BREAKING: Trump Admin Sent INNOCENT People to El Salvador Prison by Tim Miller The Bulwark Mar 20, 2025 Bulwark Takes
Tim Miller takes on shocking new revelations about Trump’s immigration policies: innocent Venezuelan refugees—including a pro soccer player—were secretly deported to a prison camp in El Salvador. Tim demands accountability, challenges both Republicans and Democrats to act, and exposes the cruelty at the heart of Trump’s ICE. Seriously, you don’t want to miss this one.
Transcript
Hey guys, it's Tim Miller from the Bulwark. We have breaking news regarding these illegal flights that the Trump Administration put Venezuelan refugees on to the El Salvador prison camp that I've Been Losing My Mind Over on several videos and podcasts of late. And this one I think Ben Wht said I had steam blowing out of my ears yesterday. For this one I'm a goddamn red fire hydrant, and there's just water blowing up out of every orifice. I am I'm enraged; I'm on fire about the reported news about what we did to a young man who was fleeing oppression, fleeing communism, trying to come to this country, trying to do so legally as so many had done since 1776, since before 1776.
Anyway, let me let me read you the details here. This is from Aaron Reichlin-Melnick. We did we did an interview with him, Bill Kristol did last weekend -- I'll put the link in this feed, who is a very good immigration analyst. I'd recommend you watch it. He writes this sworn declaration filed last night that confirms the Trump Administration sent innocent people to rot in prison in El Salvador, including a professional soccer player tortured by the Maduro regime, who entered this country legally to seek asylum, and has no criminal record in either country. How did this happen? How did a Venezuelan fleeing communism get put on a plane to El Salvador to go to that goddamn dystopian torture camp? Why, how did that happen? How did we do that? Well, I'm about to tell you how. And let me tell you, before I tell you how, here's what I really think this is the nuts of this. The people that are responsible for this, in a just world, would go to prison themselves, and Stephen Miller should be fearing prison for himself for doing this. Like the idea that this man was sent to El Salvador against a judge's order, despite the fact that he committed no crime, and was here legally, let me tell you why. ICE policy says a person can be deemed a gang member if any ICE officer notes two gang membership identification criteria. In the case of Mr Jerce Reyes Barrios, here with a tattoo modeled off the Real Madrid logo. Remember this guy is a professional soccer player tortured by the Maduro regime. It's so shocking he had a soccer tattoo. And No. 2, a picture of social media of him throwing the horns. Is Ted Cruz going to prison now? Can we send Ted Cruz to El Salvador? Can we? I don't know how many other Republicans graduated from Texas horns down in my view, but I don't know how many other Texans I'm sure Greg Abbott's thrown the horns before, can we send him to El Salvador, to a prison camp? that is it a real Madrid tattoo and a picture hook him horn that's how that's why we sent him to that torture hellscape.
We learned something else from these filings but the timing for this the uh president did the Declaration of the alien enemies Act of 1796 or whatever it is 1798 that resulted in the expulsion of these young men they did it at 3:53 p.m. uh last week the first flight to El Salvador then left at 5:26 p.m. so there were 90 minutes essentially between when the alien enemies Act was signed and when we put people with no due process on a flight to one of the most horrific prisons I've ever seen in a foreign country, had their hair buzzed, put into shackles, put down by this evil RoboCop looking man, their head down -- that's stuff we saw. That's stuff they're showing us.
You know, there's a CNN report on this, that when when the mother of this man saw the picture of him with the shaved head, she started wailing and screaming, rightfully. How could they do this? This person fled torture to come to freedom, now here we are torturing him. We're no different than Venezuela. What our government is doing is the same as what Maduro did. This is not acceptable. This is not acceptable. There should be justice for this man. Where are the politicians on this?
I'll start with the Republicans. there's a tweet I posted earlier from Jason Miller, one of Trump's top advisers, and Marco Rubio, from 2019, where they were calling for temporary protected status for Venezuelans fleeing communism. And here they are now, these same people five years later, taking the Venezuelans fleeing communism and sending them off to El Salvador without giving them a chance to even defend themselves, smearing them, calling them "gang members." Where are you Marco Rubio? You should be indicted over this, right, over the attack on the rights of this young man. Like, where are you Jason Miller? Where are you any of the Republicans on the hill? Lindsey Graham used to be for immigration reform. Everybody's silent.
And the Democrats, there have been Democrats that have criticized us, but you know, you've seen several Democrats talk about how they got to choose their battles, and and you know defending gang members isn't the best battle, and immigration isn't the best place to fight. And Trump has a mandate on immigration. And blah blah blah blah blah. Show some spine! Fight for the values of this country. Fight for that man and his mother. Draw attention to this. Figure out a way to get that man out of that camp and repatriate him. Like this is what America is fundamentally about. And I'm sure that there have been some Democrats that have spoken out on this. I I don't want to just paint with a broad brush. But let me tell you, I watch all the news about as closely as anybody, okay? I'm chained to the chair here, all right? So I watch the news; I get the press releases; I see the tweets. It's been lukewarm at best the advocacy on this from Democrats. And where is the hair on fire? Do you really think you're going to lose some election two years from now because you spoke too clearly about the rights of somebody who was here fleeing torture, fleeing communism, who just wanted to live free, who has no criminal record? You think defending that person and defending and protecting them from the torturous hellscape that he's been sent to, you think that's going to cost you an election in two years? I don't think so. I don't think so. I don't think you should be triggered that Donald Trump ran some ads about illegal sex changes in prison to some effect, and now you can't talk about illegal immigration at all. Like in this case, you know, again, let's put this caveat in here, the government could provide more information. Maybe there's something that the lawyer doesn't know. Maybe they had some cause beyond the tattoo and the one picture of him throwing hook horns. Maybe there's something out there. But in the meantime, based on what we know, we are torturing this person who did nothing, who broke no laws, who came here legally. Speak out! Do something! Show some spine! Rattle their cages. It worked in the first Trump Administration. They had to back off their worst immigration policies. It worked in the case where the Bulwark wrote about the guy that was fired from FEMA unlawfully. He got his job back four hours later. It worked in the case of the nuclear staffers down at Los Alamos who were fired wrongly by Elon Musk, and then they got their jobs back. Shake the tree! Fight for this man's rights! This is unamerican! It is wrong. It is illegal what this Administration is doing! And there is no justice if nobody rots in prison for this. There's no justice in this world.
So I don't really expect that, but in the meantime the least we can do is draw attention to it. So share this video with some friends. Call your Congressperson. Tell them to speak out. Tell them not to be afraid of being smeared by Republicans who say they're defending gang members. America cannot be a country where we just willy-nilly pull people off the street, because they have a real Madrid tattoo, and we send them to the worst conditions imaginable in another country, with no recourse. We cannot be that country! We must fight it! We must stop it! So please draw some attention to this. I appreciate it. We'll see you.
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ICE Deported Professional Soccer Player After 'I Love You' Sign Language Symbol Was Interpreted as Gang Sign: Affidavit. The asylum seeker entered the US legally after he was tortured for protesting Venezuela's authoritarian regime. by Morgan Music Updated Mar 24 2025, 12:48 PM EDT https://www.latintimes.com/ice-deported ... ted-578912
A professional soccer player seeking asylum in the US was deported to El Salvador under the Aliens Enemy Act.
Immigration officials accused Jerce Reyes Barrios of gang membership—based on a tattoo and a hand gesture he made in a photo on social media.
A former professional player and youth soccer coach, Reyes Barrios was detained by ICE in September 2024 after legally presenting himself at the border through the CBP One app. He had fled Venezuela after he was imprisoned and tortured for his participation in a protest against the authoritarian Maduro regime.
Despite having no criminal record and providing evidence supporting his asylum claim, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) alleged Reyes Barrios was a member of the Tren de Aragua gang. In early March, he was abruptly moved to a detainment facility in Texas, then deported to El Salvador on March 15.
According to court documents filed Wednesday, ICE officials had flagged a social media photo of Reyes Barrios making a gesture they believed was a gang symbol. However, his attorney, Linette Tobin, noted the gesture translates to "I love you," in sign language, and also closely resembles the gesture for "rock n' roll."
Various celebrities are seen making the same hand gesture. [Top left to right] ASL Barbie, Dee Snider, Miley Cyrus, Miles Brown, Pink [Bottom left to right] Tanner Fox, Jerce Reyes Brown, Bam Margera, former President Joe Biden Getty Images
DHS also cited his tattoo as evidence of gang membership. Reyes Barrios' tattoo is of a soccer ball with a crown, rosary and the word "Dios" (Spanish for God). A signed declaration from the tattoo artist states Reyes Barrios chose the image for its resemblance to the Real Madrid soccer team logo.
The case comes amidst Trump's invocation of the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 to expedite deportations of noncitizens suspected of Tren de Aragua affiliation.
Photos provided by the Salvadoran government show inmates on March 16, 2025 in Tecoluca, El Salvador. The prisoners were deported from the US after President Donald Trump's administration allegedly linked each individual to criminal organizations. Complete information on the detainees has not been made publicly available. Salvadoran Government via Getty Images
US District Judge James Boasberg blocked the act's use on Saturday and ordered two already-departed flights turned around, but officials did not respond to the order. Department of Justice attorneys have stated that Boasberg's subsequent request for more information is under consideration, but may be denied under state secrets privilege.
Since his deportation, Tobin and family member have lost all contact with Reyes Barrios and have no information on his condition, according to court documents.
Law Firm Trump Retaliated Against Gives In Rather Than Fighting Back by Glenn Kirschner Mar 21, 2025
The New York Times just reported that, "Law Firm (Paul, Weiss) Bends in Face of Trump Demands."
After Trump retaliated against the law firm Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison by issuing an executive order against the firm that, per the NYT is "likely illegal", instead of fighting the executive order in court, the head of the firm, Brad Karp, made that pilgrimage to the Oval Office and offered Trump $40 million in legal services to help Trump with his political priorities. In return, Trump withdrew the executive order.
Other law firms that were victimized by silimat retaliatory executive orders chose to stand up to Trump and fight the matter in court. But Paul, Weiss caved.
Transcript
well friends in the face of Donald Trump retribution one big law firm Paul Weiss refuses to fight and instead caves to Donald Trump to the tune of $40 million let's talk about that because justice matters [Music] hey all Glen Kirschner here okay friends let's set this new reporting up with the shortest team justice law school class ever extortion it is a criminal offense under the laws of Washington DC to obtain something of value or to compel another to act through threats or coercion let me say that again and boil it down even further it's a crime in DC to obtain something of value through threats or coercion that's extortion there is a kissing cousin crime to extortion called bribery bribery and extortion are used interchangeably and they're very similar crimes but basically extortion is obtaining something of value through threats or coercion coercion against that backdrop let's turn to the new reporting this from the New York Times headline law firm bends in face of Trump demands paul Weiss one of three law firms targeted by President Trump as part of his retribution campaign said it resolved the conflict by agreeing to a range of commitments and that article begins "President Trump and the head of the law firm Paul Weiss Rifken Wharton and Garrison LLP have reached a deal under which Trump will drop the executive order he leveled against the firm," Mr trump said on Thursday in the deal Trump said the firm agreed to a series of commitments including to represent clients no matter their political affiliation and contribute $40 million in legal services to causes Trump has championed including the president's task force to combat anti-semitism and other mutually agreed projects it's unclear how the money will be used to help the task force the firm Trump said also agreed to conduct an audit to ensure its hiring practices are merit-based and will not adopt use or pursue any DEI diversity equity or inclusion policies the deal materialized after the head of the firm Brad Karp went to the White House this week and had a face-to-face meeting with Trump there's no reporting about whether Brad Karp went on bended knee or not my editorial edition had a face-to-face meeting with Trump to discuss a resolution members of the legal profession said in interviews that they were surprised by the deal as it appears as if the firm which is dominated by Democrats and has long prided itself in being at the forefront of the fight against the government for civil rights was capitulating to Trump over an executive order that is likely illegal obtaining a thing of value through threats or coercion that's extortion what do we have here we have Donald Trump punishing a law firm for doing something you know of which Donald Trump disapproves and as the New York Times accurately reports it was an executive order that was likely illegal and Paul Weiss the law firm the head of that firm goes to the Oval Office and says "Wait a minute wait a minute we'll give you $40 million in legal services to help your political priorities." And Donald Trump then says "Well then I'm no longer punishing your law firm obtaining a thing of value through threats or coercion." It feels a little extortion-y doesn't it you know other law firms are on the receiving end of these likely illegal executive orders a firm called Perkins Kuey for example they went into court and they're fighting it and they will very likely win but not Paul Weiss they buckled they caved they capitulated for reasons that you know maybe someday we will know if it is something as ugly as a costbenefit analysis or a profit margin that's shameful let me turn my attention to one other aspect of this story um I turned on cable news this morning i I don't spend that much time these days watching mainstream media corporate media legacy media but I watched some of the reporting about this deal that was struck and I heard mainstream media referring to this as unconventional negotiating by a president this was just an unconventional negotiation you know friends that would be like saying if Donald Trump went out on the White House lawn and shot and killed people mainstream media reporting that as well you know this is just an unconventional form of population control no it would be murder it would be a crime and corporate media legacy media dumbing this stuff down when Donald Trump does it is doing real damage to the prospect of us keeping our republic saving our democracy you can't give in to the aspiring dictator you have to stand up to it you know you can't just roll over play dead give him $40 million so he will lift his likely illegal executive order that is us just slouching toward autocracy and you know if this qualifies as extortion and it sure seems to fulfill the legal elements of the crime of extortion you know Paul Weiss could have asserted itself as the victim could have brought a legal challenge to this likely un unlawful executive order as did another big law firm as I mentioned Perkins Kuey and they could have fought it out in court and they very likely would have won but rather than assert themselves as the potential victims here they just rolled over you know there are times when law enforcement has to stand up for victims when victims won't stand up for themselves or can't stand up for themselves you know I thought about a parallel from my days as a career prosecutor i prosecuted domestic violence cases including domestic violence murder cases and let me tell you friends domestic violence is a vicious cycle and there are times when the victim of domestic violence can't or won't stand up for themselves they tell the police and the prosecutors "I I can't I can't cooperate against the perpetrator my abuser because things will only get worse for me." And in those instances it was our responsibility as prosecutors to step in and try to protect victims who were unwilling or unable to protect themselves we had to try to protect them we had to try to hold the perpetrator accountable we had to try to protect the community from that perpetrator even beyond the domestic violence the problem is if the victim this law firm Paul Weiss won't assert its own rights won't fight this in court we sure know that the Department of Justice the FBI and the federal prosecutors who are under Donald Trump's thumb courtesy of Attorney General Pam Bondi and characters like Emile Boove and Todd Blanch we know they're not going to do anything to protect victims against Donald Trump's suspected illegal conduct so where does that leave us you know it leaves our government and our democracy hanging in the balance and friends you have to wonder if this was a profitdriven decision by Paul Weiss if it was a costbenefit analysis um you have to wonder if folks who are considering using the legal services of that law firm that capitulated to Trump versus a law firm like Perkins Kuey that is standing up to Trump in essence standing up to you know the the creeping dictatorship and autocracy the abuse of governmental power and authority and the office of the presidency that Donald Trump is engaged in by trying to punish law firms like this you have to wonder you know if those clients have to choose between law firms that take those two approaches to the rule of law and to governmental abuse overreach and corruption you know which of those two law firms and I know there are lots of others out there but if it was a choice between those two which firm would clients gravitate toward gravitate toward feel more comfortable being represented by i am not here to say let's boycott this law firm for making a decision or that law firm for not making a decision um but I think if it's a profitdriven decision by that law firm in the long run they may have done themselves more harm than good you know because you would think for a law firm that traditionally was involved in pushing back against government abuse and overreach in you know asserting the civil rights of all people a law firm like that you would think that to the Paul Weisses of the world justice matters maybe not friends as always please stay safe please stay tuned and I look forward to talking with you all again tomorrow [Music]
The MOST DISGRACEFUL Action By A Law Firm EVER (w/ George Conway) by Tim Miller & George Conway The Bulwark Mar 21, 2025
George Conway joins Tim Miller to discuss the law firm Paul Weiss bending to Donald Trump in order to have an executive order rescinded, with the exchange of pro bono lawyer support towards the administration.
Transcript
hey everybody it's Tim Miller from the bull look who I got it's George Conway uh we're doing a little bonus segment uh of George Conway explains it all he's going to explain to me and and this is the impetus for this is that I was watching his blue sky SKS I call them SKS nobody else does but I'm I'm going to and um he we need to call him something yeah SK I like SKS people don't like it because uh in in rap culture in like the 90s SKS had a had a term that you shouldn't Google if you don't like sexy talk but I I I think that you know that to me that just kind of makes it a little bit more exciting um anyway uh a Google that I can't help myself okay well I'll tell you offline uh the um George wrote this the Paul Weiss capitulation is the most disgraceful action by a major law firm in my lifetime so appalling that I couldn't believe it at first Paul Weiss to be clear for people like me who are not lawyers is not a person but is a firm it's Paul Kama Weiss uh that has done a lot of work in in DC related cases and they essentially just graveled and capitulated and were extorted by the president of the United States George why don't you explain what happened and why it's so outrageous yeah uh Paul Weiss Rifkin Wharton and Garrison is one of the preeminent law firms in the city of New York um it is a law firm that it's one of these firms that kind of form because way back in the day um you had your wasps and they didn't M care much for Jews and and so the Jews formed their own law firm and this became one of the prominent law firms to this day um and the full name of the firm is Paul Weiss Rifkin Wharton and Garrison and rifkin is a man who became who who who became lionized in the bar not only because he was a very very talented lawyer but he later became a judge and a very very well-respected judge and the firm I mean it look it's a stellar Law Firm it is it is one of the top four or five law firms to my mind in the city of New York it is considered to be one of the two or three best litigating firms in New York I think by many people um I've worked with them in the past I've had many good relationships with people at that firm I think in more recent years it's become as a lot of law firms have become they've become much more mercenary and much more oriented toward the bottom line not that these firms in New York never made a lot of money but they make oodles and oodles of money I work for one right across the street from Paul Weiss Rifkin Wharton and Garrison and you know I mean one of the reasons why I can shoot my mouth off today is I made a lot of money there and everybody can you know I have no FS to give anymore um and and I and here what happened was Paul Weiss had a former partner a retired partner um named Mark Pomerantz decided because he was a patriot and because he reached the same conclusion that I and a lot of people did um early on in the Trump Administration um that Donald Trump was a recidivist criminal and you know there were a lot of suspicions about the Shady real estate deals he engaged in and whether or not he paid taxes and in particular whether or not he for example overstated valuations for the purposes of valuations of his real estate properties for the purposes of getting bank loans and for the purposes of making insurance claims while the same time understating it for tax purposes and just BL you know having double sets of book and doing all sorts of bad things and pomerance and another very prominent lawyer a former partner partner at another one of the Stellar law firms in New York Davis poing wardwell a guy named Carrie Dunn who at one point was president of the association of the bar of City New York one of the most prominent local bar organizations in the country if not the planet they joined as Special Assistant District Attorneys the office of district attorney then district attorney of Manhattan sance and they proceeded to investigate Trump and that resulted in some litigation fast forward to the present Donald Trump is settling scores now that he is president of the United States again and he set is settling scores in particular with law firms and conducting you know a campaign against law firms and has said that he is going to get all the bad lawyers basically the ones he feels did bad things to him and there was the Perkins koi executive order which um I'm sure you've discussed on other podcasts I've discussed we've discussed it on my podcast um there was an order against the law firm in Covington and Burling and then they issued an order against Paul Weiss and the order was basically based upon the fact that Paul Weiss had an association with this longtime partner former partner Pomerantz who then retired and then went on to the DA's office and prosecuted um Donald Trump even though his actions in working for the district attorney of the city of of of Manhattan County of New York County had nothing to do with his work of Paul Weiss it just happens to be that he you Paul Weiss is on his resume right and the President issued an executive order saying that Paul Weiss was some kind of a danger to the nation and all terrible and needed to be punished and placing contal yeah I mean all sorts of stuff and it's like the dude the guy's not even there anymore and he didn't do any of this stuff of which you were probably guilty at least from a civil burden of proof um while he was at Paul Weiss and Paul Weiss you know I mean lots of people Paul Weiss go in and out of government mostly mostly it's a democratic firm which makes what happened all the more shocking I mean yeah one of the partners there is Jay Johnson former head of what DHS Obama in the I think was it the Obama Administration very very smart and capable guy Damien Williams the uh former United States Attorney for the southern district of New York who was the United States one of the United States attorneys most recently um um he was in during the Biden Administration who indirectly oversaw the prosecution of mayor Adams um and they they basically they punish this this fall firm for basically nothing I mean first of all everything pomarance did was legal he was conducting a little legitimate investigation the facts of which ultimately resulted in civil sanctions against right Trump and the only thing you could criticize pomerance for is really no business of Trump's it was the fact that he later wrote a book about the investigation and his experience about the investigation and people have raised questions about whether that was ethical and proper but that really is a question of his you know ethical obligations to the office of the district attorney but so anyway what happens is this this happens and everybody thinks well Paul Weiss is gon to fight because this is completely ridiculous it's unconstitutional it is a violation of the First Amendment it is an abuse of the public power of the presidency as was the Covington and the perins kui memos and all these other memos and all these other executive orders for all sorts of reasons the the abolishment of the Department of Education for different reasons because he doesn't have the power to overturn the statute of congress with an executive order but this one was particularly outrageous everybody just assumed Paul Weiss was going to give Donald Trump the finger yeah and because it's a you know it's known as an aggressive litigation fir that is their bread and butter they fight okay they're they're you know they're tough guys they fight defending Banks and defending you know defending their corporate clients which you know I I I I would be perfectly happy if I were the general counsel of City Bank which has been a big client of theirs over the years to to to have them on my roster of people who defended um my company from claims and yet what happened was the managing partner um who I dealt with in the past I know him um he's a very kind of slick guy and a very a very smart guy and a very able guy and he's kind of remate help he's kind of remade that firm in a lot of ways some good some bad in my opinion you know the news was he's coming down to the White House to talk to the president and everybody was like what what's there to talk about and then last night there was this settlement announced by Donald Trump where Paul Weiss agrees to conduct $40 million worth of if I have this right I mean I saw it in the middle of the night I have it right here I'll just I'll just read it to you you can read it yeah read it Paul Weiss will yeah Paul Weiss will dedicate the equivalent of 40 million in pro bono legal Source legal Services over the course of Trump's term to support the administration's initiatives including fairness in the justice system we know what that means for these guys and the president's taxk Force to combat anti-Semitism it also said that paules will not adopt to use or pursue any Dei policies Paul Weiss will take on a range of pro bono matters that represent the full spectrum of political viewpoints of our society especially he doesn't say especially uh including including conservative quote so there you go no I mean you know look I have no problem with pro bono conservative work I've done some myself over the years demanded to by the president of the United States as part of an extortion schem abely not and and also the definition of conservatism under the Trump Administration to my mind isn't conservative it's fascistic and authoritarian and it's you know I mean this is this is stuff that would make you know that make Ronald Reagan go you know roll his grave and certainly stuff that would make the founders of Paul Weiss such as judge riffkin roll over in Gray they were believed in the public interest they didn't believe in the use of government Authority in a narcissistic and self-serving fashion by a man who not only fails to conduct himself in accordance with his oath to Faithfully execute the laws in the Constitution of the United States but outright abcat it and seeks to destroy the laws and undermine the laws in the Constitution of the United States and that's my you know and that's why I just found this so appalling there's no lawyer of any degree of intelligence um who can't who shouldn't be who could misunderstand the fact that Donald Trump is engaging in a mass accretion of power belonging trying to belong to the other branches he's he's engaging in the overturning of legislation by executive order essentially usurping the article one powers of congress and he's continually undermining the courts his people are misleading the courts they are they are conducting um they are attacking the courts they're attacking judges who rule against them they are essentially trying they you know in a rather not in a rather obvious way but not in an open declaration sort of way disobeying court orders I mean this is the we are down the path to authoritarianism and that's what causes that's what caused this capitulation and it is just the it is just an astounding astounding display of moral cowardice by people who have to know better people who here I mean you take you raise your hand to become a lawyer I mean you you you are an officer of the Court you're bound to support the law and the Constitution of the United States you have a moral obligation as a laal to because you you have def you have dedicated yourself to joining a profession that is based upon the rule of law you make money off the rule of law you have it's it's a very special profession I know everybody says let's shoot all the lawyers like Shakespeare did but it's not like I don't know I I pick some other profession um although other professions have different ethical obligations and commitments we you make fun of Lobby the down the H the same firm okay yeah you've written about that and um it is it is I just I don't think this would have happened in some other age I think these law firms have become so obsessed with the money that they make um which only makes it worse to my mind I'm not against anybody making money I am Greatful for 30 years I spent at a big New York law firm where I made more money than I probably had any right to make but that should that should be the reason a reason why you should be able to stand up to these people yes right and it should come with obligation how many houses in the Hamptons do you need I I I don't I don't understand and to me George two so they're two related things with this one is the because I want to come back to their individual choices because I think you're calling for some people to qu but before we get to that just really quick the bigger picture like this cowardice is will have real ramifications like across the country in in how PRI the private sector and law firms do their work what they're willing to do and not willing to do like if you B like this you're saying this would to happen in another age but it is happening right now in Hungary where companies are just folding like people are just folding institutions are just folding they're saying look if I get any pressure from the autocrat then I'll let them dictate my hiring policies we won't take on cases that will make him mad and once once people start making those concessions like the ramifications are very re real and and it allow it gives power to this to authoritarian style power to this President without even making him fight for it they're they're just submitting to it they're just handing it over to it I I couldn't agree more Tim and I I think there are two levels upon which you can look at it first off is one of the things that authoritarians do is they divide divide and conquer you think you're alone you don't want to be single out so you capitulate and that sets an example for the next one that's the general level and that applies to corporations media entities for example uh like ABC when it settled that absolutely nonsensical lawsuit uh about George Stephanopoulos calling Trump an adjudicate essentially an adjudicated rapist when the judge had said three times that what Trump had been found to have done by the jury while not technically rape under New York law was in any ordinary colloquial sense rape because you know I mean there's no real moral difference to my mind between violently inserting one's penis into a woman a unconsenting woman vagina and inserting your finger in there but some for some reason that that Trump decided that was a big moral difference to him and he filed a lawsuit and then ABC shamefully threw Stephanopoulos under the bus and settled it but this is the second point to go back to the second one is the one is the sort of you you you divide and conquer and everybody feels like they're standing out there alone and they can't do anything and they just don't want him to to come after me and and and you know it there's sort of a domino effect but the second is who is Paul wise this is a law firm these are the people you hire to defend yourself when you have been wronged these are the people who you would hire to defend yourself against wrongful action by the government against your business and if they capitulate like wormy cowards the way they have what is that that's the message that that in particular sense that a an aggressive litigating Law Firm acts like like just I I don't even there there's got to be a better word than just Shameless slimy coward that I can't you know I need we need the problem with the Trump ER is we need we need an extended thesis to come up with more negative descriptions of of people and things we need to think about I need send incredible message why should any other law firm fight why should any of when should any Corporation fight and and or by the way if you're if you're an individual who wants to fight you're losing the like people that you would go to to potentially defend you right like so if if if Perkins Koy can't do it because they're under executive you know they're getting attacked by by the president uh you can't trust Paul Weiss like you're running out of qualified people to do it yeah and and and as the judge pointed out in the Perkins koui hearing that I attend I had a good fortune of sitting in and watching last week they could go after Perkins Ko's lawyers now Williams and Connelly which showed an incredible degree of courage and I admire them even more now because they they are their willingness to step up is such a sharp contrast to Paul Weiss and a lot of other firms you know there's no end to it because these orders these executive orders are premised on the notion that Donald Trump can just def declare anyone he doesn't like to be a threat to the I guess National Security of the United States and he's arrogating to himself he believes that if he makes that determination in his sole judgment that somebody is a threat to the United States then he can do whatever he wants to them and have to use every mechanism available to him to punish that entity and What What In fact is going on is these people aren't threats to the United States of America the biggest threat the biggest security threat to the United States of America is the president of the United States but let's leave that aside um he's just using the government as a proxy he's just using it as an extension of his own personal interest as a way to con you know these people did me wrong while I was not president therefore now that I am president I'm going to use the arms of the the mechanisms of government to destroy these people or at least bring them to heal and make them grv yeah and that that is just straight out authoritarianism that is we are there this is a last thing I'll let you go the um you wrote also that uh any lawyers at the firm Partners or Associates who don't promptly resign will defile their moral and professional reputations Beyond repair you've had a chance to sleep on that you still you still think that yeah I I you know I believe that to be true I hope that to be true if it is not it is only because if if it if that is not true if that turns out to be true this country is lost okay because if the people who are standing by Paul Weiss and staying there and allowing this to happen you know are not morally shunned then we're done we're done because that means that people are willing to put their own personal interest their own fears their own pocketbooks and whatnot um ahead of the Constitution and the laws of the United States the system that made it possible for these people to achieve the success that they have achieved yep and I I I cannot believe that there aren't going to be loyers who are just going to be sick about this and who who aren't who are going to leave and I think the associates ought to be I mean I I I I think I hope that this backfires and if it doesn't we've got a big problem people need to start doing the right thing because it's the right thing people need to look themselves in the mirror and say do I care about my country and I'm going out there and I'm I'm saying this I I I I attacked Brad karp the chairman of Paul Weiss the other day who I know and and also an old friend of mine who I think had something to do with organizing this have you heard of although I think it was done more than more by um some guys in Washington but you know I no return phone call from him yet I I don't think he'd want to call me basically like you know I I only give more of it to him and it hurts me it pains me to have to do that I mean I you know I I we and you have this had this experience too I know given you came through you know the political road yeah um to where you are today and I came through kind of the legal Thicket to where I am today but you know I get people capitulate and do the wrong thing I've done the wrong thing in the past you've done the wrong thing in the past wrote a whole book about it and but there's a certain point where you have to look your in the mirror and say how did we get here and it has been so distressing to me to see how many people who know better who should know better basically out of Moral Moral apathy moral cardice and moral corruption some combination of those three um basically exceed to or join in on things that they know to be wrong that's the thing I will never get over I mean I can understand there's going to be some of it but I I can't get over the degree to it and the Paul Weiss thing to me was just absolutely floring I did not believe the news at first when I first saw a couple of tweets about it because I thought oh maybe some reporters just getting fed some [ __ ] from the White House and then I saw Trump statement I was like well Trump's full of [ __ ] although gee it looks to be some carefully worked out text and then I saw you know the time story and it was true and I called some friends and they said yep karp did this Paul Weiss did this and to finish it off I I I lost my train of thought here but I I I really I here's what the point I wanted make and want to maybe this is a good way to finish okay I am more upset this morning about what happened with Paul Weiss that I was the morning after the election and because you held them in higher regard you you'd expected more from them I held them in higher regard I guess than than the average voter the average voter I guess but I think it's more I I guess that's true um but I think it's more that I was psychologically prepared for a trump Victory after seven years eight years of watching this [ __ ] show um that we have that will someday histo that someday historians will reflect as just a black mark on the history of the United States if it ever if it survives frankly I was prepared psychologically for Trump's win I mean that's why I spent so much effort trying to defeat him even though I had convinced myself by the end that I thought K was going to squeak by and pull it off I woke up that morning I said okay well it happened and I did my best you know with a lot of other people to try to make sure it didn't happen I was psychologically prepared for it I knew that it was a possibility I that I put anywhere from 20 to 40% sometimes 50% depending on how things were going you know I knew it could happen but last night it was something I couldn't ever I couldn't imagine it I couldn't imagine working at that firm I couldn't imagine you know cons just capitulating in such a shameful and weak and cowardly fashion and and in the same way I can't imagine going to if I were Paul Weiss going to work today without cleaning out my [ __ ] desk [Music] and I I hope I mean I I I hope this turns around somehow but it really this has is is just a very very disheartening moment that is a good place to leave it thank you George Conway for explaining what uh what was happening to me and uh we'll be uh we'll be talking to you soon brother hang in there all right yeah see everybody subscribe to the feed hey YouTube fam if you want to support the bull workk the best way to do it is by becoming a Youtube Bull workk plus member the bull workk is truly independent we have no corporate overlords we're not settling any dumb lawsuits with Trump by joining you help support our work and you can get a bunch of perks right here on this platform add free content bonus videos live streams and some emojis of me which I guess some people want so come join come hang out become a bulwark YouTube plus member and I'll be seeing you in the comments so behave
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Trump Cheap ATTACK BACKFIRES as Law Firms FIGHT BACK Legal AF Mar 23, 2025 The Intersection with Popok
In galling irony, the President who had dozens of his lawyers disbarred or sanctioned for filing bad faith litigation, is now attacking lawyers and law firms and threatening them with retaliation in the form of public shaming, pulling security clearances, exiling the firms and their clients from government contracts, and law firms are banding together to fight back to save our system of justice at the heart of our constitutional republic and democracy. Popok stands up and fights back.
Transcript
law firms and lawyers that work for them are the lifeblood of our constitutional republic and our justice system civil and criminal and they are now under attack by the president of the United States Donald Trump he just issued a new memo putting the crosshairs on my profession and and I'm going to start this off with a quote from Venita Gupta who used to be in the Department of Justice this moment calls for courage and collective action not compliance among lawyers and law firms it is time to fight back not to bend the knee to Donald Trump or all hope is lost i'm Michael Popach you're on Legal AF let's talk about the new memo and the various ways there are now calls for action and why it's important judges are under attack by Donald Trump have been since he was a criminal defendant judges are still under attack right now with renewed assault by Donald Trump trying to rip away the foundations of our democracy it is the court system the final firewall of defense of our liberties and rights and who are the advocates that bring these cases to the courts it's the lawyers and the law firms many of them big law firms that have sections devoted to representing people for free or pro bono donald Trump hates that he hates what he sees as some sort of liberal bias in the law firms or at least a bias against him because most or if not all of the major law firms in this country you know the ones that are a couple of thousand lawyers sized would not take any of Donald Trump's cases and now he's paying them back in an outright retaliation naming names including in his last two or three different proclamations executive orders trying to send a chill down the spine of lawyers and get them to back off from going after him or his administration it is not going to work i know my profession well i know the lawyers in my profession well this is what one particular law firm that does a lot of work in front of the uh or against the Trump administration including in the area of immigrant uh immigrant rights and constitutional rights they had this to say "Our liberties depend on lawyers willingness to represent unpopular people and causes including in matters adverse to the federal government our profession owes every client zealous legal representation without fear of retribution regardless of their political affiliation uh that is that needs to be the response by my profession paul Weiss needs to be the exception it was it was operative term there is past tense a leader of the bar could have been on the Mount Rushmore of ethical uh zealous law firms in America transactional and litigation but that reputation lies in tatters because it has bent the knee of Donald Trump and paid him a $40 million extorted bribe in the form of free legal service in order to get themselves off a blacklist they sacrificed they sacrificed their professional reputation and ethics and role in our society for their for their own law firm profits and greed there's no other way to put it this was a firm that you would you would have held up until this week as a shining example a paragon of values ethics and and representing our highest ideals as a profession and now it's all gone it's all gone and other firms now seeing the the Paul Weiss response and capitulation are now banding together there's a national call for law firms to file an amicus brief a friend of the court brief to support Perkins Koi a firm out of Washington that Mark Elias used to be a partner at who has a history had a history at least of representing Democratic causes and going after the prior Trump administration and this Trump administration and Donald Trump doesn't like them tried to sue them in court federally a number of years ago he got sanctioned as a result that's why it's so ironic to hear Donald Trump issue a new memorandum a new proclamation on preventing I I almost can't get this out without choking donald Trump sending out a proclamation and a policy of preventing abuses of the legal system and the federal court who knows better than the person who is the chief abuser of the federal court and of our legal system for Donald Trump to say he's now in charge of preventing abuses of our legal system it should start at home with him and and him saying by name Mark Elias is a bad person is effectively what he's just said and even though there's already rules on the books let me explain this my profession is self-p policing and also has a number of ways if things uh if misconduct results from a lawyer's conduct and behavior in court or otherwise there's a number of different ways to police that and have been ways to police that over the last 150 to 200 years first of all every lawyer not only takes an oath to defend the Constitution but also to be ethical and follow the rules of professional responsibility in their in their jurisdiction every state has some sort of either bar association or bar or a court uh a court system or a a set of judges that are responsible for regulating lawyers in that district so I'm a member of Florida Bar and the uh I'm a member of what effectively is the New York Bar but there's no New York bar it is it is regulated by each individual um uh department within New York with with judges either way it's the same thing it's regulated by either a bar association or bar or it's regulated by judges that's one too and when you file things in court whether state or federal you need to certify and sign them and then you attest that what you're filing is merit has merit it's either a good faith argument under the law or a good faith extension of the law new law that you're trying to make that often happens or under the facts and if not you can be sanctioned and penalized your other party can file a motion for sanctions the judge has his has their own inherent authority federal and state to sanction meritless vexacious uh filings and litigation practice before them so you've got this rule 11 under the federal rules of civil procedure you've got the other inherent authority of the judges if you as a person on the other side or otherwise want to file a bar complaint you can file a bar complaint wherever that lawyer has his license or his jurisdiction they will investigate it and pull a ticket we have a proper ethical self-p policing this is not about that this is about Donald Trump going after by name law firms because he's trying to bring them under his heel and some law firms hopefully will not follow the Paul Weiss hopefully that will be the outlier aberrational and they'll fight like Perkins Koi is fighting perkins Koi already got a temporary restraining order from chief former chief judge Barl Howell in the DC district court because putting them on a blacklist she found was the equivalent of violating the first amendment and violating their due process rights taking away their and their clients rights to do business before the government taking away their top secret security clearance so they can't work trying to put out on the street 2,000 people or so that work for these firms thousands of people work for these firms just so you know the top the top law firms in America and I've worked for a couple of them myself are anywhere between 1,000 and almost 3,000 lawyers and then triple that for support staff and there's f let's say 500 top law firms and then 10,000 or more other law firms this is the time to fight this is not the time to concede and it's important because if we don't draw the line here and we capitulate to the preventing abuses of legal system and federal court proclamation and we let Donald Trump pull the legs out from under our bedrock legal principles and take the lawyers with them and try to flush them down the drain then all hope is lost because the average person is not ex it's not expected or trained to litigate for themselves in a process say way before federal courts or state courts with the briefing and the procedure and the filing and the discovery process and all the rules right we're not all my cousin Vinnie we're not going to learn this over a weekend with our girlfriend this is this is serious stuff and lawyers and lawyer and law firms take it seriously and the big law firms sure they have their corporate clients and they give them billions of dollars a year each law firm each major law firm but they also do a fair amount of proono work for free and Donald Trump calls that out by name too let's be clear all Donald Trump wants to do is put law firms that that rejected him right they didn't pick him for their team on the schoolyard and now it's time for Donald Trump to pay him back what am I watching is this Carrie the movie or the musical where Donald Trump comes with pig's blood and starts and start and start starts a fire and kills everybody that's what it's starting to look like except it's real life here's the memo lawyers and law firms this is whoever wrote this for Donald Trump lawyers and law firms that engage in actions that violate the laws of the United States or rules governing attorney conduct must be efficiently and effectively held accountable accountability is especially important when misconduct by lawyers and law firms threatens our national security homeland security public safety or election integrity recent examples of gross unethical misconduct this is now defamatory towards a bar member Mark Elias from the Elias Law Group used to be with Perkins Koi who's now also the subject of being blacklisted were was deeply he was deeply involved according to Trump in a creation of a false dossier by a foreign national designed to provide a fraudulent basis by federal law enforcement to investigate a presidential candidate in order to alter the outcome of the presidential election all right the steel dossier was created by a guy in London and ended up being delivered through the Perkins Koi firm and Mark Elias was there this was all c against Donald Trump this was all criminally prosecuted and investigated by Donald Trump's special prosecutor and nobody was convicted of this uh what what Donald Trump's talking about now zero this is completely defamatory against Mark Elias to try to undermine him mark Elias already fired back and said "I will not be be bullied nor uh will it stop me from doing what's right for our client base." That's the right response paul Weiss wrong response uh then he goes off on the im after he takes a a shot at Mark Elias Trump then goes and says "Oh it's the immigration system where lawyers including those that work in big law pro bono practices that's that free service I talked about where they frequently accord with no evidence." He says the following they frequently coach clients to conceal their past or lie about their circumstances when asserting their asylum claims all in attempt to circumvent immigration policies and then he then he's got a list the ghosts of Lake and Riley Jocelyn Nur and Rachel Morren to say "See all these asylum seekers killed them because they lied with their lawyers." That's not how those people died they were undocumented they were not here on asylum applications and there's no evidence that lawyers coach their clients to lie and we have an adversarial system for that there's a lawyer on the other side there's cross-examination in court there's judges with inherent authority and if anybody thought that was really going on then you'd make a report to the bar a referral to the bar association or to judges who are responsible for that person's license and they would investigate and maybe pull their license you know who got a lot of their licenses pulled you know who got a lot of disbarment donald Trump's lawyers for talk that's why this is so um perverse donald Trump's own lawyers lost their bar licenses rudy Giuliani no bar licenses you know um all the people that that were prosecuted in Georgia most of them lost their bar license or were severely sanctioned or just missed losing their bar licenses there's up to a dozen lawyers that lost their bar license that did work for Donald Trump filing false statements now he's now he's the one that's policing that that's beyond the wolf inside the chicken coop now Donald Trump then says "Well I understand there's federal rule of federal rule of civil procedure 11 about meritless filings but unfortunately far too many attorneys and law firms have ignored these requirements in litigating against the federal government so he's directing the attorney general and Homeland Security and whoever else if they see or suspect a violation of ethical or professional conduct rules there to file appropriate um actions with the courts and then report back to me as the president as to whether I should revoke security clearances and uh the right to do business and work before the federal government for these law firms now there's a list of up to 14 law firms that are on the hit list for Donald Trump this is the this is this precages that we'll be seeing that next what do we need to do as a profession we need to do what we went to law school to do and now we need to do it for ourselves but for the greater good we need to fight we need to fight back we need to collectively join together we need to circle the wagons around Perkins Koi and Covington and Burling and all the other firms and Mark Elias and all the other firms that Donald Trump has gone after and will go after because if we don't do it now right he's now gotten a taste for it trump he's now he he he smells blood and he's going for it and so we've got to fight back or we'll never we'll never have an appropriately functioning justice system civil and criminal in this country again there's no other way to put it i'm going to continue to fight right here with you on Legal AF spotlighting these issues take a moment hit the free subscribe button it's that important till my next reporting I'm Michael Pop i'm Michael Popac and I got some big news for our audience most of you know me as the co-founder of Midas Touches Legal AF and the Legal AF YouTube channel or as a 35-year national trial lawyer now building on what we started together on Legal AF I've launched a new law firm the Pope Firm dedicated to obtaining justice through compassionate and zealous legal representation at the Pope Firm we are focused on obtaining justice for those who have been injured or damaged by a lifealtering event by securing the highest dollar recoveries i've been tirelessly fighting for justice for the last 35 years so my own law firm organically building on my legal AF work just feels right and I've handpicked a team of top tier trial fighters and settlement experts throughout all 50 states known as Big Auto injury attorneys who have the knowhow to beat heartless insurance companies corporations government entities and their attorneys big Autos attorneys working with my firm are rock stars in their respective states and collectively responsible for billions of dollars in recoveries so if you or a loved one have been on the wrong side of a catastrophic auto motor vehicle ride share or truck accident suffered a personal injury or been the victim of medical malpractice employment harassment or discrimination or suffered a violation of your civil and constitutional rights then contact the Pope Firm today at 1877 pop af or by visiting my website at www.thepopfirm.com and fill out a free case evaluation form and if we determine that you have a case and you sign with us we don't get paid unless you do the Pope firm fighting for your justice every step of the
BREAKING: Judge EXPLODES at Trump official IN COURT by Brian Tyler Cohen Mar 22, 2025 The Legal Breakdown with Glenn Kirschner
Legal Breakdown episode 491: @GlennKirschner2 discusses a judge losing her patience in court over Trump officials lying.
Transcript
you're watching the legal breakdown Glenn I think it's fair to say that these federal judges are finally losing their patience with Trump a federal judge just exploded at a trump Administration official in court can you explain what just happened yeah Brian this one involves Donald Trump's you know really horrific attempt to ban transgender people from serving in the military they've been serving honorably uh since 20201 and the Trump Administration you know just kind of cruy and arbitrarily wants to put a stop to them being able to serve our country in the military and a federal court judge in Washington DC judge Anna Reyes just exploded at Trump's dirty doj lawyers who are going in and arguing garbage basically to the court and she exploded in two ways or on two fronts both on the form of this litigation and on the substance of the litigation and what I want to do we often don't like to you know read extended segments of court rulings but I want to read just a couple of sentences of what judge Anna Rees said to these doj lawyers because it really drives home just how horrific and cruel and Lawless the Trump Administration is being so District Judge Anna Reyes found that Trump's transgender ban from military service is soaked in animus and it violates the equal protection Clause because it discriminates based on transgender status and sex quote it's the bands language is unabashedly demeaning its policy stigmatizes transgender persons as inherently unfit and its conclusions bear no relation to fact but the judge didn't stop there quote transgender persons have served openly since 2021 but defendants meaning Trump and his doj and his Department of Defense including uh defense secretary Pete heg Seth defendants have not analyzed the service of transgender service members that is unfortunate plaintiffs meaning the transgender military service members plaintiff service records alone are exhibit a for the proposition that transgender persons can have the warrior ethos physic IAL and mental health selflessness honor integrity and discipline to ensure military Excellence I mean what she's doing there is on the substance of this litigation we have transgender military service members who have been serving honorably and they have excelled in their work as members of the military since 2021 and the Trump Administration walks into court without any evidence to support their attempt to just completely ban all transgender folk from serving in the military but there's a mountain of evidence undercutting this you know ugly transgender ban that Trump is trying to implement and that's why she exploded on the substance of this litigation because these doj lawyers don't have a damn leg to stand on Glenn I want to read you another quote from Judge Reyes and I want your reaction to this quote I am not going to abide by government officials saying one thing to the public saying what they really mean to the public and coming in here to the court and telling me something different like I'm an idiot your reaction to that my reaction to that is those kind of observations by a judge and those kind of let's call them shortcomings in litigation by doj lawyers is fatal they can be fatal to litigation and Brian let me tell our viewers exactly what it was Judge Reyes was talking about there because uh Pete hegseth Secretary of Defense you know people say he's a DUI hire he said that quote transgender troops are disqualified from service without an exemption period just a blanket statement transgender folk are disqualified and yet Brian here is what these doj lawyers went in and argued to judge Reyes they said that oh oh judge we're only looking to disqualify ify people with the medical condition called gender dysphoria which is not what the proposed transgender ban says and that is what prompted her to explode you've got the Secretary of Defense saying one thing publicly which obviously is the true goal of the Trump Administration discriminate against all J transgender folk and then you have these doj lawyers coming in and contradicting that arguing something completely different frankly something that's not even supported by the language of the proposed ban do you think I'm an idiot well guess what I'm not an idiot and I think we can see the trajectory that this litigation is on Brian but Glenn this has been a recurring theme where we've watched Donald Trump say one thing in public and say another thing in court and really what matters at the end of the day is what said in court and so why doesn't this Administration just have the freedom to lie in public if they're going to if what they're saying in court is really the only thing that should matter well because the plaintiffs in the case will introduce into evidence what the Trump Administration officials are saying and doing publicly and that becomes evidence that undercuts what you know this is not just judges reading newspaper articles or watching cable news and taking that as information and evidence in the case it will be properly admitted and the statements of people like the Secretary of Defense Donald Trump and other high government officials are absolutely Fair evidentiary game in this kind of litigation and so what does it do to The credibility of the Trump Administration when when the judge really feels like they're being jerked around like what what is this what historically what has this kind of thing done what it does is once you lose your credibility as a lawyer whether you are a doj prosecutor whether you're a civil defense attorney a criminal defense attorney once you lose your credibility once the judge can no longer count on your word as being truthful and accurate which by the way we as what are called officers of the Court every attorney is considered an officer of the court and has an ethical obligation to be truthful accurate and candid with the court once you have proved to the judge's satisfaction that your word cannot be trusted um you're all but done you will have very little chance of one rehabilitating your credibility before that judge and two winning the litigation that you're involved in so you know these doj attorneys who are debasing themselves demeaning themselves insulting our democracy and insulting the judges in the process are doing themselves real harm these are people who I predict will end up being referred to Bar counsel may be sanctioned could be disbarred at the end of the day as other Trump aligned lawyers have been and here's the good news we're always looking for a point of light to give our viewers right um I think the doj is going to run out of dirty lawyers who are willing to go in and debase themselves like this ins service to Dear leader and what we're seeing Brian the people who are going into court first of all I can tell you they're not the best and the brightest at the Department of Justice because the best and the brightest are honest honorable ethical attorneys and hardworking public servants who remain loyal to the Constitution and you see these kind of high doj officials who are Trump flunkies going in and arguing cases where I can promise you you never see for example the deputy attorney general the number two at the Department of Justice going into court and arguing anything they're bureaucrats right usually it's three or four levels below them in the org chart where you see lawyers go in and arguing cases in court they're going to run out of unethical lawyers to do Donald Trump's dirty bidding in court and that's why I keep saying as bad as it looks as Bleak as it is right now I don't think any of this this is sustainable in the long run and I think it will all end up imploding now what form that implosion takes how long before it happens and how much damage can can Donald Trump do to our democracy and the American people before it implodes you know that that's anybody's guess unfortunately well I I want to dig into the the personal liability that some of these lawyers might shoulder by virtue of going into court and really jerking the judges around or lying in court or or having the or misrepresenting what the Trump administration's true position is in terms of whether they're able to keep their law licenses for example um do you think that the bar has taken an aggressive enough posture against folks in the recent past who have been part of you know the stolen election Saga that Trump raised in 2020 uh when it comes to really trying to preserve the Integrity of this entire profession yeah it's a great question and when we use a term like the bar what people need to know there are 50 bars each state has its own bar has its own Bar Council and has its own mechanism its own procedures for investigating allegedly unethical um practices by the lawyers who hold you know a law license from that state let me give you an example when you are for example a federal prosecutor you have to be a member of One State Bar I was a member of the State Bar of New Jersey and then you can practice federally in federal court in all 50 states in all 13 Federal jurisdictions so the people who are going in and when a judge says something that calls into question the credit credibility and the cander and the truthfulness of an attorney I can promise you the first thing that happens Brian is that attorney will be referred to their State Bar Council for a possible investigation and people may not know this every single Court opinion that is authored goes into a database and State Bar Council have these programs these computer programs that will review kind of you know just as a matter of course will review every Court opinion to see if a judge criticize the ethics of an attorney who's a member of that State Bar so these things will inevitably be discovered and hopefully the attorneys who are going in and arguing unethical positions or misrepresenting things to the court ultimately they will be held to account and their State Bar will give them a look to see if they should be sanctioned and and finally Glenn you had mentioned that you don't believe that there's going to be enough lawyers to sustain what the Trump Administration is doing enough prosecutors enough folks in the legal profession to be able to sustain this corrupt Behavior that's being presented by by the Trump White House when we see something like you know you and I had spoken in our previous episode about Paul Weiss this Law Firm that opted to bend the knee to the Trump Administration offer legal services that that would be more um palatable for for for conservatives and when we're seeing things kind of go in the wrong direction especially among folks who should know better like the lawyers at Paul Weiss uh just to name one firm does that give you worry because on one hand yes it it lends itself to reason that there should eventually come a point where we're going to run out of Bargain Basement lawyers who are willing to do the corrupt bidding of Donald Trump but at the same time we actually are seeing things move in the wrong direction as as it relates to these lawyers um who are in increasingly willing to allow themselves to be cowed by Trump yeah it gives me grave concern when I see doj lawyers going in and you know misleading the court saying one thing when they know full well that the secretary of defense is saying and intending something very different when it comes to Trump's transgender ban for military service um it gives me grave concern when I see law firms otherwise respectable law firms like Paul Weiss go into the Oval Office and bend the knee because Donald Trump attempted to retaliate against them and instead of standing up in court against that Lawless retaliation indeed the New York Times reported that these executive orders that Donald Trump is signing trying to punish and retaliate against law firms that displease him are quote likely unlawful and I have a feeling that's the way you'll see judges rule so you have law firms like Perkins Koy that is going in and fighting this lawlessness of Donald Trump and then law firms like Paul Weiss who are capitulating and saying I'll tell you what we'll give you $40 million in legal services if you'll just stop punishing us you know what Paul Weiss did Brian makes all of our jobs fighting for the health and viability of American democracy significantly harder but here's what I'm heartened by I have been watching very closely all of the push back from lawyers from law firms in the wake of the reporting about how Paul Weiss bent the knee that law firm bent the knee to Donald Trump and I am seeing the the legal Community coalescing around the rule of law and the Constitution and the honor of our practice in federal courts and elsewhere and I do think all of this will end up being a trump miscalculation I think the more people and entities and organizations Donald Trump alienates with his Lawless executive orders for example the more that will help hasten his ultimate political demise which I still think is coming maybe not tomorrow maybe not next year but I do think it's coming so I'm actually heartened by the response of the legal Community overall to what we are seeing you know from those select law firms that are bending the knee to Trump well look all of this underscores the importance that the courts are having right now they are really serving as the most effective buw workk against the worst excesses of this Administration we're seeing it by virtue of the fact that judges like the one that we spoke about in this very video judge Reyes losing their patience with these folks at the Trump Administration who are lying in the same way that Trump has has been lying for so long so we'll continue to stay on top of this for those who are watching if you want to support our work and stay on top of the news as it continues to Blake to break please make sure to subscribe the links to both of our channels are right here on the screen I'm Brian Tyler Cohen and I'm Glenn kersner you're watching the legal breakdown [Music]
A prosecutor with years of experience at the U.S. Department of Justice has resigned amid major changes from the Trump administration, telling NPR, "It just was not a Department of Justice that I any longer wanted to associate with."
U.S. Department of Justice W. Stephen Muldrow United States Attorney District of Puerto Rico Torre Chardón, Suite 1201 350 Carlos Chardón Street San Juan, Puerto Rico 00918 787-766-5656
March 14, 2025
The Honorable Muldrow,
With humility and gratitude, effective the end of the day today, I am suspending indefinitely my time with the United States Department of Justice. I recall during my interview for the position, the former U.S. Attorney asked me if I had ever been to Puerto Rico. I replied that I had not. I will be forever grateful that [DELETE], [DELETE], and the rest of the hiring committee nonetheless put their trust in me and offered me the opportunity to serve the people of Puerto Rico as an Assistant United States Attorney. My first trip to Puerto Rico in November 2021 was with a one-way ticket.
As anyone who has ever tried to do so knows, there is no easy answer to the question, how do you measure a year, or in my case, 2,298 days? Luckily, we now know the most meaningful way to account for our time. No, silly reader. The answer lieth not in paper straws, a.k.a., the devil’s soggy suck tube. (Quick aside: I have recently seen some folks printing out resignation letters, rolling them up into tight little tubes, and using them as paper straws in clear contravention of a recent memo and the norms of morality. Such acts of insuckordination can only be classified as a grave national injustice. I have reported you to the relevant authorities, the Department for Integration of Commissary Kits. Accordingly, I ask that if you feel inclined to print out this letter, please consider using plastic sheets.)1 [1 Yes, I did just dedicate a full paragraph of my resignation letter to a bit about paper straws.]
Without further ado, I give you the one true way by which one can meaningfully assess my personal and professional worth, to wit, five bullet points:
• I was a founding and terminating member of short-lived but proud group of AUSAs that made up F.U., the Firearms Unit. I am grateful for being able to work with the strong men and women of the Police of Puerto Rico to get guns and drugs out of the hands of criminals and off the streets. Thank you, [DELETE].
• I partnered with our various federal law enforcement agencies in OCDETF to identify, disrupt, and dismantle major drug trafficking operations in Puerto Rico and throughout the Caribbean. Thank you, [DELETE].
• I joined forces with the tremendous AUSAs and support staff at USAO-DC and nationwide USAOs and with amazing SAs and TFOs at FBI field offices and RAs around the country. Together we addressed the grave national injustice (methinks this be a better use of the phrase) that occurred on January 6, 2021, at the seat of our nation’s government, the U.S. Capitol. Thank you, [DELETE], [DELETE],[DELETE], and countless others.
• I coordinated the efforts of the Capitol Siege Section to identify and hold accountable each person that assaulted a police officer as those officers bravely and selflessly stood between a violent mob and members of Congress as those same members of Congress attempted to carry out a Constitutionally ordained function. Thank you, brave women and men of the U.S. Capitol Police, D.C. Metropolitan Police Department, and other agencies that responded to the call for assistance. To my small but mighty crew, I am forever in your debt.
• The Appeals section welcomed me with open arms, and I appeared twice before the First Circuit to argue on behalf of the United States that bad actors should remain incarcerated and subject to their duly imposed sentences. Thank you, [DELETE]. To all my developing friendships in that section, I am sorry that our professional association ends so soon and that I did not do more to lift the heavy load that is currently on your shoulders.
Through each of these experiences and in all my time in public service (BXDAforLife), I have come to know that the measure of justice is not in the outcome. We cannot ever permit ourselves to devalue our present and ongoing work and efforts through the lens of a subsequent, uncontrollable occurrence. Justice is showing up to the fight when the fight is before us.
“The words thank you are not sufficient to express my gratitude to [DELETE], [DELETE], and all the present and former support staff, attorneys, and leadership at the USAO-PR. As I step away, I am proud of the work I did at each step of my career, and grateful for the support and kindness [ received from each of you. I consider it my honor to have served alongside the many of you that are receiving this email and the many more that are not. Please keep in touch.
May you each continue strong in service for as long as you desire to or are able to remain.
May you renew daily your dedication to justice, and always seek to end each day secure in the knowledge that you showed up and sought justice for your one and only client, the people oft he United States of America. You serve no man.
Stuawfully yours,
Sean P. Murphy
In a sharp resignation letter shared with NPR, former Assistant U.S. Attorney Sean Murphy warned of the erosion of the Justice Department's independence from the president, writing to his coworkers, "you serve no man."
In response to NPR's request for comment, a spokesperson for the Department of Justice said in a statement, "This Department of Justice is acutely focused on Making America Safe Again and ensuring one tier of justice for all Americans after historic political weaponization under the previous administration."
Murphy is a veteran prosecutor who previously worked for the Bronx District Attorney in New York. In 2018, during Trump's first term, he joined the U.S. Attorney's Office in Puerto Rico and worked on drug trafficking and illegal gun prosecutions. Most recently, he served in the Department of Justice's Capitol Siege Section, which prosecuted more than 1,500 people for crimes stemming from the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol.
When Trump took office, he immediately granted clemency to all of the Jan. 6 defendants — even the most violent offenders and those with lengthy criminal records — and his administration fired and demoted many prosecutors who worked on those cases.
As a result, Murphy said, he simultaneously faced threats and harassment from Jan. 6 defendants, who were emboldened by their presidential pardons, while also having to fear retaliation from the administration.
"There are some posts on social media saying that prosecutors 'need to fry,' that prosecutors need to 'get the rope,'" Murphy said, "comments naming prosecutors directly, saying, 'now it's your turn.'"
Murphy said he did not feel that federal law enforcement under Trump's leadership would protect Jan. 6 prosecutors. In addition to the pardons, Trump has praised the Capitol riot defendants as "patriots" and described the prosecutions as a "grave national injustice."
"I don't think the safety of those that caused that 'injustice' is a priority for the current administration," Murphy said.
Murphy has three children, all of whom are still in school. He said getting fired would cause serious consequences for his family's financial situation.
Still, over the course of the last two months, Murphy told NPR that he questioned whether he could remain in the Department of Justice given its new direction under Attorney General Pam Bondi, a Trump loyalist. The recently installed FBI Deputy Director, a former Secret Service agent turned podcaster named Dan Bongino, has also repeatedly called for prosecuting Trump's political opponents.
Sean Murphy resigned from the Department of Justice this month, after agonizing over his decision.
Seven federal prosecutors resigned from the Justice Department last month over ethical concerns about the administration's decision to drop corruption charges against New York Mayor Eric Adams. Another veteran prosecutor in Washington, D.C. resigned after refusing to follow an order she believed was unsupported by the law.
Most concerning to Murphy has been the erosion of the Justice Department's independence from the president. After the Watergate scandal during Richard Nixon's presidency, subsequent administrations put more distance between the president and federal law enforcement to prevent politicization and abuses of power. The new administration has rejected that independence, all while arguing that the Biden administration "weaponized" law enforcement.
"We all work for the greatest president in the history of our country," Bondi said in a speech to the Justice Department last week. "We are so proud to work at the directive of Donald Trump."
After Bondi spoke, Trump gave a speech where he described himself as the "chief law enforcement officer in our country," and railed against his political opponents and other perceived enemies.
"To maintain credibility, there has to be some separation between the President and the Department of Justice, some measure of independence," Murphy told NPR. "And that's nearly gone."
He also pointed to a statement posted on social media from Ed Martin, interim U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia, and an activist for Jan. 6 defendants.
"The interim U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia repeatedly referred to his office and himself as 'the president's lawyers.' And that we are not," Murphy said. "An Assistant United States Attorney's only client is the people of the United States of America. None of us are 'the president's lawyers.'"
Trump has nominated Martin to take that position full-time, but he has not yet been confirmed by the U.S. Senate.
Another message from Bondi also got under Murphy's skin — not because of its importance, but its insignificance.
Earlier this month, the department issued a three-paragraph memo announcing a ban on paper straws.
"I mean, it was just so crazy to me that the attorney general of the United States would be writing a memo about the dangers of paper straws," Murphy said.
Fact Sheet: President Donald J. Trump Ends the Procurement and Forced Use of Paper Straws by The White House February 10, 2025
ENDING THE FORCED USE OF PAPER STRAWS: Today, President Donald J. Trump signed an Executive Order to end the procurement and forced use of paper straws.
• The Federal government is directed to stop purchasing paper straws and ensure they are no longer provided within Federal buildings.
• The Order requires the development of a National Strategy to End the Use of Paper Straws within 45 days to alleviate the forced use of paper straws nationwide.
BRINGING BACK COMMON SENSE: The irrational campaign against plastic straws has forced Americans to use nonfunctional paper straws. This ends under President Trump.
• Cities and states across America have banned plastic straws, caving to pressure from woke activists who prioritize symbolism over science.
• Paper straws use chemicals that may carry risks to human health – including “forever chemical” PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) which are known to be highly water soluble and can bleed from the straw into a drink.
• A study found that while PFAS were found in paper straws, no measurable PFAS were found in plastic straws.
• Paper straws are more expensive than plastic straws, and often force users to use multiple straws.
• Paper straws are not the eco-friendly alternative they claim to be – studies have shown that producing paper straws can have a larger carbon footprint and require more water than plastic straws.
• Paper straws often come individually wrapped in plastic, undermining the environmental argument for their use.
PROMOTING A CLEAN AND HEALTHY ENVIRONMENT: President Trump has made it a top priority to promote a clean and healthy environment for the American people.
• President Trump’s policies are promoting economic growth, while still maintaining standards that allow Americans to have among the cleanest air and water in the world.
• This marks a sharp contrast from the previous Administration, which wasted American taxpayer dollars on virtue signaling instead of implementing effective solutions.
• For instance, the Biden Administration spent billions on electric vehicle charging stations, yet only eight were completed.
• Meanwhile, President Trump’s commonsense approach to environmental conservation has demonstrated his true commitment to preserving America’s natural resources.
• President Trump has championed improved forest management in order to prevent forest fires that are devastating communities and ecosystems across the country.
• By pausing the expansion of windmills, President Trump recognized their detrimental environmental impact, particularly on wildlife, often outweighs their benefits.
• President Trump signed the Save Our Seas Act to preserve and protect our beautiful waters and oceans from being littered with garbage.
• President Trump is committed to securing American energy independence, recognizing that America’s domestic supply of clean coal and natural gas not only strengthens national security but also provides some of the cleanest energy in the world.
The White House 1600 Pennsylvania Ave NW Washington, DC 20500
Eventually, Murphy accepted an offer to work at a private practice in Puerto Rico, so his family would not have to uproot if he were to be reassigned by the Justice Department, or if he was fired. All of the changes at the Justice Department, he said, had, in a way, made his decision for him.
"It became for me the question of how high do you let the water rise before you get in the boat?" Murphy said. "And if it was just me, the calculus would have been different. But I have to think of my family. And I made a choice."
Murphy resigned on Friday, March 14. In his resignation letter he mocked the memo on paper straws, took time to praise the work of his fellow Jan. 6 prosecutors and rebuked Trump's criticism that they had committed a "national injustice."
"Together we addressed the grave national injustice (methinks this be a better use of the phrase) that occurred on January 6, 2021, at the seat of our nation's government, the U.S. Capitol," Murphy wrote, and went on to commend the police officers who protected the Capitol that day.
He ended his letter with an entreaty to his now-former coworkers and bosses.
"May you renew daily your dedication to justice, and always seek to end each day secure in the knowledge that you showed up and sought justice for your one and only client, the people of the United States of America," he wrote. "You serve no man."
‘Hypocritical,’ ‘lawless,’ ‘a provocation’: Laurence Tribe slams Trump’s attacks on judges by Ali Velshi & Laurence Tribe MSNBC Mar 22, 2025 #msnbc #trump #politics
As concerns grow that Donald Trump is leading America into a constitutional crisis, Harvard Law School Professor Emeritus Laurence Tribe says that’s the wrong way to frame it. He tells Ali Velshi, “For years, we have allowed the body politic to be hollowed out by a virus – a virus that attacks the very foundations of the rule of law on which the government really rests.” Meanwhile, attacks on the courts are escalating, and the president has called for the Supreme Court to rein in federal judges and “stop nationwide injunctions.” “It is hypocritical, it is lawless, and it is a provocation.”
Transcript
TAKING THE COUNTRY DOWN A DANGEROUS PATH THAT'S ULTIMATELY GOING TO COST US ALL. BUT LET'S BEGIN THIS MORNING WITH PRESIDENT TRUMP AND HIS ALLIES INCREASINGLY CONTENTIOUS RHETORIC TOWARD THE AMERICAN JUDICIARY. THERE ARE GROWING CONCERNS THAT WE ARE RAMPING UP TO AN HISTORIC CLASH BETWEEN THE PRESIDENT AND THE COURTS THAT COULD HAVE DIRE CONSEQUENCES FOR OUR DEMOCRACY. AND BY ALL APPEARANCES, THE PRESIDENT IS ACTIVELY PURSUING THIS COLLISION COURSE WITH THE ONE CO-EQUAL BRANCH OF GOVERNMENT THAT'S CURRENTLY ACTING AS THE BEST AND MOST ACTIVE CHECK ON HIS AUTHORITY. HE RECENTLY TOOK TO TRUTH SOCIAL TO CALL ON THE CHIEF JUSTICE OF THE SUPREME COURT TO REIN IN FEDERAL JUDGES WHO ARE RULING AGAINST HIS POLICIES, QUOTE, STOP NATIONWIDE INJUNCTIONS NOW BEFORE IT'S TOO LATE. BEFORE IT'S TOO LATE. THERE ARE ANY NUMBER OF COURT CASES THAT COULD BE THE CATALYST THAT SETS OFF A TRUE CRISIS BETWEEN THE PRESIDENCY AND THE JUDICIARY, BUT THE MOST LIKELY ONE AT THE MOMENT APPEARS TO BE TRUMP'S INVOCATION LAST WEEK OF THE ALIEN ENEMIES ACT OF 1798, AND THE ENSUING CONFUSION REGARDING THE AIRPLANES THAT CARRIED THOSE DEPORTEES OUT OF AMERICA. FOR THE PAST WEEK, THE TRUMP ADMINISTRATION HAS EVADED DIRECTLY ANSWERING A FEDERAL JUDGE'S FIVE SPECIFIC QUESTIONS REGARDING THE DEPORTATION OF A GROUP OF 137 MIGRANTS THAT THE GOVERNMENT DEEMED TO BE ENEMY ALIENS. NOW, DURING A HEARING YESTERDAY THAT JUDGE THIS MAN, JAMES BOASBERG, THE CHIEF JUDGE OF THE U.S. DISTRICT COURT FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA, REMARKED THAT THE RAMIFICATIONS OF THIS POLICY ARE, QUOTE, INCREDIBLY TROUBLESOME AND PROBLEMATIC AND CONCERNING. END QUOTE. CRUCIALLY, JUDGE BOASBERG IS TRYING TO DETERMINE WHETHER THE WHITE HOUSE DEFIED HIS INITIAL ORDER DIRECTING THE GOVERNMENT TO DO WHATEVER IT HAD TO DO TO HALT THE DEPORTATIONS, EVEN IF THAT MEANT ORDERING THE PLANES CARRYING THE DEPORTEES TO TURN AROUND, AS HE SPECIFICALLY ORDERED. THEY DO. THOSE PLANES DID NOT RETURN TO THE UNITED STATES. JUDGE BOASBERG EXASPERATION OVER THE ADMINISTRATION'S FAILURE TO DIRECTLY ANSWER WHETHER THAT WAS IN DEFIANCE OF HIS ORDER HAS BEEN EVIDENT THROUGHOUT THE WEEK. ON THURSDAY, BOASBERG SAID THAT THE GOVERNMENT'S VAGUE ANSWERS TO HIS QUESTIONS WERE, QUOTE, WOEFULLY INSUFFICIENT. YESTERDAY, HE REBUKED THE GOVERNMENT AGAIN FOR FILING MOTIONS USING, QUOTE, INTEMPERATE AND DISRESPECTFUL LANGUAGE THAT I CAN'T REMEMBER SEEING FROM THE UNITED STATES. END QUOTE. THE TRUMP ADMINISTRATION'S ACTIONS HAVE BEEN HIGHLY SCRUTINIZED OVER THE PAST WEEK, ESPECIALLY BY LAWMAKERS AND LEGAL EXPERTS WHO'VE RAISED CONCERNS ABOUT HOW THIS COULD LEAD TO THE BREAKDOWN OF THE RULE OF LAW. WHEN ASKED BY NBC'S KRISTEN WELKER IF THE UNITED STATES IS EXPERIENCING A CONSTITUTIONAL CRISIS, THE SENATE MAJORITY MINORITY LEADER, CHUCK SCHUMER, SAID, QUOTE, YES, I DO. HE ADDED, QUOTE, DEMOCRACY IS AT RISK. DONALD TRUMP IS A LAWLESS, ANGRY MAN. HE THINKS HE SHOULD BE KING. HE THINKS HE SHOULD DO WHATEVER HE WANTS, REGARDLESS OF THE LAW. AND HE THINKS JUDGES SHOULD JUST LISTEN TO HIM, END QUOTE, EVEN TY COBB, THIS MAN, AN ATTORNEY WHO SERVED IN THE WHITE HOUSE DURING THE FIRST TRUMP ADMINISTRATION, REMARKED, QUOTE, THIS IS A TOTALLY LAWLESS ADMINISTRATION WITH NO RESPECT FOR THE COURTS OR THE RULE OF LAW. END QUOTE. FOR MORE ON THIS, I'M JOINED BY LAURENCE TRIBE. HE'S A PROFESSOR EMERITUS AT HARVARD LAW SCHOOL. HE'S THE AUTHOR OF NUMEROUS BOOKS, INCLUDING AMERICAN CONSTITUTIONAL LAW AND TO END A PRESIDENCY THE POWER OF IMPEACHMENT. PROFESSOR TRIBE, IT IS GREAT TO SEE YOU. THANK YOU FOR BEING WITH US. IT'S NOT GREAT TO SEE YOU ON THESE UNDER THESE CIRCUMSTANCES, HOWEVER, BECAUSE WE'RE ALL BANDYING AROUND THIS TERM CONSTITUTIONAL CRISIS. IT'S A TERM THAT'S BEEN USED A LOT IN THE CONTEXT OF THE INVOCATION OF THE ALIEN ENEMIES ACT AND THE LEGAL CHALLENGE THAT'S BREWING OVER HOW THE TRUMP ADMINISTRATION ADMINISTERED IT. SOME HAVE SAID TO ME THE TERM DOESN'T MATTER, BUT THERE IS DEFINITELY SOMETHING BREWING RIGHT NOW THAT SHOULD BE OF CONCERN TO ALL AMERICANS WHO BELIEVE IN THE RULE OF LAW. >> WELL, I AGREE, BUT I DO THINK THAT. >> LOOKING FOR AN. >> EXPLOSION. >> A KIND. >> OF. MOMENT OF CRISIS, WHAT. >> PHYSICISTS LIKE. >> TO CALL. >> A SINGULARITY. >> IN IN. >> A KIND OF UNIQUE. EPISODE OF. PRESIDENTIAL DEFIANCE OF A COURT. >> ORDER THAT'S MISLEADING. >> IT FRAMES. >> WHAT WE. >> ARE EXPERIENCING. >> IN THE. >> WRONG WAY. >> I'M REMINDED. >> REALLY. OF THE GREAT POEM THE. HOLLOW MEN BY T.S. ELIOT, WRITTEN. >> 100 YEARS. >> AGO THIS YEAR. HE FAMOUSLY. >> WROTE. THIS IS THE. >> WAY THE WORLD ENDS. >> THIS IS THE WAY THE WORLD ENDS. NOT WITH A BANG. >> BUT A WHIMPER. >> FOR YEARS. FOR YEARS WE. >> HAVE ALLOWED THE BODY POLITIC TO. >> BE HOLLOWED. >> OUT BY A VIRUS. >> A VIRUS THAT. ATTACKS THE VERY FOUNDATIONS OF THE RULE OF LAW IN WHICH THE. >> GOVERNMENT REALLY RESTS. IT'S A VIRUS. WE HAVE TO FIGHT WITH ALL. >> OUR ENERGY. WITHOUT WAITING FOR JUST. >> THE RIGHT MOMENT. >> YOU KNOW, IT'S A. >> DISEASE. >> IF YOU THINK ABOUT. >> IT, ALI, THAT REACHED. >> FEVER PITCH AROUND THE JANUARY. >> 6TH INSURRECTION. >> IT WAS. OUR IMMUNE SYSTEM, FAILURE TO. RESPOND TO IT. WHEN THE SENATE LET. >> DONALD TRUMP. >> THE INSURRECTIONIST. >> IN CHIEF, OFF. >> THE HOOK. BY VOTING. >> TO ACQUIT HIM ON. >> THE. >> LEGALLY BOGUS GROUNDS. >> THAT IT HAD. >> LOST JURISDICTION. >> SINCE THE TRIAL STARTED TOO LATE. >> AND THEN. >> THAT LED TO THE SUPREME COURT'S. REFUSAL TO. >> ENFORCE SECTION. >> THREE OF THE 14TH. >> AMENDMENT TO DISQUALIFY. >> DONALD TRUMP. >> AND THEN, WHEN. >> THE SUPREME. >> COURT DELAYED THE. >> SPECIAL COUNSEL'S PROSECUTION. >> USING IT IN THE MEANTIME TO CREATE. >> A TOTALLY. >> NEW AND SWEEPING PRESIDENTIAL IMMUNITY. >> WHICH IN TURN MADE IT EASY FOR DONALD TRUMP TO PARDON ALL. >> THE INSURRECTIONISTS. >> GIVING THEM THE. IMPLICIT MESSAGE THAT IF THEY GO OUT AND CRIME. >> AGAIN IN. >> HIS SUPPORT. >> HE'LL PARDON THEM. AND THE. DISEASE NOW. IS PROGRESSING TO THE. >> POINT WHERE. >> REALLY A. >> VIRTUAL CO-PRESIDENCY. >> WHICH IS. >> COMPLETELY ALIEN TO. OUR DEMOCRACIES DESIGN. >> IS USING POWERS THAT. >> THE FRAMERS. >> GAVE TO CONGRESS TO CREATE. >> AND DESTROY AGENCIES, TO FUND AND. DEFUND ACTIVITIES. ACROSS THE BOARD. >> AND DOING. >> IT SO FAST, BREAKING THINGS. >> SO QUICKLY THAT NOT EVEN. GENUINELY INDEPENDENT. >> FEDERAL COURTS LIKE JUDGE BOASBERG CAN FULLY. >> KEEP PACE WITH THE MAYHEM. SO THAT'S WHAT WE'RE FACING CALLING, YOU KNOW, LOOKING. >> FOR THE MOMENT OF CRISIS. IS LIKE LOOKING FOR THE SHINY. OBJECT AND TAKING OUR EYES OFF. THE DISEASE THAT IS. SPREADING AND THAT WE REALLY. >> HAVE. >> TO FIGHT THE VIRUS WE NEED TO FIGHT. LET'S, LET'S I WANT TO ASK YOU ABOUT THIS THING THAT DONALD TRUMP TO DIRECTED AT CHIEF JUSTICE JOHN ROBERTS. THEY STOPPED THE NATIONWIDE INJUNCTIONS. NOW BEFORE IT'S TOO LATE. NOW, THE TWO PARTS OF THAT MOST OF THESE INJUNCTIONS ARE NATIONWIDE BECAUSE IF YOU SAID YOU YOU HAVE TO FOLLOW A PROCESS IN ORDER TO DEPORT MIGRANTS, THAT CAN'T BE A DC SPECIFIC MATTER, BECAUSE THEN YOU JUST MOVE THE MIGRANTS TO TEXAS AND DEPORT THEM. SO THERE'S THAT PART. BUT THE MORE OMINOUS PART IS THE SECOND PART WHERE HE SAYS, BEFORE IT'S TOO LATE, WHICH IS BEFORE IT'S TOO LATE MEAN. WHEN THE PRESIDENT SAYS THAT TO THE CHIEF JUSTICE. >> WELL. >> IT'S OMINOUS. HE'S TRYING. >> TO SCARE. >> EVERYBODY. >> SAYING, YOU BETTER. >> FOLLOW MY. ORDERS OR WE'LL. >> NEVER. >> KNOW WHAT'S GOING TO HAPPEN. >> AND THEN. >> JUDGES FEAR. >> BEING SHOT. ALL KINDS. >> OF TERRIBLE THINGS. >> ARE GOING ON. >> BUT TAKE THE PARTICULAR EXAMPLE. NATIONWIDE INJUNCTIONS. TRUMP HIMSELF AND THE MAGA MOVEMENT LOVED THOSE NATIONWIDE INJUNCTIONS WHEN. BIDEN WAS IN POWER, AND THEY. >> WERE TRYING. >> TO MAKE SURE THAT JUDGES WOULD DISMANTLE HIS STUDENT LOAN PROGRAM, OR. >> THAT EVEN IN. >> CASES THAT VARIED. >> STATE BY. >> STATE. >> UNLIKE WHAT YOU'RE. >> DESCRIBING, LIKE. >> ABORTION. >> THEY LOVED. >> THE NATIONWIDE INJUNCTIONS. >> ENTERED BY VERY. >> FAR RIGHT JUDGES. BUT THERE IS. >> NO ALTERNATIVE. >> WHEN THE. >> ACTION THAT IS IN. >> VIOLATION OF THE. LAW AND THE CONSTITUTION. LIKE THE. JUSTICE DEPARTMENT'S INVOCATION OF THE ALIEN ENEMIES ACT, THAT WAS REALLY. >> MOST RECENTLY. >> USED FOR THE JAPANESE INTERNMENT CASE, KOREMATSU. >> WHEN THE. ADMINISTRATION INVOKES. >> THAT ACT, WHEN IT. DOESN'T APPLY. TO PEOPLE. >> WHO HAVEN'T EVEN. >> BEEN DETERMINED TO BE WITHIN THE GROUP THAT IS SUPPOSEDLY ELIGIBLE FOR DEPORTATION. >> YOU EITHER FLY. >> THEM OUT OF THE COUNTRY AND PUT THEM BEYOND REACH, OR YOU DON'T. SO BOASBERG EITHER HAD TO THROW HIS HANDS UP AND SAY, I CAN'T ENFORCE THE LAW, OR HE. >> HAD TO. >> SAY, TURN THOSE PLANES AROUND. THAT'S WHAT HE DID. AND NOW WE'RE TOLD BY TRUMP, OH NO, THESE NATIONWIDE INJUNCTIONS ARE TERRIBLE. >> IT IS HYPOCRITICAL. IT IS. >> LAWLESS, AND IT IS A PROVOCATION WHEN THE. CHIEF JUSTICE RIGHTLY SAYS, YOU CAN CRITICIZE JUDGES ALL YOU WANT. >> BUT DON'T THREATEN. >> TO IMPEACH THEM. >> AND PUT A. >> TARGET ON. >> THEIR. >> BACKS FOR DOING THEIR JOB. YEAH, AND IT'S PRETTY SPECIFIC TARGET. HE'S REFERRED TO JUDGE BOASBERG AS A RADICAL LEFT LUNATIC. THIS IS A JUDGE WHO WAS APPOINTED FIRST TO THE BENCH BY GEORGE W BUSH, AND THEN AND THEN TO HIS CURRENT ROLE BY BARACK OBAMA. IN ALL MY READING OF HIM, I DON'T KNOW WHERE ONE WOULD FIND EITHER RADICAL OR LEFT OR LUNATIC. >> NO WAY. I MEAN, HE IS A UNIVERSALLY RESPECTED JUDGE. >> HE WAS PUT BY THE CHIEF JUSTICE ON THE. FISA COURT. >> WITH OTHER CONSERVATIVE JUDGES. HE'S NOT. >> LEFT WING IN. >> ANY SENSE. >> AND WHEN TRUMP SAYS, I DON'T KNOW WHO THE JUDGE IS, BUT I KNOW HE'S GOT TO BE RADICAL LEFT WING. >> WHAT DOES THAT MEAN? >> I MEAN. >> IT'S SELF-CONTRADICTION. >> AS IS SO MUCH OF WHAT THE CURRENT PRESIDENT SAYS. TALK TO ME ABOUT THIS IMPEACHMENT THING WHERE IT'S SPREADING THE IDEA OF IMPEACHING JUDGES. IT IS A VERY, VERY CLEARLY UNDERSTOOD MATTER. YOU AND I HAVE DISCUSSED IT, JUDGE LUTTIG, AND I AND YOU AND I HAVE DISCUSSED THIS IDEA THAT YOU CAN BE VERY, VERY UPSET WITH A WITH A COURT RULING. AND MANY PEOPLE IN AMERICA, ACROSS THE POLITICAL SPECTRUM ARE UPSET, UPSET WITH MANY COURT RULINGS, INCLUDING SOME COMING FROM THE SUPREME COURT. BUT IMPEACHMENT IS ABOUT MISCONDUCT OR SOMETHING THAT HAS GONE WRONG, NOT A DISAGREEMENT OVER A LEGAL DECISION. >> EXACTLY. >> IT'S ABOUT ABUSE. OF POWER. >> IT IS ABOUT HIGH CRIMES AND MISDEMEANORS. >> THE LAST. >> TIME PEOPLE. >> ACROSS THE COUNTRY STARTED MISUSING. >> THE. IMPEACHMENT CONCEPT. >> FOR A JUDGE WAS WHEN WE HAD. >> BILLBOARDS ALL. >> OVER THE COUNTRY SAYING, IMPEACH EARL WARREN OVER THE DECISION IN BROWN V BOARD OF EDUCATION. WELL, THERE WERE SOME PEOPLE WHO DISAGREED WITH THE DECISION. >> BUT YOU ONCE YOU START THREATENING. >> TO REMOVE. >> JUDGES BECAUSE YOU THINK THEY GOT. >> IT WRONG IN A. >> PARTICULAR CASE, HOWEVER IMPORTANT, THE. >> WHOLE. >> IDEA OF AN. INDEPENDENT JUDICIARY CRUMBLES. ONE OF THE PILLARS OF THE RULE OF LAW THAT PREVENTS US FROM BECOMING A COMPLETE. >> DICTATORSHIP. >> OR AN OLIGARCHY, OR. >> AN AUTOCRACY. >> OF SOME OTHER KIND. >> IS THE IDEA. >> THAT THE JUDICIARY IS INDEPENDENT. IT DOESN'T ALWAYS HAVE THE LAST WORD. YOU CAN AMEND THE. >> CONSTITUTION IF YOU. >> DON'T AGREE WITH. >> IT, AS I THINK WE SHOULD AMEND IT TO GET RID OF THAT. >> ABSOLUTE AND. >> SWEEPING IMMUNITY. >> THAT WAS GIVEN. >> TO. >> PRESIDENTS FOR COMMITTING. >> CRIMES IN OFFICE. >> BUT YOU DON'T THREATEN TO REMOVE THE JUDGE. AND WHEN YOU DO, AND COUPLE IT WITH THE KIND OF PROVOCATIVE. >> VIOLENT RHETORIC. >> THAT WE ARE HEARING NOW. >> YOU HAVE THINGS LIKE JUDGE. >> SALAS SON BEING. KILLED BY. SOMEONE WHO WAS. >> TRYING TO SHOOT HER. >> BECAUSE HE. >> DIDN'T AGREE WITH. >> HER DECISION. >> THAT'S NOT. >> HOW A. >> COUNTRY THAT IS. >> BASED ON LAW AND. >> ORDER AND SELF-GOVERNMENT. >> CAN EVER SURVIVE. >> AND THAT'S. >> WHY I THINK THE VIRUS. >> THAT HAS BEEN. >> SPREADING EVER SINCE THE JANUARY 6TH INSURRECTION HAS GOT TO BE COMBATED. WITH ALL THE TOOLS AT OUR DISPOSAL. EVERYONE HAS. TO STAND UP AND NOT SIMPLY CAVE IN. >> AND OBEY. AND ADVANCE THE WAY, THE WAY SOME. >> ARE. >> DOING TO. DONALD TRUMP'S THREATS. >> PROFESSOR, IT'S ALWAYS AN HONOR TO HAVE YOU ON THE SHOW. THANK YOU FOR JOINING US THIS MORNING. PROFESSOR LAWRENCE TRIBE IS A PROFESSOR EMERITUS AT HARVARD LAW SCHOOL. HE'S THE AUTHOR OF SEVERAL IMPORTANT BOOKS THAT LAW SCHOOL STUDENTS IN THIS
Questions swirl after Trump says he didn’t sign Aliens Enemies Act - so who did? Questions around the signature led some to speculate the president may have used an autopen – a device he has criticized by Ariana Baio in New York ukIndependent Saturday 22 March 2025 21:35 GMT https://www.the-independent.com/news/wo ... 19935.html
President Donald Trump confused reporters after claiming he “didn’t sign” the presidential proclamation that invoked the controversial Alien and Enemies Act in order to quickly deport migrants the administration says are part of a Venezuelan gang.
When asked by a reporter about signing the proclamation “in the dark” – rather than at the Oval Office desk or in a public capacity as the president has done with other executive actions – the president denied signing it at all.
“I don’t know when it was signed because I didn’t sign it,” the president said.
Instead, Trump appeared to push the blame for invoking the 18th-century wartime law onto “other people” in his administration including Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
“Other people handled it,” Trump said. “But Marco Rubio’s done a great job. And he wanted them out, and we go along with that. We want to get criminals out of our country.”
Despite his claim, the president’s digital signature does appear on the version of the proclamation available on the Federal Register website.
The President’s statement immediately raised alarm bells for some.
“If that’s true, if Donald Trump did not actually sign that proclamation, it’s a big problem because the law specifically requires a proclamation by the president,” asked CNN political analyst Elie Honig, according to The Hill.
There were similar questions on social media.
“Trump just said he didn't sign his own EO? This is the guy who claimed Joe Biden's pardons weren't legitimate, because he used an autopen, but he allowed someone else to sign his executive order?” one X user noted.
“If Trump didn't sign the proclamation as he claims then everything that happened after is illegal...lol,” another noted.
The White House later clarified that the president was referring to the original Alien Enemies Act, passed by Congress in 1798 and did sign the recent proclamation that invokes the highly controversial set of laws.
“President Trump was obviously referring to the original Aliens Enemies Act that was signed back in 1798,” White House Communications Director Steven Cheung said in a statement.
“The recent Executive Order was personally signed by President Trump invoking the Alien Enemies Act that designated Tren de Aragua as a Foreign Terrorist Organization in order to apprehend and deport these heinous criminals,” Cheung added.
However, the question that prompted Trump’s answer specifically referred to a federal judge’s criticism of the proclamation that was raised earlier in the day during a court hearing.
Judge James Boasberg asked lawyers for the government why the president’s proclamation was “essentially signed in the dark” on the evening of March 14 and then migrants were “rushed onto planes” on the morning of March 15.
The hearing is part of a challenge to Trump’s attempts to invoke the Alien Enemies Act to rapidly deport, without due process, alleged members of Tren de Aragua, a Venezuelan gang. Those challenging the use of the act say it was done hastily to skirt criminal and immigration laws.
The confusion over Trump’s signature on the proclamation raised also questions over whether the president used an autopen– a mechanical device that uses ink to repeat the signature of an individual - that has recently drawn his own ire.
Though past presidents and their administrations have used autopens, Trump has criticized its use – specifically condemning former president Joe Biden for using it on certain documents. Last week, Trump tried to claim Biden’s use of an autopen should “void” certain documents including presidential pardons.
The Justice Department has said the use of an autopen on official documents is legal.
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Trump's Reading of the Alien Enemies Act Defies the Usual Meaning of Its Terms. To justify the immediate deportation of suspected Venezuelan gang members, the president is invoking a rarely used statute that does not seem to apply in this context. by Jacob Sullum reason.com 3.21.2025 6:00 PM https://reason.com/2025/03/21/trumps-re ... its-terms/
James Boasberg, the chief judge of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, has caught a lot of flak for temporarily blocking the deportation of alleged Venezuelan gang members under the Alien Enemies Act (AEA). As President Donald Trump tells it, Boasberg is a "Radical Left Lunatic of a Judge, a troublemaker and agitator" who is wrongly preventing him from "doing what the VOTERS wanted me to do." According to Trump, Boasberg's intervention was so egregious that he "should be IMPEACHED!!!"
A few hours after that Tuesday-morning Truth Social rant, Rep. Rep. Brandon Gill (R–Texas) followed through on Trump's suggestion, introducing an article of impeachment that charges Boasberg with "high crimes and misdemeanors." Specifically, Gill claims Boasberg "abused the powers of his judicial authority" by "interfering with the President's constitutional prerogatives" and his powers under the AEA, which in Gill's view gives Trump "sole and unreviewable discretion" to decide who qualifies as an "alien enemy" subject to immediate removal from the United States.
As Trump and Gill portray the situation, that understanding of the statute is completely uncontroversial. But if that were true, there would be no case for Boasberg to consider. Far from abusing his judicial authority, Boasberg is doing exactly what he is supposed to do as a federal judge: choosing between dueling interpretations of the law based on arguments and evidence presented in court—an adversarial process that continued at a hearing on Friday afternoon.
The attorneys representing the targets of Trump's AEA deportations argue that he is misapplying key terms in that rarely invoked 1798 statute, which is the last remaining vestige of the notoriously repressive Alien and Sedition Acts. The AEA applies only when "there is a declared war" between the United States and a "foreign nation or government" or when a "foreign nation or government" has "perpetrated, attempted, or threatened" an "invasion or predatory incursion against the territory of the United States." In those circumstances, it authorizes the president to deport "natives, citizens, denizens, or subjects" of that "hostile nation or government."
Until Trump took office in January, the AEA had been invoked only three times in 226 years: during the War of 1812, World War I, and World War II. All of those situations fell into the "declared war" category. The AEA has never previously been invoked in response to a putative "invasion or predatory incursion" outside the context of a declared war. That is the threat Trump cites to justify peremptorily deporting suspected members of the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua.
In a proclamation that Trump published last Saturday, he describes Tren de Aragua as "a designated Foreign Terrorist Organization with thousands of members, many of whom have unlawfully infiltrated the United States and are conducting irregular warfare and undertaking hostile actions against the United States." He says the gang "is closely aligned with, and indeed has infiltrated," the Venezuelan government, "including its military and law enforcement apparatus." He adds that "Venezuelan national and local authorities have ceded ever-greater control over their territories to transnational criminal organizations," including Tren de Aragua.
The result, Trump says, is "a hybrid criminal state that is perpetrating an invasion of and predatory incursion into the United States, and which poses a substantial danger to the United States." This is the logic by which Trump counterintutively equates Tren de Aragua with a "foreign nation or government." If you buy that, you may also accept his claim that supected members of Tren de Aragua qualify as "natives, citizens, denizens, or subjects" of a "hostile nation or government." But you would also have to accept that the gang's "brutal crimes, including murders, kidnappings, extortions, and human, drug, and weapons trafficking," amount to an "invasion or predatory incursion" under the AEA.
All of this seems like quite a stretch. Trump does not claim to be at war with Venezuela. Nor does he claim that the Venezuelan government has mounted an "invasion or predatory incursion against the territory of the United States." And a criminal organization, even one that has corrupted or "infiltrated" a foreign government, is not a "hostile nation or government" as those terms are ordinarily understood.
Nor does Trump's understanding of "invasion or predatory incursion" make sense in the context of the AEA. "As the Supreme Court and past presidents have acknowledged, the Alien Enemies Act is a wartime authority enacted and implemented under the war power," Katherine Yon Ebright, a lawyer at the Brennan Center for Justice who specializes in national security issues, explained last fall. "When the Fifth Congress passed the law and the Wilson administration defended it in court during World War I, they did so on the understanding that noncitizens with connections to a foreign belligerent could be 'treated as prisoners of war' under the 'rules of war under the law of nations.' In the Constitution and other late-1700s statutes, the term invasion is used literally, typically to refer to large-scale attacks. The term predatory incursion is also used literally in writings of that period to refer to slightly smaller attacks like the 1781 Raid on Richmond led by American defector Benedict Arnold."
Ebright noted that "some anti-immigration politicians and groups urge a non-literal reading of invasion and predatory incursion so that the Alien Enemies Act can be invoked in response to unlawful migration and cross-border narcotics trafficking." They view the statute as "a turbocharged deportation authority." But that "proposed reading of the law," Ebright argued, "is at odds with centuries of legislative, presidential, and judicial practice, all of which confirm that the Alien Enemies Act is a wartime authority. Invoking it in peacetime to bypass conventional immigration law would be a staggering abuse." That is exactly what Trump is now trying to do.
On the same day that Trump officially invoked the AEA against alleged members of Tren de Aragua, Boasberg, who had already issued a temporary restraining order that blocked deportation of five named plaintiffs, held a hearing to consider extending the TRO to a class consisting of "all noncitizens in U.S. custody" who were covered by Trump's proclamation. The issue was urgent, since the Trump administration was on the verge of flying detainees to El Salvador, which happened that very evening. Boasberg heard from Lee Gelernt, the America Civil Liberties Union attorney representing the plaintiffs, and from Drew Ensign, the Justice Department lawyer representing the Trump administration.
"There is a lot of law about what constitutes a foreign government," Gelernt told Boasberg. "And I don't think the United States recognizes [Tren de Aragua] as a foreign government. They recognize Venezuela as a foreign government. I think that's the historic understanding of the statute."
Gerlent also questioned the government's definition of "invasion or predatory incursion": "We think the Court certainly can review whether immigration constitutes some kind of invasion….We know of no historical precedent that would suggest that straight migration or noncitizens coming and committing crimes constitutes an invasion within the meaning of the statute or the Constitution."
While conceding "there isn't a lot of precedent on this," Ensign cited the Supreme Court's 1948 decision in Ludecke v. Watkins, which allowed the pre-deportation detention of a German citizen after the end of World War II. In that case, he said, the Court "recognized the very broad discretion of the president" in deciding whether the AEA's "declared war" provision still applied.
Boasberg conceded that "the courts can't question the president's power to remove enemy aliens or even his determination that a state of war continues to exist." But he said the Supreme Court in Ludecke "did seem to accept that courts could hear challenges to the construction and validity of the statute." If so, he asked Ensign, "doesn't it leave open the [possibility] that judicial review is available to look at whether certain preconditions have been met for the president to invoke the statute?"
Ensign argued that such an inquiry would involve "political questions" that are not subject to judicial review. He added that the case "cuts to the core of the president's Article II powers" by challenging his authority over immigration and foreign policy.
Gelernt noted that Trump is not "invoking his inherent authority under the Constitution." Rather, he said, Trump is "invoking a specific statutory provision [for which] Congress has laid out very clear guidelines, and I think it would be fundamentally inconsistent with separation of powers for this Court not to be able to review whether those preconditions were met."
After hearing from both sides, Boasberg noted that the case presents "hard questions, close questions, and particularly hard questions on the expedited time frame that we are talking about here." But he said the plaintiffs had "certainly presented a serious question that this is justiciable because it's outside of what Ludecke talked about." He thought they had made a plausible case that "the AEA does not provide a basis for the president's proclamation given that the terms invasion and predatory incursion really relate to hostile acts perpetrated by enemy nations and commensurate to war." The plaintiffs also had plausibly argued that "the terms nation and government do not apply to non-state actors like criminal gangs."
Based on the arguments presented at that point, Boasberg said, "I don't think the AEA provides a basis for removal under this proclamation." But he emphasized the preliminary nature of his order, which was aimed at preventing "irreparable harm" to the plaintiffs while the case was pending. In the meantime, he noted, the plaintiffs would remain in custody, which should be sufficient to address the government's public safety concerns.
Boasberg issued a TRO that applies to "all noncitizens in U.S. custody who are subject to the March 15, 2025, Presidential Proclamation entitled 'Invocation of the Alien Enemies Act Regarding the Invasion of The United States by Tren De Aragua' and its implementation." He told Ensign what that meant: "Any plane containing these folks that is going to take off or is in the air needs to be returned to the United States….However that's accomplished, whether turning around a plane or not embarking anyone on the plane…I leave to you. But this is something that you need to make sure is complied with immediately."
Since then, Boasberg has been trying to figure out whether the Trump administration deliberately defied that order. That question hinges on the exact timing of the flights to El Salvador, where the deportees have been imprisoned. "The government is not being terribly cooperative at this point," Boasberg said at Friday's hearing, "but I will get to the bottom of whether they violated my order and who was responsible."
The flights that concern Boasberg did not include the five named plaintiffs, but they did include other Venezuelans covered by the broader TRO. On Monday, the White House described all of the deportees as "ruthless terrorist gang members," quoting a long list of Republican politicians who likewise welcomed Trump's effort to rid the country of "violent criminals," "rapists," "terrorists," "drug dealers," and "Tren de Aragua savages." But at least four of the named plaintiffs are asylum seekers who insist they are not in fact Tren De Aragua members. Two of them say they were identified as such based on nothing more than their nationality and misunderstood tattoos.
As Reason's Eric Boehm notes, those claims underline the importance of the due process that Trump is trying to avoid by invoking the AEA. At Friday's hearing, The New York Times reports, Boasberg "said he was concerned not only that President Trump has sought to use the [AEA] when there was neither an invasion taking place nor a declared state of war, but also that the people the government has sought to deport have no way of contesting whether they are actually gang members." He noted that "the policy ramifications of this are incredibly troublesome and problematic and concerning."
Those "policy ramifications," Trump argues, are beyond Boasberg's purview. But the central question presented by this case is whether Trump is acting within his authority under the AEA. The answer is far less clear than he and his allies imply.
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT NORTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA
AMERICAN FEDERATION OF GOVERNMENT EMPLOYEES, AFL-CIO, et al.,
Plaintiffs,
v.
UNITED STATES OFFICE OF PERSONNEL MANAGEMENT, et al.,
Defendants.
No. C 25-01780 WHA
THIRD REQUEST FOR INFORMATION
The Court has read news reports that, in at least one agency, probationary employees are being rehired but then placed on administrative leave en masse. This is not allowed by the preliminary injunction, for it would not restore the services the preliminary injunction intends to restore. Defendants shall state the extent to which any rehired probationary employees are being placed on administrative leave by MARCH 18, 2025, AT NOON.
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT NORTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA
AMERICAN FEDERATION OF GOVERNMENT EMPLOYEES, AFL-CIO, et al.,
Plaintiffs,
v.
UNITED STATES OFFICE OF PERSONNEL MANAGEMENT, et al.,
Defendants.
No. C 25-01780 WHA
SUPPLEMENT TO THIRD REQUEST FOR INFORMATION.
On March 17, the undersigned requested that defendants “state the extent to which any rehired probationary employees are being placed on administrative leave” (Dkt. No. 138). Defendants’ response reproduces compliance reports produced in a separate action, State of Maryland v. United States Department of Agriculture, without more (Dkt. No. 139).
The Department of Defense, an enjoined relief defendant in this action, is not among the “restrained defendants” in Maryland. Defendants’ reproduction of the Maryland declarations is therefore silent as to DOD. Defendants shall redress that deficiency and provide a declaration from DOD by MARCH 19, 2025, AT NOON. If plaintiffs wish to file a response, they must do so by MARCH 20, 2025, AT NOON.
PATRICK D. ROBBINS (CABN 152288) Acting United States Attorney PAMELA T. JOHANN (CABN 145558) Chief, Civil Division KELSEY J. HELLAND (CABN 298888) Assistant United States Attorney U.S. ATTORNEY'S OFFICE 450 Golden Gate Avenue, Box 36055 San Francisco, California 94102-3495 ERIC HAMILTON Deputy Assistant Attorney General DIANE KELEHER Branch Director CHRISTOPHER HALL Assistant Branch Director JAMES D. TODD, JR. Senior Trial Counsel U.S. DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE Civil Division, Federal Programs Branch P.O. Box 883 Washington, DC 20044
Counsel for Defendants
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE NORTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA SAN FRANCISCO DIVISION
AMERICAN FEDERATION OF GOVERNMENT EMPLOYEES, et al.
Plaintiffs,
v.
UNITED STATES OFFICE OF PERSONNEL MANAGEMENT, et al.,
Defendants.
Case 3:25-cv-01780-WHA
NOTICE IN RESPONSE TO THE COURT’S THIRD REQUEST FOR INFORMATION
The Hon. William H. Alsup
Defendants respond to this Court’s March 17, 2025, Third Request for Information (“Request”), ECF No. 138. In that Request, the Court referenced “news reports that, in at least one agency, probationary employees are being rehired but then placed on administrative leave en masse” and stated that “[t]his is not allowed by the preliminary injunction, for it would not restore the services the preliminary injunction intends to restore.” Request. The Court ordered Defendants to “state the extent to which any rehired probationary employees are being placed on administrative leave.” Id.
Defendants note that in a separate proceeding the government filed a status report on March 17, 2025, explaining the actions taken by 21 Executive Branch agencies to comply with a temporary restraining order (“TRO”) requiring the reinstatement of terminated probationary employees. See Status Rep., State of Maryland, et al. v. U. S. Dep’t of Agric., et al., No. 1:25-cv748 (D. Md. Mar. 17, 2025), ECF No. 52, (“State of Maryland”), attached as Ex. 1; TRO, State of Maryland, supra, ECF No. 44 (requiring reinstatement of probationary employees terminated on or after January 20, 2025), attached as Ex. 2.
As highlighted in agency declarations attached to that status report, administrative leave is not being used to skirt the requirement of reinstatement but is merely a first part of a series of steps to reinstate probationary employees. For example, a declaration submitted by an official from the U.S. Department of Energy (“DOE”), which is a named defendant in both State of Maryland and in this case, is illustrative. See Decl. of Reesha Trznadel, State of Maryland, supra, ECF No. 52-1 at 5-8, attached as Ex. 3. As Ms. Trznadel explains, “Affected Probationary Employees have been placed in a retroactive Administrative Leave status that will continue until their badging and IT access are restored, at which time they will be converted to an Active Duty status” and “DOE continues working to reinstate employees by working with Agency leadership to arrange for an orderly return to the office (onboarding) while the employees are in an administrative leave status.” Trznadel Decl. ¶ 12, at 7.
The declaration of an official with the U.S. Department of Agriculture (“USDA”), which is also a defendant in both State of Maryland and in this case, further confirms this. See Decl. of Mary Pletcher Rice, ECF No. 52-1 at 55–58. Ms. Pletcher Rice’s declaration explains that “[a]s part of a phased plan for return-to-duty, upon returning to pay status, the Affected Probationary Employee will initially be placed on paid administrative leave” and that in the meantime “USDA is acting diligently to complete the administrative steps related to notifying the Affected Probationary Employees of their reinstatement, processing the reinstatements for purposes of all relevant USDA record systems, and returning the reinstated employees to duty status.” Pletcher Rice Decl. ¶ 5, at 57. Likewise, the declaration of an agency official with the Department of Veterans Affairs (“VA”) explains that the agency “for all intents and purposes, reinstated all Affected Probationary Employees, placing them in an initial administrative leave status with full pay and benefits, effective March 17, 2025,” and was “acting diligently to complete additional administrative processes related to the reinstatement of these employees.” Decl. of Mark Engelbaum ¶ 10, ECF No. 52-1 at 61–62. Additionally, the VA official stated that “Affected Probationary Employees will also receive back pay from the date of termination to the date of reinstatement.” Id.
Defendants understand that, without this context, the Court may have had questions about whether the placement of employees on administrative leave was an effort to avoid the injunction but hope this clarification explains that this placement is an administrative, intermediate measure taken by a number of the agencies in order to return probationary employees to full duty status. Defendants propose to file a report with the Court on March 28, 2025, with any further updates about the return of probationary employees to full duty status.
Dated: March 18, 2025
Respectfully submitted,
PATRICK D. ROBBINS (CABN 152288) Acting United States Attorney PAMELA T. JOHANN (CABN 145558) Chief, Civil Division KELSEY J. HELLAND (CABN 298888) Assistant United States Attorney U.S. ATTORNEY’S OFFICE 450 Golden Gate Avenue, Box 36055 San Francisco, California 94102-3495 ERIC HAMILTON Deputy Assistant Attorney General DIANE KELLEHER Branch Director CHRISTOPHER HALL Assistant Branch Director JAMES D. TODD, JR. Senior Trial Counsel s/ Yuri S. Fuchs YURI S. FUCHS Trial Attorney U.S. DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE Civil Division, Federal Programs Branch P.O. Box 883 Washington, DC 20044 Counsel for Defendants
PATRICK D. ROBBINS (CABN 152288) Acting United States Attorney PAMELA T. JOHANN (CABN 145558) Chief, Civil Division KELSEY J. HELLAND (CABN 298888) Assistant United States Attorney U.S. ATTORNEY'S OFFICE 450 Golden Gate Avenue, Box 36055 San Francisco, California 94102-3495 ERIC HAMILTON Deputy Assistant Attorney General DIANE KELEHER Branch Director CHRISTOPHER HALL Assistant Branch Director JAMES D. TODD, JR. Senior Trial Counsel U.S. DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE Civil Division, Federal Programs Branch P.O. Box 883 Washington, DC 20044
Counsel for Defendants
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE NORTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA SAN FRANCISCO DIVISION
AMERICAN FEDERATION OF GOVERNMENT EMPLOYEES, et al.
Plaintiffs,
v.
UNITED STATES OFFICE OF PERSONNEL MANAGEMENT, et al.,
Defendants.
Case 3:25-cv-01780-WHA
Declaration of Timothy D. Dill in Support of Defendants' Notice in Response to the Court's Third Request for Information.
I, Timothy D. Dill, declare, pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1746, as follows:
I. I am currently the official performing the duties of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Manpower and Reserve Affairs of the Department of Defense ("Department"), headquartered in Washington, D.C. I have served in this position since January 22, 2025. The information below is based on my personal knowledge and information I have received in my role at the Department.
2. In my role at the Department, I am responsible for personnel policy for the Department of Defense's civilian workforce. That responsibility includes tracking and recording personnel actions, including terminations. I am responsible for ensuring that all personnel actions, including those related to probationary employees, comply with federal law.
3. I am aware of the preliminary injunction issued in this case on March 13, 2025, requiring the Department to offer reinstatement to all probationary employees terminated on or about February 13 and 14, 2025.
4. Department records indicate that since February 13, 2025, the Department separated, or notified of termination, 364 probationary employees in light of recent OPM guidance.
5. The Department has directed DoD Military Departments and Components to offer reinstatement or revoke pending termination notices for these employees. DoD Military Departments and Components have reinstated, or revoked pending termination notices, for approximately 65 employees. The remainder are pending notification, declined to accept the offer of reinstatement, or requested additional time to consider the offer.
6. Employees with pending termination notices will remain on administrative leave until the termination notice is revoked and they are able to be complete Department onboarding procedures. Previously terminated employees who have been reinstated are authorized administrative leave dating from the time of their termination until their completion of onboarding procedures. That placement of former employees on administrative leave is the first in a series of steps to reinstate probationary employees. The onboarding process will include certain training, completing human resources paperwork, obtaining new security badges, and re-enrolling in benefits programs.
Pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1746, I declare under penalty of perjury that the foregoing is true and correct to the best of my knowledge.
Dated: March 19, 2025
Timothy D. Dill Performing the Duties of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Manpower and Reserve Affairs
