Former top DOJ immigration official says she was removed with no explanation
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(WASHINGTON) — A former top Justice Department immigration official who was removed from her position by new DOJ leadership this week told ABC News that she did not receive any explanation for her removal.
Lauren Alder Reid was one of four top officials from the agency that operates the U.S. immigration courts who was removed from her post. She had been with the agency for more than 14 years.
“They did not give me any reason, other than not citing the 16 years of outstanding performance evaluation for lack of any discipline, administrative leave or reassignment in my entire career,” Reid told ABC News.
The firings come as President Donald Trump has signed a flurry of immigration executive orders after vowing on the campaign trail to clamp down on immigration and undo Biden-era policies.
When asked if she’s considering legal action, Reid, who was the assistant director of the Executive Office for Immigration Review’s office of policy, said that she and the others are considering all options available to them.
“It’s pretty hard to sit back and imagine that this could begin to happen, at will, to any employee throughout the government, especially when we’re talking about public servants who have dedicated their careers to try to make our country the best,” she said.
The Justice Department employs about 700 immigration judges who decide whether migrants seeking asylum in the United States can remain in the country legally. There is currently an historic backlog of 3.5 million cases.
Reid said drastic reform is needed to address the backlog, saying, “Congress needs to act.”
Asked what message her removal sends to other career officials in the federal government, Reid said that employees are fearful. “If fear is what they wanted, that’s what they’re getting,” Reid said.
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(MEXICO CITY) — The U.S. has paused the implementation of tariffs for a month in both Canada and Mexico following conversations on Monday with President Donald Trump, according to each country’s leader.
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said in a post on social media, writing, “Canada is implementing our $1.3 billion border plan — reinforcing the border with new choppers, technology and personnel, enhanced coordination with our American partners, and increased resources to stop the flow of fentanyl.
Trudeau also added, “Nearly 10,000 frontline personnel are and will be working on protecting the border.” The moves will result in a 30-day delay in the tariffs in order to work out a deal, he said.
The moves mirror similar promises Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum issued earlier in the day after speaking to Trump.
U.S. tariffs imposed on Mexico have been “paused for a month,” Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said in a post on X Monday shortly after speaking to President Donald Trump. Trump confirmed the news shortly after in a social media post of his own.
Sheinbaum said Mexico has agreed to “reinforce” the Mexico-U.S. border with 10,000 National Guard troops “immediately.” She also said the U.S. had agreed to work to prevent high-powered weapons from being trafficked into Mexico.
Trump did not mention the U.S. working to prevent weapons from being trafficked into Mexico, but confirmed the 10,000 Mexican troops being deployed to the border “to stop the flow of fentanyl, and illegal migrants into our Country.”
Trump said Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Howard Lutnick, Trump’s yet-to-be-confirmed commerce secretary nominee, will negotiate with Mexican leaders in the next month to achieve a permanent deal.
Sheinbaum, who took over as Mexican president in October 2024, said Trump asked her how long she would like the tariffs on Mexico to be paused, and she responded “forever,” before Trump suggested they pause them for a month.
“He insisted on the commercial deficit that the U.S. has with Mexico. I told him it was not a deficit, that we are commercial partners, and it’s the best way to compete with China and other countries,” Sheinbaum said.
“I told him to collaborate,” Sheinbaum said. “He has agreed to the working group.”
Trump had told reporters he would speak on Monday with Sheinbaum and Trudeau prior to imposing import tariffs on their goods. The U.S. president was expected to sign executive orders on Tuesday putting in place 25% tariffs on goods from Mexico and Canada and 10% tariffs on those from China, according to the White House.
Trump said Monday afternoon he plans to talk to China in the next day or two about tariffs on that country.
Sheinbaum in a video posted to social media on Sunday said her government was calling for “reason and law” among “individuals as well as among nations.”
‘This measure of 25% tariffs has effects for both countries but it has very serious effects for the U.S. economy,” she said, “because it will raise the costs of all the products that are exported from Mexico to the U.S., it will have a 25% higher cost.”
Trudeau responded to the planned tariffs on Saturday evening, announcing his country will implement 25% tariffs on 155 billion Canadian dollars, or about $107 billion, of U.S. goods. The prime minister said he has not talked to Trump since his inauguration.
Sheinbaum, who was elected in June, offered little detail on how her government’s “Plan B” would respond to the tariffs.
She instructed her economic secretary to “implement Plan B that we have been working on, which includes tariff and non-tariff measures in defense of Mexico’s interests,” she said in a statement written in Spanish and translated by ABC News.
She also sought to remind the White House that the current free trade agreements between the U.S. and Mexico have been in place for about three decades.
“The last free trade agreement was signed by President López Obrador and President Trump himself,” she said.
Trump on Sunday told reporters he was unconcerned about the potential impact of imposing tariffs on close trading partners, saying the American people would understand.
“We may have short term, some, a little pain, and people understand that, but, long term, the United States has been ripped off by virtually every country in the world,” he told reporters on Sunday, as he departed Air Force One at Maryland’s Joint Base Andrews.
He added, “We have deficits with almost every country, not every country, but almost. And we’re going to change it. It’s been unfair. That’s why we owe $36 trillion; we have deficits with everybody.”
Canada has been taking advantage of the U.S., Trump said, calling the relationship with the country a “one-way street.”
“They don’t allow our banks. Did you know that Canada does not allow banks to go in, if you think about it, that’s pretty amazing,” he said. “If we have a U.S. bank, they don’t allow them to go in.”
Trump added, “Canada has been very tough on oil, on energy. They don’t allow our farm products in. Essentially, they don’t allow a lot of things in, and we allow everything to come in. It’s been a one-way street.”
ABC News’ Matt Rivers, Max Zahn, Kelsey Walsh, Victoria Beaule and William Gretsky contributed to this report.
(WASHINGTON) — President-elect Donald Trump has invited China‘s President Xi Jinping to his inauguration in January, his spokesperson said Thursday.
Incoming White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt confirmed reports about the invitation on Fox News on Thursday morning.
Asked if she could confirm if Trump has invited Xi to his inauguration, Leavitt said, “That is true, yes and this is an example of President Trump creating an open dialogue with leaders of countries that are not just our allies, but our adversaries and our competitors, too. We saw this in his first term — he got a lot of criticism for it; but it led to peace around this world; he is willing to talk to anyone, and he will always put America’s interests first.”
Leavitt said it is “to be determined” if the Chinese president has RSVP’d, and that other world leaders are being invited as well.
CBS News was first to report that Xi Jinping had been invited.
In October, in an interview with podcaster Joe Rogan, Trump called Xi a “brilliant guy.”
“He controls 1.4 billion people with an iron fist. I mean, he’s a brilliant guy, whether you like it or not,” he said.
Trump has threatened to impose a 10% tariff on imports from China. He and Xi last met at the G20 summit in Japan in 2019.
Asked about the inauguration invitation Thursday as he made an appearance at the New York Stock Exchange, Trump wouldn’t comment on whether Xi has committed to attend.
“Well, I’ve invited a lot of great people. And they’ve all accepted. Everybody I invited has accepted,” Trump said.
“President Xi, as well?” reporters asked. Trump dodged, saying, “Very good relationship.”
(WASHINGTON) — As courts block parts of his agenda, President Donald Trump and his allies are ramping up criticism of judges and continuing to question judicial oversight of the executive branch.
While he’s said he would abide by their rulings — but also appeal them — he kept up the effort to undermine the authority of the courts on Wednesday, alleging in a social media post that a “highly political, activist judge” wanted to stop the work of Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency.
Musk’s aggressive and controversial cost-cutting effort has faced several lawsuits, one resulting in his team being temporarily restricted from accessing the Treasury Department’s vast federal payment system containing sensitive information of millions of Americans.
The court action prompted swift rebuke from Musk and Trump’s team. Vice President JD Vance went so far as to suggest judges “aren’t allowed to control the executive’s legitimate power.”
“Maybe we have to look at the judges because I think that’s a very serious violation,” Trump said in the Oval Office on Tuesday afternoon alongside Musk, who defended his team’s work.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt continued to blast the courts at Wednesday’s press briefing, claiming “each injunction is an abuse of the rule of law and an attempt to thwart the will of the people.”
“We will comply with the law in the courts, but we will also continue to seek every legal remedy to ultimately overturn these radical injunctions and ensure President Trump’s policies can be enacted,” she said.
The escalating clash between the new administration and the courts has some legal experts sounding the alarm, and is prompting fears of a potential constitutional crisis.
“The entire premise of our constitutional system of limited government of checks and balances and separation of powers involves deference to judicial determinations of what the law says and complying with it. This goes back to the beginning of the republic,” said David Schultz, a constitutional law professor at Hamline University.
Ray Brescia, a professor at Albany Law School, called the theory being pushed by Trump allies that the executive branch should operate free of judicial checks “preposterous.”
“They are velociraptors testing the fence. They’re looking for holes. They’re looking for weaknesses. They’re checking to see where they can push the envelope,” Brescia said of the Trump administration. “I think for now, the system has largely held but we’ll see as these cases get to the appellate courts, and ultimately, many of them are likely to go to the Supreme Court.”
Much of Trump and Musk’s attempt to overhaul the federal government is being met with lawsuits, including the dismantling of USAID and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau as well as the buyout offer extended to tens of thousands of federal employees.
The key question is how Trump and his officials will respond as the court challenges progress.
In his first term, Trump amended his policies to comply with judicial rulings. One example was what Trump referred to as his “Muslim ban” restricting travel from several countries that have a majority Muslim population, which was rewritten several times before it passed muster with the Supreme Court.
“We thought that administration was so shocking and bending the rules on executive authority and so on, but it turns out to have been nothing compared to this one where it is seriously being discussed and contemplated whether or not the executive branch has a duty to follow the courts,” said Claire Finkelstein, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School.
ABC News Senior Political Correspondent Rachel Scott asked Trump directly on Tuesday: “If a judge does block one of your policies, part of your agenda, will you abide by that ruling? Will you comply?”
“Well, I always abide by the courts and then I’ll have to appeal it. But then what he’s done is he slowed down the momentum,” the president responded.
If that were to ever change, however, it would be uncharted territory in the modern political era with no obvious recourse.
Judges can push back if the administration refuses to comply but their power is limited, experts said. They could hold the administration in contempt, and either impose fines or in extreme cases direct the U.S. Marshals Service to take individuals into custody.
There are complications, though. The U.S. Marshals Service falls under the Justice Department, which is unlikely to go after Trump officials.
“Presidential refusal to comply with court orders undermines the very concept of constitutional order and limited government our country is supposed to respect and if Trump were to refuse to comply, then we have a constitutional problem,” said Schultz.