Before this terrible week ends, a few thoughts on an aspect of the travel ban case that didn't get enough attention -- not what the justices wrote, but how the plaintiffs' lawyer offered Trump a way out -- and Trump rejected it. 1/
At oral argument, Chief Justice Roberts asked Hawaii's lawyer, @neal_katyal, whether Trump's anti-Muslim statements amounted to a permanent bar on enacting policies like the travel ban. 2/ 
Kaytal said Trump could renounce those statements and the constitutional issue would go away. 3/
(This wouldn't resolve the separate question of whether Congress had delegated the president the authority to issue such a ban, but most observers considered a challenge on those grounds less likely to succeed.) 4/
Given the chance to make the case essentially go away, and pocket an easy win, Trump did . . . nothing. Asked specifically about whether he would back down from his statements to save his policy, he said "There's nothing to apologize for." 5/ politico.com/story/2018/04/…
In the end, of course, he won anyway. But this tells us a lot about how much Trump cares about the substance of his policies versus how much he cares about not looking weak by backing down. 6/6
