CHECKS 2 & BALANCE

ESTB 2 25 IN DOGE COUP

see fascism

see IMPERIAL PREZ

INCLUDES (LOOMING) CONST CRISIS courts judiciary

GRASSLEY ROLLS OVER DON BACON BAILS

SEE RULE OF LAW ARREST JUDGE DUGGAN

SEE LAWFARE TRUMP2

ROBERTS/SCOTUS FAIL IMMUNITY, CHEVRON DOCT ETC

see IMPOUNDMENT

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RWW 9 26

Dalton Clodfelter believes that the president must "crush Congress": "They need to act totally subservient to you, or you need to extinguish it as an institutional power."

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8 26

The director of the Office of Management and Budget is infuriating Republican lawmakers by "going rogue" on what appropriations were approved by the House and Senate.

MS NOW's Hayes Brown wrote on Monday that Director Russell Vought has made a unilateral decision to control whether funds are actually sent out for projects that Congress approved.

The constitutional core is Article I’s Appropriations Clause: “No Money shall be drawn from the Treasury, but in Consequence of Appropriations made by Law.” So, the president can't legally spend Treasury money unless Congress has authorized it through law. Appropriations are technically laws approved by Congress. The president's Article II powers mandate that he “take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed.”

But the executive branch is refusing to disburse the funds approved by law. In fact, Brown explained that "Vought has used every lever he can reach to stanch the flow of federal dollars."

A series of reports last week cited a group of what they're calling "zombie programs" across the U.S. government. Those are programs like the CDC's Alzheimer’s disease program or programs around epilepsy and sickle cell disease data collection operations. There's even a rape prevention unit. All of them have been approved and fully funded by Congress. When Elon Musk went through his DOGE cuts, the people who worked on the programs were let go.

Vought has encouraged the president to impound money that Congress has allocated, even if it's against the law. In fact, Brown cited "a law specifically forbidding the practice."

After the huge DOGS cuts, "OMB sent a list of rescissions," saying that it would "undo" Musk's moves to kill programs that Congress funded.

"Congressional Republicans signed off on a package cutting $8 billion in foreign aid funding and roughly $1 billion from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. But that wasn’t enough for Vought, who last fall enacted a 'pocket rescission' to cut another $4.9 billion in foreign aid," Brown explained. "By only informing Congress of the hold less than 45 days before the end of the fiscal year, OMB argued, the money would be cut automatically."

Then Vought deployed the “apportionment” process, stating that federal spending must align with Trump's budget proposals. It's the way that Trump's government has been able to take tax dollars from blue states while refusing to allocate appropriated funds.

"Even more troubling, a new federal rule currently in the works would give his office unprecedented control over issuing federal grants. If enacted, the rule would effectively serve as a roundabout veto over spending that fails to 'demonstrably advance the president’s policy priorities,' even those that meet the specific guidelines Congress has put in place," the Brown wrote.

The tactics are angering lawmakers, including Republicans.

"Congress has appropriated money, and you don’t have the authority to impound it,” Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) said in a Senate Budget Committee hearing with Vought.

Rep. Mark Amodei (R-Nev.), who is also a senior Republican on appropriations, told Politico, “Pocket rescissions would be a very interesting way to curry favor with the legislative branch — especially the one part of the legislative branch which has delivered on all of the administration’s s——."

A short-term budget bill was passed by the Senate before they left for the August recess, and its language temporarily halts Vought's takeover of federal grants. The House still must pass the bill, but the odds look good, as no one wants a government shutdown weeks before the election.

Brown pointed out that it's one of the far too few occasions on which the legislature has asserted its authority in many years. In the past two years specifically, Congress has ceded its power over trade and war to the president. He said it's nice to see lawmakers finally draw a line.

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an 3 26

Law and Crime reports a federal court of appeals upheld a series of lower court orders barring the Trump administration from enforcing a "sweeping and unprecedented categorical" spending "freeze.”

In one 58-page opinion, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 1st Circuit took a group of "consolidated appeals" of several different orders and mostly rejected the White House’s argument in favor of continuing the freeze. Judges found the Trump administration’s arguments unconvincing in one case and utterly ignored the administration’s argument in another.

“In one order from March 2025, the lower court extended a pause on the spending freeze – enjoining myriad federal agencies from slashing funds and directing them to pay out ‘awarded grants, executed contracts, or other executed financial obligations,’” reports Law and Crime.

In an additional two orders from April 2025, the lower court enforced the preliminary injunction against the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and then denied a reconsideration and stay requested by the Trump administration.

With this slate of decisions, the appellate court has joined a legion of courts dismantling President’s Donald Trump’s executive orders and policies, and it further complicates Trump’s effort to starve certain nonprofits and research.

One of the lawsuits against Trump, led by New York Attorney General Letitia James, alleged the spending freeze violated several tenets of the Administrative Procedure Act (APA), federal laws and the U.S. Constitution, which mandates the distribution of congressionally-appropriated funds.

James, who has won a landmark case against Trump for fraud, welcomed the 1st Circuit's opinion.

"This decision is a clear reminder that the president cannot treat congressionally-approved funding like a switch he can flip on and off," James said. “For more than a year, the Trump administration has repeatedly tried to freeze critical funding that states rely on to serve their communities, and once again the courts have rejected that unlawful power grab."

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TARGET ABA LEGAL SUPPRESS --> FASCISM

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an `1 26

U.S. President Donald Trump was furious when, on January 8, five GOP senators — Kentucky's Rand Paul, Alaska's Lisa Murkowski, Maine's Susan Collins, Missouri's Josh Hawley, and Indiana's Todd Young — joined Senate Democrats in a War Powers Act resolution opposing military escalation in Venezuela. Trump railed against them relentlessly, saying that they "should be ashamed" and "should never be elected to office again."

But in a column published on Thursday, January 15, MS NOW's Steve Benen laments that two of them — Hawley and Young — have caved in to "bullying" from Trump.

"Three of the five GOP senators who voted with Democrats last week — Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Rand Paul of Kentucky — stuck to their guns, but two did not," Benen observes. "Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri was the first to fold, announcing his reversal on Wednesday morning, and Indiana's Todd Young soon followed suit. It's worth appreciating why."

Benen continues, "Almost immediately after last week's vote, the president made no effort to hide his disgust…. In the days that followed, MS NOW confirmed that Trump called each member of the quintet, berating the GOP members who defied him. The president, as MS NOW's source summarized, was 'very upset, angry, yelling.' Trump was especially animated with Young, whose phone meeting with the president was 'very heated.' On Tuesday, during remarks in Detroit, Trump continued to target the senators who'd disappointed him, slamming Paul as a 'stone-cold loser' and describing Collins and Murkowski as 'disasters.'"

The MS NOW columnist and "Rachel Maddow Show" producer argues that Hawley and Young underscore Trump's ability to intimidate Republicans who disagree with him.

"Paul, Collins and Murkowski, however, followed through on their beliefs," Benen argues. "Hawley and Young reversed course under pressure…. Trump wasn't willing to tolerate any attempt to limit his authority in Venezuela — even if the Senate vote wouldn't have actually limited his authority in Venezuela — and so, he tried to scold Senate Republicans into submission. By surrendering, Hawley and Young sent an unsubtle reminder to the White House: Sometimes, with some people, bullying works."

Steve Benen's full MS NOW column is available at this link.

root cause CU an 1 26

All of the dysfunction in Congress is coming from decisions that the U.S. Supreme Court ushered in, and it is completely changing the face of American government, a legal scholar explained.

Writing for The Atlantic on Tuesday, Stanford Law School fellow Duncan Hosie said that there are two key rulings that have resulted in the downfall of Congress.

"These dynamics share a root cause: the partisan polarization that has reshaped American politics over the past four decades," wrote Hosie. "But the connection is deeper and more complex than that. Whereas polarization weakened Congress, it emboldened the Court to dismantle laws and, in the process, undermine Congress’s ability to make laws at all, reinforcing Congress’s sclerosis."

The first began during the "Newt Gingrich revolution," he argued, with "rising partisanship and institutional upheaval."

Sorting members into "distant ideological camps and normalizing scorched-earth tactics" led to absolutist politics and made bipartisan politics for the greater good rare. Instead, ideological battles were launched with Supreme Court nominees with a litmus tests for partisan purity over reasonable interpretations of the law. Even justices below the High Court have become partisan as "Republican appointees began consolidating its authority at Congress’s expense."

Under Chief Justice John Roberts, Hosie said, the Court has canceled "congressional constitutionalism." Laws passed such as the Voting Rights Act, the Affordable Care Act, the Family and Medical Leave Act and campaign finance regulations have all be undermined by the Roberts cCurt.

The latter took a hit with a collection of decisions, such as Citizens United (2010), that "dismantled Congress’s two most significant efforts to regulate private money in public elections, eroding the safeguards that protect elections as conduits of public opinion," Hosie wrote.

There's a chance one case this year could make such issues even worse. The Roberts Court "dismantling" key laws "has left Congress more detached from its electorate, diminishing its claim and role as a representative authority."

Deregulating campaign finance laws has turned politics into such a huge undertaking that lawmakers and candidate spend more time trying to raise money than they do making direct contact with voters, conducting legislative oversight or fostering bipartisanship, the legal scholar said.

"Empiricalstudies confirm that reliance on large donors depresses participation in time-intensive legislative activities — things such as bill sponsorship, floor debate and committee work," Hosie wrote. "It simultaneously redirects lawmakers’ attention toward courting high-net-worth donors and away from talking to people in their districts."

The second issue is gerrymandering. Partisan legislatures draw maps that make congressional districts more one-sided. It then ensures that members of Congress appeal to the most extreme factions of their electorate.

Hosie called the court's ruling in "Rucho v. Common Cause (2019) [the most] entrenched electoral distortion in American politics. The Court has since doubled down. Last month, Justice Samuel Alito defended Texas’s gerrymandered maps on the grounds that they reflected 'partisan advantage pure and simple' — an unabashed apologia for a practice destructive to democracy."

Drawing congressional maps to craft "safe seats" means the ideologues win. That can "marginalize moderate voices," he explained. It reduces any incentive for compromise and accountability.

These rulings have ultimately reduced the power of Congress and expanded that of the judiciary branch that was meant to be equal under the Constitution. "Substantively, it has redefined what the Constitution forbids, preemptively removing entire policy domains from democratic deliberation before voters and lawmakers can even weigh in," Hosie closed.

*Read more here.

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AN 10 25

President Donald Trump has been able to have the Republican-controlled Senate confirm the vast bulk of his nominees — with the lone exception of his appointees for U.S. attorney offices.

Now, Politico is reporting that the president is leaning on his party to bulldoze the last remaining obstacle preventing his handpicked prosecutors from being fully confirmed. Trump told a gathering of Senate Republicans Tuesday that the long-standing "blue slip" procedure — in which senators from a nominee's home state have to submit "blue slips" agreeing to their nomination before it can move forward — was a "problem" that should be scrapped.

"You know, I have 10 U.S. attorneys who are phenomenal," Trump said. "And the problem is, they’re not going to ever be confirmed, I guess. I put them in, they’ll be there for three or four months, whatever it is, and then they have to leave."

The "blue slip" process is done for nominees for U.S. District court judgeships as well as U.S. attorney nominees in the Senate Judiciary Committee. Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), who chairs the committee, has so far refused Trump's demands, and promised to continue it indefinitely after the Senate gained a Republican majority after last November's election. The "blue slip" process has affected some of Trump's more controversial nominees, like Alina Habba for the U.S. Attorney's post in the District of New Jersey, with Sens. Andy Kim (D-N.J.) and Cory Booker (D-N.J.) each declining to return a blue slip.

"Anytime you have a Democrat senator, not even two, just one, they’ll say, because of the time we’re in, ‘we’re not approving that person,'" Trump said during the Tuesday lunch with senators.

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“Because of blue slip, I have to tell the person after three months, I’m sorry you’ll have to leave and I’ll put someone else in,” he continued. “This is not constitutional. And I really, I hope you can look at that blue slip thing.”

Tuesday is just the latest example of Trump zeroing in on the "blue slip" tradition. In July, he called out Grassley on his Truth Social platform and slammed the "blue slip" procedure as a "hoax" and a "scam." He complained that despite being in the minority, Democrats had exploited the procedure to impose an "ironclad stoppage" on his nominees coming before the Judiciary Committee.

Click here to read Politico's full report.

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do we need sep advise and consent on noms? have any actually been voted down vs pulled bc of fear of that eg gaetz?

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note 6? 25 2 Bove doj fuck the courts,2 whistleblowers ignored by GoP in confirmation?

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AN 10 25

Submissive' Supreme Court 'does Trump’s bidding' as new term gets underway: analysis

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SEE ALINA HABBA RE-UP FUCKERY 7 25 COUPLE OThER STATES

'Effective remedy': Defendant cites Trump-appointed judge to get MAGA prosecutor dismissed

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AN 7 25

President Donald Trump is now pushing for the Senate Republican in charge of the committee overseeing the federal courts to get rid of a longstanding tradition that would allow him to more easily prosecute his political opponents.

That's according to a Tuesday article in Courthouse News Service, which reported that Trump has now set his sights on Senate Judiciary Committee chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa). As chair of the powerful committee, Grassley is in a position to do away with the custom of "blue slips," in which senators from states under the jurisdiction of a presidential appointee to a federal judgeship or a U.S. attorney's office can effectively veto a nomination by refusing to turn in blue slips in agreement with the appointment.

One particular example is Sens. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) and Andy Kim (D-N.J.) not submitting blue slips in favor of controversial acting U.S. attorney Alina Habba for the District of New Jersey, who the Trump administration has allowed to remain in her post by exploiting a loophole in the Federal Vacancies Reform Act. In a Truth Social post on Tuesday night, Trump raged against the blue slip system, and called on Grassley to end it so he can ram through a slew of far-right prosecutors in Democratic-run states.

"Democrats like Schumer, Warner, Kaine, Booker, Schiff, and others, SLEAZEBAGS ALL, have an ironclad stoppage of Great Republican Candidates," Trump wrote in his signature style of oddly placed capital letters. "Put simply, the President of the United States will never be permitted to appoint the person of his choice because of an ancient, and probably Unconstitutional, “CUSTOM,” that if you have, even one person in the opposite Party serving in the U.S. Senate, he/she must give consent, thereby completely stopping the opposite Party’s Nomination."

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"The only way to beat this Hoax is to appoint a Democrat or, a weak and ineffective Republican," he continued. "Therefore, I would never be able to appoint Great Judges or U.S. Attorneys in California, New York, New Jersey, Illinois, Virginia, and other places, where there is, coincidentally, the highest level of crime and corruption — The places where fantastic people are most needed! ... Chuck, I know you have the Courage to do this, DO IT!"

As Courthouse News Service's Benjamin S. Weiss wrote, Trump gave no evidence that the blue slip system was "probably Unconstitutional," and that the Constitution in fact gives the Senate the power of "advice and consent" regarding presidential nominees. Weiss also noted that Trump's claim that Democrats "openly broke" the blue slip tradition was unfounded.

Democrats have abided by the blue slip system even to their own detriment. In 2023, then-President Joe Biden withdrew the nomination of Scott Colom, whom he had nominated to serve as a U.S. District Judge for the Northern District of Mississippi. Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith (R-Miss.) refused to return a blue slip for Colom's confirmation, and then-Senate Judiciary Committee chairman Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) refused to abolish the blue slip system to confirm Colom.

Click here to read Courthouse News Service's full report.

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AN 6 25

Salon Senior writer Chauncey Devega warns the authoritarian tide is “rising very quickly in America,” with President Donald Trump threatening to use his "big beautiful bill" as a weapon or revenge against his enemies, namely the Democratic Party.

During a recent trip to Capitol Hill to whip up support for his “big beautiful” budget bill, the president admitted to reporters that “We're going to make a couple of tweaks….I mean, we don't want to benefit Democrat governors.”

“… We want to help all the states, but we have governors that are from the Democrat [sic] party, let's say New York, Illinois, big ones, and let's say Gavin 'Newscum,' who's done a horrible job in California. We want to benefit Republicans. They are the ones that are going to make America great again….The Democrats are destroying our country," Trump said.

Devega points out presidents didn’t do this before Trump because a two-party system is essential to democracy. But last week Trump escalated threats to terminate federal funding from the state of California, forgetting that “Democrat-led blue states contribute more money to the federal government in terms of tax dollars and other resources than Republican-led red parts of the country,” as Devega explains.

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When Governor Gavin Newsom responded by suggesting California could retaliate by cutting off tax payments from the state to the federal government, Trump’s administration went ballistic. United States Treasury Secretary, Scott Bessent warned Newsom that he would be guilty of “criminal tax evasion” over such a move.

But this escalation is just the beginning for our “first elected autocrat and aspiring dictator,” Devega says. In addition to series of “Truth Social propaganda platform” posts where Devega says :{Trump shared conspiracy theories and menacing images of retaliation against judges who stymied his immigration policies, the administration is also harassing Democratic members of Congress with arrest.}:

Department of Homeland Security police recently handcuffed an aide to U.S. Rep. Representative Jerry Nadler, (D-N.Y.), which makes the second time in less than a month the Trump administration has used law enforcement to directly target Congress. And for the second time in less than a month, Congress doesn’t have the desire or ability to defend itself.

Atlantic columnist David Graham writes: “The Constitution’s checks and balances are premised on each branch wantingto protect its powers. What happens if that’s not the case?”

Republicans are largely unwilling to stand up to Trump, Graham argues, while Democrats are incapable of exerting formal or informal political power.

With Trump announcing he was federalizing the California National Guard—against the wishes of Gov. Newsom—after ICE raids over the weekend, the authoritarian tide is rising, Devega warns. But the American people and their leaders “had numerous opportunities to ‘drown-proof’ their democracy at the ballot box.”

They also had ample time to deal with the problem through the rule of law and by addressing the deep societal problems that birthed Trumpism, MAGA, authoritarian populism and the larger antidemocracy movement. Instead, he says they put “a man who announced he would be a ‘dictator on day one’ back” in the White House.

READ MORE:How this horrid show ends

Read the full Salon report at this link.

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SEE YT CICC A GESTURE TO HIT CAN BE assault; any touch not consented?!

AN 5 25

House Democratic Leadership has strongly condemned interim U.S. attorney for the District of New Jersey Alina Habba's decision to charge Rep. LaMonica Mclver (D-N.J.), calling it "an attack on the American people."

The Justice Department announced on Monday that it has filed charges against McIver, accusing her of assaulting law enforcement officers earlier this month at an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facility in Newark.

In a statement released Monday, House Democrats said the party "will respond vigorously in the days to come at a time, place and manner of our choosing."

"The criminal charge against Congresswoman LaMonica McIver is extreme, morally bankrupt and lacks any basis in law or fact," said the statement, shared by House Minority Leader Rep. Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) on the social platform X.

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"Members of Congress have a constitutional responsibility to conduct oversight of the executive branch wherever and whenever it is needed. We are lawfully permitted to show up at any federal facility unannounced to conduct an inspection on behalf of the American people," the Democratic lawmakers said.

"By visiting the detention center in Newark, Rep. McIver and two other Members of Congress were upholding their oath of office. They didn’t assault anyone, but were themselves aggressively mistreated by illegally masked individuals," the statement added.

"There is no credible evidence that Rep. McIver engaged in any criminal activity, and she would not have been permitted to tour the facility had she done anything wrong," the Democratic leadership said.

The statement further said that the proceeding launched "by the so-called U.S. Attorney in New Jersey is a blatant attempt by the Trump administration to intimidate Congress and interfere with our ability to serve as a check and balance on an out-of-control executive branch."

House Democrats vowed not to "be intimidated by the Trump administration."

Several Democratic lawmakers posted separate statements condemning Habba's move.

Rep. Teresa Leger Fernández (D-N.M) said in an X post: "Rep. LaMonica McIver walked into Delaney Hall to protect human rights and it is her lawful duty to conduct oversight. Now, the Trump Administration is throwing bogus charges at her for doing her job."

"They want to silence everyone. If they came for a sitting member of Congress, who will they come for next? I stand with @RepLaMonica—and for the Constitution. It is our sacred obligation as Americans to protect each other from tyranny," she added.

Rep Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.) wrote: "A RED LINE has been crossed. Trump is prosecuting his political enemies in Congress. This is just the beginning. We must take whatever we’ve done before to show dissent and go ONE RUNG HIGHER. And save your bulls--- documents on this, Alina. You’ll need them when you testify."

Political commentators and attorneys also spoke out against the development.

Immigration attorney Aaron Reichlin-Melnicksaid in a post: "Donald Trump’s personal lawyer is acting U.S. Attorney for New Jersey, despite no relevant background. She just charged a Democratic congresswoman with assaulting a cop in an incident which occurred after DHS chose to arrest Newark’s mayor for trespassing."

Meanwhile, supporters of Make American Great Again (MAGA) movement welcomed Habba's action.

MAGA conspiracy theorist Laura Loomer wrote on X: "Democrat Congresswoman @RepLaMonica has been charged for assaulting an ICE agent in New Jersey! Thank you, @AlinaHabba. You may want to keep an eye on homeboy Hakeem who said you will 'find out' if his Sista faced 'trumped up charges'. Sounds like a threat."

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an 525

President Donald Trump's critics, both left and right, often use the word "unprecedented" to describe his actions. No previous president in U.S. history — not even Richard Nixon — contemplated deporting U.S. citizens to foreign prisons or took aggressive action against law firms for having clients he didn't like.

They typically mean "unprecedented" in the United States, not unprecedented elsewhere.

In an article published by The Atlantic on May 14, Andrew O'Donohue — a political scientist at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts — warns that Trump is employing a legal strategy used by despots in other countries.

"Donald Trump’s attacks on the courts lack recent precedent in the United States," O'Donohue explains, "but they follow a clear pattern seen in backsliding democracies around the world. In many countries, when political leaders challenge the courts, the end result isn't merely a win in a single policy dispute. These attacks have a deeper, more destructive effect: They systematically weaken the courts as a check on the executive's power — opening the door for governments to abuse that power to target opponents and endanger democracy."

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The Harvard political science expert continues, "This fight takes place both inside and, importantly, outside the courtroom, in the arena of the public’s opinion. Even though citizens generally agree that governments should obey court orders, several would-be authoritarians — such as those in Turkey, Mexico, and El Salvador — have managed to defy the courts, while keeping the public on their side.

O'Donohue describes the "pattern" he has "studied" in "democratic backsliding globally" as "court-baiting."

"To understand this dynamic, consider a textbook example from Turkey," O'Donohue writes. "When Turkey’s long-serving leader, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, first rose to power in 2003, he initially faced powerful constraints from the judiciary. Whereas Erdoğan's party was religiously conservative, Turkey's courts were staunchly secular and issued dozens of decisions during Erdoğan’s first term to limit the government's sway over historically secular state institutions. To take down the judiciary, Erdoğan used the court-baiting playbook."

O'Donohue continues, "He proposed a constitutional amendment perfectly designed to galvanize public support — and trigger a showdown with the judiciary. In Turkey, the courts had repeatedly upheld a ban that prevented Muslim women from wearing the Islamic headscarf at universities in the name of upholding the constitution’s strict commitment to secularism."

Trump, O'Donohue argues, is using the "court-baiting playbook" in a similar fashion to Erdoğan in Turkey — and the goal is an "erosion of checks and balances."

"The experiences of other democracies offer a warning: Court-baiting starts by expanding executive power on a popular issue," O'Donohue writes, "but it can end with an unconstrained executive who destroys the cherished institutions of a free society."

*Andrew O'Donohue's full article for The Atlantic is available at this link (subscription required).

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3/14/25 schumer dems roll on CR that empowers doge

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NO LNX

Only one thing is going to stand in Trump's way — and he knows it

Thom Hartmann April 28, 2025

It didn’t happen in some shadowy back alley or under the cover of night.

It happened in broad daylight — in the heart of an American courthouse.

Federal agents, acting without even the decency of a signed warrant, stormed into Judge Hannah Dugan’s courtroom on Friday morning and dragged her away like a common criminal. No warning. No legal process. No respect for the law she had spent a lifetime upholding.

But they made sure the cameras were there, so America could see what they were doing. Because this was not about justice. This was about terror.

This was a warning shot aimed directly at the beating heart of America’s judiciary:

“Fall in line — or you’re next.”

In that moment, the world’s oldest democracy lurched closer to the edge of authoritarian rule. In that moment, America became a little less free — and a lot more like the nightmare Vladimir Putin always hoped we’d become.

The FBI arrested Judge Hannah Dugan last Friday without even having a legal arrest warrant; this is as outrageous and police-state illegal as an administration can get.

And Pam Bondi’s performance Friday — after her federal agents swarm-raided this county judge — wasn’t staged for the general public.

The real audience was a very small, select group: America’s judges.

Their message is very simple: “P--- us off, judges, and you could end up in prison, too.”

Trump has already pacified the Article I branch of government — Congress — and now he’s in the process of pacifying the Article III branch, the Judiciary.

There are only 3 branches to our government: cowing both Congress and the nation’s Judiciary will leave only the president in charge of the entire country under all circumstances in all ways.

Nothing and nobody else will be able to stop him, short of a military coup (and he’s already decapitated the senior leadership of the military) or unending demonstrations in the streets (demonstrators who may soon face live ammunition).

That is called dictatorship. Real dictatorship. Vladimir Putin-style dictatorship where you are punished for the smallest deviation from orthodoxy and can find yourself in prison or sued into bankruptcy if you dare speak out in public.

It appears more and more every day that Putin is Trump’s mentor, if not his handler. Trump is doing everything he can, with help from a South African billionaire, to destroy the historic American infrastructure (which has been an example for the world for 250 years) and turn us into the newest member of the dictators club, joining Russia, China, Saudi Arabia, Belarus, Hungary, North Korea, and the rest of the fascist and authoritarian world.

To get there, now that they’ve pacified every single Republican member of Congress (most recently, Don Bacon criticized Trump’s schizophrenic tariffs; a day later he started talking about retiring), they only have to seize control of the Judiciary, and then nothing except We The People will stand in their way.

Nothing. Will. Stand. In. Trump’s. Way. Except We The People. And he knows it.

Look at the striking parallels between Putin’s strategies and Trump’s actions:

From installing Trump’s loyalists in the military and the federal police agencies of the Department of Justice and FBI, to his open threats against freedom of the press, to the GOP’s efforts to rig elections and purge voters, Trump’s subversion of US democracy looks eerily familiar.

He’s taking pages directly from the autocrat’s handbook.

Trump has openly quoted and praised autocrats like Putin and Hungarian strongman Viktor Orbán, who has presented his leadership in speeches to the GOP and CPAC as a model of an “illiberal” state.

Trump’s not hiding his admiration for dictators; he’s flaunting it. And now he’s putting the final stages of their script into action.

Trump’s movement toward authoritarianism follows “a known playbook. It’s unfolded in many other countries,” as journalist Anne Applebaum notes. “These are democratically elected leaders who characterize themselves or describe themselves as deserving of no opposition. So I am the true Hungarian, or I am the only real American.”

In a mere matter of weeks into his presidency, Applebaum says, Trump and his allies “have managed to push America into that space somewhere between (no longer) democracy and full-scale autocracy.”

The speed is shocking, but it shouldn’t be surprising. It only took Hitler 53 days to completely end democracy in Germany. Others, like Lukashenko, Orbán, Putin, Mussolini, Duterte, El-Sisi, and Erdoğan took longer (none longer than two years), but you could argue that Trump has been working at this project for 9 years now.

Harvard professor Steven Levitsky, who studies how democracies slip into authoritarianism, warns that we’re heading toward what experts call “competitive authoritarianism”: regimes that “constitutionally continue to be democracies” with regular elections and legal opposition, but where “systematic abuse of power tilts the playing field against the opposition.”

Make no mistake about what’s happening: Trump and his allies are methodically working through a four-step process to establish complete autocratic control, which will turn America into a one-man dictatorship.

Terrorize Congress: Trump’s already largely succeeded here. Republican lawmakers now march in lockstep with his agenda, afraid to oppose him even when their consciences scream otherwise. The V-Dem Institute already warns that Trump’s actions are “extremely worrying” for American democracy.

Terrorize the Media: Trump has, as The Washington Post writes, “relentlessly attacked the free press, another pillar that allows democracies to stand above authoritarian regimes,” as political scientists have noted. “He has echoed the worst dictators in history, calling journalists the ‘enemy of the people.’” With help from Elon Musk and other billionaires, he’s creating a media and social media environment where truth itself is under assault. And last week his administration threatened to arrest journalists and charge them with treason, an offense for which they could be executed.

Terrorize Judges and Lawyers: What we witnessed Friday with the raid on a county judge and the arrest of a retired judge earlier in the week is just the beginning. The final step in this process will be intimidating the Supreme Court, and if Trump’s minions can first terrorize the entire federal judiciary, it will be much easier to terrorize members of the Court itself, just like Putin and Orbán have done. This follows dangerous cracks in democracy’s pillars that experts have been warning about.

Terrorize Citizens: Once the above institutions are captured and there’s no more Constitutional opposition to Trump, the final phase begins: crushing individual dissent through fear, persecution, and potentially violence. This is the playbook Malcolm Nance detailed in his work analyzing Putin’s strategies to undermine American democracy and has already started against immigrants and student visa holders. If history tells us anything, American citizens will be next.

Most of this is already in place; time is running out fast.

Trump and his fellow fascists know their time is running out because elections are coming in a handful of months and their popularity is already crashing. They are at maximum power right now, and it is already beginning to decline.

This is another reason why they are pushing so hard to frighten judges, so they can implement the final destruction of any Constitutionally-based opposition to Trump’s one-man rule.

If Trump can consolidate authoritarian rule as quickly as some other historical dictators did, the complete (albeit hopefully temporary) end of American democracy could happen very rapidly, possibly even in the next few weeks or months. The window for action is closing fast.

But there’s still hope, because we’re still We The People. As long as our protest movement continues to grow and demand a stop to the damage Trump and Musk are doing to our democratic republic, we may be able to slow or even stop this anti-American cabal and reclaim our republic.

Our protesting in the streets and reaching out to legislators may encourage resistance within the media and courts, and might even inspire a handful of Republicans to stand against this wannabe dictator.

When democratic institutions fail, the last line of defense has always been citizens willing to take to the streets. Ukraine provides the most powerful recent example of how a determined populace can rescue democracy from Russian-inspired authoritarianism.

During Ukraine’s Euromaidan protests in 2014, over half a million people joined demonstrations in Kyiv to defend democracy against creeping authoritarianism. Those protests ultimately ended Viktor Yanukovych’s Russia-backed puppet regime (and kicked out its Russian-funded American advisor, Paul Manafort, who later became Trump’s 2016 campaign manager) and became known as the Revolution of Dignity.

Ukrainians stood firm in the streets despite violence and intimidation, and their courage changed history.

Ukraine’s later Orange Revolution similarly empowered ordinary citizens to engage in mass protests, with some lasting continously more than two weeks. This peaceful revolution successfully defended Ukraine’s democratic aspirations against Russian influence and showed the world that people power can overcome autocratic manipulation.

Putin fears democracy, particularly at his doorstep like in Ukraine and the Baltic states. He knows that democracy is contagious, and any spread near Russia, he believes, poses an existential threat to his autocratic rule. That’s why he invaded Ukraine, and that’s why he spent millions on social media trolls to support Trump’s election and his assault on our democratic institutions.

As Ukrainian historian Hanna Perekhoda warns, “If we let Russian authoritarians win, it will mean that the authoritarian forces also in our countries, in the U.S., for example, will grow stronger.”

If this assault on the Courts (and the implied intimidation of all judges including those on the Supreme Court) succeeds, and the media continues to bow down, the only thing left will be us in the streets.

The time for half-measures, “very strong letters,” and polite political disagreement has passed. We are watching in real-time as our 250-year experiment in democracy is being dismantled by a would-be dictator taking his cues from — or, at least, modeling his presidency on — Vladimir Putin.

This is not hyperbole. This is not partisan exaggeration. This is the stark reality facing our nation today. Fascism and dictatorship are at our doorstep.

Just last week, it was reported that Trump has now deported three American citizens, including a child taking cancer therapy.

Not content to just pull student visas and ask them to leave the country, Trump’s goons have been imprisoning students for writing OpEd articles for weeks. And now they’re show-arresting judges.

The arrest of Judge Dugan is not an isolated incident; it’s part a broader strategy to intimidate the judiciary and consolidate power.

When judges are arrested for upholding the principles of due process, the very foundation of democracy is at risk. This moment demands vigilance and action from all who value the rule of law.

The preservation of our democratic institutions depends on our collective response to such unprecedented challenges.

Buckle up, America. Democracy itself is on the line, and if the courts fall, we’ll be its last defenders.

NOW READ: Behind the 60-year Republican plot to destroy American democracy

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OMFG

On Friday, April 25, far-right FBI Director Kash Patel announced that Milwaukee County Circuit Judge Hannah Dugan has been arrested on federal obstruction charges for allegedly helping an undocumented immigrant "evade arrest."

On X, formerly Twitter, Patel posted, "We believe Judge Dugan intentionally misdirected federal agents away from the subject to be arrested in her courthouse, Eduardo Flores Ruiz, allowing the subject — an illegal alien — to evade arrest…. Thankfully our agents chased down the perp on foot and he’s been in custody since, but the Judge’s obstruction created increased danger to the public."

A law enforcement official told ABC News that Dugan was arrested at the courthouse.

According to MSNBC, Patel's tweet on Dugan was removed from X.

IFrame Content

During an MSNBC appearance, attorney Temidayo Aganga-Williams told host José Díaz-Balart that the arrest of a judge was "unusual" but added, "I think it's going to be a pattern going forward…. I think it's only going to pick up."

Dugan's arrest is receiving plenty of reactions on X, formerly Twitter.

Some MAGA Republicans are applauding the arrest.

John Fabbricatore, a former field officer for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), tweeted, "Judge Hannah Dugan arrested by FBI for allegedly helping illegal alien 'evade arrest' by ICE. 'Lawfare' by these judges has to stop. This is a good start!"

Far-right MAGA radio host Benny Johnson posted, "Another rogue judge down. FAFO."

But others see Dugan's arrest as MAGA ramping up its authoritarian disdain for the rule of law.

Journalist Kristian Ramos tweeted, "I see we are now at 'arresting judges' on our path to autocracy.

"On Democracy" host Fred Wellman noted, "Marshalls appear to be confirming she was arrested and other news outlets are picking it up now."

X user Iron Goodman wrote, "This is a chilling escalation of federal overreach and raises serious questions about the scope of executive power versus judicial independence."

Another X user, Laura Okazaki, posted, "We must not look away while the feds take us another step into authoritarianism."

X user Hannah Martinez tweeted, "This is a deeply unsettling development with huge implications for the rule of law and potential abuses of power. The optics are disastrous."

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rww Ali Alexander declares that "If Congress tries and takes Trump's TARIFF POWER, Congress should be disbanded!"

4 25

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an 3 25

Trump, much to the frustration of Democrats, returned to Washington on January 20 with GOP majorities in both branches of the Congress. But they're small majorities.

In the U.S. Senate, Republicans have a 53-47 majority — which is large enough to get Trump's most controversial nominees confirmed, but not enough to overcome the 60-vote demand of the filibuster. Nor is it enough to get a "guilty" vote in an impeachment.

Trump and some of his allies, including billionaire Tesla/SpaceX/X.com leader Elon Musk, are calling for the impeachment of federal judges who are blocking, at least temporarily, some of the president's executive orders. But if federal judges were to be indicted on articles on impeachment in the U.S. House of Representatives, Republicans wouldn't have enough votes for a "guilty" verdict in the U.S. Senate.

According to Politico reporters Meredith Lee Hill, Hailey Fuchs and Jordain Carney, however, GOP lawmakers are thinking about ways to attack federal judges other than impeachment.

"Top Republicans are likely to put at least one bill, California Rep. Darrell Issa’s 'No Rogue Rulings Act,' on the floor in early April, according to two people granted anonymity to discuss scheduling plans," the journalists explain in an article published on March 21. "The legislation would crack down on the ability of lower-court judges to issue far-reaching injunctions. That is seen by Speaker Mike Johnson and other House Republican leaders as a viable outlet as they sort out the way forward on the judicial impeachments that have been endorsed by Trump and his billionaire ally Elon Musk. A spokesperson for Johnson said the speaker and the Judiciary Committee are reviewing 'all available options.… to address this urgent matter.'"

Hill, Fuchs and Carney continued, "House Republicans have filed impeachment resolutions targeting four district judges, including one this week targeting the jurist who sought to block Trump's effort to deport alleged gang members to El Salvador.… But there is widespread recognition inside the House GOP that impeachments — besides being costly in time and political capital — do not have the votes to succeed given Republicans' narrow majority. That has prompted GOP hardliners to back-channel with Trump allies on alternatives they could push across the House floor."

House Republicans, according to the Politico journalists, "are also discussing one-off resolutions condemning recent judicial rulings against Trump."

"House Judiciary Committee Chair Jim Jordan's team has privately advised that members' offices are free to share their opinions on legislative strategy around the courts but that Jordan himself intends to stick to a more vague approach, saying everything is on the table, according to one Republican Hill aide," Hill, Fuchs and Carney explain. "There is, however, a particular interest in restricting the authority of federal district judges to hand down nationwide injunctions, according to four Republicans familiar with the matter."

*Read the full Politico article at this link.

AN 3 25

In a short few weeks, President Donald Trump has upended many core parts and functions of the U.S. government. He dismantled the U.S. Agency for International Development and fired thousands of government employees. He has also fired several inspectors general and board members of independent agencies.*

Additionally, Trump’s administration has violated court orders to unfreeze federal funding. And Trump has issued an unprecedented number of executive orders, including one that aims to end the practice of birthright citizenship, something that is guaranteed by the plain text of the U.S. Constitution.*

Legal experts have said that all of these actions and more are leading up to, or have already sparked, a constitutional crisis.*

There is not one clear definition of what a constitutional crisis actually is. And, as constitutional law scholar Jeffrey Schmitt explains in an interview with Amy Lieberman, politics and society editor at The Conversation U.S., there is also no comparable historical example for Trump’s exercise of executive power.*

Why are some people calling what is currently underway a constitutional crisis?

I think legal experts are concerned that Trump is expanding executive power beyond anything we have known in American history. And as executive power continues to expand, we may eventually hit a tipping point that threatens the structure of the government, as laid out in the Constitution.

If the Constitution has one central feature, it is the separation of powers. The Constitution divides power between the states and the federal government, and federal power is divided between the three branches of government – the executive, judicial and legislative.

Now, Trump appears to be taking over Congress’ core powers, including taxing and spending. Typically, Congress passes a budget, and the president can sign or veto the bill. Once the budget is passed into law, the president cannot refuse to spend the allocated money.

There is some history to this. President Richard Nixon refused in the 1970s to spend money Congress had appropriated, and the U.S. Supreme Court then ordered the federal government to spend the money. Federal law now prohibits what’s called “impoundment.”

How is Trump challenging these laws now?

Trump is freezing spending on things he does not support politically, like foreign aid. He also is trying to place new conditions on the disbursement of federal funds as a way to control state and private institutions. For example, a recent letter from his administration threatens to withhold federal funding from schools that do not abandon DEI programs.

Trump has also fired top officials at independent agencies such as a member of the independent National Labor Relations Board, when federal law and Supreme Court precedent indicate that he has no constitutional authority to do so. He has also fired agency watchdogs without following legal requirements to give Congress 30 days notice. When he fired most USAID employees and froze the agency’s foreign aid payments, he shuttered an entire agency established by Congress.

And his firing of thousands of federal workers isn’t just about who works in government – cuts like this make an agency unable to perform its mission.

The federal courts are intervening in some cases, but they are blocking only a small fraction of the president’s actions.

Are there other times in history the country has come close to a constitutional crisis?

President Abraham Lincoln and President Franklin Delano Roosevelt both led the country during periods of constitutional change, and they both clashed with the Supreme Court.

Slavery in the federal territories was the constitutional crisis that precipitated the Civil War. This issue dominated politics throughout the 1850s because people thought it would determine the future of slavery as new states were admitted to the Union. When Congress was unable to reach an agreement, the Supreme Court held that it was unconstitutional for Congress to prohibit slavery in the territories in the infamous case of Dred Scott v. Sandford.

But opposition to the expansion of slavery was the unifying principle of the young Republican Party. So, during the election of 1860, Lincoln argued that Dred Scott was not binding on the country because it was not settled precedent. He acknowledged, though, that the court’s decisions are binding in the case before it.

When Lincoln campaigned for president in 1860, he promised to appoint judges who would overrule Dred Scott and to work with Congress to ban slavery in the territories. When Lincoln realized that constitutional change was necessary, he worked tirelessly to get the Thirteenth Amendment, which abolished slavery, ratified in 1865.

Franklin Roosevelt also worked within the constitutional system to expand the role of the federal government in the New Deal, a series of domestic public works programs in the 1930s. When the Supreme Court ruled against early New Deal programs, FDR complained that the justices were old and out of touch.

So Roosevelt in 1937 proposed packing the Supreme Court with new justices in a transparent attempt to push the court into accepting his broad reading of federal power. This proposed change never became law, but the Supreme Court changed its views on federal power at roughly the same time, ending the crisis. The country overwhelmingly supported the New Deal’s expansion of federal power in several national elections.

President Donald Trump and Speaker of the House Mike Johnson appear at an event in Miami on Jan. 27, 2025.Mandel Ngan/AFP via Getty Images

How does today’s situation involving Trump differ?

Unlike Lincoln or Roosevelt, Trump is trying to seize the powers of Congress and unilaterally transform the federal government. Roosevelt worked with Congress to pass legislation and eventually convince the Supreme Court to accept his views. And while Lincoln rejected the court’s proslavery reading of the Constitution, Trump may be rejecting its central feature – the structural balance of power.

Can the country resolve this crisis?

Aside from Trump deciding to change course, there is not much that can be done. Courts can issue orders, but they do not have a military and cannot easily enforce them.

Congress has the power to remove the president, via impeachment. As we learned during Trump’s first term, however, impeachment is not easy.

If the president decides to ignore the courts – and Congress continues to do nothing – the final constitutional check on Trump’s power will be the next federal election.

Jeffrey Schmitt, Professor of Law, *University of Dayton

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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AN 2 25

One of the longest tenured members of the U.S. Senate is now suggesting Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk is more powerful than all of Congress.

According to a Tuesday report in Politico, Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), who chairs the powerful Senate Judiciary Committee, said that Musk and his "Department of Government Efficiency," or DOGE (which Congress has not yet made an official federal agency) is free to make sweeping changes to how federal money is spent and that the legislative branch has no ability to interfere.

"Congress can’t do anything except complain about it," Grassley told RadioIowa, arguing that DOGE's actions fall under the umbrella of the executive branch.

"This is an executive branch decision that, who works for the executive branch is determined by the president of the United States,” the Iowa Republican continued. “The Constitution says all executive power of the federal government shall be vested, and that’s the word that’s used, vested in the office of the presidency.”

While Grassley is correct in that Article II of the U.S. Constitution designates certain powers to the executive branch, Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution explicitly grants the power of the purse to Congress. Specifically, the nation's founding documents grants the legislative branch the "Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States."

Despite arguing that he couldn't stop DOGE's budget cuts and the administration's mass firings of federal workers, the Judiciary Committee chairman offered his sympathies for longtime federal employees who lost their jobs. He called it "a tragedy for people that are getting laid off."

"Going out looking for a job after having a job for 10 years is not an easy thing to do," Grassley told RadioIowa.

Click here to read Politico's full report,, and click here to read Grassley's comments to RadioIowa.

===

AN 2 25

President Donald Trump, Vice President JD Vance, Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) head Elon Musk, and White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt are claiming that federal courts have no business blocking Trump's executive orders. Doing so, they argue, is an attack on the powers that the federal government's executive branch enjoys under the U.S. Constitution.

Musk is even calling for federal judges to be impeached by Congress if they interfere with Trump's agenda. And Vance, in a February 9 post on the Musk-owned X.com (formerly Twitter), posted, "If a judge tried to tell a general how to conduct a military operation, that would be illegal. If a judge tried to command the attorney general in how to use her discretion as a prosecutor, that's also illegal. Judges aren't allowed to control the executive's legitimate power."

But Trump's critics — a combination of Democrats, legal scholars and Never Trump conservatives— are countering that in fact, the U.S. Constitution doesn't give the executive branch nearly as much power as he is claiming. The Constitution, according to those critics, provides a system of checks and balances that gives the government's judicial and legislative branches every right to push back against a sitting president.

READ MORE:[MAGA's 'chaotic attempt to shut down' USAID put $500 million of food supplies at risk — and more

The New York Times' Mattathias Schwartz, in an article published on February 15, examines a "radical" far-right legal theory that, critics say, greatly exaggerates the amount of power the government's executive branch enjoys under the U.S. Constitution.

"Federal judges have issued preliminary orders that block some of the (Trump) Administration's most aggressive assertions of power: a freeze on as much as $3 trillion in federal spending, the termination of the 14th Amendment's guarantee to birthright citizenship, the firing of civil servants before the end of their statutorily defined terms, the forced transfer of trans women in prison to men's facilities and the turnover of sensitive data and systems to a newly minted quasi-agency headed by Elon Musk," Schwartz explains. "More than 60 lawsuits have been filed against the second Trump Administration — more than two for each day that the president has been in office. Many of the plaintiffs allege that the Trump Administration's actions are ultra vires, literally 'beyond the powers,' meaning that Mr. Trump has wielded power in ways that go beyond his lawful authority."

If the second Trump Administration decides that it is "the constitutionally designated arbiter of the limits on its own authorities" and decides to "ignore judicial rulings," Schwartz warns, it "would represent an extreme rupture to the constitutional order."

The New York Times reporter notes, "Mr. Vance is among an increasing number of elected Republicans who are influenced by new strains of conservative legal thought that entail a radical reinterpretation of the Constitution, particularly the powers it bestows on the president…. A group of right-wing thinkers is putting forward a new set of doctrines: Call it 'post-originalism.'"

"Post-originalism," according to Schwartz, envisions an extremely powerful executive branch and is decidedly more "radical" than traditional conservative legal ideas.

"It is hard to find much precedent for this moment," Schwartz explains. "President Nixon's behavior caused grave tensions between the three branches of government, but the buildup was protracted and gradual. Presidents Jackson and Lincoln both ignored important court rulings, according to the Federal Judicial Center. But those prior instances of presidential recalcitrance — just two, spread out over 248 years — were narrow. Mr. Vance hints at something very different: wholesale ultra vires executive-branch impunity. That idea is increasingly part of the Republican mainstream."

READ MORE:[DC insider warns: Trump’s 'big ego' and foreign policy blunders put US in 'very dangerous position'

*ReadMattathias Schwartz's full New York Times article at this link (subscription required).

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mma

### Daily Wire host: “When a judicial coup is underway, a response is necessary”

02/12/25 2:29 PM EST

### Newsmax guest: “There needs to be a new project started in the House of Representatives, and that's to start getting names of federal district court judges who need to be impeached”

02/12/25

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npr but voted for horrible noms?

an 2 25

Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) is diverging from many Republican lawmakers by arguing that Congress needs to stand up to President Donald Trump as he overrides their authority, Alaska Public Media reported Wednesday.

“To have the executive basically come in and dismantle something that was legislatively created — that's outside the bounds of the executive,” she said. “So it requires us, in the legislative branch, to then assert our responsibility, which is to not cede the authority.”

“You got to claim it back,” she added.

Murkowski has earned a reputation as a moderate who will challenge Trump and can act as an important swing vote. She voted to convict Trump in his second impeachment trial after the January 6, 2021 Capitol insurrection and didn't rule out leaving the party last year. She rebuffed his proposal to buy Greenland, and she voted against his pick for Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. However, more recently, she has voiced her support for controversial Trump nominees Robert Kennedy, Jr. and Tulsi Gabbard.

As for how to stand up to Trump, Murkowski offered a possible example in the form of Congressional earmarks, when legislation directs funding to a specific recipient. She called it “Ia small example of, I think, some of the steps that have to be taken to say that these authorities are the Congress’ and to push back."

Another option, she continued, would be a lawsuit. Alaska Public Media's Liz Ruskin wrote: “Ultimately, the Supreme Court could tell Trump not to tread on the authority of Congress."

But this approach only works if Trump allows it to -- something experts have pointed to as a potential constitutional crisis.

“You're now having some in the executive branch saying, ‘We don't think the courts should be deciding this. We think that this is our authority,'" Murkowski said. “You then call into question the legitimacy of your courts ... That's not a recipe for good governance.”

Murkowski expanded on this idea to reporters Tuesday: “We have a judicial system. If you don’t like the ruling, you can appeal the ruling and you can follow that through. But we are a nation of laws, and it is not necessarily for you or I to be the final arbiter here. This is why we entrust the judiciary with this responsibility,” she said.

Click here to read Alaska Public Media's full report.

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sotomayor

Supreme Court justice sounds alarm over executive power grab as Trump launches attack on judiciary

an 2 25

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no lnx

It's a crime spree — not a 'constitutional crisis'

John Stoehr February 10, 2025

The Justice Department has asked a judge to stop or amend another judge’s order, issued Saturday, that blocks Elon Musk from accessing the Treasury Department’s payment systems. The DOJ’s move came after Donald Trump’s allies openly questioned the constitutional authority of independent judges.

“Officials ranging from billionaire Elon Musk to Vice President JD Vance have not only criticized a federal judge’s decision early Saturday that blocks Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency from accessing Treasury Department records, but have also attacked the legitimacy of judicial oversight, a fundamental pillar of American democracy, which is based on the separation of powers,” the Associated Press reported.

“If a judge tried to tell a general how to conduct a military operation, that would be illegal. If a judge tried to command the attorney general in how to use her discretion as a prosecutor, that’s also illegal. Judges aren’t allowed to control the executive’s legitimate power,” Vance said.

Vance is lying, but lying is beside the point.

The point is that the Trump administration appears to be preparing to defy the courts, thus triggering what US Senator Chris Murphy called “the most serious constitutional crisis the country has faced, certainly since Watergate.” He went on: “The president is attempting to seize control of power, and for corrupt purposes … he’s trying to crush his opposition … this is a red alert moment … our democracy is at risk.”

With due respect to my senator, I think we’re passed that. Trump is already defying the courts, and as result, we are already beyond “a constitutional crisis” and in some other stage of decline and fall.

According to a motion filed Friday by 23 state attorneys general, all Democrats, the Trump administration has not complied with an order to stop a federal funding freeze that was implemented last month.

Two weeks ago, the White House Office of Management and Budget issued a memo that froze as much as $3 trillion, including Medicaid.

States sued. Some federal judges handed down injunctions, pending litigation. In response, the White House said it withdrew the memo, but according to these state AGs, the federal funding freeze didn’t stop.

In their motion, AGs allege that “despite the court’s order, defendants have failed to resume disbursing federal funds in multiple respects.” They ask that the administration be ordered “to immediately restore funds and desist from the federal funding pause until the preliminary injunction motion can be heard and decided, a process which is proceeding expeditiously in separate proceedings before this court.”

NOW READ: Trump is already out gaming America's last line of defense

According to journalist Jennifer Shutt, the AGs allege that:

the Trump administration hasn’t begun distributing billions of dollars in funding that Congress approved in the Inflation Reduction Act or the bipartisan infrastructure law.

the NIH “abruptly cancelled an advisory committee review meeting with Brown University’s School of Public Health for a $71 million grant on dementia care research, saying ‘all federal advisory committee meetings had been cancelled.’”

Head Start programs were unable to access funds.

The CDC “renewed stop work orders to a University of Washington program doing global HIV prevention work.”

Connecticut AG William Tong said in a statement that “President Trump is not complying with the court order and continues to defund states. Let’s be clear about what Donald Trump wants to do — Donald Trump wants to defund Connecticut schools. He wants to defund the police. He wants to defund Connecticut highways. He is defunding energy assistance right now in defiance of a court order when so many Connecticut families are desperate for relief. He is defunding Connecticut efforts to reduce our reliance on foreign oil and fossil fuels. He is defying the rule of law and daring courts to stop him.”

US Senator Patty Murray, of Washington, released a briefing on areas in which the administration continues to illegally withhold funding. “President Trump is continuing to block hundreds of billions of dollars in funding from making its way out to families and communities across America who are counting on investments that have been signed into law. While he withdrew his blanket funding freeze — the disastrous [Office of Management and Budget] memo — in the face of nationwide backlash, Trump has so far refused to withdraw the various executive orders he has signed that are illegally freezing enacted funding.”

Murphy said: “the president wants to be able to decide how and where money is spent so that he can reward his political friends and he can punish his political enemies. That is the evisceration of democracy. You stand that with the wholesale endorsement of political violence, with the pardons given to every single Jan. 6 rioter, including the most violence, who beat police officers over the head with baseball bats, and you can see what he’s trying to do here. He’s trying to crush his opposition by making them afraid of losing federal funding, by making them afraid of physical violence. So yes, this is a red-alert moment.”

Today, the federal judge who originally blocked Trump’s federal funding freeze sided with the Democratic state AGs, saying that there’s “evidence that some federal grants and loans are still not going out to the recipients.” He ordered that the money be released immediately.

Let’s hope he does, but don’t count it.

Donald Trump has already robbed the first branch of government of its constitutional authority – “the power of the purse.” Now he’s begun robbing the third branch, too. He isn’t leading “a constitutional crisis.”

Just four weeks in, we’re well beyond that.

===

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AN 2 25

In 2023, then-Sen. JD Vance (R-Ohio) doubled down on his position that presidents should disobey federal court rulings — even from the Supreme Court — if they contradict the actions of the president. Now as vice president, Vance may be advising President Donald Trump to do exactly that.

In a Tuesday article, Politico's Ian Ward reprinted excerpts of an interview he conducted with Vance shortly after he was sworn in as Ohio's junior U.S. senator. In that interview, Vance defended comments he made in a 2021 podcast in which he said Trump should "fire every single midlevel bureaucrat, [and] every civil servant in the administrative state" if reelected. He then argued that if the courts intervened to stop those firings, Trump should "stand before the country like Andrew Jackson did and say: ‘The chief justice has made his ruling. Now let him enforce it.'"

Ward recalled that when asking Vance if he still held that view, he responded: "Yup." And Vance communicated over the weekend that he still holds this viewpoint, writing in a Sunday tweet: "Judges aren't allowed to control the executive's legitimate power."

Ward pointed out that should Trump appeal a decision against him all the way to the Supreme Court, and if the High Court upheld the lower courts' ruling and Trump disregarded it, it would provoke "a full-fledged constitutional crisis of a different sort, one that would entirely upend the existing rules governing the separation of powers between the courts and the executive branch."

"Although there is some historical precedent for a president defying a Supreme Court order, no showdown between the executive branch and the judiciary has risen to the level of crisis that would follow a move of the sort that Vance is suggesting," Ward wrote. "As several legal commentators have pointed out in response to Vance’s post, the ability to determine the constitutionality and legality of executive action is core to the courts’ power, meaning that denying them of that authority would profoundly upset the constitutional system of checks and balances as currently understood."

And as Yale Law Professor Akhil Reed Amar said in a Tuesday segment on CNN, the Andrew Jackson quote Vance referenced is "apocryphal," meaning its origins are hazy and that it's unlikely Jackson ever made such a statement. In fact, while Jackson disagreed with the Supreme Court's ruling in the 1832 Worcester v. Georgia case, he ultimately stated that the Court's orders were final and that presidents were duty-bound to abide by them.

The Trump administration appears to already be testing the waters of the judiciary's enforcement mechanisms. On Tuesday, a top Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) official instructed FEMA's Office of Grant Administration to withhold millions of dollars in Department of Homeland Security grant money despite a federal judge ordering that those funds be disbursed, as Congress already appropriated the money in question.

Click here to read Ward's full article in Politico.

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