Justice American Style

 By Rich Kozlovich

The justice system in America is in serious need of fixing.  Radical prosecutors and judges are destroying the very concept of justice by their actions.  One criminal thug committed a murder in less that two hours of being released on bail from other crimes.

One judge decided parents who starved their baby to death didn't deserve jail time.  The New Mexico Supreme Court tosses bodycam confession in newborn hiding case.  The deranged killer of a six year old child is being released.... again!

 Exantus broke into the Tipton family’s Versailles home on December 7, 2015, stabbed Logan Tipton to death as he slept and also attacked Dean and Logan’s sisters. He did not know the family prior to the attack.

He was found "not guilty by reason of insanity" for the murder, but found him "guilty but mentally ill on assault charges against the other family members", and was sentenced to 20 years.  Does that really make any sense?  And now after only serving half his term, he's being released on parole because he was a good little boy in prison. 

In Vermont a seventeen year old "juvenile" 25 years go murdered a married couple, two Dartmouth college professors, is now getting a shot ar parole because the Supreme Court ruled life sentences for juveniles is unconstitutional.

A convicted  transgender "strangled an eleven month old baby, and was only sentenced to 55 years.  This ... at least in my view... bodes well the need to ask and answer a few questions:

1. What kind of monster murders an eleven month old baby?
2. What kind of judge would only sentence him to 55 years?
3. What kind of bleeding heart nitwits paroled this monster who continues to demonstrate he's mentally deranged insisting he's really a woman and is "demanding taxpayer-funded “gender-affirming” surgery", and an Obama judge agreed. 

He also sued President Trump for hurtful transgender speech.  Amazing, let's see if I understand this correctly. A man who could coldly strangle an eleven month old baby child to death has feelings?  Did I get that right?   

There's no end to the insanity.  One serial rapist who is serving 167 years in prison has determined he's transsexual and is demanding the state pay for surgeries to confirm to his new identity, and that be sent to a woman's prison.  Will that happen?  I'm betting it will. 

Free speech?  Well, that depends if you say something one of the protected classes finds offensive.  Shiloh Hendrix confronted a black boy who was obviously attempting to steal from her calling him a nigger, and when a bystander confronted her she told him what he could do with himself, that landed her two disorderly conduct charges from the city prosecutor, and was sentenced to "200 hours of community service and fined $1,000."

She was acquitted of one — the one regarding her interaction with the 8-year-old — and convicted of the other, which involved Omar, the videographer. Hendrix never put her hands on anyone, other than to hold her own child, and the only time she engaged another person was to retrieve her belongings and to tell a bystander to back off. Her only offense otherwise was to use a slur, which was, admittedly, the worst she could possibly use............

Public and private property is torched and looted in major cities if a drug addict ends up dead while resisting arrest — so long as he’s black. But a white woman who uses a slur after having her things stolen is nearly locked up for three months. That’s the Democrat version of American justice.

The guy who filmed her was an immigrant Somali bystander named Omar who told "Hendrix that her speech was “hate speech” and that he would post the video for the world to see."  Interesting moral code Omar has.  Hate speech is criminal, but rape is okay.  

Omar was charged in 2022 for allegedly raping and sexually assaulting a 16-year-old girl. The charges against him were later dismissed “in the interest of justice.

Let me see if I understand that.  In the "interest of justice" rape is fine, but telling someone off in a colorful term is such a criminal act it demands some form of punishment?  Did I get that right?  Well, yes, you see it appears the Judge this case ", Christa Daily, has a history of granting outrageous plea deals and letting convicted sex offenders off with light punishments and little to no jail time."

It also appears Hendrix is appealing this ruling, because whether you approve of her conduct or not is immaterial, that's a red herring fallacy.  The issue is freed speech. The fact is this standard of "justice" means Shiloh Hendrix won’t be the last victim of the left's efforts to criminalize speech.

A federal judge has ordered ICE to release a man with a notorious past, that I think can only be called a terrorist past, throwing Molotov Cocktails at the homes of Israeli solders in 1989, convicted of weapons violations 1995 and "lying on his immigration paperwork.".  For reasons I find mind boggling he's been living here for 33 years, and is considered a respected leader in his Muslim community.  CAIR's position?

 “No one should be punished for their faith, advocacy, or identity. We urge ICE to immediately comply with the judge’s order, reunite Mr. Sarsour with his loved ones, and end the disturbing pattern of targeting Muslim, Palestinian, and other community members for detention and intimidation,” Awad said. “This case is a reminder that due process, human dignity, and constitutional rights must never be optional.”

I think that's really profound.. .don't you?  Especially so since in Muslim controlled nations inequality before the law is part and parcel of The Mohammunist Manifesto.  

Update:   

1. Biden Parole Migrant Accused of Raping 2 Women in Salt Lake City, Utah - An illegal alien, paroled into the United States by the Biden administration, is now accused of raping two women in Salt Lake City, Utah.   Moise Sainteran, an illegal alien from Haiti, has been arrested by the Salt Lake City Police Department and charged with two counts of rape, forcible sexual abuse, object rape, aggravated sexual assault, and forcible sodomy.......

What I'm Reading: The Judiciary

Life is about patterns and circles. Patterns of behavior, and the social circles prompting that behavior. 

By Rich Kozlovich

 I'm not really wanting to write or post any longer, but I can't stop following issues, and I save the articles dealing with topics as source pieces.  Now... that's clearly a  study in antithetical thinking.  At any rate, it turns out all of the "" posts have been hit massively over time, so, I've decided to purge my files topically. This one will address the judiciary, but these aren't necessarily in chronological order, they are in order topically.  

Judicial Accountability

It's been clear for some time something has to change regarding the judiciary.  They're out of control, not only at the federal level, but also at the local level.  They need to be held accountable for their decisions.  I' also gong to include those judges who should be commended, and believe it or not, I'm getting a gut feeling more judges are going to come around as they watch these radicals destroying the rule of law and breaching the barrier between the judiciary and the legislative and executive branches of government.    

1. Judicial Accountability: Time for mental health and drug testing
2.  Sign the Petition to Hold Rogue Judges Accountable Please look and consider signing our petition HERE to hold activist judges accountable and share the report with the member of Congress in your district.
3. Principled Jurists Are Needed in the Federal Judiciary.
4. Rogue Judges Are Crippling The Constitution One Egregious Ruling At A Time
5. New Orleans Kangaroo Court Issues ARREST WARRANT for Louisiana AG Liz Murrill After Grand Jury Indicts Her on 16 Felony Counts for Defending State Law Against Rogue Local Officials
6. Woman Gets 18 Years for Killing Purse Snatcher
7. Parents sentenced to 50 days in prison for homeschooling their children — without teaching gender ideology. 
8. Elite Judge Sets Tiny Fine for Elite Judge Who Helped Illegal Immigrant Escape ICE

I think it's long overdue for the Congress and the State's legislatures to take a look at Judicial Immunity, and I include the immunity prosecutors get also.  It's clear it's in serious need of re-evaluation.  These left wing judges and prosecutors are out of control and they're directly responsible for crimes, including murders, that would have never taken place if they had done the job their supposed to do, and that is to protect the public, instead they're protecting murders, thieves, thugs, and rapists.  

Forget about impeachment.  If they're really serious about fixing the woke judiciary and prosecutors, then make what they're doing illegal.  Make them subject to arrest and punishment.  Judicial immunity protects judges "from civil lawsuits for action taken in their official capacity", and it's absolute.  However, judicial immunity does not protect them from any criminal activity they may be involved in.  Make their actions criminal and then prosecute.  And the same applies to woke prosecutors who are letting monsters back on the streets.

Update: Now here's a clear case of these people protecting their own.  It's a good thing she wasn't a mother who home schooled her children and refused to teach and promote transgenderism.  That would be sure jail time. 

• Wisconsin Judge Who Helped Immigrant Escape Sentenced -  Former Wisconsin Judge Hannah Dugan was spared from prison Wednesday for ushering a Mexican defendant out of her courtroom to evade US Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents. A federal judge fined her $5,000 and cited her otherwise law-abiding life in issuing the sentence, the AP reports. Dugan, 67, was convicted of felony obstruction in December. Her lawyers argued during her trial that President Donald Trump's administration sought to "crush" Dugan in an effort to ensure judicial compliance with the ICE strategy of targeting immigrants as they showed up for court hearings....

Failure to Deliver Justice 

1. Man Busted for Killing and Burying Loving Young North Carolina Mother – Perp Has Criminal History Spanning Nearly 90 CASES
2. OUTRAGEOUS! 13-Year-Old Maryland Boy Released on Probation After R*ping Two Six-Year-Old Girls Thanks to Recommendation from This Democrat
3.  Judge Sentences Professor To One Year In Jail For Killing Elderly Protester With Megaphone
4. 'Congress should start TODAY': Kavanaugh delivers roadmap for Trump's birthright citizenship battle
5.  Judge Issues Blistering Ruling on DOJ's Walz Subpoenas
6.  Judge Blocks Subpoena of Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, Minnesota Democrats
7.   New York judge rules in favor of transgender athlete booted from women’s track meet, Now that SCOTUS has declared these people can be booted out of women's sports, it will be interesting to see what happens.  
8.  Out of the Twilight Zone: Judge praises behavior of gang rapists, sentences them to 'rehabilitation'
9.  Judge in Karmelo Anthony Case Calls the Murderer a ‘Nice Kid’
10.  Iryna Zarutska’s Killer Could Walk Free

When you read the lunatic things these people say and do you have to wonder if they're certifiable or not.  Maybe they're the ones who need to be evaluated and institutionalized.  

SCOTUS  

Over the years I would hear how Scalia was the court's most intelligent and most conservative judge and Clearance Thomas was his follower.  Well, I watched these two over the years and it was clear to me it was just the opposite.  Thomas was the highly intelligent conservative and if anyone was following anyone, Scalia was following Thomas.  

Scalia's close friendship with Ruth Bader Ginsberg was troubling.  To me, that was a character issue.  She was a radical left wing nut job, and the only time the nation was safe is when she was asleep on the bench.  She supported everything that was destructive to the nation, and Scalia had a close personal relationship with she and her husband.  

Truthfully, I watched him over the years and in spite of all the accolades, I wasn't that impressed with Scalia.  I will say this with absolute confidence, it's my view Clearance Thomas is the finest Justice to sit on the Supreme Court in my lifetime, and Scalia came in as a far third in my opinion.   What no one expected was there could be so many stunningly stupid justices seated as there is now.  However, historically, that's been going on from the beginning of the court.   

I recommend reading Mark R. Levin's book, Men in Black: How the Supreme Court Is Destroying America, and see how many nitwits, losers and lunatics have been chosen for these lifetime appointments, and trust me when I say some of there were worse than Sotomayor and Jackson.   

1. Is the Supreme Court the Final Word on the Constitution? The answer may surprise Americans raised on the myth of judicial supremacy. - .......... “the belief that the Court had the last word in constitutional interpretation is a relatively late development. It was not until 1958, in Cooper v. Aaron, a school-desegregation enforcement case, that the Court overtly stated that its interpretation of the Constitution was as much the ‘supreme law of the land’ as the Constitution itself.”........... President Andrew Jackson not only refused to enforce the Supreme Court’s Worster v. Georgia decision but also specifically argued that all three branches equally interpret the Constitution............It is no secret that with the coming of Wilsonian Progressivism, the New Deal, and the Great Society, things changed radically in favor of judicial supremacy. Progressive Supreme Court leaders like Earl Warren, William J. Brennan Jr., William O. Douglas, Louis Brandeis, and Thurgood Marshall led the way and were incredibly successful in nationalizing law, policy, and power over states’ rights............As Moreno noted, Justice Clarence Thomas’s 2022 concurrence in Dobbs suggested that much more needs to be done for a wholesale reconsideration of the Court’s 20th-century rush from its original, limited Constitutional procedural interpretations into vague and too broad substantive misinterpretations, creating new “rights,” often resulting in much of today’s social disorder......................
2. Ketanji Brown Jackson Featured as “People’s Champion” on Cover of ‘Essence’ Magazine
3. The SCOTUS is turning the U.S. Constitution into a U.N. constitution
4.  SCOTUS Rejects Trump on Birthright Citizenship? Phooey!
5. More Antifa Terrorists Were Just Sentenced in Texas

From Out of Bounds to Insane Out of Bounds

SCOTUS did one thing that was right on.  They overturned the Chevron Doctrine, but some jurists don't seem to get it.  This is not in the domain of an unaccountable judiciary any more than it was in the domain of an unaccountable bureaucracy.  As you read these articles it should be clear these decisions belong in the legislative and executive branches of government, not the judiciary.   Judges aren't supposed to make laws, and that's exactly what they're doing, and at times totally ignoring SCOTUS decisions that have forbidden their activism, such as this case, Just In: Panel of Leftist Federal Judges Defy Supreme Court, Order Alabama to Reinstate its Rigged and Racially Gerrymandered Congressional Map.  Does that sound like sedition to anyone besides me? 

1.  Judge Strikes Down Trump-Era Courthouse Arrest Policy - A federal judge has vacated Trump administration policies that allowed immigration agents to arrest noncitizens at immigration courthouses nationwide. U.S. District Judge P. Casey Pitts ruled Tuesday that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents may no longer conduct arrests at immigration courts under policies implemented by the administration last year.
2. Area Gas Appliance Ban, Dismisses Federal Preemption Concerns 
3. Judges strike down Trump administration student loan forgiveness overhaul
4. Corrupt Obama Judge Amy Berman Jackson Shuts Down Trump Administration’s SNAP Junk Food Restrictions
5. D.C. Circuit Delivers Another Blow To Trump’s Drain The Swamp Mission: Activist Judges Block Immediate Plan To Slash CFPB Workforce By Two-Thirds
6. One Judge Now Controls How America Verifies Its Voters
7. Obama-Appointed Judge Blocks Bans on Buying Soda with Food Stamps
8.  Biden-Appointed Judge Orders Security Fence Removed at Eugene Federal Building – Handing Antifa and Anarchist Rioters Their Favorite Attack Staging Ground Back
9. BREAKING: Federal Judge Overturns Iran Peace Deal, Orders U.S. to Resume Bombing.  Now, how could any sane person not conclude this is out of bounds.  

Immigration

Before following any of the other links please read this one first. A bad morning for activist judges

1. Another Day, Another Biden Appointed Judge Issuing an Insane Immigration Ruling
2. Biden-Appointed Judge Throws Out DOJ Lawsuit Against New Jersey Sanctuary Cities
3.  Tension on the Bench: Justice Alito Is None Too Pleased With Sotomayor's Bitter Dissent on Asylum Case
4.  OUTRAGE: Biden Judge BLOCKS Trump DOJ From Challenging New Jersey Sanctuary Policies That Shield Illegal Alien Criminals
5.  The Supreme Court Crushed Third-World Mass Immigration—Do GOP Voters Care? Yes, they failed on birthright citizenship, but this is still a major win. 
6.  Citizens in Springfield, Ohio Rejoice at Trump’s Haitian TPS Amnesty Win
7.  90,000 Haitians Live in Massachusetts and Only 10,000 Are Working

Voter Fraud

It's clear voter fraud is rampant and ubiquitous, and yet the Republicans, who swore they were going to fix if elected not only haven't fixed it, they don't want to fix it.   And those Republicans who are serious about fixing it are being attacked by the RINO's and it appears there's a lot of RINOism in the Congress.   Cheaters are gonna cheat, now that's fundamental! 

1. Biden-Appointed Judge Blocks Trump’s New Verification System to Remove Foreign Nationals from Voter Rolls
2. Federal Judge Declares That Common-Sense Election Integrity Is Illegal
3. Third World Judge Forbids Verifying Citizenship of Voters
4.  Federal Judge Blocks Postal Service from Implementing Trump Executive Order on Mail-In Ballots
5.  UNREAL! Biden and Clinton Appointed Judges Block DOJ’s Ability To See Michigan’s Dirty Voter Rolls – Decision Makes It Easier For SOS Benson To Steal Her Own Governor’s Race
6. BREAKING: Obama Judge Permanently Blocks Trump’s Proof of Citizenship Requirement to Vote
7.  Alaska Judge Rules That Bogus Democrat-Recruited Senate Candidate Can Remain on Ballot
8.  'The View' Hosts Claim 'No One Wants Voter ID Laws,' that will 'Suppress the vote 

Judicial Sanity

One thing that really needs changed, and it will take a Constitutional Amendment to do it, is require that all members of the federal judiciary be natural born citizens of the United States.  Here's the ruling I like best, Unconstitutional:The Texas case that could bring down the NLRB.  These so-called "independent' agencies have no Constitutional basis, which the SCOTUS ruling on the Chevron Doctrine, which I discussed earlier, made clear.  The Constitution says the chief executive of the federal government is the President of the United States, and the Congress has no authority, or right, to diminish that authority by creating "independent" agencies that make decisions in direct contradiction to the President's policies.   

1. Huge Win for President Trump as Appeals Court Smacks Down Rogue Judge’s Order Blocking the Replacement of Exhibits at the President’s House National Park Site in Philadelphia
2. Trump-Appointed Federal Judge SMASHES Ruling by Foreign-Born Activist Judge — REINSTATES Critical Voter System to Root Out Illegal Alien Voters
3.  Federal Court Upholds State Law Criminalizing Illegal Aliens 
4. Antifa Is Now Threatening to Kill the Federal Judges Who Sent Members to Prison for 450 Year
5. Judge Rejects Bid to Toss Jeanine Pirro From Trump Assassination Case
6. Fed Appeals Court Allows Trump Admin to Restart ‘Expedited’ 
7.  Court Lifts 250th Anniversary Deadline For WH To Reinstall Park Exhibits
8.  Texas Supreme Court Blocks Harris County from Spending Taxpayer Dollars on Illegal Immigrants’ Deportation Defense
9. BREAKING: Judge Graf strikes down defense motion to remove death penalty from Tyler Robinson case - Graf said it would "risk an improper judicial intrusion into the executive branch's prosecutorial discretion." 
10. SCOTUS Confirms: Agents Can Reject Asylum Seekers at the Border
11. Judge blocks Biden-era immigration rule hours after Texas AG and Stephen Miller’s group sued DOJ - In this latest complaint, Paxton’s office said in the 43-page lawsuit that the Biden-era rule “effectively grant(s) indefinite amnesty to aliens illegally present in this country.”

Federal District Judges Running The Executive Branch: Even Justice Jackson Draws A Line

November 08, 2025  Francis Menton @ Manhattan Contrarian

The first nine months of the President Trump’s second term have seen repeated instances of a Federal District Court judge temporarily enjoining some action of the administration, only to have the Supreme Court stay the injunction while the litigation proceeds. Examples of this pattern of events have occurred in cases involving such things as funding rescissions, staff lay-offs, and deportation procedures.

A recurring feature of this pattern has been dissents from the three liberal Supreme Court justices — Kagan, Sotomayor and Jackson — who would have left the temporary injunctions in place during the pendency of the litigation. Justice Jackson, in addition to joining the other two liberal justices, has also issued several individual dissents strongly criticizing her conservative colleagues for vacating temporary injunctions from District Courts.

The question of whether the administration gets enjoined while litigation proceeds, versus an injunction getting issued only at the conclusion of full litigation, is very consequential. Full litigation of any one of these cases through a District Court, Court of Appeals, and Supreme Court, could take four years or more — in other words, the entire presidential term. If a temporary injunction gets put in place by a District Court judge when the case starts, and then litigation proceeds for four years with that injunction in place, that would mean that the Trump administration never gets to implement its policy at all during its term in office — even if the Supreme Court ultimately rules that Trump had the authority to implement the policy all along. With enough of these temporary injunctions, the entire Trump administration could be tied up in knots, and prevented from doing much or even most what it was elected to do.

The past week has seen two more instances of the pattern play out. But notably, in one of the cases that reached the Supreme Court on Friday November 7, the District Court injunction proved too much even for Justice Jackson. In that case Justice Jackson herself issued an administrative stay of the District Court’s temporary injunction.

The first of these two cases to reach the Supreme Court this week was Trump v. Orr. This case involves a Trump first-day (January 20, 2025) Executive Order that directed that the federal government would only “recognize two sexes, male and female,” and further directed the State Department to “require that government-issued identification documents, including passports, visas, and Global Entry cards, accurately reflect the holder’s sex.” Seven “transgender” individuals challenged the Executive Order, and their case came before District Judge Julia Kobick in the District of Massachusetts. On June 17, Judge Kobick issued a temporary injunction, barring the federal government from implementing the new policy. The Justice Department then went to the First Circuit Court of Appeals, which declined to stay Judge Kobick’s ruling. On September 19, the Justice Department filed an emergency appeal to the Supreme Court.

The Supreme Court issued its decision on November 6. There is a four paragraph unsigned opinion on behalf of the six conservative justices, followed by a 12 page dissent from Justice Jackson, in which Justices Kagan and Sotomayor joined.

The remarkable thing about this case is that there was no statute from Congress that the plaintiffs said the administration was violating. The policy to allow passports matching “gender identity” rather than biological sex was nothing more than a policy of the State Department, which had changed a previous policy of the State Department that had been consistent with the Trump administration position. The majority opinion dispatches with the plaintiffs’ argument in a few sentences, notably this one:

Displaying passport holders’ sex at birth no more offends equal protection principles than displaying their country of birth—in both cases, the Government is merely attesting to a historical fact without subjecting anyone to differential treatment.

Justice Jackson meanwhile works herself up into some high dudgeon:

[S]enseless sidestepping of the obvious equitable outcome has become an unfortunate pattern. So, too, has my own refusal to look the other way when basic principles are selectively discarded. This Court has once again paved the way for the immediate infliction of injury without adequate (or, really, any) justification. Because I cannot acquiesce to this pointless but painful perversion of our equitable discretion, I respectfully dissent.

Justice Jackson’s dissent never discusses the issue that the practical effect of the result she asks for would be to have a lone District Judge in Massachusetts running the State Department passport-issuance process for the four years of the Trump presidency.

But then the very next day, November 7, a case came to Justice Jackson that crossed even her line for what a District Judge ought to be able to do. The case is Rollins v. Rhode Island State Council of Churches, and involves the question of whether the federal government must “fully fund” the SNAP (food stamp) program during the current government shut-down, despite lack of congressional appropriations for the program.

The Rhode Island Council of Churches brought their case in the District of Rhode Island, and got themselves before the Chief Judge of that court, noted partisan John McConnell. For those unfamiliar with Judge McConnell, before President Obama appointed him to the bench he was a partner of the Motley Rice law firm, one of the lead counsel in the massive tobacco litigation that ended in a $240 billion settlement in 1998. McConnell’s total personal compensation from that litigation has not been disclosed, but Legal Newsline reports that in connection with his Senate confirmation he revealed that he would get continuing payouts of between $2.5 and $3.1 million per year from 2011 to 2024 (after he was on the bench!) and that his total payout from the settlement was “perhaps as much as” $78 million. McConnell has also tussled with the Trump administration in previous litigations.

The Council of Churches brought its case in late October, as the government shut-down continued and it looked like the food stamp program would run out of money in early November; and as the days wore on, it looked like the money would run out on November 7. According to the government’s emergency motion to the Supreme Court:

[A]fter 5 p.m. last night [November 6], [Judge McConnell] ordered the Department of Agriculture (USDA) to cover the SNAP shortfall by transferring billions of dollars that were appropriated for different, critical food-security programs—such as the National School Lunch Program—within a single business day (i.e., by tonight).

The Justice Department managed to get itself to the First Circuit (where no stay was immediately issued) and then to the Supreme Court by 9 PM on November 7. Here is another brief excerpt from the Justice Department’s application to the Supreme Court:

The district court’s ruling is untenable at every turn. The court demanded that USDA find some, any, way to fund SNAP, treating the program essentially as a mandatory entitlement. But the SNAP statute is explicit that SNAP benefits are subject to available appropriations, and it states plainly that SNAP payments shall not exceed the funds appropriated for the program. . . . As USDA explained, pulling billions of dollars from the Child Nutrition Programs would jeopardize those programs’ ability to fully operate this year—putting at risk critical food-assistance initiatives relied upon by millions of children every day, and raiding a program that Congress did fund to instead extend one that Congress has not funded.

Apparently this one was too much even for Justice Jackson. According to SCOTUS Blog, at 9:17 PM yesterday, Justice Jackson issued an administrative stay, staying Judge McConnell’s order until the First Circuit has time to consider whether it will issue a stay pending appeal. (And if it doesn’t, then presumably the government will immediately be back at the Supreme Court again.)

There still is that pesky “appropriations clause” of the Constitution: “No Money shall be drawn from the Treasury, but in Consequence of Appropriations made by Law.” We’ll see if that rather clear language can stand up to the emotional arguments being made.

In the United States, we are the country where our iconic national holiday, now approaching, celebrates how brave pioneers were able to come to an uncharted wilderness and figure out how to feed themselves. And yet somehow now we have some 42 million people, about one person in eight, dependent on government handouts and supposedly at risk of starvation if the handouts don’t arrive on time. Really, it is shameful.

Appeals Court Rules That President Trump's Emergency Tariff Gambit Is Unlawful

August 30, 2025/ Francis Menton @ Manhattan Contrarian

Editor's Note:  As usual, I find his comments informative and enlightening.  But I have some issues with two of his comments:  "you really need to stretch the language of the statute to find support for his position."  And he doesn't "think that the so-called balance of trade deficit is a national emergency, or anything close to it.  I disagree with both, especially the second one. Trade as has been conducted since the end of WWII has sapped the strength of the nation, slowly but inexorably, and nothing can refute that. It's history, and that history is incontestable.  TRK 

One of the signature initiatives of President Trump’s second term has been what I have called the “tariff gambit” — the rapid blizzard of tariff actions, including declarations of emergencies, tariff impositions, increases and decreases in rates, postponements, and negotiations of new trade deals with various countries. In several prior posts, including here and here, I have raised a series of concerns with this area of the President’s policies.

Putting aside for a moment the question of whether these various tariff initiatives constitute good public policy, a separate question is whether the President has a legal basis to impose, raise and lower tariffs on his own authority, even if he declares a “national emergency.” After all, a tariff is a form of a tax, and the taxing power is one of the core powers of Congress. It is at the heart of what is often referred to as the “power of the purse,” granted to Congress by the Constitution, and fundamental to the separation of powers that is the basis of the constitutional scheme. Has Congress somewhere along the line granted the President essentially plenary authority to set and change tariff rates at his whim as part of his conduct of foreign policy?

In my August 20 post, “A Mini Scorecard For President Trump’s First Seven Months Of Term Two,” I had this to say:

I think it is likely that the CAFC will rule that the IEEPA does not give Trump a unilateral power to set and change tariff rates, even if he has declared a “national emergency.”

On Friday (August 29), the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, sitting en banc (that is, all eleven judges) weighed in on that question. Here is a link to the court’s opinion. The bottom line is that the court found — in line with my prediction — that the President does not have the authority to set and modify tariffs that he has been purporting to exercise. (The vote of the court was seven for the majority, and four for a dissent that would have upheld the President’s actions.)

The issue in the case was whether Congress by a statute had granted to the President the unrestricted power, once he has declared an “emergency,” to set and modify tariffs. In his Executive Orders imposing the tariffs, and in the briefing on his behalf in the court, the President had decided to rely on one particular statute, namely the International Emergency Economic Powers Act of 1977, or the “IEEPA.” (There are other statutes that grant the President emergency powers relating to international trade, but each comes with its own problematic language and restrictions. For whatever reasons, the President’s lawyers made the decision in this case to rest their argument on the IEEPA.)

The majority’s discussion of whether the IEEPA authorizes the President’s tariff initiatives appears at pages 26 et seq. of the opinion. On page 26, the court quotes the statutory language on which the President relies:

IEEPA authorizes the President to:

“investigate, block during the pendency of an investigation, regulate, direct and compel, nullify, void, prevent or prohibit, any acquisition, holding, withholding, use, transfer, withdrawal, transportation, importation or exportation, of, or dealing in, or exercising any right, power, or privilege with respect to, or transactions involving, any property in which any foreign country or a national thereof has any interest by any person, or with respect to any property, subject to the jurisdiction of the United States.”

The citation is 50 U.S.C. Section 1702(a)(1)(B).

Go ahead and take your time to read that and see if you can deduce what language supposedly gives the President the authority to set and modify tariff rates at will. I have provided the clue, in the two bolded words. The argument is that the power to “regulate” the “importation” of property includes the power to impose and/or modify tariffs. The court comments:

The statute bestows significant authority on the President to undertake a number of actions in response to a declared national emergency, but none of these actions explicitly include the power to impose tariffs, duties or the like, or the power to tax.

The court points out that the statute does not contain the words “tariff” or “duty” or any synonym, while other statutes do give the President explicit authority in this area (although not sufficient authority to support what he has done).

President Trump promptly reacted to the court’s ruling by calling it “highly partisan” and vowing to appeal to the Supreme Court. There have been plenty of highly partisan court decisions frustrating various of Trump’s policies coming out of Democrat-appointed judges, particularly district court judges. However, I would not put this decision in that category. As far as I can determine, two Republican-appointed judges in the CAFC voted with the majority, while interestingly two Obama-appointed judges were among the four dissenters. The problem for Trump here is that you really need to stretch the language of the statute to find support for his position. While the Supreme Court has so far been quite supportive of Trump against activist district court judges, I would not bet on Trump’s side in the Supreme Court in this case.

Meanwhile, the CAFC has temporarily stayed its decision to give the Supreme Court a chance to weigh in.

My general comment is that I don’t think that the so-called balance of trade deficit is a national emergency, or anything close to it. And while the fentanyl importation issue is at least arguable as a national emergency, it is only peripherally related to tariffs. Put those issues together with the lack of statutory support for general presidential authority to set and modify tariffs, even with a national emergency, and this whole tariff gambit thing looks like one of Trump’s very worst initiatives. The courts will be doing him a favor to shut it down.

Legitimate Scope Of Judicial Restraints On Presidential Power -- Trump Tariffs Edition

May 30, 2025/ Francis Menton @ Manhattan Contrarian

In my last post a couple of days ago (May 28), I was critical of the blizzard of injunctions issued by the courts against seemingly every policy change that President Trump seeks to implement. I went so far as to call this the “opposite of democracy.” But I also noted that there are instances where judicial restraints on the executive are legitimate, most notably where the statute on which the President relies to implement a sweeping policy does not in fact grant him the authority he claims. Thus, on finding a lack of grant of authority in the statutes cited, the Supreme Court had reined in President Biden when he sought to implement policies forgiving student loans and banning fossil fuel power plants.

I ended that article by asking whether President Trump’s actions with regard to imposition of tariffs may fall into the same category of overreach as Biden’s student loan and power plant gambits. I also noted that multiple law suits had already been brought challenging the legal basis for the tariffs unilaterally imposed by the President.

It turns out that even as I was getting ready to post that essay, two different courts were about to issue thorough opinions analyzing exactly the issue of whether President Trump had sufficient statutory authority for his extensive imposition of tariffs over the past couple of months. Both concluded that he does not have such authority.

After now reading both those decisions carefully, and also reading the underlying statutes, I think that the courts are very likely correct on the question of President Trump’s lack of authority to impose tariffs unilaterally, at least in most instances where he has done so.

The two just-issued decisions are this one from the Court of International Trade, in the case of V.O.S. Selections, Inc. v. United States, issued on the evening of May 28; and this one from Judge Rudolph Contreras of the District Court for the District of Columbia, in the case of Learning Resources, Inc., v. Donald J. Trump, issued the next day, May 29.

The two decisions are not short (33 pages from the D.C. District Court and 49 from the Court of International Trade), but both get quickly to the main issue: Does the language of the International Emergency Economic Powers Act of 1977 (IEEPA) grant the President the power to impose and change tariffs on his unilateral authority when he has declared a “national emergency”? The CIT quotes the relevant language of the IEEPA as follows (page 9 of their opinion):

The President may . . . (B) investigate, block during the pendency of an investigation, regulate, direct and compel, nullify, void, prevent or prohibit, any acquisition, holding, withholding, use, transfer, withdrawal, transportation, importation or exportation of, or dealing in, or exercising any right, power, or privilege with respect to, or transactions involving, any property in which any foreign country or a national thereof has any interest by any person, or with respect to any property, subject to the jurisdiction of the United States . . . .

(Emphasis added.) Basically, Trump’s position comes down to saying that the power granted under that provision to “regulate” the “importation” of “property” includes the power to impose tariffs. But does the power to “regulate” include the power to tax, and in unlimited amounts? From Judge Contreras’s decision in the DC District Court, page 18:

IEEPA does not use the words “tariffs” or “duties,” their synonyms, or any similar terms like “customs,” “taxes,” or “imposts.” . . . There is no residual clause granting the President powers beyond those expressly listed. The only activity in the [relevant section of the IEEPA] that could plausibly encompass the power to levy tariffs is that to “regulate . . . importation.” . . . The Court agrees with Plaintiffs that the power to regulate is not the power to tax.

From the CIT opinion, page 26:

Plaintiffs are correct in the narrow sense that the imprecise term “regulate . . . importation,” under any construction that would comport with the separation-of-powers underpinnings of the nondelegation and major questions doctrines, does not authorize anything as unbounded as the Worldwide and Retaliatory Tariffs.

This does not look to me like a close question. Trump’s position is very weak. This is a very poor hill for him to choose to die on, and I hope that he will come to his senses soon (although that is not his usual method of operation).

In a post on Truth Social on May 29, Trump criticized the Court of International Trade, saying “The U.S. Court of International Trade incredibly ruled against the United States of America on desperately needed Tariffs . . . .” Whether or not the tariffs are “desperately needed,” that is not a legal argument for the President having unilateral authority to impose them.

The CIT does distinguish certain of the Trump tariffs, particularly those on steel and aluminum, from the bulk of them, which are included in its terms “Worldwide and Retaliatory Tariffs.” As to the steel and aluminum tariffs, the CIT finds authority for Trump’s actions under other statutes.

An interesting question is where these cases go from here. In both the DC District Court and the CIT, the plaintiffs asked alternatively for a preliminary injunction or summary judgment, that is, final judgment on the merits of the case. In the CIT case, the court granted summary judgment and denied the motion for preliminary injunctions as moot. In other words, that case is over, and Trump has lost. Normally, that would mean that the case would go on to the appeal process in the ordinary course, without the claims of emergency and expedited time schedules that have characterized many of the preliminary injunctions issued by other courts against Trump’s policies. However, it appears that the government sought an emergency stay from the Federal Circuit Court of Appeals, which was granted yesterday, at least through June 9.

Over in the D.C. District Court case, Judge Contreras granted a preliminary injunction, but issued a 14 day stay for the government to seek relief at the appellate level. Between the two cases, something is going to be happening quickly at the appellate level.

One way of looking at this situation is that these cases give the Supreme Court a clear instance where they can and should rule against the President’s actions. That may help give them the fortitude to rule in his favor in other cases where his actions are appropriate within his authority.

The Legitimate Scope Of Judicial Restraints On Presidential Authority; The Need For Politically Neutral Principles

May 28, 2025/ Francis Menton @ Manhattan Contrarian

Now more than four months into President Trump’s second term, there have been dozens of District Court injunctions blocking policies that the new administration has sought to implement. Deportations of gang members illegally in the U.S. back to El Salvador? Enjoined! Mass firings at USAID? Enjoined! Other mass firings at 22 other agencies and departments? Enjoined! Cancellation of funding of certain grants for Harvard? Enjoined! Ending of eligibility for Harvard to participate in foreign student visa program? Enjoined! Termination of federal funding for public schools maintaining DEI programs? Enjoined! Termination of security clearances for certain prominent law firms? Enjoined! And these are just examples among many more.

It seems that whatever new policy President Trump tries to implement, it will be enjoined within days by some left wing federal judge. Professor Adrian Vermuele of Harvard in a May 23 tweet called these pervasive injunctions “basically an automatic judicial veto on all new policy.” He commented, “let’s please not call it democracy.” It’s actually the opposite of democracy: President Trump tries to implement the policies he promised to implement and that the voters elected him to implement; and the unelected judges — almost all appointed by presidents of the party that just got voted out — stop him.

But before you get too outraged about the courts (and Democrat-appointed judges) blocking President Trump’s every move, let’s not forget about a few constraints that the courts imposed on prior President Biden. If you disagree with what the courts have just done in the list of injunctions in the first paragraph of this post, you might nevertheless find yourself agreeing with some big constraints that landed on Biden. 

For example, in Biden v. Nebraska, the Supreme Court held that President Biden did not have the authority under the Higher Education Act to engage in mass forgiveness of student loans; and in West Virginia v. EPA the Supreme Court held that the Biden EPA did not have the authority under the Clean Air Act to force the closure of all electric power plants using fossil fuels. The Supreme Court justices who voted to imposed these constraints on Biden were all appointed by Republicans.

So almost everyone, left or right, would agree that the courts have at least some legitimate role in reining in overreach by the executive branch. But the cases are so politically charged that one’s view of the outcome of any given case tends to turn almost entirely on the party of the President who got blocked. Republicans cheer on the courts when they block Democratic presidents, and Democrats are currently cheering on the courts when they block President Trump. At the District Court level, both sides forum shop for a friendly judge appointed by a president of their own party when trying to block an action of a president of the opposite party.

What is badly needed here are politically neutral principles by which one can distinguish the legitimate uses of the courts’ role in restraining executive overreach from the illegitimate. Remarkably, the Supreme Court to date has not really laid down such principles to any significant extent. The reason for that is that before now cases have not come before the Court requiring it to do so. But now things are different. President Trump is challenging the rule of the permanent bureaucracy to a far greater degree than did the two Bushes, or even Reagan or Nixon.

I don’t think there’s any single easy bright-line test that can separate the legitimate from the illegitimate uses of the judicial power to rein in the president. Instead, as cases come before it, I think the Supreme Court needs to lay down a set of guidelines for the lower courts, and then enforce those guidelines via prompt reversals of lower courts that step out of line.

Here are some suggestions that I will make for some proposed politically neutral principles:

• The Constitution must be the fundamental guide star of the enterprise. Most important are the provisions that “all legislative powers . . . shall be vested” in the Congress (Article I, Section 1), “the executive powers shall be vested” in the President (Article II, Section 1), and that the President “shall take care that the laws be faithfully executed” (Article II, Section 3).
• Injunctions, and particularly preliminary injunctions, to force the executive branch to do anything, should be strongly disfavored. The main function of the preliminary injunction has historically been to preserve the status quo while the case proceeds. Many of the current round of preliminary injunctions have followed the opposite of this principle, for example by forcing the government to spend money that can then never be recovered. Note that neither the Biden v. Nebraska case, nor West Virginia v. EPA, involved any injunction. Rather, the Court just stated what the law is, and expected the executive to follow it.
• There should be essentially no constraints on the President firing at will anyone in the executive branch. The alternative is that large numbers of people work in the executive branch who disagree with the President’s policies and work to undermine him. This is fundamentally at odds with the vesting of all executive power in the President, and with the President’s duty to take care that the laws be faithfully executed. It is also fundamentally at odds with the principle of democracy, that is, that the people get to change the government’s policies by voting in a new President promising new policies. Yes, there are many statutes purporting to protect the jobs of government employees. To the extent that the employees in question have any role in deciding or influencing policy, those statutes are unconstitutional.
• The courts should have a very limited role in forcing the President to spend money appropriated by Congress. Most appropriation statutes do not say that the President must spend the money, but just say that x dollars are made available for the program. The courts should not interfere in a President’s decision to spend less than all the money. Yes, it is different if money has been contractually committed, or if Congress has specifically directed that x dollars must be spent; but even in those cases, a new incoming President should have the ability to hold up funds on grounds that, for example, there may have been corruption that needs to be investigated.
• The role of the courts should be very limited in situations that involve the core functions of the executive branch, for example decisions on how to enforce laws (e.g., immigration laws), and decisions with respect to foreign policy.
• By contrast, an area where the courts have a very important role in keeping the executive branch in line is the area of potential usurpations of the legislative power through overreaching regulations or executive orders. This was the situation in both Biden v. Nebraska and West Virginia v. EPA, in both of which the executive branch under Biden sought to assert vast powers never granted to it by legislation.

Analogous to President Biden’s overreaching with student loan forgiveness and greenhouse gas regulations is President Trump’s overreaching with tariffs. Perhaps you are wondering how it is that President Trump asserts the authority to impose a tariff of 100% on some country one day, make it 200% the next day, then back to 50% a week later, and so forth in a series of dizzying moves. The answer is that there is something called the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, enacted back in 1977. The IEEPA grants power to the President to take certain actions, including imposing tariffs, in the event of the declaration of a “national emergency.” It turned out that giving Presidents the right to declare national emergencies was an open invitation to abuse. This is from Congress’s website:

As of January 15, 2024, Presidents had declared 69 national emergencies invoking IEEPA, 39 of which are ongoing. History shows that national emergencies invoking IEEPA often last nearly a decade, although some have lasted significantly longer. . . .

Numerous cases have been brought challenging President Trump’s use of the IEEPA and so-called “national emergency” powers for his series of actions on tariffs. The forum for these cases is the US Court of International Trade. Plaintiffs in the cases include many states (both red and blue) and something called the Liberty Justice Center. Here is a report from Professor Ilya Somin of the Scalia Law School on the argument of one such case that took place on May 24. Excerpt:

Judge Restani repeatedly noted that the government's position would allow the president to declare an "emergency" for any "crazy" reason, and then impose whatever tariffs he wanted.

I have not studied the details of these cases and the wording of the statute sufficiently to have a view of how it might come out. However, I do support the idea that the courts have a real role in restraining the President from making up the “law” as he goes along, thus usurping the legislative function that is delegated only to the Congress.

 Additions:

Three Judges Blocking Trump’s Tariffs Have Decades-Long Histories of Democrat Activism -The judges on the U.S. Court of International Trade who ruled that President Donald Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariffs are illegal have a history of Democrat Party activism. Each of the members of the three-judge panel issuing the Wednesday ruling – which was stayed Thursday by an appeals court, allowing the tariffs to continue – fit the profile of other activists judges who continued their political activism after joining the court.

 

Trump Derangement Syndrome

By Rich Kozlovich

Political Sabotage: The Democrats’ Obstruction of Trump’s Foreign Policy Wins - After securing a strong base of support in the 2024 election, Donald Trump is positioning himself for a renewed push in foreign policy — an area that his supporters argue has deteriorated under recent Democrat direction. With growing global instability and concerns about America’s waning influence abroad, many see Trump’s return as an opportunity to reassert U.S. strength on the world stage. Citing what they view as failures in diplomacy, deterrence, and global leadership under the Biden administration, Trump’s supporters anticipate a more forceful, deal-driven approach that prioritizes national interest and restores America’s negotiating power............. More

 

Democrats nothing more than contrarians to Trump - In an amusing twist, many Democrats have come out against President Trump’s plan to cut prescription drug prices, raising the distinct possibility that there is nothing — absolutely nothing—that Trump could propose of which they would approve.......I firmly believe if Trump came out fervently against painful rectal itch, Lyme Disease, and the repeated clubbing of baby seals over the head with a large mallet, Democrats would immediately and zealously defend these things-- and add them to their party’s platform for the 2026 midterm elections and beyond........ More

 

Will the Supreme Court Succumb to Democratic Party Pressure? - Voters in 2024 gave Trump a mandate to execute his agenda. At the top of that agenda is the deportation of millions of people who entered the country illegally but were enabled by what amounted to treason by the Biden administration. Many of these illegal aliens present significant threats to national security and public safety. Democrats are using the court system to block Trump from doing a job that needs to be done.

Democrats wanting to throw a monkey wrench into Trump’s agenda have been able to “forum shop” by seeking out sympathetic district court judges most likely to block the president’s actions. By issuing nationwide injunctions against Trump’s executive orders, these rogue judges have effectively shut down the executive branch of the federal government. “Since Trump took office,” said Texas rep. August Pfluger, “activist judges in district courts have aggressively blocked his executive actions. The fact that an unelected lower court judge can micromanage the commander-in-chief should trouble every single American.”.........  More

Trump May Cancel Habeas Corpus Over SCOTUS Injunction Cases

Will President Trump join Lincoln and Clinton in restricting court access?  

By Scott D. Cosenza, Esq. | May 11, 2025 @ Liberty Nation News, Tags: Articles, Law, Opinion, Politics

The Constitution gives the president the power to suspend a key protection afforded to those seized by the government. Stymied by multiple nationwide injunctions initiated by district court judges, President Trump may now institute that power on the eve of an oddball Supreme Court case set for argument on Thursday, May 15th. The administration has sort of given the High Court an ultimatum: rein in the lower courts, or habeas protections will go away.

Habeas corpus refers to the power of courts to demand that the executive produce a detainee or prisoner before the Court to challenge the deprivation of liberty. Thomas Jefferson wrote: “The Habeas corpus secures every man here, alien or citizen, against everything which is not law, whatever shape it may assume.” Absent this power, courts and petitioners would be toothless before the executive power to deprive anyone of their liberty, no matter the law or the Constitution. Yet, the Constitution itself says the president can suspend habeas – in certain circumstances:

“The Privilege of the Writ of Habeas Corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in Cases of Rebellion or Invasion the public Safety may require it.”

The current controversy concerns President Trump’s day-one executive order on birthright citizenship – denying US citizenship to those whose parents were in the country illegally when they were born. Three district court judges implemented nationwide bans on administration efforts to execute Trump’s order. At his latest cabinet meeting, a reporter asked him if he had “spoken to his team about ways to mitigate this.” Trump seemed to make a point of not using the words habeas corpus or discussing eliminating access to the right at the time. Instead, he said: “There is one way that has been used very successfully by three presidents – all highly respected – but we hope that we don’t have to go that route.”

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That coy discussion has gone by the wayside. White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller told a press gaggle Friday that suspending habeas corpus is “an option we’re actively looking at” and “a lot of it depends on whether the courts do the right thing or not.” Nationwide injunctions issued by district courts have become a problem at the forefront of the federal judiciary since Trump’s first term. They were exceedingly rare before 2016. According to a study published in the Harvard Law Review, however, over 50% of all such injunctions issued since 1963 have been against the Trump administration. The president asked the Supreme Court for an emergency review of three injunctions, and it said yes. His petition reads:

“The government comes to this Court with a ‘modest’ request: while the parties litigate weighty merits questions, the Court should ‘restrict the scope’ of multiple preliminary injunctions that ‘purpor[t] to cover every person in the country,’ limiting those injunctions to parties actually within the courts’ power.”

The Supreme Court will hear consolidated arguments in Trump v. Casa, Trump v. Washington, and Trump v. New Jersey at 10 a.m. on Thursday, May 15th. They have allotted one hour for the arguments, thusly – 30 minutes for Solicitor General D. John Sauer, arguing for the Trump administration, and 15 minutes each for N.J. Attorney General Jeremy M. Feigenbaum and Kelsi B. Corkran, both arguing to keep the injunctions in place. All three advocates served as Supreme Court clerks. Sauer for Justice Antonin Scalia, Feigenbaum for Justice Elena Kagan, and Ms. Corkran, the Supreme Court Director at a Georgetown law institute, clerked for Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

A decision is expected by July.

• Dig Deeper into the Themes Discussed in this Article!  Liberty Vault: The Constitution of the United States

Liberty Nation does not endorse candidates, campaigns, or legislation, and this presentation is no endorsement.

Scott D. Cosenza, Esq. Legal Affairs Editor

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