#four supreme court justices want to review it

[evilmark999]

I feel almost too dirty to be a part of this chain of posts. At the same time, both my respect and sense of duty are elbowing me HARD to not just "like" this and let it slip quietly by...

Judge for yourselves...

Quote of the Day

This is a momentous decision, just to hear this case. There was no reason in this world for the Supreme Court to take this case. Under the constitutional laws of the United States, there has never been an argument that a former president is immune from prosecution for crimes that he committed while in office.

Judge Michael Luttig (ret.)

(Judge Luttig is an icon of the conservative judicial world)

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Lisa Needham at Public Notice:

It finally happened. Judge Aileen Cannon, who has been telegraphing for months that she was committed to finding a way to get Trump off the hook in his classified documents case, came through for her guy. In a sprawling 93-page opinion, Cannon threw out the charges against the former president, agreeing with Trump that Special Counsel Jack Smith’s appointment was unconstitutional.  Since Trump stuffed the federal judiciary full of Federalist Society true believers, those courts are nothing but Calvinball. There are no longer any fixed rules and precedent doesn’t matter. What does matter to judges like Cannon is ensuring that a hard-right evangelical worldview becomes the rule of law in America and that Donald Trump is preserved at all costs. 

Cannon’s opinion is a joke

There’s little to no legal support for Cannon’s decision. In short, her ruling turns on the assertion that a special counsel is a “principal,” not an “inferior” officer. The former are appointed by the president and confirmed by the Senate — basically the same as cabinet appointments. Inferior officers generally have the same confirmation requirements unless Congress has authorized a head of a cabinet department to make the appointment. In that instance, Senate confirmation isn’t necessary.  The notion that the head of the Department of Justice can appoint special counsels as needed has been settled since the Watergate era. Indeed, if Senate confirmation were always required, special counsel appointments would become nearly impossible, as the Senate is basically non-functional thanks to the filibuster. Additionally, under Cannon’s view, if the Senate is held by the party in opposition to the current occupant of the White House, they essentially get a veto over every special counsel nomination.

The argument that special counsel appointments are unconstitutional if it makes Republicans sad has been pushed by conservative litigants who wanted to block Robert Mueller from investigating Russian interference in the 2016 election. As Quinta Jurecic noted at Lawfare, when the DC Circuit issued its appellate opinion in 2019, four other federal courts had already considered the matter, agreeing that the special counsel’s appointment was proper.  The architect of this anti-special counsel argument is Stephen Calebresi, one of the founders of the Federalist Society. Calebresi has shopped it around quite a bit, with major law review articles in 2018 and 2019 arguing Mueller’s appointment was improper and an amicus brief to the Supreme Court in Trump’s presidential immunity case.  Recall that Cannon’s decision to entertain the Trump appointments clause argument led to an extremely odd hearing where Cannon allowed amici — outside third parties like Calebresi — to present arguments in favor of Trump’s position. That’s a highly unusual step and telegraphed either that Cannon didn’t know what she was doing, was deliberately to bolster her inevitable decision in favor of Trump, or both. 

[...] Not content to deal with the case at hand, Cannon also decided she should go back to the 1980s and retroactively declare that the appointment of Lawrence Walsh, who investigated the Reagan Administration’s role in the Iran-Contra affair, was invalid. So, too, with Robert Mueller’s appointment as special counsel examining Russian interference in the 2016 election. The constitutionality of Mueller’s appointment had already been addressed by a federal appellate court five years ago when the DC Circuit Court of Appeals upheld Mueller’s appointment. However, yesterday’s opinion is very clearly Cannon’s job interview with Trump, and she’s writing this for an audience of precisely on person, so why not throw Trump some red meat about Mueller as well? Having disposed of decades of special counsel law, Cannon wasn’t left with much in the way of precedent. Perhaps that’s why she had to lean hard on Justice Clarence Thomas’s concurrence in the presidential immunity case to reach her preferred conclusion. 

[...] Special counsel Jack Smith has already indicated that the DOJ will be appealing the dismissal to the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals. Recall that the Eleventh Circuit overturned Cannon's previous ruling in this matter. Cannon granted Trump’s request that a special master review all the classified material Trump absconded with, which dragged the case to a halt. The Eleventh Circuit was not happy with this, saying, “We cannot write a rule that allows any subject of a search warrant to block government investigations after the execution of the warrant. Nor can we write a rule that allows only former presidents to do so.” And this is the core of the problem: People like Aileen Cannon are perfectly happy with a rule that only applies to Donald Trump. Indeed, Cannon’s order already states that “the effect of this Order is confined to this proceeding.” Those of us who lived through the 2000 Bush-Gore recount case will recall that the Supreme Court tried to create a similar firewall between their bad and self-serving ruling and the possibility it might ever be used against Republicans instead of just Democrats. In Bush v. Gore, when handing the presidency to George W. Bush, the Court wrote that “our consideration is limited to the present circumstances, for the problem of equal protection in election processes generally presents many complexities.” See? Calvinball. The giveaway of the presidency to George W. Bush only applies to George W. Bush. The destruction of the special counsel process only applies to Donald Trump. If Republicans need either of these issues to go the other way in a court of law, they just have to point to Cannon’s language limiting it to this instance only.  Cannon’s timing, whether a product of her overall incompetence or a deliberate choice, is exceedingly favorable for Trump. Even if Smith prevails in the Eleventh Circuit, Trump could petition his pet Supreme Court justices to review the case. No matter what, the case is DOA before the election. The process of an appeal, the result of which would ultimately only be to send the case back down for trial, will drag long past the election.

Trump-appointed judicial activist Aileen Cannon plays Calvinball to justify Donald Trump’s document theft in her United States v. Trump ruling.

[ridenwithbiden]

IMPEACH THIS CORRUPT MOTHERFUCKER

"Thomas has attended at least 2 Koch donor summits, putting him in the extraordinary position of having helped a political network that has brought multiple cases before the Supreme Court.

On Jan. 25, 2018, dozens of private jets descended on Palm Springs International Airport. Some of the richest people in the country were arriving for the annual winter donor summit of the Koch network, the political organization founded by libertarian billionaires Charles and David Koch. A long weekend of strategizing, relaxation in the California sun and high-dollar fundraising lay ahead.

Thomas has attended at least one of the dinners for top-tier donors, according to a donor who attended and a former high-level network staffer.

“These donors found it fascinating,” said another former senior employee, recounting a Thomas appearance at one summit where the justice discussed his judicial philosophy. “Donors want to feel special. They want to feel on the inside.”

A former fundraising staffer for the Koch network said the organization’s relationship with Thomas was considered a valuable asset: “Offering a high-level donor the experience of meeting with someone like that — that’s huge.”

Many details about Thomas’ role at the summits, including the specifics of his remarks, remain unclear. The network spokesperson declined to answer if Thomas’ appearances were ever tied to a specific initiative or program.

Thomas’ appearances were arranged with the help of Leonard Leo, the Federalist Society leader, according to the former senior network employee. “Leonard was the conduit who would get him,” the former employee said. During one summit, Thomas gave a talk with Leo in an interview format, the donor recalled.

“Justice Thomas attends events all over the country, as do all the Justices, and I was privileged to join him,” Leo said in a statement in response to questions about the Koch donor events. “All the necessary due diligence was performed to ensure the Justice’s attendance at the events was compliant with all ethics requirements.”

While attending the donor events would likely violate the lower courts’ prohibition on fundraising, experts said, the Supreme Court has a narrow internal definition of a fundraiser: an event that raises more money than it costs or where attendees are explicitly asked for money while the event’s happening.

On the Thursday before the January 2018 summit in Palm Springs, Thomas flew there on a chartered private jet, according to records reviewed by ProPublica. Four days later, the plane flew to an airport outside Denver, where Thomas appeared at a ceremony honoring his former clerk, federal Judge Allison Eid. The next day, it flew back to northern Virginia where Thomas lives.

Thomas’ financial disclosure for that year contains two speaking engagements: one in New York City and another at a Federalist Society conference in Texas. His trip to the Koch event in California is not on the form.

Just after 6 p.m., a Gulfstream G200 jet touched down on the tarmac. One of the Koch network’s most powerful allies was on board: Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas.

During the summit, the justice went to a private dinner for the network’s donors. Thomas has attended Koch donor events at least twice over the years, according to interviews with three former network employees and one major donor. The justice was brought in to speak, staffers said, in the hopes that such access would encourage donors to continue giving.

That puts Thomas in the extraordinary position of having served as a fundraising draw for a network that has brought cases before the Supreme Court, including one of the most closely watched of the upcoming term.

Thomas never reported the 2018 flight to Palm Springs on his annual financial disclosure form, an apparent violation of federal law requiring justices to report most gifts. A Koch network spokesperson said the network did not pay for the private jet. Since Thomas didn’t disclose it, it’s not clear who did pay.

Thomas’ involvement in the events is part of a yearslong, personal relationship with the Koch brothers that has remained almost entirely out of public view. It developed over years of trips to the Bohemian Grove, a secretive all-men’s retreat in Northern California. Thomas has been a regular at the Grove for two decades, where he stayed in a small camp with real estate billionaire Harlan Crow and the Kochs, according to records and people who’ve spent time with him there.

A spokesperson for the Koch network, formally known as Stand Together, did not answer detailed questions about his role at the Palm Springs events but said, “Thomas wasn’t present for fundraising conversations.”

“The idea that attending a couple events to promote a book or give dinner remarks, as all the justices do, could somehow be undue influence just doesn’t hold water,” the spokesperson said in a statement.

“All of the sitting Justices and many who came before them have contributed to the national dialogue in speeches, book tours, and social gatherings,” the statement added. “Our events are no different. To claim otherwise is false.”

In a series of stories this year, ProPublica reported that Thomas has accepted undisclosed luxury travel from Crow and a coterie of other ultrawealthy men. Crow also purchased Thomas’ mother’s home and paid private school tuition for the child Thomas was raising as his son. Thomas has said little in response. In a statement earlier this year, he said that Crow is a close friend whom he has joined on “family trips.” He has also argued that he was not required to disclose the free vacations. Thomas did not respond to questions for this story.

The code of conduct for the federal judiciary lays out rules designed to preserve judges’ impartiality and independence, which it calls “indispensable to justice in our society.” The code specifically prohibits both political activity and participation in fundraising. Judges are advised, for instance, not to “associate themselves” with any group “publicly identified with controversial legal, social, or political positions.”

But the code of conduct only applies to the lower courts. At the Supreme Court, justices decide what’s appropriate for themselves.

“I can’t imagine — it takes my breath away, frankly — that he would go to a Koch network event for donors,” said John E. Jones III, a retired federal judge appointed by President George W. Bush. Jones said that if he had gone to a Koch summit as a district court judge, “I’d have gotten a letter that would’ve commenced a disciplinary proceeding.”

“What you’re seeing is a slow creep toward unethical behavior. Do it if you can get away with it,” Jones said.

The Koch network is among the largest and most influential political organizations of the last half century, and it’s underwritten a far-reaching campaign to influence the course of American law. In a case the Supreme Court will hear this coming term, the justices could give the network a historic victory: limiting federal agencies’ power to issue regulations in areas ranging from the environment to labor rights to consumer protection. After shepherding the case to the court, Koch network staff attorneys are now asking the justices to overturn a decades-old precedent. (Thomas used to support the precedent but flipped his position in recent years.)

Two years ago, one of the network’s groups was the plaintiff in another Supreme Court case, which was about nonprofits’ ability to keep their donors secret. In that case, Thomas sided with the 6-3 conservative majority in the Koch group’s favor.

Charles Koch did not respond to detailed questions for this story. David Koch died in 2019.

The Koch network is an overlapping set of nonprofits perhaps best known for its work helping cultivate the Tea Party movement in the Obama years. Recently rebranded as Stand Together, the network includes the powerful Americans for Prosperity Action, which spent over $65 million supporting Republican candidates in the last election cycle.

Though Charles Koch is one of the 25 richest people in the world, worth an estimated $64 billion, he raises money from other wealthy people to amplify the network’s reach. The network brought in at least $700 million in 2021, the most recent year for which data is available. It has more than 1,000 employees who, on paper, work for different groups.

But for all its complexity, the network is a centralized operation, staffers said. Many of the groups occupy the same buildings in Arlington, Virginia, and share leadership and often staff. Many of the donations go into a central pot, from which hundreds of millions of dollars are disbursed to the smaller groups focused on various political and social concerns, according to tax filings and former employees.

For decades, the Kochs have held deep antipathy to government regulation. When Charles Koch’s brother David ran for vice president on the Libertarian Party ticket in 1980, the party platform called for abolishing the Environmental Protection Agency, the Department of Energy and the Food and Drug Administration.

Every winter, the network holds its marquee fundraising event in the Coachella Valley in Southern California. Hundreds of donors fly in to learn how their money is being spent and plan for the coming year. Former staffers describe an emphasis on preventing leaks that bordered on obsession. The network often rents out an entire hotel for the event, keeping out eavesdroppers. Documents left behind are methodically shredded. One recent attendee recalled Koch security staff in a golf cart escorting their Uber driver out of the hotel to make sure he left. The former staffers spoke on the condition of anonymity because they feared retaliation.

To score an invite to the summit, donors typically have to give at least $100,000 a year. Those who give in the millions receive special treatment, including dinners with Charles Koch and high-profile guests. Doling out access to powerful public officials was seen as a potent fundraising strategy, former staffers said. The dinners’ purpose was “giving donors access and giving them a reason to come or to continue to come in the future,” a former Koch network executive told ProPublica.

For the event that year, the Koch network rented out the Renaissance Esmeralda Resort and Spa. On the main stage, donors heard from Hall of Fame NFL cornerback Deion Sanders, who was working with the Kochs on anti-poverty programs in Dallas. Another speaker delivered a report card on the group’s political wins large and small: “repealed voter-approved donor disclosure initiative”; “retraction of mining & environmental overreach”; “stopped Albuquerque paid sick leave mandate.”

During the event, the group announced a new initiative focused on getting conservatives on the Supreme Court and the federal bench. The network, which had already given millions of dollars to Leo’s Federalist Society, planned to mobilize its activists and buy advertisements to push senators to vote for President Donald Trump’s judicial nominees. They appointed a former employee of Ginni Thomas, the justice’s wife, to lead the effort.

The first glimpse of Thomas’ connection to the network came more than a decade ago. In 2010, reporters obtained an invitation sent to potential Koch donors that mentioned Thomas had been “featured” at one of the network’s previous summits.

After critics called for more information about Thomas’ attendance, the Supreme Court press office downplayed the episode. A court spokesperson acknowledged Thomas had been in the Palm Springs area during the Kochs’ January 2008 summit. However, she said he was there to talk about his memoir at a Federalist Society dinner that was separate from the donor summit but was also sponsored by Charles Koch. She added that Thomas made a “brief drop-by” at the network summit that year but said he “was not a participant.” (Thomas disclosed the 2008 Palm Springs trip as a Federalist Society speech.)

In the 15 years since, the Koch network has left a deep imprint on American society. Its advocacy is credited with helping stamp out Republican Party support for combating climate change, once an issue that drew bipartisan concern. The “full weight of the network” was thrown behind passing the 2017 Trump tax cut, securing a windfall for the Kochs and their donors. And the upcoming Supreme Court term could bring the network a victory it has pursued for years: overturning a major legal precedent known as Chevron.

While most Americans aren’t familiar with the 1984 case Chevron v. NRDC, it’s one of the Supreme Court’s most-cited decisions. Legal scholars sometimes mention it in the same breath as Brown v. Board of Education and Roe v. Wade. In essence, Chevron is about government agencies’ ability to issue regulations. After a law is enacted, it’s generally up to agencies across the government to make detailed rules putting it into effect. The Chevron decision said courts should be hesitant to second-guess the agencies’ determinations. In the years that followed, judges cited Chevron in upholding rules that protect endangered species, speed up the approval process for new cellphone towers and grant benefits to coal miners suffering from black lung.

The Koch network has challenged Chevron in the courts and its lobbyists have pushed Congress to pass a law nullifying the decision. It has also provided millions of dollars in grants to law professors making the case to overturn it.

The network’s position has become increasingly popular in recent years. Once broadly supported by academics and judges on the right, Chevron is now anathema to many in the conservative legal movement. And there’s no more prominent convert than Thomas.

In 2005, Thomas wrote the majority opinion in a case that expanded Chevron’s protections for government agencies. Ten years later, he was openly questioning the doctrine. Then in 2020, Thomas renounced his own earlier decision, writing that he’d determined the doctrine is unconstitutional after all — a rare reversal for a justice with a reputation for being unmovable in his views.

By last year, Koch network strategists sensed that victory could be at hand. During an internal briefing for network staff, Jorge Lima, a senior vice president at Americans for Prosperity, said the Supreme Court seemed primed to radically change its approach to the issue. The network was trying to find cases that could bring about major changes in the law, according to a video of the meeting obtained by the watchdog group Documented. “We’re doubling down on this strategy,” Lima told the crowd.

Several months later, the Supreme Court announced it would take up a case, Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo, in which Koch network staff attorneys represent the plaintiffs. If Thomas and his colleagues side with them this coming term, Chevron will be overturned once and for all.

Without Chevron, “any place you would need regulation to address a pressing social problem, it’s going to be more costly to get it, harder to implement it and it’s not going to go as far,” said Noah Rosenblum, a professor at New York University School of Law.

“​​Loper Bright is a case seeking to restore one of the core tenets of our democracy: that Congress, not the administrative agency, makes the laws,” the Koch network spokesperson said.

Ethics experts said Thomas’ undisclosed ties to the Koch network could call his impartiality in the case into doubt. This sort of potential conflict is why the judiciary has rules against both political activity and fundraising, they said. “Parties litigating in the court before Justice Thomas don’t know the extent of Thomas’ relationship with the parties on the other side,” said James Sample, a Hofstra University law professor who studies judicial ethics. “You have to be pretty cynical to not think that’s a problem.”

The Supreme Court itself said in a recent statement to The Associated Press that “justices exercise caution in attending events that might be described as political in nature.” But unlike with lower court judges, there is no formal oversight of the justices.

Two decades ago, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg delivered the opening remarks at a lecture cosponsored by the NOW Legal Defense and Education Fund, a women’s rights group that filed friend-of-the-court briefs at the Supreme Court. It was a public event co-sponsored by the New York City Bar Association. But some judicial ethics experts criticized the justice for affiliating herself with an advocacy group.

Thirteen Republican lawmakers, including Mike Pence and Marsha Blackburn, who now sits on the Senate Judiciary Committee, went further, calling on Ginsburg to recuse herself from any future cases related to abortion. The justice brushed off the criticism: “I think and thought and still think it’s a lovely thing,” she said of the lecture series. (Ginsburg died in 2020.)

Charles and David Koch’s access to Thomas has gone well beyond his participation in their donor events. For years, the brothers had opportunities to meet privately with Thomas thanks to the justice’s regular trips to the Bohemian Grove, an all-male retreat that attracts some of the nation’s most influential corporate and political figures. Thomas has been a regular at the Grove for 25 years as Harlan Crow’s guest, according to internal documents and interviews with dozens of members, other guests and workers at the retreat.

“What we’re seeing emerge is someone who is living his professional life in a way that’s seeing these extrajudicial opportunities as a perk of the office,” said Charles Geyh, a judicial ethics expert at Indiana University law school. Judges can have social lives, he said, and there are no clear lines for when a social gathering could pose a problem. But the confluence of powerful political actors and undisclosed gifts puts Thomas’ trips far outside the norm for judges’ conduct, Geyh said: “There’s a culture of impartiality that’s really at risk here.”

The Grove is an exclusive, two-week party held in the Sonoma County redwoods every July. A member or his guest can wander from the Grove’s shooting range to a lecture by Blackwater founder Erik Prince, or from a mint julep party to a performance by the Grove’s symphony orchestra. Wine, sometimes at $500 a bottle, flows freely, and late at night, members consume clam chowder and chili by the gallon. More than one attendee recalled walking outside in the morning to find a former cabinet secretary who fell asleep drunk in the grass.

There’s a saying among the Bohemians, as the club’s members call themselves: The only place you should be publicly associated with the Grove is in your obituary. That privacy is paramount, members said, in part to allow the powerful to speak freely — and party — without worrying about showing up in the press. Only designated photographers are allowed to take pictures. Cellphones are strictly forbidden.

Members typically must pay thousands of dollars to bring a guest. Several people ProPublica spoke to said that before the pandemic, they saw Thomas there just about every year. ProPublica was able to confirm six trips Thomas took to the retreat that he didn’t disclose. Flight records suggest Crow has repeatedly dispatched his private jet to Virginia to pick up Thomas and ferry him to the Sonoma County airport and back, usually for a long weekend in the middle of the Grove festival.

“I was taken with how comfortable he was in that environment and how popular,” a person who stayed in the same lodge as Thomas one year said. “He holds court there.”

In response to questions about his travel to the Grove with Thomas, Crow said Thomas is “a man of incredible integrity” and that he’s never heard the justice “discuss pending legal matters with anyone.” Neither Crow nor Thomas responded to questions about whether the justice reimbursed him for the trips.

(Other justices have Grove connections too. The mid-20th-century Chief Justice Earl Warren was a member. Among modern justices, Thomas appears to have been the most frequent guest. Justice Antonin Scalia, who died in 2016, attended many years ago. Justice Stephen Breyer went in 2006; he told ProPublica he was the guest of his brother and that to the best of his memory, he paid his own way. Justice Anthony Kennedy went at least twice before he retired. Kennedy, who did not respond to a request for comment, did not disclose the trips. It’s unclear if he needed to because his son is a member and gifts from family don’t need to be reported.)

The Grove is broken up into more than 100 “camps,” essentially adult fraternity houses where the same group of men stay together year after year. Hill Billies was George H. W. Bush’s camp. Nancy Pelosi’s husband has been a longtime member of Stowaway. Thomas stays with Crow at a camp called Midway.

One of the ritzier camps, Midway employs a staff of cooks and personal valets and boasts an extensive wine cellar. The men sleep in private cabins that zigzag up a hillside. Known for its Republican leanings, Midway has a string of superrich political donors as members, including an heir to the Coors beer empire and the owner of the New York Jets. Charles Koch is an active member, as was his brother David. It’s not clear if Thomas has ever been the guest of a member other than Crow.

During the annual retreats, the Kochs often discussed political strategy with fellow guests, according to multiple people who’ve spent time with them at Midway. A few years ago, Brian Hooks, one of the leaders of their political network, was a guest at the camp the same weekend Thomas was there. A former Midway employee recalled the brothers discussing super PAC spending during the Obama years and complaining about government regulation.

“Chevron was one of the big things the Koch brothers were interested in,” the former employee said. He did not remember if Thomas was present for any of the discussions of the doctrine.

But Thomas and the Kochs developed a bond over their years at the retreat, according to five people who spent time with them there. They discussed politics, business and their families. They often sat together at meals and sat up talking at night at the lodge. A photo obtained by ProPublica captures Thomas and David Koch smiling on Midway’s deck. David’s windbreaker features an owl insignia, the symbol of the club.

One tradition at Midway is a lecture series, often held beneath the redwoods on the camp’s deck. The weekend Thomas was there in July 2016, the Midway schedule featured a talk from Henry Kissinger and another by Michael Bloomberg and Arthur Brooks, then president of the conservative think tank the American Enterprise Institute. Over breakfast Friday morning, the author Bjorn Lomborg delivered a lecture on climate change. Lomborg has for years argued the threat of global warming is overstated, saying that rising temperatures will actually save lives.

Thomas spoke that year as well. He talked about his friend Justice Scalia, who had recently died, according to a person who attended. Scalia, a conservative luminary, had been a prominent advocate for the Chevron doctrine, but Thomas said he believed his colleague was coming around to Thomas’ revised view on it before his death.

Thomas didn’t explain what he meant by that. “It was an aside,” the person said, “like he assumed most of the people in the room knew his position.”

[beardedmrbean]

Washington — President Biden on Monday announced he had commuted the sentences of nearly all federal inmates on death row, with the exception of three who did not receive clemency.

There are 37 inmates initially sentenced to death who will be impacted by Mr. Biden's action and will now receive life in prison without the possibility of parole. But the remaining three on death row whose sentences are untouched are: Robert Bowers, convicted for the mass shooting at the Tree of Life Synagogue; Dylann Roof, convicted of the shooting at the Mother Emanuel AME Church; and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, convicted for the Boston Marathon bombing.

While Mr. Biden campaigned on ending capital punishment and the Justice Department imposed a moratorium on federal executions, prosecutors still sought the death penalty in some cases.

Robert Bowers

Bowers, 51, received the death penalty in August 2023 after he was convicted of 63 federal counts for the 2018 attack at the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh. Bowers shot and killed 11 worshipers and wounded seven people in the deadliest antisemetic attack in U.S. history.

A truck driver who had a history of making antisemitic statements online, Bowers was armed with an AR-15 rifle and three handguns when he opened fire during Saturday morning prayers. Federal prosecutors said he turned the synagogue into a "killing ground," and police said Bowers told them "all Jews need to die."

The Justice Department said Bowers "meticulously planned" the attack based on his antisemitic beliefs.

Dylann Roof

A jury sentenced Roof to death in 2017 for the mass shooting at the Mother Emanuel AME Church in June 2015, making him the first person ordered to be executed for a federal hate crime. Nine Black parishioners were killed and three were wounded in the attack, which took place during a Bible study.

Prosecutors said before Roof mounted the racially-motivated assault, he posted a manifesto online that used racial slurs and expressed a belief that White people are superior to African Americans. They said Roof wanted to attack Black worshipers to stoke racial tensions.

Roof was convicted of 33 counts in 2016. He appealed his conviction, with his attorneys arguing that Roof was wrongly allowed to represent himself during the sentencing phase of his trial. But a federal appeals court upheld Roof's conviction and death sentence in 2021.

"Dylann Roof murdered African Americans at their church, during their Bible-study and worship. They had welcomed him. He slaughtered them. He did so with the express intent of terrorizing not just his immediate victims at the historically important Mother Emanuel Church, but as many similar people as would hear of the mass murder," a panel of judges on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit wrote in its ruling.

The Supreme Court declined to review the 4th Circuit's decision in 2022.

Dzhokhar Tsarnaev

Tsarnaev was convicted on 30 counts for crimes committed during the bombings near the finish line at the Boston Marathon in 2013, including three counts of using a weapon of mass destruction resulting in death.

The jury recommended, and a federal district court imposed, the death penalty on six of 17 capital counts.

Three people were killed and scores more were injured during the attack. Tsarnaev's role in the bombing is not disputed — his attorneys acknowledged he and Tamerlan Tsarnaev, Tsarnaev's older brother, detonated two homemade devices near the finish line of the marathon nearly a decade ago. But Tsarnaev's lawyers said Tamerlan Tsarnaev was the mastermind behind the attack, and the younger Tsarnaev, who was 19 at the time of the attack, acted under his brother's influence.

The two brothers attempted to flee Massachusetts following the attack, sparking a four-day manhunt that put Boston and the surrounding areas on lockdown. Tsarnaev was arrested by police after he was discovered hiding out in a boat behind a house in Watertown, Massachusetts. Tamerlan Tsarnaev died in a shootout with police during their pursuit of the two brothers.

After appealing his convictions, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 1st Circuit upheld nearly all of them in 2020, with the exception of three, and it invalidated those capital sentences and ordered a new sentencing proceeding. 

The Trump administration asked the Supreme Court to review the 1st Circuit's decision, arguing a new sentencing proceeding would impose significant burdens on the victims of the 2013 bombing. The Biden administration maintained that position in the case, despite the president's opposition to the death penalty.

The Supreme Court in March 2022 reinstated the death sentence, finding the appeals court improperly tossed out his capital sentences.

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Rob Rogers

* * * *

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

April 16, 2023

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

APR 17, 2023

A few quick notes tonight about some ongoing stories: There is more news about Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and his misreporting of his financial connections. This morning, Shawn Boburg and Emma Brown of the Washington Post reported that for twenty years, Thomas has reported rental income totaling hundreds of thousands of dollars from a real estate firm that was shut down in 2006. The misstatement might be dismissed as a problem with paperwork, the authors note. “But it is among a series of errors and omissions that Thomas has made on required annual financial disclosure forms over the past several decades, a review of those records shows. Together, they have raised questions about how seriously Thomas views his responsibility to accurately report details about his finances to the public.” The cascade of stories about Thomas threatens to continue to undermine the legitimacy of this Supreme Court. Last night, the nation suffered one mass shooting in Dadeville, Alabama, that killed four people and wounded twenty-eight others, and another in Louisville, Kentucky, that killed two and wounded four. On Friday, Republican hopefuls for the 2024 presidential nomination courted members of the National Rifle Association, the NRA, at the organization’s 2023 annual convention, promising looser gun laws. South Dakota governor Kristi Noem complained about liberals who “want to take our guns,” and boasted that her granddaughter, who is not yet two, has a shotgun and a rifle. Meanwhile, the Biden administration continues to focus on rebalancing the Indo-Pacific to counter China. Just two weeks after the fiftieth anniversary of the U.S. withdrawal from Vietnam and nearly thirty years after the restoration of diplomatic ties in 1995, the U.S. has broken ground on a new $1.2 billion embassy compound in the Vietnamese capital of Hanoi. Secretary of State Antony Blinken met with Vietnamese Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh yesterday and vowed to “broaden and deepen” relations between the two countries. Vice President Kamala Harris, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin, U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai, U.S. Agency for International Development administrator Samantha Power, and members of Congress have all visited Vietnam recently as part of a long-term strategy to help area friends and allies counterbalance China in the Indo-Pacific region. Yesterday, Blinken emphasized how the U.S. and Vietnam, working together, “can advance a free and open Indo-Pacific, one that is at peace and grounded in respect for the rules-based international order.” But, as Vietnam has a one-party communist government, he explained, “When we talk about ‘free and open,’ we mean countries being free to choose their own path and their own partners and that problems will be dealt with openly; rules will be reached transparently and applied fairly; and goods, ideas, and people will flow freely across land, the seas, the skies, and cyberspace.” Vice President Harris spoke yesterday at a march for reproductive rights in Los Angeles, where she emphasized how deeply our international standing depends on our commitment to freedom at home. “I’ve been traveling around the world as your Vice President,” she said. “When we, as Americans, walk in those rooms around the world, we have traditionally walked in those rooms, shoulders back, chin up, having some authority to talk about the importance of rule of law, human rights. “But here’s the thing we all know about what it means to be a role model: People watch what you do to see if it matches what you say. So let us understand that what is happening in our nation right now, by extension, can impact people around the world who dare to say, ‘I want my country to be like the United States and protect rights.’ And those autocrats and those dictators might look at those folks and say, ‘What are you pointing to as the example?’” “We are seeing, around the country, in a myriad of ways, those who would dare to attack fundamental rights and, by extension, attack our democracy,” Harris said. “Around our country, supposed so-called extremist leaders…dare to silence the voices of the people.” “A United States Supreme Court, the highest court in our land, that took a constitutional right that had been recognized from the people of America. “We have seen attacks on voting rights; attacks on fundamental rights to love and marry the people that you love; attacks on the ability of people to be themselves and be proud of who they are. “And so, this is a moment that history will show required each of us, based on our collective love of our country, to stand up and fight for and protect our ideals…. [W]e have been called upon to be the next generation of the people who will help lead and fight in this movement for freedom and liberty based on our love of our country…. [W]e stand for our democracy. And we stand for foundational and fundamental principles that have everything to do with freedom, liberty, and equality for all people.”

—

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

[onetwistedmiracle]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/religion/2022/05/13/study-girls-raised-jewish-outperform-christian-girls-academically/

Religion

Study: Girls raised Jewish outperform Christian girls academically

By Yonat Shimron

May 13, 2022 at 7:00 a.m. EDT

If a Supreme Court justice, the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the treasury secretary were not enough, Jewish girls can find plenty of other role models of professional success.

A new study suggests the examples of these Jewish women — Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan, CDC Director Rochelle Walensky, Treasury Secretary Janet L. Yellen and many others like them — have made a deep impression.

The study, published in the latest edition of the American Sociological Review, finds that girls with a Jewish upbringing are 23 percent more likely to graduate college, and to graduate from much more selective colleges, than girls with a Christian upbringing. (The study included comparisons with Protestants, mostly evangelicals.)

These girls, the study found, have ambitious career goals and prioritize their professional success over marriage and motherhood. The girls in the study were all reared in liberal Jewish movements that make up the vast majority of American Jewish life; none was Orthodox.

“Whereas Jewish upbringing promoted self-concepts centered on meaningful careers and public impact, non-Jewish upbringing promoted self-concepts centered on marriage and motherhood,” wrote the study’s four authors, led by Tulane University sociologist Ilana Horwitz.

The study is based on an analysis of data from the National Study of Youth and Religion, a 10-year longitudinal study of the religious lives of 3,290 American youth from adolescence into young adulthood. The NSYR included an oversample of 80 Jewish households, from which researchers based their study. (The NSYR did not include sufficient Muslim or Hindu participants for comparison.)

The researchers then matched the data with the National Student Clearinghouse, which provides educational reporting and verification.

The results were startling. The study estimates that boys and girls raised by at least one Jewish parent have a 73 percent probability of graduating from college, as opposed to 32 percent of young people raised by non-Jewish parents. In other words, they are at least 2.28 times more likely to earn a bachelor’s degree than children raised by non-Jewish parents.

When researchers looked at the elite schools attended by the Jewish NSYR participants, they found the school’s average SAT scores were higher, too.

Students raised by at least one Jewish parent attended colleges with a mean SAT score of 1201, whereas participants raised by non-Jewish parents attended colleges with a mean SAT score of 1102 (99 points lower).

And girls raised by Jewish parents were even more likely to graduate from college than boys raised with Jewish parents.

“I’d like to make a mark,” said a Jewish girl named Debbie who was interviewed by NSYR researchers. “I’m not the type of person who’s okay not being in the limelight.”

“I’m thinking about Ivy Leagues,” a Jewish girl named Jessica told researchers. “My parents both went to Cornell. I’ve been there a few times, I like it there a lot and it’s the kind of place where I would want to go.”

By contrast, some of the Christian girls in the study had other priorities.

“I think the biggest thing that a mother can do is to be with her kids,” said a girl named Mandy. “That’s the greatest thing over her career.”

The study suggests it was not any innate genetic factors that made the Jewish girls stand out. Rather it was a set of cultural, historical, political and religious factors that contributed to an environment in which parents and other Jewish elders imbued the girls with educational and professional expectations of success.

One key attribute shared by the Jewish girls: They grew up in Jewish communities that were egalitarian, believing men and women are equal in roles and responsibilities, in the home and in society at large.

Letty Cottin Pogrebin, a founding editor of Ms. Magazine and the author of “Deborah, Golda, and Me: Being Female and Jewish in America,” a 1991 book that addressed Jewish feminism, said she was not surprised by the findings.

“I think there has been a gradual accumulation of knowledge that explains women feeling that, ‘Damn the torpedoes, full steam ahead.’ As long as we can have a postgraduate degree we can mark our lives and we don’t have to marry achievement,” she said. “We can achieve our own.”

Stephen Vaisey, a professor of sociology at Duke University who was an interviewer for the NSYR when he was in graduate school, said he thought the study of Jewish girls was well designed and comprehensive. But it contrasted two very different groups: liberal Jews and often conservative Protestants. Had it included nonreligious as a comparison group, he said, the results may have looked different.

“If you took people with the same level of education and the same level of occupational prestige and compare Jewish and secular I wonder if you’d see a difference,” Vaisey said. “How much of this is about Judaism and how much about Christianity and traditional gender roles?”

All the girls in the NSYR study had what researchers described as a “moderate” level of Jewish engagement. They attended Hebrew school or perhaps a Jewish day school. They went to synagogue occasionally. Some belonged to a Jewish youth group.

But it was not Jewish teachings or any particular set of beliefs that necessarily contributed to their success so much as the stories they may have absorbed from their parents and grandparents at Shabbat dinners or bat mitzvah parties or at the Passover Seder about the accomplishments of their Jewish women ancestors, Horwitz said.

“Part of the narrative that Jewish adults convey to their children is that education helped Jews survive in Europe and eventually thrive in the United States,” according to the study.

Women are now much more likely to enroll in college than men. In 2020, just 41 percent of students enrolled in a postsecondary institution were men, according to the National Student Clearinghouse.

But Horwitz argues there is something about liberal Judaism that socializes girls to succeed academically and professionally.

“There’s an egalitarianism in Judaism where families teach their girls they can be anything they want to be,” Horwitz said. “They don’t want to do it by altruism, they want to do it by being prominent within. They want to be in the spotlight and make a difference in a loud way.”

— Religion News Service

[pashterlengkap]

Judge busted in secret recordings using racist & homophobic slurs

Veteran Oakland County Probate Judge Kathleen Ryan was relieved of her duties on Thursday after recordings of her saying racist and anti-gay slurs came to light. The recordings were sent to key public officials, including a county executive named Dave Coulter, who is gay. Some of the slurs that Ryan used were about Coulter. Related Judge busted in secret recordings using racist & homophobic slurs She has been relieved of her duties. In a statement to the Detroit Free Press, Coulter said that Ryan’s words were “abhorrent” and said they justified her removal from the county’s probate court “pending further investigation.” Stay connected to your community Connect with the issues and events that impact your community at home and beyond by subscribing to our newsletter. Subscribe to our Newsletter today “There is absolutely no place for harassment of any kind or racist or homophobic language by anyone at Oakland County, especially by someone the public must be confident will act fairly and impartially. I have confidence that the agencies reviewing this matter will treat it with the seriousness it deserves and will take further action if warranted,” Coulter said. According to county officials, Ryan was removed from her docket last week. The tapes, obtained by the Free Press on Thursday, not only capture Ryan’s crude remarks about Coulter but also record her calling the average Black American “a f**king lazy piece of sh*t” and labeling herself as “a new racist.” Ryan also called Coulter and other elected officials “little fa***t.” Dave Woodward, chair of the Oakland County Board of Commissioners, confirmed that he also received copies of the recordings. “I was appalled. There’s simply no justification for it,” Woodward said. He noted that such language “disgraces the judicial position, undermines the integrity of the judiciary, and destroys public trust in our legal system.” Woodward also expressed hope that “if it is indeed the judge making these comments,” an investigation would lead to her permanent removal from the bench. Oakland County Probate Court Administrator Ed Hutton recorded the former judge in secret, he told WXYZ News. Hutton told WXYZ-TV that he had recorded Ryan for the last two years after hearing “her hate and contempt for various protected groups.” Hutton also submitted a notice of sexual harassment involving Ryan in May to Oakland County Probate Court Chief Judge Linda Hallmark but didn’t hear any follow-up about it. Hutton took matters into his own hands, sending the recordings to Coulter, Woodward, and Michigan Supreme Court Chief Justice Elizabeth Clement. Judge Hallmark removed Ryan from her courtroom duties and forwarded information about the recordings to the Michigan Judicial Tenure Commission, the state agency responsible for recommending disciplinary actions against judges. These recommendations can include removal from office, though the final decision rests with the state Supreme Court. Ryan had domestic violence charges against her that were dropped four months later, in November 2021. A police report from the Wixom Police Department detailed that Ryan, after drinking, repeatedly hit a male companion during an argument. Although Ryan was unharmed, she was taken to Ascension Providence Hospital for evaluation. At the hospital, she allegedly shouted obscenities at police officers and hospital staff, attempted to leave custody, and warned them that she was a judge and would be “coming after” them, according to the report. The police later spoke with the victim, who stated that “he wanted to pick up his girlfriend (Ryan) as soon as possible” and added that “aside from her hitting me in the face four or five times, nothing else really happened.” Ryan was instead taken to the Oakland County Jail. The following day, she was charged with misdemeanor domestic violence, granted a personal recognizance bond, and released from jail. The charge was dropped in March 2022. http://dlvr.it/TCw9Y5

[garudabluffs]

Trump’s SICKENING Court Behavior COMES BACK to SCREW HIM

Feb 3, 2024 MeidasTouch host Ben Meiselas and Talking Feds host Harry Litman report on how Donald Trump’s uncontrollable courtroom and deposition conduct has now compounded the pain he will feel in various cases.

would lay my $1 bet on whether they will

7:38 take this up for review or not I will

7:40 tell you they shouldn't because there is

7:43 no law there is no precedent and there

7:45 is no constitutional support for the

7:48 notion that a president has absolute

7:50 immunity so they should absolutely

7:52 refuse to take the case because there's

7:54 nothing to be decided however you know

7:57 the Supreme Court likes to think of

7:59 themselves as you know the biggest

8:01 baddest court in the land they're

8:03 certainly the highest court in the land

8:05 they may want to accept review of the

8:07 case if only to definitively announce

8:11 that a president can't commit crimes in

8:14 violation of our nation's laws a

8:16 president can't commit crimes against

8:18 the American people a president can't

8:20 commit crimes to unlawfully retain the

8:22 power of the presidency because if he

8:25 does he can be prosecuted there's

8:28 actually a strong institutional interest

8:32 in having a unanimous Supreme Court

8:35 announc that that is the law of the land

8:38 I'm not saying that's the way it's going

8:39 to play out but I do think that may be a

8:43 motivator in the Supreme Court Justice's

8:46 uh decision to accept review of the case

8:49 only to say a president is not King and

8:53 guess what a president is not above the

8:56 authority of the Supreme Court which he

8:58 would be if he was absolutely immune

9:02 from

9:03 prosecution right Glenn on on the

9:05 appeals court question I'm obviously

9:07 feeling like like this is taking longer

9:09 than usual but uh you know I'm a I'm a

9:12 10 on the anxiety scale anyway that that

9:14 that's my Baseline but you you've worked

9:16 in the justice system do you feel like

9:18 this is taking an extraordinarily long

9:19 amount of time you know Brian as a

9:21 career Federal prosecutor I've argued

9:23 Criminal Appeals in front of this very

9:25 Court the DC federal circuit court of

9:27 appeals and I can tell you from

9:29 firsthand experience written opinions

9:31 ordinarily take a very long time

9:35 sometimes several months sometimes up to

9:37 a year so yes I know we're only a few

9:40 weeks out from the oral argument and it

9:42 feels like you know we need this thing

9:44 resolved yesterday if our democracy is

9:47 to thrive indeed survive but it's not

9:51 that unusual to have a delay of several

9:54 weeks remember they put this the appell

9:56 court put this on a very expedited track

9:59 just to get the briefs filed and to get

10:01 the oral arguments held so I don't think

10:04 they're going to linger much longer but

10:07 let me tell you sort of as a general

10:09 proposition waiting for three or four

10:11 weeks for an appell at court decision is

10:14 still considered light speed okay all

10:17 right well obviously we'll stay on top

10:19 of this and as soon as we get any update

10:21 from this uh DC court of appeals on the

10:24 question of immunity we'll bring it to

10:25 you so for those watching right now if

10:26 you want to follow along make sure to

10:28 subscribe the links to both of our

10:29 channels are right here on the screen

15 Comments

[hardynwa]

Trump's strategy to delay trial may be winning

The Supreme Court's decision not to rule quickly on whether Donald Trump can be prosecuted on election-subversion charges may help delay his trial, according to ex-prosecutors. But they told the BBC this strategy of filing repeated challenges will only put off the inevitable and could even backfire on the former president in terms of timing for his White House campaign next year. On Friday the justices declined to rule on whether Mr Trump has immunity from prosecution in the case, turning down special counsel Jack Smith's request to take up the matter in an expedited manner. The Supreme Court offered no explanation, saying only that Mr Smith's petition "was denied". The special counsel's office has not yet commented on the decision, which is seen as a major setback to his case against Mr Trump. It is unclear, however, how long the trial might be delayed, or whether it might be pushed back beyond the 2024 election. Mr Trump is currently the Republican frontrunner for a rematch against President Joe Biden next November. The special counsel indicted the ex-president in August for allegedly conspiring to overturn the results of the last election in the lead-up to the US Capitol riot on 6 January 2021. Friday's ruling means that the US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit will have to hear the case first. But eventually, it is likely the Supreme Court will have to make a ruling anyway. Mr Smith had argued that the appeals process could delay the start of the trial, which is due to begin on 4 March. For now, the judge in the case, Tanya Chutkan, has paused proceedings while Mr Trump's legal team appeals. He has repeatedly argued he has immunity from prosecution because he was acting in an official capacity at the time of the riot. Gene Rossi, a former federal prosecutor with decades of experience at the US justice department, told the BBC the decision is a "huge setback for Jack Smith on the scheduling front". "However, his request for expedited review was a noble attempt to move this trial along," he added. "Mr Trump, whose immunity appeal is not strong, will not face the 6 January music for multiple months." Mr Rossi added that Judge Chutkan "does not care one iota that he is a presidential candidate" and, despite the appeals process, will still want her trial to move "with utmost alacrity". The trial, he added, may ultimately end up being pushed back to late July or early August - which would fall shortly after the Republican National Convention, beginning on 15 July. "Simply put, that would be a scheduling hot mess," he said. "The worst thing would be to have a jury considering whether he's basically an insurrectionist at that time. That's not good for your campaign… he's delaying the inevitable." Another former federal prosecutor, Case Western Reserve University Professor Kevin McMunigal, said that the Supreme Court's decision "is not surprising", given that a "typical pattern" in a legal case would be for an appeals court to decide on a matter before it is brought to the high court. "But I'm not sure that this will necessarily delay the trial," he added. Gregory Wallance, a former federal prosecutor who helped convict seven lawmakers for bribery as part of an FBI sting in the late 1970s, told the BBC: "It's a win for Trump. "But how big a win depends on whether his appeal of the immunity ruling delays his January 6 trial until past the election, which right now is unpredictable." A fast-tracked process would not have been without precedent. Carl Tobias, a law professor at the University of Richmond in Virginia, told the BBC that the Supreme Court expedited 19 cases in the last four years. In 1974 the justices fast-tracked the case of US v Nixon, which led to the release of the Watergate tapes, dealing a fatal blow to the presidency of Richard Nixon. "Trump's delay strategy appears to be working," Mr Tobias said. "All of will consume time, and, thus, complicate efforts to start the trial before Judge Chutkan on the early March date." Arguments are set to be heard in the case in DC Circuit Court on 9 January. It is one of two election-subversion indictments against Mr Trump. He also faces two other criminal cases, one over classified papers and another to do with hush money. Read the full article

[mariacallous]

On November 30, Russia’s Supreme Court banned the “international LGBT movement,” and designated it as an “extremist organization.” The hearing took place behind closed doors over a period of four hours and the only people in attendance were representatives from Russia’s Justice Ministry, who wore medical masks to hide their face. Lawyers from the human rights group Department One said that the ban will come into force on January 10, 2024. Meduza has compiled reactions from politicians, journalists, and human rights activists on the Supreme Court’s decision. Here’s what they had to say.

Marie Struthers

Amnesty International's Director for Eastern Europe and Central Asia

This shameful and absurd decision represents a new front in the Russian authorities’ campaign against the LGBTI community. The ruling risks resulting in a blanket ban on LGBTI organizations with far reaching violations of the rights to freedom of association, expression and peaceful assembly, as well as the right to be free from discrimination. It will affect countless people, and its repercussions are poised to be nothing short of catastrophic.

There is little if any doubt that it will lead to the persecution of LGBTI activists, undoing decades of their brave and dedicated work, while threatening to inspire and legitimize whole new levels of violence against LGBTI persons across Russia.

We call on the Russian authorities to immediately review this ruling. The international community must stand in solidarity with the Russian LGBTI community, demanding an end to these oppressive actions and safeguarding the principles of equality, freedom, and justice for all.

Ksenia Sobchak

Russian socialite and media personality

This is the most repressive and cruel law in recent years. Even the “foreign agent” status is just a kind, fatherly suggestion compared to this. It’s madness.

You come out — you’re sent to the mines. You live with a partner of the same sex — off to the mines. You listen to the band Tattoo — to the mines. You write an extremist prefix in front of the words “community” or “people” — to the mines. 

Expect even more emigrants, dear country. And banning abortion won’t help to promote having more children, that’s not how you increase the population. You want to have a lot of children in a free country where you’re accepted. People will flee from a country where they will consider you a psychopathic criminal because of your orientation. 

My support to the entire **** community. I’m struggling to find words of encouragement. Maybe one day this will all be over. Maybe.

Tikhon Dzyadko

Editor-in-Chief of TV Rain

This means that with the stroke of a pen, in favor of cheap political points, the Kremlin has outlawed several million people and declared them criminals. It’s terrible.

The LGBT+ Group Coming Out

An organization helping LGBTQ+ people

Today’s court decision represents yet another stage of discrimination against LGBTQ+ people in Russia, this time under the guise of fighting extremism. It’s a purely political decision to declare a non-existent organization extremist, with no legal basis. That’s why it creates legal uncertainty as to whether the activities of any LGBTQ+ organization are now extremist. To an even greater extent, it’s designed to create a climate of fear and uncertainty for LGBTQ+ people and thereby send a message to society that things aren’t yet that bad for the cis-heterosexual community, but it could get worse. 

Today’s decision will result in LGBTQ+ people facing even more discrimination and violence, and getting help in these situations will become even harder, since it makes it more difficult for LGBTQ+ nonprofits to operate and puts LGBTQ+ activists, or those who don’t support discriminatory practices, at direct risk of criminal prosecution. 

Regardless of how the extremism law will be applied in practice after today’s court ruling, Coming Out will continue its work in Russia to support LGBTQ+ individuals, especially since this is needed more and more with each passing day.

Marina Ovsyannikova

Former editor at Channel One Russia

They’re the extremists.

All citizens of Russia, no matter their race, nationality, gender, sexual orientation, place of residence, social status, religious or political beliefs, have equal rights. Violating this principle is called discrimination…

Ivan Zhdanov

Director of Alexey Navalny’s Anti-Corruption Foundation

Designating “LGBT” as an extremist movement is the beginning of Putin’s election campaign. It’s not just an alarm bell. More than that, it’s his explicit platform for the new term: a step toward complete Iranization [and] isolation of Russia. 

It will be a complete distraction from real problems, the creation of mythical enemies, discrimination against the population on various grounds, this is just the beginning. 

Vakhtang Kipshidze

Deputy chairman of the Synodal Department of the Moscow Patriarchate for Church Relations with Society and Mass Media

It [“the LGBT movement”] has signs of extremism, since the logical conclusion of its activities result in the destruction of the traditional concept of marriage and family.

Crisis Group SK SOS

An organization dedicated to helping LGBTQ+ people facing persecution in the North Caucasus

Due to the secrecy of the meeting, it remains unclear who will be affected by the initiative. Separate details will be known only after the announcement’s potential publication by the Justice Ministry or the Supreme Court, or even after the first cases for LGBT extremism appear.

The work of the SK SOS Crisis Group won’t stop. Despite the increased risks, we’ll continue to help people in mortal danger in the North Caucasus.

Yevgeny Popov

Propagandist, deputy chairman of the State Duma Committee on Information Policy

If we want to protect ourselves from drag queen shows in daycare centers, I’m all for it. If we want to protect children from changing their sex without their parents being notified, I’m all for it. But basically there are different people out there. We have a free country; please express your opinion, but forcing someone to be gay or lesbian, promoting it, is also unacceptable. We have to sort it out. Cutting out gay scenes from masterpieces, I don’t know… Although we also have excess on the other side.

The state has no business in the bedroom, but on the other hand, of course, we have to protect society from all sorts of monstrous projects and the realities of modern times, such as drag queens and gender reassignment without parental notification. But we need to understand what it [the ban] was and why it [the hearing] was secret. Of course, since the Justice Ministry filed this lawsuit and the court approved it, there should be a full explanation.

Pyotr Tolstoy

Deputy chairman of Russia’s State Duma

LGBT are not some unfortunate gay or lesbian people that we are told Russia has decided to fight. It’s actually a well-organized and well-planned project to undermine traditional societies from within. Sodomy is a sin and the exact opposite of traditional values. And sodomy in pretty packaging is an attractive product designed to accomplish this. That’s the goal. Everything else is just a cover.

Of course, the law adopted last year banning LGBT propaganda has cut off many tentacles of this monster. Though it is not the tentacles that need to be destroyed, but the entire monster.

[masterofd1saster]

CJ court watch - case to watch, Johnson v. City of Grants Pass, No. 23-175

Multiple western cities and counties have asked SCt to review the case about homelessness and camping ordinances. SCt docket is at https://www.supremecourt.gov/search.aspx?filename=/docket/docketfiles/html/public/23-175.html

Many western cities have problems with homeless people camping in public areas. If you're a parent, you want your kids to be able to play soccer in the park without stepping on syringes. If you're a small business owner, you want your customers to be able to walk through the door without stepping on human waste. If you're a humanitarian, you want people to live in decent conditions.

The 9th Cir made it impossible for Boise, Idaho to enforce an anti-camping ordinance, even though Boise did have homeless shelters available. SCt had more or less dodged this issue in City of Boise v. Martin, No. 19-247 on 16dec19.

According to the petition in this case,

the Ninth Circuit extended Martin to a classwide injunction prohibiting the City of Grants Pass from enforcing its public camping ordinance even through civil citations. That decision cemented a conflict with the California Supreme Court and the Eleventh Circuit, which have upheld similar ordinances, and entrenched a broader split on the application of the Eighth Amendment to purportedly involuntary conduct. The Ninth Circuit nevertheless denied rehearing en banc by a 14-to-13 vote. The question presented is: Does the enforcement of generally applicable laws regulating camping on public property constitute “cruel and unusual punishment” prohibited by the Eighth Amendment?

Grants Pass needs four justices to vote to review the case. Even if SCt agrees to review this case, that doesn't mean it will decide in the city's favor.

[arpov-blog-blog]

It's a wonderful thing when legal talking heads speculate with stupid opinions. I think Jack Smith brought this case to Florida knowing that Alieen Cannon was a potential judge. They also know that if she tanks this case, they also will have a more serious case involving 'Sedious Conspiracy' that they can bring in DC. In other words, Cannon can torpedo the rest of her reputation, knowing that before the summer is over Trump may be served with four more indictments, two in state courts, and two additional Federal cases.

So in the total scheme of things Judge Cannon could clear the Mar-a-lago espionage and obstruction charges but in short order, before her trial begins he will be facing four more with far more ethical judges. She could possibly place herself in legal jeopardy and Trump still gets convicted in four other cases...."Reflecting on Cannon's ruling to appoint an independent arbiter (called a "special master") and other decisions she made handling the government's investigation into Trump's handling of classified documents, Barro mentioned to White on the podcast that Cannon has shown a "willingness to behave in a way that most judges likely would not, even if they were partisan Republicans."

"Sure," White replied. "She's willing to violate the Meat Loaf Rule: I'll do anything for love. But I won't do that."

White says that there are usually a "number of factors" that smooth even partisan judges out and move them "into the middle."

He listed a few: "Their relationship with other colleagues, their reputation, their hopes to be elevated to a higher bench, their place in history, you know, cocktail parties, opinion of lawyers, all that sort of thing. "

"But sometimes," White said, "Judges just don't give a shit and Judge Cannon's behavior in this case in the past was several very long strides in this direction of don't give a shit."

White suspects Cannon may be imagining what she might be able to get out of a second Trump presidency.

"You have a situation where it is not even remotely difficult to imagine: Her acquitting Trump, Trump getting elected, Trump elevating her to the 11th Circuit or the Supreme Court. He would totally do it. His fans would be completely fine with it. And it would be just a giant middle finger to the country. And I mean, he would do it."

So how, exactly, could Cannon protect Trump and end this case against him in a moment?

"She can delay things forever by making rulings that can't be appealed. She can make rulings that while they don't tank the case, make it very difficult, like excluding evidence by saying evidence was wrongfully gathered," White said. "And that can be something that has a very unfavorable standard on appeal."

"So, for instance, if she started to rule all these statements Trump made, 'that's too prejudicial. It's unfair. I'm keeping it out.' If that goes up on appeal, that's an abuse of discretion standard. And normally, you can't appeal it before the case."

And Cannon could go even further than that, White said.

"Most drastically, she can do things that can't be repaired. Once a jury is impaneled, she can dismiss the case. And there's not a goddamn thing anyone can do about it. Double Jeopardy attaches; you're done. She can grant a motion for directed verdict of acquittal after the government's case. And then we're done. You can't be retried, can't be reviewed. It's over."

White's analysis on the Serious Trouble podcast left his cohost, Josh Barro a little stunned.

Barro asked White: "Is it possible that the Department of Justice is walking us into a situation that not only could fail to obtain convictions here, but they could end up setting off a chain of events that's quite damaging to the federal judiciary?"

"Absolutely," White said.

He went on.

"People are saying that by charging Trump you're riling up his base. You're making it more likely he's going to get elected. And then he's going to have a more conservative judiciary, insulate himself more, pardon himself, all this type of stuff. And it's all true. All that is perfectly possible."

"But if you're the Justice Department, you can't think that way. Okay, you simply can't think that we now have to retreat from rule of law because it's too politically costly."

[beardedmrbean]

The Iowa Supreme Court prevented a six-week abortion ban that was signed into law several years ago from going into effect.

The court was split in a 3-3 decision Friday on the case, meaning abortion remains legal in Iowa.

The 2018 bill, which was signed into law by Gov. Kim Reynolds, prevents abortions from being performed once cardiac activity can be detected, which typically occurs around six weeks of pregnancy, before many women know they're pregnant.

However, the law was struck down by a district court in January 2019, which ruled that the law violated the Iowa Constitution and that there was no state interest in banning abortions so early in pregnancy.

In that ruling, Polk County District Judge Michael Huppert referenced a 2018 Iowa Supreme Court decision in regard to a different bill that attempted to restrict abortion, in which the justices had written "a woman's right to decide whether to terminate a pregnancy is a fundamental right under the Iowa Constitution."

urrently, abortion is banned in the state after 22 weeks, according to the Guttmacher Institute, a research group focusing on sexual and reproductive health.

Patients who want an abortion in Iowa must have one in-person counseling sessions and then return at least 24 hours later for the abortion.

After the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade last summer, Iowa's highest court in June 2022 reversed the 2018 decision and concluded that abortion is not protected by the state constitution.

Since the 2018 decision, the composition of the state Supreme Court had shifted with Reynolds, a Republican, appointing four of the seven justices.

But the court disagreed that it could revive a law that had been struck down years prior.

"The State appealed [the January 2019 ruling], and now asks our court to do something that has never happened in Iowa history: to simultaneously bypass the legislature and change the law, to adopt rational basis review, and then to dissolve an injunction to put a statute into effect for the first time in the same case in which that very enactment was declared unconstitutional years earlier," Justice Thomas Waterman wrote in the court's decision Friday.

The justice added, "In our view, it is legislating from the bench to take a statute that was moribund when it was enacted and has been enjoined for four years and then to put it into effect."

[black-paraphernalia]

Chadwick Boseman's Life Advice Will Leave You SPEECHLESS

Black Paraphernalia Disclaimer - images from Google Images

Chadwick Aaron Boseman  (November 29, 1976– August 28, 2020) was an American actor and playwright. After studying directing at Howard University, he began working consistently as a writer, director, and actor for the stage, winning a Drama League Directing Fellowship and an acting AUDELCO, and being nominated for a Jeff Award as a playwright for Deep Azure. 

Transitioning to the screen, he landed his first major role as a series regular on Persons Unknown in 2010, and his breakthrough performance came in 2013 as baseball player Jackie Robinson in the biographical film 42. He continued to portray historical figures, starring as singer James Brown in Get on Up (2014), and as lawyer and future Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall in Marshall (2017).

Boseman achieved international fame for playing the superhero Black Panther in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) from 2016 to 2019. He appeared in four MCU films, including an eponymous 2018 film that earned him an NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Actor in a Motion Picture and a Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture. As the first black actor to headline an MCU film, he was also named in the 2018 Time 100.

In 2016, Boseman was diagnosed with colon cancer. He kept his condition private, continuing to act while also extensively supporting cancer charities until his death in 2020 from the illness. His final film, Ma Rainey's Black Bottom, was released posthumously the same year to critical acclaim, earning him an Academy Award nomination for Best Actor and a Golden Globe Award for Best Actor – Motion Picture Drama.

Boseman also received four nominations at the 27th Screen Actors Guild Awards for his work in Da 5 Bloods and Ma Rainey's Black Bottom, the most for a performer at a single ceremony, winning Male Actor in a Leading Role for Ma Rainey.

According to film critic Owen Gleiberman of Variety, "Boseman was a virtuoso actor who had the rare ability to create a character from the outside in and the inside out [and he] knew how to fuse with a role, etching it in three dimensions That's what made him an artist, and a movie star, too. 

Yet in Black Panther, he also became that rare thing, a culture hero". Similarly, reviewer Richard Brody in The New Yorker finds the originality of Boseman's formidable acting technique in his ability to empathize with the interior lives of his characters and render them on screen as fully and completely belonging to the character. He was uniquely able to capture and portray the dignity of his  Peter Bradshaw wrote of the actor's "beauty, his grace, his style, his presence. These made up Chadwick Boseman's persona [and he became] the lost prince of American cinemaglorious and inspirational".

Philanthropy

Outside of performing, Boseman supported various charities. He worked with cancer charities including St. Jude's Hospital, continuing to support those battling the disease up until his own death from it; in a message to a producer days before he died,

 Boseman inquired about sending gifts to childhood cancer patients. He donated $10,000 to the Boys and Girls Club of Harlem to provide free tickets for children who wanted to see Black Panther; he did this to support and promote the Black Panther Challenge started by a New Yorker to raise money for similar children across the country. In response, Disney donated $1 million to the Boys & Girls Clubs to advance its STEM programs.

In April 2020, he donated $4.2 million in personal protective equipment to hospitals fighting the COVID-19 pandemic in black communities, starting his own Operation 42 challenge to encourage others to donate PPE.

Advocacy

In politics, Boseman supported the When We All Vote campaign, and his last tweet before his death was congratulating Kamala Harris on her selection as Joe Biden's vice-presidential nominee. Except from Wikipedia 

Wakanda Forever is a nod to the salute used by citizens of the fictional African country. 

But it became a reality of what Black Excellence is.... and we know that Black Excellence is forever

King T'Challa Wakanda forever 

[odinsblog]

While racial discrimination in jury selection is present throughout the criminal legal system, the report finds that it has especially pernicious effects in capital trials. “In cases where the death penalty is a possible punishment, the absence of meaningful representation on juries shapes sentencing outcomes, making them less reliable and credible,” the report explains. “The effect is greatest for non-white defendants, as studies show that less representative juries convict and sentence Black defendants to death at significantly higher rates than white defendants. White jurors are also less likely to consider critical mitigating evidence supporting a life sentence, rather than the death penalty, for Black defendants.”

EJI says illegal jury discrimination “persists because those who perpetrate or tolerate racial bias—including trial and appellate courts, defense lawyers, lawmakers, and prosecutors—act with impunity. Courts that fail to create jury lists that fairly represent their communities face no repercussions. Prosecutors who unlawfully strike Black people from juries don’t get fined, sanctioned, or held accountable.”

To redress the problem, EJI recommends that courts and legislatures remove procedural barriers to reviewing claims of jury discrimination, adopt policies and practices that commit to fully representative jury pools, hold accountable decision makers who engage in racially discriminatory jury selection practices, and strengthen the standard of review of jury discrimination claims. However, EJI says, only a few states “have recognized the problem and implemented reforms or initiated studies” and “most states have done nothing.”

Jury Discrimination in Death Penalty Cases

The report examines the U.S. Supreme Court’s historical “indifference to the rampant and illegal exclusion of Black people from juries” in cases in which Black defendants were sentenced to death. The Court has “repeatedly deferred to state court decisions finding no discrimination and rejected complaints about racially biased jury selection” in these cases, EJI found.

The Court’s tolerance for blatant discrimination was evident from its rulings in several Texas death-penalty cases in the early 1900s, the report says. The report notes that “the Supreme Court found that no illegal racial discrimination had occurred” despite “the total exclusion of African Americans from jury service in multiple cases where an all-white jury sentenced a Black man to death in a Texas county where African Americans comprised 25% of the population” and “even though not one Black person appeared on a jury in any of these capital cases.”

It took until 1935, in the case of the Scottsboro Boys, for the Court to intervene. In that case, nine Black teenagers were falsely charged with raping two white women in Scottsboro, Alabama, and were tried and convicted by an all-white jury. “No African American had served on a jury in Scottsboro in living memory.” Yet in 2020, the Supreme Court faced a Mississippi case with striking similarities: Curtis Flowers, an innocent Black man charged with a quadruple murder in a white-owned store in which he had previously been employed, was tried six times, with four death sentences and two mistrials, by a prosecutor whose office struck Black jurors at 4.5 times the rate that it struck white jurors. Justice Brett Kavanaugh wrote that District Attorney Doug Evans’ “relentless, determined effort to rid the jury of black individuals strongly suggests that the State wanted to try Flowers before a jury with as few black jurors as possible, and ideally before an all-white jury.”

The report also highlights the capital trials of Johnny Lee Gates and Glenn Ford, innocent Black men convicted and sentenced to death by all-white juries in Georgia and Louisiana in the 1970s. Gates was charged with robbing, raping, and murdering a white woman. Evidence from seven capital trials involving Gates’ prosecutors showed they carefully tracked the race of jurors, struck every Black juror they could, and repeatedly wrote derogatory comments about Black prospective jurors. His all-white jury deliberated for less than two hours before convicting him and took less than an hour to impose the death penalty, EJI said.

In 2018, DNA testing showed Gates was not the killer. After his conviction was overturned, he entered a no-contest plea in 2020 to secure his immediate release after 43 years in prison, 26 of which were spent on death row.

Ford was convicted and sentenced to death for the robbery and murder of a white man in Shreveport, Louisiana, despite the absence of any physical evidence linking him to the crime. He was represented by a lawyer who had never tried a case before a jury. His all-white jury deliberated less than three hours before convicting him. Ford’s prosecutor later admitted to having intentionally struck all Black prospective jurors in the case. Ford was exonerated in 2014 after 29 years on death row.

The Need for Representative Juries

“When juries represent a fair cross-section of the community,” the EJI report says, “the reliability and accuracy of criminal trials are improved and the integrity of the entire legal system is upheld.” Representative juries, the report explains, “are especially important because Black people are underrepresented in prosecutors’ offices and in the judiciary. More than 40% of Americans are people of color, but 95% of elected prosecutors are white. Similar disparities exist within the judiciary.”

Ending the exclusion of Black jurors also helps balance the viewpoints of the otherwise overwhelmingly white decision-makers in a case. “The absence of Black representation means that decisions about who to arrest, which crimes to prosecute, and how to punish people are made primarily by individuals who have less experience contending with racial bias,” the report notes.

The historical exclusion of Black jurors from service in criminal trial has perpetuated two parallel failures of the criminal legal system, EJI says: little or no punishment for white defendants accused of crimes against Black victims, and high conviction rates and harsh punishments for Black defendants accused of crimes against white victims. “[P]erpetrators of racial violence, terrorism, and exploitation of disfavored groups have escaped accountability because their criminal behavior has been ignored by all-white juries,” the report states. Quoting a Louisiana newspaper from the late nineteenth century, the report highlights a second impact of jury discrimination: all-white “juries … seem to think that it is their bounden duty to render a verdict of ‘guilty as charged,’ because the accused has black skin.”

👉🏿 https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/news/equal-justice-initiative-releases-report-on-racial-discrimination-in-jury-selection

👉🏿 https://today.duke.edu/2012/04/jurystudy

[dnaamericaapp]

Philly Judge Who Sentenced Meek Mill To Prison Has Been Transferred To Civil Court

Genece Brinkley, the Pennsylvania judge who sentenced Meek Mill to prison, is facing her own legal battle.

According to the Philadelphia Inquirer, the 66-year-old judge was transferred to civil court this year amid growing concerns about her ethics and work management. Brinkley’s pending criminal cases were reportedly reassigned and subjected to reviews by various lawyers and judges, who allegedly found a pattern of questionable rulings and behavior; these include imposing illegal sentences, allowing sentences to run past their maximum date, and failing to “quickly address cases remanded to her by higher courts.”

Brinkley filed a petition this month to reserve the transfer, saying the reassignment “raises unwarranted suspicions about [her] integrity and performance.”

“The last place that such shenanigans can be allowed is in our courts where integrity must be the hallmark,” she wrote.

The petition, which was submitted to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, came months after Brinkley filed a racial and gender discrimination complaint against Lucretia Clemons and Lisette Shirdan-Harris, two Black supervising judges for the Philadelphia County Court of Common Pleas. Brinkley, who is also Black, declined to provide details about the alleged discrimination, but said it was “based on race, age, and gender.”

Brinkley became a judge in 1993, and won retention elections in 2003 and 2013. Her time on the bench has been widely scrutinized, with many calling her rulings unjust and heavy-handed. That criticism was fueled in 2017, when she slapped Mill with a two-to-four-year prison sentence for probation violations. The sentencing, which stemmed from a decade-old drug and gun conviction, sparked nationwide calls from criminal justice reform. -(source: complex)

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