Trump regime, including DoJ on its own behalf, has identified to Judge Boasberg the individuals who together disobeyed his orders to return Venezualans in mid-flight to U.S. when the regime first acted to remove them pursuant to the Alien Enemies Act. 1/ #LawFedi https://assets.bwbx.io/documents/users/iqjWHBFdfxIU/rF.CJry9fVkI/v0
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@heidilifeldman This is great: Noem, Blanche, Bove, etc. But what about the flight crews who obeyed an illegal order? I was hoping to see those names, also.
Chief among them: Sec of Homeland Security Kristi Noem, Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, and Emil Bove, then a DoJ lawyer, now a federal judge. 2/
The Trump regime is arguing it need not make any live witnesses available in the criminal contempt proceedings Judge Boasberg is conducting. Whether or not Boasberg orders appearances Noem, Blanche, Bove or any of the other DHS lawyers mentioned in the filing, I think I can see how the Roberts Court is going to treat any finding of contempt against any of these people. 3/
The Trump regime is specifying who decided not to turn the plane back, while continuing to insist that Boasberg had not given a binding order to do so during the hearing and did not have the authority to order Venezuelans returned at the time of his written order. In the alternative, the regime argues, it was at least reasonable for Trump personnel to believe these things, and so, they did not have the mens rea necessary for criminal contempt. 4/
@heidilifeldman
"I can't have intent because I really REALLY believe the laws don't apply to me" isn't the hot defense they seem to think it is.
If Boasberg finds contempt and the matter reaches the Roberts tribunal, the right-wing, pro-Trump justices will leap to embrace the second argument if not the first. 5/
Those justices would love a path whereby they can seem, at least to themselves, to be upholding judicial authority while at the same time saying that of course it is reasonable for the Trump regime to reasonably never think that authority constrains it. This is precisely the double-talk that Roberts and the others have been delivering to and about Trump since Trump’s first term: insist that of course the judiciary is a co-equal branch, just not one that can ever actually check Trump. 6/
Will be interesting to see if Boasberg does order live testimony. If he does, sets up months of wrangling over when he has authority to order Sec of Homeland Security, a top DoJ appointee, and a federal court to appear in court as witnesses. If he doesn’t, he risks being found to have conducted an impermissibly truncated inquiry, one that cannot support a criminal contempt judgment. 7/7
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@heidilifeldman lI *really* didn't believe I had to follow the judge's order" doesn't seem like a winner IMHNLO.
@heidilifeldman By Roberts Court standards, that meets reasonability with several lengths of wiggle room.
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