Sally Yates, the former acting Attorney General, was fired by Donald Trump after she stated that the law required her not to enforce the President’s ban on refugees and on immigrants from seven Muslim countries [Image: Evelyn Hockstein for the Washington Post via Getty].

Sally Yates, the acting Attorney General, provided an example of what it means to work honorably for Donald Trump. It comes down to conducting yourself in a way that, in many cases, will result—that you know will result—in not working for him for very long.

Trump fired Yates after she refused to deploy Justice Department lawyers in defense of his executive order, issued on Friday, which bans people from seven Muslim-majority countries, and refugees from anywhere in the world, from entering the United States.

Yates … decided that her job, her official position, not her policy beliefs or even the dictates of her conscience, required that she defy the President.

She did so in a letter which notes … “My responsibility is to ensure that the position of the Department of Justice is not only legally defensible, but is informed by our best view of what the law is after consideration of all the facts.

“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.”

By daring Trump to fire her, and for doing her job until and despite his decision to do so, Yates made a powerful statement about the profession of politics itself.

But there is also, for those who form the moving parts of our constitutional machinery, a question of the duty one has—and to what, and to whom.

Source: What Sally Yates Proved About Donald Trump – The New Yorker

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