Podcasts about Eastern District

Former FBI Director JAMES COMEY talks to Paul Burke about his novel RED VERDICT, The FBI, being a socially adept introvert, Russian operations in America, the inspiration for Nora and Benny and The Kansas City Massacre. RED VERDICT THE MURDER OF THE YEAR. THE TRIAL OF THE CENTURY.An influential defense company executive sits down for dinner at an exclusive restaurant in Manhattan. It's the last meal he will ever eat.The food was spiked with Novichok in a hit that suggests Russian involvement. It sends a chilling message to the FBI – but what, exactly? And why kill this man now?Deputy US Attorney Nora Carleton launches a criminal investigation into the most dangerous individuals she has ever faced, putting herself and her family in the crosshairs of forces determined to keep their secrets buried.If she can't land a guilty verdict, she risks losing more than her life – the security of the entire country will be compromised. James Comey served as the seventh Director of the FBI, from 2013 until May 9, 2017, when he was fired by Donald Trump. A Yonkers, New York native, Jim Comey attended the College of William and Mary and the University of Chicago Law School. After law school, Comey returned to New York and joined the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York as an Assistant U.S. Attorney. There, he took on numerous crimes, most notably organized crime in the case of the United States v. John Gambino, et al. Afterwards, Comey became an Assistant U.S. Attorney in the Eastern District of Virginia, where he handled the high-profile case that followed the 1996 terrorist attack on the U.S. military's Khobar Towers in Khobar, Saudi Arabia. Comey returned to New York after 9/11 to become the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York. At the end of 2003, he was tapped to be the Deputy Attorney General at the Department of Justice (DOJ) under then-U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft and moved to the Washington, D.C. area. Comey left DOJ in 2005 to serve as General Counsel and Senior Vice President at defense contractor Lockheed Martin. Five years later, he joined Bridgewater Associates, a Connecticut-based investment fund, as its General Counsel. In early 2013, Comey became a Lecturer in Law, a Senior Research Scholar, and Hertog Fellow in National Security Law at Columbia Law School. After he was fired as FBI Director, Comey held the King Lecture Chair in Public Policy at Howard University for 2017-18 and served as a Distinguished Lecturer in Public Policy at William and Mary for 2018-2019. In September 2020, his first book, "A Higher Loyalty," was made into a Showtime limited series, "The Comey Rule." Recommended Ann Patchett The Patron Saint of Liars Paul Burke is the presenter of Spymasters. His first book Spies on Screen will be published later this year. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Susan Pendergrass speaks with Thomas C. Albus, United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Missouri, about public safety and criminal justice reform in the St. Louis region. They discuss the limits of risk assessment tools in bail decisions, why the city of St. Louis and St. Louis County have such different homicide rates, the case for judicial discretion over algorithmic recommendations, the connection between education, social capital, and crime, and more. Produced By Show-Me Opportunity

This Day in Legal History: The Northwest OrdinanceOn July 13, 1787, the Confederation Congress adopted the Northwest Ordinance, one of the most important laws in American history—and one passed under the Articles of Confederation, before the Constitution even existed. Its formal subject was dry: how to govern the vast territory north and west of the Ohio River. But in answering that question, it set precedents that shaped the entire future of the nation.The Ordinance did several remarkable things at once. It created an orderly process by which frontier territories would move through stages of self-government and eventually be admitted to the Union as new states—fully equal to the original thirteen, not as colonies or dependencies. That single principle, that new territory would become co-equal states rather than subordinate possessions, distinguished the American project from every empire that had come before. The Ordinance also guaranteed a set of rights to settlers in the territory: freedom of religion, the right to trial by jury, habeas corpus, and proportionate representation—a bill of rights in miniature, adopted before the Bill of Rights.And in its most consequential provision, Article 6, the Ordinance banned slavery throughout the Northwest Territory—the future states of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin, and part of Minnesota. It was the first time the national government prohibited slavery in a defined territory, drawing a line that would harden over the decades into the divide between free states and slave states, and setting up the bitter fights over the expansion of slavery that culminated in the Civil War. The significance of July 13, 1787 is that a Congress often dismissed as weak and ineffectual produced a statute of enduring genius—a template for national growth, an early charter of liberties, and a foundational stand, however partial, against slavery.Apple has sued OpenAI in federal court in Northern California, accusing the AI company of a systematic scheme to steal its trade secrets in order to break into consumer hardware. It's a striking reversal for two companies that struck a high-profile partnership back in 2024. Apple's complaint alleges misappropriation of trade secrets and breach of contract, claiming OpenAI leaned on former Apple employees—more than 400 now work there—along with aggressive recruiting and supplier relationships to vacuum up confidential information. Apple points a finger at OpenAI's hardware chief, a former Apple vice president, alleging he told job candidates still employed at Apple to bring “actual parts” to interviews for “show and tell,” and that another departing employee downloaded dozens of files on unreleased products. Trade-secret law protects confidential business information that gives a company a competitive edge, and the case will turn on whether OpenAI crossed the line from lawfully hiring talent—people are allowed to change jobs and use their general skills—into unlawfully exploiting Apple's protected secrets. Given the two firms' size and the stakes in the AI hardware race, this is shaping up to be a marquee tech dispute.Apple sues OpenAI alleging misappropriation of trade secrets, court records show | ReutersA federal judge has ruled that disabled Justice Department immigration lawyers can keep working from home while they press a lawsuit challenging the department's return-to-office mandate. Two attorney-advisers at the immigration courts won a preliminary injunction from Judge Patricia Tolliver Giles in the Eastern District of Virginia, temporarily halting the no-telework policy as applied to them. Their claim rests on the Rehabilitation Act, the federal statute requiring the government, as an employer, to provide reasonable accommodations to employees with disabilities—here, remote work they say is necessary to protect their health. The administration's broad directive ordering federal workers back to the office full-time collided with that individualized duty. A preliminary injunction isn't a final ruling; it means the plaintiffs showed they're likely to win and would suffer irreparable harm without relief. The significance is the tension it spotlights: a government-wide, one-size-fits-all workplace policy still has to bend to statutory disability-accommodation rights, and this ruling suggests courts will enforce that limit even against the executive's management of its own workforce.US judge says DOJ lawyers can work from home pending lawsuit over telework policy | ReutersThe administration extended work permits for hundreds of thousands of immigrants with Temporary Protected Status from Haiti and six other countries just hours before they were set to expire. It's worth being precise about what actually changed. TPS is a humanitarian designation that lets people from countries in crisis live and work here legally. Last month the Supreme Court cleared the way for the administration to end TPS for Haitians and Syrians—but what was extended here is narrower: the validity of the employment-authorization documents that workers and employers rely on for I-9 and E-Verify purposes. Haitians got two extra weeks, to July 24; those from Syria, Ethiopia, Somalia, Yemen, South Sudan, and Myanmar got one. The underlying TPS designations remain in legal limbo, awaiting district-court orders expected at the end of July. The significance is both humanitarian and practical: the reprieve came as some employers had already begun terminating these workers, and it underscores how much uncertainty TPS holders are living under—their ability to keep a job now measured in days and weeks while the courts sort out their status.US extends work permits for Haitians, other immigrants with Temporary Protected Status | ReutersAnd finally, a federal appeals court has sanctioned a lawyer for filing a brief riddled with fake, AI-generated case citations—the latest entry in a fast-growing genre. The Eleventh Circuit rebuked the attorney with a line destined for law-review footnotes: “Whatever the merits of artificial intelligence, it is no substitute for actual intelligence.” The problem is by now familiar: generative AI tools will, with total confidence, invent case names, citations, and quotations that do not exist—”hallucinations”—and lawyers who paste that output into filings without checking are presenting fictional law to a court. That breaches a basic professional duty. Under Rule 11 and the courts' inherent authority, attorneys must certify that their legal contentions are grounded in real, existing law, and courts have been escalating the consequences—reimbursed fees, fines, and public reprimands—as the same mistake keeps recurring despite repeated warnings. The significance isn't that AI is banned from law practice; it plainly isn't. It's that the tool doesn't dilute the lawyer's responsibility one bit. You can use AI to draft, but you still have to verify, because when you sign a brief you vouch for every citation in it—and “the computer made it up” is not a defense.US appeals court rebukes lawyer over fake, hallucinated case citations | Reuters This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.minimumcomp.com/subscribe

OA1277 - We continue our coverage of the Trump administration's criminalization of dissent with a brief update on the sentencing of the last remaining Prairieland defendant and a closer look at similar federal prosecutions of ICE protesters in Minneapolis, Spokane, and a number of other jurisdictions. Matt then explains how the DOJ just complicated a case against someone alleged to have leaked the second Jack Smith report in the funniest possible way. Finally, in today's footnote: that one time that Dan Crenshaw and William Shatner tried to make Starfleet happen. “Final federal Prairieland ‘antifa' defendant sentenced to six years after helping shooter evade arrest,” The Dallas Morning News (6/6/2026) Indictment in United States v. Stuckart et al., Eastern District of Washington (7/9/2025) “DOJ Targets Anti-ICE Demonstrators with Conspiracy Charges,” PBS Newshour on Instagram (3/31/2026) Indictment in United States v. Sant et al., District of Minnesota (6/11/2026) Trump's Spaghetti-Against-the-Wall Indictment Against ICE Protesters — and How to Fight It, The Intercept (6/17/2026) “As ICE protesters like ‘Spokane 3' are targeted, many still stand up,” Seattle Times (6/15/2026) “In-Your-Face DOJ Aide Rides Prosecutors for ‘Chief Client' Trump,” Bloomberg (2/19/2026) ‘Go Big and Go Loud': Inside the Justice Dept.'s Push to Prosecute Protesters, New York Times (3/19/2026) Indictment in United States of America v. Carmen Mercedes Lineberger, Southern District of Florida (5/19/2026) “William Shatner Wants to Know: What the Heck is Wrong With You, Space Force?” William Shatner, Military Times (8/26/2020) Check out the OA Linktree for all the places to go and things to do!

This Day in Legal History: Vermont Bans SlaveryOn July 8, 1777, delegates meeting in Windsor adopted the Constitution of the Vermont Republic—and in doing so, Vermont became the first place in North America to write the prohibition of slavery into its founding law. At a moment when the newly declared United States tolerated and protected human bondage, a small, unrecognized republic on the frontier put a very different principle on paper.The relevant language was striking for its era. The Vermont constitution declared that all people are born equally free and independent, and it provided that no adult could be held as a servant, slave, or apprentice against their will—specifically, no man over twenty-one and no woman over eighteen. It was not a complete abolition; the age limits meant the document did not immediately free everyone, and enforcement in practice was uneven and incomplete for years afterward. But as a matter of constitutional text, it was the first time on this continent that a government's foundational law declared slavery inconsistent with the very idea of being born free.The context matters. In 1777, Vermont was not yet a state—it wouldn't join the Union until 1791—and it existed in a kind of legal limbo, claimed by both New York and New Hampshire and recognized by neither. That outsider status may have given its drafters room to be bolder than their contemporaries. While the framers of the national government were negotiating the compromises that would embed slavery in American law for another four generations—the three-fifths clause, the fugitive slave clause, the twenty-year protection of the slave trade—Vermont's drafters wrote the opposite conviction into their first article.The significance of July 8, 1777 is partly symbolic and partly practical. Symbolically, it established that abolition was not some later invention imposed on a reluctant founding generation, but a principle that existed at the founding itself, chosen by people who could see the contradiction between declaring all men free and holding some in bondage. Practically, Vermont's provision became an early data point in the long argument that would run through the Northwest Ordinance, the gradual emancipation statutes of the northern states, the abolitionist movement, the Civil War, and finally the Thirteenth Amendment. It's a reminder that constitutional law is not just handed down from the most powerful actors—that sometimes the boldest legal principles come from the margins, from a place that wasn't even sure it counted as a state, writing down what it believed the law ought to be.A former Milwaukee County judge, Hannah Dugan, has been sentenced in federal court after being convicted of obstructing an immigration arrest outside her courtroom—a case that became a flashpoint in the fight over the Trump administration's use of courthouses to stage immigration enforcement. Dugan, who is 67 and was an elected circuit court judge, was found guilty of obstructing a federal proceeding, though a jury acquitted her of a lesser concealment charge.Federal immigration agents came to Dugan's courthouse to arrest Eduardo Flores-Ruiz, a Mexican man who was scheduled to appear before her on misdemeanor assault charges. Prosecutors said Dugan directed him out through a non-public “jury door” in an effort to help him avoid the agents waiting in the public hallway. It didn't work—Flores-Ruiz walked through a public hallway with his attorney anyway, and agents arrested him outside after a brief foot chase. But the government charged Dugan criminally for what she did inside the courthouse, and a federal jury convicted her in December.Think about the competing principles colliding here. On one side is the idea that no one, not even a judge, gets to physically obstruct federal law enforcement carrying out its duties. On the other is a real institutional worry that animated a lot of the coverage: if immigration agents stake out courthouses, people with pending cases—victims, witnesses, defendants—may stop showing up at all, which grinds the ordinary work of the state courts to a halt. Dugan's defenders framed her actions as protecting the functioning of her courtroom; prosecutors framed them as obstruction of a federal operation. The jury sided with the government on the core charge.At sentencing, the two sides were far apart. Federal prosecutors declined to recommend a specific term but argued the guidelines called for fifteen to twenty-one months in prison. Dugan's lawyers disputed that calculation and asked U.S. District Judge Lynn Adelman for time served—no prison at all. The significance of the case goes well beyond one judge. It's a marker of how aggressively the administration is willing to pursue anyone perceived to interfere with immigration enforcement, up to and including a sitting judge, and it sends a message to state and local officials everywhere about the personal legal risk of getting between federal agents and their targets.Ex-Wisconsin judge to be sentenced for obstructing immigration arrest | ReutersBayer is moving to bring an end to the sprawling federal litigation over its Roundup weedkiller, following a significant win at the Supreme Court. Late last month, the Court ruled 7-2 in Bayer's favor, and the company is now trying to convert that decision into the dismissal of the failure-to-warn claims that have driven nearly a decade of lawsuits.Thousands of plaintiffs have sued Bayer alleging that Roundup, and specifically its active ingredient glyphosate, caused their non-Hodgkin lymphoma, and that the company violated state law by failing to warn them of that cancer risk. Bayer's winning argument was about federal preemption—the principle that when federal and state law conflict, federal law wins. Bayer argued that because the Environmental Protection Agency has concluded glyphosate poses no cancer risk and requires no cancer warning on the label, plaintiffs can't use state failure-to-warn law to demand a warning the federal regulator affirmatively says isn't needed. The Supreme Court agreed, overturning a $1.25 million Missouri verdict in the process.Consider why this is such a powerful tool for Bayer. A failure-to-warn claim says, in essence, “you should have told me this was dangerous.” But if the federal agency in charge has studied the product and decided no warning is warranted, then a state jury ordering the company to warn anyway would effectively be overriding the federal regulator. Preemption resolves that conflict in favor of the federal standard. The practical effect is that the single most common theory in the Roundup litigation—failure to warn—is now largely off the table in the cases this ruling reaches.The significance is real but, importantly, not total. This should let Bayer dismiss current warning-based claims and block future ones, which is exactly why the company is now pressing courts to wind down the federal litigation, and it's pairing that push with a proposed $7.25 billion class-action settlement to sweep in remaining Roundup users. But the decision doesn't make every claim disappear. Plaintiffs may still pursue theories that don't depend on a failure to warn—like defective design—and the settlement obligations remain. So this is a milestone in Bayer's long campaign to contain its liability, not the final word. It's also a notable example of how federal regulatory findings can become a shield against state tort law, a doctrine with implications well beyond weedkiller.Bayer seeks end to federal Roundup litigation after Supreme Court win | ReutersFederal judges are sounding skeptical of a California law that bans employers from forcing workers to attend so-called “captive audience” meetings—mandatory gatherings where a company shares its views on political or religious matters, most often its opposition to unionizing. The law has already been blocked by a district court, and the signs from the bench suggest that skepticism may carry through on appeal.Here's what a captive audience meeting is and why it's contested. When a union organizing drive is underway, employers have long held mandatory meetings where attendance is required and workers listen to management make the case against unionizing. Unions call these coercive; employers call them protected speech. California's SB 399 tried to ban compelling attendance at meetings covering “political matters,” a category defined broadly enough to include unionization. Judge Daniel Calabretta of the Eastern District of California blocked the law, and his reasoning is the crux of the whole fight.He gave two independent grounds, and it's worth separating them. The first is federal preemption—the same principle at work in the Bayer story. Calabretta found that the National Labor Relations Act, which governs labor relations nationwide, occupies this field and preempts California's attempt to regulate it under the Machinists and Garmon preemption doctrines. The second ground is the First Amendment: he held that the law was a content-based restriction on employer speech, singling out “political” and “religious” topics, and that it couldn't survive strict scrutiny—the most demanding test in constitutional law, which almost nothing passes. In his view, banning all speech on those topics in mandatory meetings swept far too broadly.The significance here is that this is a collision between the labor movement's priorities and employers' free-speech claims, and right now the free-speech and preemption arguments are winning in court. A number of states have passed captive-audience bans, so how the Ninth Circuit ultimately rules—California and Attorney General Rob Bonta are expected to appeal—will shape whether this entire category of worker-protection law survives. It's a reminder that even popular labor legislation has to run a gauntlet of federal preemption and the First Amendment, and that employer speech, including anti-union speech, gets substantial constitutional protection.US judges leery of California ban on workplace captive-audience meetings | Reuters This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.minimumcomp.com/subscribe

Scott interviews attorney Bud Cummins about Bryan Malinowski, a man who was killed by ATF agents in a poorly planned and entirely unnecessary pre-dawn raid in 2024. Two years later, no government officials have been held accountable, or have even adequately explained what happened. Cummins is representing Malinowski's wife in a lawsuit that seeks to change that. Bud Cummins is an American attorney, businessman and politician. He served as United States Attorney with five years of service from 2001 to 2006 in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Arkansas.  Sign up for the Scott Horton Academy of Foreign Policy and Freedom at scotthortonacademy.com For more on Scott's work: Check out The Libertarian Institute: https://www.libertarianinstitute.org Check out Scott's other show, Provoked, with Darryl Cooper https://youtube.com/@Provoked_Show Read Scott's books: Provoked: How Washington Started the New Cold War with Russia and the Catastrophe in Ukraine https://amzn.to/43D82oY (The audiobook of Provoked is being published in sections at https://scotthortonshow.com) Enough Already: Time to End the War on Terrorism: https://amzn.to/4eMQblu Fool's Errand: Time to End the War in Afghanistan https://amzn.to/4a5fKvx Follow Scott on X @scotthortonshow And check out Scott's full interview archives: https://scotthorton.org/all-interviews This episode of the Scott Horton Show is sponsored by: Tax Attorney Matt Sercely https://agoristtaxadvice.com; Moon Does Artisan Coffee https://scotthorton.org/coffee; Tom Woods' Liberty Classroom https://www.libertyclassroom.com/dap/a/?a=1616 and Dissident Media https://dissidentmedia.com; Expat Money https://expatmoney.com/scott; and Crowdhealth https://www.joincrowdhealth.com/ (use promocode Horton) You can also support Scott's work by making a one-time or recurring donation at https://scotthorton.org/donate/https://scotthortonshow.com or https://patreon.com/scotthortonshow Audio cleaned up with the Podsworth app: https://podsworth.com Use code HORTON50 for 50% off your first order at Podsworth.com to clean up your voice recordings, sound like a pro, and also support the Scott Horton Show! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This is episode 1 of 2.  We take a look back at Ryan's 30 year law enforcement career.  Ryan retired from the Yakima Police Department last July and is now working full time at Law Abiding Biker.  Ryan's path into law enforcement didn't start with a trooper's badge. He began in 1994 as a Reserve Sheriff's Deputy for Yakima County. In 1995 he moved to the Yakima County Department of Security, working courthouse law enforcement duties. On December 11, 1995, he was hired by the Washington State Patrol, graduated the WSP Academy, and was commissioned as a Trooper in July 1996. At the Washington State Patrol Ryan performed normal trooper duties, but also was a Serious Highway Crime Apprehension Team (SHCAT) member, K9 handler, and K9 instuctor.   SUPPORT US AND SHOP IN THE OFFICIAL LAW ABIDING BIKER STORE In April of 2006 Ryan lateral transferred to the Yakima Police Department where he spent the majority of his law enforcement career.  In addition to routine patrol officer duties Ryan was a Police Training Officer (PTO), Narcotics K9 handler, Pro Act Team undercover officer, Gang Team member, Safe Streets Task Force Detective, Motors officer, and Motors Instructor.  CHECK OUT OUR HUNDREDS OF FREE HELPFUL VIDEOS ON OUR YOUTUBE CHANNEL AND SUBSCRIBE! Across his career, Ryan was voted Officer of the Year by his own squad three times in 2008, 2014, and 2016. He received a Yakima PD commendation in 2008 for going above and beyond for a house fire victim, and recognition the same year for the apprehension of two assault suspects from a 2004 shooting. He was recognized by the DEA (2004) for contributions to drug law enforcement, by the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of Washington (2005) for the large-scale "Operation No Mas" investigation, and by the Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Forces (2007) for "Operation Intolerance." Over the course of his career, he also authored and executed numerous search warrants. Ryan retired from law enforcement on July 31, 2025, after thirty years of service across multipleWashington agencies. He's now focused full-time on Law Abiding Biker, the motorcycle media branded store he built alongside his law enforcement career. NEW FREE VIDEO RELEASED: How to Remove & Install A 2024 & Newer Harley Batwing Fairing-New Redesigned Version Sponsor-Ciro 3D CLICK HERE! Innovative products for Harley-Davidson & Goldwing Affordable chrome, lighting, and comfort products Ciro 3D has a passion for design and innovation Sponsor-Butt Buffer CLICK HERE Want to ride longer? Tired of a sore and achy ass? Then fix it with a high-quality Butt Buffer seat cushion? Sponsor-HogWorkz CLICK HERE HogWorkz builds motorcycle parts the way bikers want them. Clean fit, quality finish, and customer service that actually answers. We run their gear on our own Harleys because we trust it. New Patrons: Steven Mona of Sea Cliff, New York Bernard Hawco of Newcastle, Ontario, Canada John Marcum of Spring City, Tennessee If you appreciate the content we put out and want to make sure it keeps on coming your way then become a Patron too! There are benefits and there is no risk. Thanks to the following bikers for supporting us via a flat donation: De Ann Brown of South Jordan, Utah Jeff Puyleart of Couer D Alene, Idaho Michael Gempel of Green Valley, Arizona HELP SUPPORT US! JOIN THE BIKER REVOLUTION! #BikerRevolution #LawAbidingBiker #Bikaholics #RyanUrlacher

 Download Audio. Scott interviews attorney Bud Cummins about Bryan Malinowski, a man who was killed by ATF agents in a poorly planned and entirely unnecessary pre-dawn raid in 2024. Two years later, no government officials have been held accountable, or have even adequately explained what happened. Cummins is representing Malinowski's wife in a lawsuit that seeks to change that. Bud Cummins is an American attorney, businessman and politician. He served as United States Attorney with five years of service from 2001 to 2006 in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Arkansas.  Sign up for the Scott Horton Academy of Foreign Policy and Freedom at scotthortonacademy.com For more on Scott’s work: Check out The Libertarian Institute: https://www.libertarianinstitute.org Check out Scott’s other show, Provoked, with Darryl Cooper https://youtube.com/@Provoked_Show Read Scott’s books: Provoked: How Washington Started the New Cold War with Russia and the Catastrophe in Ukraine https://amzn.to/43D82oY (The audiobook of Provoked is being published in sections at https://scotthortonshow.com) Enough Already: Time to End the War on Terrorism: https://amzn.to/4eMQblu Fool's Errand: Time to End the War in Afghanistan https://amzn.to/4a5fKvx Follow Scott on X @scotthortonshow And check out Scott's full interview archives: https://scotthorton.org/all-interviews This episode of the Scott Horton Show is sponsored by: Tax Attorney Matt Sercely https://agoristtaxadvice.com; Moon Does Artisan Coffee https://scotthorton.org/coffee; Tom Woods' Liberty Classroom https://www.libertyclassroom.com/dap/a/?a=1616 and Dissident Media https://dissidentmedia.com; Expat Money https://expatmoney.com/scott; and Crowdhealth https://www.joincrowdhealth.com/ (use promocode Horton) You can also support Scott's work by making a one-time or recurring donation at https://scotthorton.org/donate/https://scotthortonshow.com or https://patreon.com/scotthortonshow Audio cleaned up with the Podsworth app: https://podsworth.com Use code HORTON50 for 50% off your first order at Podsworth.com to clean up your voice recordings, sound like a pro, and also support the Scott Horton Show!

On this episode of Conduct Detrimental: THE Sports Law Podcast, Dan Lust (⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@SportsLawLust)⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠and Mike Kravchenko (⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Watch on YouTube⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠) are back after a three-month hiatus — with stories spanning college sports' future, an expanding NBA gambling probe, an NFL kidnapping case, and one of the biggest sports-media stories in years.After catching up on the time away — and a plan to bring back long-form guest interviews — Dan and Mike open with the Brendan Sorsby saga, the most consequential college-sports story of the offseason. They trace the whole arc: Sorsby's roughly $90,000 in bets (including on his own Indiana team), the NCAA's permanent ineligibility ruling, Jeffrey Kessler's state-court injunction in Lubbock, the Big 12's federal suit to preserve its right to punish Texas Tech, and the NFL's decision not to hold a supplemental draft at all — leaving Sorsby out of football for 2026 on every front. Dan explains why this was nearly a "watershed moment" for state-versus-federal court chaos, and the "home court advantage" problem of athletes shopping NCAA disputes to friendly local judges.From there, the duo zooms out to the bigger college-sports picture: the NCAA's new age-based eligibility model, adopted June 23 — five seasons in five years, with the clock starting at enrollment or the year after an athlete turns 19. Dan and Mike break down the wave of challenges already filed (including Campbell v. NCAA and 50-plus basketball players from the 2022 class), and how the Protect College Sports Act and a Trump executive order fit into a five-year NIL era that still has no federal law.Dan and Mike then turn to the gambling and pro-sports bucket, with Lions cornerback Terrion Arnold, charged in Florida with armed robbery, kidnapping, and conspiracy.Followed by Malik Beasley, indicted in the Eastern District of New York on four counts alongside Ed Davis. Dan and Mike get into the point-shaving theory, the unsealed text messages, why a $60M-career player joining Terry Rozier and Chauncey Billups makes this so alarming, and how this is now a federal case the NBA can't sweep away.The episode closes with the Dianna Russini story. With The Athletic's investigation looming and a new New York Times piece reigniting it, Dan walks through the Mike Vrabel reporting, the dual denials, and the defamation lawsuit that — tellingly — neither party ever filed. Dan and Mike turn it into a broader ethics conversation about honesty, owning mistakes, and what it means that Russini referred to herself as a "former journalist." Plus, in "What to Watch For," Mike flags the MLBPA's proposed prop-bet ban as the most important betting story of the back half of the year — and Dan shares a (very on-brand) World Cup story from the home front.Let us know your thoughts!***Have a topic you want to write about? ANYONE and EVERYONE can publish for ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ConductDetrimental.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Let us know if you want to join the team.As always, this episode is sponsored by Themis Bar Review: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.themisbarsocial.com/conductdetrimental⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Host: Dan Lust (⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@SportsLawLust⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠)  Featuring: Mike Kravchenko (⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Watch on YouTube⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠)Produced by: Mike Kravchenko (⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Watch on YouTube⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠)⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Twitter⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ | ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Instagram⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ | ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠TikTok⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ | ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ YouTube⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ | ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Website⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ | ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Email⁠

On this episode of Conduct Detrimental: THE Sports Law Podcast, Dan Lust (⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@SportsLawLust)⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠and Mike Kravchenko (⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Watch on YouTube⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠) are back after a three-month hiatus — with stories spanning college sports' future, an expanding NBA gambling probe, an NFL kidnapping case, and one of the biggest sports-media stories in years.After catching up on the time away — and a plan to bring back long-form guest interviews — Dan and Mike open with the Brendan Sorsby saga, the most consequential college-sports story of the offseason. They trace the whole arc: Sorsby's roughly $90,000 in bets (including on his own Indiana team), the NCAA's permanent ineligibility ruling, Jeffrey Kessler's state-court injunction in Lubbock, the Big 12's federal suit to preserve its right to punish Texas Tech, and the NFL's decision not to hold a supplemental draft at all — leaving Sorsby out of football for 2026 on every front. Dan explains why this was nearly a "watershed moment" for state-versus-federal court chaos, and the "home court advantage" problem of athletes shopping NCAA disputes to friendly local judges.From there, the duo zooms out to the bigger college-sports picture: the NCAA's new age-based eligibility model, adopted June 23 — five seasons in five years, with the clock starting at enrollment or the year after an athlete turns 19. Dan and Mike break down the wave of challenges already filed (including Campbell v. NCAA and 50-plus basketball players from the 2022 class), and how the Protect College Sports Act and a Trump executive order fit into a five-year NIL era that still has no federal law.Dan and Mike then turn to the gambling and pro-sports bucket, with Lions cornerback Terrion Arnold, charged in Florida with armed robbery, kidnapping, and conspiracy.Followed by Malik Beasley, indicted in the Eastern District of New York on four counts alongside Ed Davis. Dan and Mike get into the point-shaving theory, the unsealed text messages, why a $60M-career player joining Terry Rozier and Chauncey Billups makes this so alarming, and how this is now a federal case the NBA can't sweep away.The episode closes with the Dianna Russini story. With The Athletic's investigation looming and a new New York Times piece reigniting it, Dan walks through the Mike Vrabel reporting, the dual denials, and the defamation lawsuit that — tellingly — neither party ever filed. Dan and Mike turn it into a broader ethics conversation about honesty, owning mistakes, and what it means that Russini referred to herself as a "former journalist." Plus, in "What to Watch For," Mike flags the MLBPA's proposed prop-bet ban as the most important betting story of the back half of the year — and Dan shares a (very on-brand) World Cup story from the home front.Let us know your thoughts!***Have a topic you want to write about? ANYONE and EVERYONE can publish for ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ConductDetrimental.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Let us know if you want to join the team.As always, this episode is sponsored by Themis Bar Review: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.themisbarsocial.com/conductdetrimental⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Host: Dan Lust (⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@SportsLawLust⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠)  Featuring: Mike Kravchenko (⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Watch on YouTube⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠)Produced by: Mike Kravchenko (⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Watch on YouTube⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠)⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Twitter⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ | ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Instagram⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ | ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠TikTok⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ | ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ YouTube⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ | ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Website⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ | ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Email⁠

The Author Events Series presents Barbara McQuade | The Fix: Saving America from the Corruption of a Mob-Style Government In Conversation with Zane Memeger In The Fix, McQuade draws on her decades of experience as a federal prosecutor to reveal how systems of organized crime and political opportunism exploit the levers of power-using corruption, cruelty, and chaos as tools to dominate institutions and eliminate accountability. With clarity, precision, and moral force, she exposes the tactics of today's far-right MAGA system: information warfare, aggressive retribution, conformism enforced by fear, and pervasive dismantling of legal checks and balances necessary to defend the public interest and uphold justice. Weaving together courtroom stories, real-time political analysis, and cautionary lessons from history and democratic backsliding abroad, McQuade makes the case that the threats we face are not future possibilities-they're already here. Yet The Fix is not just a warning; it is a call to action. In the book's final chapters, McQuade outlines common-sense reforms and strategies that can reclaim the rule of law and recenter democracy with the power of the people. Accessible, eye-opening, and grounded in constitutional faith, The Fix is essential reading for everyone concerned about the future of America-and ready to work together to take a stand for it. Barbara McQuade is a professor at the University of Michigan Law School, where she teaches criminal law and national security law. She is also a legal analyst for NBC News and MSNBC. From 2010 to 2017,  McQuade served as the U.S Attorney for the Eastern District of Michigan. She was appointed by President Barack Obama, and was the first woman to serve in her position. McQuade also served as vice chair of the Attorney General's Advisory Committee and co-chaired its Terrorism and National Security Subcommittee. She and her husband live in Ann Arbor, Michigan, and have four children. Zane Memeger is the Executive Director of the Pennsylvania Innocence Project; a non-profit organization focused on exonerating those convicted of crimes they did not commit and helping the wrongfully convicted transition to freedom. Because you love Author Events, please make a donation when you register for this event to ensure that this series continues to inspire Philadelphians. Books will be available for purchase at the library on event night! All tickets are non-refundable. (recorded 6/2/2026)

DOCKET ALERTS: Maryland became the ninth state to beat back a lawsuit from the DOJ's Civil Division seeking to seize its full, unredacted voter rolls.   In Massachusetts, a judge allowed states to proceed with a lawsuit to block an executive order requiring DHS to maintain a master list of voters and barring USPS from delivering mail-in ballots from anyone on the list.    DOOFUS OF THE DAY: Sixth Circuit Judge Amul Thapar, who was featured in a Bloomberg Law story about judges embarrassing themselves by trying to get nominated for SCOTUS if/when Justice Alito announces his retirement in July. Thapar, who is 56, started a Substack to talk about how his fitness regimen means he's really only 43.   MAIN SHOW:   In Minnesota, Chief Judge Patrick Schiltz quashed DOJ subpoenas for Gov. Tim Walz, Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey, AG Keith Ellison, and several other state officials. The court held that the subpoenas were plainly levied for an improper purpose, namely to punish state officials for refusing to cooperate with Trump's immigration raids. That's a violation of the Tenth Amendment.   Also in Minnesota, charges were dropped against yet another protester from the winter immigration surge into the Twin Cities. ICE/CBP conduct here was egregious, and the US Attorney claims to be investigating.   Since the satirical newspaper The Onion is planning to launch an InfoWars parody on July 2, we revisit all of the bankruptcy court shenanigans to date and talk about what might happen next in court.   Finally, we check in on the Trump insurrectionist slush fund and the administration's continued refusal to actually promise in court, under oath, that it won't resurrect the idea. In the Eastern District of Virginia, the administration simply refused to file declarations ordered by the presiding judge. And in the original lawsuit Trump filed against the IRS in Florida, 35 eminent judges filed their reply brief urging the judge to reopen the case and inspect the settlement.   In the Subscriber Bonus, we break down a lawsuit filed by the Ford Motor Company against a law firm in California that has an… aggressive approach to trying to get its attorneys' fees reimbursed for representing consumers who get their cars replaced under the state's "Lemon Law."   US v. DeMarinis [Maryland voter rolls] https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/71980724/united-states-v-demarinis/   League of Women Voters v. Trump [Mail-in ballot EO] https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/73133197/league-of-women-voters-of-massachusetts-v-trump/   In re Subpoenas [MN subpoenas quashed] https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/73512670/in-re-subpoenas/   US v. Johnson [MN protester, charges dropped] https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/72200628/united-states-v-johnson/   Judges Jockey for Potential Trump Supreme Court Appointment https://news.bloomberglaw.com/us-law-week/judges-jockey-for-potential-trump-supreme-court-appointment   Floyd v. DOJ [lawsuit challenging Slush Fund; docket via CourtListener] https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/73383692/floyd-v-department-of-justice/   Trump v. IRS [docket via CourtListener] https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/72040010/trump-v-british-broadcasting-corporation/?order_by=desc   Ford Motor Company v. Quill & Arrow LLP [fee-shifting in Lemon Law cases; docket via CourtListener] https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/73503023/ford-motor-company-v-quill-arrow-llp/ Show Links: https://www.lawandchaospod.com/ BlueSky: @LawAndChaosPod Threads: @LawAndChaosPod Twitter: @LawAndChaosPod  

In this Federalist Society America 250 series, experts analyze modern legal and policy debates through the lens of the Founding generation. The Founders gave us the tools to answer many contemporary questions; join us as we explore those answers.Innovation is at the heart of the American economy, fueled by a patent system that represented a deliberate radical break from the British model. Under English practice, the Crown granted patents as royal favors, monopolies awarded at the sovereign's pleasure, with no requirement of genuine novelty or utility. The Framers rejected this. They believed that intellectual property rights should both reward ingenuity and advance society. By drawing Article I, Section 8, Clause 8 almost verbatim from the South Carolina Constitution, they tied the grant of patents to the mandate to "promote the progress of science and the useful arts."This system democratized invention, where anyone could apply for a patent, and set the stage for centuries of American innovative dominance. The U.S. model has largely been adopted globally.As we approach the Semiquincentennial, join our panel to explore the inventive spirit unleashed after the Founding. How did the Constitution break with British common law? Why did the Framers embed IP rights in the Constitution itself rather than the Bill of Rights? What does it mean that the provision passed without recorded controversy? And how healthy are those rights today?Featuring:Prof. Adam Mossoff, Professor of Law, Antonin Scalia Law School, George Mason UniversityProf. David S. Olson, Associate Professor, Boston College Law SchoolProf. Zvi Rosen, Associate Professor, UNH Franklin Pierce School of Law(Moderator) Hon. John D. Love, Magistrate Judge, U.S. District Court, Eastern District of Texas

In this Federalist Society America 250 series, experts analyze modern legal and policy debates through the lens of the Founding generation. The Founders gave us the tools to answer many contemporary questions; join us as we explore those answers.Innovation is at the heart of the American economy, fueled by a patent system that represented a deliberate radical break from the British model. Under English practice, the Crown granted patents as royal favors, monopolies awarded at the sovereign's pleasure, with no requirement of genuine novelty or utility. The Framers rejected this. They believed that intellectual property rights should both reward ingenuity and advance society. By drawing Article I, Section 8, Clause 8 almost verbatim from the South Carolina Constitution, they tied the grant of patents to the mandate to "promote the progress of science and the useful arts."This system democratized invention, where anyone could apply for a patent, and set the stage for centuries of American innovative dominance. The U.S. model has largely been adopted globally.As we approach the Semiquincentennial, join our panel to explore the inventive spirit unleashed after the Founding. How did the Constitution break with British common law? Why did the Framers embed IP rights in the Constitution itself rather than the Bill of Rights? What does it mean that the provision passed without recorded controversy? And how healthy are those rights today?Featuring:Prof. Adam Mossoff, Professor of Law, Antonin Scalia Law School, George Mason UniversityProf. David S. Olson, Associate Professor, Boston College Law SchoolProf. Zvi Rosen, Associate Professor, UNH Franklin Pierce School of Law(Moderator) Hon. John D. Love, Magistrate Judge, U.S. District Court, Eastern District of Texas

OA1271 - The single stupidest war of choice the U.S. has ever gotten itself into may finally be coming to an end--or at least the concept of a plan for an end? We go beyond the headlines to see what is actually in this thing, and take on some of the most interesting legal questions raised here. How could this possibly bind Israel, a country which specifically refused to be a party to it? How is the U.S. promising a $300 billion investment which hasn't been authorized by Congress? And how much power does the President of the United States really have to end Congressional and international sanctions? We then take a quick look at how DHS's  surveillance state is coming along before going deeper on the recent denial of Judge Hannah Dugan's final effort to vacate her conviction for allegedly obstructing an ICE arrest in her Wisconsin courtroom before sentencing. Finally, a quick hoofnote: is it really possible to accidentally purchase 80,000 pounds of live cattle? Matt reveals the truth behind this week's funniest legal meme. Full text of U.S./Iran agreement signed June 18, 2026 “Missing children: Mullin describes 'horrific' migrant child smuggling scheme under Biden admin,”News 3 Las Vegas on YouTube (6/12/2026) Management Alert - ICE Cannot Monitor All Unaccompanied Migrant Children Released from DHS and U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' Custody, Department of Homeland Security Office of the Inspector General (8/19/2024) “Has the US government found 145,000 ‘lost' migrant children? Fact-checking Kristi Noem,” Politifact via the Minnesota Reformer (3/9/2026) ICE agent calls legal observer 'domestic terrorist', Ken Klippenstein via Breakthrough News on YouTube (1/24/2026) 'There is no database for protestors,' acting ICE director tells Congress, PBS NewsHour on YouTube (2/10/2026) Acting ICE director Todd Lyons' response to a letter from Congressman Maxwell Frost (D-FL), accessed through NPR (4/21/2026) Mission Creep: AI Surveillance at DHS Crosses Dangerous Line Into Tracking Americans, American Immigration Council (2/6/2026) Declaration of Nicole Cleland in Tincher v. Noem, Minnesota District Court (1/21/2026) “ICE has spun a massive surveillance web. We talked to people caught in it,” NPR (3/5/2026) Decision and Order in United States of America v. Dugan, Eastern District of Wisconsin (6/16/2026) “Livestock,” CME Group (standard settlement procedures) Check out the OA Linktree for all the places to go and things to do!

This Day in Legal History: The Watergate BurglaryOn this day in 1972, at roughly 2:30 in the morning, a security guard at the Watergate office complex on Virginia Avenue in Washington named Frank Wills noticed that the latches on a stairwell door had been taped over and called the District police. The police arrested five men inside the offices of the Democratic National Committee on the sixth floor: James McCord, Bernard Barker, Virgilio Gonzalez, Eugenio Martinez, and Frank Sturgis. McCord was the security coordinator for the Committee to Re-Elect the President. Two days later, the FBI traced a $25,000 cashier's check found in Barker's bank account to the Committee to Re-Elect's finance chairman. The burglary itself was a third-rate one — bad lockpicking, surveillance gear that did not work, men carrying address books that linked them to the White House — but the legal consequences took two years to play out and rewrote large parts of American constitutional law in the process.The Senate Select Committee on Presidential Campaign Activities, chaired by Sam Ervin of North Carolina, conducted public hearings in the summer of 1973 that produced the disclosure of the White House taping system. The Saturday Night Massacre in October 1973 — Nixon's firing of Special Prosecutor Archibald Cox and the resignations of Attorney General Elliot Richardson and Deputy Attorney General William Ruckelshaus — produced the legal scholarship that became the modern law of presidential removal and the Ethics in Government Act of 1978's independent-counsel framework. United States v. Nixon in July 1974 produced the doctrine that executive privilege is qualified rather than absolute and must yield to a demonstrated need in a criminal proceeding, a holding that is still the foundational separation-of-powers case the Court returns to whenever an administration claims that internal deliberations cannot be subpoenaed.The articles of impeachment voted by the House Judiciary Committee in late July 1974 produced the modern template for impeachment-as-constitutional-remedy that has been deployed four times since. Nixon resigned on August 9, 1974. The constitutional residue of what began with five men and a roll of tape in a Watergate stairwell is in the Federal Election Campaign Act amendments, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, the Inspector General Act, the Presidential Records Act, the post-Saturday-Night-Massacre statute book that defines what limits an administration faces when it tries to use the criminal-justice system politically. Fifty-four years on, the question of how much of that residue has held up is, as the saying goes, the question.U.S. District Judge Lynn Adelman of the Eastern District of Wisconsin on Tuesday denied former Milwaukee County Circuit Judge Hannah Dugan's post-trial motion to vacate her December 2025 conviction for felony obstruction of a federal proceeding. Dugan had been charged after she let Eduardo Flores-Ruiz, who had appeared in her courtroom in April 2025 on a state misdemeanor, and his attorney leave through a side door of her courtroom after Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers had assembled in the public hallway to arrest him on a federal civil immigration warrant. A jury found Dugan guilty of obstruction and acquitted her of the lesser concealing-an-individual count.Her post-trial motion pressed two principal arguments. The first was that the Fourth Circuit's recent decision in United States v. Edwards — which addressed the scope of 18 U.S.C. § 1505 obstruction as applied to interference with administrative agency proceedings — applies to ICE warrant service and so the trial court should have given a narrower jury instruction. The second was that her conduct was protected by the doctrine of judicial immunity for acts taken on the bench. Judge Adelman rejected both. On Edwards, the court held that the Fourth Circuit's reasoning addresses a different statutory provision and a different agency context, and that Dugan's case is governed by Seventh Circuit precedent on the obstruction statute she was convicted under.On judicial immunity, the court held that the doctrine is a civil shield against private damages liability and does not bar federal criminal prosecution for affirmative conduct in aid of evading federal law-enforcement officers. Dugan's team has announced that the case will go to the Seventh Circuit. Sentencing is now back on the calendar. The appellate question that will dominate the briefing is the one Judge Adelman teed up: whether a state judge taking administrative action in the courthouse — guiding a litigant to a back exit — falls inside or outside the federal obstruction statute's reach when the action is calculated to defeat federal law-enforcement service. That issue has not been squarely decided in the Seventh Circuit. The case is going to be the vehicle.Ex-Judge Loses Bid To Undo ICE Obstruction Conviction | Law360A Maryland federal judge on Tuesday denied SCOTUSblog co-founder Thomas C. Goldstein's post-trial motion for acquittal or, in the alternative, a new trial on the twelve counts on which a jury had convicted him in February — tax evasion, assisting in the preparation of false returns, willful failure to pay over employment taxes, and false statements to mortgage lenders. The case is one of the more striking falls in modern Supreme Court practice. Goldstein had argued for years before the Court and was, for two decades, one of the most visible private SCOTUS practitioners in the country, with SCOTUSblog itself becoming the standard public-facing reference for Supreme Court news.The criminal case grew out of his recreational high-stakes poker, which prosecutors used to build out a pattern of unreported gambling income, gambling debts paid out of law-firm funds, and gambling losses claimed as business expenses. The post-trial motion principally argued that the trial court's jury instructions on willfulness improperly conflated the negligence standard with the higher mens rea Cheek v. United States requires in federal tax-evasion prosecutions, and that the court had wrongly excluded evidence going to Goldstein's claimed reliance on his accountants' advice. The court rejected both. On the willfulness instruction, the court found the instruction tracked the Fourth Circuit's pattern instruction on Cheek and made clear to the jury that a good-faith misunderstanding of the law was a defense. On the accountant-reliance evidence, the court held that the offer of proof was insufficient to establish that Goldstein had actually relied on professional advice in the particular omissions the indictment turned on, as opposed to relying on his own judgment. Sentencing is now the next event.The federal sentencing guidelines on the tax counts alone, with the loss amount the jury found, point to a substantial custodial term. Watch for an appeal that focuses on the willfulness instruction; that is the cleanest reversible-error vehicle in the record.SCOTUSblog Founder Goldstein Denied Acquittal Or Retrial | Law360A Delaware federal judge on Tuesday denied Guardant Health's post-trial motion to vacate, reduce, or stay enforcement of the $83.4 million jury verdict TwinStrand Biosciences won against it in late 2023 for willful infringement of diagnostic-sequencing patents covering duplex-sequencing technology used in liquid-biopsy cancer-screening assays. The court also declined to enhance the award under 35 U.S.C. § 284, even though the jury had found willfulness, reasoning that the multi-factor Read v. Portec analysis the Federal Circuit has refined in Halo Electronics and its progeny cut both ways here: Guardant's pre-suit notice and continued use of the accused technology supported some enhancement, but its defenses on infringement and validity, while ultimately rejected, were not objectively reckless.The decision is notable for two doctrinal reasons. First, it reflects how district courts are continuing to deploy Halo's discretion-based framework in the post-pandemic-era diagnostic-patent landscape, where the gap between objectively defensible defenses and reckless infringement is being drawn case by case in a way that is making certworthy issues for the Federal Circuit and, eventually, the Supreme Court. Second, it underscores the $83.4 million is significant but not transformative: the broader competitive question in the diagnostic-sequencing space is whether Guardant can design around the asserted claims fast enough to keep its cancer-screening assays on the market without paying a recurring royalty to TwinStrand. Guardant has indicated it will appeal to the Federal Circuit. Both the underlying infringement findings and the no-enhancement ruling are likely to be appealed in parallel — Guardant on infringement and validity, TwinStrand on the refusal to enhance. The verdict stands for now.Del. Judge Upholds $83.4M Patent Verdict Against Guardant | Law360My Bloomberg Tax column this week argues that the IRS's disclosure of taxpayer address information to ICE should be understood less as a narrow immigration-enforcement controversy and more as a tax-data governance failure.I argue that Section 6103 does not make IRS data impossible to share, but it does make confidentiality the default and disclosure the exception. That distinction matters because a statutory exception should not become a bulk-transfer mechanism whenever another agency wants access to IRS records. The IRS holds unusually sensitive information because taxpayers are legally compelled to provide it, so any interagency disclosure should require necessity, precision, security, and auditability on a record-by-record basis.The TIGTA report is troubling because the IRS apparently built an automated matching process that was vulnerable to bad ICE inputs, inconsistent formatting, malformed records, and weak matching rules. ICE also had unresolved safeguard issues and missed corrective-action deadlines before the data transfer. In my view, that combination means the problem was not simply that data moved; it was that protected taxpayer information moved through a process that treated matching quality and backend security as implementation details rather than core privacy protections.The broader point is that bad data inputs are not just a programmer's inconvenience. If the IRS relies on another agency's messy file to decide whether protected tax information can be disclosed, the quality of that file becomes part of the taxpayer-confidentiality analysis. Loose input standards and crude matching rules effectively expand the statutory exception beyond what Congress authorized.My proposed fix is straightforward: before the IRS discloses taxpayer information, requesting agencies should have to provide clean, structured, validated data; legally certify the need for each record; meet defined match-confidence thresholds; submit ambiguous cases for manual review; and accept strict limits on use, retention, and auditing. The column's central line is that Section 6103 exceptions should operate like locked doors, not loading docks.IRS Sharing Taxpayer Info With ICE Is a Data Governance Issue This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.minimumcomp.com/subscribe

Barbara McQuade is a professor at the University of Michigan Law School, where she teaches criminal law and national security law. She is also a legal analyst for NBC News and MSNOW and co-host of the #SistersInLaw podcast From 2010 to 2017 she served as the U.S Attorney for the Eastern District of Michigan. She was appointed by President Barack Obama, and was the first woman to serve in her position. Earlier in her career, she worked as a sports writer and copy editor, a judicial law clerk, an associate in private practice, and an assistant US attorney. She is the author of the national best seller Attack From Within, and is here today to discuss her new book, The Fix: Saving America from the Corruption of a Mob-Style Government. Join us for this insightful and compelling conversation about her new book; the 'corruption, cruelty and chaos' of Trump 2.0; and what we the people can do to 'take back power and save America'. Got somethin' to say?! Email us at BackroomAndy@gmail.com Leave us a message: 845-307-7446 Twitter: @AndyOstroy Produced by Andy Ostroy, Matty Rosenberg, and Jennifer Hammoud @ Radio Free Rhiniecliff Design by Cricket Lengyel

DOCKET ALERTS:   The Supreme Court issued orders today, opinions coming Thursday.   The Wall Street Journal reports that Jeanine Pirro, the US Attorney for DC, is investigating banks for "debanking" conservatives.    Judge James Boasberg benchslapped Pirro's effort to magic away his order quashing her abusive subpoena on the Federal Reserve.   DOOFUS OF THE DAY: A judge in Mississippi disqualified all the lawyers in a case after finding that both sides cited fake cases hallucinated by AI.   MAIN SHOW:   The battle over the Kennedy Center continues. At the eleventh hour, the Center's Board appealed the order to take Trump's name off the building, citing a new rule that would strip all funding from the institution if Trump's name came down. The trial judge denied the requested stay, and so did the Circuit Court. Meanwhile, the Washington National Opera is suing the Kennedy Center for expropriating its $17 million endowment.   In the Eastern District of Virginia, Judge Leonie Brinkema issued a preliminary injunction blocking the administration from implementing the Anti-Weaponization Fund whether under a new name or not.   New reporting from Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan in the New York Times reveals two revealing memos from White House advisor Will Scharf on suspending the writ of habeas corpus and the Insurrection Act.   SUBSCRIBER BONUS:   A federal judge in Massachusetts blocked Texas AG Ken Paxton's investigation into the Democratic fundraising platform ActBlue, holding that it was plainly retaliatory for its support for his Democratic Senate rival James Talarico.   SCOTUS Orders List June 15 https://www.supremecourt.gov/orders/courtorders/061526zor_5if6.pdf   Jeanine Pirro's Prosecutors Probe Big Banks for Alleged 'Debanking' https://www.wsj.com/finance/regulation/jeanine-pirros-prosecutors-probe-big-banks-for-alleged-debanking-13568e9b   Powell/Fed Reserve Subpoenas https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/72490330/in-re-grand-jury-subpoenas   ActBlue v. Paxton https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/73285205/actblue-llc-v-paxton/   Washington National Opera v. US https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/73476333/washington-national-opera-v-united-states/   Beatty v. Trump [DC Circuit] https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/73477160/joyce-beatty-v-donald-trump   Withers v. City of Aberdeen [AI Attorney Sanctions] https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/69485760/withers-v-city-of-aberdeen   Floyd v. DOJ [docket via CourtListener] https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/73383692/floyd-v-department-of-justice/?order_by=desc   Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan,"Frustrated by Courts, Trump Weighed Suspending a Constitutional Right," New York Times, June 15, 2026 https://www.nytimes.com/2026/06/15/us/politics/trump-scharf-habeas-corpus-insurrection-act.html   Will Scharf Habeas Corpus memo https://static01.nyt.com/newsgraphics/documenttools/2afc51a03e41c257/7f0f0dff-full.pdf   Will Scharf Insurrection Act memo https://static01.nyt.com/newsgraphics/documenttools/ab7a26e5d4b63268/402f052f-full.pdf   Show Links: https://www.lawandchaospod.com/ BlueSky: @LawAndChaosPod Threads: @LawAndChaosPod Twitter: @LawAndChaosPod  

In the summer of 2024, Yosemite dispatchers became increasingly concerned about a man making repeated harassing calls to the park's 911 center. What started as an investigation into nuisance phone calls and an illegal campsite hidden near a trailhead would quickly escalate into threats, violence, and an assault on a National Park Service ranger.Source:United States District Court; Eastern District of California; Case no. 1:24-mj-00085-EPGSupport the show!For bonus content join our Patreon!patreon.com/CrimeOfftheGridFor a one time donation:https://www.buymeacoffee.com/cotgFor more information about the podcast, check outhttps://crimeoffthegrid.com/Check out our Merch!!  https://in-wild-places.square.site/s/shopFollow us on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/crimeoffthegridpodcast/ and  (1) Facebook

Robert Ledogar spent over 30 years serving his country — first in the Navy then as a Supervisory Deputy US Marshal for the Eastern District of New York. He spent decades hunting down and capturing some of America's most wanted fugitives, transporting federal prisoners including El Chapo during his trial, and running some of the most dangerous operations the US Marshals Service has ever seen. In this episode of Locked In with Ian Bick, Bob pulls back the curtain on what it really looks like to hunt fugitives in New York City — the process the stories and the cases he'll never forget. He opens up about transporting El Chapo on Con Air and what that experience was really like. And then he tells the story nobody inside the agency wants told — how after 30 years of unblemished service he stood up for a female deputy marshal being harassed and assaulted by her own colleagues — and how the agency spent the next four and a half years trying to destroy him for it. Fired two months before retirement eligibility. He fought back. And in August 2021 — he finally won. _____________________________________________ #USMarshal #ElChapo #truecrimecommunity _____________________________________________ Thank You To CASH APP For Sponsoring This Episode: Download Cash App Today: https://click.cash.app/ui6m/6pao71et #CashAppPod Cash App is a financial services platform, not a bank. Banking services provided by Cash App's bank partner(s). Prepaid debit cards issued by Sutton Bank, Member FDIC. Cash App Visa® Debit Flex Cards issued by Sutton Bank, Member FDIC, and The Bancorp Bank, N.A., pursuant to a license from Visa U.S.A. Inc. See terms and conditions for the Sutton prepaid card, Sutton debit flex card, and Bancorp debit flex card. Discounts and promotions provided by Cash App, a Block, Inc. brand. Visit cash.app/legal/podcast for full disclosures. _____________________________________________ Connect with Robert Ledogar: https://www.linkedin.com/in/robert-ledogar-276277146 _____________________________________________ Hosted, Executive Produced & Edited By Ian Bick: https://www.instagram.com/ian_bick/?hl=en https://ianbick.com/ _____________________________________________ Timestamps: 00:00 US Marshal Who Hunted Fugitives and Worked the El Chapo Case — Robert's Full Story 01:00 Growing Up in Queens and the Early Life That Led to Federal Law Enforcement 03:00 The Early Influences That Set Him on the Path to the Navy and Eventually the Marshals 06:00 Navy Service and What Desert Storm Really Looked Like From the Inside 08:00 The Investigative Work Overseas That Prepared Him for Everything That Followed 11:00 Transitioning Out of the Navy and What That Career Change Really Required 13:00 Joining the US Marshals Service and What That Process Actually Looked Like 15:00 Marshal Academy Training and the Early Days That Defined His Career 18:00 Learning to Track Fugitives and What That Education Really Looked Like 21:00 Task Forces and How His Responsibilities Expanded Into Major Operations 23:00 Working Big Cases and the Surveillance Tactics That Most People Never Hear About 26:00 The Most Memorable Fugitive Capture Stories From His Entire Career 29:00 The Challenges of Probation Violations and What That World Really Looks Like 32:00 Supervising Warrants and the Team Dynamics That Define the Job 35:00 The Realities and Risks of Arresting Fugitives That Nobody Talks About Publicly 38:00 Transporting Detainees and What the Court Logistics Process Really Involves 41:00 Bounty Hunters Escape Attempts and the Stories That Still Surprise Him 44:00 High Profile Cases and His Connection to the El Chapo Investigation 47:00 The Investigative Successes and Lessons That Defined His Career 50:00 Probation Halfway Houses and the Escape Attempts That Kept Him on His Toes 53:00 What Working With Different Agencies Actually Looks Like From the Inside 56:00 Serving Warrants in New York City and What Makes That Environment Unique 59:00 The Big Arrests That Required the Most Due Diligence and Preparation 01:02:00 Balancing Duty Family and Legacy After a Career Hunting America's Most Wanted 01:05:00 His Honest Reflections on the System and the Personal Lessons That Changed Everything _____________________________________________ To advertise on the show, contact sales@advertisecast.com or visit https://advertising.libsyn.com/LockedInWithIanBicka Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Robert Ledogar spent over 30 years serving his country — first in the Navy then as a Supervisory Deputy US Marshal for the Eastern District of New York. He spent decades hunting down and capturing some of America's most wanted fugitives, transporting federal prisoners including El Chapo during his trial, and running some of the most dangerous operations the US Marshals Service has ever seen. In this episode of Locked In with Ian Bick, Bob pulls back the curtain on what it really looks like to hunt fugitives in New York City — the process the stories and the cases he'll never forget. He opens up about transporting El Chapo on Con Air and what that experience was really like. And then he tells the story nobody inside the agency wants told — how after 30 years of unblemished service he stood up for a female deputy marshal being harassed and assaulted by her own colleagues — and how the agency spent the next four and a half years trying to destroy him for it. Fired two months before retirement eligibility. He fought back. And in August 2021 — he finally won. _____________________________________________ #USMarshal #ElChapo #truecrimecommunity _____________________________________________ Thank You To CASH APP For Sponsoring This Episode: Download Cash App Today: https://click.cash.app/ui6m/6pao71et #CashAppPod Cash App is a financial services platform, not a bank. Banking services provided by Cash App's bank partner(s). Prepaid debit cards issued by Sutton Bank, Member FDIC. Cash App Visa® Debit Flex Cards issued by Sutton Bank, Member FDIC, and The Bancorp Bank, N.A., pursuant to a license from Visa U.S.A. Inc. See terms and conditions for the Sutton prepaid card, Sutton debit flex card, and Bancorp debit flex card. Discounts and promotions provided by Cash App, a Block, Inc. brand. Visit cash.app/legal/podcast for full disclosures. _____________________________________________ Connect with Robert Ledogar: https://www.linkedin.com/in/robert-ledogar-276277146 _____________________________________________ Hosted, Executive Produced & Edited By Ian Bick: https://www.instagram.com/ian_bick/?hl=en https://ianbick.com/ _____________________________________________ Timestamps: 00:00 US Marshal Who Hunted Fugitives and Worked the El Chapo Case — Robert's Full Story 01:00 Growing Up in Queens and the Early Life That Led to Federal Law Enforcement 03:00 The Early Influences That Set Him on the Path to the Navy and Eventually the Marshals 06:00 Navy Service and What Desert Storm Really Looked Like From the Inside 08:00 The Investigative Work Overseas That Prepared Him for Everything That Followed 11:00 Transitioning Out of the Navy and What That Career Change Really Required 13:00 Joining the US Marshals Service and What That Process Actually Looked Like 15:00 Marshal Academy Training and the Early Days That Defined His Career 18:00 Learning to Track Fugitives and What That Education Really Looked Like 21:00 Task Forces and How His Responsibilities Expanded Into Major Operations 23:00 Working Big Cases and the Surveillance Tactics That Most People Never Hear About 26:00 The Most Memorable Fugitive Capture Stories From His Entire Career 29:00 The Challenges of Probation Violations and What That World Really Looks Like 32:00 Supervising Warrants and the Team Dynamics That Define the Job 35:00 The Realities and Risks of Arresting Fugitives That Nobody Talks About Publicly 38:00 Transporting Detainees and What the Court Logistics Process Really Involves 41:00 Bounty Hunters Escape Attempts and the Stories That Still Surprise Him 44:00 High Profile Cases and His Connection to the El Chapo Investigation 47:00 The Investigative Successes and Lessons That Defined His Career 50:00 Probation Halfway Houses and the Escape Attempts That Kept Him on His Toes 53:00 What Working With Different Agencies Actually Looks Like From the Inside 56:00 Serving Warrants in New York City and What Makes That Environment Unique 59:00 The Big Arrests That Required the Most Due Diligence and Preparation 01:02:00 Balancing Duty Family and Legacy After a Career Hunting America's Most Wanted 01:05:00 His Honest Reflections on the System and the Personal Lessons That Changed Everything _____________________________________________ To advertise on the show, contact sales@advertisecast.com or visit https://advertising.libsyn.com/LockedInWithIanBicka Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This Day in Legal History: Wallace Stands in the Schoolhouse DoorOn this day in 1963, Alabama Governor George Wallace physically stood in the doorway of Foster Auditorium at the University of Alabama to block the registration of Vivian Malone and James Hood, the two Black students whose enrollment had been ordered by a federal district court. Wallace's “Stand in the Schoolhouse Door” was the culmination of a long campaign of state defiance of federal desegregation orders that ran from Brown v. Board in 1954 through Cooper v. Aaron in 1958 — the case in which a unanimous Supreme Court told the Little Rock school district, and by extension every state actor, that federal constitutional rulings are the supreme law of the land and that state officials may not nullify them.President Kennedy responded to Wallace's stand by issuing Executive Order 11111, which federalized the Alabama National Guard, and ordering Deputy Attorney General Nicholas Katzenbach down to Tuscaloosa to confront the governor. Wallace gave a long speech invoking states' rights and Tenth Amendment sovereignty, then stepped aside, and Malone and Hood walked in and registered. That night, Kennedy went on national television and delivered the civil rights address that put the Civil Rights Act of 1964 onto the national agenda. The legal and political throughline matters: the schoolhouse door, the executive order federalizing the Guard, the televised address, and the omnibus civil rights legislation that followed were a single coordinated federal response to massive resistance, and the institutional habit they built — the willingness of the federal political branches to back federal court orders with whatever force is necessary — is the substrate on which the modern enforcement of civil rights law sits. Whether that habit holds up under contemporary pressure is one of the live constitutional questions of our moment.The “Anti-Weaponization Fund” saga we have been following all week reached at least a partial resolution on Wednesday when Judge Leonie Brinkema of the Eastern District of Virginia declined to extend her temporary restraining order against the program into a preliminary injunction. The reason, in essence, is that the Justice Department has now formally represented to the court, in writing and through acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, that the $1.8 billion fund is “not going forward.” Brinkema took DOJ at its word for present purposes and dissolved the TRO, which under standard mootness doctrine is the right call when a defendant credibly commits to abandoning the challenged program. But she also did something practical: she warned the government in plain terms not to “play possum with this court,” language that gives the plaintiffs a built-in mechanism to come back fast if the fund quietly re-emerges under a different name.The substantive theory the plaintiffs were pressing — that the fund is an unappropriated expenditure of public money, that the underlying Trump-IRS settlement was a litigation in which the United States was never really adverse to the President in his personal capacity, and that the program's payout criteria are based on political characterizations of past prosecutions rather than any neutral standard — is now preserved for another day rather than litigated to judgment. The practical lesson is the durability of voluntary-cessation doctrine: a government defendant who is willing to abandon a program in court usually wins on mootness, but the cost is real, because future revivals get scrutinized against the prior representation. Watch the Federal Register and the DOJ component-level budget submissions for the next six months — if there is a successor program coming, those are where the first signal appears.Judge declines to halt “anti-weaponization fund” since Blanche says it's dead, but warns DOJ not to “play possum” | CBS NewsA coalition of environmental and tribal-nation plaintiffs filed suit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia on Wednesday seeking to block a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service-approved land exchange that would transfer 715 acres of the Lower Rio Grande Valley National Wildlife Refuge to SpaceX, in return for 683 acres of privately owned land elsewhere. The plaintiffs are the Center for Biological Diversity, Save RGV, the Carrizo/Comecrudo Nation of Texas, and the South Texas Environmental Justice Network.The legal theory of the case is unusually multi-statute: the complaint alleges violations of the National Wildlife Refuge System Improvement Act of 1997, the National Historic Preservation Act, the National Environmental Policy Act, and the Administrative Procedure Act, with the central administrative-law argument being that the Fish and Wildlife Service's environmental analysis failed to grapple seriously with impacts on endangered ocelots, aplomado falcons, and a long list of migratory species whose habitat the refuge was designed to protect when Congress created it in 1979. The plaintiffs describe this as one of the largest national-wildlife-refuge land exchanges outside Alaska, and the suit asks for vacatur of the exchange decision rather than damages — the standard APA remedy.The political and infrastructural backdrop is hard to miss: SpaceX's Starbase facility at Boca Chica has been expanding into the Lower Rio Grande Valley for years now, and the exchange would consolidate the company's footprint on land previously held for the protection of one of the last remaining ocelot ranges in the country. The merits of the case will turn on the rigor of the FWS environmental analysis. Expect a request for a preliminary injunction within weeks.Lawsuit challenges Trump administration's land swap with SpaceX in Texas | The Washington PostA Los Angeles County jury on Wednesday added $22 million in punitive damages to the $176 million compensatory verdict already entered against socialite and former philanthropist Rebecca Grossman and former Major League Baseball pitcher Scott Erickson, bringing the total civil award to the Iskander family to roughly $198 million.The underlying facts of the case are stark: in September 2020, Grossman and Erickson left a Westlake Village restaurant after drinking and street-raced separate Mercedes SUVs through a residential neighborhood, with Grossman striking and killing two young brothers, Mark and Jacob Iskander, then 11 and 8, as they crossed a marked crosswalk with their parents.Grossman was convicted of two counts of murder in 2024 and is serving 15 years to life. The civil case the family brought is the wrongful-death companion, and the punitive damages award the jury added on Wednesday is the part that does the most policy work: the jury split the punitive award $21 million against Grossman, $1.17 million against Erickson, which under California's reprehensibility-and-net-worth framework reflects both the much greater direct culpability of Grossman as the driver and the substantial disparity in their respective financial positions.The case is notable beyond the parties involved because of how clean it is on the standard punitive-damages analysis the Supreme Court laid out in BMW v. Gore and State Farm v. Campbell: high reprehensibility, a relatively modest single-digit ratio of punitive-to-compensatory damages, and an underlying compensatory award that itself was supported by the gravity of the loss. Watch for an appeal that focuses on the compensatory rather than the punitive number — that is where the appellate leverage actually is.Jury Ups Philanthropist, Ex-Pitcher Crash Verdict To $198M | Law360 This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.minimumcomp.com/subscribe

This Day in Legal History: Kennedy Signs the Equal Pay ActOn this day in 1963, President John F. Kennedy signed the Equal Pay Act, the first federal statute aimed directly at sex-based wage discrimination. The law took the form of an amendment to the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938, which meant that it slid into an existing enforcement framework run by the Wage and Hour Division of the Department of Labor — a deliberate choice that bypassed the need to build new institutional machinery and harnessed thirty years of FLSA caselaw and habits of compliance. The legal hook is the Act's “equal pay for equal work” command: employers may not pay employees of one sex less than employees of the opposite sex for jobs requiring “equal skill, effort, and responsibility, and which are performed under similar working conditions.”Four affirmative defenses are written into the text — a seniority system, a merit system, a system measuring earnings by quantity or quality of production, or “any other factor other than sex” — and that fourth catch-all has done more work in litigation than the other three combined, shaping how courts evaluate market-based, education-based, and prior-salary-based pay differentials decades later. The wage gap at the moment Kennedy signed was about 59 cents on the dollar; six decades on, by the Bureau of Labor Statistics's standard measure, it sits closer to 84 cents. That tells you something about how a clean, structurally well-designed statute can still leave a lot of the work undone, because the gap is and always was about more than identical pairs of jobs at the same employer.The Equal Pay Act is not the whole story of American workplace-equality law; Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Pregnancy Discrimination Act, the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, and a long line of state-law analogues do much of the modern enforcement work. But June 10, 1963 is the day Congress, with the President's signature, said for the first time that paying a woman less than a man for the same work was unlawful, full stop. Everything that has followed in this corner of the law has been built on top of that sentence.The Federal Circuit on Monday affirmed a Delaware district court judgment invalidating four Purdue Pharma patents covering an abuse-deterrent, low-toxicity version of the opioid OxyContin, in a decision the patent bar has been waiting on for months. The case is Purdue Pharma L.P. v. Epic Pharma LLC. The patents covered Purdue's reformulation of OxyContin to make the pills crush-resistant and to reduce a manufacturing impurity, and the asserted innovation grew, the company said, out of its discovery of the source of a particular toxic impurity that had previously eluded chemists at competing labs. Purdue's argument on appeal was, in essence, that the discovery of the impurity's source was itself nonobvious, and that the resulting patents inherited that nonobviousness. The Federal Circuit said no.The panel held that the relevant obviousness inquiry asks whether the claimed reformulation — not the discovery that motivated it — would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art at the time of the invention, and that once the prior art is taken into account, the answer is yes. The practical consequence of the ruling is large. It opens the door wider for generic abuse-deterrent OxyContin alternatives and clarifies a doctrinal point pharmaceutical companies have been pressing on for years: a hard-won research insight does not, on its own, automatically save a patent from obviousness if the resulting product was within the prior art's reach. Purdue's options now are a rehearing petition at the Federal Circuit, a cert petition at the Supreme Court (which the company has already pursued in a related case last spring), or quiet acceptance. Expect a cert petition. Expect the cert petition to be denied. Watch the generic-drug filings that follow.Fed. Circ. Panel Backs Invalidation Of OxyContin PatentThe plaintiffs in the Eastern District of Virginia lawsuit over the Trump administration's $1.8 billion “Anti-Weaponization Fund” — a story we covered earlier htis week— went back to Judge Leonie Brinkema on Tuesday and asked for permission to conduct limited discovery into whether the Justice Department's recent representation that it would stop work on the fund is a real commitment or a litigation convenience.The plaintiffs' problem is straightforward: acting Attorney General Todd Blanche has filed papers saying the program is “not going forward,” but President Trump publicly described the fund last week as a “great idea” that many Republicans support, and the executive order that created the fund has not been formally rescinded. From a litigation-strategy standpoint, the plaintiffs do not want to walk away from a live case on the strength of a DOJ filing, accept dismissal as moot, and then find out three months later that the fund has been quietly resurrected under a different name.Judge Brinkema has a hearing scheduled for Friday, June 12, on whether to extend the temporary restraining order into a preliminary injunction. The Tuesday filing teed up the broader mootness fight that will dominate Friday's hearing: when does a federal agency's promise to stop doing something actually deprive a court of jurisdiction to enjoin the underlying program, and what discovery, if any, is a plaintiff entitled to before that determination is made. The doctrine here — voluntary cessation, capable of repetition yet evading review, and the heavy burden the Supreme Court has placed on the party claiming mootness — favors the plaintiffs procedurally. Whether Brinkema agrees on Friday is the question to watch.‘Anti-weaponization' fund challengers question its demise – Roll CallSCOTUSblog's John Elwood walked through a useful relist roundup on Tuesday, and the four cases sitting in the relist pile are worth flagging because each of them touches a different load-bearing wall in federal practice. The first is a prolonged-detention challenge to immigration custody under Section 1226(c). The ACLU is asking the Court to clarify that very long mandatory-detention periods trigger procedural due process review under the Mathews v. Eldridge balancing test, picking up on the Second Circuit's willingness to do so. The second is Newberry v. Texas, a case where Texas itself has confessed error — a rare procedural posture in which the State agrees the defendant should win — and the question is what the Court does when the parties on both sides ask for the same remedy. The third is Kian v. Florida, a Sixth Amendment challenge to the use of six-person juries in serious felony cases, on the theory that the historical understanding of “jury” in the founding era assumed twelve and that the Court's mid-twentieth-century cases approving six-person juries were wrong on the originalist analysis. The fourth is Maxwell v. Thomas, a federal habeas case asking whether the First Step Act‘s halfway-house and home-confinement provisions are properly enforceable through 28 U.S.C. § 2241 habeas petitions, an issue with a real circuit split. None of these have been granted yet — they are relists, which means at least one Justice is interested but the Court has not yet decided whether to hear them — but the mix is the part to watch: it tells you what the Justices are circling without committing to. Expect at least one of these to be granted before the term ends.A random assortment of relists: prolonged detention, confessions of error, small juries, and new rules on habeas | SCOTUSblog This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.minimumcomp.com/subscribe

Leah and Melissa break down what may be a new low for the Court: granting Alabama's request to reinstate racially discriminatory voting maps. Then, they turn to the big questions: how dead is Trump's slush fund for insurrectionists? Just how awful are Acting AG Todd Blanche and Acting DNI Bill Pulte? Will Michigan's Democratic senators stand up to Trump's appalling nominee for a seat on the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan? They also cover three SCOTUS opinions from last week before Melissa speaks with Yale Law Professor Judith Resnik about her recent book, Impermissible Punishments: How Prison Became a Problem for Democracy.Favorite things: Leah: Maria Collett's speech to the PA Senate on LA v. Callais; Autocratic Judging, Rebecca L. Brown and Lee Epstein (UCLA Law Review); AOC for President, Megan Wachspress (Liberal Currents); A Shocking Betrayal of Black Americans, Mara Gay (NYT) Melissa: Imar Lyman at the Kreeger Museum in DC Get tickets for STRICT SCRUTINY LIVE – The Bad Decisions Tour 2026! 6/20/26 – New York CityLearn more: http://crooked.com/events Preorder Lawless in paperback (out June 16)Buy Melissa's bestselling book, The U.S. Constitution: A Comprehensive and Annotated Guide for the Modern ReaderFollow us on Instagram, Threads, and Bluesky

This Day in Legal History: Madison Introduces the Bill of RightsOn this day in 1789, James Madison rose from his seat in New York's Federal Hall — then the temporary capital of the new federal government — and gave the speech in which he introduced a list of amendments to the Constitution that we now know as the Bill of Rights. Madison had been, until quite recently, a skeptic of attaching a bill of rights to the federal Constitution: he had argued at the Constitutional Convention and in The Federalist that the structure of enumerated and separated powers was a better protection of liberty than a “parchment barrier” of textual rights, and he worried that any enumeration would be read to imply that whatever was not enumerated was not protected. What changed his mind was politics. The Antifederalist opposition in several states had made ratification conditional on amendments protecting individual rights, and Madison — by then a member of the First Congress — concluded that introducing such amendments himself was the surest way to defuse a broader constitutional convention movement that might unravel the work of 1787. The list he proposed on June 8 was longer and somewhat different from what eventually became the Bill of Rights; the House debated it through the summer, passed seventeen amendments in August, the Senate reduced them to twelve in September, and ten of those — the ones we now call Amendments I through X — were ratified by the states on December 15, 1791. June 8 is the date a reluctant convert stood up and made the case that has carried American constitutional law ever since: the proposition that the government's structural restraint is necessary but not sufficient, and that the rights of speech, conscience, due process, and the rest deserve to be written down where everyone can read them.Chief Judge John J. McConnell, Jr., of the U.S. District Court for the District of Rhode Island on Friday vacated four U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services policies that had, since late last year, frozen work permits, green-card adjudications, naturalization, and asylum claims for nationals of roughly 39 countries on the second Trump administration's travel ban list. The case, Dorcas International Institute of Rhode Island v. USCIS, No. 1:26-cv-00132, was brought by a coalition of immigrant-service organizations and labor unions. Judge McConnell held that all four policies — a “Benefits Hold” freezing affirmative benefits for travel-ban country nationals, a Global Asylum Hold halting asylum processing across the board regardless of country of origin, a Comprehensive Re-Review Policy requiring USCIS to re-examine previously approved benefits, and a separate adjudicator-instruction policy treating travel-ban country origin as a negative factor — are unlawful under the Administrative Procedure Act. The legal hook is familiar APA territory: the agency, McConnell concluded, failed to provide a reasoned explanation for the freezes and failed to account for the substantial reliance interests of hundreds of thousands of pending applicants. What makes this ruling stand out is the remedy. Other district courts that had blocked these policies in the last six months issued preliminary injunctions limited to named plaintiffs; McConnell vacated the policies themselves, which under standard APA practice means they cease to operate nationwide. That puts USCIS in the position of either rescinding the policies, going back to the drawing board with proper rulemaking, or appealing to the First Circuit and trying to get the vacatur stayed. Expect movement on all three fronts this week.US Judge Strikes Down Trump Policies Targeting Immigrants From 39 Countries | US NewsU.S. District Judge Leonie Brinkema of the Eastern District of Virginia entered a temporary restraining order on Friday blocking the Trump administration's $1.8 billion “Anti-Weaponization Fund” from disbursing any money while the underlying lawsuit proceeds. The fund — created by executive order earlier this year and funded out of a settlement the administration brokered in the Trump-IRS litigation we covered in early June — was meant to compensate people the administration described as victims of the Biden Justice Department's “weaponization” of federal law enforcement, with the first contemplated payments going to defendants and witnesses from the January 6 prosecutions. Plaintiffs include former DOJ attorney Andrew Floyd and other former federal prosecutors who argue, in essence, that the fund is an unauthorized expenditure of public money: Congress never appropriated it, the settlement that supposedly funds it is itself under judicial review for whether the United States was actually adverse to the President in his personal capacity, and the program's payout criteria are based on political characterizations of past prosecutions rather than any neutral standard. Judge Brinkema's order, narrowly drawn to “ensure that no funds are irreversibly disbursed,” set a June 12 hearing on whether the freeze should be extended into a preliminary injunction. By the end of last week the situation had escalated further: on June 5 the Justice Department told two federal judges, in writing, that it would stop work on the fund altogether and that the lawsuits challenging it are now moot. That representation will be tested at this Friday's hearing, because the plaintiffs are not satisfied with a unilateral DOJ promise and want a binding court order before they go away. Watch for what Brinkema does with that disagreement on Friday.Justice Department says it will stop work on $1.8 billion “anti-weaponization fund” after judge's ruling | CBS NewsA divided Seventh Circuit panel on Friday upheld Indiana's law restricting who may attend an execution at the Indiana State Prison, holding that the First Amendment does not give reporters a right of access to be present at the execution itself. Judge Michael Scudder wrote the 2-1 majority. The plaintiffs — the Associated Press, the Indiana Capital Chronicle, Gannett, WISH-TV, and TEGNA, represented by the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press — had argued that the long line of Supreme Court cases recognizing a First Amendment right of press and public access to criminal proceedings, from Richmond Newspapers forward, extends to the carrying out of capital sentences, particularly given Indiana's recent resumption of executions after a long pause and a 2024 statute that omitted journalists from the list of permitted witnesses. The panel disagreed. The majority emphasized that Indiana's witness list — the warden, execution staff, the prison physician, a chaplain, the prisoner's spiritual adviser, up to eight family members of the victim, and up to five unspecified additional witnesses — leaves journalists free to interview those who did attend, report on every other aspect of the proceeding, and comment on the state's choice to impose or carry out the sentence, and that there is no constitutional difference between watching the execution and reporting on it secondhand. The opinion's most striking passage, candidly weighed against the press claim: allowing “uninvited strangers with no immediate connection to the underlying crime” to watch a prisoner die “risks offending the dignity of their final moments.” The dissent argued the press's structural role in informing public deliberation over the death penalty depends on first-hand observation. The split sets up a possible petition for rehearing en banc and, in the longer run, a circuit-split-ready vehicle if other circuits go the other way.7th Circ. Says Ind. Can Bar Press From Attending Executions | Law360 This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.minimumcomp.com/subscribe

An ICE whistleblower reveals a secret memo where DHS lawyers say agents can arrest people in their homes without a warrant. The Fourth Amendment says otherwise! And the Supreme Court's conservatives were extremely unimpressed with Trump's plan to fire Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook on Truth Social. We'll break down Wednesday's oral argument in detail but first, we've got approximately one million ...   DOCKET ALERTS (Dun dun DUNNNN):   Former Special Counsel Jack Smith testified before the House Judiciary Committee. Watch it for yourself here.   The Justice Department arrested three people in relation to the protest on January 18 at Cities Church in St. Paul. Nothing has appeared on the docket, but the DOJ claims to have charged them under the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act of 1994, meant to protect women seeking abortion care.   The Eighth Circuit administratively stayed District Judge Katherine Menendez's preliminary injunction barring DHS goons from brutalizing protesters.   A jury in Chicago took just three hours to acquit a man of trying to hire someone to murder CBP's head thug Greg Bovino. Don't drunk text!    Donald Trump's latest trollsuit targets JP Morgan Chase and its CEO Jamie Dimon. It's filed in state court in Miami and seeks $5 billion for tortious debanking.   Washington Post reporter Hannah Natanson secured a standstill order barring the government from looking at the computers and hard drives it seized from her house in Virginia as part of its investigation into classified leaks by government contractor Aurelio Luis Perez-Lugones.    The Fifth Circuit, sitting en banc, reheard a challenge to Louisiana's HB71, which required every public school classroom to display the Ten Commandments. Background here.   Judge Paul Engelmayer rebuffed a request by Reps. Thomas Massie and Ro Khanna to enforce the Epstein Files Transparency Act and order the government to disclose all materials on Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell. Remember this next time you hear some rightwing pundit railing against "activist judges."   And we bid a fond farewell to Lindsey Halligan, who finally quit trying to pass herself off as US Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia. Well … fond-ish. After getting benchslapped by a federal judge and seeing her job posted online by the chief judge in EDVA, she finally took the hint.   Show Links: https://www.lawandchaospod.com/ BlueSky: @LawAndChaosPod Threads: @LawAndChaosPod Twitter: @LawAndChaosPod  

Former federal prosecutor, national security expert, and Republican nominee for New York State Attorney General, Saritha Komatireddy, joins The Finest Unfiltered for an in-depth discussion about her campaign, her vision for New York, and why she believes public safety must be the top priority for the Empire State. Saritha has spent more than a decade prosecuting terrorists, cartel members, cyber criminals, fraudsters, and violent offenders. She served as a federal prosecutor in the Eastern District of New York and later as Chief of Staff at the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA). Her campaign is centered on public safety, combating corruption, enforcing the law, and restoring confidence in New York's justice system. Topics Discussed: Public Safety in New York Crime, Prosecution & Law Enforcement The Role of the NYS Attorney General Government Accountability & Corruption Homelessness, Mental Health & Public Safety Her Vision for New York's Future Why She's Challenging Letitia James Learn More About Saritha Komatireddy Website: https://sarithafornewyork.com Donate To The Campaign: https://sarithafornewyork.com/donate Follow Saritha On Social Media:

A crazy guy harassed a Let’s Go Washington signature gatherer over initiative to repeal the state income tax. The Better Business Bureau is warning Washingtonians to do their due diligence when picking a contractor to avoid scams. Congressman Ro Khanna (D-CA) blames the LA Palisades fires on Trump. // LongForm: GUEST: First Assistant US Attorney for the Eastern District of Washington Pete Serrano on a federal jury convicting three anti-ICE agitators. Also, the Trump Administration is suing Washington and other blue states for denying DHS and ICE agents undercover license plates. // Quick Hit: Exclusive: Two gay cops suing SPD. Jill Biden calls out Kamala Harris for criticism of Joe Biden in her book.

In this episode of Status Check with Spivey, Mike has a conversation with Orin Kerr, a prominent law professor and legal academic who currently serves as a Professor of Law at Stanford Law School and a Senior Fellow at Stanford's Hoover Institution. In his 25+ years as a law school faculty member, Professor Kerr has written 75+ law review articles, authored casebooks, and been cited in 4,500+ academic articles and 500+ judicial decisions, including several U.S. Supreme Court opinions. He has held tenured positions at Stanford Law, GW Law, USC Law, and UC Berkeley Law, and he has been a visiting professor at UChicago Law, Penn Law, and Yale Law.In addition to his career in academia, Professor Kerr completed two clerkships, including a Supreme Court clerkship with Justice Anthony Kennedy, argued before the Supreme Court, and practiced law for a number of years, including as a trial attorney for the Department of Justice in the Computer Crime and Intellectual Property Section and as a Special Assistant U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia. He has a bachelor's degree in Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering from Princeton University, a master's degree in Mechanical Engineering from Stanford University, and a J.D. from Harvard Law School. Professor Kerr discusses how law schools try to balance preparing students to be practice-ready with teaching how to think like a lawyer (5:49), what Professor Kerr sees as the “ideal” legal training (11:27), what professors actually think when someone messes up a cold call (37:58), how and when he knew he wanted to become a law professor (1:47), the “old way” and the “new way” that law schools hire faculty (3:41), advice for prospective law students who want to become law professors (12:32), the different types of law professors (12:51), every professor's least favorite part of the job (23:12), the built-in advantages that some students enter law school already having (32:48), Professor Kerr's most-read law review article (33:50), and more.They also discuss a video that Professor Kerr recorded last year, “So You're About To Start Law School: A Law Student's Guide with Stanford Law Professor Orin Kerr.” You can watch that video for free on YouTube here.You can listen and subscribe to Status Check with Spivey on ⁠⁠Apple Podcasts⁠⁠, ⁠⁠Spotify⁠⁠, and ⁠⁠YouTube⁠⁠. You can read a full transcript of this episode with timestamps here.

This Day in Legal History: Rhode Island Ratifies the Constitution, 1790On this day in 1790, Rhode Island became the thirteenth and final original state to ratify the United States Constitution, doing so by a margin of 34 to 32 at a convention in Newport. Rhode Island's hesitation had been considerable: the state refused to send delegates to the Philadelphia Convention in 1787, and twice rejected ratification in popular referenda — a curiously democratic method for refusing to join a constitutional union founded in part on the premise that pure direct democracy is dangerous. The state's small-farmer and debtor classes, the same constituencies that had backed the paper-money policies that horrified Madison, were deeply suspicious of a strong federal government that would constrain state-issued currency, ban impairment of debt contracts (Article I, Section 10), and override state-level debtor protections.Ratification finally came under the gun: Congress, frustrated by the foot-dragging, was openly threatening to treat Rhode Island as a foreign nation for tariff purposes, which would have devastated the Providence merchants. The convention's narrow margin reflected a hostile deal more than a meeting of constitutional minds.Importantly, Rhode Island's ratification was conditioned on a lengthy list of proposed amendments — many of them mirroring the Bill of Rights that James Madison had already shepherded through Congress in September 1789 and that would be ratified in December 1791. With Rhode Island in, the original Union was at last complete, and the practical question of whether the new federal government could function with one stubborn holdout fell away. The episode is a useful reminder that the constitutional founding was not so much a singular moment as a slow, contested, occasionally coerced bargain — one that ended in Newport on a humid Saturday in May.The U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday handed down a narrow 5-4 ruling in Pitchford v. Cain, reviving a Mississippi death row inmate's challenge to the prosecutor's race-based use of peremptory strikes at his 2006 capital trial. Justice Kavanaugh, writing for a majority that included Chief Justice Roberts plus Justices Sotomayor, Kagan, and Jackson, held that the Mississippi Supreme Court unreasonably applied Batson v. Kentucky's three-step framework for challenges to peremptory strikes.The Court found the trial judge accepted the prosecutor's race-neutral explanations without giving defense counsel a meaningful opportunity to argue that those reasons were pretextual, and the state appellate court compounded the error by treating that omission as a waiver. The prosecutor, Doug Evans, used four of his twelve strikes to remove four of the five Black prospective jurors, leaving a jury of eleven white jurors and one Black juror in a Mississippi county that was then roughly 40 percent Black.The Court leaned heavily on its 2019 Flowers v. Mississippi decision, which involved the same prosecutor and the same trial judge and had already found Evans's pattern of striking Black jurors discriminatory. Federal habeas relief was appropriate because the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act's deferential “no fair-minded jurist could agree” standard cannot rescue a state-court ruling that simply skips Batson's third step. Justice Gorsuch dissented, joined by Justices Alito, Thomas, and Barrett, arguing the record showed counsel chose silence rather than being denied an opportunity. The case now returns to the Fifth Circuit for further proceedings.Justices Revive Mississippi Death Row Inmate's Batson Claim | Law360Caesars Entertainment agreed Thursday to be acquired by Tilman Fertitta's privately-held Fertitta Entertainment in an all-cash deal valued at roughly $17.6 billion, including the assumption of approximately $11.9 billion of Caesars' outstanding debt. Shareholders will receive $31 per share, a 49 percent premium over Caesars' unaffected share price as of February 25, and the company will be delisted from Nasdaq upon closing. The agreement includes a go-shop period running through approximately July 11 — a Delaware deal-protection mechanism that lets the target board solicit competing bids without triggering a termination fee, and that helps insulate the sale process from a Revlon-flavored fiduciary-duty challenge by signaling the board actively tested the market after signing.Latham & Watkins and Skadden are representing Caesars (the latter on antitrust), White & Case is advising Fertitta, and Freshfields is counseling the Carano family, which holds a roughly 5 percent stake and will roll part of its equity into the combined entity. The combined company would control more than 60 casino resorts and over 200 retail sports betting locations under the William Hill brand. Antitrust review will be the inflection point given the overlap on the Las Vegas Strip — where Caesars operates eight properties — and across digital betting. Funding will come from Fertitta equity and committed debt financing arranged by a syndicate of ten banks.4 Firms Steer Fertitta's $17.6B Caesars Entertainment Buy | Law360The Department of Health and Human Services on Thursday finalized a long-awaited overhaul of the federal Independent Dispute Resolution process under the No Surprises Act of 2021, the statute that pulls most out-of-network billing fights out of the patient's hands and into a baseball-style arbitration between provider and payer. The headline change slashes the per-party administrative fee from $115 to $15 per case, undoing a sharp 2023 hike that providers had successfully challenged in the Eastern District of Texas as having been adopted without notice-and-comment rulemaking under the Administrative Procedure Act.The rule also expands batching, so economically similar items and services can be bundled into a single arbitration, which the agency says will cut transaction costs and ease the chronic IDR backlog. HHS is also rolling out a centralized federal dispute portal and a payer registry intended to fix the persistent problem of providers being unable to identify which entity is actually on the hook in any given case. Reactions from physician and radiology groups have been mixed, with broad support for the fee cut but lingering concern that the qualifying payment amount methodology — the benchmark arbitrators must consider — still tilts the field toward insurers. APA Section 706 challenges to portions of the earlier IDR framework remain pending in the Fifth Circuit.US HHS finalizes rule to streamline dispute resolution under No Surprises Act | ReutersABC's New York affiliate WABC-TV filed an objection with the FCC on Thursday, calling Chairman Brendan Carr's April order requiring early license renewals for all eight ABC-owned stations an “unconstitutional” act of viewpoint-based retaliation barred by the First Amendment. WABC submitted its renewal under protest, arguing the agency has not demanded simultaneous early renewals from a commonly owned station group in more than fifty years and that the Media Bureau's stated rationale — possible violations of the Communications Act of 1934 and the FCC's nondiscrimination rules — is pretext for punishing disfavored editorial speech.The doctrinal hook is the Bantam Books line of cases through last term's NRA v. Vullo, which holds that government officials cannot use the implicit threat of regulatory sanction to coerce private intermediaries into suppressing protected expression. The order followed a separate FCC inquiry into whether “The View” has been violating the agency's equal-time rule for political candidates, and came against the backdrop of repeated White House demands that Disney fire Jimmy Kimmel. Democratic Commissioner Anna Gomez has openly urged Disney not to “flinch.”On the same day, the FCC issued a broader notice warning all broadcasters that licenses could be reviewed early if stations are deemed to be failing their statutory public-interest obligation — a posture that drops the question of broadcast licensing back into Red Lion-era First Amendment territory.FCC Targeting ABC Licenses To Punish Speech, Station Says | Law360 This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.minimumcomp.com/subscribe

Carlton Fields Shareholder and former Assistant U.S. Attorney in the Eastern District of Virginia Tax Division Gene Rossi weighs in on the legal authority of the Trump anti-weaponization fund. University of Minnesota Law Professor and former Bush chief White House ethics lawyer Richard Painter discusses Trump's IRS settlement agreement. New York Law School Professor and Director […]

Case Law Update   •          Jawad A. Shah, P.C., Alliance Anesthesia, PLLC, Insight Anesthesia, PLLC and Insight Radiologists, P.C. v Auto Club Ins Assoc, unpublished opinion per curiam of the Court of Appeals, issued April 20, 2026 (Docket No. 372543) •          MemberSelect Ins Co v Michael James Clancy, PR of the Estate of Connor James Clancy and Anthony Dwayne Magee and Debbie Magee, unpublished opinion per curiam of the Court of Appeals, issued April 23, 2026 (Docket No. 372802)   Trending Topics in PIP Litigation   •          Staged accident fraud recovery •          Uber Technologies, Inc., et al. v Powell, et al., 2:26-cv-02195, U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York, filed April 14, 2026

A father in Napier was fed up with boy racers keeping the household awake for months on end - and he eventually took matters into his own hands. In February, he grabbed his paintball gun, crept up to a vantage point with a good view of dozens of youths gathered around their cars, and fired 500 paintballs at them over several minutes. As a result, he was sentenced to 40 hours community work and had his paintball gun confiscated. Eastern District Prevention Manager Inspector Andy Sloan says he understands how frustrating this kind of anti-social behaviour can be. He explained they regularly follow-up on reports from the public, but information like vehicle registrations are useful for incidents like this. LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Jonathan Byrne of the Southern District of West Virginia and Andrew Grindrod of the Eastern District of Virginia Federal Public Defender Offices discuss recent Fourth Circuit Court news.

Andrew Weissmann is the co-host of the popular podcast Main Justice and is a frequent legal analyst for NBC/MSNBC. He serves on the board of Just Security and writes frequently for it, as well as The New York Times, The Atlantic, & The Washington Post. From 2017-2019 Andrew served as a lead prosecutor in Robert S. Mueller's Special Counsel's Office. His memoir about the Special Counsel investigation, Where Law Ends: Inside the Mueller Investigation , was a New York Times bestseller. He is also a Professor of Practice at New York University and teaches courses in national security and criminal procedure. He also served as the General Counsel for the Federal Bureau of Investigation and from 2002-2005 he served as the Deputy and then the Director of the Enron Task Force where he supervised the prosecution of more than 30 individuals in connection with the company's collapse. And he was also a federal prosecutor for 15 years in the Eastern District of New York, where he served as the Chief of the Criminal Division and prosecuted numerous members of the Colombo, Gambino, and Genovese families, including the bosses of the Colombo and Genovese families. Andrew's back to discuss his terrific new book, Liar's Kingdom: How to Stop Trump's Deceit and Save America, which is on sale May 19. We also discuss Bondi, Blanche, the DOJ SCOTUS, redistricting and more. Got somethin' to say?! Email us at BackroomAndy@gmail.com Leave us a message: 845-307-7446 Twitter: @AndyOstroy Produced by Andy Ostroy, Matty Rosenberg, and Jennifer Hammoud @ Radio Free Rhiniecliff Design by Cricket Lengyel

In this episode, trial lawyer Neil Rockind dives into the controversial federal indictment of James Bryan Comey Jr. in the Eastern District of North Carolina. The charges stem from a May 15, 2025, Instagram post featuring seashells arranged to spell "86 47," which prosecutors allege constitutes a threat against President Donald Trump, the 47th President of the United States.#neilrockind #killercrossexamination #jamescomey #8647 #indictment #trump The Meaning of "86 47": Rockind explains that in restaurant parlance, "86" means to cancel an order or remove an item from the menu. He argues that in a political context, the phrase has long been used to mean "remove" or "cancel" a politician, rather than a call for physical violence. Legal Elements of 18 U.S.C. § 871: Rockind breaks down what the government must prove to secure a conviction for threatening the President: Knowing and Willful: The defendant must have made the statement intentionally. True Threat: The communication must be a serious expression of intent to kill or inflict bodily harm. Subjective Intent: The prosecutor must prove Comey understood the post would be perceived as a threat. Selective Prosecution: Rockind highlights that others, including prominent conservatives, have used "86" in reference to politicians without facing charges, suggesting this is a singular, potentially malicious prosecution targeted at a political adversary. Neil Rockind's AnalysisRockind predicts the government's case will "crash and burn." He argues that because "86" has multiple non-violent meanings—including impeachment or removal via the 25th Amendment—the prosecution will fail to prove a "true threat" beyond a reasonable doubt. He anticipates a swift dismissal or acquittal, followed by a likely civil lawsuit for malicious prosecution filed by Comey.About Neil Rockind - Neil Rockind is a trial lawyer. Neil Rockind is often considered a bet the farm/company type of lawyer, taking on cases where the stakes are “all in.” Neil Rockind appears regularly on television and in the news, defends people in serious court cases, is a regular guest on the Law and Crime Network and also discusses popular trials and cases and current events with other top lawyers around the country. Neil Rockind has won just about every award imaginable, has represented athletes, celebrities, musicians, public figures and has obtained acquittals in all varieties of cases. His nickname is "The Rockweiler" and he's known for his cross examination style.Neil Rockind:Https://www.X.com/neilrockindlawHttps://www.instagram.com/rockindlaw https://www.rockindlaw.com/http://www.killercrossexamination.com/*************************************Subscribe to Killer Cross Examination® PodcastAPPLE: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast...SPOTIFY: https://open.spotify.com/show/424RIys...GOOGLE PODCASTS: https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0...AUDIBLE:https://www.audible.com/pd/Podcast/B0...******************************************Fair Use DoctrineThe contents are under fair use. It may contain copyrighted materials whose use has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. This, in our view, is fair use pursuant to section 107 of the US Copyright Law. Fair use allows limited use of copyrighted material without requiring permission from the rights holders, such as for commentary, criticism, news reporting, research, teaching or scholarship. We retain no rights to that material. To the extent the videos capture images or likenesses, we do not own the rights to those images, likenesses, etc and only use them pursuant to the fair use doctrine.All other rights are reserved.

Two government watchdogs are suing the Justice Department over its Office of Legal Counsel memo that declares the Presidential Records Act unconstitutional. The US Attorney in the Eastern District of North Carolina has filed charges against James Comey for sharing a photo of seashells that spell out 8647. The Government Accountability Office and the Office of the Inspector General are investigating the Department of Justice's compliance with the Epstein Files Transparency Act.  The White House Correspondents' Dinner was not designated a National Special Security Event by the US Secret Service. Plus listener questions. Do you have questions for the pod or something for HITMEINTHEHEADWITHABAT?    Get this new customer offer and your 3-month Unlimited wireless plan for just $15 a month at MINTMOBILE.com/UNJUST Check out other MSW Media podcastshttps://mswmedia.com/shows/ Follow AGMueller, She Wrote SubstackMueller She Wrote on Blueskyhttps://twitter.com/MuellerSheWrotehttps://twitter.com/dailybeanspodMore from Andrew McCabeThe Real McCabe on Substack@therealmccabe.com on BlueskyThe Threat: How the FBI Protects America in the Age of Terror and Trump This Show is Available Ad-Free And Early For Patreon and Supercast Supporters at https://patreon.com/thedailybeansOr when you Subscribe on Apple Podcastshttps://apple.co/3YNpW3P Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

An arrest warrant was issued for former FBI Director James Comey after he was indicted by a grand jury in the Eastern District of North Carolina related to his Trump assassination post on Instagram. The US Marshals were asked to provide Comey with the indictment and they issued an arrest warrant. Comey is facing up to 20 years in prison. Also happening today, One of the top cronies of one of the most destructive political figures in recent memory has been indicted by President Trump's Department of Justice. David Morens, a former senior advisor to Dr. Anthony Fauci was charged with several crimes, including: conspiracy against the United States; destruction, alteration, or falsification of records in federal investigations; concealment, removal, or mutilation of records; and aiding and abetting.Guest: Marc Morano - ClimateDepot.ComSponsor:My PillowWww.MyPillow.com/johnSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

The indictment centers on a year old social media post featuring seashells which was already investigated and set aside by the Secret Service. The timing of this renewed interest appears linked to recent events at the White House Correspondents Dinner and a desire to prove loyalty to Donald Trump. Critics suggest that the focus has shifted from obtaining actual guilty verdicts to simply filing indictments against perceived political enemies like the Southern Poverty Law Center and James Comey. Jim Jordan and other allies continue to support these moves publicly despite the legal weakness of the cases. Analysis of the charges under 18 USC section 871 reveals significant hurdles regarding free speech and the lack of imminent threat. This latest legal maneuver is being characterized by many as a political vendetta rather than a legitimate pursuit of justice. The Eastern District of North Carolina is now the staging ground for a case that many believe will be dismissed on substantive grounds just like previous attempts. SUPPORT & CONNECT WITH HAWK- Support on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/mdg650hawk - Hawk's Merch Store: https://hawkmerchstore.com - Connect on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@mdg650hawk7thacct - Connect on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@hawkeyewhackamole - Connect on BlueSky: https://bsky.app/profile/mdg650hawk.bsky.social - Connect on Substack: https://mdg650hawk.substack.com - Connect on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/hawkpodcasts - Connect on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mdg650hawk - Connect on Twitch: https://www.twitch.tv/mdg650hawk ALL HAWK PODCASTS INFO- Additional Content Available Here: https://www.hawkpodcasts.comhttps://www.youtube.com/@hawkpodcasts- Listen to Hawk Podcasts On Your Favorite Platform:Spotify: https://spoti.fi/3RWeJfyApple Podcasts: https://apple.co/422GDuLYouTube: https://youtube.com/@hawkpodcastsiHeartRadio: https://ihr.fm/47vVBdPPandora: https://bit.ly/48COaTB

Send us Fan MailStephen J. Cox is the acting Attorney General of Alaska since August 29th, 2025. He was appointed by Gov. Mike Dunleavy after the previous Attorney General Treg Taylor resigned to begin his gubernatorial campaign. Stephen Cox previously served as the United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Texas, which is headquartered in Beaumont. He was appointed to that position by US Attorney General Bill Barr during the President Donald Trump's first administration. Cox graduated from the University of Houston Law Center in 2006 with his Juris doctorate degree, summa cum laude. After law school, he was a law clerk to Judge James Larry Edmondson of the US Court of Appeals for the 11th circuit based in Atlanta, Georgia. Stephen Cox has also spent time in private practice dealing with white collar investigations, ethics and compliance, and regulatory matters. He and his wife moved with their children to Anchorage in 2021. To listen to Stephen Cox's appearance on the Hillsdale College Podcast, entitled, "Starting a Classical School in Alaska," click here.

In part one of Red Eye Radio with Gary McNamara and Eric Harley, former FBI Director James Comey was indicted Tuesday over a photo of seashells officials said threatened President Trump marking the administration's second attempt to prosecute one of his biggest political opponents. The charges approved by a grand jury in the Eastern District of North Carolina where Comey allegedly took the photo include making a threat against the President and transmitting a threat in interstate commerce, according to court documents. Also Eric has a close call with severe weather in Texas, Republicans should talk less about the White House Ballroom and more about consumer prices, President Trump is in for the long-haul on the Iranian ship blockade, a look at oil export numbers and speculating on a possible uprising in Iran to end the war. For more talk on the issues that matter to you, listen on radio stations across America Monday-Friday 12am-5am CT (1am-6am ET and 10pm-3am PT), download the RED EYE RADIO SHOW app, asking your smart speaker, or listening at RedEyeRadioShow.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Judge Elizabeth Stong calls bankruptcy court a "second chance court," a forum where companies in financial distress and individuals buried in debt can find a path forward, even if it's rarely the one they hoped for. She serves on the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Eastern District of New York, sitting in Brooklyn. Becoming a judge was never on Judge Stong's radar — she was a happy litigation partner with no bankruptcy background when a job announcement caught her eye. In this episode, Judge Stong describes managing more than 300 active Chapter 11 cases alongside individual filings, the rhythm of case management conferences, and how she works with law clerks to prepare for hundreds of orders each week. She unpacks the structure of Article I bankruptcy judgeships and the Second Circuit's appointment process, and reflects on the weight of decisions that shape whether a family keeps its home or thousands of employees keep their jobs. The Honorable Elizabeth Stong is a graduate of Harvard Law School. This episode is hosted by Kyle McEntee.Mentioned in this episode:Learn more about Juno and private student loansAccess LawHub today!Learn more about Juno and private student loansHaynes Boone LLPLearn more about Haynes Boone LLP

President Trump is expected to host the four astronauts who were aboard the Artemis II mission at the White House on Wednesday. White House spokeswoman Liz Huston says the president and the crew will be celebrating their unmatched achievements. That's as the Artemis II crew set a record for the farthest distance ever traveled from Earth during a 10-day lunar flyby. The Artemis III mission is expected to launch next year, and will be testing docking capabilities with the lunar landing spacecraft. The Artemis IV mission is expected to launch in 2028 and will feature two crew members descending to the lunar surface and spending a week near the South Pole of the moon.Former FBI Director James Comey is back in the spotlight after a grand jury sitting in the Eastern District of North Carolina returned with a new indictment. Comey now stands charged with threatening to kill or harm President Trump. Comey has been charged with one count of making threats against the president for a social media post he made in 2025 that was interpreted as a call for violence against President Trump. The charge carries penalties ranging from a fine to five years in federal prison. Comey deleted the post last year after receiving backlash and has maintained that he is innocent of any intentional wrongdoing in the case.The Supreme Court will hear arguments on Wednesday over whether the Trump administration can end Temporary Protected Status, a program that lets immigrants live and work in the U.S. when they can't safely return home. The challenge comes from Syrian and Haitian immigrants who've been in this program for more than a decade. So far, lower courts have blocked the administration's efforts, and the Supreme Court has kept those protections in place for now.

An arrest warrant was issued for former FBI Director James Comey after he was indicted by a grand jury in the Eastern District of North Carolina related to his Trump assassination post on Instagram. The US Marshals were asked to provide Comey with the indictment and they issued an arrest warrant. Comey is facing up to 20 years in prison. Also happening today, One of the top cronies of one of the most destructive political figures in recent memory has been indicted by President Trump's Department of Justice. David Morens, a former senior advisor to Dr. Anthony Fauci was charged with several crimes, including: conspiracy against the United States; destruction, alteration, or falsification of records in federal investigations; concealment, removal, or mutilation of records; and aiding and abetting.Guest: Marc Morano - ClimateDepot.ComSponsor:My PillowWww.MyPillow.com/johnSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Attorney General Pam Bondi, US Attorney Ellis Boyle, and FBI Director Kash Patel take the podium in the Eastern District of North Carolina to announce that a grand jury has returned a two count felony indictment against former FBI Director James Comey for threatening the life of President Trump in a May 2025 Instagram post. Each count carries a maximum of ten years in prison. Patel confirms Comey deleted the post and issued an apology after posting, but notes that all of that information was presented to the grand jury. The DOJ emphasizes this is the same standard applied to all threat cases regardless of the defendant's status or title. The press conference closes with pointed questions about intent, free speech, the timeline of the investigation, and whether more charges could follow.

Troy Nunley, Chief Judge of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of California, talks about the strain that immigration cases have placed on his district and what led him to ask for help from Hawaiʻi judges; Honolulu's director of botanical gardens, Joshlyn Sand, on cleanup efforts at Hoʻomaluhia Botanical Garden in Kāne‘ohe following the Kona Lows

If you enjoy this episode, we're sure you will enjoy more content like this on The Occult Rejects.  In fact, we have curated playlists on occult topics like grimoires, esoteric concepts and phenomena, occult history, analyzing true crime and cults with an occult lens, Para politics, and occultism in music. Whether you enjoy consuming your content visually or via audio, we've got you covered - and it will always be provided free of charge.  So, if you enjoy what we do and want to support our work of providing accessible, free content on various platforms, please consider making a donation to the links provided below.  Thank you and enjoy the episode!Links For The Occult Rejectshttps://linktr.ee/theoccultrejectsOccult Research Institutehttps://www.occultresearchinstitute.org/Cash Apphttps://cash.app/$theoccultrejectsVenmo@TheOccultRejectsBuy Me A Coffeebuymeacoffee.com/TheOccultRejectsPatreonhttps://www.patreon.com/TheOccultRejectsPrimary / official sourcesU.S. Attorney's Office, Eastern District of New York. “Long Island Pastor Pleads Guilty to Sexual Exploitation of a Child.” March 11, 2025.U.S. Attorney's Office, Eastern District of New York. “Long Island Pastor Charged With Sexual Exploitation of Children, Coercion and Distribution Of Child Pornography.” December 6, 2023.FBI New York. “FBI New York Arrests Long Island Pastor for Production of Child Pornography.” September 28, 2023.FBI. “Seeking Victim Information in Jose Saez Investigation.” Victim-information notice.Local / secondary reportingNews 12 Long Island. “FBI arrests Brentwood pastor accused of sexually exploiting minor.” September 28, 2023.News 12 Long Island. “Brentwood pastor already accused of sexually exploiting dozens of children charged with targeting 4 more victims.” April 10, 2024.News 12 Long Island. “DOJ: Brentwood pastor pleads guilty to sexual exploitation of child.” March 11, 2025.News 12 Bronx. “Brentwood pastor accused of coercing children into sending sexual videos, pictures.” December 2023.Also want to remind people about the website, if you're into reading we have tons of information by multiple contributors, and we got t-shirts up on the site if you're interested. Fun fact, the art is all based on the eyeball. Now let me introduce the rest of the panel and guests.

We head out East for this episode (and learn what "East" actually means)! The Rev. John Pingel (President, Eastern District of The Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod) joins Andy and Sarah to answer the now infamous Lightning Round of Favorites (which every COP member will be subjected to) and to talk about what the "Eastern" district is really East of, his experiences in seminary and various churches, how he serves today as the President of the Eastern District, and why he loves being a pastor in the LCMS. Learn more about the LCMS President and Vice Presidents at lcms.org/about/leadership/president and the 35 LCMS Districts at lcms.org/districts. As you grab your morning coffee (and pastry, let's be honest), join hosts Andy Bates and Sarah Gulseth as they bring you stories of the intersection of Lutheran life and a secular world. Catch real-life stories of mercy work of the LCMS and partners, updates from missionaries across the ocean, and practical talk about how to live boldly Lutheran. Have a topic you'd like to hear about on The Coffee Hour? Contact us at: listener@kfuo.org.

Thousands of federal prosecutors have been fired or have resigned from their roles since Pam Bondi took over as Attorney General. She has made no secret of weaponizing the Justice Department to pursue Donald Trump's vendettas. One of those prosecutors is Troy Edwards, who quit a senior national-security position in the Eastern District of Virginia. As an assistant U.S. attorney in DC, Edwardshad won convictions against members of the Oath Keepers for January 6th-related offenses. Edwards is also the son-in-law of the former F.B.I. director James Comey, and, when the Justice Department indicted Comey on grounds widely seen as flimsy, Edwards knew he had reached his red line. (The charges were quickly dismissed, though without prejudice.) The New Yorker's legal correspondent Ruth Marcus talks with Edwards about his decision to leave, how he broke it to his family, and why he thinks other prosecutors should not follow his lead.  Further reading:  “Pam Bondi's Contempt for Congress,” by Ruth Marcus “The Flimsy, Dangerous Indictment of James Comey,” by Ruth Marcus “Pam Bondi's Power Play,” by Ruth Marcus   New episodes of The New Yorker Radio Hour drop every Tuesday and Friday. Join host David Remnick as he discusses the latest in politics, news, and current events in conversation with political leaders, newsmakers, innovators, New Yorker staff writers, authors, actors, and musicians.

Thousands of federal prosecutors have been fired or have resigned from their roles since Pam Bondi took over as Attorney General. She has made no secret of weaponizing the Justice Department to pursue Donald Trump's vendettas. One of those prosecutors is Troy Edwards, who quit a senior national-security position in the Eastern District of Virginia. As an assistant U.S. attorney in DC, Edwardshad won convictions against members of the Oath Keepers for January 6th-related offenses. Edwards is also the son-in-law of the former F.B.I. director James Comey, and, when the Justice Department indicted Comey on grounds widely seen as flimsy, Edwards knew he had reached his red line. (The charges were quickly dismissed, though without prejudice.) The New Yorker's legal correspondent Ruth Marcus talks with Edwards about his decision to leave, how he broke it to his family, and why he thinks other prosecutors should not follow his lead. Further reading:  “Pam Bondi's Contempt for Congress,” by Ruth Marcus “The Flimsy, Dangerous Indictment of James Comey,” by Ruth Marcus “Pam Bondi's Power Play,” by Ruth Marcus The Political Scene draws on the reporting and analysis found in The New Yorker for lively conversations about the big questions in American politics. Join the magazine's writers and editors as they put into context the latest news—about elections, the economy, the White House, the Supreme Court, and much more. New episodes are available three times a week. Tune in to The Political Scene wherever you get your podcasts. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices