Trump DOJ’s No. 3 Official in the Hot Seat
A golf course in D.C. is the improbable venue for another significant Trump II showdown between the executive and judicial branches.
Unlike, say, the Alien Enemies Act, Abrego Garcia, and immigrant habeas cases, where the actions that precipitated the conflict between the Trump administration and federal judges were unmistakably serious deprivations of liberty, the East Potomac Golf Course case has layers of absurdism, which we’ll get into below.
My main reason for catching you up on this second-tier constitutional confrontation is to preview an important hearing in the case tomorrow, so that I can come back to this later without burdening you with a whole bunch of backstory.
U.S. District Judge Ana Reyes had already ordered the Trump DOJ to show cause by yesterday why it should not be ordered to preserve all records in the case in what could only be interpreted as a prelude to her considering sanctions against government lawyers for allegedly misleading her. Reyes was particularly focused on the Trump DOJ’s failure to comply with her orders to provide sufficient notice of the surprise removal of hundreds of trees on the golf course over the Columbus Day weekend.
But now Judge Reyes has a new bone to pick with the Trump DOJ.
Judge Reyes has suspected that the mass tree removal over the holiday weekend was part of Trump’s plan to remake the historic golf course without congressional approval — but the administration and DOJ lawyers have denied it, repeatedly and emphatically.
Then on Tuesday, on her own, Judge Reyes took judicial notice of a new Truth Social post by President Trump, in which he declared that the golf course will be closing on Nov. 15, and demanded to know why the Trump DOJ had previously told her otherwise:
Associate Attorney General Stanley Woodward told the Court on October 19 that “[w]ith regard to the November 15th date… there is no plan to close the course.” The Court ORDERS Defendants to clarify, as part of their response to the Court’s show-cause order from October 26, whether any plan exists to close East Potomac Golf Course on or around November 15, 2026. And, if so, how that can be reconciled with Associate AG Woodward’s representation to the Court.
In her order, Reyes also scheduled a “status hearing” for Friday and ordered Woodward — who represented Trump’s co-defendants in the Mar-a-Lago case and Jan. 6 rioters — to appear at the hearing in person. The DOJ’s No. 3 personally handling cases is unheard of, let alone doing the president’s dirty work. Getting hauled into court for allegedly misleading a judge is beyond next level stuff.
Yesterday, in his response to the court order, Woodward conceded that there is a plan to close the golf course, but he did not reconcile his prior statements to the contrary:
The undersigned acknowledges the President has twice directed Interior and the National Park Service to close the park by November 15. Accordingly, Interior, acting through counsel, is working to develop a plan to implement that direction and will provide this Court with notice pursuant to the Court’s October 26, 2026, Order.
That prompted another stern order from Judge Reyes ahead of tomorrow’s hearing, which she has now recast as a show cause hearing that is quite a bit broader than merely whether the Trump DOJ must preserve documents in the case:
The Court ORDERS the Government to come prepared to state at the hearing: (1) whether it continues to maintain that there is no final agency action; (2) the dates and times at which President Trump “twice directed Interior and the National Park Service to close the park by November 15”; … and (3) the first date “Interior, acting through counsel” began “working to develop a plan to implement that direction,” id. Associate Attorney General Woodward remains ORDERED to appear at the hearing in person. The Court FURTHER ORDERS the attendance of at least one counsel from the Department of the Interior’s Office of the Solicitor with pre-existing experience on this case.
Shortly thereafter, Woodward provided the court-required detailed notice of the administration’s plan to shut down the vast majority of East Potomac Park, including the golf course, even though the renovation plan at issue will not have been approved yet on the administration’s own timetable.
The ostensible reason for closing the golf course before getting approval for the renovation is familiar: “significant safety hazards.” It’s similar to the pretext offered for the separate closure of the Kennedy Center, another D.C. public asset that Trump has tried to turn into a personal project. In this case, the public safety hazard is an allegedly “deteriorated sea wall that is currently crumbling into the Potomac River.”
Meanwhile, the Trump DOJ has appealed Judge Reyes’ tour de force preliminary injunction in the case.
All of this is to tee up tomorrow’s show cause hearing for you. It’s admittedly an odd sideshow in the last week before Election Day. But it wouldn’t be Trump lawlessness without a heaping dose of absurdity.
Trump DOJ Election Interference Watch
California: U.S. District Judge David O. Carter late yesterday rejected the Trump DOJ’s request to force Los Angeles County to segregate and not yet count mail-in ballots from alleged noncitizen voters. In a stirring opinion, Judge Carter repeatedly blasted the Trump administration’s interference in California’s election:
Never before in American history has the federal government, on the eve of an election, sought to coerce a state and local government to abandon their own Constitutional elections procedures and bend to the will of the Executive Branch. In bringing this lawsuit, the Executive would have this Court believe that it reigns as a sole sovereign. But California and its people are sovereign, too.
Alaska: The Trump DOJ seized on a NYT investigation that tied the campaign of Mary Peltola to a scheme to add a second Dan Sullivan to the ballot. In a new filing by DOJ No. 3 official Stan Woodward, he withdrew his prior opposition to the Peltola campaign and the DSCC intervening in the DOJ lawsuit to block certification of the Senate election. Instead, Woodward said DOJ would use expedited discovery in the case to investigate the alleged “sprawling conspiracy to recruit and prop up a sham candidate for the purpose of deceiving Alaskan voters” and whether the Peltola campaign “attempted to deceive” the court. UCLA election law expert Rick Hasen assesses the legal implications of this whole mess.
Washington state: Secretary of State Steve Hobbs told the Trump DOJ that its purported list of 400 alleged noncitizen voters contained actual U.S. citizens. In a letter, Hobbs said it would “irresponsible and illegal” to segregate and not yet count mail-in ballots from voters on the Trump DOJ list.
SPLC Reveals Its Theory of the Case Against It
The Southern Poverty Law Center has revealed in a new filing its theory of how the vindictive prosecution of it by the Trump administration came to be.
The civil rights group alleges that the Trump DOJ — which has zeroed in on the SPLC’s former program of using white supremacists as paid informants against other white supremacists — was able to flip the SPLC’s own longest-tenured informant into a government informant against the SPLC because he had failed to pay income taxes for 30 years.
The SPLC alleges that the flipped informant practically became a member of the prosecution team, with numerous meetings and 1,800 text messages between him and investigators over the last year. Identified in the filing as “F-9,” the informant also provided documents, reports, and four so-called “Intelligence Briefings” to investigators, the SPLC alleges:
To be clear, F-9 should have been merely a witness in this case. But the government has treated him like part of the prosecutorial team itself, choosing to allow F-9 to decide which of the documents, recordings, and photographs in his possession he will produce, and how and when he will produce them. F-9 admitted that he has a “house full of documents,” some of which he has referenced plans to “shred.”
The immediate purpose of the SPLC’s new filing was to obtain permission to subpoena the informant and obtain a court order for the informant to preserve the materials in his possession.
Quote of the Day: Transformers Edition
“The Arch is a generational national defense opportunity to mitigate these evolving threats. It will be utilized as a dual-purpose structure: a major national monument that also incorporates military utility to support Homeland defense.”—Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth
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Re: the "Two Dans" and the AK Senate race..."ballot-stacking" is and has been practiced by both parties for
ages. It's one of those "don't-ask-don't-tell" sleazy dodges that nobody wants to air in public, but, like partisan gerrymandering, it's "just politics". But for the NYT, it was a "Hilary's emails" moment, so out came the "scoop" five days before elections. This — as David reported — will adjust the DOJ suit against "certification" of the AK Senate vote IF the incumbent "Dan" loses to Mary Peltola because of "voter confusion"...and yet again, more fuel for post-election meddling by the trump regime, now virtually guaranteed in AK.
Thank you, NYT — witness for the prosecution.