Free Republic

A federal appeals court on Friday lifted an injunction from crooked Obama Judge Amy Berman Jackson that had blocked the Trump Administration from dismantling the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB). The DC Circuit Court of Appeals in a 2-1 ruling allowed the Trump Administration to move forward and dismantle the CFPB. The three-judge panel included: Majority: Katsas (Trump), Rao (Trump), and dissent: Pillard (Obama). Politico reported: A federal appeals court panel has cleared the way for the Trump administration to largely dismantle the work of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, lifting a lower-court judge’s injunction that had preserved the agency’s...

WASHINGTON — A federal judge has granted a temporary restraining order blocking the Trump administration from removing some immigrants from the United States using the Alien Enemies Act. The ruling stems from a lawsuit, J.G.G. v. Trump, filed earlier today by the American Civil Liberties Union, Democracy Forward, and the ACLU of the District of Columbia challenging the president’s expected unlawful and unprecedented invocation of the act.

Corrupt U.S. District Judge Tanya S. Chutkan has unleashed a legal assault on Elon Musk and the newly formed Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), greenlighting a fishing expedition that threatens to expose DOGE employees to the wrath of left-wing bureaucrats. On Tuesday, radical left Judge Tanya Chutkan, a disgustingly dishonest Trump-hater who believes she was elected to lead this country and take down Trump, issued an order today in State of New Mexico, et al. v. Elon Musk, et al. that demands Musk and DOGE cough up sensitive documents and data within a mere 21 days—all to appease a coalition...

A federal judge said Friday he intends to temporarily block the Trump administration’s plan to place thousands of U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) employees on leave at midnight. Unions representing government employees sued to stop the shutdown of agency operations and restart the flow of foreign aid frozen by President Trump, who has accused the agency of fraud and corruption to justify its imminent shuttering. Judge Carl Nichols, appointed by Trump during his first term, said he would issue a formal order later Friday but that a “limited, very limited” order temporarily pausing the plan would be handed down....

A federal judge blocked the Trump administration from placing thousands of employees at the US Agency for International Development (USAID) on paid leave Friday, halting plans to cut its workforce down to just a few hundred. Washington, DC, US District Judge Carl Nichols imposed a “very limited” restraining order on the administration, Politico reported, sparing at least 2,200 USAID employees from being put on paid leave at midnight. Administration officials had reportedly moved to gut the agency’s more than 10,000-person workforce by the end of the week down to just 290 or so staff members. Just 500 employees at USAID...

On Oct. 5th, 2021, the day before my plea hearing, a reporter from @CNN named @MarshallCohen (seen below) Image contacted the prosecutor in my case stating that he had evidence that I was planning to plead guilty the next day in court, but that I didn't really believe I was guilty. Cohen then asked the DOJ if they might like to rethink offering me a plea deal. I was arrested and jailed on January 25th, 2021, after an FBI raid on my apartment over 8 minutes that I stood outside of the Capitol building shooting video. It's astounding that I...

After nearly eight months in limbo, former President Donald J. Trump’s federal election interference case sprang back to life on Saturday as the judge overseeing it scheduled a hearing in Washington for Aug. 16 to discuss next steps.At the hearing, the judge, Tanya S. Chutkan, will discuss with Mr. Trump’s lawyers and prosecutors in the office of the special counsel, Jack Smith, how each side would like to proceed with a complicated fact-finding mission the Supreme Court ordered last month. The order was part of its landmark ruling granting Mr. Trump broad immunity against criminal prosecution for acts arising from...

In November 2022, the first subpoena was filed against John Negroponte, the former director of national intelligence — despite no prior involvement in the lawsuit on either side. Then, in June 2023, My Pillow, Inc. filed a motion to compel the testimony of Department of Justice attorney, Carlotta Wells. The career government lawyer, again, was not previously involved in the civil dispute between the voting machine companies and the bedding retailer up to that point. “First, as Lindell does not dispute, Wells and Negroponte do not have any personal or direct knowledge regarding the allegedly defamatory statements at issue,” the...

Despite being slapped down by the U.S. Court of Appeals for ordering a Jan. 6 probationer’s computer use be monitored for so-called “disinformation,” a senior federal judge in Washington D.C. appears ready to reimpose the restriction on Daniel Goodwyn of Corinth, Texas. Senior U.S. District Judge Reggie Walton ordered Mr. Goodwyn to “show cause” for why the computer monitoring provision should not be reimposed. Judge Walton set a June 4 hearing date on the issue in Washington.

UPDATED: A federal judge has found Catherine Herridge in civil contempt of his order that she reveal the source of stories she wrote when she worked for Fox News. U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper set a fine of $800 per day, but he stayed the ruling to give her time to appeal. The judge had ordered Herridge to reveal her sources for 2017 stories that reported on a federal investigation of Yanping Chen, a naturalized U.S. citizen who founded the University of Management and Technology in Virginia. The stories had to do with Chen’s affiliations with the Chinese military. The...

Back in March, The Heritage Foundation requested documents from the DOJ using the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) regarding the government’s investigation of Hunter Biden. Unsurprisingly, the DOJ refused. Then, on June 20th, after several years of government investigations, Hunter Biden was charged with multiple, watered-down offenses. The charges were so weak they created a presumption of corruption at the DOJ. *** Six days later, the Heritage Foundation filed a FOIA lawsuit in Washington, D.C. (good luck getting a fair shake there) and requested the court force the DOJ to disclose critical records about the Hunter Biden investigation which would...

WASHINGTON — A Florida man who bragged he "broke the internet" when he was photographed carrying House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's podium during the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol was sentenced to 75 days in prison on Friday. Adam Johnson, a stay-at-home father of five boys, traveled to D.C. in support of former President Donald Trump's efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election, which Trump lost to President Joe Biden. U.S. District Court Judge Reggie B. Walton sentenced Johnson to prison on Friday, saying Johnson made "a mockery" of the events by grabbing Pelosi's lectern and...

Mariposa Castro, also known as Imelda Acosta, was sentenced Wednesday by U.S. District Judge Reggie Walton. She also received a $5,000 fine from the judge, who said the January 6 attack had "totally undermined" the peaceful transfer of presidential power, NBC News reported. Throughout the day, Castro posted videos on her Facebook account showing the riot from inside the building and outside on restricted grounds. One video shows her climbing through a broken window, using the platform located at the lower west terrace of the Capitol, according to court records. As she was entering the Capitol, she could be heard...

A federal judge invalidated the results of an oil and gas lease sale in the Gulf of Mexico on Thursday saying the Biden administration failed to properly account for the auction's climate change impact. The decision has cast uncertainty over the future of the U.S. federal offshore drilling program, which has been a big source of public revenue for decades but also drawn the ire of activists concerned about its impact on the environment and contribution to global warming. The Gulf of Mexico accounts for 15% of existing U.S. oil production and 5% of dry natural gas output, according to...

WASHINGTON — A federal court has rejected a plan to lease millions of acres in the Gulf of Mexico for offshore oil drilling, saying the Biden administration did not adequately take into account the lease sale's effect on planet-warming greenhouse gas emissions, violating a bedrock environmental law.The decision Thursday by U.S. District Judge Rudolph Contreras in Washington sends the proposed lease sale back to the Interior Department to decide next steps. The judge said it was up to Interior to decide whether to go forward with the sale after a revised review, scrap it or take other steps.Environmental groups hailed...

Paul Hodgkins, according to Joe Biden’s Justice Department, is a domestic terrorist. A working-class man from Tampa, Hodgkins committed what Democrats and the media consider a murderous crime comparable to flying a packed jetliner into a skyscraper or detonating a truck filled with explosives under a crowded federal building. Paul Hodgkins entered the Capitol building on January 6, 2021. What exactly did Hodgkins do on that day of infamy? He followed a group of like-minded Donald Trump supporters SNIP When he entered the sacred Senate chambers, Hodgkins carried with him a weapon so offensive that the mere sight of the...

For months, Merrick Garland’s Department of Justice has tried every trick in the law books to conceal from Americans a massive trove of video evidence that captured all the activity at the Capitol complex on January 6. Federal judges have played along, approving hundreds of protective orders to keep video clips—particularly footage recorded by the Capitol Police’s extensive closed-circuit television system—out of the public eye. Time, however, is running out for the government. Despite numerous discovery delays, Garland’s prosecutors are gradually turning over video evidence to defense attorneys as they prepare for trial. All surveillance video from the Capitol’s security...

Afederal judge knocked former President Trump on Monday for his repeated claims that the 2020 presidential election was stolen, arguing that former Vice President Al Gore "was a man" and accepted his election loss in 2000. "Al Gore had a better case to argue than Mr. Trump and he was a man about what happened to him," Senior U.S. District Judge Reggie Walton said, according to CNN. "He accepted it and walked away." Walton was referring to Gore's decision to concede the race to President George W. Bush after weeks of legal battles, which were triggered due to an extremely...

On Friday, a federal judge imposed the largest fine yet in any Capitol riot case. U.S. District Judge Reggie Walton sentenced husband and wife Thomas Vinson and Lori Vinson to five years of probation and 120 hours of community service for their participation in the January 6 insurrection. The Kentucky couple was also ordered to pay $5,000 each, which Buzzfeed's Zoe Tillman noted is the largest fine so far. "I know that's a lot, but I want the sentence to hurt," Walton said. In July, the Vinsons pleaded guilty to charges of entering and remaining in a restricted building; disorderly...

WASHINGTON, Oct 4 (Reuters) - Facebook Inc (FB.O) asked a judge on Monday to dismiss the U.S. government's revised antitrust case that seeks to force the social media giant to sell Instagram and WhatsApp. Facebook said in a court filing that the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) had failed to provide a "plausible factual basis for branding Facebook an unlawful monopolist." The company added it appears the FTC "had no basis for its naked allegation that Facebook has or had a monopoly." The social media giant asked that the lawsuit be dismissed with prejudice, which would make it harder for the...