Did Donald Fagan really have an old friend named Thelonious? (Anything's possible at Bard, I suppose.)

Two of the most inexplicable things about the largely incoherent OLC opinion: First, on p.19 it says (correctly) that the operation was a "use of force" under international law, and then adds: "There is either a treaty that prohibits that use of force or there isn't." [1] @justsecurity.org

A new legal category, neither fish nor fowl (armed conflict? occupation? threatened use of force?), brought to you by your Secretary of State. "The United States remains involved to see changes in Venezuela that are beneficial to the United States." storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

This just shows how absurd the whole "armed conflict" framing is. The men on the boats weren't members of an organized armed force, and therefore the question of "perfidy" is inapposite. The problem is that they were civilians who were murdered. @justsecurity.org www.nytimes.com/2026/01/12/u...

Federal agencies have long warned that firing at moving vehicles is one of the riskiest forms of lethal force, and they’ve adopted internal policies to limit it. @rgoodlaw.bsky.social compiles all the publicly available DHS, DOJ, & CBP use-of-force policies involving moving vehicles: #ReneeGood

Any ideas on how I teach my "Law on the Use of Military Force" seminar that begins this week without appearing to be hopelessly naive and/or laughably OBE? (And my other course this semester is "Separation of Powers." Sigh.)

Today’s episode of The Ezra Klein Show. Venezuela, Renee Good and Trump’s ‘Assault on Hope’ @mashagessen.bsky.social examines how the President governs through spectacle, and the message his displays of force are meant to send. open.spotify.com/episode/78mi... youtu.be/U6DbiSMi6ik?...

Marko Milanovic is absolutely right that, from a legal perspective, the most significant thing about what the U.S. is doing in Venezuela (and Greenland, and Cuba, etc.) is that the administration has been quite unapologetically indifferent to the law entirely. [1] www.ejiltalk.org/some-further...

Must-read, though (or perhaps because) it's extremely harrowing. I wish there were grounds for thinking it's overstated, but I fear not. www.nytimes.com/2026/01/10/o...

What Leah said.

Only a matter of time, I suspect, 'til conversation turns to the broader problem of the relatively new militarization of civilian law enforcement (which might be a misnomer, given that the military is trained to be far more constrained in using lethal force in situations of ambiguous risk) ... [1]

In case you were wondering whether there's anyone in the legal academy who's willing to argue in favor of Trump's apparent view that the President is entitled to disregard both Congress and a binding U.S. treaty in initiating a full-scale war against another nation ...

When's the last time (if ever) the first opinion of the Term in an argued case was a 5-4? (or even 6-3?)

Who says there are only 24 hours in a day? Marco Rubio is concurrently: Secretary of State Acting National Security Advisor Acting Archivist of the U.S. And either Dictator of Venezuela or Chief Coercer of Venezuela (depending upon the official talking points at any particular hour)

Interesting fact: Judge Hellerstein has been supervising the Maduro case for the past eleven and a half years.

How deeply frustrating that my local Fox affiliate is broadcasting an NFL game between two teams w/losing records instead of the game between two *other* teams with losing records that'll determine which of two *other* teams with losing records makes the playoffs!

Does Trump know that his Secretary of State is effectively denying Trump's repeated statements that "we" are going to govern Venezuela and, if so, has Trump approved that repudiation?

highly recommended

A few follow-ups to my Venezuela-related threads yesterday. 1. As I said at the outset, the (il)legality of any prospective U.S. occupation/governance of Venezuela will be of far greater importance than the legality of the capture/extraction of Maduro. [cont.]

Jack writes--correctly--that the military abduction and extraction of Maduro "pretty clearly isn’t" legal. It plainly violates Article 2(4) of the UN Charter, which is the supreme law of the United States (per Art. VI of the Constitution) and, as I've explained elsewhere, ... [1]

From legal, policy and international relations) perspectives, questions about both (i) the capture/extraction/trial of Maduro and (ii) the strikes on Venezuelan forces last night on a "defense of forces" theory *pale* in comparison to the profound questions raised ... [1]

Converse: My new favorite cover of a Jackson Browne song: www.youtube.com/watch?v=cvqw...

Anyone have the latest filings and decision in the California case? (Note to @nytimes.com: Please include links!) For some reason, neither Court Listener nor Bloomberg is showing them. www.nytimes.com/2025/12/31/u...

A vivid lesson for law students and young lawyers: Statutory interpretation--and, in particular, asking "What was Congress up to here?"--can make a real difference! www.nytimes.com/2025/12/31/u...

A very important and compelling paper/proposal. Two follow-up questions for Sam: (i) If you're right, why have schools almost invariably complied with "Dear Colleague" letters and agency settlement proposals? (ii) Would your proposal do much to stop the Trump strategy? After all, ...

An annual treat. So many treasures here. trismccall.net/pop-music-ab...

Self-parody reason.com/volokh/2025/...

It's noteworthy, I think, that no attorneys from the Civil Appellate Section appear on this mandamus petition in the Boasberg contempt case. storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

I'll go way out on a limb here (not) and say that this won't happen. www.washingtonpost.com/politics/202...

Probably one of the first judicial opinions to cite Byung-Chul Han, The Spirit of Hope (2024), to describe DOJ's litigating posture. storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

Hell or High Water is a helluva film--gets stronger on every rewatch. Has David Mackenzie done anything else that comes close?

Now I'm gonna be self-conscious about whether I swing my arms like a "regular American."

Wholly apart from the fact that this is a form of "Original Privately Expressed Intent of One Sponsor of an Earlier Statute with Different Language" Originalism, the more fundamental problem with Lash's effort (and the SG's) to rely upon the Trumbull letter ... [1] papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

I'm not quite sure what this says about me (or him), but I've only listened to one of Thurston Moore's 352 best records of 2025--and it's a single that I found somewhat disappointing. 72558.substack.com/p/350-best-r...

ICYMI: Nuggets score 27 points in final 2:53 of OT. Jokic with 56/16/15, 18 points in 2:46 in OT. Ho hum.

I don't think there's any understanding of the First Amendment under which this ("our Savior") is constitutional. Yet they don't care, and they've eliminated all the attorneys who would've objected. Kudos to the Goldwater and Cato Institutes for condemning it. www.nytimes.com/2025/12/25/a...

Nuggets score 27 points in final 2:53 of OT. Jokic with 56/16/15. Ho hum.

RIP Kirsty and Shane, both taken from us way, way too soon. www.youtube.com/watch?v=NrAw...

There's every reason in the world why the Trump administration chose not to comment on the 60 Minutes segment--namely, that there's little or nothing in it that they'd try to (or could reasonably) dispute: indeed, they've boasted about virtually all of it.

Alex Abramovich did a beautiful job on this profile of Willie Nelson--and then had the good wisdom and humility to defer to Dylan to capture it far better than any longform writer could (or, more to the point, convey why it can't be captured), in a single paragraph. Glimmers of light in dark times.

I wonder whether Bari Weiss tried to deep-six this opinion on the ground that it doesn't "advance the ball" given what we already know about the CECOT detentions.

I have a sneaking suspicion that no one involved in this farce, especially Trump, has the foggiest idea what "Memorial" means. www.nytimes.com/2025/12/19/u...

If this is the first appearance ever in the @nytimes.com of both the term "karmic comeuppance" and the phrase "the entire premise became ludicrous," well, ... www.nytimes.com/2025/12/19/u...

By this point, the elimination/circumvention of attorneys throughout national security agencies has predictably resulted in open boasting of illegality: Reprisal for "vengeance" is never a legitimate basis for the use of force. That's been well-established ... [1] www.nytimes.com/2025/12/19/u...

Great piece.

The most remarkable and disturbing thing about Trump/Hegseth's campaign of murder in the Caribbean has been the almost complete failure of other nations to vociferously object to the U.S.'s patent violation of the most fundamental of legal and moral norms. As a result, ... [1] @justsecurity.org

Can Darlene Love really be doing that at 84?!

NB: When I, a professor of law, profess that an act is unlawful, I am not doing it to inform the lawbreaker, but rather to inform you, the reader. So the question “what, like you think he cares?” is inapposite. The question is whether *you* care. I think you should, which is why I bother.