On April 14, Dubai’s ruler, Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, announced that the United Arab Emirates would begin using artificial intelligence to help write its laws. A new Regulatory Intelligence Office would use the technology to “regularly suggest updates” to the law and “accelerate the issuance of legislation by up to 70%.” AI would create a “comprehensive legislative plan” spanning local and federal law and would be connected to public administration, the courts, and global policy trends. //

AI, and technology generally, is often invoked by politicians to give their project a patina of objectivity and rationality, but it doesn’t really do any such thing. As proposed, AI would simply give the UAE’s hereditary rulers new tools to express, enact, and enforce their preferred policies.

Mohammed’s emphasis that a primary benefit of AI will be to make law faster is also misguided. The machine may write the text, but humans will still propose, debate, and vote on the legislation. Drafting is rarely the bottleneck in passing new law. What takes much longer is for humans to amend, horse-trade, and ultimately come to agreement on the content of that legislation—even when that politicking is happening among a small group of monarchic elites.

Rather than expeditiousness, the more important capability offered by AI is sophistication. AI has the potential to make law more complex, tailoring it to a multitude of different scenarios. The combination of AI’s research and drafting speed makes it possible for it to outline legislation governing dozens, even thousands, of special cases for each proposed rule.

But here again, this capability of AI opens the door for the powerful to have their way. AI’s capacity to write complex law would allow the humans directing it to dictate their exacting policy preference for every special case. It could even embed those preferences surreptitiously.

Since time immemorial, legislators have carved out legal loopholes to narrowly cater to special interests. AI will be a powerful tool for authoritarians, lobbyists, and other empowered interests to do this at a greater scale. AI can help automatically produce what political scientist Amy McKay has termed “microlegislation“: loopholes that may be imperceptible to human readers on the page—until their impact is realized in the real world.

But AI can be constrained and directed to distribute power rather than concentrate it. For Emirati residents, the most intriguing possibility of the AI plan is the promise to introduce AI “interactive platforms” where the public can provide input to legislation. In experiments across locales as diverse as Kentucky, Massachusetts, France, Scotland, Taiwan, and many others, civil society within democracies are innovating and experimenting with ways to leverage AI to help listen to constituents and construct public policy in a way that best serves diverse stakeholders.

If the UAE is going to build an AI-native government, it should do so for the purpose of empowering people and not machines. AI has real potential to improve deliberation and pluralism in policymaking, and Emirati residents should hold their government accountable to delivering on this promise.

SCOTUS Takes Up the Power of Nationwide Injunctions and the Threat to Executive Authority.

May 16, 2025

Mark Twain once used the word, Podunk to describe a small, unimportant town. Today, a Podunk pettifogger from just such a place thinks he is David taking on Goliath. But this time, Goliath is the duly elected President of the United States. //

The Presidential Executive Order (EO) has become the way to govern Washington at a time when Congress is entirely dysfunctional. However, the vast network of federal district judges, who are, by definition, supposed to be apolitical and neutral, often rule against the EO. They do so increasingly on a "nationwide" basis, far beyond the districts their courtrooms oversee.

It has become a pressing and multifaceted issue. The United States federal judiciary has 677 district court judges (across 94 districts, including territorial courts like those in Puerto Rico and Guam). These are lifetime appointments under Article III of the Constitution. When an activist federal judge deems the underlying challenge to an EO from a plaintiff noteworthy, the judge sets out to ensure "uniform relief" across the entire country through a nationwide injunction. Even the nine Appeals Courts do not have such a reach. Even the Supreme Court doesn't have the same power unless at least five justices agree! //

Expectedly, Justice Clarence Thomas expressed his displeasure again at nationwide injunctions, pointing out that the U.S. judicial system operated without them until the 1960s, so why were they necessary now? Justice Samuel Alito, who has previously been a skeptic, hinted that he would vote to scale them back.

Chief Justice John Roberts focused on the procedural aspects of nationwide injunctions, suggesting that the Supreme Court has become more efficient at handling emergency cases expeditiously. He undercut the concerns of Justices Barrett, Gorsuch, and Sotomayor.

Justice Brett Kavanaugh had the best legal solution by suggesting that class-action lawsuits could serve as an alternative to nationwide injunctions. His questioning was a rare demonstration of principled legal analysis, not tainted by politics.

"Federal district judges are appointed by the president, confirmed by the Senate, and serve lifetime terms. There are currently 677 such judges in the U.S. Do you support or oppose individual district judges having the authority to block or halt a president’s policy nationwide?"

A solid majority of Americans say yes. Specifically, 56% said they either support such powers "strongly" (31%) or "somewhat" (26%), while just 28% said they oppose it either "somewhat" (13%) or "strongly" (15%). A sizeable 16% said they weren't sure. //

Democrats are most supportive, with 71% saying the support the judges, just 14% saying they oppose them. Among independents, that majority falls to 54% support, and rises to 30% opposition. The surprise comes among Republicans, where a plurality of 48% support judges over presidents, while 40% support it. //

But the numbers shifted somewhat with our second question: "Do you agree or disagree that federal judges should serve for a limited term rather than a lifetime appointment?"

The answer was even more overwhelming, this time not in favor of the judges. Overall, 71% said they either agree "strongly" (41%) or "somewhat" (30%), while the disagree category mustered only 16% for disagree "somewhat" (9%) or "strongly" (7%). //

Overall, 64% said they supported arresting judges who break laws either "strongly" (43%) or "somewhat" (21%). Just 22% opposed the idea, 10% "strongly" and 12% "somewhat." //

According to the Congressional Research Service, federal judges issued 17 separate injunctions against Trump from the time he re-entered office on Jan. 20 through March 27.

This is nothing new. In 2019, William Barr, Trump's second attorney general, complained about judicial injunctions directed at Trump.

"Since President Trump took office, federal district courts have issued 37 nationwide injunctions against the executive branch," Barr said. "That’s more than one a month."

"By comparison," the nation's former top lawyer added, "during President Obama’s first two years, district courts issued two nationwide injunctions against the executive branch, both of which were vacated by the Ninth Circuit. And according to the Department’s best estimates, courts issued only 27 nationwide injunctions­ in all of the 20th century (emphasis ours)." //

Americans' appetite for enabling federal judges to halt presidential actions willy-nilly may soon be tempered by a Supreme Court decision that limits those powers. If so, it should not be politics. It should be because the Constitution does not allow it.

///

That's democracy. But what is consistent with Constitutional Law? Districts should not have jurisdiction beyond their district.

"If the ability [to brick a console] is there, someone will want to 'see how it goes.'"

One of the most frequent questions posed in response to articles regarding decisions by federal judges is: Who appointed him/her? In theory, that shouldn't matter — blindfolded Lady Justice and all that. In practice, all too often, it seems that it does.

But...maybe not quite as much as people assume. I decided it might be interesting to take a closer look at some of the statistics regarding the federal judiciary. Some of those stats will come as no surprise. Others, though, well, see what you think. //

While many assume the court typically rules in partisan fashion, the bulk of the decisions in each term are unanimous (accounting for roughly 47 percent of the decisions over the most recent three terms).
In contrast, the 6-3 decisions (what one would expect if the decisions were strictly party-line) account for only 22 percent of the decisions. //

Next, we'll take a look at the makeup of the federal judiciary, beginning with the District Courts.

Number of district courts - 94
Number of district judges - 677 (does not include those who have taken senior status). //

Alright, but what about the Circuit Courts of Appeal? Well, we have that breakdown as well.

Number of circuit-level judgeships - 179 (not including those who have taken senior status)

Because so much of the focus of late has been on the litigation challenging executive actions taken by President Donald Trump, and because so many of those suits have been filed in the D.C. District Court, I thought it might be useful to take a deeper dive into the makeup of that court. We'll also look at the distribution of these cases among the various active judges on the court. //

So, it appears that the judges who have more cases assigned to them tend to have multiple cases that have overlapping issues, and thus, the cases are related if not consolidated ... //

In other words, while I do think there are fair questions about how Judge Boasberg ended up with the J.G.G. case, overall, the only discernible patterns regarding case assignments are that the most senior and most junior have fewer, and the judges who have the most cases assigned to them tend to have cases that lend themselves to being grouped together.

Margot Cleveland
@ProfMJCleveland
·
Follow
🚨🚨🚨BREAKING: Obama appointee Allison Dale Burroughs enters TRO against Trump Administration in Harvard case WITHOUT a Trump attorney even appearing in case. Yes, TROs can be ex parte BUT THIS IS NUTS because . . .
Margot Cleveland
@ProfMJCleveland
Harvard's lawsuit against Trump Administration was predictable, as was its request for a TRO. Will a court blindly issue a TRO, given there is no immediate harm per the letter? Probably. 1/
12:24 PM · May 23, 2025 //

Josh Blackman, constitutional law professor at the South Texas College of Law Houston and President of the Harlan Institute, wrote Friday:

[We do] …not have time stamps, but the case could not have been on her docket for more than a few hours.

I have a serious question: did Judge Burroughs even read the 72-page complaint and 59-page motion for a TRO? What about all of the pages of exhibits? Did she have any time to reflect upon it or consider countervailing arguments? //

RSB
4 hours ago edited
This is one the administration should openly defy. Not only is there zero legal basis for the TRO and the judge violated multiple TRO rules but SEVP is explicitly not covered under APA (it is just an internal program of INS) and the executive has sole, nonjudiciable authority on issuing and withdrawing visas. They CANNOT be compelled to do so.

Thursday, the Senate voted to block a package of vehicle emissions regulations issued by California, including a highly controversial rule that would have banned the sale of gasoline-powered (aka real) cars by 2035. In the process, tears were shed, threats were issues, and knickers became tightly knotted by leftist Democrats out to cripple the US economy. //

Only a month before leaving office, the [Biden administration] approved a California regulation that banned the sale of new cars and trucks in California in 2035. This was a decision of earthshaking import. Given the size of its market, unilateral economic actions affect the entire country as businesses adjust their processes to accommodate California regulations. Making matters worse, 11 other states were in the process of enacting similar bans. All told, this would have reduced the market for new gasoline-powered automobiles in the US by 40%. This approval was an obviously malicious act by the outgoing EPA management. The EPA had been sitting on the approvals since 2022 but dumped this burning bag of ordure on the front porch of the Trump White House for political points.

The House teed up the action with a bipartisan vote of 246-164 to disapprove three EPA waivers granted to California: a "zero emissions" standard for trucks, a regulation that would have essentially banned heavy-duty off-road vehicles, and the 2035 ban on real cars and trucks.

When the resolution of disapproval arrived in the Senate, its fate was in question. The General Accounting Office had rendered a "legal opinion" (funny how that phrase has become synonymous with "anti-Trump mischief-making") that a mere waiver of an existing law did not rise to the level of being a regulation that the mere collective vote of Congress could override. In this assertion, the GAO was joined by the Senate parliamentarian. //

Neither the GAO nor the parliamentarian has binding authority over the will of the Senate, but what Republicans wanted to avoid was the appearance of steamrolling the parliamentarian. This is where the solid leadership of South Dakota's John Thune came into play in a clear contrast to the "failure theater" directed by Mitch McConnell whenever he was majority leader. //

Thune decided to go around the bureaucratic obstacle. “What I didn’t want to do was vote to overturn the parliamentarian," said Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine), "and with help from a lot of experts the leader came up with an approach that avoids that outcome, and I’m glad.” //

What Thune did was get a ruling from the floor that the situation was not as cut and dried as the GAO and parliamentarian had claimed and that the waivers did, indeed, fall under the provisions of the Congressional Review Act. //

DaveM
8 hours ago
"[Schumer]: This Senate vote is illegal,"

Apparently we have more than a few Senators sworn to uphold the Constitution that have never bothered to read it.

Article II Section 5 Paragraph 2:
"Each House may determine the Rules of its Proceedings..." //

Romeg
7 hours ago
After carefully scouring my copy of The Constitution of The United States of America I have to report that I was unable to find that article, clause, paragraph or amendment that grants California the power to regulate interstate commerce. Perhaps someone reading this can help me out. //

anon-hlc8 streiff
7 hours ago
Sometimes the problem is that whomever is prosecuting the case does not bring that point of law up in their briefing. If they do not bring up that states may not regulate or impede interstate commerce, the judge is not going to help them out. //

Romeg streiff
5 hours ago
I cannot avoid the conclusion that such rulings utterly negate the commerce clause of the U.S. Constitution. Wickard v Filburn went in the completely opposite direction making ALL commerce, in effect, Interstate Commerce and thus subject to congressional regulation. The ruling you cite along with past failures to challenge CA's high-handedness seem to be judicial nullification of at least certain aspects of that clause in the Constitution.

Josh Gerstein @joshgerstein
·
BREAKING: #SCOTUS allows Trump to fire labor board members. Apparent 6-3 decision with all liberal justices in dissent. Court says more harm from denying POTUS right to remove officials than from those officials staying in office. Doc: https://documentcloud.org/documents/25951855-24a966-order/
4:44 PM · May 22, 2025. //

Tom Fitton @TomFitton
·
In a massive blow to the permanent administrative state, the Supreme Court, in 6-3 order, lifts stay on @RealDonaldTrump firings of Democratic appointees to "independent agencies." Key majority finding does not augur well for the future of constitutionally suspect agencies that protect appointees from being fired by the Chief Executive:
6:21 PM · May 22, 2025

The stay reflects our judgment that the Government is likely to show that both the NLRB and MSPB exercise considerable executive power. But we do not ultimately decide in this posture whether the NLRB or MSPB falls within such a recognized exception; that question is better left for resolution after full briefing and argument. The stay also reflects our judgment that the Government faces greater risk of harm from an order allowing a removed officer to continue exercising the executive power than a wrongfully removed officer faces from being unable to perform her statutory duty.

Christian camp IdRaHaJe in Colorado refuses to comply with progressive gender ideology policies and faces potential shutdown. //

Nestled in the scenic mountains of Bailey, a town 30 miles southwest of Denver with less than 10,000 residents, IdRaHaJe has been serving children ages six to 17 since its founding in 1948 through various programs, such as summer camps, off-site backpacking, and camping trips. The camp’s name comes from the hymn “I’d Rather Have Jesus!” and reflects its commitment to Christianity.

So when they sought emergency relief at 12:34 a.m. on April 18, Petitioners “were fully aware that the District Court intended to give the Government 24 hours to file a response.” A.A.R.P., 605 U.S. at _ (Alito, J., dissenting). They “said nothing about a plan to appeal if the District Court elected to wait for that response.” Id.

At 12:48 p.m. on April 18, however, Petitioners “suddenly informed the court that they would file an appeal if the District Court did not act within 42 minutes, i.e., by 1:30 p.m.” Id. //

This charge is worth exploring. To get to 14 hours and 28 minutes (rather than 42 minutes), the Court was obviously starting the clock at 12:34 a.m., rather than 12:48 p.m. (when Petitioners told the district court for the first time that they wanted a ruling before the Government could respond).

But starting the clock at 12:34 a.m. not only ignores the court’s express instructions respecting the Government’s right to respond. It also ignores the fact that the Court is starting the clock at—12:34 a.m.

We seem to have forgotten that this is a district court—not a Denny’s. This is the first time I’ve ever heard anyone suggest that district judges have a duty to check their dockets at all hours of the night, just in case a party decides to file a motion.

And then he adds the cherry on top:

If this is going to become the norm, then we should say so: District judges are hereby expected to be available 24 hours a day—and the Judicial Conference of the United States and the Administrative Office of the U.S.Courts should secure from Congress the resources and staffing necessary to ensure 24-hour operations in every district court across the country.

If this is not to become the norm, then we should admit that this is special treatment being afforded to certain favored litigants like members of Tren de Aragua—and we should stop pretending that Lady Justice is blindfolded. //

anon-fht2
4 minutes ago
The rationale for the Founders intentionally NOT Constitutionally requiring the other two branches to comply with the judiciary is playing out in real time. It is also apparent that the judicial insurrection by the district courts is bleeding over into the interactions between the lower courts, and between the lower courts and SCOTUS. Not in a good way either.

After reading the full response of the 5th Circuit appeals judge to the SCOTUS ruling, IMO Justice Roberts should be embarrassed that such a shoddy ruling by a SCOTUS court ever saw the light of day, much less received 7 votes of 9. It almost as if Justice Roberts wants a repeat of President Jackson’s response to a Marshal SCOTUS decision.

For the judicial branch, this seems like a slow motion catastrophe being played out with each new judicial “salvo” further undermining respect and trust for the judicial branch. Our Republic was in trouble enough with Congress and the Executive being viewed with disdain by most Americans. The Executive may regain some trust and respect under Trump, but the Judiciary had been more positively viewed than the other two branches, at least until this judicial insurrection against Trump began. Now the judiciary seems to being trying to outdo Congress for the level of earned contempt in which they are held, with SCOTUS attempting to show the way with this ruling.

IMO - YMMV

DemsShouldPayReparations Curmudgeon99
13 hours ago edited

"He is the worst Chief Justice in history, "

Really? Would you reconsider if you knew more facts?

Worse than Chief Justice Roger B. Taney. who wrote the Dred Scott decision, extending slavery in all States, which was one of the triggers for the Civil War?

Once Essayli and Co. have determined that someone has committed a felony by re-entering the country, the whole game changes:

As soon as the task force ID's an alien booked into a local jail who has a previous deportation, they seek a federal criminal warrant on them for felony re-entry, signed off on by a federal judge.

Unlike an administrative ICE warrant or ICE detainer request, these criminal judicial warrants for 8 USC 1326 CANNOT be ignored by sanctuary jurisdictions, and California's sanctuary state law cannot shield aliens from these criminal warrants. Instead of releasing the alien inmates and ignoring ICE detainers, jails must hand the aliens over to the Feds, regardless of sanctuary policy.

A castle doctrine is a self-defense law that states that a person’s home (sometimes also a place of work or vehicle) is a place that grants one protection and immunity from prosecution in certain circumstances to use force or deadly force to defend oneself against an intruder. There is no duty to retreat from the situation in one’s home (or workplace or vehicle if applicable) before using force, but there may be a duty to retreat in a public place.

The United States has two different self-defense laws. The “Stand Your Ground” Law states that there is no duty to retreat from the situation before using deadly force and is not limited to one’s home, place of work, or vehicle. The “Duty to Retreat” Law states that one cannot harm another in self-defense when it is possible to retreat from a threatening situation to a place of safety. In all duty-to-retreat states, the duty to retreat does not apply when the defender is in their own home. States may have both a Castle Doctrine and a Stand Your Ground variation, such as Iowa.

Weber ultimately underwent the procedure. She said she wanted readers to know that the state’s pro-life law was “so dangerous for women.” But in reality, assuming her account is accurate — if it’s true that doctors refused to perform a lifesaving medical procedure because of the state’s pro-life law — the entire ordeal doesn’t prove anything other than that some doctors are incompetent and don’t know how to navigate relatively simple state laws.

The facts are these: the South Carolina “heartbeat bill” explicitly spells out that a doctor can perform an abortion if he determines “that a medical emergency exists or is performed to prevent the death of the pregnant woman.” For good measure, the law directly states that both “intrauterine fetal demise” and “miscarriage” constitute a medical emergency that can justify an abortion.

This is the substance of the law. There are no gimmicks or hidden rules. By her own account there was absolutely no reason that Elisabeth Weber should not have received a D&C. The problem was not with state law, but with the doctors who were either too ignorant or too risk-averse (or both) to do proper medicine.

This is and always has been untrue; Every pro-life law in the United States, without exception, contains provisions that allow for emergency medical intervention to save a mother’s life. //

Doctors are forbidden from killing an unborn child in an act of abortion, but they are more than able to perform related procedures that can save a mother’s life (all the more so in tragic cases like Weber’s, where the baby has died, or even in Thurman’s case, where the babies were killed).

We should never fall for this type of misdirection. Abortion advocates who claim that such laws forbid doctors from saving the lives of women should point to the specific part of the law they claim makes this so.

In Thursday’s hearing, Thomas asked Sauer — who represented the Trump administration — about the history of nationwide injunctions and when courts first started issuing such orders. The solicitor general answered by citing Thomas’ concurring opinion in Trump v. Hawaii, a 2018 case that resulted in SCOTUS reversing “a lower court’s decision to uphold a nationwide injunction on Trump’s travel ban,” according to The Federalist’s John Daniel Davidson.

In his concurrence in that case, Thomas noted how nationwide injunctions by lower courts “did not emerge until a century and a half after the founding.” He further observed that these injunctions “appear to be inconsistent with longstanding limits on equitable relief and the power of Article III courts.”

“These injunctions are beginning to take a toll on the federal court system — preventing legal questions from percolating through the federal courts, encouraging forum shopping, and making every case a national emergency for the courts and for the Executive Branch,” Thomas wrote.

In his response to Thomas, Sauer highlighted several examples of universal injunctions that he said began emerging in the early 1960s.

“So we survived until the 1960s without universal injunctions?” asked Thomas, to which Sauer replied, “That’s exactly correct.”

Sauer added, “In fact, those [injunctions] are very limited and very rare even in the 1960s. It really exploded in 2007 in our cert petition in Summers v. Earth Island Institute, we pointed out that the Ninth Circuit had started doing this in a whole bunch of cases involving environmental claims.”

"Democrats are learning … that Democrats can not only be the party of resistance."

"Like we resisted so hard between 2017 and 2024," Smith said. "We impeached the guy [Trump]. Like, we prosecuted him. Convicted him of 34 felony counts. And guess what, he still got elected. I don't know how much harder we can resist right now." //

Scott Jennings @ScottJenningsKY
·
I can't believe it. They finally admitted it on live TV:

The prosecution of President Trump was an organized effort by the Democratic Party "resistance."

Lawfare is real. The justice system was weaponized against President Trump.

5:39 PM · May 15, 2025 //

"Just to be clear, everyone that now touts the 34 felonies, take it from Lis, this was not a real case," Jennings said. "This was a plot to upend the presidential campaign. Which backfired." //

cupera1 Mildred's Oldest Son
13 hours ago
The Trump Soviet Union show trial in NY City is a Rube Goldberg legal construction that should not have worked. The original alleged crime is a simple misdemeanor under a New York law against falsifying business records. This law passed the Statute of Limitations over five years ago. The NY DA’s office looked at this case at that time and passed on it. Then Trump announced his candidacy to run for president and everything changed.

To defibrillate the case against Trump they claimed that misdemeanor, Penal Law Section 175.05, was connected to an alleged election violation felony. This secondary statues the prosecutors cite, state and federal election crimes, cannot and were not proven. The state law had also passed its statute of limitation years ago. Federal law can’t be tried in a state court. The FEC looked at this case and laughed at it.

The only way this trial against Trump could have worked was using “lawfare" for Democrats: Selecting a jury of anti-Trump partisans. Using known liars and perjurers to support the charges. Keeping Brady evidence from the jury, don’t want anyone to get a conscience. And a DNC judge with his thumb on the scales that made multiple reversible errors during the trial and violating Trumps 6th Amendment rights. We learned that Trump was going to be found guilty BEFORE the jury came back. Democrats applied the same legal philosophy of Lavrentiy Pavlovich Beria, head of the NKVD under Stalin "Show me the man and I will find the crime."

Nevertheless, they believe our order applies to tens of thousands of individuals.

So, you get the sense that the appellate court was a tad exasperated with the plaintiffs' more expansive reading as to who was entitled to exemption from the EO. Nevertheless, Whitehead's subsequent order read as indignant and snippy, particularly toward the administration (but even a bit toward the appellate court). He characterized their interpretation of the 9th Circuit's prior order as "'interpretive jiggerypokery' of the highest order." He concluded that [emphasis added]: //

As anticipated, the administration quickly sought further clarification from the 9th Circuit (and, "in light of the increasingly contentious collateral proceedings over compliance in the district court," a complete stay of the district court's injunction).

On Friday, the 9th Circuit obliged and, in a very succinct order, again clarified that plaintiffs (and by inference, Whitehead) were again reading the scope of the exemption too broadly [emphasis added]:

Our order should be interpreted narrowly, on a case-by-case basis, to apply to individuals with a strong reliance interest arising prior to January 20, 2025, comparable to Plaintiff Pacito. //

Cynical Optimist
7 hours ago
“Jiggerpokery?” A judge actually used that word in an official document?

Susie Moore Cynical Optimist
7 hours ago
Yup. Now - he was actually quoting Antonin Scalia (from his dissent in King v. Burwell). 😂

The order by U.S. District Judge Dabney Friedrich came amid a lawsuit by Centro de Trabajadores Unidos, an immigrant-rights aid group, against Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent.

"At its core, this case presents a narrow legal issue: Does the Memorandum of Understanding between the IRS and DHS violate the Internal Revenue Code? It does not," Friedrich wrote in his order.

(Note: Friedrich, a Trump appointee, is a woman, so that would be her order.) //

Under the tax code, those records are kept confidential and may not be shared outside the IRS, unless a particular statutory exception applies. 26 U.S.C. § 6103(a). As relevant here, one such exception, § 6103(i)(2), allows the head of any federal agency to request tax return information to aid in investigating or preparing for a judicial or administrative proceeding to enforce designated criminal statutes. Id. § 6103(i)(2). //

Also on Monday, Friedrich denied the motion of American Oversight (a group involved in several suits against the Trump administration) to intervene in the case. In doing so, she noted that she was unsealing most of the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between the IRS and DHS, along with the parties' briefs, thus obviating American Oversight's contention that intervention was warranted to access the documents at issue:

The MOU is a central focus of this litigation, and the information contained in the redacted MOU has been widely discussed, including on the record in open court at the April 16, 2025 preliminary injunction motion hearing. Although the government objects to its full disclosure, it has not asserted a compelling interest or high risk of prejudice with disclosure of the MOU and briefs. The public need for access is high given that the MOU's content is essential to the claims raised by the plaintiffs and the Court's reasoning in its forthcoming opinion on the 28 Motion for a Preliminary Injunction. The Court will not order, however, that the IRS "points of contact" on page 13 of the MOU be unsealed. With respect to those lower level government employees, the Court concludes that their personal privacy interests outweigh any public need to access their names and contact information.

In case you missed it, the below EO is a big deal. Trump is forcing the federal government to spell out everything that is a crime under federal law. The other thing the EO does is to force the government to add a "mens rea" element to most of these "crimes"; i.e., you have to be aware of the fact that you are committing a crime in order for it to be a crime.

Thus, if you decide to build a pond on your property and the EPA has some obscure regulation saying that is a crime, you would need to be aware of the criminal nature of the act before you did it in order to be guilty of anything.

This is great.

The whole EO is linked in my post below, but I wanted to call attention to one tangential aspect of it. The EO says:

"It privileges large corporations, which can afford to hire expensive legal teams to navigate complex regulatory schemes and fence out new market entrants, over average Americans.”

This is really important and is a theme I keep coming back to. Regulatory schemes like Dodd-Frank and the CFPB are created ostensibly to help the “little guy,” when in reality they create byzantine layers upon layers of compliance requirements that only mega-corporations can afford to navigate. Those sorts of laws are anti-competitive and hurt most of all the “little guy” they purport to help.

When you hear the likes of Bernie Sanders and Big Chief Lizzie Warren railing against the “oligarchy,” realize that they regulatory schemes they propose serve the oligarchy MOST OF ALL. In fact, Bernie and Lizzie and AOC are the oligarchs, not us.

Presidential Actions
FIGHTING OVERCRIMINALIZATION IN FEDERAL REGULATIONS
Executive Orders
May 9, 2025
By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, it is hereby ordered:

Section 1. Purpose. The United States is drastically overregulated. The Code of Federal Regulations contains over 48,000 sections, stretching over 175,000 pages — far more than any citizen can possibly read, let alone fully understand. Worse, many carry potential criminal penalties for violations. The situation has become so dire that no one -– likely including those charged with enforcing our criminal laws at the Department of Justice — knows how many separate criminal offenses are contained in the Code of Federal Regulations, with at least one source estimating hundreds of thousands of such crimes. Many of these regulatory crimes are “strict liability” offenses, meaning that citizens need not have a guilty mental state to be convicted of a crime.

This status quo is absurd and unjust. It allows the executive branch to write the law, in addition to executing it. That situation can lend itself to abuse and weaponization by providing Government officials tools to target unwitting individuals. It privileges large corporations, which can afford to hire expensive legal teams to navigate complex regulatory schemes and fence out new market entrants, over average Americans.

The purpose of this order is to ease the regulatory burden on everyday Americans and ensure no American is transformed into a criminal for violating a regulation they have no reason to know exists.

Sec. 2. Policy. It is the policy of the United States that:

(a) Criminal enforcement of criminal regulatory offenses is disfavored.

(b) Prosecution of criminal regulatory offenses is most appropriate for persons who know or can be presumed to know what is prohibited or required by the regulation and willingly choose not to comply, thereby causing or risking substantial public harm. Prosecutions of criminal regulatory offenses should focus on matters where a putative defendant is alleged to have known his conduct was unlawful.

(c) Strict liability offenses are “generally disfavored.” United States v. United States Gypsum, Co., 438 U.S. 422, 438 (1978). Where enforcement is appropriate, agencies should consider civil rather than criminal enforcement of strict liability regulatory offenses or, if appropriate and consistent with due process and the right to jury trial, see Jarkesy v. Securities and Exchange Commission, 603 U.S. 109 (2024), administrative enforcement.

(d) Agencies promulgating regulations potentially subject to criminal enforcement should explicitly describe the conduct subject to criminal enforcement, the authorizing statutes, and the mens rea standard applicable to those offenses.

Sec. 3. Definitions. For purposes of this order:

(a) “Agency” has the meaning given to “Executive agency” in section 105 of title 5, United States Code;

(b) “Criminal regulatory offense” means a Federal regulation that is enforceable by a criminal penalty; and

(c) “Mens rea” means the state of mind that by law must be proven to convict a particular defendant of a particular crime.

Sec. 4. Report on Criminal Regulatory Offenses. (a) Within 365 days of the date of this order, the head of each agency, in consultation with the Attorney General, shall provide to the Director of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) a report containing:

(i) a list of all criminal regulatory offenses enforceable by the agency or the Department of Justice; and

(ii) for each criminal regulatory offense identified in subsection (a)(i) of this section, the range of potential criminal penalties for a violation and the applicable mens rea standard for the criminal regulatory offense.

(b) At the same time the head of each agency provides to the Director of OMB the report required by subsection (a) of this section, the agency head shall publicly post the report on its agency webpage.