Lindsey Halligan Can’t Tell the Difference between a Man, a Woman, and a Ham Sandwich
Oh hey!
If it’s Thursday, it must be get no-billed by the Letitia James grand jury again!
Virtually every outlet (Politico, NYT, WaPo, AP, CNN) reports that DOJ tried again to indict New York’s Attorney General, once again getting no-billed by the grand jury. Maybe, just maybe, there’s not probable cause that Attorney General James did what frothers claim she did?
The day was not entirely a loss for Lindsey the Insurance Lawyer Masquerading as a US Attorney, though.
She almost managed to comply with Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly’s order yesterday to comply with Judge KK’s earlier order from last Saturday.
Before Judge KK’s deadline of 10 AM, Lindsey the Insurance Lawyer Masquerading as a US Attorney filed something called, “NOTICE of Appearance by Lindsey Halligan on behalf of UNITED STATES OF AMERICA (Halligan, Lindsey) (Entered: 12/11/2025),” dated Monday, which looks like this:
The metadata shows that Fay Brundage created the document. It also shows that it was actually created on December 8, as if they thought the better of actually filing a notice of appearance.
And at the same time, Robert McBride filed something called, “NOTICE of Appearance by Robert Kennedy McBride on behalf of UNITED STATES OF AMERICA (McBride, Robert) (Entered: 12/11/2025),” also dated Monday, which looks like this:
The metadata for that show no one changed the metadata from the original US Courts template created in 2008.
Hours and hours after Judge KK’s deadline, Lindsey the Insurance Lawyer Masquerading as a US Attorney filed something called, “NOTICE Certificate of Compliance by UNITED STATES OF AMERICA (Halligan, Lindsey),” meant to comply with this order from Judge KK.
The United States and its agent, the Attorney General of the United States, are ORDERED to identify, segregate, and secure the image of Petitioner Richman’s personal computer that was made in 2017, his Columbia University email accounts, and his iCloud account; any copies of those files; and any materials obtained, extracted, or derived from those files (collectively, “the covered materials”) that are currently in the possession of the United States.
The United States and its agents, including the Attorney General of the United States, are further ORDERED not to access the covered materials once they are identified, segregated, and secured, or to share, disseminate, or disclose the covered materials to any person, without first seeking and obtaining leave of this Court.
Here’s the language of the certificate of compliance, which is also dated December 8, which — hey! — is closer than Lindsey the Insurance Lawyer Masquerading as a US Attorney normally gets.
On December 6, 2025, the Court entered an Order [DE 10] stating that the government would “identify, segregate, and secure the image of Richman’s computer that was made in 2017, his Columbia University email accounts, and his iCloud account; any copies of those files; and any materials obtained, extracted, or derived from those files . . . currently in the possession of the United States.” The Court further ordered the government to not access, share, disseminate, or disclose these materials without further permission of the Court. Finally, the Court required the government to certify compliance with the Order by 12:00 p.m. ET on December 8, 2025.
The metadata shows that our good friend James Hayes — the guy in the thick of efforts to try to use material unlawfully accessed — is back, if only in spirit.
According to Carol Leonnig, Lindsey will be formally nominated to be US Attorney (which was already in the works). But Chuck Grassley pushed back on Trump’s complaints about the confirmation process (though without mentioning blue slips specifically). Honestly, it would be a lot of fun to have a Lindsey the Insurance Lawyer confirmation hearing.
But she may be too busy studying up on the difference between a man, a woman, and a ham sandwich.
Apparently, for this crowd, flailing is better than doing nothing.
Man, woman, person, camera, TV.
I can see why he considers that challenging.
Can the judge order Lindsey the Insurance Lawyer to undergo mandatory Continuing Legal Education related to (a) proofreading, and (b) how to read a clock? The metadata shows that Fay Brundage modified the doc Lindsey filed (the doc with Robert McBride’s name and info) at 2:32:46 PM, which is hours after the 10 AM deadline.
The modification time is when RECAP makes a copy. Plus it may be my timezone.
I’m fairly sure that the modification time is when the document was ingested by the court’s system. The modification was made by iText (adding those blue lines at the top of every document in the DC Circuit). The modification timestamp would have been 09:32:46 Eastern.
The document author info was created by the DOJ at 11:42:38 on 12/8.
IANAL, and I wonder if this is like crossing your fingers behind your back when making an oath. Could this be used by Halligan or McBride to claim that they weren’t really the attorney of record, so they can’t be on the hook for failure to comply or some other issue?
Is not the Certificate of Service (page 3) supposed to show service on the petitioner–not the defendant government lawyers?
CoS via ECF-PACER filing is usually on “all counsel of record” but yes, it is commonly stated as on the opposing party so your point is well taken
Any bets on whether Lawyer Hayes has in fact averted his gaze from the illegally seized materials? What a crew.
We’re going to learn a bit more soon, I predict.
I wouldn’t think this would have to be a serious question, but here we are. Is there any limit to the number of times (in a given jurisdiction) that they can take these charges before a grand jury? Can Halligan try every week until she gets a favorable juror pool and gets the indictment?
If she kept trying and eventually succeeded in indicting James, wouldn’t each of the prior failed attempts support a claim of vindictive and/or selective prosecution?
Yes, it very much would given the stats on how rare no-bills are at the federal level. In addition, the prosecutor may also be required to reveal that prior GJs rejected the charges before at their presentment and no doubt the defense raises that point at trial. I can’t see a 12-0 jury to convict James after all of this.
Speaking of vindictive prosecutions, Abrego Garcia was released by court order today. Cosplaying DHS Secretary Noem fled her oversight hearing to avoid further D questions to chair an already canceled meeting (TBF she may not of known it was canceled, but why did she not mention the conflict before running off?). Her fee-fees were sullied when she had to face veterans she had abused after claiming DHS and ICE hadn’t touched any vets.
The Chair of the hearing did mention she was leaving early. As a result he kept really close time on the 5 minute rule.
EW, thanks for the correction. Was it normal for the Ds to follow each other in questioning? IIRC it bounces back and forth across the parties. Apparently the chair figured there was enough time for all, but it is noteworthy that Noem ran away when she was getting the tough questions.
I think the 2008 date from the original template would be automatically altered in the metadata if the filled-out template was saved with the fields fixed. What’s in the docket is still the template, and the content may still be changed.
That’s not a proper court filing, I think — and wonder when the clerk will get back on this one.
I could be wrong but it looks like the Halligan and McBride “filed something” links are swapped.
They filed the wrong docs.
and if we’re being picky … their certificate of service could use some proofing too …
“This is to certify that I have this 8th day of December, 2025, the government served a copy of the foregoing …”
Roy Cohn would have gotten an indictment. Trump must miss Roy. How’s a man to get his revenge without more Roys to rely on? He must miss Joe McCarthy. A man who could get things done by implication of some document in a briefcase. Not needing any Truth Social platform, just stand up stuff in the Senate. At least today you have the cash flows, and a good man like Larry Ellison, tight with Bibi, to buy up media so reporters get their minds right.
Are you referring to the indictment of William Remington? The one where the foreman of the grand jury had a financial deal with principal government witness Elizabeth Bentley?
Subsequent to which Remington was beaten to death in prison. That one?
(The Wikipedia article on this is more revelatory than either of the two academic monographs on the Remington case that I have read. I don’t know if that is significant of anything but I found it interesting in the context of all the trash that gets talked about Wikipedia.)
And Joe McCarthy did it plastered half to death.
Re: Harry Eagar’s wikipedia comment, I have been rabbit holing lately there (in search of a name for a kitten with a talent for escaping his interim confinement) and found some marvelously detailed entries. Notably, however, not the one on “escape artists,” which references only TV shows.
See, for example, Victor Folke Nelson–a fascinating early 20th century figure who took his experience of incarceration and made himself a criminologist and author. As of this moment, kitten is named for him. Great wikipedia entry!
I asked the night sky. The kitten is now Jupiter Isiah.
Times of Israel, in 2021 – https://www.timesofisrael.com/netanyahu-on-vacation-at-island-owned-by-larry-ellison-a-witness-in-graft-trial/
Today Ellison is involved in USA media consolidation out of which a Gazan voice may be stifled.
https://truthout.org/articles/from-ai-to-tiktok-to-tv-this-pro-israel-billionaire-is-expanding-power-in-us/
Please don’t drop links without context. You could have indicated this was also about Larry Ellison and his son David.
Government ordered to delete all the copies of Richman’s files (except for one they have to send to Judge Kollar-Kotelly just in case they can get a new search warrant to access the files). Essentially a total victory for Richman, AFAICT.
As it should be. But Bondi et al. have tried and true shenanigans they can still pull. I can easily see them refusing to file a certificate of compliance with the judge’s final order by the 4:00 p.m. ET deadline tomorrow, with the excuse that instead they should get to ask for a stay pending appeal first.