Administrative State

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A federal judge has tossed out the Trump administration’s lawsuits against 15 Maryland judges who have ruled against President Donald Trump’s policies.

The Justice Department filed a lawsuit against all 15 judges with the US District Court for the District of Maryland in June. The complaint challenged Chief Judge Georga Russell III’s order pausing deportations for two business days when a detained illegal immigrant files a habeas corpus petition. The agency referred to the ruling as an “automatic injunction” that hampered the government’s ability to enforce immigration laws.

The DOJ asserted that district courts do not have jurisdiction over matters related to immigration. The complaint demanded that the judges recuse themselves from immigration-related cases.

In a scathing ruling, Judge Thomas Cullen, a Trump appointee, threw out the DOJ’s lawsuit, calling the case improper and constitutionally reckless. The judge argued that the policy was temporary and based on appellate court procedures. It also allowed judges time to properly evaluate the case.

Cullen acknowledged the administration’s objections to the judge’s rulings. “Fair enough, as far as it goes. If these arguments were made in the proper forum, they might well get some traction,” he wrote. However, he criticized the White House for bypassing regular channels like appeals or judicial council petitions. Instead, “the Executive decided to sue—and in a big way,” by suing every single judge in the Maryland district, the judge noted.

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Friday, a federal judge in Florida ordered the famed “Alligator Alcatraz” detention and deportation center for illegal aliens closed and dismantled. My colleague Brad Slager had that story:

Judge Kathleen Williams, late Thursday evening in a Miami courtroom, issued a temporary restraining order requiring the state to refrain from bringing in any additional detainees, and declared that in 60 days the facility needs to be cleared of all of those being held, and the process of hauling out the installed infrastructure begins to take place.

Williams, a Barack Obama appointee, stated that an environmental impact assessment was to have been conducted prior to installing the new structures and other operational needs. She noted that no such advance research was conducted by the defendants, although the state did argue with a reference to a “Preliminary Ecological Assessment” that was conducted in late July. While that study alluded to several species possibly endangered, the state asserted that installations around the facility were erected to shield those in the surrounding area.