Courts Handed Trump Some Huge Losses This Week

Transcript

This transcript was generated automatically and may contain errors — the audio is the record.

0:00:58 Thomas: Hello and welcome to Opening Arguments. This is episode 1162. I'm Thomas Smith. That over there is Matt Cameron, real life immigration attorney. How you doing, Matt?

0:01:07 Matt: You know, every so often, Thomas, I regret that this is an audio medium. Today was photo day at Cameron, Mishrone, and Sylvia. It's just like middle school. We had a great time taking pictures. And I got to tell you, my hair looks great today. You're missing out. You are all missing out!

0:01:17 Thomas: Oh, well, that's so cute. I can't wait to buy the... I'm just thinking about when my kids have their pictures done, then we get a bunch of like emails with all the links of the different stuff. It's like, okay.

0:01:21 Matt: It was fun! Get your 5x7s. Yep, yep.

0:01:30 Thomas: Yeah. Everyone, hey, new merch.

0:01:34 Matt: Yeah, no, it's a beautiful day here in Boston. I've got a bunch of good news to talk about. We haven't had a Good News Friday in a little while. I want to talk to some judges who are doing great stuff that we haven't got a chance to talk about.

0:01:42 Thomas: We could call it Good Friday. Has anyone used that? Is that taken?

0:01:45 Matt: Hmm, that might have legs, Thomas. I'm going to kind of reverse the things that we usually do. I'm going to be talking about great judges doing good stuff and some things we can be excited about in the face of everything else that's going on right now. And then for our footnote, I'm gonna talk about a bad judge who I've had a personal experience with that you, the listener, might be able to help me with. So excited about this one. We got plenty to talk about.

0:02:05 Thomas: And I'm also excited for folks to hear High Court, which is available on patreon.com/law. It had all the wrinkles you might expect from trying to get high and record a podcast. So lots of areas for improvement. But it was a lot of fun. And I hope people listen and give their suggestions for topics in the future. And hey, maybe for drugs to try. Let's just get Matt real effed up. Let's try.

0:02:30 Thomas: Heroin next, let's just try No, I'm just kidding. Spin the wheel and just whatever the yeah yeah it's a million dollars a show and then matt will do heroin I will too actually honestly if you get to that level I don't know what crazy billionaire is wanting to inflict this on us but hey if you're out there times are tough tough economy arguably

0:02:32 Matt: That is the top Patreon subscription. Yes, you get to. And I'll shoot up heroin for that. Yeah, sure.

0:02:52 Matt: I think just as an advocate, I think it's good for people to hear that my brain still works when I'm on some sativa, which is a nice

0:02:59 Thomas: Yeah no I am just kidding yeah yeah so patreon.com/law. And that's also where you can go to avoid this here ad break. So thanks so much to patrons and we'll see you after the break.

0:02:59 Matt: Jack hair. Yeah, you know, more or less. I had some fun talking about something that really has nothing to do with our current moment. And it's just fun history.

0:03:17 Thomas: All right. So we're starting with good judgy stuff first.

0:03:20 Matt: So plenty of it. We might have more than we can talk about here. We haven't had interviews recently and some other things we had to talk about, but I haven't had a chance to report back on some of the ways that judges are really standing up to this administration. And I know people keep telling me it doesn't matter and they're just going to ignore the orders anyway. And maybe in some cases that is happening, but these decisions matter and we need to continue to act like they matter. And I want to continue to celebrate them. And I think a lot of them will have long reaching effects because you have to remember, it's not just they're telling Trump not to do something. There's a whole bunch of other people that are constrained by these orders and a whole lot of people that don't necessarily want to pick up serious consequences from violating these orders. So let's talk first of all about an actual bona fide victory in which the government is going to be bringing somebody back that they wrongfully deported.

0:04:03 Thomas: Elvis? Oh no. Okay.

0:04:05 Matt: No, I don't have that technology yet.

0:04:06 Thomas: Yeah, I just want to ask something about the framing and I'm not trying to be a wet blanket, but I think it might be an important point to make, which is I haven't heard this episode of Opening Arguments yet, but it's not as though judges are proactively effectively doing something that they wouldn't otherwise be doing, right?

0:04:16 Matt: Right.

0:04:23 Thomas: Is that, I just think it's important because it's not, it makes it sound like, yeah, we found some resistance judges who are going out of their way to like be activists. And it's like, no, they're just doing the law, right? I mean, isn't that not all trying to be a wet blanket. I'm more just trying to reset to where I don't want it to seem like the exception is that the law works how it should.

0:04:42 Thomas: I think the exception isthat, yeah. It's like we're getting to the point in the process where judges are are fortunately making the correct rulings for the most part. And I just think it's important maybe to, unless you're telling me a judge, Hey, if a judge is going out of their way, like I honestly, in the first Trump term, I advocated that with some of these horrible decisions, I wish the circuit judges would just like continue to on our side, make rulings that need to be overruled by the Supreme court, because like they can't do all of them. Like the Supreme court can't get to all of those.

0:04:42 Matt: That's a great point. Right, sure, right, right. Exactly. Yeah.

0:05:08 Thomas: So I do hope for that. And if there is any of that, please distinguish it. But for the Most part, I think we're talking about judges doing their job, right perceiving reality wow well done judges

0:05:15 Matt: No they're, they're just perceiving the same things that we're perceiving. They can just do something about it. Yeah. So yeah, I'm not necessarily, and also of course we have to credit the incredible lawyers who are working so hard to bring these claims in. And I'm trying to where I can, but obviously ACLU is doing a lot of this heavy lifting and other organizations and the states, a lot of these blue states are really picking it up in these cases.

0:05:33 Matt: But yeah, no, and you're absolutely right. But the thing to watch, because again, we've got so many doomers and so many people that spend way too much time online. They keep talking about how somehow we're just already lost. And as long as we do have an independent judiciary, and we're talking Reagan appointees, we're talking George W. Bush appointees. H .W. Bush appointees are not just our guys, people that see what the law is that are correctly applying it. And as long as we have an independent judiciary, we have hope. I have plenty of hope still. So I just want to highlight some of these places where the judiciary is doing the right thing. So let's start with OCG, that's the pseudonym for Guatemalan man. Now, this is very much like Kilmer Arbrega -Garcia, where he was given withholding of removal. And that is a promise to deport you not to your home country. Basically, it's an order of deportation that is withheld. And it was withheld because the judge found that it's more likely than not that you're going to suffer some kind of persecution based on something to do with who you are. And so it's It's kind of, as I've told you before, it's like asylum light, and it's kind of like a very minimal form of protection that we can give you. But generally speaking, it works out because they're not going to go to the effort of trying to deport you somewhere else because no other country but yours is going to take you. So in this case, this man is from Guatemala, and he had also suffered harm in Mexico, and He told the judge about that at his hearing, and

0:06:41 Matt: The judge said, you know, I can only order that the government withhold deportation to Guatemala because that's the only country that you have citizenship in, right? That makes sense.

0:06:47 Thomas: Does that make sense because I thought it was just like if the point is just hey don't deport someone to put to a place where they're gonna get harmed like I don't know I feel like if like if some random country was like hey thomas we have decided that we have a religion that hates podcasts. And if you come to Belgium, we're going to execute you on the spot.

0:07:10 Thomas: I've never been to Belgium but I would hope that my government would be like, oh okay, the government if I weren't a citizen here would be Like, well, we probably shouldn't like send him there. That's like the one place that, you know, be kind of shitty if we sent him to the one place that's doing a podcaster genocide.

0:07:23 Matt: Well, Belgium would have to take you. That's the part of the equation here. So unless you're being extradited for crimes in Belgium, that is, you know, because like I've seen moments in immigration court, one of the things you have to do at the beginning of your immigration case and in deportation proceedings is the government has to prove going conclusive evidence where you're from.

0:07:26 Thomas: Yeah, that's fair. Yeah.

0:07:39 Matt: And you can deny alienage. You can just say, let them tell you. I don't want to tell you where I'm from.

0:07:39 Thomas: I guess I was doing the math of saying, well I'm already going to be deported and they've said that my home country is unsafe. Safe. Let's say my home country hates podcasters too. They're like, we can't, you know, which, you know fair. I don't blame them. And then also they're like well we're looking for another place to deport Thomas because the administration is doing that right? They're looking for like other countries which is crazy but like and then I'm like okay fine but just not this other one. Like this other one also will kill me. I guess I didn't understand why that necessarily wouldn't be something that you could do.

0:08:09 Thomas: That you could say okay well don't send him to those to not only his home country but also this other country because he's in danger there.

0:08:14 Matt: It's illegal. So for the law of international international law of what's called refellment. Yeah, right. It is definitely illegal.

0:08:16 Thomas: Ah that's the ingredient I'm missing okay okay

0:08:21 Matt: I'm just saying in terms of what the judge can do on the spot in an immigration hearing, he can't just sort of, I was going to give the example of when you're talking about alienage and removal proceedings about what country you're from. I did see a person who's representing themselves in immigration court, which a lot of people are. And the judge asked him, you know, what country, if I had to order deportation, where would I send you? And the defendant thought about it for a minute, because he'd already said, basically, let the government tell you where I'm from. I'm not going to admit that. And, you Know, they can produce his passport or birth certificate or whatever. And the defendant thought about it. He's like, can you send me to Fiji? Which is really clever, actually. And The Judge is like, have you ever been to Fijian? And he's like no, but can you deport me there? A little bit of immigration court humor there for you. No, it didn't work. You can't ask the court to send you to somewhere you're not from, and you can't ask them to protect you from somewhere that you're from if the government's not going to be specifically sending you there.

0:08:56 Thomas: This one weird trick yeah yeah

0:09:07 Matt: So this came up at his hearing, though, in this exact way. And I'm glad you brought up this question, though. Because it is about refoulement, which is the, I might be pronouncing that wrong, That's a French word. But there is internationally and nationally in our statutes, a law that you cannot send somebody back to a country where they might be facing harm, as in your example with Belgium and the podcasters. And there's a separate procedure by law that you're supposed to be able to go through. Even if you have a deportation order, if they're suddenly coming out of nowhere and saying, yeah, we're sending you to Belgium, you have to have the right to raise that claim. And so, believe it or not, they didn't do that for OCG. They just sent him to Mexico on a bus.

0:09:06 Thomas: Gotcha okay

0:09:37 Matt: And even though they specifically knew that Mexico was a place where he'd suffered harm, it wasn't specifically included in his withholding order. So Mexico, of course, once he got there, deported him to Guatemala, the one place on earth where the judges said he can't go. But of course Mexico doesn't have to honor our withholding of removal order. All of this brings us to this kind of large set of litigation that's going on. I've been talking about the other half of it in a minute, but this particular piece of it is great because we just got the status report. It's great to see this in writing because we've been seeing so much ducking and dodging and trying to get around court orders. Straight up right here from from ICE, we have that ICE made contact with OCG's attorneys because the court said, you can't, you shouldn't have done this. This was illegal. You got to bring him back. And significant public benefit parole has been approved and forwarded. And ERO Phoenix, that's Deportation Office in Phoenix, is working with ICE Air to bring OCG back to the United States on a charter flight. So this is actually going to happen. This is the first time that we're going to be, and I've had people returned after having been unlawfully deported. It is something that you can do, but it's the first times in this round of illegal deportations that we're seeing somebody brought back that we know of. So that is great news. That's a start. And of course, Kilmore -Berger -Garcia is the one we really want to see coming back because that was such an obviously illegal thing that was done.

0:10:48 Matt: But the same logic should apply here. And this should work. So now, as part of the rest of this litigation, you might have heard something about this. There's been this DBDB -DHS case. And every time I see it, I really want to say dvdvd vhs it's right there yeah right

0:11:00 Thomas: Yeah it's really I my brain was doing backflips trying to figure out why it wasn't that the laser disc precedent is also very important in the dvd vhs case yeah Boy, I wish they'd get to Blu -ray.

0:11:14 Matt: It's gonna say it's the successor to vhc beta max that one's been resolved uh but yeah

0:11:15 Thomas: Boy, they are way behind. They're just not even close. Boy,

0:11:17 Matt: Litigation you know it takes a while but this case presents a simple question before the united states forcibly sends someone to a country other than their country of origin must that person be told where they are going let's start there and be given a chance to tell the united States that they might be killed if sent there should be

0:11:31 Thomas: Seems like yes, Matt. Seems like Judge Thomas Smith says, seems like, yeah.

0:11:34 Matt: Yeah this This is from a district court judge in Massachusetts. Massachusetts is doing a lot of the heavy lifting this week. This is Brian Murphy. This is a 48 -page order, but I agree with you. We shouldn't have to get past the first page on that question. So he put in a forceful injunction. This litigation started in March, and in April, he wrote out this injunction saying that all nine setting justices of the Supreme Court, the Assistant Solicitor General of the United States, Congress, common sense, basic decency, and this court all disagree with the government's position. That's quite a statement. That's a lot. That's one of the things. Things. So he said, he put an injunction saying, you can't send anybody anywhere to any third country until we figure this out.

0:12:08 Thomas: Reminds me of Life of Brian. No one is to deport anybody until I blow this whistle. Not even, I'm going to be absolutely clear, even if they say.

0:12:17 Matt: You might've caught some of this, but they started making noise about deporting people to Libya, which is a country that doesn't even have a government.

0:12:23 Thomas: Oh, that's not good.

0:12:24 Matt: Yeah. It has like two governments that are competing. There's no way that you can say that Libya is really a country right now. It's in bad shape.

0:12:29 Thomas: Yeah, that sort of one of those, like, if you have one government, good. If you have two governments, worse than one.

0:12:34 Matt: Yeah, it's not going well.

0:12:35 Thomas: You'd rather have almost none than two. Too.

0:12:37 Matt: And it was actually kind of darkly funny that both of the governments kind of stopped fighting for a minute to agree that they had never agreed to this.

0:12:44 Thomas: Guys, we got our hands full, okay? We just can't. What are we doing?

0:12:46 Matt: Like, yeah, just kind of looking up from everything else. And yeah, somebody say her name. So they backtracked on that pretty quickly. And they decided, of course, the next logical thing to do is to send all these people. By the way, we're talking about eight people. And they picked eight people with extremely serious records. Let's be honest about this.

0:13:02 Matt: These are people with very, very bad criminal records. These Are the kinds of people that they've been looking for to put out front and center in these cases, because they want to be able to argue that they shouldn't have any rights because of these records. Now, under under immigration law, when you're convicted of an aggravated felony, you don't have a lot of rights, but you still have the basic right of refoulement, which is to say that I can't go to another country that I've never been to where I might be killed. So Brian Murphy, this district court judge, is not having it because they did actually sense this group of eight people to Djibouti in Northern Africa.

0:13:31 Matt: So they're right now there. And at the point at which he realized that they were there, he ordered, this is extremely unusual, this has never happened before, he ordered they be given a hearing in Djibouti. It just never happened.

0:13:40 Thomas: How?

0:13:41 Matt: Good question. Working on that.

0:13:43 Thomas: Didn't know we could do that.

0:13:44 Matt: After a very contentious hearing, he issued this on the 26th of May. Let me just read a bit here. I'm going to be reading some really great judicial prose today. Defendants have mischaracterized this court's order, while at the same time manufacturing the very chaos they decry. I love that. By racing to get six class members onto a plane to unstable South Sudan, clearly in breach of the law and this court order, defendants gave this court no choice but to find they're in violation of the preliminary injunction. Even after finding that violation, however, the court stayed at hand and not required defendants to bring the individuals back. Instead, the the court accepted defendants' own suggestion that they'd be allowed to keep the individuals and finish the process abroad. So he actually has lengthy excerpts from the transcript to show exactly what was promised to him on the record. And this is, again, yeah, all right, I'll just read this part. Since that hearing, merely five days ago, defendants have changed their tune. It turns out that having immigration proceedings on another continent is harder and more logistically cumbersome than defendants anticipated. No, no. The court never said that defendants had to convert their foreign military base into an immigration facility. It only left that as an option, again, in italics, at defendant's request. So he is angry. He's like, you know, you said you could do this. You promised me you were going to do this, you didn't do it, you're continuing to violate the order. So we got some very angry, and you know this is another one where he's going to be looking for people to find in criminal contempt if he can do it. So they tried to get this reconsidered, they're going to be taking this up to the Supreme Court I'm sure, but he is again demanding that they have to be given this basic hearing, basic rights. I'm certain it'll be some some kind of video hearing. And again, I don't even know how you manage this in Northern Africa, but we do have, as we're going to be talking about later in this episode, very sophisticated video conferencing technology that's available

0:15:17 Matt: To us through the immigration system.

0:15:17 Thomas: And very not even sophisticated versions, too. Yeah.

0:15:21 Matt: So sure. Yeah. Just Zoom if you need to. It's fine. We can do that. So yeah. Good news in the sense that Judge Murphy is just not having it every step of this. And you look down the dock into this thing and there's just like constant new things, new orders, new memos.

0:15:34 Thomas: So you're saying that was the, it seemed weird that the judge was ordering that. You're saying that the admin basically was like, oh, we'll do it. We'll give them the hearing in the the in the other country then that was just a time -wasting tactic like so many of this stuff is possibly alleged possibly yeah where they're like oh you know that's harder than we thought and then the judge is like yeah that's but you said you could do it okay just make sure I get that all straight

0:15:54 Matt: You know, And I crafted this whole thing, this order, based on what you told us we could do. No, no, they really want you to do the things when you say you're going to do them. And this hearing, I mean, I read all about what happened at this hearing. And he was really like, one of the arguments they're making essentially is that as they're getting on the plane, people should have been yelling, don't send me to South Sudan. Like, I don't think they even knew where they were going. But like, as if that was the hearing that you're supposed to have is like, I am afraid to go specifically to South Sudan because I will be like, they have to say some magic words or something, right?

0:15:58 Thomas: Judges don't like that oh come on yeah yeah

0:16:22 Matt: But you're suppose to be given notice of where you're doing and a chance to challenge that in this opportunity. And the law is not subtle about this. So yeah, they've got some incredible lawyers on this. I think it's going to continue to be good news potentially. So he denied their request for reconsideration.

0:16:33 Thomas: And so what was the uh sorry where's that stand right now

0:16:38 Matt: They are being given some kind of procedure into Djibouti. I want to keep a watch on this one because this is another thing at the edges. This is one of the places where they're trying to push the law, just as they did with Camargo -Garcia. And we have a very good judge who's completely on top of it. So I think It's worth watching. But the OCG portion of this is the one I really want to emphasize because that is an actual victory. That is bringing bringing somebody back that was wrongfully deported, and they're fully cooperating from what we can see. I mean, he's not back yet, but it does look like, based on this latest filing, that everything is in place to bring him back.

0:16:50 Thomas: Right good yeah that feels like a big step to have even if you know circumstances circumstances aren't identical and all that. To have one where it's like, well, this person is back, so therefore you can do that. So bring the other ones back. I think it's a little simple minded to say, but I do think that in our media environment, I think that makes a big difference. I thinkthat makes a difference to people's expectations. Be like ,well, you did it over here. Do it, but for this one.

0:17:22 Matt: It does. Yeah, it does. Right, right. And this is different from the Salvador and Seacott thing, but its parallel. And again, there's no reason we shouldn't be able to lean on El Salvador to get those things settled and get these people back.

0:17:35 Thomas: Yeah. And I think we should, when we're yelling at people over this, we should just, it isn't the different, just it's the same. Just do it. You know, like I'm tired of us pre -bargaining ourselves down. It's the same, get them.

0:17:45 Matt: Yes. Thank you. Exactly. So just very quick, one more thing from OCG.

0:17:49 Thomas: And that's, again, that's the initials of the person. Sorry, it's hard to keep straight. So many acronyms involved in this stuff.

0:17:54 Matt: No, of course, yeah. It must be said that while mistakes obviously happen, the events leading up to the decision are troubling. The court was given false information, very good to say that outright, upon which it relied twice to the detriment of a party at risk of serious and irreparable harm. Defendants then exacerbated that risk by placing OCG's full name on the public docket in violation of this court's order, which, you know, specifically has to seal as I've just done in one of my cases. The Court has ordered discovery, including depositions of the individuals involved in the false declaration and underlying data entries to better understand how this happened, obviously in contemplation of contempt. He also has a footnote here that says the court accepts defendants' apology, which is never great when you get into that stage, and finds no further action necessary. I do wonder if they apologized to OCG about that, but anyway.

0:18:34 Thomas: Yeah. Well, but how does that go with the like, but also depositions and let's figure out what the hell happened here.

0:18:40 Matt: Oh, he's just saying in terms of like, you know, I guess they actually apologized. Yeah, to him.

0:18:42 Thomas: His personal, you'll still, you can come to the Christmas party this year. Yeah.

0:18:45 Matt: Exactly. Yeah. Rules are tedious and frustrating, but they also keep us fair and honest. You shouldn't need a federal judge to tell you that, but yeah. But at oral argument, defendants counsel confirmed it is the policy of the United States not to expel, extradite, or otherwise affect the involuntary return of any person to a country at which there's substantial grounds for believing the person would be in danger of being subjected to torture. I really liked this part. The return of OCG poses a vanishingly small cost to make sure that we can still claim to live up to that ideal. So great stuff from a Massachusetts district court judge. Keep a watch on all of this litigation. So I want to move on to Mahmoud Khalil, which is still one of the most important cases happening right now, not just for immigration, but for all of us, because I just remind everybody they're using 8 U .S .C. Section 1227A4C, which which is the Foreign Policy Grounds of

0:18:52 Thomas: Come on. Yeah, yeah. Oh

0:19:29 Matt: Deportation from 1952, bad Cold War law that has hardly ever been used. The last time this statute was challenged, it was actually struck down by Trump's sister, Mary Ann Trump Barry in New Jersey. And it was reversed. Her decision was reversed by Alito in the Third Circuit on procedural grounds, not on the constitutional findings.

0:19:45 Thomas: Did his sister die?

0:19:46 Matt: She did pass. Yeah, yeah.

0:19:46 Thomas: Why do I feel like she passed away okay yeah

0:19:49 Matt: And Trump posted that she was a great judge and a great sister, which they weren't on speaking terms at the end. She didn't want nothing to do with them. But this is important because you might remember that due to some heroic lawyering, Mahmoud Khalil's habeas case was kept in New Jersey where he was being held. But his immigration proceedings are still in Louisiana where he is now, unfortunately, still being held, he did finally, and there's some good news on this too. I mean, this is marginal good news, but it is important. He was finally able to see his infant son, the son who was born while he was in custody. And that's very hard to arrange to get somebody in there. But after a lot of pushing and public outcry, he was able to finally see his son. And, you know, we're still hoping every day these can be released, but this is getting us a little bit closer. This is a habeas decision in New Jersey, and this is going to be going up to the Supreme Court, no doubt, but there's a great foundation for that. There are two things that they're claiming they can deport him on. One is the foreign policy grounds, which again, just remind everybody is that they have to be able to allege. It's Marco Rubio, specifically a Secretary of State, alleging that somehow this man is presenting a threat to a compelling foreign policy interest. And the best they could do for this man who'd helped to coordinate protests at Colombia over genocide in Gaza was saying that he was somehow promoting anti -Semitism. They weren't even really saying that He was hurting relations with Israel.

0:21:00 Matt: They're just sort of generally saying this. Right.

0:21:00 Thomas: Well like well we have a vested interest in the genocide that's happening there as a country so

0:21:06 Matt: It's in our foreign policy to support it. That is almost exactly what it comes down to, if you read that. So Judge Farbieres in New Jersey wrote this 106 -page decision. It is excellent. We will link to it. But a lot of it has to do with this statutory provision, which again, has already been found to be unconstitutional by one judge who happens to be a direct relative of Donald Trump. And that was in the Masu case, which we talked about, which is the only case, the only time that any court has really had a chance to consider this language, because it's never been used really. And that was the attorney general of Mexico who was wanted in Mexico for financial crimes. And we were deciding it was in our foreign policy interest to return him to Mexico where he was wanted and to keep good relations with that country. And, you know, that makes a little more sense, but this one really doesn't make any sense. And remember that all they have to do to support this claim that he's a foreign policy threat is put in a letter from Marco Rubio, which is what they did, where he just says it. Yeah.

0:22:00 Matt: Marco

0:21:56 Thomas: A thing that should have no value or utility otherwise

0:22:01 Matt: Rubios word. Yeah, know. Fabio has some great findings here, not just on how vague the statute is, because it really is very vague, and there's no standard really in here. But he's saying, even assuming that the statute makes sense as it is, there was no determination. He didn't say anything about negatively impacting any kind of relations with any other country.

0:22:17 Matt: An ordinary person would have no real inkling that a Section 1227 removal could go forward in this way. You don't even know what you're being charged with when you see this language.

0:22:23 Thomas: Okay so so let me just trying to refresh from what I remember I think I was pretty worried that like based on the law it seemed to read such that as long as rubio signed signed something, signed a piece of paper. That's pretty much a done deal. But it sounds like right where you're saying, like, it sounds Like they're getting into what was on the piece of paper, which I think seems like a good sign to me.

0:22:43 Matt: They have to. Right, but here's the thing. This is actually, that's a great point. Thank you. I was going to skip over that. This This is the difference between challenging things in federal Article III court, actual judiciary court versus immigration court, because the immigration judge already had to make a finding that based on the controlling precedent for the Board of Immigration Appeals, that the thing you just said is enough. That, well, we've got the letter. The BIA case basically says as long as the secretary is saying it, we have to accept it. So he found deportability, which doesn't mean there was really bad reporting about this, honestly. I really hate it when media tries to report on removal cases sometimes. They made it sound like he'd been ordered removed. He wasn't. He was found removable, which basically that they got to that stage where they said they could sustain this charge. And this is his chance now to present defenses to that. And he'll be able to challenge the removability finding on appeal. But meantime, this is a parallel proceeding. This is a habeas proceeding, which is challenging the entire detention in federal court in New Jersey. And again, just to really highlight the heroic learning here from Amy Greer and others who've been working so hard on this, because they worked so hard to keep that case in New jersey, this would otherwise be being heard in Louisiana

0:23:43 Matt: And controlled by Fifth Circuit law. So we got a much better shot at the third circuit here.

0:23:47 Thomas: And that was not to again, no, no, we don't have time to go into everything. That was essentially because it was like, hey, we got this in under the deadline before we it's not clear that they had moved him yet, which it just seems I can't believe this. This whole thing is so dystopian and fascist.

0:23:59 Matt: Whack -a -mole. Yep. Yep, right.

0:24:02 Thomas: But like, Like you're trying to disappear our guy, but hey, technically we got it in before the buzzer of disappearing this guy. But you know, good that they did that. It's just, it's amazing that that's how it works.

0:24:09 Matt: I managed to do one of those myself, where they wouldn't tell us where that guy was for days and days. And I was pretty sure he wasn't in Massachusetts, but I don't know because they won't tell me. So I filed it and I got an order.

0:24:20 Thomas: I'm sorry. Your rights, your fundamental human rights should not be based on if a fascist can like be like, I don't know where to do it. Is he in this hand or is he? It's so sick. Yeah.

0:24:29 Matt: Exactly. Right. Oh, that's so well said. Yep yep. And that really is the game right now because it's not like they don't where he is or what the plan is.

0:24:39 Thomas: I'm not really making much of a joke, right? It pretty much is that. Disgusting. Yeah.

0:24:41 Matt: No, it's true. Yeah, it is. And we've all been seeing it and you've been hearing the stories, but advocates have been seeing where where they just won't tell us for days, just 72 hours at a time or more, where it'll just say he's still in the jurisdiction of the Boston field office. And I know for sure he's no longer anywhere near here, right? But that's the last they have. And then they'll tell us, oh, you know, well, I can't really, I don't have any other information here about where he's going. Really? You don't have any plan? Like you don't know where you're sending him? You're just putting him on a plane? No, of course they know. Come on. Right.

0:25:07 Thomas: He's in a hot air balloon. It's wherever the wind takes it.

0:25:09 Matt: So that's, that's latest with that. I think that's looking really good for a setup for, honestly, I do not know what the Supreme Court is going to do with this. I feel good about what the circuit court is going do when it reviews this, because I think it's hard to argue that this is not a good statute to begin with.

0:25:21 Matt: It's extremely vague. But there has to be some kind of standard, as the judge was saying. And this is basically a standardless letter. There's just nothing to it. So because there's no precedent on this provision, there's a lot that's gonna have to be worked out.

0:25:32 Thomas: And it's like if you had judges you felt were good judges you could trust, I feel like, okay, they'll probably come up with something reasonable. But it seems like that very lack of precedent is just an opportunity for if the Supreme Court or whoever wants to do something shitty, it feels like they're going to be able to.

0:25:32 Matt: But you know, I don't know. Sure. And I'm concerned that at the end of the day, they're going to defer to the usual thing they defer to and saying it's president's foreign policy and Secretary of State, we can't interfere. But there have to be limits. As we've talked about here, you can't just write a letter saying that, you know Matt Matt Cameron poses a threat to our foreign policy and not explain it.

0:26:00 Thomas: Even though I keep writing the letter over and over. I'm trying.

0:26:04 Matt: Somebody's got to warn.

0:26:05 Thomas: Yeah." All right. Well, we're going to take a quick break and then we'll get to even more good news, allegedly. I got to figure out where to store this good news, Matt. Man, my pockets are full.

0:26:10 Matt: You got it.

0:26:19 Thomas: I can only take so much.

0:26:19 Matt: Well, you can save some for later if you need one. You need some later.

0:26:23 Thomas: Putting it in the fridge.

0:26:24 Matt: So we haven't touched on for a while about Trump's ongoing war on big law, specifically the major orders that he put out against Wilmer Hale and Jenner and Block. Those are the ones we're talking about right now. And we've got two George W. Bush appointees writing two great decisions, striking down these orders and joining them. And of course, these are the law firms that actually fought, unlike Paul Weiss and others that we've talked about that just rolled over.

0:26:46 Thomas: Cowards. Yeah.

0:26:47 Matt: These are the ones that actually stood up and said, we're not going to take this. We're not gonna let the president say that we can't do business. And again, just to stress this, we talked about this a couple of times now with Liz Skeen. We've covered it, but this is a completely unprecedented attack on specific individual law firms because of their participation in things that specifically oppose Trump.

0:27:06 Matt: You know, everything from having an MSNBC commentator on their payroll that they didn't like to helping out on a contract basis with Jack Smith's investigation.

0:27:14 Thomas: Yeah. I mean, it's almost nothing too. Not that it matters, but the connections are so tenuous. It'd be one thing if it was like, well, they led the charge in the effort to blah, blah, bla. It's like, no, they just know a guy who knows a guy. It's just like nothing. That's fascism for you.

0:27:27 Matt: And again, as we talked about with Liz, these are lawyers who, when they see these orders, should have seen that there's no way these are going to stand up if you actually challenge them. And so we've got two George W. Bush appointees who are not happy about this. I want to talk first about Richard Leon and the Wilmer Hale case, because this is a controversial opinion for a very specific and weird reason. I don't know if you saw about this, the opinion itself is awesome. Him. And I agree with every word of it, but he's using quite a lot of exclamation points, which is very unusual. There's some debate amongst lawyers about maybe the judge should get the death penalty for this, but there's a lot. A lot of exclamation points. It's a little weird, pretty much zero.

0:27:47 Thomas: We'll see. Oh, no. I don't think I saw this.

0:28:05 Thomas: How many do you normally see in a judge? I mean, God, he's near zero, right? I mean, yeah. Yeah. Wow.

0:28:12 Matt: Unless they're quoting somebody, you're not going to see a judge get exclamatory, but you know, sometimes you just got to yell and that's what he's doing here.

0:28:16 Thomas: I like it. I love it. This is a judge going above and beyond. Okay. I, I, you know, that's, that it's important to know this is that's that's taking a little bit of the extra initiative and I like.

0:28:24 Matt: I mean, judicial exclamations. Yeah. The cornerstone of the American system of justice, it's just from the beginning of the opinion, is an independent judiciary and an independent bar willing to tackle unpopular cases, comma, however daunting. The founding fathers knew this, exclamation point. I just have to yell it. It goes on and talks about how the order has to be struck down in its entireties and constitutional because it's targeting specific lawyers for specific political reasons.

0:28:50 Matt: Indeed, to rule otherwise would be unfaithful to the judgment and vision of the founding fathers, exclamation point.

0:28:50 Thomas: Yeah, I'm having trouble controlling the volume about my voice yeah I know I should just maybe get you to be louder I'll just say hey there's an exclamation point on all

0:28:57 Matt: Yes. I'm not used to speaking that way. It's kind of fun. Right. Just add one to everything. Yeah.

0:29:04 Thomas: Of everything you're saying yeah draw one right on your mic like like a little sign

0:29:11 Matt: I mean, literally, though, so many more exclamation points.

0:29:13 Thomas: That's awesome I really like

0:29:14 Matt: At the end, he says, he actually says, this order shouts through a bullhorn, colon, if you take on causes disfavored by President Trump, you will be punished, exclamation point, which is very true. That's what it's saying. But he's saying that the defendants are trying to say that WilmerHale's injuries are speculative. He says, please, that dog won't hunt, excclamation point. Defendants dispute the causal relationship.

0:29:33 Thomas: That yeah what is that an old -timey lawyer judgy phrase

0:29:37 Matt: That is an old time people are saying, thing. That dog won't hunt, son.

0:29:39 Thomas: That dog won't hunt oh okay

0:29:40 Matt: It's not going anywhere. Defendants dispute the causal relationship between the order and any client's decision to terminate its relationship because they're saying this is going to cost us business because we're going to be limited in how we deal with the government. This argument is absurd, exclamation point. This other argument about how you can't prove that we lost any clients, that they lost any client over this order, when obviously they would have lost clients. And it doesn't matter because you're severely limiting their ability to do business. So clearly you're going have to lose clients. Defenders thus urge this court to wait and see how this guidance comes out before ruling on Wilmer Hall's claims. Please, exclamation point. The court need not wait.

0:29:51 Thomas: Sorry which argument's absurd oh okay yeah Yeah. This is great. Yeah.

0:30:14 Matt: Love this guy. Just so many exclamation points.

0:30:16 Thomas: I'm so glad I made that point in the beginning because this is above and beyond. I love this.

0:30:20 Matt: It is. It is.

0:30:20 Thomas: This does not just, I mean, law -wise, I feel like it's not, but rhetoric -wise. Love it. Punctuation -wise now, are there any that are multiple right?

0:30:24 Matt: We have 27 exclamation points in this lengthy decision, and that is quite a few. That's true. Sure.

0:30:34 Thomas: When I heard the 27, I was like, that's a multiple of three. I like that. Cause well, then again, I guess if you're doing singles and or threes, cause then single or three is the way to go, right? If you you do two it feels off yeah yeah but now that I realize like some of them are ones so therefore it's multiple three rules kind of messed up but are there any that are multiples is my very important question or is it all singles yeah

0:30:43 Matt: Yeah, that's a typo. That's not, yeah. Nobody intends to do it to you.

0:30:55 Matt: I think that's the next stage of fascism, when judges start doing triple exclamation points. Yeah. Start putting things in caps.

0:30:57 Thomas: The next appeal kind of thing yeah so that means 27 different sentences and an exclamation point which is that's wow that's a

0:31:04 Matt: Yeah? Yeah, with exclamation points. That's got to be a record for a federal decision. It has got to me.

0:31:09 Thomas: Lot yeah I feel like three has got to be a record you know like that's right I mean

0:31:13 Matt: On the other end of the excitement scale, we've got Judge John Bates in the Jenner and Block case. Goes all the other way, no exclamation points, but still a very good decision. He simply says that there are interesting, difficult, and potentially meritorious questions about the scope of presidential power. So the court need not break new ground. The executive order violates settled First Amendment law and its operation must be enjoined in full. So they are granting summary judgment.

0:31:36 Thomas: Uh I could what I couldn't even hear him I didn't. Can you speak up? Yeah. Weird.

0:31:38 Matt: What's the point with a period. Yeah, but again, what matters is the result. I can take a sober decision, but it's just after reading that other one, you're expecting a little more spice.

0:31:44 Thomas: Type louder. Yeah.

0:31:52 Matt: But again, I mean, and Liz made this point really well in at least two of the episodes we've done with her about this, about how it's so cowardly to look at these orders and think you're not going to be able to win if you take them on. I mean these are being struck down.

0:32:02 Thomas: Yeah, absolute nonsense. I can't. I'm just I'm disgusted by the cravenness to put to reference high court. By the way, sober rulings like the opposite of high court, we got to come something we can do something with that. I don't know what we're still hey, there's a new yeah, hungover court maybe. But yeah, no, No, I don't know who these people are. They couldn't be further from the world of high powered, you know, hundred million dollar assholes who are absolutely caving to fascism in a way that's it's just it's the combination. I guess the point is, it's not often that I just hate somebody I don'T even know, but like the

0:32:17 Matt: The morning after high court breakfast. Yeah.

0:32:36 Thomas: Combination of just cowardice and kind of the greed of just caving in at the cost of like the entire system of law, you KNOW, but like it's going to save you a few millions of dollars, maybe if you don't lose a client or something. It's just the it's everything I hate. It's everything. I hate in one. And I'm so glad. I want these idiots to feel dumb for what they did. I did see that like four, I think four partners left.

0:32:58 Thomas: Paul Weiss, I want to say like, that's good. Do that.

0:32:59 Matt: So true. Yes. To start their own. Yeah, yeah.

0:33:01 Thomas: And we're going to start a new law firm. It's called Not Coward Fascist and you know, whatever. Name it something cool. You know, enough with the last names. Name your law firm something cool. What did that other decision do? The one that I could barely hear.

0:33:06 Matt: Same thing.

0:33:16 Thomas: It just didn't stick as much, you know?

0:33:18 Matt: Yeah. Summary judgment is granted. So that's it. Obviously the government's going to appeal, but I think it's going to be a really tough appeal because the first amendment issues are so obvious. Like you can't just target specific companies for their speech. Like that's just not, yeah,

0:33:29 Thomas: Oh, I know what I what I'm trying to ask. What does this mean? Like, at what point are these stupid deals done? Is that are those still just like, okay, you know, like $100 million deals of the pro bono work and all that? Does this undermine any of that? Or is it like, well, they agreed to it. So it's not like this even really affects that.

0:33:41 Matt: I mean, they should go back now and say, look at all these other rulings. Cause this is just two of them. There've been a couple of others too, that have been awesome. And Paul Weiss and the others should go back and say, we shouldn't be held to this because, hey, it does turn out. Maybe not though. Maybe at the point of, I don't know, I'm not a contract lawyer. Maybe the point at which you've made the agreement, you don't get to make that argument anymore.

0:34:00 Matt: You might've been waived, but they shouldn't have made these agreements. And as we've talked about, we'll see how they play out and what they're held to.

0:34:05 Thomas: So no, we don't know on that yet. But keep track. Okay?

0:34:07 Matt: Don't know. Yeah. Keep a watch. A couple more good news things to talk about. We have not talked about Doge in a while, and we had a great decision from Judge Chetkin, Tanya Chetkins, fan favorite in DC Circuit. This order is for May 27th. So this was a motion to dismiss that was brought by the defendants. And obviously, this wasn't going to go anywhere. But we've got a bunch of states suing Doge saying that you're interfering with our ability to do business. Obviously, you're harming a whole bunch of state interests. And she finds understanding, of course, for them to do that by going in with a chainsaw to take on the federal government. So this is an appointments clause question about whether Elon Musk should be able to do any of this. And what's so exciting about this, of course. Is if she finds that he was unlawfully appointed and doing things in an unlawful way, we could pretty much undo everything he did.

0:34:47 Matt: That would be the dream here. Just as if it it never happened a lot of damage has been done and it's people have died

0:34:51 Thomas: I was gonna say I don't want to sorry to be a wet blanket. I think most of this is not fixable. But still important yeah the parts that are

0:34:57 Matt: But back on the right track at least like not continuing on the doge path as she points out several several federal agencies have been dismantled thousands of federal employees have been terminated sensitive data has been haphazardly accessed edited and disclosed and federal grants and contracts have been frozen or terminated plaintiffs allege that doge and its leader elon musk are behind these actions and of course you remember she says leader because we still don't really know who's in charge of doge there was some other person that was allegedly but he's definitely the person in public who's taking credit and that trump is giving credit for all of this so she's considering about whether he was lawfully appointed. She's looking at the history of Doge. And of course, she finds that this is a serious appointment clause issue. And she gives a little lecture up front about checks and balances and about how this is all supposed to be a vital check against tyranny, that we can't just have the president putting a billionaire out there to just cause a bunch of havoc without some kind of check from the legislature and now the judiciary. So it's a very solid decision on this motion to dismiss. It's great language. It has great findings. It is kind of like we are talking about up front. This is stuff we have all seen. We know basically that this is happening and that that this is illegal. But she's saying it in really clear, concise

0:35:01 Thomas: Fixable yeah right

0:35:55 Matt: Language. It's a great order. She does have to grant the motion to dismiss as to Trump himself, because you can't actually enjoin the president from doing his official duties. This doesn't even have to do with the immunity decision. You just can't, by law, get an injunction against the actual president for doing things that, you know. But, she says, the states were looking for a declaratory judgment, essentially saying this is an illegal appointment. She can do that in other ways. She can enjoin everybody else involved. But he has to find that because appointments are discretionary, you can only get declaratory judgments and non -discretionary actions.

0:36:22 Matt: She has to dismiss him as a defendant. It's a very small loss though, because the case is going forward. And I think we're going to get some great discovery out of this, because that's really what we're moving on to here. And that's what we all want to see, is what's been going on behind the scenes with Doge, how bad it's been, how deep they've gone in this stuff. So something to watch. But this is, again, all the right direction.

0:36:40 Matt: It's the direction we're hoping for and expecting, but pushing back against the tide here.

0:36:43 Thomas: And it is incredible to me I don't know if I necessarily predicted the way this has gone with elon because he's kind of just left with tail tucked between his legs

0:36:51 Matt: Not been good for him.

0:36:51 Thomas: I did predict that he's such an asshole that there's no way anyone could like it it wasn't sustainable but I here's what I thought would happen I thought he would put up a more public tantrum you know or something you know because I'm not sure why. Maybe he realizes he has nowhere else to go. There's not going to be much of an audience for the total fascist piece of shit who, but then now also is mad at Trump.

0:37:15 Matt: That's not a...

0:37:15 Thomas: But I'm surprised that he didn't think he had the star power to just do that. I felt like there would be a big separation, like a dramatic Elon separation. He's going to fight in his own way with something, but it just seems like he's just limping off as a pathetic husk of a man. Like nobody like it's it's crazy it's good but yeah I don't know unless he's got something else planned it seems like he's just his company tesla is just absolutely decimated by this and and I guess he's like gonna go slink off into the little dark cave like golem or something just where he's gonna

0:37:39 Matt: Yeah, no, it's very bad for him. I mean, it seems like he might've gotten a bunch of our data, and he certainly got a bunch of contracts potentially out of this and other things that, and he also eliminated some competition at NASA. I know that he was cutting a bunch of stuff there that was competing with him. So there's a bunch of crimes. Yeah, did some damage. But he also has the charisma of like a monitor

0:37:49 Thomas: Be that's true oh fair yeah that's right I shouldn't underestimate how much he sucks there's probably ways there's probably ways that yeah yeah it's absolutely not

0:38:03 Matt: Lizard. So I don't know how he's going to have any kind of constituency who's going to want to hear him anymore. But I don' know. I just don't like looking at him or hearing him personally.

0:38:09 Thomas: It feels like good news news, though, that he is just out, just gone.

0:38:14 Matt: Yeah. Yeah and this is on the path to getting some truth and reconciliation about Doge. Like getting the truth out and like even if it's not going to be this year, eventually we're going to get the evidence that we we need to really understand it.

0:38:24 Thomas: You know, that's what we all should be really hoping for. The quickest thing that we can do that is a big deal is winning the House back. And I know it's the bare minimum. It is the bare minim. I hope we can win the Senate and get even more power that way. But at the very least, if we win the Houseback, which we should be able to do the investigations and not even so much, you Know, it's one thing in Trump one where it did really feel like we need some accountability. We need some investigations investigations and we need showmanship. We need to see this. That all still applies. But now more than ever, we also just need the truth.

0:38:53 Thomas: Like we just need the work to be done on what was destroyed. And there's so much of it that we're not even going to be able to keep it all in our attention. The amount of just harm that's been done by this. But winning back the house, which, you know, it's going to go quicker than you think.

0:39:06 Thomas: Like we're already halfway through the year 2025. Like we'll be there pretty soon. And then get just grilling people in these house committees, doing investigations and just documenting the truth, you know, is going to be really important.

0:39:09 Matt: People are mad. It's what they're for. It has got to happen. We can't let them write the history.

0:39:20 Thomas: And that's what we can work for. That's why it's important. I know we're all, you know, we're looking our wounds and we're a lot of people want to point fingers for all the stuff that went wrong. And I get I think it's important to take accountability and figure out what we can do. We're going to have to switch to the build up mode.

0:39:33 Thomas: That means build up whoever is your person, especially in a primary. I don't care who your person is. What I've urged people to do before Trump was elected and just after was I don' care how much we might disagree if we're both on the left somewhere. Please focus on building up rather than taking down.

0:39:47 Matt: That's right, that is right.

0:39:47 Thomas: Build up the candidates you want and the people you agree with. Build up rather then just going negative on the Democrats you don't like. I think it's still effective. It's still going to be you putting your voice in wherever that is on the left and you making your values known. But it won't have the byproduct of also destroying the enthusiasm for an already very, very damaged party and brand. We just need it. No one likes the Democratic Party now. Just no one does.

0:40:12 Matt: We can agree.

0:40:12 Thomas: But we need it like it's all we have.

0:40:14 Matt: We need opposition. And if you're looking around and nobody else is doing it, then get in touch with Amanda Lipman and run for something. You can run for school board, run for mayor, do it.

0:40:18 Thomas: Hey, hey, maybe that's you. Yeah. Yeah, there you go. Yeah

0:40:23 Matt: So yeah, just close this one out. The constitution does not permit the executive to commandeer the entire appointment's power by unilaterally creating a federal agency pursuant to executive order and insulating its principal officer from the constitution Constitution as a quote -unquote advisor in name only. So great finding.

0:40:36 Thomas: Being a judge became a lot easier recently. It's just like, oh, the bar is so low. Well, there's actually three branches of government. Thank you very much. I'll cash my check and take my lifetime appointment.

0:40:43 Matt: It's so true. Checks and balances. Heard them?

0:40:53 Thomas: It's like, man, lowest common denominator now. Anyone could be a judge.

0:40:56 Matt: So true. That's really the theme here. It's just stuff we already knew. Speaking of stuff we already knew, let's talk about tariffs. We've got a great decision from a court I didn't even know existed. I'm going to admit, did not know that there was such a thing as a court of international trade. I don't think a lot of people did.

0:41:09 Thomas: Yeah. I saw this headline I was like what is that yeah

0:41:11 Matt: Yeah. It is one of those weird little Article III courts that just exist within the federal judiciary. It was actually an Article I court until 1956, like created by Congress as an executive kind of thing. But it's actually a full judicial court that its entire purpose, its only jurisdiction is any kind of civil action against the U .S. arising out of any law involving, among other things, tariffs. So this is the only place where this could be heard under 28 U .SC. 1581. I learned a lot about the Court of International Trade recently.

0:41:37 Matt: So they have put out a great decision. And I want to point out this is a three -judge panel from gary s katzman formerly of the mess right let us introduce ourselves

0:41:37 Thomas: It reads first off hi hi everyone uh we exist I guess I don't know we're as confused as you

0:41:48 Matt: Yeah right yeah first time long time but uh gary has katzmann who I recognize from the massachusetts appeals court all -star he's an obama appointee we've got timothy reef who's actually a trump appointee from 2019 and the big winner jane rastani appointed by ronald reagan in 1983 to this court that I didn't know existed incredible work jane restowning just been at it all this time. So they behave as this beautiful decision, which once again says something that shouldn't need to be said. But it turns out that these emergencies that Donald Trump created, because as we talked about before, of course, the tariff power is supposed to be reserved to Congress under Article 1 of the Constitution, Section 8, but he claimed it based on a couple of laws that they're analyzing to see if he actually gets to do that. The Emergency International Economic Powers Act, which is very specifically supposed to being actual emergencies, and he created these emergencies having to do with border security and fentanyl and cartels and whatever whatever, you know, just so we could punish. So they're looking at two sets of tariffs. There's the ones on Mexico and Canada, and then there's the ones in the rest of the world, the retaliatory tariffs. And based on Peter Navarro's ridiculous theories about trade deficits, and I just want to quote Trump here, I had to write this down, trade deficits mean you lose and surpluses mean you win. It's so stupid.

0:41:52 Thomas: Are yeah yeah jeez so dumb dude

0:43:01 Matt: It's like a fifth grader's idea of trade. So stupid.

0:43:03 Thomas: Does anyone else just constantly do battle in their minds over he can't be this dumb oh wait yeah he is that dumb Like there's must, no, he is that dumb.

0:43:08 Matt: Right. Yes. No, he just, everything is winning or losing. And if they're getting more of our stuff and it's just, Yeah.

0:43:15 Thomas: Like you could even, I know, I'm, I know that I'm the worst, Matt, but you could even take a winning or losing view that was more based on what words mean. You know, you could be like, well, our trade deficit is us winning because we are having the extra money to buy crap that no one here wants to make while we get to have an economy. That's more fun. That's service -based. Like you can even, it's just, it says I'm always pedantic, but like there's 18 levels of stupid to this. And you could even be like the 80s businessman villain and be like, yeah, we're winning.

0:43:48 Thomas: We are. Because would you rather be a country where everyone works in manufacturing t -shirts? I tend to be someone who's like, I don't want anyone to be living in harsh conditions and making no money. But if you were taking a very winner take all black and white view of the world, we are winning in that interaction. And a deficit has nothing to do do with it it is a sign of us winning really yeah yeah

0:44:10 Matt: I'm glad you mentioned services because we are winning services. When he's talking about the deficit, he's talking about goods specifically in the surplus and deficit. So I mean, yeah, it's all so dumb. And I'd love to get deeper on this decision. We've got more good news to talk about, but essentially pretty much what you would think that this is not a national emergency, that he doesn't have unlimited powers to declare tariffs because that's what Congress is supposed to do. It really is supposed be for, let me find the the language here.

0:44:17 Thomas: So dumb wow sure sure yet another judging job that I guess I'm now qualified for baby anyone hiring I got this

0:44:38 Matt: Yeah. Maybe only exercised to deal with an unusual and extraordinary threat with respect to which national emergency has been declared and may not be exercised for any other purpose. So essentially, he's just making things up and calling them emergencies. And they are very, very mad about this. They filed an emergency motion already up to the federal circuit. So there's a circuit that just considers these little Article III courts that aren't circuit courts that reviews these. The injunction threatens to unwind months of foreign policy decision -making, again, based on bullshit emergencies, right? Sensitive diplomatic negotiations, based on things you made up at the expense of the nation's economic well -being and national security, which I have to think would be a lot worse off if the tariffs went forward.

0:45:03 Thomas: Yeah no wrong yeah

0:45:13 Matt: But anyway, so we'll see how this goes. But this is a great decision from a tripartisan panel and just like, well, I mean, I guess not tripartism, but a broad panel of judges.

0:45:20 Thomas: I didn't even know they had three of those yeah hey it's a trade thing it's an economic thing maybe they found an awful libertarian to be part of it you

0:45:30 Matt: They're already calling them activist judges, of course, and saying they're going to appeal this as hard as they can.

0:45:32 Thomas: Know these judges we've never ever heard of? Activists.

0:45:37 Matt: But yeah, but this really,

0:45:37 Thomas: Wow. That was sneaky of us activists to like inhabit a court or whatever that we don't even, I still don't know. I actually want to ask you what this is because I already forget. So that's amazing that we, it would also happen to be activists.

0:45:50 Matt: No, it's very good work.

0:45:51 Thomas: Is there anything we can't do?

0:45:52 Matt: Very good work getting those people in there just for this yeah in 1983 too that's really thinking ahead

0:45:58 Thomas: Talk about a Manchurian candidate. Yes.

0:46:00 Matt: Right sleeper so both the trafficking tariffs for canada mexico and the worldwide retaliatory tariffs have been struck down and government's very unhappy but this could be really really good for this entire disastrous plan because this is a court order that's a lot harder to violate so we'll see yeah we'll say gotta toss off one more big piece of good news and there's so much other good stuff too that I want to talk about but harvard we're gonna talk I don't usually like to talk about Harvard.

0:46:16 Thomas: Interesting. I also think toss off is This is not the phrase you were looking for there. I think that's a different kind of, yeah, toss

0:46:31 Matt: Maybe we can retake that. You don't say that? A little toss -off? Okay. I guess if you're in the British sense, it's not so good.

0:46:39 Thomas: Out is usually what Americans say for this kind of thing.

0:46:42 Matt: Speaking of tossers, Donald J. Trump.

0:46:44 Thomas: I don't think I ever made, is that connected? I don'T think I EVER made the connection that that slang is probably what that means. So it's like a, it's LIKE a wanker. Yeah. It's like the same, boy, they have a lot of great words for the same thing. Wow. Nice.

0:46:48 Matt: I think that's what a right tosser is. Yeah. Yeah, pretty sure.

0:46:55 Matt: We have a deficit on slang. We really do, the British.

0:46:59 Thomas: I know we have a lot of British listeners to fill me in if I'm if that's incorrect, because I'd never thought of it before. I love it.

0:47:05 Matt: But don't be a right dosser about it. All right. So why isn't Harvard saying, I love this as a great start, like, why didn't Harvard tell us that almost 31 % of their students are from, in caps, foreign lands? And yet those countries, some of them not friendly to the US, pay, in cap, nothing toward their students' education, nor did they ever intend to. This is such a weird standard.

0:47:23 Thomas: What are you talking about? Yeah. Did my country pay for me to go to college? No, I don't understand.

0:47:25 Matt: Do we pay for people to study in France?

0:47:29 Matt: It's nuts. This is a Truth Social post. This is related to what he's done. I'm sure you've seen. But they tried to stop Harvard's ability to issue student visas or to control student visas at all. They're suspending all new student visa interviews. This is right in the middle of the season when they're trying to get this going for students.

0:47:42 Thomas: Well, and they're the ones who already do it, right? It's like they're acting like Harvard and other, I guess, universities are smuggling in. They're like human trafficking students in. It's not like they do it. It's just like, no, they have to go through your government, the federal agency in charge of this, to even be there to begin with, right. They already know this.

0:48:01 Matt: That's, I didn't even get to the most absurd part of this whole thing where he says, we want those names and countries where these students are coming from. It's like, that's your job.

0:48:08 Thomas: Okay. Print them. Print him out. Print Him off.

0:48:09 Matt: That's we, we, maybe we should set up some kind of system where we keep track of all these students.

0:48:13 Thomas: Email yourself a PDF of them that you already have.

0:48:17 Matt: Right. Great. It's incredible. I mean, okay, I just have to say though, I mean this is, and again, I'm very proud to live in Massachusetts. I know it comes up all the time, but this is our industry. This is college. We're a university town. I got my issues with Harvard, but they are a very important school. They do a lot of good work and this is a direct declaration of war, of trying to stop, because I mean it's just again, it's exactly the opposite of what he's saying. The students from coming on student visas for the most part are paying full freight. They're not getting a lot of money.

0:48:19 Thomas: So dumb yeah we make more money off of

0:48:42 Matt: That's right. And they're great for the economy and they are great for these institutions institutions. And it is, I mean, Harvard is basically saying this is an existential threat to the entire university. I mean this is 20 to 30 % depending on the program, it's going to be foreign students. And so Kristi Noem, head of DHS, sent a letter, completely nonsense letter, two different letters, one in April and one in May, in which she's saying essentially that Harvard is perpetuating an unsafe campus environment that's hostile to Jewish students, promotes pro -Hamas sympathies, and employs racist DEI policies. So she's demanding all of these records that they have no right to demand. And so there is a system, the student exchange system that is kind of co -managed by the universities and the federal government. And the universities already have to report, for example, if you drop out, if You stop going to class, universities have to narc on you and say that, you know, you're in violation of your visa and they can come and get you.

0:49:24 Thomas: That yeah fair enough they should have done that on elon faster in the 90s but uh yeah

0:49:30 Matt: Right? Exactly. As we've talked about, should have been subjected to that, but they were going way above and asking for all kinds of stuff, citing no law whatsoever. And then just saying essentially that they're just going to cancel as of May 22nd, all of Harvard student visas and not allow them to get any more. And then they sent a really harsh one just this week where they're saying they're going to withdraw them from the student visa program completely, which is insane.

0:49:49 Matt: Nothing like this has ever happened. So of course, as I predicted, I have to say I was about 12 hours off in my prediction, but I did predict that this would be stopped by the end of the day.

0:49:48 Thomas: What wow well do better matt

0:49:58 Matt: It was early the next day, but it was stopped because this is absurd. And so we have a great preliminary injunction. It's just been extended as of the time we're recording. And obviously, Harvard is going to be able to keep issuing student visas. This was based on nothing, and they are trying actively to destroy academia right now in a very intentional way and they can't do it right

0:50:14 Thomas: This is a minor thing and maybe I'll talk about on it's more of a where there's woke topic but I love when so many of the assholes so many f sticks that are responsible for spreading anti -woke hatred which is what leads to Trump because a lot of them are Harvard people are now like whoa whoa whoa like we had to get a New York Times opinion thing from Steven Pinker such a freaking doofus god that guy sucks and he's like look there's no and it's I love it because they can't ever admit they're wrong they have to be like look yes there are crazy wokists running around the university system but it's only like a handful it's like you mean the thing you fear -mongered that like has contributed to the climate that we're in right now.

0:50:58 Matt: That you say is running

0:50:59 Thomas: But he's like, oh wait, but if you're using it to go a little too far, then nevermind. You can only use it to be really shitty about DEI and about a lot of other stuff. But if you can actually harm Harvard, oh, that's too far. And it's just so rich, you know, it's like... Yeah, exactly.

0:51:04 Matt: Everything it's my paycheck yeah right

0:51:14 Thomas: It's just, it's so pathetic. And, and it's, like, I wish... It's been one of these things where it's me and a few other people, it feels like, have seen through their shtick this whole time. I just want more people to recognize that it's been a shtic the The whole time, like all the campus free speech stuff, all the fear mongering over campus craziness, all of that has been for this the whole time. And you can't now be like, whoa, wait, wait. Nope. It's all the same thing. You're all doing the same one thing.

0:51:38 Matt: Yeah and I never thought I'd say this but solidarity to harvard university keep it going they're fighting some good fights right now

0:51:43 Thomas: I don't know if I can go that far, but okay. Solidarity to the students who probably worked really hard to get there. I don'T think foreign students, and I don' t know how many of them actually worked hard to get their, probably some, definitely some.

0:51:48 Matt: There we go oh yeah sure

0:51:55 Thomas: And I feel bad for them.

0:51:57 Matt: But harvard is putting up a fight they they they refused from the beginning to give the records which they didn't have to give it is obviously in their best interest to make sure they can still have students from foreign countries but But keep watching this. And this is a really important fight, just like all the other ones we've been talking about.

0:51:58 Thomas: Yeah, that's good. More good news well we are just about to get to our footnote which has rapidly become my favorite segment only gotta take one last little break before we get there all right matt let's have it I love this footnote segment it's been so good what do we got

0:52:24 Matt: Well, I'm not going to go as silly as we usually do. I got to talk about a follow -up to a story that I was telling you about last month in which I disappeared one of my clients and he ended up in New Mexico. And I want to just kind of tease what's going on here because I'm going to be coming back on this story much more. I'm hoping that we're going to have some audio and we'll be able to break down exactly what happened here. Because I think as a microcosm looking at this situation with my client's permission, we're not going into any identifying details. I'll just going to talk generally about what happened there. But I want focus on the immigration judge. And I would never do this otherwise. And I've never done this before. But I'm going to talk specifically about one immigration judge who was acting very badly and specifically told me on the record that he doesn't want people to know what he's doing.

0:53:01 Thomas: Holy shit bury the lead here

0:53:01 Matt: So it turns out, I've got a place where I can tell people what he is doing. So let me just introduce you to Ralph Kirvan. I've got a voicemail here, which I'm perfectly allowed to play. There's no reason I can't play it on the podcast. So let's play that voicemail I received from this judge. To the wrong number, by the way.

0:53:11 Thomas: Really holy smokes everyone this is

0:53:18 Matt: Yeah, he wasn't, he didn't call the number that we asked him to recall.

0:53:20 Thomas: But it was meant for you though oh okay gotcha just okay I was like she's it's not like him doing something separate not related to you and now you have this voicemail no this is to you okay yeah let's play

0:53:22 Matt: Right. Just wrong me number.

0:53:32 Clip: Mr. Cameron, this is Judge Gerben, using 19th century technology, unfortunately, your 21st century technology is not working, as well, I guess, we'll have to call each other, again, have a great day, sir.

0:53:39 Thomas: It what what the

0:53:45 Matt: Does that sound like a federal judge to you, Thomas?

0:53:47 Thomas: I don't that what the hell is that

0:53:49 Matt: It sounds like somebody yelling at me in the street is what it sounds like. So just a little background here. Ralph Kervin is, as far as I know, one of the only judges out of the 700 immigration judges within the immigration court system who refuses to use the WebEx video court system, the video teleconferencing system that you and I paid to get installed into his courtroom. And he insists on telephonic hearings. He insists on having... And again, to set this up, this is a judge who's overseeing detained cases in New Mexico, which is one of of the places where when you sing all these stories about people being kidnapped off the street by guys in masks, that's where they're

0:54:00 Thomas: Oh I had to pay for that

0:54:18 Matt: Sending them to places like this, to judges like this on purpose. And I am breaking some pretty serious codes here by talking about this. I would not usually be doing this, but I think it's this important. I think this is something that we can actually take on. I am taking it on through the usual channels right now, and I'm not encouraging anybody to do anything at the moment. And certainly everything we're talking about is I might be encouraging people to call and write at some point. But right now I just want to tell you what's going on. And then I want to tease this a little bit so you understand that there is a a pressure point here that there are things that we can do as citizens to make sure that our government is accountable to us and this is one place. You should not have, in May of 2025, an immigration judge deciding he's just not going to allow people to log in and see what's going on in his courtroom on video in the system he's been given. But apart from that, even if you're talking about the public openness, which is supposed to be an open courtroom, like if you go down to New Mexico right now, you're supposed to go in and watch. I mean, he probably would turn you away. But for lawyers, it's extremely inconvenient to have to sit there and wait for the phone call when you could just be sitting in the equivalent of a Zoom lobby, right? And he just lets you in as you go. I just did three of these today. Did three of them yesterday. This is very convenient. This is how it's supposed to be since the pandemic. We have this great video system. Works very well. Everybody loves it. I can sit here with my shoes off drinking coffee and appear in court. And what he wants to do is call each lawyer individually. And I've been told again and again, including in a written order, that Judge Girvin does not, in quotes, do WebEx.

0:54:18 Thomas: Fuck wow

0:55:34 Matt: So I filed an 11 -page motion with a three -page affidavit and 15 pages of supporting documents payments to request formally my video hearing, which is not something you should have to do. Usually that's if you have to file a motion for video hearing. That's going to be a couple of sentences just saying, hey, I'm in Boston. You're in New Mexico. Let's get on video.

0:55:49 Matt: Don't make me come in. And the first time that I missed his phone call, he set the case over for two more weeks. My client was basically sentenced to two more weeks in ICE custody. The second time and again, the call registered is coming into my cell phone, but I never heard it ring and I tested my ringer. Everything was fine. So maybe it rang once or twice.

0:55:59 Thomas: Yeah that happens all the time yeah

0:56:02 Matt: It can happen. Yeah. And I was told he also doesn't do second calls. So my client was put over for 26 more days, 26 more days, and I'd had it. So I called the clerk and I said, I'm filing a motion. We're going to put this on next week. I can't let my client sit there because I may or may not have missed a phone call. The whole point of this video system is to make the court easier to administer. There's multiple DHO memos telling them to use it. There was a memo that ASC pointed out was rescinded that said if they're goingto say they can't use it, they have to give me something in writing. I'm still hoping for written findings. But my point is that when I went on the record this week on this case to seek nothing more than involuntary departure because now the bond has been denied for reasons that I want to discuss right now. This is a client who is almost a living saint. This

0:56:06 Thomas: Oh how nice wow jeez

0:56:40 Matt: Guy's a deacon in his church, really well -known in his community, fix old ladies' roofs, works really hard, has a young kid, absolutely nothing against him at all. There's nothing against Him. And when I asked him finally for the only thing left that we have, which is voluntary departure, the right to go back to his country, not at taxpayer expense, to pay for his own ticket and to leave without a deportation, the response from this judge was, I don't know, I'm not feeling it.

0:57:02 Matt: I'm never publicly talked about the conduct of any given immigration judge, and I'm probably putting myself into trouble by doing this, but I'm filing a complaint. I'm finding a lengthy complaint with everything attached because the explanation when I demanded one on the record that I got from him was that he did not want immigration activists and unscrupulous attorneys. And I'm not talking about you, Mr. Cameron, but he was, doesn't want unscupulous attorneys putting this stuff up on YouTube, which again, to be clear, multiple regulation statutes and criminal penalties, potentially, and administrative penalties. I would expect to lose my bar license if I posted a video from Immigration Court that I'd recorded myself on YouTube.

0:57:17 Thomas: What? Oh, that's why he's not doing the video.

0:57:38 Matt: That's what he says. He says he doesn't want...

0:57:39 Thomas: I thought you were... The way he transitioned, I thought that was why he was not feeling it. Like why he wasn't feeling it at all. That part of it.

0:57:44 Matt: Right, no. Yeah. And again, I could barely hear the government counsel because he's doing it on speakerphone, right?

0:57:48 Thomas: Mm -hmm.

0:57:48 Matt: And if I'd done it on video, there's a mic right there. It would have been very easy. The whole thing is an inconvenience and it is intentionally so they can do more of this in the dark because they're dealing with people who are from all over the country right now being kidnapped off our streets and being sent to the most conservative places.

0:58:02 Matt: And my client informed me that in the three months that he's been there, not a single person has been been granted release on bond, which is unheard of. That is statistically impossible. I understand there's some people with records, although increasingly, having sat through a detained hearing this morning in Texas, nobody in that hearing had a criminal record.

0:58:09 Thomas: This is just terrible. Wow.

0:58:19 Matt: That's pretty unusual, honestly, at this point. They're just getting everybody right now. So I'm fired up and I'm going to do what I can. I'll keep everybody updated on this one. But I just want to make a point that there are ways that we can protest against these things as attorneys and that we can say more and do more. And that's where I'm at with it. This one little thing, and I'm, from what I understand from talking to people in the area, advocates in the area, this is a very well -known problem. This is a well-known issue with this judge, among other issues. And you can imagine if he's talking to lawyers this way, how he's talking to without lawyers. And I'm getting reports about that, too. So we will see. I've said a lot more than I should have, probably, but that's my footnote for today, is how important video is for immigration proceedings and how we have to watch this stuff. We have to see what our government's doing. And there is, I'm just going to put this out there, a webpage on the DOJ site, where every single one of the immigration judges' video court links is available.

0:59:10 Matt: All of them. And you can go watch it in immigration court. Now, not all those proceedings are open. Obviously, if it's an asylum hearing, if they're doing a particularly sensitive hearing, they're going to kick you out. But you have the right to try to ask to observe, just as you would to walk into your local courtroom, which I'd also recommend. They're still doing these in court. They're just putting them on a video as well. But this is a system that needs to be watched, just like all of our systems. And if you're not happy about these things you're hearing in the news, there's nothing wrong with just stopping in and observing immigration court, just sit in on some detained hearings and see what's going on right now.

0:59:35 Thomas: Yeah. Wow. Wow. Shoot. I want to keep an eye on this, but I would normally hurl insults and stuff, but I don't want to get you in trouble.

0:59:42 Matt: Yeah, I think we've probably done enough here.

0:59:43 Thomas: So, yeah. Well, that is... Wow. Ugh. Okay. Okay. I'm just going to stop talking. We'll just call it there and we'll keep an eye on it. But yeah. Wow. A lot to think about. But what a good episode, Matt. Lots of good news in there. And it's good to hear the law fighting back and the system somewhat existing.

0:59:50 Matt: Me too. Yeah. Still happening. Good things are still happening. And there was more than I could even get to today. We'll get to more of it next week.

1:00:06 Thomas: Yeah. All right. Well, thanks so much for listening, everyone. Hey, please tell your friends about the show, especially this one. We want to cheer up. This was a great episode. We need to fight. We need to stay engaged. And I'm so glad we have Matt to keep us abreast of this immigration stuff that I don't, I've never heard anybody talk about that. I just think it's so critical. Otherwise, these people just are disappeared quietly and we don't even know about it. Yeah.

1:00:27 Matt: That's what they want.

1:00:28 Thomas: All right. Well, thanks for listening, everyone. Thanks most of all to the patrons who support the show. Thanks, Matt. And we'll see you on Monday.

1:00:34 Matt: All right. See you later. Let's move on to some other good news. This is outstanding. Good news. We should take a break. I'm just so excited about my good news, so you might've seen, uh, this is an, Oh, there we go. Okay. Ongoing coverage.

1:00:55 Thomas: Should we take a break first? We're pretty far into it. Yeah. You're on, Matt.