because the issue wasn't decided 0:12:55.840 --> 0:12:58.959 could you count non citizen people in the census. It 0:12:59.120 --> 0:13:02.200 was just decide that that the reason that was given, 0:13:02.559 --> 0:13:06.920 which was supposedly about voting right, was pretextual in light 0:13:07.000 --> 0:13:09.240 of the comments that had been given about the non 0:13:09.280 --> 0:13:12.559 citizens issue. So Leon tell us about this three judge 0:13:12.600 --> 0:13:16.640 panel decision started as a case in the federal disrecord 0:13:16.679 --> 0:13:20.000 in New York. But what happens is under the constitution, 0:13:20.080 --> 0:13:25.480 apportionate cases under the census actually our three judge panel cases. 0:13:25.920 --> 0:13:29.199 So two circuit judges from the Second Circuit were added 0:13:29.320 --> 0:13:32.720 to the district judge in New York, and those three 0:13:32.800 --> 0:13:37.560 judges entered an order that said that the calculation that 0:13:37.640 --> 0:13:42.160 you would exclude people with undocumented statue from the census 0:13:42.200 --> 0:13:47.600 was unconstitutional and violated the abortionment clause. My question is 0:13:47.600 --> 0:13:51.000 more about the practical aspects of this. How would the 0:13:51.040 --> 0:13:57.400 Trump administration conclusively determine who's an undocumented status and where 0:13:57.400 --> 0:14:02.040 they're living to lower the census count. There are surveys 0:14:02.080 --> 0:14:05.840 that are done both by the Department of Homeland Security 0:14:06.200 --> 0:14:10.079 and by the Census Bureau in the American Community Survey 0:14:10.240 --> 0:14:13.120 that's done on a more frequent basis and the ten 0:14:13.200 --> 0:14:16.520 year Census basis that are supposed to find out that 0:14:16.600 --> 0:14:20.080 information and take it into account and try to make 0:14:20.240 --> 0:14:25.000 estimates as to what is the undocumented population in the country. 0:14:25.280 --> 0:14:29.720 But those estimates are not very accurate, and so you 0:14:29.800 --> 0:14:34.280 could be potentially costing a state, a member of Congress 0:14:34.760 --> 0:14:37.560 if you are even the inaccurate on an order of 0:14:37.600 --> 0:14:40.320 magnitude of a few thousand people one way or another. 0:14:40.920 --> 0:14:44.640 And when we're talking about eleven million people or ten 0:14:44.680 --> 0:14:47.960 million people or twelve million people, where we don't even 0:14:47.960 --> 0:14:52.880 know and there's not really any estimates that's firm, there's 0:14:52.920 --> 0:14:55.800 not a consensus on the estimate. Some people write these 0:14:55.800 --> 0:14:59.920 reports that say that there's twenty million people that are undocumented, 0:15:00.040 --> 0:15:04.440 and that lack of consensus that's out there really makes 0:15:04.480 --> 0:15:07.760 it very hard to figure out how you deduce people 0:15:08.040 --> 0:15:10.520 if you don't actually have an objective one for one 0:15:10.640 --> 0:15:14.080 match in terms of census status. If they do that, 0:15:14.160 --> 0:15:17.240 it sounds like it's ripe for challenge. Well correct, and 0:15:17.400 --> 0:15:21.320 that was the argument actually the administration was making, is well, 0:15:21.840 --> 0:15:24.680 tell us after the fact, if we actually hurt a 0:15:24.800 --> 0:15:29.720 states apportionment, then you should challenge our calculation. Don't challenge 0:15:29.720 --> 0:15:34.160 it now, it's too early. And the second Circuit rejective 0:15:34.200 --> 0:15:37.240 that argument, saying, look, it's still illegal. So even if 0:15:37.240 --> 0:15:41.280 nobody was hurt, they're still hurt by having this illegal 0:15:41.280 --> 0:15:45.000 policy place upon people. And so we're gonna invalidate it 0:15:45.040 --> 0:15:49.040 without waiting to see if a particular states counts was hard. 0:15:49.360 --> 0:15:52.080 As a matter of this, and when is the Census 0:15:52.080 --> 0:15:55.640 Bureau going to stop its counting? The President is trying 0:15:55.760 --> 0:15:59.840 to say that there's a sastatory deadline of December thirty 0:16:00.000 --> 0:16:04.360 earth and because of that, the census should stop counting 0:16:04.400 --> 0:16:08.360 as of today, and a disrecord in California has actually 0:16:08.480 --> 0:16:12.080 enjoined that stopping of the count and has scheduled the 0:16:12.080 --> 0:16:15.320 stopping of the counts to take till October thirty. Because 0:16:15.360 --> 0:16:19.360 there's no justification for why they would stop counting earlier 0:16:19.360 --> 0:16:22.040 than they had originally said. And so the court had 0:16:22.160 --> 0:16:26.680 enjoined that, and now the federal government is saying, well, 0:16:26.760 --> 0:16:30.120 we're gonna keep coming till October fifth. And so there 0:16:30.200 --> 0:16:33.000 was hearing me about whether that contempt of the court 0:16:33.160 --> 0:16:36.400 ruling and whether that October fifth decision is going to 0:16:36.440 --> 0:16:39.640 be vacated and whether that will be moved to October thirty. 0:16:39.680 --> 0:16:43.880 I against authority to do that. Leon Trump is seeking 0:16:43.880 --> 0:16:48.200 an argument session in late November or early December. That 0:16:48.320 --> 0:16:54.160 sets of a possibility that conservative Supreme Court nominee Amy 0:16:54.200 --> 0:16:57.840 Coney Barrett could be on that panel. Would that make 0:16:57.880 --> 0:17:01.160 a difference to have one more conservative? Is last time 0:17:01.240 --> 0:17:04.240 Chief Justice John Roberts was the swing vote, so it 0:17:04.320 --> 0:17:08.240 was basically conservatives versus liberals. I mean, at this point, 0:17:09.000 --> 0:17:13.359 it's hard to predict. It's it's possible that we would 0:17:13.359 --> 0:17:16.960 have an unprecedented ruling we've never had before, which is 0:17:17.000 --> 0:17:20.440 that people without science in America, even though the census 0:17:20.440 --> 0:17:23.720 has count all people, that those people are not people 0:17:24.000 --> 0:17:27.200 and that they don't count as people. Uh. And usually 0:17:27.320 --> 0:17:31.119 you don't see those rulings because the Constitution uses the 0:17:31.119 --> 0:17:34.800 word citizen. And you know, so there's a difference that 0:17:34.880 --> 0:17:37.680 when you use the word person or where you use 0:17:37.760 --> 0:17:40.400 the word citizen and makes that you would use persons 0:17:40.600 --> 0:17:43.440 when you meant persons, and it would use citizen when 0:17:43.440 --> 0:17:47.879 it meant citizens. And so that was the idea, and 0:17:47.920 --> 0:17:51.000 that's how that's been how the Constitution has been interpreted. 0:17:51.320 --> 0:17:54.199 So this would be sort of a ground breaking decisions 0:17:54.200 --> 0:17:57.800 that would deviate from president to say that suddenly people 0:17:57.840 --> 0:18:01.560 doesn't don't need doesn't mean people being people with some 0:18:01.680 --> 0:18:04.879 sort of status of the United States, that's comfortised. If 0:18:04.920 --> 0:18:08.200 this isn't actually even to say don't count a documented 0:18:08.240 --> 0:18:11.639 people think, don't count people with temporary visas or anything 0:18:11.680 --> 0:18:16.000 else like this either. So it seems as if President Trump, 0:18:16.200 --> 0:18:21.639 you know, during his last election campaign in s he 0:18:21.760 --> 0:18:25.120 talked about immigration all the time, as he did during 0:18:25.160 --> 0:18:29.359 most of his presidency immigration the wall. But does it 0:18:29.440 --> 0:18:33.640 seem as if the topic of immigration is fading into 0:18:33.680 --> 0:18:37.520 the background a little, It wasn't even mentioned its debates. 0:18:38.200 --> 0:18:41.879 I think it depends who the audience is. If the 0:18:41.920 --> 0:18:46.280 audience is the people being affected by the immigration plans, 0:18:46.720 --> 0:18:52.040 new immigration plans that are very robot and effect hundreds 0:18:52.080 --> 0:18:55.879 of thousands of people a day, are issued almost on 0:18:55.920 --> 0:19:00.600 a weekly basis, So from the administration context, wouldn't say 0:19:00.600 --> 0:19:03.200 it faded into the background. I would still say it's 0:19:03.280 --> 0:19:07.920 the front and center regulatory priority of this whiteout. It's 0:19:08.040 --> 0:19:10.879 the most important thing. It's just a question of the 0:19:11.320 --> 0:19:14.960 the news sector. This is the most interesting story of 0:19:15.000 --> 0:19:19.080 the day. Given that in general COVID is still the 0:19:19.080 --> 0:19:22.520 biggest story that there is, plus the social unrest, plus 0:19:22.560 --> 0:19:26.880 the election, people seem to want to talk less about COVID. 0:19:27.280 --> 0:19:31.040 I'd be sorry less about immigration because COVID has sort 0:19:31.080 --> 0:19:34.359 of put immigration into the background, both in terms of 0:19:34.400 --> 0:19:38.320 there isn't necessarily at this moment a very high need 0:19:38.680 --> 0:19:40.880 for new people to come in the country. There isn't 0:19:40.960 --> 0:19:44.719 travel that allowing this. The embassies aren't open for the 0:19:44.720 --> 0:19:47.600 most part. You know, they are open, but it's it's mattering, 0:19:48.320 --> 0:19:53.360 and so it's not really something that that as at 0:19:53.400 --> 0:19:56.200 the forefront because of the COVID issues. Then it will 0:19:56.280 --> 0:19:59.359 be that it was, and then it will be post COVID. 0:20:00.680 --> 0:20:04.920 Point taking leon and to your point, there are new 0:20:05.000 --> 0:20:09.120 fees that are supposed to come into effect on October two, 0:20:09.680 --> 0:20:13.760 which would jack up the fees that immigrants pay when 0:20:13.800 --> 0:20:16.080 they come to the United States and tell us a 0:20:16.119 --> 0:20:20.240 federal judges blocked that right the last night, a federal 0:20:20.400 --> 0:20:23.720 judge blocks the new fee rules that would have increased 0:20:23.720 --> 0:20:29.040 BE pubstantially for certain different categories including naturalization and UH 0:20:29.080 --> 0:20:33.640 and filing for temporary visas. And that be was invalidated 0:20:33.680 --> 0:20:37.400 because they actually ruled that the current Secretary of Homeland Security, 0:20:37.480 --> 0:20:42.440 Chad Wolf, was improperly appointed as head of Homeland Security, 0:20:42.720 --> 0:20:47.119 so he did not have authority to promulgate that rules 0:20:47.880 --> 0:20:51.120 on the feet. And so if that's true, that's can 0:20:51.200 --> 0:20:54.960 actually affect a lot of different rule that does to 0:20:55.119 --> 0:20:57.919 be rules. So this is gonna be very interesting as 0:20:57.960 --> 0:21:00.720 that gets litigated to higher it all the way after 0:21:00.760 --> 0:21:05.000 the Supreme Court. Will the Supreme Court find that Chad 0:21:05.040 --> 0:21:09.280 Wolf was improperly appointed? And I, you know, I think 0:21:09.280 --> 0:21:11.240 it will be a close case. I don't know that 0:21:11.240 --> 0:21:14.480 that's a hard is an issue. It seems hyper part 0:21:14.480 --> 0:21:16.879 has been in the sense that you're asking whether President 0:21:16.960 --> 0:21:20.560 Trump's appoint the was appointed properly, But it's really just 0:21:20.680 --> 0:21:24.439 a technical legal question. And look, if you decide it 0:21:24.520 --> 0:21:27.080 one way, then that means another administration that you're not 0:21:27.200 --> 0:21:31.359 ideologically aligned with can do the same thing and find 0:21:31.440 --> 0:21:33.280 that they can do the same thing. But if you 0:21:33.400 --> 0:21:37.639 decided in a way that you're validating it, well, that 0:21:37.720 --> 0:21:40.119 means that other administrations can't do the same thing. But 0:21:40.200 --> 0:21:43.240 it also means that a lot of policies that were 0:21:43.320 --> 0:21:46.359 promulgated while Chad Wolf has been as ahead of the 0:21:46.400 --> 0:21:49.880 Department of Homeland Security would suddenly be in danger. How 0:21:49.960 --> 0:21:53.119 much are being hyped? Does it really make a difference 0:21:53.280 --> 0:21:57.320 to It depends because it's between six hundred dollars and 0:21:57.359 --> 0:22:01.199 a thousand dollars per applications, and so if you're in 0:22:01.240 --> 0:22:04.080 a situation where it's a business paying for a worker, 0:22:04.480 --> 0:22:07.200 it might not make a huge difference. But if you're 0:22:07.200 --> 0:22:09.920 in a situation where you're a family of four who 0:22:09.960 --> 0:22:13.400 came here through either a work program or a refugee 0:22:13.400 --> 0:22:17.760 program or some other programs, and now you're being asked 0:22:17.760 --> 0:22:21.760 to pay an additional four thousand dollars per citizenship that 0:22:21.880 --> 0:22:26.119 you didn't have before, maybe that cost prohibitive and you 0:22:26.160 --> 0:22:29.000 don't want to become a citizen at that point. Another 0:22:29.119 --> 0:22:32.040 proposed rule that I haven't heard very much about is 0:22:32.080 --> 0:22:37.639 the biometrics immigration rule, So six million would be immigrants 0:22:37.680 --> 0:22:42.560 would face expanded collection of Irish scans, palm and voice prints, 0:22:42.880 --> 0:22:47.000 facial recognition, and d n A. What's the stated purpose 0:22:47.080 --> 0:22:51.119 of this? Well, I think what had happened was that 0:22:51.240 --> 0:22:56.399 the biometric collection in the administration had been done in 0:22:56.600 --> 0:23:00.640 kind of a ad hoc manner and there wasn't sort 0:23:00.640 --> 0:23:03.199 of an overarching rule that explains, this is what we 0:23:03.280 --> 0:23:06.760 wanted to collect and this is why. But from that component, 0:23:07.320 --> 0:23:10.720 that's perfectly valid, and also there needed to be a 0:23:10.760 --> 0:23:15.280 couple of clarifications about when you could collect fingerprints from 0:23:15.320 --> 0:23:19.320 miners who are going through the system, and also what 0:23:19.520 --> 0:23:22.280 do you do with the shocking amount of people you'd 0:23:22.320 --> 0:23:25.520 be surprised who you can't take fingerprints from. There's like, 0:23:25.640 --> 0:23:28.639 you know, seedier citizens a lot of times for whatever reason, 0:23:28.960 --> 0:23:32.640 have problems you're getting fingerprints from them, or people who 0:23:32.640 --> 0:23:36.640 work in construction and who've had damage to their fingers, 0:23:36.720 --> 0:23:41.159 and so you know, now there's a from that standpoint, 0:23:41.320 --> 0:23:45.040 you conferensise the ability to get back up biometrics such 0:23:45.040 --> 0:23:48.640 as Irish scans or facial scans and that kind of thing. 0:23:48.720 --> 0:23:52.520 So from that component it's good, but it also lays 0:23:52.560 --> 0:23:56.200 out very broad guidelines of being able to collect these things. 0:23:56.280 --> 0:24:01.440 Conceivably in every single case, in for any single purpose 0:24:01.520 --> 0:24:04.679 that is desired by the Department of Moland Security. And 0:24:04.760 --> 0:24:06.879 that's where folks are taking But wait a second, is 0:24:06.920 --> 0:24:11.600 this too broad because of how much how many biometrics 0:24:11.600 --> 0:24:14.520 that allows people to collect for pretty much any reason 0:24:14.600 --> 0:24:19.160 that they feel is a justified reason for homeland security purposes. 0:24:19.640 --> 0:24:21.919 Almost every time I talked to you, Leon, I have 0:24:22.040 --> 0:24:25.120 to ask a question about the wall, and I support 0:24:25.200 --> 0:24:27.040 I think that that is going to play. You know, 0:24:27.119 --> 0:24:29.560 President Trump is going to emphasize his building of the 0:24:29.600 --> 0:24:33.360 wall in his campaign. So where does the wall stand 0:24:33.480 --> 0:24:36.600 and what are the legal challenges to it? Well, the 0:24:36.640 --> 0:24:40.920 wall continues to be built quite a pace at this point. Uh. 0:24:40.960 --> 0:24:44.720 And there's you know, about four miles of wall that's 0:24:44.880 --> 0:24:49.320 official wall, like kind of President Trump said he was 0:24:49.359 --> 0:24:55.120 going to build, but only five miles of it are 0:24:55.240 --> 0:25:00.320 in locations that didn't have some barrier previously. So it 0:25:00.440 --> 0:25:04.280 just depends whether you want to call that wall or 0:25:04.400 --> 0:25:08.399 not wall. And so that's in the eye of the beholder. 0:25:08.840 --> 0:25:13.119 But there's not a lot of new locations that didn't 0:25:13.119 --> 0:25:16.399 have a barrier that have this new wall that I 0:25:16.440 --> 0:25:19.000 think the President would call the kind of wall that 0:25:19.040 --> 0:25:22.680 he promised, so is it is it still being challenged 0:25:22.720 --> 0:25:25.919 at the Supreme Court the use of military money to 0:25:26.160 --> 0:25:29.280