Alina Habba: A Parking Garage Lawyer with $1 Million in Sanction Penalties
In the first appellate court decision on Donald Trump’s persistent effort to put Insurance Lawyers, Election Deniers, and other sundry actors play-acting as US Attorneys, the Third Circuit has unanimously ruled that Alina Habba really is nothing more than a Parking Garage lawyer.
Habba is not the Acting U.S. Attorney for the District of New Jersey by virtue of her appointment as First Assistant U.S. Attorney because only the first assistant in place at the time the vacancy arises automatically assumes the functions and duties of the office under the FVRA. Additionally, because Habba was nominated for the vacant U.S. Attorney position, the FVRA’s nomination bar prevents her from assuming the role of Acting U.S. Attorney. Finally, the Attorney General’s delegation of all the powers of a U.S. Attorney to Habba is prohibited by the FVRA’s exclusivity provision. Therefore, we will affirm the District Court’s disqualification order.
This ruling, if applied elsewhere, would cause problems for Lindsey the Insurance Lawyer, Sigal the Election Denying Laywer, and Bill the Chapman Nut, as well — including Essayli, whom a judge ruled could act as First AUSA.
Abbe Lowell, who represents Letitia James in EDVA, argued this case before the court.
The Third Circuit ruling comes even as the Eleventh Circuit ruled that Alina the Parking Garage lawyer is not only just a Parking Garage lawyer, but a frivolous one at that, sustaining the $1 million in fees on her and her liege Donald Trump.
IIRC, the Third Circuit is where Emil Bove went when he got elevated to the appellate bench. If this decision was unanimous it follows that Bove voted against his former partner-in-Trump’s-defense Habba. Am I reading this right?
If yes, then I wonder whether Bove is trying to stay in the good graces of Judge Boasberg until Republican Senators try to impeach Boasberg.
Hoping Boasberg gets to Bove’s role in the DOJ flouting of his (Boasberg’s) judicial order sooner rather than later.
In the meantime, Turley is spouting misinformation about “Russiagate” and glossing over the crime at the U.S. Capitol in this Hill piece supporting anti-Boasberg Republican senators .
https://thehill.com/opinion/judiciary/5618336-the-selective-outrage-of-judge-james-boasberg/
Not quite correct.
This was a three-judge panel, as is usual. Bove was not one of the panel. He would/will be should an en banc re-hearing be granted.
https://bsky.app/profile/chrisgeidner.bsky.social/post/3m6wzafzv422u
“this was an opinion by Judge Fischer, a GWB appointee, and one of the other panelists was also a GWB appointee (Judge Smith). The third panelist was Judge Restrepo, an Obama appointee.”
The opinion was unanimous.
https://bsky.app/profile/chrisgeidner.bsky.social/post/3m6wzhwaeus2u
“Because Fischer and Smith are senior status, moreover, even if the Third Circuit — now with 6 Trump appointees, two (other) GWB appointees, and 6 Dem appointees among active judges — wanted to take this en banc, the same outcome is likely a lock since the senior status judges could participate.”
Nope. Bove the Execrable was not on the three judge panel.
Good to know! Thx
Yes! Tony, I’ve been trying to thank you for correcting me and I keep getting a “duplicate reply” notice, but then can’t cancel the one I wrote to start over.
Technical issues aside, I had assumed that EW’s “unanimously” meant the entire court, not a panel. I appreciate the correction!
Thanks, Tony. I thought I had read EW’s post carefully, but I missed that there was a panel. When she wrote “unanimously,” I inferred that it was the entire court. I appreciate the correction.
[Moderator’s note: a typo in your username in two attempts triggered auto-moderation and the spam catcher. I fixed this one but it looks like it’s a duplicate of a reply to pdaly. /~Rayne #tu]
Sorry, Rayne. Motor control issues have been giving me the slip lately. I’ll remember and take extra care. Thank you!
[FYI, you’d added an extra space – di Benci – which may have been picked up by your auto-fill as it appeared in two successive comments. When a comment doesn’t appear right away, you may want to clear your cache and try it again. /~Rayne]
Yes, it took me a while, but found this page:
https://ca03portal.powerappsportals.us/View-Case/?id=c30feac5-b1ce-f011-bbd2-001dd806fbd1
With deepest apologies to Ogden Nash:
Emil is of the Bove ilk
One end poo, the other, silk.
That’s funny, but Bove’s always struck me as the “One end poo, the other sulk” type.
I believe the reference to the tenth circuit (in Denver) should instead be to the eleventh (in Atlanta). Thanks for highlighting that 11/26 order, which I had missed.
Correct. I fixed it just as the gods booted me out, and forgot to fix it again. TY
The gods booted you out? My universe just turned upside down.
Dear Empty Wheel, I generally agree with and usually admire you—but, as an experienced lawyer conversant with insurance law and parking lot law, I find your snide characterizations of our sisters at the bar disconcerting. Not qualified? Probably. But even our bar brother Honest Abe rode the circuit and took what came his way. We all do what we can to make our way, honestly one hopes.
[Welcome back to emptywheel. Please use the SAME USERNAME and email address each time you comment so that community members get to know you. You attempted to publish this comment as “Tony” triggering auto-moderation; it has been edited to reflect your established username. Please check your browser’s cache and autofill; future comments may not publish if username does not match. /~Rayne]
First, the site’s name is emptywheel — one word, all lower case.
Second, the stakes for the overwhelming majority of cases related to insurance and parking lot law will not greatly affect the function of the Executive Branch, national security and foreign affairs, or the continuation of US democracy. Habba and Halligan have made it clear that they are better suited to the lower stakes practice from which they came.
If the shoe doesn’t fit you personally, don’t try it on.
I’ll wager that virtually no lawyers versed in the complexities of insurance or parking lot law have earned $1.0 million in court sanctions for their work. I’ll wager that’s true of virtually every lawyer. For not the reasons she and Donald Trump think, Ms. Habba is one in a million.
Not to make light of the stakes here, but Drebeen and Lowell are no doubt having a lot of fun arguing their cases against idiot lawyers representing the DOJ.
No doubt, and Popok over at Legal AF can’t hide his glee with the turn of events. After all, unless they are trumpers, judges do not like being lied to or undermined. The question is whether Convict-1 risks an en banc smackdown (which would mark Bove as a trumper) or goes straight to SCOTUS. When it comes to intimidation, the effective threat is more useful than getting exposed. That’s why appeasement doesn’t work.
“Having lots of fun”? I doubt it. Do you think their telephone and social media are filled with death threats toward them and their families?
One of the weirder things about the appointment of Habba and several other purported USAs is how easy it would be to do it the right way, the way it’s been done for decades.
That’s a sign of Trump’s weakness – he’s not sure his choices would survive either public exposure or their Senate votes – as well as his petulance and inability to delay gratification.
It’s designed to keep Trump surrounded only by sycophants, whose job is to never say No and to break the law on demand in order to protect him and to wreak vengeance on his enemies. It’s also to wreak havoc on the law, the Senate, and the basic framework of constitutional governance.
The folks who’d get through the “right way” to handle nominations are most likely to have said “No thanks – I’m good with my current job” if Trump approached them with an offer to be named a US Attorney.
Folks like Habba and Lindsey the Insurance Lawyer, OTOH, have no clue as to what the “right way” is, let alone be ready to submit themselves to that kind of examination of their qualifications. They would make Harriet Miers look terribly overqualified for SCOTUS.
Harriet actually was qualified, compared to this tribe. And at least she had the modesty to back out, the quality they most sorely lack.
Looks like she couldn’t “fake being smart” after all.