Avoid making negative or unhelpful posts, and instead focus on providing constructive feedback and ideas that can help to move the discussion forward.
- Manlobbi
Halls of Shrewd'm / US Policy❤
No. of Recommendations: 1
Judge blocks Trump from barring international students at Harvard
The judicial branch of government seems to be the primary obstacle to Trump achieving his fascist dreams.
But he may be in luck...ironically the Supreme Court seems to be willing to help him in this cause.
No. of Recommendations: 15
The judicial branch of government seems to be the primary obstacle to Trump achieving his fascist dreams.
Not necessarily.
Trump has always used the courts tactically, not as a venue for resolving conflicts. In the past, it's often been rather beside the point whether he wins the litigation or not - it's a nice bonus, but he's achieving his goals (in whole or in part) just by having the fight. For most of these moves on immigration and against the schools, it's the same thing. It doesn't matter whether the courts ever rule in his favor.
Partially because just the threat or interim imposition of the policy gets him what he wants. Either people change their behavior anyway (immigrants being scared and/or leaving, schools or television networks buckling down), or he inflicts costs on them by virtue of the things they have to do in response.
Partially because these actions are driven by politics as much as (or more than) policy. One columnist labelled the strategy as "court baiting" - Trump does something that's clearly illegal, the courts stop him, and he gets to set up the political narrative of the guy fighting for what's right but being hindered by those nasty judges. That's a political win for him among his supporters and a fair number of persuadable voters. He doesn't necessarily even care whether the policy ever goes into effect - while he'd like that, he wins regardless.
And finally, all of this provides him insurance against the inevitable failures of these policies. He's not going to be able to deport a million people out of the U.S. per year (for a ton of reasons), and he's not going to be able to get Fair Harvard to reverse course and become a bastion of conservatism (though I will say as an economics concentrator it wasn't always that liberal to begin with). But now his voters will be well aware of how he was thwarted at every turn by those dastardly jurists, and they'll blame the courts for why only 250K immigrants were deported, even though that was always in the cards.
No. of Recommendations: 4
Partially because just the threat or interim imposition of the policy gets him what he wants. Either people change their behavior anyway (immigrants being scared and/or leaving, schools or television networks buckling down), or he inflicts costs on them by virtue of the things they have to do in response.
Isn't that akin to a "slap" suit? Those are illegal in many states (though not all, and I don't think at the federal level).
No. of Recommendations: 2
Isn't that akin to a "slap" suit? Those are illegal in many states (though not all, and I don't think at the federal level).
Almost certainly not. The Administration isn't the one filing suit in these situations, for the most part. They are adopting and implementing policies, and the targets of those policies have to run into court. Those targets still suffer the consequences of both the uncertainty caused by the policies and the costs of litigation, but since the suit is theirs, they would never be "slap" suits.
No. of Recommendations: 1
Sure. But the Felon is forcing them to sue.
Seems to me it falls into the category of cases that judges often make the defendants pay for the attorney's fees because their behavior was so outrageous as to force a suit that never should have been necessary. Not a "slap", but that was the only term I could think of (hence the "akin to"). I'm guessing there are no rules about that? Don't judges censure (or even fine) attorneys when their case is so bad it never should have been a thing (e.g. bypassing due process, withholding funds they had no right to withhold, trying to defend singling out lawyers and firms that oppose them, and so much more)?
No. of Recommendations: 6
Seems to me it falls into the category of cases that judges often make the defendants pay for the attorney's fees because their behavior was so outrageous as to force a suit that never should have been necessary. Not a "slap", but that was the only term I could think of (hence the "akin to"). I'm guessing there are no rules about that? Don't judges censure (or even fine) attorneys when their case is so bad it never should have been a thing (e.g. bypassing due process, withholding funds they had no right to withhold, trying to defend singling out lawyers and firms that oppose them, and so much more)?
I think you're conflating the rules that govern when a lawsuit is frivolous with what happens when the actions that caused the lawsuit are egregious.
Judges can impose sanctions, including requiring payment for attorneys fees, when a party has done something frivolous in the lawsuit. So if the lawsuit is completely frivolous or abusive, there sometimes is a remedy (note: not sure whether that ever applies to the federal government as a party). But that's not what's happening here. The lawsuit is completely meritorious. It's the actions that the government took outside of the lawsuit that are reprehensible.
Whether a plaintiff can recover money damages and/or attorneys fees based on the government's actions, rather than litigation, depends on the substantive law governing the case. Generally, plaintiffs are usually only asking for injunctive relief - the government is going to do something they think is unlawful, they ask the court to stop the government from doing it (or to undo it). As a general matter, the federal government can only be liable for money damages if Congress has created a money remedy at law. Also as a general matter, the U.S. is not a "loser pays" system, so government would only be liable for attorneys fees if there's a specific statute that shifts fees to the losing party.
