Alan Dershowitz on Tuesday had his harshest words for President Donald Trump yet, saying the U.S. Constitution gives him the authority to stop illegal immigrant children from being separated from their parents at the southern border.
"I'm appalled at the president's statement that he doesn't have the power to reunite these families," the Harvard Law School professor emeritus told Anderson Cooper on CNN.
"The same Article II that gives him the kind of power he complains of in another context gives him the power to see that the laws are faithfully executed.
"The way to faithfully execute laws is not to separate families."
President Trump said Tuesday he would ask Congress for "the legal authority to detain and promptly remove families together as a unit."
He said it was "the only solution to the border crisis."
The president also met with Republican House members later Tuesday, telling reporters as he was heading into the closed-door session "the system has been broken for many years, the immigration system."
Many lawmakers say Trump could simply reverse the administration's "zero tolerance" policy and keep families together.
Dershowitz agreed, telling Cooper that Article II gave Trump the authority to fire FBI Director James Comey last year — and the foundation to argue he did not obstruct justice in doing so.
"The question is does the current president have the power today to order that no families be separated?" he said. "The answer to that is as clear as anything could be as a matter of Constitutional law, especially because this president claims unitary executive privilege.
"When he clings to obstruction of justice, he clings to Article II.
"The same Article II that he uses to defend himself gives him the authority to not only fire Comey but to make sure the laws are faithfully executed, meaning that they're not executed in a manner that offends human rights and the Constitution of the United States.
"Once people are in America, a child is entitled to due process — and that means not being separated from a parent," Dershowitz added.
"The president is not only wrong. He's completely inconsistent with the defenses he's been making and the defenses that I've been making for him."
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