Trump DOJ Stonewalls Criminal Contempt Inquiry
INSIDE: Pam Bondi ... Pete Hegseth ... Lindsey Halligan
A lot of things happened. Here are some of the things. This is TPM’s Morning Memo.
Will Emil Bove Have To Testify?
A lot of weekend news to cover this morning, but I want to continue to keep front and center the contempt of court proceedings in the original Alien Enemies Act case.
The Trump DOJ faced a Friday deadline set by U.S. District Judge James Boasberg of D.C. to submit sworn declarations by the officials involved in the decision to continue with the AEA deportation flights in mid-March even after Boasberg ordered the deportations stopped and the planes turned around.
The Trump DOJ acknowledged that it was taking a narrow view of what Boasberg meant by “involved in the decision” and submitted declarations from only three senior officials:
Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem
Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche
DHS Acting General Counsel Joseph Mazzara
Of note, Blanche explicitly mentioned former DOJ official and now appeals court Judge Emil Bove has having been involved in providing what he asserts is “privileged legal advice” to DHS in the matter. It remains to be seen whether Boasberg will demand either a declaration or testimony from a sitting judge whose potential contempt of court occurred prior to taking the bench.
In its filing accompanying the declarations, DOJ pulled back from having earlier identified Deputy Assistant Attorney General Drew Ensign as involved in the decision and didn’t submit a declaration from him, saying he only relayed Boasberg’s oral and written orders.
In filing the declarations, the Justice Department remained defiant. Among other arguments, it told Boasberg that:
given the declarations, there is no basis for witness testimony in the contempt inquiry;
attorney-client privilege would prevent the lawyers (Blanche, Bove, and Mazzara) from testifying;
he could be in for a constitutional fight over compelling the testimony of Noem;
no criminal contempt occurred because his order was not “clear and reasonably specific.”
Seizing on the muddled mess that the laggardly D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals made of Boasberg’s contempt inquiry, the Justice Department leaned heavily on the concurring opinion of Appeals Court Judge Gregory Katsas: “[I]f a leading jurist like Judge Katsas concluded that Defendants’ interpretation of the TRO is legally correct, it is impossible to find beyond a reasonable doubt that Defendants’ interpretation is so unreasonable as to make their conduct criminally contumacious.”
Boasberg has moved the criminal contempt inquiry along as fast as the D.C. Circuit has allowed him to, so I would expect we’ll know what he wants to do next in the case as soon as today.
Another Wrongful Deportation Case
The Trump administration deported a Guatemalan man back to his home country despite an immigration judge order barring his removal to Guatemala because of fears he would face torture there. U.S. District Judge David Guaderrama of El Paso accused the Trump administration of “blatant lawlessness” in the case and ordered it to facilitate the return of Faustino Pablo Pablo to the United States by Dec. 12.
SCOTUS Takes Up Birthright Citizenship
The invented right-wing legal theory that birthright citizenship is not guaranteed by the 14th Amendment’s Citizenship Clause is going to get decided by the Supreme Court in its current term.
Pam Bondi Needs to Talk to Pam Bondi
Last year, before she became attorney general, Pam Bondi wrote a Supreme Court brief for the America First Policy Institute in which she argued: “Military officers are required not to carry out unlawful orders.”
Venezuela Boat Watch
Among the new developments:
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth continues to deny that he ordered Special Operations forces to kill everyone aboard an alleged drug-smuggling boat during a Sept. 2 attack, but in a new twist NBC News reports that Adm. Frank “Mitch” Bradley told lawmakers in a classified briefing last week that Hegseth ordered everyone killed “because they were on an internal list of narco-terrorists who U.S. intelligence and military officials determined could be lethally targeted.”
The second strike of the boat killed the two survivors of the first strike, Bradley told lawmakers, but he ordered a third and fourth strike to sink the boat, according to the NBC News report.
Despite administration claims, the boat was not bound for the United States but to rendezvous with a larger vessel bound for Suriname, CNN reports.
Clash Over Halligan Looms
The DOJ’s Office of Legal Counsel has ratified keeping Lindsey Halligan in place as U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia despite a judge’s ruling that she was invalidly appointed to the position, the NYT reports:
The office has told department officials that because Judge Currie’s order did not require a specific measure to be taken, like removing Ms. Halligan, she could stay even though the judge declared her appointment invalid, the people said.
In other words, the administration’s position was that since the court order did not explicitly remove Ms. Halligan from the job, she could keep it.
Under Judge Currie’s ruling, only the judges in that district may now appoint an interim U.S. attorney – but they have not publicly moved to name an interim.
New Ruling Thwarts Re-Indictment of Comey
Over the weekend, U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly of D.C. issued a temporary restraining order barring prosecutors from accessing material seized years ago that belong to Columbia University law professor Daniel Richman, a close friend of and attorney for James Comey. Because the materials at issue largely formed the basis for the now-dismissed indictment of Comey, the ruling may delay any effort by the Trump DOJ to re-indict him.
Trump DOJ Leads Attack on Voting Rights
Mother Jones: “Over the last six months, [the Trump DOJ] has demanded full, unredacted voter rolls from dozens of states in an effort to create the federal government’s first-ever national database of registered voters, accompanied by their private information: party affiliation, voting history, Social Security numbers, driver’s license information, even physical characteristics.”
The Death of Independent Agencies
Ahead of Supreme Court oral arguments today over whether President Trump can unilaterally fire a FTC commissioner, a D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals panel with two Trump appointees ruled that Trump lawfully fired – without cause – Cathy Harris, a Democratic member of the Merit Systems Protection Board, and Gwynne Wilcox, a Democratic member of the National Labor Relations Board.
The Destruction: Vax Edition
A CDC panel stacked with Robert F. Kennedy Jr. allies has dramatically altered the recommendation for infants to immediately receive the hepatitis B vaccine, upending 30 years of wildly successfully public health policy.
The Corruption: Pardon Edition
Trump is big mad that his pardon of Democratic Rep. Henry Cuellar (TX) didn’t engender enough personal loyalty for Cuellar not to seek re-election, potentially costing Republicans a pick-up in the 2026 midterms.
Trump pardoned sports executive Tim Leiweke – who was convicted by Trump’s own Justice Department – after a round of golf with former Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-SC), who was one of Leiweke’s lawyers, the WSJ reports.
Convicted fraudster David Gentile, the former private equity executive whose seven-year sentence was commuted by Trump will not have to pay $15.5 million in restitution by the terms of the clemency order, Politico reports.
The Trump DOJ says it will be up to Attorney General Pam Bondi and Pardon Attorney Ed Martin to decide which people and which crimes are covered by Trump’s sweeping pardons related to the 2020 fake electors scheme and other Big Lie related offenses.
Indiana Redistricting Hangs in the Balance
With the Indiana House having passed a new GOP friendly mid-decade congressional district map, all attention turns to the Republican-controlled state Senate, where its fate is not as cut and dry as you might expect.
Such a Big Boy
At the 0:42-second mark, Trump’s mask comes off for a moment and the insatiable neediness of an unloved child emerges:
Racism With a Big Dose of Cringe
Under a new Trump administration policy, Americans will no longer have free access to national parks on Martin Luther King, Jr. Day or Juneteenth, but will now have free access on June 14 – President Trump’s birthday, which coincides with Flag Day.
RIP V3 Camera
Over the weekend, the 38th episode in the eruption sequence that began at Kilauea volcano last December was particularly vigorous, with a laterally-jetting lava fountain knocking a remote camera on the crater rim out of commission:
Hot tips? Juicy scuttlebutt? Keen insights? Let me know. For sensitive information, use the encrypted methods here.
As always, clear, concise and very informative! Kudos👏Thank you👍The recording of Camera V3’s “death” on Hawaii was breathtaking 💥
Thank you, David for
starting this week off to
a comprehensive and
thorough start. Whoo!
The volcano video is a
must watch.