Under GOP Budget Bill, You’d Have to Be Rich to Sue the Trump Administration

Federal judges around the country have blocked the Trump administration s executive orders policies and dictates dozens of times as unlawful and even unconstitutional Now Republicans are trying to use the massive budget bill which is in the present being overhauled in the Senate to limit the judiciary s power to curb presidential abuses The bill passed by the House of Representatives last month along party lines included a provision that would limit judges ability to hold governing body personnel in contempt for violating court orders Particular Republicans who voted to approve the bill later expressed regret over the contempt provision and Senate Democrats vowed to fight it Draft bill text distributed last week by the Senate Judiciary Committee shows Republicans in the upper chamber are taking a slightly different approach Instead of focusing on courts contempt power Senate Republicans revised the provision to limit judges authority to issue injunctions and restraining orders against the U S regime in the first place At a time when the President is violating the Constitution as never before seen in American history it makes no sense to make it harder for courts to issue injunctions mentioned Erwin Chemerinsky dean of UC Berkeley School of Law by email Last month Chemerinsky decried the House provision as unconstitutional Related GOP Budget Would Make It Even Harder to Hold Trump Administration in Contempt Republicans are targeting nationwide injunctions because they re beholden to a President who is latest the law but the courts are not declared Josh Sorbe spokesperson for Sen Dick Durbin D-Ill by email Durbin who spoke against the House contempt provision on the Senate floor last week is the Democratic whip and ranking member on the Senate Judiciary Committee Their newfound frustration is ironic given they cheered and even petitioned for nationwide injunctions themselves during the Biden Administration This would preclude a multitude of asserting constitutional violations from getting injunctions The Senate version would prohibit judges from blocking the White House via a preliminary injunction or restraining order unless the plaintiffs can put down money as a defense bond in circumstance the court order is later reversed as wrongful Plaintiffs would have to put down an amount proper to pay the costs and damages sustained by the Federal Establishment under the proposed provision and courts could not consider if the plaintiff whether an individual challenging their unlawful deportation or a civil liberty group challenging a broader initiative has sufficient funds This would preclude multiple asserting constitutional violations from getting injunctions Chemerinsky wrote Chemerinsky noted that the Senate bill was a slight improvement over the House contempt provision which was retroactive and would have affected an untold number of court cases The Senate Republicans proposal would only apply prospectively and to cases involving the federal establishment But Chemerinsky and other legal scholars across the ideological spectrum warned against restricting courts discretion to block executive abuses and tying legal remedies to plaintiffs financial means particularly under the current administration If this provision passes the regime could impose even blatantly illegal and unconstitutional policies for long periods of time unless and until litigation reaches a final conclusion explained George Mason University law professor Ilya Somin That could inflict grave harm on the sufferers of illegality Consider media subject to illegal censorship during a crucial news cycle illegally deported immigrants people imprisoned without due process and more Like a great number of provisions floated by Republicans the Senate budget bill s proposed restriction on federal courts is vulnerable to procedural challenge because of its tenuous link to fiscal matters Under the so-called Byrd rule named for the late Sen Robert Byrd of West Virginia and applied by the Senate s parliamentarian Congress cannot use the budget reconciliation mechanism to legislate about matters that are extraneous to the budget In text disclosed Monday evening the Senate Finance Committee advanced another budget bill provision with likely Byrd issues which would drastically increase the maximum fines and prison sentence for those who leak tax return evidence Bobby Kogan the senior director of federal budget guidelines at the Center for American Progress who has studied reconciliation and the Byrd rule explained The Intercept that both provisions face long odds under the Senate parliamentarian s review I would be deeply surprised if this makes it past Byrd Kogan wrote in an emailed declaration about the draft provision to limit judicial authority I don t see how this has anything to do with revenue so it would not be a proper provision in a budget reconciliation bill wrote Chemerinsky Related The Clear and Present Danger to the American Rule of Law Following passage of the House bill last month a spokesperson for Sen Chuck Grassley R-Iowa who chairs the Senate Judiciary Committee implicitly conceded there were Byrd rule issues with its contempt provision Grassley s office did not respond to questions about how the Senate version fares any better Senate Democrats vowed to work to remove these unnecessary provisions from the Big Ugly Bill as Durbin s spokesperson put it Sen Alex Padilla D-Calif who is also on the Judiciary Committee also has serious concerns on the substance of the bill particularly the provision that strips courts power inappropriately disrupts the separation of powers and tries to put the administration above the law according to an emailed report from Padilla s office to The Intercept The Senator strongly believes that the updated bill text disclosed by the Senate Judiciary Committee does not follow the Byrd rule and will get removed Padilla s spokesperson wrote The post Under GOP Budget Bill You d Have to Be Rich to Sue the Trump Administration appeared first on The Intercept