Free Republic

After California agreed that enforcing its licensing requirement was unconstitutionally irrational, the court ruled that small business owner Jay Fink is free to help Californians stand up to spam.. U.S. District Judge Rita Lin has permanently enjoined the California Bureau of Security and Investigative Services from enforcing its private-investigator licensing requirement against anti-spam entrepreneur Jay Fink. The order declares that forcing Jay to get a license to run his business is so irrational that it violates the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. “I’m thankful that I won’t have to worry about losing my livelihood anymore,” said Jay, who...

George Washington University class-action settlement for COVID shutdown approved with more money for students, less for lawyers. Mere "overlap between a religious and political view" doesn't negate Title VII’s religious protections, 8th Circuit says.. If COVID-19 litigation were like the virus itself, George Washington University cleared its infection with a pricey therapeutic, the Mayo Clinic's infection rebounded, and Rutgers University faces an unusually virulent strain that could spread far and wide. A federal judge gave final approval to the $5.4 million class-action settlement submitted by GWU students and the private university blocks from the White House, in a tuition-refund lawsuit...

The guilty verdict against former President Donald Trump reached by a Manhattan jury on Thursday could ultimately be reviewed by the U.S. Supreme Court, legal experts said. Trump was convicted on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records in an unprecedented verdict against the presumptive Republican presidential nominee just months before the 2024 election. The verdict is likely to be appealed by Trump’s legal team, however, and experts say the final decision in Trump’s hush-money trial could come down to a ruling from the highest court in the land. Attorney Roger Severino, who is the vice president of Domestic Policy...

Republican strategist Karl Rove urged Democrats to “go hard” at former President Trump’s rhetoric surrounding the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol, calling the former president’s pledge to free imprisoned rioters a “critical mistake.” “If they were smart, they’d take the January 6 and go hard at it. And they would say, ‘He wants to pardon these people who attacked our Capitol,'” Rove said told MSNBC’s Ari Melber. “One of the critical mistakes made in this campaign is that Donald Trump has now said ‘I’m going to pardon those people because they’re hostages,'” Rove said in the interview, which...

Red flag alert! Justice Department’s new center strikes at gun rightsThe National Extreme Risk Protection Order Resource Center bypasses Congress to undermine the Second Amendment.The U.S. Department of Justice on Monday unveiled a brand-new entity designed to train state and local officials how to apply red flag laws to confiscate firearms from gun owners who’ve been deemed “a threat to themselves or to others.” These “red flag laws” are called extreme risk protection orders, which are “civil court orders that temporarily restrict firearm access for an individual who is behaving dangerously or presents a high risk of harm to self...

The bad news is that the Biden administration is ramping up its gun confiscation agenda in the form of a whopping $750 million dedicated to establishing so-called “red flag laws” in every state in the Union. The good news is that epically incompetent Vice President Kamala Harris seems to have been put in charge of the push.On Saturday, Harris toured parts of Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, where a former student with a legally purchased firearm massacred 17 innocents on Valentine’s Day, 2018. She then announced two administration proposals purportedly aimed at quashing gun violence.The first would...

GOOD! A sheriff that knows how to get sh*t done.... you want to FA you will FO

Trump must pay $ 83.3 MILLION to E. Jean Carroll for defamation, a federal jury has ruled

Police said Tuesday they are investigating incidents directed at Colorado Supreme Court justices and providing extra patrols around their homes in Denver following the court’s decision to remove former President Donald Trump from the state’s presidential primary ballot. The Denver Police Department declined in an email to provide details about its investigations, citing safety and privacy considerations and because they are ongoing. The department “is currently investigating incidents directed at Colorado Supreme Court justices and will continue working with our local, state and federal law enforcement partners to thoroughly investigate any reports of threats or harassment,” the email said. Officers...

Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) is putting together legislation to require the U.S. military to adhere to state-level red and yellow flag laws for troops. A red flag law allows family, friends, and others, to seek a court order to have guns removed from someone they view as a danger to himself or others. A yellow flag law is more narrow, allowing law enforcement to seek the court order for firearm removal.

The U.S. Supreme Court is likely to strike down a Colorado court ruling that removed former President Donald Trump from the state’s ballot. However, the conservative majority on the highest court is likely to do so in a narrow way that doesn’t get into the weeds of whether President Trump's actions constituted insurrection, according to a constitutional law expert.The Supreme Court may say the 14th Amendment’s disqualification clause doesn’t apply to the president, predicted Horace Cooper, senior fellow with the National Center for Public Policy Research, who formerly taught constitutional law at George Mason University.The Colorado Supreme Court ruled on...

Emergency risk protection orders: They are laws that temporarily remove firearms from the possession of a person who may be experiencing a mental health crisis. Supporters of these measures say they help prevent those in crisis from harming themselves or others. What You Need To Know21 states and Washington D.C. have emergency risk protection order lawsThey allow police to temporarily take someone’s firearms if they are in crisis and could potentially harm themselves or othersThese laws are sometimes called red flag lawsKentucky lawmakers plan to file a similar measure during the 2024 legislative session These orders are commonly referred to...

The US Supreme Court has declined, for now, to decide whether former president Donald Trump has immunity from prosecution for allegedly trying to overturn the 2020 election. Mr Trump's efforts to delay his trial appears successful, as the case must now work through the appeals process. Special counsel Jack Smith had asked the court to take up the case in an expedited manner. SNIP The court did not explain its decision, instead issuing an unsigned order saying that Mr Smith's petition "is denied".

Earlier this week, the Colorado State Supreme Court determined in a 4-3 ruling that Trump is ineligible under the 14th Amendment to appear on the ballot in the state. This nonsensical ruling essentially declares that even though Trump has never been convicted of, much less tried with sedition or participating in an insurrection, he is nevertheless guilty of such. The ruling is bound to be taken up by the Supreme Court, and experts on both sides of the aisle believe it will be promptly overturned. But that doesn't change the fact that four justices in the highest court in the...

The Colorado Supreme Court’s decision to ban former President Trump from the state’s primary ballot undermines a “bedrock principle” of American democracy, one of the court’s Democrat-appointed justices wrote in a fiery dissent. Justices Carlos Samour, Maria Berkenkotter and Chief Justice Brian D. Boatright all dissented, but Samour was particularly critical of the 4-3 ruling. Samour and Boatright were each appointed by Democratic former Gov. John Hickenlooper, while Berkenkotter was appointed by current Gov. Jared Polis, also a Democrat. “The decision to bar former President Donald J. Trump — by all accounts the current leading Republican presidential candidate (and reportedly...

[Catholic Caucus] The Pope Cannot Depose Bishops Without Grave CauseEditor’s note: in light of the recent news that the Holy Father, after deposing Bishop Strickland, now allegedly intends to move against Cardinal Burke (again), we present this study in conjunction with Fr. Murray’s recent analysis of the Strickland case. Father Gerald Murray has excellently analyzed the canonical side of Bp. Strickland’s removal. He has demonstrated that the guarantee of due process has been violated. Canon 196 and other related canons were masterfully explained. I myself published a different article that I wrote before having read Father Murray’s analysis. I saw...

The Rahimi case oral arguments have been heard by the Supreme Court. It was bumped to the head of the line by the Biden administration. At its core, the case is not about domestic violence. It is about whether fundamental rights, enumerated in the Bill of Rights, can be nullified by a judge in a civil hearing with almost no due process. No jury trial, no right to a lawyer, no criminal conviction. From the Fifth Circuit decision on the case: Perhaps most importantly, the Government’s proffered interpretation lacks any true limiting principle. Under the Government’s reading, Congress could remove...

Below is the 14th Amendment brief that lawyer Robert Barnes wrote, which I think you'll all find very informative. It was sent only to subscribers, but I don't think he'd mind me reposting just this portion of his much longer newsletter. If he does, he knows my email. Let’s dispatch with the 14th Amendment argument more and more frivolous litigants file suit in to try to bar Trump from the ballot. Let’s start with the text itself. Of note, section 5 clarifies who can enforce this provision: “The Congress shall have power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of...

The four criminal trials currently scheduled for former President Donald Trump are amongst the most significant and controversial trials in American history. It is imperative that they also be among the fairest trials in our history. Regardless of the results—acquittal, conviction, hung jury—the trials must be perceived as having been fair. The defendant must receive the benefit of all of his constitutional and statutory rights. Not only is Donald Trump on trial in these cases, but the American system of justice is on trial, not only in America but around the world. The defendant is not only a former president;...

The decision provides important protection for property rights, and features a powerful concurring opinion by prominent conservative Judge Amal Thapar. In many states, asset forfeiture laws allow law enforcement agencies to seize valuable property based on mere suspicion that it was used in a crime, and then keep it even if the owner was never convicted of any crime. On top of that, some force owners to wait many months before they even have a chance to challenge the forfeiture in a hearing. Yesterday, in Ingram v. Wayne County, the US Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit issued a...