Tag Archives: President Joe Biden

Daily Beast: Judge Arrested by Trump Administration Fights Back With Trump’s Own Immunity Case

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A Milwaukee judge who was arrested for allegedly shielding an undocumented immigrant from ICE arrest has argued that she can’t be prosecuted based on the same case that granted President Donald Trump broad immunity for “official” acts.

The FBI arrested Hannah Dugan last month after she allegedly told agents with Immigration and Customs Enforcement that they needed a warrant to arrest an undocumented immigrant who had appeared in her courtroom on a misdemeanor charge.

FBI Director Kash Patel accused Dugan in a social media post of “intentionally misdirecting federal agents away” from the man, a Mexican immigrant named Eduardo Flores Ruiz who was nevertheless arrested outside the courthouse.

Dugan was indicted on Tuesday for allegedly concealing a person from arrest and obstruction. A day later, her lawyers argued in a motion to dismiss the case that Dugan is “no ordinary criminal defendant.”

The motion argued that the problems with the prosecution were “legion,” including the fact that they allegedly violated the U.S. Constitution’s fundamental principle of federalism. But “most immediately, the government cannot prosecute Judge Dugan because she is entitled to judicial immunity for her official acts,” it said.

Judge Arrested by Trump Administration Fights Back With Trump’s Own Immunity Case
Judge Hannah Dugan’s lawyers argued that she cannot be prosecuted for her official conduct.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/judge-arrested-by-trump-administration-fights-back-with-trumps-own-immunity-case

MarketWatch: Millions of Americans may lose health insurance under GOP tax plan. Here’s who will be affected most.

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The plan would represent the largest cut to Medicaid ever

The Congressional Budget Office estimates that the bill could lead to at least 8.6 million Americans losing health coverage, with the majority expected to lose Medicaid. Most affected would be low-income adults without dependents, earning a bit more than a poverty income of $15,650 for a single person.

Go for it, suckers! Mid-terms are coming, and they will come with a vengeance!

?url=httpswww.marketwatch.comstorymillions-of-americans-may-lose-health-insurance-under-gop-tax-plan-heres-who-will-be-affected-most-bd965669

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/millions-of-americans-may-lose-health-insurance-under-gop-tax-plan-heres-who-will-be-affected-most-bd965669

USA Today: Trump uses Supreme Court birthright citizenship case in bid to limit judges’ power

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President Trump is counting on the Supreme Court to limit the ability of judges to put his policies on hold while they’re being challenged.

Judges across the country have blocked some of President Donald Trump’s biggest policy changes − roadblocks the president has called “toxic and unprecedented.”

Trump is counting on the Supreme Court to fix that.

How inclined the justices might be to do so could become apparent on May 15 when the court considers Trump’s move to end automatic citizenship for children born in the United States regardless of whether their parents are citizens or permanent residents.

The president hasn’t yet asked the high court to consider the legality of his policy – which was called “blatantly unconstitutional” by the first judge to review it.

Instead, Trump wants the justices to narrow the scope of multiple court orders keeping his new rules on hold until the citizenship policy has been fully litigated.

The administration argues that, for now, Trump should be able to impose the change on everyone except the 18 parents named in the lawsuits or, at most, any member of two immigrant rights groups or residents of a state that challenged the policy.

Trump uses Supreme Court birthright citizenship case in bid to limit judges’ power
President Trump is counting on the Supreme Court to limit the ability of judges to put his policies on hold while they’re being challenged.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2025/05/11/birthright-citizenship-supreme-court-trump/83541130007

Politico: Judges have a warning about Trump’s rapid deportations: Americans could be next

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A fundamental promise by America’s founders — that no one should be punished by the state without a fair hearing — is under threat, a growing chorus of federal judges say.

That concept of “due process under law,” borrowed from the Magna Carta and enshrined in the Bill of Rights, is most clearly imperiled for the immigrants President Donald Trump intends to summarily deport, they say, but U.S. citizens should be wary, too.

Across the country, judges appointed by presidents of both parties — including Trump himself — are escalating warnings about what they see as an erosion of due process caused by the Trump administration’s mass deportation campaign. What started with a focus on people Trump has deemed “terrorists” and “gang members” — despite their fierce denials — could easily expand to other groups, including Americans, these judges warn.

“When the courts say due process is important, we’re not unhinged, we’re not radicals,” U.S. District Judge Ana Reyes, a Washington, D.C.-based appointee of President Joe Biden, said at a recent hearing. “We are literally trying to enforce a process embodied in probably the most significant document with respect to peoples’ rights against tyrannical government oppression. That’s what we’re doing here. Okay?”

It’s a fight that judges are increasingly casting as existential, rooted in the 5th Amendment’s guarantee that “no person shall … be deprived of life, liberty or property, without due process of law.” The word “person,” courts have noted, makes no distinction between citizens or noncitizens. The Supreme Court has long held that this fundamental promise extends to immigrants in deportation proceedings. In a 1993 opinion, Justice Antonin Scalia called that principle “well-established.”

Judges have a warning about Trump’s rapid deportations: Americans could be next
Judges across the country continue to note that if courts don’t protect the rights of the least popular and most vulnerable, everyone is at risk.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/opinion/judges-have-a-warning-about-trump-s-rapid-deportations-americans-could-be-next/ar-AA1EvZfM

Roll Call: Pardons for friends, retribution for foes

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Critics say Trump has Used the Powers of the President in Ways That Raise Alarms

President Donald Trump spent much of the last four years decrying Justice Department prosecutions against him and his supporters, and one of his first executive orders in January said it sought to end the “weaponization of prosecutorial power to upend the democratic process.”

But since then, Trump has used the power of his office for actions that critics and experts say inject politics into federal investigations and prosecutions, such as memorandums last month initiating government investigations into actions of two former officials who have been critical of him.

Trump wiped away the criminal cases of his supporters for the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol, and has given pardons for supporters and erstwhile allies. The Justice Department since January has dropped a high-profile criminal case against New York Mayor Eric Adams, and made personnel moves that target employees involved in the investigations of Trump and the criminal probes of rioters.

Pardons for friends, retribution for foes – Roll Call
President Donald Trump has used the power of his office in ways critics and experts say inject politics into the criminal justice system.

https://rollcall.com/2025/05/07/pardons-for-friends-retribution-for-foes

Huffington Post: The Trump Administration Thinks You Should Be OK With Being Poor

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But even as the bad news piles up, the Trump administration has decided to reassure panicked consumers with a chilling talking point: Poverty is good, actually.

Last month, as economists warned of the harm Trump’s tariff policies could cause, including drastically increasing the price of goods, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent attempted to dismiss those concerns by insinuating that being able to afford things is not important to Americans.

“Access to cheap goods is not the essence of the American dream,” Bessent said to a crowd of economists. 

It turns out this assertion was only the beginning of the Trump administration’s vision for a new American dream.

From Trump telling reporters that he’s not worried about empty stores to Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick saying during an interview that in his version of America, multiple generations will work in the same factories, it sure seems like the Trump administration is trying to prime Americans for accepting and even enjoying a drastically lower standard of living.

The Trump Administration Thinks You Should Be OK With Being Poor
As the country’s economic outlook bleakens, Trump officials are trying to convince us that actually, being poor is a good thing.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/the-trump-administration-thinks-you-should-be-ok-with-being-poor/ar-AA1E4kNp

Politico: Trump’s Controversial US Attorney Is Coming for Medical Marijuana

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The Donald Trump era has cost the District of Columbia thousands of jobs, blown a billion-dollar hole in its budget and caused a downgrade of the city’s AAA bond rating.

Now Trump’s interim U.S. Attorney, Ed Martin, is coming for the capital’s weed, too — and threatening to upend a tacit agreement where federal prosecutors have respected Washington’s local marijuana laws.

The opening salvo came via a letter from Martin to a D.C. medical-marijuana vendor. “Your dispensary appears to be operating in violation of federal law,” he wrote, “and the Department of Justice has the authority to enforce federal law even when such activities may be permitted” by local laws. So much for the store’s legal license.

It’s a turn of events that ought to petrify anyone who thinks Washington’s deep-blue local electorate should be free to choose permissive blue-state rules.

But it’s very on-brand for Martin. A longtime anti-abortion activist who previously represented Jan. 6 defendants, he’s been at the center of constant culture-war controversies ever since Trump made him D.C.’s top federal prosecutor in January.

Trump’s Controversial US Attorney Is Coming for Medical Marijuana
The Trump-allied prosecutor has threatened Wikipedia, medical journals and Congressional Democrats. Now he’s putting a medical-marijuana dispensary on notice, too.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/trump-s-controversial-us-attorney-is-coming-for-medical-marijuana/ar-AA1E3otC

Washington Examiner: Maine settles with Trump administration in funding freeze lawsuit

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The State of Maine dropped its lawsuit against the Trump administration on Friday after reaching a settlement agreement, which comes as the two parties have been feuding over transgender policies.

Maine agreed to withdraw its lawsuit in exchange for the Department of Agriculture vowing not to freeze the millions of dollars it directs to the state’s Department of Education unlawfully, according to court documents.

…

Judge John Woodcock, an appointee of former President George W. Bush, previously ruled in Maine’s favor by granting a restraining order. He said the USDA’s actions were “contrary to law, for multiple reasons,” including because Secretary Brooke Rollins did not follow legal procedures required to stop the funding.

Rollins agreed on Friday to “refrain from freezing, terminating, or otherwise interfering with the state of Maine’s access” to USDA funds, “based on alleged violations of Title IX without first following all legally required procedures,” the agreement read.

Maine settles with Trump administration in funding freeze lawsuit
The State of Maine dropped its lawsuit against the Trump administration on Friday after reaching a settlement agreement, which comes as the two parties have been feuding over transgender policies. Maine agreed to withdraw its lawsuit in exchange for the Department of Agriculture vowing not to freeze the millions of dollars it directs to the […]

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/maine-settles-with-trump-administration-in-funding-freeze-lawsuit/ar-AA1E4GLa

More here:

Win for Maine as Trump officials agree to halt school funding freeze
USDA had suspended funds for child nutrition program after state said it would not bar trans girls from girls’ sports

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/may/02/trump-maine-funding-freeze

The Atlantic: Don’t Look at Stock Markets. Look at the Ports.

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Stock markets plunged for days after President Donald Trump announced steep tariffs on imports from around the world. The sell-off ebbed only when he suspended most, but not all, of the new measures for 90 days. The ticker tape is just one indicator of an economy, and other signs are growing more and more ominous—including at the Port of Los Angeles, where high tariffs on China are crushing maritime traffic. “Essentially all shipments out of China for major retailers and manufacturers have ceased,” Eugene Seroka, the executive director of the port, said on April 24.

…

The Port of Los Angeles, the busiest containerized-cargo port in the Western Hemisphere, processes about 17 percent of everything the United States imports or exports in shipping containers. The adjoining Port of Long Beach accounts for another 14 percent. Over the years, a whole ecosystem has arisen to support the loading and unloading of the cars, clothes, electronic gadgets, and other things that people want. There are workers and warehouses, trucks and loading pads, security structures and rail lines.

Seroka estimated that cargo arrivals would soon be down 35 percent over the same time last year. At the moment, the drop in traffic seems likelier to accelerate than to reverse. The number of cargo ships canceling port calls or entire voyages is on the rise. A number of shipments now under way were instigated before Trump’s so-called Liberation Day tariff announcement, on April 2. According to Forto, a cargo-management and -tracking company, reservations for shipping products must normally be placed two weeks before a cargo vessel launches. The trip from China from California typically takes two or more additional weeks. In other words, the full effects of U.S. tariff policies on maritime traffic may not be apparent for some time.

Don’t Look at Stock Markets. Look at the Ports.
A drop in maritime traffic suggests that the worst is yet to come.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/markets/don-t-look-at-stock-markets-look-at-the-ports/ar-AA1E6eR8

Reuters: White House seeks to cut TSA funding and boost air, rail safety

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The White House said on Friday it wants to cut funding for the Transportation Security Administration by $247 million, while boosting spending on rail and air safety.

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In its proposal on Friday to cut TSA officer levels, the White House said, “TSA has consistently failed audits while implementing intrusive screening measures that violate Americans’ privacy and dignity.” It was not immediately clear how many positions the White House wants to cut.

And:

The proposal also calls for cutting funding by $308 million for Essential Air Service, which subsidizes commercial air service to rural airports and is popular with Republican lawmakers.

I’m no fan of TSA, but cutting a quarter billion dollars out of their budget hardly seems likely improve aviation security. Focus on their procedures and methods, not on their people.

Cutting Essential Air Service will be disastrous for many rural communities. It will also hit airlines hard while they’re also feeling the loss of international tourists thanks to the actions of King Donald & Co.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/white-house-seeks-to-cut-tsa-funding-and-boost-air-rail-safety/ar-AA1E4oWa