The federal lawsuit filed by fifteen blue states (and Michigan) to stop President Trump's February 15 Proclamation on Declaring a National Emergency Concerning the Southern Border of the United States is unprecedented in American history both for its subject matter, a national “emergency,” and for its attempt to aggrandize federal judicial power to an extent never before conceived.
The thrust of the states' Complaint is their attempt to prove as a factual matter that there is no such emergency at the southern border, and the states are asking the federal district court to issue a “judicial declaration” to that effect. If the federal court were to accept the standing of states to litigate this issue and if a federal court at any level were to issue a decision about what is or is not a “national emergency,” we are in unprecedented territory in American history.
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