Injunction junction, what's your function...
Posted on 09/12/2019 10:54:52 AM PDT by MarvinStinson
Sen. Tom Cotton (R., Ark.) and Rep. Mark Meadows (R., N.C.) introduced legislation Wednesday to end nationwide injunctions after a California judge took action to stop a change in the Trump administration's asylum policy from going into effect.
The legislation, titled the "Nationwide Injunction Abuse Prevention Act," would prevent individual district court judges from issuing nationwide halts to new policies.
Earlier this week, a California district court judge reinstated a nationwide injunction against the Trump administration's new asylum policy, which halted its implementation. The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals reversed the judge's decision Wednesday and allowed the policy to go into effect.
Cotton and Meadows blasted "activist" and "unaccountable" district judges in a press release about their bill.
"This legislation would restore the appropriate role of district court judges by prohibiting them from issuing nationwide injunctions broader than the parties to the case or the geographic boundaries of the federal district in which the judge presides," they wrote.
A similar bill in 2018 proposed prohibiting judges from issuing sweeping injunctions against the nationwide implementation of federal laws. It did not gain sufficient legislative momentum. Now, Meadows and Cotton are attempting to push through legislation of their own echoing criticisms made by Attorney General William Barr in a Wall Street Journal op-ed.
Last week, Barr argued for putting an end to nationwide injunctions in the article. He criticized injunctions for creating "an unfair, one-way system in which the democratically accountable government must fend off case after case to put its policy into effect, while those challenging the policy need only find a single sympathetic judge."
Both Cotton and Meadows echoed Barr's criticisms.
"In the past few years, we’ve seen an explosion of activist forum shopping and nationwide injunctions to thwart the administration’s priorities and grind government to a halt," Cotton said in the release. "This bill will restore respect for the system of government outlined in the Constitution by limiting the use of nationwide injunctions by district court judges."
Meadows also blasted individual activist judges, and added it "makes zero sense for the legality of a nationwide law to rest entirely on the opinion of one judge, or one district court."
"A district court in California should not be given sweeping authority to issue a ruling—let alone on dubious legal reasoning—striking down policy from a duly elected President," he said. "Current law inadvertently empowers detrimental judicial activism, and it needs to change."
Injunction junction, what's your function...
As a practical matter, the U.S. Supreme Court did this yesterday.
And I'll make Ted Kennedy pay.
If he fights back, I'll say that he's gay.
After our forefathers had set the parameters for the USSC to be included in the Constitution, they noted that the Court had absolutely no check.
Great ideas!
Another suggest for legislation would make it mandatory that nationwide injunctions be given in person to the Senate Judiciary committee who then get to ask questions of the judge. The committee gets the authority to grant a stay until SCOTUS rules on the merits.
——to bad somebody didn’t think of doing this when the Repubs had control of the House-—it could have passed easily then-—
-—now it is pointless posturing-—
These appointed "legal maniacs" think they are important don't cha know??
but their legal authority extends only within the confines of the judicial circuit they serve.
I hought the supreme court already ruled that district courts couldn’t order nationwide injunctions
That is the bottom line. Leave it to the stupid repulicans to go here when they well know this will go no where. Show vote.
Agreed. Maybe by design. Members of our courts are supposed to represent the elite of our society. The well educated, etc.
However, these lower court judges are not the USSC. They are beneath the level of the USSC and, more importantly, the POTUS. And the lower court judge’s jurisdiction should be limited to the regions that which they oversee.
It is as if one of one of the president’s cabinet members overrules Congress. The “cabinet member” is an underling and not equal to congress. Only the president, equal to the USSC, and Congress has a vote at that level.
This is not needed. What’s needed is for the Supreme Court to end this madness.
Yes, exactly.
‘This bill will restore respect for the system of government outlined in the Constitution’
Oh, and it would also be the case if high officials, elected, apppointed or promoted from within the bureaucracy, were subject to the same laws - and actually prosecuted when there is a clear case to be made of a possible violation thereof - instead of making it look abundantly clear that there are two standards of justice in our society.
Other than that, I’m certainly in favor of this bill. Unelected judges on the lowest federal level do not have the Constitutional authority to exercise their power outside of their own court’s jurisdiction. Any first year law student could tell you that.
“he idea that one STATE COURT can rule for all States is absurd.”
> if overturned 3 times by a higher court, they’re out, done being a judge, anywhere.
Require an impeachment vote in the House - no voice votes allowed.
The House Democrats need to be reminded that Trump is appointing so many conservative judges that, if in the future roles are reversed, they would be glad they voted yes on this bill.
I dont think there is. Clarence Thomas has spoken on this also.
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