Among Botstein’s sins (if not crimes): Donation-laundering. As President of Bard, he accepted $ purportedly from Leon Black that was actually from Epstein — and failed to disclose that to the board. drive.google.com/file/d/1axoP...

🧵 stay for the bar chart

Important FT story about the mass exodus of lawyers from DOJ From Jan. 1, 2025 to Jan. 31, 2026, 3,402 of DOJ's 12,955 lawyers left. FT alludes to -- but doesn't link -- its actual source for those #s: this excellent Justice Connection post by Philip Fields, who analyzed OPM data.

An Orwellian use of “good faith” by the NYT’s Glenn Thrush: “Blanche might be seeking … to keep Mr. Trump … satisfied [in] his campaign of retribution …. Securing an indictment on such a legally shaky case could signal … a **good-faith** effort to punish Mr. Comey, even if the prosecution fails”

The point of the indictment is to demonstrate that ➡️ the United States Department of Justice is wholly an instrument of Donald Trump’s senescent pique … ➡️ in the war between Donald Trump and the U.S. Department of Justice, Trump has won.

DOJ as Trump’s errand boy — doing whatever he wants Yesterday: a Trump rant disguised as a civil court motion. Today: a baseless indictment of Comey. CNN: Since becoming Acting Attorney General, “Todd Blanche … has picked up the pace in bringing cases that the president has publicly jockeyed for.”

It's no wonder that the 7 other DOJ lawyers on this case (both career & political) wouldn't sign their names to this screed. So it fell to the very top of DOJ -- the current # 2, the current # 1, Acting AG Todd Blanche, & a 3rd official who now holds Emil Bove's old job -- to file Trump's rant.

When a top political appointee in Trump's DOJ appears *personally* before a federal district court, it's often to file a document so extreme or corrupt, career DOJ lawyers refuse to be associated with it & don't sign the document. (For examples, see 🧵 below.) Yesterday DOJ's # 2 official, ...

Good news: While the judge in the Trump v IRS case didn’t cite @protectdemocracy.org’s excellent amicus brief, she’s doing what they asked: Trump & the IRS must explain whether they’re sufficiently adverse to give the court jurisdiction. (Apparently Judge Kathleen Williams is no Aileen Cannon.)

In this kind of situation, an insider’s disclosure — even in violation of a confidentiality norm / rule — might be called whistleblowing, and, of course, there’s a rich literature on the legality and morality of such whistleblowing.

In the the Flynn v US lawsuit, there was no one to rebut DOJ's weak arguments. But in another collusive suit, Trump v IRS, where Trump is seeking a govt payout of “at least” $10 billion, 4 former high level federal tax officials have filed ... storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

A related problem: Trump so dominates the Justice Department that when his friends (and he) file a lawsuit against the federal government, DOJ can settle the case (no matter how dubious), & the govt pays out millions of $ (out of the Judgment Fund). E.g.: DOJ $1.2m settlement w/ Michael Flynn

In decrying Trump et al's corrupt use of the Judgment Fund, @sbagen.bsky.social suggests adding this Fund to the list of items we must reform in order to restore our democracy. Who is keeping such a list? Who is creating a reform agenda for restoring the rule-of-law? #RuleOfLawReformAgenda

Sotomayor didn't walk back her public criticism of Kavanaugh But today, she acknowledged that her "remarks ... were inappropriate" & "hurtful," expressed "regret" for making them, & said she "apologized to my colleague." Most public apologies fail miserably Recent examples abound But she nailed it

A beautiful story 👇 “Maria taught her kids about all the Minnesotans who marched in the streets … the food left on their doorstep when their fridge was empty … that Good & Pretti were killed …while standing up for immigrants like them. … ‘this country is very beautiful, specifically Minnesota.’”

Trump et al. have created a “society where corruption at the highest levels is blatant, normalized, and winked at” Unless we stop him, we will become: “a society in which ordinary people are not only dishonest, but view honesty as a trait of saps and fools too dimwitted to see how the world works”

Great 🧵 about the significance of the election in Hungary 👇 “Orbánism is the model home after which a sprawling network of nationalists have patterned their politics and governance.” We need to examine how Hungarians defeated Orban & then apply those lessons to defeat Trump.

Corruption trickles down. A society where corruption at the highest levels is blatant, normalized, and winked at tends to become a society in which ordinary people are not only dishonest, but view honesty as a trait of saps and fools too dimwitted to see how the world works.

Thanks also for the link to Deputy Legal Advisor Elizabeth Wilmshurst’s resignation memo #ResignationInProtest, 2003 Iraq War-UK Foreign Ministry edition

Government lawyers — and anyone interested in the ethics of government lawyers — need to run, not walk, to this website & read @profmarkovic.bsky.social’s excellent, succinct essay about 2 British government lawyers who spoke truth to power in the run-up to the 2003 war on Iraq.

I’m not crying. You’re crying. Man, we really needed Artemis II, and not for any of its technical or scientific breakthroughs.

Idk man. Maybe we should invest all the bombing schools money into cool science shit instead.

This whole approach is torn from the playbook of the “Merchants of Doubt,” as @markhisted.org has noted: A few outlier academics who promote junk legal history, following in the ignominious footsteps of those who promoted junk science so Big Tobacco could keep killing people with impunity.

Justice Sotomayor criticizes Kavanaugh for his ignorant indifference: He refused to acknowledge the significant harm caused by #KavanaughStops Let that shameful phrase hang around his neck until his dying day @akalhan.bsky.social

#ResignationInProtest, Nashville US Attorney’s Office edition “Ben Schrader, the Middle District of Tennessee's longtime chief of the criminal division, … recommended against the prosecution” of Abrego Garcia & “resigned in protest” on the day he was indicted. www.allrisenews.com/p/abrego-vin...

🤬IF anyone should’ve known better.

Sure looks like the US Holocaust Memorial Museum is obeying in advance of Trump demands that it censor its website and programs. See:

Even war criminal Elliott Abrams opposes Trump’s war crimes

a beautiful 🧵👇 showing how, since the 1980s, science has dramatically extended the lives of folks with cancer, HIV, etc. #ScienceSavesLives

Exactly

An update: in February 2026, *every single one* of the 1,507 refugees admitted in the United States were white South Africans: In FY 2026, the U.S. has admitted a total of 3,155 white South Africans, three Afghans, and nobody else. www.rpc.state.gov/documents/Re...

important 🧵 👇 ... and read more about how the Supreme Court's adoption of "presidentialist governance" (i.e., unitary executive theory) is destroying US science, medical research & innovation here:

DOJ to federal judge: It's not our fault. It's the fault of that lawyer over there, employed by that agency (ICE, BOP)

It seems to be the season for AUSAs to throw agency lawyers under the bus. First that SDNY/ICE debacle about arresting people at Immigration Court; now this from MDFla. Deb’s thread, like so many things these days, is appalling but enlightening. Proceed at your own risk.

Federal judge invokes uber-insult: The US government is acting like the Soviet Union !

Our letter to Congress states: “The inaction of the OIG comes at a time when the amount of governmental misconduct and violation of court orders by DOJ lawyers around the country have reached epic and unprecedented proportions.” Learn more about the epidemic of alleged misconduct at DOJ. ⬇️

Echoes of Rudy Giuliani, who - shouted claims of election fraud at press conferences and public appearances, but - made no such claim in court.

This is how political law enforcement looks— DOJ’s Office of Inspector General ignores complaints, both from whistleblowers & from Members of Congress, of major wrongdoing. And DOJ’s Office of Professional Responsibility, although never a serious accountability component, now appears dormant.

No surprise but imp't lesson for reconstruction: internal DOJ ethics checks as they exist are readily disabled. DOJ's "internal watchdog has seemingly ignored 20 instances of possible wrongdoing," w/whistleblower urging Congress to address the 'apparent collapse'” of DOJ Ofc of Inspector General.

Weeks before the US started bombing Iran, Hegseth's broker tried to invest >$1m in a defense contractor equity fund. "Wall Street analysts have been scrutinising trades made" just before Trump administration policy announcements. Will the SEC investigate those trades? Will DoD's Inspector General?

A chilling explanation of what’s at stake in this case: Trump/Miller’s goal in stripping 100m Americans of citizenship isn’t to deport them, but to create “a permanent subordinate class” of noncitizen residents with “hereditary, lifelong, inferior” status who will provide labor & subservience.

Truly the best - read it immediately if you haven't yet

Bad immigration economics assumes every extra person is one less seat. Good economics notices they also bring a seat, a side dish, and demand for the bloke selling drinks. The first story is fear; the second is how economies work.

Inspiring, empowering story A tenants’ rights lawyer, solo practitioner: - bore witness to aftermath of ICE killing Renee Good - attended a zoom training about handling habeas cases - put his regular law practice on hold - started filing habeas cases for ICE abductees - helped free 14 clients so far

An EXTREMELY helpful thing folks can do, if they live near a federal courthouse, is volunteer for Habeas Dockets. Docs in habeas cases aren't viewable online by default. But they are at courthouses. This site makes them available/searchable for free. Helps lawyers a lot habeasdockets.org/volunteer/

#ResignationInProtest, war on science edition Trump has “effectively shuttered” NASA’s Goddard Institute, which “maintains a record of surface temperatures going back to 1880, tracking satellite data on planet-warming greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide.”

“Powerus is flush with cash and…says there is no problem with it bidding for government money that could make [Trumps] richer.” @starsandstripes.bsky.social “It’s corruption. Government decision makers will feel pressure to use contract awards to enrich [Trump’s] family.” @kathleenclark.bsky.social

Some good news: The JFK Library's 2026 Profile in Courage Award for Constitutional & Human Rights goes to ... "The people of the Twin Cities ... for risking their lives to protect their neighbors & immigrant community members" www.jfklibrary.org/events-and-a...

Took California less than a day to begin the process of holding people accountable and making efforts to right wrongs. And Chavez was a revered figure! He wasn't some random finance bro pedo from NYC. Funny how the Ivys/prestige universities and the GOP protect Epstein and his buddies at all costs

A year before Howard Lutnick became Commerce Secretary, he made a big (>$100m) investment in a company (Tether) that controls 2/3 of the market for stablecoins. Then Lutnick used his government perch to "promote the development and growth” of stablecoins, with a possible payday in the billions.