DOJ 3

SEE LAWFARE TRUMP RETALIATION FASCISM 6 // FBI 3 KASH BONDI

WHAT EVIDENCE MILLER INFLUENCE?

NO MERRI

SEE CLIMATE LAWSUIT SHIELD LAW SUPERFUND TRUMP XO

see FBI 3

SEE BIG LIE GASLIGHT KRAKEN ED FUCKING MARTIN GEORGIA

SEE VOTER SUPPRESSION GOP STEAL ELECTION

HARMEET D QUITS 11 26

see ILLEGal voter fraud fail 8 26 gave data to dhs illegally

SEE LEGAL SUPPRESSION EG ELECTION OFFICIALS HARMEET

see FASCISM ~ RULE OF LAW DEFY CT ORDER

SEE ACTIV SUPPRESS PPL LOSE 1ST AMEND

SEE RENEE GOOD FAIL

SEE PRESS SUPPRESSION LEMON ARREST

SEE ED FUCKING MARTIN pardon trump coup liars 11 25 TRUMP SLUSH FUND

see FAIL 5 PIRRO kelly grand jury zip big law cave 3 26

SEE RESIGN PROTEST

SEE JUDGE FORUM SHOPPING AILEEN CANNON BRENNAN 12 25

see DEI WOKE CORPS

SEE DISBAR ABA DISCIPLINARY ETHICS ED FUCKING MARTIN 3 26

ROBT LEVY EXXON LIAR REV DOOR RENAME DEPT ENVIRO--> ENERGY

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AN 11 26

Before she left the Justice Department, Harmeet Dhillon launched the prosecution of several Americans who protested in a Minneapolis church, as well as the reporters there who covered the protest. She claimed that she brought the suit through the Civil Rights Division at the Department of Justice because those involved were anti-Christian. A court filing flips that argument on its head.

Nekima Levy Armstrong submitted a supplement to the record on Tuesday, making it clear that the threats the Justice Department alleges she was making were actually quotes from the Bible.

National security analyst Marcy Wheeler spotted the detail in the new filing that alleges the DOJ not only misquoted what Levy Armstrong said, but also appeared to miss that it was based in Christian teachings.

Levy Armstrong is alleged to have said, "The time for judgment has come," which was used to support the DOJ's claim that she was issuing a threat.

"A review of the grand jury testimony of pastor Parnell indicates that the Superseding Indictment inaccurately paraphrased the alleged statement and took it out of context," said the filing.

Parnell testified, "And then she [Levy Armstrong] said, 'We're, we're here to bring judgment and judgment begins in the House of God,' which I recognize as quoting scripture from 1st Peter 4."

The quote Parnell was referring to from 1 Peter 4 reads, "For it is time for judgment to begin with God's household; and 1 if it begins with us, what will the outcome be for those who do not obey the gospel of God?"

He made it clear that he viewed the comment from her as her quoting scripture, not as her making a threat.

The filing also said that the government is alleging that Levy Armstrong said that she was a Christian and there to bring judgment.

Parnell said he "felt compelled to publicly rebuke her for that. So I said to her, 'Shame on you, shame on you to do this. This is the House of God. We're here to worship and you may leave.'"

Levy Armstrong's lawyer explained that she denies saying this. "Further, none of the audio recordings of the interaction between Parnell and Levy Armstrong provided by the government or obtained by the defense include such a statement. The defense, however, accepts that the question of whether she made the statement is a factual issue that cannot be resolved by the Court at this time."

The filing also said that she never heard Parnell ask her to leave the church and that none of the audio recordings from the government appear to have captured Parnell saying this either.

"The defense, however, accepts that the question of whether he made the statement is a factual issue that cannot be resolved by the Court at this time," the filing added again.

The filing goes on to say that there is a big difference between someone declaring "the time for judgment has come" and "we are here to bring judgment and judgment begins in the House of God."

The lawyers explain that the statement from the Gospel indicates that judgment ultimately comes from God and that the demonstrators weren't there to impose any kind of punishment.

Wheeler pointed out that there are several times that the Civil Rights Division of the DOJ appeared to miss that the Christians were quoting scripture back and forth with each other. So, accusing them of being anti-Christian or specifically targeting Christians to commit a hate crime doesn't hold up.

Parnell also doesn't state that it was a threat in his testimony; it was a conclusion made by the government. In fact, he didn't feel so threatened that he could publicly rebuke Leavy Armstrong from the pulpit.

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TOLD JUDGE IN nw NO LONGER HAVE PROSEC TO SEND TO [DEPORT?] HEARINGS?

AN 11 26

Bloomberg Law reports political appointees across the Justice Department are scrambling for exits due to fears that their associations with a Trump agenda that voters resoundingly rejected will “tank their careers,” said current and former Trump DOJ officials.

“There are people who realized things have fundamentally changed in the country, and if that’s the direction the president wants to go, they’re not as aligned anymore — partly because that’s not the direction America is going and also because they need to work,” said one former Trump DOJ official, describing discussions with multiple current appointees.

President Donald Trump’s elevation of advisor Stephen Miller to chief of staff has fueled further distress, reports Bloomberg, spurring a rash of sudden calls to private sector friends and associates for quick employment advice, according to some of the officials.

“The handful of officials spoke anonymously about sensitive deliberations that reflect a grim mood at department headquarters, where Attorney General Todd Blanche and his inner circle are bracing for bruising congressional oversight,” reports Bloomberg. “The mid-level aides and senior leaders seeking off-ramps are poised to accelerate what’s already been a rapid exodus of four Senate-confirmed DOJ officials since Democrats dominated the midterms.

Sources said there’s been “a new flurry of department politicals seeking career help in the past week.”

Bloomberg reports Kiersten Pels dismissed source claims.

“The resounding truth is that the vast majority of political appointees at the Department are proud to work here,” Pels said, and cited a “record number of prosecutions” and reduced crime.

However, DOJ’s Civil Division leader Brett Shumate abandoned his post Monday and legislative affairs chief Patrick Davis leapt from the building last month, even as national security head John Eisenberg, left with help.

“For those remaining, there’s trepidation about the future because of DOJ head Todd Blanche,” reports Bloomberg. “… As Republicans contemplate their party’s post-Trump future, some DOJ lawyers worry their professional reputations and earnings potential will suffer if they don’t distance themselves, … officials said.”

And those who have already made the great leap from the Trump administration to the private sector are suddenly fielding calls to help other DOJ types land employment.

“One recent department leader now in the private sector described receiving texts from about five DOJ political appointees seeking career advice in recent days. Several other department veterans of both Trump administrations observed similar outreach,” reports Bloomberg.

There also appears to be a split between generally younger, MAGA-aligned lawyers fresh from conservative think tanks or Republican state attorneys general offices, who are embracing Trump and Blanche’s upcoming post-midterm fight with Democratic oversight, but others with thicker resumes and solid careers “recognize their bar licenses could be on the line, depending on what’s ordered of them or what’s disclosed on Capitol Hill, some of the officials said.”

“At least a few are considering purchasing professional liability insurance — a longstanding protection many DOJ attorneys have — said one senior administration official,” reports Bloomberg.

The sudden desertion is sure to cause problems with the administration, which is already having problems keeping the DOJ stocked with competent lawyers. After the midterms, some recent recruits even “rescinded their acceptances” from the Trump administration, according to a person familiar with internal department dynamics.

“It might not be possible to keep up with the heavy workloads, and they’re going to make mistakes,” said Rod Rosenstein, deputy attorney general in Trump’s first term.

Trump’s DOJ suffers 28th defeat in battle for Americans’ voter data

Trump faces mounting legal disaster that’s just the 'tip of the iceberg'

Judge issues swift order in response to reports Trump is destroying docs

Trump suffers unanimous court defeat over illegal firing of VOA chief

Reagan judge delivers stinging rebuke over Trump DOJ’s secret records grab

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an 11 26

Brett Shumate, head of the Justice Department’s Civil Division, resigned on Monday. He is the most recent of several Senate-confirmed DOJ leaders to depart in the wake of last week’s midterm elections, which saw the GOP suffer huge losses.

In a _{statement on X}_, Attorney General Todd Blanche said he accepted the departure: “Today I accepted the resignation of Assistant Attorney General Brett Shumate of the Civil Division. Under his leadership, the Division pursued important affirmative litigation to challenge sanctuary policies and delivered key wins in lawsuits against local policies that endangered federal law enforcement. The Division also secured historic settlements to end illegal corporate DEI practices and shuttered dozens of clinics which were providing so-called ‘gender affirming care’ to minors. We are grateful for Brett’s service at DOJ and wish him continued success.”

Shumate, a former member of the Justice Department under Trump’s first term, ran a division that went after local governments uncooperative with the administration’s immigration hard line, as well as healthcare clinics for transgender minors and corporate diversity programs, _{according to Reuters}_. In court, he has also put up a defense for Trump’s move to strip citizenship from naturalized immigrants.

Last month, the department went after 40 naturalized Americans in what Blanche called the “largest denaturalization effort in modern history.”

“Every single one of these individuals lied their way into U.S. citizenship,” Shumate said, _{according to The New Republic}_.

Shumate also defended the administration’s push to give the U.S. Postal Service a role in overseeing mail-in ballots, NBC News reported. He likewise had a hand in the decision to let planes carrying alleged Tren de Aragua members land in El Salvador last year despite a judge’s order to the contrary.

The Civil Division, like others in the DOJ, has seen its ranks thin out since Trump’s reelection two years back, even in the unit tasked with defending the president’s policies in court. Lately, the division under Shumate has been offering signing bonuses as high as $25,000.

What prompted Shumate to resign remains unclear. He joins other senior officials who have moved on of late: Harmeet Dhillon of the Civil Rights Division, John Eisenberg of National Security, and U.S. attorney Jason Reding Quiñones, who oversaw probes into past criminal investigations of Trump.

The exits come as Democrats prepare to take over Congress in January with plans to investigate Trump and his administration.

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cnn yahoo 11 26

Three high-profile officials have resigned from the Justice Department in the days since the midterms, including Jason Reding Quiñones, the senior federal prosecutor who led a sprawling investigation into President Donald Trump's political foes.

Quiñones resigned from his position as the US Attorney in Southern Florida under pressure from department leadership, despite his willingness to pursue some of the most controversial investigations desired by the president, according to sources familiar with the matter.

John Eisenberg, who led the department's National Security Division, also announced his resignation Friday, and Harmeet Dhillon left her post as the head of the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division on Thursday.

The turnover at the Justice Department had been expected for weeks for a variety of reasons. With the anticipated midterm outcome, some officials are expected to return to lucrative law firm jobs while the second Trump administration still has two years remaining in office.

With Democrats now poised to have oversight control and launch investigations, some top Justice Department officials believe the firebrands inside the Justice Department could be more of a liability.

Blanche has sought to try to restore control over the department, with some officials like Quiñones and Dhillon viewed as causing problems by making high-profile promises that they couldn't deliver on. Democrats aren't likely to lose interest in investigating the actions of Dhillon and Quiñones despite their departure.

The resignations could be a challenge for the administration, which is expected to have trouble confirming new officials with a Democratic Senate. But the president could install acting leaders to do the job for the rest of his term.

The man behind a sprawling 'grand conspiracy probe

Attorney General Todd Blanche announced Quiñones departure in a social media post Friday, saying that the department is "grateful for Jason's leadership."

Quiñones being pushed out in Miami deals what may be the final blow to the Justice Department's ongoing effort prosecute a wide swath of Trump's perceived political enemies as part of a so-called "grand conspiracy."

During his year-long tenure, Quiñones' office won one of the most consequential criminal indictments brought by the Trump Justice Department: The indictment against former Cuban President Raúl Castro.

Trump to nominate Texas Supreme Court justice who lost election to federal bench

Reuters

But other antics left him on the outs with department leadership. Quiñones was behind the effort to use a grand jury in Fort Pierce, Florida, to pursue investigations of former government officials who were involved in probes of Trump and his campaign from 2016 to 2024.

He promised that his office could bring the case within months against former government officials who were involved in probes of Trump and his campaign from 2016 to 2024, top Justice officials blamed him when those plans failed to materialize.

And Quiñones frequently traveled outside his district, often to Washington, DC, which only reminded top DOJ officials of his failure to produce a big case he had promised.

In the Miami US Attorney's Office on Friday, Blanche's announcement came as a shock. Many were in the dark about Quiñones seeming rapid fall from grace, according to people familiar with matter.

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AN 11 26

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an 11 26

President Donald Trump and his top supporters have repeatedly been embarrassed in their attempts to prosecute Jack Smith, the official who himself prosecuted Trump for alleged crimes involving his election denial and document theft scandal.s. Yet even as Trump and his team fail to nab Smith over and over and over again, they continue to take swings at the lawman whose prosecutions against them apparently got under their skin.

Now his Justice Department is literally running scared of Smith.

"Trump DOJ runs scared from Jack Smith," AllRiseNews editor-in-chief Adam Klasfield posted on X on Monday. "Citing regs concerning "current or former employees," DOJ tries to block BBC from deposing Smith about Trump and the Jan. 6 insurrection. Smith agreed to testify."

Klasfield continued, "It cites grand jury secrecy, classified info privilege, exec privilege & more."

"Upon consideration of your request, the Department rejects it," the Justice Department wrote in a filing regarding the BBC's request to subpoena information about Smith from their ongoing cases with him. "Specifically, your request is denied because the testimony you seek is subject to the grand-jury-secrecy privilege, classified information privilege, law enforcement privilege, and executive privilege. See id. § 16.26(a)(2) (“In deciding whether to make disclosures pursuant to a demand, Department officials and attorneys should consider . . . [w]hether such disclosure is appropriate under the relevant substantive law concerning privilege.”). To the extent that the testimony you seek encompasses non-privileged information, Mr. Smith’s extensive public testimonies and report are adequate substitutes. Additionally, your request is denied because the deposition of Mr. Smith—a former high-ranking government official—would impose an undue burden on Mr. Smith and the Department."

Later, they further elaborated on why they did not want Smith to testify.

"The sought testimony pertains to information obtained by Mr. Smith in his former role as Special Counsel for the Department," the Justice Department argued. "You have not met your burden of establishing the presence of “extraordinary circumstances” to justify your request. See FDIC v. Galan-Alvarez, 2015 WL 5602342, at *3 (D.D.C. Sep. 4, 2015) (explaining that the party seeking the testimony of the high-ranking government official bears the burden of showing “extraordinary circumstances”). Extraordinary circumstances exist if “the official has unique firsthand knowledge related to the litigated claims or that the necessary information cannot be obtained through other, less burdensome or intrusive means.” Id. at *3 (citation omitted). As noted above, you have not shown that Mr. Smith has “unique firsthand knowledge,” of the events of January 6, 2021."

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HUH? 9TH

AN 11 26

President Donald Trump has long warred with the courts, and in particular the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals. Yet in a shocking decision, the 9th Circuit flip-flopped from an initial decision to bar Trump from intimidating election workers to allowing him to do precisely that.

"To recap: in the space of 12 hours, during which election-day voting started, the 9th Cir. issued a panel decision blocking a TRO stopping Trump admin interference with CA election workers, vacated that panel decision, then reinstated that panel decision," wrote journalist Gabriel Malor on Bluesky on Tuesday. "Purcell? I don't know her. How could this happen? A majority of the 29 active judges in the 9th Cir. voted for en banc rehearing, which vacated the panel decision. Then, the newly-constituted en banc panel, which is only 11 judges, voted to reinstate the panel decision. Crazy."

He added, "This could only happen in the 9th Cir. which uses en banc panels bc actually seating the entire bench is impracticable. This does present an excellent case for breaking up the 9th Cir."

One judge issued a blistering dissertation from the 9th Circuit's decision.

"With the election underway, Defendants insist they must be free to use their prosecutorial powers to do what they could not through their applications for injunctions in this court and the Supreme Court," Judge Mary H. Murguia wrote in her dissent on Tuesday. "But the federal executive has no right to dictate election procedures to the states. And if Defendants cannot dictate these procedures directly, then they likewise cannot dictate them by subjecting vulnerable election workers to baseless—but chilling—threats of federal prosecution. The Constitution’s allocation of election procedures to the states is meaningless if Defendants can coerce states into foregoing their chosen procedures by abusing their prosecutorial powers."

“What they all add up to is a desire to avoid any accountability to the voters in the midterm elections — to ensure, to preordain the outcome of a midterm that he thinks is going to go badly for him,” Dan Vicuña, Senior Policy Director for Voting and Fair Representation at Common Cause, told AlterNet in June. “We know, from the Big Lie of the 2020 election to spurring on a violent revolt to overthrow a free and fair election, that he has no respect for democratic norms, for the voice of the people. This is entirely about his own power and his own ego. He will even invest in protecting that ego and protecting his power at the expense of the needs of the public. People are suffering with high gas prices and affordability issues, and he does not care. All that matters is protecting his power, and he has no interest in whether he does that through democratic means.”

Vicuña went on, “I think this all adds up to a desire to ensure that his party stays in power and his ability to do what he wants — to attack vulnerable communities — remains intact.”

He also speculated that the administration's election meddling is illegal.

“I think some of these attempts to federalize, to nationalize elections are clearly illegal,” Vicuña explained. “You've seen some of that overreach already struck down — attempts to order independent agencies to force a strict voter ID requirement on people. That has been rejected. Common Cause is in court challenging the latest executive order to turn the United States Postal Service into some election administration agency and to create a further bureaucratic layer to make it more difficult to vote by mail. In terms of the president's authority to order around USPS, it's illegal. In terms of USPS's authority to become some sort of national election administration agency, it far exceeds the legal authority that Congress gave to the postal service. The statute describing what kind of work the postal service would do is about postal service work — processing mail and selling stamps. It has nothing to do with election administration.”

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SCOTUS UNSIGNED ONE LINER DENIED CERT ON ALASKA? CA?

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an 10 26

New York Times Justice Department and F.B.I. reporter Devlin Barrett says it takes more than a vengeance-driven president to prosecute his personal grievances against people he thinks have crossed him. It also takes enablers with law degrees who are willing to soak those degrees to pursue Trump’s agenda.

Barrett is ready to name-check the worst of them.

“At least eight current U.S. attorneys have played prominent roles in pushing Mr. Trump’s grievances, often citing thin evidence that has subsequently led many of their cases to collapse,’ reports Barrett. “Three of those are running their offices without Senate confirmation.”

Minnesota AG Daniel Rosen is first up on Barrett’s hit list, being a man who has “aggressively pursued cases” against people in Minneapolis who protested the administration’s immigration policies and helped oversee investigations into Rep. Ilhan Omar, a Minnesota Democrat whom Trump has vowed to deport.

Rosen, said Barrett, is a commercial litigator who had never been a prosecutor, but who jumped to Trump’s marching orders when the president outright told him to “prosecute Ilhan Omar,” according to people familiar with the exchange. Federal agents, as part of an investigation overseen by Rosen’s office, conducted a recent search at Omar’s home in Washington.

John A. Sarcone III is grievance agent No. 2, according to Barrett, for leading “efforts to investigate New York’s attorney general, Letitia James, on the theory that she violated the civil rights of Mr. Trump.”

A federal judge blocked Sarcone in January from overseeing the investigation since he isn’t lawfully serving as acting U.S. attorney, but Barrett says that hasn’t stopped him from sending federal prosecutors to try to wring evidence against James from her hairdresser.

Down in North Carolina, meanwhile, Dan Bishop — again, who has never been a prosecutor — has been tasked to pursue election integrity cases across the country as part of Trump’s hunt for “evidence of mass voter fraud in the 2020 election.” Barrett says he’s seized hundreds of boxes of ballots in Georgia to buttress Trump’s debunked claim of election fraud there.

In Los Angelas, Barrett says Bill Essayli “has pushed to charge cases against anti-Trump protesters, many of which fell apart in court.”

When Trump said “they are trying to steal that election” in California primary, Barrett said Essayli dutifully followed Trump’s orders and began a search, despite never being confirmed for his role. And according to people familiar with the matter, Essayli insisted on charging a man who had provided face shields to anti-ICE protesters, despite objections from some members of his staff, said Barrett. Essayli’s charges got thrown from court.

And then there’s Jason A. Reding Quiñones in Miami, who has overseen “a centerpiece of Mr. Trump’s retribution campaign,” according to Barrett, a “grand conspiracy” by officials in the Biden and Obama administrations to pursue Trump. While Trump’s crusade has brought few indictments, Barrett said the crusade itself has “end[ed] the prosecutorial careers of many of the lawyers assigned to it.”

“The first two U.S. attorneys were forced out, having displeased senior Trump administration officials by concluding criminal charges were not warranted,” said Barrett.

District of Columbia AG Jeanine Pirro has pursued her own indictments of the president’s critics and “others invoking his ire, even when some of her prosecutors say the evidence does not support charges,” said Barrett.

Her list of failures are racking up, he added, including the indictment of David Hearn, a former Olympic athlete, for felony destruction of the Reflecting Pool.

“In dropping the case, Ms. Pirro’s office claimed that Department of Interior officials withheld key details that would have changed prosecutors’ view of the evidence,” said Barrett. “However, she and her investigators knew even before they went into the grand jury that there was at least one significant evidentiary flaw in their case and barreled ahead anyway, according to court filings by Mr. Hearn’s lawyers.”

And a federal judge also trampled her efforts to subpoena former Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome H. Powell, saying Ms. Pirro’s office had offered “no evidence whatsoever” that he had “committed any crime other than displeasing the president.”

North Carolina’s W. Ellis Boyle is another Trump agent who brought criminal charges against former F.B.I. director James Comey — for posting a photo of seashells.

“Of all the retribution-tinged indictments and investigations that have marked the second Trump term, none has more alarmed or angered longtime Justice Department officials than the one over the seashells photo,” said Barrett. “Senior Trump administration officials tried and failed in mid-2025 to find a prosecutor willing to charge Mr. Comey with threatening the president” with beach photos.

Finally, there’s Chicago AG Andrew Boutros, who Barrett says has managed to flub two dozen of more than 30 criminal cases filed against people for crimes like assaulting a federal agent or resisting a federal agent during the operation.

“I thought it was a crock,” one grand juror told prosecutors. “And I still think it is.”

And even when Boutros nabbed an indictment, a federal judge found the office had mishandled the case and dismissed the charges.

Boutros has yet to be confirmed as AG by the Senate.

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an 10 26

Jeanine Pirro threw FBI director under the bus in new case he demanded

[NEGLECT] JUDGE PO’D

AN 11 26

Trump DOJ crushed in court for threatening to prosecute vote counters

'A bad look': Trump DOJ's aggressive court blitz completely collapses

Trump’s DOJ crushed in two humiliating court losses before Election Day

Federal judge maps out stunning plan to catch Trump officials mid-lie

MAGA’s desperate plot to avert disaster dead on arrival in court: law expert

Insider warns DOJ's 'destruction' will take ‘generations to repair’

'Bad joke': Conservative lawyer obliterates Trump DOJ over shameful filing DAVID FRENCH

Trump’s weaponized DOJ is flailing in court just to save his ego

Trump’s laptop revenge case crushed as judge scolds DOJ

10 26

'What are you doing?' DOJ mocked for questionable slapdash court filing

Court 'not going well' for DOJ as judge presses need to 'correct the record'

Judge lashes out at DOJ lawyer claiming 'executive privilege' on Trump’s posts

The Justice Department is in hot water Friday as they're facing off against a judge who made it clear she's lost all trust in the truthfulness of the government she placed her faith in.

While she began the hearing asking whether the DOJ needed to "correct the record" about any possible misstatements, it didn't get much better from there.

According to courts and justice reporter Chris Geidner, who publishes the "Law Dork" Substack, Judge Reyes called Associate Attorney General Stanley E. Woodward Jr. to the stand to find out who ordered them to circumvent her previous court ruling.

Reyes began by asking Woodward about Trump's statements on Truth Social saying that the course will be closed down on Nov. 15.

“There was not a plan to close the course on Oct. 26," said Woodward.

“You are telling me, even now, that there was no plan even on Oct. 26?" she questioned.

Woodward said he can't "hypothesize."

“I’m not hypothesizing. I’m reading what he wrote," the judge shot back. She read the Truth Social post aloud.

After conferring with those at the lawyer's desk, the ultimate answer was about a “directive,” but Woodward still says he is “reticent to put meaning” behind the president’s words.

The judge asked, "You 'cannot say' what the president meant when he said the course will close on Nov. 15?"

Woodward agreed, saying that it falls within "executive privilege."

"He posted it publicly!" the judge exclaimed. She went on to call it an "extraordinary view of executive privilege."

As the Constitution outlines, executive privilege is the president’s claimed authority to withhold certain confidential executive-branch information from Congress or the courts, especially communications with senior advisers. It is meant to protect candid decision-making, but it is not absolute: courts can require disclosure when another branch’s need for the information — such as in a criminal case — outweighs the confidentiality interest.

As AlterNet previously reported, the ordeal "began on Oct. 12, the federal court brought the White House into court after it chopped down over 430 trees on Hains Point, where the public East Potomac Golf Course is, along with a biking and walking trail and other parks. The judge had told the government that she was to be notified before anything major was done to the island."

As Snopes reported on Oct. 16, that didn't happen. Instead, "the government only [notified] the court minutes prior to close of business on a holiday weekend."

Federal judge orders special investigation into Trump DOJ’s lies

'Constitutional crisis over a golf course': Lawyers floored by Trump case

Federal judge deals Trump admin major blow over Medicaid restrictions

Trump’s 'creeping' defiance faces chilling warning from former judge

'What’s going on?' Lawyers demand answers as Trump moves to subvert courts

Head-scratching Comey legal strategy reveals major internal strife at DOJ

Trump DOJ’s third Comey case faces a make-or-break courtroom test

Newsmax’s Napolitano tears apart DOJ’s Comey ploy: 'There’s no precedent'

DOJ says it filed superseding indictment in error ahead of 'spicy' hearing

Trump’s DOJ faces extraordinary collapse of trust in federal courts

'Can't take the heat': Judges fire back at Trump after he targets colleague

Trump attacks judge who keeps handing him wins

eg many

Judges, which for years have largely been in accord with federal prosecutors, have found themselves having to take remarkable steps to force compliance with Trump administration attorneys and prosecutors. The Trump administration is apparently well aware of judges’ increasingly strong-armed tactics to force compliance out of its defiant attorneys and prosecutors — and they want the hammer to stop dropping, reports Law and Crime.

In February, U.S. District Judge Laura Provinzino held an Army lawyer assigned to the Justice Department in civil contempt. With no better target to hit in the government’s repeated violation of an order to return an arrested man’s property, the judge ordered lawyer Matthew Isihara to pay $500 per day fine until the government returned the Minnesota man’s identification documents.

At the time, Provinzino blasted the Justice Department of President Donald Trump for its handling of the case, accusing the department's Minneapolis office of skirting orders and blaming staffing shortages "again, and again, and again."

With one of its lawyers facing a daily fine for the department’s bad behavior, the administration quickly located and returned the property before any fines accrued, which purged the contempt.

... 10 26

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TODD B 10 26 ATTACKS JUDGES MINNeSOTA

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ANDREW BAILEY MIZZOU BAILS

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Judge corners Trump DOJ: You’re 'creating a new way of charging people?' BIDEN LAPTOP?

Trump's Justice Department was in court on Tuesday for a preliminary hearing after the department alleged that former FBI agents Nikki Floris and Bradley Benavides obstructed justice. When court began, things were expected to get "spicy," one lawyer hypothesized.

The hearing began with a quick explanation that the DOJ accidentally filed a superseding indictment overnight. Floris' lawyer had already filed a motion to dismiss.

Lawfare's Anna Bower transcribed the details of the hearing in which Magistrate Judge Zia M. Faruqui told the DOJ lawyers that it was "unusual" to charge a case with conduct like this by complaint. Bower paraphrased the judge saying, "usually it's when there's some danger of release/threat that you would do complaint first."

Faruqui told the DOJ that he has never had a situation like this in his career as a magistrate.

"We've never had complaints filed on the record unsigned while waiting for judge to make probable cause finding," he said.

Floris' lawyer Mary Dohrmann came out swinging, calling the whole case a "political football" and alleging that it had nothing to do with the facts or the law. Dohrmann is the principal of the Washington Litigation Group, which has represented many of the former DOJ lawyers and fired FBI agents in suits against the agencies or defended them against retaliation from the administration.

"Whether incompetence or simply cruelty, it's inexcusable to comply with the most basic requirement that complaint be sworn ... Raises serious concerns about credibility of the government's case," said Dohrmann.

"The second complaint is even more inaccurate than the first," she said. "There are changes in the facts, suggesting that there's Brady material that came to government's attention. Clerk's office has struck the complaint. But we ask that court take this conduct into consideration for probable cause determination," she added.

The Justice Department explained that it was trying to file a superseding complaint, and confessed, "I had not done this before."

The judge asked whether any other cases in the district had sought a superseding complaint without a probable cause finding, and the DOJ lawyer said they were not aware of any.

"So, to be clear, your view is that a superseding indictment could be filed adding new charges, and there's no requirement for probable cause, unless an arrest warrant is being sought?" the judge asked, according to Bower. The DOJ agreed.

However, the DOJ contends that the preliminary filing would require a grand jury's approval or a probable cause hearing.

The judge didn't appear to be happy: "So DOJ is now essentially creating a new way of charging people? This is very concerning."

The judge called it an example of "throwing gasoline on what defendants are saying about this being unusual."

"Why would you not just want a magistrate judge to make a probable cause finding as you would in every other case?" the judge asked. "Why today on this one case are you, the United States, changing the way it has done things in its entire history?"

The DOJ said it was ready for a probable cause hearing and had the witness available, but the judge took issue with the comment.

"But what do you suggest the PC hearing is on today? The defense is saying there are facts that were changed from first to second," Judge Faruqui said, according to Bower's accounting.

"There likely are some things like that, your honor. There's a delta between the two because there are facts that go to the obstruction count," said the DOJ. "We think that here today we can swear out the complaint and proceed to preliminary hearing..."

The judge made it clear they were "reluctant to do" that given "what you've said your view is of what my signing that complaint would mean ... the idea that the magistrate judge just rubber stamps it without a probable cause determination."

Ron Safer, Benavides' lawyer, said they were fine going to the first complaint.

So the judge called up the witness.

-=-=

1/3 DOJ LAWYERS QUIT

BOAT STRIKES

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10 27 26

cassidy hutchenson fail

-=-=

an 10 26 comey dtr rehire?

FR INDICTED 3X 10/26/26

Judge delivers humiliating blow to Trump’s DOJ over Comey firing

Todd Blanche warned: A presidential pardon can’t save you from state prison

Former chief of staff to Homeland Security, Miles Taylor wants to see state governments go after President Donald Trump and his allies for their attempt to steal the 2020 election, particularly now that Trump is trying to change the election again.

In his Monday column, Taylor argued that the Trump administration is preparing to challenge unfavorable midterm election results through lawsuits filed with the Justice Department. He thinks the DOJ will pressure election officials and possibly interfere with certification.

But Taylor also warned that loyalty to Trump will not necessarily protect them from prosecution or professional consequences.

A new Justice Department lawsuit filed last week seeks to block Alaska from certifying its Senate election if Republican Dan Sullivan loses, citing potential confusion with another candidate with the same name. The differences between the Dan Sullivans is obvious on the ballot.

"The brazenness is remarkable," wrote Taylor. "On October 22, DOJ sued Alaska to bar the state from certifying its Senate race if Republican Senator Dan Sullivan loses to Mary Peltola, on the theory that a second man named Dan Sullivan on the ballot might confuse voters. The election hasn’t even happened. Yet Trump told reporters he personally directed it, and even Senator Sullivan’s campaign said it never asked for DOJ's intervention."

Another federal effort tried to segregate California ballots linked to suspected noncitizens, arguing that inaccuracies in the underlying data undermine those efforts. The district attorney ultimately admitted he may not have accurate information on the voters. Former federal prosecutors chatting about it couldn't help but laugh.

All of these actions pair with Trump's demands for voter rolls, prosecution threats and federal monitoring, as an intimidation campaign rather than routine election oversight. Taylor interpreted officials’ refusal to rule out blocking certification as evidence that the administration may contest results it dislikes.

"DOJ has fired off letters to all 50 states threatening election officials with prosecution. The Department has already brought thirty lawsuits seeking the voter rolls of various states," Taylor cited. "They’re deploying a thousand federal 'monitors' to the polls, and armed agents were literally knocking on voters’ doors in nine states until a judge blocked it last week as voter intimidation. A DOJ official tells NBC that more states could be sued before or after Election Day, leaving open the possibility of ballots being frozen right through certification. And Todd Blanche says that blocking certification is a 'doomsday scenario' he won’t rule out."

But if the administration thinks it can pardon its way through election interference, Taylor said it should exercise caution.

Taylor explained that presidential pardons cover federal offenses, not state crimes, and argued that presidential immunity does not automatically shield advisers, lawyers or prosecutors. In fact, he argued, officials who unlawfully pressure state election administrators could face investigations under state laws addressing threats, conspiracy, forgery or election interference.

"So to Trump’s henchmen, let me offer a friendly reminder before you move to decertify election results or prevent the peaceful transfer of power: the man you’re doing this for is putting you at risk… he doesn’t care about you… and even if he did, he cannot save you from accountability," Taylor closed.

-=-=

COMEY INDICTED 3X 10 26 26

-=-=-=

alaska suit if sullivan loses?!

-=-=-=

an 10 26

The Supreme Court, increasingly known for its deference to President Donald Trump's agenda, handed him a surprising new loss, denying his administration the ability to move forward with a contentious new policy as a legal challenge plays out.

In a new decision handed down on Wednesday, the Court ruled that the Trump administration could not immediately proceed with a plan to deny gender-affirming care for transgender inmates in federal prisons, though the case challenging the new policy is still moving forward. The decision was made via a 7-2 vote, with the court's most conservative justices, Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito, dissenting.

The ruling did not include any sort of explanation, which a report from USA Today noted is common for decisions made based on emergency requests.

...

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an 10 26

Trump’s lawyers fight to keep FBI agents quiet about buried Smith report

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an 10 26

Trump admin launches 'unusual' investigation into one of their own

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todd b says doj has never been indep and shd not be?! 10 26

Trump took her to the 'breaking point': Former DOJ prosecutor speaks out

-=-=

RWW --> MOJO

ON n Monday, federal authorities announced the arrest in California of at least 11 people, and charges against 28, alleging they registered to vote as noncitizens. Months of fears around the presence of federal agents at the polls and the use of armed immigration enforcement to affect national elections appear to be coming to fruition, despite the Trump administration’s inability to field meaningful evidence for claims of voter fraud or substantial voting by noncitizens.

The initiative, dubbed “Operation Protect the Vote,” comes in the lead-up to the midterm elections, where the Trump administration is making good on threats to weaponize the Justice Department and other federal entities in its favor over claims of supposed voter fraud. On Tuesday, the federal government sent election officials in Los Angeles County an unverified list of 20,000 people it claims are “likely noncitizens” registered to vote in California. As the New York Post first reported Monday, federal agents used the list to make the more than two dozen targeted arrests on the basis of its voter fraud allegations.

The Justice Department said in its Monday press release that federal law enforcement arrested “11 foreign nationals” against whom it will level criminal charges, including that they “fraudulently registered to vote in U.S. elections, electoral contests in which most of them cast illegal and fraudulently obtained ballots.”

The 11 arrestees are among 28 people the department officially charged—and all are from its list of 20,000 targets in the election. The press release claims that every person targeted is a legal permanent resident of the US but not a citizen.

“Every illegal vote cancels out the vote of a lawful American citizen,” said Acting Deputy Attorney General Trent McCotter. “California must verify the citizenship of those more than 20,000 registrants before mail-in ballots are counted.”

According to Reuters, federal authorities gave election officials 48 hours to review the list and withhold ballots or face legal action. The officials rejected the demand, and the Justice Department sued for a court order to prevent California from counting ballots from the 20,000 people on its list. The Trump administration has since threatened local officials who process those ballots with criminal investigation and prosecution.

“Noncitizen voting in a federal election is a federal crime, and knowingly facilitating such conduct is equally unlawful,” McCotter wrote in a letter to county officials and California Secretary of State Shirley Weber that was obtained by the Associated Press. “If persons knowingly tabulate ballots cast by individuals identified by federal agencies as noncitizens, they risk becoming aiders and abettors to a federal crime.”

“Protecting American elections from criminal interference remains a top priority,” FBI Director Kash Patel wrote on X, in reference to the New York Post report. “We will use every legal resource to hold those who violate our election laws accountable and defend every American citizen’s constitutional right to vote."

THE Trump administration’s operation in California, along with its long history of voter suppression—which my colleagues at Mother Jones have reported on at length—will not have an impact confined to California, or to the people on the Justice Department list. The voting public’s fear of subsequent actions, based on further unverified claims, cannot be separated from ICE’s track record of raiding first and asking questions later, a practice that has yielded the detention of hundreds of US citizens, repeatedly involving serious physical harm.

Even if the federal government sticks to its claim that it will not station federal agents at polling places, it is taking actions with indistinguishable, potentially further-reaching effects—in an election in which millions of ballots are already being cast.

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an 10 26

Lindsey Graham was saved from a bribery investigation by Trump's FBI

===

an 10 26

President Donald Trump announced that he's starting a "tip line" for people to call in and report someone for committing government fraud, offering a hefty award of $30,000 for successful tips. He's dumping $25 million into the program to search for "waste, fraud and abuse."

According to *The Wall Street Journal,* Vice President JD Vance is running a government task force.

"The new $25 million program will be administered by the Justice Department and tips can be submitted through a government website. Individuals can receive up to $30,000 if a tip leads to a conviction," the Journal said.

But experts questioned whether something like that could backfire.

"I predict this won't last long -- if only because it'll lead to a flood of FOIA-able material about why DOJ refuses to prosecute Trump fraud," wrote national security analyst Marcy Wheeler.

The first check will go to right-wing content creator Nick Shirley for $10,000 for a video about fraudulent daycare centers that were already under investigation by the state and federal government. Four of the centers were already under investigation by the Minnesota Department of Children, Youth and Families.

One person remarked that this is already something done "under regulatory systems."

'How do you think most government fraud is prosecuted via whistleblowers?" they wondered.

The government had a number of fraud investigators before Trump took over on Jan. 20, 2025. The government already had substantial anti-fraud machinery outside inspectors general. That includes the FBI, the Justice Department and IRS criminal investigators. A new whistleblower fund adds an incentive to submit tips, but it does not create the government’s ability to investigate fraud from scratch.

The DOJ's Civil Fraud Division is one of the main government mechanisms that would have investigated these matters, but staffing was cut 25 percent amid DOGE layoffs.

By September 2026, The Hill reported internal DOJ charts showed substantial declines in Civil Division attorney staffing alongside rising caseloads. DOJ responded that the division had hired more than 200 attorneys since the administration began, with additional hires planned.

One person asked whether reporting fraud by White House members, including the president, would earn them a reward.

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an 10 26

President Donald Trump’s grandiose claims of voter fraud are falling apart under the weight of his own Justice Department’s figures.

The president’s administration is being asked to account for its broad allegations of fraud in California after the DOJ put forward charges on only 34 ballots said to be illegal from the nearly 94 million that have been cast in the state since 2020.

On Monday, federal prosecutors made public a statewide probe into noncitizen voting and out charges against 28 lawful permanent residents. The San Francisco Chronicle reports 23 of them are alleged to have put in 34 ballots between them in elections going back to 2020.

Put another way, that is 0.00004 percent of what was put to the vote in California’s eight statewide contests over the period, hardly the sort of numbers to back up the administration’s claims of rampant illegal voting.

The department has been at odds with the state over this. In July, the Department of Homeland Security released a preliminary review saying it had found over 190,000 possible noncitizens registered to vote in California.

By October, the figure was down to about 20,000, and the Justice Department filed suit when state officials would not comply with federal requests to root out suspected noncitizens and keep their votes off the tally.

And yet the criminal cases unsealed on Monday were limited to fewer than three dozen questionable ballots in the whole state.

The 28 defendants are U.S. residents but not citizens, so they are barred from federal elections; they face charges of false statements on naturalization papers and fraudulent registration.

Acting Deputy Attorney General Trent McCotter says the prosecutions make good on the administration’s demands, pointing to the 28 on the government’s list of suspects. “California refused to look at that list,” he said in a statement from the Justice Department.

Election experts are having none of it. Rick Hasen of UCLA’s election law program sees the case as a “drop in the bucket” compared to the 23 million voters on the California roll.

Hasen also pointed out that some of those charged never actually cast a ballot despite the illegal registration. The figures do nothing to prove every name on the administration’s list is a legitimate voter, but they do illustrate how few cases federal prosecutors have mustered in light of earlier estimates.

McCotter concedes some on the suspect list may in the end be shown to be American citizens, and Gov. Gavin Newsom was quick to deride that as the administration goes after access to registration records.

Federal judges have already turned down the administration’s bid for the full voter rolls on privacy and legal grounds.

For their part, California officials say the records are kept in order and will have none of Trump’s contention that the state’s elections are rife with fraud.

-=-=

rww

Finally, Vance Day, a right-wing judge who was suspended from the bench in 2018, is now working in the Trump administration as senior counsel to Deputy Attorney General and serving as faith liaison between the DOJ and the White House.

-=-=

TEARING UP TAKING OVER DC GOLF ~AA?

Judge demands Trump DOJ unravel 'massive coincidence' in golf course fight

Judge smacks down Trump effort to remove herself from golf course lawsuit

Exposed: How Trump uses golf courses to dodge millions in taxes

sit dn

The hearing over the East Potomac Golf course battle with President Donald Trump kicked off on Monday morning after Judge Ana Reyes, in a a late-night court filing, refused to recuse herself from the case despite the administration's claim she was too overly emotional to preside. At one point, Trump's lawyer started to stand, and she told him to sit.

The judge opened the hearing sarcastically, saying, "I trust everyone's weekend was as relaxing as mine and my clerk's."

Lawfare's Roger Parloff was on hand transcribing the hearing.

The first thing Judge Reyes did was order Trump administration lawyer Stanley Woodward to refile his submission from the previous night with as many Justice Department attorneys as are willing to sign it.

"Raise your hand if you're willing to sign it," she said to the lawyers.

Woodward said that it isn't an appropriate request.

"Right now, for rule 11 purposes, which other attorneys are willing to sign this brief?" she asked

"I'm going to instruct attorneys not to answer," Woodward said.

"I'm ordering you all to come to the podium and sign it. I'm giving them a direct order. If they want to disobey ... you've made filing ... officer of court ... you signed it. I'm entitled to know what other DOJ attorneys are willing to sign it," she said, speaking of a filing from this morning, not the one ordering her to step down.

The judge gave Woodward until 3 p.m. to refile a brief arguing why Justice Department attorneys shouldn't respond to her direct order.

She went on to read an explanation of why she believes she has the legal authority to demand this testimony.

After walking through her ruling overnight, she called the whole ordeal an exceptional situation.

"I don't know that I need to find bad faith ... that noted, the court is not required to exhibit naïveté from which ordinary citizens are free," she said.

She explained that by now, everyone has seen President Donald Trump's post on Truth Social demanding that the current golf course be destroyed. He ordered work to begin "immediately." Meanwhile, the Department of Interior has claimed there's nothing to see. In fact, they said that the government was executing a 2019 plan, but Trump uploaded the real plan on Truth Social that he wants to begin immediately.

Judge Reyes called it a strong indication of bad faith while arguing that the judge is violating fundamental separation-of-powers principles. Trump claims that the judge can't compel testimony from high-level officials.

"But people I heard from last week and will hear from today (unlike those in precedents government cited) each has personal knowledge of facts of this case," she explained. "It will help me understand if the agency has been accurate and forthcoming ... It is essential to understanding how the plan was developed."

She also said that these weren't "high-ranking officials." That would include Secretary Doug Burgum, whom she has not compelled to appear and no one at the White House has been asked to appear at this time.

She then said that "the government's behavior in this case has been nothing if not extraordinary."

The questioning then began.

One thing she asked was whether the DOJ believed last week during the hearing if the Transportation Management Plan (TMP) had anything to do with the redesign of the golf course. At that point they said that it had nothing to do with the redesign.

"Did they know whether that was accurate?" the judge asked.

Woodward began to stand up.

"Sit down," the judge ordered.

-=-=

context?

an 10 26

The BBC is pulling out all of its big cards to defend itself against President Donald Trump’s $10 billion lawsuit against the broadcasting company. Jack Smith, attorney and former special counsel for the United States Department of Justice, has been subpoenaed on their behalf. While Smith has not objected to the subpoena, Trump’s legal team has opposed it. Adam Klasfeld, editor-in-chief of All Rise News, shared the news in a post to X. The decision comes as the broadcast giant requested that a judge force Trump to sit for a deposition after he delayed being deposed several times, with Trump recently alleging he’s unable to sit for a deposition until early to mid January 2027.

The ruling notes, in part: “Plaintiff cannot seriously dispute the injustice of blocking Mr. Smith’s testimony. This Court has made it clear that the ‘Defendant is entitled to discover the contours of [Plaintiff’s] message’ in his Ellipse speech and the ‘impression that Plaintiff fomented violence,’ including, ‘whether that impression was given or received; if that impression was given or received; whether [Plaintiff] gave it intentionally or otherwise; the breadth of the audience of the message and impression; and the extent of any resulting injury or harm.'”

Trump remains in a legal battle with the BBC after he sued the company, accusing it of defamation and violating Florida's deceptive trade practices law over the BBC-produced documentary, Trump: A Second Chance. The documentary examines Trump’s political ascension ahead of his second term, as well as the fallout from the January 2021 U.S. Capitol attacks.

Those involved in creating the documentary acknowledge that two separate portions of one of Trump’s speeches, in which he seemingly encourages violence, were spliced together. In Trump’s lawsuit, he says the final edit depicts a false narrative.

BBC’s legal team says Trump has delayed the deposition on multiple occasions, and even recently canceled an agreed-upon date for his deposition. Trump’s reasoning for backing out is reportedly due to “matters of national importance.”

BBC lawyers said the initial proposed date for the deposition was for July, but they didn’t hear back until several follow-up requests until they settled on October 16.

In Trump’s filing to delay the deposition the last time around, BBC’s attorneys say they received a note saying, “Plaintiff’s counsel responded on September 28, 2026, indicating that ‘the President is no longer available for his deposition on October 16 due to other matters of national importance’ and that counsel would ‘endeavor to provide you with a replacement date by the end of this week.’ He did not.”

--=-=

an 1026

A Republican election official says she is being threatened with investigation and criminal liability after defying the Trump administration's demands, warning that threats to American elections are now coming from inside the federal government.

Lieutenant Governor of Utah, Deidre Henderson, who oversees elections in the heavily Republican state, revealed the extraordinary pressure she has faced to give up sensitive voter information during an interview with CBS News' 60 Minutes.

Henderson states that election officials are usually threatened with attacks on election integrity coming from non-governmental actors and cyber criminals, but is now receiving pressure from the President Donald Trump administration.

"In the past two elections that I oversaw as lieutenant governor, the threats were all external: non-state actors, cyber security threats and other things," she said to correspondent Lesley Stahl before adding, “But now we also have threats coming from within our own government."

She said the Justice Department unlawfully demanded that states surrender their complete voter registration lists, including confidential information which is protected under state law.

Henderson said officials were asked to provide Social Security numbers, full dates of birth and driver's license numbers. She said federal authorities did not offer any reasonable explanation for their demands or how they planned to use the information. Henderson and 29 other states from both parties refused to give in to the demands.

After the refusal, she received a September letter from the DOJ's Civil Rights Division stating she was under investigation and involved in ongoing litigation over compliance with federal election laws. The department also threatened her with potential criminal or civil liability if she did not preserve the voting records. The dispute came after the DOJ filed a federal lawsuit seeking Utah's voter data.

The Republican Utah Gov. Spencer Cox defended Henderson after the letter became public.

"It is wrong for the DOJ to investigate or threaten the lieutenant governor for carrying out her responsibilities under Utah law," Cox wrote at the time.

Trump administration officials have argued the voter records are necessary to identify noncitizens improperly registered to vote. Harmeet Dhillon, who heads the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division, told CBS that there are potentially thousands of cases under investigation.

But Henderson said Utah's own review found just 52 questionable registrations out of more than 2 million voters. The administration has sued states that refused to provide complete voter lists, even as officials say privacy laws protect the data they seek.

This warning comes at a time when a broader federal campaign is underway, including the seizure of 2020 ballots in Georgia and legal action against California over alleged noncitizen voting. The California secretary of state has challenged the government's evidence and said it is threatening eligible voters.

Henderson has no plans to back down from the threats and said she will continue to resist the DOJ’s requests.

"I have to tell myself it doesn't matter what the consequences are, as long as I feel like I'm doing what's right," she said, continuing: "I think this is an important thing for me to do, holding these guardrails, holding the line. Someone has to."

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-=-=-

AN 10 26

Judge accuses Trump DOJ of hiding its 'true motives'

Trump faces legal blow as BBC asks judge to crash his delay tactics

-=-==

-=-=

RWW --> MOJO

ON n Monday, federal authorities announced the arrest in California of at least 11 people, and charges against 28, alleging they registered to vote as noncitizens. Months of fears around the presence of federal agents at the polls and the use of armed immigration enforcement to affect national elections appear to be coming to fruition, despite the Trump administration’s inability to field meaningful evidence for claims of voter fraud or substantial voting by noncitizens.

The initiative, dubbed “Operation Protect the Vote,” comes in the lead-up to the midterm elections, where the Trump administration is making good on threats to weaponize the Justice Department and other federal entities in its favor over claims of supposed voter fraud. On Tuesday, the federal government sent election officials in Los Angeles County an unverified list of 20,000 people it claims are “likely noncitizens” registered to vote in California. As the New York Post first reported Monday, federal agents used the list to make the more than two dozen targeted arrests on the basis of its voter fraud allegations.

The Justice Department said in its Monday press release that federal law enforcement arrested “11 foreign nationals” against whom it will level criminal charges, including that they “fraudulently registered to vote in U.S. elections, electoral contests in which most of them cast illegal and fraudulently obtained ballots.”

According to Reuters, federal authorities gave election officials 48 hours to review the list and withhold ballots or face legal action. The officials rejected the demand, and the Justice Department sued for a court order to prevent California from counting ballots from the 20,000 people on its list. The Trump administration has since threatened local officials who process those ballots with criminal investigation and prosecution.

“Protecting American elections from criminal interference remains a top priority,” FBI Director Kash Patel wrote on X, in reference to the New York Post report. “We will use every legal resource to hold those who violate our election laws accountable and defend every American citizen’s constitutional right to vote.”

...

The Trump administration’s operation in California, along with its long history of voter suppression—which my colleagues at Mother Jones have reported on at length—will not have an impact confined to California, or to the people on the Justice Department list. The voting public’s fear of subsequent actions, based on further unverified claims, cannot be separated from ICE’s track record of raiding first and asking questions later, a practice that has yielded the detention of hundreds of US citizens, repeatedly involving serious physical harm.

-=-=

an 10 26

Trump attorney general’s profane outburst over firing mishap leaked

an 1026

She said the Justice Department unlawfully demanded that states surrender their complete voter registration lists, including confidential information which is protected under state law.

The Republican Utah Gov. Spencer Cox defended Henderson after the letter became public.

"It is wrong for the DOJ to investigate or threaten the lieutenant governor for carrying out her responsibilities under Utah law," Cox wrote at the time.

Henderson has no plans to back down from the threats and said she will continue to resist the DOJ’s requests.

-=-=

an 10 26

Trump faces new court battle after GOP judge quotes Orwell in rebuke

Trump faces another major court battle as a federal appeals court considers his administration's attempt to overturn a decades-old law, which requires presidents to preserve White House records. A Republican-appointed judge rebuked him with a pointed reference to George Orwell's dystopian novel 1984.

Trump’s lawyers will argue before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit on October 16 over whether official documents from the White House belong personally to the president or to the American public.

The dispute follows a ruling by U.S. District Judge John Bates, appointed by President George W. Bush, who previously rejected the administration's position in May.

The judge ruled against the White House, using a famous Orwell quote to explain his reasoning: "Who controls the past controls the future; who controls the present controls the past."

Ultimately, the judge found the Presidential Records Act likely constitutional and directed White House officials to follow its terms for the duration of the litigation.

Following the Watergate scandal, the 1978 law was put in place to ensure that official records are the property of the government rather than the person in the Oval Office.

Trump’s DOJ argued in April that the act is unconstitutional because Congress interfered with executive authority.

Lauren Bis, a White House spokeswoman, backed the department’s view, arguing it interferes with the separation of powers. Lawyers for the administration add that the recordkeeping demands are a burden and may discourage advisers from speaking honestly with the President.

Historians and watchdogs have taken the matter to court, arguing that if the statute is set aside, it would give Trump the power to decide what people could learn about his administration in the future.

Nikhel Sus, chief counsel for Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, told NPR that a victory for Trump could effectively end the public's right to access presidential papers.

John Bellinger, a former legal adviser to Bush's National Security Council, points out the national security element to the case. "Access to the records on national security issues of former presidents is really vital for the continuity of our government,

He further explained that officials rely on records from previous administrations to understand conversations with foreign leaders, adding that it will leave them at a “terrible disadvantage.”

After leaving office in 2021, he kept sensitive records at his Mar-a-Lago estate, which led ot a criminal prosecution.

The court dismissed the case in 2024 over the appointment of special counsel Jack Smith, and prosecutors later dropped the charges after Trump's election victory.

Conservative attorney Michael Edney, a Bush administration official, suggested the dispute could end up in the Supreme Court.

Friday's arguments are the beginning of a case that will test how much control a president can have over the historical record.

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AN 10 26

Trump team blames lost email for ignoring court halt in mind-boggling stunt

-=-=

ILHAN OMAR RAID ACTUALLY IHS

Ex-prosecutor shreds Trump's new 'raid' as blatantly timed 'political stunt'

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AN 10 26

Trump DOJ takes bizarre case of man forced to cook to Supreme Courthttps://www.alternet.org/trump-doj-immigrant-case/

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AN 10 26

A former George W. Bush administration official has pointed to a fatal flaw in President Donald Trump's Justice Department's latest investigation into five television networks that could end up in court, arguing that the White House may have already undermined its case.

William Kovacic, who was appointed by Bush as chairman of the Federal Trade Commission in 2008, told *_{The Washington Post}_* described the DOJ’s legal justification as "feeble."

Kovacic also pointed out how Trump’s public statements about the news organizations are a problem in themselves.

"This will be fatal to the case," Kovacic warned in reference to the president’s statements, which he says help the networks' argument that the investigation is politically motivated.

The Justice Department announced over the weekend that it was investigating ABC, CBS, CNN, Fox News and NBC for possible antitrust violations.

The investigation comes after networks temporarily stopped sharing pooled White House video coverage in September. It was in response to Trump’s White House banning CNN, Politico and MS NOW from White House grounds and stripping the press passes from the journalists.

The administration is describing the move in solidarity with the banned networks as an illegal boycott that could violate federal antitrust law.

However, Kovacic doesn’t believe this argument will hold up in court. He wrote that the networks could use Trump’s repeated attacks on the networks as unfair and “fake news” as proof that the admin was punishing them for their coverage rather than for banning them for legitimate legal reasons.

Other legal experts also backed Kovacic’s assessment. Bill Baer, who oversaw antitrust enforcement under former President Barack Obama’s DOJ, said the investigation “looks like total retaliation.”

Clay Calvert, a senior fellow at the conservative-leaning American Enterprise Institute, also called into question the White House’s legal argument, arguing that: “There’s no boycott over a business activity. It’s a decision not to give him the coverage. They don’t have to cover him in the first place.”

Antitrust expert Diana Moss of the Progressive Policy Institute made a similar argument to Calvet, noting that illegal group boycotts typically involve efforts to restrict competition.

After a federal judge ordered that the ban on networks should be permitted to receive access to the White House, the networks eventually resumed pooled coverage. However, the ban involving Air Force One pool assignments has continued.

The DOJ has defended its position by arguing the boycott was a coordinated effort involving commercial competitors and therefore could be violating the Sherman Act.

A court has yet to determine if the networks violated antitrust laws, and it remains to be seen how the investigation plays out.

In another legal battle, ABC has challenged the Federal Communications Commission review of its broadcast licenses, arguing that the administration is violating its First Amendment rights.

-=-=

AN 1 026 RECORD? DUPS?

2X? Trump DOJ is buckling as caseloads explode while staffing withers

Stark warning issued to DOJ lawyers: Your future career is 'in jeopardy' 2X?

Judge calls 'massive fire drill' because the Trump admin 'can't be trusted'

Trump officials scramble to pass blame as judge explodes in anger

'Screaming' judge rips the DOJ for defying order not to touch golf course

Trump DOJ caught using false claims in explosive court revelation

President Trump's Justice Department has admitted that a false allegation, involving former CNN anchor Don Lemon and another journalist, appeared in the federal court filings relating to its investigation of the anti-ICE protest.

The revelation comes as newly uncovered records show that federal investigators obtained warrants authorizing the use of sophisticated surveillance technology to track down Lemon's 21-year-old producer Jerome Richardson, even though Richardson was prepared to turn himself in.

According to Wired, the investigation followed a protest at a church in Minnesota that disrupted a service and drew national attention after Lemon and independent journalist Georgia Fort documented the incident.

Per the report, the federal authorities were looking to build a criminal case against people who were involved in the protest, including journalists who maintained they were there as journalists covering the event rather than as participants.

The contested allegation came in the affidavits in support of applications to track Richardson. The investigators claimed that the video showed Lemon, Fort, Richardson and others “chanting with agitators.”

But the prosecutors later admitted that Lemon and Fort had not been chanting.

As per Fort's lawyers, the government admitted that the false allegation appeared in at least 15 warrant affidavits.

The admission doesn't establish that the investigators knowingly submitted false information. It does, however, add another wrinkle to an investigation which has already been fraught with judicial pushback and disputes over the nature of the federal surveillance.

The warrants also show just how far the investigators were prepared to go in order to track down Richardson.

Federal judges in Minnesota and Pennsylvania have approved the use of cell site simulators, devices which mimic a cell tower to identify and locate a phone.

The tech can also harvest identifying information from devices of people in the vicinity who are not the subject of the investigation.

Investigators got the second warrant just two days before Richardson voluntarily turned himself in at a federal courthouse in Philadelphia.

Richardson had publicly stated that he expected to go into federal custody. He was released on bond that afternoon upon his surrender.

The records don't establish that the agents actually deployed the surveillance devices.

The investigation had already met with resistance from the courts.

A magistrate judge initially denied five of the eight arrest warrant applications. The government's request to have that decision overturned by the appeals court was also rejected, and the government has since withdrawn its request.

In the filing, the court's chief judge states that two of the people the government was targeting were journalists rather than protesters and finds no evidence of any criminal conduct on their part.

Prosecutors then secured a grand jury indictment.

The newly released records don't answer the question of why the investigators were seeking such intrusive surveillance or how the false allegation kept reappearing in the documents they submitted to federal judges.

-=-=

Trump revenge probe could unravel over key detail: ex-federal prosecutor

AN 10 26

-=-=

RWW -->

Harmeet Dhillon speaking to reporters, surrounded by cameras and recording devices.

Under its chief, Harmeet Dhillon, the civil rights division of the Justice Department has pushed hard to replenish the ranks of a unit that was once a magnet for top legal talent.Credit...Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images

By Glenn Thrush

Reporting from Washington

Oct. 6, 2026

A former prosecutor forced off a high-profile murder case for peeking at the defense team’s strategy documents.

A onetime gambling executive who promoted conspiracy theories about the Las Vegas massacre in 2017.

A Florida activist who once served 20 days in jail for hacking a local elections system.

They are among the 130 lawyers who have recently joined the Justice Department’s short-staffed civil rights division as the Trump administration has struggled to fill the depleted ranks of a unit that was once a magnet for legal talent. Since early 2025, upward of 300 nonpolitical career employees, representing decades of experience, have left the division after its leader, Harmeet Dhillon, repurposed it to pursue President Trump’s agenda.

As a consequence, the division has opened its doors to recruits, many of them conservatives, some with education and work histories that might have disqualified them from being hired in the past, former officials said. Some have left a trail of hyperpartisan, conspiratorial and, in some instances, bizarre statements, according to an examination of about a dozen recent hires based on court records, social media posts and interviews.

Department officials, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal matters, said they have rejected nearly as many applicants as they have hired, 126. Any ideological tilt in the career ranks, they added, reflected the Trump-era applicant pool, which includes conservative activists and recent law school graduates.

Ms. Dhillon praised the quality of the new lawyers, and said she was revamping a division that had been dominated by liberals for far too long....

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AN 10 26

Punchbowl News reports that former White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson is next on President Donald Trump's revenge list.

The Justice Department's Civil Rights Division presented evidence to a federal grand jury this week alleging that she "lied to Congress," sources told the outlet.

Hutchinson spent several days testifying to the House Select Committee on Jan. 6 after the attack on the U.S. Capitol. Trump has long maintained that what she said was a lie, so a key piece of the case will be whether the DOJ can prove something she said was false, particularly in the Washington D.C., federal court, which has not been a successful place for District Attorney Jeanine Pirro.

Among her more jarring allegations were that a Secret Service agent told her that the president lunged at him as he drove back to the White House following the speech on the Ellipse. According to Hutchinson, Trump wanted to go to the Capitol to see his supporters as they marched. He'd promised them moments before that he would be with them, but the Secret Service hadn't planned for that.

She also alleged that Trump didn't care about the magnetometer catching his supporters carrying guns, making it clear that he knew they weren't there to hurt him.

So far, Trump has used his Justice Department to target former FBI director James Comey, New York Attorney General Letitia James, prosecutors who investigated him, law firms connected to opponents and news organizations whose coverage he dislikes.

Reuters even documented at least 470 targets of administration retribution by November 2025, including 112 revoked security clearances.

But even failed indictments didn't stop Trump. After Comey posted an image on Instagram showing seashells spelling out "86-47," he was targeted by the FBI and DOJ, claiming he was making a credible threat against the life of the president with the post.

The campaign has also extended beyond criminal investigations and firings of government staff. Trump ordered restrictions on law firms’ security clearances, federal contracts and even access to government buildings, including the federal courts.

Trump swears he's not pursuing any revenge. As recently as Wednesday, Trump alleged that he could have "gone after" Hillary Clinton, and former Presidents Joe Biden and Barack Obama — but hasn't.

Critics argue the pattern turns government power into a tool for personal punishment. He's forcing the targets to spend buckets in legal costs and face

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AN 10 26

DOJ makes 'striking admission' as judge corners lawyer on Trump influence

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AN 10 26

President Donald Trump’s Justice Department plan to use a “a historic number” of election-monitoring initiatives is facing a challenge in court from civil rights lawyers.

The NAACP has taken legal action against Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon, the head of the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division, asking for information concerning the department's plans to deploy more than 1,000 election monitors for the November 3 election.

The lawsuit, which has been brought in the federal court in Washington, is asking a judge to compel the department to respond to a Freedom of Information Act request that was submitted on September 1. The NAACP claims that the Department of Justice failed to meet the statutory deadline for deciding on the request and is therefore seeking emergency intervention before Election Day.

According to the complaint, the planned deployment “stands to jeopardize the election” and could interfere with voters’ ability to cast ballots “free from intimidation.”

The request for records asks for information regarding the legal basis of the operation, the locations where the monitors will be deployed, how they will be selected and trained, whether state officials gave their consent, and whether personnel from federal law enforcement agencies could take part.

The extent of the operation has attracted attention since Dhillon has stated that the department aims to send around 1,000 monitors to the polling stations. Todd Blanche, the Attorney General, said on Sunday that monitors would be going to all 50 states.

Blanche described the operation as being in line with the Justice Department's long-standing role in elections. For a long time, the department has sent federal officials to oversee compliance with voting-rights laws, but the NAACP contends that this year's initiative has moved away from that traditional function and is now focused on examining allegations regarding ballot security.

The Justice Department stated to The Guardian that its observers “comply with all legal and ethical requirements” and would not intervene in the voting process.

Concerns over the way the monitors would operate grew following an incident at Wyoming's primary. The Republican governor, Mark Gordon, stated that two federal monitors came to a polling place without being informed and tried to look at the voting machines. He called their actions "aggressive, unexpected, and disruptive".

The department denied that description and stated that the monitors had not done anything improper.

Kristen Clarke, who is the general counsel of the NAACP and previously headed the Civil Rights Division under President Joe Biden, stated that the organization would like the government to make public the authority it considers to be the basis for the operation and the way in which it plans to carry it out.

Now that Election Day is less than a month away, the conflict is causing part of Trump's election campaign to be brought before a federal judge and may compel the Justice Department to make public the details, which the NAACP says is the largest election-monitoring operation in the history of the United States.

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AN 10 26

A major investigation published by The New York Times reveals deep structural disruptions within the U.S. Justice Department. Sweeping changes and career-staff departures have left the agency short-handed, prompting administrators to fill critical legal roles with far-right activists, online conspiracy theorists, and candidates carrying histories that traditionally would have barred them from federal positions.

“A former prosecutor forced off a high-profile murder case for peeking at the defense team’s strategy documents. A onetime gambling executive who promoted conspiracy theories about the Las Vegas massacre in 2017. A Florida activist who once served 20 days in jail for hacking a local elections system,” reports the Times. “They are among the 130 lawyers who have recently joined the Justice Department’s short-staffed civil rights division as the Trump administration has struggled to fill the depleted ranks of a unit that was once a magnet for legal talent.”

According to the Times data, more than 300 career, non-political personnel have exited the Civil Rights Division since early 2025. This significant loss of veteran institutional knowledge followed a decision by the division's new leader, Harmeet Dhillon, to pivot the department's focus heavily toward advancing political priorities. Former agency officials noted that as a direct consequence of this vacancy crisis, hiring bars have lowered, accommodating ideological stalwarts alongside recruits with weak credentials and unconventional legal backgrounds.

“Some have left a trail of hyperpartisan, conspiratorial and, in some instances, bizarre statements, according to an examination of about a dozen recent hires based on court records, social media posts and interviews,” reports the Times.

The internal strain is expanding beyond a single division. Separate internal files reviewed by The Hill and NewsNation show that a heavily depleted DOJ staff is falling behind on its active civil caseloads. To counter this logjam, division managers appear increasingly willing to loosen screening standards to fast-track new personnel into empty seats.

The Times profile shines a light on several high-profile appointments made under Dhillon's management. Among them is gun-rights activist Barry Arrington, who was designated as the acting head of a newly created Second Amendment unit. The newspaper's review highlights Arrington's public record as an active opponent of both evolutionary theory and same-sex marriage, noting he successfully defended conversion therapy programs in front of the U.S. Supreme Court last term.

Additionally, the Times discovered that Eric Neff was picked to temporarily manage the high-stakes voting section. Neff’s background as a local prosecutor in Los Angeles County includes an incident in 2022 where he was placed on administrative leave after his department dropped a corporate software executive's indictment due to investigative mishandling. While local taxpayers shouldered a steep $5 million settlement to resolve that dispute, Neff won reinstatement in 2024 and maintains an unresolved whistleblower claim against the county, which the Times notes adds a layer of conflict to his background.

The investigative report also points to David Michael Levin, a conservative lawyer and corporate executive appointed to a department post, who possesses a criminal conviction on his record.

“In 2015 and 2016, Mr. Levin twice hacked into the Lee County, Fla., election system as a political stunt. He faced felony charges before pleading to a pair of misdemeanors in September 2016, and served a 20-day jail sentence with two years of probation, according to court records,” said the Times.

The newspaper's deep dive into court dockets reveals a pattern of judicial admonishment. Federal judges have sanctioned Levin and his spouse for a "willful and bad faith disregard" of standard court procedures, specifically for withholding documents requested during discovery phase timelines.

“In August, the court ordered Mr. Levin to pay more than $200,000 in damages and lawyers fees, finding that he had engaged in fraudulent misrepresentation and civil conspiracy, according to a ruling last month,” reports the Times. “The docket shows no record yet of the Levins filing an appeal.”

While Levin's application cleared the agency's formal background and personnel offices like all other new hires, unnamed sources within the DOJ human resources department expressed serious concerns to reporters, cautioning that confirming these applicants sets a troubling precedent for federal law enforcement standards.

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AN 10 26

Top Utah Republican blasts Trump's 'despicable' DOJ

FBI's last-minute plot to hide Trump-Epstein videos claimed in lawsuit

Justice Department twice misspells 'north' as filing goes down in flames

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AN 10 26

According to a new exclusive report by the Wall Street Journal published on Thursday, the Department of Justice is seeking to relitigate the legacy of disgraced former President Richard Nixon. “For nearly two years, the Justice Department has made it a priority to investigate people who previously investigated President Trump,” writes the Journal. Now, “the department is reviewing whether the special prosecutor’s office that investigated the famed Watergate break-in committed misconduct, according to people familiar with the matter, more than half a century after that scandal led to Nixon’s resignation.”

According to the Journal, Geoff Shepard – a former Nixon aide turned Watergate historian and revisionist – recently delivered a two-hour presentation at Justice Department headquarters that laid out his theory that the deep state took Nixon down. The title of his 78-page slide deck was “Watergate As Lawfare," and the language used by Shepard is notably similar to that wielded by Trump when complaining about investigations against him, as he has long asserted that “deep state” actors have waged “lawfare” against him on behalf of his opponents.

“The review comes at a moment of renewed interest in the Nixon legacy,” writes the Journal. “Republicans see in the combative former president, who was loathed by the press and besieged by investigations, a historical analogue for Trump. During remarks at the Nixon Presidential Library this summer, Vice President JD Vance made the comparison explicit.” In Vance’s estimation, “If you look at the story of how the deep state took down Richard Nixon, it’s not all that different from what the same groups of people — the same institutions — tried to do to Donald Trump in the first Trump administration. There is a parallel.”

The Journal reports that a senior Justice Department official invited Shepard to come to Justice Department headquarters and make his case before the Office of Professional Responsibility, an internal watchdog that investigates allegations of misconduct. Ironically, notes the Journal, “the office itself is a product of the Watergate era, one of a number of changes aimed at shielding criminal investigations from White House influence.” Shepard has previously requested an investigation into his theories during the Biden Administration, but was denied.

“Shepard has served as a sort of godfather for the Watergate revisionists,” writes the Journal. “Mainstream scholars have long concluded that Watergate generated a genuine constitutional crisis and that Nixon, not those who investigated him, was guilty of a malfeasance which not only doomed his presidency but also led to overhauls that significantly curtailed executive power. Nixon’s tenure has been of growing interest to Trump, Vance and the larger conservative movement. Trump has asked former Nixon aides on several occasions why Nixon resigned rather than fight it out. The current president also has moved to roll back many post-Watergate overhauls, challenging limits on presidential authority to fire inspectors general and career civil servants.”

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Office of Professional Responsibility

NO NAME? Jeffrey Ragsdale 4 YRS BIDEN

Vacant

March 7, 2025

1 year, 208 days

202-514-3365

In many cases, the OPR notifies the accused attorney and requests a written response. Sometimes, the OPR also makes on-site investigations. The OPR reports the results of the investigation to the component head concerned and to the Office of the Deputy Attorney General. The OPR also advises the complainant and the accused attorney of its conclusion.

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Trump is humiliated in 25th consecutive court case defeat

AN 9 26 VOTER ROLLS

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an 9 26

Federal prosecutor tells judge she’s being 'scapegoated' by the Trump admin

New internal docs reveal soaring workload amid DOJ’s 'massive exodus'

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an 9 26

Trump officials 'still fighting' to keep 'slush fund' alive: legal expert

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DOJ TO GRASSLEY

AN 0 26

Stark warning issued to DOJ lawyers: Your future career is 'in jeopardy'

===

an 9 26

Trump's revenge investigation into all of the previous probes into him reached a new level of chaos, adding to yet another failure to the pile of recent legal battles.

Trump demanded that the Justice Department and FBI conduct an investigation tying together the investigations into him over the past six years to prove that they're part of some "grand conspiracy" from the so-called "deep state," the Associated Press reported.

The plan is to tie together the Russian election interference and Trump's retention of classified documents. The goal was to create a narrative of a government conspiracy, but the problem is that there was legitimate criminal misconduct with a long trail of evidence.

“The idea of connecting all those different investigations into one single conspiracy, there's no basis for that,” said retired federal prosecutor Randall Eliason. “Then, maybe more importantly, there's no basis for an allegation that any one of them was actually a criminal act against Trump. They've all been verified and upheld in one way or another.”

Last week, the efforts took a significant turn when the leader of the probe abruptly resigned.

Joe DiGenova, who's 81, has served in and out of government for decades, including President Ronald Reagan’s administration. He became well known after attacking Trump's cybersecurity official who maintained the 2020 election was legitimate. DiGenova said that the man should be "drawn and quartered."

Trump has seen DiGenova's investigation as a kind of reckoning from previous officials and administrations.

The president has been miffed about the slow pace of diGenova's progress. By Sept. 10, he was out, leaving comments in his wake that he doesn't see any indictments coming out of the investigation. A lack of evidence hasn't stopped Trump with others like former FBI James Comey.

“If you want indictments where there’s no evidence, you have an ethical problem,” diGenova told the New York Post.

DiGenova swears he was taken out of context and that there is "plenty of evidence in all of these cases to prove the theories of prosecution. It just takes time to get there, and some people want to get there a little faster than others — and you can’t do that.”

DiGenova came in after Maria Medetis Long, a career national security prosecutor, was removed after conveying concerns about the legal strength of a criminal case against former CIA Director John Brennan.

In a statement after diGenova's ousting, Brennan's attorney, Ken Wainstein said, "I’ve spent decades in and around the Justice Department. I’ve never even conceived of a situation like this." He alleged that the DOJ is “blatantly trying to frame somebody for a crime that is complete fiction."

The reality is that "President Trump wants action in certain cases, and this seems to be one of them,” said John Fishwick Jr., a former U.S. attorney in Virginia.

He doesn't expect the DOJ to back down any time soon.

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HUH? AN 9 26

Appeals judges appeared leery of allowing President Donald Trump’s Department of Justice to revive its dead prosecution of Attorney General Letitia James on Tuesday. James’ prosecution was dismissed under the argument that the top prosecutor pressing the case did not have a right to be leading the indictment.

But DOJ attorneys say Senior U.S. District Judge Cameron Currie "administered […] strong medicine" as a consequence of Lindsey Halligan's "unlawful" appointment, insisting a mere "error in the title" should not have led to dismissal of Letitia James' and James Comey's indictments in Virginia, reports Law and Crime.

Rather, Attorney General Henry Whitaker argued before the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that the three-judge panel should "respect" grand juries' decisions and revive fraud and false statement indictments against Trump's perceived enemies New York's attorney general James and the former FBI director Comey. Whitaker claimed Currie erroneously concluded in November that ex-U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi "unlawfully appointed" Trump's former personal attorney Halligan as interim U.S. attorney in the Eastern District of Virginia.

“But attorneys for Comey and James countered that Halligan was little more than a private citizen when she was the only prosecutor to sign the indictments and present to the grand jury. Notably, that is how U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon described ex-special counsel Jack Smith when she dismissed his Mar-a-Lago case against Trump on Appointments Clause grounds,” reported Law and Crime.

"Mr. Smith is a private citizen exercising the full power of a United States Attorney, and with very little oversight or supervision," Cannon said, tossing out the president's willful retention of classified documents and conspiracy case as a remedy.

Judges were quick to use that argument in the dismissal of James’ indictment.

"How would you then distinguish United States v. Trump when Judge Cannon found that Mr. Smith, whatever his name was, wasn't lawfully appointed? What happens in this case? How would you distinguish it if Ms. Halligan's not lawfully appointed?" asked Senior U.S. Circuit Judge Henry F. Floyd, a Barack Obama appointee. “… The point is that she says it wasn't a lawful appointment.”

Whitaker found himself flailing as he tried to discern between the two identical dismissals.

“She did, Your Honor, but Judge Cannon there was faced with the appointment of a special counsel to which different appointment authorities apply. For example, in this case, we could have appointed Ms. Halligan to conduct these prosecutions under 28 U.S.C. 542 and 543, which were appointment authorities that the United States did not invoke in defending the Jack Smith appointment," Whitaker said.

"To put it bluntly, would have, could have, should have. That didn't happen," Chief U.S. Circuit Judge Albert Diaz, also an Obama appointee, said, jumping in.

Politico

Trump admin argues Lindsey Halligan should return to US attorney post

1 day ago

The Daily Beast

Goon Grilled by Judges Over Trump's Beauty Queen Prosecutor

13 hours ago

Courthouse News

Trump tries to revive indictments against political foes at Fourth Circuit

1 day ago

Reuters

Judges question DOJ bid to revive cases against Trump foes Comey, James

1 day ago

Baltimore Sun

DOJ asks appeals court to reinstate indictments against Comey and James

8 hours ago

DK 9 26

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FAIL, FIRED BY TODD?

AN 9 26

On Thursday, September 10, attorney and veteran GOP operative Joseph diGenova abruptly resigned from the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ), where he had been focused on a conspiracy investigation targeting President Donald Trump's foes. And according to Salon's Heather Digby Parton, the fact that he left DOJ without getting a single indictment is a major blow for the Trump administration and U.S. Attorney General Todd Blanche.

"The definition of a mafia made man is one who has Italian blood and is formally initiated into the 'family,' having sworn an oath of omerta and promising to put the crime family above all else," Parton explains in Salon. "Traitors take their lives in their own hands, and they often do not live to tell the tale, which means that it's rare for anyone to go against the family, especially in public. That's why it was so surprising to see longtime Republican operative Joe diGenova resign from his job as a top Trump consigliere — or, more formally, 'special counselor to the attorney general' — on Thursday. If there was ever a GOP-made man, it is him."

Parton emphasizes that "expectations in the MAGAsphere were high" when diGenova was appointed to DOJ.

"DiGenova was appointed in April to oversee the Justice Department's big inquisition in Florida after the career prosecutor who had been running it resigned over concerns that they did not have a prosecutable case against former CIA chief John Brennan," Parton notes. "DiGenova, who had not prosecuted a case since his stint in the Reagan Justice Department, was a trusted GOP loyalist. He was involved in many of Rudy Giuliani's crusades during Donald Trump's first term, including the Big Lie court cases that went nowhere."

Parton continues, "This made him widely seen as the kind of partisan stalwart the administration needed to kickstart the investigation … DiGenova and his wife, Victoria Toensing, have been fixtures in the Republican scandal-mongering business for decades, having first made their bones during the Clinton years."

But after his resignation, Parton observes, diGenova told the New York Post, "If you want indictments where there's no evidence, you have an ethical problem."

"What's clear from this episode is that Attorney General Todd Blanche — and, by extension, Trump — will take nothing less than indictments against his perceived enemies," the Salon journalist writes. "And if they don't materialize, he is ready to sacrifice even the mostly loyal MAGA foot soldiers. When I wrote about diGenova's appointment in April, I asked the question, 'Can the TV hit man do what none of the other Trump lawyers before him have been able to do: put the president's enemies behind bars?' Now, we know the answer is no, and it's not for lack of trying. It's for lack of evidence. Even a made man can't get that job done."

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MMA

John Solomon hyped Trump prosecutor Joe diGenova's work just days before diGenova resigned

Solomon a day before diGenova resigned: “Joe diGenova, the FBI, Kash Patel, Todd Blanche are getting their horses together now. For the first time, there is a buzzing accountability machine.”

Written by Sophie Lawton

Published 09/11/26

A day prior to Joe diGenova’s abrupt resignation from his position running Trump's “Grand Conspiracy” probe, diGenova ally and “special government employee” John Solomon — whose task force just declassified documents related to the probe, including notes from the FBI's interview of former Trump national security adviser Michael Flynn — was seemingly caught flat-footed, boasting of diGenova's role as part of a “buzzing accountability machine.”

On September 10, diGenova resigned from his Justice Department appointment running Trump’s “Grand Conspiracy” probe into Democratic political figures, law enforcement officials, and other perceived enemies of the Trump administration.

During the September 9 episode of his program Just the News No Noise, Solomon interviewed Flynn, who also praised diGenova, calling him “absolutely the right person” for the probe and a “pit bull-type prosecutor.” Solomon also claimed that the latest documents release was “about providing evidence to Joe diGenova and the prosecutors of the U.S. attorney's office in Miami and Fort Pierce.”

Solomon also appeared on Steve Bannon's War Room on September 8 ahead of the documents’ release, claiming that “there are some major cooperating witnesses that have now flipped to the state to working with Joe diGenova,” which will “accelerate the ability to bring accountability.”

Following diGenova's resignation, Solomon took to social media to reassure followers that the “Grand Conspiracy” investigation is still ongoing and that prosecutors are “continuing the work Joe started with a roadmap that includes subpoenas and some cooperating witnesses.” Meanwhile, Ryan Reilly reported for NBC that “a person familiar with the investigation” said that “Justice Department leaders had lost confidence in diGenova because they believed he was unfocused, moving too slowly and pursuing a path unlikely to succeed.”

Here is Solomon and Flynn's exchange on September 9:

Video

Citation

From the September 9, 2026, edition of Real America's Voice's Just the News No Noise

JOHN SOLOMON (HOST): It isn't just about clearing Mike Flynn's name, though that's very important. It's also about providing evidence to Joe diGenova and the prosecutors of the U.S. attorney's office in Miami and Fort Pierce. They are now beginning to bring grand jury witnesses to begin securing indictments against those who weaponized the government from the summer of 2016 to January of ’25. Everything from the FBI and Russia collusion all the way to Jack Smith.

In that process, they have secured cooperation for one or two really significant FBI personnel. That's a really important thing. When someone in the middle of the drama says, we lied, we made it up, we didn't do that, that wasn't the truth, we set it up, it changes the ability of prosecutors to make a case, particularly in a partisan divide like we are in America.

Joe diGenova, the FBI, Kash Patel, Todd Blanche are getting their horses together now. For the first time, there is a buzzing accountability machine. And this — these documents today are already in the hands of prosecutors. They have it down in Florida. It would be called an overt act. It happened eight, nine years ago, which means it can't charge it itself.

…

MICHAEL FLYNN (GUEST): I just want to say, I appreciate what the Government Transparency Task Force is doing. You are working to get to the bottom of it, and I think that there's going to be more to come. In fact, I know there's going to be more to come.

I think that Joe diGenova is absolutely the right person at Fort Pierce and with this grand jury. I mean, Joe — and for people to know, I mean, Joe was one of the lawyers that I was consulting after I had gotten rid of my original lawyers and working closely with Sidney [Powell] to help us out. So, Joe is the right man to take this on. He is a pit bull-type prosecutor anyway, and he has the big strategic picture that I think that the country needs to have in a prosecutor that's going to dig and expose the truth. And that's what you guys did with this Transparency Task Force breaking story that you broke.

...

We have to bring these people to account. We have to — and I do believe that Joe diGenova is the right guy to build these various conspiracy cases to show that these people were undermining, not only guys like me, but they were undermining a duly elected president of the United States. They were undermining the Constitution of our country, and they and they basically did it, you know, in a very, almost — I would just say a criminal fashion. I mean, it's beyond corruption. It's criminal. And people are going to have to be held accountable.

Bartiromo “got fired because she wanted to come forward the last couple of weeks and talk about John Solomon, ... the task force, Pulte, all of it”

09/04/26 12:38 PM EDT

Cleta Mitchell: “We had three networks that didn't cover the president's speech. I want to know what their relationship is with China.”

08/28/26 1:33 PM EDT

John Solomon is spreading another flimsy election fraud claim

08/07/26

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AN 9 26

The Justice Department is taking another crack at indicting former FBI Director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James.

According to Bloomberg Law, the move will be an appeal of a prior decision that District Attorney Lindsey Halligan was not lawfully appointed to serve as DA because she wasn't confirmed by Congress. The Justice Department is seeking to restore the criminal cases against James and Comey.

According to the DOJ, even if Halligan’s appointment wasn't legal, it shouldn't erase the indictments. However, Comey and James argue that the cases were invalid from the start because an unlawfully appointed prosecutor brought them before grand juries.

On Tuesday, a three-judge panel at the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals will hear arguments on the matter again and decide whether a remedy is needed and what it would look like.

A panel of judges in the Eastern District unanimously approved her predecessor, Erik Siebert, to take over the office in the interim. He'd initially resigned ahead of Halligan indicring Comey and James.

"Lawyers arguing on behalf of the Justice Department, Comey, and James won’t know who they’re appearing before until the morning of argument," the report said. "The Fourth Circuit is one of the only federal appellate courts that doesn’t announce the three-judge panel in advance."

It explained it's a "crapshoot" as to who they could appear before. While it was once a conservative court, eight of the past 15 new judges were appointed by Democrats.

Lawyers should prepare for “questions about the plain language, the origins of the statute, the problem the statute was trying to solve, and the ramifications of ruling one way or another,” explained former Virginia Solicitor General Michelle Kallen.

“If I were prepping for oral argument, I’d be prepared to answer more questions about the exact circumstances that led Congress to give a role to the courts in connection with the appointment of US attorneys,” Kallen said.

Last November, the Eastern District of Virginia was in complete disarray after Halligan was told her appointment to the post was not lawful.

After the ruling in the Comey and James cases last year, two magistrate judges and a district court judge in Alexandria, Virginia, went so far as to rebuke prosecutors in open court about Halligan’s name on all recent criminal cases, explaining that it should not be there. The documents included a new criminal case filing, guilty plea papers and several indictments.

Magistrate Judge William Fitzpatrick told prosecutors it was “not acceptable” for charging papers to be filed under Halligan’s name, and both he and Judge Michael Nachmanoff said that, after the ruling, Halligan’s name should not appear on any cases.

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'Weak sauce': Federal judge bench slaps Trump lawyers

an 9 26

Secret Service report blows hole in Trump's bizarre case against Comey

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AN 9 26

Critics of President Donald Trump often accuse him of blatantly violating federal and state laws in an effort to increase his power. But according to The New Republic's Matt Ford, a major part of Trump's ongoing power grab is using a different tactic: unearthing "moribund" laws and looking for ways to weaponize them.

The "moribund" laws that Trump and his legal team are digging up, Ford reports in The New Republic, are still on the books — and they are finding ways to exploit them.

"Congress has spent the last two centuries passing laws," Ford explains. "These laws often remain on the books, so to speak, long after their purpose has been fulfilled until lawmakers repeal them. Occasionally, the Trump administration finds something buried within this back catalogue that it can wield for its own purposes — and to no good end."

Ford continues, "This summer, for example, the Trump administration has moved to revive two different courts that are authorized by Congress but have laid moribund for decades or even centuries.

One of them is the Alien Terrorist Removal Court, or ATRC, which the Justice Department plans to use to deport certain applicable immigrants in classified settings…. Earlier this week, the department also began moving towards reviving prize courts, which allow the U.S. government to seize foreign vessels captured during war — more specifically, any Iranian oil tankers captured during the ongoing illegal war with Iran. Under federal law, these prize courts operate within the existing federal district courts to hear cases on the legality of a ship's capture and pave the way for the vessel's eventual sale, as well as the sale of any goods on board."

Ford argues that Congress should respond to the Trump administration's "enthusiasm for reviving moribund laws to accomplish its policy goals" by "repealing or revising them."

"Trump and his allies have inflicted plenty of harm through violating federal laws during his second term," Ford warns. "Another important problem is when he abuses and misuses existing laws…. It is telling that the federal government had never before used the ATRC to deport someone, even at the height of the War on Terror under the George W. Bush administration."

According to Ford, Congress "has a pernicious habit of leaving loaded guns lying around in the United States Code" — and the Trump administration is taking advantage of these "moribund" laws.

"Just because past presidents haven't picked them up and abused them doesn't mean Trump and his successors should be able to do so," Ford observes. "One of Trump's first experiments with moribund laws this time was to invoke the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 last year against Venezuelan nationals living inside the United States who it claims are members of Tren de Aragua, a Venezuelan gang. History students may remember the law as one component of the Alien and Sedition Acts, a package of controversial and constitutionally dubious laws enacted by the John Adams administration in the late 1790s. The Alien Enemies Act was the only one that wasn't repealed, though it remained largely unused until recently."

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an 8 26

Trump’s voter suppression scheme just hit a major snag ct?

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AN 8 26

'You have failed': Judge tears into Trump DOJ lawyers in IRS case

SLUSH FUND

Judge slaps down Trump’s 'dead horse' move to transfer felony convictions

MAIL IN BALLOT 2ND CASE SAME JUDGE?

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an 8 26

Federal judge issues huge slap to Trump’s domestic spying attempt

President Donald Trump’s revenge scheme against various individuals he has publicly deemed political enemies is officially defunct -- at least according to several sources, in no small part because of his failure to successfully prosecute a man he wrongly accused of vandalizing the Reflecting Pool. Indeed, that trend is even extending to cases that would normally be considered airtight.

The Daily Mail's Charlie Spiering reported on Thursday that the citizens of Washington DC are treating Trump’s Justice Department like an organization which deliberately targets innocent people rather than a good faith actor, and they are responding accordingly. When they targeted Olympic canoeist David Hearn by incorrectly saying he vandalized the Reflecting Pool, for example, the case was seemingly rejected for that reason.

“The bigger problem now is that [USAG Jeanine Pirro's] office has struggled to land seemingly airtight cases, with Washington's jury pool deeply skeptical of the administration's prosecutions, say sources,” Spiering wrote. “Juries have twice deadlocked over two suspected MS-13 ringleaders, sending both trials to mistrials this week. The deadlocked juries are a sign that there is deep skepticism surrounding Pirro and the Trump administration among DC citizens.”

Those defeats seem bound to continue unabated, sources tell the Daily Mail, despite Pirro's demonstrated willingness to take controversial or outright false cases to trial.

“Jury nullification is a serious problem in DC,' a legal source following proceedings in the city said,” Spiering observed. “Jury nullification is when jurors deliver a not guilty verdict even though they believe the defendant has broken the law.”

He added that this is indicative of a deeper systemic issue.

“The deadlocked juries are a sign that there is deep skepticism surrounding Pirro and the Trump administration among DC citizens,” Spiering said. “Those defeats will likely continue, sources tell the Daily Mail, despite her willingness to take cases to trial.”

He added, “'Jury nullification is a serious problem in DC,' a legal source following proceedings in the city said. Jury nullification is when jurors deliver a not guilty verdict even though they believe the defendant has broken the law.”

The Daily Mail explained that Pirro ultimately kept her job despite her recent failures by convincing Trump of the uphill battle involved in prosecuting these thin cases.

“During the closed-door Oval Office meeting, she personally detailed the Reflecting Pool case evidence to him,” Spiering stated. “The President was angry but understanding, a source familiar with the meeting previously told the Daily Mail.”

Apparently Trump has cooled off toward Pirro, perhaps recognizing on some level that the Justice Department has undermined its own credibility by pursuing weak and blatantly political cases.

“'I don't think that she's on thin ice now, I just think Trump was [furious] about the case,' another source told the Daily Mail. 'It was kind of a dumb case. It wasn't going to go anywhere and she was fully honest with the President about it,’” Spiering reported.

The Washington Examiner reported earlier this week that DC residents are so outraged at Trump’s political warfare that they are deliberately joining grand juries and receiving instructions on how to refuse to pursue cases the president is clearly trying to prosecute for political reasons. Similarly, people throughout America are joining forces to revolt against Trump’s attempts to rig the upcoming midterm elections.

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23-0?

AN 8 26

Federal judge issues huge slap to Trump’s domestic spying attemptFederal judge issues huge slap to Trump’s domestic spying attempt

2X? Republican Party lawsuit goes down in flames as judges dismiss appeal

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This week, T. Elliot Gaiser — assistant attorney general in the U.S. Department of Justice's (DOJ) Office of Legal Counsel — issued a memo on changes at the Foreign Service Grievance Board (FSGB). And according to Politico legal reporter Josh Gerstein, the memo attacks a system that has been in place for 46 years.

In a Friday post on X, formerly Twitter, Gerstein explains, "JUST IN: Trump administration declares structure of Foreign Service in place since 1980 is unconstitutional intrusion on presidential power. DOJ's busy Office of Legal Counsel says Secretary of State has to have final say on discipline."

The memo, titled "Memorandum Opinion For The Legal Adviser Department Of State," Gaiser writes, "The Foreign Service Grievance Board ('FSGB' or 'Board') hears grievances filed by members of the Foreign Service. 22 U.S.C. § 4135. Although the Secretary of State is responsible for appointing Board members, the statute prevents him from removing them except for cause and gives the Board final decisionmaking authority within the Executive Branch. This means that, for example, if a high-ranking diplomatic official in the Foreign Service files a grievance after being separated from the Foreign Service or otherwise disciplined by the Secretary, the Board can reinstate the official over the Secretary's objection."

Gaiser, in the memo, goes on to argue that "affording the Board final decisionmaking authority in this way violates the Appointments Clause of Article II" of the U.S. Constitution.

"In United States v. Arthrex, Inc.," Gaiser says in the memo, "the Supreme Court held that 'the exercise of executive power by inferior officers must at some level be subject to the direction and supervision of' a politically accountable officer. 141 S. Ct. 1970, 1988 (2021). But that requirement has not been met here. The Board is comprised of inferior officers removable only for cause, yet the statute empowers it to make decisions that are not reviewable by any politically accountable officer, rendering the statute unconstitutional."

According to the American Foreign Service Association, the Foreign Service Grievance Board "was created by Congress under the 1980 Foreign Service Act to provide due process to Foreign Service members."

In the memo, Gaiser argues that the U.S. Constitution grants presidents broad executive powers — including wide-ranging powers with foreign relations.

"By declining to enforce those portions of the statute," Gaiser writes, "final decisionmaking authority will be appropriately returned to the relevant Executive Branch official — either the Secretary of State or the President himself…. Article II of the Constitution vests in the President the 'executive Power,' which carries with it a 'vast share of responsibility for the conduct of our foreign relations.'"

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AN 8 26

The Republican Party's lawsuit against the state of Nevada over the law allowing ballots be counted up to four days after the Election Day has been dismissed.

In several states, ballots that are postmarked on Election Day are still counted, even if they are received by election officials a few days after the election. Nevada's law allows up to four days to continue receiving ballots. Ballots with missing or unreadable postmarks may also be counted as long as they arrive within the three days that follow.

The RNC and Nevada Republican Party sued Nevada in 2024 to block the ballot counting, claiming that the law passed in 2021 unlawfully extends Election Day. They pointed to federal laws that set a uniform national date for federal elections. They also claimed that counting late-arriving ballots could dilute Republican votes and provide Democrats an unfair advantage. Nevada officials and voting-rights advocates countered that the relevant act is casting or mailing the ballot by Election Day, not the postal service’s delivery date, and that the law helps ensure legally cast votes are counted.

In the lower-court ruling, U.S. District Judge Miranda Du dismissed the appeal, saying that the plaintiffs lacked standing to sue. The plaintiffs then appealed to the Ninth Circuit, where the case remained pending until Friday's decision.

According to decision, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals similarly decided on procedural grounds, not on the law itself, Democracy Docket posted.

The three-judge panel explained that the plaintiffs were not actually harmed by the lower court’s ruling. And if they were not harmed by it, they had no legal right (no standing) to pursue the appeal. The court therefore dismissed the appeal.

This isn't the only case the GOP has filed related to mail-in ballots received after Election Day.

The most important case came from Mississippi, where the RNC, Mississippi Republican Party and individual voters challenged a law allowing absentee ballots postmarked by Election Day to arrive up to five business days later.

A federal district court initially rejected the challenge, but the Fifth Circuit struck down the law. In June 2026, however, the U.S. Supreme Court reversed that ruling in Watson v. Republican National Committee in a 5–4 agreement

"The federal Election-Day statutes do not prevent Mississippi from counting absentee ballots postmarked by Election Day but received up to five days thereafter; nothing in the federal Election-Day statutes requires ballots to be received by Election Day," explained SCOTUSblog.

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AN 8 26

On Friday, a federal court dealt a huge blow to President Donald Trump’s efforts to weaponize the Department of Justice, ruling that a U.S. attorney who obtained grand jury subpoenas targeting New York Attorney General Letitia James had been illegally appointed. According to the 2nd Circuit Court’s opinion, “This case concerns whether John A. Sarcone III validly served as, and lawfully exercised the duties of, the Acting U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of New York.” In the court’s assessment, “We hold that he did not.”

The case dates back to August 2025, when Trump loyalist Sarcone issued subpoenas to James’ office in an attempt to undermine civil lawsuits the latter filed against Trump, his family business, and the National Rifle Association. Both Trump and the NRA were found liable, but claimed they were being targeted politically. Sarcone’s subpoenas were part of an effort to bring charges against James, whom he accused of violating Trump and the NRA’s civil rights. His inquest ultimately failed to bring charges.

James filed suit questioning the validity of the subpoenas, which a lower court quashed, at the same time disqualifying Sarcone from future involvement with the investigation. The DOJ then appealed to a higher court, which sided 2-1 with the original determination.

According to the new opinion, “We hold that Sarcone was not serving as Acting U.S. Attorney when he obtained the subpoenas” and that “the general delegation to Sarcone of all the duties of the U.S. Attorney’s office was an unlawful” use of authority. He therefore lacked the power to obtain subpoenas, so the court affirmed their quashing. What’s more, the court noted that the government’s appeal never offered an argument as to why the lower court erred in disqualifying Sarcone from future investigations, so that order was upheld as well. The majority judges were appointed by Presidents Bill Clinton and Joe Biden, while a third dissenting judge had been appointed by Trump.

The subpoenas have been part of Trump’s wide-ranging lawfare effort against James, who had indicted the president for fraud after it was found he had inflated the value of his properties. Trump was initially fined over $450 million, but the financial penalty was later thrown out on appeal. Since then, however, Trump has been vocal about his desire for revenge, declaring on the 2024 campaign trail that James should "be arrested and punished accordingly.” Once he returned to office, his DOJ indicted James under allegations of mortgage fraud. These charges were thrown out when a court found that the U.S. attorney leading the case had been – like Sarcone – illegally appointed.

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an 8 26 //

President Donald Trump’s politicized Department of Justice has abandoned major white-collar prosecutions in favor of waging legal war against Trump’s perceived political enemies. But a White House whistleblower from Trump’s first term says there will be no way to hide Trump’s lawfare from investigators when he leaves office — no matter how much paper he shreds.

“[T]he Trump administration is not hunting fraud. It’s hunting down its enemies with anything it can find. ‘Fraud’ just happens to be the easiest label to apply,” said former U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) analyst Miles Taylor.

Trump’s DOJ used “welfare fraud” as the “thinly veiled pretext” to launch a massive political shakedown in a state that Taylor points out is led by Democrat Tim Walz, who dared to challenge Trump for the White House in 2024. Before it was halted by a federal judge, Trump’s DOJ tried to investigate Walz for allegedly impeding the president’s immigrant crackdown.

“The true nature of Trump’s ‘anti-fraud’ plans came into view last year, as the White House pursued retribution against New York Attorney General Letitia James, the woman who won a nine-figure civil fraud judgment against Trump,” said Taylor. “In September, the president publicly demanded on social media that “JUSTICE MUST BE SERVED, NOW!!!” Weeks later, a former White House aide indicted James for alleged ‘mortgage fraud.’”

But look to the money to see Trump’s true motivation, said Taylor.

“A White House genuinely obsessed with protecting taxpayer dollars would not be spending nearly a billion of those dollars (much of it raided from other agencies) to gild the White House and build a ballroom, or just as much to retrofit a luxury jet from Qatar. You cannot loot the treasury with one hand and call yourself its guardian with the other.”

But Trump’s presidency is already nearly halfway through. When he’s gone, he will be a powerless target.

“[W]hen power changes hands, which it eventually will, we will seek all the documents, including every criminal referral memo, target list, email between the White House and the task force, hand-written notes from the vice president’s fraud meetings, and so on. All of it will be subpoenaed and reviewed, whether by a new Congress next year or a new Justice Department after that,” said Taylor. “And guess what? They can’t shred it all on the way out the door, because they’ve trapped themselves.”

Paperwork, emails and private notes, assured Taylor, is the lifeblood of the prosecution process.

“If they want their prosecutions to survive, there must be evidence, discovery, and a chain of custody. The records must exist somewhere, or the cases go away. I suspect that when investigators finally follow that paper trail, it will lead exactly where the Letitia James and Adam Schiff cases already point — back to the White House — and to proof of the deliberate weaponization of the American government against its own citizens,” said Taylor.

“That’s when the real fraud trials will begin,” he added.

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AN TC 8 26

In April 2026, a federal grand jury returned indictments charging the Southern Poverty Law Center with wire fraud, bank fraud and conspiracy to commit money laundering.

The indictment alleges the SPLC, a nonprofit legal advocacy group, secretly funneled more than US$3 million in donated funds to people associated with violent extremist groups, including the Ku Klux Klan and Aryan Nations.

Prosecutors allege that the SPLC secretly paid members of those groups to act as confidential informants without telling donors. Eight informants received the money between 2014 and 2023, according to U.S. Attorney General Todd Blanche.

The SPLC has denied the charges and seeks their dismissal, with lawyers for the group adding that the charges constitute “vindictive prosecution.” The SPLC’s interim president, Bryan Fair, has stated that the informant program “saved lives” and reflected decades of dangerous civil rights work.

Critics of the prosecution at Lawfare, a media site focused on the U.S. legal system, argued that the indictment is among “the most cynical criminal cases ever brought by the Department of Justice.” They noted that the SPLC had no legal duty to disclose the confidential nature of its informant program to donors.

Within hours of the Justice Department’s indictment, I found that white supremacist influencers on Telegram, Gab and other social platforms were celebrating the arraignment. They portrayed the charges as proof that journalists and civil rights groups documenting extremist movements could no longer be trusted.

The indictment became a rallying point to discredit not only the SPLC but the wider body of research on hate groups and political extremism. I believe that these narratives will be used to help justify increasingly radical and, in some cases, violent responses.

Ideological ammunition

Some conservative advocacy groups and right-wing media outlets – including Moms for Liberty and the Daily Signal – immediately stripped the indictment of its legal context. In online posts, they recast it as established proof that the SPLC had been deliberately creating extremist activity rather than investigating it.

A Telegram search I conducted on May 6 identified 22 posts mentioning the SPLC across at least six white nationalist channels. Most appeared within 72 hours of the indictment. The posts did not engage in sustained discussion. They repeated a small set of claims.

The Super Sincere Alpha GOONMAXXING Aryan Sigma Patriot channel wrote: “The SPLC is a hate group.”

Other channels cited the indictment as proof that the SPLC had been paying sources to manufacture the very extremism it claimed to fight. In the White Lives Matter Official Telegram channel, users were urged to “become an activist for your race” while referencing the SPLC as an opposing force.

The similarity across channels and social media is notable. The same framing appeared repeatedly within a short time window. This suggests rapid circulation of a shared narrative across networks rather than independent commentary.

The neo-Nazi, neo-fascist layer

Comments on the Southern Poverty Law Center indictment by members of the Commander George Lincoln Rockwell channel – named for the founder of the American Nazi Party – demonstrate how antisemitic conspiracy theories work, not as explicit rhetoric but as a broader narrative.

Internet discussions portrayed the SPLC as a politically motivated or illegitimate actor. Posts in Patriot Front Updates, for example, circulated allegations of fraud and money laundering while criticizing the SPLC and its efforts to identify and challenge white nationalist activity.

I found that this criticism of the SPLC also became connected to a broader antisemitic conspiracy narrative – one that portrays the organization as operating on behalf of purported Jewish interests rather than simply as an advocacy organization with political and ideological commitments.

These narratives circulated alongside the “great replacement theory,” which falsely claims that shadowy elites are encouraging immigration and demographic change to replace the white population and diminish its political and cultural influence. It’s a conspiracy theory that the SPLC and others have documented as central to contemporary white nationalism.

In this logic, the indictment is not an isolated fraud case – it is evidence that a coordinated network of institutions has been systematically suppressing white identity.

Victimhood as recruitment

Scholars of white nationalism have long identified victimhood narratives as central to that movement’s appeal. By portraying white people as under attack or unfairly displaced, these narratives transform social change into a story of persecution and provide a powerful justification for political mobilization.

My research on white nationalism shows how contemporary extremist movements rely less on formal membership and more on decentralized digital spaces. It is there that narratives, grievances and identities are continuously reinforced.

In these environments, major news events like the SPLC indictment become opportunities.

Why this pattern repeats

Extremist movements have long used mainstream controversies as recruitment opportunities.

Participants often interpret external events through narratives of threat, injustice and persecution. In doing so, they transform moments of controversy into evidence that their worldview is correct.

In the 1990s, for instance, the deadly standoffs between federal officers and the Branch Davidians religious sect near Waco, Texas, and survivalist Randy Weaver in Ruby Ridge, Idaho, became foundational persecution narratives for militia and Christian Identity movements. These groups saw the sieges as proof that the federal government was hunting gun owners and religious dissenters.

In online extremist communities, these events can become powerful tools for reinforcing group identity and attracting individuals who are searching for explanations or belonging.

With a real-world legal event like the SPLC indictment, extremists can point to government action as evidence that their worldview is being validated. The result is a narrative that appears responsive to current events, even when the connection is shallow or distorted.

Redirected domestic terrorism policy

Legal scholars have noted that the Justice Department indictment fits within the Trump administration’s broader pattern of redirecting domestic terrorism policy away from white supremacist groups.

The Trump White House’s 2026 Counterterrorism Strategy does not mention violent far-right groups as a domestic terrorism threat at all.

That context matters for understanding how the SPLC case landed in extremist spaces: not as an isolated fraud allegation but as institutional permission. The indictment has become a symbol before the evidence has been weighed.

In today’s fragmented digital media environment, symbols travel faster than facts, especially when they confirm what a radicalized audience already wants to believe. I believe the real danger is not that white supremacists believe the SPLC is guilty. It is that the controversy, whatever its legal outcome, has already done its work.

Art Jipson, Associate Professor of Sociology, University of Dayton

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

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an 8 26

While President Donald Trump claims he’s been waging a war against fraud, one of his former officials asserts that the White House-led anti-fraud task force is really a “ruse to prosecute political foes.” This is according to Miles Taylor, who served as Homeland Security Deputy Chief of Staff during Trump’s first term and at the time penned an anonymous article exposing the dysfunctional inner workings of the administration.

As Taylor wrote on Thursday, according to reports from the New York Times and other outlets, the Trump administration has been leveling claims of fraud against targets ranging from immigrant-owned ice cream trucks to Democratic governors. “The goal was not to take down serious criminals,” argues Taylor. “It was storytelling. Trump says his enemies are grifters. Accordingly, he’s reorienting the federal government to prove — whether they’re governors or immigrants — that his political and societal opponents are rotten right down to the food trucks from which they sell.”

YES I AM CROOKED BUT SO ARE THEY THEM ENEMY

Taylor says there is a clear giveaway to the president’s intentions, writing, “As DOJ is building these types of cases, it’s simultaneously abandoning major white-collar prosecutions. Corporate investigations (which can uncover billions in theft and billions in restitution for victims) have fallen to their lowest level in decades. In fact, the Times found that the volume of such cases is literally thousands below the Biden administration and far below Trump’s own first term. Meanwhile, the president has been pardoning wealthy executives and dropping cases left and right against friendly corporations. So no, the Trump administration is not hunting fraud. It’s hunting down its enemies with anything it can find. ‘Fraud’ just happens to be the easiest label to apply.”

Trump’s actions in Minnesota, says Taylor, offer a clear example. As he writes, “Late last year, welfare fraud was used as the thinly veiled pretext for the Trump administration to launch a massive immigration crackdown (and political shakedown) in a state led by Democrat Tim Walz, who challenged Trump for the White House in 2024. Thousands of ICE and CBP agents flooded into Minnesota to address a problem that — if the reasons were genuine — should have required not more than a few dozen accountants. It certainly didn’t need gun-toting agents. While Trump was forced into retreat, his team first tried to coerce state leaders to forfeit their voter rolls, which critics pointed out had precisely nothing to do with the original fraud claims. Of course it didn’t; from the start, the whole exercise was about political leverage.”

“To understand what Trump’s task force is actually meant for,” says Taylor, “just look at how it’s being managed. The DOJ’s new fraud division doesn’t report to some expert in criminal investigations. It reports directly to Vice President JD Vance, an arrangement without precedent, especially since it effectively circumvents the Attorney General himself…In June, he personally made the criminal referral against Walz. Asked where the ‘war on fraud’ goes next, Vance answered: California. (Surely it’s just a coincidence that they’re going after the blue state led by the man Trump most fears will try to succeed him.)”

Taylor notes other examples, such as charges of mortgage fraud leveled against New York Attorney General Letitia James — who had previously won a nine-figure civil fraud case against Trump — Senator Adam Schiff (D-NY), and Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook. According to Taylor, “‘Fraud’ has become the administration’s codeword for ‘revenge.’ The term is a respectable-sounding wrapper for criminalizing the political opposition. And now that Trump’s team has systematized the plan with a task force — making the issue a top priority for all U.S. attorneys in the country — we will see more and more cases brought, like the recent cases against left-leaning nonprofit Southern Poverty Law Center.”

The reality, asserts Taylor, is that Trump’s White House is rampant with fraud, the scale of which will be exposed by a future Democratic administration. While Trump and his allies will attempt to conceal their crimes, “They can’t shred it all on the way out the door, because they’ve trapped themselves. If they want their prosecutions to survive, there must be evidence, discovery, and a chain of custody. The records must exist somewhere, or the cases go away. I suspect that when investigators finally follow that paper trail, it will lead exactly where the Letitia James and Adam Schiff cases already point — back to the White House — and to proof of the deliberate weaponization of the American government against its own citizens. That’s when the real fraud trials will begin.”

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an 826

Trump's loyalist prosecutors keep going down in flames

Church leaders ask federal judge to punish Trump’s DOJ lemon?

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don lemon?

Judges sound alarm over Justice Department 'controlled by the White House'

an 826

Ex-DOJ prosecutor reveals tactic Trump uses to 'disguise' his ineptitude

The DOJ just blew up its own Reflecting Pool case — again

Trump's retaliation 'Revenge Tour' has sparked a national emergency: NYT

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Trump DOJ prosecutors 'appear to be shaky' about what words mean

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an 8 26

Judge hands Trump 23rd straight loss as she rips apart 'fishing expedition'

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an 8 26

Trump is rumored to be furious and considering firing US Attorney Jeanine Pirro over her decision not to pursue a criminal case against Olympian David Hearn — and her possible attempt to save face could “spectacularly backfire,” according to one legal expert.

“Last week, WaPo reported that a “special grand jury” has been empaneled in D.C.,” Lawfare’s Anna Bower wrote on X on Monday. “Could U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro use that grand jury to release a damaging report against Trump’s critics?”

Bower added, “If that’s her galaxy-brain plan, it’s not a very good one.”

In her Lawfare analysis on special grand juries, Bower pointed out that “turning one loose to investigate purported crimes can, on occasion, spectacularly backfire.” A specialized tool created through the Organized Crime Act of 1970 to make it easier for prosecutors to address complex organized crime cases, special grand juries are like regular grand juries in that they both operate in secrecy and are empowered to subpoena documents, require testimony and issue indictments. They are also mandatory to be empaneled every 18 months in judicial districts with over four million people, although they can be used under distinct circumstances in smaller districts as well. Special grand juries can also be convened for up to 36 months, twice as long as regular grand juries.

Perhaps most notably, special grand juries are allowed to issue a public report at the end of their time, which regular grand juries cannot do. According to Bower, this makes them less potent as a political weapon against Trump’s critics.

“Beyond the statutory limitations, the practical realities of this particular special grand jury make the idea of using its report as a political weapon look even less plausible,” Bower wrote. “A report can only be submitted with the concurrence of a majority of the grand jurors. And this is, after all, a D.C. grand jury. Pirro’s office has already had a remarkably difficult time persuading D.C. jurors to go along with some of its more politically charged prosecutions.”

She added, “And the judge who will likely decide whether any report becomes public is hardly a pushover. That task would fall to Chief Judge James Boasberg, who has already had occasion to criticize Pirro’s use of grand jury powers. Earlier this year, he quashed subpoenas issued in Pirro’s investigation of Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, concluding that the government had produced ‘essentially zero evidence’ of a crime and that the subpoenas were issued for an improper purpose."

Overall, this caused Bower to conclude that if Pirro is convening a special grand jury in the hope of pleasing Trump by continuing to pursue his political adversaries, she may be making a serious mistake.

“All of which is to say: If Pirro’s objective is simply to conduct a long-running criminal investigation, a special grand jury may give her a useful tool,” Bower wrote. “But if the objective is to manufacture a public document condemning Trump’s political enemies, the tool looks considerably less formidable. The statute was not written to give prosecutors a mechanism for publishing accusations they cannot otherwise persuade a grand jury to charge.” Ultimately “if you give a grand jury the opportunity to speak, you cannot count on it to tell the story you want it to tell.”

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TODD SAYS WE WILL NOT BE INTIM

'Not a threat — it's a promise': Judge says he'll hold DOJ in contempt

‘Public deserves to know’: Angry judge grills DOJ over hidden Epstein files

'0 for 21': Trump’s 'losing streak' proves the limits of his authority

AN 8 26

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an 8 26

First Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli promised President Donald Trump that California was “a fraudster’s paradise,” and pledged would announce charges within weeks of his appointment. That was two months ago.

The San Francisco Chronicle reported on Friday that Essayli talked a big game but has failed to deliver.

After the California primary election, Trump and Republicans sounded the alarm that there had to be fraud going on because it was taking too long to count the ballots in Los Angeles County.

"They are trying to steal the governor of California primary, and the mayor of Los Angeles, primary, away from two great Republican candidates. Here we go with the very late and massive numbers of mail in ballots," Trump ranted in all-caps on Truth Social.

Essayli posted his own promise to Trump on X, saying, "Without commenting on any specific investigation, my office has multiple election fraud investigations underway in coordination with @FBILosAngeles . We will follow the evidence wherever it leads and prosecute any violations of federal election law to the fullest extent."

Only a few days later, he was speaking to Glenn Beck, promising to charge individual actors “in the next … one to two months.”

“I hate to put timelines on things,” Essayli said. “We need some of these results to be certified so we can prove some of the allegations. But we will be charging some people.”

He also called on the public to send tips proving voter fraud was "widespread" in California.

“We are looking for any widespread conspiracy, if you will. Right now, I would say our investigations lean more into individual actors,” he explained. “Theoretically, I’d have to charge thousands of people to prove that it changed the outcome of the election. … But we are looking. We are looking.”

When he spoke to Chris Cuomo on News Nation, Essayli said, “there is evidence of voter fraud … and when we’re ready to bring those cases, you’ll see the evidence. You’ll see the case.”

But, that was at the beginning of the summer. On June 14, Essayli promised KCRA news, “So some of them are more developed and they’re ready to charge.”

After nothing for months, it appears the prosecutor is beginning to change the narrative, the report explained. The Chronicle cited Essayli, saying that to get access to the voter rolls, the Justice Department must sue the state of California and it might take a while.

A constitutional law professor explained how situations like this go beyond a debate about whether widespread voter fraud exists.

“At this point, unfortunately, I don’t know why anybody would believe the Department of Justice,” said Justin Levitt, who teaches at the Loyola Law School. “And that is not a thing that I relish saying as somebody who used to work there … It’s also not something that I would have said in the administration of any individual other than President Trump.”

When The Chronicle called the office to ask what the hold-up was, they were told they'd have an update in two weeks.

“It turns out that voter fraud does occasionally happen, but it is incredibly rare, like single-digits-of-balance rare,” Levitt said. “The elections in California, the elections in Southern California, the elections in other parts of California are very clean. And election officials work incredibly hard to make sure that they’re very clean. It does great disservice to the election officials when people run their mouths.”

He explained that Essayli is "a piece" of the larger whole of the Justice Department and currently the DOJ doesn't enjoy much credibility in court.

“I’m not sure this U.S. attorney has established himself as a trusted local partner with the sort of vague allegations of widespread wrongdoing that he hasn’t been able to back up. To be clear, he hasn’t been able to back it up because I don’t personally believe that these things he was saying are true," Levitt said.

Trump and Republican allies spent over a week spreading claims that fraud was afoot in California and calling for action. Levitt explained that these kinds of conspiracy theories from officials spread further mistrust and sow doubt.

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AN 8 26

Trump just lost another big elections case in a key swing state

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RWW 8 26

Hannah Rabinowitz and Holmes Lybrand @ CNN: Former employee at Southern Poverty Law Center arrested on fraud charges

The charges are part of the Justice Department’s case against the SPLC over the alleged payments, which prosecutors say were done through shell companies.

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AN 8 26

President Donald Trump's lawyers filed an appeal on Wednesday alleging that they are the victims of a judge's abuse after they were sanctioned in court and the president was slapped with a gag order.

After losing a case last month, Trump's lawyers are now asking that sanctions against them and the Trump gag order be paused pending their appeal, Law&Crime reported.

At issue is Trump's "agreement" between the Justice Department and the IRS to create a nearly $1.8 billion "anti-weaponization fund" for anyone who felt they were wronged by previous administrations. Already, there are dozens of Jan. 6 attackers demanding millions in financial compensation despite being found guilty or pleading guilty.

Trump sued the IRS in the Southern District of Florida after his taxes, along with those of over 400,000 others, were exposed in a data breach. In his January filing, Trump demanded a $10 billion payout for damages from the IRS. Trump then claimed he had reached a "settlement" with the U.S. government, which he runs.

U.S. District Judge Kathleen Williams didn't buy it. In her July ruling over the matter, she not only said that there can be no "settlement," but she also issued sanctions for the lawyers involved in the case.

Finding that “sanctions are appropriate here,” Williams said Trump’s personal attorney Alejandro Brito will be referred to the Florida Bar for “its consideration, review, and determination as to whether any disciplinary action is appropriate in light of the findings and rulings made in this order.”

Williams also banned another Trump lawyer, Daniel Epstein, from seeking admission to practice law in the Southern District of Florida for one year.

Further, she attacked acting U.S. Attorney General Todd Blanche’s “apparent capacity to speak for both plaintiffs and defendants, sign a ‘settlement’ document on behalf of all parties to this action, and then repudiate part of that agreement, demonstrates that there was only one party whose interests were being represented throughout this case.”

Additionally, Williams restricted Trump, the government, their lawyers and certain related individuals from discussing or using the settlement agreement.

On Wednesday, those lawyers filed an appeal with the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals, alleging that the judge lacked the authority to issue sanctions.

"This appeal arises from the district court’s extraordinary abuse of its sanctions power. In this action, Plaintiffs President Donald J. Trump, Donald J. Trump Jr., Eric Trump, and The Trump Organization, LLC sued the Internal Revenue Service and the Department of the Treasury, pursuant to a congressionally-authorized remedy, over the undeniably unauthorized and illegal disclosure of their confidential tax-return information to the press," the filing said. "After reaching a settlement with the IRS and Treasury, Plaintiffs voluntarily dismissed the action, which the court so-ordered."

The lawyers alleged that the judge had no "proof of collusion and bad faith," while punishing them with a "sweeping, unconstitutional, and unlawful gag order" that targets the president himself.

"The injunction categorically forbids Movants from even 'referring to' the Settlement Agreement, and separately bars any use of its provisions in official proceedings," the brief continues. "That gag order wrongly silences the sitting President, the Government, private parties, and counsel on a matter of obvious public concern at a politically consequential moment — and denies the public the right to hear their views."

The filing says that any gag order against the president is "unconstitutional," meanwhile, any penalties against them could damage their careers.

The lawyers further claim that the judge wrongly believes that because Trump runs the government, he can't sue it. In this capacity, he was suing as a private person.

The brief said her sanctions "flowed from a single predicate legal error: that presidential supervision under Article II supposedly eliminated Article III adversity."

In fact, Williams' issue is not with the suit itself; it's that Trump controls whether or not to settle with himself.

IRS employees have sued over the Trump fund, saying that the agreement has a hidden legal trap.

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AN 8 26

Judge smacks down Trump’s 'desperate' attempt to seize control of elections

An Arizona judge who has previously expressed sympathy for President Donald Trump's election deniers just delivered a major blow to them.

A judge in Arizona — who already dismissed charges against Trump allies for their role in the effort to overturn the 2020 election results — has rejected their effort to block the state from trying to re-indict them," tweeted Politico journalist Kyle Cheney on Tuesday.

In his ruling, Judge Sam J. Myers argued that "the Court has considered the requests for a dismissal with prejudice contained in the Defendants’ responses to the State’s Motion to Dismiss and in Defendant John Eastman’s Motion to Dismiss Pursuant to A.R.S. §13-12-751(B) and the joinders thereto. Defendants have cited, among other factors, the passage of time, the amount of money spent, the stress caused to the Defendants, fundamental fairness, and the interests of justice."

He concluded, "While the Court does not discount the significance of those circumstances, the Court finds that the interests of justice do not require a dismissal with prejudice."

This continues a pattern of Trump and his supporters being disappointed in the courts. More than 20 judges from both parties have unanimously rejected his efforts to force states to share voter information with him, characterizing his efforts as a threat to democracy and the separation of powers between the federal government and states. Trump's politically-motivated prosecutions have also decimated the judiciary's trust in his Department of Justice, with experts saying that many suspect his prosecutors lie to the courts in order to do the president's bidding.

“Ordinarily, the first order of business would be restoring DOJ's political independence and restoring DOJ's credibility in the courts, but it doesn't seem that Blanche is super interested in either of those,” CNN legal analyst Elie Honig told CNN anchor Brianna Keilar on Monday. “Those are the two biggest issues facing the department right now — the fact that they have undertaken and are still in the midst of several prosecutions aimed at people, in large part or entirely, because they are political enemies of the president.”

This leaves the door wide open for prosecutors to bring fresh charges against the defendants, extending a costly and stressful legal battle they desperately hoped to escape. Legal experts note that this decision highlights a growing fatigue among judges who are increasingly unwilling to shield political actors from accountability. As public confidence in the justice system wavers amid accusations of political bias, this ruling serves as a stark reminder that even sympathetic courts draw a hard line at stopping active prosecutions. The defense now faces a steep uphill climb to avoid a second round of indictments in Arizona.

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an 7 26

New York Attorney General Letitia James is challenging President Donald Trump again — and this time she's challenging the power of his presidency.

Law&Crime spotted the 27-page court filing, which is being joined by Oregon Attorney General Dan Rayfield and eight other attorneys general. They allege that the Trump administration isn't doing its job enforcing payments from big banks over their "predatory practices."

At issue is that many home mortgages include an escrow account. Each month, the homeowner pays a little extra, and the bank hangs onto that money for property taxes and homeowners' insurance.

"However, lenders often required significantly larger deposits than necessary," allowing them to profit from homeowners' money, the lawsuit says.

There are many states that have specific laws saying that if the bank holds your escrow funds, it must pay you interest. For example, Oregon requires a 2.61 percent interest and California requires at least 2 percent interest.

The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), which regulates banks, decided that national banks, not state laws, can determine whether mortgage banks must pay interest. The administration argues that it frees up capital for the bank to trickle down. If the banks chose, they could lend to more people or reduce fees. Or, they could continue to profit from the interest.

Trump's administration believes that its new rules can overpower the laws. The states argue that the OCC doesn't have any legal authority to ignore, let alone eliminate, laws on the books.

"Instead, it exists solely as a pretext to manufacture a conflict between this new federal rule and state interest-on-escrow laws," the lawsuit continues.

The states aren't seeking damages for the homeowners; they merely want the courts to rule that the OCC's actions are unlawful and that these mortgage banks must follow the law. If there are any financial awards available, the suit asks that they be given for attorneys' fees.

As James explains in a press release, "In May 2026, OCC issued two new rules to prevent state escrow interest laws from applying to national banks and federal savings associations, threatening the interest payments that help homeowners pay their bills."

The Trump administration rules "violate the law by exceeding critical limits that Congress placed on OCC's ability to preempt state consumer protection laws in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis," the release continues.

"At a time when homeownership is more expensive than ever, the Trump administration is trying to make it even more costly with these unlawful rules," James continues. "Big banks and mortgage lenders should not be able to force homeowners to lock away significant amounts of money without paying interest. For decades, New York has prevented lenders from taking advantage of homeowners, and my office is taking action to defend our laws."

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an 8 26

The FBI just botched DOJ’s entire case against James Comey: legal expert

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Trump's many lawsuits have a tendency to implode during the discovery phase, so much so that conservative commentator Rick Wilson has dubbed it one of his "rules" of politics, and the latest bombshell revelations from Capital One show exactly why.

Wilson, a vocal conservative critic of Trump for many years, was the latest guest on commentator Molly Jong-Fast's podcast, "Fast Politics." During the discussion, the pair discussed the stunning new revelations emerging from Trump's lawsuit against Capital One.

Capital One Financial is among the institutions that Trump has sued, alleging that they "debanked" him and his companies for political reasons in 2021 following his involvement in the Jan. 6 riots. This week, however, Capital One disclosed that it shuttered around 300 Trump Organization accounts after a months-long investigation into signs that they were connected to money laundering. The company is now asking a federal judge in Florida to dismiss the case, arguing that its new disclosures "make clear that Capital One closed Plaintiffs' accounts for anti-money laundering ('AML') reasons."

Per NPR, the company said that the decision to close the accounts followed "months of analysis and a careful review," though it is not clear if the Trump Organization was given notice and time to explain the signs of money laundering. It is also not clear if any other banks raised similar alarms, and the Trump Organization has not responded to any outlet's request for comment so far.

Digging into the development during his "Fast Politics" appearance, Wilson said that this summed up "the performative nature of all Trump lawsuits," and suggested the creation of a "third Wilson rule," after his first two rules about politics: "Everything Trump touches dies" and "Everyone hates Ted Cruz."

"And the third one is no Trump lawsuit survives discovery," Wilson explained. "Because now that the bank is going to say, OK, well, if you want us to show why we think you were money laundering, we will reveal in court why we think you were money laundering. And Trump's people, I promise you, they're going to go... 'nevermind.'"

Wilson continued: "It is like all these cases ... when the rubber hits the road, when the facts matter, when the discovery is going to embarrass the living hell out of them, right? You know, it's why they dropped the charges against the Olympian this week after he allegedly personally destroyed the Reflecting Pool. It's why they just can't hold up on these B.S. defamation cases, like against the BBC and other things. There's just a sense that these lawsuits are like a lottery ticket for him. Maybe sometimes somebody will just collapse and go, okay, we'll give you money."

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DOJ GETS --- THE BULL MOBSTER TO SAY THAT 86 MEANS KILL 7 29 26 MSNBC COMEY

AN 7 26 NEW

Trump has been making specific demands of those involved in the James Comey sea shell case, court exhibits show.

According to exhibits in a recent court filing published by CNN, Trump asked a Secret Service agent who interviewed Comey to give him his notes so he could use them for a press conference he was having later that day.

According to CNN, "one agent messaged that Comey’s post and investigation 'is a hot topic' on Air Force One and noted that Trump 'is very interested.'"....

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AN 7 26

Judge drops hammer on Trump admin: ‘You’re violating my order!’

President Donald Trump has lost again at another appeals court over the mass detention policy he's pushed out over the past year.

MS NOW producer Kyle Cheney reported that the 9th Circuit rejected U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement's (ICE) detention policy. It's the fifth straight loss at an appellate court. Cheney remarked that the district is the crucial one that covers California, Arizona, Nevada and Washington.

Politico reported Thursday that the decision is "the most significant rejection yet." Lower courts will now be bound by the ruling in states where there are thousands of detainees.

The ruling came down 2-1, and the court decided that he misconstrued immigration laws from decades ago that set the rules for the modern deportation system.

“The government’s change in policy has resulted in detained aliens filing thousands of habeas petitions in federal courts across the country, seeking bond hearings and possible release from detention,” wrote Trump appointee Judge Daniel Bress in the majority decision. “The implication of the government’s position is that Congress in 1996 made a major change to the immigration laws by subjecting millions of unadmitted aliens present in the United States to mandatory detention, but that this change then went unnoticed and unheeded, with the Executive Branch for the next three decades … We accordingly do not think that Congress in 1996 made such a large-scale change to our established system of immigration detention in the way that the government now contends.”

Anyone who has been in the U.S. for years and has established families can now only be detained after a bond hearing, which requires convincing an immigration judge that they can live safely in their own communities while the process unfolds.

Of the five courts that have ruled this way so far, Politico cited, are the Atlanta-based 11th Circuit, the New York-based 2nd Circuit, the Colorado-based 10th Circuit and the Cincinnati-based 6th Circuit, explained the report. Only two courts, the 5th and the 8th Circuit, have ruled in Trump's favor. There are court battles in four other circuits forthcoming.

Meanwhile, there have been a whopping 460 federal judges who have ruled against the administration on more than 10,000 cases involving the detention policies. This compares with 54 judges who have supported the ruling in about 1,100 cases, calculated Politico.

Trump's mandatory detention policy has faced unprecedented judicial resistance across the federal court system. Federal judges have overwhelmingly rejected the administration's interpretation of 1996 immigration law, with 460 judges ruling against the policy in more than 10,000 cases compared to only 54 judges supporting it in about 1,100 cases. The 9th Circuit ruling is particularly significant because it covers California, Arizona, Nevada, and Washington—regions with substantial immigrant populations.

The decision marks Trump's fifth consecutive loss at the appellate level. Only two circuits, the 5th and 8th, have sided with the administration. Legal experts argue Trump misread congressional intent, claiming Congress never intended to mandate detention for all undocumented immigrants regardless of ties to U.S. communities, creating a constitutional conflict between executive power and due process rights.

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AN 7 26

New Don Lemon court filing alleges federal officer lied to the judgeral officer lied to the judgehttps://www.alternet.org/don-lemon-ice/

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AN 7 26

President Donald Trump has made it clear that he plans on rigging the 2026 midterm elections, from delivering a speech touting unsubstantiated claims of meddling in the 2020 presidential election and trying to purge people from the voter rolls to attempting to thwart mail-in balloting and potentially firing the House of Representatives Clerk for not being sufficiently compliant.

Yet he has been 0 and 18 in the courts, with the latest defeat being notable because it involves a case in which non-citizens were proven to have voted.

“President Donald Trump’s Department of Justice (DOJ) suffered its 18th defeat, with no wins, in its nationwide voter data crusade Wednesday, when a federal judge dismissed the department’s lawsuit seeking New Jersey’s unredacted voter rolls,” reported Democracy Docket's Yunior Rivas on Wednesday.

Rivas added, “U.S. District Judge Zahid Quraishi wrote that the error had ‘no bearing’ on whether DOJ had a right to the voter rolls.” The reporter pointed out that “in his ruling, Quraishi granted New Jersey’s motion to dismiss and denied DOJ’s motion to compel the records, ruling that the Civil Rights Act of 1960 does not give the federal government access to the state’s live voter registration database.”

Rivas continued, “The dismissal with prejudice prevents DOJ from refiling the same claim in the district court, though the department can appeal, as it has almost every other loss.” They also pointed out that “New Jersey had already provided DOJ with its publicly available voter list.”

In his decision, Judge Quraishi pointed out that “the Constitution's architects chose to delegate election administration to the states, recognizing that local governments have the deepest understanding of their constituents' circumstances.” Later, quoting the Massachusetts Convention’s 1788 debates about the Constitution, the judge added that “the Framers of the Constitution chose to embrace balance in crafting the Elections Clause. The diffusion of power between state and federal government was intended to ‘preserve and restore to the people their equal and sacred rights of election [against] the influence of ambitious or popular characters, or in times of popular commotion, and when faction and party spirit run high.’”

Trump’s latest gambit was prompted by news that New Jersey accidentally added roughly 6,600 noncitizens to the state’s voter rolls through a glitch in its DMV software, with roughly 400 actually casting ballots in 2023 and 2024 elections.

Trump's 0-18 court record on voter data demands reflects a broader pattern of judicial rejection of his election-related claims.

Legal experts argue that Trump's DOJ is using the noncitizen voting issue—which affects less than 0.01% of votes cast—as a pretext to gain access to voter databases that could enable partisan purges. Constitutional scholars note that the Framers intentionally distributed election authority between states and the federal government to prevent exactly this type of centralized manipulation.

Despite repeated legal defeats, Trump's administration continues filing similar suits, suggesting the litigation is less about addressing actual election fraud and more about creating a veneer of legitimacy for undermining state election administration.

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AN 7 26

President Donald Trump’s subpoenas of The New York Times has been widely criticized for potentially violating the First Amendment, to the point where the prosecutors trying to force out the publication’s sources on weaknesses with Trump’s Qatari-gifted jet have been threatened with losing their Bar license. Now a recent report reveals a judge presiding over that case has humiliated a prosecutor trying to win it.

“The Times swiftly moved to quash the subpoenas, arguing that they were issued in a bad faith effort to harass and intimidate the journalists,” reported Lawfare's Anna Bower on Tuesday. “What’s more, the newspaper contended that the government hadn't come close to meeting the standard set out in New York Times v. Gonzales, the Second Circuit precedent establishing that prosecutors seeking a reporter's confidential sources must show, among other things, that the information can't be obtained by other means.”

Bower added, “The Justice Department, in response, didn't ask the court to deny the motion outright. Instead, it asked the court to hold the subpoenas in abeyance for two weeks while it pursued additional investigative steps—steps that, the government suggested, might bear on the scope of the subpoenas and on whether the Gonzales factors could ultimately be satisfied.”

She then discussed Judge Arun Subramanian, who blasted the government for failing to rise to the Gonzales standards.

“Given that the government has asked to hold the subpoenas in abeyance while it pursues further investigative steps, is the government willing to just withdraw them?” Bowers asked U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York Sean Buckley.

But Buckley said the government believes the ‘appropriate measure’ is to hold the subpoenas in abeyance while it takes unspecified additional investigative steps. In other words: the government wants to put enforcement of the subpoenas on pause rather than withdraw them entirely.

Subramanian then reportedly interjected, “[Let me] stop you right there. So the answer to my question is 'no'?” After some back and forth with Buckley, the government conceded it could not rise to that standard.

Subramanian then quoted from the Justice Department’s own filing, that to overcome the qualified reporter’s privilege recognized in Gonzales, the government must show that the information it wants is not obtainable from other sources.

"You agree, right?" the judge asked aloud. But Buckley had to acknowledge that Subramanian was correct, adding that he believed the steps have now been achieved even though they had not when the subpoenas were first issued.

“It’s the kind of admission that tends to end an argument before it starts, and Subramanian treats it that way,” Bowers reported. “‘Seems like you've got two options,’ he says to Buckley. ‘Either we can quash the subpoenas or you could withdraw the subpoenas.’”

The judge was similarly dismissive of the rest of the government's position because of its failure on that key question.

“Asked if he has anything to add, Buckley allows himself one small act of defiance: the government disputes any suggestion of bad faith, he says.

And that's where Buckley left it, Bowers reported.

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AN 7 26

U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro made a significant enough mistake that one legal expert says was incredibly stupid.

A bombshell report on Monday revealed that the government's own witness in the David Hearn case over the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool. Hearn is being accused of grabbing the pool lining with both hands and ripping it up.

The DOJ's witness revealed that the damage the DOJ alleges came from Hearn was already there before Hearn arrived.

An even bigger bungle, however, comes from an observation from writer and lawyer Amee Vanderpool, who runs the "Shero" Substack.

Citing an NBC News report about the case, saying that the person who indicated the pool was already damaged spoke to the grand jury about the damage prior to Hearn.

Beyond the fact that it sinks the DOJ's case, Vanderpool explained that by "using this" information, lawyers for Hearn "can now get all of the Reflecting Pool repair documents (and all documentation that is missing) in disclosure."

Hearn's lawyers are asking for information about the disclosure and legal instructions grand jurors were given. They want to see the trial minutes, which will detail the dialogue line by line.

In a different case involving six activists and politicians who protested outside of an ICE facility in Broadview, Illinois, it was discovered that the grand jury was being given conflicting information that wasn't factual and that the prosecutors were talking about defendants as if they were already found to be guilty. Anyone who looked to be wavering was excused from the jury.

It's unclear whether the DOJ did the same in this case, but Hearn's lawyers having access to all of the information may reveal what happened in the grand jury as well as a slate of other details.

Hearn's lawyers will be able to see documents involving the Reflecting Pool contractors, why they were chosen in a no-bid contract and why the costs were so much higher than President Donald Trump said they would be.

"Jeanine Pirro is an idiot to pursue this," said Vanderpool.

Last week, the judge in the case warned the DOJ that all of the workers looking at fixes to the pool and tearing up the liner were tampering with evidence.

“Non-preservation,” the judge told the DOJ, “the government does it at its own peril.”

One of Hearn's long-time friends, Adam Van Grack, who once served as chair of the U.S. Olympic governing body for canoe and kayak sports, said that going after Hearn was a mistake.

"The U.S. government could not have picked a worse person to be the headliner felony defendant in this trial," Van Grack told The Atlantic.

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an 7 26

Across the country, federal judges are calling out Department of Justice lawyers, questioning in unprecedented ways whether they can be trusted to tell the truth or uphold centuries-old legal norms.

From Washington, D.C., to Rhode Island to Oregon, federal judges nominated by presidents from both parties, including Donald Trump, have zeroed in on what’s called “the presumption of regularity.” It essentially means that judges must presume that the government — whether it be federal prosecutors, an IRS auditor or an FBI agent — did their jobs according to the rules and in good faith.

Until Trump’s second term, which has seen an exodus of veteran DOJ lawyers and a transformative shift in priorities from issues like enforcing civil rights to instead defending a mass deportation agenda, this foundational tenet had rarely been discussed in federal courtrooms, former judges, lawyers and scholars say. But as Trump’s DOJ exhibits behavior that judges have called “unlawful,” “unethical,” “unseemly” or otherwise dishonest, adherence to that bedrock standard is now being questioned.

ProPublica reviewed hundreds of cases since Trump retook the White House in which judges criticized the actions of DOJ lawyers and found more than 40 in which they explicitly referenced the presumption of regularity. In many cases, judges have expressed frustration that they can no longer take the government at its word.

“Judges simply don’t believe the representations that are being made by United States attorneys, assistant United States attorneys and the like,” said John E. Jones, a former federal judge for the District of Pennsylvania, appointed by President George W. Bush.

“I don’t think in the annals of the Department of Justice, in the history of jurisprudence in the United States, we’ve ever seen anything close to this.”

In Rhode Island in May, Trump-appointed federal Judge Mary McElroy rebuked federal prosecutors’ conduct — saying they withheld information and misrepresented facts — as she quashed their requests for a subpoena in their investigation into a hospital’s care of transgender children. The judge alleged the DOJ had inappropriately claimed its investigation was operating out of Texas to secure subpoenas targeting sensitive medical records of patients in another state and that it falsely claimed the Rhode Island hospital hadn’t communicated with the department.

“The discrepancy between the honorable conduct expected of federal prosecutors and DOJ’s tactics in this case is unsettling,” McElroy wrote. “The Court cannot help but share the sentiment that ‘[t]he presumption of regularity that has previously been extended to [DOJ] that it could be taken at its word — with little doubt about its intentions and stated purposes — no longer holds.’”

Judges have emitted a chorus of condemnations against the legal basis for some of Trump’s political agenda, including the mass firings of federal workers, an immigration dragnet that has imprisoned hundreds of U.S. citizens and retribution campaigns against the president’s political enemies.

In doing so, federal judges are imbuing forceful language into their orders in a way that scholars say signals to the Trump administration that the third branch of government is losing trust in the Justice Department.

“I don’t think in the annals of the Department of Justice, in the history of jurisprudence in the United States, we’ve ever seen anything close to this.”

Former federal Judge John E. Jones, a George W. Bush appointee

Federal judges rarely grant interviews, and none of the judges who criticized the Justice Department in their orders granted interviews to ProPublica.

In a statement, a spokesperson for the DOJ said its attorneys are “dedicated public servants who represent the United States with integrity, in accordance with their ethical obligations and the law.”

“The Department stands firmly behind the professionalism and good faith of its attorneys,” said spokesperson Kiersten Pels. The White House did not respond to a request for comment.

Federal judges have found that the government filed statements generated by artificial intelligence that referenced nonexistent case law, wrote briefs that ignored facts and filed declarations with inaccurate dates, the ProPublica review shows.

In one case, the government included documentation claiming a detainee had been convicted of marijuana possession in 2009. That detainee, the judge noted, citing what she called the government’s persistent “sloppiness,” would have been 4 years old.

“This Court will no longer blindly accept statements of fact from [the U.S. government] unless they are made under oath by an individual with personal knowledge,” Judge Christine O’Hearn, a President Joe Biden appointee, wrote in New Jersey while reviewing a writ of habeas corpus petition filed by a man who claimed he was unlawfully imprisoned by immigration officers. O’Hearn accused the government of defying her orders when, instead of releasing the man, Immigration and Customs Enforcement transferred him to a different facility in New York.

In Minnesota, the state’s top political leaders had publicly clashed with the administration following the violent ICE raids that led to the deaths of two U.S. citizens. Then the administration filed a flurry of subpoenas against them.

Last month, Judge Patrick J. Schiltz, who was appointed by George W. Bush and clerked for Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, slammed the government’s actions and “spurious claims,” saying the presumption of regularity was being abused.

“Initiating a criminal investigation in order to harass political opponents or to coerce them into taking official action — particularly official action that the federal government cannot directly require those political opponents to take — is a blatantly unlawful and unethical use [of] the grand-jury process,” the judge wrote.

“Breakdown” of a Presumption

The presumption of regularity creates a high bar for those suing the government or defending themselves against it in criminal cases. They often must provide evidence that the government willfully violated a policy or otherwise deviated from its charge — that is, did something irregular — to overcome the standard.

It’s a shield the government wields often, with little notice, and one that is almost always successful. But overcoming that presumption has become increasingly common under Trump’s second term, according to court watchers.

About half of the cases ProPublica identified as questioning the presumption come from districts, including D.C., Maryland and Virginia, where by proximity and jurisdiction many of Trump’s actions are challenged and often heard by Democratic-nominated judges. The Southern District of New York, which has issued repeated rebukes of Trump administration actions, and the Northern District of California, another Democratic stronghold, are other hotbeds of judicial scrutiny.

Last September, D.C. District Magistrate Judge Zia M. Faruqui accused the administration of working around the federal grand jury process, getting an indictment from a state court after prosecutors had failed to get one in his court, which he called “unseemly,” if not “unlawful.” He fired off one of the earliest signs that the presumption itself could come into question.

“This only deepens the growing mistrust of the actions of prosecutors,” the judge wrote. “That is a sentiment that was once unthinkable, but the irregular is now the regular.” While the case was largely managed by assistant U.S. attorney Caelainn Carney, according to court transcripts, Faruqui was aiming his frustration at her bosses, including senior prosecutor Jonathan R. Hornok, and the leadership at DOJ. Neither attorney responded to requests for comment.

Pels, the DOJ spokesperson, told ProPublica that Faruqui “was wrong on the law” and noted that after the government appealed to the district’s chief judge, his order was overruled. “Judge Faruqui has a long-standing documented pattern of editorializing from the bench beyond the scope of the cases before him,” Pels added.

But in recent months, skepticism about the presumption has also come from judges appointed by Republicans, such as McElroy, or in GOP strongholds.

In Indiana, Trump-appointed federal Judge James Patrick Hanlon ordered the release of Salah Sarsour, president of the Islamic Society of Milwaukee and a lawful U.S. resident, from ICE custody in March. Sarsour’s lawyers argued the government had targeted him to suppress his First Amendment right to free speech. The DOJ invoked the presumption of regularity and argued his arrest was part of an anti-terrorism dragnet, which the judge threw out.

In the Southern District of Ohio, Judge Michael R. Barrett, appointed by George W. Bush, ordered ICE to release a detainee after concluding the presumption had been overcome because the government hadn’t presented a reasonable argument that the man was a flight risk.

News outlets, including CNN, have documented federal judges’ ire with Trump’s DOJ, and some of the cases under question have been well-publicized, such as the government’s illegal deportation of Maryland resident Kilmar Abrego Garcia to El Salvador. In that case, Judge Paula Xinis, a President Barack Obama appointee, criticized the government, saying, “You have taken the presumption of regularity, and you’ve destroyed it.”

Many of the rulings challenged one of Trump’s hallmark efforts: immigration enforcement and deportations.

“The presumption of regularity and integrity previously and routinely afforded to the Executive branch and the United States Attorney’s Office has been undeniably eroded in this jurisdiction and across the country,” O’Hearn wrote in February, noting that the federal government had repeatedly violated court orders in her district and others related to immigration operations.

In another immigration detention case, this one in Washington state, Biden-appointed Judge Lauren King said, “[t]he ‘presumption of regularity’ is dislodged here by the numerous factual errors in Respondents’ filings and by their conflicting representations.”

Jeremy Fogel, executive director of the Berkeley Judicial Institute and a former federal judge from California, said what’s happening in the courts feels more like a “political conflict” than the normal ebb and flow of the justice system.

“It’s really one branch that is really sort of questioning the legitimacy of the other one,” Fogel said. “I think the judges are trying to stand up for the legitimacy of their branch.”

Just Security, an online law and policy journal, has been tracking cases in which federal judges have admonished Trump’s prosecutors, including those involving the presumption.

“We’re witnessing a breakdown in the ways in which any administration ordinarily carries out its responsibilities, through the Justice Department in particular,” said Ryan Goodman, Just Security’s co-editor-in-chief.

Erosion of Trust, Ethics Inquiries

The erosion of trust from the federal bench comes as Trump has profoundly shifted priorities at the DOJ to align with his political platform: ending civil rights and diversity programs, deporting immigrants and stripping away environmental protections.

Those who deal with DOJ lawyers have noticed the difference in court.

Mitch Bernard, chief counsel at the nonprofit Natural Resources Defense Council, has faced off on environmental issues with the DOJ many times. Although they may disagree, he said, he always expected his opponents to be “fair and above board.”

That dynamic is gone, he said.

“I would call it a transformation of the role of the Justice Department,” he said. “There are many different judges in different jurisdictions not only ruling against the government but calling the government out for dishonesty and dissembling, and that’s an extraordinary thing.”

The result, Bernard said, is that “the government will lose more cases as a result of the way the Justice Department is behaving.”

“There are many different judges in different jurisdictions not only ruling against the government but calling the government out for dishonesty and dissembling, and that’s an extraordinary thing.”

Mitch Bernard, chief counsel at the Natural Resources Defense Council

Meanwhile, groups such as his are benefitting from the government brain drain. “We hired 10 litigating attorneys last year,” he said. Of those, eight came from the DOJ.

Judges aren’t just losing faith in the DOJ. Some are pushing to sanction Justice Department lawyers.

This month, Miami federal Judge Kathleen M. Williams ruled that Trump’s lawsuit against the IRS was an improper exercise in self-enrichment, citing the president’s lawyers for a series of misstatements in the case.

The Obama appointee referred the lawyer who brought the president’s case against the IRS, Alejandro Brito, to the Florida Bar for potential disciplinary proceedings. She also forwarded her ruling to disciplinary officials in New York, who had earlier received an ethics complaint about acting Attorney General Todd Blanche.

A DOJ spokesperson called the Blanche case “nothing more than a politically motivated bar complaint, filed by partisan activists who disagree with this Administration’s policies.” Brito did not respond to a request for comment.

In Rhode Island, McElroy referred DOJ lawyers to a review board for possible discipline for their handling of the hospital investigation.

“As citizens, we trust that federal prosecutors, when wielding this awesome power against a state, a company, or certainly against vulnerable children, will play fair and be honest with its counterparts and the judiciary,” McElroy wrote. “DOJ has proven unworthy of this trust at every point in this case.”

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RWW--> Yunior Rivers @ Democracy Docket: Trump’s DOJ launched a new ‘election integrity’ website. It’s riddled with errors

The errors would be embarrassing on any federal website. On this one, they also appear to serve an ideological purpose.

NO LNX GFX

Trump’s DOJ launched a new ‘election integrity’ website. It’s riddled with errors

By Yunior Rivas

July 20, 2026

Hours before President Donald Trump delivered a primetime address brimming with debunked conspiracy theories about the 2020 presidential vote, his Department of Justice (DOJ) unveiled a new website tracking state-by-state efforts to supposedly protect American elections.

The site, branded as a joint initiative with the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), includes 243 completed “Enforcement Actions to Safeguard Election Integrity” across 50 states and Washington, D.C.

In fact, the Trump administration’s new “election integrity” website is so comprehensive that it includes completed actions from the future.

When the page launched Thursday, it claimed the department had “Inspected Federal Election Records to Ensure Only Eligible Americans Vote” in Florida, Kansas and South Dakota on Aug. 14, 2026.

As of Monday, that date was just under a month away, but the inspections were still listed as “completed.”

And the administration’s apparent ability to enforce federal election law across the space-time continuum was not limited to voter roll inspections. At launch last week, the site also used the present-tense “ensures” to describe future actions related to military ballots, including entries dated July 18 in Massachusetts and July 27 in Delaware.

Unless they’ve invented time travel, the DOJ may have some explaining to do.

And those are only the most temporally ambitious errors on the government website. It also contains an incorrect timeline, a blatant mischaracterization of a lawsuit and at least one county that does not exist.

Take North Carolina, for example.

The site says the DOJ sued the state on March 27, 2025, then obtained a court order on May 27 requiring officials to correct more than 100,000 voter registrations that lacked required information.

The DOJ’s own records tell a different story.

The department actually filed the lawsuit on May 27 — the same date the website assigns to the supposed court order. A judge didn’t approve the parties’ negotiated consent agreement until Sept. 8. And even that was a settlement approved months after the case began, not a merits ruling handed down on the day the DOJ sued.

The site’s March 27 date does not correspond with the filing date in the DOJ’s announcement. And it’s unclear what event — if any — took place on that day. But that date does fall two days after Trump signed his first anti-voting executive order, which a court permanently blocked last month.

Alabama fares no better in the DOJ’s chronicle.

The website claims that, on March 14, 2025, the DOJ “Withdrew From Biden-Era Suit Demanding Race-Based Election Maps.” But the DOJ’s own announcement from that date says the department dismissed a lawsuit challenging Alabama’s pre-election voter-removal program. The case concerned an effort to purge thousands of voters right before the 2024 election — not the drawing of congressional or legislative maps benefiting minority voters.

Then there’s Massachusetts, where the federal government apparently discovered a new county.

The site says the DOJ plans to send election monitors to “New Bedford County” on Sept. 1. But there’s no such place: New Bedford is a city in Bristol County.

But at least the DOJ got the future tense right in Massachusetts.

The errors would be embarrassing on any federal website. On this one, they also appear to serve an ideological purpose.

The site offers an official, highly selective history of the Trump administration’s escalating intervention in elections — presenting lawsuits, warning letters, inspections and arrests as major accomplishments. Its featured DOJ news section highlights announcement after announcement about states being sued for refusing to hand over voter rolls.

But it conveniently ignores what happened after those lawsuits were filed.

As of Friday, the DOJ had lost all 16 voter roll cases that had reached a district court ruling, plus one appeal. So far, no court has ordered any state to provide the department with its unredacted statewide voter file.

The latest defeat came in Connecticut, where the DOJ had demanded voters’ names, addresses, dates of birth and driver’s license or Social Security numbers. A Trump-appointed judge rejected the department’s legal theory, denied its motion to compel the records, dismissed the case and ordered it closed.

These embarrassing losses are nowhere to be found on any of the 16 states’ pages. The site simply says the DOJ sued for “Failing to Provide Federal Election Records,” adopting the department’s disputed legal characterization while omitting that the court ruled those records were not subject to its demand.

The administration’s new portal is not merely a DOJ publicity project.

It prominently displays the seals of both DOJ and DHS and calls itself “a joint initiative” of the two departments. Alongside the DOJ’s civil lawsuits, it promotes DHS funding directives, immigration arrests and deportation policies as election integrity work.

It also asks members of the public to help the DOJ and DHS “protect the vote by reporting concerns.” Its privacy notice says submitted information may be shared with federal, state or local law enforcement agencies.

That invitation carries added significance because the website debuted the same night Trump used a White House speech to revive false and unsupported claims about the 2020 election, to allege sweeping foreign interference and to demand passage of the anti-voting SAVE America Act.

Trump offered no evidence that foreign or domestic actors manipulated votes or changed the result of the election he lost. Election experts were quick to point out that the intelligence documents declassified by the administration actually refuted Trump’s claims.

The new DOJ website helps convert Trump’s rhetoric into federal infrastructure: a map portraying the administration’s campaign as a series of victories, links encouraging the public to report election suspicions and two powerful departments presented as partners in policing them.

The errors may be funny, but the federal campaign they advance is serious.

Still, a government website devoted to “election integrity” should probably get the dates, lawsuits and counties right. For now, the DOJ’s new page appears to need some “list maintenance” of its own.

AN 7 26

President Donald Trump’s Justice Department continued its track record of humiliation defeats, this time over a special education classroom assistant in Minnesota who was detained while protesting U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).

Former attorney general Pam Bondi was quick to post on X the arrest of protestors connected to Homeland Security in January, but on Tuesday Trump's own prosecutors in Minnesota surrendered charges against Christina Rank, who Bondi accused of attacking agents. The government lawyers themselves concluded they did not have enough evidence to proceed with a prosecution.

“The United States of America, by and through its attorneys, Daniel N. Rosen, United States Attorney for the District of Minnesota, and Robert G. Tucker III, Special Assistant United States Attorney, hereby requests that the Court dismiss this case with prejudice pursuant to Rule 48(a) of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure,” the court said in its statement.

They added, “On July 9, 2026, the Court issued an order granting the Defendant's motion for a bill of particulars. Upon a further review of the evidence and affidavit in support of the complaint, the government does not believe that probable cause for assault exists. Based on a lack of probable cause and in the interest of justice, the government requests this case be dismissed with prejudice.”

At the time of Rank’s detainment, the Department of Homeland Security’s Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin claimed that “on January 12, while ICE law enforcement were parked in a parking lot in Inver Grove, MN a vehicle belonging to a U.S. citizen pulled up next to the agents, asked if they were ICE, and began honking her horn and yelling ‘you are terrorists.’”

They added, “ICE departed the parking lot and she proceed to stalk law enforcement officers and moved her vehicle dangerously getting close to them. As ICE agents attempted to turn, the individual tried to cut their vehicle off and collided with law enforcement's vehicle.Officers then attempted to get her out of the vehicle and arrest her for obstruction—a federal crime. The woman refused and disobeyed commands. ICE officers followed their training and used the minimum amount of force necessary to make the arrest.”

But this surrender is far from the first occasion when Trump’s Justice Department has let him down. Despite trying to create a $1.8 billion slush fund for his political supporters and Trump-affiliated institutions after suing his own IRS over his leaked tax returns, judges stepped in to block the disbursement of the funds on the grounds that it may have constituted illegal self-dealing.

As of December, Trump’s track record with the Justice Department was so spotty that the institution — which normally has no difficulty obtaining indictments because of its sterling reputation — was instead failing on one out of five occasions.

“A 21 percent dismissal rate,” wrote Mediaite contributing editor Sarah Rumpf. “Twenty-one percent. That means that more than one out of every five criminal cases brought by the U.S. Attorney’s Office in D.C. are getting dismissed by the courts, a truly stunning turnaround for an office long known for experienced prosecutors able to handle the most complicated of cases.”

Indeed, despite the famous expression that the Justice Department can indict a ham sandwich, in August they failed to secure an indictment against a high-profile case involving a sandwich. An indictment against Charles Sean Dunn, a former Justice Department paralegal who threw a Subway sandwich at a federal officer in Washington, fell through.

an 7 26

DOJ tells court it won’t put things in writing because it could be 'used against it'

AN 7 26

The Justice Department has subpoenaed 14 major law firms for records about their communications tied to President Donald Trump’s executive orders.

The State reported Monday that the Trump administration is escalating its fight with major law firms by using Justice Department subpoenas to demand records. The move is part of an ongoing lawsuit from the American Bar Association, which alleges the administration has been trying to punish law firms for their past legal work, diversity efforts and political relationships.

Trump issued an executive order in early 2025 targeting more than five law firms with connections to investigations into Trump. Three of those firms sued civilly, alleging it was retribution. Some of Trump's biggest legal foes worked for the firms, so Trump targeted them, specifically naming the lawyers in the orders.

The broader suit comes from the American Bar Association, which alleges the administration used its authority to restrict things like access to federal buildings and security clearances and, in some cases, could hurt its clients’ government work.

Four of those firms that challenged the order in court have been successful, but some big firms agreed to hand over millions in free legal work. The ABA lawsuit wants a judge to declare the entire policy moot and prevent it from moving forward. The firms that were willing to settle with Trump could be put in an awkward position as a result.

Among the many concerns the ABA cites, it said firms may stop taking certain clients or cases because they fear retaliation.

One of the details in the subpoenas deals with longtime Trump advisor Boris Epshteyn, who doesn't work for the White House, but has reportedly been seen with the rest of the White House staff. Epshteyn appears to have been a go-between in dealmaking with the law firms that settled, reported the *New York Times*. The DOJ is demanding records of communications between the firms and Epshteyn and the ABA is now saying that they too want to see them.

Those communications could show the way that the bargains were made, what the White House wanted, and whether the arrangements were part of a broader pressure campaign. The Justice Department is trying to keep those communications under wraps, which suggests they’re central to the dispute. But since Epshteyn isn't a government employee, it will be difficult to invoke executive privilege or any of the other protections that a president can use.

Ultimately, the law firms want to find out what the pressure campaign looked like behind the scenes and whether it used power to intimidate or manipulate the law firms.

an 7 26 bbc

How a Trump target is trying to 'turn the tables' on DOJ

an 7 26

Since returning to the White House one year and a half ago, Donald Trump has used to the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) to target his political foes — from former FBI Director James Comey to New York State Attorney General Letitia James — while pardoning allies, loyalists and supporters, including those connected to the January 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol Building. According to former Energy Department Director William S. Becker, Trump is creating a two-tiered justice system in which his allies are exempt from all "legal accountability."

"In his second term, Trump is doing more than ignoring legal and ethical constraints on his behavior," Becker argues in a Monday op-ed for The Hill. "He is helping his allies escape legal accountability, too. He has subverted equal justice to create two classes of citizens: one privileged, the other persecuted. The privileged group includes around 1500 supporters who participated in the Capitol riot on January 6, 2021. As president, Trump not only released them from jail and erased most of their criminal records, but he also wants to pay them millions of taxpayer dollars in restitution for the inconvenience of facing justice for trying to overturn a lawful election."

Becker continues, "Trump has also granted pardons to people who have given him political donations and financial favors, as well as to colleagues with whom he has direct financial or political ties. This pay-to-play scheme is wildly unethical, but the Constitution does not limit the president's pardon power. At last count, Trump's pardons had not only deprived victims of justice; they also wiped out nearly $2 billion in court-ordered fines, forfeitures and restitution for victims and taxpayers."

The "privileged group," according to Becker, "apparently includes the 1835 loyalists Trump has appointed to federal jobs as well as his 22 Cabinet-level officers."

"Thus protected, members of his Cabinet have openly lied to Congress and ignored laws," Becker laments. "For example, Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche refuses to comply with the bipartisan law that requires him to release all files related to sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. The withheld files may contain additional references to Trump. They also contain the allegations against the 'Epstein class' — that is, other rich and prominent people who live lives of leisure, lack moral scruples and could have been involved in Epstein's crimes. The Justice Department has prosecuted none of them, except for Epstein's colleague, Ghislaine Maxwell."

Becker adds, "The untouchables also appear to include tens of thousands of federal immigration and border officers, including some who should be charged with civil rights violations and even killings…. It is no longer accurate to say that Trump aspires to be an autocrat, king or dictator. With his self-serving sabotage of the rule of law, he is already there."

OMG

BULWARK SOMMER 7 26

TRUMP’S PRIMETIME ADDRESS Thursday is shaping up to be a grab bag of conspiracy theories, all of them intended to help Republicans take control of the midterms. He might declare that Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock are somehow fake senators; or announce a national emergency on voter fraud. The latest reporting suggests Trump will claim China tried to steal the 2020 election.

Whatever Trump does, it’ll be because of John Solomon—a star conservative reporter who is, somehow, also a White House staffer. For nearly a decade, Solomon has had a hand in the creation of nearly every major MAGA grievance narrative, from the Russia investigation to Ukraine to 2020 election fraud. Solomon has a pretty clear M.O.: He’ll spin a story that seems like a massive exposé, getting it trumpeted on Fox News and throughout the right-wing media ecosystem before it has a chance to deflate under scrutiny, as it usually does.

Now in his gig as a short-term White House staffer, Solomon has been digging up the raw material necessary for both prosecuting Trump’s enemies and the expected attempt at electoral chicanery.

Yet this narrative impresario and his brand of quasi-journalism remain largely unknown outside the world of right-wing media.

In 2007, when Solomon was an investigative reporter at the Washington Post, the Columbia Journalism Review was already complaining that his stories amounted to the “John Solomon special”: front-page revelations that, when scrutinized, turned out to be little more than a “steady stream of mediocrity.”

Now, thanks to his role in the Trump administration, Solomon has a chance to work that magic on a much larger scale.

Typically, MAGA muckrakers are liars or crackpots, like Mike Lindell, or that one rogue falconer (but not the one you’re thinking of). Compared to these folks, Solomon is a veritable Walter Cronkite. He has a serious journalistic background after working for Post and the Associated Press, and he dresses in ties and navy suits. His veneer of seriousness provides a valuable service for the MAGAverse. Watching him can almost feel like watching a grizzled mainstream investigative journalist who just happens to validate Trump’s obsessions.

A story from the final days of the first Trump administration shows how much Solomon lives in the Trumpworld pocket. The day before Joe Biden’s inauguration, then-Trump chief of staff Mark Meadows called Solomon to the White House to review a binder of newly declassified files from the FBI’s “Crossfire Hurricane” investigation into Trump and Russia—just the kind of document handout Solomon loves.

Meadows wanted Solomon to publish the contents of the binder on Inauguration Day. Solomon’s staffers at his website, Just The News, scrambled to scan them all. Then a new envelope arrived for Solomon, with new files “he was permitted to write about,” according to a lawsuit Solomon later filed against the Justice Department.

Unfortunately for Solomon, the whole plan got botched when a White House staffer recalled the files for further redaction. The binder disappeared back into the new Biden administration. Solomon’s fervor for getting access to them again led to a special favor from Trump, who named Solomon as one of his personal representatives at the National Archives, where he would have the freedom to again pursue the story (to give you a sense of Solomon’s perceived reliability to the ex-president, the only other person designated as Trump’s representative at the time was Kash Patel). It was a decision intended to redound to mutual benefit, and sure enough, Solomon eventually published the files in April 2025.

HOW DID SOLOMON WIND UP as Trump’s favorite journo? After leaving the Post in 2008, Solomon moved between journalism nonprofits and conservative media for a while, powered by a personality once described as “charming and garrulous and brimming with swagger.”

He reached a new level of prominence on the right when he became an executive at The Hill in 2017. His portfolio there was superhuman: simultaneously launching a TV channel, drumming up ad business, and filing news and opinion articles. As you might expect, it was a situation rife with conflicts of interest, with one staffer warning that Solomon was up to “reputation-killing stuff.”1

Solomon’s first big moment at The Hill came with his coverage of the Uranium One faux-scandal, during which he heavily insinuated—but did not come close to proving—that Hillary Clinton had approved the sale of rights to a key American uranium reserve to Russia in exchange for donations to the Clinton Foundation. At the time, Republican anxieties about Trump’s own Russia ties were in overdrive, so Solomon’s articles gave them the tantalizing feeling that the “real” Russia scandal was that Clinton was the true Putin patsy.

In March 2019, Solomon waded into even murkier waters: the bizarre series of events that led to Trump’s impeachment over efforts to pressure Ukraine to dig up dirt on Joe Biden. Solomon inexplicably began to target American ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch in articles for The Hill, portraying her as disloyal to Trump and weak on corruption. A month after Solomon’s series began, Trump fired Yovanovitch.

House Democrats later alleged that Solomon’s columns were part of a smear campaign run by Rudy Giuliani and a web of right-leaning Ukrainians and Americans, in a complex deal meant to convince Ukrainian officials to investigate the Bidens.

Solomon met regularly with figures involved in digging up dirt on the Bidens. The group became known as the BLT Team, named after the BLT Prime restaurant in the Trump International Hotel in Washington where they met. The gang included Giuliani, the prolific Ukrainian-American schemer Lev Parnas, and husband-and-wife legal team Victoria Toensing and Joe diGenova. He even shared a draft of a story with the group before publication—a major journalistic taboo.

DiGenova and Toensing seem to have made something of a cottage industry out of this. They represented at least one Ukrainian involved in the scheme. They had also, perhaps not coincidentally, represented a key Uranium One “whistleblower.” And they were also Solomon’s own lawyers, even though he used them and their clients as sources in his articles without disclosing that relationship. Once again, all of this flies in the face of journalistic standards.

Conflicts of interest aside, much of Solomon’s reporting on Ukraine was simply wrong, according to experts on the byzantine world of Ukrainian politics. Even as Solomon became a regular on Sean Hannity’s Fox News show (and used that relationship to make himself valuable to the BLT Team, according to Parnas), an internal Fox News research document I reported on at the time acknowledged that Solomon was involved in a Ukrainian “disinformation campaign.”

“It was primarily non-truths and non-sequiturs,” one State Department noted of Solomon’s reporting during the first Trump impeachment investigation.

Solomon left The Hill in October 2019. The newspaper skewered him in an internal review, with some of the editor’s notes added to his Ukraine’s articles running nearly as long as the articles themselves.

DESPITE QUESTIONS ABOUT SOLOMON’S credibility during his run at the Hill, his star on the right continued to rise. In 2020, he launched Just The News, a conservative news outlet where he has run pro-Trump stories without even the thin layers of editorial oversight he faced at prior media outlets.

Solomon is also becoming a right-wing media mogul, adding minor conservative brands The Post Millennial and (the historically significant) Human Events to his holdings in November. In June 2025, the publisher of RealClearPolitics accused Solomon of convincing some of that website’s donors to withdraw their support in an attempt to soften it up for a takeover, too.

IAF

Solomon also helped launch and continues to provide office space to a foundation that doles out millions of dollars to a network of conservative media outlets and think tanks, including his own site. As Mother Jones reported, few if any of those funding connections are disclosed in Solomon’s journalism when he cites groups that have benefited from the nonprofit’s largesse. Mother Jones describes the sort of ideologically driven news sites in the foundation’s network as “pink slime,” a name that comes from “by-products added as filler to ground beef.”

But Solomon’s biggest honor came this summer, when Trump made him a special government employee tasked with helping “identify some documents, some secrets” to be declassified and released to the public. He is eligible to serve in the role for up to 130 days. Solomon, who said he’s not being paid for the White House declassification work, announced in June that he was stepping down as Just The News’s editor-in-chief, although he continues to host his show and publish articles on the Just The News website.

Solomon isn’t the only member of the BLT Team joining the administration. In April, diGenova was sworn in as a counselor to the Justice Department operating out of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Florida, where he’s reportedly working with a grand jury to indict Trump critics like former CIA director John Brennan. The judge overseeing the proceedings—and making decisions on whether to approve things like subpoenas for witness testimony or documents—is infamous Trump loyalist Aileen Cannon, who ran interference for the president during special counsel Jack Smith’s classified documents investigation between Trump’s terms in office. Earlier this spring, Cannon blocked the release of Smith’s final report on his investigation’s findings.

Toensing came out of retirement in May to be sworn in as a “deputy chief for civil rights in the criminal section” in the same prosecutor’s office, according to a statement filed in court by District of Columbia U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro.

“Ms. Toensing has extensive obligations in that [Florida] District related to a grand jury proceeding,” Pirro wrote, suggesting that Toensing too is working on some kind of urgent grand jury case against perceived Trump enemies.

Solomon has openly admitted that his role declassifying government documents is central to helping that same grand jury, suggesting the once-ridiculed group involved in crafting the anti-Biden Ukraine narrative is now helping Trump pursue his enemies through the Justice Department.

Referring to the administration’s push to declassify files about investigations into the president, Solomon told Benny Johnson in April that “those documents will help this prosecutorial team in Miami” by taking away the need for the sorts of secret and time-intensive processes that would otherwise be needed to make use of them in court.

But Solomon’s decades-old reputation for letting down his audience is starting to reach conservatives, too. Popular conspiracy theory blog Conservative Treehouse has grown skeptical of Solomon’s promises, even adding a bolded warning label of sorts to a preview of Trump’s Thursday speech so readers wouldn’t get too excited.

“Caution should be noted as newly appointed Special Government Employee John Solomon is responsible for the content,” the post read.

Emerald Robinson, an anchor at Mike Lindell’s online channel, wasn’t excited either.

“LOL why would anybody trust John Solomon based on his record?” she wrote on X.

When you’ve lost Lindell’s crew…

REF 4? CT DOC TOE 40K CS 200 PP VAUGHN INDEX?

Status Report – #25 in TOENSING v. U.S. DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE (D.D.C., 1:24-cv-02444) – CourtListener.com

JEANINE FERRIS PIRRO United States Attorney By: /s/ Thomas W. Duffey THOMAS W. DUFFEY Assistant United States Attorney 601 D Street, NW Washington, DC 20530 (202) 252-2510 Attorneys for the United States of America /s/ Matthew D. Hardin MATTHEW D. HARDIN, D.C. Bar # 1032711 Hardin Law Office 101 Rainbow Drive # 11506 Livingston, TX 77399 (202) 802-1948 MatthewDHardin@protonmail.com

Now comes the Plaintiff, Victoria Toensing, and the Defendant, the United States Department of Justice (“Department”), by and through undersigned counsel, and hereby submit this Joint Status Report pursuant to the Court’s May 27, 2026, Minute Order. This report follows a June 18, 2026 meeting of the parties and their counsel at the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Washington, D.C. In attendance at the meeting were undersigned counsel, Plaintiff Victoria Toensing and her husband, Joseph diGenova, and Patrice Parker Hale from the Department of Justice.

Defendant’s Statement The Department represents that it has completed its review and has processed in excess of 41,000 pages. There remain outstanding 29 pages that need to be returned from the Office of Information Policy, which are expected to be returned by the middle of next month. The Department anticipates providing a Vaughn index to Plaintiff addressing approximately 1,000 pages withheld in full pursuant to FOIA Exemptions, and certain partially redacted records to which Plaintiff has conveyed its challenges. This Vaughn will be provided to Plaintiff by July 31, 2026, as contemplated by this Court’s May 18, 2026 Minute Order. The Department is not claiming that records at issue in this case are classified.

....

Plaintiff’s Statement Plaintiff appreciates the opportunity to confer with the Department and its counsel on June 18, 2026. As previously indicated, Ms. Toensing recently began serving as Deputy Chief for Civil Rights in the Criminal Section, of the United States Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Florida, and Ms. Toensing has extensive obligations in that District related to a grand jury proceeding.

The brief postponement of the conferral allowed Ms. Toensing to better serve our country’s pressing interests in effective and efficient criminal justice. The June 18, 2026 meeting in D.C. was productive in terms of allowing the parties to better understand their respective positions and to agree on a path forward for this litigation. As indicated at ECF No. 22, Plaintiff has received less than 200 pages of records, such that Plaintiff has difficulty understanding how 41,000 pages were processed with so few pages produced. The Department has now clarified that it withheld in full approximately 1,000 pages of records. Still, the Department apparently asserts that approximately 40,000 pages of records were non-responsive to Plaintiff’s FOIA request. Plaintiff reserves the right to challenge the accuracy of Defendant’s assertions as to the volume of responsive records on summary judgment.

...

2x try

on Jan. 6, 2021, a man approached the Capitol who looked like many others in the crowd that day: white, with a Trump 2020 hat on and a shirt marking his service to the country in Afghanistan.

But this one was different. Brian W. Lynch was months into a new job as a federal prosecutor in Maryland when he attended the march on the Capitol. Yet, somehow, Lynch’s presence at the Capitol that fateful day has not been publicly reported until now, more than five years later. In the meantime, Lynch remained at DOJ and, under the second Trump administration, received a big promotion: He’s now running a national task force to prosecute left-wing political violence.

A DOJ official confirmed to TPM that Lynch “was present but never entered the capitol, left the grounds after a brief period, and did not commit and was never accused of any violation of law.”

The prosecutor, Brian W. Lynch, did not return TPM’s requests for comment.

Michael Romano, who was a deputy chief in the DOJ’s since-disbanded Capitol Siege Section, described Jan. 6 to TPM as an act of massive political violence. He told TPM that he had never heard of anything like a federal prosecutor having been present at the march and continuing to work and be promoted years on.

“People were trying to stop the certification of the electoral college vote on January 6th,” he said. “They were trying to stop the peaceful transfer of power between one presidential administration and the next.”

In the images, Lynch is wearing a Trump 2020 baseball hat. He has on a black shirt emblazoned with a map of Afghanistan that reads, “Afghanistan 2012-2013.” A LinkedIn profile for Lynch that was removed after an earlier TPM story about him said that he deployed to Afghanistan from 2012 to 2013 as part of a legal assistance program.

One image that the DOJ confirmed to be of Lynch shows him in front of a green crane. Romano told TPM that it is “definitely in the restricted area,” and that “the boundaries were streets. Anyone that close to the building was inside the restricted area.”

Lynch stands on the Capitol grounds on Jan. 6 while wearing a star-spangled mask. (Obtained by TPM)

In March, Lynch became co-director of Joint Task Force Vanguard, which DOJ has described as central to its effort to prosecute alleged left-wing political violence cases, including last month’s indictment of 15 anti-ICE protesters in Minneapolis. Lynch reports to Todd Blanche, the deputy attorney general currently serving as acting attorney general while the Senate considers his nomination to the permanent position.

Lynch’s presence at the march on Jan. 6 puts him at the center of the highest-profile example of political violence in the U.S. this century and the first break in the country’s streak of peaceful transfers of power since the country’s founding. After more than a month of trying to overturn his loss in the 2020 election through legal wrangling, pressure on state legislatures and pressure on the courts, President Donald Trump directed his supporters to march on Congress as members voted to certify Joe Biden’s victory. The march culminated in hours of spectacular violence in which rioters broke down barricades, assaulted law enforcement officers, and stormed into the heart of the Capitol, forcing members of Congress to flee.

There’s no evidence that Lynch entered the Capitol building itself or that he engaged in violence.

Romano, the Jan. 6 prosecutor, described the scale of the task facing DOJ as “huge.”

“We knew that there had been thousands of people, um, who entered the Capitol and should not have, and who took part in disrupting the certification of the Electoral College that day,” he said. “And so we had the task of identifying as many of those people as possible.”

Romano added that charges largely depended on the person’s conduct that day – limited investigative and prosecutorial resources went to those who committed acts of violence or who made it deeper into the Capitol. Those strayed into restricted areas were often overlooked out of resource constraints.

“We took a lot of care and a lot of deliberation to really assess what people did and whether there was good evidence that they understood they were doing something wrong or something illegal before we charged,” he said.

The attack on Congress prompted widespread condemnation, led to Trump’s second impeachment, and resulted in the largest investigation in the DOJ’s history.

Several people that TPM spoke with expressed disbelief that Lynch was not identified during the Jan. 6 investigation. The DOJ assigned hundreds of prosecutors and FBI agents from across the country to pore through footage and identify the rioters; a small army of online sleuths dedicated their lives to tracking down the identities of the people who breached the Capitol that day. More than 1,500 people were arrested in the course of the probe; several law enforcement officials and military personnel were identified and prosecuted over their involvement. The FBI said in 2023 that it revoked the security clearances of three agents in relation to the attack.

Through all of that, Lynch does not appear to have ever been identified.

In his final report, Special Counsel Jack Smith described Trump’s coup attempt as an effort “to defeat a federal government function foundational to the United States’ democratic process.” After Trump won the 2024 election, he pardoned nearly all of the rioters and commuted the sentences of a small few.

When the Capitol insurrection took place, Lynch was serving as an assistant U.S. attorney in the District of Maryland. He had moved there in November 2020 after spending years as a state prosecutor in Cleveland and, before then, in Ohio’s Wayne County. In Maryland, Lynch prosecuted violent crime, weapons, and drug cases. He was three months into his tenure as a federal prosecutor when he appeared in a Trump 2020 hat among the crowd on Jan. 6.

TPM reviewed a video of people marching down Pennsylvania Avenue on Jan. 6. It briefly shows a man resembling Lynch; several former colleagues of Lynch’s told TPM that they recognized him as the man in screenshots of the video that TPM shared with them.

By 2022, Lynch had changed offices to DOJ headquarters for a position in what’s now known as the Violent Crime and Racketeering Section. There, he took charge of organized crime cases in Ohio and in Minnesota, where he lived for a time, and became a presence in the criminal division of the U.S. Attorney’s Office.

Lynch (right) at a press conference in Minneapolis in June announcing the indictment of 15 anti-ICE protesters.

TPM first reported last month that the DOJ created Joint Task Force Vanguard to pursue political violence cases across the country. That, a DOJ official told TPM, means implementing National Security Presidential Memorandum 7. Issued after the killing of Charlie Kirk, NSPM-7 directs federal law enforcement to treat “anti-Americanism, anti-Capitalism, and anti-Christianity” as indicators of political violence.

Lynch appeared at a press conference in Minneapolis last month announcing the new conspiracy indictment brought against 15 anti-ICE protesters who took part in demonstrations against the Trump administration’s surge of federal immigration enforcement into the city. The indictment dubbed the group “Antifa.” Though he did not speak there, he was quoted in a DOJ press release saying that Vanguard’s purpose is “to counter groups that use violence and the threat of violence to achieve political ends.”

“Acts of political violence are priority matters for federal law enforcement and will be zealously investigated and prosecuted,” he said.

Josh Kovensky @ Talking Points Memo: Trump DOJ’s Top ‘Antifa’ Prosecutor Marched With Crowd on Jan. 6

It was not known publicly that a federal prosecutor marched to the Capitol on Jan. 6. He was appointed this year to run a national task force targeting alleged left-wing political violence.

on Jan. 6, 2021, a man approached the Capitol who looked like many others in the crowd that day: white, with a Trump 2020 hat on and a shirt marking his service to the country in Afghanistan.

But this one was different. Brian W. Lynch was months into a new job as a federal prosecutor in Maryland when he attended the march on the Capitol. Yet, somehow, Lynch’s presence at the Capitol that fateful day has not been publicly reported until now, more than five years later. In the meantime, Lynch remained at DOJ and, under the second Trump administration, received a big promotion: He’s now running a national task force to prosecute left-wing political violence.

A DOJ official confirmed to TPM that Lynch “was present but never entered the capitol, left the grounds after a brief period, and did not commit and was never accused of any violation of law.”

The prosecutor, Brian W. Lynch, did not return TPM’s requests for comment.

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Lynch stands on the Capitol grounds on Jan. 6 while wearing a star-spangled mask. (Obtained by TPM)

There’s no evidence that Lynch entered the Capitol building itself or that he engaged in violence.

Romano, the Jan. 6 prosecutor, described the scale of the task facing DOJ as “huge.”

The attack on Congress prompted widespread condemnation, led to Trump’s second impeachment, and resulted in the largest investigation in the DOJ’s history.

Through all of that, Lynch does not appear to have ever been identified.

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Lynch (right) at a press conference in Minneapolis in June announcing the indictment of 15 anti-ICE protesters.

“Acts of political violence are priority matters for federal law enforcement and will be zealously investigated and prosecuted,” he said.

AN 7 26

Lawyers arguing on behalf of the Trump administration appear to have used a fake, AI-generated citation, prompting a bench-slap from the judge.

“The Justice Department appears to have included a fake AI-generated citation in an ICE detainee's case, “ Politico Senior Political Affairs Correspondent Kyle Cheney posted on Thursday. “Judge Jarbou, a Trump appointee in Michigan, called it out.”

Cheney attached screenshots of a ruling by Judge Hala Jarbou, who was appointed by President Donald Trump in March 2020. The first read, “The cited case, Taylor v. Hott, is not located at the identified page of the Federal Appendix. Indeed, page 387 is contained within two different opinions–—Atkins v. CGI Techs. & Sols., Inc., 724 F. App’x 383 (6th Cir. 2018)—which is about commercial arbitration, not immigration bond determinations. In its research, the Court was unable to identify a Sixth Circuit case with the caption Taylor v. Hott, or any federal case containing the quoted language. Thus, it seems this citation was likely produced by generative artificial intelligence (‘AI’).”

A second screenshot continues, “It should be obvious that any attorney who uses AI must scrupulously review its work product to ensure that the cited cases exist and that the citations accurately and fairly represent the underlying case law. The duty of candor towards this tribunal demands no less.”

The judge was lenient on the attorney, writing, “Although the Court will not presently impose sanctions for this conduct, it goes without saying that the Government must ensure its future filings with this Court do not include non-existent case law.”

Reactions have been wide ranging, but Bulwark editor Sam Stein summed it up in a word: “Embarrassing.”

AN 7 26

Trump Reflecting Pool lawyers just blew up their own case

AN 726

Meltdown: Trump DOJ in total chaos as mass exodus continues

A federal court judge got "really worked up" in a ruling against President Donald Trump and his Justice Department on Monday.

Legal analysts posted the ruling in Trump's IRS case, in which the judge decided the lawsuit and creation of $1.8 "anti-weaponization fund" was improper as Trump was in control of both sides of the negotiations and litigation.

One of the findings from the judge is that the plaintiff's attorney, Alejandro Brito, is being referred to the Florida Bar for an investigation to decide whether disciplinary actions are warranted. Another attorney, Daniel Z. Epstein, "will be denied for one year" admission "*pro hac vice* in the Southern District of Florida."

According to legal reporter Chris Geidner, who runs the Law Dork substack, "Judge Kathleen Williams also sanctions Trump's lawyers, issues monetary sanctions and harshly criticizes DOJ's 'untenable' conduct."

Trump legal foe Norm Eisen took a victory lap, commenting on BlueSky, that the ruling "Knocks out any legal basis for the $1.8 billion, Also undermines the accompanying settlements, And opens the way to ethics [and] financial SANCTIONS."

Among the comments from the judge includes the accusation that Trump "abused the judicial process" in what amounts to a sham case just to have "access to taxpayer funds and exemption from audits and other investigations."

"It is risible to suggest there was ever adverseness between the parties," wrote Judge Williams.

New Mexico civil litigator Owen Barcala posted specifics about the case, encouraging folks to peruse it as it's "a fun read, you can tell the judge really got worked up by what Trump/DOJ was trying to do, but I'm not really sure it invalidates or nullifies the settlement agreement as some people are saying."

"The main holding," he explained, "is that there was not sufficient adversity to support Article III jurisdiction. That means the court never had jurisdiction over this supposed claim and can't enter any orders on the merits. So, functionally, the court can't enter an order directed at the validity of the agreement."

He added, "But the court can enter non-merits orders against the parties in the form of sanctions. This supports the purpose of Rule 11 because, otherwise, a party who files a frivolous case escapes precisely because the case is frivolous. So a court has to have the ability to sanction even after dismissing. The court recognizes this because the sanction is directed toward the parties, not the merits of the settlement fund itself. The parties cannot refer to the purported 'settlement agreement' as a 'settlement' reached in this matter. The last part is important — limited to a 'settlement' in this case."

The ruling is a tough blow, coming mere days ahead of attorney general candidate Todd Blanche's appearance before the Senate Judiciary Committee, where he will face questions from lawmakers on the matter.

"Blanche and [Stanley] Woodward were required to recuse themselves from issues related to the [January 6] and stolen documents criminal inquiries (because they represented Trump) and instead those were Exhibits A and B in 'anti-weaponization' claims for settlement," Law & Chaos co-reporter Andrew Torrez remarked on BlueSky.

---

AN 7 26 Judge slaps Trump DOJ with sanctions and a lecture for 'manipulating' legal process - Alternet.org

Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche was called out by name in a recent ruling by Judge Kathleen Williams just days ahead of his confirmation hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee

Speaking about the ruling on CNN, host Dana Bash and senior justice correspondent Evan Perez reported that there were a few Justice Department prosecutors named by the judge for possible disciplinary action.

As Perez reported, "The judge is calling out this entire thing, saying that this was essentially an attempt to defraud the court, because this was not really an adverse litigation. This was not the president suing an adverse party, but rather because the president controls the Justice Department and his own former personal lawyer essentially was involved in this, that there was really no two separate sides on this."

But then Blanche got his own take down from the judge.

"The day after the dismissal, Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche testified before Congress," the ruling reads. "In response to a question as to why the 'settlement agreement' had not been provided to this Court for review, he replied that 'there is no judge' because the case had been dismissed and, therefore, there was 'no mechanism' for reviewing the 'settlement agreement.'"

"On that same day," the judge continued, "Acting Attorney General Blanche issued an 'order' (the 'Release Order') which referenced the 'settlement agreement' and released the President, his relatives, companies, and affiliates from 'any and all claims, counterclaims, [and] causes of actions; that 'have been or could have been asserted' against Plaintiffs that arise out of '(1) any matters that were raised or could have been raised in the Case or the Pending Agency Claims; (2) Lawfare and/or Weaponization; (3) any matters currently pending or that could be pending (including tax returns filed before the Effective Date) before Defendants or other agencies or departments.'"

Blanche's name and signature were on the "Release Order," she added.

"On June 2, 2026, in testimony before the United States House of Representatives, Acting Attorney General Blanche advised that the Anti-Weaponization Fund would not be moving forward," the judge added. "He did not, however, commit to a similar termination of the audit and immunity protections set forth in his Release Order. Six days later, President Trump nominated Mr. Blanche to permanently serve as Attorney General of the United States."

Blanche has continued to refuse to sign a legal document asserting that the slush fund is dead.

"She also points out that after Todd Blanche said that the fund was dead, he has refused to say in writing that it is dead forever, that there is not some other version of this that could be resuscitated," Perez said. "Of course, Dana, all of this is important timing because, of course, Todd Blanche is headed for his confirmation hearing on Wednesday before the Senate."

Bash confirmed, "This judge is effectively saying that Todd Blanche, who is the acting attorney general and is going to be, as you mentioned, up on Capitol Hill this week, for confirmation to be the permanent attorney general, maybe should be disbarred. Right?"

Perez agreed that the judge was "referring him to the Bar Associations."

[VID]

---

an 7 26

The ongoing saga of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool continued Monday as the water drained, revealing the damage that was visible. Thus far, there is no 350-foot gash in the lining.

Photos from Washington D.C., activist Joe Flood and Democratic Party strategist Matt Rein show the slow process of the pool draining. Rein's photos in particular show that as the pool drained along the parts of the pool that were reachable by the public, there were no gashes.

U.S. District Attorney Jeannine Pirro has charged individuals with intentionally damaging the pool. In one case, Olympian David Hearn was accused by Pirro at a press conference of “forcefully and violently” pulling up the Reflecting Pool liner "with both hands." But the charging documents only say he "maliciously did injure, break and destroy certain property."

"The president said that somebody took a box cutter—" a reporter began to ask during Pirro's press conference.

Pirro agreed, "Yeah." She added, "Someone intentionally did a tremendous amount of damage to the pool, and you can actually see where all the cutting is. They took a sharp object and cut for many feet along the pool."

For someone to have made such a gash, it would be along the side, unless someone jumped into the pool and began cutting the bottom.

The reporter asked Pirro if there were photos confirming her claims.

:{"When I file a charge, I'll be happy to show you a picture. All right? What I'm trying to do is we're trying to find out who did it. Okay? And until we get to that point, I'm not going to be able to get to that point. I'm not going to be able to you know, discuss anything more than there was tremendous damage that was caused,"[ Pirro said at the time. ]

President Donald Trump went further with his box-cutter conspiracy theory, saying, without proof, that "vandals" had sliced the gash into the pool.

"No, we had vandalism ... no, vandals," Trump said at the end of Junewhen asked about it. "We have a 290-, I think 300-foot slit right through, probably a box cutter or a knife of some kind."

For a few weeks leading up to the July 4 celebration, Trump hired a company that used a "nanobubble technology" to fix the algae problem in the Reflecting Pool. It was successful and the nanobubblers were removed for the big fireworks display. Within days, the algae was back and has remained for the past week.

---

MPU

Abbott Laboratories was investigated for poisoning babies. After a $500,000 donation, Trump let them off the hook.

The government had been investigating a baby formula producer for life-threatening facility contamination. After a half-million-dollar donation, Trump’s enforcers just dropped the case.

Jun 29

*By Lucy Dean Stockton, More Perfect Union

The Department of Justice just dismissed a years-long criminal probe investigating potentially life-threatening contamination at an Abbott Laboratories facility, an Illinois-based health care and technology company that donated more than $500,000 to President Donald Trump’s inauguration funds and has extensive financial connections to one of Trump’s top cabinet members.

The DOJ this week confirmed that it had dismissed its investigation into potential negligence from Abbott Laboratories, which manufactures popular formula brand Similac, over its mismanagement of a baby formula production facility that potentially endangered infants’ lives — and may be connected to two infant deaths.

The probe, which began under the Biden administration, followed an incident in which regulators discovered potentially deadly bacteria on equipment in the facility in February 2022. The facility resumed production in June of that year, but tight industry concentration strained the baby formula market, contributing to a national shortage in 2022, which forced families to seek assistance from food banks, friends and doctor’s offices.

According to reporting from The Wall Street Journal, some DOJ prosecutors believed they had evidence to criminally charge the company, but the agency’s top decision-makers closed the probe instead, now opting to pursue financial clawbacks and civil penalties.

Abbott faced another legal battle in January 2023, when Biden’s Federal Trade Commission began formally investigating the company for collusion in the baby formula market. The agency alleged that Abbott may have colluded in bidding for contracts with the USDA’s Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) food assistance program. The company is also facing legal penalties of nearly $500 million in a Missouri lawsuit related to its formula for premature infants.

Abbott previously won a $750 million federal contract in 2020 to deliver 150 million COVID-19 rapid test kits, and won another under Biden. In his first term, Trump’s administration also fought on behalf of the baby formula industry, arguing against international resolutions that would have limited companies’ ability to advertise and sell baby formula abroad, threatening Abbott’s part in a $70 billion global industry. Last May, Trump publicly celebrated Abbott’s $500 million investment in its Illinois and Texas manufacturing facilities as a step towards reviving American drug manufacturing.

In the 2024 election, Abbott’s former CEO Miles White — who stepped down from the company in 2021 after a 38-year tenure — chaired former North Dakota Governor Doug Burgum’s presidential campaign. White, Abbott employees and their families gave $4 million in donations to the Best Of America PAC, which was created to support Burgum’s presidential run. Of that, White gave at least $2 million. In February 2025, Burgum was confirmed as Trump’s Secretary of the Interior.

Abbott also donated at least $35,000 to Trump’s inaugural event in 2016, and White publicly expressed he was “optimistic” about Trump’s presidency.

No unopened, distributed Abbott baby formula products have tested positive for the bacteria that sickened the babies, an Abbott spokesperson told More Perfect Union in an email. Abbott declined to comment on the company’s political donations.

---

AN 7 26

Olympian David Hearn will appear in court on Thursday morning alongside one of President Donald Trump's biggest legal foes: Norm Eisen.

One of the co-founders of CREW (Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington), Trump has raged about Eisen for years as he loses case after case against the former ethics czar. Trump once referred to Eisen as a “major sleazebag” and “the Lawfare King and Color Revolution Expert” in Truth Social posts. At one point, Trump even blasted CREW, complaining, “Everything I read is Norm Eisen.” According to Trump, “You don’t get much lower than him.”

Eisen responded by saying that it's clear Trump is obsessed with him.

Eisen has taken up a high-profile case in which the administration is accused of trying to make Hearn the "scapegoat" for their own failures around the Reflecting Pool.

This is the "latest scandal of scapegoating and blame shifting and the administration's own failures on the Reflecting Pool," Eisen said in a video chat with former prosecutor Joyce Vance. "They've charged, with a felony, our client with The Washington Litigation Group, my wonderful co-counsel Mary Dorman, Davy Hearn, the Olympic canoeist."

He asked Vance how, as a former prosecutor and former U.S. attorney, she would have handled something like this. She explained that in cases like this, she looks through the lens of someone who not only ran a U.S. attorney's office but also spent a decade prosecuting criminal cases.

In "a properly functioning DOJ," she said, something like this would have been investigated by the National Parks Service before being handed to the Justice Department. In her experience, the NPS typically handles things like smoking cannabis on federal lands, a relatively low-level felony. NPS doesn't "do big criminal cases," she said.

"Your job as a prosecutor is to consider whether that case is significant enough to merit becoming a federal felony," Vance continued. "This case doesn't pass the smell test on that ground, but it also has another major flaw, which is evidence."

Secretary of the Interior where he was asked directly about the Reflecting Pool and asserted, "It didn't peel off. It was — it was — there was vandalism. There was box cutters. There have been seven arrests." At no point did police find a box cutter on Hearn, who was cycling down to the mall in his bicycle shorts and jersey.

A video from Emily Miller of the arrest shows Hearn talking about the pool scandal being "funny," and later he relayed that he accidently hit the hose from the giant cleaner.

Hearn has said publicly, “I did not remove, I did not damage, I did not rip, tear, break, destroy or harm any part of the Reflecting Pool."

According to him, he dipped his hand into the pool to feel the coating on the bottom, which was supposed to be "American Flag blue."

Vance explained that, unlike in many other cases, there was no grand jury that U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro went to for an indictment. They merely filed the case in superior court, which has "less rigorous standards." Pirro has failed to indict several people by going to grand juries in D.C.

In her press conference, Pirro alleged an NPS employee witnessed Hearn willfully and "violently" ripping up about two square feet of the pool's newly installed liner using his bare hands. She asserted to reporters questioning her about evidence, “He damaged the pool! He damaged this pool!”

Pirro's charging document also doesn't say anything about "violently" doing anything. It claims Hearn “ripped a piece of the recently installed blue pool sealant” or “pulled up and removed the bottom liner with both hands."

Miller's video shows Hearn took off one of his padded cycling gloves to put his hand in. He pulled his hand out of the pool and put the glove back on in the video.

"The U.S attorney should have stepped in and said, folks we have a lot bigger fish to fry," Vance said. "But even if this case was an important one, it doesn't have the evidence. I mean, Norm, that's my issue with this case. I just don't see how the government proves its case. I suspect that they'll do everything that they can to keep it from going to trial they've made their splash indicting the case now they're going to try to stay as far away from a courtroom as they can."

---

[

Adam Gustafson

Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General, Environment & Natural Resources Division, DOJ](https://www.linkedin.com/in/adamgustafson/)

---

OMG

AI Overview

The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) has officially renamed its Environment and Natural Resources Division (ENRD) to the Energy and Natural Resources Division (ENRD). The division is actively hiring and shifting its focus toward prioritizing energy security and promoting domestic oil, gas, and power production. [1, 2]

Key Changes and Actions

The Rename: The division dropped the word "Environment" to signal a broader policy shift towards energy development, infrastructure, and "American energy dominance". The agency's official website is available on the DOJ Energy and Natural Resources Division Portal. [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]

The Rationale: Officials leading the change stated that "energy security is national security," highlighting a renewed focus on defending the administration's energy policies and pushing back against state-level climate litigation. You can read the division leadership's official announcement via the Wall Street Journal Op-Ed. [1, 2]

Key Hires: The DOJ has appointed Robert Levy, former executive counsel at ExxonMobil, as a senior counsel within the newly renamed division. [1]

Litigation Pivot: The department is refocusing efforts to defend federal orders on fossil fuel production and challenging state laws (such as climate legislation in California, Hawaii, and New York) that it argues obstruct energy progress. [1, 2]

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AN 7 26

A letter from Harmeet Dhillon, who heads President Donald Trump’s DOJ’s Civil Rights Division, is demanding that Georgia officials explain within five days how they are preventing illegal voting in the state — despite the fact that illegal voting is not a legitimate problem in U.S. elections.

The Atlanta Journal Constitution reports the U.S. Department of Justice has also warned officials in the increasingly swingy Peach State that they could face criminal prosecution if noncitizens cast ballots, something that is already illegal.

Georgia Republican Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, who has a bumpy relationship with Trump, pointed out that his office has already cracked down on cases of noncitizen voting, which studies show is exceedingly rare, reports AJC. Raffensperger’s spokesperson, Robert Sinners, said the SOS conducted the first statewide citizenship audit of Georgia’s voter rolls, improved a federal election database and even pressed Congress to enshrine citizen-only voting in the Constitution.

The AJC reports Trump’s threat arrived the same day a federal judge in Atlanta “sharply questioned the Justice Department’s attempt to revive Trump’s false claims of widespread fraud in Georgia’s 2020 election.”

Trump-appointed U.S. District Judge Billy Ray II threw out a sweeping subpoena seeking information on thousands of Fulton County election workers and found that the five-year statute of limitations for crimes linked to the election had “long expired.” However, Trump’s DOJ issued the threat after a devastating Fox News poll revealed Democrats are destroying Republicans in most of the former red state’s most contentious races.

“In the Georgia governor’s race, Democrat Keisha Lance Bottoms has a 5-point edge, with 52 percent support compared to 47 percent for Republican Rick Jackson,” reported AJC, citing the Fox poll. Additionally, Lance Bottoms' supporters are more certain of their vote than Jackson's by 80 percent vs. 75 percent

That same poll revealed Republicans in this swing state, which Trump lost to Biden years ago but reclaimed in 2023, also have a more favorable view of incumbent Democratic candidate John Ossoff, who Republicans will need to unseat in order to easily maintain their Senate majority.

Nearly 6 in 10 voters have a favorable opinion of Ossoff, which is much higher than the 4 in 10 for Republican Collins, or even Trump — who only gets 42 percent favorability — down 5 points in the 2024 Georgia Fox News Voter Analysis.

Worse, Georgians are six points more likely to say they are “extremely or very concerned” that Collins is too close to Trump than the Democratic incumbent is “too liberal.”

---}:

AN 7 26

On Tuesday, NBC News confirmed that the Justice Department has sent threatening letters to election officials spanning every state and Washington, D.C., asserting that they could “face criminal prosecution over noncitizen voting.” According to NBC, the letters are the latest move in President Donald Trump’s effort to promote his false claims of widespread noncitizen voting and “assert more federal control over state elections.”

As NBC explains, “The letters, signed by Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon, who heads up the department’s Civil Rights Division, give states five days to explain how they will comply with federal voter eligibility laws and how they will maintain ‘clean voter lists.’” And as NBC notes, noncitizen voting is so rare it’s almost nonexistent, “but Trump and his administration have falsely portrayed it as a widespread issue.”

The DOJ letters assert that state election officials “could be criminally prosecuted for aiding and abetting” any noncitizen voting. They also emphasize that any election officer who knowingly retains noncitizens on a voting registration list or who helps noncitizens receive and cast ballots in any way could be subject to criminal liability, and that “an intentional act that is aimed at diluting the votes of citizens could also constitute a violation.”

WHAT DOES THAT MEAN?

According to Utah Lt. Gov. Deidre Henderson, a Republican election official who received one of the letters, the threats amounted to “truly bizarre behavior.”

Posting on social media, she revealed, “Got another love letter this morning from the DOJ sprinkled throughout with threats of criminal prosecution. I’m sure I’m not the only chief election officer of a state who is being targeted for following state and federal laws by resisting DOJ’s demands for private voter data that have thus far been ruled illegal by at least a dozen courts. This is truly bizarre behavior by the federal agency that is supposed to be protecting civil rights.”

Per NBC, “While some states have complied with the administration’s demands that they hand over voter roll data, the Justice Department has sued 30 states and Washington, D.C., for resisting. So far, 11 different federal courts have dismissed the Justice Department’s efforts to seize voter rolls.”

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AN 6 26

Storm chaser gets visit from Trump’s FBI after algae spores joke

an 7 26

A Colorado-based storm chaser was visited by the FBI after cracking a joke about introducing algae spores into the "paint" a Virginia company used on the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool.

Patrick Pineda, a photographer of severe weather, motion designer and video game developer, cracked a joke on social media that was so scientifically absurd, he presumably assumed his audience would know it was a joke. The FBI did not.

"I am the leftist who put algae in the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool. This plan was months in the making. I introduced spores into the paint used by the contractors who repainted the pool. It was me the whole time," said Pineda, in a since-deleted BlueSky post.

Right Wash, a professional render cleaning service, has a section on its website that explains that algae in a swimming pool can be eliminated by painting over it. It isn't the "best" solution for a number of reasons, it explains, but paint can eliminate an algae problem. But the pool wasn't merely painted.

In a June release, Rhino Linings claimed it was the company that provided an epoxy primer, elastomeric waterproofing and a protective finish coating, tinted American Flag Blue.

"This project demonstrates how modern protective coating systems can help extend the lifespan of aging infrastructure while reducing maintenance requirements and preserving public spaces for future generations," the company said.

To cure, the epoxy needs a low-moisture and chemically hostile surface to adhere. Living organisms like algae need water, light, and nutrients to grow, Florida Atlantic University explains. It simply can't grow in paint, much less the chemicals used for the pricey lining used on the Reflecting Pool.

A swimming pool expert explained that keeping algae out of the reflecting pool will be impossible unless the government uses strong chemicals, which could significantly damage the new liner.

After coming into office, President Donald Trump appointed Kash Patel to lead the FBI. Among his first actions was to fire scores of experienced directors, agents, and other staff, the *New York Times*reported. It has left the department short-staffed. PBS News explained that this has left both the Justice Department and the FBI in a tough spot as it desperately tries to rebuild.

According to Forbes, leaders are now "easing hiring requirements and accelerating recruitment in ways that some current and former officials see as a lowering of long-accepted standards." The report also said that some current and former agents "say the FBI is promoting into positions of leadership employees with less experience than would be customary for the jobs."

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PRAIRIELAND 100 YRS

30 YRS CONSPIR FOR MOVING BOX OF ZINES, NOT AT NOISE PROTEST

ANTIFA TERROR

Prairieland Nine: Texas ICE Protesters Get Up to 100 Years in Prison as Trump Targets Anti-Fascists

Jun 25, 2026 Latest Shows

:{A group of anti-ICE protesters in Texas were sentenced to 30 to 100 years in jail on Tuesday, after federal prosecutors accused them of being an "antifa terror cell." The activists attended a protest outside the Prairieland ICE jail in Alvarado, Texas, on July 4 of last year, during which fireworks were set off and a police officer was shot and wounded. All nine defendants were found guilty after being tried before a federal judge in Texas.

Matt Sledge, political reporter for The Intercept, warns that "we just have to watch for this playbook to be applied elsewhere." "Now anyone engaged in basic protests with the wrong political beliefs can be labeled a domestic terrorist, when they have no intention of violence, not engaged in any violence, not interested in any violence," says Sufia Khalid, deputy director of the National Security Criminal Defense Center, who represents one of the Prairieland defendants.}:}:

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6/25/26 ANOTHER JUDGE ARE YOU KIDDING

KICKASS TODD BLANCHE? FRAUD AGAINST THE CT?

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DOJ INVESTIGATION, POWERFUL RETORT VIDEO WIFE

TODD DUCKED Q?

Right-wing streamer Asmongold on the DOJ investigating Gavin Newsom: “Hopefully, they figure out and make up whatever they possibly can to get this guy in jail”

06/16/26

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AN 6 26

Before President Donald Trump's administration dropped charges against Indian billionaire Gautam Adani, he had a meeting with the president's son, Donald Trump Jr.

Bloomberg reported Tuesday morning that when Trump Jr. was in India last November for "a wedding and a wildlife sanctuary tour," he met with the billionaire about a year after the Justice Department "accused the 63-year-old Adani Group chairman and his nephew Sagar Adani of orchestrating an allegedbribery scheme in India." They continue to deny the charges and the DOJ moved to drop them last month.

The conversation between the two was private. Don Jr. has been occasionally helping his brother run the Trump Organization, but a spokesperson for him maintains, “Don had zero to do with DOJ’s actions in this case."

Adani's indictment came shortly after the 2024 election.

"The case, which accused Adani and others of a scheme to pay more than $250 million in bribes to Indian government officials to lock in solar energy contracts, immediately drew some criticism as an overreach. The Justice Department claimed the Adanis had lied about the alleged scheme when their renewable energy business raised capital from US-based investors and international institutions through dollar bonds and loans," reported Bloomberg.

In response to the charges, Adani hired a team of lawyers and lobbyists to help him kill the case. His two sons were also helping with the effort. His son Jeet is leading the operation, according to those familiar. He met with Don Jr. at Mar-a-Lago last year, though a person familiar with the meeting said the two didn't discuss the case against Adani's father.

Trump's immigration policies made it difficult for Adani to enter the United States for business purposes. He'd previously pledged to invest $10 billion in the United States after Trump was elected.

"Earlier this year, Adani’s lawyers shifted gears and moved aggressively to get the criminal case dropped. They also sought to resolve a parallel Securities and Exchange Commission civil fraud case and a separate probe by the Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Controlinto whether an Adani unit violated Iran sanctions," the report explained.

Adani hired the law firm Sullivan & Cromwell, whose co-chair, Robert Giuffra Jr., is working as one of Trump's personal attorneys. It delivered them a direct line to the president. The legal team argued that the suit was absurd and had no credible evidence. It also included a slide in the presentation showcasing the $10 billion investment in the U.S.

By May, the DOJ dropped the case, and the SEC agreed to an $18 million settlement with Adani. "The conglomerate’s flagship Adani Enterprises Ltd. also reached a deal to resolve OFAC’s sanctions probe for $275 million without an admission of wrongdoing," the report added.

While in court last month, prosecutors said that they simply decided “not to devote further resources to these criminal charges against individual defendants." They never said directly what prompted them to drop it.

---COTER SUPP

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1st amend STUDENT SUPPRESS 6 26

GGL

AI Overview

The Michigan chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-MI) is actively representing pro-Palestinian student activists at the University of Michigan (U of M). Legal actions include a federal civil rights lawsuit against U of M officials, campus police, and private contractors for the alleged targeting, surveillance, and arrest of student advocates. [1, 2, 3]

Key developments and legal actions concerning CAIR-MI and U of M students:

Federal Civil Rights Lawsuit: CAIR-MI, alongside the Sugar Law Center for Economic & Social Justice, filed a federal civil rights lawsuit on behalf of Josiah Walker, a Black Muslim student advocate, citing unconstitutional punishment, unlawful arrest, and harassment. [1, 2]

DOJ Indictments: Federal prosecutors and the DOJ unsealed indictments against pro-Palestinian activists linked to the University of Michigan following coordinated FBI and state law enforcement raids. [1]

Free Speech Advocacy: CAIR-MI has actively pushed back against disciplinary sanctions on pro-Palestinian student groups—such as the Students Allied for Freedom and Equality (SAFE)—arguing that public universities are violating students' First Amendment rights by selectively punishing them for political advocacy. [1, 2]

Review additional information on these cases via the official CAIR Press Releases or read the initial reporting from CBS News Detroit.

MICHIGAN STUDENTS DOJ 6 26 cair-mi-raises-serious-first-amendment-concerns-regarding-university-of-michigan-protest-indictments

The Michigan chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-MI) today expressed serious concerns regarding the recently unsealed indictments arising from protests at the University of Michigan, warning that while allegations of criminal conduct should be addressed through the judicial process, charging documents should not blur the line between alleged unlawful acts and constitutionally protected political expression, peaceful protest, and advocacy on matters of public concern.

WOW MJR CYA PARa]

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NYT

Eight people who federal prosecutors said had ties to the University of Michigan were accused Wednesday of conspiring to threaten campus leaders and others into severing ties with Israel.

An indictment unsealed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan, accused the pro-Palestinian activists of crossing the line from campus protest to crimes that included threats and vandalism. The defendants face varying charges, but the indictment included federal counts of conspiracy to transmit threats, witness intimidation and destruction of property to prevent seizure.

The charges in Michigan, all felonies that carry the possibility of years in prison, appeared to signify an escalation in the federal government’s efforts to crack down on pro-Palestinian activism that roiled American campuses in recent years.

“Their criminal activity included spray-painting threats, breaking windows and throwing glass jars filled with noxious chemicals into family homes,” the indictment said. “They marked their victims with threatening symbols used by Hamas, including red inverted triangles and red handprints. They used the internet and social media to broadcast their message to ensure their threats and commitment to continuing criminal activity were heard by their victims and others who support Israel.”

The Trump administration has taken a hard line against pro-Palestinian protesters, whose activism after the Hamas-led October 2023 attack on Israel and the subsequent war in Gaza led to tumult on campuses. Until now, the administration had mostly targeted universities themselves over their response to protests, although it did move to strip visas and deport some individual students last year.

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GUK OOPS

A Palestinian middle school student in Michigan who was publicly admonished for refusing to stand for the pledge of allegiance as part of a personal protest against the war on Gaza has settled with her school district following a lawsuit around her first amendment free speech rights.

The teenager, identified as DK in court documents, said she faced racism from a teacher at the East middle school in Plymouth, Michigan, after she did not participate in the pledge. The teacher reportedly told DK to “go back to her country”, Fox 2 Detroit reported.

In a statement following the settlement, DK called the ordeal “terrifying” and “overwhelming” at times.

“But it taught me the importance of speaking up for what I believe is right,” said DK. “I feel proud of the outcome and of being part of something that reinforces how important free speech is. I’ve learned that even when it feels uncomfortable or risky, speaking out can make a difference, not just for me, but for others as well.”

DK, who is 14, chose not to participate in the pledge on 10 January 2025 given the continuing war on Gaza.

“I decided I wanted to sit down because I didn’t feel comfortable standing because of what’s happening in Palestine,” said DK at a February press conference.

After the pledge, DK said that a teacher told the class that “anyone that was sitting down was being very disrespectful to soldiers, to America”. DK said she tried to explain her view to the instructor but was told that if she did not like the US, she should go back to her own country. DK later left the room in tears.

The Arab American Civil Rights League and the American Civil Liberties Union of Michigan later filed a lawsuit in June 2025 against the Plymouth-Canton community schools district on behalf of DK.

As a part of the recent settlement, the Plymouth-Canton community schools district has pledged to provide diversity, sensitivity and first amendment training for staff. The district has also agreed not to punish DK, remove any indication from school files that suggest her protest was inappropriate and provide needed counseling.

Jacob Khalaf, DK’s father, applauded his daughter for her bravery in advocating for her freedom of speech.

“My daughter has shown her strong moral fiber throughout all of this,” he said in a statement to Fox 2 Detroit. “She had the courage to resist when a person in authority tried to make her relinquish her right to free speech, and then, with the help of the ACLU and ACRL, brought a lawsuit to make sure her first amendment rights, as well as those of others, were protected.”

A representative of the district could not be reached for comment by the Guardian.

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FAIL

AP News

https://apnews.com › article › chicago-prosecutor-immigration-protest-case-grand-jury-5b85f9f94306f850249a0ffb2843e65b

Grand jurors dismissed for disagreeing with case against 'Broadview Six ...

1 day agoMecklenburg and her partner, newly minted Assistant U.S. Attorney Matthew Skiba, played video footage for the grand jury from a protest two weeks prior outside of a federal immigration facility in Chicago's near-west suburb of Broadview.

Capitol News Illinois

https://capitolnewsillinois.com › news › transcripts-show-grand-jurors-dismissed-for-disagreeing-with-governments-case-against-broadview-six

'Crock of s---': Transcripts show grand jurors dismissed for ...

2 days agoThe transcripts detail how former Assistant U.S. Attorney Sheri Mecklenburg, who, at the time was the lead prosecutor on the case, dismissed grand jurors for disagreeing with the government's case.

BLOOMB

Sheri Mecklenburg was lead prosecutor on the case until she was detailed to the Judiciary Committee in February. A spokesperson for Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) said Friday the committee didn’t directly employ Mecklenburg, but “because of the gravity of the charges in this case” her detail was terminated.

University Attended:

Northern Illinois University, B.A., 1979

Law School Attended:

Loyola University of Chicago, J.D., 1982

Year of First Admission:1982

Admission:1982, Illinois

ISLN: 904887493

The Richard J. Phelan Public Service Award

In her 19 years as a public servant, Sheri Mecklenburg has gone above and beyond to improve the justice system. Sheri began with the City of Chicago Law Department, followed by an appointment as General Counsel for the Chicago Police Department, where she drafted legislation protecting free speech in mass demonstrations and the nation’s first Witness Rights Policy. In 2007, Sheri founded the Women’s DNA Initiative to address a backlog of untested rape kits and drafted legislation to ensure that future backlogs are not overlooked. Sheri currently works with the U.S. Attorney’s Office, where in addition to being a dedicated trial attorney, she continues to be involved in a variety of initiatives to improve the court system and the community. She currently serves as President of the Board of Directors for the Federal Bar Association’s Chicago Chapter.

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POW ESSAYLI NOT EVEN ACTING USAG

Bill Essayli - Wikipedia 6 26

TALK It needs to be updated to relieve that his appointment was deemed illegal by a federal judge. 104.243.181.224 (talk) 01:50, 29 October 2025 (UTC)

Bilal Ali "Bill" Essayli (born November 24, 1985) is an American lawyer and politician who currently serves as the first assistant United States attorney for the Central District of California. He previously served as the interim United States attorney for the Central District of California from April to July 2025.^[2][3][4][5] A federal judge ruled that he had illegally served as the acting US Attorney. Essayli was disqualified from holding the position because he stayed on beyond the initial interim period without having received official congressional approval,^[6][7][8] and was immediately reassigned to the First Assistant United States Attorney role.^[9][10]

Essayli served as a member of the California State Assembly from 2022 until 2025. A Republican, he was the first Muslim elected to the state assembly,^[11] where he represented the 63rd district, which includes Canyon Lake, Corona, Eastvale, Lake Elsinore, Menifee, Norco, Riverside, Temescal Valley, and Woodcrest.^[12]

Early life and education

Essayli's parents are immigrants from Lebanon who fled to the United States to escape the Lebanese Civil War.^[11] He graduated from the public Centennial High School in Corona, California.^[13]

Essayli received a bachelor's degree from California State Polytechnic University, Pomona and a Juris Doctor degree from Chapman University.^[14]

Early career

Essayli served as an intern in the White House Counsel's Office in 2008. He then worked in private practice, where he focused on employment law. Then he joined the Riverside County District Attorney's office as a prosecutor. He then became an Assistant United States Attorney for the Central District of California. Among the cases he worked on was the 2015 terrorist attack in San Bernardino.^[15]

California State Assembly

In 2018, Essayli ran for the California State Assembly against incumbent Democrat Sabrina Cervantes. He lost the election, but made a strong showing, which raised his local profile.

In 2022, Essayli ran for the state Assembly in the newly created 63rd Assembly District. He defeated Eastvale Mayor Clint Lorimore in the primary and businesswoman Fauzia Rizvi in the general election.

Acting and First Assistant United States Attorney

In April 2025, United States Attorney General Pam Bondi appointed Essayli as interim United States Attorney for the Central District of California.^[3][4] The appointment was made under federal law allowing the Attorney General to fill vacancies without Senate confirmation for up to 120 days.^[16] The district, headquartered in Los Angeles, encompasses seven counties and nearly 20 million residents, making it the largest federal judicial district.^[17]

His appointment prompted pushback from Democratic officials and progressive organizations, culminating in the launch of Stop Essayli, a grassroots effort opposing his confirmation on grounds of alleged political retaliation and civil rights concerns.^{[18][19][20][21}]

The Los Angeles Times reported that Essayli struggled to secure convictions at grand juries for charges he brought against protestors during the June 2025 Los Angeles protests. By July 23, federal prosecutors brought 38 felony cases against protestors but secured only seven indictments, with many being dismissed or reduced to misdemeanor charges. Three federal law enforcement officers reported to the Times that they overheard a speakerphone conversation in the vicinity of the grand jury room in which Essayli screamed at a prosecutor to ignore the Department of Justice's Justice Manual and instead to secure indictments as directed by Pam Bondi. The report said Essayli's low number of indictments raised concerns among legal experts over the strength of the cases he was filing.^[22]

On October 28, 2025, in a 64-page order, Senior Judge John Michael Seabright of the United States District Court for the District of Hawaii ruled that Essayli's authority as an interim appointee had expired as of July 29, 2025.^[7] Seabright wrote that "Essayli unlawfully assumed the role of Acting United States Attorney for the Central District of California", stating that "He is disqualified from serving in that role".^[23][24][25] The judge determined that Essayli had been illegally serving in the acting role since July 2025, due to the lack of an official Senate confirmation, and clarified that Essayli may instead hold the title of "First Assistant United States Attorney" for the Central District of California.^[6][7][8]

On January 24, 2026, in response to the killing of Alex Pretti, Essayli posted on Twitter: "If you approach law enforcement with a gun, there is a high likelihood they will be legally justified in shooting you. Don't do it!"^[26] The gun-rights organizations National Rifle Association and Gun Owners of America both criticized the comments. The National Rifle Association called these comments "dangerous and wrong" and called for a full investigation.^[27] Gun Owners of America responded by stating: "We condemn the untoward comments of U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli. Federal agents are not 'highly likely' to be 'legally justified' in 'shooting' concealed carry licensees who approach while lawfully carrying a firearm. The Second Amendment protects Americans' right to bear arms while protesting—a right the federal government must not infringe upon."^[28]

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AN 5 26

ANALYSIS LING

Trump admin indictment of Comey falls apart under linguistic analysis - Alternet.org

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Indictment Of Cuba's Raúl Castro DOJ | Rev

RAUL CASTRO PRESSER SEN MOODY

(09:54)

I'm proud to stand here on this podium with US Attorney Jason Reding Quiñones to my right. Chris Raia, Deputy Director of the FBI.

(10:10)

You're going to get to clap for Jason in 20 seconds. Chris Raia, Deputy Director of the FBI and James Uthmeier, the Attorney General of this great state. And your great US senator is here as well. She's very busy in D.C. but wouldn't miss this for the world. So thank you for being here, Senator Moody.

(10:36)

So I want to thank Jason for his leadership down here in Florida. He's doing a great job beyond today and I'd also ask him to replace me at the podium to say a few words. So thank you, Jason, very much....

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AN 5 26

YEt AGain

'Trust has been broken': Judge unleashes on Trump DOJ 'misconduct' in closed-door hearing - Alternet.org

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AN 5 26

A federal judge is so annoyed with the Justice Department that she's advising those opposing the top agency to try to kill any subpoena submitted because she no longer believes they can be trusted.

U.S. District Court Judge Mary S. McElroy said at the end of a hearing over involving a pediatric hospital attempting to avoid handing over medical records of transgender minors that the DOJ “should be prepared to field thousands of motions to quash, tens of thousands maybe, because I don’t know how any party can rely on a conversation with the Department of Justice that they’re working on compliance” given the track of this case.

Bloomberg Law reported that the transcript of the case was only recently added to the docket.

“I’m not a practitioner, but as a judge I would say to anybody you should be filing motions to quash in every case where the Department of Justice is seeking information and you’re trying to negotiate it,” McElroy said, according to the document.

She said that the case was "a cautionary tale."

McElroy ultimately sided with the Rhode Island Hospital in a scathing ruling that involved removing the medical privacy of minors. She then blasted prosecutors for trying to withhold information and misrepresent the facts of the case. The exchange in court goes further, as the judge condemned Civil Division officials representing the government's case.

One, Jordan Campbell, is a deputy assistant attorney general, and is overseeing a nationwide investigation into children with gender dysphoria. The DOJ is endeavoring to end the practice of gender affirming care altogether, it confirmed in a press release. In many cases, a first step in gender affirming care is talking to a psychologist, the Gender Affirming Health Program at the University of California, San Francisco outlines.

The Justice Department was trying to "forum shop the investigation," Bloomberg reported. Judge McElroy said that the DOJ knowingly misled the judge in the North District of Texas, falsely claiming that the Rhode Island Hospital, had ignored the subpoena for months. In fact, lawyers for the hospital tried to meet with DOJ lawyers to narrow the search terms in their extensive demand for medical documents. The Justice Department never responded.

“You ghosted them,” McElroy said in court to the DOJ attorneys. She said that the DOJ lawyers never told Fort Worth-based Judge Reed O'Connor that before he agreed to enforce the Rhode Island subpoena.

The head of the DOJ's Civil Division, Brantley Mayers, was shredded by the judge as she demanded to know specifics about his experience. Mayers confessed that he's only spent one month in legal practice. He's done three clerkships in the past, but only joined the DOJ in November. The report cited his LinkedIn page showing that he clerked for a Donald Trump-appointed judge in Florida after graduating from the University of Florida in 2022.

Campbell, however, helped co-found “the first and only firm dedicated to exclusively representing detransitioners and victims of radical gender ideology,” his government bio reads. He has sued the Rhode Island Hospital previously while he was practicing in Dallas, Texas.

Eric Olshan, a lawyer representing the hospital, said that the lawyer's background is important because “we’re left wondering, given the nature of our communications with the government, how we wound up in this situation that we’re currently in.”

When Justice Department “attorneys came to this court to explain their conduct, the senior attorney—who was present at many of the events that took place in this case—sat silently by as his counterpart, a junior attorney who has been practicing law for approximately six months and had no relevant information, was forced to answer questions about DOJ’s blatant disregard for the proper course of negotiations,” the judge wrote in her final ruling.

McElroy is one of the federal judges who has been critical of the Justice Department under President Donald Trump. The Obama appointee has particularly taken issue with the use of conservative-friendly Texas courts to go after other states in which they have no jurisdiction.

“At least be honest enough to admit that,” McElroy said, according to the transcript.

“Admit what, your honor?” Mayers responded.

“That you chose Fort Worth where there’s two judges intentionally knowing that you were going to get a forum, since you had lost seven of these—every single one of them that were filed in other cases—right?” the judge replied.

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AN 5 26

President Donald Trump’s former adviser Michael Caputo has reportedly filed the first known claim to the new $1.8 billion fund established for supposed victims of lawfare.

“I was the target of the illegal Crossfire Hurricane investigation and our family suffered greatly during that dark era of political weaponization,” Caputo claimed in a letter to the acting attorney general, Todd Blanche, according to a report by CNN.

The fund will be controlled by five members selected by Blanche and one selected with congressional input. The group has not established any guidelines as to who will be paid, but they have not ruled out paying Jan. 6th insurrectionists or agencies directly connected to Trump himself. They also have not explained how they will determine the amounts to be dispersed. The fund itself is controversial because Trump sued his own IRS, reportedly did not permit his Justice Department (which is supposed to defend the IRS from lawsuits) to advocate for the IRS in good faith and then skirted a judge’s order to make sure his suit was legal by having the two agencies he controlled settle without third-party oversight.

The settlement also bars the IRS from ever investigating Trump or his family members for past tax issues. Legal experts agree that there is no precedent for a sitting president pocketing money from his own IRS for himself and those he personally deems to have been wronged by the federal government. Skeptics argue that, despite Trump’s promises to not self-deal or dispense the money for partisan reasons, his past of self-dealing and using federal money to help allies suggests his promises should not be believed.

"Because the Notice does not reference any settlement or include a stipulation of settlement, there is no settlement of record," Judge Kathleen M. Williams, the judge assigned to oversee the case, commented on Monday. When the case had been referred to Williams, she argued that the potential for illegality was so great that she needed to consult legal experts before the parties could continue. Trump quickly rushed to come up with the settlement before Williams’ May 20th deadline.

"Unfathomable levels of corruption,” legal reporter Chris Geidner told Politico, adding that "it's the underscore waiting to fill in the date that really does it for me."

Geidner was referring to the document's date at the top of the page which read "May ___, 2026,” with a “19” later added in.

"New addition just inserted in settlement agreement: a promise that the IRS won't go after Trump, his companies, and his families for unpaid taxes,” legal analyst Harry Litman wrote. “Potential huge additional cost to Treasury -- i.e., us -- all in exchange for, well, nothing, an uncognizable lawsuit."

Another legal expert argued the settlement is an impeachable offense.

"I assumed we would never see the 'settlement agreement,' or whatever you want to call it, but evidently, DOJ went ahead and posted it on its website,” New Mexico civil litigator Owen Barcala posted on Bluesky. “A couple things are interesting if you can steel your mind for the outrage and horror of its general nature.”

After reviewing the various ways in which the settlement is unprecedented and arguably illegal, Barcala concluded that it "must be nice to have figured out the One Neat Trick to avoid Congressional appropriations. Just sue yourself, direct yourself to settle for billions, and agree with yourself that you can put that money wherever you want.”

He concluded, “Entities can also make claims, making it possible that Trump Org could make a claim for the NY litigation. To be eligible for relief, you only have to make a 'legal claim' stating that you were a victim, presumably in some kind of crayon."

Finally Christian Mott, a criminal law expert, argued that the settlement’s language suggests Trump plans on personally drawing from the fund.

"It seems like you'd only do this if you are anticipating that Trump will make a claim," Mott said. "The agreement also appears to allow Trump to continue pursuing his monetary damages claims through the Fund set up in the agreement. See Sec. III.B. So, he has effectively created a more favorable forum for himself, which is a huge benefit given that several of his claims were very weak."

Speaking with this journalist for Salon in 2018, a year which like 2026 included midterm elections, Caputo argued then what Trump supporters are arguing today: That he needs to prevail in the midterm elections in order to avoid being impeached for his alleged crimes.

“I agree with Steve Bannon 100 percent: the mid-term elections are a referendum on the President and a vote for Republican House candidates is a vote to stop a bogus partisan impeachment,” Caputo, who worked as a communications adviser for Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign and later as his assistant Secretary of Health and Human Services, told this reporter at the time. “I understand why some in the White House and official GOP organs may not behind this message — they have many reasons. But I’m not buying it: impeachment will definitely be on the Democrat agenda if they win the House, and this must be stopped. I’m not afraid to talk about this, regardless of where the Washington Republicans consultant class comes down on it.”

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mma

Right-wing media react to Trump's slush fund for allies with unquestioning loyalty — and some vague skepticism

Written by Sophie Lawton

:{Published 05/21/26

Some right-wing media figures are jumping on board with the Trump administration's newest effort to support MAGA allies despite numerous questions about its legality; a few are voicing light skepticism of the plan.

This week, the Department of Justice announced that the Trump family had agreed to drop a legally questionable $10 billion lawsuit against the IRS in exchange for the creation of a $1.776 billion “Anti-Weaponization Fund.” According to Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, the fund's intended recipients are “victims of lawfare and weaponization” by the federal government. Critics of the move are calling the idea a “slush fund,” and The New York Times called the deal “highly unusual” and wrote that the fund is “a pipeline to funnel taxpayer money to President Trump’s allies.”

Some right-wing media figures have been praising the fund, calling it a great idea and complementing Trump for his “patriotic” use of the number 1776 while ignoring the more problematic details of the fund.

Newsmax host Carl Higbie staunchly defended the fund, claiming that Trump has “dropped — he dropped — his $10 billion lawsuit against the IRS in exchange for a $1.776 — 1776 — billion-dollar fund set up for truth and justice compensation for people who were victims of Biden's weaponization of government” and that “Trump and his family will get $0 in exchange for just simply an apology from the IRS and a fund set up for every other person who Biden targeted.”

:{Video

Citation

From the May 18, 2026, edition of Newsmax's Carl Higbie: Frontline

Fox's Sean Hannity said the Department of Justice “rightly agreed to set aside the patriotic amount of $1.76 billion to settle other claims like this.”

:{Video

Citation

From the May 19, 2026, edition of Fox News' Hannity

Trump's former co-deputy director of the FBI Dan Bogino praised the fund and the Trump administration on his podcast, saying that “things are happening all over the place, good, positive things.”

Another right-wing podcaster, Vince Coglianese, said on his show that the fund “sounds like justice” and said, “I think it's perfectly wonderful.”

Coglianese also suggested a few people and groups who could benefit from the fund, including anti-abortion activist Mark Houck, other “conservatives who stood outside of abortion mills” and who faced charges, “parents at school board meetings” complaining about curricula and gender-neutral bathrooms who he said were attacked by the FBI and left-wing groups, and “traditional Catholics” who he claimed were targeted by Biden's FBI.

:{Video

Citation

From the May 19, 2026, edition of VINCEstreamed on Rumble

Greg Kelly took to his Newsmax show to make specific claims about the legal precedent for the fund, stating, “The US government gets sued all the time, and they make settlements. This is not an outlandish arrangement. It actually makes a lot of sense.”

Kelly also claimed that the announcement of the fund came after he sat down with Trump and proposed a “compensation fund for the January 6ers.”

:{Video

Citation

From the May 19, 2026, edition of Newsmax's Greg Kelly Reports

The DOJ also claims there is precedent for this type of fund, saying it’s similar to the Obama-era "Keepseagle" case. In reality, the fund seems to have little legal basis.

As Mike Masnick wrote for Techdirt, the fund was created as a settlement offer because “Trump needed to drop that lawsuit in order to end it before a judge called bullshit on the fact that he was negotiating with himself to take $10 billion from American taxpayers.”

Masknick also refuted the DOJ claims of legal precedent, writing, “The Keepseagle settlement was approved by a court in response to a class action lawsuit. Here, this fund, is being created in a manner deliberately to avoid having the court review it.”

A New York Times piece reported that “legal experts struggled to make sense of this week’s developments, saying tentatively that it was unlikely anyone could sue to stop the moves.” The article noted nevertheless that the fund’s creation is a “jarring shock to the conventional understanding of the constitutional system.”

Reuters quoted Tax Law Center policy director Brandon DeBot calling the fund a “breathtaking abuse of the tax and legal system" and Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR) calling it a “slush fund” that represented “a stunning act of corruption.”

Some Republican lawmakers have spoken out against the fund, such as Senate Majority Leader John Thune, who said he doesn't “see a purpose” for it, and others seem bothered by the lack of details surrounding where the money might go. “I’ve got more questions than I’ve heard answers for,” said Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK).

January 6 Capitol Police Officers have sued to block the fund on the grounds that it violates the 14th Amendment's prohibition on using federal funds for “any debt or obligation incurred in aid of insurrection or rebellion against the United States.”

Even a few right-wing media voices have been lightly skeptical of the move.

On Fox's Special Report, guest anchor Trace Gallagher admitted that “who gets the money and where it comes from is a bit unclear.”

Special Report's reporting on the topic also included clips of Sens. John Kennedy (R-LA) and Jerry Moran (R-KS) asking for clarity on where the money is coming from and “the legality of creating a fund that Congress hasn't had anything to say about.”

The Daily Wire's Ben Shapiro touched on the matter, saying on his show, “I'm generally against slush funds, to be clear. I do not like them. I think there are other ways of pursuing redress for grievances in this fashion. However, many of the myths that you're hearing about it are overstated.”

Megyn Kelly said on her podcast about the fund, “I don't like it,” explaining that she'd rather see individual suits. But she also made false correlations between this move and Obama's Keepseagle fund, saying, “This was created by Barack Obama,” and, “The same media that's now ripping Trump to shreds for doing it said nothing, nothing when Barack Obama started it. … So I really have no tolerance for their cries and protestations about what Trump is doing.”

Already, January 6 rioters, election deniers, and Trump allies are lining up for a chance at the taxpayer money.

### True the Vote founder hopes “we will see some level of compensation” from Trump's weaponization fund

05/21/26 11:50 AM EDT

### Enrique Tarrio: “Every J6er needs to be able to get some type of funds” from Trump's weaponization money

05/20/26 5:26 PM EDT

### Newsmax's Greg Kelly defends Trump “weaponization” fund: “This is not an outlandish arrangement”

05/20/26

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an 5 26

The Justice Department announced that it was a done deal that they are setting up a fund for President Donald Trump's allies who claim they have been "wronged" by former President Joe Biden's administration.

The decision was signed by acting Attorney General Todd Blanche.

The Justice Department press release reads, "There is legal precedent for such a Fund..."

That excerpt prompted The Atlantic's legal analyst, Quinta Jurecic, to comment, "This press release reads a tad defensive to me."

National security expert Marcy Wheeler pointed out that Blanche is supposed to appear before lawmakers to answer questions this week.

Some legal analysts were skeptical, but others were downright disgusted.

"Acting AG Todd Blanche directly involved," said Lawfare's Roger Parloff.

Other legal and national security analysts questioned some specifics about the new DOJ "policy."

National security lawyer Bradley P. Moss questioned whether the judge would be willing to play ball with Trump after he asked to drop the case.

"I'm going to go out on a limb and say the judge overseeing Trump's IRS case is not going to just let this slide the way he is hoping," Moss wrote on BlueSky.

He later added the fund mentioned in the DOJ release to claim "precedent" is vastly different from the one that Blanche and Trump have developed.

"That fund was crafted as part of a legal settlement that required court approval and directly responded to the legal claims for damages in the lawsuit itself. Trump's slush fund has none of this," Moss wrote.

Law school professor Jon Becker half-joked, "Tired: reparations for slavery Wired: reparations for being prosecuted for committing crimes."

"A slush fund for Trump’s goon squad. Paid for with American tax dollars," said veteran reporter Jim Acosta.

"How many different ways can one president try to spend unappropriated money?" asked lawyer Joe Dudek.

Media Matters for America fellow Matthew Gertz commented, "The president is stealing tax dollars from the public treasury to pay off his criminal cronies."

Lawyer Michael Salerno added, "One has to wonder how much of this the Proud Boys et al are going to receive."

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an 5 26

Latest Trump nominee has botched prosecutions 'slam dunk' murder cases - Alternet.org

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AN 5 26

Alito refuses to recuse from Supreme Court case despite owning stock in industry - Alternet.org

Court-appointed lawyer asks judge to evaluate DOJ’s 'atypical' handling of Trump IRS deal - Alternet.org

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AN 5 26

In 2025, U.S. President Donald Trump issued an executive order calling for a federal investigation of a conservative who served in his first administration: former U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Chief of Staff Miles Taylor. Taylor discusses Trump's actions against him in an article for the UK-based i Paper, emphasizing that the president's executive order became a blueprint for his efforts to use the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) against political foes.

Trump accused Taylor of "treason" — a claim that many legal experts and constitutional scholars attacked as ludicrous. Taylor was still serving in the first Trump Administration when, on September 5, 2018, the New York Times published his anonymous op-ed, "I Am Part of the Resistance Inside the Trump Administration." Trump was furious when Taylor later came out as the op-ed's author.

"A year ago," Taylor explains in the i Paper, "Trump issued an executive order directing federal agencies to investigate me for 'treason.' It was the first time in 250 years of American history that a president had signed such an order to open a specific inquiry into a specific critic. The crime? I quit his first administration and exposed the misconduct I witnessed. And I haven't shut up about it since. He came back into office determined to make an example. But it didn’t stop there."

Taylor continues, "As I later found out, then-Attorney General Pam Bondi used Trump's order against me as the flimsy justification to strip away longstanding protections for reporters."

Taylor argues that the "treason" probe of him has broad implications for U.S. democracy and free speech in general.

"Of course, the Trump Administration has made it sound like this is about stopping leaks of classified information," Taylor writes. "Unfortunately for Trump, criticism of a president is not 'classified,' no matter how badly he wants it to be. Trump's logic is obvious. He doesn't want dissent amplified, and certainly not the most damaging kind — from insiders who have seen his impulsiveness and corruption up close."

The former DHS official continues, "So, they're using mob-like tactics to scare news outlets and the sources who they rely on to expose what's really happening around the president…. Last year, the president's aides told Rolling Stone he was coming after me to 'send a message.' He certainly has, though it's gone far beyond me. He's out to make an example of people everywhere who say what he doesn't want them to say. If the U.S. president wants to conflate free speech with 'treason,' then we should proudly wear the label of traitors."

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AN 5 26

Trump is angling to obtain this money as a settlement with the Justice Department he controls in a$10 billion lawsuithe filed by claiming that the agency is responsible for his tax returns being leaked. Now Trump says he will redirect $1.7 billion to a compensation fund for supporters like the nearly 1,600 individuals charged with the Jan. 6 insurrection and agencies connected to Trump himself.

He has promised not to self-deal from funds given to the agencies he controls, and instead says all of the money will go to supporters he claims were persecuted by his predecessor, President Joe Biden.

Trump sued the federal government for $10 billion when his tax returns were leaked in 2019, which revealed that he had paid very little in federal income taxes and suffered a string of undisclosed financial failures. He has also sued the government for $230 million for the 2022 search of his Mar-a-Lago estate over allegedly stealing classified documents and the investigation into his ties to the Russian government.

Experts pointed out that it is impossible for a president to nothave a conflict of interest when suing the government he controls, and that the Justice Department, which is assigned the role of defending agencies like the IRS, cannot be expected to do so when the president will presumably fire or otherwise punish employees there who do not follow his wishes.

“While the settlement is expected to be agreed upon in the coming days, sources caution that the final terms will not be set until they are officially announced,” CNN reported Thursday night. It later noted that “the settlement terms are expected to prohibit Trump from directly receiving payments related to those three legal claims; however, entities associated with Trump are not explicitly barred from filing additional claims, sources said.”

As the libertarian commentator James Bovard recently pointed out in USA Today, if Trump’s original lawsuit had prevailed and he received $10 billion, that would require every American taxpayer to pay him roughly $100 directly. Mathematically this would instead mean every American would have to pay people like the Jan. 6th insurrections an average of $17.

“Roughly 100 million Americans pay federal income taxes annually (not counting people who receive more in earned income tax credits than they pay in income taxes),” Bovard wrote. “A $10 billion settlement divided by 100 million taxpayers works out to about $100 per taxpayer, or $200 per couple.”

He added, “If congressional Democrats are savvy, they would mandate that the payout to Trump be financed by IRS penalty letters sent directly to 100 million taxpayers. To add salt to the wound, citizens could be compelled to send their payments directly to his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida.”

There are also doubts as to whether Trump will not self-deal if he gets a settlement. As conservative commentator Andrew Egger pointed out, “Trump had been using his personal charity ... to pay his business debts, make political contributions, and buy things for himself.”

U.S. Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) called the fund a "$1.7B fraud on the American taxpayer to line the pockets of his MAGA political allies ... and turn the federal government into a personal cash machine for his unpopular extremist movement."

---

AN 5 15 26

Law enforcement celebrates departure of embattled Trump official: 'It’s like Christmas' - Alternet.org

DOJ should look 'very carefully' at Blanche's role in Trump cases: Comey - Alternet.org

Trump's DOJ just opened the door to Dem retaliation - Alternet.org

President Donald Trump’s Justice Department (DOJ) is asking the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia to allow it to take security clearances away from law firms that accept cases with which they disagree — even though that same precedent could empower future Democratic presidents to persecute Republican law firms.

“The DOJ returned to court Thursday and told the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit that President Donald Trump's executive orders to strip elite law firms of security clearances and tear up their government contracts must be revived, even if that means a Democrat eventually comes into power and deems MAGA lawyers enemies of the state,” reported Law and Crime on Thursday. “Chief U.S. Circuit Judge Sri Srinivasan, U.S. Circuit Judge Cornelia Pillard and U.S. Circuit Judge Neomi Rao — two appointees of Barack Obama and a lone Donald Trump appointee, respectively — formed the three-judge panel in a case the DOJ was prepared to drop in March.”

Despite the judges previously seeming poised to throw out the case, prompting the government to withdraw it, Trump’s officials are arguing that they have a right to penalize law firms who criticize the president.

“In a bit of a preamble, the DOJ attorney claimed losses across the board boiled down to district court judges rushing to block ‘orders that they clearly didn't like the content of’ — effectively nullifying the president's unreviewable ‘security clearance determinations’ and restoring them without authority,” Law and Crime reported. It added that Judge Pillard then asked about whether their argument, if implemented, could boomerang against Republicans one day.

"So if an incoming president — let's say a Democrat — says, I think that any lawyer who represents a Republican, by virtue of that representation, even if the lawyer is him or herself a Democrat, I think that the representation of my enemies is a threat to national security. So any lawyer who represents a Republican immediately today has their security clearance revoked?" Pillard asked.

Attorney Abhishek Kambli, representing the government, answered Pillard’s question in the affirmative, saying that he believed impeachment, elections and congressional laws alone could strip the president of his right to penalize political opponents through their law firms.

"And your view is — the pardon power example is where you go — that this power over security clearances is so intrinsic that even … you could be race-based, and it could be race-based," and there would be no judicial review, Srivinasan asked. Kambli once again agreed.

"If a president said, I don't trust law firms that represent Catholics, law firms that represent African Americans, law firms that represent Asian Americans, and so just law firms that represent people in those three groups, they have to give me lists of their clients who are under control by people in those three groups, and we will deny security clearances to any lawyer in those firms. Political question? Nonjusticiable?" she asked.

"So Your Honor, yes, because of the threshold question before you even examine any of those facts," Kambli replied. Other attorneys speaking at the trial echoed Kambli’s views.

Earlier this month, Trump lost his appeal of a personal lawsuit he launched against former Secretary Hillary Clinton, former FBI Director James Comey, the Democratic National Committee, the law firm Perkins Coie, LLC and others he blames for investigations into his connections to Russia.

U.S. District Judge Donald M. Middlebrooks wrote in his ruling that Trump has a "pattern of abuse of the courts" by filing such lawsuits specifically for political purposes, saying this "undermines the rule of law" and "amounts to obstruction of justice."

"Here, we are confronted with a lawsuit that should never have been filed, which was completely frivolous, both factually and legally and which was brought in bad faith for an improper purpose," he added.

---

AN 5 26

The Donald Trump-era U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ), under former U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi and now, Acting AG Todd Blanche, hasn't been shy about targeting the president's adversaries for criminal investigations — from New York State Attorney General Letitia James to outgoing U.S. Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell. And former FBI Director James Comey is now facing a grand jury indictment — a prosecution that, Bloomberg News argues in a May 14 editorial, "marks a new low" for the Trump-era DOJ.

"Comey's purported crime came a year ago, when he posted a photograph on social media of seashells arranged as '86 47,' and writing, 'Cool shell formation on my beach walk,'" the Bloomberg editorial board explains. "The Justice Department alleges that the photo constituted 'a threat to take the life of, and to inflict bodily harm upon, the President of the United States.' According to the president, eighty-six is 'a mob term for 'kill him.' Trouble is, most Americans use the slang term in the same way that Merriam-Webster defines it: to eject or ban a customer (i.e., 'eighty-six them'), or 'to reject, discontinue, or get rid of (something).'"

The editorial continues, "As Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche acknowledged, the phrase 86 47 'is used constantly' by Americans who aren't indicted for it. Comey's post may have been in poor taste, but to state the obvious, it doesn't equate to a murder hit."

Bloomberg's editorial writers stress that the Comey indictment fits into a "troubling pattern" of "dubious" and politically motivated Trump DOJ investigations of everyone from former CIA Director John O. Brennan to Sen. Adam Schiff (D-California).

"The message the administration is sending — crossing the president risks criminal charges, while playing ball can get you out of trouble — is a destructive one," the Bloomberg board warns. And it may yet get worse. ... Some of the president's loyalists contend that he's merely treating his enemies the way they treated him. Not so."

The writers add, "It's fair to debate whether several local and state cases brought against him were tainted by politics, but the blatancy and scope of the political retribution now being pursued by the federal government has little precedent in American history."

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AN 5 26

Trump’s document shredding boosted by DOJ memo about records: veteran reporter - Alternet.org

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AN 5 26

DOJ lawyers told Todd Blanche to recuse himself from Trump cases last May: official - Alternet.org

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GO AFTER ca DISTRICTS POST CALAIS

AI Overview GGL 5 26

Following the Supreme Court's ruling in Louisiana v. Callais (April/May 2026), which curbed the use of race in redistricting, U.S. Senator Eric Schmitt (R-MO) has spearheaded a Republican effort to challenge Democratic-led congressional maps. [1, 2]

Schmitt's Actions Following Callais

DOJ Pressure: Schmitt sent a letter to the Department of Justice (DOJ) urging them to act on the ruling, which he argues makes it illegal to use the Voting Rights Act (VRA) to justify racially gerrymandered districts. [1, 2]

Targeting Blue States: Schmitt has specifically called on the DOJ to target California, arguing their maps were driven by partisan, not racial, considerations. He described the ruling as a "map war" that allows for challenging maps in blue states. [1, 2]

Subcommittee Role: Acting as Chairman of the Subcommittee on the Constitution, Schmitt is pushing for a nationwide review of districts. [1]

GOP Strategy & "Map War"

Shifting Legal Landscape: Republicans, including Schmitt, argue that the Callais decision means states can no longer use the VRA as an excuse for racial gerrymandering. [1]

"Ending Racial Gerrymandering": Schmitt states that the decision restores the promise of equal representation and prevents "carving up America into racial spoils". [1]

Reactions: While proponents suggest this ensures fair maps, critics argue it allows for more traditional partisan gerrymandering and could eliminate majority-minority districts that ensure representation. [1, 2]

Harmeet Dhillon Response: Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon responded to Schmitt, stating the DOJ is "on it" regarding the review of potentially illegal districts. [1, 2]

Callais is expected to cause significant changes to the 2026 midterm election landscape, with the potential for legal battles over district lines in several states. [1, 2]

---

RWW

05/13/2026

Kyle Mantyla

Michelle Boorstein, Laura Meckler and Natalie Allison @ The Washington Post: White House to host 9-hour prayer festival focused on Christian roots of U.S.

Pete Hegseth, Marco Rubio and Mike Johnson will speak at the event, which centers on the idea that the founders wanted the U.S. to be explicitly Christian.

Andrew Duehren and Alan Feuer @ The New York Times: Justice Dept. Officials Consider Settling Trump Suit Against I.R.S.

One of the settlement terms under review is for the I.R.S. to drop any audits of the president, his family members and businesses.

Phil Williams @ Hate Comes To Main Street: Far-Right Grudge Match: 'Unite the Right' Organizer Sues Proud Boys Founder

Proud Boys founder Gavin McInnes had suggested that Unite the Right organizer Jason Kessler may have been on the payroll of the Southern Poverty Law Center.

Anthony DeBarros and Annie Linskey @ The Wall Street Journal: The Late-Night Truth Social Storms That Offer a Window Into the President’s Mind

A WSJ analysis of thousands of posts found that the president uses the social-media platform to spread conspiracy theories and attack his adversaries.

Jose Pagliery @ NOTUS: FBI Created ‘Payback Squad’ to Handle Political Cases, Sources Say

Investigators are eyeing cases similar to the recent criminal prosecution of former FBI Director James Comey, one current government official told NOTUS.

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JOCKEY FOR GIG

AN 5 26

The evidence against would-be presidential assassin Cole Tomas Allen is overwhelming, but former prosecutor Elie Honig says that doesn’t stop President Donald Trump’s hapless appointees from blowing it.

Witnesses saw Allen running with a shotgun and a handgun toward the ballroom where Trump was about to address the White House Correspondents’ Association. His mad dash was captured on surveillance video, and he confessed in writing in an email to friends and family.

“It’s a case prosecutors cannot conceivably botch — but Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche and D.C. U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro are trying their best to screw it up,” said Honig. “The problem is both Blanche and Pirro have stubbornly refused to recuse themselves from the case, notwithstanding their status as witnesses and intended victims. In the process, they have given Allen a sliver of a chance.”

It does not help that U.S. District Court Judge Trevor McFadden, a 2017 Trump appointee, enabled their self-sabotage by suggesting Blanche and Pirro might not be witnesses because Allen never made it into the ballroom and they didn’t see anything at a hearing this week. But Pirro personally involved herself in the issue when she told Fox News on May 2 that: “I was in the line of fire here. I could have been killed.” And the accused assassin was explicit about his intentions in his pre-attack email prioritizing “administration … from highest-ranking to lowest.”

“It is a bedrock principle that any time a prosecutor is a potential witness or victim in a given case, they must recuse themselves to avoid a conflict of interest or the appearance of such,” said Honig, who served as director of the New Jersey Division of Criminal Justice. “A federal statute requires the AG to ensure the recusal of any prosecutor who has a “personal [or] political conflict of interest, or the appearance thereof.”

The DOJ’s own regulations mandate recusal where the prosecutor could be seen as “less than fully impartial” or “create[s] an appearance of a conflict of interest likely to affect the public perception of the integrity of the investigation or prosecution,” said Honig, adding that if Blanche and Pirro continue to refuse to recuse, they’ll endanger the entire prosecution.

A failure to recuse will certainly give Allen a legitimate argument on appeal that his prosecution was tainted by conflicts of interest. And federal appeals courts have thrown out plenty of convictions based on the improper failure of prosecutors to recuse themselves.

But Blanche and Pirro love the limelight, said Honig: “Collectively, they have held multiple press conferences about the case, posted about it aggressively on social media, and done interviews on CNN, Fox News, and NBC.”

And both are hoping Trump will nominate them to permanent DOJ leadership positions

“Let’s be real about what’s happening here. Blanche and Pirro are both experienced prosecutors who understand that they should recuse. But then they would forgo the opportunity to grandstand about the case, and they’d risk p—— off the person who will decide whether to nominate them for big, important jobs,” said Honig. “Apparently, they would rather play the politics of personal glory, even if they risk blowing a case against a dangerous assassin who tried to kill the president whose favor they so deeply crave.

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VRA AMICUS DOJ3 --> ALITO FUCKERY

D . JOHN SAUER Solicitor General Counsel of Record

HARMEET K. DHILLON Assistant Attorney General HASHIM M. MOOPPAN

Deputy Solicitor General JESUS A. OSETE

Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General AARON Z. ROPER

Assistant to the Solicitor General ANDREW G. BRANIFF

DAVID N. GOLDMAN

Attorneys Department of Justice Washington, D.C. 20530-0001 SupremeCtBriefs@usdoj.gov (202) 514-2217

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an 5 26

President Donald Trump lost his appealof a personal lawsuit he launched against former Secretary Hillary Clinton, former FBI Director James Comey, the Democratic National Committee, the law firm Perkins Coie, LLC and others he blames for the Russia investigation.

Politico's Kyle Cheney reported on Tuesday that the 11th Circuit declined to rehear Trump's case, leaving his only option an appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Trump and lawyer Alina Habba in 2023 were sanctioned $1 million for the "frivolous" lawsuit. Florida has rules that allow defendants to ask that a court decide whether a lawsuit is "bogus," the Associated Press reported.

At the time, U.S. District Judge Donald M. Middlebrooks wrote in the ruling that Trump has a "pattern of abuse of the courts" for filing such lawsuits specifically for political purposes. He said that the move "undermines the rule of law" and "amounts to obstruction of justice."

Chief Judge William Pryor, a George W. Bush appointee, along with Trump appointee Judge Andrew L. Brasher and Joe Biden appointee Judge Embry Kidd, denied Trump's demand to rehear the case.

They added the detail, "... no judge in regular active service on the Court having requested that the Court be polled on rehearing en banc," which means none of the judges had any interest in weighing in on rehearing the matter. On the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals, six of the 12 judges were appointed by Trump.

Lawyer Marc Elias commented on BlueSky, "I was a defendant in Trump’s frivolous lawsuit. I did not settle. I did not compromise. I did not stop speaking out. We fought and won."

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AN 5 26

Major cases 'hobbled by turmoil' as 'shock waves ripple through' Trump’s DOJ - Alternet.org

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com dr 5 26

‘Stinks of Rotting Meat’: Critics Warn Trump DOJ Settlement Would Legalize Price-Fixing

“Get ready for even higher prices for chicken, turkey, and pork,” said one antitrust attorney.

Jake Johnson

May 08, 2026

IFrame Content

US President Donald Trump’s Justice Department moved Thursday to settle a Biden-era antitrust lawsuit against the analytics firm Agri Stats, proposing an agreement that critics say would effectively give the stamp of federal approval to meat industry price-fixing schemes.

The Justice Department—now headed by Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, formerly Trump’s personal lawyer—hailed the proposed settlement as a “historic” win over a company whose “business model directly raised the price of chicken, turkey, and pork in local grocery stores across our nation.” But critics said the agreement, which must undergo review by a federal judge, would do nothing substantial to rein in price-fixing in the meat industry.

Lee Hepner, senior legal counsel for the American Economic Liberties Project, said the deal “stinks of rotting meat,” noting that the settlement was proposed just days before the case was set to go to trial.

“No way does it address the harms,” Hepner said of the 79-page settlement. “Agri Stats spent decades hiking prices on over 90% of processed meat in the country. Now they’re being told to exercise some discretion going forward.”

“It’s a gut punch to those who worked on this case for four years thinking it might actually deter these price fixing services from cropping up in every other industry,” Hepner added.

The Biden administration brought the antitrust lawsuit against Agri Stats in September 2023, accusing the company and its subsidiary EMI of “collecting, integrating, and distributing competitively sensitive information related to price, cost, and output among competing meat processors.”

“While distributing troves of competitively sensitive information among participating processors, Agri Stats withholds its reports from meat purchasers, workers and American consumers, resulting in an information asymmetry that further exacerbates the competitive harm of Agri Stats’ information exchanges,” the Biden DOJ said.

“This settlement legalizes meat price-fixing—it just says you have to bring the giant retailers and distributors in on the game.”

The Trump Justice Department’s settlement would require Agri Stats to “make the vast majority of information” it distributes “available to all interested domestic purchasers on reasonable and non-discriminatory terms,” along with several other conditions.

But the settlement states that EMI is not otherwise “prohibited... from continuing to provide EMI Price Reports in substantially the same manner as it did as of April 24, 2026.”

Agri Stats noted in a statement Thursday that it “denied all allegations” of illegal conduct and “has admitted no wrongdoing” as part of the settlement. Agri Stats’ lead counsel in the case called the deal “a win” for both the company and consumers—a claim that antitrust advocates rejected, calling the agreement blatantly one-sided in the corporation’s favor.

“This settlement legalizes meat price-fixing—it just says you have to bring the giant retailers and distributors in on the game,” wrote Basel Musharbash, managing attorney at Antimonopoly Counsel. “Get ready for even higher prices for chicken, turkey, and pork.”

The proposed Agri Stats settlement is the latest favorable deal that Trump’s Justice Department—which is in the grip of lobbyists with ties to the president—has cut with a major corporation accused of illegal price-fixing.

Last November, as Common Dreams reported, the Justice Department agreed to settle a Biden-era lawsuit filed against the real estate software company RealPage, which was accused of an “unlawful scheme to decrease competition among landlords in apartment pricing and to monopolize the market for commercial revenue management software.”

RealPage welcomed the settlement, noting that the agreement included “no financial penalties, damages, or findings or admissions of wrongdoing.”

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fbi morale low an

an 5 26

Under Donald Trump loyalist and Acting U.S. Attorney General Todd Blanche, the post-Pam Bondi U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) continues to target Trump's foes —including former FBI Director James Comey, who is facing a grand jury indictment for, Blanche alleges, threatening to kill the president by posting, on Instagram, a photo that showed seashells arranged in a way to read "8647." Many of the legal experts featured on MS NOW, including Lisa Rubin and former DOJ federal prosector Barbara McQuade, believe the Comey indictment has no merit.

Trump's critics in the legal world, from Rubin and McQuade to Democracy Docket's Marc Elias to The Bulwark's Kimberly Wehle, argue that he is using DOJ to take revenge against his opponents and reward his allies.

In an article published by The Contrarian on May 7, attorney Lauren Stiller Rikleen — executive director of Lawyers Defending American Democracy — laments that DOJ is now a resource for MAGA's "grifters."

"The Department of Justice's grift store for friends and supporters of the president, laying a solid foundation for settlement payouts, should be an affront to every taxpayer in America," Rikleen warns. "In the past few weeks, Michael Flynn, a 2016 Trump campaign adviser, seems to have benefited twice from DOJ largesse. Flynn pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI about discussions with the Russian ambassador during the 2016 transition — a case that was dismissed after President Trump pardoned him. Not satisfied with the good fortune of a pardon and dismissal, Flynn sued the government, alleging malicious prosecution and related claims. The DOJ, which had been successfully fighting the case, reversed course under the Trump Administration, paying a reported $1.25 million taxpayer-funded settlement to Flynn. And just days ago, the government submitted a court filing asserting it had reached yet another settlement in principle with Flynn on a different claim."

The attorney adds, "The DOJ also reportedly paid $1.25 million to former 2016 Trump campaign adviser Carter Page for his claims against the government relating to the Russia investigation, notwithstanding that lower courts had dismissed Page's lawsuit and an appeal was pending."

Trump, according to Rikleen, is even using DOJ to benefit rioters who violently attacked the U.S. Capitol Building on January 6, 2021.

"At the start of his second term," Rikleen explains, "Trump continued to upend history's retelling of the January 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol by issuing blanket clemency to more than 1600 January 6 riot defendants and absolving the attackers from owing restitution for the millions in damages they caused. Many of those pardoned have become repeat offenders. Now, in a display of jaw-dropping audacity, pardoned January 6 rioters have sued the federal government for tens of millions of dollars for alleged physical and emotional damages caused by the police seeking to repel the attacks."

Rikleen adds, "Another DOJ settlement seems more likely in light of the department's recent move to vacate the conspiracy and sedition convictions against Proud Boys and Oath Keepers leaders."

According to Rikleen, "loyalty and personal benefit" are "mutually reinforcing" with the second Trump administration.

"The settlements to Trump's cronies, however, may merely be practice for the ultimate payment to the president and his family that would result in one of the most brazen examples of public corruption in history," the Lawyers Defending American Democracy director laments. "The president, his two sons, and The Trump Organization have sued the Internal Revenue Service — an agency the president oversees — for $10 billion, alleging the IRS disclosed confidential tax information to the media. The president had previously filed claims before the DOJ seeking $230 million as compensation for grievances that included the search for classified documents at Trump’s Florida home and the Russia investigation."

Rikleen continues, "The president controls both sides of these cases. Todd Blanche, the acting attorney general and Trump's former criminal defense lawyer, demonstrates the same slavish devotion to the president that his fired predecessor, Pam Bondi, exhibited…. If the DOJ resolves this case for even a fraction of the billions sought, it will validate its disdain toward the taxpaying public and its contempt for conflict-of-interest requirements."

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an 5 26

After two years of investigating MAGA diehard Congressman Andy Olges (R-TN) for fraud, the Department of Justice is preparing to drop its case, and has agreed to “return or destroy” evidence seized before the FBI has a chance to review it. While the case began under former President Joe Biden, since President Donald Trump’s return to office, critics say that the DOJ has largely been reshaped as a tool of his political will, and Ogles has lobbied the administration hard for the investigation to end.

The investigation has centered around his first congressional run in 2022. According to Nashville’s Newschannel 5, it “focuses on campaign reports filed by Ogles in 2022 claiming he had personally loaned his campaign $320,000 of his own money — a claim he later admitted was false” during an investigation by the same news outlet.

Evidence has shown “that Ogles did not appear to have the financial resources to make such a loan. His personal financial disclosures filed with the U.S. House did not indicate that he even had a savings account. The Maury County Republican later filed amended campaign reports declaring that he had only loaned his campaign $20,000. He claimed that he had ‘mistakenly’ included the amount of money that he was prepared to spend if necessary. In January 2025, the House Ethics Committee announced the findings of a preliminary investigation that confirmed NewsChannel 5’s questions. In that report, Ogles’ treasurer speculated that the GOP candidate may have misrepresented the amount of money he had available to make his campaign look stronger in order to ‘buy the primary.’”

When Trump reentered the White House, prosecutors from the U.S. Attorney’s office in Nashville abruptly withdrew from the case, handing it off to a division in D.C. that “was decimated by cuts made by the incoming administration.” Afterwards, “Ogles repeatedly appeared to be attempting to curry favor with President Trump, introducing legislation to allow the MAGA leader to seek a third term, to allow the president to open negotiations to acquire Greenland and to impeach federal judges who had ruled against the Trump administration.”

By December the case was up in the air as it waited for a judge’s ruling, who left the bench a month later without ever delivering it. According to Newschannel 5, “She never explained the delay, and it is not clear what may have transpired behind the scenes since then.”

Then on Tuesday, Olges’ legal team filed a motion to prevent the FBI from reviewing his phone and email once and for all, declaring that, "In discussions with the Office of the Assistant Attorney General for the Criminal Division of the United States Department of Justice, the Government has advised defense counsel that it will promptly return or destroy the property obtained pursuant to the respective search warrants at issue.” His team’s core argument was that because the FBI operates under the executive branch, it should not be allowed to view the personal correspondence of a sitting member of Congress.

The apparent end to the investigation comes at a critical moment for the Tennessee GOP, which is holding a special session to redraw congressional districts in a way that will “put the state under complete Republican control.” That redistricting will also likely “insulate Ogles from what had been expected to be a serious Democratic challenge.”

According to Newschannel 5, the fraud case is just one of several scandals linked to Ogles.

The outlet's investigations "revealed that Ogles fabricated or exaggerated much of his political biography, including his claims to be an economist, a nationally recognized expert in tax policy and healthcare, a trained police officer, even an expert in international sex crimes. He claimed to have an undergraduate degree in International Relations, but *NewsChannel 5 Investigates* obtained his college transcript, which showed that he had a general degree in Liberal Studies. He took only one economics course and got a ‘C’ grade. Ogles also claimed to have received a ‘graduate education’ or to have done ‘graduate work’ at both Vanderbilt and Dartmouth.” In fact, “he had enrolled in several non-credit courses offered for professionals. On his resume, the Tennessee Republican claimed to have served four years on the ‘board of directors’ for the city of Franklin — which does not have a board of directors.”

He’s also faced questions about tens of thousands of dollars spent from his campaign accounts to companies that are either unrelated to the services Ogles claims to have purchased or don’t appear to exist at all.

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AN 5 26

FOX FAULKNER POT NEARBY

Fox News was broadcasting immediately as the FBI conducted a raid on the office of Virginia state Sen. Louise Lucas, a Democrat, and progressive foe of President Donald Trump.

Trump has spent the past several months using his Justice Department to target his political enemies after his former attorney general failed to secure indictments of them.

Lucas has been a thorn in the digital side of Trump for the past few years, relentlessly trolling him and Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) on X.

There is currently no information on how the FBI obtained a warrant to raid Lucas' office, however, WJLA News cited sources saying it might be related to a corruption probe. The warrants were approved by a federal judge.

Bulwark reporter Sam Stein questioned how Fox News happened to be on hand just as the FBI acted.

"I will say. Some pretty remarkable instincts by Fox News to have its London correspondent placed in Portsmouth, Virginia right in time for the FBI raid of Louise Lucas," wrote Stein.

According to Fox's reporting, it wasn't merely Lucas, there were many people taken into custody during the raid "as agents move through the area."

WJLA News reported that federal agents are also serving a warrant at a cannabis dispensary nearby.

Former FBI Director James Comey was indicted about a year after he posted a photo of shells on the beach spelling out 8647.

"She told Fox News that she had no idea what the FBI agents were doing at her office," the Fox report said.

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AN 5 26

Investigations in peril as Trump’s 'corrupt' DOJ credibility burns - Alternet.org

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AN 5 26

'Outrageous' corruption as DOJ pushes for appeal of $83 million Carroll case - Alternet.org

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an 5 26

Anonymous sources tell Bloomberg that the Department of Justice and President Donald Trump’s prosecutor allies in Florida are letting white collar crime suspects go unprosecuted while Trump pursues his political enemies.

“Shortly after ascending to the top of the Justice Department last month, Todd Blanche gathered prosecutors in Miami to press for results from a highly sensitive probe into some of President Donald Trump’s perceived political enemies,” reports Bloomberg. “Blanche and Jason Reding Quiñones, the relatively little-known US Attorney for the Southern District of Florida, have ramped up the months-long investigation into politically charged allegations that former senior government officials acted illegally years ago to undermine Trump.”

But “more than a dozen former prosecutors and defense lawyers” — speaking anonymously — say “there is mounting concern that the pursuit of Trump’s agenda has triggered an exodus of experienced prosecutors and hampered Miami’s expertise in building major white collar crime and narcotics trafficking cases.”

According to Bloomberg, many expressed concern that the high-profile drug, corruption, fraud and money laundering prosecutions that the district is known for will “fall by the wayside” while Trump sends his DOJ lieutenants and GOP allies to fucus on the doings of Biden and Obama from years ago.

Several dozen attorneys in the Southern District of Florida have been fired, quit or retiredsince Trump’s second term began in January 2025, which undermined the talent pool for prosecuting complex cases, say anonymous sources familiar with the office. One unit dedicated to prosecuting economic crimes is down to about a dozen attorneys from the more than 30 it traditionally had.

“A top Blanche aide earlier this year relocated to be a prosecutor in the office. Then, last month, an attorney overseeing the investigation was replaced with former US attorney and Trump loyalist Joseph diGenova following a disagreement over how best to proceed, according to people familiar with the situation,” reports Bloomberg. “Multiple grand jury subpoenas have gone out in recent weeks, and FBI officials have been conducting a flurry of interviews, said people familiar with the matter, who asked not to be identified discussing a confidential probe.”

But as prosecutors neglect investigations against legitimate suspected wrongdoers, Bloomberg reports Trump’s focus on his political hit list is coming up dry with prosecutors struggling with cases against current and former government officials considered to be enemies of the president.

“Charges against New York Attorney General Letitia James and former FBI Director James Comey in Virginia were dismissed last year,” said Bloomberg, and an additional case against Comey last month in North Carolina has kindled criticism that US law enforcement is being directed wielded for retribution for Trump.

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an 5 26

DOJ is so desperate for lawyers that they’re offering cash for 'well-qualified' staff - Alternet.org

AN 5 26

Legal experts detail how Todd Blanche lost the James Comey case in one interview - Alternet.org

https://www.alternet.org/trump-doj-mistake/

an 5 26

Trump DOJ makes rare apology after gaffe threatened judge’s job - Alternet.org

AN 4 26

Whistleblower says DOJ ordered prosecutors to rush SPLC indictment: report - Alternet.org

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AN PP 5 26

When President Donald Trump attempted to overturn the 2020 election, the institutional guardrails of American democracy held — but just barely.

If faced with the same tests today, those guardrails and the people who held the line would largely be missing, a ProPublica examination found.

At least 75 career officials who once held roles at federal agencies related to election integrity and safety are gone. Two dozen appointees — including many who either actively worked to reverse the 2020 vote or are associates of such people — have been hired to replace them. And once-fringe actors now have access to vast powers.

As the midterms approach, current and former government officials and election security experts expressed concerns that Trump appointees who’ve espoused debunked conspiracy theories about balloting are now in positions to control the narrative around the vote’s soundness.

It’s hard to debunk false claims “coming with the seal of the federal government,” said Derek Tisler, counsel and manager with the Brennan Center for Justice’s elections and government program. “I certainly worry what damage that could do to voters’ confidence.”

Here are some of the key things you should know about the Trump administration’s efforts to, as the president said, “take over” the midterms. Read the full investigation here.

1. In 2020, institutional guardrails helped to prevent Trump from overturning the election.

Following his defeat in the 2020 election, Trump pushed for federal officials to uncover proof that he had, in fact, beaten Joe Biden at the polls. Election cybersecurity experts with the Department of Homeland Security relayed to Attorney General William Barr that the election fraud claims that they looked into were false. Barr then told the president what he didn’t want to hear: The election had not been hacked.

Barr was one of many federal officials — most of them Trump appointees — who refused to bend to the president’s demands, which only intensified in the weeks leading up to Jan. 6, 2021. Despite the violent uprising at the Capitol on that day, the election results held firm.

2. Less than 18 months into his second term, Trump has dismantled many of those same guardrails.

Since the start of his second term, Trump and his appointees have made significant changes at federal agencies tasked with helping to safeguard elections. In all, at least 75 career officials who’d played important roles in elections work at DHS, the Department of Justice and other agencies have left, been fired or been reassigned, ProPublica found.

In their place are roughly two dozen people Trump has installed in positions that could affect elections. Ten of them actively worked to reverse the 2020 vote, and the rest are associates of those people. In some cases, ProPublica found, officials have been hired from activist groups that are pillars of the election-denial movement.

3. Among the first agencies Trump gutted after returning to office was one that had repeatedly disproved his stolen-election claims.

Officials at DHS’ Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency had provided research to the first Trump White House that disproved many theories claiming that the 2020 election had been hacked. CISA also played a crucial part in publicly countering these claims by producing a “Rumor Control” website to rebut them.

Then, only weeks into Trump’s second term, DHS leadership put employees focused on countering disinformation and helping safeguard elections on leave. They also froze CISA’s other election security work, which included assessing local election offices for physical and cybersecurity risks. Eventually, all CISA employees specializing in elections were fired or transferred.

A DHS spokesperson told ProPublica that the changes at CISA were in response to “a ballooning budget concealing a dangerous departure from its statutory mission,” which included “electioneering instead of defending America’s critical infrastructure.”

4. Trump and his appointees have gutted election-related teams at federal law enforcement agencies.

FBI Director Kash Patel dismantled the agency’s public corruption team, which had previously been deployed to help monitor possible criminal activity on Election Day. The Foreign Influence Task Force, which aimed to combat foreign influence in U.S. politics, was also disbanded.

(An FBI spokesperson said the bureau “remains committed to detecting and countering foreign influence efforts by adversarial nations.”)

The voting section of the DOJ’s Civil Rights Division had enforced federal laws that protect voting rights, particularly those that combat racial discrimination. But now, nearly all of the section’s roughly 30 career lawyers have resigned or been moved. Trump then filled the section with conservative lawyers, including at least four who participated in challenging the 2020 vote or have worked with people who helped Trump try to overturn the 2020 election.

Trump has replaced ousted career specialists with “Team America.”

In the summer of 2025, after the Trump administration had forced out most of the career specialists, a small group of political appointees — which once called itself “Team America,” according to sources familiar with the matter — began convening at DHS headquarters, looking for federal levers it could pull to realize a March 2025 executive order, in which Trump tried to exert greater federal control over aspects of voting.

Among the core members of the group was David Harvilicz, a DHS assistant secretary tasked with overseeing the security of election infrastructure, including voting machines, and three of his top staffers. As ProPublica has reported, Harvilicz co-founded an AI company with an architect of Trump’s claims about election hacking in Michigan.

Heather Honey, who serves under Harvilicz in a newly created position focused on elections, is a source of the false claim that more ballots were cast in Pennsylvania than there were voters in the 2020 presidential election — a claim Trump cited on the morning of Jan. 6, 2021.

At least 11 administration appointees, including Honey, have ties to the Election Integrity Network, a conservative grassroots organization led by Cleta Mitchell, a lawyer who tried to help Trump overturn the 2020 election. Since moving into government, Honey has maintained close ties to Mitchell’s organization, and she and at least two other federal officials have given its members private briefings.

6. Team America members are using a powerful Homeland Security Investigations tool to try to identify noncitizen voters.

The DOJ has been demanding that states turn over confidential voter roll information, and it has sued around 30 states for this data.

Meanwhile, DHS has urged states to upload their voter rolls to its tool, called the Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements system.

The goal in both efforts has been to find noncitizens on the voter rolls. But the SAVE tool has come up short, often identifying citizens as noncitizens, as ProPublica has reported, and officials have faced other roadblocks with its use.

More recently, according to two people familiar with the matter, Team America has worked to harness a more powerful tool used by another branch of DHS, Homeland Security Investigations, to increase its ability to search for noncitizen voters and bring criminal charges against them.

In response to questions sent to DHS, Harvilicz and Honey, a DHS spokesperson disputed that they were seeking to use the department’s powers to advantage Trump. In response to questions about their ties to the election denial movement, the spokesperson wrote, “To meet the diverse and evolving challenges the Department faces, we hire experts with diverse backgrounds who go through a rigorous vetting process.”

7. Trump’s head of election security is behind the FBI’s seizure of 2020 election ballots in Georgia.

Attorney Kurt Olsen once worked to try to overturn Trump’s 2020 loss in court and was later sanctioned by judges for making baseless allegations about Arizona elections. He is now Trump’s director of election security and integrity and is the driving force behind the January raid of the election center in Fulton County, Georgia.

Toward the end of 2025, Olsen flew to Georgia to meet with Paul Brown, the head of the FBI’s Atlanta field office, according to people familiar with the matter. Olsen wanted the FBI to seize ballots from the Democratic stronghold, and he gave Brown a report he claimed would justify the extraordinary action. Brown’s team submitted an affidavit to superiors at the DOJ that did not make a strong enough case to move forward with what Olsen wanted. Afterward, Brown was given a choice: retire or be moved to a new office. Brown retired. The raid went forward under his replacement, based on an affidavit that cited information from the report Olsen provided to Brown.

Olsen did not respond to requests for comment.

An FBI spokesperson said that Brown “elected to retire” and that its “work in the election security space is entirely consistent with the law.”

8. The DOJ’s Public Integrity Section could have tried to block the administration’s Georgia voting investigation.

In the months following Trump’s return to office, the DOJ’s Public Integrity Section, which had been responsible for making sure the department’s inquiries weren’t improperly influenced by politics, was eviscerated. Resignations, firings and transfers reduced the 36-person section to two.

Multiple former lawyers for the section said they likely would have tried to block the Fulton County investigation because it lacked strong evidence, had a clear political slant and went against department directives that actions should not be taken “for the purpose of giving an advantage or disadvantage to any candidate or political party.”

John Keller was principal deputy chief of the section from 2020 to 2025 and was acting chief when he resigned in early 2025. He worries that allegations of irregularities in the upcoming election will be handled on a partisan basis.

“Without that review and without apolitical, objective, honest brokers involved in the process, there is a much greater risk for intentional manipulation or inadvertent interference,” Keller said.

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AN 4 26

DOJ indictments are converging with MAGA media narratives

Written by Matt Gertz

Published 04/30/26

Recent Justice Department indictments whose validity have been questioned by legal experts demonstrate an increasing alignment of the Trump DOJ’s activities with the narratives of the MAGA media echo chamber.

President Donald Trump has long sought to use federal law enforcement to punish his enemies, and under former Attorney General Pam Bondi, the DOJ and FBI launched scattershot and apparently pretextual probes targeting figures like Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell, New York Attorney General Letitia James, and Democratic Sen. Adam Schiff over behavior unrelated to the president’s gripes.

But since Trump’s former personal lawyer Todd Blanche became acting attorney general last month, the president’s federal retaliation machine has seemed to sync up more closely with long-running talking points of his propaganda arm rather than simply focusing on the same targets.

Federal charges were filed or unsealed in recent days against the Southern Poverty Law Center, a civil rights group; former National Institutes of Health official Dr. David Morens; and former FBI Director James Comey. Legal experts have said that each of these cases are either weak or concern behavior common among Trump administration officials.

Each set of charges, however, has buttressed MAGA arguments, and provided their proponents with fresh opportunities to leverage them for content. And they foreshadow the potential fruits of DOJ’s ongoing “Grand Conspiracy” investigation, which unifies a string of conspiracy theories promoted by Fox News hosts like Sean Hannity under the auspices of Joe diGenova, a Republican lawyer and longtime fixture in right-wing media.

James Comey

Citation

Fox News

The target. Comey served as director of the FBI from 2013 until May 2017, when Trump fired him over his handling of the federal probe of Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election, which the president describes as a “hoax”; he subsequently became a key figure in the right’s “deep state” conspiracy theories. The DOJ indicted Comey last year over congressional testimony he gave in 2020, but a judge dismissed the case, ruling that the appointment of the prosecutor who filed the indictment (and replaced a U.S. attorney who had questioned the case) had been unconstitutional.

The charges. Federal prosecutors on April 28 charged Comey with one count of “Threatening the President” and one count of “Transmitting a Threat in Interstate Commerce” related to a now-deleted May 2025 Instagram post in which Comey posted a photo of shells arranged on a beach to spell out “86 47” and commented, “Cool shell formation on my beach walk.” In the press release announcing the charges, Blanche said, “The temperature needs to be turned down, and anyone who dials it up and threatens the life of the President will be held accountable,” while FBI Director Kash Patel added, “James Comey disgracefully encouraged a threat on President Trump’s life and posted it on Instagram for the world to see.”

The underlying right-wing media narrative. MAGA pundits have argued that recent examples of political violence targeting the right are the result of overheated commentary from Democrats and the media, often erasing incidents of right-wing political violence and ignoring violent rhetoric from the likes of Trump in the process. Numerous Fox News personalities suggested last May that Comey face an investigation or charges over his post, with Jesse Watters calling for it as “retribution.” And the indictment came days after a gunman allegedly targeting the president was stopped trying to breach the perimeter at the April 25 White House Correspondents Association’s annual dinner, which Trump, the White House, and media allies subsequently blamed on criticism from Democrats and journalists. VID]

The response from legal experts.“Supreme Court precedent has placed a high bar for convictions in threat cases like these, and former prosecutors and First Amendment scholars alike were highly skeptical the new prosecution would be successful,” CNN reported. Even some lawyers who are Fox News contributors aren’t buying DOJ’s argument — George Washington University law professor Jonathan Turley said on Fox that Comey’s Instagram post would “very likely be viewed as protected speech if it was the basis of a criminal indictment” and “have a hard-time standing up in court,” while Andrew McCarthy wrote at National Review that the “bogus” indictment is a “farce,” called Comey’s conviction “inconceivable,” and added: “Of course, when the Justice Department abuses power this way, as it has repeatedly, it shreds its credibility with the courts and undermines the integrity of all its work.”

The response from the MAGA right. While the indictment drew skepticism on Fox’s daytime coverage, the network’s evening programs championed it on Tuesday night. MAGA lawyer Mike Davis said on The Ingraham Angle that the charges were “a long time coming,” offered “cheers” to Blanche and Patel, called Comey’s post “a clear threat,” and claimed, “There have been people who have gone to prison for a lot less than this.” Hannity, meanwhile, mocked the idea that “86 47” could mean anything but “get rid of Trump,” and hosted Fox legal analyst Gregg Jarrett to claim that Comey “surely knew what the phrase meant” and that “if he tries to claim free speech as a defense, that's not going to work.”

Dr. David Morens

Citation

Fox News

The target. Morens is an expert in public health and infectious diseases who served from 2006 to 2022 as senior adviser to Dr. Anthony Fauci, then the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.

The charges. The Justice Department announced on April 28 that Morens had been charged with “conspiracy against the United States; destruction, alteration, or falsification of records in federal investigations; concealment, removal, or mutilation of records; and aiding and abetting,” specifically by using his personal Gmail account to conduct what prosecutors allege was government business in order to avoid public disclosure. Blanche alleged in the press release that Morens “deliberately concealed information and falsified records in an effort to suppress alternative theories regarding the origins of COVID-19,” while Patel claimed that “circumventing records protocols with the intention of avoiding transparency is something that will not be tolerated by this FBI.”

The underlying right-wing media narrative. The right-wing media echo chamber responded to the COVID-19 pandemic in part by turning Fauci into a hate object. Its participants also claimed that the coronavirus originated through a lab leak from a Chinese virology facility and its development may even have been funded by American tax dollars, rather than the prevailing view that the virus initially spread among wild animals before jumping to humans at a market in Wuhan, China. Morens and his email practices came under scrutiny from congressional Republicans and right-wing media in 2023 and 2024. While the Justice Department suggests Morens was acting to suppress the lab leak theory, The New York Times reports that the DOJ’s investigation “has so far yielded no evidence that scientists or health officials were involved in research that started or spread the coronavirus outbreak” and his emails in the indictment “do not show him trying to conceal evidence of a lab leak.”

The response from legal experts.Scott Amey, general counsel at the nonpartisan Project on Government Oversight, told The New York Times that “the allegations are quite concerning,” but also “noted that senior members of the Trump administration have themselves been accused of trying to evade federal record-keeping laws.” Indeed, The Washington Post reported last year that top Trump administration national security officials were communicating over their private Gmail accounts, and in March 2025, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth shared operational details of an impending U.S. military strike over an unsecured Signal chat with Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, other Trump administration officials, and Atlantic editor-in-chief Jeffrey Goldberg, who had been accidentally added to the chain.

The response from the MAGA right. The New York Post reported on — and effectively generated — “pressure on DOJ to prosecute Anthony Fauci” in light of Morens’ indictment. Its Thursday article claimed that “critics say Fauci … bears the most responsibility and that he should be hauled into court,” citing the head of a right-wing think tank, Republican Sen. Rand Paul, and a former DOJ official who is now national political reporter at the right-wing media outlet Real America’s Voice.

The Southern Poverty Law Center

Citation

Fox News

The target.The SPLC is a nonprofit civil rights organization best known for its monitoring, researching, and reporting on white supremacists, neo-Nazis, and others it describes as “hate and antigovernment extremist groups” that “make up some of the most extreme elements of the hard right.”

The charges. The Justice Department revealed April 21 that a grand jury had returned an indictment charging the SPLC with “11 counts of wire fraud, false statements to a federally insured bank, and conspiracy to commit concealment money laundering.” DOJ alleges that by using paid informants to infiltrate hate groups, the SPLC “secretly funneled more than $3 million in donated funds to individuals who were associated with various violent extremist groups” from 2014 to 2023, including to one individual who “was a member of the online leadership chat group that planned the 2017 ‘Unite the Right’ event in Charlottesville, Virginia, and attended the event at the direction of the S.P.L.C.” Blanche claimed in a press release that SPLC was “manufacturing racism to justify its existence,” while Patel alleged the group “engaged in a massive fraud operation to deceive their donors.”

The underlying right-wing media narrative. As the American right adopted positions previously espoused only by explicit white supremacists, the SPLC drew its ire by expanding its monitoring to include “extreme” right-wing elements that were nonetheless accepted within its mainstream, like Turning Point USA. Right-wing media figures denounced SPLC’s characterizations of TPUSA after the assassination of its founder, MAGA operative Charlie Kirk, in September 2025, and the following month, Patel said the FBI was cutting ties with the group, which he described as a “partisan smear machine.” Right-wing media figures have also pushed back hard against links between Trump and the deadly Charlottesville event, and described white supremacy itself as a “hoax.”

The response from legal experts.The SPLC indictment “may contain serious legal defects that could lead to a full or partial dismissal because it struggles to articulate the elements of the alleged crimes,” CBS News reported after consulting former federal prosecutors. “Legal experts say it is not clear exactly how the SPLC's statements to donors represent material falsehoods or omissions, or why its past use of paid informants would run counter to its mission of dismantling white supremacist groups, a tactic that federal and local law enforcement also utilize to infiltrate and break up criminal organizations,” the report added. Andrew Weissmann, who led the DOJ Fraud Section from 2015 to 2019, likewise wrote in a piece for Just Security that DOJ’s claims “may sound superficially plausible in a press release against an organization dissimilar to the SPLC, but nothing in the speaking indictment against the Center appears to meet the legal standard required” for the charges.

The response from the MAGA right.Right-wing pundits have gleefully parroted the DOJ allegations, using them both to the SPLC and to suggest that the Charlottesville “Unite the Right” rally had been a false-flag hoax instigated by the left as a way to sabotage Trump. Fox personalities alone have mentioned the SPLC nearly 400 times since the indictment’s release, according to a Media Matters review. (The indictment was “huge breaking news,” as Hannity put it before hosting Patel to accuse the SPLC of the “ultimate definition of hypocrisy.”) Trump himself has picked up the story, rambling about how “Southern Law” is a “total scam” in an interview with CBS over the weekend. The president said in part:

I see these No Kings which are funded just like the Southern Law was funded. You all that Southern Laws, financing the KKK and lots of other radical, terrible groups. And then they go out and they say, oh, we’ve got to stop the KKK. And yet they give them hundreds of thousands and even millions of dollars. They work. It’s a total scam run by the Democrats. It shows you that, like Charlottesville, Charlottesville was all funded by the Southern Law. That was a Southern Law deal, too. And it was done to make me look bad. And it turned out to be a total fake. It basically was a rigged election. This was a part of the rigging of the election. And that’s what you really should be doing. I mean, I hope one of your 60 Minutes episodes, which really hasn’t changed very much for the last few years, I’m surprised. But one of those episodes should be on Southern Law, and the fact that they spent millions and millions of dollars on absolute far right and just bad, bad groups, and then they’d use those groups and they’d say, these are Republican groups, and we’re coming to your rescue, and they’re the ones that have funded it, and they’re the ones that kept them, keep them going. Pretty sad.

### GOP lawyer Joe diGenova, now running Trump’s “Grand Conspiracy” probe, said Bondi had “nixed” him from the role

04/20/26

### Blaming the left for Trump's weaponization of law enforcement means pretending his first term didn't happen

10/14/25 10:06 AM EDT

### On the killing of Charlie Kirk, political violence, and the right’s response

09/12/25

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an 4 26

Senator Thom Tillis (R-NC) has a stern message for President Donald Trump: “Take me at my word when I say anybody who equivocated on the Jan. 6 rioters, I just can’t support.”

According to Politico, he’s referring to any potential candidates the White House may put forth to fill the attorney general role vacated by Pam Bondi’s firing in early April. Knowing that Trump has a propensity for nominating election deniers to key roles, this is Tillis’s latest effort to keep J6 insurrectionists out of government. A high-profile member of the Judiciary Committee where Republicans hold only a single vote advantage, there is extra power to his yay or nay as he can essentially veto any attorney general candidate.

Tillis has a track record of successfully opposing actions by the Trump administration. His latest such victory involved putting a stop to Trump’s politically motivated criminal investigation of Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell. As a member of the Senate Banking Committee, he held up the advancement of possible Powell successor Kevin Warsh for three months, agreeing on Wednesday to approve Warsh for a floor confirmation in exchange for dropping the probe against Powell, who has been targeted by Trump for months for refusing to lower federal interest rates.

After delivering his yes vote for Warsh, Tillis spoke out against the administration’s efforts to whitewash the January 6 attack, recounting his experience as the last senator to leave the chamber amidst the violence. He has previously blocked the nomination of Ed Martin for U.S. attorney general for his ties to and support for the insurrection.

When asked how he’ll proceed with nominees to replace Bondi, he said, “I’ll scrub it when a nominee comes forward, and I’ll apply the Martin standard.”

What’s more, when asked whether his fellow Republicans should take similar actions to block the administration’s actions, he seemed to urge his colleagues to follow his lead, saying, “Every single member of the conference has the same option.”

During the fight over Warsh, Tillis looped in the recent debate over Trump’s demand that the GOP nuke the filibuster. Tillis, like most senators, wants it to remain in place. “Then a simple majority would have been enough to discharge [Warsh] from committee,” Tillis said, explaining that such actions are done by consensus due to the filibuster.

While the majority of Republicans have shown an unwillingness to oppose the president out of fear of electoral retaliation, Tillis is uniquely positioned to stand against Trump as he will soon retire from the Senate, freeing him from political consequences. What’s more, his role on several key committees lends him a powerful hand in approving or holding the administration’s actions, and he has become increasingly vocal about his disagreements with the White House.

For his part, Trump has felt Tillis’s pressure, even musing that the latter had already left the Senate, telling Fox when asked about Tillis blocking Warsh, “You know Thom Tillis is no longer a senator, right? He quit.” Tillis’s response: “I’m not dead yet.”

Tillis has also pressed the administration to “recognize reality” and end the Department of Homeland Security shutdown, saying, “We own the shutdown right now because we can’t get the House to vote on something that 100 senators voted on. The American people are not dumb, and they know that the holdup now is not Democrats in the House. It’s Republicans.”

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Trump's scheme to get $10 billion from the IRS just hit a big snag - Alternet.org

an 4 26

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MEHTA J6 IMMUNITY?

AN 4 26

Trump DOJ official’s 'losing streak' isn’t letting up - Alternet.org

A major bombshell from the Donald Trump-era U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) came on Friday morning, April 24, when the news broke that federal prosecutor and former Fox News host Jeanine Pirro was dropping the criminal investigation of Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell. MS NOW's Ken Dilanian, in response, described the news as a "180-degree surrender," telling his colleague Ana Cabrera, "What Jeanine Pirro is essentially conceding here is that there's no criminal case. There never was."

In an April 27 column, MS NOW's Steve Benen describes the Powell investigation's demise as a major humiliation for Pirro — whose "losing streak" at DOJ, he argues, is going from bad to worse.

"To be sure, the top federal prosecutor for Washington, D.C., didn't want to drop the case," Benen says of Pirro's decision. "Two weeks ago, two prosecutors from Pirro's office showed up without invitation or advance notice at Federal Reserve headquarters seeking a tour of the construction site. A week later, the former Fox News host said she would forge ahead with a case against Powell. Pirro was, however, quickly overwhelmed by reality."

The "Rachel Maddow Show" producer continues, "The politically motivated investigation obviously had no merit; a federal judge had already quashed the Justice Department's subpoenas, emphasizing the inconvenient fact that prosecutors 'produced essentially zero evidence' — and the longer the baseless case continued, the more it threatened to delay confirmation of Trump’s new Fed chair nominee."

Conservative Sen. Thom Tillis (R-North Carolina), an outspoken critic of Pirro's Powell investigation, vowed to oppose the nomination of Kevin Warsh as a replacement for the Fed chair — whose term ends in mid-May — unless the probe ended.

"Short on options," Benen observes, "Pirro threw in the towel on Friday, and Kevin Warsh's odds of confirmation approached 100 percent soon after…. Pirro's failed effort against Powell was humiliating, but it coincided with a similarly humiliating effort to indict Democratic veterans in Congress who advised service members to follow the law, which coincided with a separate failed criminal investigation into (former President) Joe Biden. In fact, Pirro's office has lost so many closely watched cases, with such regularity, that it's been challenging to keep up. After the president fired (former U.S. Attorney General) Pam Bondi earlier this month, it sparked speculation as to whom Trump might choose as the next attorney general, and there was a round of chatter about whether Pirro would be among the top contenders."

Benen adds, "The odd thing is, it’s far from clear whether her repeated failures make her any less appealing to the White House — or more. On one hand, Trump rejects those seen as 'losers'; on the other, the hapless U.S. attorney keeps going after his perceived foes, indifferent to merit or propriety, which is exactly the kind of quality the president seems to be looking for at Main Justice."

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AN 4 26

More than friendly to fascists both abroad and at home, the Trump administration is now seeking to destroy the Southern Poverty Law Center -- historically one of the nation's most powerful and effective opponents of the Ku Klux Klan, American neo-Nazis and other white supremacist movements.

This was the latest in a long series of signals from the White House to the president's swastika-flying fans. It means that such groups need no longer fear a resolute federal response to their criminality.

On April 22, Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche and FBI Director Kash Patel announced -- at a blatantly political press event -- that the Justice Department has indicted the SPLC for "wire fraud, false statements, and conspiracy to commit money laundering." The indictment, described by Patel as "massive" and "sweeping," relies on the notion that the SPLC 's use of paid informants in violent white supremacist outfits such as the Klan and the neo-Nazi National Alliance and Atomwaffen somehow defrauded its donors.

Blanche and Patel went on to assert that those payments -- which over the years amounted to millions - had financed the continued existence of those groups, a claim echoed in right-wing media outlets. In the New York Post, for instance, a columnist wrote that by paying its confidential informants, the SPLC "kept relic organizations like the Ku Klux Klan on life support."

The alleged motive was to justify the SPLC's own continued existence and fundraising by maintaining a threat from fascist violence, which Republicans in Washington have persistently minimized or dismissed. Indeed, the Trump administration has hired and promoted any number of far-right extremists, especially since its return to power.

The absurdity of the indictment ought to be obvious to anyone -- including former federal prosecutor Blanche -- who knows how the FBI prosecutes organized crime, terrorism, narcotics smuggling or violent extremism, in nearly every case depending on paid informants. Over the past few decades, in fact, the FBI and the Justice Department have relied on information from SPLC and its informants to jail violent Klansmen and Nazis.

The indictment also charges that the SPLC "concealed" its identity behind false fronts when sending money to informants, following similar practices by the FBI and the Justice Department to avoid exposing their paid agents.

To suggest that the SPLC "supported" the activities of those criminal groups, as the DOJ indictment alleges, is precisely the same as saying that federal prosecutors and FBI agents were responsible for financing the Mafia, narcotics cartels and terrorism networks.

Under questioning from reporters, Blanche essentially admitted that the indictment's fundamental claim is baseless. Asked whether the indictment specifically alleged that the SPLC payments benefited the Klan, Atomwaffen or other extremist groups, Blanche admitted that it offered no such evidence. "To the extent that there's any link between that individual receiving the money and benefits to that organization," he said, "that's not in the indictment."

Not surprisingly, perhaps, former federal prosecutors who have gone after the Klan and other violent extremists were appalled by the government's attack on SPLC.

Doug Jones, who served as U.S. attorney in Alabama, described the indictment as "outrageous" and "pure political retribution" by President Donald Trump. Having taken down white supremacist gangs himself, Jones recalled how the SPLC "helped dismantle the Ku Klux Klan's operations in Alabama and beyond" in 1981, when its attorneys and investigators secured justice in a Mobile, Alabama, lynching incident.

There are dozens of similar cases in the SPLC files, including major victories against the United Klans of America, the Invisible Empire Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, the Imperial Klans of America, and the paramilitary White Patriot Party and the Aryan Nations.

It isn't only liberal lawyers who can see through the flimsy accusations in the DOJ indictment. In The Free Press, Bari Weiss' Trump-friendly online publication, conservative Yale law professor Jed Rubenfeld warns that "the Justice Department will have a hard time proving that the (SPLC's) use of informants amounts to fraud."

Many other right-wing commentators and organizations have welcomed the indictment as just desserts for an organization whose views they despise, particularly because the SPLC has defended Muslims, gays and trans people as well as Blacks and Jews. So much for freedom of speech, a value more likely to be upheld on the right when convenient and comforting to their own.

The most telling commentary on this disgraceful frameup comes not from liberals or conservatives but from the fascist underworld. Gleeful as they are, the fascists admit that the indictment is nonsensical and indeed view its legal falsification as evidence that Trump is truly on their side.

Curtis Yarvin, the authoritarian gadfly whose writings have influenced various Big Tech figures and others in the Trump circle, celebrated the indictment on X: "What's cool is that I don't really see a strong legal case that the SPLC shouldn't be able to run these kinds of wacky black ops. That means DOJ is prosecuting the SPLC just because it (kind of) can. If so this would be an unusual sign of 'finally getting it.'"

On the "revolutionary fascist" American Futurist Telegram channel -- whose authors include former members of the Atomwaffen neo-Nazi group, linked to at least five political murders -- the indictment won praise for the same sickening reason. They know that the SPLC, far from secretly propping up violent white nationalists, is their worst enemy.

"The SPLC was not funding racist groups to enable their racism -- they, in fact, were not funding racist groups at all," the American Futurist-linked TAF Private channel posted, according to Raw Story. "What they were doing was funding bad actors within groups, with the intention of destroying those groups from the inside."

The enemy of my enemy is my friend, as the old saying goes -- and for the Trump White House, the enemy of fascism is its enemy too.

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NYT

NO LNX

How the Southern Poverty Law Center Drew the Ire of Conservatives

Before the Justice Department filed charges against it, the group had faced scandal and critiques from both the left and the right.

By Richard Fausset

April 22, 2026

For much of the 21st century, the Southern Poverty Law Center has been at the center of a bitter partisan war in America over what constitutes hate.

The law center, which is based in Alabama, began in 1971, earning a reputation for battling the Ku Klux Klan in court and helping reporters and law enforcement keep tabs on far-right domestic extremists. More recently, however, the S.P.L.C. has earned the ire of conservatives by criticizing a number of organizations — including Moms For Liberty, the Family Research Council and Turning Point USA — that many on the right consider to be squarely within the American mainstream.

The conflict entered a new phase this week, when the Justice Department charged the S.P.L.C. with a number of financial crimes, including wire fraud and conspiracy to commit money laundering. The indictment focused on the law center’s past use of paid informants to infiltrate far-right groups. Todd Blanche, the acting attorney general, accused the group of “manufacturing racism to justify its existence.”

To some who have been criticized by the S.P.L.C., it was a moment to savor — a potential comeuppance for what they perceive to be a powerful, politically correct bully that has sought to shame and silence legitimate voices.

“Well, I mean, obviously I experienced a certain schadenfreude, because this couldn’t happen to a nicer bunch of creeps,” said Mark Krikorian, executive director of the Center for Immigration Studies, a group that supports immigration restrictions and has been on the S.P.L.C.’s influential list of hate groups for years.

The S.P.L.C. defines a hate group as an organization that “has beliefs or practices that attack or malign an entire class of people, typically for their immutable characteristics,” according to its website.

The indictment appears to fit within the Trump administration’s pattern of using the Justice Department to punish its political adversaries. The S.P.L.C. has certainly been adversarial toward the president: In an article last year, Margaret Huang, who was then the president and chief executive of the group, wrote that with President Trump’s second election, hard-right extremism now had “an ally in the highest office in the nation.”

Whether the federal charges will stick is unclear. The second Trump administration has failed to build winning cases against other political opponents, including Attorney General Letitia James of New York and James Comey, the former F.B.I. director.

But in the S.P.L.C., the administration has picked a formidable and deep-pocketed foe. Over decades, the group has been buffeted by scandal and scathing critiques from both the left and the right, yet has managed to thrive with its promise to be “a beacon of hope fighting white supremacy.”

Image

Morris Dees, a lawyer who started the S.P.L.C., with Katie Relf, left, and her daughters Minnie Lee and Mary Alice. The girls were part of a lawsuit involving sterilization procedures in 1973.Credit...Gary Settle/The New York Times

The law center was founded by Morris Dees and Joe Levin, white Alabama lawyers intent on ensuring that the gains of the civil rights movement in the Deep South stuck. With Julian Bond, the African American activist, as its first president, the S.P.L.C. took to the courts, filing suit after suit attacking the remnants of the segregation system, reforming juvenile justice and addressing matters of concern to immigrant workers, women, gay and lesbian people, and others.

The work engendered significant good will among like-minded Southerners. Catherine Coleman Flowers, an African American environmental activist from the Black Belt, recalled in an interview that the S.P.L.C. bankrupted a group called the United Klans of America with a lawsuit after two members lynched a Black man named Michael Donald in 1981.

“A lot of the work they were doing early on, was work around insuring that marginalized communities were not terrorized,” Ms. Coleman Flowers said.

Rumblings of discontent came later. In 1994, The Montgomery Advertiser ran a series of articles in which Black employees of the S.P.L.C. raised concerns about racial discrimination inside the organization. (Mr. Dees denied the accusations.)

But the law center remained influential. In 2001, its multimillion-dollar headquarters — a daring contemporary building in the sleepy heart of Montgomery — was completed. Many national news outlets regularly turned to the group’s Year in Hate reports, relying on them to give a portrait of homegrown extremism around the country.

Even so, left-wing critics soon began accusing the group of hoarding millions of dollars and paying its leaders big salaries while soliciting donations from wealthy coastal liberals and exaggerating the grass-roots threat. In a column for The Nation in 2009, Alex Cockburn, the provocative leftist writer, called Mr. Dees, who had become the face of the organization, “the arch-salesman of hate-mongering.”

Image

“A lot of the work they were doing early on, was work around insuring that marginalized communities were not terrorized,” said Catherine Coleman Flowers, an environmental activist.Credit...Audra Melton for The New York Times

“Ever since 1971, U.S. Postal Service mailbags have bulged with his fund-raising letters, scaring dollars out of the pockets of trembling liberals aghast at his lurid depictions of a hate-sodden America in dire need of legal confrontation by the S.P.L.C,” wrote Mr. Cockburn, who died in 2012.

The rise of the so-called alt-right, and a deadly rally organized by white nationalists in Charlottesville, Va., in 2017, showed that racist extremism remained a tangible threat. But old concerns within the S.P.L.C. came to the fore again in 2019, when Mr. Dees was fired, and a number of top executives quit, amid allegations of sexual misconduct and racial discrimination within the organization. Mr. Dees denied wrongdoing, but acknowledged that a female employee had filed a complaint against him in 2017, stating that his actions had made her feel uncomfortable.

Conservatives took notice. For years they had bristled as the S.P.L.C. put groups that opposed L.G.B.T.Q. rights and immigration on its hate list. The Center for Immigration Studies earned a spot, the S.P.L.C. argued, as a result of its “repeated circulation of white nationalist and antisemitic writers in its weekly newsletter and the commissioning of a policy analyst who had previously been pushed out of the conservative Heritage Foundation for his embrace of racist pseudoscience.”

In 2019, the Center for Immigration Studies sued Richard Cohen, then the president of the S.P.L.C., in federal court, saying that the organization had violated civil racketeering statutes in trying to “destroy C.I.S. by ruining it financially.” The lawsuit was rejected by the courts.

That same year, Senator Tom Cotton wrote to the Internal Revenue Service, asking the agency to consider revoking the law center’s nonprofit status.

“Recent news reports have confirmed the long-established fact that the S.P.L.C. regularly engages in defamation of its political opponents,” Mr. Cotton wrote. “In fact, the S.P.L.C’s defining characteristic is to fund-raise off of defamation.”

The effort was unsuccessful, but the pressure from Republicans has only ramped up since Mr. Trump’s return to the White House. In October, Kash Patel, the F.B.I. director, announced that the bureau would no longer cooperate with the S.P.L.C., calling it a “partisan smear machine.”

That same month, Elon Musk posted on social media that the group was “guilty of incitement to murder Charlie Kirk,” the co-founder of Turning Point USA who had been killed a month earlier. Mr. Musk cited another post that noted that Mr. Kirk had recently been featured in the S.P.L.C.’s Hatewatch newsletter.

...

OMFG

Justice Department moves to toss seditious conspiracy convictions of Oath Keepers and Proud Boys

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Justice Department on Tuesday asked a federal appeals court to throw out the seditious conspiracy convictions of Proud Boys and Oath Keepers leaders who were sentenced to prison terms for leading members of the far-right extremist groups in attacking the U.S. Capitol to keep President Donald Trump in office over five years ago.

Trump commuted the prison sentences of several Proud Boys and Oath Keepers leaders last January in a sweeping act of clemency for all 1,500-plus defendants charged in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack.

The request by the Justice Department would go a step further and erase all the convictions for extremist group leaders, including Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes, who didn’t receive pardons last January.

The move to abandon the convictions represented a stunning reversal from the Biden administration, which hailed the guilty verdicts as a crucial victory in its bid to hold accountable those responsible for what prosecutors described as an attack on the heart of American democracy. It’s part of the Trump administration’s continued efforts to rewrite the history of the Jan. 6 attack and downplay the violence carried out by the mob of Trump supporters that left more than 100 police officers injured.

AP correspondent Ben Thomas reports the Justice Department is seeking the dismissal of seditious conspiracy convictions over the Capitol Riot.

In court filings, prosecutors asked the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit to vacate the convictions so that the government can permanently dismiss the indictments.

DOJ Wants to Scrap Watergate-Era Rule That Makes Presidential Records Public

Lauren Harper

Killing the Presidential Records Act would allow private individuals to hold the keys to American history, forever.

A Redditor Criticized ICE. Trump Is Trying to Unmask Them by Dragging the Company to a Secret Grand Jury.

Ryan Devereaux

An ICE summons to get the user’s identity failed. Advocates worry the move to a grand jury signals an escalation of the war on dissent.

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AN 4 26

Trump DOJ official misled federal judge about sensitive voter data - Alternet.org

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AN 4 26 PATTERN

Trump DOJ is infuriating judges as experts say his 'contempt' for the law is backfiring - Alternet.org

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AN 4 26

The attorney general might be out, but the Department of Justice problems persist.

*The Los Angeles Times* reported Friday that every case federal prosecutors in L.A. have pursued against protesters they allege "assaulted federal officers" have been dropped.

Even a federal judge is calling the U.S. attorney's office "amateur hour" after losing one assault trial. They have charged more than 100 protesters since June 2025, claiming assault or "interference with immigration enforcement."

U.S. District Judge André Birotte presided over a case in which federal prosecutors failed to disclose additional discovery to the defense.

“A mistake was made,” claimed Asst. U.S. Atty. William Kanellis, placing the blame on the previous U.S. attorney.

“I’ve got 12 people here, are you going to tell them to come back in a month?” Birotte said.

“I don’t think it’s going to take a month,” Kanellis responded, according to the Times.

“How do you know how much time they need to prepare?” Birotte snapped, asking if Kanellis had ever worked as a defense attorney.

The court-appointed attorney said that the new evidence did impact the case for defendants Erin Petra Escobar and Nick Gutierrez.

“You’ve got to be ready for prime time and you’re not,” said Birotte, a former assistant U.S. attorney.

“This trial is probably not going to happen,” he added at one point.

The following day, Judge Birotte admonished, “The government has tried numerous cases like this, I’m just surprised that there wouldn’t be a check to see ‘Has everything been turned over?' The notion that they inadvertently failed to add reports to this case is just not compelling to this court. This is something that should have been looked at and it wasn’t.”

“The court’s left with this dilemma that I have not faced in my entire time on the bench, and I don’t take it lightly,” Birotte said.

The case was officially dismissed "with prejudice," which means it can't be brought again, said the Times.

In another case, Luis Hipolito was accused of punching an officer with Immigration and Customs Enforcement in the face. He didn't deny it, but he was still acquitted despite videos showing the incident. According to Hipolito, the officers never identified themselves, and he was scared they were trying to kidnap a woman who was screaming, “I’m a U.S. citizen."

At first, he thought she was a teenager because she was so small. So he intervened. When they pepper-sprayed and elbowed him in the face, he said he fought back as a simple reaction to the violence.

“I didn’t see where I landed the punch, I just took a swing,” he said. “I just wanted to defend myself.”

The videos show that the men jumped on Hipolito, one putting his arm around Hipolito's neck. "Soon after, Hipolito’s legs shuddered and buckled and his body began to shake violently," the report described.

Asst. U.S. Atty. Jason Pang told the jury that Hipolito was lying and that the vest the men were wearing said "POLICE" on them. But Hipolito said anyone could buy a vest like that. The jury acquitted him.

Attorney Ricardo A. Nicol told the L.A. Times, “You would think that, at some point, they might start to realize that history and the public are not on their side, that the will of the people is not on their side. But they’re so determined to get convictions on these cases, they don’t stop.”

“The government and the people they’re supposed to be representing are not in sync right now, obviously,” he said.

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CONTEXT SAUER FAIL 14TH AMEND? LIED?

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BONDI FIRED -- > AN 4 26

Now that former AG Pam Bondi has been guillotined for not delivering up President Donald Trump’s enemies on a platter, MS NOW producer Steve Benen says the remaining department heads are desperately casting around for targets to appease the president.

Cassidy Hutchinson, the former aide to ex-White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows is a major Trump critic and admitted that she saw him as a dangerous threat to U.S. democracy. But before she became a key witness for the January 6 Select Committee, Hutchinson was actually a Trump supporter.

Hutchinson's book "Enough" earned considerable media coverage, and she testified before the Jan. 6 committee that Trump was aware of the violent mob of his supporters storming the building but did not care.

“I overheard the president say something to the effect of, 'I don't effing care that they have weapons. They're not here to hurt me,” Hutchinson told the committee.

But now, with Republicans in control of the House, a partisan House panel led by Rep. Barry Loudermilk (R-Ga.) claims Hutchinson lied to Congress about Trump’s awareness of violence ahead of the 2021 insurrectionist riot.

Plus, this no longer Bondi’s DOJ, which was already heavily politicized. Now it is a heavily politicized DOJ under a cloud of panic.

“Under normal circumstances, the DOJ would blow off a criminal referral like this, recognizing it as more of a political stunt than a serious recommendation. However, note this detail that featured in a report The New York Times published Thursday on the DOJ’s efforts to please the president by pursuing his political foes: “ … They have … pushed prosecutors to investigate a former White House aide, Cassidy Hutchinson, whom the president has accused of lying about his actions on Jan. 6, 2021, according to two officials briefed on the effort,” cited Benen.

“While MS NOW hasn’t independently verified this reporting, it dovetails with everything we’ve seen and learned about the White House’s control of federal law enforcement,” said Benen. “It also serves as a timely reminder that Hutchinson remains a Team Trump target — to the point that the most powerful officials at Main Justice have reportedly pushed prosecutors in private to pursue her.”

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AN 4 26

The Trump administration is no stranger to the courts. Since the beginning of President Donald Trump’s second term, his actions have resulted in a reported 300 legal challenges, largely due to the issuance of executive orders later deemed "baseless." These repeat court appearances, says legal scholar Kimberly Wehle, are an intentional part of Trump’s mission to make “lawlessness seem normal.”

According to Wehle, a key part of a White House lawyer’s job is to advise the administration on the legality of its efforts and dissuade it from attempting to implement edicts that could be struck down as illegal. But in the case of Trump, the administration has “pumped out a tsunami of baseless, illegal, and even unconstitutional” orders, which have “forced judges to waste precious time stating the obvious — that there’s no justification for much of the legal garbage coming out of this administration.”

Wehle uses the recent example of the administration’s actions toward Anthropic. After the company refused Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s demands to drop safety protocols from its Claude AI that prevent the mass surveillance of Americans and autonomous killing, it was designated a “supply chain risk” and banned from use by federal contractors. A judge, however, ruled that this was illegal.

But what was most incredible, says Wehle, was that “a government lawyer showed up in federal court to defend these indefensible policies” in the first place. The lawyer even went so far as to admit there was no statute to support the government’s actions, and that its proclamation regarding Anthropic had “absolutely no legal effect at all.”

In a functional administration, this would never have made it to court.

“From the standpoint of legal ethics and the rules governing civil proceedings in federal court, legally baseless representations to a court of law constitute grossly sanctionable misconduct,” writes Wehle. “This should raise questions about how any lawyer could enter a federal courtroom and try to defend something so indefensible.”

According to its own principles, the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel is supposed to vet orders from the White House to provide “clear, accurate, thoroughly researched, and soundly reasoned” advice. Wehle asserts that it is “tragically evident” that government lawyers are failing to do so.

Instead, it seems that the mission of Trump’s lawyers is merely to “cast a false patina of legality upon his lawlessness.”

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an pp 3 26

In the first days after Pam Bondi was appointed attorney general last year, the Department of Justice began shutting down pending criminal cases at a record pace.

The cases included an investigation into a Virginia nursing home with a recent record of patient abuse; probes of fraud involving several New Jersey labor unions, including one opened after a top official of a national union was accused of embezzlement; and an investigation into a cryptocurrency company suspected of cheating investors.

In total, the DOJ quietly closed more than 23,000 criminal cases in the first six months of President Donald Trump’s administration, abandoning hundreds of investigations into terrorism, white-collar crime, drugs and other offenses as it shifted resources to pursue immigration cases, according to an analysis by ProPublica.

The bulk of these cases, which were closed without prosecution and known as declinations, had been referred to the DOJ by law enforcement agencies under prior administrations that believed a federal crime may have been committed. The DOJ routinely declines to prosecute cases for any number of reasons, including insufficient evidence or because a case is not a priority for enforcement.

But the number of declinations under Bondi marks a striking departure not only from the Biden administration but also the first Trump term, according to the ProPublica analysis, which examined two decades of DOJ data, including the first six months of Trump’s second term. ProPublica determined the increase is not the result of inheriting a larger caseload or more referrals from law enforcement.

In February 2025 alone, which included the first weeks of Bondi’s tenure, nearly 11,000 cases were declined, the most in a month since at least 2004. The previous high was just over 6,500 cases in September 2019, during Trump’s first administration.

Some of the cases shut down were the result of yearslong investigations by federal agencies such as the FBI and the Drug Enforcement Administration. For complex cases, the DOJ can take years before deciding whether to bring charges.

The shift comes as the DOJ has undergone an extraordinary overhaul under the Trump administration, with entire units shuttered, directives to abandon pursuit of certain crimes and thousands of lawyers quitting or, in some cases, being forced out of the agency.

In doing so, the DOJ is retreating from its mission to impartially uphold the rule of law, keep the country safe and protect civil rights, according to interviews with a dozen prosecutors and an open letter from nearly 300 DOJ employees who have left the department under Trump. The Trump DOJ, the employees wrote, is “taking a sledgehammer” to long-standing work to “protect communities and the rule of law.”

The change in priorities was outlined in a series of memos sent to attorneys early last year. Trump’s DOJ has said it is “turning a new page on white-collar and corporate enforcement” and emphasizing the pursuit of drug cartels, illegal immigrants and institutions that promote “divisive DEI policies.” Trump, in an address last March at the department, said the changes were necessary after a “surrender to violent criminals” during the past administration and would result in a restoration of “fair, equal and impartial justice under the constitutional rule of law.”

The department prosecuted 32,000 new immigration cases in the first six months of the administration, which was nearly triple the number under the Biden administration and a 15% increase from the first Trump term. It has pursued fewer prosecutions of nearly every other type of crime — from drug offenses to corruption — than new administrations in their first six months dating back to 2009.

The DOJ has also closed hundreds of cases involving alleged crimes that the administration has publicly emphasized as enforcement priorities. Even as the Trump administration unleashed Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency operatives to root out waste, fraud and abuse in the federal government, the DOJ declined over 900 cases of federal program or procurement fraud. About three times as many cases of major fraud against the U.S. were declined under Trump compared with the average of similar time periods under prior administrations. And while the Trump administration has promised to “make America safe again,” its DOJ has declined more than 1,000 terrorism cases, also more than prior administrations.

Federal prosecutor Joseph Gerbasi had spent years in the department’s Narcotic and Dangerous Drug Section helping build cases against major suppliers of fentanyl ingredients in India and China. After Bondi came in, he was left bewildered when his team was ordered to abandon its work.

“All of the building blocks of what would become successful prosecutions were pulled out,” said Gerbasi, who retired as the section’s acting deputy chief for policy in March 2025 after 28 years with the department.

The move had an “overwhelming deflating effect on morale,” he said.

Barbara McQuade, who worked as a federal prosecutor in Michigan for two decades until 2017 during Republican and Democratic administrations, said it was not unusual for new administrations to come to office with a few “pet priorities” — such as a focus on violent crime or drug trafficking. But she said those changes usually involved modest adjustments in policy and that most of the decisions on what crimes to focus on were typically made at the local level by the district U.S. attorney in coordination with the FBI or other agencies.

“We would revise those about every five years, not having anything to do with any administration, just because it made sense,” she said.

[DREADED REFORM? DOGE AI FUCKERY?

A DOJ spokesperson, in an emailed response to questions about the spike in declinations, said that in “an effort to clean, remediate, and validate data in U.S. Attorneys’ case management system,” the department reviewed all pending criminal matters opened prior to the 2023 fiscal year, which included updating the status of closed cases. “This Department of Justice remains committed to investigating and prosecuting all types of crime to keep the American people safe, and the number of declinations is a direct result of our efforts to run the agency in a more efficient manner.”

The agency did not respond to questions about the types of cases declined.

The spike of declined cases began in February 2025 when the department ordered prosecutors to review every open case launched prior to October 2022 and determine whether to close it. Such a review would typically take months, according to one attorney tasked with reviewing cases. A memo, which was described to ProPublica reporters, ordered the review to be completed within 10 days.

Former DOJ prosecutors told ProPublica that they typically reviewed caseloads every six months with supervisors and that closing out languishing cases wouldn’t ordinarily be cause for concern. They said the February directive, however, was unusual. None could recall a similar order.

The directive came as higher-ups in the department had begun making frequent demands for data about specific types of cases and charging decisions, such as the outcome of fentanyl cases, according to former prosecutor Michael Gordon. Gordon, who helped prosecute Jan. 6 cases before moving to white-collar crime prosecutions, said the “fire drills” from officials in Washington became so regular that he grew used to the forlorn look on his supervisor’s face when he showed up at Gordon’s door, apologetically delivering yet another frantic request.

“It was either ‘give us stats we can use to make ourselves look good’ or ‘give us the stats to show how bad things are in this area,’” Gordon said. “It was never productive fact-finding.”

Though Gordon didn’t see the memo, he remembered getting the request to review all cases that had been open for more than two years and report back on their status, entering into a master spreadsheet basic information about any that he wanted to keep pursuing.

“The office was pushing us to close everything by a certain date so that when they had to report up to D.C. they had a low number of open cases,” he said. “You really had to go to bat to keep open a case that was more than two years old.”

Gordon said he was fired by the DOJ last June. He has filed a lawsuit alleging his termination was politically motivated. The department did not respond to questions about Gordon’s comments or his lawsuit. The government filed a motion to dismiss the case late last year, arguing that the federal court did not have jurisdiction over the matter. The court has not yet ruled on that motion, and the case is still pending.

Investigations into individuals or corporations declined for prosecution are generally not reported to courts and usually only disclosed in summary form by the DOJ in annual reports. To conduct its analysis, ProPublica obtained declination data from the DOJ and the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse, a center that obtains data through Freedom of Information Act requests.

Here are some of the areas most impacted by the spike in declinations.

Drugs

As president, Trump has spoken frequently about the “scourge” of drugs coming into the country. At the same time, the Justice Department has declined to prosecute nearly 5,000 cases of federal drug law violations, including trafficking and money laundering. The number of declinations were 45% higher than the average of the prior three new administrations.

Gerbasi, the counternarcotics prosecutor, declined to comment on specific cases that might have been declined in his office. But, he said, once Bondi was appointed, the priority in the office became building cases against Tren de Aragua, a Venezuelan group that the Trump administration has labeled a foreign terrorist organization.

“Tren de Aragua was not anywhere close to the scale or impact of the cartels we were focused on,” Gerbasi said. “But we were told to generate those cases.”

He said his office had to scramble to fly people to investigate local gangs in small towns that were reportedly affiliated with Tren de Aragua. “They never would have merited a full-scale federal investigation,” he said.

“It told me that decisions were going to be based on political appearances and not based on the merits of where investigative resources should be placed.”

The DOJ declined to comment on Gerbasi’s remarks.

National Security

Under Bondi, the DOJ declined more than 1,300 cases involving terrorism and national security, nearly twice what was typical at the start of the most recent new administrations. While domestic terrorism was the hardest-hit program, just over 300 cases involving charges of providing material support to foreign terrorist organizations were also dropped.

The DOJ program handling matters relating to national internal security — which considers cases of alleged spy activity and the security of classified information — saw over 200 declinations, which is four times as many as typical in the first six months of a new administration. Some of the cases related to serving as an unregistered foreign agent, a charge Bondi ordered prosecutors to stop pursuing unless they involved “conduct similar to more traditional espionage by foreign government actors.”

Jimmy Gurulé, a former federal prosecutor and George W. Bush appointee to the U.S. Treasury Department who investigated the financing of terrorism, said the decline in terrorism cases was troubling.

“The Trump DOJ has been used as a political weapon,” he said. “It’s a question of prioritizing resources. Are they going to be used for national security threats or to prosecute his political enemies and critics?” The DOJ did not respond to a request for comment on Gurulé’s remarks.

Labor

The DOJ shut down over 60 union corruption and labor racketeering cases, 2.5 times the number in Trump’s first term. Nearly half of the cases turned down for those offenses were out of the New Jersey U.S. attorney’s office, which in the past has aggressively pursued alleged union corruption. All were noted as declined for insufficient evidence.

Most of those cases had been opened by Grady O’Malley, an assistant U.S. attorney who oversaw several prosecutions of union corruption while working in the New Jersey office over four decades. He retired in 2023 and was disturbed to learn from former colleagues that the office was shutting down the open union probes.

A Trump supporter, O’Malley said that while he doesn’t blame the president, he worries the decision to drop so many cases could embolden unions that he and his colleagues spent years working to hold accountable. “No one is assigned to do labor union cases, and the unions have every reason to believe no one is looking.”

The New Jersey U.S. attorney’s office said it had no comment on the declination of labor cases.

White-Collar Crime

The Trump administration has pledged to root out “rampant” fraud in federal benefit programs like food stamps and welfare. The controversial surging of federal agents to Minnesota in January began as a stated crackdown on noncitizens allegedly ripping off nutrition and child care programs.

The DOJ, however, shut down more than 900 cases of federal program or procurement fraud in the first six months of the administration, including one targeting a mortgage lender accused by several state regulators of defrauding the Federal Housing Administration. The case was dropped due to “prioritization of federal resources and interests.” The U.S. attorney’s office for the Northern District of Alabama, which declined the case, did not reply to a request for comment. The number of fraud cases closed was about double that in the same time period of the Biden and first Trump administrations.

The agency also closed over 100 health care fraud cases as a result of “prioritization of resources and interests” even though the Trump administration has said it is making this area of enforcement a priority.

Among other cases the DOJ determined weren’t a priority: the probe into the Virginia nursing home accused of abuse, as well as investigations in Tennessee into fraud at a national hospital chain and one of the largest Medicaid managed care companies.

The Western District of Virginia U.S. attorney’s office, through a spokesperson, declined to comment on the nursing home case. A spokesperson for the U.S. attorney in the Middle District of Tennessee said the office does not comment on investigations that do not result in public charges.

The DOJ’s Antitrust Division, which focuses on preventing big businesses from creating harmful monopolies, also declined an unusually high number of cases in Trump’s second term. More than 40 cases were dropped within the first six months of Bondi’s tenure. That’s more than double the number declined in the same time period by the prior three new administrations.

Despite the declinations, the department said it charged slightly more people with fraud in 2025 compared with the final year of the Biden administration, and those cases alleged larger financial losses.

Promises Kept

The DOJ under Bondi has also rapidly pursued many of the priorities laid out in Trump’s early executive orders and her own “first day” directives to staff.

Trump in February 2025 issued an executive order pausing new investigations under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, which prohibits citizens and companies from bribing foreign entities to advance their business interests. The order asked the attorney general to review and “take appropriate action” on any existing probes to “preserve Presidential foreign policy prerogatives.”

In the first six months, Bondi’s DOJ shut down 25 such cases, which is more than the combined number dropped by the prior three new administrations over the same time period. One of the cases declined for prosecution involved a major car manufacturer, which had reported possible anti-bribery violations to federal investigators involving a foreign subsidiary. The DOJ declined the case for prosecution last June, citing the “prioritization of federal resources and interests.”

On her first day, Bondi ordered a review of criminal prosecutions under the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances, or FACE Act, which prohibits people from illegally blocking access to abortion clinics and places of worship. The department dropped as many cases under the act in its first six months as the past three new administrations combined, over the same time frame. Bondi’s order focused on “non-violent protest activity,” although at least one of the closed cases was being investigated as a violent crime. The DOJ has since charged protesters against Immigration and Customs Enforcement and journalists in Minneapolis under the FACE Act. The defendants in the case have pleaded not guilty.

The agency closed three times the number of cases alleging environmental crimes as the Biden administration did and one-and-a-half times as many as compared with Trump’s first term. The declinations came as the DOJ reassigned and cut prosecutors working on environmental cases. One-fifth of all of the dropped environmental protection cases were shut down for “prioritization of federal resources and interests.”

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OMG AN 3 26

The Department of Justice has awarded Michael Flynn, the retired three-star Army general who served as Trump's National Security Advisor for less than a month, a $1.25 million settlement—a decision that legal experts are comparing to outright theft of taxpayer funds.

Flynn's settlement, announced this week, compensates him for what the Trump administration is characterizing as wrongful prosecution. The irony is stark: Flynn pleaded guilty under oath in 2017 to intentionally making false statements to the FBI. He admitted to the crime in court with a lawyer present, with a judge confirming his understanding of what he was confessing to. Trump later pardoned him in 2020.

Now, with a new Trump administration in place, the Department of Justice under Attorney General Pam Bondi and Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche has agreed to hand over more than a million dollars in public money to a man who has already admitted guilt.

"I really do not understand how you justify this as anything but theft," said Andrew Weissmann, a former DOJ prosecutor who spent 20 years at the Department of Justice and served as general counsel at the FBI,during an appearance on "The Illegal News" podcast this week. "To make this a legitimate settlement, there would have to be a good faith belief that he has a meritorious argument and that there might be some downside in litigating this."

Weissmann's critique goes to the heart of how government settlements are supposed to work. When the DOJ settles a case, there must be a reasonable belief that the other side might actually win if the case went to trial—a genuine legal dispute, in other words. But in Flynn's case, Weissmann argues, there is no such ambiguity.

"I don't see the downside of having taken it to court," Weissmann said. "The issues here seem so completely one-sided that I really do not understand how you justify this as anything but theft."

The case against Flynn was straightforward. As National Security Advisor, Flynn had engaged in back-channel communications with Russian officials during the transition period. When FBI agents questioned him about these contacts, he lied. Vice President Mike Pence later went public saying he had repeated Flynn's denials on air, only to discover they were false—a betrayal that led directly to Flynn's firing after just 24 days in the job.

Flynn initially tried to withdraw his guilty plea, leading to years of litigation, but ultimately the legal process confirmed the guilty plea stood. There was no meritorious legal argument waiting to be discovered. There was no ambiguity about whether Flynn had committed the crime he admitted to committing.

Yet Bondi and Blanche signed off on the settlement anyway.

Weissmann raised additional concerns about the precedent this sets. "This is something that Michael Flynn admitted under oath he did, which was lied to the FBI. Now he then moved to withdraw his guilty plea. There was lots and lots of litigation back and forth, and that ultimately ended up with Donald Trump pardoning him," Weissmann explained.

The settlement also raises questions about potential conflicts of interest. Blanche was Trump's personal criminal defense attorney during his hush money trial and conviction. Now, as Deputy Attorney General, he's using government resources to benefit his former client.

"The next administration can look into this as an ethics issue," Weissmann said. "Remember, they represented Donald Trump individually. And they have to be looking out for the interests of the public, not for the interests of Donald Trump."

Perhaps most troubling to Weissmann is what this settlement signals about future Trump administration conduct. "This is the harbinger of more to come," he said, "because we know that Donald Trump wants to do this. And for all we know, this has been happening with other people doing this without bringing a lawsuit—just having a private agreement with the Department of Justice where they give out money and we just don't know."

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AN 3 26

President Donald Trump is continuing his “improper revenge campaign” against New York Attorney General Letitia James — and she is fighting it actively.

“President Donald Trump’s top housing official Bill Pulte issued two new criminal referrals for New York Attorney General Letitia James on Wednesday, attempting to revive the administration’s ongoing legal pursuit of one of his political opponents,” reported CNN on Wednesday, adding that the referrals were sent to Illinois and Florida for “suspected homeowners insurance fraud.” The Justice Department confirmed to CNN that “referrals were received by our US Attorney Offices,” while James' attorney Abbe Lowell accused Trump of continuing his “improper revenge campaign instead of helping bring down the rising cost of living in this country.”

The lawyer added in a statement to CNN, “Frustrated by repeated failures, where judges and grand juries have rejected their attempts to charge Attorney General James, Trump and his political enablers keep abusing their power to pursue a vendetta against her by trying to rename, refile, and repeat baseless allegations. They continue this improper revenge campaign instead of helping bring down the rising cost of living in this country.”

Lowell also predicted that “these desperate tactics will fail — just as every previous attempt has failed — and exposes an Administration that has abandoned its responsibility to the American people in favor of petty political payback.”

Among the “previous attempts” mentioned by Lowell was an October indictment on one count of making false statements to a financial institution and one count of bank fraud. A judge dismissed that case after Trump’s appointment of interim US Attorney Lindsey Halligan in Alexandria, Va. was deemed invalid. Other Trump prosecutions of his political enemies have also failed.

“This is how grand juries were meant to work,” UC Berkeley Criminal Justice Center Director Chesa Boudin and UC Davis Law Professor Eric S. Fish wrote in The New York Times about Trump’s failures to prosecute people he dislikes for political reasons such as James, adding that “a primary security to the innocent against hasty, malicious and oppressive persecution.” When U.S. District Judge Cameron McGowan Currie dismissed Trump’s attempted prosecution of another political enemy, former FBI Director James Comey, in November, she made it clear she had done so because of the sloppy methods Trump used to prosecute the case.

“Because Ms. Halligan had no lawful authority to present the indictment, I will grant Mr. Comey’s motion and dismiss the indictment without prejudice,” Currie explained.

Dickinson College President John E. Jones III, a former federal judge, told The Conversation’s politics editor Naomi Schalit that when grand juries reject Trump’s attempted prosecutions, they do so to defy an overreach of power.

“The grand jury would have to totally reject the whole premise of the case that’s being presented to them by the United States attorney because, remember, there are typically no witnesses appearing before the grand jury to dispute the facts,” Jones told Schalit. “The grand jury is clearly saying, ‘Even accepting the facts you’re putting before us as true, we don’t think under these circumstances this case is worthy of a federal indictment.’”

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AN 3 26

Fed up with the Trump administration's attempts to twist and rewrite rules for its own benefit, judges have become increasingly outspoken in their fight to preserve the rule of law, but according to a new report from the New York Times, some are "quietly" expressing worries about the "risks" involved in speaking up.

As the Tuesday report noted, "Judges are turning up the volume" in their rulings against President Donald Trump and his political machinations, abandoning their traditional "restrained style" in favor of language that conveys the gravity of the threat at hand. The Times called it "an emotive, populist approach," one that better allows them to give "full vent to the intensity of their concernsabout cases flooding their dockets since President Trump returned to office."

"One compared her district’s ballooning caseload to a demigod’s battle against a mythological monster," the Times detailed. "Another sought to buttress his argument against National Guard deployments to U.S. cities with a YouTube link to a 1970 protest song. A third compared the Trump administration’s rewriting of American history to the Ministry of Truth in George Orwell’s novel '1984.'"

Speaking with the Times about the trend, judges and other legal experts said that this sort of fiery, impassioned approach "has been helpful in underscoring judges’ belief in the urgency of the courts’ role as a check on Mr. Trump’s expansive interpretation of presidential power." On the flipside, however, some of those same sources "have worried that the heated rhetoric may also come with risks." For one thing, there is a concern that this approach could lead some in the public to suspect that the rulings from certain judges are "motivated by political animus, instead of the basic application of law to the facts of a case."

Others also expressed concern that the frequency with which judges are employing this sort of language might end up doing the opposite of underscoring the severity of Trump's misdeeds.

“The risk is being the boy who cried wolf,” Noah Feldman, a professor at Harvard Law School and the author of a book about Supreme Court nominees, explained to the Times. “If you say that the republic is collapsing in every single case, will anyone listen when the republic really is collapsing, and the Supreme Court says so?”

Marin K. Levy, a professor at Duke Law School, acknowledged that this could be an issue, but added that it should not deter judges from speaking up.

“If you’re repeatedly engaging in alarm-sounding, the force of that alarm is going to be diminished over time,” she said. “But just because there have been several fires doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t sound the alarm for the next one.”

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SAME DAY 3 25 26

Trump admin begs judge's forgiveness after another flub - Alternet.org

Firestorm erupts as Trump admin ridiculed after admitting lack of evidence - Alternet.org

Another judge obliterates Trump’s 'massive' attack on blue states - Alternet.org

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ALSO NOEM PLANE?

AN 3 26

The Wall Street Journal— hardly an outpost of left-wing propaganda — reported yesterday on the results of an investigation conducted by the Journal’sHannah Critchfield and her team.

I’m summarizing it below because it deserves your attention.

Critchfield and her team found that 279 people have been accused online by the Trump administration of assaulting federal ICE and Border Patrol agents, and more than half of these people — 64 percent — are American citizens.

Of the 181 American citizens that the Trump administration has accused of attacking federal ICE and Border Patrol officers, close to half have never been charged, and none have been convicted at trial. But the public charges alone have caused them significant harm.

The investigation

The Journal’s team analyzed more than 200 videos associated with allegations of assault against ICE and Border Patrol agents, using both police body camera footage and bystander recordings from social media. Many of the videos cast doubt on the federal government’s claims that agents were assaulted.

The Journal also reviewed more than 100,000 posts on X, posts made in the last year by accounts linked to government agencies and senior government officials.

Each time the government identified a person on a post, theJournal tracked that case through the legal system to see what charges were brought, under what statute, whether the charges were later modified, and what happened to the person in the case.

One of the cases they investigated was that of Sydney Lori Reid, a 44-year-old veterinary assistant in D.C. and a U.S. citizen.

In July, Reid went to a jail to witness an immigration enforcement action. Federal officers had gone there to arrest two migrant men, and Reid said she felt a duty to document it.

As Reid began videotaping, an agent grabbed her and pinned her to a wall. Reid was then surrounded by several federal law enforcement officials. One of them was an FBI agent wearing a face covering and an FBI vest. Two others were ICE officers, dressed in plain clothes, plaid shirts, and khaki pants.

Reid was handcuffed and told she was being arrested for interfering with their operation. Videos reviewed by Critchfield and her team cast doubt on the agents’ claims.

Reid was then placed in a government vehicle and transferred to federal custody. Like many American citizens who wind up in the crosshairs of DHS, she was accused of assault.

The government alleges she assaulted an FBI agent on the basis of scrapes on the agent’s hands, but the scrapes occurred in the process of putting handcuffs on Reid.

The government later charged Reid with felony assault of a federal official, a charge punishable with up to 20 years in prison — a serious federal charge that’s being applied far more broadly now than at any time in recent history.

When Reid was being arrested, she dropped her phone, but the phone was still recording. An agent picked up the phone and put it into the same vehicle that she was riding in on her way to detention.

One officer says: “We’re at the D.C. jail. We’re at the D.C. jail. We have an agitator in custody for ...”

Reid was handcuffed in the backseat. You can hear agents going back and forth about exactly how Reid had assaulted them. First, it was a raised knee, then an elbow.

Another officer: “Yeah, it appeared that there was an elbow that was ... When she was resisting, but she definitely interfered. So we have interfering and I’m going to get ...”

One of the ICE agents called her a stupid female as he was talking to a colleague: “Hey brother, are you good? I have to return to 1D and process this stupid female now that I f------ don’t want to process her.”

Reid was held by federal authorities for roughly two days. She wasn’t allowed to make a phone call during that time.

In the aftermath of her arrest, prosecutors tried to indict her, but that needed to be done through a grand jury, and the grand jury declined to indict her. They tried again before another grand jury, which also declined to indict her. Then they went back to a third grand jury, which declined to indict her.

This is almost unheard of. It showed both the resistance from the public to charge her based on the evidence and the government’s determination to bring charges in this case.

Prosecutors ultimately charged Reid with misdemeanor assault of an officer, a lesser offense that doesn’t require going through a grand jury. Reid was acquitted of that misdemeanor charge at trial.

The Trump Administration’s Strategy

Critchfield and her Journal team found that the push to charge more people for assaulting federal officers — as happened to Reid — is an administration-wide strategy.

Attorney General Pam Bondi and her Department of Justice have pledged to prosecute these cases aggressively. From the very beginning of Bondi’s tenure, starting on her first day in office, she issued a flurry of memos, including one that encouraged prosecutors to aggressively investigate any instances of violence against law enforcement or obstruction of law enforcement.

Gregory Bovino, then the head of Border Patrol, directed his agents to arrest anyone who touched them. “Arrest as many people that touch you as you want to. Those are the general orders all the way to the top, everybody f------ gets it if they touch you. You hear what I’m saying?”

In addition to an increasing number of prosecutions, the Department of Homeland Security has been using social media to exaggerate these alleged attacks, often with a warning to the public: “Don’t be like this person. If you behave in this way, we will come for you.” And they have posted people’s pictures and their full names, seeking to make an example out of these people even before they’re convicted of a crime.

This happened to Reid. A week after she was arrested, her mug shot and name went up on the official ICE account on X, along with the fact that she’s based in Washington, D.C., and a post that said, “Assault an officer or agent get arrested. It’s not rocket science.”

ICE also publicly alleged that Reid assaulted federal agents on behalf of two alleged international gang members.

The Purpose of This Strategy

The Journal’s investigation makes clear that the purpose of this strategy has been to intimidate and silence Americans who might otherwise protest what ICE and Border Patrol are doing.

ICE publicly describes many of these protesters as rioters, agitators, thugs, and terrorists.

Here’s Vice President JD Vance speaking of Renee Good’s death:

“I can believe that her death is a tragedy while also recognizing that it’s a tragedy of her own making and a tragedy of the far left who has marshaled an entire movement, a lunatic fringe against our law enforcement officers.”

And here’s then-DHS Secretary Kristi Noem on the death of Alex Pretti:

“This individual who came with weapons and ammunition to stop a law enforcement operation of federal law enforcement officers committed an act of domestic terrorism, that’s the facts.”

Renee Good was in her car when she was killed. Critchfield and her team found that federal government officials have accused 32 U.S. citizens of intentionally using their vehicles as weapons. DHS considers a vehicle to be a deadly weapon, justifying the use of force. Of those 32 drivers, only one pleaded guilty to an assault charge. Three had their cases dismissed; the rest were never charged.

TheJournal investigation found that in most cases where citizens were accused by the government, the outcome was similar to Reid’s.

181 citizens were accused by the government on X of attacking federal officers, but close to half of them were never even charged at all. When people werecharged, more often than not, the cases fell apart. Either they were acquitted or found not guilty at trial.

Fifteen people mentioned in government posts pleaded guilty before going to trial. Ten of whom pleaded guilty for lesser offenses than what the government initially charged them with.

Videos have often played major roles in contradicting the government’s case. Critchfield and her team viewed videos that repeatedly cast doubt on the government’s allegations. Protesters were often called violent rioters or professional agitators and accused of making physical contact in some way with agents, but video footage often showed immigration agents being the first to lay their hands on demonstrators....MORE

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AN 3 26

US attorney resigned instead of signing federal conspiracy charge against Army vet - Alternet.org

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an 3 26

At the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ), Attorney General Pam Bondi and her allies have been running into quite a few roadblocks when it comes to prosecuting President Donald Trump's foes — from prosecutors resigning from DOJ to grand juries deciding not to go forward with indictments to unfavorable ruling from judges in the lower federal courts. On MS NOW, some of the most vehement criticism of Bondi's leadership at DOJ is coming from former federal prosecutors who once worked there, including legal scholars Barbara McQuade and Joyce White Vance.

Bondi, with DOJ losing employees, is looking to hire new prosecutors. And MS NOW's Hayes Brown, in his March 19 column, argues that she is becoming increasingly desperate.

"There are a lot of empty desks in the Justice Department's offices compared to this time two years ago," Brown explains. "Attorney General Pam Bondi has been struggling to restock the much-depleted ranks of federal attorneys after last year's flood of firings, resignations and buyouts. Now, in the interest of quickly getting bodies in courtrooms, the DOJ has reportedly shifted its policies to allow U.S. attorneys' offices to hire lawyers straight out of law school."

Brown notes that according to reporting from Bloomberg Law, a DOJ memo said the department's one-year minimum experience standard can be waived in order to get more people hired. The memo said DOJ was facing an "exigent hiring need for attorneys across the Department."

"The 'exigent need' for fresh hires that the Justice Department cites is a relatively recent development," Brown observes. "Burgeoning lawyers used to leap at the chance to add a DOJ credential to their resumes. But that credential has lost some of its appeal since the start of President Donald Trump's second term. Bondi's day-one demand that federal lawyers 'zealously advance, protect, and defend their client’s interests' — with almost no room for dissent — hasn't made it easy to replace the thousands of staffers who have left the department since last January…. There's a world where this shift toward hiring newly graduated lawyers could be a good thing. If this project were truly about meritocracy, seeing more slots available for lawyers who didn't all go to the same handful of schools could be admirable. But the (Trump) Administration's screenings for ideological purity and loyalty to the MAGA agenda would undercut any claim that the department is truly trying to hire the best attorneys possible."

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DAVID CORN 3 26

For a year, the Trump Justice Department has been on an odd mission: to assist a mysterious former FBI informant with ties to Russian intelligence who ended up in prison for passing disinformation about Joe Biden to the bureau. His crime deeply affected American politics. The false claim he slipped to the FBI—that Biden and his son Hunter each were paid a $5 million bribe by a Ukrainian energy company—became the main evidence in the House Republicans’ reckless and ill-fated impeachment drive against the 46th president.

For pushing this phony tale, Alexander Smirnov, who pleaded guilty of lying to the FBI, was sentenced a year ago to six years of incarceration. (The punishment also covered failing to pay taxes on more than $2 million in income.) But for some strange reason, Trump’s DOJ has been helping him to get out of prison. On March 4, in a move that has drawn no media attention, the department quietly filed an unusual brief—submitted by Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche—supporting Smirnov’s attempt to throw out his sentence and withdraw his guilty plea.

The Smirnov saga has the feel of a spy thriller.

This was not the first time the Trump Justice Department sided with Smirnov in his ongoing legal battle. It has forged a curious alliance with this convicted Russia-connected fabricator whose lies were embraced by Trump, MAGA Republicans, and right-wing media and cited as smoking-gun evidence for Biden’s impeachment.

The Smirnov saga has the feel of a spy thriller. A fortysomething Israeli American businessman who grew up in Ukraine, he was a longtime confidential informant for the FBI. Court filings do not reveal the details of his work for the bureau, but they note he participated in operations in which he was authorized to engage in illegal activity as part of FBI criminal investigations. He apparently shared information about oligarchs and the business contacts he made around the world, possibly including some shady characters. He made millions of dollars through activity federal prosecutors could not identify.

During the 2020 campaign, Republicans—most notably, Rudy Giuliani—were promoting the debunked allegation that Biden, when he was vice president, had threatened to withhold a $1 billion loan guarantee to Ukraine unless its government quashed an investigation of Burisma, a Ukrainian energy company that had recruited his son Hunter to be a well-paid board member. As that conspiracy theory was being hyped by the right, Smirnov told his FBI handler that in late 2015 or 2016 the CEO of Burisma had said to him that Hunter, through his father, could end an investigation of Burisma if the two Bidens each were paid a $5 million bribe.

The FBI handler dutifully recorded Smirnov’s account in what the bureau calls an FD-1023 form. The FBI reviewed this information—which was much at odds with previous statements Smirnov had made to his handler about Burisma—and decided there was nothing to it. (There was no active probe of Burisma at the time of the supposed bribe.) And that was that.

Yet three years later, someone in the FBI passed the FD-1023 to congressional Republicans, and they went to town, claiming this was the proof President Biden had pocketed a huge bribe and was leading a crime family.

The document clearly stated there was no confirmation of the hearsay information Smirnov had provided. But for months, through that summer and fall and into 2024, House Republicans—led by Rep. James Comer of Kentucky, who chaired the House oversight committee—hailed the FD-1023 (which redacted Smirnov’s name) as Exhibit A for their baseless impeachment inquiry targeting Biden. Fox News aired scores of segments about it. Kash Patel and other MAGA stalwarts cited it as evidence of Biden criminality.

His new allegations about Hunter Biden were also false. It appeared he had been trying to plant anti-Biden information within the bureau.

With Republicans raising a fuss about this once-confidential report, the FBI brought Smirnov in for questioning. He stuck to his story. He even added new allegations about Hunter Biden that he said he had received from four Russian officials, including two associated with Russian intelligence, telling the bureau the Russians had made incriminating recordings of the president’s son.

The bureau dug into all of this—reviewing Smirnov’s travel records and other information—and concluded that he was lying and that he had never even had those conversations with the Burisma CEO outlined in the FD-1023. His new allegations about the younger Biden were also false. It appeared he had been trying to plant anti-Biden information within the bureau.

On February 14, 2024, as Smirnov arrived from an overseas trip at Harry Reid International Airport in Las Vegas, FBI agents arrested him. The next day, David Weiss, a Justice Department special counsel who had been appointed to investigate Hunter Biden, announced that Smirnov had been indicted for making false statements to the FBI. His indictment was later expanded to cover the tax charges. Smirnov’s arrest outed him as the confidential informant cited in the FD-1023—and essentially ended the GOP impeachment crusade. The Republicans had been duped.

In subsequent legal filings, federal prosecutors stated that Smirnov professed to have contacts with multiple foreign intelligence agencies, including the Russian spy services. The feds characterized Smirnov’s interactions with Russians as “extensive.”

“Smirnov’s contacts with Russian officials who are affiliated with Russian intelligence services are not benign,” the prosecutors said—a suggestion that Smirnov had actively been in cahoots with the Russians.

One filing revealed he had numerous contacts with a Russian official “who has been described by Smirnov in a number of ways, including as the son of a former high-ranking Russian government official” and someone “who purportedly controls two groups of individuals tasked with carrying out assassination efforts in a third-party country,” a reference to Ukraine. “Smirnov’s contacts with Russian officials who are affiliated with Russian intelligence services are not benign,” the prosecutors said—a suggestion that Smirnov had actively been in cahoots with the Russians.

The Justice Department’s filings in the case depicted Smirnov as having “spread misinformation” about Biden, adding “the misinformation he is spreading is not confined to 2020. He is actively peddling new lies that could impact U.S. elections after meeting with Russian intelligence officials in November [2024].” It looked as if Smirnov had been part of a Russian operation to tarnish Biden in both 2020 and 2024.

On January 8, 2025, after Smirnov accepted a plea agreement, federal Judge Otis Wright of the Central District of California sentenced him to six years. “In committing his crimes he betrayed the United States,” Weiss stated in court papers.

A scamster tied to Russian intelligence who had promoted disinformation to the FBI to harm Biden in two elections was behind bars. A win for the Justice Department. Case closed.

Not quite. Shortly after his conviction, Smirnov requested he be released on bail from prison pending an appeal he had filed. The Justice Department, now tightly controlled by Trump, joined Smirnov in supporting this request. Smirnov and the feds filed a joint stipulation asking he be freed while his appeal was underway.

This was weird. The Justice Department had just locked him up. But with Trump in the White House, it was under new management.

What was different now—and peculiar—was that that the Justice Department had flipped and was supporting the request of a man who had tried to deceive the FBI and who, as Weiss said, betrayed the United States.

During Smirnov’s criminal case, Justice Department lawyers had argued that because he had access to $6 million in funds (the origins of which he hadn’t been able to explain), was an Israeli citizen who could easily obtain an Israeli passport, and claimed to have contacts with multiple foreign intelligence services, he was a flight risk. They requested he be kept in prison prior to his trial. Smirnov’s lawyers contended at that time that he ought to be released on bail because he had a serious medical condition related to his eyes that required continuing care. The court didn’t buy that and imprisoned him while he awaited trial.

Following his conviction, Smirnov made the same argument: Due to his eye condition, he should be let out on bail while his appeal proceeded. What was different now—and peculiar—was that that the Justice Department had flipped and was supporting the request of a man who had tried to deceive the FBI and who, as Weiss said, betrayed the United States.

The government had once said Smirnov was a flight risk; now it argued the opposite. During a hearing last April, a department prosecutor pointed out that Smirnov had “the lowest incentive that he would ever have to flee the country…when he has a receptive ear to people who are willing to look anew” at his case. A “receptive ear”? That was a surprising statement, indicating that the Trump Justice Department was considering reviewing the case of this suspected Russian agent. The Trump administration was advocating for him.

On April 30, 2025, Judge Wright turned down the joint Smirnov–United States request for his release, noting that nothing significant had changed since Smirnov was determined a flight risk and “the fact remains that Smirnov has been convicted and sentenced to seventy-two months in prison, providing ample incentive to flee.”

That was not the end of the Trump Justice Department’s cooperation with Smirnov. And the former informant did catch a break after losing the fight for bail.

In November, independent journalist Jacqueline Sweet discovered that Smirnov had been released from FCI Terminal Island, a low-security prison in Los Angeles, where he had been fulfilling his sentence. A process server who had been trying to serve Smirnov with papers related to a civil lawsuit had been informed that Smirnov was “furloughed.” David Chesnoff, Smirnov’s lawyer, told the New York Post that his client had been released on a “medical furlough” due to his eye condition, which required surgery. A health-related furlough from a federal facility can last up to 30 months. Chesnoff said at the time he expected to request multiple furloughs for Smirnov.

With Chesnoff, Smirnov had a high-powered and widely connected lawyer who was part of the Trump administration. A well-known celebrity attorney based in Las Vegas, he was appointed in June to serve on an advisory council for the Department of Homeland Security.

Several years ago, Chesnoff represented Republican political operative Corey Lewandowski, when Lewandowski was accused of harassing and inappropriately touching a Trump donor at a fundraising event. Chesnoff obtained a plea agreement in which Lewandowski admitted no wrongdoing but agreed to impulse control counseling and 50 hours of community service. When Chesnoff was named to the DHS council, Lewandowski was serving as the chief adviser to Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem. Other members of this advisory board include Giuliani, venture capitalist Marc Andreessen, right-wing commentator Mark Levin, Bikers for Trump founder Chris Cox, and Lewandowski.

It’s unclear how long Smirnov was out of prison for the medical furlough. Chesnoff did not respond to an inquiry. On Friday, a spokesperson for the Bureau of Prisons confirmed Smirnov was currently in custody at Terminal Island.

This month, the Justice Department continued to go all-out for Smirnov. On March 4, with no fanfare, it submitted a filing supporting Smirnov’s appeal of his conviction.

Smirnov had agreed to a plea deal in which he acknowledged lying to the FBI and committing tax evasion. But following his conviction, he filed an appeal that hinged on a technical point. He claimed Judge Wright had not stuck to the deal’s provision regarding a reduction in Smirnov’s sentence to match his pretrial detention.

The Trump administration appears to be bending over backward to help him escape his sentence and win another trial—or perhaps avoid one.

The plea agreement between the Justice Department and Smirnov stated that Smirnov was “entitled” to a credit for time served. But at sentencing, Judge Wright said he would not “get involved” in the calculation of the credit and would leave that to the Bureau of Prisons.

In the appeal, Smirnov’s lawyers argued that even though Smirnov ended up being credited by BOP with time served, Wright, by not directly recommending the time off to BOP, had not adhered to the plea agreement. Consequently, they contended, the sentence should be revoked and Smirnov permitted to withdraw his guilty pleas and return the case to the pre-agreement stage. The Justice Department filing supports Smirnov’s argument and his requests.

The Trump administration appears to be bending over backward to help him escape his sentence and win another trial—or perhaps avoid one. There’s no guarantee the Justice Department would continue the prosecution if Smirnov succeeds with his appeal. One government official who has followed this case tells me he wonders if the ultimate plan of the Trump administration is to let Smirnov go free.

Judge Wright has challenged this argument advanced by Smirnov and the DOJ. In a ruling last year, he said that Smirnov’s claim that he had not followed “all of the stipulations” of the plea agreement was “factually and legally incorrect.” Wright cited the exact language of the agreement: “The parties also agree that the defendant is entitled to credit…for the period of his pretrial detention…and that credits that the Bureau of Prisons may allow…may be credited against this stipulated sentence.”

Wright pointed out the agreement did not “provide that the Court would order that Smirnov receive credit for time served…This provision regarding credit requires nothing of the Court.”

Smirnov’s case does not seem a strong one, turning on the question of whether the provision that he was “entitled” to credit for time served compelled Wright to make an explicit recommendation to the BOP. It certainly doesn’t come across as a matter that would call for the participation of the deputy attorney general. Yet Blanche signed this filing. Deputy attorneys general usually don’t get involved in such matters.

I asked the Justice Department why it decided to back Smirnov’s appeal. A spokesperson replied, “We have no comment.” I also asked if the DOJ would renew its prosecution of Smirnov if he wins his appeal. I received the same response.

Trump’s Justice Department has shown an unusual amount of consideration for Smirnov, a confessed criminal tied to Russian intelligence who betrayed the FBI and who perpetuated a fraud that roiled American politics. But he did make trouble for Biden and the Democrats. This case warrants scrutiny as Smirnov’s appeal proceeds.

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AN 3 26 FAIL

Another Justice Department prosecutor is facing off against an angry judge, and this time, he was thrown out of court.

“You have lost the confidence and the trust of this court. You have lost the confidence and the trust of the New Jersey legal community, and you are losing the trust and confidence of the public," said Judge Zahid Quraishi, an appointee of President Joe Biden in 2021.

According to the *New York Times*, the issue was that the judge grew frustrated with the Justice Department's head of appeals, Mark Coyne. It seems Coyne hadn't "formally disclosed that he would appear, and fiercely interrogated a more junior prosecutor about whether the former interim U.S. attorney, Alina Habba, still had some role in operating the office."

"Are you here for moral support? Because you're not going to speak," the judge asked at one point, according to the transcript.

"All right. So I've ruled. I'm not going to hear from you, Mr. Coyne. If you want to sit there for moral support or hand Mr. Rosenblum Post-its or whisper in his ear, I'll let you do that as supervisor," the judge said, referring to line prosecutor Daniel Rosenblum.

As the discussion continued and Rosenblum began speaking to the judge about why there were three U.S. Attorneys, Coyne stood to try and speak about Habba not working for the office any longer. The judge repeatedly told Coyne to "sit down."

"Sit down, Mr. Coyne. If you speak again, I'm going to have you removed. I already told you not to speak." Coyne tried to protest, but the judge continued to tell him to sit down, noting that he didn't file a notice of appearance before the meeting.

Finally, after a back and forth, the judge said, "I'm directing the court security officers to remove Mr. Coyne. Mr. Coyne, I told you not to address this court. You didn't file a notice of appearance. You don't get to blindside this court. I'm going to ask you to leave. I'm going to ask you to leave. Kindly, I'm going to ask you to leave, or I'll have you removed."

Habba was dismissed after the U.S. Senate did not approve her appointment before the deadline. She ultimately resigned in December after courts determined she could not legally sign onto cases.

Coyne was thrown out of court.

Last week, three leaders of the New Jersey office was found to be "occupying their positions unlawfully." Judge Quraishi demanded they appear next month to testify about what's happening in their office. The three-person team came from Attorney General Pam Bondi directly, who decided that the U.S. Attorney post would be occupied by three people. Judge Matthew W. Brann, the judge who disqualified Habba, found that the panel was unlawful.

There's a concern from Brann that “scores of dangerous criminals” could have their cases dismissed amid the Justice Department's disorganization.

The DOJ has faced off against several jurisdictions where it couldn't get U.S. Attorneys confirmed. One came from the Eastern District of Virginia, where the acting U.S. Attorney resigned. One was then installed, but only after the deadline to have someone confirmed. She, too, was found to be disqualified.

Some of the new DOJ lawyers have come under fire with ethics complaints from their state bar associations. In response, the DOJ proposed a new regulation that would suspend any state ethics proceedings against a current or former Justice Department lawyer without first conducting its own review, Democracy Docket reported last week.

The DOJ also clashed with a judge who threw out subpoenas of Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell as part of a criminal investigation the department lodged against him under U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Jeanine Pirro.

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How an ex-Fox News host has created a 'fiasco' for Trump with her 'ongoing' incompetence - Alternet.org

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The Trump Justice Department on Monday reportedly reached a tentative deal with Live Nation—the owner of Ticketmaster—to settle a Biden-era antitrust lawsuit that aimed to break up the company, accusing it of illegally monopolizing the live entertainment industry.

News of the settlement, which would not require a breakup of Live Nation, came days after the trial began, with a lawyer for the Trump Justice Department’s decimated antitrust division saying last week that the company abuses its market power and earns its massive profits “through illegal action.” The antitrust division’s counsel in the case, David Dahlquist, was apparently not made aware of the settlement until he appeared in court Monday morning.

Lee Hepner, senior legal counsel at the American Economic Liberties Project, said it is “highly unorthodox for the Justice Department’s lead litigator to be left out of the loop on the settlement and highly prejudicial to the jury’s deliberations.”

“According to every observer, this trial was already going well for the Justice Department and states,” said Hepner. “They had just won summary judgment and a jury had already heard evidence of Live Nation’s longstanding pattern of retaliation against venues who had attempted to open the market to competition. State AGs are once again left to clean up the mess left by this Administration’s incompetence.”

Under the settlement, which must be approved by a judge, Live Nation “would pay a fine of up to $280 million and divest itself of at least 13 amphitheaters across the country as it opens up its ticketing processes so that competitors can share in the sale of tickets,” the Associated Press reported.

The National Independent Venue Association (NIVA), a trade group representing thousands of independent live entertainment venues, festivals, and promoters, noted in a statement that the reported $280 million settlement amount “is the equivalent of four days of [Live Nation’s] 2025 revenue, which means they could potentially make it back by this Friday.”

“The reported settlement does not appear to include any specific and explicit protections for fans, artists, or independent venues and festivals,” said Stephen Parker, NIVA’s executive director. “Reported details also indicate that ticket resale platforms could be further empowered through new requirements for Ticketmaster to host their listings, which would likely exacerbate the price gouging potential for predatory resellers and the platforms that serve them.”

“If these facts are true,” Parker added, “NIVA views this as a failure of the justice system.”

The antitrust lawsuit against Live Nation was filed in 2024 after a nearly two-year investigation launched amid mounting public outrage aimed at Ticketmaster, spurred in part by its botched presale of Taylor Swift concert tickets in 2022. Then-President Joe Biden’s Justice Department filed the complaint in partnership with 30 state attorneys general, most of whom vowed Monday to continue the fight without the Trump administration’s support.

“For years, Live Nation has made enormous profits by exploiting its illegal monopoly and raising costs for shows,” said New York Attorney General Letitia James. “My office has led a bipartisan group of attorneys general in suing Live Nation for taking advantage of fans, venues, and artists, and we are committed to holding Live Nation accountable.”

The settlement deal comes weeks after Gail Slater, the former head of the Justice Department’s antitrust arm, was pushed out by DOJ leadership. Prior to Slater’s removal, Live Nation executives and lobbyists had reportedly been negotiating the terms of a possible settlement with senior Justice Department officials outside of the antitrust office, heightening corruption concerns.

Emily Peterson-Cassin, policy director at the Demand Progress Education Fund, said in a statement that “this settlement amounts to a slap on the wrist that tinkers around the edges of the real problem: Live Nation’s monopoly.”

“Instead of breaking up Live Nation and Ticketmaster, Live Nation will now get to continue forcing the vast majority of live venues to use Ticketmaster,” said Peterson-Cassin. “Following the ousting of Gail Slater and the gutting of the government’s antitrust enforcement capabilities, this settlement is the clearest sign yet that this administration serves big business, not the people.”

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Outgoing "weaponization" chief Ed Martin was supposed to have left the Justice Department sometime in February after Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche "made moves to significantly limit Martin’s ability to wield power," CNN reported at the time. Now, Martin is facing an ethics investigation.

"On his way out the door from the U.S. attorney's office, [Martin] announced to his entire staff that he was under investigation by the D.C. Office of Disciplinary Counsel without elaborating on the details, CBS News reported Tuesday. According to the report, Martin is facing ethics charges after he sent a letter to the Georgetown University Law Center alleging that a whistleblower reported them for teaching "diversity, equity, and inclusion."

Martin's Feb. 17, 2025, letter made the allegations, but before he heard a response, he said he would impose sanctions on Georgetown by telling his staff not to hire any students from the school.

Now-former dean, William Treanor, responded in a letter challenging Martin's Catholic faith, saying it was "an attack on the University's mission as a Jesuit and Catholic institution."

A filing revealed Tuesday shows Disciplinary Counsel Hamilton "Phil" Fox III of the D.C. Bar alleged on Friday that while working for the federal government, Martin violated the First and Fifth Amendments with his letter. "Mr. Martin knew or should have known" that.

"Acting in his official capacity and speaking on behalf of the government, he used coercion to punish or suppress a disfavored viewpoint, the teaching and promotion of DEI," the court filing says. "He demanded that Georgetown Law relinquish its free speech and religious rights in order to obtain a benefit, employment opportunities for its students."

The filing goes on to say that Martin replied to the exchange, "stating that he would not be responding to Disciplinary Counsel’s inquiry, complained about Disciplinary Counsel’s 'uneven behavior' and requested a 'face-to-face meeting with all of you to discuss this matter and find a way forward.' He copied the White House Counsel 'for informational purposes because of the importance of getting this issue addressed.'"

Technology lawyer Kendra Albert mocked on BlueSky that Martin's comments in count two had "I want to speak to your manager" energy.

Lawfare's senior editor, Roger Parloff, called the comments from Martin, "very Ed Martin-y." He noted that after the D.C. Bar Association began its inquiry, "Martin [wrote] Chief Judge of D.C. Court of Appeals three times." He was warned not to on two occasions and did so anyway.

The first letter was sent to the judge ex parte, meaning it did not inform the opposing counsel.

Slate legal analyst Mark Joseph Stern suggested this is one of many reasons Attorney General Pam Bondi is going after state Bar Associations for filing ethics complaints.

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A report in the Washington*Post*reported Friday described the government purge at the FBI and Justice Department, noting the loss of decades of experience and has left some key positions either unfilled or otherwise occupied. And according to the Post, President Donald Trump's administration might be woefully unprepared for the fallout.

For the past six months, Matthew Blue, the chief of the Justice Department’s counterterrorism section, has been deployed to "protect" Washington, D.C. Trump called in the D.C. National Guard to handle "out of control" crime in the city. While many have been deployed elsewhere, Blue remains on duty and not at the Justice Department.

About three days before the bombing campaign began in Iran, FBI Director Kash Patel fired the agents who "specialized in addressing threats from Iran and its proxies."

Speaking with current and former officials familiar with the firings, the Postreported that there are still some skilled leaders in top posts, but the "bench of expertise has significantly thinned," particularly among those with a history of handling domestic threats.

The report explained that when the U.S. goes to war or engages in a conflict elsewhere, domestic law enforcement keeps its ear to the ground about possible threats at home out of fear that terrorist groups abroad can trigger anyone who might be in the U.S. But now, those prosecutors and agents are scarce.

One ex-prosecutor who refused to give his name was fired out of the blue despite working on the surveillance of a man the FBI feared may have been plotting a violent attack. Patel reassigned the FBI agents to focus on immigration instead.

FBI spokesman Ben Williamson told the Post that anyone who they fired were found to have "acted unethically" either on the Jan. 6 investigations or with probes into Trump.

“While we do not comment on personnel matters, the FBI maintains a robust counterintelligence operation, with personnel all over the country, who delivered record results in 2025 — including a 35 percent increase in counterintelligence arrests, six of the Ten Most Wanted Fugitives captured, and multiple foiled terrorism plots just in December alone,” Williamson said in a statement. “Our teams remain fully engaged across the country and prepared to mobilize any security assets needed to assist federal partners — as well as state and local law enforcement."

But one former and longtime senior national security official warned, “We are now in a heightened-threat situation, not just in the Mideast but also here in the U.S. Iran, acting through its proxies, has long sought to carry out a terrorist attack or assassination inside the country."

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"Aghast" federal judges are increasingly angry at President Donald Trump's Departments of Justice and Homeland Security for immigration judges making decisions they believe do not comport with the evidence, much less the law.

Legal reporter Kyle Cheney wrote for Politico on Friday that Trump's "unprecedented campaign to lock up thousands of immigrants with longstanding roots in the United States" is forcing families and even children to face off against these judges for trials that "have been fundamentally flawed or even pre-cooked." Some judges even decide that the individuals are a "danger to the community" or a "flight risk" without hearing evidence.

One immigration judge allegedly relied on "uncorroborated police reports" given by the detainee himself. He was released. Another, in Missouri, found that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers called the migrant a flight risk "without sufficient evidence."

The ready-made rulings are starting to infuriate federal judges, who are demanding "do-overs," the report said. In some cases, the judges don't even do re-trials; they simply order the person to be released. U.S. District Judge Irene Berger, a Democratic appointee, concluded a bond hearing by saying it would be pointless. Her GOP-appointed counterpart agreed, saying it “would be futile."

“The bond hearing has indications of predetermined outcome,” complained U.S. District Judge Douglas Harpool. “The [immigration judge’s] order enumerates that Petitioner: has been in the U.S. for 9 years, has not missed a court hearing, has family in the U.S. (husband and 3 children), and owns a home and operates a business in the U.S. The IJ’s determination regarding flight risk is clearly untethered by the facts and any logical conclusion to be determined from the facts.”

Cheney wrote that federal law forbids the courts from second-guessing “discretionary” bonds made by the "immigration judges."

“These federal judges simply disagree with the outcomes of the immigration judge bond decisions,” a Justice Department spokesperson told Politico. “They are impugning the integrity or competence of our immigration judges solely to give them a hook to review the IJ decisions they disagree with but would otherwise be unable to directly review.”

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Former federal prosecutor Joyce Vance is disputing a Wednesday claim by President Donald Trump's administration that it can sideline investigations by Bar Associations around the country.

According to Bloomberg Law, the Justice Department is working to "suspend stat bar ethics investigations" targeting DOJ lawyers. The DOJ has clashed with judges across the U.S. and judgment, behavior and legal violations have prompted complaints to state Bar Associations as a result.

According to the proposal, which was posted in the Federal Register on Wednesday, the DOJ wants to do its own internal review of the lawyers rather than the regulatory association. Critics see it as diminishing the power of the Bar Associations as a whole.

Commenting on the report on X, Vance called it "bunk."

"State bars license attorneys and consider misconduct allegations. Historically, state bars have deferred to DOJ‘s internal discipline process as a courtesy, but they are not obligated to, and the AG has zero authority to suspend state bar operations," Vance said about Attorney General Pam Bondi.

"DOJ can’t avoid investigation and incredible allegations of clear, ethical violations, like lying to or misleading judges and failing to follow court orders if state bars want to pursue them," Vance added. "The process is usually long and involves wrist slaps instead of jumping straight to disbarment, but egregious cases deserve serious discipline."

University of Michigan Law School Professor Barbara McQuade agreed.

"All DOJ lawyers are members of a state or DC bar, and subject to its ethics rules and penalties, up to disbarment. Subverting state bar authorities would give DOJ lawyers carte blanche to violate ethics rules," she said about the report.

Self-described "recovering lawyer" Jeff Jacobs commented, "You would think that, given the ethical implications of many of the actions by this DOJ and its state-licensed attorneys, the administration would go out of its way to avoid antagonizing state bar associations."

In January, the Texas Supreme Court ended the 42-year reliance on the American Bar Association for law school accreditation because the ABA has diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) requirements. Florida has now done the same. Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-Fla.) has proposed his own accreditor for Florida law schools instead.

If Bondi's proposal moves forward after a public comment period, “whenever a third party files a bar complaint alleging that a current or former Department attorney violated an ethics rule while engaging in that attorney’s duties for the Department, or whenever bar disciplinary authorities open an investigation into such allegations,” the attorney general “will have the right to review the complaint and the allegations in the first instance,” it states.

Bondi is calling ethics probes into attorneys at the DOJ part of an anti-Trump "weaponization" effort.

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Political scientist Austin Sarat on Wednesday warned that Donald Trump's Justice Department is making a "virtually unprecedented" demand on behalf of MAGA activist Steve Bannon that would effectively "rewrite the past" and further encourage supporters to break the law on his behalf.

Writing in a piece for The Hill this week, Sarat, a professor of political science at Amherst College, highlighted an extremely unorthodox legal request submitted by the DOJ last month, asking a federal judge to dismiss the contempt of Congress indictment leveled against Bannon over four years ago. This would, in turn, essentially vacate his conviction on that same charge.

Bannon, a former adviser to Trump and outspoken proponent of the MAGA agenda, was initially indicted by Congress in late 2021 for refusing to answer a subpoena from the House select committee investigating the January 6 attack on the Capitol. By the summer of 2022, he was convicted and sentenced to serve four months in prison and pay a $6,500 fine. Despite years' worth of appeal efforts, all the way up to the Supreme Court, Bannon ultimately ended up serving his time from July to October 2024 at a federal prison in Connecticut.

While the DOJ's new request on Bannon's behalf might fly under the radar for many as another in a long line of efforts by Trump to reward his loyalists, Sarat argued that this effort to dismiss a conviction after the prison sentence has been completed is "unprecedented" and would represent a new escalation in Trump's efforts to incentivize loyalty towards him at all costs.

"To dismiss an indictment after a prison sentence has already been served is virtually unprecedented and shows the lengths to which the administration will go to whitewash history and rewrite the past," Sarat wrote. "The judge, Trump appointee Carl Nichols, would be well advised to refuse."

It is not unheard of for prosecutors to ask that indictments or convictions be overturned, though Sarat said it is "extraordinarily rare" for it to happen after a sentence has been completed. Typically, such requests are only made after new evidence of the convict's innocence has been discovered or if there is a clear argument that their constitutional rights were violated.

"Again, none of that applies to Bannon," Sarat wrote.

Trump previously decried Bannon's indictment and conviction, claiming that the attempt to compel his testimony before Congress was a violation of his legally dubious assertions about "executive privilege." In the request from February, Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche called the original subpoena "improper" and claimed that the DOJ is attempting to "undo the prior administration’s weaponization of the justice system."

"Bannon had his day in court. He was tried and convicted. He appealed all the way to the Supreme Court and lost before going to prison," Sarat wrote. "The only thing that has changed is that his friends have returned to power. What the Justice Department is doing in the Bannon case is just the latest example of why, as former Secretary of Labor Robert ReichRobert Reich puts it, 'Trump justice is an oxymoron.'"

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The Trump administration has recently filed motions to strike, or requests that a judge delete sections of lawsuits, in four of American Oversight’s Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuits. This is an unusual tactic, and seems to be part of an effort to delay cases and avoid admitting damaging facts in court.

What are Trump administration lawyers doing?

If the government does not respond to a FOIA request, we often take them to court to get the information we are looking for. Often, our lawsuits begin with a section that includes key background facts about the records we are requesting, to explain why it is important for the public to have access to them.

In four of our recent cases — lawsuits that are seeking records related to the $400 million jetQatar gifted to Donald Trump, the whistleblower allegations that a top official defied court orders to deport a planeful of people to a prison in El Salvador, the FBIreview of Jeffrey Epstein files, and interviews with Trump in the Epstein investigation — the government’s attorneys have asked judges to delete the background facts in our lawsuits. In these cases, they claim this information is “irrelevant” and “scandalous” — even though the information we include is often from government sources.

Here’s a sampling of the information that the administration has attempted to strike:

A Truth Social post by President Donald Trump about the jet gifted by Qatar
A social media post by FBI Director Kash Patel about transparency at the agency
A news article that directly quotes Attorney General Pam Bondi discussing the Department of Justice (DOJ) review of the Epstein files
A memo from the DOJ and the FBI about the Epstein file review
Citations to news articles from the PBS Newshour, CNN, ABC News, the Associated Press, the Washington Post, NPR, Bloomberg Law, Newsweek, the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, and New York Magazine, among others.

Why is this so unusual?

Motions to strike are rarely used and judges typically don’t like them.

According to the Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(f), a judge can remove “an insufficient defense or any redundant, immaterial, impertinent, or scandalous matter” in a lawsuit. But even the Trump administration admits in its legal briefings that “motions to strike are generally disfavored.”

Typically, it’s more important for the lawyers and judge to focus on whether the government has violated the law in not releasing requested records. A motion to strike is considered a delay tactic that interferes with that work.

Motions to strike are also considered extreme because they address a relatively minor issue with a “drastic remedy:” permanently deleting entire portions of a lawsuit.

The administration’s arguments for removing text are weak.

The administration’s lawyers have claimed that our complaints include “incendiary” allegations, but the language the administration has attempted to strike includes direct quotes from administration officials and reporting from reputable outlets.

We include this background information in our complaints because it is relevant to the case. This information can help us demonstrate why we need the documents as fast as possible, if the government’s search for records was sufficient, why the government’s justification for withholding documents is wrong, and why the government should have to pay our attorney fees.

So far, two federal judges already agree with us. In our lawsuit for records related to the FBI’s review of the Epstein files, Judge James Boasberg found that we “largely quote[d] administration officials” and that is “hardly scandalous or prejudicial.” Judge Boasberg ruled that it was best to keep the case moving by not requiring us to delete anything from our lawsuit. In our lawsuit for any interviews conducted with Trump as part of the Epstein investigation, Judge Timothy Kelly denied the motion to strike. We mostly “simply allege[d] that administration officials made certain publicly reported statements or took certain publicly reported actions,” he wrote. “And the allegations themselves are hardly scandalous or prejudicial.”

Why are government lawyers using this tactic?

The motions to strike are an attempt to avoid admitting damaging facts in court.

As part of a court case, defense lawyers are required to say whether the allegations in a lawsuit are true. That can include confirming or denying the information we include in our complaint.

In other words, a government attorney could be asked to confirm or deny reports about what’s going on in the Trump administration. Doing either of those things can put an attorney in a difficult situation. If the lawyers deny information that is accurate, they could face sanctions or even disbarment. If they confirm or correct facts they’re also at risk, especially if those facts could be embarrassing to the administration. For example, in a hearing regarding the wrongful removal of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, DOJ attorney Erez Reuveni confirmed that Abrego Garcia’s removal was an error. Later that night, the DOJ ordered Reuveni to file a brief that distorted that the removal was a mistake. After he declined, he was placed on administrative leave.

Asking the judge to strike these factual statements from our court cases could help government attorneys sidestep the issue.

Motions to strike also allow the Trump administration to delay responding to the substance of our lawsuits.

Our lawsuits argue that the government broke the law — specifically the Freedom of Information Act. The government has to respond to our lawsuit and argue that it didn’t do anything illegal — or, as is most often the case when we sue, the government must admit that it didviolate FOIA.

DOJ attorneys have their hands full defending a wide range of illegal Trump administration actions, such as deadly use of force by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents and the National Guard’s unlawful deployment to suppress peaceful protests. In some cases, a motion to strike might be a cheat code that gives the attorneys more time.

Instead of writing a detailed response straightforwardly addressing the allegations in our complaint, the DOJ attorneys can move to strike the sections included for context. That stops the case from moving forward until the judge makes a decision. Even if the judge eventually rejects their motion to strike — as Judge Boasberg and Judge Kelly did — the Trump administration attorneys bought themselves more time to write their briefs.

Luckily, the Trump administration’s attorneys have yet to be successful with this ploy. We will continue to fight against these delay tactics and push for the release of public records that could help hold the administration accountable.

Read more about the Trump administration’s use of motions to strike in Salon.

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President Donald Trump’s attempt to strip several progressive law firms and individual lawyers of security clearances and federal contracts is over.

The Wall Street Journal is reporting that the Trump administration is abandoning its defense of the president’s executive orders issued last year. Those actions sanctioned several law firms and individuals for their associations with Trump rivals and causes that he didn’t favor.

Subsequent trial court rulings in four instances struck down the Trump executive actions. On Monday, the Justice Department told the WSJ that it will drop its appeals of the trial court rulings.

Trump’s executive orders would have prevented firms and individual lawyers from entering federal buildings, eliminated federal contracts with the firms and their clients and removed any security clearances. Now, that threat is ended.

Law firms Jenner & Block, WilmerHale, Perkins Coie and Susman Godfrey were among those affected. But the impact of Trump’s actions sent a broader chill. Several other large law firms cut deals with the president, providing more than $1 billion in pro bono work on causes Trump favored.

Trump cited the sanctioned parties for their connections to his political rivals. He also noted their diversity initiatives and pro bono work for immigrants, transgender rights and voting protections in his executive orders.

The affected firms and individuals called the actions unconstitutional retaliation and an abuse of executive power. In one trial court decision, Judge Richard Leon, appointed by Republican President George W. Bush, said blocking the sanctions would preserve an “independent bar willing to tackle unpopular cases, however daunting.”

The Trump administration countered in its appeals and defenses that a president has leeway to act when it comes to firms that work with the federal government.

MSNBC journalist Sam Stein saidthe decision by DOJ to end its defense would be particularly “humiliating” for firms that preemptively settled.

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On Thursday, February 26, the Trump-era U.S. Department of Justice's (DOJ) case against journalist and former CNN host Don Lemon took on a Philadelphia element when Jerome Richardson — a Minnesota native now attending Philly's Temple University — was recognized by members of the Philadelphia City Council. Richardson is facing charges as part of the same DOJ case against Lemon, who was arrested after covering a protest inside an evangelical fundamentalist church in Minneapolis. And the case continued to evolve and expand on Friday, February 27, when Politico's Josh Gerstein reported on new defendants.

Late Friday morning, Gerstein — in a post on X — reported, "DEVELOPING: Superseding indictment returned in Don Lemon Minnesota church protest case. Local press says more defendants added and arrested. Awaiting more details."

According to Samantha Fischer, a reporter for KARE Channel 11 in Minneapolis, "KARE 11 confirmed at least nine more people were arrested in connection with a St. Paul church protest last month that already saw the high-profile arrests of journalists Georgia Fort and Don Lemon, as well as attorney and activist Nekima Levy Armstrong. KARE's Lou Raguse said sources reported those arrested were taken to the federal courthouse in St. Paul, where they're expected to make their first court appearances Friday afternoon."

Gerstein tweeted a copy of a federal court document in United States of America v. Nekima Valdez Levyarmstrong, Et Al.

In the document, Harmeet K. Dhillon — assistant U.S. attorney general in DOJ's Civil Rights Division — and other federal prosecutors write, "The United States of America, by and through its undersigned attorneys, hereby moves the Court for an order to unseal the Superseding Indictment in the above-referenced matter."

Lemon and his allies maintain that the Trump DOJ case him has no merit, as he wasn't part of the demonstration inside the Minneapolis church and was strictly there as a journalist.

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President Donald Trump wants a Republican politician in Utah, Lt. Gov. Deidre Henderson, to hand over the entire voter registration database — but she is refusing.

“Neither state nor federal law entitles the Department of Justice to collect private information on law-abiding American citizens,” Henderson said in a statement responding to Trump’s lawsuit against Utah and 28 other states. “Utahns can be assured that my office will always follow the Constitution and the law, protect voters’ rights, and administer free and fair elections.”

Trump’s Justice Department continues to claim without evidence that there is widespread voter fraud and they must acquire all states’ voter registration data. Federal judges have dismissed Trump’s lawsuits in California, Georgia, Michigan and Oregon.

Henderson is not alone among state officials condemning Trump’s actions. Nevada Secretary of State Francisco Aguilar (D) described Trump’s claims of noncitizen voting and other kinds of foreign interference as a “red herring” and “non-issue” meant to intimidate voters.

“The only people who should be concerned by this are criminals,” White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson said in a statement defending its actions. “Noncitizen voting is a crime. Anyone breaking the law will be held accountable.”

Although the White House has repeatedly threatened to nationalize elections, the president lacks the authority to do so.

“Here is the reality: the president has no authority to run federal elections,” University of Kentucky professor Joshua A. Douglas said. “The Constitution, through the Elections Clause in Article I, Section 4, assigns that power to the states, while allowing Congress to make or alter election regulations. Courts have already blocked the president’s executive order on voter registration rules. Neither an executive order nor presidential bombast can override our decentralized constitutional structure.”

Conservative historian Robert Kagan told CNN’s Christiane Amanpour earlier this month that the GOP is the “party of dictatorship” because it is considering anti-democratic measures to keep Trump in power.

“I am worried, as I have said and others have been pointing out, about whether we will even have free and fair elections in 2026, let alone in 2028,” Kagan told Amanpour. “I think Trump has a plan to disrupt those elections, and I don't think he's willing to allow Democrats to take control of one or both houses as could happen in a free election.”

Sometimes Republicans drop their mask regarding their intentions regarding the midterm elections.

:{“The writing on the wall,” tweeted Republican Rep. Anna Paulina Luna of Florida in a message tagging Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.). Luna attached a flowchart which showed two paths from “Gain majority” in which, unless Republicans pass the SAVE Act, they lose control of the House.

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2 26 pirro fail to get even one single grand juror on kelly

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Judge tears apart Trump admin for misleading him in new ruling

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Politico legal reporterKyle Cheney wrote on X that the Justice Department and Department of Homeland Security may get hauled into court if an angry New Jersey Judge has anything to say about it.

Over the past months, news outlets have reported that judges at the magistrate and federal levels have reached their limits with ill-prepared or inexperienced DOJ lawyers, lies byprosecutors, and Homeland Security staff who refuse to follow their court orders.

Such was the case in New Jersey on Thursday when U.S. District Court Judge Zahid N. Quraishi demanded the immediate release of a 29-year-old native and citizen of El Salvador

"Arguably worse, while the procedures for the Government's immigration arrests and detention may have had the initial appearance of negligence, they have since slid downward into manifest recklessness," the judge wrote in the ruling.

"Immigrants are swept up into custody and shifted repeatedly around the country without warning or explanation. Efforts by the Court in this District to protect detainees' rights have been largely frustrated by the Government. Earlier this month, the U.S. Attorney's Office conceded to violating 72 orders issued in immigration habeas corpus cases in this District alone," the judge continued. 'That number by itself is objectively appalling, but at least one judge has indicated that it was underreported. The U.S. Attorney's Office couched these violations as unintentional."

The second Cheney pointed out ended by saying, "Sadly, the well-deserved credibility once attached to that distinguished Office is now a presumption that 'has been undeniably eroded.' The Government's continued actions after being called to task can now only be deemed intentional. The Undersigned will not stand idly by and allow this intentional misconduct to go on. It ends today."

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Ryan Goodman, editor-in-chief of"Just Security," uncovered a document in which the New York Police Department was told by the federal government to "stand down" on its investigation into Jeffrey Epstein.

In a video posted Monday, Goodman said that he found documents in which the FBI sent the instructions the NYPD just five days after Epstein's arrest. Goodman said he found it surprising that the order also applied to the SVU (Special Victims Unit). Goodman explained that it's the key part of law enforcement "that is specially trained and equipped to investigate crimes against minors and crimes of such abuse."

The documents show that the existing district attorney of New York was in an ongoing investigation into Epstein and was communicating with the victims. Some of those victims then began to speak out, including a 2019 interview with Savannah Guthrie on NBC.

Goodman said that they considered the DA reaching out to victims a "fire" that needed to be put out. All of this was during President Donald Trump's first administration.

"It's quite stunning because a large part of the allegations against Epstein, Ghislaine Maxwell and alleged co-conspirators happened in New York. That would be the epicenter of a lot of the crimes, of the trafficking of the young girls and women, the sexual abuse of the young girls and women happened in the townhouse of the Upper East Side in Manhattan," Goodman explained.

So, to close off such an investigation from those on the ground, he said, is "astonishing" as it would be the most productive avenue of getting at the other men involved in the crimes.

While the federal government may have assumed that the NYPD and DA stopped, they actually continued the probe through a "robust investigation," including speaking to the survivors through their attorneys. One part of that investigation focuses specifically on Leon Black, a private equity investor, whom Business Insider reported on last week. Black has never been charged.

The Office of the New Mexico Attorney General, Raúl Torrez, said last week that in 2019, it was also told to stand down.

The "investigation was closed in 2019 at the request of the U.S Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York," Torrez said. He wants them to be reopened. The U.S. attorney in 2019 was Geoffrey Berman, who was also actively investigating potential financial abuses related to Donald Trump's 2017 Presidential Inaugural Committee and pursuing investigations involving Michael Cohen from 2018 to 2019.

The documents show that on Dec. 6, 2018, the NYPD, SDNY and the FBIChild Exploitation Human Trafficking Task Force opened a case on Epstein.

On July 10, 2019 an Epstein survivor, Jennifer Araoz, was interviewed by Guthrie for the TODAY Show. She said the recruiter knew she was 14. After the interview aired, Araoz submitted a New York State court filing seeking information from Epstein about a recruiter who allegedly worked with him to "recruit" her. Her lawsuit against Maxwell and an assistant was filed on Aug 14, 2019, just four days after Epstein was found dead. So, she filed the suit against his estate.

The "stand down" directive came in 2019 on July 10 and 11. One month later, Epstein was dead.

By Jan. 2020, emails showed that the FBI was discussing the NYPD's probe of Epstein.

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'String of embarrassing defeats' for Trump DOJ as courts expose officers’ lies

Judge tears apart Trump prosecutors for omitting crucial info

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an 2 26

According to New Republic sources, President Donald Trump's allies in the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) were determined to move ahead with a federal prosecution of six Democrats even though they couldn't specify exactly what laws were violated. And the allegations from reporter Greg Sargent's sources are so damning, a legal blogger argues, that DOJ attorneys who pursued the case should be disbarred.

In a late 2025 video, six Democrats — who included Sen. Mark Kelly (D-Arizona) and Sen. Elissa Slotkin (D-Michigan) — told members of the U.S. Armed Forces that they should disobey any orders from Trump if they are blatantly illegal. Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth were furious, with Trump attacking the Democrats as "traitors" and saying they deserved to be "arrested and put on trial."

But a federal grand jury, on February 10, decided against an indictment. And Sargent reported that according to attorney Preet Bharara — who was representing Slotkin — Trump's DOJ allies, including prosecutor Jeanine Pirro, were unable to tell him what specific statutes were violated. Regardless, the prosecutors were determined to move ahead with an indictment.

Responding to Sargent's reporting in a February 18 post on X, legal blogger Scary Lawyer Guy argued that such "misconduct' should result in the federal prosecutors losing their right to practice law.

Scary Lawyer Guy tweeted, "Textbook prosecutorial misconduct that should result in disbarment. Walking into a GJ and attempting to obtain an indictment against sitting members of Congress WITH NO IDENTIFIED CRIMINAL STATUTE BEING VIOLATED should also be a 'gate' level scandal but no one in the press cares."

Scary Lawyer Guy isn't the only one who is criticizing the Trump DOJ's conduct.

Kristy Parker, counsel for the group Protect Democracy and a former DOJ prosecutor told Sargent, "That is irregular. Typically, when someone is the target of a criminal investigation, it's unusual to dissemble with the target's lawyer about what the charges might be that close to an indictment. It's not how federal prosecutors are supposed to conduct themselves."

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:{:{sue trump}:

an 2 26

Fulton County, Georgia, has hit back against the Trump administration following the controversial election center raid last month, with Politico's Josh Gerstein reporting that a revised filing from the county accused the government of being "woefully short" on evidence of wrongdoing and violating the Constitution.

Near the end of January, FBI agents raided an election center in Fulton County, the most populous county in Georgia, and a major focal point for Donald Trump's false claims that voter fraud cost him the 2020 election. Agents gathered various records from the building, including 2020 ballots, as part of an investigation into long-debunked allegations of fraud in the state, which went for Joe Biden by a slim margin in the 2020 race. Critics have also alleged that the raid is intended to fabricate a pretext to allow the federal government to interfere with Georgia elections.

The county has since taken the administration to court over the incident, demanding that they return the ballots seized last month and accusing it of pushing through with the operation despite having no evidence of wrongdoing. A revised filing from Tuesday afternoon made that argument clear, as Gerstein explained in a post to X.

"Revised Fulton County demand for return of 2020 ballots seized by FBI calls evidence 'woefully short' of showing probable cause that a crime was committed," Gerstein wrote. "County says actions would have to be willful to be crimes & no claim/proof of that."

Within the new filing, the county alleged that the sworn affidavits submitted by FBI agents claiming there to be probable cause for the raid were lacking actual evidence, despite a judge later signing off on a warrant for the operation. It also accused the government of violating Fourth Amendment rights against "unreasonable search and seizure."

"In seizing Petitioners’ property by relying on a warrant that was entirely devoid of probable cause, Respondent callously disregarded Petitioners’ rights underthe Fourth Amendment," the county's petition argued. "This flagrant constitutional violation compels immediate equitable relief from this Court—namely, an order requiring Respondent to return Fulton County’s original election records, as well as any copies."

In response to another X user, Gerstein noted that "probable cause to believe a crime was committed" is necessary to get a search and seizure warrant.

Legal experts have previously weighed in on these affidavits after they were unsealed, expressing befuddlement as to how a judge could have signed off on a warrant in response to them. David Becker, the founder and director of the Center for Election Innovation and Research, told CNN last week that there was "nothing" in them that showed probable cause.

"I have no idea how it was signed off on," Becker said. "When I heard they were unsealing the affidavit, I was actually expecting — even though we knew there would be no actual reality of a crime there, those ballots have been counted multiple times — but I was wondering what the administration would use that was new, that would justify these claims... There was no allegation of intent, which is a necessary element of the crime. In fact, they admit there's no intent that's evident at all."

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an 2 26

Donald Trump appears to have made a major mistake with his purge of top lawyers from the Department of Justice, as many of these "all-star" professionals are now joining the institutions fighting back against his presidency, in a turn of events one former attorney dubbed "idiocy."

On Tuesday, CBS News' top justice correspondent Scott MacFarlane shared a video to X and BlueSky detailing this trend, likening it to a sports team trading its best players to rival teams.

"It's hard enough to get by without your best players on the field, but you certainly don't want to play against them, and have huge adversaries when you play your opponents," MacFarlane explained.

The Trump administration, he argued, "has been getting rid of some of its all-stars" in the DOJ, and it is starting to become a huge "problem" as they join the efforts to "challenge the administration," essentially "joining the rival team." That is on top of the severe drain of professional experience and "institutional memory" that these hiring purges have cost the government across every department.

As MacFarlane laid out in the video, Trump's purge of these top lawyers was driven primarily by political motivations and a desire for personal retribution. Many of the attorneys who got the ax when Trump returned to the White House were the ones who had worked to convict Jan. 6 rioters, whom he gave a mass pardon early on in his term. He also cut many individuals who took part in the federal investigation of him during his time away from Washington, D.C.

"Some have been fired, some have been pushed out, some have said, 'You know what? I've had about enough of this politicized Department of Justice, I'm out of here,'" MacFarlane said. "I'm moving on to greener pastures."

MacFarlane gave the example of Mike Romano, a "storied, prolific" former DOJ lawyer known for his "incredible record" prosecuting Jan. 6 defendants. Since leaving the federal government in 2025, he has joined a firm handling "labor cases, among other things." He also recently testified before the Senate last week in a hearing where he "reinforced the truth about Jan. 6, that it was a righteous prosecution and an important prosecution, pushing back on the administration's false claims and lies."

He also highlighted the Washington Litigation Group, a nonprofit staffed with many individuals who previously worked with Jack Smithon the criminal cases against Trump. This group is now taking part in the fight against such things as Trump's effort to add his name to the Kennedy Center and the closure of a "key civil rights division" within the DOJ.

"These nonprofits and firms are capitalizing on the Department of Justice's idiocy," one anonymous former prosecutor told MacFarlane.

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an 2 26

Leading officials in the Trump administration have been aware of the skyrocketing use of violent force by federal agents, according to newly unearthed emails, with the trend being known well before two U.S. citizens were gunned down in Minnesota.

According to a Tuesday report from Politico, the emails were obtained by American Oversight — a "liberal leaning watchdog nonprofit" — using Freedom of Information Act requests. They reveal that instances of "lethal force or non-lethal efforts to physically restrain or subdue people or neutralize threats" began to increase "rapidly" among federal immigration officers after Trump's return to the White House, and that officials in charge of these agents were aware of it.

The Department of Homeland Security has maintained over the last year, in the face of mounting reports of ICE agents' harassment and brutal physical tactics, that its agents were acting in accordance with the standards set during training and using "incredible restraint" to avoid force in the field.

"Our ICE agents are following the law and are running their operations according to training," DHS Secretary Kristi Noem said last month, following the deaths of Renee Good and Alex Pretti at the hands of ICE and CBP agents.

The emails, however, show that instances of violent force quadrupled in the early months of Trump's second term.

"Caleb Vitello, at the time the official tasked with overseeing field and enforcement operations at ICE, was informed on March 20 that ICE officers had reported 67 incidents where they had used force in the first two months of Trump’s term, according to the emails," Politico's report detailed. "In the same time frame in 2024, that number was 17 incidents, representing a nearly four-fold increase. Days before, Vitello was informed that the use of force in the first two weeks of March alone had quadrupled compared with the same timeframe the year before, per another email."

The emails also reveal the priorities of those in charge when faced with this trend. According to Politico, ICE officials had no "particular urgency" as far as addressing the use of force by agents. Instead, they were more interested in shifting the narrative to assaults on ICE agents, which were also up more than fourfold in the early months of 2025. Officials also deflected blame onto Democratic leaders in the cities where their agents operated, accusing them of "stoking tensions."

"The email indicated that ICE leadership was keen to prosecute those cases," Politico explained. "With a unit chief writing to Vitello that a team in a regional office could 'package up a summary of the needed elements of the crime, definitions of what constitutes assault, etc with the intent of broadcasting to the workforce in an effort to drive more presentations for prosecution.'”

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AN 2 26

'Aberrational': Former judge stunned at DOJ’s 'unprecedented' string of grand jury defeats - Alternet.org

AN 2 26 KELLY?

Republican-appointed judge cites Orwell in scathing rebuke of Trump admin

David Badash

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AN 2 26

Trump fires top DOJ official after disagreement over case

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an 2 26

The Trump administration's accusation against former CNN journalist Don Lemon appeared to be contradicted in a newly released piece of video, according to a Friday report from the Washington Post, casting significant doubt on the rationale given for his the charges brought against him.

Last month, Lemon, along with Twin Cities-based reporter Georgia Fort and several others, was arrested by federal officers in connection with his presence at a protest that took place at a St. Paul church weeks prior. Lemon and Fortasserted that they were present for the event as journalists covering it, but the federal indictment against them claims that they were "agitators" along with the rest of the protesters, who "entered the Church in a coordinated takeover-style attack."

The indictment did not characterize Lemon and Fort as reporters, aside from mentions of Lemon engaging in a livestream for his online show and Fort conducting an interview. They and the rest of the protesters are charged with conspiring to deprive congregants of their religious rights and of interfering with access to a place of worship. The DOJ alleged that they "oppressed, threatened, and intimidated" church attendees "by physically occupying most of the main aisle and rows of chairs near the front of the Church, engaging in menacing and threatening behavior."

"Don has been a journalist for 30 years, and his constitutionally protected work in Minneapolis was no different than what he has always done," Lemon's attorney, Abbe Lowell, said following his arrest.

On Friday, the Washington Post reported on footage of the protest from a Black Lives Matter livestream and a livestream conducted by Fort. At no point in the footage, the outlet explained, did Lemon appear to behave in a manner consistent with the allegations against him.

"Alive stream from Black Lives Matter Minnesota captures Lemon standing at the back of the sanctuary when the protest begins about two minutes later," the report detailed. "He soon moves forward to where the demonstrators are gathered and can be heard on his feed narrating the events for his audience. Fort’s live stream shows protesters chanting anti-ICE slogans and in some cases confronting parishioners... Lemon remains toward the front of the church — sometimes off to the side and sometimes near the main aisle — for roughly 16 minutes. "

The report continued: "For less than half of that time, he is off-camera but his feed remains live with audio from his microphone. His feed drops out entirely on several occasions for a few seconds at a time. The videos and audio reviewed by The Post contain no indication Lemon threatened church congregants or chanted or yelled."

At one point in the footage reviewed, Lemon can be heard saying, "I’m not part of the group; I’m just here photographing. I’m a journalist." Later on, he holds the door for people leaving the church, asking some for interviews. When one man declines the request, Lemon said, "Okay, thank you, I appreciate it." The two continue a heated back-and-forth after the man claimed to support the deportation operation in the Twin Cities area, with Lemon accusing him of not listening to facts and the man countering that Lemon was posing as a journalist. While tense, the Post noted that Lemon at no point prevented the man from exiting the building, as the indictment said.

“There is clearly no physical obstruction of that exit,” Judy Appelbaum, who worked as a lead congressional staffer involved in drafting the 1994 law that Lemon was charged under, explained to the Post. “And I don’t see any use of force, nor any threat of force.”

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AN 2 26 NOT SURE WHAT LEVEL

Judge denies DHS push for 'retaliatory' deportation of 5-year-old’s family

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AN 2 26

DOJ ordered prosecutor back to work on case after she recused herself - Alternet.org

===

FAIL IN CT

AN 2 26

The New York Times reports a Washington D.C. grand jury has again refused to acquiesce to President Donald Trump’s quest to prosecute his political foes, with the paper calling the rejection “a remarkable rebuke” from ordinary citizens.

The Times reports: “Federal prosecutors in Washington sought and failed on Tuesday to secure an indictment against six Democratic lawmakers who posted a video last fall that enraged President Trump by reminding active-duty members of the military and intelligence community that they were obligated to refuse illegal orders, four people familiar with the matter said.”

The *Times* additionally reports it was already remarkable that the U.S. attorney’s office in Washington — led by Trump ally Jeanine Pirro — even authorized prosecutors to approach a grand jury with an indictment of the six members of Congress, all of whom had served in the military or the nation’s spy agencies.

It is rare for grand jurors to snub prosecutors’ indictment requests, considering prosecutors get to dominate the jury with one-sided arguments leading up to their decision. However, the Times reports it has happened with increased frequency with Trump’s Justice Department “as his appointees push ahead with questionable cases.”

It is doubly surprising considering the president of the United States accused Sen. Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.) and the other legislators of seditious conspiracy and said they could potentially be put to death. The U.S. Department of Defense later announced that it was launching an investigation into Kelly for participating in the video warning active-duty troops to not follow illegal orders from Trump and also threatened to court martial the NASA astronaut.

But the jury apparently disagreed on all counts and refused to indict any of the legislators incriminated by Trump.

Trump’s targets also Sen. Elissa Slotkin (D-Mich.) and four colleagues in the House: Jason Crow (D-Colo.) Maggie Goodlander, (D-N.H.), Chrissy Houlahan (D-Pa.) and Chris Deluzio (D-Pa).

Kelly is already suing the Pentagon over its attempts to punish him.

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AN 2 26

Fox News host-turned U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro's attempt to criminally charge six members of Congress fell flat this week. That may be due to the personnel she put in charge of making the case to the grand jury.

Bloomberg Law reported Wednesday that one of the Department of Justice (DOJ) prosecutors Pirro tasked with convincing a grand jury to indict members of Congress — who recorded a video message encouraging active-duty military service members to honor their oath to disobey illegal orders — is a dance photographer with no prior DOJ experience.

According to Bloomberg, Steve Vandervelden currently maintains a photography studio, and his Instagram profile shows posts as recent as Wednesday morning. He previously worked for Pirro several decades ago when she was the district attorney in Westchester County, New York. The other prosecutor on the case, Carlton Davis, last worked for the DOJ in 2018 as an assistant U.S. attorney in the Eastern District of Virginia.

"I spent a good portion of my life peering into the darkness looking for the bad guy,” Vandervelven told the Rockland/Westchester Journal News in 2023, when explaining why he gave up his law career for photography. “Now it’s a joy to peer into the darkness and look for the light and find beauty as opposed to the grime.”

The outlet reported that it is "unprecedented" for the DOJ to assign a high-level investigation to an outside attorney. Typically, the Justice Department relies on longtime career prosecutors with multiple years of experience working on complex cases to ensure a suspect is indicted by a grand jury.

According to Bloomberg's unnamed sources within the DOJ, career prosecutors were alarmed that Pirro prevented the Justice Department's Public Integrity (PIN) section — which typically handles investigations of sitting elected officials – from the case involving the six Democratic lawmakers. However, PIN was effectively hollowed out last year with a wave of firings and resignations, and Bloomberg reported that PIN's remaining staff may have not had any input on the case.

The six Democrats in the video are all veterans of either the U.S. military or intelligence agencies. Sens. Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.) and Elissa Slotkin (D-Mich.) joined Reps. Jason Crow (D-Colo.), Maggie Goodlander (D-N.H.), Chris DeLuzio (D-Pa.) and Chrissy Houlahan (D-Pa.) to remind troops of the Uniform Code of Military Justice's instructions to obey all orders from superior officers, except for orders that are illegal.

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REBOOT BAND BACK TOGETHER FULTON CTY BALLOTS 2 26

The newly released warrant application behind the FBI raid of 2020 election ballots from Fulton County, Georgia is under new scrutiny. A new report reveals the FBI's criminal investigation originated from a referral sent by a “stop the steal” campaign attorney known for “spreading baseless allegations of election fraud.”

The supporting affidavit for the warrant to search Fulton County election records was unsealed Tuesday, publicly revealing the mechanics behind the invasive search and seizure conducted by President Donald Trump’s politicized FBI.

“The FBI criminal investigation originated from a referral sent by Kurt Olsen, presidentially appointed Director of Election Security and Integrity,” stated an attachment to the application for the warrant approved by U.S. District Court magistrate judge Catherine M. Salinas.

Politico revealed that Olsen is also being furnished with "highly classified material" with few limitations, despite Olsen having no intelligence background or experience. Some of the documents he has received from American spy agencies reportedly includes "sensitive compartmented intelligence programs," which are among the most secretive materials held by intelligence agencies. He also reportedly has a direct line to Trump, and exploits those ties whenever agencies push back against his demands for material.

“Every time he hits a roadblock, he just calls POTUS," An anonymous source told Politico.

Social media slammed the news that the same lawyer receiving highly sensitive voter data is also the source of the warrant that delivered the info.

“A beleaguered election denier — who had already been debunked many times — somehow convinced Trump and Bondi and Patel and Gabbard that there was cheating in Georgia when, in fact, it was disproven many times over,” posted one commenter on X. "Poorest Loser Ever."

“So this is basically a rehash of every single conspiracy about the G.A. elections, filed as an affidavit by an FBI agent,” said another critic on X. “They're even bringing back the ‘folded ballots’ thing. Incredible.”

“Kurt Olsen was one of Kari Lake's attorneys when she kept suing to be the Governor of Az. He was charged with making FALSE STATEMENTS TO THE COURT,” posted yet another commenter.

“Basically, the person who issued the warrant has a big f—— red hat on their head right now,” said another.

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RWW

02/09/2026

Kyle Mantyla

Miles Klee @ Wired: Turning Point USA’s Halftime Show Was Exactly What You’d Expect

“The All-American Halftime Show," born out of outrage over Bad Bunny’s Super Bowl performance, fell short of the hype. From Kid Rock’s poor lip synching to Erika Kirk being MIA, it was simply dull.

Ellen Ioanes @ The American Prospect: Board of Peace Is a Board of Profits

Corporate interests dominate the organization planning the reconstruction of Gaza.

Oriana González @ NOTUS: Republicans Want Nothing to Do With Conservative Efforts to Ban Gay Marriage

Trump has moved the Republican Party away from its decades-old opposition to same-sex marriage, and public support remains high.

Bryan Kaylor @ Public Witness: At National Prayer Breakfast, Hegseth Says US Soldiers Gain Salvation by Dying for ‘Christian Nation’

Pete Hegseth, who likes to call himself the “Secretary of War,” spoke after Trump to baptize the U.S. and especially its military. He did so by highlighting the worship services he’s been leading at the Pentagon. And he even suggested that soldiers can gain salvation by fighting for the United States.

Hafiz Rashid @ The New Republic: March for Life Attendees Are Getting Measles

It turns out the anti-abortion March for Life demonstration was a measles superspreader event.

Josh Kovensky @ **:{Talking Points Memo: Trump DOJ Files 9/11-Era Charges Against Leftists Across the Country}:

Under Trump, the DOJ has changed how it brings terrorism cases, and is training them on the opposition.

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AN 2 26

President Donald Trump's administration is now inviting election officials from all 50 states to a conference call later this month, where they will reportedly briefed on plans for this fall's midterm elections.

Crooked Media correspondent Matt Berg reported Thursday on an email sent to state officials overseeing elections from an FBI agent identifying themselves as an "FBI election executive." The email invites states to participate in a February 25 conference call with "your election partners at the FBI, DOJ, DHS, USPIS [U.S. Postal Inspection Service] and the EAC [Election Assistance Commission]" where agencies will discuss "preparations" for the 2026 midterm elections. The email also mentioned a separate March 4 call "for members of the EAC's Local Leadership Council."

Berg noted that the purpose of the call "remains unclear," though noted the email was sent after Trump repeatedly called for the federal government to "nationalize the voting" in a podcast interview with former FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino. Berg wrote that he obtained the email via a public records request.

"I asked the FBI for an explanation, but a spokesperson wouldn’t give me one, writing: 'Thank you for reaching out. The FBI has no comment,'" Berg tweeted.

Nevada Secretary of State Cisco Aguilar told Berg that in his three years overseeing Nevada's elections, he had never heard of the FBI organizing a call between state election officials and federal agencies. He felt so unnerved by the message that he replied and asked: "Is this real?"

"I was just like, ‘what is this?’ It’s the strangest thing in the world that the FBI is reaching out to us and trying to coordinate election security," Aguilar said. "It's never happened in the past. The casualness which they did ... it was just beyond crazy."

"They’re just sowing this confusion and chaos to try to intimidate us into compliance," he added.

The Nevada elections chief said he is "constantly preparing and strategizing" for potential interference in the Silver State's 2026 election, and that he is taking Trump's threats seriously.

"ne. “We have to prepare for that litigation at a moment's notice, and we will be prepared in Nevada to push back," he said.

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AN 2 26

Concern is mounting over reports that the FBI emailed election officials in all 50 states to invite them to a conference call with multiple federal agencies about the 2026 midterms — an outreach election officials reportedly view as unusual and concerning.

“The exact purpose of the call remains unclear. But it’s raising concerns after President Donald Trump called for state elections to be nationalized,” Crooked Media reported on Thursday. “The email is raising anxiety at a moment when Trump is calling for the federal government to take control of elections in 15 states, and dispatching the FBI to investigate the 2020 election in battleground state Georgia.”

“Election officials from every state received an invitation for the call on Feb. 25th, to be joined by Trump’s FBI, Department of Justice, Department of Homeland Security, U.S. Postal Inspection Service and U.S. Election Assistance Commission,” according to Crooked Media’s Matt Berg. He added: “The email, which was obtained via public records request, was sent on Tuesday by an official named Kellie Hardiman, who gave her title as ‘FBI Election Executive.'”

Berg published a copy of the email to social media.

“To prepare for the 2026 US midterm elections, your election partners at the FBI, DOJ, DHS, USPIS, and the EAC would like to invite you to a call where we can discuss our preparations for the cycle, as well as updates and resources we can provide to you and your staff,” it read.

“Last week,” NBC News, adding to the story, reported that “at a meeting of the National Association of Secretaries of State, officials pushed back against a Trump administration official who spoke about supporting election officials’ work.”

Critics expressed deep concern.

Veteran journalist Jay Bookman described it as “extremely alarming,” and wrote: “It sounds like the Mafia declaring itself your ‘partner’ and inviting you to a meeting that you dare not refuse.”

“Trump is very actively planning to rig the upcoming elections,” alleged attorney Aaron Regunberg, a contributing editor at The New Republic. “I guess we better keep funding the terrorist militia force he’s going to use to execute these plans without ever securing a single real concession.”

“The regime is now doing everything in its power to prevent the midterms from being free, fair and independent elections — if they even allow elections to occur at all,” argued MS NOW analyst Fernand R. Amandi.

“Better get ready, and at every level,” claimed professor and historian Steven Seegel. “The incumbent MAGA-GOP party-cult will allege fraud (‘stop the steal’) in advance, use ICE in strategic districts and locales, then escalate from voter intimidation to violence. That’s the basic set-up here for 2026. It’s premeditated.”

“Trump said he wants to nationalize elections and deploy ICE to Blue cities in swing states, which is his way of trying to steal the midterms, and every election after,” alleged health care activist Melanie D’Arrigo. “This is how it begins.”

Historian and associate professor Keith Orejel claimed the “maneuvering to try and steal the midterms is so clumsy and transparent.”

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AN Lawyers 'astonished' at mass exodus from Trump DOJ as recruiting 'plummets'

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AN 2 26

Court system 'chaos' as judges say Trump officials make it hard to 'keep up with it all'

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An 2 26

President Donald Trump's administration seems very confused as to why Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard was in Georgia for the FBI's raid on the Fulton County Election Hub and Operation Center late last month. The story has now changed four times, and twice in the past 24 hours.

The first to comment on Gabbard was Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, who claimed that Gabbard just happened to be in Atlanta when the raid happened. Gabbard then said that Trump asked her personally to go to Atlanta for the raid.

In a letter she sent to Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.) and Rep. Jim Himes (D-Conn.), Gabbard wrote, "My presence was requested by the President and executed under my broad statutory authority to coordinate, integrate and analyze intelligence related to election security, including counter-intelligence, foreign and other malign influence and cybersecurity."

By Wednesday, Trump appeared to forget about it.

In a conversation with "NBC Nightly News" anchor Tom Llamas, Trump spoke about his conspiracy theory that he lost the 2020 election. Llamas asked Trump point-blank, “Why is Tulsi Gabbard there?”

“I don’t know,” Trump answered. “But a lot of the cheating comes from, it’s international cheating.”

Less than 24 hours later, Trump's story changed again.

While he was speaking to the National Prayer Breakfast, Trump gushed over Gabbard for attending the raid.

“She took a lot of heat two days ago because she went in at Pam’s insistence,” the president said, referring to Attorney General Pam Bondi.

“They say, ‘why is she doing it’… because Pam wanted her to do it. And you know why? Because she’s smart," Trump added, relayed The Guardian.

Georgia lawmakers are concerned about Trump's spreading of conspiracy theories and the purpose of the Fulton County raid. Georgia’s Democratic lawmakers sent a letter to Bondi on Thursday morning, asking for specifics.

“We are deeply concerned that President Trump’s consistent spreading of misinformation and dangerous conspiracy theories about the 2020 election fundamentally undermines the electoral process, endangers election workers, and erodes public trust in our democracy,” the lawmakers wrote. “This unprecedented seizure only heightens those concerns.”

If "the Trump administration is investigating a legitimate foreign intelligence nexus," it would legally require "an immediate congressional briefing," said Sen. Raphael Warnock and Reps. Lucy McBath and Nikema Williams all Democrats from Georgia.

The search warrant that demanded "copies" of the necessary documents didn't come from a local judge. According to the lawmakers, “unusually, the warrant was filed by the U.S. attorney for the eastern district of Missouri and follows the reported firing of the Atlanta FBI special agent in charge Paul Brown after expressing concern about this search."

The Associated Press reported that Brown was ousted the week before the raid. He was overseeing the Atlanta office. MS NOW confirmed in the days that followed that the Brown was pushed out because he refused to cooperate.

The group requested a briefing from the Department of Justice “concerning this activity and its related investigation by February 13, 2026."

The statute of limitations on the case has long expired. So, the only way the administration would be able to do anything about it is if there was some kind of ongoing conspiracy, said Georgia lawyer Michael J. Moore when speaking to CNN.

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an 2 26

Jeanine Pirro backs down from gun threat after 2nd Amendment backlash

Adam Lynch

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An 2 26

It was reported earlier this week that Ed Martin, President Donald Trump's leader on his "anti-weaponization" effort, was sidelined and is expected to leave the Justice Department altogether.

According to CNN, the reason for Martin's departure is he leaked secret grand jury information to the public, which is illegal. An investigation by Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche that began last year found Martin leaked information about the Trump administration's efforts to indict Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calf.) and New York Attorney General Letitia James.

The Trump DOJ has been unable to indict Schiff and the charges against James were dismissed after a judge found that prosecutor Lindsey Halligan was not in the post legally. A new grand jury then refused to indict James.

The CNN source that was briefed on the matter said Martin tried to deny he leaked secret information, but he evidently used emails to coordinate it.

"The review of Martin’s handling of materials burst into public view in December after a witness who received a subpoena showed up at the courthouse in Greenbelt, Maryland, seeking to testify," the report said.

The woman said she was asked about two people who have been working on investigations with Martin and Federal Housing Finance Agency Director Bill Pulte. The DOJ wanted to know whether the people were impersonating federal agents.

Attorney General Pam Bondi wrote on X, “There is no investigation into Bill Pulte," but never mentioned Martin.

Martin hasn't been charged with a crime yet and CNN said that the DOJ hasn't determined "whether any law was broken."

Leaking federal grand jury information is a criminal offense, according to the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press. It violates Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 6(e). The Justice Department's own website outlines the rules in detail.

Blanche denied there were any "misconduct investigations into Ed Martin." He said, "Ed is doing a great job as Pardon Attorney.”

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an 2 26

A newly surfaced Trump administration memo has been deemed "outrageous," per an analysis from Bloomberg, for paving the way to turn federal agents into "an all-powerful police force" for the president.

The memo, first reported on by the New York Times, pertains to officers with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and authorizes them to make arrests of anyonethey suspect of being undocumented, without the need for a warrant and without providing any proof that the individual is a flight risk. Breaking down the details for Bloomberg, legal scholar Noah Feldman decried the memo as an attempt not merely to exploit "loopholes" in the system, but to fundamentally rewrite the law itself.

"The directive, contained in a memo obtained by the New York Times, reverses long-standing ICE policy and effectively renders the warrant requirement itself empty," Feldman wrote. "Coming on the heels of another legally indefensible memo, which purported to allow ICE agents to enter the homes of suspected undocumented people without a judicial warrant, the new policy shows that ICE isn’t just exploiting legal loopholes to create massive sweeps. Instead, it reveals an agency actively attempting to change the legal landscape to turn itself into an all-powerful police force."

According to Feldman, ICE was previously authorized to make warrantless arrests under two circumstances. The first was when an officer directly witnessed someone making an unlawful crossing at the U.S. border. Given the nature of ICE's nationwide mass deportation agenda, he noted that this circumstance is essentially irrelevant. The second instance would be, as he noted earlier in his piece, when an office “has reason to believe” that someone is in the U.S. with undocumented status and “is likely to escape before a warrant can be obtained for his arrest.”

Feldman argued that this new memo stems from a 2025 Supreme Court ruling that "disasterously eroded" the protections afforded by the law to individual rights. In the decision, Justice Brett Kavanaugh said that officers were permitted to make arrests based on "reasonable suspicions," which could include factors such as their ethnicity or the language they spoke, two factors that did not previously meet the standard for probable cause.

The memo broadens the definition of a flight risk for ICE officers, allowing them to arrest anyone who is "likely to escape," meaning anyone who might not be expected to remain at the scene of a stop by the time an arrest warrant is obtained.

"Since just about anyone would walk away from an ICE arrest if they could (at least under current circumstances), it follows from this interpretation that anyone stopped by ICE is 'likely to escape' — and therefore may be subjected to warrantless arrest," Feldman explained.

He later added: "I realize all these legal technical details are a lot. So let me put it simply. Under the new memo, ICE agents can detain anyone they think might be undocumented, based on factors like ethnic appearance, language, and where you happen to be hanging out when they stop you. Once they’ve stopped you, they can claim to have probable cause that you’re undocumented (for example, because you don’t have proof of citizenship on you). Then the officers can simply arrest you, without a warrant. The total package amounts to a sweeping authorization for ICE agents to roam the streets, grab just about anyone they want, arrest and detain them."

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an 2 26

Trump’s DHS doesn’t know what its own agents are saying in court: lawyer

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AN 2 26 OLD WHITE MEN NAME REDACT BUT NOT WOMEN?

'Mind-boggling': Expert says Epstein files release a 'perfect storm' of 'incompetency'

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AN 2 26

Within the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ), Donald Trump loyalist Daren Margolin is serving as director of the Executive Office of Immigration Review — which oversees asylum claims and deportations in immigration cases. And he’s doing so as U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and U.S. Border Patrol agents carry out militarized raids in Minneapolis and other American cities.

The Daily Beast, according to reporter Will Neal, discussed Margolin with four immigration officials who have worked with him. And they were highly critical of his performance.

Neal, in an article published on February 3, reports, "Donald Trump's gun-toting immigration courts chief is a 'total moron' ... who doesn't actually understand his job, according to multiple sources who've worked alongside him. ... They slammed him as 'lazy' and 'extremely dysfunctional,' with a 'fundamental lack of understanding' of both his administrative duties and the laws he oversees."

One of the four interviewees, all of whom spoke on condition of anonymity, told the Beast, "Nobody ever had much confidence in him. I never got the impression he understood the law very well. He just wanted an easy job, where he didn't have to learn or do anything."

Another interviewee told the Beast, "He's a total moron. Such a 'f—— dope."

One of the interviewees alleges that Margolin was picked not despite his "incompetence," but "because of" it.

That interviewee told the Beast, "He's just going to be a mouthpiece, relaying orders and telling everybody else they have to follow them."

Another interviewee lamented, "I'm so worried about the agency. It really breaks my heart to see."

George Pappas, a former immigration judge in Georgia, argues that the United States' immigration system is in total disarray during Trump's second presidency.

Pappas told the Beast, "We're witnessing a complete dismantling of the immigration courts, which in substance are now dead."

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AN 1 26

Atlanta Journal Constitution Senior Political columnist Patricia Murphy said the Wednesday FBI raid at the Fulton County Election Hub and Operation Center was not about prosecuting President Donald Trump’s disproven claims of a stolen election in 2020 for the millionth time.

“Although the records they took were from the election five years ago, it’s important to understand that the raid in Fulton County is not really about the 2020 elections at all, which have long since come and gone,” said Murphy. “Instead, the raid is about the next elections — who will control them in Fulton County in 2026 and who will run them in Georgia two years after that when the 2028 presidential election takes place.”

Trump may croon that “people will soon be prosecuted” but Georgia Election Commissioner Robb Pitts said the ballots that agents seized were the same ones “counted, recounted, hand-counted, debated, litigated and fought over” after Trump’s 2020 election loss in Georgia.

“Despite every attempt by the president and his legal team to prove the election had been stolen from him at the time, every road led back to the same result — Trump lost and Joe Biden won,” said Murphy. “The … question at hand is who will oversee Fulton County elections in 2026.”

Currently, elections are run by the Fulton County Election Board. But Republicans in the General Assembly passed a massive new voting law that contained language giving the Georgia State Election Board the power to replace any so-called “underperforming” county election board, including Fulton County’s, with an interim leader of their choosing.

“Replacement could only happen after an audit or investigation, and the state board left Fulton’s elections in the hands of county officials in 2023 after it said the county had made “substantial improvements” to its processes during a performance review,” said Murphy.

However, Fulton County is a large, cosmopolitan and overwhelmingly blue region of an otherwise red state, so Republicans consider it a bad actor interfering with their plan for political dominance. It was just a few years ago that the county’s population singlehandedly handed Trump his nasty defeat, turning the Southern state of Georgia blue for President Joe Biden.

Trump was furious, and so were his Republican allies — who seized upon the county’s past record of long lines, late returns and slow bookkeeping, mostly due to its inordinately high population.

“On 2020, the president went further, claiming that Fulton County was a hotbed of so much nefarious activity and rampant fraud that it cost him the election, all accusations that his White House staff dismissed and multiple courts in Georgia threw out,” Murphy wrote.

She added that thanks to the work of the state’s majority Republican government the current majority on the State Election Board “now includes three Republican members whom Trump infamously singled out in 2024 as ‘pit bulls fighting for honesty, transparency and victory.’”

Two of the so-called “pit bulls” were actually with the FBI in Union City during the Wednesday raid, Murphy said.

“If this week’s raid produces enough of a pretext for the board to act in the future, the 2026 elections in Fulton County could be overseen by someone picked by the pro-Trump State Board, not by elected Fulton commissioners themselves,” Murphy warned.

Read the AJC report at this link.

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cofman

Federal agents executed a search warrant at the Fulton County elections office in Georgia on Jan. 28, seizing 2020 ballots and related election materials in an investigation tied to alleged election law violations. The warrant listed a Missouri-based prosecutor, Thomas Albus, interim U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Missouri, as the Justice Department attorney on the document, an unusual choice for a Georgia-based investigation.

The involvement of a Missouri prosecutor in a Georgia warrant has fueled questions and controversy about the federal operation. Fulton County officials and national reporters noted that Theodore Hertzberg, the U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Georgia, was not named on the warrant, and DOJ has not publicly explained the arrangement.

Local authorities confirmed the FBI, operating under a “court-authorized activity,” found and loaded hundreds of boxes of ballots, voting rolls and machine tapes into trucks during the multi-hour search. It is unclear what evidence was presented to justify the warrant, as the supporting affidavit remains sealed.

One potential reason for Albus’s appearance on the warrant may stem from a special DOJ appointment. According to a Bloomberg Law report, Attorney General Pam Bondi quietly designated Albus under a federal statute to coordinate election integrity cases nationwide, allowing him to sign warrants and pursue investigations outside his home district.

Follow The Coffman Chronicle on NewsBreak for daily breaking political coverage.

Still, county officials and outside legal analysts say DOJ has not clarified why Georgia’s own U.S. Attorney was not listed, raising unanswered questions about the case’s handling and federal oversight.

“This is a highly unusual setup,” said one legal analyst familiar with federal election investigations, “and that’s why everyone wants to know just what legal basis exists for it.”

The raid and use of a Missouri official to authorize a Georgia warrant is now drawing scrutiny from lawmakers in both states, and legal challenges may follow as county officials seek more transparency on the federal action and detainee custody of the ballots.

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REUTERS

Nov 14 (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump on Friday announced three federal district court judge nominees, including a former law clerk to conservative U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and a lawyer pursuing litigation over the participation of transgender athletes in women's college sports.

The three new picks to serve as trial court judges in Indiana, Missouri and Tennessee brought to 34 the number of judicial nominees the Republican president has announced in his second term as he works to further shift the judiciary's ideological balance to the right.

The Republican-led Senate has confirmed 19 of them, adding to the 234 judicial nominees whose appointments Trump secured during his first term as president.

The latest nominees include Brian Lea, a former Thomas clerk and partner at Jones Day who joined the U.S. Department of Justice near the start of Trump's return to office and was picked to be a judge on the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Tennessee.

Lea, a deputy associate attorney general, has served as a lead defender of efforts by the National Institutes of Health and other agencies under Trump to sharply cut research funding provided to universities, moves that have been repeatedly blocked by judges in Boston.

"In his new role, Brian will boldly defend our Constitution, and prioritize LAW AND ORDER in Tennessee — HE WILL NOT LET YOU DOWN," Trump wrote on his social media platform Truth Social.

To fill a district court seat in the Southern District of Indiana, Trump tapped Justin Olson, a lawyer at Kroger Gardis & Regas whom the president said "has been fighting tirelessly to keep men out of women’s sports."

Olson with other lawyers has been representing former University of Kentucky swimmer Riley Gaines and other current and former college athletes in a lawsuit challenging now-rescinded NCAA policies that allowed transgender women to compete in women's sports as long as they met testosterone limits on a sport-by-sport basis.

A federal judge in Atlanta in September dismissed much of the lawsuit but allowed the plaintiffs to continue pursuing a claim arising out of Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972.

Trump also said he is nominating Platte County Circuit Court Judge Megan Benton in Missouri to serve as a life-tenured judge on the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Missouri.

She is the daughter of U.S. Circuit Judge Duane Benton, a member of the St. Louis-based 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals who last month announced that he plans to take senior status, a form of semi-retirement for judges, creating a vacancy on the appeals court that Trump can fill.

Trump in announcing Megan Benton's nomination noted her prior tenure as a prosecutor and said she "is currently delivering strong results for the Rule of Law."

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OMG

AN 1 26

When Donald Trump won the 2024 GOP presidential nomination, two of the four criminal prosecutions he was facing at the time stemmed from his efforts to overturn the 2020 election results: a federal indictment prosecuted by then-special counsel Jack Smith, and a Georgia indictment prosecuted by Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis. Both of those election interference cases were doomed when Trump defeated Democratic nominee Kamala Harris in 2024's general election, and the president continues to claim, without evidence, that the 2020 election was stolen from him.

One of Trump's most aggressive supporters after he lost Georgia to Democrat Joe Biden in 2020 was attorney Sidney Powell, who promoted a range of conspiracy theories on the election results in Georgia. And now, Powell is resurfacing after an FBI search in that state.

On Wednesday, January 28, FBI agents searched a Georgia election center, looking for records on the 2020 election. And the following day on X, formerly Twitter, Ed Martin (a Trump appointee to the U.S. Department of Justice) posted a photo of him with Powell — writing, "Good morning, America. How are ya?"

The Bulwark's Will Sommer, in response to Martin's tweet, posted, "After FBI raid on GA election office for 2020 ballots, top DOJ official posts a picture with leading election conspiracy theorist Sidney Powell."

Attorney David Colapinto, responding to the Martin/Powell photo, tweeted, "Are these two in charge of recounting the ballots?"

Powell was among Trump's many co-defendants in Willis' election interference case. In October 2023, she pleaded guilty to six misdemeanor charges and avoided jail time but was sentenced to six months of probation.

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rww

01/29/2026

Kyle Mantyla

Doug Bock Clark and Jen Fifield @ ProPublica: FBI’s Search of Georgia Election Center Is “Dangerous,” Experts Warn

The search warrant, which sought 2020 election ballots, tabulator tapes, digital data and voter rolls from Fulton County, marked what experts described as a significant escalation in President Donald Trump’s breaking of democratic norms.

Richard L. Hasen @ Slate: Trump’s Continued Obsession With 2020 Is a Joke. His Raid on a Georgia Election Site Is Not.

It’s about the raid being a test run for messing with election administrators and the counting of ballots in the midterm elections in 2026, when control of both houses of Congress could be at stake. Now is the time for state and local governments, the courts, and the people to work against such potential election subversion.

Steve Benen @ The Maddow Blog: Why did Tulsi Gabbard join an FBI raid tied to Trump’s election conspiracy theory?

The director of national intelligence was looking for ways to return to the president’s good graces. She apparently found one in an unexpected place.

Kiera Butler @ Mother Jones: Right-Wing Influencers Want Women to Love ICE

“We need more stories and images showing the professionalism and compassion of ICE.”

Will Sommer @ The Bulwark: Did Ilhan Omar Stage Her Attack? Of Course Not. But Trump Thinks So.

A real false flag story for your favorite False Flag newsletter.

Ed Mazza @ HuffPost: Trump Makes Wild Accusation Against Obama In Unhinged Evening Posting Spree

The president pushed conspiracy theories in a series of Truth Social posts.

Noah Dowe, Isabella Sherk, and Alex Kaplan @ Media Matters: The right-wing media figures who have justified Alex Pretti's killing by Trump’s DHS

MAGA media and far-right figures smeared Pretti, calling him a “race traitor” who aimed to “commit a mass murder.”

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AN 1 26

Judge tells DOJ to hand over or destroy materials used to score Comey indictment

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an 1 26

President Donald Trump was recently dealt another unfavorable ruling by a federal judge, who struck down his attempt to obtain sensitive information about voters.

On Monday, Politico legal correspondent Josh Gerstein reported that U.S. District Judge Mustafa Kasubhai – an appointee of former President Joe Biden — dismissed a lawsuit filed by the Trump administration's Department of Justice (DOJ) to obtain Oregon's database of registered voters. Kasubhai also reportedly asked the Trump administration about Attorney General Pam Bondi's letter to Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz (D) asking for Minnesota's voter database.

Gerstein reported that neither the Trump DOJ nor Oregon said that Bondi's letter to Walz impacted the Oregon case "at this stage," though Kasubhai's line of questioning suggests that the letter may potentially come up as an issue should the administration decide to appeal.

In order to overturn Judge Kasubhai's ruling, the Trump administration will have to petition the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals (whose jurisdictions includes the District of Oregon). However, the Ninth Circuit is widely regarded as one of the most liberal judicial circuits since the late 1990s. Should the Ninth Circuit decline to overturn Judge Kasubhai's decision, the Trump DOJ will have to hope for relief from the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS).

The administration's loss in the District of Oregon comes on the heels of another separate loss in the Central District of California in a similar suit. Earlier this month, U.S. District Judge David O. Carter granted a motion filed by California Secretary of State Shirley Weber to dismiss the administration's lawsuit for California's voter rolls.

"The foundation upon which American democracy has been built is the right to vote. Brave Americans have given their lives for more than two hundred years to protect this right," Carter wrote. "Now it seems the Executive Branch of the United States government wants to abridge the right of many Americans to cast their ballots."

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an 1 26

A key Trump official is facing the possibility of being held in contempt, according to Politico's Kyle Cheney, after a leading judge in Minnesota lashed the administration for failure to comply with court orders in a new filing from Monday.

According to filing documents shared to social media by Cheney, Judge Patrick J. Schlitz, the chief federal judge for the District of Minnesota, ordered Todd Lyons, the acting director of ICE under Donald Trump, to appear in court on Friday to answer for his agency's evident court order violations.

"Judge Schlitz, the chief federal judge in Minnesota, has ordered the head of ICE, Todd Lyons, to [appear] in court Friday and threatened him with contempt for the agency’s repeated violation of court orders," Cheney wrote in a post shared to X and BlueSky Tuesday morning.

In the documents, Schlitz explained that the court had previously ordered ICE to hold a bond hearing for a petitioner named "Juan T.R.," an individual detained by the agency, within one week of the order's issuance. If that hearing had not been provided in the time given by the court, T.R. was to be released from custody. As the filing explained, after the allotted time elapsed, T.R. had not been given a hearing and remained in detention.

This, Schlitz wrote, was part of a growing trend of ICE flouting court orders in Minnesota, resulting in detained individuals, many of whom have no criminal history, being taken to holding facilities in Texas.

"This is one of dozens of court orders with which respondents have failed toc omply in recent weeks," Schlitz's filing reads. "The practical consequence of respondents' failure to comply has almost always been significant hardship to aliens (many of whom have lawfully lived and worked in the United States for years and done absolutely nothing wrong). The detention of an alien is extended, or an alien who should remain in Minnesota is flown to Texas, or an alien who has been flown to Texas is released there and told to figure out a way to get home."

The filing continued: "This Court has been extremely patient with respondents, even though respondents decided to send thousands of agents to Minnesota to detain aliens without making any provision for dealing with the hundreds of habeas petitions and other lawsuits that were sure to result. Respondents have continually assured the Court that they recognize their obligation to comply with Court orders, and that they have taken steps to ensure that those orders will be honored going forward. Unfortunately, though, the violations continue. The Court's patience is at an end."

Schlitz therefore ordered Lyons to personally appear in court to explain why he should not face contempt charges for his agency's actions. The judge acknowledged that this was an "extraordinary step" to take, but argued that it was warranted in the face of ICE's "likewise extraordinary" defiance of court orders.

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AN 1 26

U.S. District Court Judge Katherine M. Menendez probed the Justice Department on Monday over whether a Temporary Restraining Order (TRO) should be issued against the federal government after the recent slaying of a second Minneapolis citizen.

Speaking to federal lawyer Brantley Mayers, Judge Menendez questioned the purpose of the surge of federal agents and whether it was to get the state and cities to change their policies, wrote legal reporter Chris Geidner of the "Law Dork" newsletter.

Geidner recounted that Mayers attempted to say that the federal goal was to enforce federal law, but Judge Menendez pointed to statements from top Trump officials, including Attorney General Pam Bondi.

In a recent letter to Gov. Tim Walz (D-Minn.), Bondi said she would ensure that all federal agents were withdrawn if he turned over all voting records in the state.

"How am I supposed to interpret [Bondi's letter]" other than that if the state/cities change these policies, 'then this will end?'" the judge asked, according to Geidner.

Meyers said that even if the policies change and the surge is relaxed, it still isn't a Tenth Amendment issue, because the "stated" reason for the surge is valid enforcement of federal law.

Menendez asked if Meyers said, "We are here until and unless you change your policies," would that be a 10th Amendment anti-commandeering problem?

Meyers answered: "No."

She then asked about Trump's comments, "Minnesota, your day of retribution is here."

"That doesn't negate the fact that legitimate law enforcement is going on," said Meyers.

Menendez asked if there was "no limit" to the number of agents Trump's administration could send. Meyers didn't answer the question, responding only that it isn't a Tenth Amendment issue.

"Is the executive trying to achieve a goal through force that it can't achieve through the courts?" the judge asked, referencing the Bondi letter again.

“It concerns me that Attorney General Bondi’s letter cites three things that are the subject of pending litigation before this court,” the judge said, according to Adam Klasfeld, who writes the "All Rise" Substack.

She then referred to a statement from Tom Homan, Trump's executive associate director for Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO).

Homan said, "If you want less officers on the street, then let us in the jails."

So, Menendez questioned if Meyers was using the idea of "law enforcement" as a catch-all.

"Your position is that it doesn’t matter how clear that the quid pro quo" is, Klasfeld quoted the judge saying.

"I have all of these quotes in the record. You're telling me that I'm reading them wrong," the judge said. "What do I have in the record to show that the surge is to make up for the harms caused by the policies?"

Meyers maintained that the surge has nothing to do with a coercion campaign to change the state's policies.

Geidner added, "Mayers is trying mightily to argue that any challenges to actions in Minnesota can be brought in separate litigation and are not proper under a Tenth Amendment claim."

Legal analyst Klasfeld agreed with the assessment.

"This was an uphill battle for the state of Minnesota — but Pam Bondi's letter may have turned it into a viable one, if not today, down the line," he wrote on BlueSky.

*See the full thread here.

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AN 1 26

A federal appeals court has now lifted restrictions on U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in how they're meant to deal with local protesters in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

Politico legal correspondent Kyle Cheney reported Wednesday that the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals — whose jurisdiction encompasses Minnesota along with six other states — has now granted a motion by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to impose a stay on a temporary restraining order (TRO) put in place by U.S. District Judge Kate Menendez (an appointee of former President Joe Biden). This means that the restrictions will no longer be in place while the DHS appeals them to the circuit court.

After Judge Menendez's TRO was stayed, this means that ICE agents will now once again be allowed to use less-than-lethal munitions on protesters, like flash-bang grenades and tear gas, and make arrests. Politico reported that the TRO was initially put in place following a lawsuit filed over DHS' heavy-handed response to protests that unfolded in the wake of the fatal shooting of U.S. citizen Renee Good.

DHS and ICE had previously been prohibited from "using pepper-spray or similar nonlethal munitions and crowd dispersal tools against persons who are engaging in peaceful and unobstructive protest activity." Judge Menendez's order also forbade federal agents from pulling over citizens for following them, as long as they were keeping an "appropriate" distance.

The overturning of Menendez's TRO comes on the heels of the Trump administration telling military personnel to prepare for a "possible mobilization to Minneapolis." The Department of Justice (DOJ) has also announced federal investigations into Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey and Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz – who have encouraged citizens to film and document ICE actions — for allegedly impeding law enforcement operations.

Former U.S. Attorney Joyce Vance recently compared the Trump administration's handling of Minneapolis protesters to former Birmingham, Alabama Sheriff Bull Connor's treatment of protesters during the Civil Rights Movement. She also condemned the DOJ for objecting to Judge Menendez's order, writing on her Substack: "DOJ has stopped being the independent gem in the crown of the American rule of law."

"Now, it’s just Trump’s law firm," she wrote. "He’s finally found his Roy Cohn, a number of them."

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AN 1 26

Liz Oyer, a former Justice Department pardon attorney, told Jim Acosta that the DOJ is participating in a massive cover-up over the shooting of a Minneapolis woman in Minnesota.

Among the revelations reported this week, Renee Nicole Good, who was shot by an ICE agent, still had a pulse when first responders arrived on scene. ICE denied a doctor access to Good who wanted to render her aid.

Oyer said that it may mean that there are other ICE officers who could be culpable in Good's death.

Both she and Acosta agreed that an investigation into the entire situation was warranted. However, the deputy attorney general already decided that there would not be an investigation into the shooting.

"I don't think I'm exaggerating, Jim, when I say that DOJ is effectively participating in a cover-up of any potential crime that may have occurred," said Oyer. "Now, it wouldn't be proper for the deputy attorney general to jump to the conclusion that this officer should be prosecuted. But it would be absolutely expected that the deputy attorney general would be calling for a thorough investigation, so that the Justice Department could determine whether a prosecution is warranted."

She added that the fact that that isn't happening in this case is alarming.

"The fact that prosecutors in the civil rights division have been told that they cannot go to the scene and participate in an investigation — it is really — I cannot overstate how absolutely how shocking and wrong that is to the degree that DOJ is really complicit," she said. "The leadership of DOJ is complicit in covering up what happened during this incident."

Acosta added he wouldn't be surprised if this matter went all the way up to Attorney General Pam Bondi if not Donald Trump himself.

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1 15 26 PIRRO LTR INTERVIEW SLOTKIN // MARK KELLY

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RASKIN? ASKS HOW MANY JAN 6ER WORK THERE WYSE

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AN 1 26

A new court filing by disqualified former interim U.S. Attorney Lindsey Halligan is now accusing a judge appointed by President Donald Trump of committing a "gross abuse of power."

On Tuesday, All Rise News editor-in-chief Adam Klasfeld tweeted that Halligan — backed by Attorney General Pam Bondi and Deputy Attorney General Pam Bondi — attacked U.S. District Judge David J. Novak (who Trump appointed to the Eastern District of Virginia in 2019) as "flat wrong" for suggesting that Halligan should no longer call herself a U.S. attorney due to her prior disqualification. Klasfeld called the filing an "extraordinary, pugilistic brief."

The DOJ's briefing submitted Tuesday is Halligan's official response to an order Novak handed down last week giving the disqualified prosecutor seven days to explain why she continues to wrongly use the title of U.S. attorney given that senior U.S. District Judge Cameron McGowan Currie (an appointee of former President Bill Clinton) in November disqualified her in a binding ruling.

In the 11-page filing, Halligan, Bondi and Blanche used former DOJ special counsel Jack Smith as an example of why Judge Currie's order was not binding. They noted that when Trump-appointed U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon dismissed Smith's 37-count felony indictment of the then-former president, she also deemed him to be improperly appointed under the Appointments Clause of the U.S. Constitution as he was never confirmed by the U.S. Senate, yet Smith continued to use his special counsel title in subsequent briefings. This is despite multiple DOJ special counsels appointed under both Democratic and Republican presidents never having been confirmed by the full Senate and still having their findings respected and found credible.

Klasfeld observed that Halligan and DOJ leadership accused Novak of making a "rudimentary error," and of using his powers as a judge as a "cudgel" against the executive branch. They also referred to his order demanding Halligan explain her continued use of the U.S. attorney title as an "inquisition."

"To put it mildly, this isn't the type of language one typically sees by a party addressing a judge," Klasfeld tweeted. "Halligan, Blanche and Bondi downplay the ruling disqualifying Halligan as a 'disagreement' with the government, which they say isn't binding on any other case."

Trump initially named Halligan as acting U.S. attorney in the Eastern District of Virginia after former U.S. Attorney Erik Siebert was forced to resign after declining to bring charges against former FBI Director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James, who are two of Trump's most high-profile political opponents. Halligan indicted both Comey and James shortly after replacing Siebert, though both indictments were dismissed after Judge Currie disqualified her.

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AN 1 26

The Washington Post* reported, and *The New York Timesconfirmed Wednesday,that a Post reporter was raided by the FBI in search of classified materials.

Semafor's Max Tani posted on X that "a Washington Post spokesperson confirmed to me that the paper is reviewing and monitoring the situation."

Post reporter Hannah Natanson was at her Virginia home when federal agents arrived and searched her home and devices. It's part of an investigation into "Aurelio Perez-Lugones, a system administrator in Maryland who has a top secret security clearance and has been accused of accessing and taking home classified intelligence reports that were found in his lunchbox and his basement," the report said, citing an FBI affidavit.

Natanson has covered some of the most "high-profile and sensitive coverage" from President Donald Trump's first year in office, the report explained.

The FBI reportedly took a phone and a Garmin watch.

The raid was "signed off on at highest levels of the Justice Department," said Punchbowl News'John Bresnahan on X.

*Read the full report here.

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AN 1 26

The fatal shooting of 37-year-old motorist Renee Nicole Good by a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agent in Minneapolis on Wednesday, January 7 is drawing scathing condemnation on both the left and the right. Some prominent conservatives and libertarians — including The Bulwark's Bill Kristol, MS NOW's Joe Scarborough, former Judge Andrew Napolitano (a legal analyst for Newsmax), The New York Times' David French and The Lincoln Project's — are joining liberals and progressives in condemning the shooting as excessive force.

Yet allies of President Donald Trump, from Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem to Vice President JD Vance, are vigorously defending the ICE agent and claiming that he acted in self-defense. Noem, without evidence, even attacked Good as a "domestic terrorist." And according to reporting from the Washington Post, several U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) officials were so appalled by Trump allies' response to Good's death that they resigned from the agency.

In an article published late Monday night, January 12, Washington Post reporters Carol Leonnig and Ken Dilanian explain, "At least four leaders of a Justice Department unit that investigates police killings have resigned in protest over the (Trump) Administration's handling of the fatal shooting of a motorist in Minneapolis by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer, according to three people briefed on the departures. Top leaders of the criminal section of the Civil Rights Division have left their jobs to register their frustration with the department after the Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights Harmeet Dhillon decided not to investigate the ICE officer's fatal shooting of Renee Good last week."

Leonnig and Dilanian note that ordinarily, the criminal section of the DOJ Civil Rights Division would investigate a fatal shooting by a federal law enforcement officer.

Kristen Clarke, who led the Civil Rights Division under former President Joe Biden, told the Post, "Investigating officials to determine if they broke the law, defied policy, failed to deescalate, and resorted to deadly force without basis is one of the Civil Rights Division’s most solemn duties. Prosecutors of the Civil Rights Division have, for decades, been the nation's leading experts in this work."

These resignations, according to Leonnig and Dilanian "represent the most significant mass resignation" at DOJ since February 2025.

"Good's shooting on January 7 has galvanized Democrats and civil libertarians but also frustrated Minnesota politicians and state police investigators," the Post reporters observe. "On January 10, the FBI announced it would be handling the investigation of Good's shooting on its own and blocked Minnesota authorities from their typical role in reviewing evidence and investigating the shooting themselves."

*Read Carol Leonnig and Ken Dilanian's full article for the Washington Post at this link (subscription required).

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AN 1 26

Leaked documents reveal desperate push for federal agents as rank-and-file buck orders.L;;

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AN 1 26

Joe Rogan condemns Trump's 'Gestapo' for 'snatching up people'

Marjorie Taylor Green slams Trump’s 'politicization of the Department of Justice'

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AN 1 267

President Donald Trump's Department of Justice (DOJ) is now claiming that Americans do not have a Constitutional right to film law enforcement officers.

NOTUS reported Tuesday that the DOJ made the claim during a hearing in U.S. District Judge Katherine Menendez's courtroom. The hearing was the result of ongoing litigation by Minneapolis residents over claims that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents pepper-sprayed and arrested them without cause. While the initial complaint was filed prior to the fatal shooting of U.S. citizen Renee Nicole Good by ICE agent Jonathan Ross, the plaintiffs cited Good's death as reason to issue a temporary restraining order against federal agents.

DOJ attorney Jeremy Newman defended the recent trend of ICE agents drawing their weapons on civilian vehicles following them, saying that "following" can lead to "dangerous activity," and that it was "reasonable for officers to be concerned about their safety. NOTUS further reported that Newman cited the 2023 Molina v. Book case to support his argument that "observing and recording police is not a clearly established First Amendment right."

"It’s very clear that this is an ongoing emergency," Newman said.

However, other court cases decided at the federal appellate court level have ruled that Americans do indeed have the right to document police officers in the course of their duties. In the 2022 Irizarry v. Yehia case, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit ruled that the First Amendment guaranteed the right to film police officers "subject to reasonable time, place and manner restrictions."

Judge Menendez – an appointee of former President Joe Biden — reportedly chided ICE agents for not including copies of any police reports, body camera footage or statements from agents involved in altercations with plaintiffs. Newman responded that the agency "did the best we could" as their response to the litigation was cobbled together over the holiday season.

Menendez also told plaintiffs she would rule on their petition for emergency relief by Thursday or Friday, and hinted that any ruling would pertain to their specific case, rather than a broader decision impacting all protesters in Minneapolis.

Click here to read NOTUS' article in its entirety.

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The federal prosecutors had traveled to the White House for a photo shoot, The Wall Street Journal reported on Tuesday, but after Attorney General Pam Bondi introduced them to the president, “Trump criticized them as ineffective, saying the group was making it difficult for Bondi and Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche to do their jobs.”

The exchange between Trump and the U.S. Attorneys “came a day before federal prosecutors sent grand jury subpoenas to the Federal Reserve on Friday, related to Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell’s testimony last summer about the central bank’s building-renovation project.”

Jeanine Pirro, the U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia, was in attendance at the White House event, the Journal reported. The subpoenas reportedly were sought by prosecutors in her office.

One of Trump’s complaints to the U.S. Attorneys was that they were not acting fast enough and had yet to bring a case against U.S. Senator Adam Schiff (D-CA), a top Trump adversary.

The DOJ reportedly has been examining whether Schiff engaged in mortgage fraud, which has become a common allegation against other Trump critics, including New York Attorney General Letitia James. That case was dismissed, and subsequent grand juries have refused to indict her.

“The president criticized some specific prosecutors by jurisdiction and said he felt betrayed,” the Journal added.

On Monday, Pirro appeared to be quickly backtracking in her office’s investigation of Powell. The Federal Reserve Chairman announced on Sunday that he was being investigated by the Trump Department of Justice, sending markets — and prominent Republicans — spinning.

The Daily Beast reported that Pirro’s investigation is “an inquiry that even Republican lawmakers have blasted as a revenge plot against one of the president’s adversaries that threatens the independence of America’s central bank.”

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Leaked classified DOJ memo claims Trump immune to all laws in capturing Maduro

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maddow? 1 13 26 just lost 4 ct cases? norm eisen says 2/3rd

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In Minneapolis, federal Judge Kate Menendez is ruling on an emergency motion by protesters who oppose the tactics being used in U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raids in that city. The motion comes at a time when Minneapolis is reeling from the fatal shooting of unarmed 37-year-old motorist Renee Nicole Good by an ICE agent.

Politico's Kyle Cheney reported on the motion and a Tuesday, January 13 hearing in a thread on X, formerly Twitter — describing the frustrations Menendez expressed to U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) lawyers.

Cheney tweeted, "Menendez again frustrated that she doesn't have firsthand accounts from police officers who claim protesters suing them were acting in unruly ways. 'Why don't I have that officer's declaration before me?' she asks when DOJ lawyers alleges a protester 'pushed past' an officer. Menendez: I don't have any ability to assess that because I don't have anything but an unknown level of high summary."

The Politico reporter noted that Menendez, during the hearing, made it "clear she intends to rule on the emergency motion by protesters — seeking to halt key police tactics by ICE in Minnesota — by Thursday afternoon," January 15.

According to Cheney, "Under questioning from Menendez, DOJ struggling again to articulate why ICE officers can draw guns on drivers who are following them, so long as those drivers are not breaking traffic laws or posing any other articulable threat."

After the hearing concluded, Cheney described the skepticism that Menendez expressed over the ICE-related claims by Trump administration officials.

"Update: Hearing in Minneapolis is over," Cheney tweeted. "Judge Menendez appeared skeptical of Trump administration on a few key points: That ICE can pull over cars that are following them, even if those cars obey all traffic laws; that officers can draw guns on stopped motorists without evidence of a crime. But she also seemed skeptical of effort by protesters to apply an injunction statewide, or that in a post-CASA world, she could (or needed to) provisionally certify a class at this stage of the case."

CASA refers to Trump V. CASA, where, as ScotusBlog reports, "the Supreme Court curtailed the use of universal injunctions."

Cheney continued, "She's eyeing a ruling that would cover specifically 'Operation Metro Surge' or the 7 counties in the Twin Cities metro area. Next step: Protesters/DOJ must decide whether the judge can demand video of specific arrests prior to ruling on the preliminary injunction. Ruling on the PI to come Thursday PM or Friday AM."

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AN 1 26

A prominent Democrat is demanding to know how many January 6 “insurrectionists” have been hired by the U.S. Department of Justice and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, as critics warn that federal agents under President Donald Trump are increasingly engaging in violent enforcement actions.

“We know that several participants in the January 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol have been rewarded with high-ranking positions in the Department of Justice (DOJ),” U.S. Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD), the Ranking Member of the House Judiciary Committee, wrote to Attorney General Pam Bondi and DHS Secretary Kristi Noem.

“However, it remains unclear how many more have been invited to join the ranks of this Administration, including among the masked Department of Homeland Security (DHS) agents and officers that have dragged, tackled, beaten, tased, shot, and killed citizens and non-citizens alike in communities across the country,” he added.

According to Raskin, Jared Wise, a former Supervisory Special Agent with the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), “stormed his way into the Capitol Building” on January 6, 2021.

“As he did so, he taunted and threaten police officers defending the building and the ones inside, screaming: ‘You guys are disgusting. I’m former—I’m former law enforcement. You’re disgusting.”

Raskin included additional language attributed to Wise, then wrote that he “has never expressed remorse or contrition for his criminal actions.”

Wise was pardoned by President Donald Trump, along with nearly 1,600 others, “including hundreds of cop beaters.”

“Today, Mr. Wise serves as senior adviser in the office of the Deputy Attorney General, alongside another January 6th participant, Ed Martin, the U.S. Pardon Attorney and head of the DOJ Weaponization Working Group,” Raskin wrote.

Congressman Raskin also blasted the recruitment and vetting processes being used by the Trump administration.

“For its part, DHS seems to be courting pardoned January 6th insurrectionists. It uses white nationalist ‘dog whistles’ in its recruitment campaign for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents that appear aimed at stirring members of extremist militias, including the Proud Boys, Oath Keepers, and Three Percenters, which participated in the insurrection,” he stated. “The recruitment campaign began with a $50,000 sign-on bonus, removal of the college degree requirement, and a relaxed vetting process.”

“Who is hiding behind these masks?” Raskin demanded to know. “How many of them were among the violent rioters who attacked the Capitol on January 6th and were convicted of their offenses? The American people deserve to know how many of these violent insurrectionists have been given guns and badges by this Administration.”

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Conservative National Review rips Trump for making DOJ a 'tool for partisan vengeance'

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Jeanine Pirro, the Fox News host turned Trump U.S. Attorney, appears to be quickly backtracking in her office’s investigation of Jerome Powell. The esteemed Federal Reserve Chairman announced on Sunday that he is being investigated by the Trump Department of Justice, sending markets — and prominent Republicans — spinning.

Pirro, in a Monday night social media post, insisted that Powell has not been indicted, saying: “The word ‘indictment’ has come out of Mr. Powell’s mouth, no one else’s.”

According to The Daily Beast, Pirro issued her “ultra-defensive statement” after “major backlash” against her investigation into the 72-year-old Republican investment banker and lawyer who has steered the Federal Reserve since 2018, when President Donald Trump appointed him chairman.

Suggesting that Pirro may have gone “rogue,” the Beast added that reports suggest “Pirro failed to obtain the necessary sign-off from her superiors at the Department of Justice before subpoenaing the Federal Reserve as part of her probe, according to Bloomberg.”

It appears that others were also left out of the loop in the unprecedented, high-profile investigation.

“Sources also told NBC News that Pirro’s office did not contact the White House or the Treasury Department before issuing the subpoenas, and that Federal Housing Finance Agency Director Bill Pulte—who spearheaded the push to investigate the Federal Reserve—was also allegedly left in the dark.”

“Investors are doubtful of her success,” Bloomberg News added. “While U.S. assets initially sold off on news of the investigation in early trading Monday, stocks and bonds bounced back by the end of the day. That suggests traders think Republicans will find ways to dial back the probe given the critical importance investors assign to a Federal Reserve that’s free from political influence.”

On Sunday, Chairman Powell revealed that he is under a criminal investigation by the U.S. Department of Justice, an investigation stemming from his congressional testimony on the renovation of Federal Reserve buildings. The Fed is fully self-funded, and that renovation is not funded by American taxpayers.

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U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro has been tasked with a new probe into Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell, but one CNN commentator suggested she resign instead.

Pirro doesn't have a good track record of winning controversial cases in Washington, D.C., losing several grand jury cases against protesters who opposed federal agents.

Trump has been attacking Powell for years after Powell refused to cut interest rates.

Speaking to the morning show, S.E. Cupp said she hopes the opposition to Trump from Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) doesn't stop with him.

"Listen, the credibility of the DOJ under Trump was already hanging by a thread," Cupp said. "When you look at its activism, its political activism to Letitia James and James Comey, and then its failure to do its job on [Jeffrey] Epstein. It was already, already really hanging by a thread. If you want to destroy what shred of credibility the DOJ has left, go ahead and indict a Fed chair for failing to raise interest rates. I can't think of anything more preposterous."

"And if I worked at the DOJ in particular for Pirro, I would resign. I'd walk out to preserve what integrity I had left," Cupp suggested.

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AN 1 26

President Donald Trump is rapidly losing faith in one of his most senior-level Cabinet members, and his complaints about her have lately become more frequent.

That's according to a Monday article in the *Wall Street Journal, which reported that Trump views Attorney General Pam Bondi as "weak and an ineffective enforcer of his agenda." The *Journal cited unnamed administration officials and others close to the president in reporting that Trump is angling for Bondi to be more aggressive in using the Department of Justice (DOJ) to pursue his political enemies.

The Journal further reported that Trump is now considering naming various special counsels to handle investigations into his opponents, as he is unhappy with the pace of Bondi's DOJ in filing criminal charges against his chief rivals. The president is reportedly upset with how the DOJ has handled the investigations of former FBI Director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James (D) in the Eastern District of Virginia.

The cases against Comey and James were ultimately dismissed after Lindsey Halligan — who Trump appointed to the replace U.S. Attorney Erik Siebert after he was pressured to resign for saying there was insufficient evidence to bring cases — was found to have been improperly appointed.

Trump is also reportedly upset with Bondi over her handling of documents pertaining to convicted sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein. According to the Journal, the president publicly agreed with White House chief of staff Susie Wiles when she told Vanity Fair that Bondi "completely whiffed" on the Epstein files and caused months of political consternation for Trump. The president is also reportedly upset that Bondi hasn't done more to investigate the 2020 election, which he lost to Democrat Joe Biden.

The complaints with Bondi also reportedly run deep within Trump's MAGA base. Former Trump White House chief strategist Steve Bannon claimed that Bondi was "bleeding support" from Trump's "most loyal troops" due to a perceived lack of urgency.

"Folks are desperate for action and just haven’t seen it," Bannon said.

The Journal's report comes on the heels of a recently announced DOJ investigation into Federal Reserve chairman Jerome Powell renovation of its Washington D.C. offices. Powell has maintained that the investigation is due to him refusing to accede to Trump's demand that the Fed lower interest rates. Despite the report, the White House is praising Bondi on the record, with Trump telling the outlet: "Pam is doing an excellent job. She has been my friend for many years. Tremendous progress is being made against radical left lunatics who are good at only one thing, cheating in elections and the crimes they commit."

Click here to read the Journal's full report (subscription required).

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'The judge lost' it: NYC lawyer says courts are 'over' Trump’s Justice Department

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Trump DOJ fires attorney who refused to prosecute James Comey - Alternet.org

The Trump Department of Justice has terminated a 64-year old attorney, the number-two official in the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Virginia, after he refused to prosecute former FBI Director James Comey in a highly-controversial case.

MS NOW on Monday reported that Robert McBride, a senior DOJ prosecutor and former Navy lawyer, “was brought into the prominent satellite office of the Justice Department to serve as first assistant to U.S. Attorney Lindsey Halligan and took a more prominent role as her status was in question and after a judge ruled in late November that she was not legally appointed to run the office.”

McBride reportedly had held private meetings with judges, MS NOW reported, calling it a move that was “viewed as undermining the Administration.”

He had declined to prosecute Comey, sources said, reportedly telling top Justice Department officials that it would be difficult to do that and also run the office.

MS NOW’s Carol Leonnig added that McBride was also suspected of “gunning for” the top job.

The New York Times reported that there was a “disagreement about whether he would take charge of the Trump administration’s effort to re-indict James B. Comey,” and called McBride’s firing “the latest development in the fallout in the Justice Department over President Trump’s effort to punish Mr. Comey, the former F.B.I. director and his longtime nemesis, whom the president blames for past investigations of his conduct.”

The Times added that meeting with judges is considered “commonplace.”

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icn

As efforts continue to hold some of the world’s largest fossil fuel corporations liable for destructive and deadly climate impacts, backlash from the politically powerful oil and gas industry and its allies in government is on the rise, bolstered by the Trump administration’s allegiance to fossil fuels.

From lobbying Congress for liability protection to suing states over their climate liability laws and lawsuits, attempts to shield Big Oil from potential liability and to shut down climate accountability initiatives are advancing on multiple fronts.

“The effort has escalated dramatically in the past six or seven months,” said Richard Wiles, president of the Center for Climate Integrity, an organization that advocates for holding fossil fuel companies accountable for selling products they knew were dangerously warming the planet.

Pushback to liability initiatives from fossil fuel interests is not new. But the political landscape has shifted dramatically this year as the second Trump administration works to reward loyalists and campaign donors, including fossil fuel interests.

The oil and gas industry spent $445 million during the last election cycle to influence President Donald Trump and Congress, including $96 million on Trump’s re-election campaign, according to the progressive advocacy group Climate Power.

“What has changed is that there is a new administration,” said Lisa Graves, founder and executive director of True North Research, a national investigative watchdog group. And the Trump administration, she said, “is continuing to defend the fossil fuel industry and assail anyone who dares try to hold them accountable.”

Over the past eight years, communities across the country have filed tobacco-style lawsuits targeting ExxonMobil and major players in the fossil fuel industry, seeking to recover damages for localized climate impacts or to force companies to cease greenwashing and other misleading behavior.

More than 30 of these lawsuits brought by municipal, tribal and state governments are working their way through the courts, and several are now closer than ever to reaching trial.

At the same time, some states are enacting or considering so-called climate superfund legislation that would hold large fossil fuel companies strictly liable for climate damages and require them to help pay for a portion of climate change costs incurred by state governments. Vermont and New York both passed climate superfund laws last year, and similar legislation is pending in a handful of other states.

In response to these budding accountability efforts, the fossil fuel industry, the Trump administration, Republicans in Congress and GOP attorneys general are mounting what Wiles describes as a “massive orchestrated campaign” to try to stop climate liability laws and lawsuits in their tracks, and to push for legal immunity akin to what gun manufacturers received two decades ago. Trump’s Department of Justice has even filed highly unusual, if not unprecedented, lawsuits against Vermont and New York seeking to overturn their climate superfund statutes.

“It’s just this superbly choreographed effort on the part of the oil industry and its allies to get gun-industry-style legal immunity for all the damage that they’ve caused,” Wiles told Inside Climate News.

Oil Industry Is Lobbying Congress for a Liability Shield

Among the climate liability lawsuits inching closer to trial: a consumer protection case brought by Massachusetts against ExxonMobil, and suits seeking damages filed by Honolulu, Hawaii, and Boulder, Colorado.

As reported by The Wall Street Journal earlier this year and confirmed by The New York Times last month, industry representatives are lobbying Congress for a liability shield of some kind.

The details remain unclear. But the American Petroleum Institute, a trade group, reports lobbying on “draft legislation related to state efforts to impose liability on the oil and gas industry,” while disclosures from ConocoPhillips show that the company has lobbied on the matter of “state superfund legislation,” including draft legislation in Congress addressing it.

Neither API nor ConocoPhillips responded to requests for comment.

Pat Parenteau, emeritus professor of law at Vermont Law and Graduate School, told Inside Climate News that he thinks immunity provisions for the fossil fuel industry are unlikely to pass the Senate.

But the fact that the fossil fuel industry is lobbying for legal protections suggests to Wiles that the industry realizes it could be facing serious legal jeopardy. “Let’s be clear. You don’t seek a [liability] waiver unless you know you’re guilty,” Wiles said.

Darren Woods, CEO of ExxonMobil, speaks alongside Energy Secretary Chris Wright (left) and Dario Amodei, CEO of Anthropic, at the Pennsylvania Energy and Innovation Summit at Carnegie Mellon University on July 15 in Pittsburgh. Credit: Jeff Swensen/Getty Images

Over the summer, language emerged in a draft House Appropriations Committee spending bill that specifically would prohibit the District of Columbia from using funds to enforce its consumer protection law “against oil and gas companies for environmental claims.” The bill that included this provision passed the committee but was not brought to the full House for a vote.

But climate accountability advocates say the provision was still alarming because it effectively would have shut down D.C.’s ongoing consumer protection lawsuit against Big Oil. That suit, filed in 2020, alleges that several major oil companies lied to consumers about the climate risks of their products and that they continue to mislead consumers through greenwashing campaigns. In April the D.C. Superior Court rejected the companies’ motions to dismiss the suit.

Anne Havemann, deputy director and general counsel at Chesapeake Climate Action Network, said the appropriations provision “is a threat to this ongoing lawsuit.”

“If [D.C.] can’t use any money to prosecute these cases and advance these cases, then it effectively can’t work on them,” she said.

Big Oil Lawyers Seek Supreme Court Intervention

A parallel effort to skirt accountability is playing out in the courts. Fossil fuel companies are vigorously defending themselves in climate liability lawsuits, and they have seen some success in recent months getting cases dismissed by state trial courts.

Now Boulder’s lawsuit is back before the nation’s highest court on a fresh petition from the oil company defendants, after Colorado courts, including the state Supreme Court, refused to dismiss the case. The question posed by the companies in their petition is whether federal law precludes such state law claims.

It is unclear whether the Supreme Court will take up the case this time.

In January the Supreme Court denied a similar petition from oil companies in a case brought by Honolulu. Courts in Hawaii have rejected the companies’ bids to have the case dismissed, and with the Supreme Court declining to intervene, Honolulu’s case is advancing toward a trial.

Parenteau said the prospect of facing a trial and a potential adverse verdict likely has the oil companies extremely worried. “They’re certainly frightened of a trial just from a reputational standpoint,” he said.

The new petition in the Boulder case now offers the Supreme Court another opportunity to step in. Should the justices decide to intervene, legal experts say that it could essentially shut down all climate liability attempts.

“If they do step in, that’s huge. That changes everything,” Parenteau said. “That is the end game.”

“In one fell swoop it could get rid of all of these cases,” said James May, a law professor at Washburn University.

On Oct. 9, over 100 Republican House members submitted an amicus brief to the Supreme Court backing oil companies ExxonMobil and Suncor in their petition to block Boulder’s lawsuit from moving forward. It is the first time that Republicans in Congress have called on the Supreme Court to intervene in this litigation and to shut down not just this one lawsuit but all others like it.

“In recent years, multiple state and local governments have launched a courtroom war against the American energy industry,” the brief asserts in its opening. “It must stop now.”

The 103 Republican House members who signed onto the brief argue that the municipal and state lawsuits against oil and gas companies are trying to “dictate national energy policy” and that only the federal government has the authority to regulate transboundary greenhouse gas emissions.

“They are arguing that it’s solely EPA’s role to regulate greenhouse gases, but the Trump administration is attempting to eliminate that role by revoking the Endangerment Finding. If that revocation goes through and survives in the courts, it will greatly weaken the oil companies’ preemption defense,” Michael Gerrard, founder and faculty director of the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law at Columbia University, told Inside Climate News.

“This full-court press to block these lawsuits shows that the oil companies and their allies in Congress are really nervous about what would come out if any of these cases actually went to trial,” Gerrard added.

Trump Administration on the Offensive

The Trump administration, through its Department of Justice, is fully backing the fossil fuel industry in climate liability litigation, filing amicus briefs, for example, in cases now pending before the U.S. Supreme Court and the Maryland Supreme Court.

But its efforts to shield the industry from accountability extend beyond friend-of-the-court briefs.

Following a White House meeting where oil company executives raised concerns about state climate laws and lawsuits, Trump issued an executive order in April directing Attorney General Pam Bondi to try to put a stop to these legal initiatives.

In response, the DOJ then sued four states, including preemptive suits brought against Hawaii and Michigan before either state had filed such a lawsuit (Hawaii sued major oil companies the next day). The DOJ’s other lawsuits targeted Vermont and New York to try to strike down their climate superfund laws, which are based on the “polluter pays” logic of the Environmental Protection Agency’s Superfund program aimed at forcing polluting companies to remediate damage from toxic waste sites.

President Donald Trump poses for photos after signing a series of executive orders on American energy production during a ceremony in the East Room of the White House on April 8. Trump was joined by (from left) EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin, Interior Secretary Doug Bergum and Energy Secretary Chris Wright. Credit: Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images

Advances in a field known as climate attribution science have made the “polluter pays” aspect of the superfund laws possible, enabling scientists to quantify the individual contributions of major fossil fuel producers to climate impacts such as sea level rise and heat waves.

The DOJ has now filed motions for summary judgment in both of these lawsuits, asking federal courts to permanently block the states’ climate superfund laws.

“Vermont’s flagrantly unconstitutional statute threatens to throttle energy production, despite this Administration’s efforts to unleash American energy. It’s high time for the courts to put a stop to this crippling state overreach,” Acting Assistant Attorney General Adam Gustafson said in a statement issued by the DOJ on Sept. 16.

Havemann, with the Chesapeake Climate Action Network, told Inside Climate News that the current Trump administration seems to be taking a more aggressive approach to protecting the fossil fuel industry and to fighting attempts to hold it accountable.

“The Trump administration has come in and used many different tools in its toolbox to go after these accountability lawsuits and the laws that also seek to hold the biggest polluters accountable for climate damages,” she said. “It’s very much on the radar of the Trump administration in a way that it has not been in the past.”

The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

“Enter the Dragon”

With U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) holding the gavel, climate litigation came up as the subject of a Republican-led congressional hearing this summer before a Judiciary Committee subcommittee.

The hearing’s provocative title: “Enter the Dragon—China and the Left’s Lawfare Against American Energy Dominance.”

Cruz used the hearing to attack climate liability lawsuits and claim that they are a nefarious left-wing plot that is in part funded by, and that benefits, the Chinese Communist Party. “Both China and the Democrats want to bankrupt the American energy industry,” Cruz said during the hearing.

NPR’s Michael Copley reported last month that “Cruz’s office has not offered evidence that China or a China-linked nonprofit that Cruz identified by name has funded climate lawsuits in the United States.”

In response to that reporting, Cruz told Inside Climate News that “NPR deliberately ignored objective facts.”

“The Chinese Communist Party uses cut-outs and ‘nonprofits’ to shape U.S. energy policy, funding propaganda, advocacy, and litigation that harm American workers,” Cruz said in an emailed statement, which was also included in the NPR story after it was published. The “China-linked nonprofit” referenced in the NPR story, Energy Foundation China, does fund some climate initiatives, Cruz said in his statement.

“In January 2024, three House committee chairs opened an investigation into Chinese influence, citing EFC’s ties and funding of groups like [the Natural Resources Defense Council] and RMI,” he added.

A spokesperson for RMI, a nonprofit group working on the global energy transition, said that the organization “does not participate in litigation.” RMI’s “work supported by Energy Foundation China, which is a U.S. based charitable organization, is focused squarely on the energy transition inside of China,” the spokesperson added.

The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), a nonprofit group that works to protect public health and the environment, does some “work in China for one reason: there’s not a single global environmental problem that can be fixed unless China is part of the solution,” NRDC spokesperson Josh Mogerman said. He added that the organization “does not fundraise in China” and that “money from China does not fund NRDC litigation in the United States, period.”

Cruz, who represents the country’s biggest oil and gas producing state, did not respond to Inside Climate News’ question about whether he supports immunizing oil companies from liability.

GOP Attorneys General Enter the Fray

During the Cruz-led hearing, the Republican attorney general for the state of Kansas, Kris Kobach, testified as one of the majority witnesses. He referenced the New York and Vermont climate superfund laws, claiming these statutes impose extraterritorial regulation on energy companies, and mentioned that his state and other Republican-led states are suing to try to overturn these state laws.

“We will continue these fights in court as state attorneys general. But we do need some help from Congress,” Kobach said. He suggested that Congress could legislate to expressly preempt state climate laws like the climate superfund laws.

Kobach and 15 other Republican state attorneys general also made this suggestion, along with several other recommendations for congressional action, in a letter addressed to Bondi, the U.S. attorney general.

The June 12 letter references Trump’s executive orders to “unleash” fossil fuels and protect the fossil fuel industry from “state overreach.” The letter says its purpose is to “suggest additional steps” the Department of Justice could take to effectuate these orders and assist in the “fight against anti-energy interests.”

Specifically, the Republican AGs suggest the DOJ could recommend legislation to reinforce federal preemption of state climate liability laws or lawsuits; restrict federal funding for states seeking to impose liability on energy companies; create a right of removal to federal district court for climate suits; and, among other items, stop “activist-funded climate lawsuits” with a liability shield, similar to the law that granted immunity for gun manufacturers.

Wiles, with the Center for Climate Integrity, said it is especially striking to see Republican attorneys general explicitly recommend a similar liability shield for fossil fuel companies. “The attorneys general actually called for Congress to enact a gun-style liability waiver for the oil industry,” he said. “We saw how that [gun industry immunity] ended up. It certainly was not helpful in curbing gun violence or in serving any public interest objective.”

The coordinated litigation strategies and actions of Republican state attorneys general in defense of fossil fuel and other industries stem from an organization called the Republican Attorneys General Association (RAGA), which Graves said was created in the wake of the tobacco industry being held accountable through the 1998 Master Settlement Agreement.

The organization, which currently lists 29 Republican state attorneys general as members, has been funded through donations from conservative judicial activists like Leonard Leo as well as from corporate interests including those in the fossil fuel industry. The American Petroleum Institute gave over $125,000 to RAGA in 2024, and in the first six months of this year Chevron’s Policy, Government and Public Affairs division donated $25,000 to the organization, for example.

Graves describes RAGA as a “pay-to-play organization.”

“It has a pay sheet listing what kind of access you get to attorneys general based on how much you give,” she told Inside Climate News.

“These attorneys general use the prestige of their office and their power and the resources that their taxpayers are providing to serve the interests of industry, select industries that they are most tied to, and that certainly includes the fossil fuel industry,” Graves added.

The Republican Attorneys General Association did not respond to a request for comment.

“A Perilous Moment”

The intensifying backlash to climate accountability efforts coming from the fossil fuel industry and its political defenders is happening at a time when some political scholars warn that the U.S. is sliding into some form of authoritarianism, which advocates say magnifies the challenges of holding powerful interests to account writ large.

“It’s a perilous moment for democratic norms and institutions,” said Kathy Mulvey, accountability campaign director for the climate and energy program at the Union of Concerned Scientists.

“Anybody who is pursuing policy change or litigation for accountability or enforcement is counting on the courts to be a real backstop for democratic institutions,” Mulvey told Inside Climate News.

Should the fossil fuel industry somehow succeed in securing legal immunity, Wiles said it “would be consistent with the erosion of the rule of law that we’re seeing.”

“No industry should be above the law,” he added.

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A judge has released documents naming Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche's office as responsible for telling Tennessee U.S. Attorney Robert McGuire that targeting Kilmar Ábrego García was a "top priority."

An order from Dec. 3 was unsealed late Tuesday showing Judge Waverly D. Crenshaw Jr. reviewed about 3,000 government documents in his chambers and allowed "a few dozen" to be turned over to Ábrego's defense team.

In 2019, under the first Trump administration, Ábrego was given a work permit in the U.S. and a federal judge ruled that he could not be deported to El Salvador. Under President Donald Trump's new administration, however, Ábrego was taken into custody while driving his 5-year-old son home. Despite a judge's attempts to stop it, Ábrego wad deported to a brutal prison in El Salvador.

In April, the U.S. Supreme Court ordered the Trump administration to bring Ábrego back to the U.S. It took more than two months for the administration to comply with the demand. Upon returning him, the Justice Department then charged Ábrego with human smuggling in the middle district of Tennessee stemming from a 2022 traffic stop. It has been an ongoing battle to deport him ever since, emblematic of the battle between the administration and the federal court system.

U.S. District Court Judge James Boasberg has initiated contempt proceedings because the Trump administration defied his orders.

The newly-released documents not only confirm the orders were intentionally ignored, but it also proved the Justice Department only pressed to prosecute Ábrego after it mistakenly deported him. Ábrego's legal team is now alleging "vindictive prosecution."

McGuire previously swore he alone was behind the indictment of Ábrego, but the new documents show Blanche telling McGuire that an indictment was a “top priority." He said that the DOJ wanted it “sooner rather than later” and they even oversaw its content, noted Lawfare's Roger Parloff.

Legal analyst and former federal prosecutor Joyce Vance said that releasing the documents to Ábrego's lawyers "is bad news for the Trump administration, which is going to have to defend itself against Ábrego Garcia’s claim he’s being vindictively prosecuted. But that claim is supported by some of the government’s own emails."

The vindictiveness case "hinges on timing," Parloff explained in a BlueSky thread. "For 3 years the government took no steps to charge him for his 11/30/22 traffic stop. It sent him to CECOT on 3/15/25 and on 4/1/25, closed his arrest file."

"Only after Ábrego won his Maryland civil case, with the Supreme Court on 4/10/25 ordering the government to facilitate Ábrego's return, did the government reopen Ábrego's criminal case," Parloff added.

Blanche confessed to Fox News in an interview that the reason they went after Ábrego was "a judge in Maryland" accused the government of doing something wrong.

"That sounds vindictive," said Parloff.

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an 12 25

Donald Trump's Department of Justice is getting in on the push to force diversity programs out of American businesses with a "novel" interpretation of an 1863 fraud law, but an analysis from MS NOW found that this new "bullying" tactic amounts to "a complete waste of resources."

According to a recent report from the Wall Street Journal, the DOJ is now attempting to use the 1863 False Claims Act to go after companies that receive government money through federal contracts to make sure they do not have "diversity, equity and inclusion" programs in place. The report specifically singled out Verizon and Google's parent company, Alphabet, as some of the initial targets.

Trump issued an executive order in March calling for the end of all DEI initiatives in the federal government. His administration has also been aggressive in targeting such programs at private businesses with any means available to it, and major companies like Amazon, Target and Paramount opted to roll them back in response.

Examining the new legal tactic at the heart of this push, MS NOW's Hayes Brown explained that the False Claims Act was first introduced to take on defense contractors attempting to bilk the Union government for more money during the Civil War. Recently, it's mostly been used to go after healthcare companies suspected of overcharging the federal government.

This new intended use of the law by the Trump administration, holding companies liable and potentially leveling fines against them for having DEI programs in place while taking government money, would be a "novel" interpretation, Brown wrote, and one that "hasn’t been tested in court and could easily fall flat." Still, he argued, "the mere fact that DOJ is pursuing this route is chilling in and of itself."

Brown also noted that, by utilizing this novel approach to the False Claims Act, the Trump administration is shifting responsibility for its anti-DEI crusadeonto the DOJ from the department's civil rights division to its fraud division, which has been ordered to "aggressively" pursue the matter. Aside from being "clear politicization of the legal system," Brown also argued that it represents "a major waste of resources" for the DOJ, which has recently "been struggling with its workload" under Attorney General Pam Bondi's remaking of the department.

"Even if the cases go nowhere, or don’t result in charges, businesses with less money than Google may step up efforts to roll back their diversity programs," Brown concluded. "MAGA pours a lot of resources into achieving its goals, but it prefers that its targets for bullying comply in advance."

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AN 12 25

National security analyst Marcy Wheeler noticed a strange edit in the court filing about the Jan. 6 bomber, Brian Cole, who confessed to planting pipe bombs at the Democratic and Republican Party headquarters.

Writing Monday, Wheeler said that it might be a minor point, but the detention memo quotes Cole saying one thing, while changing the meaning of the confession later.

This month, Cole told the DOJ, "I really don't like either party at this point."

But a few paragraphs later, the DOJ changes the tense of the opinion he had in 2020.

"In his own words, the defendant did so because he did not'like either party,' but 'they were in charge' and thus were, in the defendant’s mind, an appropriate target for extreme acts of violence," the document says.

Wheeler noted the past tense is "consistent with him having been a Trump supporter and souring on him." It was only later thatthe DOJ turned it into a "both-sides thing."

"By his own admission, the defendant committed these chilling acts because he was unhappy with the response of political leaders on both sides of the political aisle to questions raised about the results of the 2020 election, and 'something just snapped.' [my emphasis throughout]."

The documents make it clear that Cole was a 2020 election denier.

Wheeler commented, "It may well be that something about what Cole said makes it fair to put his animosity to both parties back in time to 2020, but that’s not the tense he used."

Her most "stunning" observation, she said, is that the detention affidavit throws out what seems like an important detail from the arrest affidavit. Cole was on Capitol Hill on Dec. 14, 2020. Starting on Dec. 15, 2020, he started resetting his phone to "factory settings."

"The alleged pipe bomber started exercising operational security the day after that trip to Capitol Hill, the scene of his alleged crime," Wheeler said, quoting the details from the affidavit.

It details "a Samsung cellular device" taken from Cole when he was arrested. "... between December 2020 and December 2025, the device recorded 943 events identified as a 'factory reset' or 'wipe,' including a 'wipe' event approximately three hours before the defendant’s arrest on December 4, 2025."

The first reset happened on Dec. 15, 2020, the day after his trip to Capitol Hill. The second was a month later, on July 15, 2022. At that point, Cole began resetting his phone weekly.

The trip to Washington D.C. on Dec. 14 piqued Wheeler's interest, but she noticed that suddenly, there's no mention of the the visit.

"Jeanine Pirro doesn’t want to talk about the trip he made there at all," speculated Wheeler.

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AN 12 25

Former CIA Director John Brennan is fearing that a judge who has frequently ruled in President Donald Trump's favor could be handling a case concerning him and several others. Now, he's asking the court to directly intervene.

The New York Times reported Monday that Brennan – who served in former President Barack Obama's administration – is officially petitioning the chief judge of the U.S. District Court in the Southern District of Florida to prevent U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon (who Trump appointed in 2020) from handling a case in which he has been subpoenaed. Brennan's subpoena is part of a Department of Justice investigation into the role former Obama administration officials played in launching the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election.

Attorney Kenneth L. Wainstein, who is representing Brennan, acknowledged that his client's request may be unusual, but argued it was not unwarranted. He maintained that the administration sought to "manipulate grand jury and case assignment procedures" to make sure the investigation that ensnared Brennan ended up in Cannon's hands.

"[W]ere we in a normal time, we might hesitate to question the propriety of the government's actions in the grand jury process. However, we are no longer in a normal time," he wrote. "We are now in a time when the Justice Department has surrendered much of its independence and the President is directly commanding his Attorney General and her leadership team to use their prosecutorial authorities against his perceived political adversaries."

Wainstein's letter further questioned the influence that MAGA political operative Mike Davis was having on U.S. Attorney Jason A. Reding Quiñones, who helms the DOJ's operations in the Southern District of Florida and signed off on Brennan's subpoena. Wainstein noted that Davis has previously referred to Quiñones as his "buddy" and "good friend." Quiñones has empaneled an extra grand jury in Fort Pierce, Florida, where Judge Cannon is based.

As Wainstein documented, Davis has played an outsized role in publicizing the investigation that has singled out Brennan, along with former Obama administration officials James Clapper (the former director of national intelligence) and former FBI counterintelligence agent Peter Strzok and former FBI attorney Lisa Page among others. In November, Davis posted a selfie to social media of him and Quiñones with the caption: "Justice is coming."

Brennan's attorney urged chief judge Cecilia M. Altonaga "to defend and reinforce the rule of law in our criminal justice system at this fragile moment in our Nation's history."

"We urge Your Honor to exercise your supervisory authority as chief judge to ensure the United States Attorney does not steer this matter to the Fort Pierce Division and to the courtroom of Judge Aileen Cannon," he wrote.

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an 12 25

The Justice Department may have been caught lying in court – and Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche could be on the hook for it, legal experts say.

There has been an ongoing court case involving Kilmar Ábrego García, who was was sent to the El Salvador prison CECOT against another judge's ruling.

That case has exposed the Justice Department for possible wrongdoing.

Speaking on a Saturday podcast, MSW Media's Allison Gill and "All Rise News" reporter Adam Klasfeld walked through the new documents uploaded to the docket for the Ábrego case.

"There's been some stuff going on under seal," explained Gill. "Ex parte hearings, things that have been redacted. Stuff that's under seal."

She said that it seems to be related to a finding by U.S. District Court Judge Waverly Crenshaw that there was evidence of "vindictive prosecution." Gill said that it appears that the quick prosecutions of Ábrego may have been a deliberate attempt to stop a case before another judge could uncover possible wrongdoing in that case.

where he said that they began investigating Ábrego after a Maryland court judge demanded the man be returned. What Blanche said indicated there was a likelihood of vindictiveness. Gill said that what was missing, however, were the documents that could prove that Blanche made the decision to prosecute.

For months, Gill said she and Klasfeld have discussed the DOJ's claimed that prosecution of Ábrego had nothing to do with Blanche or an effort to shut down document discovery from the DOJ. The department has consistently said that the decision to go after Ábrego rested only with U.S. Attorney Robert E. McGuire, of the Middle District of Tennessee.

The new documents, revealed late Friday night, "finally pried loose some evidence showing Todd Blanche's involvement in prosecuting Mr. Ábrego."

The filing that was released begins: "For months, the government has insisted that this is not a vindictive prosecution because Acting U.S. Attorney Robert McGuire alone made the decision to charge Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia after he challenged his unlawful deportation to El Salvador. Six lawyers for the government — including the Associate Attorney General of the United States Stanley Woodward and Acting U.S. Attorney McGuire — signed a brief averring that 'undisputed evidence shows that there is no link between the Office of the Deputy Attorney General and the decision to prosecute.'"

It continues: "The government has repeatedly claimed — sometimes under penalty of perjury — that the buck stopped with Mr. McGuire. That claim, it turns out, was false. It remains unknown where the buck actually stopped — the Deputy Attorney General? The Attorney General? The White House? We may never know. But what we do know, from documents the defense and the Court had to pry out of the government’s hands, is that the government deceived the Court, the defense, and the public about Mr. McGuire’s purported status as the sole decision maker. Put bluntly, numerous government lawyers chose to mislead this Court in order to try to save this unjust prosecution."

"We now know: it was Mr. Blanche and his office, the Office of the Deputy Attorney General," the lawyers write.

Gill called it indicative of a lot of other cases under the purview of the DOJ and "implicates them in some bad stuff that result in the dismissal of these charges or the dismissal of other charges."

"For them to say, 'we don't know where the buck stops, but what we do know is Todd Blanch had a hand in it,'" Gill continued. The revelation could result in court sanctions.

She noted that even with the redactions in the documents it becomes clear that Blanche told the lower-level prosecutors what to do.

"It is, I think, definitive proof that this administration is vindictively and selectively prosecuting him. To punish him, to get discoveryto stop," Gill continued.

Klasfeld brought the conversation back around to the entire probe into vindictive and selective prosecution.

Klasfeld also noted that Blanche has tried to quash any efforts to have him testify in the case, claiming that there is no link between Blanche and U.S. Attorney McGuire.

"The only thing the Court found missing from the record was evidence 'tying [Mr. Blanche’s statements] to actual decision makers.' (Id. at 8). Not anymore. Previously, the Court rightly wondered who placed this case on Mr. McGuire’s desk and what their motivations were. (Dkt. 185 at 2). We now know: it was Mr. Blanche and his office, the Office of the Deputy Attorney General, or 'ODAG.'"

"So, they say it, flat out," Klasfeld noted. "Apparently, the messages are so damning that they say one, that's why they're no longer credible, and two, they're changing their story. They said there was no link. Now they're saying this was 'unremarkable oversight.'"

Ábrego has already won his civil case, and if he wins on the vindictive prosecution, the other cases are gone.

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an 12 25

Two of President Donald Trump's donors have been able to exert immense influence over the U.S. government's chief financial regulator — largely due to their closeness with the president and his family.

That's according to a Monday article in the New York Times, which reported that Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss (also known as the Winklevoss Twins) have managed to singlehandedly shift how the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) approaches the cryptocurrency industry. The Times reported that the Winklevosses, whose combined net worth is in excess of $9 billion, have not only turned an SEC investigation with potential for a criminal referral from the Department of Justice into a settlement, but have effectively stopped the SEC from opening any new cases into crypto firms since Trump's second presidency began.

Crypto firms were routinely investigated by former President Joe Biden's SEC, with the Times reporting that Trump's predecessor averaged two crypto investigations per month while Trump's SEC averaged one new investigation each month in his first term. Some of those firms, like Binance and Coinbase, were referred to the DOJ for criminal indictments. However, the SEC has yet to open a single investigation into any cryptocurrency companies in 2025, per the Times' reporting.

When Trump came into office, the Winklevosses were being investigated by the SEC after their firm, Gemini Trust, saw its crypto program collapse, affecting 230,000 investors. According to the Times, Gemini collaborated with another firm, Genesis Global Capital, that went bankrupt after making bad loans with roughly $2 billion worth of investors' assets. Investors only managed to recover their money after an 18-month fight.

A suit filed by plaintiffs in New York was settled, though the SEC was still litigating the Gemini as of Trump's second inauguration. As of September, the SEC announced it had resolved the Gemini case, meaning a settlement announcement is likely pending. When Tyler Winklevoss endorsed Trump in June of last year, he did so while also bashing the Biden administration's regulatory approach to crypto.

"President Donald J. Trump is the pro-Bitcoin, pro-crypto, and pro-business choice. This is not even remotely open for debate. Anyone who tells you otherwise is severely misinformed, delusional or not telling the truth," Tyler Winklevoss posted to X. "It’s time to take our country back. It’s time for the crypto army to send a message to Washington. That attacking us is political suicide."

The SEC's new kid-gloves approach to crypto comes at a time when Trump has drastically increased his net worth since taking the oath of office for the second time, largely due to crypto. Forbes reported in June that $3.3 billion of the president's estimated $5.5 billion in net worth is held in cryptocurrency. His eldest adult sons, Don Jr. and Eric, are also crypto investors. The Winklevosses have funded the firm American Bitcoin, which Eric Trump co-founded and where Donald Trump Jr. is a key investor.

Click here to read the Times' full report (subscription required).

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an 12 25

A top FBI official struggled to explain his claim that Antifa is the “most immediate violent threat” America is facing, as he was challenged to provide details.

Former Trump FBI Director Christopher Wray stated in 2020 congressional testimony that Antifa is “not a group or an organization. It’s a movement or an ideology.” The BBC has explained that Antifa is “a loosely organized, leftist movement that opposes far-right, racist and fascist groups.”

“Antifa is short for anti-fascist,” BBC added. “It is a loose, leaderless affiliation of mostly far-left activists.”

:{:{House Homeland Security Committee Ranking Member Bennie Thompson }:on Thursday asked Michael Glasheen, FBI National Security Operations Director, to describe “organizations that pose, on the domestic side,” the number one and number two threats to the homeland.

Glasheen asked for clarification.

“Any domestic terrorist organizations that poses a threat to the homeland as we speak,” Thompson replied.

Pointing to President Trump’s designation of Antifa as a domestic terrorist organization, Glasheen said, “That’s our primary concern right now.”

He described Antifa as “the most immediate violent threat that we’re facing on the domestic side.”

“So, where is the Antifa headquartered?” Thompson pressed.

After a pause, Glasheen said: “What we’re doing right now —” before Thompson cut him off.

“Where, in the United States, does Antifa exist?” he asked. “If it’s a terrorist organization — and you’ve identified it as number one.”

“We are building out the infrastructure right now,” Glasheen responded.'

“So what does that mean?” Thompson pressed. “Where do they exist? How many members do they have in the United States as of right now?”

“Well, that’s very fluid,” Glasheen said, describing it as “ongoing,” before comparing the situation to Al Qaeda and ISIS.

“I asked one question, sir,” Thompson replied. “I just want you to tell us. If you said Antifa is the number one domestic terrorist organization, operating in the United States, I just need to know where they are, how many people. I don’t want a name. I don’t want anything like that. Just, how many people have you identified with the FBI, that Antifa is made of?”

“Well, the investigations are active,” Glasheen replied.

“Sir, you wouldn’t come to this committee and say something you can’t prove. I know. I knew you wouldn’t do that. But you did.”

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AN 12 25

About 200 former attorneys and staff from the Civil Rights Division of the U.S. Department of Justice are warning of the “near destruction of DOJ’s once-revered crown jewel,” and what they call Attorney General Pam Bondi’s “demand” for “loyalty to the President, not the Constitution or the American people.”

“For decades, the non-partisan work of the Civil Rights Division at the United States Department of Justice (DOJ) has protected all Americans—especially the most vulnerable—from unfair treatment and unequal opportunities,” they write in a letter dated Tuesday. They added that “after witnessing this Administration destroy much of our work, we made the heartbreaking decision to leave—along with hundreds of colleagues, including about 75 percent of attorneys.”

Bloomberg Law reported on Tuesday that the DOJ’s Civil Rights Division will now focus only on “intentional discrimination,” and not “policies that may appear neutral but disproportionately affect racial minorities and other protected classes.”

In their letter, the former attorneys and staff specifically state that they left the Civil Rights Division “because this Administration turned the Division’s core mission upside down, largely abandoning its duty to protect civil rights,” and that it “achieved this goal by discarding much of the Division’s most impactful work.”

The group blasted Attorney General Bondi, who, they said, “issued a series of memos that subverted the Division’s mission in favor of President Trump’s political agenda.”

“One stood out: it insinuated that DOJ attorneys were Trump’s personal lawyers, an assertion that struck at the heart of the agency’s independence. Bondi’s demand to us was obvious: loyalty to the President, not the Constitution or the American people.”

In another scathing section, they charged that Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon “focused her efforts on ‘driving [the Civil Rights Division] in the opposite direction’ of its longstanding purpose.”

They allege she issued mission statements “that included fighting diversity initiatives instead of race-based discrimination, investigating baseless allegations of voter fraud rather than protecting the right to vote, and dropping any mention of the Fair Housing Act, a landmark 1968 law that protects Americans from landlords’ racial discrimination and sexual harassment.”

And they charge that the administration “demanded that we find facts to fit the Administration’s predetermined outcomes.”

“Having no use for the expertise of career staff, the Administration launched a coordinated effort to drive us out,” they wrote. “The campaign to purge staff culminated in Dhillon encouraging everyone to resign after a period of paid leave while threatening layoffs if enough staff did not accept.”

Christine Stoneman, one of the letter’s signatories, told Bloomberg Law, “It is a sad commentary that in this anniversary of the Civil Rights Division, the Trump administration has chosen to eliminate a regulation that, for nearly 60 years has helped root out illegal race and national origin discrimination by recipients of federal funds.”

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AN 12 25

Ex-assistant AG says Trump DOJ 'going to re-indict' after Halligan flubs

Trump scrambling as White House runs out of lawyers to defend the MAGA agenda in court

Adam Lynch

DOJ weighs 'politically fraught' legal action to retry cases tossed thanks to Halligan

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an 11 25

11/26/2025

When six Democratic senators with military and intelligence community experience posted a video last week calling on people now serving to refuse to carry out illegal orders, President Trump and many of his supporters lost it – even though the video was simply reminding servicemembers of their obligation under the Uniform Code of Military Justice.

The White House has walked back Trump’s initial outbursts calling for execution of the senators, but he said Sunday he still wants to see “the traitors that told the military to disobey my orders” in jail. He reposted a Truth social post calling the senators “traitorous sons of bitches” and “pompous traitorous communists” who “should be impeached and prosecuted.”

The senators have reported receiving death threats, and Trump allies are fanning MAGA outrage with false characterizations of the senators’ video.

Many MAGA attacks ignored the essential point of the senators’ video, which was to urge servicemembers not to obey illegal orders.

Trump adviser Stephen Miller, who has overseen official brutality against immigrants and their defenders, falsely claimed, “Democrat lawmakers are now openly calling for insurrection” and told Fox News viewers that it was “a general call for rebellion.”

Last week Libs of TikTok posteda claim that “Elected Democrats just released a video encouraging members of the military to commit treason and DEFY orders from Trump and Hegseth.”

On Sunday, the Republican National Committee sent an email claiming “Democrats want to stage a military coup” and falsely claiming that the video “called for an all-out coup against President Trump and Pete Hegseth” by “directly asking troops to disobey their orders.”

The RNC called the senators “disgusting socialists” and claimed they were “urging INSUBORDINATION.”

On Monday, the Washington Examiner’s Elizabeth Stauffer wrote that “Democrats are openly calling for a military mutiny.” She said the senators’ video had “all the hallmarks of a psychological operation lifted straight from the CIA’s playbook.”

Political dirty trickster Roger Stone claimed Monday that the video “is a call to arms for a revolt” and complained that “congressional seditionists” were emboldened by the fact that the Justice Department has not moved quickly enough to prosecute former “Deep State” officials.

Gary Bauer—yes, he’s still at it—used his daily newsletter to attack the senators for “stoking division and fueling mistrust in our government, which is the goal of our enemies”—and, let’s be honest, is the hallmark of Trump and the MAGA movement.

The Pentagon announced that Sen. Mark Kelly, a retired Navy Captain, would be investigated and could be recalled to active duty to face a court martial over what Hegseth claimed was a “seditious” video.

Kelly and the other senators made it clear that they were not cowed by Trump’s bluster, and many of their congressional colleagues came to their defense. Rep. Jason Crow of Colorado called it “a decisive moment.” Crow wrote on X, “Trump is trying to incite violence, intimidate, and punish those who speak up to hold him accountable. But the only thing we fear is not rising to this moment and defending the country we love.”

Former Rep. Adam Kinzinger said in a videothat military officers are told on “day one” of their training that they are obligated to not follow unlawful or illegal orders. Kinzinger called the Defense Department’s threat “chilling” and said it was designed to strike the fear of God into former officers who are publicly critical of Trump.

A rare critical voice from a sitting Republican came from Rep. Don Bacon who wrote that he thought the senators’ video was a bad idea, but that talk of sedition and threats of court martial were “crazy.”

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AN 11 25

In the service of President Donald Trump, Lindsay Halligan, Trump’s second interim appointment as U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, may lose her license to practice law.

Who is Halligan?

Competence is a key requirement for obtaining and retaining a law license. But nothing in Halligan’s education, experience, or training qualified her to prosecute federal crimes, much less lead a US Attorney’s office of more than 300 attorneys and staff in four divisions in Alexandria, Richmond, Norfolk, and Newport News. For starters, she has never tried a criminal case. But Trump always prefers loyalty over competence.

Halligan attended a private Catholic high school and a Jesuit university where she studied politics and broadcast journalism. She competed in the Miss Colorado USA pageant in 2009 and 2010 and received her law degree from the University of Miami School of Law. Upon graduation, she went to work in a Miami law firm, representing insurance companies against homeowners and businesses.

Even if Halligan manages to keep her law license, she will never recover her professional reputation. It’s the Trump effect.

Halligan met Trump in November 2021 at Trump International Golf Club in West Palm Beach. In early 2022, he made her part of his legal team on the Mar-a-Lago documents case.

After the election, she worked on Trump’s project to whitewash US history by cleansing the Smithsonian Institution of historically accurate but unpleasant facts. In August, she co-signed a letter instructing eight of the Smithsonian’s museums to replace exhibits that include “divisive or ideologically driven” material with “unifying, historically accurate” displays.

Answering Trump’s Call…

Based on the weakness of the cases against former FBI director James Comey and another Trump target, New York Attorney General Letitia James, Trump’s first interim US Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, Eric S. Siebert, refused his demand to indict them. Trump responded by declaring that he wanted Siebert “out.” Hours later, he resigned.

With the statute of limitations on charges against Comey expiring in days, Trump told Attorney General Pam Bondi to appoint 36-year-old Halligan—a senior White House staff secretary and special assistant to the President—as Siebert’s replacement.

“Lindsay Halligan is a really good lawyer, and likes you a lot,” Trump posted in a public message to Bondi.

Two days later, Halligan was sworn in as the new interim US Attorney. Her singular mission was to secure indictments against Comey and James.

Two days after that, on September 24, she succeeded. Halligan presented the case against Comey personally to the grand jury. Federal judges are now exposing her incompetence.

November 17:A federal magistrate judge found that the government may have violated Comey’s constitutional rights and his attorney-client privilege. The court listed 11 bases upon which the government’s misconduct—including Halligan’s statements to and conduct before the grand jury—may have violated the Constitution and require dismissal of Comey’s indictment.

November 19:Halligan admitted to another federal judge that she never showed the final indictment to the entire grand jury after it had rejected her first submission – a remarkable prosecutorial failure.

November 24:In rulings that invalidated the Comey and James indictments based on Trump’s unlawful appointment of Halligan, a third court began its opinion with this shot:

On September 25, 2025, Lindsey Halligan, a former White House aide with no prior prosecutorial experience, appeared before a federal grand jury in the Eastern District of Virginia. Having been appointed Interim U.S. Attorney by the Attorney General just days before, Ms. Halligan secured a two-count indictment charging former FBI Director James B. Comey, Jr….

…And Suffering the Consequences

Every attorney requires a license to practice law. The bar examiners who issue and renew those licenses promulgate rules of conduct that every lawyer must follow. Even before the latest judicial revelations, Halligan was defending complaints that she had violated those rules. But with the latest court rulings, she is in a whole new world of hurt. And Trump’s pardons won’t help her.

Here’s a partial list of the Model Rules that could pose problems for Halligan:

Rule 1.1: Competence

A lawyer shall provide competent representation to a client. Competent representation requires the legal knowledge, skill, thoroughness and preparation reasonably necessary for the representation.“

[Halligan has never tried a criminal case.]

Rule 3.1: Meritorious Claims and Contentions

A lawyer shall not bring or defend a proceeding, or assert or controvert an issue therein, unless there is a basis in law and fact for doing so that is not frivolous,….“

[Halligan’s predecessor found that the case against Comey was too weak to pursue.]

Rule 3.8: Special Responsibilities of a Prosecutor

The prosecutor in a criminal case shall:

(a)refrain from prosecuting a charge that the prosecutor knows is not supported by probable cause;….“

[Here, again, her predecessor found that any case against Comey was a loser for the government.]

Rule 8.4: Misconduct

It is professional misconduct for a lawyer to:

(d) engage in conduct that is prejudicial to the administration of justice;….“

[The circumstances surrounding Trump’s appointment of Halligan and her subsequent indictment of Comey suggest an abuse of power and conduct prejudicial to the administration of justice.]

Special rules for federal prosecutors echo and reinforce the Model Rules. They too require probable cause for charges, investigations and prosecutions that are conducted fairly and without vindictiveness, and a ban against politicized or partisan prosecutions.

In fact, the Justice Department has a “longstanding threshold requirement that a prosecutor may commence or recommend federal prosecution only if he/she believes that the person will more likely than not be found guilty beyond a reasonable doubt by an unbiased trier of fact and that the conviction will be upheld on appeal.”

Even if Halligan manages to keep her law license, she will never recover her professional reputation. It’s the Trump effect.

Maybe she can get Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s old job at Fox News.

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AN 11 25

The electronic voting company Smartmatic has submitted another filing that details more shocking revelations about Fox Corp.

The company is suing over what it alleges were false allegations about its electronic voting equipment in the wake of the 2020 election. Each part of the case has shown details about what Fox staff and on-air talent have said under oath that could undermine Fox's defense.

More exhibits appeared on the docket Sunday night under Document 2818, revealing the extent of the financial damage to the company since the 2020 election allegations began.

Last week, The Guardian reported that President Donald Trump's Justice Department would begin an investigation into conspiracy theories that allege Venezuela had a role in somehow rigging the election.

Among the exhibits was the testimony of a finance and damages expert.

Financial expert Christopher James submitted a report on Feb. 15, 2024, that used a formula to calculate the damages he feels Fox Corp. caused in its ongoing attacks against Smartmatic.

The document, released on Sunday, was a June 12, 2025, update to that initial report.

His calculations of damages from 2021-2025 total a loss of $526.2 million in profits and a loss of $165.4 million in expected profits from U.S. markets.

"After discounting the nominal lost expected profits from specifically identified international opportunities and the U.S. Market of $691.6 million, using a discount rate of 10.1 percent, I calculate a net present value of these lost expected profits of $537.3 million as of January 2021," the expert concluded.

The company is also seeking economic damages "on the harm to its business after 2025," he said in the affirmation.

"If the Trier of Fact concludes that Smartmatic will suffer continuing harm to its business in certain geographies — the United States and Latin America — linked to the Disinformation Campaign and dissipating harm in other geographies, a reasonable measure of Smartmatic's additional economic damages for periods subsequent to 2025 would be approximately $882 million...." James continued.

That number is slightly higher than the January 2021 "Opening Export Report," which cited $876.8 million.

Trump DOJ 'may not get Comey case to trial': CNN reporter

Sarah K. Burris

===

no lnx

Politics

Michael Flynn, DOJ in Settlement Talks Over $50 Million Claim

By Zoe Tillman

November 14, 2025

The Justice Department has been discussing settlements with two former officials from Donald Trump’s first term who — like the president — claim they’re owed major payouts from the US government as victims of politically motivated actions.

The administration has been in talks since at least late summer to resolve lawsuits brought by Trump’s first national security adviser, Michael Flynn, and former senior White House lawyer Stefan Passantino, according to court filings. Flynn is seeking $50 million for what he alleges was a wrongful prosecution, while Passantino says a House committee probing the 2020 election harmed his reputation by leaking private information....paywall blombrg

Bloomberg.com

Michael Flynn, DOJ in Settlement Talks Over $50 Million Claim

The Justice Department has been discussing settlements with Michael Flynn and Stefan Passantino, two former officials from Donald Trump's...

an 11 25

IFrame Content

Jay Clayton, Attorney General Pam Bondi's most recent appointment to investigate Democrats involved with late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein after President Donald Trump's sudden reversal, has been chosen for what The New Republic's Michael Tomasky says is a "political task that has nothing whatever to do with justice."

Clayton, a corporate lawyer who is "mostly a high finance guy," Tomasky notes, chaired the Security and Exchange Commission during Trump's first term.

"One thing that impressed me, and that was at odds with the standard Trumpian flouting of rules of any kind governing the behavior of appointees and their families, is that his wife, a Goldman Sachs official, resigned her position when he took the job," Tomasky notes.

"What? People in the Trump solar system acting ethically of their own volition? Hard to imagine how Trump tolerated that," he adds.

However, Clayton has "no prosecutorial experience at all" Tomasky writes.

When Trump named Clayton to run the Southern District of New York earlier this year, Sen. Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) blocked his nomination, but Trump appointed him on an interim basis for 120 days. After that the federal court for the district decides whether his appointment should go forward, and Manhattan's federal judges gave him the green light.

Clayton has been quiet in that position, Tomasky writes, saying "critics noted that when Bondi fired Maurene Comey, the daughter of James Comey who had overseen the prosecutions of Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell, Clayton said nary a word."

"The Aaron Sorkin-movie version of Clayton would have told Bondi to stuff it Saturday and resigned—I do not hold this public trust to go on politically motivated fishing expeditions. But that’s not real life, especially in Trumpworld," Tomasky writes.

It would be "brave" if Clayton comes back and says there's no evidentiary basis to indict his targets—former Democratic President Bill Clinton, Democratic presidential adviser Larry Summers, and Democratic donor Reid Hoffman, but if he does bring indictments, Tomasky says, there are only two plausible reasons.

"One might that there’s actually evidence sufficient to an indictment. In which case, let justice be done. But in Donald Trump’s, and Pam Bondi’s, America, we would be quite justified in suspecting a second explanation: That Clayton did what he was ordered by the White House to do," he writes.

"The Trump era is a time of learning what people are made of. I’m guessing that in six months’ time, we’ll know a lot more about Jay Clayton than we know today," he adds.

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an nyt 11 25

Dozens of former US Department of Justice attorneys have now gone on record to describe the unprecedented corruption of federal law enforcement taking place during President Donald Trump’s second term.

In a lengthy story published on Sunday by theNew York Times, the former DOJ attorneys described rampant politicization of prosecutions, directives to dig up evidence on Trump’s political foes, and orders to drop investigations into potential terrorist plots and white-collar crimes.

Several attorneys told the paper that the corruption of the DOJ began on Trump’s very first day in office when he issued a blanket pardon to everyone who had been convicted of rioting at the US Capitol building on his behalf on January 6, 2021, in a last-ditch effort to prevent the certification of former President Joe Biden’s electoral victory.

Gregory Rosen, who oversaw the unit at the DOJ that prosecuted January 6 rioters, told the Times that he felt “numb” seeing the pardons of the rioters, but he nonetheless facilitated the pardons because he understood they were within the president’s constitutional powers.

Mike Romano, a prosecutor who worked on January 6 cases, said that he had to resign as soon as he saw the broad scope of the pardons, which included rioters who were guilty of assaulting police officers.

“It’s incredibly demoralizing to see something you worked on for four years wiped away by a lie—I mean the idea that prosecution of the rioters was a grave national injustice,” he said. “We had strong evidence against every person we prosecuted.”

The mass pardon of the Capitol rioters was only the beginning, as prosecutors said that this politicization soon swept over the entire department.

In early March, for instance, Trump signed an executive order targeting law firms that had in the past represented prominent Democrats. Among other things, the order demanded federal agencies cancel government contracts with the firms and strip the firms’ employees of their security clearances.

The orders also accused some of the firms in engaging in supposed racial discrimination for maintaining policies related to diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI).

Dena Robinson, a former attorney at the DOJ’s Civil Rights Division, told the Times that the DEI investigation into law firm Perkins Coie was a particularly extreme example of the department’s politicization under Trump.

“The idea of the investigation was that Perkins Coie supposedly engaged in illegal discrimination against white men,” she explained. “But Perkins Coie is an extremely white firm—only 3% of the partners are Black. When my colleague pointed that out, the leadership didn’t care. They’d already reached their conclusion.”

Robinson said that this attitude was emblematic of how Trump appointees conducted investigations: They begin with desired conclusions and systematically ignore evidence that undermines them.

“I wouldn’t even call it the Justice Department anymore,” she said. “It’s become Trump’s personal law firm. I think Americans should be enraged.”

Another aspect of the DOJ under Trump that has drawn scrutiny has been his use of pardons for political allies, including his decision last month to pardon Changpeng Zhao, the founder of cryptocurrency exchange Binance, who pleaded guilty to money-laundering charges in 2023, and who had helped boost the value of the Trump family’s own cryptocurrency venture.

A new investigation from ProPublica found that Trump’s use of the pardon hasn’t just been relegated to prosecutions that took place during Democratic administrations.

The ProPublica report found Trump had wiped out convictions in “at least a dozen criminal cases that originated during his first term,” many of which involved politicians convicted of taking bribes or engaging in kickback schemes.

Frank O. Bowman III, a professor emeritus of law at the University of Missouri, told Pro Publica that the Trump pardons taken together are part of what he described as “the systematic destruction of the Justice Department as an objective agency that seeks to uphold the law and fight crime.”

In addition to this, Joseph Tirrell, former director of the Departmental Ethics Office, told the Times that the Trump DOJ has been hacking away at rules that bar law-enforcement officials from accepting gifts.

In one instance, Tirrell said he tried to intervene to stop DOJ employees from accepting cigars given by mixed martial arts fighter Conor McGregor and a soccer ball from the Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA).

“I felt like I really had to go to the mattress to convince the AG’s office: You can pay for the item or you can return the item or you can throw the item away,” he said. “There’s no other way to do this.”

Shortly after this, Tirrell said he got a call from the FBI general counsel inquiring “about changing exceptions to the gift rules because his boss, [FBI Director] Kash Patel, felt like he should be able to accept more expensive gifts.”

Tirrell said that he then reminded the counsel that “his client was not Mr. Patel, but the United States.”

Patel in recent weeks has come under scrutiny for some of the perks he’s taken during his time as FBI director, including using the FBI’s private jet to fly to a wrestling event where his girlfriend, country music singer Alexis Wilkins, was performing the national anthem.

MS NOW reported on Monday that Patel has also given Wilkins “a security detail made up of elite FBI agents usually assigned to a SWAT team in the FBI field office in Nashville,” an unprecedented arrangement for the girlfriend of the FBI director.

Christopher O’Leary, a former senior FBI agent and MS NOW law enforcement contributor, said that there is “no legitimate justification” for granting Wilkins this level of security.

“This is a clear abuse of position and misuse of government resources,” he said. “She is not his spouse, does not live in the same house or even the same city.”

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AN 11 25

A federal judge in Virginia on Thursday heard arguments in a bid from formerFBI Director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James to disqualify President Donald Trump-appointed prosecutor Lindsey Halligan. And, according to a CNN report, the judge's questioning of the Department of Justice at times from courthouse observers.

Attorneys for Comey and James argue Halligan was hand-picked by Trump to prosecute his perceived political enemies. They allege she is serving as interim U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia unlawfully.

CNN's crime and justice correspondent Katelyn Polantz described how Judge Cameron McGowan Currie, "a laid back questioner, a very concise questioner," led "a grilling of the Justice Department if I have ever seen one before from a judge like this."

Polantz detailed the judge's last question to the Justice Department, noting Currie asked: "Do you believe theU.S.v. Trump was wrongly decided?"

Polantz said that question was telling.

The federal case in Washington D.C., related to efforts to overturn the 2020 election results, was dismissed in November 2024 by Judge Tanya Chutkan at the request of special counsel Jack Smith.

Polantz explained Trump "won his case by having the prosecutor, Jack Smith, tossed off of it in Florida in a set of arguments very similar to this."

"And Judge Curry is now asking the Justice Department, 'Are you guys against that now?' as the Justice Department is wanting these cases against James Comey and Letitia James to go forward," the reporter said.

"The Justice Department lawyer responded, 'that's a different thing. That was a different situation. That doesn't apply here,' Polantz reported. "But that was quite a question that elicited gasps across the courtroom from a lot of people that were listening to this hearing."

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11 25

5500 QUIT FIRED THO NOT ALL ATTY

Lawyers 'astonished' at mass exodus from Trump DOJ as recruiting 'plummets'

DOJ prosecutors 'on pins and needles' hoping to avoid cases involving Trump's enemies

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AN 11 25

Politico reports that federal defense attorneys are making another attempt to oust President Donald Trump appointee Bill Essayli as the top federal prosecutor in Los Angeles.

In a motion filed Monday night, the federal defenders' office asked U.S. District Judge Michael Seabright (an appointee of former President George W. Bush) to reverse part of a ruling he issued last month that stripped Essayli of his title as acting U.S. attorney but allowed him to keep supervising that office in his capacity as first assistant U.S. attorney.

The attorneys argued that Seabright failed to confront the “resulting, and still-ongoing, constitutional violation” of Essayli serving the office even as an inferior officer without an official Senate confirmation.

“[T]he Constitution requires by default that inferior officers be nominated by the President and confirmed by the Senate. The only exception is where Congress has statutorily authorized another appointment method for the office in question,” lawyers argued. “There is no such statute here, and Mr. Essayli cannot constitutionally wield officer-level powers.”

Because Seabright’s order left the defense’s constitutional arguments unresolved, the attorneys argue that the court should not only reconsider its earlier order, but also bar Essayli from supervising prosecutions and dismiss any indictments coming out of his office as unlawful.

“Whatever title Mr. Essayli uses, if he is to wield inferior-officer powers, he must first either be confirmed or appointed to a statutorily authorized inferior office. Otherwise, he cannot exercise the significant governmental authority he claims, and the Court should bar him from doing so,” Federal Public Defender Cuauhtemoc Ortega wrote.

In their Monday night order, federal defenders' attorneys also highlighted a statement Essayli made on social media last month boasting that he was still wielding the same authority from his new perch.

“For those who didn’t read the entire order, nothing is changing. I continue serving as the top federal prosecutor in the Central District of California,” Essayli wrote on X shortly after Seabright’s order.

The fight over Essayli’s appointment is one of four disputes over U.S. attorneys that the Trump administration has attempted to install on an interim or acting basis without Senate confirmation.

Politico reports judges have already ruled against the appointments of Alina Habba in New Jersey and Sigal Chattah in Nevada, although the Trump administration is appealing both decisions.

Attorney General Pam Bondi appointed Essayli to serve as interim U.S. attorney for the Central District of California. In July, she attempted to extend his tenure by naming him as the first assistant in the same office and then elevating him to acting U.S. attorney.

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an 11 25

Far-right influencers are looking to Miami as a venue to pursue "long-promised charges of a 'grand conspiracy'" against President Donald Trump’s perceived adversaries, according to a New York Times report.

The influencers have even found a federal prosecutor there— Jason A. Reding Quiñones, Trump-appointed United States Attorney for the Southern District of Florida, who was sworn into office in August 2025 and is currently a central figure in a high-profile investigation into a 2017 intelligence community assessment regarding Russian election interference.

As for their alleged 'grand conspiracy,' the Times explains that its theory is "still unsupported by the evidence."

"A cabal of Democrats and 'deep-state' operatives, possibly led by former President Barack Obama, has worked to destroy Mr. Trump in a yearslong plot spanning the inquiry into his 2016 campaign to the charges he faced after leaving office," the Times explains.

Last week, however, Reding Quiñones issued over two dozen subpoenas, including to officials who took part in the inquiry into ties between Russia and Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign, according to people with direct knowledge of the matter, the Times writes.

Among the recipients include familiar Trump foils: James R. Clapper Jr., the former director of national intelligence; Peter Strzok, a former F.B.I. counterintelligence agent who helped run the Russia investigation; and Lisa Page, a former lawyer at the bureau.

The Florida investigation currently focuses on a "January 2017 intelligence community assessment about Russian interference in the 2016 election, particularly the role played by John O. Brennan, the former C.I.A. director, in drafting the document," the Times says.

The Brennan investigation started "after criminal referrals to the Justice Department by top Trump intelligence officials," the Times writes, and was assigned to David Metcalf, the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, "who was given special authority to scrutinize and possibly prosecute Mr. Brennan, according to four people with knowledge of his actions who requested anonymity to discuss an open matter."

Metcalf held senior Justice Department positions during the first Trump administration.

The Brennan case, however, was transfered from Metcalf to Reding Quiñones, "as part of a decision to greatly expand the scope of the Brennan investigation into other, unspecified activities, according to two people with knowledge of the situation," the Times explains.

The Florida subpoenas, the Times explains, "seek documents or communications related to the intelligence community assessment from July 1, 2016, through Feb. 28, 2017, according to people familiar with them. It commands the recipients to provide them to prosecutors in Miami by Nov. 20."

Despite the dubious nature of these investigations, the Times says, they do have one thing on its side.

"Reding Quiñones, a military veteran, has pursued his mandate to hunt down Mr. Trump’s foes with a gung-ho attitude that has endeared him to the president and the small but influential cadre of loyalists pushing hardest for prosecutions," notes the Times.

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RWW

Ryan J. Reilly @ NBC News: Jury acquits D.C. 'sandwich guy' charged with chucking a sub at a federal agent

Sean Dunn faced a single misdemeanor after federal grand jurors refused to indict him on the felony charge sought by prosecutors.

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an 10 25

Two federal prosecutors placed on leave after describing Jan. 6 'mob of rioters' in legal brief

reoffend weapons?

===

// sue wsj for bday card

an 10 25

Trump reportedly appears to be demanding the U.S. Department of Justice pay him $230 million in compensation after multiple investigations during his presidential campaign.

"The situation has no parallel in American history, as Mr. Trump, a presidential candidate, was pursued by federal law enforcement and eventually won the election, taking over the very government that must now review his claims," The New York Times, citing people familiar with the matter, reported.

Noting that President Trump has installed his former personal lawyers at the top of the DOJ, the Times called it "the starkest example yet of potential ethical conflicts."

Trump, according to the Times, in 2023, submitted a claim that "seeks damages for a number of purported violations of his rights, including the F.B.I. and special counsel investigation into Russian election tampering and possible connections to the 2016 Trump campaign, according to people familiar with the matter."

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Another complaint, filed the following year, "accuses the F.B.I. of violating Mr. Trump’s privacy by searching Mar-a-Lago, his club and residence in Florida, in 2022 for classified documents."

Bennett L. Gershman, an ethics professor at Pace University, told the Times it was "a travesty."

“The ethical conflict is just so basic and fundamental, you don’t need a law professor to explain it,” Gershmann said. "And then to have people in the Justice Department decide whether his claim should be successful or not, and these are the people who serve him deciding whether he wins or loses. It’s bizarre and almost too outlandish to believe.”

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AN 10 25

CNN anchor Boris Sanchez reports that federal law enforcement is starting to feel the heat as a Chicago judge condemns the Trump administration's tactics, saying that there are still reports of tear gas being deployed without warning.

U.S. District Court Judge Sara Ellis, a Barack Obama appointee, ordered Immigration and Customs Enforcement field director Russell Hottto appear in court Monday. But he returned to Washington, D.C. that same day on what the Department of Homeland Security calls a "planned return."

Former federal prosecutor and POLITICO senior writer Ankush Kardori says that Hott's failure to appear in Chicago is not typical.

"Usually when a judge requests a specific government official show up, they expect that official to show up, and that person shows up. So, no, it's unusual," he says.

Instead, two federal officials are taking Hott's place and testifying instead, answering questions from the judge about the use of tear gas, who ordered the tear gas and who was directing them to do so. Kardori doesn't think they will offer much.

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"This has been a big issue, actually, with some of the government's representations in court. They will put people up who know little to nothing about the relevant issues. So I expect her to put some pressure on that level of analysis," he says.

When Sanchez asked Kardori how a judge knows whether their orders are being followed or not, he said, "She's doing what she should be doing. She's seen a report, some indication that it's not being followed, right? For instance, tear gas being used in a residential neighborhood. Her order required that that only occur if there's some sort of actual threat, imminent threat to the officers."

The judge, who on Thursday ordered "all agents who are operating in Operation Midway Blitz ... to wear body-worn cameras," sparked controversy among ICE agents who don't want to work with FBI agents wearing body cameras.

The Department of Justice, Kardori explained, is "opposing this."

The use of body cameras is a complicated area of the law, Kardori said.

"And there are exceptions. It's not necessarily mandated across all federal officers. But I do think in this particular context, she is right to be sort of pushing the line on this," he added. "I think I think it's become apparent, quite honestly, that the anonymity of the agents they're masking has become areal problem."

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DEM DOCK

Lindsey Halligan, a lawyer with no prosecutorial experience, was appointed by President Donald Trump Monday as temporary U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia.

Halligan’s appointment marks a dangerous escalation in Trump’s effort to use the power of the U.S. Justice Department to advance his personal and political interests — a push that is spurring intense criticism and alarm among former prosecutors and legal experts.

“Trump wants to skip constitutional safeguards in order to carry out retribution,” one former U.S. attorney told Democracy Docket.

It comes after Erik Seibert was forced out of the post last week amid pressure from the president and senior Trump officials to indict New York Attorney General Letitia James on unproven mortgage fraud allegations. And it follows Trump’s order to U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi to prosecute his political adversaries, including James, former FBI Director James Comey and U.S. Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.)

Trump’s scheme has been widely condemned by former DOJ officials. And it has ignited fears that other U.S. attorneys overseeing political investigations will also be threatened with removal for failing to comply with orders from the White House.

Though Siebert resigned in a letter to staff last week, Trump over the weekend claimed he fired Siebert because the prosecutor raised concerns about the legal viability of bringing charges against James.

“He even lied to the media and said he quit, and that we had no case. I fired him, and there is a GREAT CASE, and many lawyers, and legal pundits, say so,” Trump posted on his Truth Social platform after Seibert resigned.

Seibert’s office spent months investigating James but concluded there was insufficient evidence to support bringing criminal charges.

In addition to the James probe, the Eastern District of Virginia is investigating Comey over claims that he lied under oath while testifying before Congress during Trump’s first term.

Trump has repeatedly vowed to seek revenge against James, who won a multi-million dollar judgment against the Trump Organization, and Comey, who has become a prominent Trump critic.

Halligan’s background is in insurance law, but her profile rose among Trump’s inner circle after she joined his defense team during the FBI’s Mar-a-Lago search in 2022. She later became special assistant to Trump, taking on ideological projects such as reviewing federal museums for what Trump called “improper ideology.”

Trump’s order to Bondi, his ouster of Seibert and appointment of Halligan marked an escalation of Trump’s longrunning effort to obliterate DOJ’s independence to use it as an arm of his sprawling revenge campaign against his perceived enemies, former prosecutors have said.

“Trump wants to skip constitutional safeguards in order to carry out retribution,” John McKay, a former U.S. attorney in Seattle who served during the administration of President George W. Bush, told Democracy Docket. “That is unconstitutional. That is unlawful. Everyone should be speaking up about it, especially including the public in nonviolent ways.”

McKay was one of nine U.S. attorneys ousted by the White House for politically motivated reasons during the Bush administration. The scandal led to a congressional investigation and ultimately the resignation of Attorney General Alberto Gonzales.

“In my case, when I was fired by Alberto Gonzales as U.S. attorney in Seattle, they lied about the reason for doing it because they didn’t want anyone to think they were doing it for political reasons,” McKay said. “But now, they’re saying it right out loud. They’re saying, ‘We are doing it for political reasons. That is unlawful. That is unethical. It violates due process. And we have to speak out against it.’”

McKay added that Trump’s directive to Bondi and the forced ouster of Siebert was “characteristic of authoritarianism and fascism.”

“I don’t think Siebert will be the last one to be fired,” Stacey Young, the executive director and founder of Justice Connection, a support network for DOJ alumni, told Democracy Docket “I don’t think this seemingly unqualified nominee is going to be the last unqualified nominee we’ll see,”

“And I’m worried about how far this is going to go,” Young added. “Every prosecutor in the DOJ now understands that if there’s a case where they don’t think they will have enough evidence to convict one of the president’s enemies, they’ll probably be fired too.”

The Society for the Rule of Law Institute, a center-right legal organization founded by prominent former DOJ officials, in a statement denounced Trump’s treatment of Siebert and his weaponization of the Justice Department.

“The resignation of U.S. Attorney Erik Siebert marks a new low point in the ongoing corruption of the Justice Department by a White House intent on using federal resources – not to defend the Constitution and the Rule of Law – but to persecute political critics and reward presidential sycophants,” the Society said.

James’ attorney, Abbe Lowell, called the effort to oust Seibert and replace him with a loyalist “an act of political revenge.”

“The Justice Department has firm policies against using investigations and against using prosecutorial power for achieving political ends,” Lowell said after Seibert submitted his resignation. “This is ever more the case when that demand is made to seek political revenge against a public official in the opposite party.”

The mortgage fraud allegations against James stemmed in part from a preliminary loan document obtained by Bill Pulte, the director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency who has recently become one of Trump’s favored attack dogs. He has leveled similar accusations against Schiff and Federal Reserve Board Governor Lisa Cook, who stands in the way of Trump’s attempted takeover of the central bank.

Trump’s appointment of Halligan is a continuation of his unprecedented move to populate the DOJ with his former attorneys.

In addition to Halligan, Bondi, Deputy Assistant Attorney General Todd Blanche, Solicitor General John Sauer, temporary U.S. Attorney of New Jersey Alina Habba, and temporary U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of New York John Sarcone are either former Trump defense attorneys or represented his campaign.

Habba and Sarcone are among several loyalists atop U.S. attorneys offices across the country who have taken explicitly partisan actions in their traditionally nonpartisan roles.

Halligan’s appointment came just days after Mary Cleary, a conservative lawyer who recently said she was “framed” for participating in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, unexpectedly said she had been named acting U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia.

The federal statute governing U.S. attorney vacancies holds that Halligan can legally only hold the post for 120 days. However, with other temporary U.S. attorney appointments, most prominently Habba’s, Bondi has attempted to circumvent the 120-day limit by shifting around titles.

Legal experts have warned that the effort has undermined federal law and Congress’ constitutional authority to confirm U.S. attorneys.

“It’s obvious they are trying to manipulate the law to put in place persons they think will be compliant with President Trump’s autocratic impulses,” McKay said. “They’re going to be successful in some cases. They’re going to be unsuccessful in others.”

The Eastern District of Virginia has long handled cases involving espionage, terrorism and political corruption. Now with a loyalist leading it, it may become a weapon to target Trump’s enemies.

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an 10 25

After keeping a low profile during the first eight months of Donald Trump's second administration, former U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) special counsel Jack Smith broke his silence and discussed his two criminal cases against the now-president: the Mar-a-Lago/classified documents case, and the January 6, 2021 election interference case. Smith revealed that in the documents case, he had even more damning evidence against Trump than was reported in 2023 and 2024 and summarized it in a full report. But that report remains unpublished, and now that Trump loyalist Pam Bondi is U.S. attorney general, the Trump-era DOJ will — in the words of The New Republic's Greg Sargent — "keep it completely covered up."

During an appearance on The New Republic's "Daily Blast" podcast posted on October 16, legal scholar and Constitutional Law Center fellow Matthew Seligman addressed what host Sargent describes as an "extreme level of corruption of DOJ to serve Trump's political demands." That corruption, Sargent lamented, also includes "highly dubious" prosecutions of Trump's foes being carried out by Trump loyalist and interim U.S. attorney Lindsey Halligan in DOJ's Eastern District of Virginia.

Seligman said of Smith's unpublished report, "What it contains, we don't fully know — although we know the broad outlines. One of the things that's remarkable about Donald Trump's crimes is that he has committed them virtually out in the open. The thing that might be added to what we've seen in public already is just more direct evidence of his state of mind…. As to whether we're ever going to see this, that's a hard question to answer. In the short term, the answer is almost certainly not."

If a Democrat wins the 2028 presidential election and Democrats regain "the keys to the Justice Department," Seligman added, Smith's unpublished report might see the light of day in 2029.

Seligman lamented that House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) will continue to prioritize loyalty to Trump, and he said of Halligan's prosecutions, "It's horrible."

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Seligman told Sargent, "Number two, does someone like Lindsey Halligan ever face consequences? And the answer is yes. And she very likely will, at some point, face disbarment proceedings. The caveat there is that she's from Florida, and I don't know how much the Florida Bar is going to try to hold Trump’s lawyers to account — but at least elsewhere in the country, we’ve seen Rudy Giuliani get disbarred. We've seen Kenneth Chesebro have his legal license suspended. We've seen John Eastman, who I testified against on behalf of the California Bar, be subject to attorney discipline — he's been disbarred pending appeals."

*Listen to the full New Republic podcast at this link and read the transcript here.

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AN 10 25

Top Trump official pressured DOJ to 'pursue president’s foes' — even as career prosecutors refused

Ailia Zehra

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AN 10 25

The Not Above the Law Coalition on Thursday released a report documenting how President Donald Trump’s administration has been corrupting every aspect of federal law enforcement.

The report, titled Trump’s “Crooked Cops”: The Corruption of Federal Law Enforcement, said that the president has “gone to extreme lengths to appoint top officials with no compunction about abusing their power to pervert justice to punish political enemies and favor political friends,” before showing how these appointees have swiftly eliminated their agencies’ independence from White House political pressure.

“Law enforcement that serves the political interests of the president rather than the public eliminates a core tenet of democracy, namely that we are a country of laws, not of men,” the report emphasizes.

The report begins by recounting how Attorney General Pam Bondi followed direct orders from the president to file criminal charges against former FBI Director James Comey, while at the same time noting that she has overseen “a department-wide purge of career officials who were assigned to Trump’s criminal cases or who were suspected to be insufficiently loyal to Trump personally.”

Other Trump officials who feature prominently in the report include FBI Director Kash Patel, who is facing a lawsuit from former agents who have alleged they were fired as part of a “campaign of retribution”; Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, who conducted an interview with convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell, and then moved her “to more comfortable, low-security accommodations” after she told him that Trump had no involvement in her former partner Jeffrey Epstein’s criminal activities; and White House border czar Tom Homan, who was allegedly caught on video accepting a $50,000 cash bribe from undercover FBI agents.

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The report also takes a swipe at Federal Communications Commission Chairman Brendan Carr, who publicly pressured ABC to take late-night talk show host Jimmy Kimmel off the air mere hours before the network decided to suspend him.

“This was by no means the first instance of Carr weaponizing his regulatory enforcement power for political ends,” the report says. “His threats have been all the more significant as many media companies have business interests pending before the administration.

During a conference call announcing the report, Rep. Joe Morelle (D-NY) described the Trump administration’s actions as ”so distressing and so disturbing,“ and vowed that he was ”not going to stand by while the Department of Justice is used to subvert the rule of law.“

Rep. Daniel Goldman (D-NY), a former federal prosecutor, said on the call that it was ”personally devastating“ to watch the corruption of the Justice Department, and he vowed that House Democrats would be ready to go with oversight investigations should they return to the majority after the 2026 midterm elections.

”Trump is trying to turn this government into his own personal fiefdom,“ said Goldman, who later described the weaponization of the Department of Homeland Security as ”downright scary.“

”We’re losing the fabric of our country,“ he said.

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BONDI HARMEET D INVEST EMPLOYEE REFUSE PRINT KIRK FLYER

AN 9 25

A takedown of Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche by a U.S. lawmaker and former federal prosecutor received acclaim by critics of the Trump administration on Wednesday.

U.S. Rep. Daniel Goldman (D-N.Y.) slammed Blanche for suggesting that the loud protest of President Donald Trump at a D.C. restaurant qualifies for racketeering charges and prosecution.

“RICO (Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act) is available to all kinds of organizations committing crimes and wrongful acts, not just organized crimes,” Blanche told CNN anchor Kaitlan Collins. “So … is it sheer happenstance that individuals show up at a restaurant where the president is trying to enjoy dinner and accost him with vile words and vile anger? … [I]s it completely random that they show up? Maybe. But to the extent that it’s an organized effort to inflict harm and terror and damage to the United States there’s potential investigation there.”

Trump spoke about being confronted by protesters at a Washington D.C. restaurant last week during a Monday press gaggle in the Oval Office.

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“… [T]hey should be put in jail. What they're doing to this country is really subversive," Trump said of protestors railing against his federalization of law enforcement in the capital city and calling for an end to hostilities in Gaza.

Collins pushed back on Blanche’s claim during his interview. “Were they inflicting harm or terror and damage to the United States ... by shouting in his vicinity?”

“That cannot be a serious question, said Blanche, who was Trump’s personal attorney defending him against multiple criminal indictments, including a case in which Trump was found guilty of using campaign money to bribe a woman for her silence over an alleged sexual escapade.

“People can protest the president,” Collins told Blanche, and Goldman agreed.

“I charged RICO cases. Yelling at the President is not a racketeering act and cannot be the basis for a criminal charge,” Goldman posted on X. “Blanche knows better. He is corrupting the DOJ with ridiculous comments like this.”

Social media backed up Goldman’s claim, with one commenter saying on X: “Wondering when it dawns on these guys that Trump will soon be gone and I mean in the permanent sense and what will they do with their careers? Who could possibly take them seriously?”

“To suggest that [Blanche] knows better is naïve, commented another X user, while a third said: “This echoes Trump's 2024 campaign vows to jail opponents, blurring protest with organized crime and chilling dissent.”

Another commenter questioned Blanche’s scope of knowledge: “Maybe he doesn’t know better … His ineffectual defense of Trump at trial certainly suggests either a corrupt or inaccurate understanding of the law.”

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politico

on March 15, just weeks into his new job as the Department of Justice lawyer in charge of immigration litigation, Drew Ensign was called into an unusual Saturday evening court hearing.

The government was preparing to whisk Venezuelan immigrants out of the country, giving them no opportunity to challenge their deportations, and send them to El Salvador’s brutal prison that its government calls the Terrorism Confinement Center, or CECOT. When the hearing began at 5 p.m., Ensign said he did not know if the deportations were underway. U.S. District Court Judge James E. Boasberg took a break so Ensign could find out, but when the hearing resumed, Ensign said he still did not know. “I do not have additional details I can provide at this time,” he said.

The judge ordered the government not to deport the immigrants, telling Ensign, “This is something that you need to make sure is complied with immediately.”

Judge James E. Boasberg, pictured above, has ruled that there is probable cause to find the government in criminal contempt of court for its actions during a March hearing in which Ensign represented it. | Carolyn Van Houten/The Washington Post via Getty Images

But it quickly emerged that the government did not comply. Two planes filled with immigrants had taken off from Texas during the break in the hearing, and they landed in El Salvador and discharged their passengers hours after Boasberg issued his order.

As Boasberg investigated whether the government had violated his order, Ensign’s court filings became increasingly combative; he called the judge’s questions a “judicial fishing expedition” and “intrusions into the prerogatives of the Executive Branch.” In a 46-page decision a month later, Boasberg traced the details of the flights, writing that they “were obscured from the Court when the hearing resumed shortly after 6:00 p.m. because the Government” — meaning Ensign — “surprisingly represented that it still had no flight details to share.”

In April, Boasberg ruled that there is probable cause to find the government in criminal contempt of court for what he called its “willful disregard” of his order, an extraordinary rebuke from a judge against a sitting administration. An appeals court issued a stay of Boasberg’s inquiry the same month, and if it eventually moves forward, it remains to be seen who might be found responsible for violating the court order. But one possibility is Ensign.

On June 24, a dismissed Department of Justice whistleblower, Erez Reuveni, shed new light on the Boasberg hearing in a report filed to lawmakers and the Justice Department inspector general. The account, first obtained and published by the New York Times, alleged that Ensign learned the day before the Boasberg hearing that the government would send people to the El Salvador prison that weekend, and that “Ensign willfully misled the court” when he told Boasberg he had no information about the flights.

It’s not yet clear what role Ensign played, if any, in the decision to continue with the deportations despite Boasberg’s order. In a letter he filed to the court on Thursday, Ensign said the government denies the whistleblower account.

Top: A prison officer stands guard in the watchtower with the San Vicente volcano in the background at maximum security penitentiary CECOT (Center for the Compulsory Housing of Terrorism) on April 4, 2025 in Tecoluca, San Vicente, El Salvador. Bottom: Supporters of Kilmar Abrego, who is the Salvadoran legal immigrant mistakenly deported by the Trump administration in March, hold a rally in support of Abrego in front of the U.S. District Court in Greenbelt, Maryland, before a trial hearing on May 16, 2025. | Alex Peña/Getty Images, top; Samuel Corum for POLITICO

If Ensign is ultimately found to be in contempt — a slim but real possibility — he could be fined, lose his law license or even face prison time. The DOJ did not respond to a request for comment about the possibility of contempt proceedings before publication, but after this article was published, Attorney General Pam Bondi wrote in a statement to POLITICO Magazine, “Drew is a talented attorney, outstanding person, and highly respected member of our team at the Department of Justice who has helped us secure historic wins for the American people.” Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche and Assistant Attorney General Brett Shumate also sent statements of support for Ensign.

Ensign did not respond to requests for comment or interviews for this article.

Ensign, deputy assistant attorney general for immigration litigation at DOJ, has become the legal face of the Donald Trump administration’s unprecedented and highly controversial deportations to CECOT. He is also defending the Kilmar Abrego Garcia case, in which the government admitted to mistakenly deporting Abrego to the El Salvador prison, in defiance of a previous court order. For weeks, Ensign argued that there was nothing the government could do to retrieve the man and that the judge had no power to order the government to do something.In that case, too, the judge, U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis, has raised the possibility of contempt proceedings. (On June 6, the government suddenly returned Abrego to the United States; he is facing federal human smuggling charges in Tennessee.)

Before the Department of Justice, Drew Ensign graduated from Duke University and New York University Law School, then went on to spend a decade at the white-shoe law firm Latham & Watkins. | Department of Justice

All of this — the headlines, the angry judges, the defense of an mistaken deportation, the possibility of contempt — comes as a surprise to people who knew Ensign in earlier stages of his career.

Unlike lawyers who fought for Trump in trying to challenge the results of the 2020 election or justify the Jan. 6 insurrection, Ensign does not have the profile of a MAGA true believer. He has never donated to Trump’s campaigns or to notable Trump acolytes.

A graduate of Duke University and New York University Law School, one of the most selective law schools in the country, Ensign went on to spend a decade at the white-shoe law firm Latham & Watkins, representing major corporations.

Those are institutions not known for Trumpiness. Although Latham recently capitulated to Trump, promising $125 million in free legal services to causes the president favors, it previously had a reputation as a non-ideological firm whose lawyers skewed liberal — in last year’s election, about 90 percent of its lawyers’ political donations went to Democrats. But regardless of their individual politics, lawyers at prestigious law schools and selective firms are expected to uphold the rule of law and their professional ethical obligations above all else — which made Ensign’s defense of Trump’s agenda at any cost even more surprising to two former colleagues.

“It’s shocking to see somebody of his caliber and somebody who has been trained at a firm like Latham out there making these arguments,” said a former colleague at the firm, who, like another former Latham colleague and a former classmate, was granted anonymity because they did not want their name or current employer associated with immigration-related controversies.

By choosing to defend an administration that is “way out on a limb and not following the constitution,” the first former colleague said, Ensign was making decisions that would harm his own career and, potentially, the country. “I don’t think there’s anybody who Drew has worked with, who’s been a mentor to Drew, who cares about Drew’s legal career, who would think that he is making really good decisions personally.”

But teaming up with MAGA-world might not be career-ending at all for Ensign, who never reached the pinnacle of the staid world of big law firms. For one, his allies still see the same hard-working Drew in his role today. “Not only is he just brilliant, but he also just has an unbelievable work ethic,” said Jill Holtzman Vogel, managing partner of Holtzman Vogel, a firm where Ensign later worked in Arizona.

And then there’s the possibility that Ensign may not have damaged his career by joining the Trump administration, as some former colleagues and acquaintances suggest. He may have simply found a different way to the top — a path that is becoming increasingly popular in elite fields in the age of Trump.

Trump administration has failed to deport Kilmar Abrego Garcia to Africa

Although Latham recently capitulated to Trump, promising $125 million in free legal services to causes the president favors, it previously had a reputation as a non-ideological firm. | Francis Chung/POLITICO

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The Trump administration is waging war on the legal profession on every front.

He’s issued a raft of executive orders aim to punish private lawyers for doing their jobs. Trump has targeted big law firms for crossing him personally and politically, and he’s treated the representation of disfavored clients — be they immigrants, voting right advocates, or LGBTQ+ service members — as working against the national interest.

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Inside the government, he’s fired attorneys who worked on the special counsel investigations and investigated lawyers who prosecuted January 6 defendants. He’s shredded the Justice Department’s prosecutorial independence, demanding politically-motivated prosecutions and firing attorneys who won’t betray their ethics and go along.

And so it’s incumbent upon us to name and shame the lawyers enabling this wholesale assault.

Obviously high-level Trump officials like Attorney General Pam Bondi, Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, Principal Associate Deputy Attorney General Emil Bove, Acting Solicitor General Sarah Harris, and soon-to-be Solicitor General John Sauer will live forever in the pantheon of disgrace. And Ed Martin, the acting US Attorney for DC, will surely be remembered for his ignominious conduct.

But the legal foot soldiers who made this era of lawlessness possible should not escape infamy. The Trump administration could not wage this battle without midlevel and line attorneys willing to do the research, draft the pleadings, and sign their names. Put simply, these people had a choice. They chose to participate in these disgraceful actions, rather than resigning, as so many of their colleagues did. They should be shamed and called out, and we will attempt to update and maintain this list during this administration to make sure that they are.

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Vinita Andrapalliyal is Senior Counsel and the lead line attorney on the briefs inPFLAG v. Trump, a challenge to Trump’s executive order banning gender-affirming care for people 19 and under. The DOJ argued that discriminating against trans people is not discrimination on the basis of sex, and the government’s briefs grossly mischaracterize the science on gender affirming care.

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Michelle Bennett is Assistant Director of the Federal Programs Branch. She has supervisory authority in PFLAG v. Trump, the challenge to Trump’s executive order banning gender-affirming care for people 19 and under.

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Marcia Berman is the Assistant Branch Director of the Civil Division. She has line supervisory authority inAFL v. Dep’t of Labor, which seeks to protect government employees’ data from Elon Musk’s DOGE minions.

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Christian Daniel is a Trial Attorney and is on the briefs in PFLAG v. Trump.

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Drew Ensign is a Deputy Assistant Attorney General and lead counsel onJ.G.G. v. Trump, where he defended kidnapping Venezuelan nationals and sending them to a Salvadoran gulag prison pursuant to the Alien Enemies Act. The government defied Chief Judge James Boasberg’s direct order to “turn those planes around.” Ensign argued that the court’s order did not count until it was memorialized in a writing and that court had no jurisdiction after the planes left US airspace.

In an effort to hide its non-compliance, the government filed a Notice Invoking State Secrets Privilege, signed by Ensign, in which it refused to answer further questions about the removal of the suspected gang members without due process.

Ensign also has supervisory authority in US v. Illinois,the administration’s challenge to Illinois’s sanctuary jurisdiction laws. Courts have consistently upheld such laws under the Tenth Amendment and the anti-commandeering doctrine, but Ensign argues that the statutes are invalid because they “effectively obstruct” the Trump administration’s draconian immigration policies.

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August Flentje is a career DOJ official, currently serving as Acting Director of the Federal Programs Branch, Civil Division. He assisted in writing the briefs in J.G.G. v. Trump, described above under the entry for Drew Ensign and US v. Illinois, described above in more detail under the entry for Drew Ensign.

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Michael Gerardi is Senior Trial Counsel and principal author of the briefs submitted in AFL v. Dep’t of Labor, described above in more detail under the entry for Marcia Berman.

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Patrick Glen is Senior Litigation Counsel, and assisted with the briefs in JGG v. Trump, described above in more detail under the entry for Drew Ensign.

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Alexander Haas is Director of the Federal Programs Branch, Civil Division. He has supervisory authority inAIDS Vaccine Advocacy Coalition v. Dep’t of State, the lawsuit challenging the shutdown of USAID. In that case, the government deliberately refused to comply with Judge Amir H. Ali’s order to resume paying contractors and grantees, later claiming that it was unable to comply in the time frame set out by the court.

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Christoper Hall is a career Justice Department lawyer, currently serving as Assistant Branch Director of the Federal Programs Branch, Civil Division. He has supervisory authority in AIDS Vaccine Advocacy Coalition v. Dep’t of State, described above in more detail under the entry for Alexander K. Haas.

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Eric Hamilton is a Deputy Assistant Attorney General. He is the lead supervising attorney inNTEU v. Vought, the challenge to President Trump’s efforts to shut down and eliminate the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Judge Amy Berman Jackson described the government’s conduct in this case as “so disingenuous that the Court is left with little confidence that the defense can be trusted to tell the truth about anything.”

Hamilton is also a supervising attorney in AIDS Vaccine Advocacy Coalition v. Dep’t of State and U.S. v. Illinois.

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Liam Holland is a Trial Attorney at the Department of Justice and the principal author of the pleadings filed in NTEU v. Vought.

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Benjamin Kurland is a Trial Attorney at the Department of Justice and one of the drafters of briefs submitted in AFL v. Dep’t of Labor.

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Kirk Manhardt, the Director of the Corporate/Financial Litigation Section, has supervisory authority inClimate United Fund v. Citibank. In that suit, “greenbank” fund grantees are fighting the Environmental Protection Agency’s effort to claw back $20 billion allocated under the Inflation Reduction Act based on a deceptively edited Project Veritas video.

The DOJ failed to persuade the court that that the EPA’s terminations arose from a careful, case-by-case analysis, rather than a rightwing smear campaign.

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Elisabeth Neylan is a Trial Attorney with the Federal Programs Branch. She appears on the briefs in U.S. v. Illinois, described above in more detail under the entry for Drew Ensign.

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Erez Reuveni, an Assistant Director of the Federal Programs Branch, assisted in writing the briefs in J.G.G. v. Trump and U.S. v. Illinois.

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Brad P. Rosenberg is Special Counsel assigned to NTEU v. Vought, described above in more detail under the entry for Eric J. Hamilton.

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Yaakov Roth is the Acting Assistant Attorney General in the Civil Division, and is supervisory counsel on a number of the administration’s cases, including: AFL v. Dep’t of Labor, described above in more detail under the entry for Marcia Berman; AIDS Vaccine Advocacy Coalition v. Dep’t of State, described above in more detail under the entry for Alexander K. Haas; J.G.G. v. Trump, described above in more detail under the entry for Drew Ensign; Climate United Fund v. Citibank,described above in more detail under the entry for Kirk T. Manhardt; PFLAG v. Trump, described above in more detail under the entry for Vinita B. Andrapalliyal; U.S. v. Illinois, described above in more detail under the entry for Drew Ensign.

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Marc Sacks is the Deputy Director of the Corporate/Financial Litigation Section at the Department of Justice. He is the lead line attorney on the briefs in Climate United Fund v. Citibank,described above in more detail under the entry for Kirk T. Manhardt.

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Brett Shumate is the Acting Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Division at the Department of Justice. He has supervisory authority in State of Washington v. Trump, the lawsuit challenging Trump's executive order purporting to undo birthright citizenship. He's also the lead attorney of record in two cases brought by the United States against states seeking to force those states to disregard their sanctuary jurisdiction laws, including U.S. v. Illinois and US v. State of New York (challenging New York's so-called "greenlight law"), and several others, including the now-dismissed lawsuit brought by former Special Counsel Hampton Dellinger challenging his illegal termination.

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Jacqueline Coleman Snead is an Assistant Director of the Federal Programs Branch, Civil Division, and appears on the briefs in U.S. v. Illinois, described above in more detail under the entry for Drew Ensign.

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Indraneel Sur is the lead line attorney on the briefs and at oral argument in AIDS Vaccine Advocacy Coalition v. Dep’t of State, described above in more detail under the entry for Alexander K. Haas.

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Kevin VanLandinghamis an Assistant Director of the Corporate/Financial Litigation Section. He appears on the briefs in Climate United Fund v. Citibank,described above in more detail under the entry for Kirk T. Manhardt.

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Brian C. Ward is an Acting Assistant Director of the Federal Programs Branch, Civil Division and assisted in writing the briefs in J.G.G. v. Trump, described above in more detail under the entry for Drew Ensign.

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Lauren Wetzler is Deputy Director of the Federal Programs Branch, Civil Division. She has supervisory authority in AIDS Vaccine Advocacy Coalition v. Dep’t of State, described above in more detail under the entry for Alexander K. Haas.

Seriously: the reason why we at Law and Chaos can name and shame these assholes is that we’re supported by you, our readers. Please consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

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AN 10 25

A senior prosecutor in Virginia is reportedly preparing to decline a high-stakes directive to indict New York Attorney General Letitia James (D), raising serious questions about political interference at the Justice Department.

MSNBC reported Monday that Elizabeth Yusi, who leads major criminal prosecutions in the Norfolk office of the Eastern District of Virginia, has privately informed colleagues she finds no probable cause to charge James with mortgage fraud.

According to the report, she intends to formalize this view and present her reasoning to the newly installed acting U.S. Attorney for that district, Lindsey Halligan.

Halligan, a former White House aide and private attorney, replaced Erik Siebertafter President Donald Trump publicly called for his removal, an effort sparked by Siebert’s reluctance to bring charges against James and former FBI Director James Comey.

Within the Eastern District, prosecutors anticipate potential reprisals against Yusi for resisting political pressure to pursue the James case. According to the report, her colleagues fear she could be dismissed for insubordination.

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Trump has publicly demanded that the Justice Department pursue criminal charges against James, even though long-serving prosecutors have concluded there is insufficient evidence to show that she lied or intended to lie in her mortgage application for her niece’s home, per the report.

In a post on his Truth Social platform Saturday, Trump called James “SCUM” and demanded she be removed as New York’s attorney general, citing what he characterized as her “WITCH HUNT against President Donald J. Trump, and others.”

Randall Eliason, former chief public corruption prosecutor for the U.S. Attorney’s Office in D.C., told MSNBC: “This supervisor clearly is doing the right and ethical thing by refusing to bend her legal conclusions to fit the president’s desire for political retribution.“

Eliason added that career prosecutors are being "forced to choose between honoring their oaths and risking their livelihood" and "forced out by the president’s politicization of the Justice Department.’”

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AN 9 25

Under the direction of U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) is investigating New York State Attorney General Letitia James for mortgage fraud.

But Trump's critics argue that the probe is a baseless fishing expedition motivated by a desire for revenge against a political foe.

According to ABC News reporters Peter Charalambous, Katherine Faulders and Alexander Mallin, Trump's allies continue pushing for an indictment of James — but the investigation is turning up nothing substantial.

"After a five-month investigation and interviews with more than a dozen witnesses," the reporters explain in an article published on September 17, "federal prosecutors have so far uncovered no clear evidence that James knowingly made false statements to a financial institution to secure favorable terms on a mortgage for her Virginia home, according to multiple sources briefed on the investigation. Trump himself has pressured the Department of Justice leadership to investigate James more aggressively, and two officials — Ed Martin, the head of the DOJ's Weaponization Working Group, and Bill Pulte, the director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency — have pushed the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia to seek an indictment of James."

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The reporters add, "When federal prosecutors recently declined to indict James, Pulte encouraged Trump to fire Eric Siebert, the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, and replace him with a prosecutor who would be willing to bring charges against James, sources said. "

*Read the full ABC News article at this link.

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AN 9 25

404 Media reports the Department of Justice has taken down a study showing white supremacist and far-right violence outpaces “all other types of terrorism and domestic violent extremism” in the United States.

The DOJ website hosted the study, conducted by the National Institute of Justice, until September 12, 2025.

In its place is the message: “The Department of Justice's Office of Justice Programs is currently reviewing its websites and materials in accordance with recent Executive Orders and related guidance. During this review, some pages and publications will be unavailable. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause.”

The report What NIJ Research Tells Us About Domestic Terrorism revealed “Militant, nationalistic, white supremacist violent extremism has increased in the United States. In fact, the number of far-right attacks continues to outpace all other types of terrorism and domestic violent extremism.”

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The document reports “far-right extremists have committed far more ideologically motivated homicides than far-left or radical Islamist extremists,” since 1990, “including 227 events that took more than 520 lives.”

In this same period, the report claimed, “far-left extremists committed 42 ideologically motivated attacks that took 78 lives.”

“We don’t know why the study about far-right extremist violence was removed recently,” writes 404 Media reporter Emanuel Maiberg, “but it comes immediately after the assassination of conservative personality Charlie Kirk, accusations from the administration that the left is responsible for most of the political violence in the country, and a renewed commitment from the administration to crack down on the ‘radical left.’”

The DOJ did not respond to 404 Media’s request for comment.

Read the 404 Media report at this link.

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// BONDI ON HATE SPEECH

Trump’s AG scrambles to do 'damage control' after conservatives rage against free speech threat

AN 9 25

Senior Trump administration officials on Monday made fresh threats to crack down on a nonexistent left-wing “domestic terror movement” following last week’s assassination of Charlie Kirk—a move that critics called an attempt to exploit the far-right firebrand’s murder to advance an authoritarian agenda targeting nonviolent opposition.

Even as investigators work to determine the motive of Kirk’s killer, members of Trump’s inner circle and supporters have amplified an unfounded narrative of a coordinated leftist movement targeting conservatives.

According to The New York Times:

On Monday, two senior administration officials, who spoke anonymously to describe the internal planning, said that Cabinet secretaries and federal department heads were working to identify organizations that funded or supported violence against conservatives. The goal, they said, was to categorize left-wing activity that led to violence as domestic terrorism, an escalation that critics said could lay the groundwork for crushing anti-conservative dissent more broadly.

Appearing on the latest episode of “The Charlie Kirk Show” podcast—which was guest hosted by US Vice President JD Vance—White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller said that “we are going to use every resource we have at the Department of Justice, Homeland Security, and throughout this government to identify, disrupt, dismantle, and destroy these networks and make America safe again for the American people.”

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“It will happen, and we will do it in Charlie’s name,” Miller vowed.

Vance said during the podcast that he wanted to explore “all of the ways that we’re trying to figure out how to prevent this festering violence that you see on the far left from becoming even more and more mainstream.”

“You have the crazies on the far left who are saying, ‘Oh, Stephen Miller and JD Vance, they’re going to go after constitutionally protected speech,‘” the vice president said. “We’re going to go after the network that foments, facilitates, and engages in violence.”

Vance, who like Trump and numerous supporters claim to champion free speech, also took aim at “people who are celebrating” Kirk’s killing.

Another unnamed administration official told the Times Monday that government agencies would be investigating people, including those accused of vandalizing Tesla electric vehicles and dealerships and allegedly assaulting federal immigration agents, in an effort to implicate US leftists in political violence.

Vance and Miller’s threats ignored right-wing violence—which statistically outpaces left-wing attacks—including the recent assassinations of Democratic Minnesota House Speaker Melissa Hortman and her husband Mark Hortman, who were murdered in June by a right-wing masked gunman disguised as a police officer.

Investigative reporter Jason Paladino reported last week that the US Department of Justice apparently removed an academic study previously published on the National Institute for Justice’s online library showing that “since 1990, far-right extremists have committed far more ideologically motivated homicides than far-left or radical Islamist extremists, including 227 events that took more than 520 lives” versus “42 ideologically motivated attacks that took 78 lives” committed by “far-left extremists.”

Responding to Miller’s remarks, New Republic staff writer Greg Sargent noted on social media that “Stephen Miller was directly involved in one of the largest acts of organized domestic political violence the United States has seen in modern times, the January 6 [2021] insurrection.”

Congresswoman Diana DeGette (D-Colo.) weighed in Monday on Miller’s attempt to exploit Kirk’s murder, writing on the social media site Bluesky that “it’s never acceptable to kill someone for their political beliefs. But the Trump [administration] exploiting the shooting of Charlie Kirk to follow their authoritarian instincts and crack down on the left is incredibly disturbing.”

“We must end any form of political violence—and reject those who try to exploit it,” she added.

Democratic California Gov. Gavin Newsom noted Monday on social media that Miller “has already publicly labeled the Democratic Party as a terrorist organization.”

“This isn’t about crime and safety,” Newsom added. “It’s about dismantling our democratic institutions. We cannot allow acts of political violence to be weaponized and used to threaten tens of millions of Americans.”

The progressive Working Families Party (WFP) said Monday on social media that “JD Vance and Stephen Miller want to use the horrifying murder of Charlie Kirk to target and dismantle pro-democracy groups.”

“Their comments call to mind some of the darkest periods in US history,” WFP continued. “They’re dividing people based on what box we ticked on our voter registration.”

Vance and Miller “want to stoke fear and resentment to justify their un-American crackdowns on free speech, mass abductions of working people, and military takeovers of our cities,” WFP added. “This isn’t going to fly. We’ve survived crises like this before as a country, and we can choose to live in a place where our political freedoms are protected, where we settle disagreements with words not weapons, and where no one has to fear losing a loved one to gun violence.”

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MILLER LAWFARE SELF DEFENSE RETALIATE

AN 9 25 CLAIM NO SUPPORT

White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller was Vice President JD Vance’s guest on Monday’s edition of “The Charlie Kirk Show,” just days after the right-wing political commentator was assassinated. The suspected gunman’s motives and political beliefs remain unclear, but the vice president pinned the blame for Kirk’s murder on “left-wing extremism.”

“While our side of the aisle certainly has its crazies,” Vance declared, “it is a statistical fact that most of the lunatics in American politics today are proud members of the far-left.”

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The vice president did not define “lunatics,” but statistics from the Cato Institute show that the vast majority of political violence comes from the far-right.

Guest-hosting for the late organizer and activist, Vice President Vance viewers, “I wanted to zoom out and talk with Stephen [Miller] a little bit, and talk about all of the ways that we’re trying to figure out how to prevent this festering violence that you see on the far-left from becoming even more and more mainstream.”

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The vice president—who placed blame at least in part on the left for Kirk’s death—said, “we have to talk about this incredibly destructive movement of left-wing extremism that has grown up over the last few years, and I believe is part of the reason why Charlie was killed by an assassin’s bullet.”

“We’re gonna talk about how to dismantle that,” he continued, “and how to bring real unity, real unity that can only come when we tell the truth and everybody knows that they can speak their mind about the issues of the day without being cut down by a murderer’s gun.”

Miller, who is considered by many—including some highly respected conservatives—a skilled propagandist, on Friday spoke out against what he called left-wing violent extremism.

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“I’ve not shared with anybody, but the last message that Charlie Kirk gave to me before he joined his Creator in heaven was, he said that we have to dismantle and take on the radical left organizations in this country that are fomenting violence.”

“That was the last message that he sent me before that assassin stole him from all of us.”

“And we are gonna do that,” Miller vowed. “Under President Trump’s leadership, I don’t care how—it could be a RICO charge, a conspiracy charge, conspiracy against the United States, insurrection—but we are going to do what it takes to dismantle the organizations and the entities that are fomenting riots, that are doxing, that are trying to inspire terrorism, and that are committing acts of wanton violence.”

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“It has to stop,” he declared, “and my message is to all of the domestic terrorists in this country spreading this evil hate? You want us to live in fear? We will not live in fear, but you will live in exile. Because the power of law enforcement under President Trump’s leadership will be used to find you, will be used to take away your money, take away your power, and if you’ve broken the law, to take away your freedom.”

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an 8 25

Veterans and legal analysts say the Trump administration’s arrest of a former army sergeant and roadside bomb victim marks an escalation in the administration’s attacks on first amendment rights, reports the Guardian.

Officials arrested Afghanistan war veteran Bajun Mavalwalla II for “conspiracy to impede or injure officers” after joining a demonstration against federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in Spokane, Washington.

“Here’s a guy who held a top-secret clearance and was privy to some of the most sensitive information we have, who served in a combat zone,” said Kenneth Koop, a retired colonel who trained the Afghan military and police during Mavalwalla’s deployment. “To see him treated like this really sticks in my craw.”

The Guardian reports Mavalwalla was not among the more than two dozen people arrested at the scene of a June protest that left a government van with a broken windshield. Nevertheless, FBI officials arrived at the door of Mavalwalla and his Afghanistan war veteran wife one month later.

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According to the indictment, Mavalwalla and his co-defendants “physically blocked the drive-way of the federal facility and/or physically pushed against officers despite orders to disburse and efforts to remove them from the property”.

Video shows Mavalwalla, who has no criminal record, locked arms with other demonstrators to block a gate.

Mavalwalla has pleaded not guilty, and the Guardian reports Richard Barker, the former acting US attorney for eastern Washington state, resigned before signing the arrest warrant.

“I am grateful that I never had to sign an indictment or file a brief that I didn’t believe in,” Barker wrote on Linkedin.

However, replacing Barker is Trump-appointed acting US attorney Pete Serrano, which the Guardian reports as having filed an amicus briefat odds with the 14th amendment. Serrano also has no prosecutorial experience and has described Jan. 6 U.S. Capitol rioters as “political prisoners.”

Luis Miranda, former chief spokesman for the Department of Homeland Security, told the Guardian Serrano appears willing to test the waters for Trump’s use of political detainment.

“He’s a test case to see how far they can go,” said Miranda.

Read the full Guardian report at this link.

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Click the image to the right to watch.

Testimony of Alison Morrow

Silent Majority Foundation filed a lawsuit against the State of Washington Department of Natural Resources (DNR) and executive level DNR employees, on behalf of award-winning journalist, Alison Westover (formerly Alison Morrow) for Alison’s wrongful termination stemming from Alison posting an interview with Dr. Aaron Kheriaty, MD on her personal YouTube channel, which she made on her own time with her own resources.

Alison shares why Silent Majority Foundation needs your support to protect all of our rights, including the right to speak and hear!

Click the image to the left to watch.

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Video shows Mavalwalla, who has no criminal record, locked arms with other demonstrators to block a gate.

Mavalwalla has pleaded not guilty, and the Guardian reports Richard Barker, the former acting US attorney for eastern Washington state, resigned before signing the arrest warrant.

“I am grateful that I never had to sign an indictment or file a brief that I didn’t believe in,” Barker wrote on Linkedin.

Luis Miranda, former chief spokesman for the Department of Homeland Security, told the Guardian Serrano appears willing to test the waters for Trump’s use of political detainment.

“He’s a test case to see how far they can go,” said Miranda.

Read the full Guardian report at this link.

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Jeanine Pirro mocked with January 6 photos after charging man for throwing sandwich at cop

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In Washington, DC — where protesters are speaking out against President Donald Trump's federalizing of local law enforcement —

a man is being charged with felony assault for throwing a Subway sandwich at a police officer.

U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi highlighted the arrest in a late Thursday morning, August 14 post on X, formerly Twitter.

"If you touch any law enforcement officer," Bondi tweeted, "we will come after you. I just learned that this defendant worked at the Department of Justice — NO LONGER. Not only is he FIRED, he has been charged with a felony. This is an example of the Deep State we have been up against for seven months as we work to refocus DOJ. You will NOT work in this administration while disrespecting our government and law enforcement."

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Bondi's post is drawing some scathing responses from X users, some of whom are attacking her as a hypocrite in light of the fact that Trump granted federal pardons to the January 6, 2021 rioters — including those who violently attacked police officers that day.

Reporter Sam Youngman tweeted, "When you know DOJ reporters are too chickens—— to call you on your obvious hypocrisy.'"

Attorney Tracey Gallagher posted, "You mean like the DOJ employing Jared Wise, a Jan. 6 defendant who called cops 'Nazis' and urged the crowd to 'kill em' as they stormed the Capitol? By the way Bondi hitting someone with a sandwich under state or federal law is not a felony.(18 U.S.C. § 111) you are missing an element here."

Gallagher, in a separate tweet, wrote, "You're missing the element of a deadly weapon OR GBI you have neither."

Self-described "constitutional conservative" Kelly McCarty humorously posted, "Sandwich crime arrests should always be the top priority for the DOJ."

Attorney James Hess commented, "But you won't go after people on the Epstein list?"

X user Pat Greentree wrote, "But if you work for a foreign spy agency and traffic children to US leaders for blackmail purposes they will protect you. THIS is the deep state, not a guy throwing a sandwich."

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Atlantic writer Quinta Jurecic reports Trump’s plan to use the DOJ for revenge against protesters and Democratic politicians is not going as well as he’d like.

“The Justice Department has been slow to move forward with the investigations Trump demanded, hemmed in by the constraints of the legal system,” writes Jurecic. “… American criminal law appears to be a less flexible tool in the hands of an authoritarian than Trump hoped — at least for now.”

Attorney General Pam Bondi may be ready to carry out Trump’s “personal-retribution project” with investigations of the Obama administration and former prosecutor Jack Smith, says Jurecic, but a prosecutor still requires a jury to issue an indictment, and to do that the prosecutor has to make a convincing case. This is usually easy, but Jurecic says the “administration keeps tripping up.”

Acting U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli filed more than 35 felony prosecutions against June protestors against ICE raids in Los Angeles, but they only managed to persuade grand juries to indict some of them. Later, his office dismissed eight of his own indictments and downgraded others to misdemeanors after “falling short at the grand jury stage” according to the LA Times.

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By comparison, Jurecic reports only six refusals by grand juries to indict suspects across the nation in 2016 — out of roughly 180,000 cases.

Meanwhile, over on the east coast, prosecutors moved to dismiss U.S. Attorney Alina Habba’s trespassing charges against Newark Mayor Ras Baraka after he attempted to visit an ICE detention facility. The judge in that case slammed Habba’s office so hard for trying to press the charges that Baraka could be heard saying: “Jesus, he tore these people a new a——.”

And Jurecic reports Bondi appears to be “struggling” to pursue Trump’s demand to prosecute people involved in perpetrating what Trump calls the “Russia hoax.”

“The biggest challenge there is that there was no hoax,” said Jurecic, “as both Special Counsel Robert Mueller and a bipartisan Senate intelligence report concluded, Russia really did try to help Trump win the 2016 election.”

Jurecic said it looks like Bondi“was caught unawares” by Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard’s release of documents related to the “hoax” from 2016, and “displeased about the political pressure from the right to launch an investigation in response.”

“All Bondi appears to have done is ask prosecutors to possibly present grand jurors with evidence, with no clear deadline,” said Jurecic, despite “exciting” Fox News headlines.

And regarding the investigation of Smith, Jurecic says the “harshest penalty that the Office of Special Counsel could demand would be Smith’s dismissal from government service, but he has already resigned.”

“A jury is in essence a democratic institution, requiring citizens to exercise their judgment in a model of shared deliberation that is at odds with Trump’s autocratic tendencies,” said Jurecic. “… So far, that system has held up against Trump’s encroachment. But the rapid erosion of democratic life in the United States over the past six months is a reminder of how quickly things can change.”

Read the full Atlantic report at this link.

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U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer, presiding over a case in San Fransisco regarding President Donald Trump’s deployment of military forces to Los Angeles in June, pressed the Department of Justice (DOJ) for answers during the hearing Tuesday.

“Where are the limits? Where are the limits?” the judge repeatedly asked the DOJ, according to reporting by journalist Adam Klasfeld.

Breyer is hearing arguments to determine whether the Trump administration broke federal law by deploying National Guard troops and U.S. Marines to Los Angelesin response to June protests over immigration raids. The operation, which aimed to disperse demonstrators in Los Angeles against immigration raids, was criticized by legal experts.

During Tuesday's hearing, the judge emphasized the inherent danger of law enforcement, asking if that justified a carte blanche use of military force inside American cities. The DOJ lawyer, in seeking to defend the deployment, offered no clear boundaries, prompting concern about unchecked executive authority.

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On the opposing side, California's legal team offered vehement objections. “There has been a standing army in Los Angeles for two months,” the state’s lawyer declared.

The attorney further argued forcefully for judicial intervention.

“Plaintiffs ask that the court issue a permanent injunction and bring a halt to the defendants’ military crusade across this state," she said.

California’s counsel also unpacked the layered symbolism behind the operation’s code name: Excalibur — “inspired by the sword of King Arthur,” she explained — symbolizing “kingship and divine right of rule.”

It was, she argued, a troubling emblem of the Trump administration’s mindset.

Roughly 250 National Guard personnel continue to be stationed in the Los Angeles region. The San Francisco trial has the potential to define boundaries on Trump’s power to activate the National Guard in the future — both within California and beyond.

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maddow disbar teter legal accty ctr michael teter thics complaint slc?

even big law ~ trump back off pro bono for ppl

new small purpose firm oppose imp prez, 2 fired doj

freedom of press assoc sued carr fcc

jeff clark

https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/law-strikes-back-lawyers-doing-trump-s-bidding-targeted-where-integrity-still-matters-244355141795}:

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New York Times reporter Alan Feuer reports that U.S. judges are openly questioning the honesty of Justice Department lawyers and their filings.

“As a general rule, judges tend to take them at their word and assume they are telling the truth,” wrote Feuer. “But in the past several months, as members of President Trump’s Justice Department have repeatedly misled the courts, violated their orders and demonized judges who have ruled against them, some jurists have started to show an angry loss of faith in the people and the institution they once believed in most.”

This goes beyond judges using harsh language like “egregious,” “brazen,” and “lawless” to describe Trump’s power-grabbing policies, said Feuer.

Consider Magistrate Judge Zia M. Faruqui, in the Federal District Court in Washington, who Feuer describes as “ripping” federal prosecutors in June after they asked him to be “highly deferential” in keeping a warrant sealed.

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“Blind deference to the government?” Faruqui wrote. “That is no longer a thing. Trust that has been earned over generations has been lost in weeks.”

Faruqui then reminded prosecutors that their justice department fired prosecutors who worked on Trump’s two criminal cases. They have attacked the charges brought against the rioters who stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, as a witch hunt, and they have violated judicial orders in cases stemming from Trump’s deportation policies and from his efforts to freeze federal grants.

“These norms being broken must have consequences,” Judge Faruqui said. “High deference is out; trust but verify is in.”

Feuer reports Judge Dale E. Ho, of Federal District Court in Manhattan, went so far as to call federal arguments false in an April order dismissing bribery charges against Mayor Eric Adams of New York. Ho ultimately agreed to throw out the charges, but Feuer reports he “took a swipe at the department’s credibility, saying it appeared as though officials had used their power in a quid pro quo with Mr. Adams to get him to support Mr. Trump’s immigration crackdown in the city.”

“Everything here smacks of a bargain,” wrote Ho. “Dismissal of the indictment in exchange for immigration policy concessions.”

Feuer said another federal judge on Long Island refused last month to take the department’s word after prosecutors asked her to dismiss an indictment against Vladimir Arévalo Chávez in preparation for sending him back to El Salvador, and she demanded to know the politics behind their motivation. A Los Angelas judge overseeing a federal request to drop fraud charges against Trump donor Andrew Wiederhorn recently asked the Justice Department to further outline its reasons for wanting to do so, Feuer added.

“I think people don’t fully appreciate how much the ability of the legal system to work on a daily basis rests on the government’s credibility,” said Stephen Vladeck, a Georgetown University law professor who spoke with Feuer. “Without that credibility, it’s going to be harder for the government to do anything in court — even ordinary things. All of a sudden, you’re going to have courts second-guessing things that they wouldn’t have before.”

Former U.S. attorney Barbara McQuade agreed, telling Feuer the collapse of DOJ integrity was likely to gum up some of its work.

“If government lawyers have to prove up every statement they make at every level in every case every time they go to court, it would grind the justice system to a halt,” McQuade said.

Read the full New York Times report at this link.

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During his first presidency, Donald Trump angrily clashed with some of his own appointees to the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) — including two U.S. attorneys general: Jeff Sessions and Bill Barr. And he ended up hating Christopher A. Wray, the conservative Republican he chose to replace James Comey as FBI director.

The fact that Wray enjoyed strong bipartisan support and remained as FBI director under former President Joe Biden intensified Trump's disdain for him. And when he nominated far-right conspiracy theorist Kash Patel for that position, Trump sent out a loud message that he wanted ultra-MAGA loyalists running the FBI.

In an article published on July 29, attorney/legal expert Quinta Jurecic warns that six months into Trump's second presidency, the FBI is in total disarray.

Jurecic points to the resignation of former FBI special agent Michael Feinberg as a prime example of the agency's dysfunction: Feinberg, according to Jurecic, was under pressure merely for being friends with a former agent who was critical of Trump. Feinberg, like Wray, resigned before Trump had a chance to fire him.

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"The FBI has long seen itself as an organization built on expertise," Jurecic explains. "Its founder, J. Edgar Hoover, was an early and devoted advocate of professionalizing the government bureaucracy, to the point of mandating that agents wear a dark suit and striped tie. Now, however, the bureau is in the early stages of something like a radical deprofessionalization. The most important quality for an FBI official to have now appears to be not competence but loyalty. The exiling of Feinberg and others like him is an effort to engineer and accelerate this transformation."

Jurecic continues, "Feinberg’s boss, Special Agent in Charge Dominique Evans, didn't allege any misconduct on his part, Feinberg told me. Rather, as Feinberg set out in his resignation letter…. Evans explained that FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino had found out that Feinberg had maintained a friendship with the former counterintelligence agent Peter Strzok, a longtime target of Trump's ire."

Feinberg, Jurecic notes, is lamenting the "decay" of the FBI.

"An FBI without constraint or apolitical oversight is exactly what Trump wants, and what Bongino and FBI Director Kash Patel seem to be working toward," the attorney warns. "Trump launched his 2024 campaign by declaring to his supporters, 'I am your retribution,' and in their previous lives as MAGA influencers, both Patel and Bongino voiced support for locking up the president's opponents. Citing 'Justice Department sources,' Fox News recently reported that the FBI has opened a criminal investigation into former intelligence chiefs who led the government's assessment of Russian election interference in 2016."

Jurecic continues, "In the first Trump Administration, such a blatant use of the FBI for political ends would have been an unthinkable breach of law-enforcement independence. But the FBI's new leadership has been pushing out many of those who might object. So many people have been driven away, in fact, that after his departure, Feinberg found himself adopted by what he calls an 'exile community' of former Justice Department and FBI officials working to help one another adjust to post-government life."

During his interview with Jurecic, the conservative Feinberg — who was active in the Federalist Society in the past — was highly critical of Trump's politicization of the FBI as well as the way U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), with the FBI's help, is handling deportations. And thinks that wearing masks is a bad idea for ICE agents.

Feinberg told Jurecic, "I was absolutely furious. We live in a democracy. We are an organization that serves the public. We do not hide from our actions."

*Quinta Jurecic's full article for The Atlantic is available at this link (subscription required).

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July 21, 2025, edition of The Benny Show, streamed on YouTube

BENNY JOHNSON (HOST): I mean, you're simply left to assume that all of it's been a lie and that they're 100% authentic, and I think most people in this audience already believe that.

But then if that's the case, then there's a lot of questions that are gonna be asked of Hillary Clinton. Now there's reports that Hillary Clinton and her team were aggressively pushing Barack Obama to launch Russiagate. We'll wait to see those documents — perhaps that's what Tulsi Gabbard is telling us is going to be dropping soon. We're not sure. But Tulsi Gabbard is saying not only are there major whistleblowers from inside the IC, but also that there's a lot more to come. And, you know, at what point do you begin to pull the threads back to Hillary Clinton? Could she potentially be culpable in any of this?

JULIE KELLY (HOST): I doubt it. I mean, you know, let's cut to the chase. No one's gonna indict Hillary Clinton. No one's gonna indict Barack Obama. So we can, I think, disabuse ourselves of that vision or —

JOHNSON: Really? You don't think Obama either?

KELLY: No. No. No. No. No. No. And, you know, of course, you got the issue with Barack Obama. What would you charge him with? We have the immunity ruling from the Supreme Court, really, a year ago that carves out only specific instances where a president in office could be held criminally liable. And I'm sure that Barack Obama, if anything came down, would be smart enough and his lawyers would figure that out. So no.

But look. I really wanna see the henchmen like Lisa Monaco — and I know I keep going back to her. But look, she also ran the Biden DOJ. So she was the one that really ran the first two invest — the two investigations into the president for classified documents and for January 6. She, I'm sure, worked with special counsel Jack Smith, was involved in his appointment. People from the DOJ leaving the Department of Justice, going to the special counsel's office — Chuck Grassley just, last week, I believe, the last several days, releasing emails showing how Tom Windom, another prosecutor who went to the DCUS attorney's office, which was in constant contact with the DOJ, I'm told, specifically Lisa Monaco's office, how he was pushing top-down the FBI to open this January 6 investigation into the president, which of course they did.

So I'm looking for a lot more records related to that as well. And so, those are the people who I think are the most likely to be held responsible, criminally liable, and the ones who should be.

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no re up?

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'Pack it up': 'Partisan' Trump lawyer draws scathing criticism as her 'chaotic' DOJ term ends

'Pack it up': 'Partisan' Trump lawyer draws scathing criticism as her 'chaotic' DOJ term ends - Alternet.org

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The Trump Justice Department recently threw its weight behind Washington’s Catholic bishops, filing a legal motion to invalidate SB 5375, siding with clergy arguing the law unconstitutionally targets religious practice.

U.S. District Chief Judge David G. Estudillo issued a preliminary injunction Friday, preventing Washington state from enforcing SB 5375’s mandatory reporting rule “as to the Sacrament of Confession” in the dioceses of Seattle, Yakima, and Spokane — just days before the law’s July 27 effective date.

Last month, the Department of Justice (DOJ), led by Attorney General Pam Bondi, officially intervened in the lawsuit Etienne v. Ferguson, backing the Archdiocese of Seattle, Yakima, and Spokane. In its filing, the DOJ labeled Washington’s new child-abuse reporting statute — Senate Bill 5375, which requires clergy to report all suspected child abuse, even if disclosed during confession — as “anti‑Catholic” and likely in violation of First Amendment protections.

Estudillo emphasized that the law, unlike similar statutes in around 25 other states, included no exceptions for confession, and held that the plaintiffs had demonstrated a strong likelihood of success on First Amendment grounds.

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The judge's ruling comes amid the controversy related to convicted pedophile Jeffrey Epstein and allegations of a coverup.

A Rolling Stone article by journalist Alex Ashley published Sunday highlighted the administration's efforts to defend organized religion.

Under the new state law — SB 5375—all clergy, regardless of faith, are required to report suspected child abuse to authorities within 48 hours, even if the information is obtained during confession. They are not required to testify in court, hand over notes, or breach attorney‑client privilege. The obligation is narrow but significant, the author noted.

The article noted that that lone obligation effectively closes a confessional loophole that remains open in most states. While all 50 states (and D.C., Guam) list clergy as mandatory reporters, 33 states exempt what’s disclosed in confession, making SB 5375 a bold exception.

The law places Washington in the minority — alongside only six other states (New Hampshire, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, Texas, West Virginia) — that have eliminated confessional exemptions entirely. Yet enforcement remains problematic: 36 states have religious‑freedom protections (RFRAs or constitutional), making prosecution for confession‑based reporting virtually impossible. Washington has no state RFRA but does apply strict scrutiny to religious‑freedom cases.

The Catholic Church argues the confessional seal isn’t just private counseling — it’s a sacrament essential to faith.

Ashley argued that this marks one of the most forceful federal efforts to defend organized religion against a state law in recent memory — DOJ isn’t asking for a narrow carve‑out, but pushing to overturn the law entirely and remind courts of the centrality of religious liberty.

According to the author, the "Trump-era DOJ and the Catholic Church have found common cause in attacking Washington state, even if they don’t agree on where the line should be drawn, forming a rare alliance against one of the first laws in decades to strip away clergy’s confessional shield in child abuse cases."

He added: "It has turned into a national flashpoint, a constitutional test case watched across the country, poised to redefine the boundary between church and state."

"Together, the two lawsuits, along with the DOJ’s involvement, have made Washington’s law a high-stakes legal test. Whether its promise of ending clergy secrecy in abuse reporting holds, or collapses under constitutional challenge, now rests with the courts," the piece said.

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The Department of Justice’s (DoJ) civil rights chief is urging a federal judge to hand down just one day behind bars for the Louisville Metro Police Department (LMPD) officer convicted in Breonna Taylor’s 2020 death, the New York Times reported Thursday.

This is a surprising shift from the unit’s typical stance on combatting racial inequities in law enforcement.

Taylor was a 26-year-old Black emergency medical technician from Louisville, Kentucky. In March 2020, LMPD officers executed a “no-knock” warrant at her apartment, linked to a drug investigation targeting someone else. During the raid, police fired multiple shots into her home.

In a Kentucky federal trial last year, Officer Brett Hankison was found guilty of violating Taylor’s civil rights. The jury determined he used excessive force by firing multiple shots through her window during a drug raid gone wrong.

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On Wednesday, Harmeet K. Dhillon, the assistant attorney general for civil rights, urged Judge Rebecca Grady Jennings to impose “one day in prison” for Hankison — time he has essentially already served — and to sentence him to three years of supervised release.

Facing up to life in prison, Hankison’s fate hinges on a sentencing hearing scheduled for next week, during which the judge will weigh the government’s recommendation, per the report.

The DOJ's move generated backlash on social media.

Wisconsin state senator Chris Larson (D) wrote on the social platform X: "Just when you think this Administration can’t stoop any lower, they go and do something like this. I don’t ever want to hear anyone who supports this President talk about being 'tough on crime' ever again."

Author Devin Burghart wrote: "Trump's DOJ declares emphatically that Black lives don't matter. Justice Dept. Asks for 1-Day Sentence for Ex-Officer Convicted in Breonna Taylor Raid."

History professor Hasan Kwame Jeffries, the brother of House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) wrote: "Cop facing up to life in prison for his conviction for actions connected to the murder of #BreonnaTaylor, and this racist a-- regime's #JusticeDepartment asks the judge to sentence him to one. This is what white supremacy looks like."

Lawyer and civil rights activist Maya Wiley said: "#BreonnaTaylor should be alive & we can’t look away. Her life, Black lives, are worth more than a day. Trump Exec Order explicitly stated police should be 'unleashed.' Police must be accountable. This isn’t accountability!"

Journalist Brian Fydenborg wrote: "People can argue that MAGA isn't inherently racist. Those people would be f------ wrong. For how else can you explain that Breonna Taylor's life is worth 1 day? So blatant it's literally designed to spark riots, so Trump can send in troops. L.A. was warmup."

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former FBI agent who allegedly encouraged rioters to murder police officers during the January 6 Capitol insurrection has been given a job at the Justice Department. According to a 2023 indictment, the former agent, Jared Wise, repeatedly shouted “Kill ’em!” at rioters as they battled a police line of officers protecting the Capitol. Wise was on trial in January when President Trump issued sweeping pardons and commutations for over 1,500 January 6 rioters on his first day back in office. The New York Times reports Wise is now serving as counselor to Ed Martin, the director of the so-called Weaponization Working Group, which Trump established to seek retribution against his enemies. This comes after Attorney General Pam Bondi last week fired three more federal prosecutors who worked on January 6 cases.

Topics:

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raw msnbc

Ex-RNC spokesman laments MAGA's 'dark heart' over new DOJ advisor - Raw Story

a former Jan. 6 attacker was on trial for two felony counts and four misdemeanors when he was pardoned by President Donald Trump upon entering office. Now, that man, Jared L. Wise, is being named an adviser or counselor to Justice Department official Ed Martin.

Wise, who pleaded not guilty to his charges around Jan. 6, will be advising the so-called "weaponization working group," a program under Trump's Justice Department to target prosecutors and investigators who worked on Jan. 6 cases.

Speaking about the matter on MSNBC's "Deadline: White House" on Wednesday, former Republican National Committee spokesman Tim Miller called the new hiring part of the "dark hearts" of the MAGA movement.

ALSO READ:'I read summaries': GOP rep admits he's only skimmed bill he's voting on

Stand-in host Alicia Menendez called it "lionization" of the Jan. 6 attackers. "The placing, not just in the public domain, but in an actual position of power, a person who has undermined American democracy."

Miller noted that the "Back the blue element is very selective" when it comes to the conservative support of law enforcement.

"This is an appointed position, but, you know, across the country people that were there on January 6th or participating at various levels, you know, ran in Republican primaries for offices that were supported," he pointed out. A friend, he said, ran a campaign where the Jan. 6 participation "was a plus for them with the electorate, according to all their polling."

"So, I mean, this is kind of the dark heart of what we're seeing in the MAGA movement. So, it's not particularly surprising that some of these folks will have positions in the Trump administration," said Miller.

He also said that Wise isn't the only one, there are others in the Trump administration who are "horribly unqualified, who have been advanced horribly" due to their "extreme views."

Tim Heaphy, former lead investigator for the House Select Committee that investigated Jan. 6, called the matter "discouraging," but said that they'll never find the "weaponization" they seek because it wasn't there.

Instead, he explained, Wise was "charged and prosecuted for conduct, not his beliefs about the election."

Wise worked on the FBI's terrorism task force when he went to the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6.

See the clip below or at the link here.

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The New York Times Editorial Board says President Donald Trump has derailed countless investigations on his road to turning the F.B.I. into an “enforcement agency for MAGA’s priorities.”

“Over the past five months, many F.B.I. agents, including top managers and national security experts, have been fired, pressured to leave or transferred to lesser roles. Hundreds have resigned on their own, unwilling to follow the demands of the Trump administration,” the Times writes. “Their absence has left a vacuum in divisions that are supposed to protect the public,” obliterating “decades of experience in national security and criminal matters.”

One former Justice Department official told NBC News the decimation of the senior ranks has left it “completely unprepared to respond to a crisis, including the fallout from the current conflict in the Middle East.” Meanwhile, Trump’s department politicization has left it less able to “combat terrorism, foreign espionage, biosecurity threats, organized crime, online scams, white-collar crime, drug trafficking and more” the board claims.

Trump’s “first priority” with the F.B.I. is loyalty, the Times says, and this explains why the F.B.I. “looked the other way” instead of investigating when senior officials recently disclosed sensitive information in a Signal group chat. Trump installed political hacks Kash Patel and Dan Bongino as director and second-in-command, and they’ve assigned agents to pursue “long-running MAGA grievances,” including conspiracies that China “helped manipulate the results of the 2020 election.”

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“Mr. Trump spent years baselessly accusing the F.B.I. and the Justice Department of being weaponized against him; now he is turning federal law enforcement into the very thing he claimed it was: a political enforcer,” the Times warns.

Along with conspiracy theories, the board says the administration is pulling agents away from areas that present true risks to the country and making them search for undocumented immigrants “who have no criminal record.”

Because of what it does, the Times says the F.B.I. has “a particular need to demonstrate that it deserves the nation’s confidence. And that agents “need to know that their managers and civilian leaders have their backs and don’t consider them to be jackals.”

“The public — on which the bureau relies for tips and cooperation — has to trust that agents operate without political bias,” the Times adds. “By abusing that trust, Mr. Trump, Mr. Patel and Mr. Bongino have put the reputation and effectiveness of the F.B.I. at risk. In doing so, they are risking the safety of the American public.”

Read the full New York Times report at this link.

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'Throwing out votes': Trump DOJ sues NC elections board — recalling failed election lawsuit

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FOOD SAFETY

AN 5 25

The administration of President Donald Trump told the public nothing of a hazardous E. coli outbreak that killed one person and sickened nearly 100 more — including one Indiana boy who became severely ill.

The bacteria, commonly found in feces, damaged 9-year-old Colton George’s kidneys and put him on dialysis. It was also “a genetic matchto the strain that killed one person and sickened nearly 90 people in 15 states last fall,” reports the Washington Post. “Federal health agencies investigated the cases and linked them to a farm that grew romaine lettuce.”

However, the paper reports most people have never heard of this outbreak, which experts say is runs counter to federal health practices.

“There were no public communications related to this outbreak,” says a heavily redacted February internal Food and Drug Administration memo that witholds the name of farm that served as the source of the outbreak. The federal government refused to name the business “because there was no product remaining in commerce” at the time of the report.

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“Victims have a right to know who made them sick. This is my kid. He’s my life," said George's father, Chris George.

The Washington Post reports Trump officials have still never issued public communications after the investigation or identified the grower. The public might not know of the outbreak today had George’s parents not filed a lawsuit against the lettuce grower in April in federal court for the Southern District of Indiana.

In addition to failing to publicize a major outbreak and scaling back safety alert specialists and rules, the Trump administration’s has also withdrawn a proposed Biden-era regulation to reduce the presence of salmonella in raw poultry. That regulation, estimates the Food Safety and Inspection Service, could have prevented up to almost $30 million worth of illness in roughly 3,000 victims from chicken and turkey products

In addition, the Washington Post reports the administration is “disbanding a Justice Department unit that pursues civil and criminal actions against companies that sell contaminated food and is reassigning its attorneys.”

Staffing cuts at the FDA and CDC will mean further delays in publicizing deadly outbreaks, said former FDA worker Susan Mayne, an adjunct professor at Yale School of Public Health.

“Consumers are being notified with delays about important food safety notifications,” she said, referring to a recent outbreak in cucumbers. “People can die if there are pathogens like listeria, which can have a 30 percent fatality rate.”

Read the full Washington Post report here.

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The Trump administration on Friday faced swift backlash to the U.S. Department of Justice's deal to end a felony case against Boeing that stemmed from a pair of 737 MAX passenger jet crashes that collectively killed 346 people in Ethiopia and Indonesia.

Responses on social media included: "No accountability, no safety, just corruption." "Really gotta feel for the families here. Just awful." "Just utterly appalling that Boeing escape[s] real criminal penalties here. People should have gone to jail." "They don't want to set the precedent that powerful people should have to answer to the public for f------ up."

Some critics also pointed to U.S. President Donald Trump's controversial luxury Boeing plane from the Qatari government, asking: "Is Trump getting another free plane? Is that the deal?"

During the Biden administration, Boeing had agreed to plead guilty to a criminal fraud conspiracy charge and pay a fine of up to $487.2 million over the 2018 and 2019 crashes—a deal that was also criticized by some victims' relatives who wanted a trial. However, at a meeting last Friday, federal prosecutors told families the company's posture changed after a judge rejected the plea agreement in December.

That's according toReuters, which cited unnamed sources. The news agency also shared remarks from families' attorneys:

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Paul Cassell, a lawyer for the families, said in a statement the government was intent on dropping the prosecution, saying "they conveyed their preconceived idea that Boeing should be allowed to escape any real consequences for its deadly lies." Another lawyer representing family members who attended the meeting, Erin Applebaum, said the DOJ's "scripted presentation made it clear that the outcome has already been decided."

Despite Cassell's conclusion, the lawyer wrote to the DOJ on Thursday to argue against the agreement. He wrote that "in this case any further concessions to Boeing would be utterly inappropriate. This case is the deadliest corporate crime in U.S. history, as found by" Judge Reed O'Connor in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas, who rejected the previous plea deal.

Also on Thursday, U.S. Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) urged Attorney General Pam Bondi not to sign an agreement that "would amount to a slap on the wrist, requiring Boeing to pay an additional fine and compensation to the victims' families, and hire an independent compliance consultant, in exchange for dismissal of the criminal fraud charge."

"DOJ must not sign a nonprosecution agreement with Boeing that would allow the company to weasel its way out of accountability for its failed corporate culture, and for any illegal behavior that has resulted in deadly consequences," argued Warren and Blumenthal, respectively the ranking members of the Senate Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee, and the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, in their letter to Bondi.

"Instead, DOJ should ensure that both the company and the executives that ran it are held accountable for any wrongdoing by thoroughly investigating the potential culpability of Boeing executives and holding criminally accountable any individuals that contributed to or allowed the pursuit of profits over people in violation of federal laws or regulations," they added.

Ignoring those urgings, the DOJ on Friday announced an "agreement in principle" that—if it receives final approval—will cost Boeing more than $1.1 billion, including an additional $445 million for families of those killed on Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302 and Lion Air Flight 610. In exchange, the department would dismiss the fraud charge, and the company would not be subject to oversight by an independent monitor.

"Ultimately, in applying the facts, the law, and department policy, we are confident that this resolution is the most just outcome with practical benefits," a DOJ spokesperson said in a statement. "Nothing will diminish the victims' losses, but this resolution holds Boeing financially accountable, provides finality and compensation for the families, and makes an impact for the safety of future air travelers."

While Boeing hasn't commented, Cassell told Reuters that "this kind of nonprosecution deal is unprecedented and obviously wrong for the deadliest corporate crime in U.S. history. My families will object and hope to convince the court to reject it."

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mma

DOJ’s “weaponization” plan B is to provide frothy content for right-wing conspiracy theorists

Written by Matt Gertz

Published 05/14/25

The Justice Department’s “Weaponization Working Group” is the fruit of a yearslong right-wing effort to portray federal law enforcement against Donald Trump and his allies as criminal in nature. But if that task force fails to bring charges against Trump’s purported enemies, its head, the right-wing activist Ed Martin, is promising to publicly “name” and “shame” those individuals — a clear violation of longstanding DOJ policy which would provide chum for MAGA media while turning its targets into hate objects.

“There are some really bad actors, some people that did some really bad things to the American people. And if they can be charged, we’ll charge them. But if they can’t be charged, we will name them,” said Martin, who recently stepped down as acting U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia when it became clear he could not secure Senate confirmation. “And we will name them, and in a culture that respects shame, they should be people that are ashamed. And that’s a fact. That’s the way things work. And so that’s, that’s how I believe the job operates.”

Martin may not actually realize this — he’s a political hack who represented January 6 defendants rather than an experienced prosecutor — but that is not how the job is supposed to operate. Indeed, as NBC News’ Ryan J. Reilly notes: “During Trump's first tenure, the justification given for Trump's firing of former FBI Director James Comey was that Comey had given a press conference in which he released ‘derogatory information’ about then-presidential candidate Hillary Clinton in 2016.”

Martin’s proposal to “name” and “shame” rather than prosecute Trump’s foes seems on the one hand like a significant retreat — a sign that he doesn’t think that the purported crimes he and his colleagues happily detailed in their books, podcasts, and Fox shows can pass muster with a federal judge.

As Trump sought to brand the federal law enforcement officials who investigated him and successfully prosecuted several of his top advisers as the real criminals, a right-wing media ecosystem emerged to support his claims and try to flesh them out. Many of the key players in that ecosystem have since been appointed to the top ranks of the FBI and DOJ, no doubt at least in part because of their willingness to suggest that a reckoning was coming.

For example:

Martin hosted a podcast and radio show in which he “amplified Trump’s claims … that prosecutors may have violated federal criminal conspiracy laws” and led discussions which “revolved around Trump’s desire for ‘retribution’ against current or former department prosecutors,” The Washington Post reported.

Fox host Jeanine Pirro, Martin’s replacement as interim U.S. attorney for D.C., called for a “cleansing” of the FBI and the Justice Department, which she said were full “of individuals who should not just be fired, but who need to be taken out in handcuffs.”

Dan Bongino, the deputy director of the FBI, is a former Fox host and podcaster who called for an investigation into “special tyrant” Jack Smith and described special counsel Robert Mueller’s probe as “an obvious frame job and set-up” by the corrupt deep state.

FBI Director Kash Patel said in a 2023 interview that a second Trump term would target “the conspirators, not just in government but in the media” who had “helped Joe Biden rig presidential elections.” The appendix of his 2023 book “names more than 50 current or former US officials that he claims are ‘members of the Executive Branch deep state,’ which he describes as a ‘dangerous threat to democracy,’” CNN reported.

Pam Bondi, now the attorney general, said in an April 2023 Fox appearance following Trump’s fourth indictment: “The Department of Justice, the prosecutors will be prosecuted, the bad ones. The investigators will be investigated.”

Martin wouldn’t be the first federal prosecutor to discover that right-wing claims of crimes committed by Trump’s foes collapse under scrutiny. Trump’s media allies — Pirro in particular — said Hillary Clinton’s role role as secretary of state in the sale of a uranium company featured massive criminality and demanded an investigation. The Trump appointee who conducted that investigation apparently found there was nothing to it, closing the probe without charges.

But what Martin appears to be planning now is unsettling. His “name” and “shame” strategy amounts to a public declaration from the federal government that the targets of an otherwise unsuccessful investigation are nonetheless Bad People.

It is easy to predict the path that strategy might take based on what we’ve seen from this administration thus far. MAGA influencers could be called in to DOJ headquarters to receive exclusive access to reports that smear the president’s supposed foes. Pirro might give what amounts to a demagogic Fox monologue from behind a Justice Department lectern. Top federal law enforcement officials would fan out across right-wing outlets to smear the target of the failed probe. Trump himself would likely chime in from his social media accounts and in White House appearances. Perhaps a new executive order would be crafted seeking to damage the employer of an individual the government was unable to successfully charge with a crime. And the president’s media allies at Fox and elsewhere would devote themselves to regurgitating all of it to their audiences.

We’ve seen what can happen to those who come under sustained fire from Trump and his MAGA media allies — they become subject to harassment campaigns and death threats. Now those attacks will come with the imprimatur of the Justice Department.

### The Trumpist media is demanding politicized justice

06/14/23 1:24 PM EDT

### After Trump’s indictment, the “lock her up” brigade feigns horror over “political prosecution”

06/09/23 12:26 PM EDT

### Jeanine Pirro’s Fox producer thought she was “nuts.” Trump just named her DC’s top prosecutor.

05/08/25

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AN 525

Whistleblowers and leakers, many constitutional scholars argue, play an important role in safeguarding democracy. When conservative Miles Taylor was serving as chief of staff to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) in 2018, he wrote an anonymous op-ed for The New York Times that was famously headlined "I Am Part of the Resistance Inside the Trump Administration."

Now, President Donald Trump is calling for the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) and U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi to investigate Taylor for potentially "treasonous" conduct. And his defenders are arguing that the ex-DHS official turned Never Trumper did the U.S. a huge favor by anonymously drawing attention to his national security concerns.

Trump and Bondi are also taking aim at journalists and media organizations that use whistleblowers and leakers in their reporting.

In an article published by Salon on May 12, journalist/historian James Thornton Harris explains why he finds this so disturbing.

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Bondi, Harris warns, is making a forceful, if underreported, "effort to suppress reporting by seeking to collect the phone records of reporters and trying to force their testimony in court, all in pursuit of government 'leakers.'"

:{:{"Attorney General Pam Bondi announced (a) new policy which replaces a Biden Administration rule restricting federal agencies from intimidating reporters in this manner,}:

" Harris explains. "In 2021, Biden's Department of Justice revealed that in 2017, the Trump Administration had secretly obtained the phone records of reporters from both the New York Times and Washington Post. It also tried unsuccessfully to obtain the reporters' e-mails. The (DOJ) said no legal action was taken against the reporters."}:

Harris adds, "Trump appears eager to pick up where he left off in his first term. Reporters Without Borders described Trump's current campaign as an attack on 'the credibility, independence, and sustainability of the news media.' Despite this disturbing all-out war on the press, which goes directly against First Amendment protections of freedom of speech, most Americans do not seem to care…. A recent poll by the Pew Research Center found that just 36 percent of Americans reported hearing 'a lot' about the Trump Administration's relationship with the news media."

Harris notes that according to the Committee to Protect Journalists, Trump's attack on freedom of the press is "happening rapidly, and, apparently, many Americans don't know, haven’t heard, or are choosing to look away."

"Free speech advocates are particularly concerned about Bondi's new policy," the journalist/historian warns. "Her directive states the new measures are needed to protect 'classified, privileged and other sensitive information.' By including the vague term 'sensitive information,' the new policy potentially covers a wide range of government information; it goes far beyond the federal criminal code, which focuses on protecting classified information…. Democratic President, John F. Kennedy, a former journalist, spoke out for press freedom and warned that 'without debate, without criticism, no administration and no country can succeed — and no republic can survive.'"

*James Thornton Harris' full article for Salon is available at this link.

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AN 525

The Department of Justice (DoJ)'s civil rights division is reportedly facing significant internal disruption. This unrest is linked to a shift in focus away from police and voting-rights cases and towards culture-war topics such as discrimination against Christians and transgender participation in sports. As a result, over half of the division's lawyers are anticipated to resign, according to an articled published in The Bulwark Tuesday.

Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon, who runs this crucial division, has been unusually active on the social platform X amid this crisis.

"Like Pete Hegseth at the Pentagon, Dhillon represents an experiment in whether right-wing media personalities can transfer their attention-seeking skills into running the federal government," said the Bulwark article, written by journalist Will Sommer.

Sommer described Dhillon as "a California lawyer who became prominent in MAGA media for championing conservative legal cases, especially opposition to COVID mandate."

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Dhillon, who has over 1 million followers on X, has posted on the platform more than 263 times, per the report, excluding the content she has re-posted.

Dhillon frequently engages in online arguments on X, where she appears to have little tolerance for criticism. She told social media users who criticized her that she has "muted" them for general impoliteness or "dimwittery."

In one instance, the piece notes, this applied to someone who responded to a post by Dinesh D'Souza rather than one of hers.

In an April post, Dhillon solicited suggestions from her followers about which podcasts and television programs she should prioritize for media appearances.

“Do something,” replied a user to her post, adding: “Is the entire DOJ obsessed with TV hits??”

“Muted for being a jerk,” Dhillon said in response.

Since taking office, she has publicly stated that she has muted 30 individuals and blocked one, averaging 1.35 blocks or mutes daily.

Meanwhile, Dhillon has acknowledged that the civil rights division is facing a severe exodus of employees. During an interview on Glenn Beck's podcast, Dhillon said approximately 100 lawyers have already resigned and more are expected to quit. She suggested that up to 70 percent of the division's staff could ultimately depart.

AlterNet reached out to a DoJ spokesperson for comment.

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mma 4 25

President Donald Trump is ramping up his assault on the press, opening new avenues for federal retribution against outlets which displease him as his administration prepares to mark 100 days in office.

Trump has long railed against journalists as the “enemy of the people,” used the power of the state as a cudgel against the industry in his first term, and promised more of the same in his second.

His return to office brought what Columbia Journalism Review’s Jon Allsop described as a “sharp, often contemptuous rupture” between the federal government and the press, with the White House seeking over the last few months to dominate reporters, place new restrictions on critical outlets, and lift up right-wing propagandists in their place.

The president’s threats against news outlets have been so extreme for so many years that by contrast, such moves struck some observers as “small beer” or “trivial nonsense.”

But Trump’s talk is cheap until it isn’t — at any time, on a whim, he or the assortment of ideologues and shills he’s appointed can set the gears of government grinding against his foes. And this weekend brought a sharp escalation and worrying signs for the future.

Justice Department ends restrictions protecting journalists}:

Attorney General Pam Bondi on Friday laid the groundwork for the imprisonment of journalists who produce reporting that damages the president’s interests.

In an internal Justice Department memo, Bondi rescinded Biden-era protections which restricted prosecutors “from seeking records and compelling testimony from members of the news media,” stating this was necessary “in order to identify and punish the source of improper leaks” by individuals whose conduct she described as “treasonous.”

Notably, her memo targets not just the leaking of classified information but also “disclosures that undermine President Trump’s policies, victimize government agencies, and cause harm to the American people.”

Trump regularly rails against reporting based on anonymous sources. Bondi’s move raises the prospect of the Trump administration responding to such reports by forcing reporters to choose between revealing their sources and going to jail.

Bondi, a Trump loyalist who previously parlayed frequent Fox appearances defending Trump into a post on his first impeachment legal defense team, will apparently be making the call over when the Justice Department uses that legal tool.

Other top prosecutors and investigators who might weigh in include her deputy, Emil Bove, who previously represented Trump in state and federal prosecutions; Ed Martin, the lawyer for January 6 defendant who now serves as interim U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia; FBI Director Kash Patel, who has called for the federal targeting of journalists; and his extremely online deputy, the former Fox host Dan Bongino.

How far will they go? Trump wants them to go very far indeed.

### Trump calls for investigations of media pollsters

Trump responded on Monday to new surveys which show his approval ratings plunging in light of his catastrophic tariff rollout by calling for investigations into the pollsters and the media outlets which conduct them.

Trump claimed in an early morning post on Truth Social that results from New York Times/Siena and ABC/Washington Post polls were due to the surveys “looking for a negative result.”

“These people should be investigated for ELECTION FRAUD, and add in the FoxNews Pollster while you’re at it,” he wrote. “They are Negative Criminals who apologize to their subscribers and readers after I WIN ELECTIONS BIG, much bigger than their polls showed I would win, loose a lot of credibility, and then go on cheating and lying for the next cycle, only worse.”

Trump regularly accuses his media foes of breaking the law, and in a March speech at the Justice Department headquarters he instructed its employees to “watch for” their “totally illegal” behavior.

The president is currently suing Iowa pollster J. Ann Selzer over the results of one of her presidential campaign surveys.

Trump has personally dictated Justice Department investigations into two former officials from his first administration who became critics, as well as into ActBlue, the hub for Democratic campaign fundraising — and he could launch a similar legal assault on any news outlet which displeases him at any time.

### A cry of desperation from CBS News

60 Minutes anchor Scott Pelley Sunday’s broadcast with a blunt explanation for the resignation last week of Bill Owens, a journalist with decades of experience at CBS News and the show’s longtime executive producer.

“Our parent company, Paramount, is trying to complete a merger,” he said. “The Trump administration must approve it. Paramount began to supervise our content in new ways. None of our stories has been blocked, but Bill felt he had lost the independence that honest journalism requires.”

Trump and his administration had targeted CBS News for retribution following a 60 Minutesinterview of Kamala Harris, the editing of which the president alleged had been unfair to him.

Trump launched a lawsuit seeking $10 billion in damages from the network, which First Amendment attorneys described as “ridiculous junk” and “a frivolous and dangerous attempt by a politician to control the news media.” Brendan Carr, his handpicked chair of the Federal Communications Commission, is conducting an investigation into the editing that former FCC commissioners have denounced.

Rather than stand firmly behind the company’s journalists, Paramount Chair Shari Redstone is reportedly seeking a settlement with Trump and an agreement with Carr that will allow the company’s merger to go through.

### Trump gloats about media owners bowing to his will

Trump thinks he’s winning his battle against the press, as The Atlantic reported in a recent interview with the president:

“Tell the people at The Atlantic, if they’d write good stories and truthful stories, the magazine would be hot,” he said. Perhaps the magazine can risk forgoing hotness, he suggested, because it is owned by Laurene Powell Jobs, which buffers it, he implied, from commercial imperatives. But that doesn’t guarantee anything, he warned. “You know at some point, they give up,” he said, referring to media owners generally and—we suspected—[Washington Post owner Jeff] Bezos specifically. “At some point they say, No más, no más.” He laughed quietly.

Trump understands that many of the news outlets whose work he decries are owned by multinational corporations or wealthy magnates whose business interests make them vulnerable to federal retaliation.

After only a few months in office, he’s seen the pressure he’s exerted on CBS News push it to the breaking point, while the resolve of major newspaper owners is seemingly crumbling. And he has years more time in office to try to break them to his will.

### Trump is trying to throttle the free press — and U.S. moguls are going along with it

02/04/25 9:00 AM EST

### Donald Trump’s authoritarian playbook to crush the free press in a second term

10/29/24 9:09 AM EDT

### Trump is threatening to use the government to “come down hard” on the free press. Believe him.

11/30/23

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an 4 25

On Sunday, April 6, Dearborn, Michigan-based attorney Amir Makled was returning from a visit to the Dominican Republic when he was detained by federal agents for roughly 90 minutes at the Detroit Metropolitan Airport. Makled, who is representing Samantha Lewis — a pro-Palestinian demonstrator arrested at the University of Michigan in 2024 — described the experience during an interview with the Detroit Free Press.

According to Detroit Free Press reporter Tresa Baldas, Makled was "questioned about his clients and asked to give up his cellphone" but "stood his ground" and "didn't give up his phone."

Makled explained to the Free Press, "So, I tell them, 'I know you can take my phone. I'm not going to give you my phone, however.... 90 percent of my work is on my phone. You're not getting unfettered access to (it).'"

Baldas reports, "What followed was a 90-minute, back-and-forth verbal tussle between Makled and two federal agents, who, he said, ultimately released him without taking his phone, but looked at his contacts list instead. For the 38-year-old civil rights and criminal defense attorney, it was a daunting experience that he says highlights a troubling phenomenon that's occurring across the United States: Lawyers are getting targeted for handling issues the administration of President Donald Trump disagrees with."

Trump, in March, sent the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) a memo urging sanctions against attorneys he is accusing of making "rampant fraud and meritless claims" in the immigration system.

Makled, however, points out that he is not an immigration attorney.

Makled told the Free Press, "This current administration is doing something that no administration has done — they are attacking attorneys. This is a different type of threat to the rule of law that I see. They are now challenging the judiciary, or lawyers; they're putting pressure (on them) to dissuade attorneys from taking on issues that are against the government's issues. We have an obligation as lawyers to stand up to this stuff."

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thehill

Trump administration Friday demanded a federal judge step aside from overseeing Perkins Coie’s challenge to President Trump’s executive order targeting the law firm.

The new filing claims U.S. District Judge Beryl Howellhas repeatedly demonstrated “partiality” against and “animus” toward Trump, taking aim at both her decisions in the lawsuit and previous major cases she oversaw.

“Reasonable observers may view this Court as incapable of fairly adjudicating these claims against the Commander-In-Chief,” Deputy Associate Attorney General Richard Lawson wrote in the motion.

It marks the second time the Justice Department has called for a judge’s removal from a pending lawsuit against the administration, which comes as Trump himself steps up his chastising of judges who rule against him. Earlier this week, the administration called for the removal of the judge overseeing a high-profile deportation flight case.

Howell was randomly assigned to oversee Perkins Coie’s lawsuit challenging Trump’s executive order restricting firm attorneys’ security clearances and access to federal facilities. Trump has long clashed with the firm over its work advising Hillary Clintonduring her 2016 presidential campaign and connections to the discredited Steele dossier that contained unflattering allegations about Trump and his connections to Russia.

The case remains in early stages, but the judge has already temporarily blocked part of Trump’s order.

Nominated to the federal bench by then-President Obamain 2010, Howell longhasdrawn Republicans’ ire.

She previously served as chief judge of Washington’s federal district court and oversaw several sealed disputes concerning the criminal investigations into Trump. Howell’s decisions included invoking the “crime-fraud” exception to provide special counsel Jack Smith with documents from one of Trump’s attorneys and holding X, then known as Twitter, in contempt for not handing over Trump’s private messages.

“This Court’s pattern of hostility toward President Trump is not limited to his supporters. It also utilized the judicial power against President Trump himself,” Lawson wrote.

The Justice Department’s new motion also takes aim at a gala speech Howell gave in 2023 while accepting an award, when the judge did not name Trump but indicated she agreed that the country was “at a crossroads teetering on the brink of authoritarianism.”

“We are having a very surprising and downright troubling moment in this country when the very importance of facts is dismissed or ignored,” Howell said.

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7 AG QUIT ON ERIC ADAMS FEDSOC CLERK FOR ALITO?

AN 2 25

On Tuesday morning, February 18, the Trump-era U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) was rocked by yet another resignation.

According to Reuters' Sarah N. Lynch, Denise Cheung — the top senior prosecutor in DOJ's Washington office — told her colleague Ed Martin, in her resignation letter, that she is leaving DOJ because of a request from Trump Administration officials she considers improper. The Trump allies, Lynch reports, asked Cheung "to launch a criminal probe" and "ordered her to investigate a government contract awarded during Joe Biden's administration and pursue a freeze of the recipient's assets."

In her resignation letter, Cheung wrote, "I have been proud to serve at the U.S. Department of Justice and this office for over 24 years. During my tenure, which has spanned over many different administrations, I have always been guided by the oath I took.... to support and defend the Constitution."

Cheung's resignation is inspiring a lot of reactions on X, formerly Twitter.

Washington Post reporter Carol Leonnig tweeted, "Yet another resignation in protest after DOJ leadership orders veteran fed prosecutor this weekend to freeze enviro grants made by Biden administration. @TheJusticeDept can freeze funds when there is evidence the assets are linked to a crime. Veteran Denise Cheung felt such a step was improper/unethical now and resigned, sources tell the Post."

CBS News' Scott MacFarlane posted, "The wave of resignations among longtime Justice Dept attorneys continues Denise Cheung is leaving her post as a top criminal prosecutor in Washington DC, amid tumult in the agency."

Former federal prosecutor Daniel R. Alonso wrote, "Having served as a criminal chief in a Republican administration that did not abuse its authority with respect to our office (EDNY), I can say D.C. Criminal chief Denise Cheung was exactly right to resign. You DO NOT open investigations without predication."

In a separate tweet, Alonso commented, "It's a conundrum to be sure, but lawyers have ethical obligations. It's true different lawyers interpret them differently, but how can we ask her to stay when her conscience dictates otherwise? A more pressing issue is that the Senate should reject Martin's nomination - he belongs nowhere near federal prosecutorial decision-making."

The Hill's Niall Stanage wrote, "Developing story — NYT reports this happened because the person in question would not carry out a 'directive' from the Trump team."

CNN's Jim Sciutto tweeted, "The sudden departure of Justice Department veteran Denise Cheung comes a day after President Donald Trump announced his nominee to lead the prosecutor's office, Ed Martin, who has supported unwinding all January 6 criminal cases that the office brought."

X user Millard Fillmore remarked, "She is resigning because they ordered her to break the law via a trumped investigation."

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02/03/2025

Kyle Mantyla

Adele M. Stan @ The New Republic: Trump’s Pick for Federal Prosecutor in D.C. Gives Hacks a Bad Name

Now it appears that [Ed] Martin is positioning himself to “investigate the investigators,” as Trump and his minions have promised, perhaps looking for words in charging documents that he can twist into a false narrative of prosecutorial malfeasance on the part of the government lawyers who charged the insurrectionists.

Vittoria Elliott @ Wired: The Young, Inexperienced Engineers Aiding Elon Musk’s Government Takeover

Engineers between 19 and 24, most linked to Musk’s companies, are playing a key role as he seizes control of federal infrastructure.

Jacob Kornbluh @ Forward: Former Trump staffer fired for attending white nationalist conference tapped for top State Dept. position

The ADL has condemned appointing Darren Beattie, who invoked the antisemitic trope that George Soros orchestrated efforts to oust President Trump

Angry White Men: Stew Peters Denies Being A ‘White Supremacist’ Before Interviewing ‘Living Legend’ David Duke

At his confirmation hearing, Kash Patel — President Trump’s nominee to lead the FBI — was grilled over his association with Holocaust denier and Nazi sympathizer Stew Peters. On a Friday livestream, Peters denied being a white supremacist, shortly before introducing former Klan leader David Duke as a “living legend.”

Brian Kaylor @ A Public Witness: Lutherans Hammer Against Misinformation by Michael Flynn & Elon Musk

We might need to update that famous saying by German Lutheran theologian Martin Niemöller. First they came for the Episcopalians … then they came for the Catholics … then they came for the Lutherans.

Mark Silk @ Religion News Service: Idaho goes after same-sex marriage

This week, the Idaho House of Representatives passed a “joint memorial” (i.e. resolution) of the Legislature calling on the U.S. Supreme Court to reverse Obergefell v. Hodges, the landmark decision that in 2015 established a constitutional right to marry for same-sex couples and insisting that “the issue of marriage and enforcement of all laws pertaining to marriage” be returned to the states. The state Senate is expected to take up the memorial shortly.

Rob Port @ The Grand Folks Herald: Port: North Dakota lawmaker suggests overthrow of 'Jew' Mexican president

"Isn't she Jewish?" an unapologetic state Rep. Nico Rios asked when reached by phone. "Why is it wrong that I state a fact?"

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