Transcript
Legal Battles and Rule of Law: From Oil Giants to Supreme Court Showdowns
Amicus: A Law Review · Sat Apr 18, 2026
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My name is Jim Santel.
I am your host both this hour and next hour as well as we discuss those major stories on the geography of
rule of law, administration of justice, and yes, the operation of government this week's agenda, again, is no disappointment in any of those areas.
There is a lot to discuss, and we'll be focusing both inside the courtrooms of America and one beyond America, and then also lots of things going on in the area of justice, administration, outside of the courts, and in our second hour this weekend,
We're going to be examining some of those as well.
As always, you are invited to be a part of our conversation.
our discussion, our exploration of many, if not all of those animating stories in our lives, in our livelihoods.
You can call in to this broadcast station of Civic Media at 855-752-4842.
My excellent producer, Max, will be here taking your phone calls.
You can also drop your comments, your questions, your inquiries, those things that prompt you to scratch your head.
into our civic media chat box and be a part of our discussion about these major issues in America and beyond.
Let me give you a general sense of the kinds of things on our chock full agenda or syllabus that ranges far and wide in all of those areas.
With a major case coming out of the Supreme Court, this once again, that time of year when the Supreme Court begins to issue some of its principal opinions among the 60 or so cases that it is reviewing in this term, we're gonna begin with its review of an examination of an opinion issued unanimously.
by the Supreme Court just this past week having to do with oil companies and where they can sue or be sued in federal court versus state court.
A major win for the oil companies.
A major loss in the environmental area.
We'll talk all about that.
We're also going to talk about what a federal jury, a federal jury, a trial jury did in New York finding that live nation providing tickets for us
for many, many years, is in fact a monopoly.
We'll talk about what that means coming out of that federal courtroom in New York.
Somewhat related to that, the decision by another federal judge finding that the merger of Dexter with another company has to be frozen, again, on anti-competitive reasons, that coming out of another federal court.
And finally, an appeals court telling Judge James Bosberg in Washington, DC, that he has to stop
pursuing the administration on his claims that the administration may have lied to him back in March 15th of 2025 and in the times since that date in connection with those
of those movements of large numbers of migrants from this country to El Salvador.
We'll talk all about what the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit has done in preventing a federal district court judge named James Bosberg from going ahead to find out exactly who did what, when did they know things, what kinds of misrepresentations were made to the court,
in the past year or so then, in other areas, a series of losses for the Trump administration for this White House, beginning in Rhode Island, a federal judge ruling that the government cannot have state voter rolls coming out of Rhode Island, a second case in South Florida.
in which a federal district court judge dismissed that frivolous lawsuit brought by our president against the Wall Street Journal alleging defamation.
We'll talk all about that as well.
And then, yes indeed, once again, in the continuing battle over the east wing of the White House and the construction there, non-construction there, the ballroom, we'll talk about what a federal district court judge did to stop.
at least the above ground construction going on.
And finally, in the capacity of federal judges acting in America, we will talk about a recent decision of a local federal district court judge, his name is Lynn Adela, now setting a sentencing date, a time for the sentencing of Hannah Dugan.
the former Wisconsin Circuit Court judge in Milwaukee County.
We'll talk about that and give you some reporting on what that means going forward as well.
We're going to move overseas then and talk, as we sometimes do, about the rule of law in other venues, again focusing on France and a major case that is redefining corporate responsibility when it comes to terrorism.
and support of terrorism, a finding by a French judge that a major cement manufacturer, a major cement manufacturer, not just in France, but across the planet, responsible for supporting terrorism through its activities, principally financial, we'll chattel a little bit about that as well.
And then, as I promised, going outside of the courts, straddling some court issues, but also moving beyond the courts,
We'll talk about a very rare apology again from the Supreme Court and associate justice of the Supreme Court apologizing to another.
We'll explain what that is all about.
We're going to move across the parking lot there on Capitol Hill to tell you all about a congressional vote extending FISA.
at least for a little while.
That, of course, is the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, FISA.
We'll talk about the dispute about whether or not FISA should be extended and some strange bedfellows there on Capitol Hill.
That also a part of the rule of law action in our nation's capital this past week, and then moving further down Pennsylvania to the U.S.
Attorney's Office, headed up by Jeanine Pirro, as you well know, and her efforts.
which are successful in one area, to charge some employees of the Psychiatric Institute of Washington with criminal negligence and their failure to keep alive one of their patients a fascinating case involving intersection of health care and criminal prosecution, and then also, much more curiously,
an attempt by some of the investigators and attorneys from the U.S.
Attorney's Office there in the District of Columbia to get into the Federal Reserve, apparently as a part of their continuing attempt to investigate Jay Powell.
perhaps others involved in the renovation of the Federal Reserve there.
It is curious and it is a lot.
And then, at time permitting, we'll talk about some things going on in the Labor Department.
We'll talk about what a state prosecutor has done in Minnesota, charging ICE agents for their activities, and one in particular, involved in the brandishing of a weapon.
at Citizens Residence there in Minneapolis back in February.
We'll talk about John Eastman, remember him?
Disparred now by the California Supreme Court and then also the decision by the Department of Justice to remove from the ranks of those attorneys who are investigating Brennan and the focus there in an attempt to pursue John Brennan in that forum.
Allegedly for making statements to the Congress that are perjuries, the product, rather, of perjury, we'll talk all about that and the curious way in which that matter is going ahead.
in South Florida.
All of that is coming up here on Amicus, a law review.
And again, you can be a part of our discussion by calling in at 855-752-4842.
That number, once again, 855-752-4842.
Let us begin as I indicated by talking
all about the United States Supreme Court, as we often did this past week, late this past week on Friday, the Supreme Court issuing one of its major environmental rulings, which it has not done in a while, determining that some major energy companies who are facing lawsuits over environmental damage to Louisiana's coast area from oil and gas production there can in fact move.
They can remove cases
challenging their actions from the state courts into much friendlier federal venues, friendlier federal courts in particular.
The ruling, undeniably a success for major oil companies like Chevron and Exxon, it goes on in the midst of a legal battle, which is environmental, about who should pay for the state's coastal erosion in that particular area.
Justices
in a rare show of unanimity unanimously agreeing to allow the oil companies to remove those cases basically to petition the the court and fighting them in federal court as opposed to the state courts which are traditionally more friendly to these kinds of environmental cases just as Clarence Thomas writing for the majority writing for a unanimous court here says this
Congress has long authorized federal officers and their agents to remove suits brought against them in state court to federal court.
The case is Chevron versus Plaquemines Parish in Louisiana.
It focuses again upon this narrow question of whether the oil companies can remove, can basically remove from the courts there into federal courts.
cases involving environmental damage that are affecting the future livelihood of that area.
State courts, again, generally thought to be more receptive to people
who sue over damages caused by climate change, including things happening right there along the shore of Louisiana.
This particular parish, which is the state's southernmost parish, you've got an area of physical land that's jutting out into the water where the Mississippi River meets the Gulf of Mexico.
This particular area is crisscrossed with oil and gas canals,
long been there, has already lost nearly half of its size in the last century, as sea levels have risen because of climate change.
The parish, this particular geographic area, also becoming a whole lot more vulnerable to storms, in part because those levees, which we heard a lot about during Katrina, of course, levees intended to shield New Orleans and other areas from flooding, also deprived those coastal areas
of some of the freshwater, access, and the sediment that would otherwise be a part of that geographic land.
Canals that aid in oil and gas production have also weakened the ecosystem, all of that according to the lawsuits and the experts that support those lawsuits.
Among other things, it is reported that Louisiana has a $50 billion master plan
to try to preserve some of this, to keep the coastal land, including more than 100 projects, to dredge sand, to rebuild marshes there, and to add flood protection measures, including some of those levees and some storm surge barriers.
The plan, again, responding to these major environmental crises there, intended to create tens of thousands of acres of new land
and to shore up what remains.
But the issue here again is where can these challenges?
Where can these challenges be brought?
Well, the lawsuit initially brought, again, in the state court there in Louisiana, a whole lot more friendly, or at least it's thought to be more friendly, to these kinds of lawsuits for damages.
And the Supreme Court saying the companies can in fact remove them, can bring them from the state courts into the federal court there.
Justice Thomas explained that the oil company had cleared the bar required to move the case into federal court.
Because the lawsuit dealt with oil production in Louisiana dating way back to the Second World War when Chevron, again one of the targeted companies there, had refined crude oil into aviation gasoline for the U.S.
military, he writes that Chevron had shown that it's wartime production.
of crude oil related to its wartime aviation gasoline refining for the military is in fact a federal priority.
Therefore, they can bring their lawsuit, continue their lawsuit, move their lawsuit into federal court.
That from the Supreme Court.
Just this past week, when we come back, we'll talk about what's going on in other courts around our nation here on Amicus, a law review.
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Honor, delighted that you have chosen to spend some portion of your weekend in review with me of some of the major stories in the areas of rule of law, administration of justice, the operation of government beginning in our first segment with this review of a major Supreme Court case having to do with where
The prosecution and defense of some of these major environmental cases should proceed.
This one in Louisiana, the Supreme Court siding with oil companies telling them that they can in fact remove basically transplant cases from the state courts that are typically more friendly to these kinds of environmental cases.
Remove those into federal court.
The Trump administration not surprisingly joined the case in the side of those oil companies.
and argued that the cases should be tried in federal court.
There's another interesting aspect of this case, and that it also involves a recusal.
The justices are unanimous, but there are only eight of them who heard this case because, just as Sam Alito recused himself in the days before the oral argument, he was pointing at the time to some financial interest that he holds in Conoco Phillips, which is the parent corporation of the Burlington Resources Oil and Gas Company.
The company had withdrawn from the court filings, but they still were hanging around in the lower court cases.
And so in what we should acknowledge is a good thing when justice is opined, when they conclude that they've got a conflict of interest of some sort, Justice Sammelita recusing himself saying, I should not be a part of this because of my past connections, the financial interest he holds in one of these oil companies.
that I would offer to you is good news because it means that perhaps the justices a bit more focused on those things that they should be attentive to when it comes to conflicts of interest.
This one, Sam Alito doing it, resulting in an eight-member majority, a unanimous.
Supreme Court finding that removal can in fact happen on behalf of these oil companies Let's move to a jury and in particular a jury in New York Also in a federal court major news this past week for all of us because it involves ticketmaster a federal jury just this past week
Finding that live nation, you know what that is, that's that concert giant that owns Ticketmaster has operated, yes, that's right, as a monopoly.
And that, the jury found, was in violation of federal and state anti-trust laws, a hugely watched case because of its implications for Ticketmaster.
The ways in which we all buy tickets for major entertainment events, the jury deliberating for four days after a long trial, which saw lots of experts, lots of executives, lots of people testifying about the impacts
of the so-called, again, concert giant ticket master having this monopoly over the ways in which we purchase tickets.
The judge overseeing the case, named Arum Sabranemian, is now going to determine the remedies in a separate proceeding.
So the jury finds that the company is in fact liable.
Now the question is, what should the judge do in response to that?
How do you remedy that in some way?
that could include some significant divestments by Live Nation, some financial divestments of its assets, could even include maybe a breakup of Live Nation and Ticketmaster, somehow changing their structure, and all of that, all of that coming in the midst of an awful lot of focus on Ticketmaster.
Live Nation could also face monetary damages as a result of the jury's verdict.
The law suit itself was brought by about 33 different states along with the Washington, D.C.
and the jury determining once again that ticket master in the refined aspects of its finding had overcharged consumers, that's you and me, about a dollar and 72 cents for each ticket that it sold.
The judge again now has responsibility for setting
overall damages, and doing those other things, whether somehow divesting Live Nation and Ticketmaster of some of its assets, dividing it up, restructuring in some ways, all of that, all of that now in front of the Federal District Court Judge going ahead.
A seven-week trial, seven-week trial in all of this, and of course, not without its contest, Live Nation denying all along the way that it has had, in any way, engaged in any sort of monopolistic behavior,
and denying that it threatened venues to sign deals with Ticketmaster or else risk losing access to live nations.
concert tours and other popular events.
The lawyer for Live Nation said, we are fierce competitors, he said.
He told the jury in closing argument, we are simply trying to win the business.
Now, whatever, whatever the judge may do in this case, and we'll continue to monitor that here on this broadcast, it will certainly likely shift the competitive landscape
in this huge concert business where Live Nation has been just huge, really without any equal.
Here's some statistics for you.
Last year, the company put on 55,000 events and sold about 646 million tickets around the world.
And according to testimony, again, during this weeks long trial,
Ticketmaster sells about 10 times as many tickets as its closest rival, AEG.
And that's where you get.
That's where the anti-competitive allegations come in.
And as a result of the verdict on Wednesday, not surprisingly, shares of Live Nation on the stock market fell by about 6%.
The trial featured testimony from some top executives
of Live Nation again denying that there was any involvement in any sort of business related events or conspiracies that would in any way have resulted in some sort of skewing of the business.
No monopoly creation there.
The leaders of Live Nation testify.
And it's a complaint filed way back in 2024.
The government had accused Live Nation contrary to what those Live Nation executives have said of operating this illegal monopoly, doing what specifically stifling that competition.
hindering innovation preventing people from being creative in this area in the live entertainment industry driving up ticket prices a jury now saying yes they agree with those complaints we'll hear more about this down the road we'll continue talking about what's happening in the courts of america right after this break here on amicus a lot of you
My name is Jim Santel and this is Amica Solaroview.
We are talking once again about courts in America because they define so much of who we are and how we act in our nation and on the face of this planet.
A couple of major cases involving commerce and monopolies and those kinds of things that are alleged in federal sometimes state court as well already told you about
this jury finding in New York, finding that Live Nation is acting as a monopoly in a victory for the states that brought this lawsuit when it comes to ticket prices, that coming out of a federal court, a federal jury in New York.
Here's another one.
This one is coming out of the Eastern District of California, the opposite side of the nation, a federal judge, not a jury in Sacramento, just this past week, entering in junction.
That's basically, as you know well, an order stopping something from happening.
temporarily preventing a television giant named Nexstar, NEXSTAR, Nexstar from combining its operations with the station group Tegna, T-E-G-N-A.
It is a huge skirmish across the nation, certainly in California, having to do with who's gonna control the local airwaves.
The judge in this case, his name is Troy Nunley, N-U-N-L-E-Y.
He is presiding over this and he said in his ruling that next star, another station owner would have to take steps to remain separate from Tegnar while all of these proceedings are continued.
Judge Unley wrote this.
He said, next star must permit Tegnar to continue operating as a separate and distinct independently managed business suit from next star.
And he went on to say, next star must put measures in place to maintain Tegna as an ongoing economically viable and active competitor.
All of that coming out of the federal district court again in Sacramento just this past week.
Now next star and Tegna again to give you some of the factual predicates of all of this.
There are two of the largest television groups in our nation.
They had agreed.
to merge last year and what's about a six point two billion dollar deal an arrangement between them that put many many stations under the umbrella of next star the biggest local broadcaster nationwide the company says it controls or provide services to a whopping 201 stations reaching get this about 39% of households
in the United States of America.
And of course, all of this goes forward in the
situation where the companies are in fights with others who maintain that that's just too much.
Direct TV, a major satellite TV provider, as you know well, filed this lawsuit to block the merger saying it would drive up consumer costs.
Again, that anti-competitive spirit reduced local competition.
A number of states, including New York and California, Colorado, Oregon, also sued.
Next Star responded, as you can well imagine, to the ruling late this past week with a statement saying its merger with Tegnar had already happened.
It's too late, they said, judge.
And it had received approval already from the Federal Communications Commission and from the Department of Justice in Washington DC.
We've already done this.
The leadership of the company said this transaction closed more than four weeks ago.
Next Star media group now owns Tegna.
question about whether or not the judge's order comes too late, the merger here again supported by the Trump administration that had described this merger as a team up that would provide more competitive aspects against national TV networks, which you referred to as the enemy in a post on social media, that coming out from our president.
The ruling, of course, also in the midst of a time when states
and private actors as we're seeing in these lawsuits are stepping up.
There's scrutiny of corporate America while the Trump administration for the Department of Department of Justice and others including of course the Federal Communications Commission is settling these antitrust lawsuits and these consumer protection lawsuits.
The live nation
lawsuit, the jury verdict that we saw before, that's a part of this overall effort as well.
There are other aspects of this previously.
The U.S.
Court of Appeals for the Ace Circuit had tossed out aspects of the FCC rules that restrict the number of television stations, limit the number of stations nationwide that one company can own,
in a local market again as a part of this move to ensure that competition is alive and well.
And all of that, as the FCC also is assessing now, whether it should modify some rules that prohibit any individual broadcaster from reaching more than 39% of households in the country, a move that of course could also
bring about a great flurry of deal-making.
Litigation, of course, remains in progress, but a federal judge once again this past week out in California saying, at least for now, they've got to remain separate.
The companies themselves saying it's too late.
We're all ready together.
We'll see more from, again, Sacramento and other places around the country as this competition, this anti-monopoly or monopoly perspective in our courts continues no small thing.
no small thing for all of us to be attentive to.
And then, and then we also have this going back to Washington DC, a common focus of our attention, our review, our reporting here on Amicus Law Review.
And that is the work of James Bosberg.
You may recall well that it was James Bosberg who are a little bit more than 13 months ago now, March, March 15th or so of this past year of 2025.
was the one who directed the U.S.
Department of Justice to stop those planes from taking individuals without due process from this country to that high security prison in El Salvador.
Ever since then, ever since those planes never came back, never returned any of them, with a notable exception of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, you know his case well,
None of that in compliance with what Judge Bosberg had said, which is bring those planes back, turn them around, return all of those folks to this country, not because they may not be deportable, but because they have not been afforded due process.
The judge has bemoaned the fact that the U.S.
Department of Justice and Homeland Security has failed to follow up on his directives, prompting him repeatedly, stops and starts along the way, as we reported, to initiate contempt proceedings.
Trying to figure out why it is the government has failed to follow his directives, who is responsible, who knew what from him, when,
Under what circumstances were his orders directed to Homeland Security and the Department of Justice, and why weren't they complied with?
He's been doing that off and on for the past year or so, as I said, just about 14 months or so altogether.
And now, and now, just this past week, a federal appeals court, a divided federal appeals court in Washington, D.C.
has told him to stop.
and end this contempt inquiry into these deportation flights of early last year.
The federal appeals court is once again weighing in on whether or not a federal district court judge can entertain this kind of contempt proceeding with respect to the conduct of
what really is a Department of Justice that's simply saying no to a federal district court judge.
Judge Bosberg, again, trying repeatedly for the past more than a year, trying to figure out a simple answer to what may be a complex question, whether some of the White House aides other people at the Department of Justice had deported the immigrants to El Salvador.
using this 18th century wartime law in violation of Judge Bosberg's clear order, not to expel them from the country without first giving them what, giving them the due process, the chance to be heard to challenge their removal.
This is a two to one ruling.
Again, you've got a three judge panel in the US Court of Appeals.
for the District of Columbia, killing off what Judge Bosberg has described as his attempt to try to figure out what's going on, the Court of Appeals describing his work as an improper investigation, and this would now obviously shut down any attempt to figure out why it is the Department of Justice was not complying, was saying no to him, we're not going to give you the information, we're not going to give you the responses that you want.
The hearings, as you may recall from our past reporting on this, have focused on the testimony from a Justice Department whistleblower named Arez Rouvenny, R-E-U-V-E-N-Y, and Drew Ensign.
We talked about them in many broadcasts past.
He's a senior department lawyer.
The same appeals court temporarily paused those proceedings shortly before they were set to be held.
And so we've never had the testimony of these two people who presumably know.
know what happened inside the Department of Justice.
The panel's latest decision, yes, they've dealt with this before, to shut them down altogether after finding that Judge Bosberg had engaged in what they called an abuse of discretion by seeking their sworn testimony from members inside the executive branch.
The judge, her name is Naomi Rao, our AO.
She has been a part of other major decisions there at the Court of Appeals.
She said this, she said, these proceedings improperly threaten and open ended, freewheeling inquiry into executive branch decision making.
On matters of national security that implicate ongoing military and diplomatic initiatives, this judicial intrusion into the autonomy of a co-equal department cannot be remedied by a later appeal from a contempt conviction.
Now, needless to say, that sharp rebuke of what Judge Bosberg has been doing does not come without criticism itself.
And needless to say, a two-to-one result here coming out of the panel, meaning that there was dissent.
Judge Michelle Childs issued one of those dissenting opinions.
She criticizes her colleagues for this opinion for ending an inquiry that could have embarrassed this administration shutting it down.
She says this, contempt of court is a public offense.
And the fate of our Democratic Republic will depend on whether we treat it as such.
Judge Childs, again, she's the minority, she's the loser, the losing judge in this three-judge panel.
She writes, in the many forms in which it can be committed, contempt degrades the power that the people
Through their Constitution and Congress gave the federal courts, without the contempt power, Judge Childs writes, the rule of law is an illusion, a theory that stands upon shifting sands.
And indeed, it was on March 15th that we first began to see the constitutional crisis that we have talked about a lot, not only in Judge Bosberg's courtroom, but also in many others around the country.
And Judge Childs, Childs, stating clearly,
this past week, that the effort and the successful attempt to shut down these kinds of findings, contempt determinations, those are undermining the rule of law, even as the constitutional crisis continues.
Judge Bosberg now, come Monday, no longer able to continue with that major activity that he has been pursuing in his court, trying to figure out what the Department of Justice has been.
doing in other parts of the country, in other parts of the country, not nearly as successful for Donald Trump and the administration and the White House.
Let's talk about at least three of those cases also coming out of federal courts.
A common theme on this broadcast, federal courts
the safeguards of our democracy, the ones who are providing the guardrails against these attacks on our Constitution, on the rule of law, and the ways in which we do business.
Let's talk about three federal judges in three different areas doing things of huge importance and then perhaps of less importance.
We'll talk about all of those three now.
Let's begin with one of those having to do with voting.
We know well that the Justice Administration has been requesting, from all states across the country, voter rolls.
Voter rolls on the basis that they are attempting to identify something that does not exist, which is voter fraud.
Well, this past week, a federal district court judge weighed in on a lot of that.
Federal judge on Friday rejecting the department justice efforts in Rhode Island.
to get the voter rolls, that sense of information there.
When we come back after this break, I'll tell you what the judge did in that case, and why it's so important going forward, not just in Rhode Island, but across America.
All of that here on Amicus, a lot of
you.
Find the latest news, information, and archives of all your favorite shows on the Civic Media website, civicmedia.us.
Once again, spending a lot of our time this weekend reviewing what Federal District Court judges are doing around the country.
upholding the Constitution, upholding the statutes passed by our Congress, and in particular, coming out of Rhode Island just this past week, a federal district court judge, her name is Mary McElroy, M-C, E-L-R-O-Y.
She is rejecting.
She is telling the Justice Department, no, you cannot force the state of Rhode Island to turn over sensitive voter information.
Again, this is the latest blow to the Trump administration.
And it's attempts, which have been going on for a long time, to gain access to voter registration limits and all sorts of other things that are a part of our voter registration records throughout the nation.
You may recall well that the Justice Department, as reported here previously, has sued about 30 states in the District of Columbia after officials in those various venues around the country basically said, no, we're not handing over our voter rolls.
Why are those so important?
Well, they contain the names and the birth dates and driver's license numbers and partial social security numbers as well.
District Court Judge Mary McElroy says that the government cannot have that information.
She writes a 14 page decision.
that the Justice Department's effort was, in her words, a fishing expedition not authorized by federal election laws.
She also denied a motion from this administration from the Department of Justice that sought to force the Rhode Island Secretary of State, his name is Greg Amor, M-A-A-M-O-R-E, to hand over the voter data.
The state of course is supportive of this decision and the secretary of state there says voter list maintenance is a responsibility entrusted to the states and I that is the state official remain confident in the steps we take here in Rhode Island to keep our list as accurate as possible the dismissal again of this Rhode Island lawsuit marks the fifth loss by my count counted five altogether
for the Justice Department as it tries to do what?
Tries to access these state voter registration roles and lists around the country.
The judges, our federal judges around the country have also dismissed lawsuits seeking the same kind of information in places like California and Oregon and Michigan and in Massachusetts as well.
Now, how has the Department of Justice justified its efforts to go after to get these lists?
The answer is,
It's claimed that it needs this information in order to ensure that states are complying with two federal laws, two federal laws that require states to undertake efforts to maintain accurate voter registration lists.
Those two laws are the National Voter Registration Act and the Help America Vote Act.
Of course, both of those lawsuits, all the lawsuits and both of those statutes,
are premised upon the notion that somehow there's huge voter fraud going on.
We know that that's not the truth at all.
And Judge McElroy, the judge again, writing her decision, kind of picks up on that.
She writes her decision that government's demand for the Rhode Island voter data lacked any factual allegations, she says, suggesting that the state may be violating requirements for maintaining voter registration, this actually in violation of other laws.
She said the Justice Department's purpose stated in the Attorney General's demand
purportedly to ensure compliance with the NVRA and the HAVA those are the two statutes that are the predicate for these lawsuits does not plausibly relate to individual voting rights no connection between the protection of the franchise and access to the polls and and the purposes for which the government wants this which is to root out
voter fraud, which again doesn't exist.
Interestingly, the Justice Department had not previously acknowledged that it intends to provide voter information from the states to the Department of Homeland Security until recently, and to use that information for immigration and some law enforcement purposes right inside that agency.
But media sources determined that the Departments of Justice and Homeland Security were actually close, fairly close, coming in on an arrangement.
about how the data that they would be getting would in fact be shared between them and a government lawyer in this Rhode Island case acknowledged.
This is a good thing when the government lawyers are honest with the judges, right?
We've had some problems with that in the past 14 months.
When the government lawyer acknowledged to the Rhode Island judge
these plans to share information so it can be run through the Homeland Security databases to see if non-citizens are registered to vote.
That, according to the judge, not a legitimate reason for doing this without a factual predicate to believe that non-citizens are voting.
They're simply not in anywhere near the numbers, if at all, across America.
Of course, the president continues to maintain that non-citizens are voting.
That is in part the predicate for the various iterations of this thing called the Save America Act, which among other things would, as we have said before, required Americans to show proof of citizenship in person, to register to vote in federal elections, and would also implement some voter photo ID requirements for voting that would disenfranchise major sections of our population, including those
including women who may have changed their names during the course of their lives.
The Save America Act has not recently passed the Congress and not like to do so anytime soon.
It did pass the House back in February, but failed in the Senate.
Even so, we've got a federal district court judge who's telling the U.S.
Department of Justice has passed.
We go away.
I don't want to hear this claim
that you're entitled to the Rhode Island voter registration lists and information plainly precedent for other lawsuits around the country.
And then we've got even more, a couple of losses directed at the president himself, maybe not personally, but certainly this is official capacity and coming pretty close to home.
A judge has halted the above ground construction of President Trump's White House ballroom.
and said because the president has failed to provide information about how that's to go forward, that cannot happen.
When we come back in our second hour, I'll tell you more about that and other lawsuits in which the president has not been successful.
Stay with us here on the broadcast stations of Civic Media.
I'm your host for this, the second hour of our weekend broadcast, as always, inviting your comments, your questions.
Your inquiries about anything on our syllabus by calling in at 855-752-4842, that number, once again, where you can talk with Max and be a part of our discussion, 855-752-4842.
We are talking, as we often do, about federal district court judges, things going on inside our courtroom a little bit later in this, the second hour of our broadcast.
We're going to do those things that straddle both inside and outside the courtrooms and talk about things not necessarily the products of federal courts and federal juries.
But right now, we are talking a lot about federal judges because once again, the actions of the administration and of our president in particular have prompted a lot of litigation nationwide.
Among other things, the decision by the president.
to tear down to tear down the east wing of the White House in October to make space for that 90,000 square foot ballroom that he's apparently financing with about 50 million dollars raised from corporate donors and some political allies that still in court and in fact it gets the attention.
This past week, it's continuing attention by Federal District Court Judge Richard Leon, L-E-O-N.
We've talked about him before.
He's another Federal District Court Judge.
He is in Washington, D.C.
and he said that above ground construction on the president's White House ballroom has to stop, has to halt until lawmakers, the Congress and others, authorized the project.
He said the president appeared intent on skirting a previous order of his
by redefining the ballroom project as a critical national security upgrade, the judge isn't buying it.
Judge Leon said that adding features like bulletproof windows and other standard security features that exist throughout the White House does not exempt the ballroom project from his directives.
He said this in particular, national security is not a blank check to proceed with otherwise unlawful activity.
the judge has paused his order for a week to give the president until about April 23rd to pursue a new appeal, and he wrote that his new order would allow the administration to continue to work below ground, below ground, including on construction of a bunker that the administration said is necessary for national security.
Now, there's some history here that's relevant.
Judge Leon had previously agreed
to allow work on the project to continue, but only temporarily to allow for this appeal.
And appeals court then agree that work could continue, but only until mid-April to allow time for Judge Leon to weigh in again on the arguments that the Trump administration was making that the project is necessary to provide, to create these national security improvements.
That's a lot.
There's a lot of procedure going on here, but in April,
in April, nearly four months after litigation earlier this month, judge Leon sided with the National Trust for Historic Preservation.
That's the organization that's charted by the Congress to protect historical sites and buildings.
And that entity sued to stop the sudden redevelopment of the White House.
Almost immediately after Judge Leon concluded that the president had bypassed congressional oversight, and here's the rub, the president and his staff began to describe the project in different ways.
We'll justify this in a different way, the White House said.
Previously complaining about the lack of, say for example, indoor space for major events at the White House, again, he's right about that, but he's proposing this ballroom as a practical solution.
for the limitations on these very public, sometimes international events, gatherings of hundreds of people.
But this month, this April,
His lawyers went into court again before the judge and said we've got a new concept here judge This is less about adding event space and more about overhauling the security of the White House compound and sure enough in recent weeks the administration has said that the ballroom is is the is only the above-ground portion of what really is a sprawling bunker complex they said that the military has helped plan as a replacement
There's something called the Presidential Emergency Operations Center.
Well, the judge again says, I'm not agreeing with all that.
And in particular said that previously that he would block construction because most of the concerns about security of the complex had been created by launching the construction hastily, tearing down the East Wing.
And then only afterwards figuring out what's going on.
And he says this following up on that previous and continuing theme of this.
He says, while I take seriously the government's concerns regarding the safety and security of the White House grounds and the president himself, the existence of a large hole beside the White House is of course a problem of the president's own making.
There's an exclamation point after that sentence in the judge's order.
And again, the president had seized on this narrow security exception to try to justify this.
The result of that this week is that the judge says, no, I see through this.
And in fact, while you can continue to work on those things below ground to enhance national security, the above ground stuff, that's got to finish.
Trump, the Trump social media response to that was just this, from our president.
The president has written a Trump-hating Washington D.C.
district court judge, a man who has gone out of his way to undermine national security and to make sure that this
Great gift, capital G, capital G, to America gets delayed or doesn't get built, is attempting to prevent presidents and world leaders from having a safe and secure, large scale meeting place or ballroom.
All that's from the president on his social media outlet.
In a second message, the president writes, too much hard work, time and money spent in order that a judge can claim that he ruled against Donald Trump.
all capital letters, something which I have gotten very used to, but will not accept also all capital letters.
The administration has immediately appealed this decision to the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, more of that to come.
The National Trust, which is advocating for the stopping of this, has described this ballroom as a vanity project, sacrificing a large portion of, of course, the East Wing, this historical structure.
To satisfy what they described at the President's whims and leave his personal imprint on the building, National Trust arguing that the administration has now shifted goals with its security agreements and has urged Judge Leon to adopt this new theory to permit the continued construction
of this building more of that to come from the court of appeals and presumably from judge leon at some point down the road and the president lost again in another federal lawsuit this one this one into the south the southern district of florida at the hand of judge darin gales g-a-y-l-e-s he's a federal district court judge southern district of florida
dismissing, dismissing outright, this is not an injunctive order, dismissing outright what?
The President's Trump's $10 billion defamation lawsuit, you may remember this one well, against the publisher of the Wall Street Journal over the reporting in that media outlet,
of his lewd birthday card greeting to written to sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
You have seen this reporting previously.
The district court judge saying in a decision that the president has not plausibly alleged, those are his words, that the Wall Street Journal published the article with actual malice.
That's a reference to New York Times versus Sullivan.
That's the very high standard you've got to meet to attack successfully.
a representative and agency of the media, the judge finding no plausible allegation of actual malice here, meaning that the newspaper knew or should have known what it was publishing was false and had acted with reckless disregard.
as to the accuracy of that information.
That's the New York Times versus Sullivan standard that's been around for a long time.
The judge finding that the president has not met that standard.
He dismissed the complaint without prejudice, which again means the president could bring it back if he wants to.
And a spokesman for Mr. Trump's legal team.
quoted as saying that the president would refile quote this powerhouse lawsuit.
Well, the district court judge begs to disagree with that.
Lawyers for the Wall Street Journal asked the judge dismiss the lawsuit, arguing that it was plainly the article that they've written was true and the defamation claim was complete and false.
They'd argued for the dismissal of this outright with prejudice.
They had also maintained inside the substance that the
The article could not be defamatory to the president because the conduct described in the article was consistent with his reputation.
Again, the conduct being that the president had authored had written this birthday card and that the Wall Street Journal had written about it in back in July with a headline.
Jeffrey Epstein's friends sent him body letters for his 50th birthday album.
In that article, once again, the judge dismissing this lawsuit alleging defamation, described a letter that appeared to be from Donald Trump in a 2003 birthday album compiled for Epstein.
You recall this because it has a visual aspect too.
The article said that the letter had a drawing of a naked woman on it with Trump's signature below her waist and a message that read happy birthday and may every day be another wonderful secret.
That's what the president sued on.
The judge dismissing that lawsuit saying no defamation, no even approaching the standard that any petitioner, including the president, would need to meet to satisfy
the high standard of a viable lawsuit.
So the president again suffering a couple of setbacks in federal courts.
Above gone construction of his ballroom can't continue and his Wall Street Journal lawsuit also also
now stopped there in South Florida.
And finally, and finally in the area of federal district court judges around the country, coming back to the Eastern District of Wisconsin, and in particular, a decision made by Judge Lynn Edelman.
You recall, well, he is the federal district court judge here in the Eastern District of Wisconsin.
He sits in Milwaukee in the federal courthouse right there in Wisconsin Avenue in downtown Milwaukee.
Recall, he presided over the trial, the criminal trial of former
Wisconsin Circuit Court Judge Hannah Dugan.
She was convicted of obstructing federal agents from carrying out an immigration enforcement operation at the Milwaukee County Courthouse last year, accusing the judge at that time, the Department of Justice, of obstruction of federal agents by helping an undocumented man evade those agents.
They were there to arrest him.
in the Milwaukee County Courthouse in April of last year.
Prosecutors again saying that Dugan told the agents to go to the Chief Judge's office down in the building and then directed the man and his attorney to leave through a related or an adjacent door.
All of that as you call well the subject of a jury trial in which a jury found now former Wisconsin Circuit Court Judge Hannah Dugan guilty of
fell in the obstruction, but not guilty of a misdemeanor charge that accused her basically of helping the undocumented man evade the agents.
The judge did in fact resign early in January of this year.
But the case, the case not proceeding to sentencing until recently.
The judge, as reported last week, has denied some post-verdict motions, including claims and encouragement from the defense to dismiss the case entirely.
The judge now setting the sentencing hearing for Judge Dugan when we come back.
I'll tell you all about that and what we can expect next in this important case pending right here in Wisconsin.
when Amica Solar Review continues.
My name is Jim Santel and this is Amicus, a law review here in the broadcast stations of civic media.
We're spending much of our time once again this weekend talking about what federal judges and in just a moment or so, what a foreign judge in the Republic of France overseas has done to affect to accomplish the rule of law, getting back to the Eastern District of Wisconsin.
Before we get to that, however, federal district court judge Lynn Adelman finally now sent setting a sentencing date.
for the imposition of sentence on Wisconsin Circuit Court Judge, Hannah Dugan.
She resigned her position earlier this year.
And after having denied dismissing various motions of the defense, rejecting their encouragement, rejecting their request to the federal district court to dismiss the case, to retry the case based upon a number of different grounds, including immunity principles and various issues related to
the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution, including, among other things, this so-called split verdict in which the jury found the judge guilty of obstruction, felony obstruction, but not guilty of a related misdemeanor charge.
on the same facts, but premised upon a different injury instruction from the judge.
All of that, all of that addressed again by the federal district court judge, Lynn Edelman.
He denies all those defense motions and says, no, I am not going to upset the jury verdict.
We're going to sentencing.
And that's what he's done just this past week.
He has now directed that a so-called pre-sentence report be prepared.
That's a document.
that will be provided to the judge and to defense counsel under the prosecution in which the US probation office will put together an account not only of what happened.
but provide the judge with a lot of information that is relevant to his all important decision about sentencing in this case, including information about the judge's own past history, which again, as you know, well, previously she served as a distinguished lawyer in the Milwaukee area and most recently as a Wisconsin circuit court judge, all sorts of information relevant to that decision, not necessarily focused just upon what happened in trial, but concluding with records
recommendations under the sentencing guidelines about what the judge may want to do.
In this particular case, because those sentencing guidelines almost certainly dictate a very, very low exposure for any incarceration, the strong prediction is that the judge imposing a sentence will not sentence the former judge to any time in prison, probably impose some probationary terms, some supervised released, and maybe some kind of a fine.
as a result of his disposition.
But all of that, again, going to be discussed inside this pre-sense report, which will be in part the focus of a lot of attention when former Judge Dugan is sentenced at 10 a.m.
on Wednesday, June 3rd.
10 a.m.
on Wednesday, June 3rd, obviously going to get a lot more attention at that time.
The judge will enter his order.
And then the case will be completed at the federal district court level.
The judge then completed with the case before him and the judgment is now ready.
for an appeal which the defense counsel, in this case, have promised to perfect to pursue.
They are certainly going to pursue the final judgment, which includes everything that has happened in front of Judge Edelman up to this point.
They can raise issues going back to pretrial dispositions, trial-related things, jury selection, post-trial matters.
All of those can be wrapped up now in an appeal where?
To the Seven Circuit Court of Appeals, and that's where they will certainly pursue
all of these claims seeking either a new trial, a dismissal of the case outright, some remedies that Judge Edelman has chosen not to afford this defendant up to this point.
The appeals court process, of course, as you know well, involves writing briefs to the appeals court.
It's a three judge panel they meet in the seventh circuit in downtown Chicago.
And eventually there will be oral argument on those issues that the defense will raise to the seventh circuit
in support of their petition to overturn what the lower court has done.
That will presumably take months.
It is possible.
It is possible that there may be an appellate decision sometime later this year, but it is already April.
And these things normally take months to schedule to conduct the briefing and also to schedule and conduct the oral arguments.
The judges also need time to author their opinion again, coming from a three judge panel, depending upon what they do.
Alternatives include affirming completely.
what the lower court judge, Judge Edelman has done, or finding that there is indeed some merit to one or more of these decisions made by the judge and sending it back for all kinds of options, either for dismissal, which is perhaps unlikely for a new trial, which is maybe a bit more likely, but also somewhat unpredicted.
Maybe, maybe for a resentencing, although once again, difficult to find specific problems that would be identified there.
Most likely the court of appeals, given the standards of deference and review that the courts of appeals grant to lower district court judges, will pursue the arguments here, will listen to them and entertain them.
Highly likely that the appeals court will not overturn what Judge Edelman has done.
But there are some serious issues here, including especially the constitutional issues, having to do with the 10th Amendment, the prerogatives of the federal government intruding as the defense has maintained into the prerogatives, the work of state court proceedings.
There's this major issue about whether or not the judge gave the proper jury instruction to the jury when it came to these two different counts that produced two different.
different verdicts, at least verdicts that seem on their face to be different in nature.
All of those things could be seized upon by the federal judges, even as they give a great deal of deference to the lower court judge.
We will see what happens in all of this as it moves forward.
And then, and then we're going to go from Milwaukee to overseas to France, once again, to a Paris criminal court on Monday that directed the arrest of some executives of one of the world's largest cement manufacturers, called Lafarge, directing the arrests in court.
of a fellow named Bruno LeFont and another of the chief executives, Christian Harald, for supporting terrorism in Syria and beyond.
Can we come back?
I'll tell you all about that rule of this case in France and other matters outside of the courts of America and around the world when our broadcast continues after this.
This is Amicus, a law review.
My name is Jim Santel.
We are continuing our discussion of the geography of rule of law, not just in this nation, but also overseas in France.
We've visited there before on other occasions.
We're going to do it again right now.
Just this past week, some individual sentences imposed in a criminal matter, the Paris Criminal Court on Monday, ordering the arrest of the chief leaders of...
a corporation called the Farge.
It is one of the world's largest cement manufacturers.
I know this isn't a civil case regarding cement in particular, but rather finding the judge did that they were involved in financing and supporting international and regional terrorism in Syria and beyond.
Maybe, just maybe, this is the first time ever
anywhere in the, first of all in France and perhaps on the face of the planet, that a corporation, which indeed you can sue, and here in the United States, corporations are sued routinely, both civilly and yes, you can prosecute criminally a civil, a corporation, but here, here, one of the first times, if ever, that a corporation can charge criminally and is found responsible for doing what?
For enabling terrorism.
The judge whose name is Isabel Prevost Desperes verdict took four hours to read into the record and it is scathing she concluded that between 2013 and 2014 this cement maker LeFarge again through its chief executives paid about eight point I'm sorry six point five million dollars to the Islamic State and other terrorist groups in Syria to facilitate
that company's operations there.
Lafarge, which is now, for what is worth, owned by a Swiss conglomerate called Wholesome, will now have to pay $1.3 million in fines for the crime of what?
Of financing terrorism and $5.3 million for violating international sanctions.
In yet another case, Lafarge is facing charges of complicity in crimes against humanity.
And if that case, again, tangentially related to this one, goes to trial, and Lafarge, through its corporate leadership, is again found guilty, we've got another new chapter in the prosecution of war crimes in France and other places on the face of the planet.
We know that as a result of much of what the judge told us in this case, that the defendants knew,
that staying in Syria operating there would require cooperation with terrorist groups.
That's what the judge found.
That made Lafarge complicit, she said, not only in the atrocities, which we recall well from this time period in Syria, but also in affirmative acts of terrorism that the Islamic State carried out in France.
And in fact, the judge brings this back to another event that you may recall.
Well, you will recall it.
Well, it was in 2015.
When one of the most horrific, violent terrorist acts happens in Paris, the attacks at the Bataclan Theater in Paris, and other coordinated attacks in other locations, recall well, those killed 130 people and left about 400 people injured, a cataclysmic terrorist attack right there in France in her verdict.
The judge, Judge Prevost Desperes, kept her turning to the testimony of this witness talking about that event back in 2015.
She said, I am trying to make you understand how choices made in your offices, thousands of kilometers away, turned into bullets and blood.
The money that Lafarge plowed into the coffers of these militant terrorist organizations that Judge found likely made a significant difference in their capabilities.
The court emphasizes that Judge says that given the cost of living in Syria during the period in question, the sum of about 5.6%
million euros dispersed by Lafarge does not have equivalent purchasing power in Raqqa as it does in Paris.
Thus, by knowingly paying extremely large sums over many months to three terrorist organizations, Lafarge enabled them to expand their influence and fuel their deadly campaigns, ultimately leading to attacks committed abroad
as well as on French soil.
A major, a major decision.
Again, a different system where the judge has a whole lot more involvement in the investigation, the prosecution, the trial and the sentencing of criminal offence here.
It is a corporation and also it's two individual leaders, Bruno LeFont and Kristin Heraldt, the former now getting six years in prison, the latter five years in prison for financing terrorism.
in Syria and beyond a wake-up call to any other corporations across the planet who might be doing similar things in the interest of advancing their financial interests, but also supporting terrorism.
A major, major rule of law decision coming out of the Paris Criminal Court just this past week.
We have been spending all of our time on this broadcast of Amicus, a lot of you, talking about things inside the courtrooms.
Federal District Court judges
criminal judges in Paris, other places, appeals court judges around our nation.
Let's do some straddling.
Let's go just beyond courts and talk about things beginning in venues outside of the courts, but straddling into those same courts as well.
They have connections on both sides, inside and outside of our court.
Let's begin once again.
with the United States Supreme Court and this curious and very almost almost unprecedented apology by one associate justice of the Supreme Court with respect to another.
Justice Sonia Sotomayor issuing what can only be considered a rare public apology for criticizing one of her colleagues, Justice Brett Kavanaugh.
She said, I made remarks that were inappropriate.
And I regret my hurtful comments.
I have apologized to my colleague.
This may a couple, highly unusual, obviously from one justice to another.
comes at a time when some of the vitriol both on the bench and in writings is reaching very high levels.
The controversy began at the University of Kansas Law School this past week when the justice was asked about the Trump administration's crackdown on immigration and specifically her blistering dissent to that decision, which we talked about to a temporary ruling.
again in the shadow docket that the court had issued in September that permitted immigration related stops in the Los Angeles area.
Remember this case involving a major decision by Judge Maim Frimpong basically reaffirming these standards for arrests on the city streets there in Los Angeles.
Challengers of the policy that had been implemented there
by Homeland Security, by the federal government, told the justices that the stops, the detentions there, involved blatant racial profiling.
And when the Supreme Court reversed the lower court and basically said, yeah, go ahead and do these arrests, and specifically when Justice Kavanaugh appended to that otherwise very skeletal ruling,
his own concurrence, finding the statistics and also sort of a combination of things that wouldn't otherwise support detentions would in fact justify arrests.
That is when the Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor responded.
She suggested that a concurrence written by Justice Kavanaugh showed that he was out of touch.
with the experiences of working class people.
He had emphasized that the majority was permitting brief investigative stops, those sometimes called Kavanaugh stops these days.
And she went on to say that there are some people who can't understand our experiences even when you tell them.
And she now has said that I had a colleague in that case who wrote that these are only temporary stops, noting that even a brief interaction with law enforcement can have major consequences for a person's job security and children.
She went on to say, this is from a man whose parents were professionals and probably doesn't really know any person who works by the hour or the piece like I do.
Now, Justice Sotomayor in her
Apology for those comments did not mention Justice Kavanaugh by name, but he was plainly the focus of that and in particular Justice Sotomayor has often referred of course to her own experiences Noting noting that her views on these issues are dissimilar from those of others on the bench Justice Kavanaugh did not immediately respond to a question to this this apology
And the Justice Sotomayor went on to say, I dissent so much, I'm not very successful.
She said, in general, she did not define her colleagues by their worst ideas.
That's also an attempt to extend the olive branch here and instead look for the best in them as human beings.
She said, with virtually all of them, I certainly have a civil relationship.
And with many of them, I dare say that I have a friendship.
Again, apologizing, Justice Sotomayor is doing
for criticism, personal criticism of Justice Kavanaugh in issuing the concurrence on that Supreme Court justice opinion that was issued coming out of Los Angeles last year.
Other things going on on Capitol Hill that also are not inside the courtrooms but adjacent to it, this one coming from the United States Congress just across the parking lot from
the location where the Supreme Court does its work.
Congress, late this past week, voting, voting, a major vote.
This is significant to extend an expiring surveillance law for about 10 days.
That's the procedural mechanism that does this.
After a combination of Republicans and Democrats, many of them libertarian leading concerned about the overreach
of federal legislation demanded that they be allowed to vote on some new privacy limits on any long-term extension involving something called the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.
That's a lot.
Let me unpack that a bit.
You know this well as FISA.
It was set to expire this coming Monday, and instead of letting it expire, there's a short-term extension that everybody agreed to, almost everybody, that was approved by the House and it pushes the deadline for the expiration of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act until April 30th, creating more time to figure out what, if anything, one does.
what the Congress does, what the President may do in terms of FISA.
You know this well.
This is the statute that permits the government, the Department of Justice, to seek some special access to information about overseas communication that sometimes necessarily sweep in their breath and their strength, communications involving United States citizens as well.
So what happens here, we've got a lot of drama on Capitol Hill.
this past week, including the president pressuring members of Congress, his own party to pass an 18 month reauthorization of what's called section 702 without any changes to it.
We've got people in the Congress, both parties opposing that because they want limitations on the FISA authorization, the sweeping power given to the government, almost all the work of the FISA court that actually meets meets inside of the main justice building.
formulated, appointed judges from around the country.
They meet and make determinations on these non-public private applications for access to this information.
People in Congress and around the nation asking for amendments to section 702 to ensure that the FISA court and these FISA processes are not beyond the scope of what they we all of us may deem as inappropriate intrusions into the privacy of Americans and The president prompting prompted by all this says I am willing to willing to risk giving up my rights and privileges as a citizen
for our great military and country.
He's describing that on social media.
For a while in any event, this Section 702 remains in place, allowing the government to collect on domestic soil and without a warrant, communications of foreigners abroad.
Again,
including people who are interacting with Americans, and that's the rub.
That's the focus.
And we'll see whether the FISA law continues beyond this 10-day extension.
When we come back, some other things coming out of the U.S.
Attorney's Office in Washington, D.C.
and a couple of other things from around the country as Amicus Law Review continues.
This is amicus alarm view.
My name is Jim Santel.
This is the final segment of our two hour broadcast this weekend
Doing as we often do in this final segment, some rule of law snapshots to get you up to date on other things.
All of these, again, straddling inside and outside the courtrooms.
We begin with the U.S.
Attorney's Office, located right there in Washington, D.C.
Lots of things coming out of Jeanine Pirro's office.
She is the U.S.
Attorney there.
She has announced this past week that three former employees of something called the Psychiatric Institute of Washington have been indicted by her office.
by the grand jury there and charges related to the 2020 death of a patient at a facility that's gotten a lot of national attention for being long troubled.
Again, U.S.
Attorney Janine Pirro announces a grand jury indictment, charging three former employees, including a registered nurse, a tech and a third individual.
All three have pleaded not guilty.
U.S.
Attorney's Office alleging that way back in 2020,
These three former staffers of the Psychiatric Institute of Washington found a 58-year-old patient, a man identified only as GW, in the indictment, unresponsive in his room and failed over a period of minutes to provide potentially life-saving measures for that particular patient.
The indictment itself is a talking indictment and describes what happened during the course of those minutes.
Piro has also indicated that this is a part, appropriate part of her office, any U.S.
attorney's office that is alleging violations of fundamental rights, crediting the director of the Medicaid Fraud Control Unit, the office of the inspector general for the District of Columbia, underscoring the relationship once again between healthcare fraud and healthcare fraud.
criminal activity and the role of U.S.
Attorney's offices in pursuing those people who would compromise, in this case, at a criminal level, the health and well-being of patients at any particular institution.
Jeanine Pirro also had a difficult week in another way.
However, when her office tried to access the Federal Reserve headquarters, reports that two of her prosecutors and one investigator actually showed up.
at the location of the Federal Reserve right there in Washington, DC, and wanted access to it, presumably, as a part of its continuing investigation to review these renovations, which are themselves the subject of a month-long active criminal investigation, maybe possibly likely targeting Jay Powell, who is the chief of the Federal Reserve, as you well know well know.
And those two prosecutors, the investigator,
Very, very atypical, unusual showing up.
They are denied access to the facility, appropriately so.
And that gets a lot of news this past week.
In January, recall that Jay Powell, again, the head of the Fed revealed that the Federal Reserve
had gotten grand jury subpoenas from the Justice Department as a result of this criminal investigation into him and statements he made to Congress and these renovations at the Federal Reserve Building.
You may recall well that James Bosberg, again the same judge who was recently told by the appeals court that he cannot pursue these contempt proceedings against the Department of Justice,
Bozberg, as we reported recently, quashed a pair of subpoenas on the grounds that there was no basis there.
Well, this past week, Janine Pirro apparently sent one of her prosecutors, one of her investigators, and two of her prosecutors to the actual site.
Knocked on the door and said, can we get in?
We want to take a look at this.
They were denied entry.
A fellow named Robert Hur, you may recall, served as the Justice Department's special counsel when President Joe Biden was being investigated for classified documents.
told them no and said that when the men appeared at the Fed without prior notice, and they wanted to check on the progress, he said no.
He said, your interest in the Federal Reserve's renovation projects is pretextual, Robert Hurr wrote, should you wish to challenge that finding of Judge Bosberg, the courts provide an avenue for you, it is not appropriate for you to try to circumvent it,
goodbye and showed them the door.
Well, actually, they never got inside the building at all.
A curious event happening right there physically outside of the courtroom on the geography near the National Mall.
Couple more things before our broadcast concludes.
And that is on the west side of our nation.
We also have this major news involving former Trump election lawyer John Eastman.
He has been disbarred.
California Supreme Court on Wednesday ordered John Eastman disbarred, striking his name from the role of attorneys, which is how that happens, imposing a $5,000 judgment.
You may recall well that Eastman had played a central role in the plot to overturn the 2020 election.
He was pressuring state officials, advancing all these baseless claims in court, promoting this fringe theory that the vice president could reject certified electoral votes.
His unethical actions have finally caught up with him.
And the lasting consequences for democracy, as the California Supreme Court has announced, are significant concluding in the decision to disbar him.
to strip him of his capacity to serve as a lawyer.
At least in California, actions have consequences.
Another instance of one of the Trump lawyers advocating for something unsupported by the law and the facts, and therefore getting into a huge amount of professional trouble.
no longer can John Eastman serve as a lawyer, at least not in California, even as other like proceedings go ahead in other districts.
And finally, going to the South, John Brennan, John Brennan, the former CIA director, who has himself been the focus of apparently another investigation, also encouraged by the president, alleging that he may have perjured himself, made false statements.
about a 2017 intelligence assessment that found that Russia had, in fact, interfered in the 2016 presidential election.
An investigation opened at the encouragement of the former Attorney General Pam Bondi, encouraged by the President, Attorney General Todd Blanche, and certainly urged by the President.
Undeniably,
John Brennan, a political foe of the president, turns out that the prosecutor who is leading that investigation has now been taken off the case because she has not produced the indictment the president wants.
We'll talk more about that and other rule of law events in future iterations and invocations of our good broadcast capability here on Amicus.
A lot of you join us for those future broadcasts.
For now, have a good weekend, everybody.
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Civic Media is dedicated to providing quality local and state news coverage across Wisconsin.
With the Civic Media app, you can get notifications about local stories that matter to you and your community.
Find the free Civic Media app in your phone's app store and choose notifications from the menu to tell us what kind of news you want to hear about.