Migrants from Mexico and Guatemala are apprehended by U.S. Customs and Border Patrol officers after crossing a section of border wall into the U.S. on Jan. 4, 2025 in Ruby, Arizona. (Photo by Brandon Bell/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — A panel of District of Columbia Court of Appeals judges Monday heard oral arguments from the Trump administration defending the president’s move to end asylum claims at the southern border through an executive order.

Civil rights and immigration advocacy groups sought to make permanent a District of Columbia District Court’s July injunction that found the Trump administration could not block asylum seekers from making asylum claims — a form of protection extended to those fearing persecution. 

A separate appeals panel lifted the lower court’s order, permitting the administration to block asylum seekers while the merits of the case were argued.

The Trump administration cited the 212(f) proclamation and claimed that because there is an “invasion” at the southern border, asylum protections – which were created by Congress – could be denied. The 212(f) proclamation gives the president the authority to suspend entry of migrants under certain circumstances.

Encounters with migrants at the southern border have remained the lowest in years. 

Immigration crackdown

The executive order from January fell in line with the president’s immigration crackdown, as he aims to limit immigration in the interior of the country with mass deportations and cease migration to the United States through curbing access to asylum and refugee resettlement. 

During Monday’s oral arguments, Department of Justice attorneys on behalf of the Trump administration argued that Trump has the authority to decide who is admissible into the country, regardless if it’s an asylum claim.

The suit was brought on behalf of three organizations by the American Civil Liberties Union, National Immigrant Justice Center, Center for Gender & Refugee Studies, Texas Civil Rights Project, ACLU of the District of Columbia and ACLU of Texas. 

Those three organizations are the Refugee and Immigrant Center for Education and Legal Services, or RAICES, Las Americas Immigrant Advocacy Center and the Florence Immigrant & Refugee Rights Project. They provide legal services to people seeking asylum and argued that they are unable to do so under Trump’s proclamation.

The judges on the panel included Cornelia T.L. Pillard, Justin R. Walker and J. Michelle Childs.

Former President Barack Obama nominated Pillard and former President Joe Biden nominated Childs. President Donald Trump nominated Walker during his first term. 

Trump executive powers

Arguing on behalf of the Trump administration, DOJ attorney Drew Ensign said the president’s proclamation was an extension of his executive branch powers.

Ensign argued that the Trump administration views asylum as discretionary, and that the president can “take the steps necessary to make an entry bar effective, including defining consequences for violating it.” 

Ensign argued that because the appeals court this summer allowed for the district court’s order to be paused, it means the government is likely to prevail on its argument.   

Lee Gelernt of the ACLU argued that the proclamation’s use of 212(f) cannot override asylum law in the Immigration Nationality Act that Congress passed.

“This is an internally coherent statute which Congress has put together the pieces,” Gelernt said of the INA. “And what’s ultimately happening here is that the administration doesn’t like the way Congress has put together the pieces.”

He added that Congress was specific in describing a migrant who would not be allowed to qualify for asylum, such as someone who has ties to terrorism. 

“But 212(f) itself cannot override asylum,” Gelernt said. 

Ensign also asked the panel of judges, if they decide to allow the lower court’s injunction to go into effect, to give the Trump administration at least two weeks to implement the new policy at the southern border.

A barista prepares a coffee drink. (Nazar Abbas Photography via Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — Five Republican U.S. senators joined Democrats Tuesday to terminate President Donald Trump’s national emergency that triggered steep tariffs on goods from Brazil.

The vote came ahead of a major case before the Supreme Court that could decide whether many of the president’s tariffs violate the Constitution.

Sens. Mitch McConnell and Rand Paul of Kentucky, along with Alaska’s Lisa Murkowski, Maine’s Susan Collins and Thom Tillis of North Carolina, supported a joint resolution in a 52-48 vote.

The measure’s passage in the Senate marks a shift from a previous effort in April, when Senate Republicans blocked a resolution to terminate Trump’s emergency tariffs on Canada. Murkowski, Collins and Paul also supported that measure.

The resolution is not likely to see a vote in the Republican-controlled U.S. House, meaning it is not likely to become law.

Coffee canister in the Senate

Senate Democrats forced Tuesday’s floor vote just days after they filed an amicus brief urging the Supreme Court to find Trump’s unprecedented tariffs, triggered under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, unconstitutional. Murkowski was the lone Republican to join the brief.

The bill’s sponsor, Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., spoke on the floor ahead of the vote with a canister of Maxwell House coffee beside him. 

Kaine said Trump’s tariffs on Brazilian goods are an “abuse of presidential power that people are feeling every time they walk down a grocery store aisle to buy coffee for their families, to buy ground beef for their families.”

“No president, Democrat or Republican, should be able to declare a national emergency justifying the imposition of 50% tariffs because a friend of theirs is being prosecuted for breaking the law in another country,” he said.

Kaine used a decades-old law that allows the minority party to force a vote to terminate a national emergency.

Trump declared a national emergency and imposed a 50% tariff on Brazilian imports on July 30 after accusing Brazil’s government of “politically persecuting” its former far-right President Jair Bolsonaro for plotting a coup to remain in power in 2022.

‘No taxation without representation’

Sen. Rand Paul, a Kentucky Republican who cosponsored Kaine’s bill, said on the floor ahead of the vote Trump is using his emergency powers “to tax us without our consent.”

“I, for one, still believe in the principle of no taxation without representation, and will vote to terminate this contrived emergency and end these unconstitutional import taxes,” Paul said.

The vote to reverse Trump’s tariffs on Brazilian products was the first of three bipartisan resolutions this week protesting the administration’s emergency tariffs.

Kentucky’s senior senator and former Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said, “Tariffs make both building and buying in America more expensive.”

“The economic harms of trade wars are not the exception to history, but the rule. And no cross-eyed reading of Reagan will reveal otherwise. This week, I will vote in favor of resolutions to end emergency tariff authorities,” McConnell said, referring to Trump’s decision to add another 10% tariff on Canadian goods. That came after the Ontario province ran an anti-tariff ad featuring the words of President Ronald Reagan.

Trump tariffs defended

Sen. Mike Crapo, R-Idaho, criticized the joint resolution as “counterproductive to the progress already made by President Trump.”

“The president’s historic trade negotiations are bearing fruit. President Trump already announced new deals, trade deals with major trading partners, including, most recently, Cambodia and Malaysia. Other such announcements may still be forthcoming. I urge other trading partners to reach similar trading deals,” Crapo, chair of the Senate Committee on Finance, said on the floor ahead of the vote.

Both tariffs and climate change are to blame for the recent spike in coffee prices, reports the Los Angeles Times.

Chair of the Federal Reserve Jerome Powell, left, administers the oath of office to Lisa Cook, right, to serve as a member of the Board of Governors at the Federal Reserve System during a ceremony at the William McChesney Martin Jr. Building of the Federal Reserve May 23, 2022 in Washington, D.C.  (Photo by Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Supreme Court will take up in January the question of President Donald Trump’s firing of Federal Reserve Board governor Lisa Cook, according to an order filed by the court Wednesday.

The unsigned order states Trump’s application to stay a lower court’s decision to keep Cook on board while the case plays out will be deferred until oral arguments on an unspecified date in January. 

Trump tried to remove Cook from the Federal Reserve Board of Governors in late August, alleging she lied on a mortgage application. A federal district judge sided with Cook in early September after she challenged the president in court.  

A three-judge panel then split 2-1 in rejecting Trump’s appeal to overturn the lower court decision and affirmed on Sept. 16 that Cook could keep her position as the case plays out. 

Trump asked the Supreme Court to intervene, adding to his series of petitions to the justices since his second term began. The decision could have major bearing on Trump’s powers as the chief executive.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters during Wednesday’s briefing that the administration remains confident about the legality of Cook’s firing.  

“Look, we have respect for the Supreme Court but they’re going to hear the actual case and make a determination on the legal argument in January. And we look forward to that because we maintain that she was fired well within the president’s legal authority to do so. She was removed from the board. And we look forward to that case being fully played out at the Supreme Court,” Leavitt said.

The legal battle is occurring against a backdrop of Trump’s ongoing pressure to insert himself in the decisions of the independent central bank. 

For months Trump and his allies have attacked Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell with antagonizing social media posts amid Trump’s continued campaign for lower interest rates.

The president and Senate Republicans recently installed White House economist Stephen Miran on the board. Miran is taking a leave of absence as chair of the White House Council of Economic Advisers while he serves in the role.

The Fed lowered interest rates for the first time in 2025 by a quarter percentage point on Sept. 17. Miran was the only board governor to vote against the change after lobbying for a half-point cut.

Cook, the first Black woman to serve on the Fed board, was appointed by former President Joe Biden in 2023 and confirmed by the Senate in a 51-47 vote.

The Federal Reserve’s dual mandate is to maximize the nation’s employment while also stabilizing prices by keeping inflation low and steady over a long period of time. Among the tools the central bank uses to accomplish the two missions is regulating interest rates to cool inflation or stimulate the economy.