Time to Unplug the American Century and Restart the Machine
Mr. EW and I are closing on our 25th wedding anniversary in a few months.
Yeah, us!
I raise that not because I’m expecting you all to start shopping silver (that’s what I’m supposed to buy anyway, right? Mr. EW insists it’s power tool anniversary again anyway).
I say that as a way of conveying that, in a literal sense, I have been married to Europe for (effectively) the entirety of this century.
Sure, I had an affinity before that. In a Czech class in Prague in 1997 , for example, on a day when the other American was absent, the entire class told me I seemed like a European and why didn’t I just move. Without a beat, one of them said, “But you stay there and fix it for the rest of us.” I can’t tell you how deeply I felt (and feel) an obligation to fulfill that order.
And so I think of where we go from here, both in the larger effort to defeat Trumpism, but more specifically in a week when Europe contemplates what to do about the Greenland crisis, I’m cognizant what a shitty hegemon the US has been in this century.
Three of the four things that gave Trump a foothold, in my opinion, were failures in this century (the fourth is the legacy of slavery and the organized political violence that replaced it).
The other three, though, are the War on Terror, the financial crisis, and social media. (COVID was the final catalyst, I think; having moved during the height of COVID, I can’t express how much worse the US dealt with it than much of the EU, and now Trump is using the aftermath of his own jerry-rigged system — COVID fraud — as his excuse to invade Minnesota.)
I had been thinking this anyway. As we optimistically imagine things we would need to do recover from Trump, I think the US should simply reset the computer to 2000 (preferably before Bush v. Gore), and start over again. Don’t spend 20 years creating new terrorists in response to a terrorist attack. Don’t expand emergency and executive power beyond all recognition, in the process foreswearing America’s rickety Cold War claim to be an exceptional nation. Don’t bail out bankers who destroyed the global economy and, especially, wiped out the wealth of broad swaths of the population. And sure as hell don’t demand austerity in response, a betrayal of the post-war consensus that staved off the kind of malaise we’re seeing drive extremism. And whatever you do, do not grant the banksters’ counterpart, the techbros, their own chance to remake the world, mainstreaming far right extremists in the process. I feel like the coming AI collapse may be social media’s crisis point, and sadly, the techbros have prepared for it by implanting David Sacks in the White House.
Thinking in these terms does not provide immediate solutions. Reminding EU ministers how much of today’s economic malaise and immigration scapegoating arose from American failures doesn’t provide a solution. But it does provide one possible frame, one that can exploit increasing global animosity towards Trump, as a scapegoat.
Mark Carney got elected on a wave of animosity to Trump and he is not the only one.
There was a Defense One report on the National Security Strategy — not matched by any other outlet and therefore of uncertain provenance — that nevertheless haunts me. It disavows the inexpensive power projection of hegemony by imagining American hegemony as nothing more than American domination.
The full NSS also spends some time discussing the “failure” of American hegemony, a term that isn’t mentioned in the publicly released version.
“Hegemony is the wrong thing to want and it wasn’t achievable,” according to the document.
In this context, hegemony refers to the leadership by one country of the world, using soft power to encourage other countries to consent to being led.
“After the end of the Cold War, American foreign policy elites convinced themselves that permanent American domination of the entire world was in the best interests of our country,” the NSS states. “Yet the affairs of other countries are our concern only if their activities directly threaten our interests.”
I don’t think that’s right at all. Whoever wrote this, for example, seems to misunderstand how fragile an invasion of Venezuela without regime change can be — and importantly, how much worse Venezuela will be if, instead of attempting to reign in Maduro’s mafia state, instead blesses it. (In reality, America’s failures started before my designated reset date, when the US believed Shock Doctrine was a good way to cure communism rather than foster mafia states.) I don’t think the person who wrote that “Hegemony is the wrong thing to want” has considered how many advantages the dollar exchange has given the US. I don’t think the person who wrote, “Hegemony is the wrong thing to want” has thought through all the ways that coercion is more likely to backfire.
America was a piss poor global policeman, but the alternative we’re facing down now is worse for the US and worse for much of the world.
And if Donald Trump wants to embody those failures, providing a ready political response, well then, he asked for it.
Donald Trump has abdicated America’s role as a hegemon.
Well, okay then.
However else the rest of the world responds, they (we) should keep in mind that we can reject the underlying choices that created Trump as a symptom.
Voiding International Agreements Can Have Awkward Consequences
His Majesty the King of Denmark by this convention cedes to the United States all territory, dominion and sovereignty, possessed, asserted or claimed by Denmark in the West Indies including the Islands of Saint Thomas, Saint John and Saint Croix together with the adjacent islands and rocks.
[snip]
In full consideration of the cession made by this convention, the United States agrees to pay, within ninety days from the date of the exchange of the ratifications of this convention, in the City of Washington to the diplomatic representative or other agent of His Majesty the King of Denmark duly authorized to receive the money, the sum of twenty-five million dollars in gold coin of the United States.
The bulk of the document spells out the details, like how long Denmark has to vacate the premises, what items go with them and what transfers to the new owners, etc.
So OK, the US bought the Virgin Islands from Denmark? What’s the big deal, you ask.
The big deal is a little clearer when you see the “Declaration” at the end, made by US Secretary of State Robert Lansing:
In proceeding this day to the signature of the Convention respecting the cession of the Danish West-Indian Islands to the United States of America, the undersigned Secretary of State of the United States of America, duly authorized by his Government, has the honor to declare that the Government of the United States of America will not object to the Danish Government extending their political and economic interests to the whole of Greenland.
Ah. So the deal was the US gets the Virgin Islands, and Denmark gets Greenland and $25M in gold coin.
And now, Trump wants to void the deal. He ought to be careful, though, because there are other deals like this that the US made that other leaders might want to void.
Whereas by the Article the third of the Treaty concluded at St Ildefonso the 9th Vendé miaire an 9/1st October 1800 between the First Consul of the French Republic and his Catholic Majesty [of Spain] it was agreed as follows.
“His Catholic Majesty promises and engages on his part to cede to the French Republic six months after the full and entire execution of the conditions and Stipulations herein relative to his Royal Highness the Duke of Parma, the Colony or Province of Louisiana with the Same extent that it now has in the hand of Spain, & that it had when France possessed it; and Such as it Should be after the Treaties subsequently entered into between Spain and other States.”
And whereas in pursuance of the Treaty and particularly of the third article the French Republic has an incontestible title to the domain and to the possession of the said Territory–The First Consul of the French Republic desiring to give to the Unit ed States a strong proof of his friendship doth hereby cede to the United States in the name of the French Republic for ever and in full Sovereignty the said territory with all its rights and appurtenances as fully and in the Same manner as they have bee n acquired by the French Republic in virtue of the above mentioned Treaty concluded with his Catholic Majesty.
[snip]
The Government of the United States engages to pay to the French government in the manner Specified in the following article the sum of Sixty millions of francs independant of the Sum which Shall be fixed by another Convention for the payment of the debts due by France to citizens of the United States.
For the payment of the Sum of Sixty millions of francs mentioned in the preceeding article the United States shall create a Stock of eleven millions, two hundred and fifty thousand Dollars bearing an interest of Six per cent: per annum payable half y early in London Amsterdam or Paris amounting by the half year to three hundred and thirty Seven thousand five hundred Dollars, according to the proportions which Shall be determined by the french Govenment to be paid at either place: The principal of t he Said Stock to be reimbursed at the treasury of the United States in annual payments of not less than three millions of Dollars each; of which the first payment Shall commence fifteen years after the date of the exchange of ratifications:–this Stock Shall be transferred to the government of France or to Such person or persons as Shall be authorized to receive it in three months at most after the exchange of ratifications of this treaty and after Louisiana Shall be taken possession of the name of the Government of the United States.
It is further agreed that if the french Government Should be desirous of disposing of the Said Stock to receive the capital in Europe at Shorter terms that its measures for that purpose Shall be taken So as to favour in the greatest degree possible the credit of the United States, and to raise to the highest price the Said Stock.
Again, lots of details passed over in these three conventions, but the essence of deal is simple: the US gets the land, and France gets cash and a settlement on the debts they owe to US citizens.
Perhaps if Trump wants to revoke by fiat the Convention with Denmark over the Virgin Islands and Greenland, President Macron might start thinking he should do the same with Trump over Louisiana.
His Majesty the Emperor of all the Russias, agrees to cede to the United States, by this convention, immediately upon the exchange of the ratifications thereof, all the territory and dominion now possessed by his said Majesty on the continent of America and in adjacent islands, the same being contained within the geographical limits herein set forth, to wit: [geographic details omitted]
[snip]
In consideration of the cession aforesaid, the United States agree to pay at the Treasury in Washington, within ten months after the exchange of the ratifications of this convention, to the diplomatic representative or other agent of His Majesty the Emperor of all the Russias, duly authorized to receive the same, seven million two hundred thousand dollars in gold.
Again, lots of details omitted, but these two paragraphs lay out the broad parameters of the deal. Now imagine Putin wanting it back.
See, that’s the thing about international agreements. If you decide they aren’t worth the paper they are written on, other folks might agree with you and act accordingly.
Sarah Palin might want to brush up on her Russian, and I may need to be working on my French.
ADDENDUM
Don’t know how I could have forgotten this one from 1819, but I hit publish before it occurred to me.
His Catholic Majesty [of Spain] cedes to the United States, in full property and sovereignty, all the territories which belong to him, situated to the eastward of the Mississippi, known by the name of East and West Florida. The adjacent islands dependent on said provinces, all public lots and squares, vacant lands, public edifices, fortifications, barracks, and other buildings, which are not private property, archives and documents, which relate directly to the property and sovereignty of said provinces, are included in this article. The said archives and documents shall be left in possession of the commissaries or officers of the United States, duly authorized to receive them.
[snip]
The United States, exonerating Spain from all demands in future, on account of the claims of their citizens to which the renunciations herein contained extend, and considering them entirely cancelled, undertake to make satisfaction for the same, to an amount not exceeding five millions of dollars.
Lots of other details omitted, but you get the idea.
Perhaps Trump can ask one of his minions how to say “Welcome to Mar-a-Lago” in Spanish?
When Even the German Far-Right Thinks You’ve Gone Too Far . . .
Germany’s far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party has long sought close ties to the Trump administration in its quest for powerful international allies and an end to its political isolation at home.
But as public sentiment in Germany increasingly turns against U.S. President Donald Trump and his foreign interventionism — in particular his talk of taking control of Greenland and his seizure of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro — AfD leaders are recalibrating, putting distance between their party and a U.S. president they previously embraced.
“He has violated a fundamental election promise, namely not to interfere in other countries, and he has to explain that to his own voters,” Alice Weidel, one of the AfD’s national leaders, said earlier this week.
Hmm . . . I don’t recall Weidel complaining when Trump, Vance, and Musk were stumping for the Afd in the last national elections in Germany.
With that as background, it’s that much more impressive that Weidel now is throwing Trump under the bus. Think about that for a minute: a would-be Führer who is underbussed by the neo-Nazi AfD is no Führer at all. And for it to be the German far-right . . . that’s really gotta leave a mark. Stephen Miller must be so sad.
Or emboldened. “These AfD folks are so soft, so lacking in strength . . . Looks like it is up to us to remind Germans of their own heritage and strength.”
The AfD is the second-largest party in the Bundestag, much to the horror of Germany’s conservatives and liberals alike, and the AfD seems to support everything Miller and Trump embrace: Islamophobia, anti-immigration, and historical revisionism, just to name a few. Even so, the AfD looks at Trump’s comments about Greenland (following his actions in Venezuela) and says “no thanks – that’s too extreme, even for us.”
So to be clear — do you think comparing Trump’s rhetoric to Hitler or Nazi ideology is fair?
I would go further than that. I think that it would be fair to say that Trump knows what he’s doing. I think he chose that rhetoric on purpose. But yeah, there are some real similarities. If you’ve read Hitler’s own writing — which I don’t recommend to anyone, by the way — you see a dehumanizing dimension throughout, but the speeches are an even more interesting case.
What we have of Hitler’s speeches are mostly recorded, and they’re not always particularly coherent. What you see in efforts to compile his speeches are scholars trying to piece together what they sounded like. So, it’s a little bit like going to watch a standup comedian who’s hitting all of his great lines. You see again and again Hitler repeating himself. He’ll repeat the same lines or the same sentiment on different occasions.
With Trump, whatever else you might say about him, he knows what kinds of lines generate the kinds of reactions that he wants. The purpose of the rallies is to have applause lines, because that creates good media, that creates video. And if he repeats his lines again and again, it increases the likelihood that a particular line will be repeated in media reporting. So that’s right out of the playbook.
And now the lines aren’t hitting in quite the same way, as the AfD (of all people!) has noticed. Nothing hurts worse that being the open-mic comedian who throws out what they think is a great punchline, only to hear the sounds of silence.
Godwin ends his interview like this:
When I was growing up and being taught the American system of government, we would always be taught that the U.S. government has checks and balances in its design, so you can’t take it over with a sentiment of the moment. But I think what we’ve learned is that the institutions that protect us are fragile. History suggests that all democracies are fragile. So we have to be on the alert for political movements that want to undermine democratic institutions, because the purpose of democratic institutions is not to put the best people in power, it’s to maintain democracy even when the worst people are in power. That’s a big lift.
“Even when the worst people are in power.”
Godwin said that two years ago, but damned it if doesn’t sound like he said it yesterday. And we are finding out now just how big a lift it is to maintain democracy with folks like that in power.
“Epstein Is Dead:” Pam Bondi Is Neglecting Live Sex Trafficking Prosecutions to Criminalize Democrats
A week ago, on January 8, Donald Trump bitched out his US Attorneys (as well as those play-acting as US Attorney) — some, apparently, by name — because they are not focusing enough on prosecuting his perceived adversaries.
Dozens of U.S. attorneys, who lead prosecutors’ offices around the country, went to the White House Thursday for what was supposed to be a ceremonial photo shoot. After Attorney General Pam Bondi introduced the group of prosecutors, Trump criticized them as ineffective, saying the group was making it difficult for Bondi and Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche to do their jobs, the people said.
[snip]
Among his grievances with prosecutors, Trump complained that the Justice Department hadn’t yet brought a case against one of his most prominent Democratic adversaries, Sen. Adam Schiff of California, the people said.
The department has been investigating whether Schiff engaged in mortgage fraud. The senator has called the probe a bogus attempt at political retribution.
The president criticized some specific prosecutors by jurisdiction and said he felt betrayed, the people said.
[snip]
Trump’s blowup at Justice Department prosecutors comes as the president ramps up pressure on the agency to more aggressively pursue his priorities. He has complained repeatedly in recent weeks about Bondi, calling her an ineffective enforcer of his agenda.
As WSJ noted in its story on this, the day after Trump’s tantrum, Jeanine Pirro sent a subpoena to Jerome Powell, setting off a crisis for Trump.
Also in the wake of that attack, the Minnesota US Attorney’s Office decided to investigate Renee Good’s network rather than the guy who shot her, Jonathan Ross, leading to the resignation of six AUSAs in MN and possibly some in the Civil Rights Division in DC, though Pam Bondi — who looked stunning for a 59 year old a year ago but now looks like shit — now claims she fired those MN AUSAs and Harmeet Dhillon claims the Civil Rights attorneys left for other reasons.
Donald Trump has made it the top focus of his DOJ to prosecute his enemies, and as a result, DOJ has been hemorrhaging experience for a year now.
That’s on top of the singular focus on Stephen Miller’s jihad against immigrants, which has led DOJ to reassign lawyers from national security cases to immigration cases (indeed, that’s one of the stated reasons why Bondi fired Robert McBride, because the First AUSA for one of the key national security divisions in the country didn’t sufficiently chase immigration cases).
But there’s another staffing choice that became public in recent weeks.
As multiple outlets have covered and as Jay Clayton detailed in two letters (January 5; January 15) to Judges Richard Berman (who presided over the Epstein case) and Paul Engelmayer (who picked up the Ghislaine Maxwell case after Alison Nathan moved to the 2nd Circuit) — DOJ has dedicated up to 580 people (the 500 reported last week, plus another 80 added this week) to replicating the review that over a thousand FBI personnel did a year ago, this time accounting for victim privacy and “independent privileges” not permitted under the act.
To date, the Department has employed over five hundred reviewers to review and redact millions of pages of materials from the investigations into Epstein and his convicted coconspirator, Maxwell.2 The SDNY alone, in conjunction with the Department, has dedicated significant resources (including AUSAs as well as other SDNY personnel), which this week has been supplemented by approximately 80 attorneys from the Department’s Criminal Division, who will coordinate and work with SDNY during the review of documents identified as likely to contain victim information. As part of that review, the Department is identifying not only those materials the publication of which are required under the Act, but also those that carry independent privileges as well as the need to redact victim-identifying information, among other things. Act, § 2(c).3
3 Any materials withheld on this basis of course will be disclosed in a report to Congress. Act § 3.
We still have no explanation for what the hell Bondi did in the last review, such that she has to dedicate 580 attorneys to replicate the review (though the explanation probably lies in the matters DOJ plans to claim privilege over).
But not only is the need to replicate the work that taxpayers already paid for drawing from national security cases, but it is drawing from other high profile sex trafficking cases.
On Tuesday, another federal judge in the Southern District of New York told prosecutors to hold off of the Epstein assignment to focus on another marquee sex crime prosecution: the case of Oren, Alon and Tal Alexander — a trio of wealthy brothers in real estate accused of using their status to rape and traffic dozens of women.
With that case set to head to trial later this month, U.S. District Judge Valerie Caproni told prosecutors that they need to focus on expeditiously sending over discovery materials.
“A few people can be strung from the Epstein case given that these people are on trial,” said the Obama appointee. “Epstein is dead.”
That’s not good enough, Trump said last week. He needs the hollowed out DOJ to pursue his enemies faster.
Meanwhile, Pam Bondi is so incompetent or corrupt, she has to replicate work she already did, reviewing the Epstein files. 1,000 FBI personnel last March, 580 attorneys now. As a result, she’s neglecting current sex trafficking prosecutions.
And we have yet to tally what the impact of the reassignment of attorneys who focus on real national security issues. Many of them are chasing Stephen Miller’s fever dreams.
DOJ Continues to Let DHS Pick and Choose Screen Shots Pertaining to Their Assaults
There’s a general reason and specific reasons why people should care about Bill Essayli’s response to David Huerta’s motion to compel the government to turn over metadata associated with the evidence obtained against him.
Generally, DHS has permitted — encouraged, seemingly — DHS officers to use their own personal phones and to use Signal. And whether officers are using their own or government phones, DHS ditched its archiving software last year; it is relying on officers’ taking screen caps of relevant communications.
The Department of Homeland Security has stopped using software that automatically captured text messages and saved trails of communication between officials, according to sworn court statements filed this week.
Instead, the agency began in April to require officials to manually take screenshots of their messages to comply with federal records laws, citing cybersecurity concerns with the autosave software.
[snip]
The policy expects officials to first take screenshots of the text messages on their work phones, send it to their work email, download it on their work computers and then run a program that would recognize the text to store it in searchable formats, according to the department’s guidance submitted to the court.
Under the Federal Records Act, government agencies are required to preserve all documentation that officials and federal workers produce while executing their duties. They have to make federal records available to the public under the Freedom of Information Act unless they fall under certain exemptions.
And we’ve seen AUSAs rely on officers themselves to review their own devices for communications covered by discovery.
In the LaMonica McIver case, for example, officers didn’t turn over exculpatory texts until Judge Jamel Semper ordered supplemental discovery.
It wasn’t until November 26 — almost two weeks after Judge Jamel Semper ruled on McIver’s immunity bid — that DOJ turned over texts copying this video, observing that it looked bad.
5 The Spotlight News video came to light during the course of supplemental briefing only because it was referenced in a May 9, 2025, text message that the government finally turned over on November 26, 2025. HSI special agents exchanged the video in that May 9 conversation, where the agents also acknowledged that the evidence in the video was “bad.” Ex. Y at 2-3. The prosecution team therefore clearly knew about the text messages (and thus the video) when disclosures were due in July.
McIver’s lawyer, Paul Fishman, says he will address this delayed discovery in a follow-up letter.
Inexplicable delays in the government’s discovery productions mean that the record continues to be developed.1
1 Congresswoman McIver will detail these shortcomings in a forthcoming letter to the Court.
But the implication of this is clear.
DOJ was never going to turn over these discussions — conducted on Signal — until Judge Semper ordered this supplemental briefing. They were sitting on evidence that shows that before DHS first started calling McIver’s actions an assault on May 10 (McIver had to ask to have these Tweets taken down, but the timeline is in her motion to do so), they had shared video noting that their own actions looked bad.
Consider how this policy would work in the case of Jonathan Ross’ killing of Renee Good. Given that Ross’ video of the killing was released unofficially, it seems likely he was using his own phone that day. Particularly given the impunity with which Pam Bondi has treated him so far, there’s no reason to believe he’d retain anything incriminating himself, much less people like Greg Bovino or Stephen Miller.
It would take someone actually seizing his phone to see if there are incriminating details about his own motives.
That’s what David Huerta is asking for: that DOJ provide the metadata associated with both the videos and texts messages surrounding the day.
The metadata Mr. Huerta requests here—for the agents’ text messages already produced in this case,10 and for the photos and videos taken of the scene on June 6 and already produced—is critical and material to his ability to adequately prepare for his defense in this case. It is also relevant to understanding the sequence of events that occurred on June 6, both the actions of protestors and Mr. Huerta at the scene (e.g., shown in photographs and video recordings) and the agents’ statements to one another and activities that day as reflected in the text messages. Lastly, the metadata information affiliated with iPhone photos and messages is routinely stored in the ordinary course for such ESI, and would be straightforward to extract from the agents’ cellphones or devices. Moreover, producing the photos and videos in a native, load-ready format along with a corresponding index is routinely done in criminal cases by the Department of Justice.
10 Because the agents’ text messages and the photos and videos have already been collected by the government in this case and produced to the defense, there can be no dispute about the government’s “possession, custody, or control” of that material and/or those devices, as the government already had, and likely continues to have, access to them in preparing their discovery productions.
Even if these witnesses — HSI Supervisory Agent Ryan Ribner and Undercover Officer Jeremy Crossen — were reliable, this would be a reasonable ask. While the bulk of the video in discovery is unavailable publicly, the texts are difficult to unpack, and because Ribner “wrote the arrest report … from memory,” there are time discrepancies between the narrative he tells in the arrest report and the texts, to say nothing of additional discrepancies in Crossen’s countersurveillance report.
But these witnesses are not reliable. Crossen, for example, told interviewers that he was using his personal phone because his government phone “was not working at the time of the incident.”
TFO Crossen stated he used his personal phone to document the events which was turned over to an HSI Computer Forensics Agent (CFA) to download and preserve evidence.
TFO Crossen stated his government issued phone was not working at the time of the incident.
Except his texts show he switched phones during the incident (his testimony is so inconsistent I actually misunderstood whose phone this was on first read).
Plus, he told Ribner had had a couple hundred videos. The discovery includes far short of that.
And that’s just one reason to question Crossen’s candor when he told investigators, “he did not alter or delete any videos.” There are other holes in what appears in exhibits (this may be available in videos): he told investigators that somebody — I think he means protestors — called out “he’s a union member,” about Huerta, which is … not how I’d expect people in left-leaning politics to describe a senior SEIU official. The specific description of Huerta would go to the denials of everyone involved that they assaulted Huerta because he is a senior union official.
And Crossen described not filming the most important footage for this case, purportedly showing Huerta standing right in front of the van, rather than to its side, where the DHS goons assaulted him.
TFO Crossen recalled that immediately before 0:10 seconds before starting video 2790, he observed HUERTA standing in front of the van, closer to the center of the van. He stated that he did not film that particular moment because there were a lot of distractions “from persistent instigators” including HUERTA.
And that’s why Essayli’s argument — that DOJ can provide Electronically Stored Information in whatever format they want so long as it maintains the data integrity — falls short.
In relevant part, the ESI protocol recommends that (1) after conferral, any format selected for producing discovery should maintain the ESI’s integrity, allow for reasonable usability, and reasonably limit costs, and, if possible, conform to industry standards for the format;
Crossen’s testimony, along with problems in the testimony of others, raises more than enough reason to question the integrity of the data as provided. A Cellebrite extraction, which is what Huerta is asking for, would show whether there were gaps in production.
Essayli is also citing in poor faith to misrepresent Huerta’s argument (and in his motion to dismiss, switched between PDF and document page numbers, further obscuring his references). He repeatedly claims Huerta just wants DOJ to create a searchable index.
To the extent defendant is requesting the government create an index of the metadata in a searchable format, see Dkt. 58 at 3:1-5, that request is beyond the government’s discovery obligations.
[snip]
Instead, defendant’s true complaint is that the government has not created a searchable index of the photos’ and videos’ metadata. (Dkt. 58 at 3.)
But the cited passage (this is on document page 2) reveals they’re asking for far more than that.
The screenshot PDF images of the messages do not contain any metadata affiliated with the messages or the source iPhones, and no corresponding index was provided to defense counsel with this information. Notably, the phone numbers belonging to the sender(s) and recipient(s) of the messages, or even the iPhone contact cards, were not included in the production or visible in the screenshots. Nor do the iMessage screenshots contain a timestamp for each message; while some messages do have a timestamp at the top (sometimes owing to a gap in time), many of the messages contain no timestamp whatsoever.6 Additionally, because of the nature of the initial production (individual PDFs named only by “IMG” file number), there is no way in which to tell who the owner and custodian (e.g., which agent) is of each set of messages and each phone. Additionally, due to the screenshot nature of the messages, certain messages are cut off and the messages were not all provided in chronological order to Mr. Huerta. Finally, the iMessage screenshots do not contain any geolocation or coordinate information, if any is available, as is often part of cellphone metadata or any “native” file.
There are a whole bunch of reasons this is necessary to reconstruct what happened.
But in DHS’ new parallel evidentiary role, it’s not clear whether Huerta — or any of the other people accused of assault using evidence from officers’ personal cell phones — will have access to that.
Chekhov’s Back Door Gate Appears in the David Huerta Assault Saga
F[ucking] A[sshole] Bill Essayli submitted his response to David Huerta’s motion to dismiss his information (see this post for an explanation of why I’m calling Essayli, “F[ucking] A[sshole]”).
Here’s a summary of the argument: Huerta intentionally blocked the only available entrance of the search (but not arrest) location, he did this via means other than standing in front of a van, and encouraged others to do so, which led (after Ryan Ribner assaulted Huerta) LAPD to declare a riot.
During the execution of a search warrant, defendant intentionally blocked the only available entrance of the Warrant Location. He did this by sitting down and walking in circles directly in front of the entrance of the Warrant Location, making it impossible for any law enforcement vehicles to enter or exit, without defendant moving. In addition, he also successfully encouraged other individuals to join him in blocking the entrance of the Warrant Location in the same manner eventually contributing to LAPD declaring a riot at the Warrant Location. As defendant concedes in the Motion, defendant was told explicitly he “shouldn’t block or impede the [law enforcement vehicle] that would be arriving.” (Dkt. 55 at 14.)
Even this passage conflates two things Huerta did — sit, and picket, before the van showed up — with blocking it.
But the most interesting part of the passage is that word “available,” which is doing a lot of work. Along with the filing, DOJ submitted seven exhibits: three compilations of video (filed manually, so we don’t get them), and the interview reports from HSI Special Agent J Smith (who seems to have overseen the search), a second interview with the van driver, Brian Gonzalez, an interview with HSI Special Agent Andre Lemon, who helped Gonzalez change a tire, and a picture of the tire that got slashed while or shortly after Huerta was being assaulted. These late interviews appear to be an attempt to salvage the case with witnesses besides Ryan Ribner and Carey Crook, the guys who assaulted Huerta. DOJ is spinning a new story that because of what happened with Huerta — that is, because Ribner, especially, assaulted the SEIU CA President — HSI had to flee the site of the search hours earlier than they otherwise would have, which limited the number of undocumented workers they could detain, which wasn’t supposed to be the point of the search.
As Lemon described, they fled out a back gate.
SA Lamon stated they loaded the vehicle with “Some of the detainees and snuck out of the back gate”.
You see, from the moment I read this line in Ribner’s affidavit supporting the arrest warrant, I was pretty sure there was another gate ready to open, just like Chekov’s gun, a plot point that must be resolved.
Our trusty cyber expert also suggests that the van entering the gate of the facility — the predicate for making Huerta move and therefore the predicate to tackling him, injuring him, and then arresting him — may not, after all, be the only entrance. He describes that “as far as I was aware,” it was.
As far as I was aware, this gate was the only location throughwhich vehicles could enter or exit the premises.
I wonder whether his awareness has changed over the weekend.
Ribner said a bit more about Chekov’s gate in the arrest report (and also revealed that he left in a caravan via “the secondary gate,” which he did not otherwise explain).
ERO SDDO C C approached SSA Ribner to discuss a plan to safely escort an ERO USG vehicle into the facility. SSA Ribner provided the same information to SDDO C as he did to the DEA agents regarding subjects potentially impeding/blocking agents and USG vehicles. SDDO Cr asked if there was another entrance/exit to the facility; SSA Ribner related that he did not have knowledge of a secondary entrance/exit. SSA Ribner related that agents would need to go outside of the gate and encircle the sides of the van to make sure it isn’t blocked and/or damaged. SDDO C asked how agents would move the pickup truck [playing loud music] from the driveway. SSA Ribner advised that he would verbally request the driver to move the truck. [my emphasis]
DOJ didn’t bother to ask Crook whether he knew of a second gate last August, as it became clear neither his nor Ribner’s testimony was credible. But his interview report describes that Crook, “recalled himself and GS Ribner coming up with a plan for the main gate to slightly open to allow the van to enter the property and then close it after the van entered,” just before he made a claim — that Huerta had “straddle[d] the hood of the van” and “ma[de] his body an X,” a claim no other witnesses nor the video corroborated.
The “main gate.”
You only call something a main gate if you know there’s another.
Brian Gonzalez — the guy who drove the van and all of a sudden remembered David Huerta being close to it after he got a permanent job at CBP and had a follow-up call, probably the guy DOJ hopes will be their star witness given problems with calling Ribner or Crook to the stand –was not asked about any gates in his first interview (or the follow-up, where his memory about Huerta evolved).
But in his interview last week, he was asked about the gate.
Before I explain what he said, note that the F[ucking] A[sshole] Bill Essayli confessed in his response that earlier — right up until the moment David Huerta arrived, Essayli seems to suggest — DHS had no problem getting cars and vans through the entrance where protestors were.
Shortly thereafter, between 10:30 a.m. and 11:45 a.m. demonstrators began to show up at the Warrant Location and congregated near the entrance to the front gate. During this initial period, before defendant arrived, the demonstrators did not block the driveway and repeatedly allowed vehicles to enter and exit the Warrant Location through the front gate. (Ex. 1 at 7:30-7:35; 8:16-8:27; Ex. 2 at 4:25-5:25, 7:49-7:53, 8:22-8:26, 9:45-9:48, 11:47-11:58.)
There was a white van captured in one of Jeremy Crossen’s photos, showing a time stamp of 11:10 (it’s possible the van in one or both of these pictures is the one driven by Gonazalez; per Google his drop-off at the Federal Building was a 9-minute drive away).
Crossen’s countersurveillance report describes what may be this van — at around that time, a van and a beige car were able to pass through the gate because someone asked nicely for the protestors to move and they complied.
At approximately 11:25 a.m., The southwest gate of the business opened, and a beige Toyota sedan and a white ICE ERO transport van approached the south apron of the driveway. As the gate opened, UHM-1 ran from where he was standing, just east of the apron. UHM-1 initially stood center driveway of the apron, blocking the egress of the car and van while filming. An unidentified agent standing just north of the gate ordered UHM-1 to move and he subsequently complied.
Half an hour later, per Crossen’s report, a mini-convoy came up at a time when Huerta was legitimately in front of the gate, if we can believe any of these reports (we can’t).
At approximately 11:54 a.m., A black Government Jeep Grand Cherokee, along with several other government vehicles, approached the apron of the driveway from E. 15 Street. The vehicle th remained stopped as both the gate was closed and standing protesters were blocking the apron of the driveway, preventing the vehicle from pulling closer to the south gate for entry into the business. At this time, TFO Crossen observed HUERTA, LENEHAN, UHF-8 and UHM-7 sit down on the ground, approximately two to four feet from the closed gate. TFO Crossen both audibly heard and video recording HUERTA motioning with his left hand with an “enviting motion” to the crowd around him, yelling “Sit down! Sit Down!” repeatedly. HSI Supervisory Special Agent (SSA) Ryan Ribner approached the closed gate from the other side and informed the seated protesters they were impeding the vehicles and needed to move. Upon hearing this, HUERTA, while still seated, “scooted” forward, where he was now seated on his knees, right against the gate. HUERTA ignored SSA Ribner’s orders to move because they were impeding law enforcement vehicles attempting to enter the business. HUERTA yelled to SSA Ribner, “What are you doing! What are you doing! I can’t hear you through your fucking mask! How are you keeping me safe by doing this!” SSA Ribner, calmly again admonished HUERTA that he was impeding law enforcement vehicles from entering.
Those vehicles do not appear in Ribner’s report, as far as I can tell, at all.
There’s no resolution to what happened to those vehicles, though. They disappear from the narrative by the time the van driven by Gonzalez shows up, which is when seven people move to block the van, and oh by the way, so does David Huerta, added as an afterthought in Crossen’s report.
At approximately 12:15 p.m., a white Law enforcement van pulls up to the apron of the driveway, just south of the main south gate with its siren and emergency lights activated. As the vehicle pulled up, agents opened the south gate, and several agents walked from inside the property compound to the apron of the driveway to assist with moving protestors so the emergency vehicle could gain entrance. As most of the crowd moved for the loud audible siren and emergency police lights, LENEHAN, GARDUNO, CUERVO, ALTAMIRANO, UHM-7, and an unidentified Hispanic female, later identified as Edith DIAZ (DOB: /1977; COC UNK) and UHM-8, who was now out of his unoccupied vehicle, which was playing loud music and blocking the apron, ran closer to and in front of the law enforcement vehicle to block it.. HUERTA also moved toward the emergency van with activated lights and siren and stood approximately two feet from the front bumper, directly in front of it, ignoring the emergency lights, activated siren and ignoring agents orders to move.
Gonzalez stated that he called Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO), Supervisory Detention and Deportation Officer (SDDO) Carey Crook when he was about a block away from the location.
Gonzalez stated that he drove past the crowd at the front gate and asked SDDO Crook if he could come through the back.
Gonzalez stated that SDDO Crook informed him that the back gate was locked and they didn’t have the keys to the lock.
At noon, when Ribner was staging a confrontation with the people he believed were “vicious, horrible people,” he didn’t know there was a second gate.
But somehow Gonzalez, who found out just that morning he’d be doing this drive and had already done one pick-up that day, knew there was one. Not only Gonzalez knew of it. But Crook — whom Ribner claims asked him, Ribner, if there were a second gate — not only knew of one, but knew it was locked.
When they needed to get by protestors before Ribner had assaulted David Huerta, they asked nicely and everyone complied.
When they needed to get by protestors after Ribner had assaulted David Huerta, they knew exactly how to do that: go out the back door gate, which it turns out they had keys to.
Update: On Thursday, Huerta asked to delay the trial until May. I suspect this reflects a bid by DOJ to implicate Huerta — possibly even to supersede him with a felony — for the punctured tire.
b. Defendant contends that the omnibus opposition and the recent discovery productions of the government raise issues that warrant additional investigation and the need for additional pretrial filings. Moreover, defendant anticipates making additional discovery requests based on and in response to the recent productions of by the government that raise new trial issues.
c. In light of the foregoing, counsel for defendant also represents that additional time is necessary to confer with defendant, conduct and complete an independent investigation of the case, conduct and complete additional legal research including for potential pre-trial motions, review the discovery and potential evidence in the case, and prepare for trial in the event that a pretrial resolution does not occur. Defense counsel represents that failure to grant the continuance would deny them reasonable time necessary for effective preparation, taking into account the exercise of due diligence.
Timeline
June 6: Arrest
9:00 AM: HSI task force officer (and Inglewood cop) Jeremy Crossen arrives under cover
9:20: Agents start executing search
9:57: Crossen interacts with Asian woman
10:26: Crossen interacts w/Hispanic protestor, claims he is monitoring the police
11:07: Crossen sees pick-up without plates whose Hispanic driver films
11:19: Crossen describes a Hispanic woman with a neck gaiter; his report provides background on a Kids of Immigrants sweatshirt she wears; start time of alleged criminal conduct
11:25: A sedan enters the gate; after an agent instructs those filming it to step away, they do; Crossen texts Ribner,
11:31: A Hispanic woman whom Crossen IDs by name shows up, makes phone calls
11:36: Crossen describes a white woman by name, describes that she masked as the crowd grew
11:37: Crossen describes the Hispanic leader of ACCE Action, Council Member Jose Delgado, show up, make calls
11:49: Crossen claims he sees Huerta walk up
11:51: A white woman from Tenants Union starts yelling obscenities
11:53: Ribner instructs Crossen to focus on Huerta
11:54: Huerta and others sit in front of the gate
12:01 PM: Ribner leaves the property and assaults Huerta [note his report timeline goes haywire in here]
12:00-12:09: Crossen texts Ribner
12:15: Crossen claims van arrives (his description describe others who were in front of the van, then says Huerta also was)
12:15: Ribner calls 911 (claiming this is about pepper spray)
12:18: Crossen describes a scrimmage line
12:20-12:40: Discussions about Huerta’s attempt to call his attorney
12:30: LAFD responds; Huerta asks to be brought to the hospital; Crossen describes LAFD arrival this way:
At approximately 12:28 p.m., TFO Crossen observed a Los Angeles City Fire truck with activated emergency lights and loud audible siren, attempting to gain entry to the business, still being blocked by protestors, to render aid for HUERTA, inside the business, who had been exposed to OC Spray, during his arrest.
12:40: Ribner reports arrest to CACD US Attorney office
12:42: Ribner tells Crossen his personal phone is out of battery, asks him to use his government one
12:47: Ribner admits he used pepper spray
1:05: Ribner speaks to USAO again
1:30: Huerta taken to hospital w/agent in car
2:45: Ribner asks Crossen for pictures of Huerta
Unmarked time: Mayor Bass shows up to hospital room; they ask her to leave (and she does)
9:12: Crossen sends last clip from videos to Ribner (the discovery turned over provides nowhere near the “4 hours” or “100 videos” that Crossen told Ribner, five hours earlier, that he had taken (though the defense did not include all the texts in their exhibit)
June 17: Date created for one photo provided in discovery
June 19: Initial incident report; Ribner would later (in his September 10 interview) admit he wrote the report from memory and simply did not “recall that he told HUERTA, ‘You are not impeding’. He does not know why he did not include that statement in his report and agrees that his statement could sound exculpatory.”
First Assistant AUSA Bill Essayli, who continues to serve most functions of US Attorney in Los Angeles even after Judge Michael Seabright ruled he’s not lawfully the US Attorney, has an identity crisis.
And it’s not his continued attempts to use textual gimmicks to obscure that he’s not the US Attorney, as the way he adds the initials “F.A.” in his Xitter profile as if his given name is “Fucking Asshole.”
Though the defendant who first forced a ruling that Essayli was playacting, Jaime Hector Rodriguez, continues to insist that Essayli can’t just change his title in a bid to keep powers he does not lawfully possess.
The simple answer is that Mr. Essayli is exercising power he does not possess. He has transcended the land of statutes. He is wielding significant authority, but the whole point is that he lacks that authority: it was not validly conferred on him by Congress. No powers are conferred on “a FAUSA” by statute, id., because the FAUSA position is absent from the statutes, R.M. 9–10. But this FAUSA has inferior-officer powers, because he is exercising powers he has never been conferred. E.g., R.M. 9 & n.2. This is just another way for the government to cast the trick it has played in benign language: appoint an ineligible individual to a vacant office, give him a different title not set out in the statutes, and thereby avoid all statutory limits on the appointment.
Lindsey Halligan’s similar identity problem in EDVA is heating up too.
Rather, I’m talking about the identity issues that threaten to destroy his efforts to criminalize doxing in the immigration context.
In US v. Raygoza, Essayli charged three women who followed an ICE officer — believing he was headed to conduct another snatching — only to arrive at his home. They continued to livestream, and from a neighbor’s property, they both invited others to come to the neighborhood but also announced to his neighbors that he’s la migra.
Yesterday, Fucking Asshole Bill Essayli responded to Sandra Samane’s and Ashleigh Brown’s motions to dismiss (Brown is represented by the same FPDs who made a frivolous assault charge against her go away last year). It’s not so much that their arguments were rock solid; motions to dismiss are really difficult to win. Rather, it’s that in the course of two footnotes, Fucking Asshole Bill Essayli revealed grave problems with his case. The second explained why a separate motion moved to dismiss the second count of the indictment, doxing, the crime which the defendants allegedly conspired to commit.
4 Defendants failed to state the actual home address of R.H. on social media, and instead said the number of a neighbor’s home approximately 100 feet from that of R.H. Because 18 U.S.C. § 119 criminalizes making publicly available “the home address” of covered individuals, the government has moved to dismiss the substantive count (Count Two).
The definition of restricted personal information as used in the law pertains only to the alleged victims own address; the defendants here livestreamed his neighbor’s address (in detention filings in her now-dismissed assault case, Brown explained that they stayed some distance from the victim’s house so as to comply with her release conditions).
A still graver problem for Fucking Asshole Bill Essayli is that — in a filing that elsewhere focuses closely on the terms specifically defined in the doxing statute (“restricted information” and “covered persons”) and on the import of the definitions generally (which is normal in responding to a void for vagueness challenge), Fucking Asshole Bill Essayli uses his first footnote to offer a definition of doxing.
1 Doxxing is short for “dropping documents.” Vangheluwe v. Got News, LLC, 365 F. Supp. 3d 850, 858 (E.D. Mich. 2019). The practice involves “using the Internet to source out and collect someone’s personal and private information and then publicly releasing that information online.” Id. The “goal of doxxing is typically retribution, harassment or humiliation.” Id.
He’s got two problems with that footnote.
First, what the defendants did — follow a guy home unwittingly and livestream where they ended up — is entirely different from “using the Internet to source out and collect someone’s personal and private information,” which only underscores that no one alleges that the defendants specifically sought out the ICE guy’s address. They didn’t dox him, according to the definition in this footnote.
Worse still, the defined goal of doxing in that footnote — “retribution, harrassment[,] or humiliation” — differs from the intent requirement in the statute:
(a) In General.—Whoever knowingly makes restricted personal information about a covered person, or a member of the immediate family of that covered person, publicly available—
(1) with the intent to threaten, intimidate, or incite the commission of a crime of violence against that covered person, or a member of the immediate family of that covered person; or
(2) with the intent and knowledge that the restricted personal information will be used to threaten, intimidate, or facilitate the commission of a crime of violence against that covered person, or a member of the immediate family of that covered person,
The defendants may have doxed the ICE goon. They may well have decided to humiliate him in front of his neighbors by revealing that he is an ICE goon.
But there’s a chasm between hoping to humiliate someone who does a disfavored job and intending for someone to use that information to commit a crime of violence against them. Fucking Asshole Bill Essayli attempts to dodge that by saying the conspiracy should not incorporate the elements of the count he’s seeking to admit and also stating that they won’t argue the defendants intended a crime of violence to happen to the ICE guy.
Separately, Brown argues the indictment must be dismissed because it does not specify the “crime of violence” Brown allegedly intended to incite. (Brown Mot. 19-21.) Even assuming this argument is applicable to the conspiracy alleged in Count One and not just the substantive count the government has moved to dismiss, at trial the government does not intend to proceed on the theory that defendants conspired to release R.H.’s home address with the intent to incite the commission of a crime of violence against him, or did so with the intent and knowledge that the restricted information would be used to facilitate the commission of a crime of violence against him. Defendant’s argument with respect to this portion of the statute is thus moot.
But he never gets around to addressing the larger point. Humiliation is not a crime of violence. But it is also not a threat or even intimidation.
The problem with this is made more apparent when Fucking Asshole Bill Essayli engages in a hypothetical dismissing Brown’s attempt to say she couldn’t have doxed the victim, because his address was already public. Brown’s tack would lead to absurd results, Fucking Asshole Bill Essayli says, because if it held, then how would they criminalize someone threatening the daughter of a judge (like Trump’s doxing of Barack Obama, something Trump has done), and how would they criminalize a defendant posting a witness’ address with the intent they they be intimidated by the criminal’s mob (again, something Trump has done more than once or twice or a hundred times).
And to interpret the statute as Brown would have it would lead to absurd results. Take, for example, the hypothetical of a judge’s daughter posting a photograph on Instagram that reveals her home address: a photograph of her family standing outside her home where the mailbox is visible. A defendant who later appears before the judge would not be subject to prosecution for posting the judge’s home address on an online forum with the intent to threaten the judge due to the daughter’s prior Instagram post. Similarly, a juror, informant, or witness would be cut off from statutory protection if a defendant’s family member or gang associate followed her home and posted the address on Facebook to intimidate her, but her address was already listed in the Whitepages.
In both those cases, of course, a prosecutor could — and should have, in the case of serial criminal Donald Trump — charged that as obstruction, witness tampering.
But these hypotheticals only underscore the point: in a filing asserting that doxing is done for humiliation, Fucking Asshole Bill Essayli is dodging language that requires further intent, not just to humiliate a goon in front of his neighbors, but to threaten him.
Threatening someone with social opprobrium is not the same as threatening someone with physical violence.
Yet the former is what Fucking Asshole Bill Essayli attempts to criminalize here.
Fucking Asshole Bill Essayli wants to criminalize any effort to shame someone for doing a shameful job. And while the argument may well get beyond this effort to dismiss the indictment, he has confessed in this filing that these women didn’t commit the charged crime.
In this post I described three scripts that different political groups use to describe our current situation. Trump apologists say that we are in a constitutional moment, roughly defined as a period in which the American people update the Constitution by insisting on changing prior interpretations. This script is based on a theory proposed by Bruce Ackerman, Sterling Professor of Law and Political Science at Yale Law School. Ackerman’s idea is laid out in his 1991 book We The People: Foundations, and is discussed in the second of his Oliver Wendell Holmes Lectures of 2006. It’s gained prominence since the 2024 election and the wholesale assault on our governmental system by Trump. For example, the New York Times did a podcast featuring long-time SCOTUS reporter Adam Liptak (link is to transcript).
I was dismissive of this idea, partly because I’d never heard of it, and partly because it seems weird that anything about Trump would fit into a responsible theory of the Constitution. And, of course it doesn’t fit: Trump apologists have to distort and prune the theory to make seem vaguely plausible.
The dualist Constitution and the Constitutional Moment
Ackerman calls his theory a dualist constitution. He describes the basic ideas. In our system of representative democracy, power flows from the people. Some decisions are made directly by the people, such as elections. Spme are made by the government directly, for example rules and executive orders; and some indirectly through representatives of the people, such as laws and appointments to certain bodies. Thus, a dualist constitution.
With respect to constitutional issues, the people can act in two ways. They can amend the Constitution following Article V. This hasn’t been done in a long time, and may no longer be possible. The second way is the relevant part of Ackerman’s theory.
Most of the time the people do not engage in constitutional debates, or even extended policy debates. We are consumed by the demands of our private lives, work, family, community, and that’s as it should be. These are the blessings of liberty. But occasionally some event occurs that requires the people to pay attention and make a decision. I’ll focus on the Civil Rights Era as in the Lectures.
In the Lectures Ackerman says:
In past work, I have shown how key constitutional transformations in American history have passed through a distinctive institutional dynamic, consisting of five phases: signaling, proposing, triggering, ratifying, and finally consolidating the new principles supported by the American people. Fn omitted.
Very briefly, signalling is the recognition by a significant institution or large group of people that change is needed and must be considered, and the issue is forced to the forefront. Proposing is the stage at which the issue is debated and specific proposals are made. Triggering is the adoption of new legislation or a change made by SCOTUS, or new rules adopted by the federal government. Ratification takes place as the moving group wins elections. Consolidation occurs as the new principle is embedded in confirming cases and bureaucratic practice.
In the case of the Civil Rights Era, Brown v. Board was the signal, the marches, demonstrations, citizen organizing, and agitation that followed are the proposing stage, The trigger was the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The ratification was that year’s landslide victory of Lyndon Johnson over Barry Goldwater along with huge majorities in Congress. The consolidation phase took place as the Voting Rights Act and other legislation passed with substantial bipartisan support. Richard Nixon continued and reinforced enforcement of those laws, and SCOTUS upheld the new laws and allowed powerful judicial enforcement.
Ackerman calls examples like the Civil Rights Era Constitutional Moments. The Trump crowd claims that this is one.
Applying the Ackerman theory
It’s difficult to diagnose the current state of a society, as Lescek Kolakowski tells us. At the time Ackerman was writing his book, the Civil Rights Era was 25 years in the past. His analysis in the Lectures was written 40 years later, which allows for at least some historical perspective, We are operating in real time, so I think it’s not safe to apply historical theories blindly; caution is essential.
Even so it seems obvious that the Trump crowd has nothing like the record of the Civil Rights Era to support a claim that we are in a Constitutional Moment. Trump never won a majority in an election, let alone a landslide victory like Johnson’s.
The Republicans, now firmly under Trump’s control, have never won a substantial majority in the House, and their fragile majority was won through computerized racial and political gerrymandering sanctioned by the Republican SCOTUS. The Republicans have a small majority in the Senate, but the Republican Senators represent fewer people than the Democratic Senators.
Trump has no popular support for his policies. His agenda is set out in Project 2025, and it was so toxic he disavowed it during the campaign. His favorability numbers are and have been negative. Polling consistently shows that a substantial majority of Americans loathe his policies. The brutality of his immigration enforcement, his attacks on the judiciary, his refusal to comply with the Epstein Transparency Act, his stupid tariffs, cutting research in violation of appropriation laws, and his foreign wars, none of them have even close to majority support.
I do not think the MAGA movement is a grass roots expression of the will of the American people. There are always racists and fascists, and authoritarians and anti-Semites, and religious crackpots, but the vast majority of Americans mostly ignore them. Trump’s not-crazy voters are largely influenced by demagogues, liars, and grifters, funded by filthy rich right-wingers with astonishing views about the rest of humanity. Without them, he’s a blow-hard flogging fraudulent universities.
The slightly bigger picture
Ackerman is a firm believer in the idea of a living Constitution. To put it very simply, the Constitution is a mix of organizational and operational rules; and a set of aspirations. The former include the establishment of the three branches, allocation of powers, and election rules. The latter are mostly contained in the Preamble and the Bill of Rights. Almost all of it is open to some degree of interpretation. The Supreme Court arrogated to itself the power to make final decisions on the meaning of both as[ects of the Constitution.
But in the end, the power of government lies in the people. If SCOTUS gets it wrong, the people force change. That’s one way to understand the Civil Rights Era: the absurdly limited interpretation of the Reconstruction Amendments in the Slaughterhouse Cases and the Civil Rights Cases established racial segregation as our baseline, and overturning it took decades and deaths.
Another of Ackerman’s examples is the New Deal. For decades SCOTUS struck down almost all progressive legislation regulating business and empowering unions, in such cases as Lochner v. New York. But the Depression was such a hideous problem that SCOTUS capitulated.
That’s not likely to happen given the relationship between Trump and SCOTUS Chief John Roberts. The front page pic of Trump and Roberts at the 2025 State of the Union address is the lead pic in this article at Law & Crime, titled “Chief Justice Roberts just handed Trump another win on foreign aid cuts after admin complained of judge’s ‘brinkmanship’”. The title and the pic are a not-so-subtle sneer at Roberts’ claims of independence from Trump.
Electoral victories won’t fix that.
==========
Photo credit: Leah Millis/Pool via AP
The Jerome Powell Clusterfuck Is a Clusterfuck of Pam Bondi’s Own Making
On Sunday, the politically astute Fed Chair Jerome Powell posted a video describing subpoenas he received on Friday, which he claimed (credibly) were part of an effort to attack the independence of the Fed.
This new threat is not about my testimony last June or about the renovation of the Federal Reserve buildings. It is not about Congress’s oversight role; the Fed through testimony and other public disclosures made every effort to keep Congress informed about the renovation project. Those are pretexts. The threat of criminal charges is a consequence of the Federal Reserve setting interest rates based on our best assessment of what will serve the public, rather than following the preferences of the President.
This is about whether the Fed will be able to continue to set interest rates based on evidence and economic conditions—or whether instead monetary policy will be directed by political pressure or intimidation.
The statement (and what has since been reported as a good deal of political maneuvering) set off a number of counterreactions that could prove really costly to Trump — and the United States as a whole.
While financial markets recovered from their initial shock by the end of the day (but not before gold hit a new record price), that may only continue as the political pushback continues.
Not all the markets were impervious to Powell’s harassment by DOJ goons. The dollar, which is down 8.3 percent over the past year—that is, more or less since Trump took office—dropped steeply Monday morning before rising a bit in the afternoon. The yield on 30-year Treasury bonds, which has been rising since October, spiked Monday morning. That’s a sign that fewer people wish to buy them. Why purchase dollars or Treasury bonds when the president is so determined to lower their value that he’s willing to throw the Fed chair, who’s been lowering interest rates lately but not fast enough to suit Trump, in jail? Over the course of the afternoon, however, bond yields fell, leaving them about where they closed Friday.
Gold, meanwhile, jumped nearly 3 percent. As I’ve explained previously, the rising price of gold is the surest sign that the United States economy is headed in a terrible direction. It’s a vote of no-confidence in the dollar. As I explained in October, investors call rising gold prices “debasement trade,” which means money is fleeing from assets in which the market is losing faith—in this case, the dollar and Treasury bonds. The higher the price of gold rises, the more debased our currency and our nation’s debt become.
More problematic for Trump, a number of Republican members of Congress — starting with some of the usual rebels, like Thom Tillis and Lisa Murkowski (who described in a Tweet that she had spoken with Powell)…
Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., said Sunday he will block any Trump appointees to the central bank, including for the new chair, in light of revelations over the weekend that the Justice Department is investigating Powell for potential perjury charges.
“If there were any remaining doubt whether advisers within the Trump Administration are actively pushing to end the independence of the Federal Reserve, there should now be none. It is now the independence and credibility of the Department of Justice that are in question,” Tillis said in a statement.
“I will oppose the confirmation of any nominee for the Fed — including the upcoming Fed Chair vacancy — until this legal matter is fully resolved,” he added.
… But extending t0 loyalists like French Hill, John Thune, and John Kennedy — complained about the disruption caused by the news, including to a crypto bill Congress has long been chasing.
inancial Services Chair French Hill, who called Powell a “man of integrity” and said the investigation threatened “sound monetary policy decisions.” Senate Majority Leader John Thune, meanwhile, called for the probe to be “resolved quickly.”
“I want to see [the Fed] operate in an independent way free of politics,” he added.
[snip]
While Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.) called Powell a “bad” Fed chair, he added, “I do not believe, however, that he is a criminal.”
Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.), a Banking Committee member, said if administration officials thought Powell had committed perjury, then they needed to back up the accusations. He added, “I would be stunned if he had done anything wrong.”
“We need this like we need a hole to the head,” Kennedy said, warning of a possible spike in interest rates as markets lose faith in Fed independence.
Meanwhile, Scott Bessent — who has managed to stave off a great deal of stupidity worse than his own in the last year — worried not just about the effect this would have on the markets, but on his ability to stack the Fed with people who wouldn’t be independent.
A perturbed Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told President Trump late Sunday that the federal investigation into the Federal Reserve chair “made a mess” and could be bad for financial markets, two sources familiar with the call told Axios.
Why it matters: Bessent’s worries about the financial fallout were somewhat realized Monday, when the dollar dropped as bond yields and the price of gold rose amid worries about political interference in the Fed.
“The secretary isn’t happy, and he let the president know,” one source familiar with Bessent’s call to Trump told Axios.
That is, Pirro’s investigation of Powell may threaten precisely the purpose that she — or whoever’s brilliant idea all this was — thought she’d serve, giving Trump more power over the Fed.
As I keep saying, Donald J. Trump has done a piss-poor job in choosing his political martyrs this term.
And all that’s before you consider how Powell’s statement will add to Lisa Cook’s credibility before the Supreme Court next week, when she claims her purported firing was an attempt to destroy the independence of the Fed. The entire exception for the Fed SCOTUS created served to protect Powell, and now he’s under the same threat Cook is.
Privately, some White House officials see the episode as radioactive, with aides and allies eager to distance themselves from a probe they believe could do more damage to the White House than to Powell. One of the five people familiar said some inside and close to the White House are “freaked out” that a further threat to the Fed chief’s job security could spook the bond market.
How this happened deserves closer attention.
WaPo describes that Bill Pulte — who has had it in for Powell for months (in part because Pulte is not very good at his own job running FHFA, and so imagines low interest rates will make his own failures less acute) — wanted to precipitate such an investigation, but did not.
Housing finance regulator Bill Pulte met recently with President Donald Trump at Mar-a-Lago and shared a prop resembling a “wanted poster” he had made up featuring Federal Reserve Chair Jerome H. Powell, according to a person with knowledge of the meeting.
Pulte laid out scenarios that included investigating Powell and Trump liked the idea, the person said.
It’s not clear how the inquiry into Powell was approved, but an official with the Justice Department said it launched a criminal probe into Powell in November and Pulte was not a factor in the inquiry. The extraordinary investigation of a sitting Fed chairman was disclosed by Powell himself late Sunday.
[snip]
By the time Pulte met with Trump, the U.S. attorney’s office in D.C. had already launched an investigation, according to a person briefed on the situation.
Jeanine Pirro posted a defensive tweet yesterday, attacking Powell because he didn’t respond to prosecutors’ bullshit questions without a subpoena, which is within his right.
Someone at DOJ threw Pirro under the bus to Marc Caputo.
U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro’s office in D.C. launched the probe without giving a heads-up to Treasury, top White House officials or the main Justice Department, sources told Axios.
[snip]
A DOJ spokesperson said the department doesn’t comment on investigations, but an administration source said Pirro “went rogue.”
The effort to blame Pirro for this tremendous own goal comes in the wake of a WSJ article describing that Trump is bitching about his Attorney General, though his complaints suggest he might well support the criminal investigation of Powell, especially given that he doubled down on his complaints against the Fed Chair yesteday.
President Trump has complained to aides repeatedly in recent weeks about Attorney General Pam Bondi, describing her as weak and an ineffective enforcer of his agenda, administration officials and other people familiar with his complaints said.
The criticisms appear to be part of an intense campaign by Trump to pressure the Justice Department to more aggressively pursue his priorities, some of the officials said. Trump has previously criticized Bondi at times but his vocal concerns about his attorney general have grown more frequent in recent months, officials said.
A clusterfuck, the White House needs someone to blame, and they’re pointing to DOJ.
And yet, this clusterfuck is a clusterfuck of Pam Bondi’s own making.
In a normal DOJ, there’s an established non-political body that would vet an investigation like this one, Public Integrity. At the very least they would ensure the integrity of the inquiry and flag the investigation for necessary approvals. If we can believe those accusing Pirro of free-lancing, that didn’t happen.
To protect against politically motivated abuses, the DOJ’s Justice Manual has long required prosecutors in local U.S. attorneys’ offices to consult with the Public Integrity Section on any “federal criminal matter that involves alleged or suspected violations of federal or state campaign financing laws, federal patronage crimes, or corruption of the election process.”
But Trump’s DOJ reversed that policy in June. “Department leadership is currently revising this section,” this part of the Justice Manual now says. “The consultation requirement is suspended while revisions are ongoing.”
Several former Justice Department employees expressed extreme concern that the change in the Justice Manual, coupled with the flattening of the Public Integrity Section, opens the door for the Trump administration to engage in partisan prosecutions of Democrats by assigning the job to prosecutors working for U.S. attorneys — political appointees nominated by the president.
[snip]
But with so few lawyers left to consult, former members of the team say those consultation requirements are essentially meaningless.
“In a stripped-down office, the consulting function becomes nominal, if it exists at all. It sort of exists on paper so the government can say it exists and claim to be complying with the law,” said Michael Romano, a former prosecutor on the team. “But if you want people to provide legitimate oversight, guidance and expertise, you can’t do that with a team of two. In reality, the advising function becomes a box-checking exercise.”
Sure, they destroyed PIN precisely so they could predicate investigations into Trump’s enemies more easily.
This was entirely the point.
And now the entire Trump Administration is panicking about the results.
Ms. Pirro also did not share information with her bosses at the main headquarters of the Justice Department — including Attorney General Pam Bondi and her top deputy, Todd Blanche — citing the discretion granted local U.S. attorneys’ offices to investigate the head of the most powerful monetary policy body on earth, according to several officials with knowledge of her actions.
Senior officials at the department were stunned, and annoyed, that Ms. Pirro did not consult them on an investigation of such international importance, the officials with knowledge of her actions said.
