Brown County Judge Issues Restraining Order Against Green Bay Demanding Officials Cease Bugging City Hall

A Brown County judge has issued a temporary injunction, ordering the city of Green Bay and its mayor to “cease all audio surveillance and recording in Green Bay City Hall.”  

Circuit Court Judge Marc Hammer late Thursday granted the injunction sought by the Wisconsin State Senate. He ordered the city to end its bugging program by 5 p.m. Thursday, almost immediately. 

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Shaterra Reed Marion Appointed as Judge on the Court of Workers’ Compensation Claims

Shaterra Reed Marion was appointed as a judge on the Court of Workers’ Compensation Claims in Memphis, by new Bureau of Workers’ Compensation (BWC) Administrator Troy Haley the state Department of Labor & Workforce (TDLW) announced Wednesday.

“Shaterra Reed Marion will be a welcome addition to the Court of Workers’ Compensation Claims in Memphis. She has the heart of a public servant and, as a judge, I know she will be fair to all parties and reflect the values for which the Court of Workers’ Compensation Claims is known,” Haley said.

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Commentary: No Shot at a Fair Trial for January 6 Defendants in the Swamp

Large group of people storming Washington D.C. in protest on January 6.

The first set of trials for the hundreds of protesters charged in the Justice Department’s sweeping criminal investigation into January 6 begins later this month. Since the Capitol building is considered the scene of the crime, every trial will be held in the District of Columbia—which means the jury pool will be composed solely of residents living in the nation’s capital.

To say this is a problem for Trump supporters facing even minor charges is a huge understatement.

January 6 defendants already have suffered the wrath of D.C.-based federal judges who’ve imposed unusually harsh prison sentences for low level misdemeanors and nonviolent felonies while routinely berating defendants from the bench.

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Iowa Senators Consider Increasing Governor’s Role on District Court Judge Selection

Iowa senators advanced a bill Monday that would change the makeup and leadership of district judicial nominating commissions.

Iowa’s 14 judicial election subdistricts each has a nominating commission that screens applicants and selects two nominees for district court judicial vacancies. The governor chooses one of the two to appoint for a district court vacancy.

Currently, the judge of the longest service in the district is the chair of the nominating commission, according to Iowa state statute. If there are two longest-serving judges, the elder is the chair. The commissions have 11 members: five elected by lawyers; five nonlawyers appointed by the governor; and the chair. Each commissioner, apart from the chair, serves a six-year term.

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Judge Rules Absentee Ballot Drop Boxes Illegal in Wisconsin, Regulators Must Retract Guidance

People at a voting location, voting early at polls

A Wisconsin judge has ruled that the absentee ballot drop boxes widely deployed during the 2020 election are not allowed under state law, a decision that could dramatically impact voting ahead of the swing state’s midterm elections.

Waukesha County Circuit Court Judge Michael Bohren ordered on Thursday the Wisconsin Elections Commission to retract its instructions to election officials on how to use drop boxes. Bohren declared that the WEC had overstepped its authority in issuing the guidance in the first place.

Bohren called the WEC’s guidance a “major policy decision that alter[s] how our absentee ballot process operates,” that was significant enough that it should have required approval by the Legislature.

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Judge Suspends COVID Vaccine Mandate for Military Service Members Seeking Religious Exemption

The Navy cannot force service members with religious objections to COVID-19 vaccines to take them so long as the exemption process remains “by all accounts … theater,” a federal judge ruled Monday.

“Our nation asks the men and women in our military to serve, suffer, and sacrifice. But we do not ask them to lay aside their citizenry and give up the very rights they have sworn to protect,” U.S. District Judge Reed O’Connor wrote in approving a preliminary injunction against the mandate as applied to the 35 service members who sued.

“Every president since the signing of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act has praised the men and women of the military for their bravery and service in protecting the freedoms this country guarantees,” O’Connor said.

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Judge in Case of Anti-Trump Mudslinger is Married to Attorney for Ex-FBI Lawyer Lisa Page

FBI logo outside of building

Last week, the special counsel appointed to oversee the probe into the FBI’s investigation of former president Donald Trump indicted Michael Sussmann, a lawyer for the 2016 Hillary Clinton presidential campaign. Republicans and Trump allies are optimistic about the latest development in John Durham’s investigation but are still concerned that Attorney General Merrick Garland might halt the investigation to protect allies and even the president himself.

FBI notes appear to suggest that as vice president, Joe Biden played a role in the Democratic Party project to smear Trump as a Russian asset by raising the obscure, disused, 18th century statute the Logan Act as a possible vehicle for prosecuting Michael Flynn for speaking with the Russian ambassador to Washington — even after FBI case agents had cleared Trump’s incoming national security adviser of wrongdoing.

And now Republicans are raising concerns that the judge appointed to the Sussmann case has too many conflicts of interest to preside over it fairly.

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Judge Okays Preliminary Injunction for Western Michigan University Athletes

Western Michigan University football practice

Federal District Court Judge Paul L. Maloney granted 16 Western Michigan University (WMU) athletes’ request to continue participating in intercollegiate athletic competition without being injected with the COVID-19 vaccine.

Initially, four soccer stars sued in August over WMU’s vaccine mandate for athletes, which required athletic participants take the COVID-19 vaccine by Aug. 31 or forfeit their spot on the team. WMU has denied all the athletes a religious liberty accommodation.

No similar vaccine requirement exists for any other students at WMU and other universities. The lawsuit says Michigan State University and the University of Michigan are granting religious accommodations to their athletes.

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Judge Rules Christian Baker Jack Phillips Must Make ‘Gender Transition’ Cake

Jack Phillips

A Colorado baker and self-described cake artist who won a 2018 victory at the Supreme Court faced a related setback this week when a state court ruled in another case that the law requires him to make a cake to celebrate a gender transition. 

Denver District Court Judge A. Bruce Jones ruled against Jack Phillips, the Christian owner of Masterpiece Cakeshop in Lakewood, Colorado, in the case of Scardina v. Masterpiece Cakeshop. 

“The anti-discrimination laws are intended to ensure that members of our society who have historically been treated unfairly, who have been deprived of even the every-day right to access businesses to buy products, are no longer treated as ‘others,’” Jones wrote Tuesday in a 28-page opinion.

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Tennessee Supreme Court Hears Case Concerning Availability of Absentee Ballots for All Tennesseans

The Tennessee Supreme Court heard arguments Thursday concerning the citizens’ right to vote via absentee ballot.

The cases presented (Earle J. Fisher et al. v. Tre Hargett et al. and Benjamin Lay et al. v. Mark Goins et al.) have become the focal point of the ongoing debate surrounding the efficacy of absentee and mail-in ballots and voters’ rights to absentee and mail-in ballots during the COVID-19 pandemic.

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Federal Judge Blocks Part of Ohio Law Banning Second Trimester Abortion Procedure

A Federal Judge has ruled that portions of an abortion-limiting bill, signed into law late last year, cannot be enforced as the law is written. As previously reported: On December 13, 2018, then-Governor John Kasich signed Senate Bill 145 (SB 145), commonly referred to as a Dismemberment Abortion Ban into law. It is, as reported at the time, “an act that restricts one of the most common methods in which second-trimester abortions are performed.  The Dismemberment Abortion Ban, as the bill is known, restricts doctors from performing procedures in which dismemberment of the fetus occurs. The law also made it a “fourth-degree felony” for a doctor to perform the procedure. Should a doctor do so, they could face up to 18 months in prison and the loss of their license to practice medicine. The procedure can only be performed if the mother’s life is at serious risk or if the doctor causes “fetal demise” before the procedure. In late March, Senior U.S. District Judge Michael Barrett in Cincinnati placed a temporary hold on the bill. This was placed as the result of a lawsuit filed by Planned Parenthood against the bill on the grounds that the law was unconstitutional. “They…

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Ohio Judge Recommends Resignation for Disgraced ‘Gang of Five’ City Council Members

County Judge Robert Ruehlman called on five Cincinnati City Council members – all Democrats – to resign Thursday following revelations the group, the so-called “Gang of Five” violated several Ohio Sunshine Laws. On April 9, 2017,  a conservative watchdog group filed a startling lawsuit. Mark Miller, Ohio citizen and treasurer of the Coalition Opposed to Additional Spending and Taxes (COAST) was accused Cincinnati Councilman P.G. Sittenfeld, Wendell Young, Chris Seelbach, Tamaya Dennard and Greg Landsman, (all Democrats) of “attempting to decide matters of great public import behind closed doors and in secret communications, and subverting the public’s right to know and understand the actions of its public officials.” According to court documents, per Ohio law: Article II § 5 of the City Charter of the City of Cincinnati declared that “[t]he proceedings of the council shall be public,” and that “[t]he council shall keep a journal of its proceedings which shall be a public record.” Likewise, R.C. § 121.22(C) requires that “[a] 11 meetings of any public body are declared to be public meetings open to the public at all times,” and further declares that “[t]he minutes of a regular or special meeting of any public body shall be promptly prepared, filed, and…

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Second Amendment Advocacy Organization Wins Case Over Bump Stock Ban

Friday, Hamilton County Court of Common Pleas Judge Robert Rhuehlman granted an injunction against an ordnance by the city of Cincinnati that would have made “trigger activators,” which are more commonly know as bump stocks, illegal in city limits. A bump stock is any device that uses “bump fire,” to increase the rate-of-fire of a semiautomatic weapon, and some revolvers. The device uses the natural recoil of the gun to permit the weapon to fire at a much higher rate. The ATF, led by appointees of the Obama Administration ruled in 2010 that these devices were legal and could be sold without regulation. Despite widespread availability and at relatively modest prices, they were not commonly adopted. This changed dramatically in 2017. On October 1st, 2017, a gunman opened fire in Las Vegas, Nevada, killing 58 people, wounding more than 400 with gunfire, and injuring 851. Upon investigation, it was found that he was utilizing bump stocks on several of his weapons. This propelled the otherwise innocuous firearm modification into the national spotlight. Overnight, demand for bump stocks spiked. Many progressive groups began calling for immediate bans. To many second amendment advocates, this appeared to be an overreaction by the federal government that infringed upon the second amendment.…

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California Judge Blocks TPS Cancellation, Says Trump’s Decision was Based on Racial Prejudice

by Will Racke   A federal judge in California blocked the government’s plan late Wednesday to wind down a humanitarian program for hundreds of thousands of foreign nationals living in the U.S., citing concerns the decision was motivated by racial animus on the part of President Donald Trump. U.S. District Judge Edward Chen issued a preliminary injunction that prevents the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) from canceling Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for roughly 300,000 migrants Haiti, El Salvador, Nicaragua and Sudan. In a 43-page ruling, Chen ordered the government to continue granting TPS protections and work permits to qualifying foreign nationals while a lawsuit challenging the TPS decision makes its way through the courts. Chen questioned whether DHS, which ordered the TPS cancellations, had been pressured to end the program by the White House. Specifically, he said certain racially charged remarks by Trump suggested the decision was made on the basis of prejudice against “non-white, non-European immigrants,” not conditions on the ground in the affected countries. “There is also evidence that this may have been done in order to implement and justify a pre-ordained result desired by the White House,” Chen, an Obama appointee, wrote in his order. “Plaintiffs have…

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The West Virgina Legislature Moves to Impeach Its Entire Supreme Court for Corruption

West Virginia Supreme Court

by Kevin Daley   Who presides over the impeachment trial of a state Supreme Court justice if the entire state Supreme Court is being impeached? It’s an absurd constitutional hypothetical West Virginians are left to grapple with, after the West Virginia House of Delegates Judiciary Committee drafted articles of impeachment against four justices on the state’s highest court. Five justices sit on the state Supreme Court in West Virginia. The state legislature has drafted articles of impeachment against Chief Justice Margaret Workman and Justices Robin Jean Davis, Beth Walker, and Allen Loughry. The court’s fifth justice, Menis Ketchum, retired in late July. Ketchum will plead guilty to two federal corruption charges on Aug. 29. Loughry was placed on unpaid administrative leave in June after a state commission lodged a 32-count complaint against him, alleging pervasive violations of the state ethics code. He has since been indicted in federal court for fraud, witness tampering, and making false statements to investigators. The remaining three justices — Workman, Davis, and Walker — face impeachment for wasting government resources and failing to effectively administer the state courts. All three spent large sums of taxpayer dollars on lavish improvements to their chambers in the state capital, which cumulatively totaled…

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Commentary: It’s Time For President Trump To Go Full Andrew Jackson On Overreaching Judges

John D Gates

by CHQ Staff   The news that a Bush-appointed federal district judge, John D. Bates (pictured), has ruled that Obama’s executive amnesty, not actual immigration law, is the law and that Trump must fully restore and renew the program is such a radical exhibition of judicial overreach that it should have been a banner headline or lead segment in every major media outlet. Instead it generated hardly a mention, let alone any outrage, from the establishment media who long ago fell into the trap of accepting the anti-constitutional concept of judicial supremacy over the Executive and Legislative branches of government. For a complete rundown on this outrageous usurpation of the powers of the legislative and executive branches of government see Daniel Horowitz “Bush judge demands that Trump rule as king. Really!” “The tyranny of the legislature is really the danger most to be feared, and will continue to be so for many years to come,” Jefferson wrote Madison six weeks before Washington’s first inauguration. “The tyranny of the executive power will come in its turn, but at a more distant period.” Jefferson, Adams, Madison and other members of the founding generation of the American republic rightly feared the tyranny of the…

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Commentary: It’s Time For President Trump To Go Full Andrew Jackson On Overreaching Judges

John D Gates

by CHQ Staff   The news that a Bush-appointed federal district judge, John D. Bates (pictured), has ruled that Obama’s executive amnesty, not actual immigration law, is the law and that Trump must fully restore and renew the program is such a radical exhibition of judicial overreach that it should have been a banner headline or lead segment in every major media outlet. Instead it generated hardly a mention, let alone any outrage, from the establishment media who long ago fell into the trap of accepting the anti-constitutional concept of judicial supremacy over the Executive and Legislative branches of government. For a complete rundown on this outrageous usurpation of the powers of the legislative and executive branches of government see Daniel Horowitz “Bush judge demands that Trump rule as king. Really!” “The tyranny of the legislature is really the danger most to be feared, and will continue to be so for many years to come,” Jefferson wrote Madison six weeks before Washington’s first inauguration. “The tyranny of the executive power will come in its turn, but at a more distant period.” Jefferson, Adams, Madison and other members of the founding generation of the American republic rightly feared the tyranny of the…

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Bob Corlew Commentary: Democrats Will Stop at Nothing to Impeach President Trump

Bob Corlew

by Judge Bob Corlew, Candidate for Tennessee’s 6th Congressional District   Political prognosticators have predicted there might be a blue wave coming in November. They believe the House will flip to Democrat control and the U.S. Senate race in Tennessee could decide who controls the U.S. Senate. It is important to keep in mind these same prognosticators also discounted then-candidate Donald J. Trump, and all but anointed Hillary Clinton as the 45th President of the United States. Although I believe the Republicans will stay in control in Washington, Democrats in the House of Representatives have become more vocal on impeaching our president if they do take control as the prognosticators predict. Impeaching President Trump is becoming a campaign promise from Democratic candidates in races across the country and a litmus test for their far-left liberal donors and activists. Democratic Congressman Al Green of Texas stated that President Trump is “the quintessential person that impeachment was designed for” and Democratic Congresswoman Maxine Waters of California said “to get ready for impeachment.” Tom Steyer, a billionaire liberal from California, is running over $20 million worth of television ads imploring Congress to impeach President Trump. Because impeachment is becoming a normal talking point…

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Commentary: Another Federal Judge Seizes Presidential Power

by George Rasley, CHQ Editor February 15, 2017 Reprinted with permission from ConservativeHQ.com Emboldened by Judge James L. Robart’s anti-constitutional power grab and the refusal of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals to vacate his order temporarily restraining President Trump’s Executive Order 13,769 temporarily pausing immigration from seven terrorist hotspots Judge Leonie Brinkema, of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia has also chosen to seize the president’s Article II constitutional prerogatives. (To oppose this power grab please sign our Impeach Power Grabbing Judges Petition). In a 22-page ruling Monday night, Judge Brinkema, said lawyers for President Trump had provided no evidence supporting the restriction of travel from seven majority-Muslim countries. According to WTOP’s Neal Augenstein, Judge Brinkema said, “…they [the Trump administration] have not offered any evidence to identify the national security concerns that allegedly prompted this EO (executive order), or even described the process by which the president concluded that this action was necessary.” The claim that the government has “not offered any evidence to identify the national security concerns that allegedly prompted this EO” is either incredibly bad pleading by the government’s lawyers, willful blindness on the part of Judge Brinkema – or an anti-constitutional power grab. Last summer, Muna Osman Jama and Hinda Osman Dhirane, two Somali immigrants, were found guilty of conspiracy to provide material support to a foreign terrorist organization, and providing material support to…

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