Politics
Column: Congress wants to impeach judges instead of doing its job
Some Republicans want U.S. District Judge James Boasberg removed from the bench for allegedly interfering with the president’s authority — under the Constitution and the 1798 Alien Enemies Act — to deport members of a Venezuelan gang.
Texas Rep. Brandon Gill and several colleagues introduced articles of impeachment charging that Boasberg violated his oath of office by “knowingly and willfully” using his “judicial position to advance political gain while interfering with the President’s constitutional prerogatives and enforcement of the rule of law.”
This is ridiculous. For starters, there is zero evidence Boasberg “knowingly and willfully” violated his oath, never mind that he acted in pursuit of “political gain.” Moreover, even if the House managed to pass articles of impeachment against Boasberg, nobody thinks two-thirds of the Senate would vote to convict. At best, this is theater; at worst it’s an attempt to intimidate judges so they stop scrutinizing Donald Trump’s deportation efforts.
And not just deportation. Republicans have introduced articles of impeachment against more than a half-dozen judges for ruling against Trump on a number of fronts.
But the war on Boasberg is the most intense and significant.
A quick recap. The Trump administration deported more than 200 people, delivering them to an El Salvador prison. Without providing much in the way of evidence, the government says most of them are part of a Venezuelan gang. The president claims the authority to do all this under the 1798 Enemy Aliens Act, which is one of the components of the notorious Alien and Sedition Acts. Indeed, the Enemy Aliens Act is the only component of the sedition acts that hasn’t been repealed or allowed to expire.
The 1798 law says that “whenever there is a declared war between the United States and any foreign nation or government, or any invasion or predatory incursion is perpetrated, attempted, or threatened against the territory of the United States by any foreign nation or government,” the president can, after a formal proclamation of such an emergency, remove “all natives, citizens, denizens, or subjects of the hostile nation or government” over the age of 14.
On March 15, Trump issued a proclamation asserting that the gang Tren de Aragua is a foreign terrorist organization that is “closely aligned with, and indeed has infiltrated, the Maduro regime.”
We aren’t at war with Venezuela last I looked, nor do I buy that Tren de Aragua is an invader controlled by a foreign government waging war on the U.S. But on the latter, perhaps the administration has better evidence than it has been willing to provide.
For argument’s sake, let’s say the gang meets the criteria of the Enemy Aliens Act. In that case, I have no first-order objection to a policy of arresting, imprisoning or deporting proven members of Tren de Aragua.
The key issue is whether a judge can scrutinize the president’s actions under the Enemy Aliens Act (including the arguably crucial question of whether or not the government is deporting who it says it’s deporting). Gill and the Trump administration say no. And any attempt to do so renders Boasberg and any other magistrate a “rogue judge.”
It’s noteworthy that the smartest defenses of the administration do not necessarily contend that what Trump is doing is legal or constitutional. Rather, defenders hold that scrutinizing the president’s action is a “political question.” Under the so-called political question doctrine there are some issues, particularly pertaining to national security, that are simply not justiciable — that is, the courts rightly stay away from them. For instance, Congress hasn’t issued a formal declaration of war since World War II, but the courts have not ruled that subsequent wars were unconstitutional.
I am very skeptical of the political-question defense in this case, but it is not an unserious argument. If Venezuela or any other country launched a surprise attack on the United States, I wouldn’t want the courts to monkey-wrench our prompt response.
At the same time, there’s a reason why the Enemy Aliens Act has only been used — and abused — during declared wars. If you’re not troubled by the idea that a president — any president — can simply assert that we’re in a war, without much evidence, and start deporting or imprisoning people, possibly including American citizens, without due process, I question your dedication to the Constitution and even your patriotism.
But that doesn’t automatically mean the judiciary is the right institution to stop the president or empower him. That’s Congress’ job.
Congress doesn’t have to rely on the last surviving relic of a package of laws that were reviled by Jefferson and Madison and discredited. It could write new ones. It could clarify what the president can or can’t do. It could even declare war on Venezuela or Tren de Aragua — that would clear things up in a hurry.
In short, Congress could take its role as the first branch of government seriously.
It’s grotesque constitutional malpractice for legislators to attack judges trying to determine what the Constitution and the law allow while booing from the cheap seats. It’s fine to argue that the judiciary overplays its role as a check on the executive, but I’m grateful for judges when Congress refuses to play any role other than spectator — or heckler.
@JonahDispatch
Politics
'Failure's not an option': Trump budget bill will be 'big' help for seniors, top House tax-writer says
EXCLUSIVE: The top tax-writer in the House of Representatives is arguing that President Donald Trump’s “big, beautiful bill” will be “big” for American taxpayers as well – including seniors.
House Ways & Means Committee Chairman Jason Smith, R-Mo., and other Republicans on the panel spent months negotiating behind closed doors on how to enact Trump’s tax policies.
Among those is an added $4,000 deduction for Americans aged 65 or older. Seniors with income of less than $75,000 as single filers, and less than $150,000 as joint filers, would be eligible for the full deduction, which then would begin to phase out.
“So, that’s on top of their guaranteed deduction, and that’s per person . . . anyone who has total earnings of $75,000 a year or less is going to be made completely whole, so all the low-income and middle-income seniors on Social Security will be paying zero on Social Security in the long run,” Smith told Fox News Digital, while adding of others, “most of them will be paying much less.”
ANTI-ABORTION PROVIDER MEASURE IN TRUMP’S ‘BIG, BEAUTIFUL BILL’ COULD SPARK HOUSE GOP REBELLION
President Donald Trump is pushing Republicans to pass his “big, beautiful bill” (AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein)
Republicans are using the budget reconciliation process, which lowers the Senate’s threshold for passage from 60 votes to 51 for certain pieces of fiscal legislation, to advance a vast bill full of Trump’s priorities on taxes, immigration, energy, defense and the national debt.
Because the House already operates under a simple majority, reconciliation allows the party in power to pass sweeping legislation while sidelining the other side, in this case, Democrats.
Trump has directed congressional Republicans to permanently extend his 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA), as well as implement new policies eliminating taxes on tips, overtime pay and retirees’ Social Security.
But the law that established the reconciliation process, the Congressional Budget Act of 1974, also specifically forbade direct changes to Social Security via the process.
Smith said Republicans’ had added $4,000 tax deduction as a way to make them “completely whole.”
BROWN UNIVERSITY IN GOP CROSSHAIRS AFTER STUDENT’S DOGE-LIKE EMAIL KICKS OFF FRENZY
House Ways & Means Committee Chairman Jason Smith, R-Mo., is helping craft the tax portion of the bill. (Tom Williams)
Rather than seeing that tax relief month-to-month, however, Smith said it would come in people’s yearly tax returns.
He argued that it was more beneficial for lower-income seniors as well, giving added relief to those whose incomes were too low to pay Social Security taxes in the first place.
“Under the rules of reconciliation, you cannot touch Social Security directly. What we did is to make sure that they get . . . tax relief for any senior who makes less than $75,000 per year,” Smith said. “It’s not that we didn’t want to do it, it’s that it cannot be done under the rules of reconciliation, or you wouldn’t qualify for the 51-vote threshold over in the United States Senate.”
“But the tax relief they will receive is an added tax cut, and that will make up for what they have paid in Social Security tax.”
The White House also endorsed Smith’s plan despite its departure from Trump’s initial campaign pitch.
“The one, big, beautiful bill not only delivers permanent tax cuts and bigger paychecks, but it secures a historic tax break for seniors on Social Security,” White House spokesperson Anna Kelly said. “This is another promise made, promise kept to our seniors who deserve much-needed tax relief after four years of suffering under Bidenflation.”
The $4,000 tax deduction, which would be in effect from the 2025 through 2028 tax years, would be on top of the higher standard deduction that people above age 65 already receive.
It would not be a tax credit, reducing tax liability directly regardless of tax brackets. A deduction reduces taxable income and is dependent on the taxpayer’s rate.
But for single seniors making up to $75,000, and married seniors making less than $150,000, qualifying for the $4,000 deduction, it would likely provide some relief for millions of taxpayers across the country.
“It’ll be a wash of what their Social Security tax would’ve been,” Smith said, adding later in the interview: “Failure’s not an option. We’re going to get this done.”
Politics
Supreme Court rebukes Texas judges, backs hearing before deportation for detained Venezuelans
WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Friday told conservative judges in Texas they must offer a hearing to detained Venezuelans whom the Trump administration wants to send to a prison in El Salvador.
The justices, over two dissents, rebuked Texas judges and Trump administration lawyers for moving quickly on a weekend in mid-April to put these men on planes.
That led to a post-midnight order from the high court that told the administration it may “not remove any member of the putative class of detainees.” The administration had argued it had the authority to deport the men as “alien enemies” under a wartime law adopted in 1798.
On Friday, the court issued an unusual eight-page order to explain their earlier decision. In doing so, the justices faulted a federal judge in Lubbock, Texas, and the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for taking no action to protect the due process rights of the detained men.
The ruling noted that the government “may remove the named plaintiffs or putative class members under other lawful authorities.”
The order carries a clear message that the justices are troubled by the Trump administration’s pressure to fast-track deportations and by the unwillingness of some judges to protect the rights to due process of law.
After the ruling was issued, President Trump wrote on Truth Social on Friday: “THE SUPREME COURT WON’T ALLOW US TO GET CRIMINALS OUT OF OUR COUNTRY.” He added in a second post: “This decision will let more CRIMINALS pour into our Country, doing great harm to our cherished American public.”
Lee Gelernt, deputy director of the ACLU’s Immigrants’ Rights Project and lead counsel, said in a statement: “The court’s decision to stay removals is a powerful rebuke to the government’s attempt to hurry people away to a Gulag-type prison in El Salvador. The use of a wartime authority during peacetime, without even affording due process, raises issues of profound importance.”
On a Saturday in mid-March, Trump’s immigration officials sent three planeloads of detainees from Texas to the maximum-security prison in El Salvador before a federal judge in Washington could intervene. The prisoners included Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Maryland man who had an immigration order that was supposed to protect him from being sent back to his native El Salvador.
Afterward, Trump officials said the detained men, including Abrego Garcia, could not be returned to this country. They did so even though the Supreme Court had said they had a duty to “facilitate” Abrego Garcia’s return.
The same scenario was nearly repeated in mid-April, but from a different prison in Texas.
ACLU lawyers rushed to file an emergency appeal with U.S. District Judge James Hendrix. They said some of the detained men were on buses headed for the airport. They argued they deserved a hearing because many of them said they were not members of a crime gang.
The judge denied the appeals for all but two of the detained men.
The 5th Circuit upheld the judge’s lack of action and blamed the detainees, saying they gave the judge “only 42 minutes to act.”
The Supreme Court disagreed with both on Friday and overturned a decision of the 5th Circuit.
“A district court’s inaction in the face of extreme urgency and a high risk of ‘serious, perhaps irreparable’ consequences” left the detained men with no options, the court said. “Here, the district court’s inaction — not for 42 minutes but for 14 hours and 28 minutes — had the practical effect of refusing an injunction to detainees facing an imminent threat of severe, irreparable harm,” the justices wrote.
“The 5th Amendment entitles aliens to due process of law in the context of removal proceedings. Procedural due process rules are meant to protect” against “the mistaken or unjustified deprivation of life, liberty, or property,” the majority said. “We have long held that no person shall be removed from the United States without opportunity, at some time, to be heard.”
Justices Samuel A. Alito Jr. and Clarence Thomas dissented last month, and they did the same on Friday.
Friday’s ruling doesn’t affect the status of the men who were already sent to El Salvador.
Former FBI Director James Comey is expected to meet face to face with U.S. Secret Service officials in Washington, D.C. for an interview about his “86 47” post, two sources briefed on the meeting told Fox News.
Comey is under investigation for an Instagram post showing seashells arranged on a beach to read “86 47.”
“Cool shell formation on my beach walk,” he wrote in the since-deleted post. Some have interpreted the post to mean “86” – get rid of – “47” – Donald Trump, the 47th president.
Former FBI Director James Comey is expected to meet face to face with U.S. Secret Service officials in Washington, D.C. for an interview about his “86 47” post, two sources briefed on the meeting told Fox News. (Mark Reinstein/Corbis via Getty Images)
The U.S. Secret Service is leading the investigation at this point, but the FBI and Department of Justice could take a larger role if necessary, Fox News is told.
Grandmother arrested at abortion clinic warns of expanding free speech 'buffer zones'
'Failure's not an option': Trump budget bill will be 'big' help for seniors, top House tax-writer says
Weight loss, diabetes drugs can cause mood changes: What to know about behavioral side effects
Big Knicks playoff game brings celebrities to Madison Square Garden
How to breathe new life into an old computer
-
Austin, TX7 days agoBest Austin Salads – 15 Food Places For Good Greens!
-
Technology1 week agoNetflix is removing Black Mirror: Bandersnatch
-
World1 week agoThe Take: Can India and Pakistan avoid a fourth war over Kashmir?
-
News1 week agoJefferson Griffin Concedes Defeat in N.C. Supreme Court Race
-
News1 week agoReincarnated by A.I., Arizona Man Forgives His Killer at Sentencing
-
News1 week agoWho is the new Pope Leo XIV and what are his views?
-
News1 week agoEfforts Grow to Thwart mRNA Therapies as RFK Jr. Pushes Vaccine Wariness
-
Entertainment1 week agoReview: 'Forever' is a sweet ode to first love (and L.A.) based on Judy Blume's novel