Donald Trump's sacking of acting Attorney General Sally Yates is being described as the President's failure to comprehend the American constitution.

Former US Ambassador to the Czech Republic Norman Eisen worked for President Obama in his legal team.

He told Rachel Smalley the Attorney General is the President's lawyer, and that's who the president turns to for direction.

"Normally when the Attorney General tells the President something is against the law, the President doesn't do it."

"Here you have a President that is determined to violate the law."

Civil liberties groups in the US are scrambling to get legal help to people caught up in Donald Trump's immigration ban on people from seven Muslim majority countries.

LISTEN ABOVE: Carol Rose, executive director American Civil Liberties Union of Massachusetts, speaks to Rachel Smalley

Several judges in the US have blocked the enforcement of the executive order which prevents authorities from deporting people, but some people are still being held at US airports.

Carol Rose, executive director American Civil Liberties Union of Massachusetts, told Rachel Smalley they've gone to court to fight the ban.

"We're trying to get the entire executive order struck down as quickly as we possibly can, because as students there are people who are doctors, there are faculty members, there business people, there are contributing members of our global society.

"I think we have a good chance of striking it down. It so clearly unconstitutional. Among other things, it discriminates against people based on their religion. We have freedom of religion in the United States under our constitution."

The Council on American Islamic Relations in the United States. is launching a federal lawsuit.

"Millions of people who love America, individuals and counties are concerned and worried about what this President is doing, dangerously making policies and statements," said the Council on American Islamic Relations executive director Nihad Awad.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel's again questioning Trump's order stopping people from seven Muslim-majority countries.

She said the global fight against terrorism doesn't warrant putting groups of people under suspicion.

But the US President has tweeted there are a lot bad dudes out there.

He said people would rush into the US if the ban was announced with a week's notice.

Sarah Assali is a relative of one family turned away from Philadelphia Airport, with their visas in hand.

"We felt hopeless. We were scrambling trying to figure out what we could, if we could do anything."

CNN's Ben Wedeman is in Iraq, where there's dismay.

"What I'm hearing is astonishment and a bit of resentment. Many Iraqis will tell you, and have told me today, 'we are allies of the United States. We are both fighting against ISIS.'"

The Drug Foundation says the health system doesn't appear to be equipped to cope with gang members who want to kick their addictions.

The leader of the Hastings Mongrel Mob chapter has lodged a Treaty of Waitangi claim against what he describes as a 'racist' health system.

Rex Timu says Mob members find it extremely difficult to access services for P addiction, because they're turned away for how they look, and who they are. He says the Government isn't doing enough to help.

Drug Foundation executive director Ross Bell told Rachel Smalley the organisation has been working with a couple of gangs who are frustrated.

He said when there's an individual who's at the point of wanting help, they can find it very difficult to access that.

Mr Bell said other New Zealanders find the services difficult to access too.

"We've under-invested in drug treatment in this country for many, many years and we need to be addressing that more widely," he said.

He said if you can provide a treatment, you not only address the person's addiction, you begin to address some wider issues.

LISTEN ABOVE AS THE DRUG FOUNDATION'S ROSS BELL SPEAKS WITH RACHEL SMALLEY

Prime Minister Theresa May says she'll publish her plan for Britain's exit from the European Union, as described in a speech last week, in a formal 'White Paper' document to allow parliament to scrutinise it.

LISTEN ABOVE: UK correspondent Ben Bland speaks with Rachel Smalley about Theresa May's plan for Brexit

Last week, May said Britain would quit the EU's single market when it leaves the union, charting a course for a clean break with the world's largest trading bloc.

A court ruled on Tuesday that the government must seek parliamentary approval before triggering the legal process of exiting the bloc.

Following her speech and the court ruling, many lawmakers, including some from her own party, said they wanted to see the plans set out in a formal 'White Paper' to facilitate greater scrutiny before a parliamentary vote on triggering .

White papers are policy documents produced by the government that set out their proposals for future legislation.

The government had responded to those calls by saying it believed the publication of a white paper was not necessary.

But, on Wednesday, May changed her position.

"I set out that bold plan for a global Britain last week and I recognise there is an appetite in this house to see that plan set out in a white paper," May told parliament. "I can confirm to the house that our plan will be set out in a white paper."

The Institute for Government, a think tank, said there were no rules about what must be included in a white paper, and that any such document could simply repeat the contents of May's speech.

BMW is reviewing its ambassador deal with Sonny Bill Williams after complaints over his links to controversial Muslim clerics.

A BMW New Zealand spokesman says the rugby player's contract with them is unchanged but is being looked at.

PR expert Bill Ralston told Rachel Smalley it's a storm in a teacup, but it'll be bad for the car company either way.

"I think Sonny's going to lose his BMW X5 or whatever it is," said Ralston.

"A large company like BMW is just paranoid I would suspect but it is ridiculous."

The move comes after complaints about the dual-code international and two-time World Cup winning All Black's associations with controversial Muslim clerics, Mufti Ismail Menk and Ebrahim Bham.

Menk is known for his extreme anti-homosexual views, and was once recorded as saying: "With all due respect to the animals, [homosexuals] are worse than those animals".

Williams has been photographed with him several times and has tweeted about the pair, including retweeting one of Menk's quotes after his grandmother died last May.

Articles have appeared in a variety of publications about WIlliams' links with Muslim extremists and a number of people have complained about the associations on BMW's Facebook page.

Donald Trump has reportedly left the controversial FBI director with his job.

The US president's decision to leave bureau boss James Comey in place is unusual, considering how harshly he criticised him for not prosecuting Hillary Clinton during the election campaign.

But US correspondent Jennifer Strong told Rachel Smalley the US government has to vote on all his picks, so it may have just been a battle not worth fighting.

"This is not exactly surprising to folks who are watching this, because Trump has a huge number of jobs he has to fill."

President Trump has nearly 700 positions to fill, and only three have been confirmed so far.

Today will see hearings for the president's choice to lead the Department of Health and Human Services, Tom Price.

Jennifer Strong said he was trading in health-related stocks while serving in Congress.

"Stock trades made in medical companies while sponsoring legislation that might have benefited those same companies - at best from an ethics stand-point, even if not illegal, it simply does not look good."

There were also red flags raised when Tom Price wrongly said he'd never before been investigated for a breach of ethics.

LISTEN ABOVE AS US CORRESPONDENT JENNIFER STRONG SPEAKS WITH RACHEL SMALLEY

The minimum wage may be going up by 50 cents to $15.75 per hour from April, but there are calls for it to go higher.

SEE ALSO: Minimum wage rise won't meet cost of living: Union

Labour's workplace relations and safety spokesperson Iain Lees-Galloway said with rampant housing costs, this increase doesn't even cover the rise in rent.

He told Rachel Smalley most people on the minimum wage are renting.

"I would have said when you've got house price inflation at around about 5.8 percent, then a figure that was a little bit closer to that would be appropriate," he said.

Mr Lees-Galloway said the real problem is the number of people who are on the minimum wage or have their wage directly affected by the minimum wage, which he said is around 200,000 people.

"If fewer people were reliant on the minimum wage, then it wouldn't be such a difficult balancing act for the government because you wouldn't have so many people who were reliant on that decision."

LISTEN ABOVE AS LABOUR'S IAN LEES-GALLOWAY SPEAKS WITH RACHEL SMALLEY

Auckland's Chamber of Commerce is taking businesses exploiting their workers to task.

It's launching a service to investigate in confidence how workers are being treated.

It's for people who think they're being ripped off by their bosses.

Chamber chief executive Michael Barnett told Rachel Smalley migrant workers are being taken advantage of.

"The diversity in employers is seeing new migrants into New Zealand, as employers, bringing in practices that perhaps we wouldn't consider acceptable in New Zealand."

Listen to the full interview above

Donald Trump is set to become the President of the United States in a matter of hours and now people can see him up close - in wax

Four wax figures of Trump will be unveiled at the Madame Tussauds Museum, coinciding with his inauguration

Lead studio artist Kim Schrader told Bernadine Oliver-Kerby the hardest part was perfecting his famous hair.

"It's like a combination of real hair and synthetic hair, he had just the right shade of white and a little bit of blonde."

Questions are being asked of businessman Chris Liddell's tenure on the board of Kiwi accounting software firm Xero after it emerged he'd gained a prestigious spot in United States president-elect Donald Trump's incoming administration. 

If Liddell decides to stay on as chairman of Xero, a conflict of interest could be triggered. 

Jane Arnott, Associate and New Zealand Representative for the Institute of Business Ethics, talks to Bernadine Oliver-Kerby about the situation above.