JUST IN: Unsealed filing in Trump Florida case says there were two rounds of classified documents discovered at Mar-a-Lago *after* the FBI search. storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.usco…
Judge HOWELL also found last year that prosecutors provided sufficient evidence that Trump sought to hide classified documents from prosceutors. It was part of her ruling granting crime-fraud exception to attorney-client privilege. storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.usco…
This entire opinion from Judge Howell assessing the evidence prosecutors presented on Trump's "willful retention" of classified docs and efforts to obstruct the probe is extraordinary.
She described Nauta as "dissembling" in his FBI interview as well.
For example, Howell can't fathom how Trump missed the four classified docs in his own bedroom that his lawyer found in December 2022. storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.usco…
NEW: Attorney found four classified documents in Trump’s Mar-a-Lago bedroom in December 2022 — four months after the FBI search, newly unsealed court documents shows.
MORE: A witness connected to Trump’s Save America PAC scanned and stored documents from the box containing those materials on a laptop provided by the PAC, per Howell’s opinion. politico.com/news/2024/05/2…
NOTABLE: Howell’s opinion was actually unsealed because Trump’s lawyers appended it to their claim of prosecutorial misconduct — citing this footnote in which Howell quotes a procedural text. politico.com/news/2024/05/2…
JUST IN: Chief Judge Boasberg has *denied* Walt Nauta’s request to transfer some grand jury materials from DC to Florida, says Nauta failed to make specific case.
BREAKING: A federal judge in Massachusetts (the Reagan-appointed William Young) has declared the Trump administration's cuts to NIH grants — ostensibly over Trump's EOs on gender ideology and DEI — are "illegal" and "void." He's ordering many grants restored.
YOUNG: "I am hesitant to draw this conclusion, but I have an unflinching obligation to draw it – that this represents racial discrimination. And discrimination against America’s LGBTQ community. That’s what this is. I would be blind not to call it out. My duty is to call it out."
MORE YOUNG: "It is palpably clear that these directives and the set of terminated grants here also are designed to frustrate, to stop, research that may bear on the health – we’re talking about health here, the health of Americans, of our LGBTQ community. That’s appalling."
BREAKING: Judge Breyer orders Trump to return control of the National Guard back to California, saying the call-up was illegal. storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.usco…
Breyer stays his order until noon tomorrow, which should be enough time for Trump to seek emergency appeal at 9th Circuit and perhaps Supreme Court. storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.usco…
NEW: Judge Breyer said the violence in Los Angeles falls "far short" of the "rebellion" Trump described to justify calling in the troops. And he said Trump's use of the military over the actions of "stray bad actors" was "untenable and dangerous."
HAPPENING NOW: Emergency hearing in Newsom v. Trump, re dpeloyment of the Guard and Marines.
Judge Breyer making some "preliminary" remarks.
BREYER says he's 'appreciative' of both parties for filing a detailed record with the court on a short timeframe and says these are very serious/weighty matters and he intends to act as quickly as the urgency of the matter requires.
Breyer asks a hypothetical: If Trump didn't follow the letter of the statute in calling up the guard, would his order be invalid?
DOJ says no, and court has no role in policing it either.
NEW: The Trump administration has conceded that it improperly deported another Salvadoran man in violation of a court order — blaming a "confluence of administrative errors."
Jordin Melgar-Salmeron had a criminal record — he pleaded guilty in 2021 to possessing an unregistered gun — but his deportation had been on hold since 2024 amid broader Biden-era litigation.
DOJ had assured a federal appeals court court that Melgar-Salmeron wouldn't be deported before May 8-9. But after the court issued a May 7 order blocking his deportation, ICE put him on a plane just minutes later and told the court he was gone. politico.com/news/2025/05/3…
NEW: Trump's latest legal rejection comes from the U.S. Court of International Trade, which ruled his tariffs in response to "national emergencies" were illegal. politico.com/news/2025/05/2…
The three-judge panel that ruled against Trump? Appointees of:
HERE WE GO: Latest hearing in Kilmar Abrego Garcia's case is underway with Judge Xinis on the bench.
XINIS says she intends to do as much of this in open court as possible, despite discussion of privileged materials. they can use the husher/phones if they need to reference confidential info, she notes.
XINIS signals frustration with the Justice Department for not making available officials with firsthand knowledge of Abrego Garcia's status and efforts to facilitate his return, despite her order. She notes the depositions were crammed with "I don't knows" from the witnesses.