Free Republic

A federal judge has found that former President Donald Trump "more likely than not" committed felony obstruction in the effort to overturn the 2020 presidential election. The judge said Trump's former lawyer John Eastman must turn over documents to the Jan. 6 House committee investigating the attack on the U.S Capitol.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit sided with a California seminary on Monday, ruling that it is entitled to ignore federal anti-discrimination law and expel students in same-sex marriages. Graduate students Nathan Brittsan and Joanna Maxon... sued the seminary, claiming that Fuller Theological Seminary accepts federal funding and is therefore bound by Title IX’s anti-discrimination mandate. In turn, the school argued that it is entitled to a defense based on what is known as the “religious exemption” under 20 U.S.C. § 1681(a)(3). ...

LOS ANGELES A federal judge who previously invalidated a portion of the USA Patriot Act as too vague delayed a decision on a similar challenge to a post-Sept. 11 executive order Wednesday but indicated in a tentative ruling she was inclined to uphold wide powers asserted by President Bush under an anti-terror-financing law. U.S. District Judge Audrey Collins heard more than an hour of arguments from a lawyer for the Washington- based Center for Constitutional Rights and from a Department of Justice lawyer before delaying her final ruling to allow more briefs to be filed. In her tentative 41-page ruling,...

A federal lawsuit filed in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California seeks to stop the Gavin Newsom recall election from happening as scheduled on Sept. 14. The suit, filed by voters R.J. Beaber and A.W. Clark, alleges that the recall election is unconstitutional because it denies pro-Newsom voters equal protection of the law guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment. This argument was made by Berkeley Law School Dean Erwin Chemerinsky, who wrote a New York Times op-ed last week arguing that because Newsom "can receive far more votes than any other candidate but still be removed from...

This isn’t about the rule of law; this is ensuring that people are too frightened to work with Trump or any Republican ever again. There are so many things wrong with the story of Thomas Barrack that it’s hard to know where to begin. Briefly, Biden’s DOJ charged Thomas Barrack, the man who chaired Trump’s inaugural fund, with illegal lobbying for the UAE. Then, for the 74-year-old Barrack to get out of jail, a federal magistrate imposed a $250,000,000 bail on him, along with other serious restrictions on travel. This is a travesty of justice and a clear threat to...

Real estate titan Tom Barrack was arrested on Tuesday morning on federal charges tied to illegally lobbying Donald Trump for the United Arab Emirates, according to the Department of Justice. A seven-count indictment was unsealed today in federal court in Brooklyn charging Barrack, Matthew Grimes and Rashid Sultan Rashid Al Malik Alshahhi, also known as “Rashid Al Malik” and “Rashid Al‑Malik,” a citizen of the United Arab Emirates, with acting and conspiring to act as agents of that nation between April 2016 and April 2018, according to the Department of Justice. The indictment said the charges are related to advancing...

LOS ANGELES—Late Tuesday, U.S. District Judge R. Gary Klausner granted a temporary restraining order that stops the government from using civil forfeiture to take the contents of safe deposit boxes seized in the FBI’s raid on Beverly Hills company U.S. Private Vaults. Jeni Pearsons and her husband Michael Storc, along with Joseph Ruiz and Travis May, teamed up with the Institute for Justice (IJ) to fight that unconstitutional seizure and the FBI’s attempt to take their cash and valuables forever.In May, the FBI sent a 19-page forfeiture notice to the attorneys for U.S. Private Vaults, informing the company the FBI...

I am pretty certain that California taxpayers will have to cough up the money to pay for Gavin Newsom's misbehavior, even as cop-haters press to make police officers personally liable for judgments against their actions on the job. Nonetheless, it is a satisfying development in the disposal of Newsom's unconstitutional shutdown of religious services in the name of COVID.Landon Mion reports on Townhall:California Gov. Gavin Newsom has been ordered by a federal judge to pay $1.35 million for the lockdown of 3,000 churches amid the coronavirus pandemic, which has been deemed discriminatory.Newsom is required to pay the costs and attorney...

LOS ANGELES (CBSLA) - A federal judge overseeing the criminal case against former political donor Ed Buck Friday denied a request to postpone the trial that has been set to begin July 13. Buck, 66, was arrested last September after being charged in the United States District Court with providing methamphetamine to a man who died after receiving the drug intravenously. He was subsequently charged with one charge alleging that Buck knowingly enticed 26-year-old Gemmel Moore to travel to the Los Angeles area to engage in prostitution and that he further allegedly provided methamphetamine to Moore, who overdosed on the...

Victims of the FBI's constitutionally dubious raid say they've been told to come forward and identify themselves if they want their stuff back. Dagny discovered that the FBI had seized the contents of her safe deposit box—about $100,000 in gold and silver coins, some family heirlooms like a diamond necklace inherited from her late grandmother, and an engagement ring she'd promised to pass down to her daughter—almost by accident. She'd been asked by a friend to recommend a convenient and secure location for keeping some valuables. Dagny searched Yelp to find the phone number for U.S. Private Vaults, a Beverly...

Last month, the city and county of Los Angeles filed an appeal of a sweeping injunction from U.S. District Judge David O. Carter ordering urgent action to get people off skid row. In their appeal to the 9th Circuit, the city and county asked for the deadlines to be suspended while their appeal is heard. The appellate court didn’t grant that request outright. Instead, the panel of judges paused the order until June 15 and asked for more information on how granting the stay pending appeal sought by the city and county might affect the case before Carter.

A stay would freeze the order from U.S. District Judge David O. Carter, including the requirement that the city put $1 billion in escrow to pay for the clearance, until the appeal was decided. At the heart of Carter’s injunction is the argument that a long history of state-sponsored racism in Los Angeles has driven Black people into homelessness. [T]here are several questions that an appellate court panel will likely ask, including whether government has committed a constitutional violation by failing to help homeless people get off the streets. Additionally, it will look to see if the fixes Carter is...

A federal judge has ruled that Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies acted properly when they seized drugs and other evidence from the West Hollywood home of Democratic donor Ed Buck after a man was found dead there in 2017. Buck... asked U.S. District Judge Christina A. Snyder to bar prosecutors from using as evidence syringes, drug paraphernalia and nearly two grams of methamphetamine deputies discovered in what Buck called an illegal search of his apartment. Snyder denied the request. In a ruling Wednesday, she wrote that Buck effectively invited law enforcement into his home when he called 911 to report...

This will be a weekly post. Count is now 234 judges confirmed. 3 Trade Court judges 234 District Court judges 54 Circuit Court judges 3 Supreme Court justices There are three nominees on the Senate floor awaiting a vote. All other nominees will expire with the Congress.

ICE released more than 250 detainees after a federal judge ordered the population be reduced A number of illegal immigrants who were released from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention in October after a court order due to COVID safety have since been re-arrested for crimes including child sex and drug offenses, according to the agency. ICE released 250 detainees from its facility in Adelanto, Calif., after a federal judge ordered the population be reduced in order to halt the spread of coronavirus infections in response to a lawsuit. ICE complied with the order but objected strenuously to it on...

A federal court ordered Los Angeles to hand over more than $100,000 to the National Rifle Association after ruling that the city had violated the gun-rights group's First Amendment rights. Federal district court judge Stephen Wilson struck down a city ordinance aimed at punishing prospective contractors with ties to the NRA as an infringement on the right to free speech and association. On Tuesday, he ordered city officials to pay for the Second Amendment group's attorney fees, which totaled nearly $150,000. "Even though the Ordinance only forces disclosure of activity that may not be expressive, the clear purpose of the...

Federal district court judge Stephen Wilson ordered the city of Los Angeles to pay the NRA’s lawyer fees of approximately $150,000, just months after he ruled a city ordinance violated the NRA’s First Amendment rights. Wilson ruled on the First Amendment violation on December 11, 2019, in National Rifle Association of America et al v. City of Los Angeles, which was heard in the United States District Court for the Central District of California. The case centered on City Ordinance 18600, which required “a perspective contractor of the City to disclose all contracts with or sponsorship of the National Rifle...

So the good MAGA news is that the US Senate has confirmed 6 judges so far this week (with 2 more pending today) to the bench 4 of them on central district of CA, 2 in south IL and 2 in north IL--all of which are liberal cesspools as far as the existing benches go, with lots of vacancies still to fill. So it's great news that Trump is filling slots with judges that at least will follow the law, But can someone who might know more about how this works explain something to me: Two district judges for the...

A U.S District Court judge in the Central District of California ordered the federal government to release migrant children being held in detention for more than 20 days. The order calls for the children to be released by July 17 due to concerns over the coronavirus pandemic. U.S. District Judge Dolly Gee, appointed to the Central District of California by President Barack Obama in 2009, ruled on Friday that the federal government cannot hold children in U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facilities for more than 20 days, NBC News reported. Judge Gee cited concerns over the danger posed by...

In the order issued last week, U.S. District Judge David O. Carter called for the relocation of up to 7,000 people living near overpasses, off-ramps and on-ramps, saying they face severe health risks from tailpipe emissions and car crashes. If carried out, it would mark a major shift in policy in a city and county that have seen a record number of people living in tents and makeshift shelters in recent years. Following a series of court rulings and legal settlements, efforts to clear encampments from sidewalks and other public spaces have been heavily restricted.