The Law and Chaos Newsletter & Podcast
LightNews LightNews
banner
lawandchaospod.bsky.social
The Law and Chaos Newsletter & Podcast
@lawandchaospod.bsky.social
1.5K followers 140 following 110 posts
How to makes sense of the law ... when everything is CHAOS
with @lizdye.bsky.social and @andrewtorrez.bsky.social

lawandchaospod.com
patreon.com/lawandchaospod
Posts Replies Media Videos
lawandchaospod.bsky.social
7/ Also, hilariously, Trump's lawyers accuse Judge Hellerstein of "improperly invoking summary remand procedures" and then proceed to cite to... the provision of the removal statute that gives the trial court judge the power to summarily remand the case.

It's almost as if they're not serious.
This Court requires that § l442(a)(l) be construed "liberally,77 and each requirement applied "blroadly. Badilla U. Midwest Air Traffic 77 Control Serv., Inc., 8 F.4th 105, 120 (2d Cir. 2021). The district court did the opposite by improperly invoking summary remand procedures to address complex issues of first impression, see 28 U.S.C. § 1455(b)(4), overlooking key features of recent Supreme Court rulings, resolving disputed factual and legal issues against President Trump without adversarial proceedings, and ignoring compelling arguments regarding "good 77 cause for the Second Removal Notice, including prior misrepresentations by the prosecutors regarding the scope of their case in connection with President Tlrump's First Removal Notice, id. § 1455(b)(1)-(2).
September 5, 2024 at 4:55 AM
lawandchaospod.bsky.social
5/ The request to the Second Circuit really gives away their fundamental misunderstanding, because Trump's team cites to Forty Six Hundred LLC U. Cadence Educ.,LLC, 15 F.4th 70, 81 (1st Cir. 2021) as support for their argument -- a civil case!

scholar.google.com/scholar_case...
Under these circumstances, all of the traditional factors favor a stay pending appeal to prevent this case "from becoming a shuttlecock, batted back and forth between a state court and a federal court." Forty Six Hundred LLC U. Cadence Educ.,LLC, 15 F.4th 70, 81 (1st Cir. 2021). There is a substantial likelihood of success on appeal, and a grave risk of irreparable harm if the case is remanded and continues on a schedule that includes a potential sentencing of President Trump in approximately two weeks, which could result in his unconstitutional incarceration while the 2024 Presidential election is imminent.
September 5, 2024 at 4:37 AM
lawandchaospod.bsky.social
4/ That's why a defendant has a MAXIMUM of 30 days after indictment to file their notice of removal, a deadline (April 29, 2023) that Trump has missed by A YEAR AND A HALF.
(b)Requirements.— (1)A notice of removal of a criminal prosecution shall be filed not later than 30 days after the arraignment in the State court, or at any time before trial, whichever is earlier, except that for good cause shown the United States district court may enter an order granting the defendant or defendants leave to file the notice at a later time.
September 5, 2024 at 4:34 AM
lawandchaospod.bsky.social
3/ So when Trump tells Judge Hellerstein that he needs to "preserve the status quo," that's NOT "stop the state court proceedings." The status quo even when removal is GRANTED, is that the state court proceedings continue, until the federal court, in its discretion, holds an evidentiary hearing.
Following President Trump’s notice of appeal, the Court has extremely limited power to enter orders relating to this matter. It is well established, however, that this discretion includes authority to stay execution of the Order to preserve the status quo while the Second Circuit considers the appeal. The traditional considerations bearing on a stay—likelihood of success on the merits, irreparable harm, and balance of equities—all favor the relief requested herein in order to protect important federal interests, including the institution of the Presidency, the integrity of the 2024 Presidential election, and the Constitutional rights of President Trump and voters around the country.
September 5, 2024 at 4:31 AM
lawandchaospod.bsky.social
2/ Trump's lawyers either do not know (or do not care) that federal CRIMINAL removal, unlike civil removal, does NOT stay the underlying state court proceedings. That's 28 USC 1455(b)(3).

(The reasons for this involve state/federal court sovereignty & parallel Younger abstention.)
(3)The filing of a notice of removal of a criminal prosecution shall not prevent the State court in which such prosecution is pending from proceeding further, except that a judgment of conviction shall not be entered unless the prosecution is first remanded.
September 5, 2024 at 4:26 AM
lawandchaospod.bsky.social
In March 2023, CJ Beryl Howell in DC ruled that Trump attorneys must testify to the grand jury pursuant to the crime-fraud exception. Today, Judge Aileen Cannon rules that because Trump "disputes" that finding, *she* can revisit it.

This is lawlessness.

storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...
June 27, 2024 at 4:38 PM
lawandchaospod.bsky.social
NRA lobby posting half of the Second Amendment. Guess which half??
June 21, 2024 at 6:54 PM
lawandchaospod.bsky.social
5/ Jackson's concurrence (not dissent; she joins in the result) notes that DC v. Heller was made up out of whole cloth.

Maybe, Justice Jackson suggests, the Court could have cobbled together a somewhat workable jurisprudence out of just Heller. But adding Bruen to the mix made that impossible.
This discord is striking when compared to the relative harmony that had developed prior to Bruen. To be sure, our decision in District of Columbia v. Heller, 554 U. S. 570 (2008), which first recognized an individual right to keep and bear arms for self-defense, see id., at 628, was disruptive in its own way. After all, before Heller, “[t]he meaning of the Second Amendment ha[d] been considered settled by courts and legislatures for over two centuries,” and “judges and legislators . . . properly believed . . . that the Second Amendment did not reach possession of firearms for purely private activities.” Id., at 676, n. 38 (Stevens, J., dissenting). Nonetheless, after Heller, lower courts took up the necessary work of reviewing burdens on this newly unearthed right. By the time this Court decided Bruen, every court of appeals evaluating whether a firearm regulation was consistent with the Second Amendment did so using a two-step framework that incorporated means-end scrutiny.
June 21, 2024 at 5:09 PM
lawandchaospod.bsky.social
4/ From now on, I'm just going to read Justice Jackson's dissents first. She says what we all know: Bruen was wrongly decided because it's an ideology-driven madcap of a decision and it has left the law a complete and utter mess.
It isn’t just that Bruen’s history-and-tradition test is burdensome (though that is no small thing to courts with heavier caseloads and fewer resources than we have). The more worrisome concern is that lower courts appear to be diverging in both approach and outcome as they struggle to conduct the inquiry Bruen requires of them. Scholars report that lower courts applying Bruen’s approach have been unable to produce “consistent, principled results,” Brief for Second Amendment Law Scholars as Amici Curiae 4, and, in fact, they “have come to conflicting conclusions on virtually every consequential Second Amendment issue to come before them,” id., at 4–5; see also id., at 5–6 (collecting examples). Given this, it appears indisputable that, after Bruen, “confusion plagu[es] the lower courts.” Id., at 6.
June 21, 2024 at 5:01 PM
lawandchaospod.bsky.social
3/ If you prefer that obvious lies in Supreme Court jurisprudence come from Brett Kavanaugh instead; don't worry, he's got you covered.
That is especially true with respect to the broadly worded or vague individual-rights provisions. (I will use the terms “broadly worded” and “vague” interchangeably in this opinion.) For example, the First Amendment provides that “Congress shall make no law” “abridging the freedom of speech.” And the Second Amendment, at issue here, guarantees that “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms” “shall not be infringed.”
June 21, 2024 at 4:47 PM
lawandchaospod.bsky.social
1/ Like the NRA, Justice Gorsuch's concurrence in today's Rahimi decision quotes only the second half of the Second Amendment.

When a lobbying group does it, that's one thing. When a sitting Supreme Court justice does it, you know that we've entered the land of make-believe.
That is not because the Constitution has little to say about the matter. The Second Amendment protects the “right of the people to keep and bear Arms.” “‘[T]ext and history’” dictate the contours of that right. Ante, at 6 (quoting New York State Rifle & Pistol Assn., Inc. v. Bruen, 597 U. S. 1, 22 (2022)). As this Court has recognized, too, the Amendment’s text “‘guarantee[s] the individual right to possess and carry weapons in case of confrontation.’” Id., at 32 (quoting District of Columbia v. Heller, 554 U. S. 570, 592 (2008)). And where that “text covers an individual’s conduct,” a law regulating that conduct may be upheld only if it is “consistent with this Nation’s historical tradition of firearms regulation.” 597 U. S., at 17; see ante, at 6.
June 21, 2024 at 4:19 PM
lawandchaospod.bsky.social
Consider that if your method of Second Amendment jurisprudence involves a lengthy discuss of King Canute's frankenpledge system of ten-man tithings from the year 1016, then maaaaaaaaybe, just maybe, you're not doing real American law stuff in the 21st century?
The first were the surety laws. A form of “preventive justice,” these laws derived from the ancient practice of frankpledges. 4 id., at 251–253. Reputedly dating to the time of Canute, the frankpledge system involved compelling adult men to organize themselves into ten-man “tithing[s].” A. Lefroy, Anglo-Saxon Period of English Law, Part II, 26 Yale L. J. 388, 391 (1917). The members of each tithing then “mutually pledge[d] for each other’s good behaviour.” 4 Blackstone 252. Should any of the ten break the law, the remaining nine would be responsible for producing him in court, or else face punishment in his stead. D. Levinson, Collective Sanctions, 56 Stan. L. Rev. 345, 358 (2003).
June 21, 2024 at 3:56 PM
lawandchaospod.bsky.social
2/ It's a good *result* but continues the Roberts Court's absolutely bonkers wholesale rewriting of the Second Amendment, which - contrary to the appeal to "tradition" - was not used to strike down a single state or federal gun control law until 2008 (!!)
When a restraining order contains a finding that an individual poses a credible threat to the physical safety of an intimate partner, that individual may—consistent with the Second Amendment—be banned from possessing firearms while the order is in effect. Since the founding, our Nation’s firearm laws have included provisions preventing individuals who threaten physical harm to others from misusing firearms. As applied to the facts of this case, Section 922(g)(8) fits comfortably within this tradition.
June 21, 2024 at 2:27 PM
lawandchaospod.bsky.social
2/ It is a prototypical Roberts court opinion, using the craziest strain of originalism to reach the politically right-wing result and dividing on partisan lines.
Mu z, on the other hand, is a citizen, and she filed her own challenge to the consular officer’s decision. She reasons as follows: The right to live with her noncitizen spouse in the United States is implicit in the “liberty” protected by the Fifth Amendment; the denial of her husband’s visa deprived her of this interest, thereby triggering her right to due process; the consular officer violated her right to due process by declining to disclose the basis for finding Asencio-Cordero inadmissible; and this, in turn, enables judicial review, even though visa denials are ordinarily unreviewable by courts. Mu z’s argument fails at the threshold. Her argument is built on the premise that the right to bring her noncitizen spouse to the United States is an unenumerated constitutional right. To establish this premise, she must show that the asserted right is “‘deeply rooted in this Nation’s history and tradition.’” Washington v. Glucksberg, 521 U. S. 702, 720–721 (1997).
June 21, 2024 at 2:13 PM
lawandchaospod.bsky.social
3/ ...and as part of a promotional stunt, Ziegler took a self-described "field trip" to locations on the Hunter Biden hard drive, describing one California hotel as "this infamous bungalow."

If you're going to argue you don't belong in California, don't commit your crimes in California.
Ziegler also promoted the Report in California. Ziegler posted a photo of himself holding a copy of the Report in December 2023 on Instagram in front of the Chateau Marmont Hotel in West Hollywood with the caption: “The activities in & around this infamous bungalow are captured for posterity in BidenReport.com.” Ellis Decl. Ex. H. He also posted a Rumble video of himself in San Francisco in November 2022, entitled “Report on the Biden Laptop CA Field Trip,” again promoting the Report. Ellis Decl. Ex. I. In sum, his entry into California and social media posts reflecting such promotion in California support the exercise of jurisdiction. See Yue v. Yang, 62 Cal. App. 5th 539, 543–48 (2021) (“California-focused” social medial messages, including statement that defendant “arrived in California,” support specific jurisdiction). Taken together, these contacts with California are more than adequate to satisfy the purposeful direction test.
June 21, 2024 at 1:00 AM
lawandchaospod.bsky.social
2/ Ziegler lost; the case is going forward in part because Zieger bragged about "calling each and every person" in his bogus Hunter Biden Laptop "report" -- many of whom were California residents...
Contacts with the forum are also supported by Ziegler’s purported actions after publishing the report to verify the facts and promote the report. For example, he sent copies to multiple California residents to verify Plaintiff’s information. Ziegler said in interviews that his team talked with each person named in the report. Ellis Decl. Exs. C at 12 (“I took the time to call each and every person that is in this report”) [Dkt. No. 30-5]; D at 8 (“we’ve sent the dossier to all 4,000 contacts on Hunter’s laptop) [Dkt. No. 30-6]. He even includes a table of alleged Plaintiff family crimes with California area codes, many listing “where (venue)” as C.D. Cal. Ellis Decl. Ex. E at 233–35, 400–01. Other California residents include an FBI agent in the San Francisco field office, Ellis Decl. Ex. E at 22. And Ziegler even sent the Report to the personal residence of one of Plaintiff’s California-based attorneys.
June 21, 2024 at 12:57 AM
lawandchaospod.bsky.social
7/ Obviously, O'Connor knew his TSLA stock would be affected the moment this case hit his desk. This is a warning shot by MMFA's elite legal team that they're not going to take this lying down.

We'll be watching.
June 20, 2024 at 6:08 PM
lawandchaospod.bsky.social
6/ ...with the implication being that once O'Connor is informed that his ruling could affect the price of his TSLA stock, he'll be compelled to recuse himself from the case.
Had X properly disclosed that Tesla and its shareholders are “financially interested” in the outcome of this case under Local Rule 3.1(c), this Court would have had the information necessary to allow it to make an informed recusal decision. Federal law requires that a judge must recuse whenever “[h]e knows that he . . . has a financial interest in the subject matter in controversy or in a party to the proceeding, or any other interest that could be substantially affected by the outcome of the proceeding.” 28 U.S.C. § 455(b)(4). Congress has further instructed judges to avoid even the appearance of partiality, by disqualifying themselves whenever their “impartiality might reasonably be questioned.” Id. § 455(a). Because of X’s failure to disclose all individuals and entities who maintain a financial interest in this case, this Court could not have “know[n]” that its financial interest in Tesla “could be substantially affected by the outcome of the proceeding"
June 20, 2024 at 6:07 PM
lawandchaospod.bsky.social
4/ O'Connor denied the MTD & kept the case. Monday's filing is a broadside by MMFA's lawyers at @gibsondunn that they are not giving up in the battle to get this case where it belongs.

It is prelude to a motion to disqualify O'Connor, with the velvet hammer in footnote 2.
Defendants have not, at this juncture, filed a motion to recuse under 28 U.S.C. § 455 because the oversight at issue is X’s failure to notify the Court of Tesla’s financial interest, disclosure of which would have enabled the Court to make a recusal decision sua sponte. See Nieves, 2014 WL 2587577, at *2 & n.5 (by mandating “a complete list” of all persons and entities “that are financially interested in the outcome of the case,” L.R. 3.1(c) “enables the judge” to make an informed decision of “whether recusal is required based on the judge’s financial self-interest”).
June 20, 2024 at 6:06 PM
lawandchaospod.bsky.social
SCOTUS, 9-0, tosses the 5th Circuit's mifepristone restrictions on standing.

www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/23p...
In sum, the doctors in this case have failed to establish Article III standing. The doctors have not shown that FDA’s actions likely will cause them any injury in fact.
June 13, 2024 at 2:14 PM
lawandchaospod.bsky.social
The DC Circuit Dropkicked Trump's Magical Immunity Claims. Now What?

www.lawandchaospod.com/p/the-dc-cir...
Image: Trump as an angry baby in a highchair. Text: The DC Circuit dropkicked Trump's magical immunity claims. Now What? Subhed: No, the president can't do crimes. Shut up.
February 8, 2024 at 2:29 AM