Clarence Thomas is big mad, and big law pays off the president

Injustice for All is a weekly series about how the Trump administration is trying to weaponize the justice system—and the people who are fighting back.

Would you like some good news, even if it is only a temporary dopamine hit? Of course you would. Let yourself experience the sheer joy of seeing the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals treat the Trump administration’s legal arguments with precisely what they deserve—scorn. 

On Wednesday, the appellate court issued a decision denying the administration’s request to overturn Judge James Boasberg’s order that blocked the Trump team from deporting migrants without due process. 

The ban is a mere two weeks long, briefly halting the practice of piling migrants into planes and sending them to a brutal mega-prison in El Salvador, where Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem did a cutesy media hit earlier this week. Donald Trump has justified this by invoking the Alien Enemies Act, previously used only in times of war. 

The administration found the idea of a two-week delay so outrageous, it made an emergency appeal to the D.C. Circuit, saying Boasberg infringed on the executive branch’s power regarding national security. 

Things started going badly for the administration during oral argument when Judge Patricia Millett said that “Nazis got better treatment under the Alien Enemies Act.” 

Ouch. 

Judge Karen Henderson, a George W. Bush appointee, wrote an opinion concurring with the decision to uphold the stay, rejecting the administration’s ridiculous argument that courts aren’t even allowed to review the government’s conduct because national security blah blah blah. 

She also took the administration to task for using a random dictionary definition of “invasion” as its only support for the argument that we are somehow under attack by Venezuelan gangs, and therefore migrants can be deported. 

Millett’s concurring opinion pointed out the absurdity of the administration saying it doesn’t have to comply with the temporary restraining order while simultaneously challenging the order. 

“The one thing that is not tolerable,” Millett wrote, “is for the government to seek from this court a stay of an order that the government at the very same time is telling the district court is not an order with which compliance was ever required.”

The administration may take this to the Supreme Court, where Trump can see if the conservative majority will do him a solid, like they so often do, and let him keep deporting anyone he wants based on, well, nothing except the dictionary. 

The judiciary rouses itself from slumber

The judicial branch finally seems to have realized that it is suboptimal for judges to be threatened with impeachment and defunding just because the president doesn’t like their rulings. There’s also the tiny problem of death threats. 

It no doubt stings that the Trump administration has lost lower court battles over its unprecedented funding freeze, its mass firing of government workers, and its horrific deportations. No other administration, though, has reacted to losses in court by deciding to just rid the world of these meddlesome judges. 

The judiciary has set up a task force about security and the independence of the courts. Federal judges and court clerks will make up the task force, which will help the judiciary “respond to current risks, and to anticipate new ones.”

There should be no risk to judges for ruling against Trump, and it’s appalling that it’s reached the point where a task force is needed. But here we are, and it’s good the judiciary eventually noticed. 

Clarence Thomas is incandescent with rage that we can’t all have ghost guns like the founders intended

Earlier this week, the Supreme Court upheld an incredibly mild Biden-era rule about ghost guns. Ghost guns are sold as parts, not complete weapons, to be assembled by the buyer or another private party. They’re untraceable, have no serial numbers, and you don’t need a license to buy them. 

Regrettably, the regulation doesn’t ban ghost guns. All it requires is that ghost guns are treated like other firearms, requiring sellers to add serial numbers, verify buyers are at least 21, and perform background checks. 

You will not be surprised to learn that Justice Clarence Thomas finds this an outrageous limitation on freedom. His dissent predictably whines about “government overreach” and contains what feels like eleventy-thousand words debating the meaning of words in the rule. 

What he’s really mad about, though, is a worry that the ghost gun rule could be applied somehow to block home modification of AR-15s. God forbid. 

Have you considered that the people who really need reparations in America are the Jan. 6 rioters?

When Ed Martin, the interim U.S. attorney for Washington, D.C., isn’t protecting a GOP House member from domestic violence charges, investigating nonexistent voter fraud, or threatening law schools, he’s very busy calling for reparations for the Jan. 6 rioters who stormed the Capitol. 

Martin fixated on this well before Trump tapped him as the top prosecutor in D.C. Back in January 2024, he mused that he had “finally come around” to reparations and that J6 insurrectionists should get “a big pot of money, like the asbestos money we got for asbestos victims.” 

Yes, literal insurrectionists who received the benefit of full due process in the judicial system are precisely the same as people who got mesothelioma thanks to breathing cancer for decades. It’s also an odd comparison because asbestos victims are paid out from private compensation funds, not the government, though veterans who were exposed during their service can apply for disability compensation. 

Now Trump has picked up the torch, saying he’s thinking about establishing a government compensation fund for the very criminals he pardoned. Trump is not, of course, down with reparations for the descendants of enslaved persons. 

Guess we’ve finally found something the administration will spend money on. Too bad it’s this. 

Two more law firms get their turn in the barrel for … reasons

It was only a week ago that the law firm of Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP rolled over and showed their tummies to Trump to get him to rescind an executive order targeting the firm. 

It was inevitable that capitulation would embolden Trump, who promptly issued new executive orders targeting additional firms he has beef with, Jenner & Block and WilmerHale. These executive orders generally suspend the security clearances of firm employees, block their access to federal buildings, and drastically restrict their ability to talk to government employees. 

WilmerHale was targeted because Robert Mueller worked there before and after his role as special counsel investigating Russian interference in Trump’s first election. In the case of Jenner & Block, attorney Andrew Weissmann, former deputy to Mueller, previously worked there. 

Never mind that Mueller retired from WilmerHale four years ago, and Weissmann hasn’t been at Jenner & Block since 2021 and is now a Substacker.

Both WilmerHale and Jenner & Block sued the administration on Friday. WilmerHale’s lawsuit points out that the executive order violates the separation of powers, the right to due process, and the right to counsel. 

Jenner & Block’s complaint explains that the executive order threatens not only the firm, but the legal system itself and that the Constitution “forbids attempts by the government to punish citizens and lawyers” based on their choice of clients, their legal positions, and the people they associate with.”  

Trump’s attack on law firms has had the desired effect, as firms are starting to refuse to represent his opponents. 

On Thursday, The New York Times reported that mega-firm Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom had entered into talks with the Trump administration to stave off a similar executive order. By Friday afternoon, Skadden was reportedly agreeing to give $100 million in pro bono work to administration-approved causes, which Trump called “essentially a settlement.”

Now that’s some complying in advance.