Today the DOJ appeared back in his court on the question of illegally allowing 2 planes of migrants to continue to El Salvador. They are not coming off well. Their next premise is that a verbal order carries less weight than a written order. Their first excuse said the planes were over international waters and they couldn’t turn them around. The DOJ is showing itself as second best.
Essentially, they are trying to use fast talk to muddy the issue. All they had to do was answer a simple question. The DOJ is dodging that 6 ways from Sunday. I may be thinking along the same lines as the judge. What do they have to hide? They are trying so many ways to avoid it. What *do* they have to hide? Seems to me he knows that they don’t want to answer.
Here, have some quotes.
Boasberg, an appointee of former President Barack Obama, appeared incensed on Friday over how the Justice Department has handled the fast-moving case, opening the hearing by tearing into the tone the administration had taken in some of its court filings.
He told DOJ attorney Drew Ensign that the government had used “intemperate and disrespectful” language that he’s “never seen from the United States” as it pushed various legal arguments before him earlier this week, including the suggestion his orders from the bench last Saturday carried less weight than a written order that was issued shortly after those proceedings.
Ouch. Better get something for that burn! I would say he’s telling them that their lies are not working. Judge Boasberg is smart – he’s a chief *Federal* judge, after all – and he’s telling them that dodging is not an option no matter how much they are trying to hide the answer. He will keep asking as long as it takes.
Now, this is going to an appeals court on Monday. I wonder what they’re going to say. Is it too much to hope that the appeals judges slap them down too? It certainly got to them quickly. Who knows. But I can still hope. Pretty sure it’s going to be a waste of their time – the judges, that is. Ha.
Much of Friday’s hearing was around the judge stopping the use of the Alien Enemies Act, to deport migrants who are part of the Tren de Aragua gang, that has been designated as a terrorist organization by Agent Orange. The administration is arguing that Boasberg exceeded his authority in blocking the removals because, they say, Trump’s use of the act is unreviewable by federal courts. Excuse me? DOJ attorney Drew Ensign repeatedly argued that the migrants subject to tRump’s proclamation can raise challenges through individual habeas petitions. I already see one problem with that. It’s hard to challenge something from an El Salvadoran jail cell, especially when we know they will be treated very poorly there.
The policy implications of Trump’s invocation of the law, the judge said, “are awfully frightening,” as he tested how far a president could take the law if there was not any oversight from courts.
He went on to say that under the arguments pushed by Justice Department attorneys defending Trump’s actions, the president could claim “that anybody is invading the United States,” necessitating another use of the wartime authority.
Trump’s use of the law last week, he said, is “a long way from the heartland of the act.”
Judge Boasberg has become symbolic of the scores of district court judges who have frustrated – even on a temporary basis – the Confused Carrot’s agenda during the opening months of his new term. His frustration with the department spilled further into the open view on Thursday when he spoke out against the DOJ’s “woefully insufficient” information in response to his request for more details. I think that translates into “enough with the games and I am so over this”. The government evaded its obligations. See below for an example.
“The Government cannot proffer a regional ICE official to attest to Cabinet-level discussions of the state-secrets privilege; indeed, his declaration on that point, not surprisingly, is based solely on his unsubstantiated ‘understand[ing],’” he added.
The Justice Department has repeatedly insisted it did not violate the orders of last weekend. On TV and social media, they have pushed a range of arguments for why they believe the judge exceeded his authority in the matter, as well as painting him as a rogue jurist.
Let me give you one more quote.
“We have one unelected federal judge trying to control foreign policies, trying to control the Alien Enemies Act, which they have no business presiding over. And there are 261 reasons why Americans are safer now – that’s because those people are out of this country,” Attorney General Pam Bondi said Wednesday on Fox News.
So I ask again – what are they hiding? Methinks they doth protest too much.
*****And now, please read a very special request from our awesome boss******
Zoomers, if you can hunt through the sofa cushions for spare change, we could use it. We are in month five of depressed traffic while a depressed nation tunes out. I have every belief that the disenchanted will tune back in and some point and return to the fight but until that happens, the bills keep coming and we need help. Thank you. Ursula
I’d love for a judge to remind Drumpf’s little passel of dimwits playacting as real lawyers that it was the Supreme Court that opted to say a President can’t be prosecuted for acts committed in his “official capacity” but that very same court can turn around and declare certain acts committed in his “official capacity” CAN lead to his being prosecuted.
And, that even if a President can’t be prosecuted, the same protection does NOT necessarily–or automatically–extend to Cabinet officials or Executive departments. Especially when one considers that it’s usually Departments and their heads who are usually sued in court when policies are being challenged. (Not a lawyer but I think that’s the main reason why so few Presidents have ever been sued directly over policies that THEY initiate; the agency/department head who winds up as the defendant in the lawsuit is generally supposed to be the one who goes to the President and counsels both the pros and cons of such policies being enacted. And with the dodos currently occupying the Executive branch not having enough vertebrae among the lot of them to have a single spine and their only purpose for being where they are is their blind loyalty and subservience to Drumpf, none of them is going to tell Drumpf “no” or “that’s not a good idea” or even “Sir, we need to take things slower.”)