On Thursday, Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-NY), chairman of the House Judiciary Committee and one of the current House impeachment mangers prosecuting the impeachment case against President Donald Trump in the Senate, opined that Trump&#8217;s conduct with respect to temporarily withholding the disbursement of foreign aid funding to Ukraine &#8220;puts even President Nixon to shame.&#8221; President Richard Nixon, of course, resigned in disgrace following the commencement of House impeachment proceedings against him due to his involvement in the infamous Watergate scandal.
&#8220;Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler Thursday accused President Trump of putting his own personal interests above national security and American democracy and charged that Trump is the only president in history to violate his oath of office so flagrantly,&#8221; Fox News <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/politics/democrats-impeachment-trial-arguments-trump-worse-than-nixon">reported</a>.
“No president has ever used his office to compel a foreign nation to help him cheat in our elections — prior presidents would be shocked to the core by such conduct and rightly so,” the New York Democrat said on the Senate floor, as noted by the outlet.
Reaching a crescendo, Nadler then made his <a href="https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/senate-impeachment-trial-live-updates-democrats-make-constitutional/story?id=68480275">stunning comparison</a>: &#8220;This presidential stonewalling of Congress is unprecedented in the 238-year history of our constitutional republic. It puts even President Nixon to shame. Taken together, the articles and the evidence conclusively establish that President Trump has placed his own personal political interests first. He has placed them above our national security, above our free and fair elections, and above our system of checks and balances. This conduct is not America first, it is Donald Trump first.&#8221;
The video can be seen <a href="https://www.politico.com/video/2020/01/23/nadler-trumps-alleged-misconduct-puts-even-president-nixon-to-shame-069461">here, at Politico</a>.
Earlier today, The Daily Wire&#8217;s Hank Berrien <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/nadler-accuses-gop-senators-of-cover-up-now-he-may-lose-one-gop-swing-senator">reported</a> that earlier this week at the outset of the Senate impeachment trial, Nadler irked infamously moderate Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) with his inflammatory rhetoric about Senate complicity in an alleged White House cover-up.
&#8220;On Tuesday night, [Nadler], speaking before the Senate as it considers the impeachment of President Trump, stated that senators who voted against allowing additional witnesses who were not called upon by the House were guilty in abetting a White House cover up,&#8221; Berrien reported. &#8220;Those comments angered a senator who is largely considered to be a swing vote on the decision, Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska. She reportedly took great offense to Nadler’s remarks, allegedly snapping, &#8216;I took it as very offensive. As one who is listening attentively and working hard to get to a fair process, I was offended.'&#8221;
Nadler&#8217;s incendiary rhetoric from earlier in the week <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/nadler-accuses-gop-senators-of-cover-up-now-he-may-lose-one-gop-swing-senator">included the following</a>:
<blockquote>I’m struck by what we have heard from the president’s counsel so far tonight. They complain about process but they do not seriously contest any of the allegations against the president. They insist that the president has done nothing wrong.  But they refuse to allow the evidence and hear from the witnesses; they will not permit the American people to hear form the witnesses, and they lie. And lie, and lie, and lie … the president sometimes relies on a theory of absolute immunity that says that he can order anybody in the executive branch not to testify to the House or the Senate or to a court. Obviously this is ridiculous; it’s been flatly rejected by every federal court to consider the idea. It’s embarrassing; the president’s counsels will talk about this today.</blockquote>

Jerry Nadler

Jerry Nadler: Trump’s Conduct ‘Puts Even President Nixon To Shame’

Donald Trump

Impeachment

Richard Nixon

Earlier today, as The Daily Wire <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/chill-prince-charles-did-not-snub-vice-president-mike-pence-at-world-holocaust-forum">noted</a>, Vice President Mike Pence was in Jerusalem, Israel to attend the World Holocaust Forum. This year&#8217;s Forum is themed around the 75th anniversary of the liberation of the Nazis&#8217; infamous Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp.
&#8220;Vice President Mike Pence delivered a stirring speech in Jerusalem before an audience that included world leaders and Holocaust survivors, vowing that never again shall the world allow the atrocities committed by the Nazis to be repeated,&#8221; Fox News <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/politics/pence-speaks-in-israel-at-auschwitz-liberation-anniversary">reported</a>. &#8220;Pence spoke on behalf of the United States, joined by leaders of more than 40 nations, at Israel&#8217;s Yad Vashem World Holocaust Remembrance Center, commemorating the 75th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz.&#8221;
Pence, a devout Christian who previously served as Indiana governor and a U.S. congressman from the Hoosier State, is a longtime friend of the Jewish people and a staunch supporter of the Jewish state of Israel.
“To look at Israel is to see that the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob keeps his promises,” Pence has said at the annual <a href="https://www.cufi.org/mike-pence-to-cufi-i-support-israel-because-i-am-a-christian/">Christians United for Israel</a> national convention. “Like all of you, my passion for Israel springs from my Christian faith. The songs of the land and the people of Israel were the anthems of my youth. As for me and my house, we pray for the peace of Jerusalem and all who call her home. It’s really the greatest privilege of my life to serve as Vice President to a President who cares so deeply for our most cherished ally.”
Because the editors of The Daily Wire believe that the vice president&#8217;s remarks are particularly moving and deserve to be widely read, we are reproducing them in full (with hat tip to <a href="https://www.timesofisrael.com/we-marvel-at-jewish-resilience-full-text-of-pences-speech-to-holocaust-forum/">The Times of Israel</a>):
<blockquote>
President Rivlin, Prime Minister Netanyahu, Your Majesties, Presidents, Excellencies, honored survivors and distinguished guests: It is deeply humbling for me to stand before you today, on behalf of the American people, as we mark the 75th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz.
On this occasion, here on Mount Herzl, we gather to fulfill a solemn obligation — an obligation of remembrance: to never allow the memory of those who died in the Holocaust to be forgotten by anyone, anywhere in the world.
The word “remember” appears no fewer than 169 times in the Hebrew Bible — for memory is the constant obligation of all generations.
And today we pause to remember what President Donald Trump rightly called the “dark stain on human history” — the greatest evil ever perpetuated by man against man in the long catalogue of human crime.
The faces of a million and a half children reduced to smoke under a silent sky for the crime of having a single Jewish grandparent. The night Elie Wiesel called “seven times sealed” consumed the faith of so many then, and challenges the faith of so many still.
Today we remember what happens when the powerless cry for help and the powerful refuse to answer.
The town’s name was Oświęcim. As part of their plan to destroy the very existence of Polish culture, the Nazis gave Polish towns German names. And this one they called Auschwitz.
When soldiers opened the gates of Auschwitz on January 27, 1945, they found 7,000 half-starved, half-naked prisoners, hundreds of boxes of camp records that documented the greatest mass murder in history. Before the war was over, in its five years of existence, more than 1.1 million men, women, and children would perish at Auschwitz.
As my wife and I can attest firsthand, from this past year, one cannot walk the grounds of Auschwitz without being overcome with emotion and grief. One cannot see the piles of shoes, the gas chambers, the crematoriums, the lone boxcar facing the gate to the camp, and those grainy photographs of men, women, and children being sent to their deaths without asking: “How could they?”
Today we mourn with those who mourn and grieve with those who grieve. We remember the names and the faces and the promise of the six million Jews who were murdered in the Holocaust.
Today we also pay tribute to those who survived, who all these years have borne witness to that evil and have served mankind by their example.
And today we honor and remember the memory of all the Allied forces, including more than two million American soldiers, who left hearth and home, suffered appalling casualties, and freed a continent from the grip of tyranny.
And, finally, we pay tribute to the memory of those non-Jewish heroes who saved countless lives — those the people of Israel call the “righteous among the nations.”
In an age of indifference, they acted. In an age of fear, they showed courage. And their memory and their example should kindle anew the flame of our hearts to do the same in our time.
We must be prepared to stand as they did against the wave of their times. We must be prepared to confront and expose the vile tide of anti-Semitism that is fueling hate and violence all across the world. And we must stand together.
In that same spirit, we must also stand strong against the leading state purveyor of anti-Semitism, against the one government in the world that denies the Holocaust as a matter of state policy and threatens to wipe Israel off the map. The world must stand strong against the Islamic Republic of Iran.
And, finally, we must have the courage to recognize all the leaders and all the nations that are gathered here that, today, we have the responsibility and the power to ensure that what we remember here today can never happen again.
Mr. Prime Minister, as we honor and remember the six million Jewish martyrs of the Holocaust, the world can only marvel at the faith and resilience of the Jewish people, who just three years after walking in the valley of the shadow of death, rose up from the ashes to reclaim a Jewish future and rebuild the Jewish State.
And I’m proud to say, as Vice President of the United States, that the American people have been with you every step of the way since 1948. And so we will remain.
As President Trump declared in his historic visit to Jerusalem, the bond between our two peoples is “woven together in the fabric of our hearts.” And so it shall always be.
Today we remember not simply the liberation of Auschwitz but also the triumph of freedom — a promise fulfilled, a people restored to their rightful place among the nations of the Earth. And we remember — we remember the long night of that past, the survivors and the faces of those we lost, the heroes who stood against those evil times. And today we gather nearly 50 nations strong, here in Jerusalem, to say with one voice: Never again.
Through pogroms, persecutions, and expulsions in the ghettos, and finally, even through the death camps, the Jewish people clung to an ancient promise that He would “never leave you or forsake you” and that he would leave this people to inherit the land that he swore to your ancestors that he would give them.
And so, today, as we bear witness to the strength and the resilience and the faith of the Jewish people, so too we bear witness to God’s faithfulness to the Jewish people.
May the memory of the martyrs be enshrined in the hearts of all humanity for all time.
May God bless the Jewish people, the State of Israel, the United States, and all the nations gathered here.
And may He who creates peace in the heavens create peace for us and for all the world.
</blockquote>

Mike Pence

Mike Pence At World Holocaust Forum: ‘We Bear Witness To God’s Faithfulness To The Jewish People’

Anti-Semitism

Holocaust

Israel

Jerusalem

Judaism

Nazi Germany

Nazis

On Wednesday, <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-senator-josh-hawley-most-important-freshman-josh-hammer">ascendant</a> freshman Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) had some particularly harsh words for the way House Democratic impeachment managers comported themselves thus far during the Senate&#8217;s nascent impeachment trial.
&#8220;#ImpeachmentTrial Day 1 = epic fail for House managers,&#8221; Hawley tweeted. &#8220;Used 13 h[ou]rs to grandstand, repeatedly taking rebuttal time just to delay. Attacked senators. Alienated their audience. Admonished by the Chief Justice for unprofessionalism. If this is best they can do, should just stop now.&#8221;
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
<a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/ImpeachmentTrial?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#ImpeachmentTrial</a> Day 1 = epic fail for House managers. Used 13 hrs to grandstand, repeatedly taking rebuttal time just to delay. Attacked senators. Alienated their audience. Admonished by the Chief Justice for unprofessionalism. If this is best they can do, should just stop now
&mdash; Josh Hawley (@HawleyMO) <a href="https://twitter.com/HawleyMO/status/1220033771086458880?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 22, 2020</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
But Hawley, a formerly prolific constitutional attorney and Missouri attorney general who once served as a law clerk on the U.S. Supreme Court for Chief Justice John Roberts, also had some strong words to describe the Democratic antics that precipitated his former boss&#8217;s remarkable rebuke, in the wee hours of the morning, of the rambunctious trial he saw unfolding before him.
As The Daily Wire <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/chief-justice-roberts-finally-the-umpire-he-wanted-to-be-criticizes-both-sides-of-impeachment-trial">reported</a> earlier today, Roberts reprimanded what he deemed the overly fraught and puerile behavior of the dueling parties:
<blockquote>“It is appropriate at this point for me to admonish both the House managers and the president’s counsel in equal terms to remember that they are addressing the world’s greatest deliberative body,” Roberts sternly rebuked. “One reason it has earned that title is because its members avoid speaking in a manner, and using language, that is not conducive to civil discourse.”
“In the 1905 [Judge Charles] Swayne [impeachment] trial, a senator objected when one of the managers used the word ‘pettifogging’ — and the presiding officer said the word ought not to have been used,” the chief justice continued. “I don’t think we need to aspire to that high a standard, but I do think those addressing the Senate should remember where they are.”</blockquote>
The chief justice&#8217;s excoriation took Hawley aback: As Fox News <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/politics/hawley-calls-chief-justice-roberts-admonishment-at-impeachment-trial-extraordinary">reports</a>, Hawley said he has &#8220;never heard [Roberts] deliver an admonishment like that from the bench ever.&#8221;
&#8220;He chooses his words very very carefully,&#8221; Hawley continued, according to Fox News. &#8220;He cited a 1905 case impeachment case in which &#8230; one of the sides was &#8230; using language that was thought to be inappropriate. And so while he was careful to &#8230; I think &#8230; to be even-handed about it as is appropriate judicially, it&#8217;s very clear what the impetus for that was &#8230; [Rep. Jerry] Nadler [(D-NY)] getting up and calling the president&#8217;s counsel a bunch of liars.&#8221;
&#8220;I mean, that&#8217;s an extraordinary thing to say on the floor the United States Senate the middle of the trial and that&#8217;s what drew the rebuke [from Roberts] and rightly so,&#8221; Hawley concluded. &#8220;I can tell you, there was an open, open gasping on the Senate floor when Nadler was saying these things.&#8221;
Chief Justice Roberts, a George W. Bush high court nominee who is <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-kavanaugh-and-gorsuch-have-issues-john-josh-hammer">widely reputed to care tremendously</a> about preserving the <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-it-past-time-trump-openly-defy-court-order-josh-hammer">purported</a> non-politicization of Alexander Hamilton’s <a href="https://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/fed78.asp">“least dangerous”</a> branch, famously analogized the role of a Supreme Court justice to that of a baseball home plate umpire calling balls and strikes during his Senate Judiciary Committee confirmation hearing.
&#8220;[T]his time, [Roberts] really is just the umpire,&#8221; Politico <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2020/01/20/john-roberts-trump-impeachment-101114">observed</a> earlier this week. &#8220;He’s not the one we’re tuning in to see, and the game’s most important decisions and actions belong to other people. And the rulings he makes, for once, can be made under an umpire’s decision-making conditions: All by himself, yes or no, and maybe in real time.&#8221;

Josh Hawley

Josh Hawley: Chief Justice’s Impeachment Criticism In Response To ‘Extraordinary’ Democratic Antics

John Roberts

Supreme Court

U.S. Senate

The U.S. Supreme Court this morning heard oral argument in the crucial First Amendment religious liberty case of Espinoza v. Montana Department of Revenue. The legal issue, as framed by <a href="https://www.scotusblog.com/case-files/cases/espinoza-v-montana-department-of-revenue/">SCOTUSblog</a>, is &#8220;[w]hether it violates the religion clauses or the equal protection clause of the United States Constitution to invalidate a generally available and religiously neutral student-aid program simply because the program affords students the choice of attending religious schools.&#8221;
Amy Howe of SCOTUSblog <a href="https://www.scotusblog.com/2020/01/argument-preview-justices-to-consider-dispute-over-tax-credits-for-scholarships/">contextualizes the importance</a> of Espinoza through the prism of the Court&#8217;s recent First Amendment religious liberty jurisprudence:
<blockquote>Two and a half years ago, the Supreme Court ruled that Missouri’s policy of excluding churches from a program to provide grants to resurface playgrounds violated the Constitution. In a footnote in their opinion in <a href="https://www.scotusblog.com/case-files/cases/trinity-lutheran-church-of-columbia-inc-v-pauley/">Trinity Lutheran Church v. Comer</a>, the justices emphasized that their decision was limited to the facts before them and did “not address religious uses of funding or other forms of discrimination.” [In Espinoza], the justices will return to the question they left open in Trinity Lutheran, when they review a decision by the Montana Supreme Court invalidating a tax-credit program because the scholarships created by the program could be used at religious schools.</blockquote>
The Montana state constitutional provision challenged in Espinoza is a so-called &#8220;Blaine Amendment&#8221; — an unfortunate area of law that has its insidious origins in blatant anti-Catholic bigotry. <a href="https://firstliberty.org">First Liberty Institute</a>&#8216;s Jeremy Dys explained the sordid history yesterday in a <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/dys-its-time-to-end-the-bigotry-of-blaine-amendments">Daily Wire op-ed</a> calling for the Court to end &#8220;Blaine Amendments&#8221; once and for all:
<blockquote>In 1875, &#8230; [James] Blaine introduced a proposed amendment to the United States Constitution that would prevent any government aid to “sectarian schools,” targeting Catholic schools in particular.
His federal amendment failed, but various states borrowed his proposal and their own constitutions were amended instead. Today, almost 40 states have a constitutional provision that prevents government aid to religious institutions. These state constitutional amendments have empowered states to legally discriminate against religious organizations when they perform the same work secular institutions do.
For years, activists have used Blaine Amendments to successfully exclude religious individuals and organizations from benefitting from public benefits. Justice Clarence Thomas wrote of Blaine Amendments in the 2000 decision of <a href="https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/530/793/">Mitchell v. Helms</a>, “This doctrine, born of bigotry, should be buried now.”</blockquote>
Ilya Shapiro, who filed a “<a href="https://www.cato.org/sites/cato.org/files/2019-09/Espinoza-merits.pdf">friend of the court brief</a>” on behalf of Cato Institute&#8217;s Robert A. Levy Center for Constitutional Studies, is optimistic that the Court will do precisely what Justice Thomas called for it to do in Mitchell. Speaking exclusively with The Daily Wire, Shapiro opined: &#8220;The Supreme Court has the opportunity here to remove the last legal barrier to school choice, and I think it’s poised to do so. Constitutional principles of free exercise and equal protection don’t allow Montana to exclude religious groups from public benefits solely because of their religious nature. Similarly, there’s no room in Supreme Court precedent to exclude religious schools from programs structured around private choice (as opposed to, say, direct taxpayer funding of devotional education).&#8221;
In an additional <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/slugh-jewish-groups-must-support-ending-the-bigotry-of-blaine-amendments">Daily Wire op-ed</a> published this morning, <a href="https://www.jcrl.org/">Jewish Coalition for Religious Liberty</a> (JCRL) General Counsel Howard Slugh also lambasted the bigotry of Blaine&#8217;s legacy. &#8220;Espinoza has a strong legal basis for her claims,&#8221; Slugh wrote. &#8220;The Supreme Court recently <a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/16pdf/15-577_khlp.pdf">indicated</a> [in Trinity Lutheran] that excluding a religious organization &#8216;from a public benefit for which it is otherwise qualified, solely&#8217; because it is religious &#8216;is odious to our Constitution … and cannot stand.&#8217; The Supreme Court should strike down Montana’s Blaine Amendment based on the same reasoning.&#8221;
Slugh, who filed a “<a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/18/18-1195/116233/20190918141339707_No18-1195JRCL.pdf?fbclid=IwAR2-39Qgpp2Hc2MEbPaRhiXeeFVGOgNpEWF0_5AMTEa6onbe90Xbsc5_yzU">friend of the court brief</a>” on behalf of JCRL, was in attendance this morning at the Supreme Court oral argument. Speaking exclusively with The Daily Wire, Slugh described what he saw: &#8220;I was very pleased with how the oral argument went. It seemed that at least five justices understood that the key issue in this case is whether it was permissible for the Montana Supreme Court to act pursuant to a law that, on its face, requires discrimination against religious people without even considering whether such discrimination is permissible under the U.S. Constitution. The answer to that question is that it is not permissible, and at least five justices seemed to support that position.&#8221;
Proponents of religious liberty and school choice ought to hope that Slugh&#8217;s intuition proves prescient.

The U.S. Supreme Court Building

Supreme Court Hears Blockbuster Case On Religious School Choice

Clarence Thomas

Constitution

Education

First Amendment

Judicial Branch

Judiciary

Lawsuit

Religion

School Choice

After the clock struck midnight on the East Coast last night, toward the final hours of the marathon U.S. Senate impeachment trial session that featured both the U.S. House manager prosecution and the presidential defense team dueling about the trial&#8217;s procedural rules, Chief Justice John Roberts was peeved. The nation&#8217;s highest jurist, <a href="https://www.heritage.org/constitution/#!/articles/1/essays/17/trial-of-impeachment">constitutionally required</a> to preside over a Senate impeachment trial of a president, excoriated both sides for the rambunctiousness and juvenility of their respective rhetoric.
&#8220;A marathon, 12-hour first day in the Senate impeachment trial against President Trump erupted into a shouting match well after midnight Wednesday morning, as Trump&#8217;s legal team unloaded on Democratic impeachment manager Rep. Jerry Nadler, D-(NY) — in an exchange that prompted a bleary-eyed Chief Justice John Roberts to sternly admonish both sides for misconduct in the chamber,&#8221; Fox News <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/politics/senate-impeachment-trial-begins-with-win-for-the-white-house-as-dems-rules-proposal-is-nixed">reported</a>.
&#8220;Nadler, who was overheard apparently planning to impeach Trump back in 2018, said it would be a &#8216;treacherous vote&#8217; and a &#8216;cover-up&#8217; for Republicans to reject the [former National Security Advisor John] Bolton subpoena amendment, claiming that &#8216;only guilty people try to hide evidence,'&#8221; the outlet continued. &#8220;Bolton has reportedly described Trump&#8217;s conduct as akin to a &#8216;drug deal,&#8217; and he has indicated he would be willing to testify and provide relevant information.&#8221;
President Trump&#8217;s two main defense lawyers, White House Counsel Pat Cipollone and Jay Sekulow, both fired back against Nadler. &#8220;Mr. Nadler came up here and made false allegations against our team,&#8221; Cipollone said. &#8220;He made false allegations against all of you [senators]; he accused you of a cover-up. He&#8217;s been making false allegations against the president. The only one who should be embarrassed, Mr. Nadler is you, for the way you&#8217;ve addressed the United States Senate. This is the United States Senate. You&#8217;re not in charge here. &#8230; It’s about time we bring this power trip in for a landing.&#8221;
This exchange proved too much for the chief justice.
&#8220;It is appropriate at this point for me to admonish both the House managers and the president&#8217;s counsel in equal terms to remember that they are addressing the world&#8217;s greatest deliberative body,&#8221; Roberts sternly rebuked. &#8220;One reason it has earned that title is because its members avoid speaking in a manner, and using language, that is not conducive to civil discourse.&#8221;
&#8220;In the 1905 [Judge Charles] Swayne [impeachment] trial, a senator objected when one of the managers used the word &#8216;pettifogging&#8217; — and the presiding officer said the word ought not to have been used,&#8221; the chief justice continued. &#8220;I don&#8217;t think we need to aspire to that high a standard, but I do think those addressing the Senate should remember where they are.&#8221;
That the chief justice saw fit to reprimand both sides did not sit well with every Republican senator in the &#8220;world&#8217;s greatest deliberative body.&#8221; Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT), himself a lawyer and former U.S. Supreme Court law clerk for Justice Samuel Alito, <a href="https://video.foxnews.com/v/6125557687001#sp=show-clips">told Fox News</a> earlier today that he thought it was &#8220;unfair&#8221; for Roberts to include Trump&#8217;s defense lawyers alongside the Democratic prosecution as part of his critical remarks.
Chief Justice Roberts, a George W. Bush high court nominee who is <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-kavanaugh-and-gorsuch-have-issues-john-josh-hammer">widely reputed to care tremendously</a> about preserving the <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-it-past-time-trump-openly-defy-court-order-josh-hammer">purported</a> non-politicization of Alexander Hamilton&#8217;s <a href="https://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/fed78.asp">&#8220;least dangerous&#8221;</a> branch, famously analogized the role of a Supreme Court justice to that of a baseball home plate umpire calling balls and strikes during his Senate Judiciary Committee confirmation hearing. Politico <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2020/01/20/john-roberts-trump-impeachment-101114">recently observed</a> how his role overseeing the nation&#8217;s first presidential impeachment trial in two-plus decades could afford him a unique opportunity to bring that analogy to fruition:
<blockquote>[I]n his 14 years as chief justice, Roberts hasn’t really had the role of umpire — and he knows it. That said, Roberts’s comment about balls and strikes probably reflected an aspiration. To the extent that the Court can be perceived (rightly or wrongly) as acting with principled neutrality, its reputation as an arbiter floating above the political scrum is strengthened. And for judges who like to be perceived as doing nothing more than faithfully applying the law, the umpire analogy is always tempting. There’s something appealing about just getting to call balls and strikes.
Now for the first time, the impeachment trial is giving Roberts that chance. For once, Roberts will have a decision-making role in a forum where he himself is not a major player in the drama. The big players are people like McConnell and Schumer, Romney and Murkowski, Nadler and Schiff, Starr and Dershowitz, the witnesses (if any) who testify—and, offstage, the president. Roberts is there, at the center, and he needs to make decisions. But this time, he really is just the umpire. He’s not the one we’re tuning in to see, and the game’s most important decisions and actions belong to other people. And the rulings he makes, for once, can be made under an umpire’s decision-making conditions: All by himself, yes or no, and maybe in real time.
</blockquote>
Roberts, the infamous deciding vote in favor of constitutionally upholding Obamacare&#8217;s individual mandate back in 2012, has long drawn the ire of many conservative critics. Last summer, I opined in a <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-kavanaugh-and-gorsuch-have-issues-john-josh-hammer">Daily Wire op-ed</a> about the lessons conservatives should learn from his oftentimes lackluster career on the nation&#8217;s highest court:
<blockquote>
The lessons to learn from Roberts’ tremendously disappointing career on the Court are the same <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/47351/hammer-draw-right-lessons-kavanaughs-bad-start-no-josh-hammer" data-reader-unique-id="67">lessons that conservatives ought to learn</a> from [Justice Brett] Kavanaugh’s similarly disappointing start. I have <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/44037/hammer-three-things-conservatives-must-look-future-josh-hammer" data-reader-unique-id="68">identified three broad criteria</a> for which we ought to carefully vet the next Supreme Court nominee: (1) full-spectrum conservatism, (2) stiff resistance to the “<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenhouse_effect_(United_States_Supreme_Court)" data-reader-unique-id="69">Greenhouse Effect</a>,” and (3) eagerness to aggressively correct course. And for the love of God, also make sure the nominee is also someone with a lengthy paper trail and who will not be tempted by non-legal concerns — such as Roberts’ obvious and indefensible preoccupation with the Court’s “institutional integrity.”
</blockquote>

Chief Justice John Roberts

Chief Justice Roberts, Finally The ‘Umpire’ He Wanted To Be, Criticizes Both Sides Of Impeachment Trial

Democratic Party

Republican Party

On Tuesday, House Democrats launched a new demand for the Senate&#8217;s nascent impeachment trial of President Donald Trump: White House Counsel Pat Cipollone, who is helping to lead the president&#8217;s <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/trumps-impeachment-team-adds-more-big-names-two-from-bill-clinton-report">prolific legal defense team</a>, must either disclose any pertinent information he has about Democrats&#8217; substantive impeachment claims or otherwise be dismissed as a Trump defense lawyer at trial.
&#8220;President Donald Trump&#8217;s lead impeachment lawyer, White House Counsel Pat Cipollone, was a central witness to many of the facts of the case against Trump, House Democrats argued Tuesday, demanding that the Cipollone disclose any firsthand knowledge and warning that his role &#8216;threatens to undermine the integrity of the pending trial,'&#8221; Politico <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2020/01/21/pat-cipollone-trump-ukraine-scandal-101355">reported</a>.
&#8220;You may be a material witness to the charges against President Trump, even though you are also his advocate,&#8221; House Democrats&#8217; impeachment managers wrote in a letter to Cipollone, the outlet noted. &#8220;[A]t a minimum, you must disclose all facts and information as to which you have first-hand knowledge that will be at issue in connection with the evidence you present or arguments you make in your role as the President&#8217;s legal advocate so that the Senate and Chief Justice can be apprised of any potential ethical issues, conflicts, or biases,&#8221; the impeachment managers continued.
Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX), who has been a consistent defender of the president&#8217;s throughout the entirety of Democrats&#8217; partisan impeachment push, is having none of it. The junior senator from Texas, a formerly prolific constitutional attorney who clerked on the U.S. Supreme Court for former Chief Justice William Rehnquist, blasted the Democratic demand in no uncertain terms. Cruz called the demand an &#8220;absurd request&#8221; on <a href="https://www.facebook.com/tedcruzpage/posts/10157741123607464">Facebook</a>:
<blockquote>Democrats’ opening salvo in impeachment: they demand Trump get rid of his lawyer, Pat Cipollone.
Absurd request.
Unlike the House, the Senate will have a FAIR trial. That means we won’t deny the President his lawyer ON THE DAY the trial starts.
The Sixth Amendment provides the accused the right &#8220;to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defense.&#8221; Note that the Sixth Amendment does not apply to the prosecution; it protects only the accused. Under the standard put forth by the House Democrats today – that any potential fact witness cannot serve as counsel in the impeachment hearing – there is an obvious person who should be disqualified: Adam Schiff.
Schiff, it has been alleged, spoke directly with the so-called &#8220;whistle-blower&#8221; and may even have helped him draft the complaint that launched this entire impeachment.
So, maybe we should disqualify Schiff as a lawyer, and schedule him instead as a witness to explain his role in creating the &#8220;evidence&#8221; in this proceeding?</blockquote>
The Constitution affords no role for the impeachment trial prosecution to impose procedural demands upon the Senate itself. <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/articlei">Article I, Section 2, Clause 5</a>  says that the House “shall have the sole power of impeachment,” and <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/articlei">Article I, Section 3, Clause 6</a> says that the Senate “shall have the sole power to try all impeachments.” The <a href="https://nypost.com/2019/12/19/pelosis-newest-dirty-trick-putting-trumps-senate-trial-on-hold/">obvious textual implication</a> is that House members and Senate members, respectively, possess plenary authority to establish their own internal procedures for conducting the impeachment process.

Ted Cruz being interviewed

Ted Cruz Blasts Democrats’ Opening Impeachment Demand

Adam Schiff

Ted Cruz

U.S. House of Representatives

As we approach the first-in-the-nation Iowa caucuses, former Vice President Joe Biden continues to hold a sizable lead over the rest of the 2020 Democratic Party presidential primary field in national polling. <a href="https://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2020/president/us/2020_democratic_presidential_nomination-6730.html">Biden currently stands 8.0% above second-place Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT)</a> in the average of recent national polling. Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), South Bend, Indiana Mayor Pete Buttigieg, and former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg round out the top five in most recent national polling. Sanders&#8217; lead over third-place Warren is now substantial: 5.6%.
Buttigieg and Sanders have both been surging in the crucial early-voting states of Iowa and New Hampshire over the past couple of months, although Buttigieg&#8217;s moment may have finally passed. Sanders can always reliably count on the fact that his supporters are the most enthusiastic and loyal of any candidate&#8217;s in this 2020 Democratic presidential primary field. The septuagenarian socialist Sanders is likely the candidate with the most momentum at the present moment, although Biden himself has slowly crept back up in both the Iowa and New Hampshire statewide polling averages. Alas, never count out Joe Biden.
Warren emerged over the latter parts of the summer as a national frontrunner, but her moment has passed — she will all but assuredly need a surprise victory in Iowa or New Hampshire to resuscitate her campaign&#8217;s fading hopes. Biden&#8217;s consistent polling has remained relatively unaffected by the onset of the Ukraine scandal and subsequent impeachment imbroglio — perhaps to the surprise of many pundits who thought he would ultimately have to be dumped by Democrats as a sacrificial lamb of sorts.
At this point, pundits should be hard-pressed to predict anyone other than Biden as the likely Democratic presidential nominee — at least until we get results from Iowa and New Hampshire. But Bernie Sanders, with his rabid base of Soviet Union-nostalgic radicals, has now positioned himself as a very serious contender. The uniquely wealthy Bloomberg is also a candidate to still keep a close eye upon, despite the Democratic National Committee&#8217;s recurring outside donation debate criterion that portends to box out the self-funding Bloomberg from the debate stage for the foreseeable future.
Electoral prediction market website <a href="https://www.predictit.org/markets/detail/3633/Who-will-win-the-2020-Democratic-presidential-nomination">PredictIt</a> now has Biden as its frontrunner, although Sanders is in second by a wide margin. After that large gap, Bloomberg, Warren, and Buttigieg then all distantly follow. The Warren campaign collapse from its erstwhile frontrunner perch, with now even Bloomberg leading her in the electoral betting market, is truly something to behold.
The <a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2020/president/us/2020_democratic_presidential_nomination-6730.html">RealClearPolitics</a> polling average for 1/06/20 – 1/16/20 shows Biden with an average national polling lead of 8.0%.
A recent <a href="http://www.surveyusa.com/client/PollReport.aspx?g=b4747822-277e-4d2c-b896-eb4e04672c09">SurveyUSA</a> national poll conducted from 1/14/20 – 1/16/20 showed Biden, at 32%, with an 11-point lead over Sanders. Sanders was up seven points on Warren, and no one else polled in double digits.
A recent <a href="https://d25d2506sfb94s.cloudfront.net/cumulus_uploads/document/ueji3eha6i/econTabReport.pdf">Economist/YouGov</a> national poll conducted from 1/11/20 – 1/14/20 showed Biden, at 27%, with a seven-point lead over Sanders. Sanders was up one point on Warren, and no one else polled in double digits.
A recent <a href="https://thehill.com/hilltv/rising/478208-sanders-hits-highest-support-since-august">Hill/HarrisX</a> national poll conducted from 1/13/20 – 1/14/20 showed Biden, at 29%, with a 10-point lead over Sanders. Sanders was up eight points on Warren, and no one else polled in double digits.
A recent <a href="https://poll.qu.edu/national/release-detail?ReleaseID=3653">Quinnipiac</a> national poll conducted from 1/08/20 – 1/12/20 showed Biden, at 25%, with a six-point lead over Sanders. Sanders was up three points on Warren, and no one else polled in double digits.
A recent <a href="https://morningconsult.com/2020-democratic-primary/">Morning Consult</a> national poll conducted from 1/06/20 – 1/12/20 showed Biden, at 29%, with a six-point lead over Sanders. Sanders was up nine points on Warren, and no one else polled in double digits.
Will Biden remain the frontrunner? Can Sanders sustain his early state surge? Stay tuned.
Latest Aggregate Early State-By-State Polling Data
Iowa: Biden 21.0%, Sanders 17.3%, Warren 16.7%, Buttigieg 16.3%, Klobuchar 8.3%
New Hampshire: Sanders 19.8%, Biden 18.5%, Buttigieg 14.3%, Warren 14.3%, Klobuchar 5.8%
Nevada: Biden 25.0%, Sanders 19.3%, Warren 14.7%, Buttigieg 7.7%, Steyer 7.3%
South Carolina: Biden 32.0%, Sanders 15.0%, Warren 14.0%, Steyer 8.3%, Buttigieg 6.3%
This article has been updated to reflect the most recent survey data.

Democratic Presidential Candidates Debate In Detroit Over Two Nights

Who Will Win The Democratic Primary? The Latest On 2020 Presidential Primary Polling.

2020 Election

Bernie Sanders

Elizabeth Warren

Joe Biden

Pete Buttigieg

As the 2020 Democratic Party presidential candidates <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/48863/who-will-win-democratic-primary-latest-2020-josh-hammer">battle it out for the nomination</a>, politicos must also pay close attention to President Donald Trump&#8217;s approval rating across the 50 states. While Trump&#8217;s national approval rating has been hovering below 50% for his entire presidency, it was <a href="https://emersonpolling.reportablenews.com/pr/july-national-poll-biden-extends-lead-in-democratic-primary-trump-closes-the-gap-in-the-general-election">on the upswing</a> for the beginning of the summer before faltering a bit toward the end of July. The president&#8217;s approval rating recovered a bit in September before falling again as news of the Ukraine phone call incident rattled national headlines. Since the onset of congressional Democrats&#8217; partisan impeachment efforts, it has more or less stabilized in the mid-40s. If anything, Trump&#8217;s approval rating has recently been on the affirmative rise, as evidence continues to mount that Democrats have <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/defeated-democrats-announce-vote-on-sending-impeachment-articles-but-not-wholl-be-running-the-show">overplayed their hand</a> on impeachment.
Historically, presidents have fared well in re-election campaigns when they maintain approval ratings above 50%. This president, to be sure, has never had such an approval rating at any point throughout his presidency. But President Trump oversees a soaring economy, with record-low unemployment rates, and has a hardened base of core supporters. One must also never forget the sheer power of incumbency: Since FDR, only Presidents Jimmy Carter and George H.W. Bush were elected and then subsequently not re-elected four years later.
As of January 21, 2020, the <a href="https://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/other/president_trump_job_approval-6179.html">RealClearPolitics average</a> for Trump&#8217;s national job approval rating sits at 44.0% — or 8.6% underwater. To be sure, many still have hardened views — in both directions — about the president, but there is still a core nucleus of moderate, independent, largely suburban swing voters who will help determine the outcome of the 2020 presidential election.
Henry Olsen of The Washington Post had an <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2019/11/06/trump-is-down-far-out" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?hl=en&amp;q=https://email.dailywire.com/e2t/c/*W3HmRfg8wKtnCW4cGZSL1CSrXg0/*W5BKVhh96Gpb4W8-1y2m5m6ghN0/5/f18dQhb0Sq5J8Y9XHdW80JfVF1k63-nW7sTg0H2P2ZFHW6Dk5Sd1Vq7GqVLDpF18CSvhfW8CRtsF3P0gztW5yJNx18l2p1TW1nPLDM8rZZ3CW3L3hj18BVHkvW3knCMv8yXl2fN5x53HbSbM86W8CZT8L8tBst7VScmWZ5wMTWVW5wL96L1sL3M0W3Mybvy6RNDcsN5wYBLnZvRBfVRH-mh1l5XsBW55nSC91VJH71W4c2Rr971B_trW1x4lQB6GKLK6W1s0LSF5mKjF6W3m2jX953X_ZpW52Ylfx3_8mplW9fgwMT4fdf2wW1CKFgB4fCj-4W6yGjGM57QYy5W1zslkT7LNKKVW2twnxd6z4yN9W1GQ1T21fqP84W1BQNJF2PXVH6N8W1FtxGX70sW5YCjHQ1HGqqhW3mV5CD6Y6gM5W1j14QF1j9W8pN7KWJRDpdj-nV4slhZ3MYtL8W4HrzTg45Ly2MVkwRN48b6cnqW2GFB531GH84tW27PQWj8tVZYWVj8tbN4c-1VzW6PZLJt8zhkqrW4ffn6C5LdRRhW8qBft_2PLnMWW4rGbTz5ymY9KMZpcmq9ZLg8f2CCSW411&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1574867914609000&amp;usg=AFQjCNHkSMBe5OEEGUjYZNH6vGN2ZmbXFw">incisive piece</a> in November that analyzed the relationship between Trump’s approval ratings and his re-election chances. According to Olsen’s historically informed analysis, Trump would need his approval rating to rise to roughly 46% – 47% in order to confidently position himself to capture the Electoral College next November. That ought not to be too difficult, given Trump&#8217;s current polling, although it will require the president to truly focus on reaching out to persuadable moderates, independents, and suburban swing voters. To that end, I have previously offered some <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-trump-needs-to-focus-on-a-safety-and-security-agenda-for-2020">unsolicited advice</a> to the Trump campaign: Focus on a safety and security agenda to appeal to these persuadable voters.
The Daily Wire will also be tracking Trump&#8217;s state-by-state approval rating as the general election nears. Here is the latest Trump approval rating information from across all the various swing states.
Battleground State-By-State Trump Approval Rating (latest data via <a href="https://morningconsult.com/tracking-trump-2/">Morning Consult&#8217;s December 2019</a> monthly survey)
ARIZONA:
<ul>
<li>2016 presidential result: Trump + 3.57%</li>
<li>Governor: Republican</li>
<li>U.S. Senate: Republican, Democrat</li>
<li>Current Trump approval rating: -3%</li>
</ul>
COLORADO:
<ul>
<li>2016 presidential result: Clinton + 4.91%</li>
<li>Governor: Democrat</li>
<li>U.S. Senate: Republican, Democrat</li>
<li>Current Trump approval rating: -18%</li>
</ul>
FLORIDA:
<ul>
<li>2016 presidential result: Trump + 1.20%</li>
<li>Governor: Republican</li>
<li>U.S. Senate: Republican, Republican</li>
<li>Current Trump approval rating: EVEN</li>
</ul>
GEORGIA:
<ul>
<li>2016 presidential result: Trump + 5.09%</li>
<li>Governor: Republican</li>
<li>U.S. Senate: Republican, Republican</li>
<li>Current Trump approval rating: -2%</li>
</ul>
IOWA:
<ul>
<li>2016 presidential result: Trump + 9.41%</li>
<li>Governor: Republican</li>
<li>U.S. Senate: Republican, Republican</li>
<li>Current Trump approval rating: -9%</li>
</ul>
MICHIGAN:
<ul>
<li>2016 presidential result: Trump + 0.23%</li>
<li>Governor: Democrat</li>
<li>U.S. Senate: Democrat, Democrat</li>
<li>Current Trump approval rating: -15%</li>
</ul>
MINNESOTA:
<ul>
<li>2016 presidential result: Clinton + 1.51%</li>
<li>Governor: Democrat</li>
<li>U.S. Senate: Democrat, Democrat</li>
<li>Current Trump approval rating: -10%</li>
</ul>
NEVADA:
<ul>
<li>2016 presidential result: Clinton + 2.42%</li>
<li>Governor: Democrat</li>
<li>U.S. Senate: Democrat, Democrat</li>
<li>Current Trump approval rating: -12%</li>
</ul>
NEW HAMPSHIRE:
<ul>
<li>2016 presidential result: Clinton + 0.37%</li>
<li>Governor: Democrat</li>
<li>U.S. Senate: Democrat, Democrat</li>
<li>Current Trump approval rating: -19%</li>
</ul>
NORTH CAROLINA:
<ul>
<li>2016 presidential result: Trump + 3.66%</li>
<li>Governor: Democrat</li>
<li>U.S. Senate: Republican, Republican</li>
<li>Current Trump approval rating: EVEN</li>
</ul>
OHIO:
<ul>
<li>2016 presidential result: Trump + 8.13%</li>
<li>Governor: Republican</li>
<li>U.S. Senate: Republican, Democrat</li>
<li>Current Trump approval rating: -3%</li>
</ul>
PENNSYLVANIA:
<ul>
<li>2016 presidential result: Trump + 0.72%</li>
<li>Governor: Democrat</li>
<li>U.S. Senate: Republican, Democrat</li>
<li>Current Trump approval rating: -6%</li>
</ul>
TEXAS:
<ul>
<li>2016 presidential result: Trump + 8.99%</li>
<li>Governor: Republican</li>
<li>U.S. Senate: Republican, Republican</li>
<li>Current Trump approval rating: +1%</li>
</ul>
VIRGINIA:
<ul>
<li>2016 presidential result: Clinton + 5.32%</li>
<li>Governor: Democrat</li>
<li>U.S. Senate: Democrat, Democrat</li>
<li>Current Trump approval rating: -5%</li>
</ul>
WISCONSIN:
<ul>
<li>2016 presidential result: Trump + 0.77%</li>
<li>Governor: Democrat</li>
<li>U.S. Senate: Republican, Democrat</li>
<li>Current Trump approval rating: -10%</li>
</ul>
This article has been updated to reflect the most recent survey data.

Trump rally Kentucky

Will Trump Win? The Latest On Trump’s National And State-By-State Approval Ratings.

Economy

On Saturday, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) continued its pushback against the <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-why-no-one-pointing-out-sanctuary-cities-josh-hammer">lawless</a> scourge of sanctuary cities — this time focusing upon the particularly recalcitrant government of Mayor Bill de Blasio&#8217;s New York City.
ICE &#8220;served four immigration subpoenas Friday on the New York Department of Corrections (NYDOC) requesting information on multiple illegal aliens who were criminally arrested in New York City, and yet under New York’s non-cooperation policies officials have refused to honor ICE detainers or even provide ICE with information about the release dates of criminal alien public safety threats,&#8221; the agency stated via <a href="https://www.ice.gov/news/releases/ice-issues-subpoenas-obtain-information-refused-under-ny-sanctuary-policies">press release</a>. &#8220;Issuance of these immigration subpoenas was necessary because the NYDOC has continued to ignore ICE’s requests for information and cooperation.&#8221;
&#8220;ICE uses statutorily-authorized immigration subpoenas to obtain information as part of investigations regarding potential removable aliens,&#8221; the release continued. &#8220;ICE has not historically needed to use its lawful authority to issue these subpoenas to obtain information from other law enforcement agencies as most law enforcement agencies throughout the country willingly provide ICE with information regarding aliens arrested for crimes in the interest of public safety.&#8221;
&#8220;ICE is using every tool available to obtain information regarding the whereabouts and other relevant information regarding removable aliens from jurisdictions that chose to, or are unable to, cooperate with ICE,&#8221; the agency wrote, before providing details about the four criminal aliens — ranging from age 21 to 38 — about whom it recently sought information from NYDOC.
&#8220;Like any law enforcement agency, we are used to modifying our tactics as criminals shift their strategies; but it’s disheartening that we must change our practices and jump through so many hoops with partners who are restricted by sanctuary laws passed by politicians with a dangerous agenda,&#8221; lamented Henry Lucero, acting deputy executive associate director for ICE’s Enforcement and Removal Operations, as quoted in the ICE press release.
Just yesterday, The Daily Wire&#8217;s Hank Berrien <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/ice-releases-list-of-9-violent-illegal-immigrants-freed-by-ny-sanctuary-policy-plus-6-more-who-could-be-released">reported</a> that ICE has also released a list of nine illegal aliens whom ICE claims have been &#8220;released in New York communities&#8221; due to the metropolis&#8217;s sanctuary policies. &#8220;ICE also named six additional illegal immigrants who may be released, some of whom have been charged with murder and child rape,&#8221; Berrien noted.
As <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/politics/ice-illegal-immigrants-freed-by-new-york-citys-sanctuary-city">reported</a> by Fox News, acting ICE Director Matthew Albence &#8220;cited statistics saying that last year ICE lodged 7,526 detainers via its New York field office. Those individuals accounted for 17,873 criminal convictions and 6,500 criminal charges. He went on to say that those charges and convictions include over 200 homicides, over 500 robberies, over 1,000 sexual offenses, over 1,000 weapons offenses, and over 3,500 assaults. However, only about 10 detainers were honored by the city, officials said.&#8221;
In a <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-why-no-one-pointing-out-sanctuary-cities-josh-hammer">Daily Wire op-ed</a> last July, I argued that most sanctuary jurisdictions flagrantly violate federal law — and in particular, <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/8/1373">8 U.S.C. § 1373(a)</a>, which provides: &#8220;Notwithstanding any other provision of Federal, State, or local law, a Federal, State, or local government entity or official may not prohibit, or in any way restrict, any government entity or official from sending to, or receiving from, the [Department of Homeland Security] information regarding the citizenship or immigration status, lawful or unlawful, of any individual.&#8221; I opined:
<blockquote>It is true that the U.S. Supreme Court’s so-called “<a href="https://constitutioncenter.org/blog/on-this-day-the-supreme-court-reinforces-the-10th-amendment">anti-commandeering doctrine</a>,” most famously articulated in the 1992 case of <a href="https://www.oyez.org/cases/1991/91-543">New York v. United States</a> and the 1997 case of <a href="https://www.oyez.org/cases/1996/95-1478">Printz v. United States</a>, stands for the proposition that the federal government cannot forcibly “commandeer” state governments to help the federal government enforce federal law. As Justice Scalia <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/95-1478.ZO.html">wrote in Printz</a>, “The Federal Government may neither issue directives requiring the States to address particular problems, nor command the States’ officers, or those of their political subdivisions, to administer or enforce a federal regulatory program.”
But a plain reading of 8 U.S.C. § 1373(a) does not seem to countenance a violation of the anti-commandeering doctrine. Under § 1373(a), state and local officials are not coerced into “enforc[ing] a federal regulatory program.” Rather, under the text of the statute, all state and local officials are prohibited from doing is issuing a “restrict[ion] [upon the] sending to, or receiving from, the [Department of Homeland Security] information regarding the citizenship or immigration status, lawful or unlawful, of any individual.” Put simply, the issue at hand in § 1373(a) is not federal commandeering of state actors to enforce a federal program; rather, the issue is the prevention of state and local officials from openly defying and subverting federal law. And the Constitution’s Supremacy Clause plainly forbids the states from openly defying and subverting federal law. The Constitution’s Supremacy Clause, as applied to § 1373(a), therefore prohibits state and local governments from shielding a removable illegal alien from ICE when ICE issues a detainer request on the alien.</blockquote>

Immigration and Customs Enforcement logo

ICE Hits Back, Issues Subpoenas Against Criminal Aliens In Sanctuary New York City

Bill de Blasio

Crime

Illegal Immigration

Immigrants

Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)

New York City

New York Police Department (NYPD)

Sanctuary Cities

Tomorrow will commence the third presidential impeachment trial in the history of the United States Senate. And on the eve of such a rare and solemn institutional undertaking, it is still not entirely clear what exactly President Donald Trump has done to deserve such a fate.
At the outset of this saga, House Democrats spent weeks promoting an oh-so nefarious &#8220;quid pro quo&#8221; that transpired during Trump&#8217;s now-infamous July 25 phone call last summer with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. It turns out that abstruse Latinate didn&#8217;t poll-test well — and never mind that such a &#8220;quid pro quo,&#8221; when cabined to a public official&#8217;s lawful exercise of his <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-at-the-new-york-post-trumps-alleged-impoundment-of-ukraine-money-doesnt-make-for-an-impeachable-offense">constitutional authority</a>, amounts to <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-there-is-one-terrific-impeachment-defense-that-the-white-house-is-not-making">constitutionally protected free speech</a>. Democrats next engaged in the hilariously public floating of bribery — which is actually enumerated as a presidential impeachment criterion in <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/articleii">Article II, Section 4</a> of the Constitution — before deciding that they simply lacked the grist to advance such a claim. Democrats ultimately settled on the mealy-mouthed, amorphous gibberish of &#8220;abuse of power&#8221; and the <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-at-the-new-york-post-obstruction-of-congress-is-an-utterly-ridiculous-impeachment-charge">utterly nonsensical</a>, constitutionally illiterate &#8220;obstruction of Congress&#8221; as their charges of choice.
As Daily Wire Editor-in-Chief Ben Shapiro and I have each <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-todays-judiciary-committee-impeachment-hearing-is-yet-another-waste-of-time">observed</a> countless times since Democrats first glommed onto the Ukraine phone call as possible grounds for impeachment, it is true that actually committing a black-letter crime is not a constitutional requirement to impeach a sitting president. &#8220;High crimes and misdemeanors,&#8221; the catch-all presidential impeachment criterion enumerated in the Constitution after treason and bribery, was a well-known term of art in the English common law. Alexander Hamilton <a href="https://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/fed65.asp">explained</a> in <a href="https://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/fed65.asp">The Federalist No. 65</a> that it encompasses &#8220;offenses which proceed from the misconduct of public men, or, in other words, from the abuse or violation of some public trust.&#8221;
True, the Hamiltonian language presents a necessarily political and malleable standard. But it is also true that the Constitution&#8217;s Framers did not view everything as a <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-stop-calling-everything-impeachable-offense-josh-hammer">potentially impeachable offense</a>. To wit, the Framers <a href="https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/inside-founding-fathers-debate-over-what-constituted-impeachable-offense-180965083/">expressly deliberated</a> whether to make the far lesser &#8220;maladministration&#8221; an impeachment criterion before rejecting it out of fear that it could lead to highly partisan impeachment proceedings motivated by either a mere policy disagreement or the raw pursuit of political power. Hamilton certainly understood that, writing in the same Federalist that impeachment would &#8220;seldom fail to agitate the passions of the whole community, and to divide it into parties more or less friendly or inimical to the accused.&#8221;
Accordingly, even though the actual violation of a law is not constitutionally required, Democrats&#8217; current partisan gambit represents the first time in the history of the republic that an impeachment has nonetheless been attempted without the undergirding of a legally violative act. President Andrew Johnson violated the Tenure of Office Act — an unambiguously unconstitutional statute, but technically a statutory violation nonetheless. President Bill Clinton, investigated for years by former independent counsel Ken Starr, committed perjury. President Richard Nixon, who resigned in disgrace before a formal House vote on impeachment, was knee-deep in the Watergate scandal.
What exactly has President Trump done? He acted in a ham-fisted and sloppy manner on a phone call with a foreign leader when it came to the conducting of his foreign policy — an action squarely within his well-established <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-at-the-new-york-post-trumps-alleged-impoundment-of-ukraine-money-doesnt-make-for-an-impeachable-offense">constitutional bailiwick</a>. True, he should not have mentioned Joe Biden by name. But ultimately, Trump tried to attach <a href="https://www.nationalreview.com/2019/10/the-two-theories-of-trumps-actions-in-the-ukraine-affair/">corruption-related strings</a>, however clumsily, to the doling out of one of the most consistently <a href="https://today.yougov.com/topics/politics/articles-reports/2016/03/11/foreign-aid">politically unpopular</a> items in annual federal budgets: Foreign aid.
The conduct upon which Democrats are now attempting to impeach the president is orders of magnitude less destructive than the conduct upon which the Framers would have considered impeachment justified. It reeks of the sort of petty politics and jostling for power that led the Framers to conscientiously reject the far lesser &#8220;maladministration&#8221; as a possible grounds for impeachment. What&#8217;s worse, House Democrats rushed their process due to political timing and, in their rush, have <a href="https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2019-12-09/opinion-trump-impeachment-hearings-democrats">fundamentally failed to make their case</a> to the American people. They have <a href="https://theresurgent.com/2020/01/20/democrats-have-failed-at-impeachment-trump-will-remain-president/">failed at impeachment</a>, and they have no one to blame but themselves. And in their recklessness, Democrats have also set a deeply pernicious precedent for the future of the Constitution&#8217;s carefully calibrated separation of powers framework.
Alas, let the trial commence.

House Speaker Pelosi And Senator Schumer Hold News Conference On DACA Case

HAMMER: What Exactly Are They Impeaching Him For, Again?

Charles Schumer

Federalist

In the soon-to-be-released documentary about U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, &#8220;Created Equal: Clarence Thomas in His Own Words,&#8221; the jurist has some harsh words about former vice president and <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/who-will-win-democratic-primary-latest-2020-josh-hammer">current leading</a> 2020 Democratic Party presidential candidate Joe Biden. At the time of Thomas&#8217;s infamously raucous confirmation hearing before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee, Biden, a Delaware Democrat, was the committee&#8217;s chairman.
Director Michael Pack, <a href="https://video.foxnews.com/v/6124958353001">speaking this morning</a> to Fox News host Steve Doocy on &#8220;Fox &amp; Friends,&#8221; described the much-anticipated documentary as a chance for viewers to &#8220;hear [Thomas&#8217;s] whole story&#8221; from the famously reticent justice himself. Pack noted that Justice Thomas and his wife Ginni are the only two people directly interviewed in the film.
Thomas, a black man who grew up in extreme poverty in Jim Crow-era Georgia, endured an extraordinarily nasty Senate Judiciary Committee confirmation hearing following his nomination to the nation&#8217;s highest court by then-President George H.W. Bush. Thomas famously described the efforts to derail his nomination, in the aftermath of the public airing of allegations of sexual harassment by Anita Hill, as a &#8220;high-tech lynching.&#8221; Thomas is seen in the film&#8217;s trailer telling the camera: &#8220;We know what this is all about. This is the &#8216;wrong black guy.&#8217; Just say it.&#8221;
In December, The Daily Wire&#8217;s Amanda Prestigiacomo <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/watch-trailer-for-new-clarence-thomas-documentary-drops-justice-says-liberals-worse-than-the-klan">highlighted</a> how, in the documentary, Thomas also claims that modern-day liberals have proved to be a bigger &#8220;impediment&#8221; for him throughout his meteoric rise than has the Ku Klux Klan itself:
<blockquote>“I felt as though, in my life, I had been looking at the wrong people as the people who would be problematic toward me,” Thomas reportedly says in the documentary, according to <a href="https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/justice-clarence-thomas-rebukes-biden-led-confirmation-hearings/story?id=67235780" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">ABC News.</a> “We were told that, ‘Oh, it’s gonna be the bigot in the pickup truck; it’s gonna be the Klansmen; it’s gonna be the rural sheriff.&#8217;”
“But it turned out that through all of that, ultimately the biggest impediment was the modern-day liberal,” the justice continued. “They were the ones who would discount all those things because they have one issue or because they have the power to caricature you.”</blockquote>
That Thomas excoriates Biden in the documentary has been previously reported. Earlier this month, The National Interest <a href="https://nationalinterest.org/blog/buzz/we-watched-new-clarence-thomas-documentary-its-not-good-biden-113466">wrote</a> that, &#8220;[a]t one juncture of the film, Thomas was asked about a colloquy with Biden over natural law philosophy and the Constitution. Though he did not cite Biden by name, Thomas lamented that lawmakers do not seem to have full command of the subject matter during judicial confirmation hearings.&#8221;
In a <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-2020-democratic-field-will-come-down-josh-hammer">Daily Wire op-ed</a> last March, I noted the leading role that Biden had similarly played in the <a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/itsallpolitics/2012/12/19/167645600/robert-borks-supreme-court-nomination-changed-everything-maybe-forever">vicious 1987 smearing</a> of then-U.S. Supreme Court nominee Judge Robert Bork:
<blockquote>Biden simply has too much baggage, in the current environment. Who in their right mind thinks that coquettish <a href="https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/joe-bidens-woman-touching-habit" data-reader-unique-id="48">creepy</a> “Uncle Joe” is a good fit for the current #MeToo moment? Who in their right mind thinks that Biden’s formerly held views on <a href="http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/03/joe-biden-record-on-busing-incarceration-racial-justice-democratic-primary-2020-explained.html" data-reader-unique-id="49">race</a> and <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2019/01/21/politics/joe-biden-criminal-justice/index.html" data-reader-unique-id="50">crime</a> won’t come back to destroy him in the minds of the increasingly dominant hard left faction of the Democratic base? Biden has simply been in the national spotlight for too long, and has too long a track record to cleanly avoid opposition research-driven scrutiny. And, amazingly, the man who once tag-teamed with Ted Kennedy to vilely <a href="https://www.investors.com/politics/editorials/america-freer-with-bork-on-supreme-court/" data-reader-unique-id="51">savage Robert Bork’s</a> judicial career is almost assuredly now too “moderate” for the batcrap crazy hard Left.</blockquote>

Clarence Thomas Confirmation Hearing

Justice Clarence Thomas Blasts Joe Biden In Soon-To-Be Released Documentary

Fox News

Oklahoma, a state that sits in the unique crosshairs of the South, Midwest, and Southwest regions of the nation, is one of the most reliably Republican states in the country. In 2016, Donald Trump defeated Hillary Clinton in every single county in the Sooner State, ultimately accumulating a whopping 36+% total statewide margin of victory. In fact, no Democratic presidential candidate has won a single county in Oklahoma since Al Gore (who still lost the state to George W. Bush by a 21+% margin) in 2000.
Now, seeking to both capitalize upon President Trump&#8217;s overwhelming popularity in Oklahoma and raise money for veteran organizations, Republican state legislators in the Oklahoma Senate are proposing the introduction of a new &#8220;MAGA&#8221; specialty license plate.
&#8220;Two Republican state senators in Oklahoma proposed a bill that would create specialty license plates that showcase the president’s campaign slogans, a move that could violate federal campaign finance laws,&#8221; The Hill <a href="https://thehill.com/homenews/state-watch/478943-oklahoma-senators-propose-new-maga-specialty-license-plates">reports</a>. &#8220;Sens. Nathan Dahm (R) and Marty Quinn (R) penned the legislation, which would make state license plates that say &#8216;Make America Great Again&#8217; (MAGA) and &#8216;Keep America Great&#8217; available for purchase.&#8221;
&#8220;Proceeds from the &#8216;MAGA&#8217; and &#8216;Keep America Great&#8217; license plates won’t go directly to the president’s reelection bid, but instead they’ll be split between two veterans groups: The Warriors for Freedom Foundation and the Folds of Honor Foundation,&#8221; the outlet continues.
What&#8217;s more, the <a href="https://www.tulsaworld.com/news/local/government-and-politics/state-senators-propose-maga-license-plate-options-for-oklahomans/article_9115e015-7e7c-58a1-8f69-56891f0d5424.html">text of the bill</a> expressly contemplates the president&#8217;s involvement in the license plate design process: &#8220;The license plates shall be designed in consultation with the corporation or entity designated by Donald J. Trump for such purposes.&#8221; And as the New York Post <a href="https://nypost.com/2020/01/18/oklahoma-lawmakers-propose-maga-license-plates-to-raise-money-for-veteran-groups/">notes</a>, the proposal &#8220;authorizes the Oklahoma Tax Commission to issue the plates &#8216;to any person wishing to demonstrate support for the proclamation made by Donald J. Trump.'&#8221;
As far as cost, the Washington Examiner <a href="https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/oklahoma-lawmakers-propose-maga-and-keep-america-great-license-plates-to-support-veterans">reports</a> that &#8220;[m]otorists would be charged a fee of $35 per year, and $20 of that fee will be donated to two local veterans groups.&#8221;
In a &#8220;Fox &amp; Friends&#8221; appearance this morning, Sen. Dahm <a href="https://video.foxnews.com/v/6124908061001#sp=show-clips">explained</a> that he chose The Warriors for Freedom Foundation and the Folds of Honor Foundation as the bill&#8217;s two specified veterans groups of choice because they are two groups to which Trump has donated directly in the past.
The overtly partisan nature of the &#8220;MAGA&#8221; license plate will all but assuredly raise the eyes of federal election officials, however. &#8220;These are political slogans,&#8221; Columbia Law School professor Richard Briffault told <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2020/01/18/okla-senators-want-maga-license-plates-which-might-violate-federal-campaign-finance-rules/">The Washington Post</a>. “This has the look and feel of using state resources to support a political candidate, which seems improper &#8230; and possibly illegal.&#8221;
The bill would, of course, require the approval of both houses of the Oklahoma legislature and the ultimate signature of the governor before its enactment into law.
As also noted by The Hill, the same two Republican state senators who introduced the license plate proposal have also proposed a piece of legislation that would rename an Oklahoma portion of historic Route 66 as the &#8220;President Donald J. Trump highway.&#8221; As noted by the Oklahoma Senate&#8217;s <a href="http://www.oksenate.gov/news/press_releases/press_releases_2019/pr20191105a.htm">official website</a>, Sen. Quinn said of the bill: &#8220;Oklahoma is in the heart of America. Its conservative values of freedom, liberty and limited government are what our country was built on and has made America a strong nation and President Trump continues to fight for these values.&#8221;

State Flag flies over Oklahoma State Capitol, Oklahoma City OK

Oklahoma State Senators Propose ‘MAGA’ License Plate

Oklahoma

Veterans

Daily Wire Editor-at-Large Josh Hammer, who is a constitutional attorney by training, had the following piece yesterday at the <a href="https://nypost.com/2020/01/17/trumps-ukraine-money-holdup-doesnt-make-for-an-impeachable-breach-of-the-law/">New York Post</a>.
The Government Accountability Office (GAO) this week found that President Trump violated the Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act (ICA) when he <a href="https://nypost.com/2020/01/16/trump-broke-law-by-freezing-aid-to-ukraine-government-watchdog/" data-reader-unique-id="36">delayed $215 million in foreign aid to Ukraine</a>. “Faithful execution of the law does not permit the President to substitute his own policy priorities for those that Congress has enacted into law,” the GAO bureaucrats said.
Cue the ritual hue and cry from the left. The same folks who publicly flirted with impeachment justifications like “quid pro quo” and bribery before settling on amorphous “abuse of power” and nonsensical “obstruction of Congress” charges have now glommed on to the GAO’s finding with alacrity. There’s even been some talk of drafting a new article of impeachment based on it.
They should curb their enthusiasm. First, Trump likely did not violate the ICA. Second, even if he did breach it, that law itself comes with its own remedy baked in — and it is a far less draconian remedy than impeachment.
Congress passed the ICA to counter its belief that Richard Nixon abused his executive branch powers by impounding duly appropriated funds — a presidential custom stretching back to the presidency of Thomas Jefferson. The ICA allows for a president to formally request that Congress rescind appropriated funds; Congress then has 45 days to approve the president’s request. The GAO alleges that Trump flouted this process, and, in turn, his Article II constitutional duty to “take care that the laws be faithfully executed.”
To be sure, expressly directing a subordinate to violate federal law is inconsistent with the Take Care clause. But the president also has other obligations under Article II of the Constitution. The very first clause of Article II vests the president with “the executive Power.” The doling out of foreign aid is an integral part of conducting foreign affairs, and, according to a 2001 Yale Law Journal article by legal scholars Saikrishna Prakash and Michael Ramsey, 18th-century English common law — which helped form the Framers’ thinking — had an “ordinary &#8230; meaning of executive power” that “included foreign affairs power.”
Similarly, in the 1936 Supreme Court case U.S. v. Curtiss-Wright Export Corp., the justices describe the president as “the sole organ of the federal government in the field of international relations — a power which does not require as a basis for its exercise an act of Congress.”
Democrats might argue that Congress’ plenary power of the purse, coupled with the statutory grounding of the ICA, might override the president’s foreign-affairs power. That is, at best, a highly contestable claim. But it is certainly not new impeachment grist for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer — not least because the drafters of the ICA were savvy enough to provide for a self-contained remedy.
<a href="https://nypost.com/2020/01/17/trumps-ukraine-money-holdup-doesnt-make-for-an-impeachable-breach-of-the-law/">Read the rest here.</a>
&nbsp;
RELATED: <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-at-the-new-york-post-obstruction-of-congress-is-an-utterly-ridiculous-impeachment-charge">&#8216;Obstruction Of Congress&#8217; Is An Utterly Ridiculous Impeachment Charge</a>.
RELATED: <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-there-is-one-terrific-impeachment-defense-that-the-white-house-is-not-making">There Is One Terrific Impeachment Defense That The White House Is Not Making</a>.

President Donald Trump

Hammer At The ‘New York Post’: Trump’s Alleged Impoundment Of Ukraine Money Doesn’t Make For An Impeachable Offense

Nancy Pelosi

Thomas Jefferson

&#8220;Never let the facts get in the way of a good narrative.&#8221; – Leftist Journalism 101
Judge William H. Pryor Jr. of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit is, you see, a conservative man. In what was still a relatively rare move, at the time, Senate Democrats filibustered the judicial nomination of the then-Alabama attorney general due to their belief that Pryor was a devil-may-care extremist. In 2004, President George W. Bush first installed Pryor on the bench via <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2004/LAW/02/20/bush.pryor/">recess appointment</a>. During an at-times heated eventual Senate Judiciary Committee confirmation hearing, the avowedly pro-life Pryor had these <a href="https://www.congress.gov/108/chrg/CHRG-108shrg91200/CHRG-108shrg91200.htm">remarkable exchanges</a> with Sens. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and Arlen Specter (R-PA):
<blockquote>Schumer: Now, you have said on occasion, on several occasions, that Roe v. Wade is &#8220;the worst abomination in the history of constitutional law.&#8221; Do you believe that as of right now?
Pryor: I do.
Schumer: I appreciate your candor, I really do. &#8230;
Specter: &#8220;In the 1992 case of Planned Parenthood v. Casey, the Court preserved the worst abomination of constitutional law [Roe] in our history.&#8221; Is that an accurate quotation of yours?
Pryor: Yes.
Specter: Is that [comment] one which would fall into the category that Senator [Orrin] Hatch has commented on, you wish you had not made?
Pryor: No, I stand by that comment.
Specter: Why do you consider it an abomination, Attorney General Pryor?
Pryor: Well, I believe that not only is the case unsupported by the text and structure of the Constitution, but it has led to a morally wrong result. It has led to the slaughter of millions of innocent unborn children. That&#8217;s my personal belief.</blockquote>
Since joining the federal judiciary, Pryor — on issues ranging from criminal sentencing to habeas corpus to due process to the role of religion in public life — has indeed been a consistent voice for an originalist, conservative jurisprudence. He was publicly floated as a leading contender for the Supreme Court vacancy left by the late Justice Antonin Scalia, which was ultimately filled by now-Justice Neil Gorsuch. Alas, that was a botched opportunity for those of us <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-yes-alabama-legislature-right-openly-defy-josh-hammer">staunchly pro-life</a> and <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-a-political-wish-for-2020-less-socialism-more-law-and-order">traditional law-and-order</a> conservatives with no small degree of skepticism for the genre of <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-three-things-conservatives-must-look-future-josh-hammer">libertarian-infused</a> originalism sometimes <a href="https://www.conservativereview.com/news/gorsuch-dead-wrong-immigration/">peddled by Gorsuch</a>.
Regardless, the Left has never forgiven Pryor for his steadfast refusal to bend the knee at the altar of the progressive golden calf. He has repeatedly found himself, over the years, in the crosshairs of what Andrew Breitbart famously called the &#8220;<a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052748704471504574451703003340362">Democrat-Media Complex</a>.&#8221; Which brings us to the recent 11th Circuit case of <a href="http://media.ca11.uscourts.gov/opinions/pub/files/201715470.pdf">U.S. v. Brown</a>.
If you believe the findings of the trial court, former U.S. Congresswoman Corrine Brown of Florida is about as corrupt as an elected Democrat can come. Brown, who served in Congress for 24 years, was ultimately convicted in May 2017 on 20 federal corruption charges, ranging from mail fraud to filing false tax return documentation. In December 2017, she was sentenced to five years in federal penitentiary and ordered to pay restitution.
And now, just last week, her federal appeal in the 11th Circuit was denied — over the dissent, perhaps curiously at first blush, of Judge Pryor. For having the temerity to opine that an allegedly deeply venal Democrat is rightfully &#8220;entitle[d] to a new trial,&#8221; Pryor was <a href="https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2020/01/trump-supreme-court-shortlister-william-pryor-god-juries.html">excoriated at Slate yesterday</a> by longstanding leftist legal blogger Andrew Cohen.
It is important to understand why Cohen&#8217;s risible smear does not even pass the smell test.
Brown&#8217;s trial featured a peculiar twist. One prospective juror, to whom the dueling 11th Circuit opinions only refer as &#8220;Juror 13,&#8221; appears to have been a devout Christian. For the trial court, this was problematic. Here is how Matthew Franck <a href="https://www.nationalreview.com/bench-memos/the-case-of-the-florida-politico-and-the-praying-juror/">accurately summarizes</a> the crux of the legally relevant issue at National Review&#8217;s &#8220;Bench Memos&#8221; blog:
<blockquote>After an eight-day trial, the jury was given its instructions by the court; at the end of the second day of its deliberations one juror (Juror 8) relayed her concern to the judge that another juror (Juror 13) had spoken of being guided by a “higher being” in reaching the conclusion that Brown should be acquitted on all counts.
Summoned to meet with the judge and counsel in the case, Juror 13 was questioned about what he had said, and about his ability to participate in deciding the case according to the evidence and testimony. After two probing — but often somewhat opaque — interviews, the judge decided to excuse the juror (and seat an alternate in his place), ruling that it was “beyond a reasonable doubt” that he could not be trusted to abide by his juror’s oath to do impartial justice according to the evidence.</blockquote>
Specifically, Juror 13&#8217;s purportedly disqualifying sin was saying, at some point during juror deliberations, &#8220;something to the effect of &#8216;the Holy Spirit told me that Corrine Brown was not guilty on all charges.'&#8221;
Cohen, mocking Pryor&#8217;s &#8220;long, rambling dissent,&#8221; cavalierly asserts that &#8220;[t]he problem with Juror 13 wasn’t just that he believed he was being directed by God to render a decidedly secular verdict. The problem also was that he evidently did not understand that to say so, to believe so, would undermine his ability to abide by the judge’s instructions and evaluate Brown’s guilt or innocence based solely on the evidence in court.&#8221;
This is a disingenuous and willful distortion of the record in this case.
Pryor&#8217;s dissent, spanning 65 pages, painstakingly produces large chunks of the trial court record in order to demonstrate that Juror 13 did not do precisely what Cohen accuses him of having done. The 11th Circuit&#8217;s legal standard for dismissing a deliberating juror is the high threshold of &#8220;beyond reasonable doubt,&#8221; and as Pryor writes, &#8220;[i]f this devout juror’s religious language alone proved his misconduct &#8216;beyond reasonable doubt,&#8217; &#8230; then the phrase &#8216;reasonable doubt&#8217; has changed its meaning.&#8221;
Pryor&#8217;s dissent is a tour de force, devoting pages to citations of religious texts from manifold faiths in order to demonstrate that &#8220;every prayer implies a hope that the prayer be answered.&#8221; Every juror takes a solemn oath, after all, and it is undisputed that the taking of such an oath — &#8220;an ancient tradition of ensuring honesty by invoking supernatural sanction on those who swear a false oath&#8221; — necessarily means that jurors are allowed to pray for guidance that they reach the correct outcome. And &#8220;if religious jurors may pray for God’s guidance, it follows that they must be entitled to receive God’s guidance, or at least to believe that they have received it.&#8221;
As with so many others facets of our legal and constitutional order that leftists routinely obfuscate and bastardize, the legal principles in play here are really not that complicated. In fact, Pryor expressly and unambiguously disavows the very line of argumentation that Cohen recklessly imputes to him (some internal citations omitted and emphasis bolded):
<blockquote>
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[A] juror who refuses or is unable to apply the law to the evidence for a spiritual reason is no less subject to dismissal than a juror who does the same thing for a secular reason. When it is apparent beyond a reasonable doubt that “‘religious inspiration’ prevent[s] [a] juror from considering the evidence at all,” United States v. Salvador, 740 F.2d 752, 755 (9th Cir. 1984), that juror may be dismissed, just like a juror who refuses to deliberate for any other reason. And when it is apparent beyond a reasonable doubt that a juror has “abandon[ed] his or her judgment [about the evidence] to what he or she perceives to be oracular signs,” that juror may be dismissed, just like a juror who decides to base her vote on any other nonevidential event, like the weather or the outcome of a coin flip.
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On the other hand, &#8220;[a]s long as the object of [a religious juror&#8217;s] prayers is an honest attempt to discern the facts from the evidence and to apply the law to those facts, the prayerful meditations of such a juror are no less valid a form of deliberation than any other.&#8221;
The Founders would have been positively aghast at the notion that this could somehow be controversial. That it is deemed controversial, in the year 2020, says everything one needs to know about the insidious secularization of contemporary society.
In short, there was nothing in a careful review of the trial court record to demonstrate that Juror 13 was incapable of assessing the evidence presented at trial. On the contrary, Juror 13 &#8220;told the district court time and time again that he was basing his decision on the evidence,&#8221; and only believed that the Holy Spirit spoke to him in the context of answering his prayers for guidance in reaching the right outcome after adducing the evidence. Those would be the same prayers for guidance that must be viewed in the context of Juror 13&#8217;s having sworn an oath, just like all his fellow jurors, to &#8220;truly try the case now before this court and render a true verdict, according to the law, evidence, and instructions of this court, so help [him] God.&#8221;
Secularists may not care for such niceties, but the reality is that, as constitutional law scholar Michael Stokes Paulsen has been fond of noting over the years, the Founding generation viewed the solemnity of oaths quite seriously. In fact, as I note in my <a href="https://fedsoc.org/contributors/josh-hammer">current Federalist Society</a> lecture on the constitutionality (or <a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/18pdf/17-646_d18e.pdf">lack thereof</a>) of stare decisis in constitutional interpretation, the gravity of the judicial oath helped undergird Chief Justice John Marshall&#8217;s iconic ruling in the landmark 1803 <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/5/137#writing-USSC_CR_0005_0137_ZO">Marbury v. Madison</a> decision:
<blockquote>Why otherwise does it direct the judges to take an oath to support it? This oath certainly applies in an especial manner to their conduct in their official character. How immoral to impose it on them if they were to be used as the instruments, and the knowing instruments, for violating what they swear to support! &#8230;
Why does a judge swear to discharge his duties agreeably to the Constitution of the United States if that Constitution forms no rule for his government? If it is closed upon him and cannot be inspected by him?
If such be the real state of things, this is worse than solemn mockery. To prescribe or to take this oath becomes equally a crime.
</blockquote>
The reality is that those like Cohen — those who would fearmonger and alienate by putting &#8220;religious freedom&#8221; in scare-quotes — reek with dripping condescension for religious Americans. Cohen, a lawyer himself, is part of the &#8220;culture of legal discourse&#8221; that Pryor rightly describes as one that &#8220;often struggles to understand religious practice or to take religious perspectives seriously.&#8221; Cohen and his ilk, part of our most supercilious bicoastal ruling class clerisy, simply despise the rubes and yokels of flyover country. They despise the <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-who-will-stand-for-the-forgotten-american">forgotten Americans</a> of the heartland. And they despise those members of &#8220;our credentialed judicial elite,&#8221; such as Pryor himself, who adamantly stand for those same forgotten Americans.
This is the narrative that motivates Andrew Cohen. And he will not allow such stubborn things as facts to get in the way of his preferred narrative.
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Hand of witness on Bible in courtroom

HAMMER: Judge William Pryor Is Yet Again A Victim Of The Left’s War On Truth

Abortion

Christianity

Slate

On Wednesday, a divided panel of the New Orleans-based U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit ruled, in 2–1 fashion, that a transgender litigant — a biological male who suffers from gender dysphoria and subjectively feels that he is a female — cannot require a court to address him using female pronouns.
The case, <a href="http://www.ca5.uscourts.gov/opinions/pub/19/19-40016-CR0.pdf">U.S. v. Varner</a>, pitted Reagan nominee Judge Jerry E. Smith and Trump nominee Judge S. Kyle Duncan in the panel majority, against Clinton nominee Judge James L. Dennis as the lone dissenter. What made the opinion particularly fascinating was that Duncan&#8217;s majority opinion used male pronouns, whereas Dennis&#8217; dissent used female pronouns.
Alas, the latest and most disputatious, headline-grabbing front of our ceaseless culture war has fully hit the federal judiciary.
As highlighted by legal blogger extraordinaire and Ethics and Public Policy Center President Ed Whelan <a href="https://www.nationalreview.com/bench-memos/transgender-pronoun-conflict-in-the-fifth-circuit/">noted yesterday</a> at National Review&#8217;s &#8220;Bench Memos&#8221; blog, Duncan&#8217;s majority opinion provided three distinct reasons for denying the plaintiff Varner&#8217;s motion for the &#8220;use [of] female pronouns when addressing&#8221; him:
<blockquote>
First, no authority supports the proposition that we may require litigants, judges, court personnel, or anyone else to refer to gender-dysphoric litigants with pronouns matching their subjective gender identity. &#8230;
Second, if a court were to compel the use of particular pronouns at the invitation of litigants, it could raise delicate questions about judicial impartiality. &#8230; Increasingly, federal courts today are asked to decide cases that turn on hotly-debated issues of sex and gender identity. In cases like these, a court may have the most benign motives in honoring a party’s request to be addressed with pronouns matching his “deeply felt, inherent sense of [his] gender.” Yet in doing so, the court may unintentionally convey its tacit approval of the litigant’s underlying legal position.
Third, ordering use of a litigant’s preferred pronouns may well turn out to be more complex than at first it might appear. &#8230; [O]ne university has created this widely-circulated pronoun usage guide for gender-dysphoric persons.
</blockquote>
Duncan then inserted the &#8220;pronoun usage guide for gender-dysphoric persons,&#8221; borrowed from the &#8220;LGBTQ+ Resource Center&#8221; at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, which is a colorful five-by-nine matrix. This is potentially confusing, to say the least, as Duncan noted, and &#8220;[d]eploying such neologisms could hinder communication among the parties and the court.&#8221;
Duncan then referenced New York City&#8217;s <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/2016/05/17/you-can-be-fined-for-not-calling-people-ze-or-hir-if-thats-the-pronoun-they-demand-that-you-use/">regulation</a> that &#8220;prohibit[s] &#8216;intentional or repeated refusal&#8217; to use pronouns including &#8216;them/them/theirs or ze/hir&#8217; after person has &#8216;made clear&#8217; his preferred pronouns&#8221; as an example of his point that &#8220;[w]hen local governments have sought to enforce pronoun usage, they have had to make refined distinctions based on matters such as the types of allowable pronouns and the intent of the &#8216;misgendering&#8217; offender.'&#8221;
Ultimately, Duncan concluded, &#8220;[c]ourts would have to do the same. We decline to enlist the federal judiciary in this quixotic undertaking.&#8221;
It was something of a proverbial &#8220;mic drop&#8221; moment for the Louisiana-based judge, who has been on the Fifth Circuit for less than two years. Formerly the general counsel for the prominent Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, Duncan was confirmed by the U.S. Senate in April 2018 by a narrow 50–47 margin.
Along with fellow Trump-nominated Fifth Circuit Judges Andrew S. Oldham and James C. Ho (for whom, in the interest of full disclosure, I previously served as a judicial law clerk), Duncan has frequently been mentioned as someone who should be added to any new Supreme Court nominee &#8220;list&#8221; produced by the Trump administration. In fact, in some ways, Duncan seemed to be following the lead of his colleague Ho. Duncan&#8217;s opinion cited twice a March 2019 opinion, <a href="http://www.ca5.uscourts.gov/opinions/pub/16/16-51148-CV0.pdf">Gibson v. Collier</a>, written by Ho, which similarly used male pronouns to refer to a biological male individual who subjectively felt that he was a woman.
Good for Judge Duncan for both adhering to the letter of the law and for defiantly standing athwart the modern cultural Left&#8217;s pernicious insistence on gaslighting the American citizenry into thinking that words may not mean what they so clearly do, in fact, mean.

US. Fifth Circuit Court Of Appeals

Culture War In The Courts: Federal Appeals Panel Rejects Transgender Pronouns

LGBT

Transgender

During a recent interview with Fox News&#8217; Brian Kilmeade, retired U.S. Navy SEAL Jocko Willink — who was a former commander of the <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/navy-seal-jocko-willink-top-lesson-dont-quit-2018-6">most decorated</a> special operations unit of the entire Iraq War — described President Donald Trump&#8217;s recent ordered strike on top Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps–Quds Force general Qassem Soleimani as a &#8220;gamble&#8221; that nonetheless clearly &#8220;paid off&#8221; for the president.
&#8220;Retired Navy SEAL and author Jocko Willink applauded the &#8216;gamble&#8217; taken by President Trump in ordering the killing of top Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani, which was followed by anti-regime protests that erupted on the streets of Tehran,&#8221; Fox News <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/media/navy-seal-jocko-willink-trump-iran-soleimani-killing">reported</a>.
“When you look at it from that perspective you could say that this was a brilliant move to kill a person that was an enemy of America and an enemy of the Iranian people,” Willink said on “The Brian Kilmeade Show,&#8221; Fox News wrote.
“Was it a risk to do this operation?&#8221; Willink continued. &#8220;Absolutely. And if you were to poll everyone that had knowledge about what the conflict is like over there, &#8216;Hey should we do this or not?&#8217; There would have been mixed feelings.”
Willink then explained how such operations are always a risk, analogizing to the famous Navy SEAL raid in Pakistan to take down 9/11 mastermind jihadist Osama bin Laden of al-Qaeda.
“It was a risk to do this just like it was a risk when Obama sent SEALS in to go kill [Osama] bin Laden. That was huge risk,” Willink continued, as also reported by Fox News. “He’s going into Pakistan, he didn’t tell Pakistan what we’re doing. There was massive risk. You know the whole building could have been bombed. That’s a massive risk to do that operation. Pulled it off. Bravo. Outstanding.”
“We don’t know what could have happened. Trump took a gamble and did this, and you know what? From what it looks like right now the gamble paid off,” Willink said as he wrapped up his remarks.
In a <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-the-just-and-proper-strike-of-mastermind-iranian-jihadist-qassem-soleimani">Daily Wire op-ed</a> published the day after President Trump&#8217;s successfully ordered strike of Soleimani, I wrote approvingly of the &#8220;just and proper strike&#8221; of &#8220;mastermind Iranian jihadist&#8221; Qassem Soleimani:
<blockquote>The world has awoken today a safer and more just place. And the unraveling of former President Barack Obama’s pro-Iran regional Middle East realignment, which began with President Donald Trump’s <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/watch-trump-just-shredded-iran-deal-here-are-5-ben-shapiro">thunderous exit</a>from his predecessor’s pro-ayatollah nuclear capitulation, has now reached its logical conclusion.
The Obama Middle East foreign policy legacy is dead. As is the Islamic Republic of Iran’s infamous jihadist mastermind, <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/breaking-trump-responds-to-u-s-military-killing-2-top-iranian-military-leaders-involved-in-terrorists">Qassem Soleimani</a>.
Good riddance to both. &#8230;
Qassem Soleimani was a monstrous thug. In addition to the hundreds of Americans killed in Iraq via Iranian-supplied roadside IEDs, Soleimani personally oversaw the jihad-led destabilization of all nations within Tehran’s coveted <a href="https://www.jewishpolicycenter.org/2019/09/03/the-shiite-crescent-and-regional-disaster/">“Shiite crescent”</a> of desired regional hegemony. He likely is responsible, on net, for tens of thousands of deaths. He was a relentless and unceasing foe of Western civilization, more broadly, though he held a special disdain for the mullahs’ “Little Satan” of Israel and “Great Satan” of the United States.</blockquote>
As The Daily Wire&#8217;s Emily Zanotti <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/ted-cruz-dares-democrats-offers-senate-resolution-praising-soleimani-mission">reported</a> earlier this month, Iran hawk Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) introduced a formal Senate resolution praising the Soleimani strike. &#8220;Senator Ted Cruz wants Democrats to publicly declare their feelings on the Trump Administration’s mission to kill Iranian Gen. Qasem Soleimani,&#8221; Zanotti wrote.

President Donald J. Trump Watches Raid On Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi’s Compound

Retired SEAL: Trump’s ‘Gamble’ On Soleimani Strike ‘Paid Off’

Al Qaeda

Foreign Policy

Iran

Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps

Middle East

Military

Osama bin Laden

Qassem Soleimani

We in the pro-Israel community are certainly accustomed, by now, to the myriad of pro-Palestinian activists and political leftists who engage in rank hypocrisy when it comes to the Jewish state. In fact, the U.S. State Department&#8217;s <a href="https://www.state.gov/defining-anti-semitism/">working definition of anti-Semitism</a> actually includes such hypocrisy as one example of anti-Semitic behavior: &#8220;Applying double standards by requiring of [Israel] a behavior not expected or demanded of any other democratic nation.&#8221;
Alas, someone ought to notify the folks at far-left <a href="https://www.hrw.org">Human Rights Watch</a>.
<a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/a-selective-opponent-of-settlers-11579046287?mod=opinion_lead_pos9">Writing today</a> at The Wall Street Journal, international law expert and law professor Eugene Kontorovich — scholar at the Kohelet Policy Forum in Jerusalem, professor at George Mason University’s Scalia Law School, and director of that law school&#8217;s new <a href="https://cilme.gmu.edu">Center for International Law in the Middle East</a> — opines that Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East and North Africa director of Human Rights Watch, &#8220;promot[es] boycotts and international prosecution [of Israel] for the supposed crimes of occupation and settlement,&#8221; but &#8220;elsewhere &#8230; strongly supports settlements in occupied territories.&#8221;
&#8220;The settlements Ms. Whitson supports are in Nagorno-Karabakh, an area that was within the borders of post-Soviet Azerbaijan until 1994, when Armenia occupied the region after a protracted war,&#8221; the international law scholar continued. &#8220;Since then, the Armenian leadership in Yerevan has actively encouraged the movement of settlers into the area. Many Armenians regard Karabakh as their historic homeland. But the United Nations, international courts and the U.S. all consider it occupied Azeri territory.&#8221;
Kontorovich then unraveled the precise nature of Whitson&#8217;s hypocrisy. In response to Kontorovich asking Whitson about her work with Armenian National Committee of America, which Kontorovich labels a &#8220;pro-settler charity,&#8221; Whitson responded to the professor: &#8220;My personal support for Armenian diaspora organizations pertains to their charitable and educational work in Armenia and their efforts to advocate for recognition of the Armenian Genocide.&#8221;
But having none of it, Kontorovich then ripped Whitson for trying to have it both ways.
&#8220;This explanation is at odds with [Human Rights Watch&#8217;s] approach to Israel, where the group calls for boycotts of entire companies — including unrelated divisions — because some of their work is in settlements,&#8221; he wrote. &#8220;It is also at odds with the record: Ms. Whitson’s fundraising appeals for pro-settlement groups are in no way limited to educational issues. She has celebrated the work of the Armenian General Benevolent Union, which supports new settlement construction to encourage &#8216;young families to set down their roots.&#8217; She specifically <a href="https://agbu.org/news-item/sarah-leah-whitson/?mod=article_inline" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-reader-unique-id="15">praised the group for helping Syrian Armenians who have &#8216;resettled in Armenia&#8217;</a>; many or most such refugees have been resettled in the occupied territory.&#8221;
&#8220;If [Human Rights Watch] were serious about its opposition to &#8216;settlers&#8217; and &#8216;occupation,&#8217; it wouldn’t have a supporter of them heading its Middle East division,&#8221; the professor continued.
Reached by The Daily Wire for exclusive comment, Kontorovich elaborated on leftist hypocrisy on the nexus of Israel, international law, and the law of &#8220;occupation.&#8221;
&#8220;It is not news that progressives, in the name of international law, target Israeli obsessively and exclusively for boycotts and delegitimization,&#8221; he told The Daily Wire. &#8220;But they dismiss such observation as &#8216;whataboutism,&#8217; saying their efforts to enforce international law must start somewhere.&#8221;
&#8220;My revelations show that Rashida Tlaib [who is co-sponsoring a bill to normalize relations with Armenian settlements], Sarah Leah Whitson, and others are not simply ignoring situations of occupation around the world — they are promoting them, without having their progressive bona fides revoked. All of their talk about enforcing international law is just a euphemism for creating a Judenrein zone in Judea and Samaria.&#8221;
RELATED: <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-the-trump-administration-is-absolutely-correct-to-call-israeli-settlements-legal">The Trump Administration Is Absolutely Correct To Call Israeli &#8216;Settlements&#8217; Legal.</a>

Sarah Leah Whitson, HRW

HYPOCRISY: Human Rights Watch Opposes Israeli ‘Settlements,’ Supports Settlements Elsewhere

Lawfare

Palestinians

George Washington University Law School Professor Jonathan Turley, who served last month as one of three House Judiciary Committee <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-todays-judiciary-committee-impeachment-hearing-is-yet-another-waste-of-time">legal academic witnesses</a> on the topic of the U.S. Constitution&#8217;s specified criteria for impeachment, has been very outspoken since his testimony. Shortly after testifying, Turley took to the Los Angeles Times to <a href="https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2019-12-09/opinion-trump-impeachment-hearings-democrats">pen an over-arching message</a> to Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and House Democrats: You have rushed this process and have not sufficiently convinced the American public. &#8220;The problem is that this is the thinnest record of any modern impeachment as well as arguably the shortest impeachment investigation in history,&#8221; he wrote in the Times.
Later last month, as The Daily Wire <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/liberal-law-prof-turley-not-a-sin-to-testify-for-republicans">reported</a>, Turley — who, despite being House Republicans&#8217; lone witness at the aforementioned House Judiciary Committee hearing last month, is hardly a Republican partisan and is best described as an old-school liberal civil libertarian — took to The Hill to defend his decision to testify as a Republican-called witness. “Journalist Henry Louis Mencken once observed, ‘Say what you will about the Ten Commandments, you must always come back to the pleasant fact that there are only ten of them,&#8217;” Turley <a href="https://thehill.com/opinion/judiciary/476088-testifying-for-republicans-should-not-be-a-sin-for-academics">wrote</a>. “Despite unending respect for Mencken, this is an occasion in which I found him mistaken, after I violated the Eleventh Commandment, ‘Thou shalt not testify for Republicans.&#8217;”
Now, as Fox News <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/media/jonathan-turley-pelosi-blunder-impeachment">reports</a>, Turley has written a blog post that is simply scathing of Pelosi&#8217;s decision to delay the formal transmission of impeachment articles from the House of Representatives to the Senate in a (failed) attempt to extract procedural concessions from Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) as to the conduct of a prospective impeachment trial.
&#8220;From the outset, the ploy of Pelosi withholding the House impeachment articles was as implausible as it was hypocritical,&#8221; Turley <a href="https://jonathanturley.org/2020/01/14/pelosis-blunder-how-the-house-destroyed-its-own-case-for-impeachment/">wrote</a> yesterday in a column entitled, &#8220;Pelosi&#8217;s Blunder: How the House Destroyed its Own Case for Impeachment.&#8221;
&#8220;There was no reason why Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell would make concessions to get an impeachment that he loathed,&#8221; he continued. &#8220;More importantly, just a couple of days earlier, House leaders insisted that some of us were wrong to encourage them to wait on an impeachment vote to create a more complete record. Pelosi previously insisted that House committees could not pursue direct witnesses like former national security adviser John Bolton because there was no time to delay in getting this impeachment to the Senate. She then waited a month and counting to send the articles over to the Senate.&#8221;
&#8220;The fact is that Pelosi played into the hands of McConnell by first rushing this impeachment forward with an incomplete record and now giving him the excuse to summarily change the rules, or even to dismiss the articles,&#8221; Turley later added.
At the time that Pelosi announced her withholding of the formal transmission of impeachment articles, I pointed out Democrats&#8217; hypocrisy in a <a href="https://nypost.com/2019/12/19/pelosis-newest-dirty-trick-putting-trumps-senate-trial-on-hold/">New York Post op-ed</a>:
<blockquote>
Thorny legal issues aside, ­Pelosi’s gambit lays bare the brazen hypocrisy of the sanctimonious “norm”-worshippers. Most of Trump’s purportedly grievous sins pale in comparison to the destructive and ­destabilizing nature of Pelosi’s transmission delay — not to mention the unfair and underhanded nature of the proceedings in her own chamber.
The president may not have an explicit constitutional right to a Senate trial. But if Democrats really cared about rule of law and good order, they would have allowed the Framers’ process to unfold as it was supposed to do. Their delay tactics merely expose the frivolity of their Trump-induced mass hysteria.
</blockquote>

Jonathan Turley testifying at House Judiciary Committee

Law Prof Turley: Pelosi ‘Destroyed’ Democrats’ Case For Impeachment

Daily Wire Editor-at-Large Josh Hammer, who is a constitutional attorney by training, has the following op-ed today at the <a href="https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2020-01-15/william-barr-attorney-general-donald-trump">Los Angeles Times</a>.
Many have been all too quick to make Atty. Gen. William Barr out to be a reflexive toady for President Trump. Just last week, the New York City Bar Association took the <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-trumped-up-case-of-bar-v-barr-11578699265?mod=opinion_lead_pos2" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-reader-unique-id="2">extreme</a> step of <a href="http://documents.nycbar.org/files/Exercising_Congressional_Oversight_AG_Barr_01082020.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-reader-unique-id="3">writing to congressional leaders</a> to investigate Barr for political bias. And last month, he came under blistering criticism for <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/justice-department/barr-thinks-fbi-may-have-acted-bad-faith-probing-trump-n1098986" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-reader-unique-id="4">defending the Trump campaign</a> and characterizing the FBI’s Russia investigation into the 2016 election as bogus.
Slate has <a href="https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2019/12/bill-barr-lying-inspector-general-horowitz-report.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-reader-unique-id="6">accused</a> Barr of using the Department of Justice as “a personal law firm for Trump.” Vox has <a href="https://www.vox.com/2019/12/9/21003334/inspector-general-horowitz-barr-durham" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-reader-unique-id="7">bewailed</a> “the department’s politicization under Barr.” The Daily Beast has <a href="https://www.thedailybeast.com/bill-barr-exposed-as-horowitz-report-dismisses-trumps-conspiracies-and-clears-trumps-enemies" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-reader-unique-id="9">lamented</a> how Barr has “become another of Donald Trump’s personal lawyers.” The New York Times has <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/09/us/politics/barr-durham-ig-report-russia-investigation.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-reader-unique-id="10">noted</a> that the attorney general had “reprised his role as a vocal defender of President Trump.”
Perhaps none of these media outlets recall the time when then-Atty. Gen. Eric Holder famously described himself as President Obama’s “<a href="https://www.politico.com/blogs/politico44/2013/04/eric-holder-im-still-the-presidents-wingman-160861" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-reader-unique-id="12">wingman</a>.” Curiously, Holder actually took to the Washington Post to <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/eric-holder-william-barr-is-unfit-to-be-attorney-general/2019/12/11/99882092-1c55-11ea-87f7-f2e91143c60d_story.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-reader-unique-id="13">decry</a> Barr’s ostensible self-debasement as an unfortunate “instrument of politics.”
Holder’s hypocrisy aside, the newfound stance in favor of a strongly independent attorney general among liberals is misguided as a matter of constitutional interpretation and ahistorical as a matter of American custom.
Article II, Section 1, Clause 1 of the Constitution states that “[t]he executive Power shall be vested in a President of the United States of America.” The power is vested not in numerous sources, but solely in the president. The president maintains plenary authority over the entirety of the executive branch.
The “unitary executive theory,” which Democrats routinely excoriate, comes from the plain text of the Constitution. As Atty. Gen. Barr <a href="https://www.justice.gov/opa/speech/attorney-general-william-p-barr-delivers-19th-annual-barbara-k-olson-memorial-lecture" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-reader-unique-id="18">recently said</a> during his remarks at the Federalist Society’s 2019 National Lawyers Convention, the notion of the unitary executive “is not ‘new,’ and it is not a ‘theory.’” On the contrary, he continued, “[i]t is a description of what the Framers unquestionably did in Article II of the Constitution.”
Throughout American history, attorneys general have intuited and acted upon their non-independent subordination to presidents of the United States. In “<a href="https://kansaspress.ku.edu/978-0-7006-0530-9.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-reader-unique-id="20">Conflicting Loyalties: Law and Politics in the Attorney General’s Office, 1789–1990</a>,” the scholar Nancy V. Baker explored the historical nature of the attorney general’s position. Baker devoted entire book sections to “The Attorney General as a Legal Adviser” and “The Attorney General as a Policy Advisor.” She observed that “before he became an administrator” of a sprawling Department of Justice bureaucracy, “the attorney general assumed the role of the advisor to the president.” What’s more, the attorney general’s “responsibility” to serve in such an advisory capacity “has antecedents in seventeenth-century England.”
Indeed, the role of the attorney general as a top presidential advisor has been a recurring theme throughout American history. When President Lincoln’s attorney general, Edward Bates, <a href="https://archive.org/stream/suspensionofwrit00unit/suspensionofwrit00unit_djvu.txt" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-reader-unique-id="22">famously wrote to Congress</a> in 1861 to defend Lincoln’s unilateral suspension of the writ of habeas corpus, he did so not as a neutral arbiter of legal principle, but as Lincoln’s top legal advisor who shared his superior’s ultimate policy aim of a Union victory in the Civil War.
<a href="https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2020-01-15/william-barr-attorney-general-donald-trump">Read the rest of the piece here.</a>

RELATED: <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-america-is-better-off-for-having-bill-barr">America Is Better Off For Having Bill Barr.</a>

Attorney General William Barr

Hammer At The ‘Los Angeles Times’: Attorney General Barr Is Not Simply A Trump Shill.

Department of Justice

Eric Holder

Law Enforcement

Los Angeles Times

William Barr

Political observers in the year 2020 know that, for the Democratic Party and the broader political Left alike, intersectionality often reigns supreme. For those still wondering what exactly &#8220;intersectionality&#8221; is, Daily Wire Editor-in-Chief Ben Shapiro has produced a helpful explanatory video on the topic:
<iframe title="What Is Intersectionality?" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/rc7VUoytoU4?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>
&#8220;Intersectionality is a form of identity politics in which the value of your opinion depends on how many victim groups you belong to,&#8221; Shapiro <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/ben-shapiro-what-intersectionality-jacob-airey">explained</a>. &#8220;At the bottom of the totem pole is the person everybody loves to hate: The straight, white male. And who’s at the top? Well, it’s very hard to say, because new groups claim victim status all the time. No one can keep track.&#8221;
Alas, it should come as no surprise that contemporary Democrats would rally around what is perhaps one of the most readily identifiable sub-identity groups boasting immense &#8220;intersectional&#8221; street credibility: The transgender illegal alien.
&#8220;House Democrats plan to call on a key immigration agency to release all transgender people who are currently being detained, arguing that the U.S. has failed to follow guidelines to protect individuals who face more perilous conditions in detention than other migrants,&#8221; The Hill <a href="https://thehill.com/policy/national-security/477954-lawmakers-to-call-on-ice-to-release-all-transgender-detainees">reported</a> yesterday.
The outlet then reported on the precise contents of the early copy of the letter it obtained. The letter will be sent to Acting Department of Homeland Security Secretary Chad Wolf and Acting Immigration and Customs Enforcement Director Matthew Albence. Per <a href="https://thehill.com/policy/national-security/477954-lawmakers-to-call-on-ice-to-release-all-transgender-detainees">The Hill</a>, the letter reads, in relevant part:
<blockquote>We write to demand the release of all transgender people currently detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Transgender migrants and asylum seekers are particularly vulnerable to sexual harassment, solitary confinement, physical assault, and medical neglect. These inhumane conditions and systematic abuses are evidenced in countless reports and accounts by formally detained people.</blockquote>
According to the outlet, the letter cites research from left-wing organizations such as the Human Rights Campaign, Amnesty International, and the Center for American Progress in order to argue that &#8220;due to their gender identity, transgender migrants are more likely to face &#8216;the pervasive use of solitary confinement&#8217; and that they are &#8217;97 times more likely to be sexually victimized&#8217; compared to &#8216;their cis-gender and straight counterparts in detention.'&#8221;
The effort is being led by Rep. Mike Quigley (D-IL), who TheBlaze <a href="https://www.theblaze.com/news/house-democrats-want-ice-to-release-all-transgender-detainees">notes</a> is of the belief that ICE is actually required to release all transgender detainees. In order to advance that claim, the letter cites a 2015 ICE memo and the Department of Homeland Security&#8217;s 2020 appropriations bill.
&#8220;Quigley&#8217;s office is working to get lawmakers&#8217; signatures on the letter and expects to send it to acting DHS Secretary Chad Wolf and ICE Director Matt Albence later this week,&#8221; the Washington Examiner <a href="https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/house-democrats-to-ask-ice-to-release-all-transgender-immigrants-in-custody">reports</a>.
The year 2019 was a busy year for ICE, especially over the first six months. Record numbers of illegal aliens seemed to flood over America&#8217;s porous southern border on a seemingly monthly basis, although the tide has stemmed over the <a href="https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/month-decline-unauthorized-border-crossings-nearing-million/story?id=66134521">past few months</a>. As the 2020 election heats up, President Donald Trump is continuing to emphasize border security and immigration enforcement as key political priorities.

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Josh Hammer

Articles by Josh Hammer