UPDATE: As the deadline expired today, the prosecution dropped this motion which discloses that they searched an attorney’s phone with a warrant.

Because the stuff on this phone is a landmine of attorney-client privilege, they contend, there must be a complicated and lengthy clean room-style process to sort the privileged stuff from non-privileged.

Comey disagrees and wants to challenge the search warrant first.

I strongly suspect they didn’t actually turn over much of anything today, but we shall see.

Comey’s attorney told the judge he has plans to bring 4 separate motions to dismiss the case, on 4 separate grounds.

• selective and vindictive prosecution
• Lindsey Halligan was not properly appointed as the US attorney, so she has no authority to charge the case.
• Abuse of grand jury, i.e. the indictment is invalid because the Halligan violated the very loose rules that exist when presenting the case to the grand jury.
• outrageous government conduct. Who knows what that is.

I was surprised he didn’t move to dismiss right there at the arraignment for failure to state an offense.

The prosecutors said they have a bunch of classified evidence they have to sort through. The judge did not like that. There’s no reason for anything to be classified in this case. Comey’s alleged lie was in public to Congress on CSPAN. And he was talking about unclassified stuff.

So this classified documents stuff seems to be a delaying tactic, because these guys have no idea what they’re going to do with discovery. And I’ve heard that eastern district of VA is called the “rocket docket” because the judges like to move fast. They don’t like delays.

BUT this time her own children are facing the premium hikes. That makes everything totally, completely different.

If you’re getting into private jets, you should also know that brands have reputations even there.

Gulfstream is a luxury brand within the private jet world. You can easily get a comparable product from Bombardier or Cessna Textron that performs equivalently, but only pay half as much operating costs as Gulfstream. Like Gucci, you pay a lot of money just for the Gulfstream name.

At the low end of the market, Honda makes a small jet. (This is in the Very Light Jet category which bumps up against the turboprop market).

At the very high end of the market you get into Boeing Business Jets, and the Airbus equivalent. These are converting airliners to your exact interior design specifications. Airliners are like another order of magnitude higher cost to operate.

“Scorched” is the right word here:

• The judge photocopied a handwritten anonymous post card he received directly at the top of the page, before the case caption.
• The post card reads like a veiled threat: “Trump has pardons and tanks. What do you have?”
• then the judge writes a public letter to the post card writer, inviting them to read the opinion too see how it works. At the very end, he invites the post card writer to come see the administration of justice in person, at the Boston court house.
• Out of 161 pages, the judge spends 12 pages talking about Donald Trump’s flaws as a person and as a President. This section is not super related to the main opinion, which is about the first amendment and immigrants.
• This judge was appointed by Ronald Reagan, and he’s been on the bench since approximately forever ago.

The whole piece seems to have serious literary aspirations, not typical of a judicial opinion. Especially with the post card as a literary framing device. The judge seems to be talking, not just to the litigants in this case, but to the average MAGA American, represented by the post card writer. And also to all patriotic Americans, now and in the future. This is a bugle call, cutting above the din, calling to ordinary Americans to retake Constitutionalism as Americanism. The rule of law as American patriotism.

It certainly seems to be going that way. If Trump can just choose not to spend money that Congress appropriated… Well, that’s a lot more power than even George III had when Thomas Jefferson wrote out that listicle of 28 reasons why he sucked.

This is the fringe legal theory called unitary executive becoming not so fringe at all. In fact it seems to be headed towards firmly mainstream, precedential status.

Article II, section 1:

The executive Power shall be vested in a President of the United States of America.

Everyone used to think this sentence was pretty harmless. It was put in to say there’s one President at the top, instead of an executive committee (which was proposed and debates at the convention).

But to the unitary executive theorists, that one sentence actually means that all of the executive Power must flow through the President, and there can be no executive Power that does not.

The previous thinking is that this power was only talking about the powers specifically listed in Article II, which is not a lot. (Veto, cabinet nominations, pardons, and a few other things). And that if Congress chose to delegate part of its Article I power to the executive branch by passing a law, it could put whatever limitations, checks, and balances it wanted to.

I think they meant, “purge every Epstein list pedo out from the Democratic party.”

Technically, the status of Germany was settled b by the Treaty on the Final Settlement with Respect to Germany, in 1990. That was certainly a negotiated agreement.

I think, even after reading and understanding the books, Hitler would still fuck it up. And I also think that, following the Hari Seldon school of history, that Germany is doomed in any case, unless they turn around and make an alliance with USA/USSR. (For instance, by honoring and strengthening Ribbentrop / Malotov). In that case, they can be a junior partner in the cold war. (Or maybe not. Maybe USSR Barbarossas then a little later).

Yes, but.

Perjury is a serious crime that must be proven beyond a reasonable doubt. It’s expensive and time consuming to make that kind of case. And a US attorney needs to decide to prosecute.

I bet their free energy machine even has a secret plug into the wall!

As a country, we made a law that the ER has to treat you no matter what regardless of your financial status. That is an ultimate backstop: if people are about to die, as a society we decided that they should not if there is a means to prevent it.

Medicaid is there to allow some people to go to regular doctors to save a couple of bucks vs. the ER. And it also pays for a lot of nursing homes.

I guess what I’m saying here, is the headline is kinda misleading. ICE wants the data, true, so they can find deportation targets. But it’s probably more about inflicting additional cruelty, forcing people to ERs instead of clinics; or cutting funding to health care providers and forcing rural hospitals to close.

This lawsuit is on a really narrow ground: the law says that when the president calls up a state guard into federal service, the orders must issue through the state governor.

In this case, the President wrote the words “Through: The Governor of California” at the top of the memos. But he never actually sent anything to Gavin Newsom, or gave California any formal notice at all.

This suit also doesn’t challenge the active duty marines, which are indisputably under Trump’s chain of command. But they can’t do domestic law enforcement unless the Insurrection Act is invoked (it hasn’t, formally).

I didn’t know that the feds accredited universities. When I was in school, the one that mattered for engineering was ABET or somesuch.

The short answer is that prosecutors do not have absolute immunity when conducting investigative and maybe administrative functions outside the courtroom.

I haven’t read the mayor’s complaint and how he pleads this.

Alina Habba is sued in her personal capacity. If damages are awarded, she is likely to pay out of her own pocket. Facts and evidence discovered during this litigation may also be relevant to her continuing to hold a law license.

The mayor was invited inside the fence line by a federal agent. When the feds changed their mind, he agreed to leave. That’s not trespassing.

You can* sue CBP and Secretary Noem in her official capacity for collecting illegal tariffs from you.

*Probably. I’m not a lawyer. Don’t take legal advice from the Internet.

But then who says what the statutes that Congress passed mean…?

In this case, the court has determined that notices in English only, that give a 24 hour deadline, with no information about how to contact an attorney, are illegal. That amount of notice is not due process as guaranteed by the 5th amendment of the Constitution.

The constitution overrides all parts of federal law, including the Alien Enemies Act. There is no power to suspend the constitution here. Not even a war power. The constitution applies to the plaintiffs in this case, because they are in the territory of the United States. Full stop.

The government has argued to the court, without citing any specific clause of the constitution, that the President enjoys broad “war powers” that prevent the court from looking into any aspect of what the administration is doing here. The court has clearly rejected that argument* with respect to the 5th amendment concerns.

So that is what the law is, and that’s what the law is not. That’s a final decision.

*The court has not decided yet on whether the government can use this reasoning to block any interpretation of the meaning of the words “invasion” or “predatory incursion.” The lower courts that have ruled are something like 4 or 5 to 1, on the side that the judiciary can interpret those words.

EDIT: Actually, I think the one judge that ruled for the AEA proclamation did so by interpreting “invasion” by looking it up in a dictionary. She just used a modern dictionary, while the others have been using 1798 dictionaries.

Everything the Supreme Court orders is “legal”, by definition. That’s what Supreme means. They have taken up the duty of the judicial department to say what the law is. There is no further appeal.