Trump Admin Stonewalls Another Judge With Incompetent Witnesses

Posted on by David Kurtz

Trump Admin Wrongfully Deported More Than 100 Asylum Seekers

The big news coming out of yesterday’s hearing in federal court in Baltimore was that more than 100 asylum seekers have been wrongfully deported in violation of a court-approved settlement agreement involving unaccompanied minors.

I happened to be the only journalist in attendance at the evidentiary hearing in front of U.S. District Judge Stephanie Gallagher, who thankfully denied an uncontested last-minute request to seal the hearing. My full write-up is here.

My interest in this case has frankly less to do with the immigration issues at stake, though they’re undoubtedly important in their own right, and more to do with that fact that this case is an important front in the ongoing battle between the Trump executive branch and judicial branch.

The case — awkwardly styled as J.O.P. v. Department of Homeland Security — is one of the “facilitate” cases, a progeny of Kilmar Abrego Garcia’s wrongful deportation case. In the early stages of the case, Judge Gallagher closely modeled U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis’ handling of the Abrego Garcia case, which was blessed by the Supreme Court. As in that other Maryland case, wrongful deportations in violations of court orders have been followed by stonewalling from the Trump administration.

Since then, the J.O.P. case has evolved away (at least for now) from the narrower issue of “facilitating” the return of wrongfully deported people to a broader inquiry into why the wrongful deportations continue to happen, to the tune of somewhere in the “low 100s” of people out of a class of litigants that numbers, by the government’s estimate, between 70,000 and 75,000 people. But one thing remains the same: The Trump administration continues to use the Justice Department to stonewall federal judges by producing witnesses who can’t competently testify on the issues before the court.

That would have been the main news coming out of yesterday’s hearing, where a frustrated judge continued to call out the administration for not giving her witnesses who could testify based on their personal knowledge about what happened that led to deportations in violation of the settlement agreement.

We’re back at it again today, after a stern order from Gallagher for the government to do better today. I’m heading into court now. Stay tuned.

‘Go Big and Go Loud’

Our old friend Aakash Singh, a top official in Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche’s office who made an important cameo in the Abrego Garcia criminal case, is back in a well-reported NYT story on the Trump administration’s targeting of anti-ICE protestors:

In a conference call in late January, the official, Aakash Singh, laid out the department’s basis for prosecuting demonstrators: National Security Presidential Memo 7, a sweeping directive issued by President Trump last September. It expanded the definition of domestic terrorism to include not only violent crimes like assault, but also relatively minor ones, like revealing the personal details of agents or getting in the way of immigration enforcement.

Mr. Singh said that “coordinators” in U.S. attorneys’ offices responsible for charging protesters under NSPM-7 should be “hounding” federal agents to make cases, according to people familiar with his remarks. He also suggested that the department wanted headlines along with indictments, promising that officials in Washington would be “blasting out” prosecutors’ work.

“Go big,” Mr. Singh said, “and go loud.”

The Retribution: Trump DOJ Edition

  • Axios: Former FBI Director James Comey has been subpoenaed in the mother of all “investigate the investigators” retributions down in South Florida.
  • NYT: Two anonymous former FBI agents who were fired for their work on the Jan. 6 investigation of Trump are suing over their wrongful terminations, claiming they were targets of “political retribution.”

Utterly Insane

I’m not sure I’ve ever seen anything as tortured, corrupt, and upside down as President Trump’s attempt to save his own political skin by lifting sanctions on Iran so that it can sell its oil and stabilize energy prices while simultaneously conducting a war against Iran.

Since I was in court most of the day yesterday, I don’t have a fine-grained read on how this new development is playing in the public sphere. But this is truly one of the most eye-popping things I’ve seen in the Trump II presidency.

Shoring up your adversary in an armed conflict you initiated in a desperate attempt to mitigate the consequences of your elective war may forever stand as the paramount example of Donald Trump putting his personal and political interests above the national interest.

Trump’s election year self-bailout is bolstering a key economic lifeline for Iran — and inevitably boosting its war-fighting capabilities — while U.S. service members are actively in harm’s way in the air and at sea. Anything to drive down gas prices ahead of the midterm elections.

Latest From the Middle East …

  • WSJ: U.S. War Planes and Helicopters Kick Off Battle to Reopen Hormuz
  • In the face of overwhelming evidence, President Trump backtracked from his wild claims that Israel had attacked Iran’s South Pars Gas Field without his knowledge.
  • The WSJ charts the critical energy assets hit in the Middle East conflict, including most recently a major Kuwaiti oil refinery

For Your Climate Change Radar …

In what could be the seminal challenge to President Trump’s attempt to wreck U.S. climate policy, a coalition of states and cities has sued to reinstate the EPA’s endangerment finding on greenhouse gas emissions.

Judge Blocks RFK Jr’s Anti-Trans Finding

U.S. District Judge Mustafa T. Kasubhai of Oregon blocked HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s December declaration that providers of gender-affirming care for minors “do not meet professionally recognized standards.”

The Corruption: Trump Coin Edition

I don’t want to lose sight of the fundamental lawlessness of putting Trump’s visage on a U.S. coin, but it also represents a pristine illustration of the absurdism that a personalist regime fosters.

Just take a look at the abject devotion of the Trump-appointed members of U.S. Commission of Fine Arts as they talk about their very special big boy’s need to have the biggest coin … at least the 3 inches that is the current largest coin, via the AP:

Some commissioners noted Trump’s fondness for big things as they advocated for the largest size coin. …

“I think the president likes big things,” said Commissioner James McCrery II, who was the architect on Trump’s design proposal for a 90,000-square-foot ballroom addition to the White House.

[Commissioner Chamberlain] Harris told McCrery she agreed with him. She works in the White House as a special assistant to the president and deputy director of the Oval Office.

“I think the larger the better. The largest of that circulation, I think, would be his preference,” Harris said, speaking of Trump.

Stay Tuned Later Today!

A quick heads up that TPM’s Josh Marshall and Joe Ragazzo will be doing a Substack Live today for Morning Memo readers to discuss some of the big trends and stories right now in the news business. If you’re among the 20,000 people who subscribe to receive Morning Memo as an email, you’ll get an automatic alert when their Substack Live begins.

While it’s crucial to sign up new members during our annual membership drive, we also use it as an opportunity to peel back the curtain on TPM so you can see who we are and what we’re about.

If you’re thinking about becoming a TPM member, their conversation may answer your questions about how TPM works and where your money goes. If you already a TPM member (thank you!), you’ll get insight into what TPM has done and is doing to continue to grow and succeed as a reader-supported news outlet.

Hot tips? Juicy scuttlebutt? Keen insights? Let me know. For sensitive information, use the encrypted methods here.

In Surprise to No One, Lewandowski Was Reportedly Doing Shady Stuff With DHS Contracts

Posted on by Nicole LaFond

Corey Lewandowski, who has long served as an adviser and ally to President Trump and who worked closely with now-fired Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem may have, according to NBC News, been requesting a “success fee” as part of his work securing contracts for the department’s immigration and deportation work.

Continue reading “In Surprise to No One, Lewandowski Was Reportedly Doing Shady Stuff With DHS Contracts” →

EXCLUSIVE: Trump Admin Wrongfully Deported More Than 100 Asylum Seekers

Posted on by David Kurtz

BALTIMORE—In surprise testimony in federal court Thursday, an immigration officer revealed that more than 100 asylum seekers were wrongfully deported in violation of a court-ordered settlement agreement in a long-running case that has gotten national attention.

Before today, the number of wrongfully deported asylum seekers in the case was thought to be less than a dozen. But under persistent questioning from plaintiff’s counsel, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services asylum officer Kimberly Sicard testified that in the past three to four weeks it had come to her attention that more than 100 asylum seekers covered by the settlement agreement have been removed. She put the number in the “low 100s.”

The revelation prompted an immediate reaction from U.S. District Judge Stephanie Gallagher, who has been tightly managing the case of J.O.P. v. DHS since early 2025, when the Venezuelan asylum seeker only known in court filings as “Cristian” was deported under the Alien Enemies Act in violation of the settlement agreement.

“It’s certainly news to me that there with this many removals,” Gallagher interjected. “I am very concerned having that number.”

The timing of the discovery of the additional, not-previously-disclosed removals appears to roughly line up with when Gallagher issued a Feb. 23 order setting today’s evidentiary hearing and demanding the government produce witnesses who could testify about the circumstances of the removals of eight asylum seekers and possibly a ninth.

Ironically, the day’s hearing kicked off with the revelation that two more asylum seekers were wrongfully removed in February, although the government disputes that one of them is covered by the settlement agreement. That brought the total number of wrongful deportations in the case to at most a dozen, including “Cristian.” But bigger revelations were still to come.

Sicard was deep into her testimony when the revelation spilled out. It came after Gallagher had put up numerous roadblocks to further questioning of Sicard from class counsel Michelle Mendez of the National Immigration Project, primarily because of Sicard’s limited personal knowledge of the case of the nine deported asylum seekers at issue today.

The testimony was interrupted by a long back and forth between the judge and counsel for both sides about what Sicard could meaningfully testify about, during which Mendez was visibly frustrated by the constraints Gallagher had imposed. When testimony resumed, Mendez took another shot, and Sicard made the big reveal.

Asked how the additional removals had come to her attention, Sicard said she wasn’t sure of the exact process but that officials had “queried systems.” As part of the process of notifying ICE of the wrongful removals, the matter went to the office of chief counsel at USCIS three to four weeks ago, Sicard said.

In a statement to TPM after the hearing, Mendez said: “We are concerned that these removals are just the tip of the iceberg.”

Gallagher called the revelation of the more than 100 wrongful removals “extremely troubling to the court.”

The revelation was the pinnacle of a day of frustration for Gallagher. She had listed in her order calling the hearing five topics on which she expected the Trump administration to produce witnesses “with personal knowledge” to testify. The government failed to produce such witnesses.

“We are no farther in figuring out what happened to these people than when the hearing started,” an exasperated Gallagher said toward the end of five-hour hearing after hearing from five of the approximately 11 witnesses the government expected to call.

“I am not happy with where we are,” Gallagher said more than once. At one point, she warned the government, “You might want to start preparing more witnesses for tomorrow.”

The 2024 settlement agreement in the class action case barred the removal of a subset of unaccompanied minors seeking asylum in the United States. The removal of “Cristian” last March set off a yearlong effort to enforce the settlement agreement. In a case with echoes of the wrongful deportation of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, Gallagher ordered the recalcitrant Trump administration to facilitate the return of “Cristian” and was upheld on appeal. Things did not go well for “Cristian,” whose whereabouts remain unknown.

The evidentiary hearing, which was expected to last one day, will continue tomorrow.

“There are ways to get this information,” Gallagher said at the end of the day, her voice rising to nearly a shout. “We need to know what happened to these people.”

Help Us With This Big Push

Posted on by Josh Marshall

We’re finishing up the second week of our Annual TPM Membership Drive and want to get to 40% of our goal before the end of the week. We’re currently at just over 30%, so we need about 100 more sign ups. If you’re not currently a member, please join us. This is what keeps TPM thriving: memberships and the subscription fees that come with them. That’s more than 90% of our revenue. Can you help us today? Just click right here.

The Pentagon is Setting Congress Up For a Vote That Could Provide Backdoor War Authorization

Posted on by Emine Yücel

Since President Donald Trump started to wage war against Iran without authorization from Congress and seemingly without much logistical or financial planning, there have been reports that the White House may request that congressional lawmakers authorize emergency supplemental funding to bolster his unauthorized war.

Early reporting on the possible supplemental request suggested that the White House may ask for up to $50 billion in new money. But, according to new reporting by the Washington Post, the Pentagon asked the Trump White House to approve a more than $200 billion request that it wants to send to Congress amid the ongoing war in Iran. The New York Times also separately reported on the details of a $200 billion funding request. 

Approving the money could allow the Trump administration to argue that Congress had retroactively authorized the war, legal experts told TPM this month. President Bill Clinton made a similar argument about the war in Kosovo, which began absent Congressional authorization. The Clinton White House argued that funding Congress passed for that conflict doubled as authorization. 

Continue reading “The Pentagon is Setting Congress Up For a Vote That Could Provide Backdoor War Authorization” →

Maricopa County’s GOP Recorder Won’t Block DOJ Overreach

Posted on by Khaya Himmelman

Hello, and welcome back to The Franchise!

This week we’ll unpack the latest developments and the crucial backstory behind the Trump administration’s Maricopa County 2020 election probe. We’ve also got Cleta Mitchell celebrating (and taking credit for) Senate Republican leadership finally caving to Trump and opening a marathon debate of the SAVE America Act, and, relatedly, Florida, taking a cue from the Trump administration and passing its own version of the SAVE America Act. 

Let’s dig in. 

Continue reading “Maricopa County’s GOP Recorder Won’t Block DOJ Overreach” →

The Leaks Come for Corey—and Maybe Joe Kent Too

Posted on by Josh Marshall

Semafor reported last night that Joe Kent, momentary half-resistance hero and full-time white nationalist weirdo, is being investigated by the FBI for leaking classified information. According to Semafor, at least, the investigation predates his high-profile, news-driving resignation. We don’t know many details of this investigation. It’s at least possible that, rather than being retaliation for the resignation, it was actually the cause of it. In other words, maybe Kent saw the investigation was building, that the moment was right, and made his push to clothe the investigation and any possible future charges as retaliation. But let’s set that possibility aside for the moment. Because there’s another possibility I want to explore, one that goes to the heart of how Trump II works.

How Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s Vaccine Agenda Risks a Resurgence of Deadly Childhood Plagues

Posted on by Allegra Kirkland

ProPublica is a nonprofit newsroom that investigates abuses of power. Sign up to receive our biggest stories as soon as they’re published.

Dr. Adam Ratner hovered over a gravely ill infant in a New York City intensive care unit on a grim day in 2022. The 3-month-old girl spiked a fever two days earlier and had become lethargic. Soon she was having seizures and struggling to breathe.

She didn’t register Ratner’s towering frame or the bright hospital lights. Her eyes stared up and to the right, eerily frozen. 

He ran his hand over the soft spot on her head, which should have been flat. Instead, it bulged, a sign that too much fluid was building up inside her skull. 

The baby’s life was in danger, and Ratner needed to figure out why. He worried the culprit was bacterial meningitis, an infection of the membranes that protect the brain.

What came back on her lab tests was something out of the history books.

Continue reading “How Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s Vaccine Agenda Risks a Resurgence of Deadly Childhood Plagues” →

Mullin Nomination Moves Out of Senate Committee With Assist From Fetterman

The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee voted to support Sen. Markwayne Mullin’s (R-OK) nomination as Department of Homeland Security secretary on Thursday morning.

The Republican committee chair, Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY), voted against Mullin’s nomination, as he said he would after the hearing yesterday. Sen. John Fetterman (D-PA) supported it. The vote means Mullin has cleared the first and most significant hurdle towards becoming the leader of the department that is currently shutdown as Republicans largely refuse to engage in Immigration and Customs Enforcement reform discussions with Democrats.

Paul made his opposition to Mullin’s nomination clear during the hearing yesterday.

During his opening remarks, Paul tore into Mullin for a past comment the Oklahoma senator had apparently made about Paul not long after the two had met. Paul claimed that Mullin said that he “understood” why Paul’s neighbor had attacked him in 2017, a reference to an assault that took place when Paul’s neighbor tackled him in his yard during President Trump’s first term. Paul suffered broken ribs and serious lung injuries. His neighbor was sentenced to a little less than a year in prison for the incident.

Throughout the hearing before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, Mullin was mostly unapologetic toward Paul — both for his remarks about the violence that Paul was subjected to and his belief that Paul, the committee chair, was using the hearing to engage in “character assassination.” Paul, at one point, told Mullin that he thought he had “low impulse control” and a strong “pattern” of “machismo” that’s not suitable for the Department of Homeland Security leadership position. Paul also joined with his Democratic colleagues to question Mullin about supposed classified trips that Mullin claims he took while serving in the House. After discussion with Mullin, a Republican senator later yesterday seemed to suggest the trips were covered by an NDA, raising more questions than answers.

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