Transcript
Presidential Powers, Legal Precedents & Privacy Rights
Amicus: A Law Review · Sat Jul 5, 2025
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This is our Independence Day weekend broadcast.
As always, taking our name, Amicus from the notion, the Latin, the legal term for friend, friend of the court, friend of the community.
This weekend consistent with that commission to provide information insight and
perspective on the world in which we live, we're going to be addressing a great number of things, especially, especially in the wake of our two-part broadcast of last weekend, talking specifically about some of the major cases issued, released by our United States Supreme Court in this 2024, 2025 term.
We're going to be visiting that in part in this weekend broadcast, talking about some of the consequences of at least two major
decisions there's that one having to do with national or universal injunctions.
And then they're having to do with the capacity of parents to opt out and not have their children exposed to certain kinds of instruction in public schools.
We're gonna talk not only about the decisions in those matters, but also perhaps just as importantly, if not more, the consequences, the likely results of those particular cases coming out of the United States Supreme Court.
In addition, we're gonna talk about some big themes, including this notion
that the Supreme Court increasingly using its emergency docket will recite once again some specific examples of that and the consequences for the transparency of the court when it comes to pursuing cases, resolving decisions, resolving challenges based not upon a full exposition of the matters before them, but rather pursuant to this emergency sometimes called a shadow docket.
We'll talk again about the ideological split.
witnessed in some, not all, but some of the cases in the Supreme Court just this past year.
Some of the very controversial dissents were visited, a couple of those in particular.
And then we're going to chat about some of the things that the Supreme Court is plainly continuing to look at into the 2025, 2026 term.
And yes, that indeed, it does include issues related to transgender matters.
We'll talk about all of that as Amica Salara
you begins, begins our discussion in this weekend broadcast.
As always, especially since, especially since we reviewed so many cases and so much information in so much detail last weekend, what will forward all of you a broad and expansive opportunity to be a part of our discussion in this live broadcast this weekend?
That phone number is 855-752-4842.
Once again, that's 855-752-4842.
Ask questions that I encourage you to write down last weekend about any of our analyses, our reviews of those major Supreme Court cases.
Bring those to my attention so that my producer Max and I can get those as a part of our discussion this weekend on Amicus, a law review.
In addition to reviewing and getting a sense of the long-term consequences, the trends inside.
the Supreme Court.
We're also going to be looking at a couple, actually three more recent events having to do with some actions in the criminal courts and one action in a civil court.
And we'll talk about the reasons why those non-Supreme Court cases.
in those other venues are important to understanding what is going on in America when it comes to the administration of justice, the rule of law, and what judges do and do not do in that connection.
We also, necessarily, importantly, need to talk about a major decision of the Wisconsin Supreme Court of just this past week.
Yes, that's right, the Wisconsin Supreme Court finally wrestling with that 1849 law that forbade the...
conduct, the administration of any medical services in the nature of abortion, reproductive services, the Supreme Court just this past week saying that the 1849 law is no longer in effect.
And we'll talk about the reasons why they did that, the impact of that, and then we're going to go more broadly and talk more generally about where abortion stands in America, not just in the state of Wisconsin, but across the nation.
What is the status in the wake of the 2022 decision of the Supreme Court finding that there is no longer a privacy right to reproductive opportunities and rights inside the Constitution?
What is the consequence of that, not just here in Wisconsin as a result?
of this recent opinion.
But where does it go nationwide?
What is the status generally out there?
And then of course we're necessarily going to talk about the Department of Justice and some major new policies articulated internally and externally to the department about how they're going to go about pursuing the president's policies and activities again, completely erasing the line that has previously existed between the White House and the
the Department of Justice, they're a ninth in constitution.
We'll talk about two major things that the...
The Department of Justice has announced just this past week when it comes to the implementation and the administration of justice coming out of the Department of Justice, the only agency in our federal government that has as its name an aspiration, a lot to take up, a lot to undertake here this weekend on Amicus Hall of Review.
As always, it is indeed ambitious, but it is achievable.
Let us begin with that analysis right away.
Again, by chatting once again about these two major cases among the 66, 66 different opinions issued by the United States Supreme Court just in this past term.
Many of them, as we talked in the last weekend's broadcast, issued just about seven days or so ago, seven, eight days ago.
and resolving some major decisions.
Principle among those, probably the top of everyone's list, is this major case involving Trump versus Casa, that's the name of the case.
This is the so-called
birthright citizenship case.
In fact, again, the Supreme Court did not resolve that issue, did not tell us definitively, did not overrule prior Supreme Court opinions and decisions that say that, yes, indeed, if you are born in the United States, you are a citizen of the United States.
But what the Supreme Court did do
Fairly inconsistent with the oral argument of weeks and months earlier was it said that federal district court judges can no longer can no longer issue national
universal injunctions.
When parties appear before them on big issues, constitutional issues can no longer make clear that whatever the judges do with respect to an injunction, stopping, for example, an executive order from going ahead, that can no longer be applied across the board to all districts, all places in the nation, is instead restricted presumably just to the district court.
in which the district in which the district court is sitting and perhaps even just to the parties in front of them now some districts have done just that but we know that in connection with many of these cases involving constitutional principles the judges have gone much more broadly and the Supreme Court has said in this major opinion authored by Amy Coney Barrett
major opinion written at her pen, the Supreme Court has said no more.
If you resolve a case, you can enter injunctive relief, you can enter a temporary restraining order, but you can no longer make that order effective across the nation.
And that dramatically changes the way in which we do things in the United States of America.
As I've said before, the consequence of that is across the board for all presidents.
And while it may seem to be
and is for this president a further expansion of his capacities to serve as the president in this executive authorities it plainly applies to future presidents as well and so we've talked about as did the dissenters to some possibilities about a future president also issuing plainly unconstitutional orders but requiring that to
push back on them to get them enjoying, to get them stopped.
Now, based upon this order, this ruling of the Supreme Court, individual plaintiffs, individual challengers will need to go into individual federal district courts around the country.
There are 93 of them, 93 different districts, and seek the vindication of the rights.
Sonia Sotomayor, for example, identified a couple of options here.
One is, plainly, if...
A party is concerned about a president who suddenly has directed, contrary to the Second Amendment, that all guns be seized, all guns be surrendered.
In the past a federal district court judge for example in this hypothetical could have issued a nationwide injunction saying that's not consistent with the law as interpreted by the Supreme Court and therefore it's illegal cannot apply across the board now under this new ruling under this hypothetical situation the reality is that
individuals who own guns would need to go into their particular district court and get their right, their right, vindicated there.
Another example that's used is under the First Amendment.
If, for example, an equally out-of-control president of the future should wake up one morning and say, I'm no longer going to permit people to exercise their faith as they like, that's plainly in violation of the First Amendment, the Free Exercise Clause.
If a Christian, a Jew, a Hindu, a Muslim
a Buddhist, a Sikh wanted to go into their synagogue, their temple, their church, their Gurdwara, no longer subject to a national jurisdiction injunction imposed by a judge would need to go into their local federal district court and get permission to worship as they choose.
That would change dramatically the way in which we understand the law, understand the import of the jurisdiction of federal courts.
And what was the, what was the,
probable, the likely result coming out of the Supreme Court.
That is splitting things in half, saying there may indeed be those cases where there are large issues of the constitutional mention.
I just mentioned two hypothetical situations.
The First Amendment right to a religion, religious exercise.
A second one, the right to bear arms, both of those constitutionally protected.
those may be the kinds of things that would have national impact and so a rule identifying major significant constitutional rights those could be the subject of national
injunctions.
There may be other things as Amy Coney Barrett was suggesting during the course of the oral argument that would not be in that category.
And so one of the things that appeared the Supreme Court was heading toward was the articulation of a rule that described for lower judges exactly what falls in one category and what falls in the other.
Not at all an easy thing to do, but nonetheless the kind of thing the Supreme Court does routinely.
including even in this term, as it articulated, for example, inside an employment case, standards for the litigation of discrimination cases under Title VII.
Supreme Court does that all the time.
Here, here the Supreme Court, in this very definitive opinion written by Amy Coney Barrett, says no, no, no rule out there.
There is a bright line prohibition
on national injunctions, universal injunctions, and without much of an opportunity to get around that.
There are a couple of things they talk about.
They talk about, of course, the possibility of states through the attorney's general vindicating in federal courts, maybe in the state courts as well, the rights that an attorney general.
Might pursue on behalf of her or his constituents throughout the state that remains an option There are also class actions not an easy thing to do requiring class certification identification of large groups of people who fall into the same category That's also that's also out there the Supreme Court suggested and third There is this continuing Avenue under the Administrative Procedures Act
We've talked about that.
It's fairly wonky.
It's in the weeds.
But it also requires when government does things, it needs to do those things according to rules and regulations.
Standards permitting people to come in and have their voices heard about what government is doing.
So the Supreme Court identified workarounds, if you will, that are still available.
And yes, indeed, district court judges still do have injunctive relief.
It is simply narrow dramatically.
The big takeaway, of course, is a change in the way that
federal court's work.
When we come back, we'll talk about the larger implications for this presidency and any future presidency, and then talk about three instances in what federal district judges are indeed pursuing those workarounds, even in the wake of this major Supreme Court decision when Amicus, a law review, returns.
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We're spending some time doing some 20 or 30,000 foot analysis
what the Supreme Court has done in this term.
Talking right now about the major impact about what is probably the most significant case, that is this case called Trump vs. Casa C.A.S.A.
which the Supreme Court through the pan of Amy Coney Barrett said, no more, no more national universal injunctions need to run into your local federal district court and get every single right of yours.
pursued and challenged with respect to any executive order, anything the government does, get your rights vindicated by individual applications, noting along the way that there are mechanisms for doing that under the Administrative Procedures Act and class actions, and maybe even state attorneys general pursuing your claims on your behalf in those courts.
The largest takeaway.
Historically, however, on the CASA case, in addition to all of the changes that it has already accomplished and will accomplish in the future, is the bookend.
We recall well that it was just a year ago that the Supreme Court in this major catastrophic decision called Trump versus United States found not only that a president is immune from criminal prosecution for things that he, one day, she may do in office for many of those things, some of them expressly identified, but also found in those first pages that the executive needs to be muscular, needs to be very nimble, needs to be deft, cannot be feeble, as the Chief Justice said, need to be able
to act in exactly the way that this president has been acting for the past five months or so.
Giving him that authority expressly, that is the rule of law in America today by virtue of that case decided one year ago.
in this week.
Last week, last week, the Supreme Court provides us all with the bookend to that and says, okay, in addition to giving the president all of this authority, basically to do what he needs to do and issue these executive orders, if you challenge those, if you challenge those, you can no longer get them reversed at a national level.
You need to go in and do this in a way that is far less effective than it has ever been before.
You need to go in once again to vindicate your individual, maybe class rights,
But it again strengthens dramatically dramatically the authority of this president and any future president to do what he or she
wants to do, even if it's in violation of the Constitution.
And yes, indeed, a future unconstitutionally acting president may find himself herself on the receiving end of an individually district court issued injunction.
The reality is that that is far less effective, far less significant in terms of stopping that unconstitutional behavior than we had just a week earlier.
And so these two decisions, Trump versus the United States, July one,
of 2024 and Trump versus Casa June 26, 2025.
They vest in the president a huge amount of power we've never seen before and doesn't give him carte blanche to do anything he wants but makes it much easier for him or her to pursue those policies that may in fact be unconstitutional without the capacity to get them stopped fairly quickly and decisively as we had before.
A dramatic change once again
given to the executive by the Supreme Court.
I indicated just before the break that there are indeed some workarounds, and indeed one of the good news items coming out of just the past week is that it appears that federal district court judges are taking the Supreme Court at its word and saying, yes, I can do certain things, I can enjoin certain activities, I don't have to issue national injunctions, but I can still act.
And indeed, the rule of law is alive and well in America.
Let's talk about some of the things that federal district court judges have done just in the past week in the wake of that decision, Casa, that seemingly shut it down much of their injunctive relief.
Turns out, turns out that district court judges invoking the Administrative Procedures Act, indicating that indeed larger groups of people like class actions can in fact get results even if they're limited
to their particular districts and also finding again through the APA a measure of solace when it comes to pushing back on the unconstitutional
and administratively illegal things that a president may be doing.
So let's talk about three of those.
A federal judge in New York on Tuesday of this past week blocks the Trump administration.
This again, in the wake, in the wake following the Supreme Court's decision to Casa, stops the Trump administration from ending temporary legal status for about 500,000 Haitians who are already in the United States of America.
We have talked about this case before.
District Court Judge Brian Kogan
He's in New York.
He rules that moving up the expiration of the temporary protected status.
Recall this, the TPS program.
By at least five months for these groups of Haitians, some of whom have lived in the United States of America for more than a decade, that's unlawful.
You will call, as we talked about this before, the Biden administration that extended Haiti's TPS status through at least February 3rd of 2026, based upon its findings about gang violence and political arrest and some other things there, a major earthquake in 2022, 2021, several other factors as well.
Last week, the Department of Homeland Security announced it was terminating those legal protections as soon as September 2nd and then the deportees from Haiti, the Haitians there,
presumably going to be the subject of that.
In a 23-page opinion, 23 pages, the judge says that the Department of Homeland Security's move to terminate the legal protections early violates the temporary protective status of the Haitians.
And that, of course, requires that a certain amount of notice be considered before that designation is given.
The judge goes on to say, when the government confers a benefit over a fixed period of time,
beneficiary can reasonably expect to receive that benefit at least until the end of the fixed period.
That is one judge doing something in the wake of what the Supreme Court said, invoking injunctive relief.
When we come back, a couple more instances of the same thing going on in trial courts around the country.
Here on Amicus, a law review.
This is Amica Salar Review.
My name is Jim Santel and we are talking in this first hour of our weekend broadcast about the consequences of some of these major decisions issued by our United States Supreme Court in the final days of its active release of decisions just last week and in the weeks prior to that.
Noting once again that the Supreme Court has said that national injunctions
across the board, applying to all districts, no longer available to litigants, petitioners, challengers in the courts.
Nonetheless, we have district court judges who are invoking, I think called the Administrative Procedures Act, invoking other possible avenues, including class actions to still issue orders preventing this administration from doing various things.
We talked about this
Order issued by Brian Kogan in New York having to do with the Department of Homeland Securities move to terminate the legal protections of about 500,000 Haitians here in America.
There's more.
You've got a federal district court in Rhode Island on Tuesday ordering the Trump administration to stop a series of planned layoffs at the United States Department of Health and Human Services.
We have talked a lot about those and you have digested those as well.
This is a 58 page.
opinion by District Judge Melissa Dubose.
She has granted a motion for a preliminary injunction, barring the government from, as she said, taking any actions to implement or enforce any firings or plan restructurings.
The judge taking the government to task for trying to avoid spending money already allocated by the Congress.
She says, in the case at hand, Congress directed the Department of Health and Human Services to maintain specific initiatives with the support of the congressional appropriations pursuant to the applicable statutes.
We're not to say HHS cannot decide for itself whether it has exceeded its statutory authority because there are congressional statutes in place to serve as
guardrails, there's that word, guardrails to the agency's actions.
She says this court concludes that the defendants, that is the administration, usurped congressional power to manage the public health appropriations at stake.
And the states are likely to succeed on their contrary to law claims that as a part of this order, again, in the wake of what the Supreme Court has done, and yet there's more.
And this one also specifically invoking the Administrative Procedures Act.
This happens on Wednesday of this past week.
There is a 128-page opinion by Judge Randolph Moss.
He is sitting there in the Federal District Court in the District of Columbia.
He rules just on Wednesday that the Trump administration can
cannot categorize, deny asylum claims from people crossing the southern border.
This is very significant.
It's striking down one of the changes made on President Trump's first days in office.
The ruling, the ruling rejects the idea, which is...
repeatedly been advanced by the administration that these extraordinary powers exercised by the president are justified to curtail, to address what Donald Trump has repeatedly called an invasion by the United States by immigrants crossing the border.
Again, 128 pages.
The judge Randolph Moss there says this, the court recognizes that the executive branch faces enormous challenges in preventing and deterring unlawful entry into the United States.
and in adjudicating the overwhelming backlog of asylum claims of those who have entered the country.
Goes on to say, but neither the Constitution nor current law governing asylum seekers can be read to grant the president or his delegates and people who work on his behalf authority to adopt an international and alternative immigration system
which supplants the statutes that the Congress has enacted.
The order, once again, coming in the wake of this decision by the Supreme Court that no national injunctions can be entered, finding in this case that the Trump's proclamation was called guaranteeing the state's protection against invasion.
seeking to suspend the nation's refugee admissions program, overriding the direction of Congress, set in something called the Immigration Nationality Act.
All of that, all of that cannot go forward.
This judge, once again, as are the others, invoking other mechanisms.
And yes, indeed, broadly enjoining events from happening, but doing it not so much under constitutional bases, but in violation of...
the Administrative Procedures Act that is saying that the administration is acting in violation of the APA, and also establishing, when you get into the weeds of these cases, the particular facts that permit judges in their discretion to do these kinds of things as to those plaintiffs, as to those challengers who are before them.
Class actions, APA, all of this continues to provide some mechanisms we will see about the extent to which these work around.
again expressly adopted and embraced by the Supreme Court, do in fact get back to the Supreme Court as a procedural matter, and history will tell plainly about the consequences of what is still undeniably a major decision.
that does give this president and a future president a whole lot more power to do what he or she opines is appropriate to do, especially in the wake of that decision a year ago, giving a president a huge amount of authority to act.
in the first place.
A lot of things going on here.
Let's talk about that other major case that we described during the course of our discussion last weekend.
This one has to do with academic freedoms and also religious rights and the capacity of parents who based upon religious beliefs do not want their children, their school age children.
to be exposed to storybooks with LGBTQIA themes.
We know that this case was pending in front of the Supreme Court coming out of Maryland.
The district there had, after a lot of experimentation, prohibited parents from opting their young children out.
And in the end, saying, no, we are responsible for teaching your children responsibly.
We know what we're doing.
And the parents, again, based upon religious grounds, said that we are opposed to
what is being taught when it comes to these LGBTQIA missions and purposes and themes, a position that's Samuelito in language that is quite dramatically different from what the Supreme Court said when it was deciding about the dignity of human beings in connection with those same-sex marriage cases many years ago.
Samuelito saying, nope.
It may well be that people who have different views about LGBTQIA rights not only have the right to maintain those views, which they do, but also have the right to prevent their children on religious grounds from hearing anything about them.
And so directing the Maryland school districts to do carve outs to ensure that the parents have the opportunity to opt out with respect to a particular lesson on LGBTQIA storybooks.
Interestingly, as I said last weekend, those opinions, both the majority opinion, the dissenting opinion attached to the text of the orders, some fascinating things.
There are color pictures of the books of extras from the pages of those books, obviously the majority.
attaching them to say, see, this is what we're looking at.
This is the problem that the Maryland School District has.
The dissenters saying, see, this is how benign and non-controversial this is.
The dissenters, again, going on to say, that's what education is all about.
Sonia Sotomayor, in particular, describing the purposes of education being exposing everyone to views and perspectives with which they may not agree.
for religious reasons, for other reasons, but that's education, she says, and it does not undermine, as Sonia Sotomayor and the other two dissenters said, the capacity of young children, even young children to learn, and most importantly, and here's the point, here's the large term consequence, the capacity, the ability, the responsibility vested in school boards and teachers and principals and the designers of academic curriculums to teach as their expertise
and their experience and their background, their education indicates.
And here's the consequence.
This is about LGBTQIA storybooks.
If indeed, if indeed as we talked last weekend, if a parent comes along and says, my religion tells me that my young students should no longer be exposed to anything having to do with the scientific concept of evolution.
I want that to be redacted out of the curriculum and redacted out of the education given my young boy or girl in school.
What about other things?
Again, premised upon religious beliefs about the way the homes should be crafted.
Mothers stay at home, fathers go to work.
My religion tells me that's right.
I don't want my young boy or girl exposed to anything other than that kind of a family setup.
based upon what the Supreme Court has opened the door to now, admittedly, in this case, just about LGBTQ storybooks, but down the road, other issues, again, premised upon religious beliefs, maybe upon political beliefs, demanding that their school districts not expose my student, my young school age student to a particular subject matter.
Right now, across the board, as we are in summer terms,
school districts and school boards and teachers and principals should be looking very carefully at this case.
Mamoud versus Taylor to determine what is next.
What can parents now ask of teachers and of academics in these settings to prevent them?
And to require opt-outs, preventing them from educating in certain subject matters, you can fill in the blank on what those may be.
Like this other case involving the way that the courts work injunctively, this case changes the way that our schools work.
And again, I have no doubt that school boards and administrators, superintendents, teachers in the classrooms, not just of kindergarteners and first and second, fourth and fifth graders, but everyone K through 12.
Looking at this case Mahmoud and saying, gosh, what if I have a parent who says, I no longer want this particular scientific or arithmetic or even literature related thing taught in my schools to my children.
Are schools now obliged to grant that request to opt out?
It appears from the Supreme Court the consequences of the mood is that they would need to do that a dramatic change in the way that our schools work coming up for the 2025 2026 academic term right now school districts around the country looking at that case and determining what their policies should be all of that having to do with the significant consequences of the substance of what the Supreme
court has done just in this past.
year.
We know as well that there are huge ideological splits.
We've seen many of those in cases like once again the birthright citizenship that's six to three, the opt out the classroom that's six to three.
We talked about this age verification for for adult sites that's six to three.
We talked about this case involving preventive care in which the Supreme Court does indeed support the task forces that permit the decisions to be made about what kinds of preventive care
insurance companies are obliged to provide under the Affordable Care Act.
But that was also six to three.
Another six to three opinion, transition care for trans youth.
That was six to three, giving these states the capacity to prohibit
healthcare providers from providing transgender care to transgender youth.
That was a six to three decision as well.
There was that four to four decision that was split right down the middle on religious charter schools.
Remember this one coming out of Oklahoma?
Decided principally or not decided because Amy Coney Barrett wasn't deciding the case.
And so the case goes back to the Oklahoma folks with the affirmation that what the Oklahoma Supreme Court said
which is that those charter schools could not become a part of the public schools because of their religious instruction.
But that was four to four also.
And so we had many cases, many cases of this past term in which there was split, split.
majorities and minorities on the court.
There were also those unanimous decisions, nine to zero, that reverse discrimination case I made reference to.
Every justice saying, yes indeed, we've got to have uniformity when it comes to applying Title VII.
That gunmaker liability coming out of Mexico, Mexico attempting to assign liability for much of its violent crime to gunmakers here in America.
The Supreme Court nine to zero saying, nope, no such thing can.
not do that under the congressional legislation.
Ghost guns, someone related to that, finding that indeed they can be regulated by the administration.
That was a split, but 7-2, 7-2.
The TikTok case, remember that one?
Overcome.
My name is Jim Santelis, always taking your phone calls at 855-752-4842.
Those have some comments and we'll get to those in the top of our second hour all about what the Supreme Court is and is not doing, talking a lot about the substance of what it's done and the consequences apolitically without a partisan perspective on what the future holds and the reason why.
We are now living in a time when the Supreme Court has said for this president and future presidents, the notion that you can indeed engage in activities and issue executive orders in the capacity of a very strong and muscular.
presidency.
That was last year.
We know again as of a week ago that the Supreme Court has also further defined the power of the executive branch to limit dramatically the capacity of any challengers today for years from now, eight years from now, 10 years from now to go in and stop a
an executive who is engaging in conduct that is viewed as unconstitutional.
All those things should be of concerns to individuals across the political aisle because they don't just apply today.
They apply to all presidents down the road.
We recognize as well that there are ideological splits on the Supreme Court that will continue and that there are standards by which the Supreme Court applies its decisions.
Sometimes, sometimes America
Americans appropriately will disagree with those.
Sometimes they will support those.
That too is the beauty of our system in which political perspectives and government perspectives and legal perspectives have a right to be heard in the public domain.
There's another aspect.
There's another aspect of what we saw an awful lot of in this term that should be of concern to people across the political aisle because once again it opens up a mechanism, a procedural mechanism at a level that we have not seen before.
For prior administrations, there have indeed been lots of applications for emergency action.
typically involving the administration and execution of the death penalty.
We have seen in recent years, not just in this administration, not just in the Biden administration, not just in Trump won, but in other administrations and increasing use of this going to the court and asking for an emergency application, even while lower courts are still addressing the underlying litigation, stop that from happening, enjoy that from happening.
It's called the emergency docket.
and it has reached fever pitch.
And once again, the reasons why all Americans should be concerned about this is because the result of this emergency application is number one, to jump over effectively the normal course of litigation that sometimes results in favorable actions to challengers, sometimes results in unfavorable actions.
But we're going right away to a Supreme Court and asking them to intervene.
has done that 19 times since January 20th of this year.
And again, why is that a problem?
Why is that to be viewed in any way as concerning?
It's because of the way that it is done.
Unlike all those other 66 cases, including us indeed, the Casa case and the Mammoud case and all those others we talked about, those are the product of transparency.
And whether you agree with them or not, you have to say that they were given the process that they
deserve.
that includes the lawyers writing briefs appearing in front of the Supreme Court for oral arguments and doing all those things that are a part of the judicial process that winnows and sifts and comes in the end to decisions about how cases should be resolved the difficulty with the emergency sometimes called the shadow docket is that we don't get any of that and indeed here a couple of instances among among many others from just the past five months you know well that in
early June, the Supreme Court let members of the Musk team have access to sensitive records of millions of Americans held by the Social Security Administration.
Now again, that was not without a dissent, a vigorous dissent authored by Sonia Sotomayor, and we talked a lot about that when that decision was issued.
The point is that the reason for granting that
was unknown.
The court's order permitting that access was brief, unsigned, and no reasons given.
You can simply do that.
The Supreme Court simply saying, we're going to let, we're going to let the government go ahead and do the work that it needs to do.
That as a part of the Social Security Administration case and the access to those materials.
There was another one that has been back in the news as well.
Again, many others out there as well.
This is the
case involving the so-called South Sudan deportees.
You may recall there was Brian Murphy at the lower court who has directed pursuant to congressional legislation that these eight or nine deportees, they ended up in Djibouti in South Sudan, are in fact eligible to be deported, should be deported, he effectively says, but need to be told, they'd be given advice, need to be given the opportunity to contest the location of where they are deported to.
And that's what he said in his orders, the Supreme Court comes
back and again in an unsigned and undescribed order says no, the administration does have the capacity to go ahead and deport these people.
presumably, but not clearly without affording them due process.
The judge comes back and says, I don't know what the Supreme Court has told me to do.
And he goes ahead with this order.
And sure enough, late last week, the Supreme Court comes back and has to re-clarify what it has done or not done in the first instance, way back in late June, and says, no, we went when we said the administration can go ahead with the deportation of these deportees now in Djibouti, now in South Sudan.
other places without giving them the notice of where they're going and where they're headed pursuant to the legislation.
And they did that once again initially and again recently without the exposition.
that you normally get in these other cases.
The result of that is a court that's no longer, at least in these instances, is not transparent.
And absent that, the concern that you have is the Supreme Court now issuing decisions on major cases, on major cases, and there are more plainly out there.
in which we do not get a description about the reasons why they're doing it.
That's a good thing.
You may not agree with the majority.
You may not agree with the dissenters, but it is good to be able to read the reasons why they feel the way they do and to take those apart.
That's what we miss when this focus upon the emergency shadow docket takes over the docket of the Supreme Court.
When we come back on amicus, we're going to shift to some other major cases in America that have happened just recently.
Stay with us for that discussion.
My name is Jim Santel.
I am your host for this the second hour of our weekly weekend broadcast of all things related to the rule of law and justice the delivery of justice and the operation of government and as always we appreciate so very much your calls your inquiries your questions about all sorts of things including the subject matter of our first hour and that is broad takeaways from the Supreme Court's last term including some substance
in the areas of the capacity of federal district judges to act in furtherance of their oath of office and to resolve disputes among parties who have legitimate claims against each other.
Second, a major case involving the future of academics in America and the capacity of parents to direct what is and is not.
taught in our schools.
And beyond that, an awful lot of procedural things coming out of this past term, including these descents, which in many ways have become a whole lot more vociferous, to use a very diplomatic word.
We talked before about the heated exchange between Amy Cooney Barrett and Katanji Brown Jackson.
In that Casa case, almost coming to blows, if you will, at least linguistically,
And that is a level of animosity that we have seen, perhaps in small doses before, but not at the level that we've seen in this past term.
The ideological split that has always existed, we see it again this term, even while we see some unanimous decisions coming out of the Supreme Court.
And perhaps most importantly, procedurally, we see the increasing use and the application of this emergency docket, whereby petitioners, including the government, most often in the...
past five months, but others in history coming to the Supreme Court while underlying litigation is still going on and asking for their immediate intervention.
And the Supreme Court granting that and the problem being that when they act that quickly with that emergency power, they don't give us reasons why.
They don't have the benefit of argument and we are left to guess about the reasons why a majority of the court directed that something happened without an explanation, without the transparency.
that we know in the other branches, including the executive branch, including the legislative branch, that is a problem I would offer across the board for a Supreme Court that should indeed
be deciding cases and telling us the reasons why they decide those cases.
It's also the focus of an awful lot of the dissenting opinion in some of these cases in which they bemoan the fact that the majority has not explained why it is they're doing what they're doing and leaving the dissenters and leaving litigants to guess at what the Supreme Court actually means.
Lots of things happening at our Supreme Court even as they begin to fill up their docket.
in the coming 2025, 2026 term.
We know that they will continue to focus on religious issues.
They have had a special focus on that as they have had just this past term.
And indeed, transgender issues.
We know that there are at least two cases coming out of the Supreme Court, one of them in the emergency docket, permitting the president to terminate the 10 years of transgender military members, even while the underlying litigation is going on.
Also that other major case coming out of Tennessee and
transgender issues, finding that indeed a legislature can restrict the administration of hormone therapies and various medicines blocking puberty to provide support for
youth who are undergoing transition, finding that indeed the legislatures can impose restrictions on that.
And effectively saying, as John Roberts did, that because there's so much difference of opinion about this, we'll leave that to the legislature.
Transgender issues looming large in this past term.
And once again, in the coming term, the Supreme Court announced just this past week, that's going to hear two more cases.
They're similar in nature.
They're coming out of a couple of states, those states banning
banning transgender athletes from participating in sports that's coming up in the coming term and so presumably with that case unlike at least the military case you'll have the exposition of views in both directions or a argument and probably sometime around this time next year a disposition of that case as well lots of substantive issues coming out of the Supreme Court
promise for the future as well, some procedural things that we should also be attentive to as our Supreme Court makes these major decisions that affect our lives and livelihoods.
As always, we appreciate the callers and the comments from our listeners.
And Mark, we appreciate calling in from Prairie du Sac.
We appreciate your participation in our broadcast this weekend.
Yeah, it's especially significant coming up now.
We are in the 249th anniversary of
our Declaration of Independence, and part of a mention on there is the courts, and they were freely developed in the Constitution, but they were upset with the fact that these courts are making secret decisions, they seem to be answerable only to the King himself, and that the courts are supposed to be the last refuge of defending our constitutional rights as well, and that when the Constitution actually says that you're born in this country,
You're a citizen of this country and All the justices they take an oath as do many officers of the courts they take an oath to support the Constitution to actually follow the Constitution and how they What kind of sophistry that this court has engaged in to avoid?
Actually just coming out and saying and you know to serve to serve one man, you know Donald Trump who?
You know is by every definition.
He's becoming a tyrant.
I mean that I
Texted earlier the other quote from the from the Declaration of Independence is that the man seems to you know incapable of Obey in the Constitution itself and the Supreme Court should actually say something because What they've made Donald Trump is what the anti-Federalists are actually afraid of is that they were afraid that we would have a king who was a monarch you know surrounded by minions and mistresses and With with I with ice is doing right now.
I would maintain that they're
getting awfully close to the murderous genus, or is it, you know, Hamilton tried to argue against it.
The president was not going to have.
I agree with you, has given him an awful lot more power.
And future presidents as well.
This is not just for Donald Trump as well.
And again, we do take a look at the Declaration of Independence, one of the principal grievances of
Our founding fathers was this notion that we're doing things contrary to our fundamental systems that do, in fact, contemplate going to the courts and seeking redress of grievances.
We may not always be successful.
We may win.
We may lose.
But that notion that you don't do what a judge says, which we've also seen in many of these cases, we tell judges, no, we're not doing that.
We make decisions based upon our own prerogatives.
contrary to the rule of law, that's what our founding fathers were in many ways disputing when it comes to the king, many, many, 249 years ago and beyond.
The other point that you make is a good one, which is it would have been cleaner and neater for the Supreme Court to issue a decision resolving the core issue, having to do with the 14th Amendment, saying what it has said before, which is that if you're born here, you are a citizen of the United States of America, and the Supreme Court, once again, having said
that previously it makes a clear sense, bringing all of this to conclusion, not having to get involved also in this issue about national as opposed to regional or even district specific injunctions, all of that making things much more complicated for not just this president, not just for challengers to this president, but now for anyone who seeks to vindicate constitutional dimension rights.
All of that, all of that, a significant part of what the Supreme Court has done.
I thank you so much for bringing that to our attention as we celebrate this weekend, the 249th anniversary of our nation.
Also want to comment that Mark, another Mark from Sussex wrote in, I will not repeat exactly what he has said.
I'll strip away some of the name calling, but indicating that yes, indeed, when individuals in America are not successful,
in a political realm or in other areas, they go into court.
And Mark, I agree with you that that is the mechanism through which we do things here, recognizing that judges who take an oath of office to be fair and impartial, we can criticize them.
We do that.
That's the First Amendment stuff.
But that too is our system.
And indeed, there are times when failures in the political system end up in the courts, failures in the court system end up in a legislative or an executive branch.
That's a part of our system.
So, Mark, I appreciate what is implicitly, implicitly in your comment here on Amicus, a law review.
Let's talk more about a Supreme Court, and that's the Wisconsin Supreme Court, that just this past week issued a major decision of its own.
Supreme Court routinely doing the same kinds of things.
which both marks this weekend have embraced and talked about, which is resolving differences.
Sometimes in unanimous opinion, sometimes not.
This past week, the United States Supreme Court, again, making decisions about those future cases, even while our Wisconsin Supreme Court is striking down an 1849 law, again, in a split court.
What happened just this past week?
Well, we know, we know.
that in 2022, at the pen of Justice Samuel Alito, the United States Supreme Court found that about 49 years of history in America, privacy rights that in here in the Constitution, a privacy right that gives women the right to make decisions about their own bodies.
pursue reproductive rights with their doctors, including the right and access to abortion.
That's, of course, Roe versus Wade.
That's Casey, other cases since 1973 overturned decisively, clearly, unmistakably in 2022, Supreme Court saying that Roe versus Wade was improperly, unfairly, unreasonably decided.
And so finding that there is, in fact, no, no privacy right.
inside the constitution, the federal constitution, therefore going back to the states and indeed we'll talk in just a moment or so about what the consequence of that has been across the country.
But one of the consequences right here in the state of Wisconsin is that we had
reference past tense, an 1849 law, basically an abortion ban here in the state of Wisconsin.
And basically that 1849 law said that anyone other than a pregnant woman who intentionally destroys the life of an unborn child could face six years in prison, a $10,000 fine, only exception to the abortion ban accomplished by that law back in 1849 was for what's called a therapeutic abortion to save the life
of the mother.
Well, again, a lot of controversy about that.
We, along the way, we had a lower court judge finding that the 1849 law does not prohibit abortion.
Appellate work on this, the Supreme Court at various times indicating that the case should be resolved.
And it goes into the Dane County courts back in 2023 finding that the 1849 ban was not valid.
And
all sorts of things going on in the lower courts that lead up to what happened just this past week in which a majority by four to three are striking down the ban, striking down the 1849 abortion ban and finding, finding that because of all the things that have happened, all the things that have happened since the time of 1849, that 1849 law was effectively rescinded, effectively no longer in place anyway.
The court basically,
saying that there's been so much legislation that contemplates implicitly, if not explicitly, that abortion is legal in the state of Wisconsin, that it plainly intended that the abortion ban no longer be in place.
Here's what the Supreme Court says, the Wisconsin Supreme Court says, in support of that conclusion.
The Supreme Court says comprehensive legislation
enacted over the last 50 years regulating in detail the who, what, where, when, and how of abortion, so thoroughly covers the entire subject of abortion that it was meant as a substitute for the 19th century near total ban on abortion.
That's what the Supreme Court said at his key ruling.
When we come back, we'll talk more about what that means here in the state of Wisconsin, what the court said, and indeed what it means throughout the United States of America as other states continue to wrestle with this issue of reproductive rights in America in the early part of the 21st century.
Stay with us for all of that.
This is Amicus, a law review.
My name is Jim Santel.
I am your host for these remaining segments of this second hour of our program here on the broadcast stations of Civic Media, celebrating, as we noted, the 249th anniversary of our nation.
And the processes of government, including the checks and balances among the executive branch and the judicial branch, the legislative branch, a constant recurring theme here on our broadcast.
Talking now about one of those branches of government actually involving many branches of the government here in the state of Wisconsin, the decision by our Wisconsin Supreme Court just this past week to find that this 1849 law that
that prohibited abortion in the state of Wisconsin no longer valid based upon all the legislative activities and events that have happened since the time of the passage of that law.
Once again, the majority writing that the who, what, where, when and how abortion in all those pieces of legislation so thoroughly covers all kinds of things related to the reproductive rights that plainly the 1849 law.
as we interpret it and understand the legislative intent can no longer stand.
The court along the way, to get a bit legalistic, says that it's historically set a very high bar for an implied repeal.
That's the legal term for by virtue of your conduct.
You haven't officially announced that you're repealing, but you have impliedly repealed the lower court or another court or previous decision.
But in this case, majority found that the legislature had met that
bar by entirely revising the state law on abortion, so had in fact engaged in an implied repeal of the 1849 law.
The court goes on to say indeed these statutes specify often in extraordinary detail the answer to nearly every conceivable question about abortion.
This is from the pen of Associate Justice Rebecca Dalla.
She's writing for the four to three majority.
She says, who may perform abortions?
Only doctors.
But about another question, where may abortions be performed?
Within 30 miles of a hospital where the doctor has admitting privileges.
Another question, when may abortions be performed?
prior to viability or 20 weeks of pregnancy, except when necessary to preserve the life or health of the mother or in a medical emergency.
What she's quoting from are all the pieces of legislation that have been enacted since 1849, again, impliedly repealing that law and finding that abortion is legal in the state of Wisconsin, clearly and dispositively, and health care providers can
provide this particular service to their patients as a part of the healthcare treatment given to them.
A significant decision not only, not only for reproductive rights and privacy rights here in the state of Wisconsin, but also for the way in which it was accomplished.
And plainly, we have dissenters to that.
There can continue to be dissenting views.
That's again, what we embrace about our nation and our state.
You can be critical of that opinion.
We embrace the
process and indeed that's what's going on in other states around the country taking this opportunity now to chat about what the status of abortion is across the country again in the wake of our own state supreme court 19 states 19 states ban abortion or restrict the procedure earlier in pregnancy than the standard that was set in roe versus Wade way back in 1973 that as I indicated once again that was the standard for about 49 years
and it was overturned in 2022.
In many states, in many states, the fight...
just as it was in Wisconsin until the just this past week, about abortion continues.
And that's taking place in all those different venues.
It's taking place in courtrooms where various advocates have sued to block bans and restrictions.
Other states have moved to expand access to abortion by adopting, in some cases, you've got constitutional amendments that they've enacted that have permitted abortion and privacy rights to be expanded.
And sometimes they've added legal protections
in those kinds of legislative and constitutional enactments.
And so what about the legality of abortion generally?
It is broadly legal, broadly legal, in about 31 states and the District of Columbia.
In Wyoming, the procedure remains legal for now, courts there determining whether separate laws banning most abortions can take effect.
So kind of a variation on what the Supreme Court here in Wisconsin was wrestling with, still going on in...
in Wyoming.
More than half of the states where abortion is legal limit the procedure as we do in Wisconsin to around fetal viability.
That's the word that we've all been wrestling with since Roe vs. Wade through Dobbs and beyond.
That's the point at which a fetus could survive outside the uterus and that's somewhere around 24 weeks of pregnancy.
It's one of the reasons why
Roe versus Wade was overcome, if you will, by the Casey case, did not rescind the right to an abortion, but just abandon a very, very structured mechanism for understanding trimesters.
Now, the principle in those states is viability.
somewhere around 24, four weeks or so.
Dozens of states, as I said, have added protections since the Dobs decision.
That's how they responded to the decision by the Supreme Court saying you no longer have a federal right, but they have done that to preserve or expand access to the right.
Many have passed abortion shield laws.
What are those all about?
Well, those provide legal protections for both patients and providers in states where abortion is legal and basically
shielding health care providers, arguably even the patients themselves from prosecution by other states that are out there.
Eight states have gone even further by enacting telemedicine shield laws that aim to protect doctors and others who prescribe and send abortion pills in the mail to patients located in states where the ban exists.
We saw that recently in the case involving New York.
and Texas, the sparring between the governors of those two states about whether an attempt to find a New York doctor responsible for prescribing to a patient in Texas is something that would be illegal there.
The governor of New York saying, not in my state, won't happen.
That's the shield concept.
When we come back, when we come back, we'll talk a little bit more about abortion, and then we'll get on to some other cases that have been decided in the criminal and civil courts just this past week here on Amicus, a law review.
This is amicus a law review my name is Jim Santel your host for these remaining segments in this weekend's analysis of all things rule of law related spending appropriately some time talking about this major decision of our Wisconsin Supreme Court that struck down this 1849 abortion ban
and finding that because the state legislature has done an awful lot of things when it comes to the who, what, where, when, how, and why of how reproductive services can be provided here in Wisconsin, what that implicitly means is that the 1849 law.
was never effective while all that legislation was being enacted, is not effective today, this implied repeal notion.
And because of all the questions that have been answered by subsequent legislation in the wake of 1849, the 1849 law no longer applies, began to talk a little bit more about the national scope of things and noting that yes indeed, as many people predicted on all sides of this aisle, that in the wake of the 2020,
22 decision written by Justice Alito finding once again that there is no privacy right in the Constitution to abortion.
In the wake of that, you will get a patchwork of states around the country that do this differently.
Indeed, that's exactly what you've got.
And this is not going to be an exhaustive presentation on all of that, but you do have places like Alabama and Arkansas and Louisiana and Mississippi and Oklahoma where
Abortion is banned in almost all circumstances.
You've got other places.
We've talked about some of these.
For example, remember the situation in Florida, for example, where there was an attempt to accomplish some changes there.
They were not effective in the end, but the result was that there is right now a six-week ban on abortion in the state of Florida.
And the people went to the polls in that state, attempted along the way to get a result.
And 2024, that's when a majority of voters supported that ballot measure that would have enshrined the right there in that state to abortion.
But it fell short, procedurally, of 60% of the voters needed to win.
And so today, there is a six-week ban on abortion in Florida.
Other places like Texas abortion is banned in almost all circumstances Private citizens can sue abortion providers and those who assist patients who are seeking an abortion after about six weeks of pregnancy That's in Texas at the other end of the spectrum got California the California Supreme Court recognized a right to abortion and
and voters explicitly there enshrined, codified abortion protections in the state constitution in 2022, the same year that Dobs was decided.
State law also shields those who are seeking or providing abortions in California from laws in other states, regardless of the patient's location.
That, for example, is in California, Massachusetts.
The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court has recognized
the right to abortion under the state constitution.
Viability is once again the standard there.
State law shields those seeking or providing abortions from those laws in other states.
We know that as well.
And as we go through the entire group here, for example, in Pennsylvania, there's a 24 week legal limit and executive order shields those seeking or providing abortions in Pennsylvania from laws in other states.
That also happening again.
in other states throughout.
the nation.
We know, for example, in Illinois, just to our south here in Wisconsin, once again, the standard is viability.
There, the state Supreme Court has recognized abortion protections under the state constitution.
State law does it once again protect the procedure and shield people seeking or providing abortions in Illinois from those other states.
All sorts of things going on throughout the United States of America.
Tennessee abortion is banned in
almost all circumstances.
New Hampshire abortion is not expressly protected by state law, but there's a 24 week standard there in that state.
And again, the point of this is we do, after Dobs, three years after Dobs, have a variety of different approaches across the country when it comes to the providing of reproductive services in America, very much predicted at the time that the Supreme Court issued that decision in Dobs.
It is true.
Now, Wisconsin takes its place where abortion is legal and viability, once again, about 24 weeks is the standard here in our state.
There have been other things going on in the courts of America.
We have not spent a lot of time here in Amicus, a lot of you talking about some of the other cases in the criminal context involving individual defendants.
Both of them, both of these particular cases, surfaced this week, although they've been percolating for a very long time in trial and in pretrial proceedings, respectively.
The first one involves Sean Combs, who know this well.
He was convicted just this past week of transporting prostitutes to participate in drug, drug fueled events, sex events,
that were described with great, great particularity in the weeks long trial, significantly, significantly in the jury after a lot of back and forth.
At one point they came forward and said, Judge, we cannot decide this case.
They acquitted him in the end of the principal charges, the major charges of racketeering conspiracy.
That's that RICO charge, the racketeer influenced and corrupt organizations act charge.
That's the big federal charge against him.
And also sex trafficking in violation,
of the federal criminal code.
Those were the most serious charges against him.
And the jury came back and said, we cannot find, we do not find, you guilty beyond a reasonable doubt of those major charges.
Undeniably a disappointment for the prosecutors.
Plainly a matter for some, maybe not jubilation, although Mr. Combs and his attorneys were both almost in a jubilant mood after the convictions were only for transport.
as a result of the jury verdict.
Plainly a disappointment for prosecutors who felt strongly and presented a strong case.
against this defendant in support of this racketeering charge.
It was at the core of the indictment against him.
This again, in federal court, this is a federal charge and the judge, Judge Aram Subramanian ordered Mr. Combs, who has been held at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn, back to jail until a sentencing, even on those other charges.
He remains in custody.
The attorneys will certainly seek his release and could return again to court to do just that very, very soon.
But all of that, all of that happening in a Manhattan federal courtroom just this past week.
across the country in Colorado.
Another case of great national notoriety, this one involving this fellow named Brian Coburger.
Recall the horrific events in this case as well.
He's this PhD student.
He's at the University of Idaho, Moscow, Idaho.
And you recall well that in November of 22,
He is responsible for killing, brutally murdering four University of Idaho students stabbed to death in the middle of the night in their home near campus.
Now, for a long period of time, obviously, Mr. Coburg remained his or retained and remained of the position that he was not guilty, took that posture.
As is his right, we recognize, like Mr. Combs, like Mr. Coburger, that charges are just that, that they do in fact convey a sense of probable cause that you have committed these crimes, but not, not proof beyond a reasonable doubt.
Now, now...
in a different disposition of the sort that we saw in Manhattan with respect to Sean Combs, there a verdict of a jury finding him guilty of some counts, not guilty of others.
He will still be sentenced there probably to somewhere around something less than the 20 years or so that he is exposed, but maybe several years in prison.
Coburger, Coburger did not go to trial, although every indication was that he was going to do just that.
In fact, what he does is he pleads guilty.
He pleads guilty there and he acknowledges in a plea hearing of just this past week that he did indeed murder those four students.
And that of course comes in the wake of an exhaustive investigation.
You may remember this involving DNA swabs and tying him across country.
where he was in Pennsylvania, to the murder back in Colorado, all kinds of fascinating law enforcement work done in support of the finding of probable cause first that he engaged in that horrific murderous homicidal conduct.
Now, once again, going to trial, he has a right to defend against that.
That trial right, he has now given up.
And the judge during the course of his plea colloquy says you're pleading guilty because you are guilty and Coburger responds yes.
And that means that there will be no trial in that case.
And once again, prompting some differing views about this position here, why?
Because of the circumstances under which he pled guilty.
By virtue of entering his plea, Mr. Coburger there in that court.
has said that, yes indeed, I acknowledge that under the law, the judge will be obliged to sentence me to prison for the rest of my life without parole.
He will spend the rest of his life in prison without a chance of parole.
What he does get out of this arrangement, the plea agreement, is that the prosecutors agree not to seek the death penalty, not to put him to death for the conduct that he was engaging in.
And that, plainly, like the Sean Combs verdict, which is causing some levels of disagreement and views in all directions, this one also.
prompting people, including members of the victim families.
Some of them are saying, yes, I am glad that we do not have to go through a trial where we have to hear about the circumstances and they are brutal and they are graphic that the investigators know about the situation involving his actual murder of these four.
Glad that we do not have to go through a trial.
Glad this is brought to an end and we can begin to move on, including a sentencing hearing at which the victim families
will plainly have the opportunity to speak.
That's they're called their right of allocution.
Others, others, both in families and also in the public, saying no.
He should have been tried and the government should have preserved the right to pursue the death penalty for this horrific nature of this conduct.
He should have been put to death.
Again, appropriate to have that discussion in America about the disposition.
Interestingly, we may find out more about it, but we still don't know exactly the motive for co-burgers engaging in this terrible.
terrible murderous rampage back in November of 2022.
Maybe, maybe we'll find out more at the sentencing and maybe not.
We do not know how that particular information piece will play out.
What we do know and the reason why I identify both of these cases completely different in venue and completely different in the nature of the charges against them, completely different in the context of the ways in which they were disposed of.
Again,
homes.
is the recipient of a jury verdict.
He went to trial.
He's got that right under our system to be tried by a jury.
The jury came back.
What can only be described as a split verdict?
He will still be sentenced by the judge and will probably, as I said, spend some time in prison.
Coburger decides to waive his right to a jury trial, which again is constitutionally guaranteed to him.
And in exchange for that, the prosecution says we will not seek what we could also
seek under the law, which is the imposition of the death penalty as to you.
And that is what he, Coburger,
receives as a result of this arrangement.
Now why again do I raise both of these things?
You've seen all of these dispositions in the news.
They are different and they are disparate not only in geography but also in disposition.
It is because even in the midst of these horrific events and yes indeed without now convicting Sean Combs of the sex trafficking and rico violations for which he was acquitted, the conduct itself
including the transportation of individuals for prostitution is condemnable.
We know that.
As we know that the murderous event in Utah, similarly so.
When we come back...
I'll draw this to a conclusion, explain why in both of these cases the rule of laws upheld and why without in any way celebrating these results, we should nonetheless acknowledge that justice, justice precedes a pace in America.
When we continue here on Amicus, Allah review.
This is Amicus, a law review.
My name is Jim Santel.
This is the final segment of our weekend, our Independence Weekend broadcast here on the broadcast stations of Civic Media.
We're talking about the broader implications of these two major cases that is involving this former criminology student in Idaho pleading guilty, admitting to killing brutally four Idaho students way back in November 22.
And at the other end of our nation, Sean Combs being acquitted of sex trafficking but found guilty of lesser charges involving transporting prostitutes.
What is the big takeaway again you have and should have and rightly do have views about the particular dispositions?
In America, we have the capacity under the First Amendment to speak out about those publicly, privately, and you have the right to express views about the dispositions of both of those cases, about any case, criminal or civil, in America.
What we can all agree on, what we can all agree on is we have processes in this nation, again, at a time when we are celebrating this weekend the independence of our nation in Middle East, 249 years ago, but the continuing
systems of justice in this nation that afford you the right, number one, to be told what the government is charging you with.
They give you the right to confront witnesses against you.
They give you the right to review the documents, the information assembled by the criminal prosecutors.
Give you the right to have counsel.
That's also a constitutional right.
Your opportunity to be heard in court, pretrial proceedings, and trial proceedings as well.
Give you the opportunity to testify.
on your own behalf if you'd like to do that, to cross-examine witnesses brought against you, even after a jury verdict, which you've got a right to as well, even after a plea, a plea itself is just chock-full of procedural safeguards, the judge asking you what you did and ensuring that your understanding completely, your waiver of your right to trial, all of that is a part of the American system of justice that we should embrace and acknowledge.
Even with its imperfections and its inadequacies, still works.
Both of these defendants will be sentenced.
And in that sentencing proceeding, they have a right, once again, to speak to the judge.
the judge is about the disposition of their cases.
The public has the right to come in, the family members, to talk about what happened to the victims of those crimes.
If there are any appellate proceedings, not likely in the Idaho case, but perhaps in the New York case, there again, more process, more procedure availed
to you in America by virtue of our system of constitutional law and statutory law as well.
And so it is a good thing on the 249th anniversary of our nation that we recognize that in the criminal arena, we afford defendants rightly an awful lot of very good and decent and appropriate procedure and process.
We call it due process in the civil side as well.
The civil side as well, we'll talk next week about this major case involving paramount and the decision to dispose of that case, a $16 million settlement of that 60 minutes lawsuit.
There again, you have a right to disagree about what will likely happen there, but you've also understand as you do that that process as well, a result of charges made, of discovery conducted, of depositions taken, and of a process that may be imperfect and may be inactive.
Adequate and maybe incomplete that results in the end with a disposition again an awful lot of people in all of those three cases including the Paramount CBS news case having very strong views which is also a part of our system here
in the United States of America, we celebrate that.
And we honor that on the 4th of July, this 4th of July, this Independence Day weekend when we come to you from civic media.
A couple more things just to note about the Department of Justice as we go forward beyond the 249th year into the 250th year.
That is some announcements coming out of the Department of Justice, Justice Department announcing that is aggressively prioritizing efforts to strip some Americans of their U.S.
citizenship established, the Department of Justice, past week, directing attorneys to prioritize denaturalization in cases involving naturalized citizens who commit certain crimes and giving United States attorneys.
throughout the 93 districts in our nationwide discretion, and went to pursue this tactic according to a mid-June memorandum that was distributed from the Attorney General to U.S.
attorneys nationwide.
Also, also, senior Justice Department officials are now exploring whether they can bring criminal charges against state or local election officials if the Trump administration determines they have not sufficiently safeguarded
They're voting computer systems.
The department's effort, again, it's early stages according to what the department is saying, not based on any new evidence or data, but premised upon this continuing unsubstantiated argument that American elections are easy prey to voter fraud.
The Department of Justice now exploring whether they can bring criminal charges against state officials, the clerks, presumably other people, if they fail to provide sufficient safeguards in their computer systems.
Again, no evidence.
that that's been done in the past, the failure to provide that.
But that is coming out of the Department of Justice as well.
We know that there are spokespeople for the Department of Justice that are conferring and confirming that indeed the Department of Justice is going down that road with respect to some future possible criminal charges against election officials, even while, again, in another area, another pursuit inside the Department of Justice directing these efforts
to strip Americans.
of their citizenship, denaturalization, the president has spoken a lot about that in recent times, was a tactic that is heavily used during the McCarthy era, 1940s, early 1950s, expanded a bit during the Obama administration and grew further during President Trump's first term.
It's meant to strip citizenship from those who may have lied about their criminal convictions or membership in illegal groups on their citizenship applications.
Denaturalization, again,
appropriately applied in some circumstances, a concern if it is applied to people who have not fallen into those categories of people who have failed to be honest about their naturalization process.
All of that, all of that coming out of your United States Department of Justice just this past week.
When we return next week, more things, more activities, more events in the areas of law,
and government, and the administration of justice here in the United States of America.
Have a good Independence Day weekend, everybody.
Take
care.
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