Interesting news.law.fordham.edu/blog/2026/01...

1. Third Circuit litigants: the court sent out a notice overnight that the court is implementing a new automated program on the CM/ECF electronic filing system that checks briefs as they're filed for compliance with federal and local rules.

Charles Sumner was a leading voice in Congress for abolishing slavery and Reconstruction. Honestly, I wasn’t sure what to expect from an ambitious historical biography written by a law student. It ended up being my favorite book I read in 2025. www.powells.com/book/charles...

A really important piece. The times when we have opened our country to talented people from around the world are among the moments when America has been truly great. Trump is destroying that legacy and fomenting unconscionable racism. www.nytimes.com/2025/12/29/o...

These declines are MASSIVE. And the comparative silence in media coverage is absolutely DAMNING. “Why are ppl always so afraid of crime?” THIS is why. When crime goes up, media trips over itself to report it. Falls to pre-war (!!) levels? Just CRICKETS.

One of the biggest stories most people aren’t paying enough attention to yet.

I don’t read the split as moral or principled. I read it as simply disagreeing assessments about whether Trump will retain power indefinitely or not. Which is still good news.

1 - the exec branch can't decline to spend $ Congress appropriated 2- the fed govt can't use federal $ to extort states over policy/political disagreements 3-the fed govt can't use federal $ to impose conditions unrelated to the funding program 4-the fed govt can't use federal $ to coerce states

Just want to add: Being convicted of a crime in the U.S. wouldn’t justify sending someone to a foreign gulag to be tortured, and arguably violates separation of powers since the “sentence” they are legally bound to serve is one issued by a judge, not Stephen Miller (i.e. the factoid is irrelevant)

“State constitutionalism makes it easy to consider Roberts Court jurisprudence white noise,” Hawaii Justice Todd Eddins wrote in a recent ruling that assailed the U.S. Supreme Court’s conservative majority.

Equal Justice Under Trump

Well put, Matt. Hard to overstate the courage it took to make this video.

If you’ve lost your capacity to be horrified by the systematic use of a judge’s murdered child to terrorize other judges, you’ve lost your humanity

I've written a review of Rachel Maddow's new podcast #BurnOrder, about Japanese American incarceration in WWII. This is its opening. I'm pitching it to editors right now. Know someone you think would be interested? Please let me know! #MSNow #Maddow #RachelMaddow #ExecutiveOrder9066 #internment

This is extraordinary, heartbreaking, and a red alert warning sign for our democracy. These people are about to be federal judges, and they refuse to answer whether the U.S. Capitol was attacked on January 6. They say they can't comment because it's "a political controversy".

Everyone should watch this video. Everyone. Judge Salas is a person of extraordinary bravery, at a moment in our nation’s history when bravery is vital. www.nytimes.com/2025/12/18/o...

Polling: "Do you think the rich have too much political power in the U.S.?" Yes: 80% No: 8% Independent voters are 81%/6% on this; even Trump voters are 68%/18%. Maybe a political party could lead on this issue. d3nkl3psvxxpe9.cloudfront.net/documents/ec...

Maybe this new blog can respond, in one of its first posts, to the argument that the term “interim docket” is a deliberately misleading attempt to minimize the (very permanent) doctrinal and real-world consequences of #SCOTUS’s rulings on emergency applications? www.stevevladeck.com/p/177-the-no...

Code of Conduct for United States Judges, Canon 5: "A judge should not . . . attend or purchase a ticket for a dinner or other event sponsored by a political organization or candidate... A judge should not engage in any other political activity." (All judges receive training on this.)

There are a bunch of reasons for this, most of them bad. The biggest reason is that Democratic leaders tend to overestimate how much trying-and-failing makes you look weak and underestimate how much not-trying makes you look weak.

BREAKING: We won! 3rd Circuit affirms illegality of Habba appointment We @democracydefendersfund.org are honored to work on this case with the wonderful folks at Lowell & Associates, Gerald Krovatin & many others 👇

The most openly racist, eugenicist monsters are running the U.S. They will use every opportunity to advance their agenda. And as the wheels come off their regime they will only grow more brutal and obscene. These are dangerous days for us all.

Prof. @rachelbarkow.bsky.social's book should be required reading for *state* justices, specifically. Why should state supreme courts blindly follow deeply-flawed rulings responsible for widespread atrocities when they have their own, independent *state* constitutions?? bsky.app/profile/stri...

The US Marshals have posted updated data on threats to federal judges. Comparing FY2025 to the year prior, more judges reported threats, and the total number of reported threats increased by over 10%. About 16% of all judges--1 in 6--were targeted. The rise in threats continues so far in FY2026.

Watch this 👇 I am proud to have @crow.house.gov as a fellow public servant and friend. Calls to arrest and execute public servants are outrageous. And calls to uphold the Constitution are important and our shared duty.

Acts of political violence are characteristic of authoritarian regimes and dictatorships – not strong democracies. Violence of any kind has no place in our society and we must all condemn it. Especially when it comes from the President.

"The Barnes and Noble in York—where Fetterman was born and raised—had sold zero copies. The Barnes and Noble in Philadelphia had sold two copies. An independent store in Pittsburgh and an independent store in Philadelphia each told me they weren’t stocking Unfettered" defector.com/john-fetterm...

NEW: I wrote for @statecourtreport.org about the important role *state* law plays in immigration enforcement, and some ongoing litigation in WI, NY, and CA that will shape the relationship between ICE and the states and localities in which it operates. statecourtreport.org/our-work/ana...

I was recently surprised and a little alarmed to be informed that an anonymous account I've interacted with a bit here is someone I know in real life. If you post anonymously and you wonder if I've puzzled out who's behind your anonymous account without you actually telling me: not a chance.

Ellis repeatedly accuses multiple CBP and ICE officials of lying (under oath) and says their "widespread misrepresentations call into question everything" they "say they are doing in their characterization of what is happening." She broadly discredits their testimony as objectively false.

That John Roberts was more concerned with nuisance lawsuits against the president than he was with whatever this is will haunt this country for a long time

I love him. “The first time I caught up to [ICE], I could tell that they already knew who I was. They had seen me before, so they thought they were just going to speed away. I was like, ‘Ha ha, bitches, I got a new scooter!’”

Grim

EVERY SINGLE PERSON IN CONGRESS should be pressed about Trump calling for their colleagues to be killed

/3 Asserting the (legally correct) point that members of the military may refuse illegal orders is not conspiring to overthrow the government or hinder the laws by force. You can tell because if it were seditious conspiracy Trump would be pardoning it. www.pbs.org/newshour/pol...

I don't know Fifth Circuit Judge Jerry Smith and I don't follow CA5 especially closely, so I don't have anything like the same degree of insight about his dissent yesterday that'd I'd have if he were a judge in the Third Circuit, where I practice.

This might just be the least-important contribution I could possibly make to society tonight, but … I see many journalists referring to federal magistrate judges as “magistrates” and I understand that to be a no-no.

Same.

Look, as the resident fifth circuit guy here, it is not surprising that Judge Smith wrote a … vigorous …. dissent — after all, he wrote the “good ship fifth circuit is afire” dissent (where he was right) — but this is another level.

This dissent in the Texas gerrymandering case is batshit crazy and SCOTUS is going to eat it up

SCOOP: Notes obtained exclusively by Democracy Docket reveal Cleta Mitchell, leading anti-voting activists, and right-wing lawmakers met to discuss plans to limit early and mail voting — returning us to one-day elections and radically restricting ballot access.

To clarify a point that might be confusing some, this is a 3-judge district court panel on which 5th Circuit Judge Smith is sitting, not a 5th Circuit appeal panel. Almost all district court rulings are by a single (district court) judge, but one exception is for redistricting challenges like this.

Given the unprecedented and widely discussed avalanche of violent threats targeting federal judges these days, an appellate judge's decision to go after a district judge in this way in a high-profile opinion seems inappropriate. At best.

NOW: Chief Judge Boasberg is holding a hearing in the Alien Enemies Act, and announces that he does plan on continuing the contempt proceedings. He believes that will entail having people testify, but is asking the parties for their positions. “Justice requires me to move promptly on this.”

Criminal practitioners don’t astonish easily. This is astonishing.

Stop whatever you're doing and read this piece by @pemalevy.bsky.social & @ariberman.bsky.social laying out how John Roberts has spent his entire adult life constructing the scaffolding for Trump's authoritarian takeover, and why he's so invested in rigging the system to continue to help Trump.

<facepalm>

I urge members of the legal profession to realize that prosecuting individuals who seek to overturn the constitutional order is not "retaliation" in any normatively significant sense.

Some pretty rad winners here

Our local cheesesteak place just got a Michelin Bib Gourmand. How about that?