Carlos Barria/Reuters
Dozens of former national security officials including former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright and former Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel, among others, are set to formally rebuke President Trump’s emergency declaration on Monday. In a 13-page joint statement to be entered into the Congressional Record, the bipartisan group of former officials will say “there is no factual basis” for Trump’s declaration of a national emergency at the southern border and no evidence “that entitles the president to tap into funds appropriated for other purposes to build a wall at the southern border,” The Washington Post reports. “The President’s actions are at odds with the overwhelming evidence in the public record, including the administration’s own data and estimates,” the statement reads.
The statement is reportedly meant to support lawsuits over the emergency directive and force the Trump administration to provide a legal and factual basis for it. The signatories include former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, former CIA Director John Brennan, former National Security Adviser Thomas Donilon, former Commissioner of Customs and Border Protection Gil Kerlikowske, former Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, and former Ambassadors to the United Nations Thomas Pickering, Samantha Power, and Susan Rice, among others.