By now you’ve maybe seen the news that House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) is, effectively, shutting down the House’s legislative work and sending everyone home early for August recess in order to block any House floor action on the release of investigative files on Jeffrey Epstein, the deceased convicted sex offender.
Continue reading “Mike Johnson’s Supposed ‘Moral Responsibility’ to Pack It Up Early”House and Executive Branch Now Totally Derailed by Epstein
Every time I think Donald Trump is putting some distance between himself and the Epstein scandal he does some new thing to make it the centerpoint story in the American news ecosystem. Last night House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) decide to shut the entire House of Representatives for the rest of the summer so members don’t have to make any more painful coverup votes related to the Epstein case. Yesterday, the White House ordered the release of a vast trove of FBI files about Martin Luther King, Jr., a bizarre, pathetic, wrong and ultimately counterproductive attempt to distract from the Epstein Files.
We should start by noting that the King files were overwhelmingly the product of illegal surveillance that then FBI-director J. Edgar Hoover ordered to get blackmail information on King either to discredit him, force him out of public life, or, in specific cases, drive him to suicide. So it was anything but disinterested surveillance, and FBI agents had a huge incentive to include rumor, innuendo and more, whether it was true or not. With that said, King was also what used to be known as a womanizer. This is simply a fact of history along with King being one of the giants and heroes of the American 20th century. We know this mainly from the FBI files that were released decades ago — which is to say that we know from illegal surveillance that was conducted with the specific intent of neutralizing him as a leader of the civil rights movement.
I can only imagine that Trump ordered this with the idea that people can say “Ahha! Many prominent men had subpar sexual morality! Ahha! Ahha!” Either that, or to somehow cast Trump as another freedom fighter who the deep state is trying to bring down with sexual peccadillos. It is very important to note that I don’t think there’s ever been evidence or the suggestion that King’s paramours were anything but adult and willing. The part of this that is so wild is that I don’t think Epstein was really top of mind in the news world Monday morning, certainly not as much as was any day last week. But Trump put it right back there with the King materials. It’s the most obvious thing: releasing any trove of documents just reminds people of the trove Trump is moving heaven and earth not to release. I don’t think anything is more obvious. It’s like a quick fix that deepens the craving.
Today we learn that Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche will be meeting with convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell looking for the “real pedophile” and presumably coordinating stories. And just this morning while meeting with the President of the Philippines, President Trump told reporters his intelligence chief has now proven that Hillary Clinton and “Barack Hussein Obama” are guilty of “treason” and they “ought to take a look at that and stop talking about” the Epstein files.
It’s really not too much to say that just as the House has been shut down to avoid more Epstein cover-up votes, the executive branch is now more or less exclusively focused on trying to shut down the Epstein story: MLK assassination documents, a meeting with Maxwell, a new Hillary/Obama treason investigation. It’s all they’re doing.
I keep thinking some new thing will happen or people will lose interest. This weekend there was an emerging conventional wisdom in the Beltway publications that Trump had flipped the script with the Wall Street Journal article, something that never made much sense. But that clearly wasn’t the case and Trump himself forced it back to the top of news attention with his flurry of new diversions.
What can possibly be in those files?
Why Trump Lawyer Emil Bove Is So Different Than Past Controversial Judicial Appointments
This article is part of TPM Cafe, TPM’s home for opinion and news analysis. It was originally published at The Conversation.
President Donald Trump’s nomination of his former criminal defense attorney, Emil Bove, to be a judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the 3rd Circuit, has been mired in controversy.
On June 24, 2025, Erez Reuveni, a former Department of Justice attorney who worked with Bove, released an extensive, 27-page whistleblower report. Reuveni claimed that Bove, as the Trump administration’s acting deputy attorney general, said “that it might become necessary to tell a court ‘fuck you’” and ignore court orders related to the administration’s immigration policies. Bove’s acting role ended on March 6 when he resumed his current position of principal associate deputy attorney general.
When asked about this statement at his June 25 Senate confirmation hearing, Bove said, “I don’t recall.”
And on July 15, 80 former federal and state judges signed a letter opposing Bove’s nomination. The letter argued that “Mr. Bove’s egregious record of mistreating law enforcement officers, abusing power, and disregarding the law itself disqualifies him for this position.”
A day later, more than 900 former Department of Justice attorneys submitted their own letter opposing Bove’s confirmation. The attorneys argued that “Few actions could undermine the rule of law more than a senior executive branch official flouting another branch’s authority. But that is exactly what Mr. Bove allegedly did through his involvement in DOJ’s defiance of court orders.”
On July 17, Democrats walked out of the Senate Judiciary Committee vote, in protest of the refusal by Chairman Chuck Grassley, a Republican from Iowa, to allow further investigation and debate on the nomination. Republicans on the committee then unanimously voted to move the nomination forward for a full Senate vote.
As a scholar of the courts, I know that most federal court appointments are not as controversial as Bove’s nomination. But highly contentious nominations do arise from time to time.
Here’s how three controversial nominations turned out – and how Bove’s nomination is different in a crucial way.
Robert Bork
Bork is the only federal court nominee whose name became a verb.
“Borking” is “to attack or defeat (a nominee or candidate for public office) unfairly through an organized campaign of harsh public criticism or vilification,” according to Merriam-Webster.
This refers to Republican President Ronald Reagan’s 1987 appointment of Bork to the Supreme Court.
Reagan called Bork “one of the finest judges in America’s history.” Democrats viewed Bork, a federal appeals court judge, as an ideologically extreme conservative, with their opposition based largely on his extensive scholarly work and opinions on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.
In opposing the Bork nomination, Sen. Ted Kennedy of Massachusetts took the Senate floor and gave a fiery speech: “Robert Bork’s America is a land in which women would be forced into back-alley abortions, blacks would sit at segregated lunch counters, rogue police could break down citizens’ doors in midnight raids, schoolchildren could not be taught about evolution, writers and artists could be censored at the whim of government, and the doors of the federal courts would be shut on the fingers of millions of citizens for whom the judiciary is often the only protector of the individual rights that are the heart of our democracy.”
Ultimately, Bork’s nomination failed by a 58-42 vote in the Senate, with 52 Democrats and six Republicans rejecting the nomination.
Ronnie White
In 1997, Democratic President Bill Clinton nominated White to the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri. White was the first Black judge on the Missouri Supreme Court.
Republican Sen. John Ashcroft, from White’s home state of Missouri, led the fight against the nomination. Ashcroft alleged that White’s confirmation would “push the law in a pro-criminal direction.” Ashcroft based this claim on White’s comparatively liberal record in death penalty cases as a judge on the Missouri Supreme Court.
However, there was limited evidence to support this assertion. This led some to believe that Ashcroft’s attack on the nomination was motivated by stereotypes that African Americans, like White, are soft on crime.
Even Clinton implied that race may be a factor in the attacks on White: “By voting down the first African-American judge to serve on the Missouri Supreme Court, the Republicans have deprived both the judiciary and the people of Missouri of an excellent, fair, and impartial Federal judge.”
White’s nomination was defeated in the Senate by a 54-45 party-line vote. In 2014, White was renominated to the same judgeship by President Barack Obama and confirmed by largely party-line 53-44 vote, garnering the support of a single Republican, Susan Collins of Maine.
Miguel Estrada
Republican President George W. Bush nominated Estrada to the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in 2001.
Estrada, who had earned a unanimous “well-qualified” rating from the American Bar Association, faced deep opposition from Senate Democrats, who believed he was a conservative ideologue. They also worried that, if confirmed, he would later be appointed to the Supreme Court.
However, unlike Bork – who had an extensive paper trail as an academic and judge – Estrada’s written record was very thin.
Democrats sought to use his confirmation hearing to probe his beliefs. But they didn’t get very far, as Estrada dodged many of the senators’ questions, including ones about Supreme Court cases he disagreed with and judges he admired.
Democrats were particularly troubled by allegations that Estrada, when he was screening candidates for Justice Anthony Kennedy, disqualified applicants for Supreme Court clerkships based on their ideology.
According to one attorney: “Miguel told me his job was to prevent liberal clerks from being hired. He told me he was screening out liberals because a liberal clerk had influenced Justice Kennedy to side with the majority and write a pro-gay-rights decision in a case known as Romer v. Evans, which struck down a Colorado statute that discriminated against gays and lesbians.”
When asked about this at his confirmation hearing, Estrada initially denied it but later backpedaled. Estrada said, “There is a set of circumstances in which I would consider ideology if I think that the person has some extreme view that he would not be willing to set aside in service to Justice Kennedy.”
Unlike the Bork nomination, Democrats didn’t have the numbers to vote Estrada’s nomination down. Instead, they successfully filibustered the nomination, knowing that Republicans couldn’t muster the required 60 votes to end the filibuster. This marked the first time in Senate history that a court of appeals nomination was filibustered. Estrada would never serve as a judge.
Bove stands out
As the examples of Bork, Estrada and White make clear, contentious nominations to the federal courts often involve ideological concerns.
This is also true for Bove, who is opposed in part because of the perception that he is a conservative ideologue.
But the main concerns about Bove are related to a belief that he is a Trump loyalist who shows little respect for the rule of law or the judicial branch.
This makes Bove stand out among contentious federal court nominations.
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
Appeals Court Stirs Awake in Long-Delayed Contempt of Court Case Over AEA Flights
A lot of things happened. Here are some of the things. This is TPM’s Morning Memo. Sign up for the email version.
What an Absurd Position to be in
More than three months after the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals “temporarily” blocked contempt of court proceedings against the Trump administration in the original Alien Enemies Act (AEA) case, it showed signs of life for the first time yesterday — but only after the detainees at CECOT were repatriated to Venezuela over the weekend.
Like a drunk after a bender, the appeals court wandered into the aftermath of its own misconduct with lots of questions and few answers. In a new order, the court insouciantly noted the weekend developments:
The [government] sought this Court’s intervention based, in part, on their view that the order impermissibly pressured the [government] to engage in diplomacy with El Salvador. … The [government] informed this Court that on July 18, 2025, El Salvador transferred the class members to Venezuela, which has made certain assurances to the U.S. government.
With events having long ago overtaken the court, it ordered the Trump administration to file a brief of no longer than 2,500 words by tomorrow “addressing whether and how these factual developments affect their position in this case.” It set what for this panel is a blindingly fast briefing schedule of about a week for the parties to address this and related issues in the case, including the government’s response to a motion that plaintiffs filed last week to try to nudge the court along.
It should be noted that only two of the three judges — Gregory Katsas and Neomi Rao (Trump appointees) — agreed to grant the Trump’s administration’s request for an administrative stay in April. The third judge — Cornelia Pillard (an Obama appointee) — opposed the stay.
As Morning Memo noted last week, the unconscionable delay by the appeals court blocked U.S. District Judge James Boasberg from continuing with contempt proceedings after he found probable cause that the Trump administration had committed criminal contempt by continuing with the Alien Enemies Act removals in defiance of his orders to turn back the deportation flights.
To put a blunt point on it: If Boasberg’s order had been followed, there would have been no Venezuelan nationals imprisoned at CECOT, at least not until higher courts in the U.S. had weighed in. Given how courts have ruled subsequently, it’s not clear anyone would have been removed under this AEA proclamation. It’s hard to conceive of conduct in contempt of court more far-reaching, historic, and consequential.
In the three months since the appeals court stay went it effect, fired DOJ lawyer Erez Reuveni turned into a whistleblower and released internal department communications that showed more starkly than ever before how purposefully and willfully defiant the administration had been in the face of Boasberg’s orders. DOJ official Emil Bove emerged as perhaps the central villain in the account provided by Reuveni, but by this time President Trump had nominated Bove to a seat on the Third Circuit Court of Appeals. Still, the D.C. Circuit panel didn’t issue a ruling or move to lift the stay or otherwise bother itself with the case in any public way.
The inexcusable delays had compounding effects in other cases against the Trump administration. While Boasberg had a head start as the judge in the first AEA case, that advantage was squandered by the appeals court, with the result that the administration could engage in similar stonewalling and defiance with subsequent judges in various others challenges to executive power without the specter of a criminal contempt proceeding, let alone a contempt finding, hanging over its head.
With the new briefing schedule, it appears likely that the “temporary” administrative stay will have lasted from April until late July or early August. The world kept spinning while the appeals court dawdled.
Awaiting Big Decision I: Pro-Palestinian International Students
Trial ended Monday in the case challenging the Trump administration’s targeting of pro-Palestinian international students for their political views. U.S. District Judge William G. Young of Boston said he would need some time to render his verdict.
Awaiting Big Decision II: Harvard’s Case Against Trump
During a two-hour hearing Monday, U.S. District Judge Allison D. Burroughs of Boston appeared receptive to Harvard’s arguments that President Trump has unlawfully targeted it with contingent funding cuts. Harvard is seeking summary judgment, meaning there are no disputed facts to be resolved at trial and the judge should rule now.
CBO: 10 Million Will Lose Health Insurance Under BBB
The CBO’s final tally on the centerpiece legislation of Trump II is in: 10 million people will lose health insurance coverage as the deficit balloons by $3.4 trillion over 10 years. The bulk of the deficit spending comes from the permanent extension of Trump’s 2017 tax cuts.
Medicaid Cuts Will Hit Disabled Americans Hard
NYT: “Federal law deems most home- and community-based services as optional, so they are often targeted when states have to tighten their belts. When temporary Great Recession increases in Medicaid funding expired in the early 2010s, for example, every state reduced home care by limiting enrollment or lowering spending on existing recipients.”
Good Read
Wired: How Trump Killed Cancer Research
Dems Use Epstein to Send House GOP Into Hiding
While President Trump plays all the old MAGA hits to try to woo back disillusioned right-wing conspiracists, House Republicans basically shut down the lower chamber rather than face votes on troll-y amendments by House Democrats calling for the release of more records related to Jeffrey Epstein. The upshot is that not much will get done this week before the House leaves for August recess.
Trump Punishes WSJ Over Epstein Letter
Thanks to a D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals decision last month that allowed President Trump to continue punishing the Associated Press for not using “Gulf of America” in its stories, there was nothing stopping him from retaliating against the Wall Street Journal for reporting on his letter to Jeffrey Epstein. The White House yanked the WSJ from the press pool covering the president’s upcoming trip to Scotland.
Good Riddance
Today is the last day on the job for interim U.S. attorney Alina Habba of New Jersey. The former Trump lawyer and hanger-on has been a disaster in the temporary role, and the federal judges in the state declined to extend her term.
Retribution Watch: Thomas Windom Edition
House Judiciary Chair Jim Jordan (R-OH) has issued a subpoena to former DOJ prosecutor Thomas Windom, who was deeply involved in the criminal cases against Donald Trump both before and after the appointment of Special Prosecutor Jack Smith. The subpoena — part of the larger Trump-led retribution against prosecutors and investigators — comes after Windom declined to answer some committee questions in a private session last month. The subpoena calls for Windom to appear before the committee in September.
FEMA Search and Rescue Chief Resigns
Ken Pagurek’s, the head of FEMA’s Urban Search and Rescue unit, resigned Monday after it took more than 72 hours for Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem to authorize deployment after the catastrophic flooding this month in Texas, CNN reports.
Dems Plot Counter to GOP Redistricting in Texas
Democratic leaders are considering mid-decade redistricting in five blue states — California, New York, New Jersey, Minnesota and Washington state — to counter the GOP redistricting effort underway in a special session in Texas, according to CNN.
Colbert Mock-Relishes His Role as a Martyr on the Cross
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Trump Admin Still Using National Guard to Do ‘Performance Art,’ Punish Dems in LA
About half of the 4,000 National Guard troops that President Trump deployed last month to Los Angeles to crack down on protesters demonstrating against ICE raids in the Democrat-led sanctuary city still remain in the city, LA Mayor Karen Bass said in an interview with ABC that aired Sunday. The Pentagon plans to remove an additional 700 active-duty Marines this week, according to the New York Times.
Continue reading “Trump Admin Still Using National Guard to Do ‘Performance Art,’ Punish Dems in LA”Trump and the American People — Two Ships Crossing in the Night
I wanted to take a moment today to highlight something that to me, at least, is behind a certain uncanny quality to the summer of 2025. Two things, which point in two entirely different directions, are happening at the same time. Every day you can find in the news a new example of the president cutting funding (either by legal or extra-legal means) or asserting direct control over funding in order to entrench his direct personal power. This might be defunding universities, ending funding of public broadcasting, or anything in between. He’s now opened criminal probes into numerous public officials. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) continues to expand its war not only against the undocumented and legal residents but also against self-government in major American (blue) cities. I could mention dozens of other examples but the simplest overview is that the president continues to expand and entrench his authoritarian vision of rule, in which the whole machinery of government exists to impose his will and battle his enemies, with courts that are mostly but not always compliant.
Continue reading “Trump and the American People — Two Ships Crossing in the Night”Let’s Keep Up This Momentum
I’m happy and relieved to report that early yesterday we hit the halfway point to our goal of raising $500,000 in this year’s annual TPM Journalism Fund drive. We’re currently at $252,305. The second 50% is way harder. That’s just the logic of drives. But getting to this point in less than one week is very encouraging. As we’ve been explaining, the TPM Journalism Fund is a key part of how we keep this site alive and thriving. So if you’ve been considering making a contribution this year, please take a moment to do so now. It’s quick and easy, and every dollar helps. Just click right here.
Your Government on Trump
Here’s a story a TPM Reader just flagged to me which seems somehow unremarkable in the Trump II Era but would be comical and unreal in a non-degenerate era. “A top State Department official who oversaw recent mass layoffs is now taking over as the acting head of the General Services Administration, according to an email sent to staff.” The article, which Federal News Network ran as a breaking news item with details to follow, explains that Michael Rigas, Deputy Secretary of State for Management and Resources, has personally been ordered by Donald Trump to take over as acting head of GSA, while the just-relieved acting head will remain as Rigas’ deputy acting GSA head.
What’s Next Now That the CECOT Detainees Were Freed?
A lot of things happened. Here are some of the things. This is TPM’s Morning Memo. Sign up for the email version.
Three Cases to Watch
Friday’s repatriation of the Venezuelan nationals that the Trump administration had consigned to the hellishness of El Salvador’s CECOT isn’t the end of the story.
While a host of political, legal, and humanitarian issues remain unresolved, I want to flag three cases to watch:
The ‘Cristian’ Case
In the case of “Cristian,” the pseudonymous Venezuelan man deported to El Salvador under the Alien Enemies Act (AEA) in violation of an earlier court-approved settlement agreement, his lawyers went to court Friday once they heard that the detainees were being transferred to Venezuela and asked the judge to intervene. U.S. District Judge Stephanie Gallagher ordered an immediate status update from the Trump administration. Later in the day, the administration filed an affidavit from a Department of Homeland Security (DHS) official claiming the decision to release the detainees was entirely El Salvador’s “in the exercise of its sovereign authority” — clearly an effort to burnish the administration’s position that the detainees were under El Salvador’s control the entire time. The DHS official also stated:
A lot going on there, but what stands out is the stated ability of the Venezuelans to return to the U.S., at least for further court proceedings. In Cristian’s case, the administration was ordered weeks ago to “facilitate” his return to the United States, but it had stonewalled those efforts. In another filing in the case after Cristian was released from CECOT, the Trump administration said the State Department has pledged to help DHS in facilitating his return.
The original Alien Enemies Act Case
In the original Alien Enemies Act case, the Trump administration and plaintiffs agreed to postpone a key deadline in the appeal of the case to the D.C. Circuit in light of the repatriations to Venezuela.
The plaintiffs also asked U.S. District Judge James Boasberg to order the administration to provide an “immediate status update” on “whether it is prepared to bring the members of the class back to the United States for habeas proceedings.” Boasberg hasn’t issued such an order yet, and the administration hasn’t responded.
It’s not clear how the release of the detainees under the AEA will impact their habeas claims, what the process will look like, and what position the administration will take. A lot still to be worked out here.
The Case of Jordin Alexander Melgar-Salmeron
This is the least uncertain of the three cases I’ve highlighted. Melgar-Salmeron was removed to El Salvador in May in violation of an order by the Second Circuit Court of Appeals, which has ordered the government to facilitate his return. There’s no reason to think that Melgar-Salmeron, a Salvadoran national, would have been involved in the detainee transfer to Venezuela, but their release has implications for his case. The administration was already under order from the appeals court to provide weekly status updates beginning today. Stay tuned.
MUST READ
TPM’s Josh Kovensky spoke with the wife of Jesús Alberto Ríos Andrade, one of the Venezuelan nationals removed to El Salvador under the Alien Enemies Act who was reportedly freed Friday. Angie, a Trump supporter, recounts what the last few months have been like and her reaction to the news that the detainees were being released.
State Dept. Official Makes Stunning Admission
At the end of a two-week trial over whether the Trump administration targeted pro-Palestinian international students for their political views, a State Department officials confirmed that criticism of Israel was one of the considerations in revoking student visas. Taking the stand was John Armstrong, the senior bureau official in the Bureau of Consular Affairs.
“Pushed for examples of things he might consider in weighing whether to deny or revoke a student’s visa, Mr. Armstrong testified that calls for limiting military aid to Israel or ‘denouncing Zionism’ could all factor in his agency’s decisions,” the NYT reports.
Closing arguments in the trial are expected to begin today.
Trump Turns U.S. Into International Pariah
- Secretary of State Marco Rubio is yanking the visa of Brazilian Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes, his allies on the court, and their close family members in retaliation for the prosecution of ex-President Jair Bolsonaro for his attempted coup. Moraes is presiding over the trial of Bolsonaro.
- Rubio ordered the State Department to “stop commenting on the fairness, integrity and legitimacy of foreign elections, a major shift away from a decadeslong practice of promoting democratic elections abroad,” the WSJ reports.
- A federal judge in Maine ruled that President Trump’s executive order punishing people who work with the International Criminal Court likely violates the First Amendment.
Rule of Law Under Siege
- WaPo: “President Donald Trump and his appointees have been accused of flouting courts in a third of the more than 160 lawsuits against the administration in which a judge has issued a substantive ruling, a Washington Post analysis has found, suggesting widespread noncompliance with America’s legal system.”
- NYT: “Mr. Trump has fired or demoted more than 20 inspectors general or acting inspectors general since he took office six months ago, hobbling offices that for years have served as a check on waste, fraud and abuse.”
- Politico: “Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard called for several Obama administration officials to face criminal prosecution for participating in a ‘treasonous conspiracy’ surrounding the 2016 election … the latest example of the Trump administration targeting critics of the president.”
The Purges
- NYT: After months of denying it would do so, the Trump administration announced Friday it will eliminate the EPA’s scientific research arm and began firing hundreds of chemists, biologists, toxicologists and other scientists.
- WaPo: The Trump administration’s purge of the Justice Department has involved the firing of at least 200 career employees in violation of civil service rules protecting federal workers from political retaliation, according to an advocacy group for former DOJ employees.
- Government Executive: The Trump administration is arguing in the case of fired U.S. pardon attorney Liz Oyer that a subset of federal workers are at-will employees who can be fired at any time for any reason.
Judge Orders RFE/RL Funding Restored
U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth of DC on Friday ordered the Trump administration to restore funding for Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, lambasting it for its “unprecedented” freezing of the congressionally appropriated funds and its “nonsensical” legal arguments.
Not Normal
NYT: “President Trump held a ceremonial swearing-in on Friday in the Oval Office for Billy Long, the new commissioner of the Internal Revenue Service, in a sign of the unusually close relationship Mr. Trump has sought with the typically apolitical tax agency.”
Trump Sues WSJ for Defamation Over Epstein Connex
President Trump filed a federal defamation lawsuit in the Southern District of Florida against the WSJ, News Corp., Rupert Murdoch, Robert Thomson, and two WSJ reporters for its story from Thursday on the letter Trump allegedly penned to Jeffrey Epstein for his 50th birthday.
Meanwhile, in a bit of showmanship, the Trump DOJ asked the federal court in Manhattan to unseal the grand jury transcripts of the investigations into Epstein and his associate Ghislaine Maxwell. As multiple legal experts have opined, the courts may not have a proper basis to make the secret grand jury proceedings public, and even if they do, the contents may be a relatively innocuous compared to the FBI investigative files.
Good Sleuthing
For the past several months, the small but persistent reporting team at Court Watch has been tracking a peculiar federal criminal case in Rhode Island that now turns out to be related to the earlier prosecution of two right-wing accelerationists for allegedly plotting to target the power grid in Baltimore in 2023. It’s a great bit of reporting that uncovers how the feds were able to to use participation in neo-Nazi group chats on Telegram to bring felon-in-possession charges against the defendant.
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How Florida’s Plan for Immigration Judges at ‘Alligator Alcatraz’ May Violate Constitutional Rights
This article is part of TPM Cafe, TPM’s home for opinion and news analysis. It was originally published at The Conversation.
Seeking to expand Florida’s role in federal immigration enforcement, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis in May 2025 submitted the state’s Immigration Enforcement Operations Plan to the Trump administration.
The plan, endorsed by President Donald Trump, says all of Florida’s roughly 47,000 law enforcement officers have received, or soon will receive, training to act as immigration officers. It’s part of an effort to, as the plan notes, “maintain state-led border security operations in the absence of federal support.”
The DeSantis plan includes a proposal to deputize Florida’s nine National Guard Judge Advocate General’s Corps officers to serve as immigration judges. JAG officers are attorneys who serve as legal advisers, prosecutors, defense counsel and military judges in a wide range of matters specific to the armed forces. That includes courts-martial and civil matters involving the military.
DeSantis has said the move is necessary to create a fast-track deportation system at Florida’s new immigration detention facility in the Everglades, Alligator Alcatraz.
He has dismissed due process concerns — such as a lack of training and independence — from legal experts, pointing to the backlog in immigration courts. Immigration judges in Florida’s immigration courts have one of the largest backlogs in the country, with over half a million cases.
Congress establishes immigration policy
The Constitution grants Congress, not the president or state governments, the power to establish immigration laws.
Under the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952, also known as the McCarran-Walter Act, Congress created a clear process for immigration removal cases.
In general, a U.S. noncitizen may face removal from the country based on violations to the immigration laws. Those range from unauthorized entry to committing or being convicted of certain crimes.
Congress designated the Executive Office for Immigration Review, an agency within the Department of Justice that houses the immigration courts and the Board of Immigration Appeals, as the body exclusively responsible for deciding immigration removal cases. The office also details the authority and standards for how immigration judges conduct deportation hearings.
Immigration judges undergo rigorous vetting and training. And their decisions are subject to appeal to the Board of Immigration Appeals, the administrative appellate body for decisions made by immigration judges.
The McCarran-Walter Act also contains several provisions that subject most immigration court decisions such as removal or asylum to judicial review in federal courts. That can happen on direct appeal or as part of habeas corpus petitions that challenge the legality of detention or removal.
The system is far from perfect. But Congress designed it to ensure legal expertise and due process guarantees.
As an immigration scholar, I believe that allowing Florida JAG officers to serve as immigration judges bypasses this framework that is set in law, and violates the constitutionally mandated separation of powers.
JAG officers, including those in Florida’s National Guard, are not governed by the McCarran-Walter Act. They are military lawyers in an entirely separate system, overseen by the Uniform Code of Military Justice, which defines the role of military judges. The code retains a unique military character that is substantially different from the judicial appellate system that governs immigration administrative rulings.
Simply put, neither Trump nor DeSantis can create an entirely new system of immigration judges outside of the one already established by Congress.
Federal agencies cannot deputize JAGs
A current immigration provision, known as the 287(g) program, authorizes U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to collaborate with local law enforcement to enforce federal immigration laws.
But this provision only authorizes deputizing local law enforcement to assist “in relation to the investigation, apprehension, or detention” of immigrants — not the arbitration of deportation cases.
In the nearly three decades since 287(g) was enacted, no state or local officials — let alone military officers — have been permitted to act as immigration judges.
DeSantis’ plan seeks to convert Florida’s JAG officers from state to federal officials to function as immigration judges. Trump’s approval of this plan would also exceed the scope of his statutory authority.
Federal statutes allow the president to federalize the National Guard in limited instances: during times of war or national emergency.
But neither DeSantis’ rhetoric nor Trump’s framing of undocumented immigration as an “invasion” meet these legal thresholds.
JAGs cannot engage in domestic law enforcement
Even if Florida’s National Guard were federalized, JAG officers still could not legally serve as immigration judges.
The Posse Comitatus Act, enacted in 1878, restricts the use of federal military personal in civilian law enforcement. It reflects a longstanding American principle: The military should not police civilians.
Immigration enforcement — including deciding whether someone is deported — is fundamentally a civilian enforcement function.
The only narrow exceptions to the Posse Comitatus Act’s restrictions require a clear statutory basis, such as Trump invoking the Insurrection Act of 1807, a law that would allow the president to rely on the military for domestic enforcement to quell a rebellion or widespread violence.
Due process concerns
The DeSantis plan also compromises constitutionally guaranteed rights to a fair process for immigrants facing removal.
Immigration law is notoriously complex. Even experienced immigration lawyers struggle to keep up with its constant changes.
JAG officers, trained primarily in military law, would face immense challenges interpreting and applying immigration statutes. That’s especially true with only weeks of preparation, as DeSantis proposes.
But due process isn’t only about knowledge of legal technicalities. The Fifth Amendment guarantees due process rights to all persons on U.S. soil, regardless of immigration status.
For decades, courts have interpreted these protections to include fair hearings before qualified immigration judges — and, in most instances, judicial review.
By circumventing established procedures, DeSantis’ plan risks creating a system where expedited deportations come at the expense of accuracy and constitutional rights.
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
