Tag: Supreme Court

Julie Kelly Commentary: The Supreme Court Can Right an Egregious Wrong in Jan 6 Cases, But Will It?

Julie Kelly

In July 2023, Joshua Youngerman was arrested in California on five misdemeanors for his participation in the events of January 6. According to charging documents, Youngerman entered the Capitol at 2:37 p.m. — 20 minutes after the House went into recess amid the escalating chaos — through an open door as Capitol Police stood by. He exited through the same door two minutes later. But just last week, U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Matthew Graves added another charge to Youngerman’s case: 18 U.S.C. § 1512(c)(2), obstruction of an official proceeding. Youngerman is one of more than 330 J6ers charged with the evidence-destroying statute passed in the wake of the Enron-Arthur Anderson accounting scandal that Joe Biden’s Justice Department has weaponized to punish Americans who protested Biden’s election that afternoon. The count also is included in both of Special Counsel Jack Smith’s indictments against Donald Trump. Graves’ decision to indict Youngerman now is a stunning act of hubris and defiance. Why? Because the Supreme Court will hear oral arguments this Tuesday in Joseph Fischer v. USA, which challenges the government’s interpretation of the obstruction count in Jan 6 cases. Many legal and court observers expect the court to wholly or partially overturn how the…

Read the full story

Supreme Court Declines to Halt Police Officer’s Lawsuit Against Black Lives Matter Protest Organizer

Admin

The Supreme Court declined Monday to stop a police officer’s lawsuit against a Black Lives Matter activist who led the 2016 protest where he was injured by another individual.

Black Lives Matter activist DeRay Mckesson had asked the justices to decide whether the First Amendment prevents a protest leader from being held personally liable for violence perpetrated by another individual when the organizer “neither authorized, directed, nor ratified” the act.

Read the full story

Newly Appointed 4th Circuit Judge Married to Pro-Abortion Christine Ford Lawyer

Admin
Nicole Berner

Recently appointed 4th Circuit Judge Nicole Berner is legally married to the pro-abortion lawyer who represented Christine Blasey Ford, the woman who accused Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh of sexually assaulting her.

The Washington Post describes Berner as “the first openly gay judge and the first labor lawyer on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit,” which covers Maryland, Virginia, West Virginia, North Carolina, and South Carolina. Berner, who is also pro-abortion, formerly served as a staff attorney for Planned Parenthood, where she focused on “protecting and expanding access” to chemical abortion drugs.

Read the full story

Some Jan. 6 Defendants Win Early Release Ahead of Key Supreme Court Decision

Just the News
January 6 protesters

Judges are ordering Jan. 6 defendants who fought against their sentences to be released early pending an appeal as the Supreme Court is set to hear arguments next week about the legitimacy of a key charge that many of them were indicted.

The attorneys of three Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot defendants are set to argue before the Supreme Court that the crime of obstructing or impeding an official proceeding is only limited to destroying evidence in governmental probes, The Washington Post reported Tuesday.

Read the full story

White House Pressure to Censor Social Media No Worse than Yelling at Journalists, SCOTUS Suggests

Just the News

Federal officials privately scold reporters and attempt to shape or even stop their coverage on a regular basis, without getting sued for First Amendment violations.

How close is that to White House aides privately and repeatedly badgering their counterparts at social media companies and President Biden publicly accusing Facebook of “killing people,” for insufficient censorship of disfavored narratives on COVID-19?

Read the full story

Mayes Issues Consumer Alert on Crisis Pregnancy Centers; Republicans Want Retraction

The Center Square

Arizona Republican lawmakers are asking Attorney General Kris Mayes to retract a consumer alert on crisis pregnancy centers.

A news release from Mayes’ office on Wednesday said that the centers, which are meant to assist pregnant women as an alternative to Planned Parenthood or other abortion facilities, are masked as “legitimate healthcare clinics” but have the intent of encouraging women not to have abortions. 

Read the full story

Supreme Court Rules Gov Officials Can Block Constituents from Their Social Media Pages in Certain Situations

Admin
James Freed

The Supreme Court unanimously ruled Friday that there are circumstances when government officials can permissibly block a constituent from their social media pages, provided they are not claiming to speak on the state’s behalf.

The case, Lindke v. Freed, stemmed from Port Huron, Michigan, resident Kevin Lindke’s First Amendment lawsuit against city manager James Freed, who blocked Lindke from his Facebook page over comments criticizing the city’s response to COVID-19. While officials may look like they are “always on the clock,” not every encounter is “part of the job,” Justice Amy Coney Barrett wrote in the opinion of the court.

Read the full story

Commentary: In Prosecuting Trump, Democrats Have Exonerated Him

Admin
Trump Walking

Despite their best efforts, have Democrats begun an inexorable elevation of former President Donald Trump? For the better part of a decade, Democrats and the Left have thrown everything they could think of against the man they live to loathe. In the process, they have created a quasi-caricature that appears to be decreasingly believable to an increasing proportion of Americans. The question is whether these attacks have come full circle, accomplishing what Democrats most sought to avoid. Have they vilified Trump to victimhood and prosecuted him back into the presidency?

Since Trump burst on the political scene in 2016, Democrats and the Left have busted their guts laughing at him. When that didn’t work and he won, they burst all boundaries going after him. Their efforts have ranged from slights to a Russian dossier to two impeachments. Even after Trump left office, they refused to stop. Unquestionably, these efforts have had an effect — and equally unquestionably, Trump has given ample fodder to use against him: the result being that with Trump poised to win an unprecedented third successive major party presidential nomination (a feat last accomplished by Franklin D. Roosevelt 84 years ago), he has become a highly polarizing figure.

Read the full story

Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin Signs Bill Banning Legacy Admissions

Admin
College Students

Republican Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin signed a bill Friday banning legacy admissions at public colleges in the state.

Several states have moved to eliminate legacy admissions, which are admissions based on prior familial attendance to a school, after the fall of race-based admissions at the Supreme Court in June 2023. The bill passed the Virginia Senate with bipartisan support, 39-0, and passed the state’s House of Delegates 99-0, and has now been signed by Youngkin.

Read the full story

Former Assistant Attorney General Jeff Clark Explains How SCOTUS Colorado Ruling Will Protect Potential Trump Administration

Kaitlin Housler
Trump President

Jeff Clark, former acting assistant attorney general during the Trump administration, said the Supreme Court’s ruling in Trump v. Anderson, which restores former President Donald Trump’s name on the Colorado ballot, will also protect a future Trump administration from a “whole bunch of Section 3 litigation in 2025.”

Clark said in addition to the unanimous 9-0 decision in the case, five of the Supreme Court justices went on to “decide another set of issues” in regards to states’ enforcement of Section 3 of the 14th Amendment to regulate federal candidates.

Read the full story

Commentary: Technology Changes and Bipartisanship are Causing Journalism’s Woes

RealClearWire
Journalists Press

by Carl M. Cannon   For the American media, 2024 has been a fiasco. And it’s still only February. Nine days into the new year, highly respected Los Angeles Times editor Kevin Merida resigned rather than tolerate another round of layoffs and the meddlesome ways of a billionaire publisher and his progressive political activist daughter. Two weeks later, California’s largest newspaper announced it was shedding 20% of its staff, including half of its Washington bureau. Sports Illustrated was still reeling from an ethical lapse that cost its CEO his job (the magazine used AI to generate news stories under fake bylines) when management told the staff in a seven-minute Jan. 19 Zoom call of mass layoffs. Many SI journalists were terminated that day via email. Earlier that week, new Baltimore Sun owner David D. Smith met with the apprehensive staff of his new acquisition. The meeting didn’t go well. Smith, a television executive, told the reporters and editors at the venerable 187-year-old daily that he hadn’t read the paper in years. That didn’t stop him from insulting the quality of their journalism. Nor did Smith disavow his previous critique of U.S. print journalism as being “so left-wing as to be meaningless dribble.” Perceived bias…

Read the full story

FDA Threatens Endangered Species with Shoddy Abortion-Drug Reviews: Lance Armstrong Investigator

Just the News

Federal public health officials created strange bedfellows among animal-welfare advocates, scientists and vaccine skeptics for allegedly cutting corners in viral and COVID-19 vaccine research and oversight, possibly engineering a pathogen, then a cure that’s worse for some.

The Food and Drug Administration may be creating another odd couple in a case at the Supreme Court: environmental and pro-life activists.

Read the full story

Biden Cancels Another $1.2 Billion in Student Loan Debt

Admin

In yet another move circumventing the Supreme Court on the question of student loan debt, Joe Biden announced the cancellation of approximately $1.2 billion in student loan debt for about 153,000 borrowers.

As reported by ABC News, the Biden Administration made the cancellation official on Wednesday, including a draft email that will be sent to all of the borrowers in question. The email will read, in part: “Congratulations — all or a portion of your federal student loans will be forgiven because you qualify for early loan forgiveness under my Administration’s SAVE Plan.”

Read the full story

Teacher’s Assistant Sues Union, Ohio School District for Illegally Withholding Dues from Her Paycheck

Admin
Perry High School

An Ohio teacher’s assistant who helps special needs students is suing her school district and former union because the district withheld union dues from her paycheck even after she left the union and formally asked it to cease taking her money.

“Using the coercion of government to take money from a government employee and give it to a union without the employee’s consent is not only egregious, but the Supreme Court has held that it’s unconstitutional,” Jeffrey Schwab, a senior counsel at Liberty Justice Center who represents the Ohio teacher’s assistant, told The Daily Signal in a written statement Monday.

Read the full story

Michael Patrick Leahy and Crom Carmichael Debate Bill That Would Allow State Attorneys General to Sue DHS

Kaitlin Housler

Editor-in-Chief and CEO of The Tennessee Star Michael Patrick Leahy and Crom Carmichael, original all-star panelist of The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy, discussed on Monday a bill recently introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives that would give state attorneys general a greater standing to sue the Department of Homeland Security when it fails to enforce existing immigration laws passed by Congress.

Read the full story

Supreme Court Justices Appear Skeptical of Removal of Trump from Colorado Ballot Under Insurrection Clause

Just the News
Trump Supreme Court

Supreme Court justices on Thursday appeared skeptical during oral arguments of Colorado plaintiffs’ assertions that former President Donald Trump should be kept off of the state’s ballot for president.

The justices focused on the consequences of allowing Colorado to remove former President Donald Trump during oral arguments on Thursday, pressing the Colorado plaintiffs’ attorney on the issues that could occur across the country. 

Read the full story

Commentary: Was It Legal to Appoint Jack Smith in the First Place?

Admin
Jack Smith

Was Special Counsel Jack Smith illegally appointed by Attorney General Merrick Garland and is his prosecution of former Pres. Donald Trump unlawful? That is the intriguing issue raised in an amicus brief filed in the Supreme Court by Schaerr Jaffe, LLP, on behalf of former Attorney General Ed Meese and two law professors, Steven Calabresi and Gary Lawson, in the case of U.S. v. Trump.

We won’t get an immediate answer to this question because on the Friday before Christmas, the Supreme Court issued a one-line order refusing to take up Smith’s request that the court review Trump’s claim of presidential immunity, which was denied by the trial court, in the federal prosecution being pursued by Smith in the District of Columbia. The special counsel had petitioned the court to take the case on an expedited basis, urging the justices to bypass review by the Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit.

Read the full story

Supreme Court to Hear Arguments in Federal Bump Stock Gun Case

The Center Square
Gun Range

The U.S. Supreme Court is considering a federal ban on bump stocks later in February, the latest opportunity for the high court to rule on gun violence and 2nd Amendment rights.

The case in question, Garland v. Cargill, came after the Trump administration banned bump stocks, attachments added to semiautomatic weapons to make them fire more quickly, classifying them as “machine guns,” which are banned by federal law.

Read the full story

Tennessee Attorney General Joins Letter Supporting Texas’ Border Defense Barriers

Kaitlin Housler
Skrmetti Border

Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti joined a coalition of 26 other attorneys general in sending a letter to the Biden administration proclaiming support for the steps Texas has taken at its border with Mexico to prevent illegal immigrant crossings.

Last week, the Supreme Court ruled 5-4 in favor of the Biden administration to allow Border Patrol agents to cut through or move razor wire Texas installed on its border with Mexico to prevent illegal entries into the U.S.

Read the full story

Ohio Senator JD Vance Introduces Bill to Codify Border States’ Rights to Defend Own Territory from Illegal Migrants

Kaitlin Housler

Ohio U.S. Senator JD Vance (R-OH) introduced a bill on Wednesday that would “codify the right of every state along the U.S.-Mexico border to defend its own territory.”

Vance’s State Border Security Act would prevent federal agents from dismantling barbed wire or other fencing erected by state governments within 25 miles of the U.S.-Mexico border.

Read the full story

Leahy Tells Bannon Texas Gov. Abbott’s Response to Supreme Court’s Decision on Border Wire Sounds a Lot Like Andrew Jackson

Kaitlin Housler
MLP

Editor-in-Chief and CEO of The Tennessee Star Michael Patrick Leahy joined Steve Bannon’s War Room on Wednesday to discuss Texas Governor Greg Abbott’s response to the Supreme Court’s 5-4 ruling in favor of the Biden administration, which allows Border Patrol agents to cut through or move razor wire the state installed on its border with Mexico to prevent illegal immigrants from crossing.

In a statement released Wednesday, Abbott argued President Joe Biden has “refused to enforce” current federal laws protecting states, “including immigration laws on the books right now.”

Read the full story

Supreme Court Rejects Appeal from Former Hunter Biden Business Partner Devon Archer

Just the News

The Supreme Court rejected former Hunter Biden business partner Devon Archer’s appeal of his criminal conviction in connection to a scheme to defraud a Native American tribe. 

Archer was convicted in 2018 and sentenced to just over a year in prison in 2022 for defrauding a Native American tribe of $60 million in bonds. The Supreme Court refused to hear Archer’s appeal challenging his sentence on Monday.

Read the full story

Commentary: DEI Destroys Excellence, Military Cohesion at Service Academies

RealClearWire
Military

Applicants who self-identified as a member of a race the Academy wished to privilege—at the time I was on the Admissions Board it was African American, Hispanic, and Native American—were briefed separately to the committee not by a white member but by a minority Navy lieutenant. Briefings (a minute and forty seconds per applicant, no more) ran through a number of factors quite quickly and offered a recommendation that we had been told was appropriate: “qualified” for USNA if grades A/B for white applicants (but not minorities, who needed only C grades), 600 score in each part of the SAT for white applicants (but about 550 for minorities who come to USNA without remediation), and Whole Person Multiple (points given for grades/tests, school leadership positions, and sports) of at least 55,000 for whites, no bottom for minorities.

Read the full story

Supreme Court Declines to Hear Case Regarding Transgender Bathroom Policies in Schools

Admin

On Tuesday, the Supreme Court refused to intervene in a case that could have potentially set a nationwide precedent on the question of transgender bathroom policies in school districts.

As ABC News reports, the case in question stems from an Indiana public school district, the Metropolitan School District of Martinsville, which is located about 30 miles southwest of Indianapolis. Most recently, the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a previous order determining that biological females can use the male restroom, and vice-versa. A similar ruling was made by the federal appeals court in Richmond, Virginia, while the appeals court in Atlanta ruled against such policies.

Read the full story

DOJ Supreme Court Filing Reveals Details Inconsistent with DHS Narrative Blaming Texas for Migrant Drownings

ADN America
CBP Help

A new Supreme Court filing by the Department of Justice (DOJ) raises new questions that could help exonerate the Texas Military Department after the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) English) accuse the state agency of allowing the deaths of three migrants who drowned in Shelby Park last week.

Both the White House and Biden’s Department of Homeland Security blamed state officials after three migrants, including two children, drowned in the Shelby Park area.

Read the full story

Senator James Lankford Commentary: The Abortion Industry’s ‘Very Safe’ Lie Is Putting Women at Very Big Risk

Admin
James Lankford

It sounds so simple. Take these pills, and your problem will be over—except, it isn’t. People do not forget an event so significant. A few months ago, social media went into a frenzy when Britney Spears shared that she was pressured by her boyfriend 20 years ago to take abortion pills. After two decades she still described the chemical abortion as “one of the most agonizing things I have ever experienced in my life.” She is not alone.

The abortion industry has worked overtime to convince women that chemical abortions are “very safe”—even making the claim that they are safer than Tylenol. They attempt to conflate chemical abortions with contraceptive pills to push them on moms as a “safe” way to end a pregnancy. But the drugs used in a chemical abortion are far more dangerous.

Read the full story

Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson’s Ethics Complaint Being Reviewed

Just the News
Kentaji Brown Jackson

An ethics complaint filed against the Supreme Court’s newest justice, Ketanji Brown Jackson, is being reviewed by a committee with the Judicial Conference, which is the policy making body for federal courts. 

The Center for Renewing America, a conservative non-profit, filed the complaint last month against Jackson, alleging that she “willfully failed to disclose required information regarding her husband’s medical malpractice consulting income for over a decade.”

Read the full story

Commentary: Trump’s Ballot Disqualification Case Reaches Supreme Court

Admin

In what may turn out to be the most pivotal election case since Bush v. Gore, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a short order on Jan. 5 granting the request by former President Donald Trump asking the court to overturn the Colorado state Supreme Court’s Dec. 19 decision disqualifying him from appearing on the state’s presidential primary ballot. The U.S. Supreme Court moved with unprecedented speed; Trump filed his petition for certiorari on Jan. 3, and the court granted the appeal only two days later.

The case has been put on what, for the Supreme Court, is a “rocket docket.” Trump’s brief and any amicus briefs supporting the former president in Trump v. Anderson have to be filed by Jan. 18; the challengers’ brief and amicus briefs supporting Trump’s removal have to be filed by Jan. 31. Trump’s reply brief is due on Feb. 5, and oral arguments will be held on Feb. 8. 

Read the full story

Commentary: Democrats Lie About Election Integrity as Republicans Work for It

Admin

A couple of months ago, Major League Baseball (MLB) announced that it would hold its 2025 All-Star Game in Atlanta, Georgia. This news is more than just a sports scheduling update: it represents the unraveling of Democrat conspiracy theories about election integrity in Georgia and across the country. 

In 2021, a host of leading Democrats – from Stacey Abrams, to Raphael Warnock, to Joe Biden – spread rampant misinformation about election integrity in Georgia, aided by a sympathetic mainstream media. The MLB was bullied into moving its game out of Atlanta, costing local businesses $100 million in projected revenue. They were lying about Georgia’s Senate Bill 202, which strengthens voter ID protections, expands early voting hours, and protects bipartisan poll watching, among other common sense functions. Polling shows that a strong majority of Americans support the measures contained in Senate Bill 202. However, Democrats saw an opportunity to unfairly demonize their political opponents and claimed, with no evidence whatsoever, that the law was aimed at suppressing minority voters. 

Read the full story

Religious Liberty Had Major Court, Legislative Wins in 2023

Admin

Advocates for faith won several major victories this year through the legislature and the court, despite a growing hostility toward religious communities.

There were several examples of anti-religious sentiment over the past year, some of which included an FBI-drafted memo targeting traditional Catholics as “potential domestic terrorists” and the University of West Virginia’s transgender training labeling Christians as oppressors. However, 2023 also boasted several victories for religious Americans in schools, the workplace and the pro-life movement.

Read the full story

Supreme Court Hands Jack Smith a Major Defeat in Trump 2020 Election Case

Admin

The Supreme Court declined special counsel Jack Smith’s request Friday for it to quickly consider a key question in former President Donald Trump’s election interference case without letting the lower court weigh in first.

Smith asked the justices last week to hear former President Donald Trump’s bid to have his election interference case dismissed based on presidential immunity without allowing the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals to first consider the issue. In an unsigned order Friday, the justices shot down his request.

Read the full story