So Trump didn’t rendition Mamdani. They appear to be huge friends now. What gives?
Here’s my take since I’ve got this question again and again in the last hour.
Continue reading “What to Make of That Mamdani-Trump Meeting?”The Brittle Grip of Ultra-Wealth
Just before I began writing this post, I saw this article from The Washington Post about the rise of billionaires in American politics. Given Bezos’s ownership and the recent shift in its editorial policies I’m mildly surprised they published it. The key points aren’t terribly surprising. But it brings them together in one place — the vast growth in billionaire giving over the first quarter of this century, the rapid trend from a relatively even partisan split to overwhelming giving to Republicans. It is among other things the story of billionaires becoming increasingly class conscious. It’s always been true that money buys influence in American politics. In some ways, it was even greater and more brazen in the past since there wasn’t even the pretense of limits on giving or disclosure.
But the role of billionaire ownership of the political process has not only grown rapidly in recent years. Public recognition of that fact has, too, which has — perhaps paradoxically or perhaps not — spurred the drive for even tighter ownership. It’s no exaggeration to say that the deca-billionaire or even centi-billionaire class — setting aside those who might command a mere few billion dollars — act now as a kind of post-modern nobility, a class which does not rule exclusively but interacts with politics in a fundamentally different way from the rest of society.
Continue reading “The Brittle Grip of Ultra-Wealth”A Brutal Ending to One of the Worst Trump II Cases
A Thoroughly Unsatisfying Result
U.S. District Judge Stephanie Gallagher just unsealed this morning her Nov. 14 opinion in the case of “Cristian,” the 20-year-old Venezuelan man wrongfully deported under the Alien Enemies Act in violation of an existing court-approved settlement agreement.
As in the Abrego Garcia case, Gallagher had ordered the Trump administration in April to “facilitate” Cristian’s return to the United States from El Salvador’s notorious CECOT prison. The government stonewalled for months, filing frequently delinquent status reports that provided little information and no real assurance that it was making a good faith effort to comply with her order.
After Cristian and the other CECOT prisoners were repatriated to Venezuela — the country from which he was seeking asylum in the United States — his lawyers lost contact with him. That means one of two things, Gallagher wrote in her newly unsealed opinion (emphasis mine):
It is possible, at this point, that Cristian has decided to forego a return to the United States and has voluntarily absented himself from contact with his counsel. It is equally possible that Cristian has been the victim of the anticipated violence that caused him to seek asylum in the United States in the first instance.
In perhaps the harshest language of her opinion, Gallagher wrote that “it is clear that [the Trump administration] knowingly played a role in Cristian’s landing in the country from which he had sought asylum.”
If the prospect of an asylum-seeker being cast back to the wolves wasn’t jarring enough, Gallagher’s opinion today declined to find the Trump administration in contempt of court for its conduct in the case.
While Gallagher didn’t dispute the government’s lack of good faith or its desultory efforts to abide by the terms of her orders, she ultimately concluded that criminal contempt was overkill: “While this Court shares Class Counsel’s frustration with what appears to be lack of good faith government efforts at compliance with this Court’s order, it cannot find, on the particular facts of this case, the factors needed to find probable cause for criminal contempt.”
Gallagher found the late and paltry status reports from the government to be too ticky tacky a violation of her order to warrant criminal contempt, and she attributed the lack of good faith efforts in seeking Cristian’s return not the DHS but to the State Department, which was not a defendant in the case and therefore beyond her reach for a contempt finding:
Of course, in other times, one might assume that a federal agency not specifically named in a case would still use its best efforts to effectuate its sister agencies’ compliance with a valid order from a federal court. This Court certainly hoped, in entering the April 23 Order, that events would unfold in that manner and that the federal government as a whole would undertake compliance efforts. Its hopes were dashed.
It was cold comfort that Gallagher left intact her order that the Trump administration must facilitate Cristian’s return to the United States … if he ever resurfaces.
The Never-Ending Abrego Garcia Saga
The Trump administration spent another day in court stonewalling U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis of Maryland, defying her explicit order to put on a government witness who could testify with direct knowledge of its efforts to deport the much-abused Kilmar Abrego Garcia to a third country. I was at the courthouse and wrote a full report on that aspect of the hearing.
Separately, on the merits of the case, the Trump administration seems increasingly hobbled by its inability to produce any evidence that a final order of removal was ever issued for Abrego Garcia. Xinis has all but concluded that a final order of removal simply never existed, and her pending decision may well turn on that omission, as Politico’s Josh Gerstein reports.
The bitter irony is that the absence of a final order of removal means Abrego Garcia’s wrongful deportation to El Salvador in March was doubly unlawful. We already knew that it was in violation of an immigration judge order that he not be removed to El Salvador specifically, but it now appears likely there was no legal basis to remove him anywhere at all.
Halligan Does a Double Reverse Somersault in Comey Case
One day after prosecutor repeatedly told a federal judge in open court that the grand jury in the political prosecution of James Comey had not reviewed the final two-count indictment in the case, U.S. Attorney Lindsey Halligan reversed course in a new filing that insisted the grand jury had in fact signed off on the indictment.
Citing the transcript of the presentment proceeding in court, Halligan used almost comical passive voice and misdirection in the filing — titled “Government’s Notice Correcting The Record” — to execute her double reverse somersault, without ever owning the statements from prosecutors in court.
Not at All Sure What to Make of This
I’m sure Morning Memo will be coming back to the question of whether Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche is criminally investigating U.S. Pardon Attorney/Weaponization Working Group czar/Special Attorney Ed Martin, but for now here are the best of the many, many reports that emerged yesterday on this very curious new wrinkle:
- ABC News: DOJ, FBI probing top Trump administration officials over investigations of president’s adversaries: Sources
- CNN: Justice Department is investigating handling of Adam Schiff mortgage fraud probe led by Ed Martin and Bill Pulte
- NBC News: A federal grand jury is investigating the handling of the Adam Schiff criminal probe
- NYT: Justice Dept. Appears to Be Examining Potential Leaks in Schiff Inquiry
- WSJ: Justice Department Probes Trump Allies’ Conduct in Schiff Probe
Good Read
Don Moynihan: How the FBI Became the Face of Deprofessionalization
Coda
In the flurry of unusual prosecutions in DC during Trump’s initial surge of federal law enforcement and the national guard into the District, one case stood out. After a federal grand jury refused to indict Kevontae Stewart on a weapons charge, the Trump DOJ took the case to a D.C. Superior Court grand jury, secured an indictment, and then brought that indictment back to federal court. The federal magistrate judge balked at the unusual maneuver and ultimately refused to accept the indictment.
The Trump DOJ then asked U.S. District Judge James Boasberg to overturn the magistrate’s decision, and yesterday Boasberg sided with the government. In an opinion that was solicitous of the magistrate and conceded it was a close call, Boasberg concluded that the government had the better argument for which statutory scheme applied, favoring the D.C. Code over the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure.
Coast Guard: Fine, Swastikas and Nooses ARE Bad
The Coast Guard swiftly reversed course and reclassified the swastika and the noose as prohibited hate symbols, after a WaPo report that it had downgraded them to just “potentially divisive” symbols.
Not Something You See Every Day
When Rep. Chrissy Houlahan (D-PA) filed a complaint with Capitol Police about President Trump issuing death threats against Democratic members of Congress, she had to complete a form that included a field for identifying who made the threat. Houlahan simply filled in “The President,” she told Greg Sargent.
Thread of the Day
On George Washington, President Trump, and his calls for Democratic members of Congress to be put to death:
Hot tips? Juicy scuttlebutt? Keen insights? Let me know. For sensitive information, use the encrypted methods here.
Are Zohran Mamdani and Katie Wilson Democratic Socialists or FDR Democrats? They Are Both
This article is part of TPM Cafe, TPM’s home for opinion and news analysis.
Between now and next year’s midterm elections, the “S” word, and even the “C” word, are going to get a workout. President Trump and his allies have called New York’s socialist mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani a Communist, a Marxist, a terrorist, and even a jihadist. They’re warning that the U.S. is experiencing a wave of “socialism,” a term that they hope still carries its hoary Cold War connotations. They hope to make Mamdani the face of the Democratic Party, a tactic intended to discredit its candidates in swing races.
Continue reading “Are Zohran Mamdani and Katie Wilson Democratic Socialists or FDR Democrats? They Are Both”House Dems Are in Touch With Capitol Police About Trump Death Threats
Dark Day
You have likely seen the news by now, but a quick recap of today’s dark events: a group of Democratic lawmakers who have served in the military or in national security posted a video on Facebook Tuesday morning calling on members of the military to “stand up” for the nation’s laws and the Constitution. They outlined the ways in which the Trump administration has been weaponizing the military against American civilians in recent months and reminded service members that “you can refuse illegal orders.”
Continue reading “House Dems Are in Touch With Capitol Police About Trump Death Threats”Trump DOJ Defies Another Court Order in Abrego Garcia Case
GREENBELT, MD—If the Justice Department had brazenly defied a judge’s order a year ago the way it did again today in the Abrego Garcia case, it would have been a banner headline and the buzz of legal circles.
But 10 months into the Trump II presidency, it’s become all too normal for his Justice Department to refuse to comply with direct court orders, to engage in bad faith charades in court, and to dare judges to do anything about it.
The case of Abrego Garcia — the El Salvadoran man wrongfully deported to his home country in March in violation of a immigration judge’s order — may be where the Trump administration has been most persistently defiant for the longest time. It’s refusal to correct its error and bring him back sparked a constitutional clash that landed at the Supreme Court, and it only brought him back after indicting him for unrelated crimes.
You don’t have to get too deep into the weeds to understand the significance of what happened today.
Continue reading “Trump DOJ Defies Another Court Order in Abrego Garcia Case”Judge Rules That National Guard Deployment In DC Is Illegal, Concerned That 2,000 Troops May Become ‘Permanent’
A federal judge ruled Thursday that Trump’s Defense Department illegally overstepped its authority in deploying 2,000 local and out-of-state National Guard to Washington D.C., part of President Trump’s crackdown on blue cities.
Continue reading “Judge Rules That National Guard Deployment In DC Is Illegal, Concerned That 2,000 Troops May Become ‘Permanent’”Trump Admin Retreats From ‘Domestic Terrorist’ Cases Against Chicago Protestors
Federal prosecutors are beating a broad retreat from cases they had brought against people protesting the surge of CBP and ICE agents into Chicago.
Continue reading “Trump Admin Retreats From ‘Domestic Terrorist’ Cases Against Chicago Protestors”Will Emil Bove Have to Testify in AEA Contempt of Court Inquiry?
The Most Important News of the Day
While the James Comey case provided real courtroom drama, the most historically significant courtroom development happened in more muted tones in the original Alien Enemies Act case. The long-stalled contempt of court inquiry into the Trump administration’s brazen defiance of a March court order — that blocked the AEA deportations and required the planes of immigrants en route to El Salvador to turn around — is back on.
U.S. District Judge James Boasberg of Washington, D.C., picked up pretty much where he left off in April when the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals got involved and dragged the case out for seven months.
The AEA case is a prime test of whether the judicial branch can hold a rogue executive like Trump in check. So far, it’s not looking good, but it’s not been for a lack of trying by Boasberg.
Starting as soon as the week after Thanksgiving, Boasberg wants to hear testimony under oath from DOJ lawyers involved in the case at the outset. He’s particularly interested in hearing from Erez Reuveni, who later became a whistleblower, and Drew Ensign, who has rarely been seen in this case since his dubious representations to the court that memorable weekend in March.
A key witness to all of this is Emil Bove, who was the acting DOJ No. 2 at the time. Bove, according to Reuveni and internal communications that he made public, allegedly told DOJ lawyers in advance of the AEA deportations that they might have to tell the courts “fuck you.” It was Bove, according to those internal communications, who said it was legally permissible to deplane the AEA detainees in El Salvador despite Boasberg’s order.
Bove — who has denied proposing to defy the courts and said he doesn’t recall the fuck you remark — is now a Trump-appointed federal appeals court judge, setting up the potential for a titanic clash over his testimony in the contempt inquiry. Boasberg made no mention of Bove yesterday in court. I would imagine that Boasberg would wait until the testimony of other witnesses makes Bove’s testimony essential before he goes kicking the giant ant hill of summoning an appeals court judge into his court for a possible contempt of court referral.
Either way, I expect we’ll see the Trump administration look for any reason to bring this case back to the appeals court before it lets any of its officials testify. Here’s my full report from court.
High Drama
Courtrooms in real life rarely match what you see in the movies or on TV, but the drama was real in Comey’s case yesterday as U.S. District Judge Michael Nachmanoff picked apart interim U.S. Attorney Lindsey Halligan’s missteps in handling the grand jury that purportedly indicted Comey. There are now real legal and factual questions about whether Comey was ever properly indicted. The shenanigans only add to the cloud of bad faith and ill motive that surround a case driven by Trump’s lust for retaliation.
I broke my coverage from the Comey courtroom into two posts:
- Due to Botched Paperwork, Comey May Never Have Been Properly Indicted
- How James Comey’s Vindictive Prosecution Claim Fared In Court
Venezuela Watch
In August, the judge advocate general for U.S. Southern Command “specifically expressed concern that strikes against people on boats in the Caribbean Sea and the eastern Pacific Ocean, whom administration officials call ‘narco-terrorists,’ could amount to extrajudicial killings,” NBC reports, but the strikes proceeded after he was overruled by higher-ups, including the DOJ’s Office of Legal Counsel.
Appeals Court Blocks Limits on Use of Force in Chicago
In a new ruling, the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals paused a lower court ruling limiting the use of force in the Trump administration’s mass deportation operations in Chicago while the case is on appeal.
Epstein Watch
- President Trump signed the bill demanding the release of the Epstein files that Trump refuses to release.
- The Trump DOJ’s acquiescence to his demand that Democrats — but not himself — be investigated for their Epstein ties may provide another fig leaf of a rationale for not releasing the Epstein files since there’s now an “active” investigation.
- Larry Summers took a leave of absence from Harvard.
Wild Stuff
5th Circuit Appeals Judge Jerry Smith let loose with a wild dissent for the ages in the Texas redistricting case, hopping mad that U.S. District Judge Jeffrey Brown had issued the three-judge panel’s majority opinion before the dissenting opinion was ready, as Politico noted:
Smith lit into Brown as an “unskilled magician” who “prefers living in fantasyland.” Smith said Brown committed “pernicious judicial misbehavior” by racing to issue his opinion. Smith also slammed Brown as “no stranger to inconsistency,” called him “wrong on multiple levels” and accused him of handing “Soros a victory at the expense of the People of Texas and the Rule of Law.”
House Tries to Clean Up Senate’s Jack Smith Mess
The House voted unanimously last night to repeal a provision in the deal to end the government shutdown that allows senators to sue the federal government for seizing their phone records, including, retroactively, the eight GOP senators whose phone records were seized by Special Counsel Jack Smith in his Jan. 6 investigation. It’s not clear whether the Senate, too, will reverse its vote from last week.
Couldn’t Happen to a Nicer Guy
Rep. Cory Mills (R-FL) fended off a House censure vote over rampant allegations of misconduct but not before the House Ethics Committee launched an investigation into “claims that he improperly disclosed—or failed to disclose—information on official filings; misused congressional resources or campaign finances; received gifts or favors inappropriately; and engaged in sexual misconduct or dating violence,” the WSJ reports.
Dem Rep Indicted for FEMA Fraud
An investigation that began under the Biden administration has yielded an indictment of Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick (D-FL) and her brother for allegedly using a $5 million overpayment under a FEMA contract to fund straw donations to her congressional campaign, the WaPo reports.
The Destruction: CDC Edition
Under anti-vax jihadist Robert F. Kennedy Kr., the CDC has revised one of its webpages from saying vaccines do not cause autism to now saying they might.
The Purge: FBI Edition
A former FBI staffer who was fired last month for having a Pride flag in his office is suing for wrongful discharge. David Maltinsky, a gay man, had worked for the bureau for 16 years in a staff role and was training at Quantico to be an FBI special agent when he was terminated.
The Purge: Charlie Kirk Edition
In a purge spearheaded by senior Trump administration officials, local Republican lawmakers, and their allies, more than 600 Americans have been fired, suspended, placed under investigation or disciplined by employers for comments about the September 10 assassination of Charlie Kirk, according to a Reuters review of court records, public statements, local media reports and interviews with two dozen people who were fired or otherwise disciplined.
The Purge: Texas Edition
A Republican woman overseeing the Alamo’s renovation has been ousted from two different positions after (i) taking the blame for a “woke” social media post commemorating Indigenous Peoples’ Day and (ii) receiving a call from Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick (R) objecting to this passage from page 80 of her 2023 PhD dissertation: “Personally, I would love to see the Alamo become a beacon for historical reconciliation and a place that brings people together versus tearing them apart, but politically that may not be possible at this time.” She’s now suing.
Thread of the Day
Hot tips? Juicy scuttlebutt? Keen insights? Let me know. For sensitive information, use the encrypted methods here.
Trump Admin Terrorist Designations Show Latest Attempt to Target Domestic Enemies
When Secretary of State Marco Rubio added four European anti-fascist groups to the list of Foreign Terrorist Organizations last week, he failed to tell the public one thing: how, exactly, these groups threaten Americans.
Continue reading “Trump Admin Terrorist Designations Show Latest Attempt to Target Domestic Enemies”