ACLU Ready to Defend Against Trump's "One-Man
Constitutional Crisis"
'Taken together, his statements and
policy proposals would blatantly violate the inalienable rights guaranteed by
the Constitution, federal and international law, and the basic norms of a free
and decent society.'
Trump's policy proposals, including
pledges to deport over 11 million undocumented immigrants; to ban Muslims from
entering the United States; to surveil American Muslims and their houses of
worship; to bring back waterboarding
and other forms of torture; and to expand libel laws in order to sue media
outlets "and win money," would violate the First, Fourth, Fifth, and
Eighth Amendments, according to ACLU executive director Anthony Romero on
Thursday.
For example, Romero wrote in an op-ed in
the Washington Post:
On immigration policy, there is simply no way a Trump administration could deport more than 11 million people within two years of taking office. To achieve such a feat, Trump's deportation machine would have to arrest 15,000 people a day on immigration charges, seven days a week, 365 days a year.
The only way to accomplish this would be to shred the Fourth Amendment's protections against unreasonable searches and seizures.
To carry out such an
order, immigration agents would have to engage in suspicionless interrogations
and arrests, unjustified traffic stops, warrantless searches of workplaces and
homes, and door-to-door raids in immigrant neighborhoods.
There can be little
doubt that agents would rely on racial profiling and target people of Latino
and Hispanic descent disproportionately, violating their right to equal
protection under the law regardless of their race or national origin.
"Taken together, his statements and
policy proposals would blatantly violate the inalienable rights guaranteed by
the Constitution, federal and international law, and the basic norms of a free
and decent society," Romero added in a post at Medium.
Romero's claims are backed up by the
27-page Trump Memos (pdf),
a legal analysis of some of the real estate tycoon's most egregious proposals.
Along with the op-ed and Trump Memos,
the ACLU also launched on Thursday a petition that reads: "I pledge to speak
up, stand up, call out, and hold elected officials and candidates accountable
to the Constitution. Trying to win an election is no excuse to disregard or
dismiss the Bill of Rights."
The ACLU's analysis comes on the heels
of a report from the Sierra Club earlier this week, which warned that
Trump's "failure to acknowledge basic climate science wouldn't just leave
him isolated on the world stage as President, it would undermine our
relationships with key allies and threaten our ability to work effectively
internationally."