Top recent posts by Legal Academics on Bluesky

Let's not forget that this seat was vacant because Islamaphobic Democrats wouldn't let Biden's appointee be confirmed. And Schumer let the clock run out.

Thinking of career DOJ attorneys I know who had the integrity to resign rather than participate in the dirty Eric Adams deal. www.nytimes.com/2025/07/29/u...

You dont need a scholar of authoritarianism and the military like me to tell you this does not produce good outcomes

One of these newspapers is doing straight reporting of the facts with appropriate context. The other is editorializing in its news coverage to normalize authoritarianism

Orwell is turning in his grave.

New York is one of the safest big cities in America. If I were this cowardly I wouldn’t go advertising it on social media.

This fucking administrative stay.

Parental leave at my school is relatively good (by US standards), but whenever people say “How lucky!” I have to correct them. No, it wasn’t luck. This is a legally-binding policy my union fought for. Don’t minimize the fight.

THEY LITERALLY DID THE ONION HEADLINE

Catholic Priests Barred From Ministering to Detained Migrants in Florida migrantinsider.com/p/catholic-p...

And what did you do to stop it, Senator Schumer, except exactly nothing from the moment Trump won the election, including failing to fill that seat with a Biden appointee and otherwise letting Senate business carry on as if nothing was catastrophically wrong with anything Trump has done.

I've lived in NYC for 13 years. It's the place as a WOC I felt most comfortable outside of Honolulu where I grew up. Surely some of you can get that. It's tiresome to hear these whiny assholes who don't live here trash American cities when the crime rates in their cities are much higher.

Absolutely this. And I’d add that it’s people with weak, crankish ideas who are often most gung-ho about formal verbal debates, because it’s a format much more conducive to making terrible arguments seem compelling.

"As explained above, the emails and texts provided by the whistleblower show that Bove played a central role in ignoring Boasberg’s orders. What happened here is not a close case."

KK PSA: I've officially joined @lawfaremedia.org as a Senior Editor where I'll be focused on tech, law, & geopolitics! Still a full time prof at SJU, just now with more work -- and of course because it's me @benjaminwittes.lawfaremedia.org again -- with even less fun!

In-party disaffection for Democrats is coming from the left, where voters are still likely to vote for Democrats in elections. But among Republicans, it’s moderates and conservatives who rate the GOP image worse. That’s a bigger problem, because those voters are likelier to cross over and vote Dem.

At this point, Dems ought not agree to approps without (a) specific statuory exemption from rescission, (b) statutory language automatically apportioning funds, and (c) serious consideration of Holman Rule.

This is true across the board, in all parts of American society. But more specifically, I continue to be dismayed & ashamed at how few of our university leaders & our very senior & most prominent disciplinary colleagues are speaking out against this.

In exchange for giving the AI companies everything they want, all they have to do is create an anti-woke AI for the government to use. Call it ChatGPTrump. My latest at Public Notice: www.publicnotice.co/p/trump-ai-a...

Deplorables was really underselling it

@donmoyn.bsky.social has been saying, correctly, for years, that the commanding heights of higher education are deeply conservative places. It is turning out to be the case that they are not just conservative, but pro-authoritarian

He’s quite simply an abusive liar who can’t take no for an answer from anyone.

The “leaders” who are fighting Zohran and all of the changes his coalition represents are doing it out of self-interested fear and that is it. www.semafor.com/article/07/2...

Feel like I’ve had Article 55 of the Fourth Geneva Convention tattooed on the inside of my eyelids for going on two years now.

Trump's collapsing approval rating should give institutions like CBS and Harvard more of a backbone. And yet!

Another day, another tragic act of gun violence that will spur absolutely no policy change whatsoever

The Trump DOJ is now filing utterly frivolous misconduct complaints against judges who rule against them as an intimidation tactic. www.stevevladeck.com/p/170-dojs-r...

I hold the Herbert Kurz Chair in Constitutional Rights at Brooklyn College, a chair established by our alum who watched his uncle fired during McCarthyism from the English dept b/c he wouldn't inform on his colleagues. It's happening again. Power brought to bear on a severely understaffed dept.

Not feeling safe in NYC is very much a you problem.

Mitch McConnell refused to allow a vote for Merrick Garland for the Supreme Court & just voted for Emil Bove for a lifetime appeals court position. Mitch McConnell is a destroyer of American institutions.

Hours after President Donald Trump shortened the deadline for Russia to reach a ceasefire with Ukraine, Russian strikes killed at least 27 people including a pregnant woman in a maternity hospital. www.washingtonpost.com/world/2025/0...

National Review is upset that some jurisdictions have hired noncitizens as cops, and it even seems to be upset if the officers in question hold green cards as legal permanent residents. Wait till they find out that noncitizens can serve in the U.S. military.

Good idea for SCOTUS reform: create another court that's got the features it should have and give that court most of its jurisdiction

Every criminal defense lawyer (especially those from NY): what KIND of immunity? www.cnn.com/2025/07/29/p...

This cannot become normalized. wapo.st/3H5Z8sh

Congress's failure to put a stop to this nonsense and reclaim its constitutional prerogatives over foreign commerce is yet another illustration of the Article I crisis.

Joe Biden <actually> won the war on a pandemic & inflation, without wildly violating the law or ratified international treaties, & he was eviscerated in the National Conversation™️ for it. He never got treated like this One Special Boy 🧐🤷‍♂️🤦‍♂️

Avowed enemies of the Constitution are now indisputably vested with power in all three branches of government, if there was any doubt left

mRNA COVID-19 vaccines are very, very safe, as studies from multiple countries show. Internet stories are not really a good answer to these large, careful studies. jamanetwork.com/journals/jam...

If I understand today's right-wing position correctly, it's that the existing contempt powers of Article III judges are a runaway threat to the nation, while entirely new contempt powers should be bestowed on immigration judges who are part of and answerable to the executive branch.

Reminder that Florida cannot lawfully detain these folks for immigration violations because a federal judge has enjoined Florida's attempt to create its own criminal immigration enforcement. Which leaves detention under federal authority.

Important reading. DOJ has filed a frivolous complaint against Chief Judge Boasberg whose most plausible motivations are 1) to intimidate other federal judges inclined to stand up to Trump and 2) to fuel the bogus narrative that the courts have behaved improperly or prejudicially toward him.

Congratulations to Jacky Rosen and @cortezmasto.senate.gov for their only political achievement of any consequence

"25 million Americans are about to pay more for their health care," when Biden-era subsidies end. Based on proposed rates filed by insurers, premiums will go up around 15%. The "premium shock... would mostly dwarf any gains they’re getting from tax cuts," one analyst tells @citizencohn.bsky.social.

The wall of levies announced by the president since he took office again in January has taken the country’s effective tariff level to an estimated 17.3%….The figure brings the total US levies close to the 20% last seen in the years after the 1930 Smoot-Hawley Act. on.ft.com/3UyQ9Tv

This is why I kept working on my book until I just finished even though I know it will be banned in several states. Someone inside or outside the US will read it. Someone needs to know it.

Also my dept has employed a longtime excellent adjunct. She was not renewed for unclear reasons--a decision NOT made by the Chair, Dean, or Provost. My dept is down 8 people (no TT replacements) + we just lost another long time experienced adjunct. Used to be a thriving dept. Has not been for awhile

👇🎯 Again, none of us wants to hear or endorse this, but it’s right. Democracy Dies In Unilateral Disarmament, where only one party abides by the law & Constitution A grand bargain where everyone does that would obviously be much better. It’s called “democracy” though & all parties must buy into it:

It's true. The public has <no idea> how universities work, or why the federal budget cuts are an existential crisis, or anything else about how the assault on 🇺🇸 higher ed will affect society. Because our university leaders have been <totally absent> from the public square: bsky.app/profile/mcop...

Reminded that law students are in the throes of the bar exam. Best of luck, and may you block the whole experience out entirely after, like I have.

It looks like homeownership rates for Black and moderate-income households are falling sharply, but I suppose that is no longer news now that Biden is out of the White House www.census.gov/housing/hvs/...

So let me get this straight. Somehow it's better that *sick* children are starving. Is that the message here?

Yes, but again, I will simply note that - as we've now seen with 🇮🇷, 🇪🇺, 🇨🇦, 🇯🇵, etc. etc. - the thing folks need to spend a lot more time pondering, instead of obsessing about the end of 🇺🇸 power/hegemony, is that 🇺🇸 power/hegemony is going to persist in a much uglier, unilateralist, & selfish form.

Since the Jan. 6 insurrection, more than 2,000 corporate and industry group PACs have given over $174 million to members of the Sedition Caucus. These companies clearly miss the danger of choosing short-term economic interests over safeguarding democracy.

Well one good thing is bound to come out of the newest 3rd Circuit confirmation. There will now be a circuit judge who you can say "fuck you I'm not following your order" to and he'll say "ok that's totally fair." Right?

This is such a bad faith overplayed question for @kasie.bsky.social to ask this disgraced loser. How many people need to ask this question to this man? It’s there nothing else to talk about?

Phase 2 has begun. Phase 1 was DOGE coming in and hollowing everything out. Phase 2 is DOGE being tossed out and Heritage/Project 2025 people coming in to Buffalo Bill the husks.

17-year-olds are not hired to give massages at clubs. This is bullshit.

Last night I filed a FOIA request on behalf of @lawandchaospod.bsky.social for one little niggling thing the complaint elided over. Planning to litigate if necessary, given how important Karen--sorry, Chad--said this matter was. I'm sure it was just an oversight.

www.huffpost.com/entry/trump-...

It is really important that any sanctioning process against Bove continue to play out. He hasn't suddenly become special or immune to being held responsible for his lawlessness. And no one should act as though he is.

why would someone like Grassley, at the end of a long political career, agree to look like an idiot to appease Trump?

Tell me you don’t know how the census works without telling me you don’t know how the census works.

Dems/lefties sending out texts asking for donations, I beg you - read the room.

He doesn’t need a massive propaganda machine. The media & every other societal institution are sanewashing & normalizing it for him: bsky.app/profile/mcop...

Mr. Rove is just trying to help us.

Reminder: while it is true that members of the House are stunningly dumb as a group, state lawmakers are uniquely the dumbest motherfuckers who ever thought they were smart.

"Violate the law," you say? Next, you're going to tell me that openly monetizing the presidency in plain sight & inciting political violence to overturn elections are "unconstitutional," that the sun rises in the East, & that water, in its liquid form, exhibits both adhesive & cohesive properties 🤔

Prediction: We haven’t heard the last about Donald Trump and Jeffrey Epstein.

I signed up for a 3.5 hours Zoom training on a new learning management system. I just couldn't fucking do it. Too depressed at my dept being stripped and sold for parts. One of my two friends resigned suddenly, a tenured Associate Prof, and this 👇 involves one of our long time excellent adjuncts.

Points on gun control aside, hey, if you have a bunch of idiots running around the country, maybe don't slash education or mental health programs.

We learned—and keep learning—so much stuff about Medicaid and not all of it fit into the @unbreaking.org Medicaid explainer so here is a blog post I wrote about all those “able-bodied” people the administration and its allies claim are on Medicaid. unbreaking.org/blog/medicai...

Human desperation and agony so immense it is visible from space. I recall how the U.S. once shared satellite imagery of the mass graves from Srebrenica to mobilize other countries to stop atrocities. (Graves I later visited.) Now the U.S. is co-author of the satellite documented atrocities.

Trump is making it easy to get permission to pollute (a quick e-mail) www.nytimes.com/2025/07/29/c... but hard to get Medicaid.

All wildly illegal, but he’s One Special Boy so somehow he’s allowed to do it bsky.app/profile/mcop...

The absolute perfect ending to this movie would be if Trump pardons her and then she goes out and throws him completely under the bus for making her beg and rot in jail for so long because you can't take back a pardon.

With the fall semester looming, it’s starting to feel like teaching our pre-Trump syllabi, let alone adding more “woke” readings to them, is a form of everyday resistance

And every "conservative" institution on & of campuses in 🇺🇸 is totally silent Today, class, we will once again discuss "revealed preferences" bsky.app/profile/mcop...

If you had any illusions that this complaint against Boasberg was filed in good faith, I'll point out one critical fact. Chief Judge Srinivasan was in the meeting where Boasberg said all these horrible, horrible things. And the rulings were public rulings.

Another US intelligence official Loomered. Incredible way to run the US government. www.nytimes.com/2025/07/29/u...

Authoritarian consolidation is happening very quickly & not enough of our fellow Americans are speaking out against it.

Recent law grads — we're now hiring for legal fellows to begin in Fall 2025. Our First Amendment rights are under daily assault. I hope you'll consider applying to work with us at @knightcolumbia.org to push back. knightcolumbia.org/page/legal-f...

I chose wrong and now am sans crêpes

Pope Leo calls on ‘Digital Missionaries’ to have real friendships, and not focus on ‘followers’ cruxnow.com/vatican/2025...

Timeline cleanse: I think this is Kaneohe area off of Oahu in ~2015

Here's a plot supplement to the piece I published this morning. Left-leaning Democrats don't like the party, compared to how pro-GOP right-wing Republicans are, but these disaffected Democrats still massively prefer their party to the GOP. www.gelliottmorris.com/p/democratic...

Yes, this really sucks. One of the first things I noticed upon driving to the law campus for orientation was how many Mercedes and BMWs were in the parking lot. I was driving a ten year-old Ford.

Age verification? Honey, I own an iron. And I use it every week!

At this moment in time, in a battle between @wired.com and @cbsnews.com.web.brid.gy, I know who I'm going with.

Academics: you have impostor syndrome? Don’t. Look at this jackass thinking someone wants to read about him.

One of the few shows my immigrant parents allowed me to watch growing up was Sesame Street. I loved it.

Look, Joe Manchin found the "dead center" between a replacement-level, pro-democracy rich country center-left party & a far right authoritarian party. And so here we are.

The NYTimes literally went full The Onion

They did it. They really fucking did it.

<all together now> 🤦‍♂️

In all fairness, space should have been made for mendacious DHS spox Tricia McLaughlin.

A federal court just made it a whole lot harder for blind people, people with disabilities or people who cannot read, to protect their rights at the ballot box. www.huffpost.com/entry/one-of...

Happy week, everyone!

For @lawfaremedia.org, @juliarosekraut.bsky.social and I dive deep on the past, present, and future of ideological exclusion and deportation to suppress dissent in the wake of the arrest and detention of Mahmoud Khalil, Rümeysa Öztürk, Mohsen Mahdawi, and others. Link below 🔽

It might be good to create better ties between social democratic parties across the Atlantic. Just as there's a 'nationalist' international, we need a social democratic international to counterbalance, commiserate, and share the joys of success and distribute the emotional burdens of failure