Chutzpa! Now acting Attorney General Sally Yates Wont Defend #TravelBan

Imagine the Chutzpa!

Sally Yates, second-in-command to former president Barack Obama’s justice departments Loretta Lynch, and now acting Attorney General until Jeff Sessions or another appointee is confirmed, ordered Justice Department lawyers not to defend President Trump’s temporary immigration ban!

Mark Berman and Matt Zapotosky write at the Washington Post:

Acting Attorney General Sally Yates has ordered Justice Department lawyers not to defend challenges to President Trump’s immigration order temporarily banning entry into the United States for citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries and refugees from around the world, declaring in a memo Monday she is not convinced the order is lawful.

Yates wrote that, as the leader of the Justice Department, she must ensure the department’s position is both “legally defensible” and “consistent with this institution’s solemn obligation to always seek justice and stand for what is right.

“At present, I am not convinced that the defense of the Executive Order is consistent with these responsibilities nor am I convinced that the Executive Order is lawful,” Yates wrote. She wrote that “for as long as I am the Acting Attorney General, the Department of Justice will not present arguments in defense of the Executive Order, unless and until I become convinced that it is appropriate to do so.”

You can read the rest of the story here.