I appreciate @dropout.tv releasing the ultimate set of hypotheticals on the day when recent law graduates are supposed to begin studying for the bar.

New at Can We Still Govern? Trump is relocating more federal employees, this time for the USDA Food and Nutrition Service, which oversees SNAP. The rationale is to bring services closer to the public. But that is not what the data shows, says Jon Schwabish. 🧵 donmoynihan.substack.com/p/why-is-tru...

Ten years ago today, I walked across the stage at Northrop Auditorium and received my JD. On Saturday, I get to stand on the same stage and read the names of the 2026 graduates (the first full cohort that I taught in law school). We have come full circle.

Shaw on Power and Immunity in Youngstown and Trump v. United States Katherine Shaw (University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School) has posted Power and Immunity in Youngstown and Trump v. United States (174 University of Pennsylvania Law Review Online 39 (2026)) on SSRN. Here is the abstract: In…

Oh boy! Do @tphillips.bsky.social and I have an article for everyone about the recent mischievousness surrounding quorums. papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

House Republicans are zeroing in on why agencies settle so many disputes with federal workers, while attorneys who handle these cases say dragging every fight through litigation would likely cost the government even more. By Erich Wagner:

The destruction of US pandemic preparedness, infectious disease research, our withdrawal from WHO, is a five-alarm fire. Want something to be worried about? Should we be faced with another pandemic, we are now more vulnerable than ever. www.thenation.com/article/soci...

Creating tools you can use to stay informed doesn’t happen by accident. They're built—and sustained—by people who support it: lawfaremedia.org/support

My paper “Bureaucracy and Distrust: the Civil Service in the Constitution” has been published in Current Legal Problems. It looks at the UK civil service’s constitutional foundations, and how it might respond to a populist govt. It's open access. currentlegalproblems.org/article/bure...

Some feds are eyeing OPM’s latest workforce skills survey with suspicion, saying months of layoffs, purges and “efficiency” messaging have made even routine hiring initiatives feel harder to trust. Erich Wagner reports: buff.ly/thK9B0a #federalworkforce

Social Security field offices are not OK after the loss of thousands of frontline employees last year. Terrific new reporting on the human costs of the Trump Administration's deep cuts on older, disabled, and bereaved families. www.newyorker.com/news/deep-st...

"The Government cannot escape liability for DOGE’s work by scapegoating ChatGPT." A US judge slammed DOGE's use of AI in a decision today blocking the termination of $100M in humanities grants, finding DOGE lacked authority and unlawfully based decisions on race and viewpoint buff.ly/Qw0qcDH

If we experience another global pandemic exacerbated by the erosion of administrative capacity, I will lose my mind.

Michael Lewis's book The Fifth Risk is all about how the modern federal government was set up to reduce & eliminate a vast array of invisible problems, which it has done so well that it opened a door to wreckers who claim it did nothing, & are now making that lie true—with disastrous results

DOJ cares enough about @lawfaremedia.org to troll us. If our work matters to you as well, please consider making a donation! www.lawfaremedia.org/about/support

The Trump regime's desire for authoritarian domination is bottomless, but its capacity is not. In corrupting DOJ, changing it from a law enforcement org into a try to hurt people the president personally dislikes org, they've reduced their prosecutorial capacity to the point of desperation.

Law profs - ICYMI, @washulawreview.bsky.social just posted a Call for Papers on Scholastica for their upcoming Symposium on "The Many Faces of the State." What a great idea for a symposium - very timely and innovative.

What a strange coincidence... news.bloomberglaw.com/us-law-week/...

Attended a University-wide awards ceremony tonight. Truly awe-inspiring. You forget you’re surrounded by people devoted to questions like “how do wind turbines behave in snow?” and “what’s the best way to treat outpatient COVID?” Academics' hyper-specific obsessions are keeping civilization running.

🚨New paper. 🧵Our baseline estimate implies that preserving trust in the integrity and quality of official statistics generates economic benefits of about $25 for every $1 spent on the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics's budget. cc: @nickbloom.bsky.social, @ericagroshen.bsky.social, #econsky

USDA is moving food assistance staff out of DC and regional offices into new hubs. Officials say it will improve service. Workers warn many won’t relocate, and #SNAP and #WIC could break if the workforce walks. Eric Katz explains: buff.ly/lSIvV27 #USDA

This article asks whether the Roberts Court’s formalist turn—resurgent nondelegation, major‑questions doctrine, & unitary‑executive theory—threatens independent agencies, focusing on the U.S. Sentencing Commission. Read: spkl.io/63324AAnZC Subscribe: spkl.io/63328AAnw8

US Department of Justice loses a quarter of its lawyers ft.trib.al/VHEV5T4

ICYMI: Watch @benjaminwittes.lawfaremedia.org, @annabower.bsky.social, @mollyroberts.bsky.social, @rparloff.bsky.social and @nicholasbednar.bsky.social discuss the indictment of James Comey, the 2nd Circuit rejecting the mandatory detention policy, and more.

Interesting research agenda by @alanrozenshtein.com on @lawfaremedia.org about what scholars need to consider with the rise of AI in the executive branch. www.lawfaremedia.org/article/exec...

In 1 hour, watch @benjaminwittes.lawfaremedia.org, @nicholasbednar.bsky.social, @annabower.bsky.social, @rparloff.bsky.social, and @mollyroberts.bsky.social discuss the James Comey indictment, TPS oral argument at the Supreme Court, and more. youtube.com/live/uReoTs5...

Judge Dale Ho blocks termination of TPS status for Yemen (about 3000 nationals). Failure to adhere to procedural requirements violated APA. (Noem had conceded conditions still "prevent Yemeni nationals from returning in safety.") storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

Over at @lawfaremedia.org, I discuss Judge Furman's latest order in the Maurene Comey case. I'll talk about it in more detail this afternoon at 4:00PM ET on Lawfare Live.

I should just start a running thread. www.washingtonpost.com/climate-envi...

As someone who finds reviewability questions somewhat uninteresting, I find that I am writing a lot about Thunder Basin these days....

Over at @lawfaremedia.org, we are launching a 5-week effort to sustain our independent, nonpartisan, expert analysis. Keeping our work accessible to anyone who wants it requires support from our readers and listeners. If Lawfare matters to you, reshare this and donate today!

My latest article "Faithless Prosecution" is now available on SSRN. Comments welcome via email. papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

I know I listen to too much @lawfaremedia.org because I was able to identify @benjaminwittes.lawfaremedia.org on @npr.org without an introduction.

Call for papers for a workshop on state public law here in Boulder on August 13-14! Abstracts due May 31. More info below!

This is great — and seems right on the statutory interpretation question to me. The CSRA aimed to create an efficient, professional federal workforce, not countenance the president’s personal vendettas. It exists to *promote* accountability, not deflect it. Kudos to Judge Furman

Victoria Nourse, LDAD, and I have filed a brief in Harris v. Bessent in favor of granting certiorari and reversing the D.C. Circuit's decision that members of the MSPB are removable at will.

Judge Furman of SDNY dismisses the government's motion to dismiss for lack of jurisdiction in the Maurene Comey case. Case does not fall within the purview of CSRA's review scheme. storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

There is massive infrastructural damage being done to our country by this administration, some of which we will not recover from in my lifetime, possibly even my kids'. www.nytimes.com/2026/04/27/c...

The federal government currently employs zero elevator operators or film assemblers and repairers, yet these job titles still officially exist. OPM is finally abolishing these and other obsolete job titles as part of a consolidation affecting 5K federal workers. Eric Katz reports:

Senate Dems are asking #SCOTUS to reverse a ruling that allowed the president to remove a member of the Merit Systems Protection Board. The fight is really about whether the fed employee appeals system can stay insulated from White House control or not. By Sean Michael Newhouse:

Lucy got some new @umnlawschool.bsky.social swag.

I would argue that rebuilding is a long project but not a defeated one. The question of how to build capacity preceded Trump. A lot of existing capacity was built in 10-20 year stints following intense moments of institutional stress. It requires both institutional reform and public persuasion.

In the first eleven months of 2025, 10,109 doctoral-trained scientists left the federal government. The losses were concentrated in agencies that fund medical research, regulate environmental standards and model climate. theintellectualistofficial.substack.com/p/more-than-...?

Young Americans are very low trust, sometimes bordering on nihilism. It’s up to us to build institutions that make them want to act with social trust—to make an effort at school, to vote, to have normal social interactions in public spaces, to date, to not shoplift or evade fares, etc

When DOGE arrived at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the operatives had no real background in nuclear issues. They boxed out experienced hands, forcing resignations and massive exodus of talent. Over 400 people have since left or been forced out. Our full story: https://propub.li/3OBQMwk

The #USDA is moving 2,600 employees out of Washington to regional hubs across the country, despite Congress blocking such relocations without authorization. The department says it has legal approval to proceed anyway, though Democrats suggest this will end up in court. Eric Katz: buff.ly/sjt00Rg

🚨Job opportunity🚨 UNC Poli Sci is hiring a postdoc (one year renewable) to advance research on political behavior, with a special focus on free expression in higher education. Competitive salary and benefits. No teaching. Please encourage people to apply. Ad: timryan.web.unc.edu/wp-content/u...

Just read the sentence: "Coffee is incompatible with anarchy." Now that's my kind of political economy.

The biggest future fights over appointments and removals are going to involve the inferior officer/SES tier of the civil service. These are critical offices that involve a hard-to-separate mix of empirical/ legal work on the one hand and policy discretion on the other.