Donald Trump’s second administration has shown “unprecedented resistance” to the court’s ruling, experts say it is part of a powerful attack on American judiciary, which threatens to undermine the rule of law, undermine comparable branches of government and weaken American democracy.
Experts say the attacks threaten one of the basic pillars of the US government. The judicial department has the authority to interpret the law, while the other departments comply with that judgment.
This week, the attack came to mind as the Trump administration ignored an order from US District Judge James Boasberg to turn a plane carrying Decoy. “I don’t care what the judges think,” Thomas Homan, accused of implementing Trump’s deportation agenda, said in a Fox News TV interview Monday as the decision was scrutinized. The next day, Trump called for Boasberg to be fired each, calling him an “extreme left-madman.”
For months, the Trump administration has made it clear that they believe they can ignore judicial orders. “The judges are not permitted to control the legitimate power of executives,” Vice President JD Vance tweeted on February 9th. Trump’s top advisor, Elon Musk, has repeatedly sought Judges for Merge Each, and has donated to Congressional Republicans who support doing so. House Republicans introduced resolutions to Boasberg and four other judges who controlled Trump.
Trump’s call for each bullet prompted a rare public responsibilities from Secretary John Roberts. In a statement Wednesday, Secretary John Roberts said:
Stephen Vladeck, a law professor at Georgetown University who studies federal courts, said there is no parallel situation in American history. Trump officials are trying to see what can escape in front of a federal judge, he said.
“They are testing the fences in a way that allows them to claim plausible negativity when Congressional Republicans say they can’t ignore the court,” he said. “Whether you call it a crisis or not, this is certainly an unprecedented resistance to the decision of the sub-court of the enforcement department.”
“America is in a constitutional crisis,” J Michael Ruttig, a respected former conservative federal judge, told MSNBC on Tuesday. “The US President essentially declared a war on the rule of law in America,” he said.
Luttig told the Guardian he believed the US Supreme Court ruling last summer had admitted that Trump was exempt from criminal prosecution for official conduct that was attacked by the court. “That’s the reason for his mercy,” he said.
During Trump’s first administration, federal courts played a major role in constraining administrative policies that violated the US Constitution and federal law. The Trump administration has won 54 cases involving efforts to implement policies through federal agencies, and either withdraws 192 cases or withdraws action, according to the New York University Institute of Policy Integrity.
Since Trump’s second term began in January, more than a dozen judges have blocked his enforcement actions, including efforts to fire large numbers of federal workers, to freeze federal funds and end their natural end.
During the first Trump administration, Vladek appears happy that authorities will “return to drawings” to rework the policy after it was suspended by the court to comply with the law, he said.
“You saw more effort to streamline everything the administration was doing in law, as opposed to power,” he said.
The attacks on the judiciary not only include perch, but also extend to personal attacks on judges, prompting concerns about their safety. The New York Times reported that Supreme Court Judge Amy Connie Barrett’s sister was threatened with a hoax bomb. The attack involves sending pizza orders to judges and family homes as a way to threaten jurists who know where they live.
You saw more effort to streamline everything the administration was doing in law, as opposed to power.
Stephen Vladeck
Another judge, John Cornoa of Washington’s Western District Court, said he was the victim of an attempted “swatting” by law enforcement fell to his home after he blocked a Trump administration’s order to end birthright citizenship.
Unlike politicians and public figures, judges are prohibited from speaking about political issues and saying anything about cases that could make them seem biased. This prevents them from correcting the incorrect information and responding to attacks against them.
Ester Salas, a New Jersey federal district judge, spoke openly about the need for judges to protect after an unfortunate litigator killed his son and shot his husband at home in 2020, Ester Salas said:
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“Judges say they are human like everyone else. We have emotions, fears, concerns about the safety of our families and ourselves,” she said. “It will affect the judicial officers.”
The judges are free to use several tools to enforce compliance with the order. They can sanction lawyers. Alternatively, if a party refuses to comply with the directive, the judge may issue a civil or light empty order. A civil cont order, which could be something like a daily fine, punishes non-compliant parties until they comply with a court decision. The detective’s light emptying is similar to the prosecutor. In 2017, Trump forgives Joe Arpaio after the former sheriff was found on a court criminal cont.
Federal courts also rely on the US ex, part of the Department of Justice. They are part of the Justice Department to enforce the verdict, urging Trump may interfere with their functioning.
In fact, Boasberg has already asked the Trump administration to “show the cause” why the administration failed to comply with his ruling to turn the planes around.
However, the claims of light empt and one finding often come at the end of long legal proceedings, with a lengthy legal dispute over whether the parties actually comply with the court’s orders.
For example, when the court blocked the Trump administration’s federal fund freeze, there was evidence that the administration was not following it. The 22 states sued filed an motion to enforce the court’s decision, winning it, and sought a light empty order, but ultimately, New York Attorney General Letitia James, one of the state’s attorney generals involved in the lawsuit, said Thursday.
“We were considering the light emptying allegations, but there were some explanations they provided to us,” she said. They proceeded with an enforcement motion to release the remaining funds, but she told reporters at an event Thursday.
Vladeck speculated that there are other actions that the court could take if the Trump administration’s rebellion reached “breaking the glass moment.” He said the government relies on federal courts for many matters, including approval of warrants and allowing criminal cases to proceed.
“If the leading court is not violated if it is unlikely to make a federal bid in Case B, that would be a real issue from a government perspective,” he said. For example, a federal court in Washington could hypothetically dismiss all government-controlled charges. “It’s going to be very escalating, but I think we’ll deal with a lot of provocation.”
But the bigger point was that no one would benefit from the unstable US legal system. The economic market depends on the ability of all to accept that they follow the judgement of the court.
“There is no long-term political endgame due to openly ignoring judgment,” he said.
Rachel Leangan contributed the report
