blog

May 6, 2022

Will Demise of “Roe” Be a Death Knell for Contraception, Marriage Rights?

In his explosive draft opinion in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, which was leaked to Politico, Justice Samuel Alito overrules Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey. His draft holds that abortion is no longer a constitutional right and leaves the fate of those who seek abortions to the vagaries of state laws.

“We therefore hold that the Constitution does not confer a right to abortion,” Alito writes. “Roe and Casey must be overruled, and the authority to regulate abortion must be returned to the people and their elected representatives.”

If four other members of the Supreme Court adopt Alito’s draft, many other privacy rights we hold dear will be in jeopardy. They include the rights to contraception and same-sex marriage, among others.

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May 2, 2022

Supreme Court Seems Torn on Whether Biden Can End Trump’s Inhumane Asylum Policy

Shortly after taking office, Joe Biden sought to cancel the Trump administration’s “Remain in Mexico” policy (formally known as Migrant Protection Protocols, or MPP). Under the policy, asylum seekers who leave a third country and travel through Mexico to the U.S. border are forced to stay in Mexico while awaiting a court hearing on their asylum petitions. Many of the tens of thousands who have been compelled to wait in Mexico have become victims of kidnapping, sexual assault and torture as they wait in crude encampments.

On April 27, Alejandro Mayorkas, secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, testified before the House Appropriations Subcommittee and the House Homeland Security Committee that under Trump’s Remain in Mexico program, 1,500 people were murdered, tortured, raped or were victims of other serious crimes.

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April 19, 2022

After Undermining International Criminal Court, US Now Wants It to Charge Russians

Although the United States has tried mightily to undermine the International Criminal Court (ICC) since it became operational in 2002, the U.S. government is now pushing for the ICC to prosecute Russian leaders for war crimes in Ukraine. Apparently, Washington thinks the ICC is reliable enough to try Russians but not to bring U.S. or Israeli officials to justice.

On March 15, the Senate unanimously passed S. Res 546, which “encourages member states to petition the ICC or other appropriate international tribunal to take any appropriate steps to investigate war crimes and crimes against humanity committed by the Russian Armed Forces.”

When he introduced the resolution, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-South Carolina) said, “This is a proper exercise of jurisdiction. This is what the court was created for.” The United States has refused to join the ICC and consistently tries to undercut the court. Yet a unanimous U.S. Senate voted to utilize the ICC in the Ukraine conflict.

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April 7, 2022

Federal Judge’s Opinion May Compel DOJ to Bring Criminal Charges Against Trump

Donald Trump and his lawyer, former Chapman law school dean John Eastman, launched “a coup in search of a legal theory,” U.S. District Court Judge David O. Carter recently wrote in his stunning 44-page opinion. Carter found it “more likely than not” that Trump committed two federal crimes to further his and Eastman’s “campaign to overturn a democratic election, an action unprecedented in American history.”

Carter’s opinion provides a road map for Attorney General Merrick Garland’s Department of Justice to bring criminal charges against Trump. Although the House of Representatives Select Committee to Investigate the January 6 Attack on the U.S. Capitol (“Select Committee”) can send a criminal referral to the Justice Department, only the department can file a criminal indictment.

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March 28, 2022

GOP Senators Use Jackson Hearing to Agitate Their Base Before Election Campaigns

Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson is inching toward confirmation as a Supreme Court Justice after sailing with strength and grace through days of racist and disrespectful attacks by GOP senators. Conservative Democrat Joe Manchin has now signaled that he will vote to confirm Jackson, showing that the often fractured Democratic senators are uniting to support her confirmation.

Although Judge Jackson is exceptionally qualified to sit on the Supreme Court, she was subjected to snide, condescending and racist attacks by Republican members of the Senate Judiciary Committee during her confirmation hearing this week. Jackson remained remarkably unflappable in the face of grueling questions and hostile, vicious assaults.

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March 18, 2022

Extradition Looms for Assange After UK Supreme Court Refuses to Hear His Appeal

The British judicial system has erected still another barrier to Julian Assange’s freedom. On March 14, the U.K. Supreme Court refused to hear Assange’s appeal of the U.K. High Court’s ruling ordering his extradition to the United States. If extradited to the U.S. for trial, Assange will face 17 charges under the Espionage Act and up to 175 years in prison for revealing evidence of U.S. war crimes.

With no explanation of its reasoning, the Supreme Court denied Assange “permission to appeal” the High Court’s decision, saying that Assange’s appeal did not “raise an arguable point of law.” The court remanded the case back to the Westminster Magistrates’ Court, which is the same court that denied the U.S. extradition request on January 4, 2021.

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March 9, 2022

Supreme Court Says Torture at CIA Black Site Is a “State Secret”

Abu Zubaydah, whom the CIA once mistakenly alleged was a top al-Qaeda leader, was waterboarded 80+ times, subjected to assault in the form of forced rectal exams, and exposed to live burials in coffins for hundreds of hours. Zubaydah sobbed, twitched and hyperventilated. During one waterboarding session, he became completely unresponsive, with bubbles coming out of his mouth. “He became so compliant that he would prepare for waterboarding at the snap of a finger,” Neil Gorsuch wrote in his 30-page dissent in United States v. Zubaydah.

On March 3, in a 6-3 decision, the Supreme Court dismissed Zubaydah’s petition requesting the testimony of psychologists James Mitchell and John Jessen, whom the CIA hired to orchestrate his torture at a secret CIA prison (“CIA black site”) in Poland from December 2002 until September 2003. Zubaydah was transferred to other CIA black sites before being sent to Guantánamo in 2006, where he remains today with no charges against him.

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March 2, 2022

Here’s an Action the UN General Assembly Can Take Against Russia’s Invasion

As the Russian military continues to mount rocket attacks that target Ukraine’s airports and military installations, and as its ground troops advance, reportedly firing missiles and long-range artillery, what can the United Nations do to stop the violence, protect civilians and work to achieve a diplomatic path to peace?

The UN Security Council is not able to act to restore international peace and security due to Russia’s veto of its resolution. But given the fact that Russia did not act in self-defense or with Security Council approval — and thus its military actions constitute illegal aggression — there is a step that the UN General Assembly could and should take immediately to promote a ceasefire, a withdrawal of Russian troops from Ukraine, and the pursuit of a diplomatic solution.

Under the Uniting for Peace resolution, when the Security Council is unable to act due to the lack of unanimity of its five permanent members, the General Assembly can take up the matter to restore international peace and security, even ordering the use of force. On February 27, the Security Council referred the matter of Ukraine to the General Assembly under Uniting for Peace.

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February 25, 2022

US Stokes Tensions With Russia by Building Military Base 100 Miles From Border

On February 21, after Russian President Vladimir Putin recognized the independence and sovereignty of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) and the Luhansk People’s Republic (LPR), he sent troops into those regions to carry out what he called “peacekeeping functions.” This was undertaken in response to actions that Russia characterized as a Ukranian government offensive.

During the previous weekend, Ukraine had significantly increased fire against residential sections of DPR and LPR, reportedly launching 1,600 projectiles and killing civilians. Nikolai Pankov, deputy Russian defense minister, said that Ukraine has 60,000 troops prepared to attack DPR and LPR, an intention Ukraine has denied.

United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres characterized “the decision of the Russian Federation to be a violation of the territorial integrity and sovereignty of Ukraine and inconsistent with the principles of the Charter of the United Nations.”

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February 7, 2022

Biden Should Replace Breyer With a True Progressive

As we await President Joe Biden’s nomination to fill the Supreme Court seat that Stephen Breyer will vacate this summer, many commentators are saying the nominee will not alter the ideological balance of the court. The 6 to 3 split in favor of the right-wingers will not change. But each new member transforms the dynamics of the court. “The Court changes every time there’s a new face. The dynamics are different” when a new justice joins the court; “that is the way the system works,” Justice Harry Blackmun told Professor Philippa Strum in a 1993 interview. Biden has a golden opportunity to replace Breyer with a progressive justice — one who could help lay the foundation for a political shift in the future.

An examination of Breyer’s voting record in the areas of criminal justice and civil rights reveals that he has been out of step with his fellow liberals on the court.

Breyer cast a smaller percentage of liberal votes than any other Democratic appointee with whom he served on the court (Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan), according to a January 24, 2022, report by professors Lee Epstein, Andrew Martin and Kevin Quinn.

This divide between Breyer and his liberal colleagues is particularly apparent in cases involving defendants’ rights and civil rights litigation.

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