Tag Archives: legal

Friday Cat Blogging – 21 August 2015

by LucieLHAEafk Posted on August 21, 2015

Mother Jones

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My old friends at the Washington Monthly sent me an early copy of their latest College Guide issue, and apparently it inspired Hilbert to think about pursuing an advanced degree. Unlike humans, though, he doesn’t need to read the issue. He merely has to absorb it through his fur. Stupid humans.

Anyway, because I have this issue in my hot little hands, I know which college scored #1 in the Monthly’s unique “Bang for the Buck” ranking. Among Western colleges, this year’s winner is the University of—

Aack! It’s embargoed until Monday. And the embargo police are at the door. I have to leave now before they bust in. Does anyone have a hidey-hole nearby I can use for a few days?

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Friday Cat Blogging – 21 August 2015

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Obamacare Is Facing Yet Another Legal Challenge

by Palahnajje Posted on August 20, 2015

Mother Jones

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Do you remember John Boehner’s House lawsuit against President Obama over some details of Obamacare? When it was finally unveiled, it turned out it had two parts. The first challenged a delay in implementing the employer mandate. That was a big meh. Even if the suit prevailed, it would be meaningless by the time it finished its trip through the court system.

But the second part was a surprise. It challenged the outlay of $175 billion as part of the Cost Sharing Reduction program, which pays out money to insurance companies and lowers premiums, primarily for the poor. Obama claims that CSR is like Medicare or Social Security: a mandatory payment that doesn’t require yearly authorizations. Congress claims it does, and went to court to fight its case. So how is that going? David Savage of the LA Times gives us an update:

In May, U.S. District Judge Rosemary Collyer voiced exasperation when a Justice Department lawyer tried to explain why the Obama administration was entitled to spend the money without the approval of Congress. Why is that “not an insult to the Constitution?” Collyer asked.

But the more formidable barrier now facing the lawsuit is a procedural rule. Judges have repeatedly said lawmakers do not have standing to re-fight political battles in court….But in late June, the high court gave the House lawsuit an apparent boost when it ruled the Arizona Legislature had standing to sue in federal court to defend its power to draw election districts….Ginsburg in a footnote said the court was not deciding “the question of whether Congress has standing to bring a suit against the president.” But administration supporters acknowledge the high court’s opinion in the Arizona case increases the odds the suit will survive.

….Washington attorney Walter Dellinger, a former Clinton administration lawyer, believes the courts will not finally rule on the House lawsuit. “There has never been a lawsuit by a president against Congress or by Congress against the president over how to interpret a statute,” he said.

If the courts open the door to such claims, lawmakers in the future will opt to sue whenever they lose a political battle, Dellinger said. “You’d see immediate litigation every time a law was passed,” he said.

In other words, this is starting to look an awful lot like King v. Burwell: a case that initially seemed like an absurd Hail Mary by conservatives, but that eventually started to look more formidable. In the end, King still lost, but not before plenty of liberals lost a lot of sleep over it.

I think that’s still the most likely outcome here. Allowing Congress to sue the president would be a huge reversal for the Supreme Court, and it’s not clear that even the conservatives on the court want to open up that can of worms.

But there’s more to this. If the Supreme Court rules that Congress has no standing to sue, but it looks like they might treat the case sympathetically on the merits, conservatives merely have to find someone who does have standing to sue. That probably won’t be too hard. It may take years, but one way or another, this might end up being yet another legal thorn in the side of Obamacare.

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Obamacare Is Facing Yet Another Legal Challenge

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Trumpmentum Has Been Losing Steam Ever Since the Debate

by DonnieWhited Posted on August 20, 2015

Mother Jones

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I hopped over to RealClear Politics this morning to take a look at their latest poll averages, and it shows something interesting: Donald Trump may have hit his ceiling. On August 5, he hit a peak at 24.3 percent. He then plateaued for a few days and has been falling ever since. He now stands at 22.0 percent.

Not all poll averages show the same thing. I also took a look at Pollster, and they show Trump’s climb starting to slow down, but not quite peaking yet. Even there, though, it looks like Trump is going to hit a ceiling soon.

At the risk of making a hard prediction that will soon look foolish, it looks to me like Trump has peaked at about 25 percent. Even among the Republican base, his blustery showmanship only gets him so far.

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Trumpmentum Has Been Losing Steam Ever Since the Debate

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Donald Trump: The 14th Amendment Is Unconstitutional

by EmilyBouton Posted on August 19, 2015

Mother Jones

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After launching his presidential campaign by calling Mexican immigrants “rapists,” Donald Trump is now following up on his nativist rhetoric by taking aim at the Constitution.

On Tuesday, when Bill O’Reilly challenged the presidential hopeful’s proposal to end birthright citizenship in light of the 14th Amendment, Trump hit back: “Bill, I think you’re wrong about the 14th amendment and frankly the whole thing about anchor babies.”

“I can quote it, you want me to quote you the amendment?” O’Reilly responded. “If you’re born here you’re a citizen. Period!”

But Trump insisted he and his lawyers have found some disturbing holes in the amendment, which unequivocally states that anyone born in the United States is in fact an American citizen.

“What happens is, they’re in Mexico, they’re going to have a baby, they move over here for a couple of days, they have the baby,” Trump said, while trying to break down his legal take. “Bill, lawyers are saying, ‘It’s not going to hold up in court, it’s going to have to be tested.'”

“I don’t think they have American citizenship, and if you speak to some very, very good lawyers, some would disagree,” Trump added. “But many of them agree with me—you’re going to find they do not have American citizenship. We have to start a process where we take back our country. Our country is going to hell. We have to start a process, Bill, where we take back our country.”

O’Reilly pointed out that if Trump wanted to end birthright citizenship he could push for an amendment to the constitution—a position held by the former reality TV show star’s fellow GOP presidential candidate Scott Walker—but in a slight capitulation, Trump acknowledged that that would probably “take too long” and said he’d rather use his potential presidency to “find out whether or not anchor babies are citizens.”

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Donald Trump: The 14th Amendment Is Unconstitutional

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Cruz, Fiorina Are Big Winners In First Post-Debate Poll

by LuisGwendolen Posted on August 9, 2015

Mother Jones

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A new NBC poll has gotten a lot of attention today for suggesting that Donald Trump won the Republican debate on Thursday. And maybe he did! But I’d take the results with a grain of salt. Here’s why:

As the chart on the right shows, Trump’s support didn’t increase. It stayed where it was. The big gainers were Ted Cruz, Carly Fiorina, and Ben Carson.
It was an overnight poll. So it might reflect what viewers thought of the debate itself, but it doesn’t take account of the weekend fallout over Trump’s post-debate treatment of Megyn Kelly. Nor does it take into account the media treatment of Trump over the past few days. This may or may not make a difference, but I’d wait a few days to see how things play out.
It’s an internet poll, not a telephone poll. The methodology is fairly sound, but it’s nonetheless another reason to treat the results with caution.

I’m not foolish enough to predict what’s going to happen to Trump’s poll numbers over the next week. I feel safe saying that Trump will implode eventually, and that he’ll implode over something like this weekend’s lunacy. But whether it will happen over this weekend’s version of this weekend’s lunacy—well, who knows? The base of the Republican Party is pretty inscrutable to a mushy mainstream liberal like me. I’m really not sure what will and won’t set them off these days.

As for the rest of the results, I’m stumped over Ted Cruz’s gain. He didn’t seem to especially stand out on Thursday. Conversely, Fiorina is easy to understand, and Carson’s bump might just be due to increased name recognition. Bush and Walker dropped a little more than I would have guessed, but 3 percent still isn’t much. We’ll see if all these results hold up over the next week.

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Cruz, Fiorina Are Big Winners In First Post-Debate Poll

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Donald Trump Has Finally Catapulted Us Into an Alternate Universe

by FrederiVogler Posted on August 9, 2015

Mother Jones

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The Donald Trump saga continues its trip into Bizarroland today with the exit of Roger Stone from the Trump campaign. Trump claims he fired Stone, while Stone says he resigned—and he has the resignation letter to prove it. I never thought I’d say this, but I’m guessing Stone is the more believable party here. So why did Stone leave?

In the letter, which was obtained by The Post, Stone expressed regret for the end of a “close relationship — both personal and political/professional — since the 1980s.” But, he added, since “current controversies involving personalities and provocative media fights have reached such a high volume that it has distracted attention from your platform and overwhelmed your core message … I can no longer remain involved in your campaign.”

Not all of you are familiar with the Stone oeuvre, so how can I put this? Roger Stone complaining that Trump has become too vitriolic and combative is like the Kardashian family getting on your case for being too much of a publicity hound. It’s like Dick Cheney advising you that you’re banging the war drums too loudly. It’s like Louis XIV telling you to cool it with the mansion building.

Roger Stone is famous for calling himself a “GOP hit man.” He admires Richard Nixon so much he has Nixon’s face tattooed on his back. During the 2008 presidential campaign, he founded an anti-Hillary group called Citizens United Not Timid. He played a bit part in the Watergate scandal at the age of 19. He is famous for his many rules, one of which is “Attack, attack, attack—never defend.”

This is the guy who left the Trump campaign because Trump was too preoccupied with “provocative media fights.” The same guy who has proudly called his brand of politics “performance art” can no longer stomach the performance art that is the Trump campaign.

So this is where we are. On Friday, Erick Erickson criticized Trump for being sexist. Today, Roger Stone quit Trump’s campaign because he was being too combative. We are now officially living in an alternate universe. Mr. Spock finally has his beard.

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Donald Trump Has Finally Catapulted Us Into an Alternate Universe

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The Wisconsin Supreme Court Just Removed a Major Threat to Scott Walker’s Presidential Campaign

by GiselleMcCorkin Posted on July 16, 2015

Mother Jones

On Thursday morning, the Wisconsin Supreme Court squashed a criminal investigation into whether Gov. Scott Walker’s campaign illegally coordinated with conservative dark-money groups to defeat a recall effort against him in 2012. The sharply worded decision aggressively slapped back the local prosecutor leading the probe and contended there was no constitutional basis for the investigation. This move appears to permanently settle a matter that posed a potential threat to Walker’s presidential ambitions.

The inquiry focused on whether Walker’s top advisers worked with a dozen outside groups—politically active nonprofits that do not disclose their donors—to run campaign ads opposing the recall campaign that was launched after Walker crushed public sector unions in his state. On the federal level and in most states, it is illegal for outside groups that can collect unlimited amounts of money to work closely with candidates they support. In today’s decision, the Wisconsin court ruled there was no legal rationale for an investigation because the dark-money groups did not explicitly call for voters to vote against the recall. Instead, they put out a slightly less specific message: support Walker. As a result, the court ordered the investigation to halt immediately—and they instructed prosecutors to destroy all related documents and free witnesses from the obligation to cooperate.

“To be clear, this conclusion ends the…investigation because the special prosecutor’s legal theory is unsupported in either reason or law,” Justice Michael Gableman wrote for the majority in the four-to-two decision. “Consequently, the investigation is closed.”

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The Wisconsin Supreme Court Just Removed a Major Threat to Scott Walker’s Presidential Campaign

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The Donald Trump Firestorm Comes to Pennsylvania Avenue

by Trena5523i Posted on July 9, 2015

Mother Jones

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Loose lips sink ships—or in the case of the Donald Trump’s latest controversy, they sink lucrative business partnerships. Macy’s, ESPN, and NBC are among the businesses that have severed ties with the tycoon/reality TV star running for president after his comments denigrating Mexican immigrants as rapists and drug traffickers. And now the fallout is hitting closer to the place he’d like to call home.

Trump is currently transforming Washington, DC’s Old Post Office Pavilion—which is a mere five blocks from the White House—into a luxury hotel. But politics is getting in the way of business. On Wednesday, acclaimed restaurateur José Andrés announced he would no longer be opening a planned restaurant in the hotel, citing Trump’s offensive remarks. On Thursday, the New York Times reported that Geoffrey Zakarian, a chef and partner at several Manhattan restaurants, decided to cancel his plans to open a branch of his brasserie-style restaurant the National in the new hotel, explaining that Trump’s statements “do not in any way align with my personal core values.” Hours later, close to one hundred community leaders and Washington residents converged on the hotel site to protest Trump’s remarks, and they demanded that his name be removed from the development, which bears a gigantic blue sign bearing his name.

The protest brought out a number of local elected officials. Franklin Garcia, the district’s “shadow representative” in Congress (which has no voting representative from DC) said that the aim of the protest was to pressure additional companies to sever ties with Trump and to urge Trump to apologize for his remarks.

“We all share the same passions for making America as great as it is,” Garcia told the crowd near the hotel. “We want to send a strong message that we are against hatred and xenophobia.”

D.C shadow senator Paul Strauss issued a plea to the Department of the Interior, given that the land under the hotel is owned by the government: “We ask the DOI to take that logo off that scaffolding, on the building that belongs to the people.”

The logo is causing its own problems. The facade of the hotel is covered in a placard that reads, “COMING 2016: TRUMP,” with his name in characteristically huge letters. (Trump’s team has said that the project, conveniently, is expected to be completed near the time of the presidential election next fall.)

That prominently displayed sign has led some residents to wonder if Trump is using the hotel project as advertising for his campaign. “Because this is trumphotel.com, and because presumably this is an accurate estimate of when the hotel would be done, I’m assuming this would be legitimate signage,” says Paul Ryan of the Campaign Legal Center, casting doubt on the notion that the sign violates any laws. “But if I were at the FEC and we got a complaint about this, I would want to know if other developments had similar signage.” And in fact, other Trump buildings opening next year don’t share that language on their signage. In Vancouver, a Trump Hotel is set to open in 2016, but the signs do not say “Coming 2016.” At Trump’s most recently completed Chicago project, there was also no such message.

Even if Trump didn’t intend to link the signage to his bid to inhabit the building down the street, Strauss’ fellow shadow senator, Michael Brown, is making that connection. “We don’t want his name on our building,” Brown said at the protest, “and we certainly don’t want him at 1600 Penn.”

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The Donald Trump Firestorm Comes to Pennsylvania Avenue

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The Wit and Wisdom of Antonin Scalia, the Supreme Court’s Lovable Curmudgeon

by KatherineUbc Posted on June 25, 2015

Mother Jones

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Here is Antonin Scalia’s dissent in the Obamacare case. Although Scalia would not approve, I have arranged the excerpts out of order so they make more sense and are more amusing. I have also eliminated all the legal arguments and other boring parts. You can always read the full opinion here if you want. For now, though, tell us what you really think, Mr Scalia:

Words no longer have meaning if an Exchange that is not established by a State is “established by the State.”

Yet the opinion continues, with no semblance of shame, that “it is also possible that the phrase refers to all Exchanges—both State and Federal.”

But normal rules of interpretation seem always to yield to the overriding principle of the present Court: The Affordable Care Act must be saved. Scalia makes it clear throughout that he’s still really pissed about losing the original Obamacare case in 2012. –ed.

Contrivance, thy name is an opinion on the Affordable Care Act!

Faced with overwhelming confirmation that “Exchange established by the State” means what it looks like it means, the Court comes up with argument after feeble argument to support its contrary interpretation.

The Court’s next bit of interpretive jiggery-pokery involves other parts of the Act that purportedly presuppose the availability of tax credits on both federal and state Exchanges….Pure applesauce.

The somersaults of statutory interpretation they have performed…will be cited by litigants endlessly, to the confusion of honest jurisprudence. And the cases will publish forever the discouraging truth that the Supreme Court of the United States favors some laws over others, and is prepared to do whatever it takes to uphold and assist its favorites.

We should start calling this law SCOTUScare.

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The Wit and Wisdom of Antonin Scalia, the Supreme Court’s Lovable Curmudgeon

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Ruth Bader Ginsburg Shuts Down Gay Marriage Challengers

by RobinDixon Posted on April 29, 2015

Mother Jones

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As the Supreme Court started to hear oral arguments to Obergefell v. Hodges—the historic case that could determine the legality of gay marriage bans—on Tuesday, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg delivered quite the perfect response to her same-sex marriage opponents.

Back in February, the 82-year-old justice expressed her optimism that the court will eventually rule in favor of gay marriage, citing the evolution in “people’s attitudes” on the issue “has been enormous” in recent years. Although the rest of the court appeared deeply divided on Tuesday, judging by the fact that even anti-gay activists are expecting gay marriage will ultimately win, we’re hoping to see Ginsburg’s prediction become a reality soon.

Below are some of the same-sex marriage arguments and her responses to each.

Argument: The court does not have legal right to change a “millennia” of tradition.

RBG’s Response: “Marriage today is not what it was under the common law tradition, under the civil law tradition. Marriage was a relationship of a dominant male to a subordinate female. That ended as a result of this court’s decision in 1982, when Louisiana’s Head and Master Rule was struck down. Would that be a choice that state should be allowed to have? To cling to marriage the way it once was?”

Argument: The institution of marriage is inherently linked to a couple’s ability to pro-create:

RBG’s Response: “Suppose a couple, 70-year-old couple, comes in and they want to get married? You don’t have to ask them any questions. You know they are not going to have any children.”

Argument: Gay marriage “impinges on the state” and takes benefits away from straight couples.

RBG’s Response: “How could that be, because all of the incentives, all of the benefits of marriage affords would still be available. So you’re not taking away anything form heterosexual couples. They would have the very same incentive to marry, all the benefits that come with marriage that they do now.”

Argument: Legal gay marriage has never been a possibility for most of history. Why now?

RBG’s Response: “Same-sex couples wouldn’t be asking for this relief if the law of marriage was what it was a millennium ago. I mean, it wasn’t possible. Same-sex unions would not have opted into the pattern of marriage, which was a relationship, a dominant and a subordinate relationship. Yes, it was marriage between a man and a woman, but the man decided where the couple would be domiciled; it was her obligation to follow him.

There was a change in the institution of marriage to make it egalitarian when it wasn’t egalitarian. And same-sex unions wouldn’t — wouldn’t fit into what marriage was once.”

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Ruth Bader Ginsburg Shuts Down Gay Marriage Challengers

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