Columnist: Fired AG Sally Yates��� Behavior ���Textbook Case of Insubordination���

The uproar over President Donald Trump���s executive order on immigration, one that includes a 120-day moratorium on the admission of refugees into the United States as well as a 90-day ban on the entrance of citizens from seven predominantly Muslim countries, led to a stunning moment Monday night when acting Attorney General Sally Yates was relieved of her duties for instructing Justice Department lawyers in a letter not to defend the order from legal challenges.

���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,��� said Yates in her missive.

While many were taken aback at the speed and abruptness with which Yates was terminated, Politico columnist Josh Blackman says that she left Trump with no choice in the matter.

Of Yates��� objections to the executive order, Blackman writes that ���she should have told the president her conclusions in confidence. If he disagreed, she had one option: resign. Instead, she made herself a political martyr and refused to comply. Trump obliged, and replaced her with the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, Dana Boente.���

���This is a textbook case of insubordination,��� Blackman continued, ���and the president was well within his constitutional powers to fire her.���

At her 2015 confirmation for deputy attorney general, Yates said, ���I believe that the attorney general or the deputy attorney general has an obligation to follow the law and the Constitution, and to give their independent legal advice to the president.���

Blackman points out in his piece that ���Yates acknowledged that there was a credible argument that the executive order was constitutional,��� and that ���her objection, instead, was that the order was unwise or unjust. These may be valid points for a public citizen to raise, but the attorney general has a statutory duty to ���[r]epresent the United States in legal matters generally,��� regardless of her personal proclivities.���

���If Yates���s conscience said ���no,��� but the law said ���yes,��� her choice was to proudly voice those opinions,��� Blackman writes. ���Doing so would have been essential to maintaining the independence of the Justice Department. But if her entreaties were rebuffed, she should have resigned, and then publicly voiced her dissent.���

By Robert G. Yetman, Jr. Editor At Large