Not only was the question bound to arise from Trump’s “firing” of board members of agencies created by Congress to be independent, such that they could putatively perform their function based upon impartiality and expertise rather than political partisanship, but it was bound to be decided. Humphrey’s Executor was on the table and everybody knew it.

What everybody did not know, and did not expect, was that the Supreme Court would effectively overrule a 90-year-old precedent on the shadow docket. Yet, that’s what it did in a 6-3 two-page per curiam decision in Trump v. Wilcox. Continue reading →

It’s been clear for a while now that the Trump administration ignored Judge Boasberg’s order, violated Judge Xinis’ order and even ignored the Supreme Court’s decision in Noem v. Abrego Garcia, which may have been unclear with the meaning of the word “effectuate,” but held that “facilitate” was more than clear.

The order properly requires the Government to “facilitate” Abrego Garcia’s release from custody in El Salvador and to ensure that his case is handled as it would have been had he not been improperly sent to El Salvador.

Seen Abrego Garcia around lately? Heard about the government’s efforts to “facilitate” his return? That’s because the government didn’t facilitate. The government did nothing to comply with Judge Xinis’ order, even though the Supreme Court held it must. And what did the courts do about it? In fact, it’s largely disappeared from the news, something else to be forgotten in the daily hourly fog of Trumpianism. Continue reading →

The debate has largely centered around a fellow named Kilmar Abrego Garcia, largely because his case has captured the headlines and the docket. In continuing violation of Judge Paula Xinis’ order, the government has yet to lift a finger to “facilitate” the return of an alien they renditioned by admitted mistake. The case made a good vehicle for the challenge given an immigration judge’s order that he not be deported to El Salvador was ignored and he was sent there to spend the rest of his life in prison.

Of course, President Trump wasn’t concerned since, in his twisted mind, Abrego Garcia had “MS-13” tattooed to his knuckles, proving the righteousness, if not lawfulness, of the rendition. But as for the rest, the argument has largely taken for granted that the renditioned Venezuelans were, indeed, Tren de Aragua (or MS-13?) gangbangers, and really, who cares whether they were lawfully deported to a Salvadoran torture prison? Continue reading →

There are a great many question arising from the fact pattern in Doe v. KIPP NY, a case decided last August that just found its way onto Eugene Volokh’s radar with a rather salacious title. How did the video get into the hands of students? Why would the teacher use a district-provided cellphone to take video of her pleasuring herself? Why did she take video at all? If the plaintiff continued her employment as a junior high and high school teacher, would her students have something other than education on their minds such that she would have difficulty teaching?

[P]laintiff commenced this action a year after her employment as a teacher at KIPP middle school and high school was terminated following the dissemination of a video to students depicting plaintiff in a sex act that was saved on her KIPP-issued cellular phone (the “Video”). On June 3, 2022, plaintiff alleges she became aware of the video dissemination, when students brought it to her attention that the video had just been “airdropped” to certain students at KIPP. The plaintiff maintains that the video was taken on personal time and personal property and was potentially accessed and disseminated by students and others, without her consent. Continue reading →

The salaries range from $190,000 to $235,000 per year, excluding bonuses, numbers that bring tears to the eyes of many hard-working, experienced and highly-skilled trial lawyers, the babies of Biglaw earn incomes that bear no relation to the value they bring to the table. The only drawback is that their work went from engagement in the practice of law that prepared them to be lawyers one day to the indignity of document review, work best suited to back office drones.

With the incorporation of AI by Biglaw into its mind-numbing grind, even that may soon be gone.

There are growing signs that artificial intelligence poses a real threat to a substantial number of the entry-level jobs that normally serve as the first step for each new generation of young workers. Uncertainty around tariffs and global trade are only likely to accelerate that pressure, just as millions of 2025 graduates enter the work force.

Continue reading →

Pending the second flight of alleged Tren de Aragua gang members out of Texas, the ACLU sought an emergency injunction. Time was short. The threat was clear. Once the bodies were on a plane and the plane was off the ground, the government would claim it was out of their hands and there was nothing they could do. It isn’t true, but that’s the presumptive claim since it’s the same contention made about Abrego Garcia in the first flight.

And the district judge sat on it. And the Fifth Circuit wiped its hand of the problem since it was up to the district judge in the first instance to make a decision. That was the orderly process. That was the way it was supposed to work. And the government promised that no flight would take off that day, although it made no promises as to what would happen after midnight. The Supreme Court, by a 7-2 majority, had enough of being played by the Trump administration, which figured out that by ignoring orderly process, flying them to a life in prison in El Salvador and claiming it was out of their hands, they could beat the system. The Supreme Court said no. Continue reading →

Friends, have you ever sat down to watch a television show expecting a few cheap laughs at the expense of others and then find yourself wondering if you should apologize for wasting several hours of your television’s life? That would be your humble humorist after several seasons of an Investigation Discovery show my better half subjected me to called “The Curious Case of Natalia Grace.” I went in thinking this would be a new “Tiger King” at which to gawk, and now have left the series finale with a bad taste in my mouth and less faith in humanity.

If you’ve yet to experience this mess allow me to attempt to break this wreck down like the massive “Final Destination”-sized car crash it is. An Indiana couple named Michael and Kristine Barnett adopt a little girl from Ukraine named Natalia Grace. Continue reading →

The oral argument was interesting, as there are strong arguments and legitimate concerns on both sides when it comes to the authority of district court judges to issue nationwide injunctions. Presidents before Trump hated it, and Trump does too. No president wants 680 district judges to individually possess the authority to put a stop to the president’s actions and thus thwart his agenda.

Then again, if a president engages in unlawful or unconstitutional action, must every person affected bring suit or, as Justice Jackson queried, isn’t an order to stop doing something unlawful more than sufficient for the government to stop doing something unlawful?

But that raised a question posed by Amy Coney Barrett. The colloquy between Justice Barrett and Solicitor General John Sauer was surprising, to say the least. Continue reading →

A.G. Sulzberger, current publisher and scion of the New York Times, writes that a free people need a free press.

The role of a free and independent press in a healthy democracy is under direct attack, with increasingly aggressive efforts to curtail and punish independent journalism. I don’t believe it’s an overstatement to say that this anti-press campaign threatens the special formula that has made the American model so successful for nearly 250 years.

A free people need a free press.

Could any reasonable person disagree? Of course not, which is why Dash, as Sulzberger is called, is full of shit and needs to own up to it. Where was he when editorial page editor James Bennet was sacrificed to the woke? Continue reading →

As Eugene Volokh explains, it may violate the First Amendment. But why, one has to wonder, would the Encinitas Union School District believe treading along, and over, the line of constitutionally protected speech and expression was so important that it would not merely take the risk, but take the risk at the expense of a fifth grade buddy?

The school activity at issue occurred in the context of the buddy program, a weekly class pairing younger and older students. The buddy program is a mandatory part of the school curriculum. P.D. and S.E., both fifth graders, were each paired with a kindergartener. In this program, “students in the older classroom mentor students in the younger classroom.” Continue reading →