Some immediate reactions to the Supreme Court not taking cert today on whether Trump is immune from prosecution for acts taken during his presidency. First, the denial of cert came as a single-sentence order with no dissents or statements. 1/
To the extent there was disagreement, we don’t know how many justices, if any, would have granted review now, nor who they are. For an institution that has lost public confidence in part because of its opacity, this feels like an odd choice, even if the vote was unanimous. 2/
Trump’s brief made two points may have been convincing to several justices: 1) that Judge Chutkan’s opinion was the only judicial opinion ever to rule on a former or current president’s immunity from prosecution; 3/
and 2) that while he agreed with Smith that the case warrants eventual SCOTUS review, Smith never sufficiently explained the “why now” part. 4/
On the first, the court may want the cover of a D.C. Circuit opinion that modifies Judge Chutkan’s ruling and adopts a rule similar to existing case law in civil cases involving former or current presidents. 5/
That rule, as recently enunciated by the DC Circuit in a trio of 1/6 civil cases against Trump, is that former presidents are immune from suit for conduct within their official duties, even up to the “outer perimeter” of those duties. 6/
And as in that civil case, I can see a scenario in which the D.C. Circuit adopts that holding and then rules that the allegations against Trump in the indictment fall far outside that outer perimeter in any event. That, in turn, could be an easier place for SCOTUS to land. 7/
With respect to Smith’s failure to justify the emergency here, the world knows that if Trump is elected in November, he will somehow ensure he is never tried for any federal crimes. 8/
What Smith should have said is that the public has an interest not just in Trump’s speedy trial but in the holding of any trial at all. But he is bending over backwards to avoid the appearance of partisanship—and therefore, his briefs strained to explain the urgency. 9/
One more thought: I read a piece last night that suggests a court invested in preserving democracy could have taken cert on the immunity question and ruled for Smith while overturning the CO Supreme Court on some legal question. That struck me as brilliant—& now we know it was only a dream.
NEW: The Paul Weiss departures keep coming, this time with former U.S. Attorney for the Southern District Damian Williams exiting . . . for Jenner & Block.
Williams -- a former Garland & Stevens clerk who has never worked at a law firm other than Paul Weiss -- served as the U.S. Attorney throughout Biden's presidency and oversaw the prosecutions of Ghislaine Maxwell, Sam Bankman-Fried, Sean Combs, and, of course, Eric Adams.
Williams then was pilloried by Trump's DOJ for allegedly pursuing Adams for political reasons--a narrative wholly rejected by Judge Dale Ho after examining the record presented by DOJ in seeking Adams's dismissal.
NEW: While the Department of Justice issued a statement last night about the criminal charges against Rep. McIver, a spokesperson for her legal team confirms that it did not receive the charging document for until this morning, 12-plus hours later. 1/
DOJ policy, as embodied in the Justice Manual, is clear: "DOJ personnel shall not respond to questions about the existence of an ongoing investigation or comment on its nature or progress before charges are publicly filed." 2/
There are exceptions, including "[w]hen the community needs to be reassured that the appropriate law enforcement agency is investigating a matter, or where release of information is necessary to protect the public safety," but neither is relevant here. 3/
Harvard researcher Kseniia Petrova has been charged criminally with smuggling goods -- e.g., frog embryos and samples thereof -- into the United States on the same day the judge overseeing her habeas case questioned the government's authority to revoke her visa. 1/
The administration told that judge, Christina Reiss, they intend to send Petrova back to Russia, despite her fear of arrest due to her support for Ukraine. Reiss scheduled a bail hearing on May 28, "potentially setting the stage for Ms. Petrova’s release." 2/ ...nytimes.com/2025/05/14/h
At some point today, the administration moved to unseal its criminal complaint against Petrova in a Massachusetts federal court and represented she has been arrested. 3/
There's been significant focus today on what the opinion dismissing the criminal case against Eric Adams says about Trump's DOJ. But what it says about the career prosecutors involved is as, if not more, significant. 1/
The Adams debacle resulted in the resignation of two prosecutors, then-acting U.S. Attorney Danielle Sassoon and AUSA Hagan Scotten, both former SCOTUS clerks and all-around superstars. And DOJ placed three other members of the core case team on administrative leave. 2/
In a now-public memo, DOJ told Sassoon they would be investigated by DOJ's Office of Professional Responsibility and pursuant to Trump's executive order directing the A.G. to investigate "weaponization of justice" and to issue a report. 3/
I want to live in a world where we do not talk about judges as if they owe their allegiance, or their very existence, to a particular president. Based on my experience as both a litigator and a journalist, that describes the vast majority of the federal judiciary. 1/
And yet, Judge Aileen Cannon, for all of her credentials and pre-judicial experience, has consistently staged the hearing of motions in a way that favors Trump and his co-defendants, handpicked a theory of dismissal at the invitation-by-concurrence of Justice Thomas, and even exercised jurisdiction she did not have. 2/
Her actions concerning the Special Counsel’s report, for example, were premised on authority she had stripped herself of by dismissing the case and an eventuality she refused to acknowledge: that the indictment against the two people who would supposedly be prejudiced by the report’s release not only had been dismissed but that DOJ’s pending appeal of her ruling will soon disappear too.
NEW: Per @adamreisstv, Rudy Giuliani is now almost 90 minutes late for a one-day trial on whether his Palm Beach, FL condo can be taken to satisfy his $146 million debt to former GA election workers Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss. 1/
Rudy owes the women that money because his failure to participate in their defamation lawsuit was so complete that they won a default judgment on liability. And when they tried the issue of damages to a jury last December, that $146 million was the jury’s award. 2/
Since then, he has been playing games with several courts in an attempt to conceal or even exclude his assets from being seized to pay them. He first filed for bankruptcy, only to have his case kicked out of court for his obfuscation and withholding of information. 3/