Not Possible in a Functioning Democracy

A whirlwind of developments closed the deal yesterday on what is arguably the single most corrupt scheme of the Trump II presidency to date.

In broad daylight, President Trump raided the U.S. treasury to the tune of $1.776 billion, to be disbursed at his discretion to an assortment of insurrectionists, pardoned criminals, and disgraced former officials whom he counts among his political allies.

The day unfolded like this:

• A settlement agreement is signed by Trump’s personal attorney, the DOJ’s No. 3, and the IRS commissioner to resolve Trump’s collusive lawsuit against the IRS in federal court in Miami and establish an “Anti-Weaponization Fund.”
• Trump dismisses his lawsuit before U.S. District Judge Kathleen Williams can weigh in on whether the IRS and Treasury Department are under Trump’s effective control, which would have ended the lawsuit and prevented any “settlement.”
• The DOJ touts the settlement in a press release and issues a bare-bones summary of the “Anti-Weaponization Fund.”
• With obvious reluctance, Williams, whose hands are tied by court rules, orders the Trump case closed.
• The DOJ releases the settlement agreement itself.
• Brian Morrissey, the general counsel of the Treasury Department, resigned Monday just hours after the “Anti-Weaponization Fund” was announced and only seven months after he was confirmed as the department’s top lawyer.

A few observations:

Six pages! The settlement agreement, at a mere six substantive pages, has to be among the skimpiest legal documents ever drafted for a settlement of this scale. The ratio of settlement agreement pages drafted to dollars committed is off the charts.

How convenient! The settlement agreement contains a nifty provision that purports to allow only the collusive parties to the agreement — and no one else — to challenge it.

Conflict of interest much? The No. 3 at DOJ, Stanley Woodward, represented a host of clients, including Jan. 6 defendants, who stand to be beneficiaries of the “Anti-Weaponization Fund.”

A free-for-all! None of the documents released by the DOJ, including the settlement agreement itself, defines “weaponization,” provides clear standards for reviewing claims, or otherwise establishes any guardrails for transparency of accountability.

In a normal, functioning democracy, none of this would be possible. If it were attempted, the legal and political blowback would ruin careers, lead to prosecutions, end in impeachments, and might shift the balance of power away from those associated with the culprits for a generation for more.

The importance of what happened yesterday is that Trump and his cabinet declared to the world that they can do anything they want — and they will. Unshackled by the Roberts Court before he was even sworn in and backed since then by a supine Republican Congress, Trump is free to raid the Treasury, to use public funds to prop up his political machine, to use the federal courts to launder his schemes, and to unleash upon civil society domestic terrorists, insurrectionists, and other bad actors to perpetuate his regime.

Only the Best: Trump DOJ Edition

In a stunning decision late last week, three federal judges in Wyoming dismissed felony indictments in nine different cases due to prosecutorial misconduct in front of the grand jury by then-interim U.S. Attorney Darin Smith of Wyoming.

The dismissed indictments, which can be resubmitted to a new grand jury, included murder, weapons possession, drug distribution, and possession of child pornography.

In their joint order dismissing the indictments, the judges describe an avalanche of errors by Smith in a March 16 grand jury session, which they grouped into two categories: (i) “conclusive statements about the bad character of the Defendants and the weight of the evidence”; and (ii) “statements and conduct that erode the independence of the grand jury.”

Despite this fiasco, Senate Republicans took the interim tag off of Smith last night by confirming him as U.S. attorney.

Minnesota Charges ICE Agent in Shooting

For the second time, Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty has brought criminal charges against a federal agent involved in Operation Metro Surge. The latest charge comes in a notorious shooting incident after a pursuit, where the ICE agent allegedly fired his gun through the closed front door of a home, striking a Venezuelan national. Moriarty identified the ICE agent publicly for the first time as she brought assault charges against him and obtained a nationwide warrant for his arrest.

Midterms Money Business Watch

• President Trump seized on a legitimate error in the distribution of mail-in ballots for Maryland’s upcoming primaries to order a Justice Department investigation and to make wild and unfounded allegations on social media that the state “sent out 500,000 Illegal Mail In Ballots, and they got caught!” adding that “nobody knows what’s happening with the first 500,000 they sent.” The state caught the error by a vendor, which led to some voters receiving ballots for the wrong party, and is working to resend the correct ballots.
• A coalition of 10 big city district attorneys are expected to announce as soon as today that they will investigate and prosecute any suspected voter intimidation by federal agents during the midterms.

Judges Duel Over Anti-Trans Subpoena

In dueling court cases in Rhode Island and Texas, two federal judges have issued conflicting rulings over a Trump DOJ administrative subpoena served on Rhode Island Hospital for records of its transgender care program.

In the most recent development yesterday, notorious right-wing federal judge Reed O’Connor of Fort Worth, who previously upheld enforcement of the subpoena, ordered the hospital to begin producing the subpoenaed records beginning today for him to hold in chambers while various appeals proceed.

O’Connor’s order — which comes after U.S. District Judge Mary McElroy of Rhode Island last week blocked enforcement of the subpoena — includes a highly unusual injunction that prohibits the hospital from seeking relief from his order except at the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals or the Supreme Court:

[The hospital] is hereby ENJOINED from seeking relief, encouraging others to seek relief, or cooperate with others in seeking relief from any other court related to these proceedings, and from aiding and abetting others or encouraging others from seeking relief from any other court but those identified …

At least seven other federal courts have agreed to quash or limit the expansive civil subpoenas sent to more than 20 doctors and hospitals last summer, the AP reports.

Anti-Trans Watch

• Colorado: The state Supreme Court ordered Children’s Hospital Colorado to resume providing transgender care for minors. The hospital had paused such care after the Trump administration moved to block federal funding for hospitals that provide such care.
• Kansas: A state judge blocked the state’s ban on transgender care for minors, finding that it ran afoul of the state Constitution’s expansive Bill of Rights.
• Texas: Under an agreement coordinated with the Trump DOJ to settle a state investigation by state Attorney General Ken Paxton, Texas Children’s Hospital will create the nation’s first “detransition” clinic focused on medical care for young people who stop or reverse their gender transitions.

Pentagon IG Investigates Boat Strikes

The Pentagon’s inspector general is investigating the Trump administration’s high seas campaign against alleged drug-smuggling boats in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific, according to a May 11 IG memorandum.

Ebola Watch

• The death toll from the ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo and Uganda, which raged for weeks before the alarm was sounded, has risen to more than 130 people, with more than 500 suspected cases.
• An American doctor working for a missionary group in the DRC tested positive for ebola after treating patients. He is being transported to Germany for treatment, along with six other Americans who had high-risk exposure to the virus.
• In response to the outbreak, the Trump administration limited entry to the United States from the DRC, Uganda, and South Sudan.

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