Let's Talk About Hannah Dugan, and a Judiciary That's Out of Control

By Rich Kozlovich

 

There's been a big uproar over Wisconsin state judge Hannah Dugan over her being arrested by the federal government for her complicity in aiding and abetting the escape of an illegal alien, one with a criminal record.  

First, unlike some claims ICE didn't' barge into her courtroom.  They waited in the hall for the case before Dugan and this criminal to be over before arresting him.  When she found out she huffed and puffed her way out into the hall and chastising them demanding what right they had to arrest this man without an arrest warrant, and to gain time to aid his escape:

......she instructed the agents to obtain a judicial warrant for Ruiz's arrest, which bought time, ultimately leading to the great escape. Federal agents later caught Ruiz, and Judge Dugan was arrested later.

An administrative warrant isn't the same as an arrest warrant.  But, when observing someone committing a crime the police are arresting people daily without a warrant, and if someone is here illegally, by their very presence they're committing a crime, in point of fact, a felony, and since she helped him to escape, that's a crime, and it's punishable by law:

Per 8 U.S.C. § 1324:........(1)(A) Any person who—.........(iii) knowing or in reckless disregard of the fact that an alien has come to, entered, or remains in the United States in violation of law, conceals, harbors, or shields from detection, or attempts to conceal, harbor, or shield from detection, such alien in any place, including any building or any means of transportation;.........shall be punished as provided in subparagraph (B).

According to subparagraph (B), the consequences are steep: Since Dugan presumably acted not for financial gain, which could mean up to 10 years in prison, but for other reasons (e.g., fighting imaginary “Nazis”), she faces fines or up to five years in prison, or both.

April 28, 2025 by Silvio Canto, Jr. writes instead of enforcing the nation's laws judges are acting like immigration activists.  Through their decisions and actions they are in effect writing de facto new immigration "laws".  Unwritten laws based on their personal morality.  Laws no legislature in the nation ever passed.  And in Wisconsin Hannah Dugan isn't an anomaly, she's part of a philosophical cabal, as another Milwaukee County judge joins rebellion.  After all, these laws were written by some old white guys in some dusty old document from the 18th century, and they're far more noble and far wiser being guided by a higher cause.  So, in the universal leftist mind set, that justifies viewing laws actually passed by Congress as meaningless, and can be ignored, and even usurped.   Isn't that a form of insurrection?  Just a thought.

 

Only the Trump administration disagrees.  AG Bondi intends to prosecute these judges who are in violation federal law in their attempt to obstruct the efforts of the Trump administration.  And she needs to look at the governors of these states also.

What's been the reaction from the left? While touting the phrase, “no one is above the law", which no Democrat really believes when it comes to .... well.... Democrats, and those criminals they wish to protect.  Dem Rep. Moore says a judge’s control is ‘bigger, and that “jurists ought to be able to have control of their courtroom, and localities should not be pressured into executing and assisting ICE, and I think that’s the bigger question.”   What a load of clabber, and when asked if Judge Dugan should be required to follow the law she evades answering with more clabber:

“Well, you know what, this is not fair to ask me that question, because she has not had her day in court yet to litigate and to defend herself vigorously, which I think she will do. What you’re asking me to do is…to sort of not go along with what I believe is — because I think that ICE ought to operate and they ought to do it clearly, outside of her — not outside her courtroom, but maybe on the street, where they arrested him on the street was the appropriate place. They should not even have been in the courthouse as far as I’m concerned. And so, to say that they can arrest you in the cafeteria of the hospital, but not in your hospital room, this is slicing and dicing it in such a way where the Justice Department is determined to intimidate the judiciary. And I think that we need to fight back.”

It's interesting, that's not the way they viewed the staged arrests by the FBI of Trump supporters in recent years with swat team early morning arrests of totally non-violent old men forcing a hand cuffed perp walk with the Pravda media there waiting to film it.    

 

Milwaukee’s mayor, Cavalier Johnson, says it's just wrong for Trump to enforce the law and to  scare innocent illegal aliens, implying what Dugan did was the right thing to do.   Did he actually say "innocent illegal aliens"?  If they're here illegally, they're not innocent, they're criminals.  

It appears the entire body of government in Wisconsin is infected with this insanity, as Wisconsin Rep.: Dugan says, what Hannah Dugan did is "what all of us will be called to do in the days and weeks and months to come, and it’s standing up for people in our community that are being targeted by the Trump regime”, and Wisconsin's lawless governor issues guidelines to shield illegal aliens from ICE agents. 

Democrats chose a hill to die on—they will defend the last violent, human-trafficking Central American gangbanger escape from ICE no matter what the cost. According to documents leaked by conservative radio host Dan O'Donnell, a Department of Administration (DOA) memo dated April 18 lays out explicit steps for Wisconsin state workers to follow when ICE agents arrive at government buildings. Instead of cooperating with federal immigration enforcement, employees are being told to stonewall — refuse to answer questions, deny access to files, and even demand agents leave if no attorney is available.

What about Democrat governors around the nation?  Arizona Gov. Hobbs has vetoed a  bill that requires the police to cooperate with ICE, which matters little because there's federal law that requires state law enforcement to cooperate, and at some point I'm convinced the Trump administration will start invoking and enforcing that law, which means legislators, governors, and law enforcement people might be arrested.   Governors like Illinois Governor JB Pritzker who declares “The State of Illinois will Stand Up for the Rule of Law”.

Then we have that giant intellect, Chris Christie, who says while Judge Dugan over stepped her bounds, but she shouldn't be put in jail.  Over stepped her bounds? So that's what it's called with someone helps criminals to escape law enforcement?  Remarkable!

 

Then there's Judge Andrew Napolitano, who went over to the dark side years ago, says Trump overreached with this arrest, calling it a, ‘Jihad Against Judges’, decrying administrative warrants, and saying he thinks this judge has immunity.  Well, that's not a universal view, and apparently she also thinks she's not immune since Dugan has added a former Bush solicitor general to her high priced defense team.  Who's funding that?

Jonathan Turley seems to think it's "out-of-control judges, not FBI, appear to have crossed 'red line', and a black robe doesn't make one immune from the rule of law".   A Yale law professor thinks the arrest is legitimate.  The Wisconsin state Supreme Court, a very liberal court, has temporarily pulled this judge from the bench, with former Governor Scott Walker saying:  "It is time for the members of the Wisconsin State Legislature to vote to remove her from office."

The complaint is the Trump administration is doing this to send a message.  Good, and in point of fact, Congress Should Expand Scope of Expedited Removals to Include Mass Deportation.

As for calling this arrest a "jihad against the judiciary", here's who threw down the gauntlet.  

1. 220 lawsuits in 100 Days: Trump Administration Faces Unprecedented Legal Blitz
2. Biden-Appointed Judge Blocks Border Patrol from Arresting Suspected Illegal Aliens Without Warrants    
3. Exclusive—Reps. Jim Jordan & Brian Mast: Rogue Judges Are Out to Stop Trump’s America First Agenda 
4. Another Stops Trump from Ending Taxpayer-Funded Lawyers for Migrants

This is a battle that's been long overdue, and now that gauntlet has been picked up by an administration willing to do battle.  

One more thing.  It's long past time former Biden and Obama administration officials faced the consequences for the crimes they committed while in office, including Mayorkas! For murder. 

• Update, 5/7/25:  ‘Throw the Book’ at Judge Who Helped Illegal Alien Evade ICE, Sen. Johnson Says

Editor's Note:  And the hits keep right on coming.  Now we see why she's had to hire a high priced team of attorneys to defend her.  I would love to know where the money is coming from to pay them.  At any rate, it's getting worse by the day, and by all rights, she should end up in jail. Here's the latest update.  RK

• Update, 5/8/25: Houdini in a Robe: Judge Dugan’s Courthouse Escape Plan 

 

Obama Judge Says 14th Amendment Gives Muslim Migrants the Right to Invade America

Any kind of immigration law is then unconstitutional.

By Daniel Greenfield June 8, 2023 @ Frontpage.com 

Biden recently suggested that the final clause of the 14th amendment gives him the right to print as much money as he pleases while over in New York, an Obama judge claimed that the first clause gives Muslim migrants the right to invade any part of New York that they please.  Judge Nelson S. Roman, a clownish Obama appointee, ruled in favor of an ACLU lawsuit on behalf of Sidi Mouhamed Deide, Adama Sy, Abdallahi Salem, and Mouhamed Said Maloum Din filed against counties in upstate New York that were preventing New York City’s Mayor Eric Adams from dumping illegal alien migrants there.

Roman spent the hearings ranting that the attempt to keep hotels from becoming migrant shelters were “Jim Crow” and issued a ruling falsely claiming that the fourteenth amendment protects the rights of migrant invaders to go anywhere they please in the country they invaded and thus also that local governments may not interfere with any resettling project............To Read More....

Colorado Bans Controversial Court-Ordered Reunification Camps

By Alice Giordan June 7, 2023

Colorado has become the first state to ban court-ordered camps that places children into a relationship with a parent who has been accused of abusing them. The camps, known as reunification camps, are ordered by family court judges in private custody disputes or divorces involving minors. As part of the order, workers with private transport companies for the camps are sometimes given temporary custody of the children so they can legally take the children from their homes. Children sent to reunification camps are forced into what some in the system’s care have described as a “brainwashing technique” that the system calls “reunification therapy.”................

It also followed results of a state audit that turned up evidence that at least one custody evaluator admitted he dismissed 90 percent of child abuse claims without investigation them. The main trigger for ordering children to attend reunification camps is an allegation that they have made false allegations of child abuse against their parent as part of the other parent’s plot to alienate them from the accused parent...............In some cases, the judges have ordered the suppression of criminal convictions of child abuse against a parent. Some parents who brought up past convictions have themselved been accused of parental alienation....................“Family court judges are basically doing whatever they want with our kids,” Riley, who says he went broke paying for the camps, told The Epoch Times.

In addition to the Colorado legislation, Swithin’s group has filed a class action lawsuit against the Turning Points for Families reunification camp and its owner Linda Gottlieb on behalf of several children who say there were abused at the camp.............To Read More,,,,,

Judge Tim Kelly’s Court of Contempt

The D.C. District Court Judge is anything but impartial in the J6 cases coming before his court.

By Julie Kelly 

Following an armed FBI raid with SWAT vehicles that terrorized his neighborhood and pregnant wife, Zachary Rehl was arrested in March 2021 for his involvement in the events of January 6. A Philadelphia judge ordered Rehl, a member of the Proud Boys, to be released from custody pending trial.

But Joe Biden’s Justice Department immediately asked a D.C. federal judge to keep Rehl in jail indefinitely even though he was not accused of committing a violent crime. Claiming Rehl “abetted” the destruction of government property—“a federal crime of terrorism,” prosecutors wrote—the government argued that no condition of release could keep the community safe from Rehl, a former Marine with no criminal history.

Enter D.C. District Court Judge Timothy Kelly............What’s unfolding in Kelly’s courtroom is a mockery of justice—a politically motivated case heavily reliant on  speech and activity that should be protected by the First Amendment rather than substituted for hard proof of any crime, let alone a plan to overthrow the government. For example, when FBI investigators raided Rehl’s home, they found no weapons or detailed plot to run Congress out of town on January 6 but instead recovered clothing and challenge coins produced by the Proud Boys.............To Read More.......

• Did a Government Intel Asset Plant Key Evidence in Proud Boys Case?
• FBI misused FISA data to surveil 'political party' and congressman
• Judge strikes 'misguided' attempt to impose 'hate speech' definition on public 
• 'Nothing less than weaponization': IRS blasted for regulating speech 

Roe overturned! Supremes call 1973 decision 'abuse of judicial authority'

Abortion decision 'was egregiously wrong from the start'

 By WND News Services   June 24, 2022 

  

The ruling, which had been leaked apparently by a court insider to reporters several weeks ago, said stare decisis, the doctrine of recognizing previously precedents, "does not compel unending adherence to Roe's abuse of judicial authority." 

 

"Roe was egregiously wrong from the start. Its reasoning was exceptionally weak, and the decision has had damaging consequences. And far from bringing about a national settlement of the abortion issue, Roe and (related case) Casey have enflamed debate and deepened division."

The court majority said, "It is time to heed the Constitution and return the issue of abortion to the people's elected representatives. 'The permissibility of abortion, and the limitations, upon it, are to be resolved like most important questions in our democracy: by citizens trying to persuade one another and then voting.' … That is what the Constitution and the rule of law demand."

The court bluntly said, "The Constitution does not confer a right to abortion: Roe and Casey are overruled; and the authority to regulate abortion is returned to the people and their elected representatives." ............To Read More.....

With claims against pharmacies, trial lawyers are becoming a public nuisance

By Jeff Stier June 9, 2022 @ Washington Examiner 

In America's tragic opioid crisis , trial lawyers believe they have found an untapped well of financial wealth. More specifically, they think they've found a way to collect legal fees by redefining the concept of nuisance laws for their personal gain. This get-rich-quick scheme will only line the pockets of trial lawyers and create new legal hurdles.

In our legal system , nuisance lawsuits were designed to resolve community-level situations such as the presence of malodorous, unsightly, or even toxic debris next to a residence or a contaminated well. An individual or company would only be subject to legal liability under this legal construct if they have caused another person to suffer loss or harm. This structure allows public nuisance laws to punish actions that are already illegal and harmful to communities so that those injured can be compensated.

Public nuisance litigation was never intended to create legal or regulatory standards. Yet that's exactly what trial lawyers are now trying to do.

By attempting to apply nuisance law in ways never intended, they are targeting companies they believe will settle for large sums, including pharmaceutical makers, pharmacies, gun manufacturers, and energy producers. Lawyers have used this scheme to cast a net wide enough to include any sufficiently deep-pocketed company that distributes or sells these products. Under this tortured application of public nuisance, it doesn't matter how the problem began or who is at fault so long as the lawyers get their payday.

This dangerous attempted expansion of public nuisance law is caused by trial lawyers' overreach, according to a recent report from the Heritage Foundation. "In the trial lawyers' conception of nuisance claims, almost anything can be couched as a public nuisance, and trial lawyers stand to gain a huge windfall in contingency fees without having to comply with class action rules if they are successful in persuading a state, city, or county government to let them litigate on its behalf," the report reads.

That's key because, often, it is taxpayers in jurisdictions that hire these lawyers who get left with the big legal fees when higher courts overturn jury decisions because the lower court incorrectly allowed these cases to advance.

A recent case in Ohio is a prime example of how out of control the process can become. Federal Judge Daniel Polster, who oversees all the multidistrict litigation opioid lawsuits across the nation, held a trial against several major pharmacy chains in his Ohio courtroom. Polster, who has been quite vocal about his role in solving the opioid crisis, has pushed for parties to settle cases quickly rather than go to court.

"Polster has pushed the defendants to pay up," the Wall Street Journal recently noted . "When the pharmacies refused, he scheduled a trial in a lawsuit involving the two Ohio counties. He then stacked the deck against the pharmacies and declined to call a mistrial after a juror shared information biased against the defendants with fellow jurors."

Unsurprisingly, that jury decided that several retail pharmacy chains created a public nuisance by failing to do enough to stem the abuse of opioids — even though every prescription filled was valid and the pharmacies complied with all regulations. What's ironic is that pharmacies have been sued for refusing to fill opioid prescriptions , and under this decision from Polster's court, these companies can now be sued for filling a prescription or not filling a prescription. That isn't justice.

Tellingly, the lawsuit was only brought against large chain pharmacies — CVS, Rite Aid, Walmart, Walgreens — not the small, independent pharmacies that fill the majority of opioid prescriptions in the two counties involved in the lawsuit. It's clear this is about targeting those with the largest wallets, not solving the complex problem of the opioid crisis. It certainly isn't about justice.

However, the verdict may only be a temporary victory for the trial lawyers and their shakedown schemes. The 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has overridden Polster on numerous occasions in these cases. In fact, the appeals court has "chastised the district judge" and said his court "abused its discretion."

Across the board, higher courts tend to be skeptical of the novel application of nuisance lawsuits. In the most recent example, the Oklahoma Supreme Court tossed out a $465 million judgment against Johnson & Johnson in a case employing the same dubious pharmaceutical public nuisance tactic by a 5-1 decision. Late last year, in a case against drug manufacturers, a California superior court judge similarly ruled in favor of J&J and other drug companies.

Despite these rulings from high courts, trial lawyers are not backing down in their effort to use public nuisance law against a variety of industries. Companies are incentivized to settle to avoid even greater exposure to lawsuits. The pressure from trial lawyers to settle creates a vicious cycle because that allows trial lawyers to receive a payday without having to face scrutiny from a higher court.

This abuse of public nuisance law must end. America cannot withstand punitive legal behavior by those who seek to retroactively rewrite laws they dislike. Ultimately, legislatures and principled judges must step up and end such jurisprudential hijacking. The creation of law is the purview of Congress and state legislatures, and trial lawyers do not constitute a fourth branch of government.

Jeff Stier is a senior fellow at the Consumer Choice Center in Washington, D.C. 

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Sen. Graham Shows Judge Jackson How Her Ruling Flouted Congress’ ‘Sole and Unreviewable Discretion’ Proviso

Craig Bannister | March 23, 2022 

At Wednesday’s Senate confirmation hearing of Supreme Court nominee Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson, Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC) reminded Judge Brown of one of her rulings that was overturned because a higher court determined that she ignored the crystal-clear intent of a statue. In a case regarding the administration’s authority to employ expedited removal of illegal aliens, Judge Brown’s ruling ignored a statute’s declaration that the U.S. Attorney General has “sole and unreviewable discretion” in the matter, Sen. Graham explained:.........“So, this is an example to me, and you may not agree, where the plain language of the statute was completely ignored by you. You reached a conclusion because you disagreed with the Trump Administration.”............. To Read More......

   See my list of updates, by topic, on this SCOTUS nominee. 

Ketanji Brown Jackson Accused of Judicial ‘Activism’ for Halting Deportations of Illegal Aliens

John Binder 23 Mar 2022

President Joe Biden’s nominee to replace Justice Stephen Breyer on the Supreme Court, Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson, was accused of judicial “activism” for a ruling where she halted quick deportations for newly arrived illegal aliens despite federal law............. Jackson issued a preliminary injunction to halt the policy on the grounds that the administration violated the Administrative Procedure Act (APA) and did not sufficiently weigh the impact that the policy would have on illegal aliens.  “That, to me, is exhibit A of activism,” Graham said. “… you’re not convincing me that it is anything other than activism.”........To Read More....

   See my list of updates, by topic, on this SCOTUS nominee.