Free Republic

Link only - https://www.salon.com/2021/02/20/biden-had-a-secret-elite-legal-team-to-stop-trump-from-stealing-the-election-report_partner/

Religious institutions could be at risk of losing their tax-exempt status due to their beliefs about marriage if the Supreme Court holds that gay couples have a constitutional right to wed, President Obama’s attorney acknowledged to the Supreme Court today. “It’s certainly going to be an issue,” Solicitor General Donald Verrilli replied when Justice Samuel Alito asked if schools that support the traditional definition of marriage would have to be treated like schools that once opposed interracial marriage. “I don’t deny that.”

Lawyers for the Obama administration compared Israel’s control of Jerusalem to Russian claims over the Ukrainian territory of Crimea during oral arguments this week before the Supreme Court in a case concerning the rights of U.S. citizens to list Jerusalem as part of Israel on their passports. U.S. Solicitor General Donald Verrilli, who is rumored to be in the running to replace outgoing Attorney General Eric Holder, drew the comparison on Monday while he attempted to convince the Supreme Court that Jerusalem is not officially part of Israel. The controversial case hinges around Menachem Zivotofsky, who was born in Jerusalem...

As for the short list to replace Attorney General, here are the top names our sources are giving us: Former White House counsel Kathryn Ruemmler U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara of New York Outgoing U.S. Attorney Jenny Durkan of Seattle U.S. Solicitor General Donald Verrilli Former Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano Current Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson Labor Secretary Tom Perez No longer on this list is Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick, who was once considered the favorite. The reason why: “On Thursday, Patrick denied rumors that he is next in line for the job. According to an aide, he said at...

Question for legal tweeps: Obama campaign is now denying that administration SG ever argued that Obamacare mandate is a tax. Looking at oral arguments, SG Verrilli said mandate is 'justifiable under its tax power.' Can't find him saying 'It is a tax'… So therefore: Is Obama hiding behind legal hairsplitting, arguing mandate is constitutional under tax power but is not actually a tax?

Poor Solicitor General Donald Verrilli. Once again he's been pilloried for fumbling a historic Supreme Court case. First shredded for his "train wreck" defense of ObamaCare's individual mandate, he is now blamed for the defenestration in oral argument of Obama's challenge to the Arizona immigration law. The law allows police to check the immigration status of someone stopped for other reasons. Verrilli claimed that constitutes an intrusion on the federal monopoly on immigration enforcement. He was pummeled. Why shouldn't a state help the federal government enforce the law? "You can see it's not selling very well," said Justice Sonia Sotomayor....

As James Madison wrote in the Federalist No. 45, "The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the federal government, are few and defined. Those which are to remain in the State governments are numerous and indefinite. The former will be exercised principally on external objects, as war, peace, negotiation, and foreign commerce; with which last the power of taxation will, for the most part, be connected. The powers reserved to the several States will extend to all the objects which, in the ordinary course of affairs, concern the lives, liberties, and properties of the people, and the internal order,...

In Tuesday’s oral arguments before the Supreme Court, Solicitor General and chief ObamaCare advocate Donald Verrilli was presented with a substantial portion of his own posterior by Justice Antonin Scalia. The summary execution began when Verrilli made the extraordinary mistake of schooling the Court on the proper meaning of its own decisions. “No it didn’t,” said Scalia to the stunned Solicitor General in reference to his errant references to the significance of previous cases. And what followed was a merciless barrage of facts exposing the overreach of the individual mandate, ObamaCare’s method of creating “fairness in healthcare” by making those...

Tuesday may have been the biggest day in Solicitor General Donald Verrilli's career, when he went before the Supreme Court to defend the central tenet of the health care reform law. To many who were watching, it looked like he choked. "He was passive. He was stumbling. He was nervous," CNN legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin told POLITICO. "I was just shocked.” His halting delivery was so pronounced that BuzzFeed mercilessly edited together 40 seconds of coughing, throat clearing and water-drinking. "I've seen him argue under pressure," said Arnold and Porter's Lisa Blatt, a former assistant to the solicitor general who's...

The guy who uploaded this to YouTube calls it a “benchslap.” It's loads of fun, and the point about limited powers will sound familiar. The key part comes early when Scalia jumps in to challenge Verrilli's citation of Court precedent. Those cases dealt with commerce, he says; in this case, the legislation is aimed at people who aren't participating in commerce, i.e. people without insurance. That's a gut-punch to the left since, once you make that move conceptually, the Commerce Clause defense of the statute is hanging by a thread. You can follow his thinking over the rest of the...

Justice Samuel Alito was back in his skeptical mode today, chiding the Obama administration for — in his view — trying to have it both ways on whether the individual mandate penalty is a tax. The same justice who shook his head at President Barack Obama during the 2010 State of the Union address, appearing to mouth the words “not true” when Obama criticized the Citizens United decision, gave Solicitor General Donald Verrilli a hard time Monday about the administration’s views on the mandate penalty: JUSTICE ALITO: General Verrilli, today you are arguing that the penalty is not a tax....

Obama Lawyer Laughed at In Supreme Court On the first day of health care reform arguments before the Supreme Court, two justices needled a top Obama lawyer for simultaneously calling the fine that will be paid under the law for not purchasing insurance a “penalty” and a “tax.” The confusion arises because of the administration’s argument that the power to enforce the individual mandate is rooted in Congress’ taxing power — but that the mechanism itself is designed to be a penalty, not a revenue-generating policy. The narrow but important distinction created a communication challenge for the lawyer representing the...