WEBVTT - Trump and Allies Ramp Up Attacks on Judges 0:00:02.759 --> 0:00:07.000 This is Bloomberg Law with June Grosseol from Bloomberg Radio. 0:00:08.960 --> 0:00:14.000 President Donald Trump's blitz of sweeping, aggressive, and often unlawful 0:00:14.080 --> 0:00:18.520 executive orders has hit only one roadblock so far, the 0:00:18.560 --> 0:00:23.800 federal courts. As Trump and Elon Musk slash government agencies, 0:00:23.920 --> 0:00:28.560 freeze funding, and oust federal workers, the Republican Congress has 0:00:28.800 --> 0:00:32.040 just gone along. In fact, House Speaker Mike Johnson has 0:00:32.040 --> 0:00:35.400 said the court should just let Trump do what he wants. 0:00:35.640 --> 0:00:38.320 And I think that the courts should take a step 0:00:38.320 --> 0:00:41.240 back and allow these processes to play out. What we're 0:00:41.280 --> 0:00:43.760 doing is good and right for the American people. 0:00:44.280 --> 0:00:47.480 It's been federal judges who've put the brakes on many 0:00:47.520 --> 0:00:51.440 of Trump's early moves to freeze federal grants and loans 0:00:51.840 --> 0:00:56.560 and birthright citizenship, and remove transgender soldiers from the military. 0:00:57.200 --> 0:01:00.840 Trump has a history of attacking judges who rule against him, 0:01:01.160 --> 0:01:04.800 and he remains consistent in that way, blaming judges for 0:01:04.920 --> 0:01:06.240 slowing down his agenda. 0:01:06.800 --> 0:01:09.520 We want to weed out the corruption, and it seems 0:01:09.520 --> 0:01:11.800 hard to believe that a judge could say, we don't 0:01:11.840 --> 0:01:14.840 want you to do that. Well, so maybe we have 0:01:14.920 --> 0:01:18.080 to look at the judges because it's very serious. I 0:01:18.080 --> 0:01:19.680 think it's a very serious violation. 0:01:20.480 --> 0:01:25.280 A potential showdown between the administration and the judiciary was 0:01:25.319 --> 0:01:29.360 averted for now when Trump agreed to comply with court orders. 0:01:29.760 --> 0:01:32.800 Yeah, the answer is I always abide by the courts, 0:01:33.040 --> 0:01:36.759 always abide by him, and will appeal. But appeals take 0:01:36.800 --> 0:01:37.480 a long time. 0:01:38.280 --> 0:01:41.480 My guest is former federal judge Paul Grimm, director of 0:01:41.520 --> 0:01:45.320 the Bald Judicial Institute at Duke Law School. So looking 0:01:45.360 --> 0:01:48.800 at the big picture right now, you have judges being 0:01:49.000 --> 0:01:53.600 attacked by Trump allies, and even the House Speaker saying, 0:01:53.800 --> 0:01:56.640 I think the court should take a step back. Where 0:01:56.680 --> 0:01:57.360 are we here? 0:01:58.080 --> 0:02:01.160 I think that we're at a place where everybody who 0:02:02.000 --> 0:02:08.160 believes that the firewalls that the Constitution imposes on all 0:02:08.240 --> 0:02:11.280 three branches of government to make sure that no one 0:02:11.360 --> 0:02:15.480 branch exercises successive authority in a way that's unaccountable under 0:02:15.560 --> 0:02:18.720 the law, that anybody who believes in this should be concerned. 0:02:18.919 --> 0:02:22.960 We know that for well over a decade that the 0:02:23.000 --> 0:02:26.480 public's perception of the courts has been declining. This is 0:02:27.080 --> 0:02:28.880 due to a lot of reasons. Part of it is 0:02:28.919 --> 0:02:32.320 that public figures and public officials from both sides of 0:02:32.400 --> 0:02:37.600 the political spectrum feel increasingly comfortable attacking individual judges for 0:02:37.800 --> 0:02:39.960 their decisions when the judges were just trying to do 0:02:40.040 --> 0:02:42.720 what their job was. It's created by the fact that 0:02:43.200 --> 0:02:46.160 social media is where a lot of people get their information, 0:02:46.520 --> 0:02:48.560 and a lot of the information on social media that 0:02:48.600 --> 0:02:50.720 deals with the courts is by people who may be 0:02:50.840 --> 0:02:54.320 well intentioned but misinformed, or maybe not even well intentioned 0:02:54.400 --> 0:02:58.079 and are trying to miss one. Judges are traditionally reluctant 0:02:58.080 --> 0:03:00.960 to engage with the public. They can't talk about their cases, 0:03:01.040 --> 0:03:04.120 and that reluctance sort of spills over to make them 0:03:04.160 --> 0:03:07.000 sometimes more cautious than they should be in terms of 0:03:07.000 --> 0:03:09.360 communicating to the public. Most of the public has no 0:03:09.440 --> 0:03:11.720 contact with the digital system. They've never been in the courts, 0:03:11.760 --> 0:03:14.640 They've never had an engagement with a judge. The media 0:03:14.760 --> 0:03:18.200 portrayal of judges is not particularly favorable in movies and 0:03:18.240 --> 0:03:21.040 on TV, and the judges don't speak out for themselves, 0:03:21.639 --> 0:03:25.400 So who does well? The ABA ethics under the can 0:03:25.480 --> 0:03:30.600 and eight of the Ethics Model Rules, Commentary three says 0:03:30.639 --> 0:03:33.240 that lawyers should speak up to defend the system. But 0:03:33.800 --> 0:03:36.440 when the ABA comes out with a statement or the 0:03:36.480 --> 0:03:39.480 American College of travelers who does that reach. So we're 0:03:39.480 --> 0:03:43.840 at a point now where we are a highly polarized 0:03:43.840 --> 0:03:48.240 society and we are highly divided over many things. We 0:03:48.400 --> 0:03:53.120 also have a Congress which is highly politicized and highly 0:03:53.160 --> 0:03:56.600 polarized and does not function the way in which anybody 0:03:56.600 --> 0:04:00.000 who thinks the legislatures should function thinks is functioning well. 0:04:00.360 --> 0:04:04.400 And so when Congress is sort of paralyzed by its 0:04:04.400 --> 0:04:08.760 own polarization, nature reports a vacuum. Who steps into that 0:04:08.840 --> 0:04:11.720 vacuum in power? It's going to be the president, whether 0:04:11.720 --> 0:04:15.160 it's a democratic president or a publican president. And the 0:04:15.200 --> 0:04:18.960 current president has a very specific agenda and very clear 0:04:19.040 --> 0:04:22.760 ideas about how he wants to proceed, and a very 0:04:22.839 --> 0:04:26.240 muscular view of the powers of the president needs to 0:04:26.279 --> 0:04:29.599 be the other branches. And so in that environment, with 0:04:29.760 --> 0:04:33.040 the number of executive orders and actions that have been 0:04:33.040 --> 0:04:36.680 initiated in the last month, they have gone into areas that, 0:04:37.080 --> 0:04:40.320 you know, maybe breaking tradition in terms of what presidents 0:04:40.360 --> 0:04:43.239 have done, seem to be animated by a very broad 0:04:43.320 --> 0:04:46.240 view of the authority of the president, and that leads 0:04:46.279 --> 0:04:48.599 to losses, and the losses lead to cases that have 0:04:48.680 --> 0:04:51.840 to be started by judges and the judges rule, and 0:04:51.880 --> 0:04:54.040 then of course if they rule in a way that 0:04:54.240 --> 0:04:57.919 people who were in favor of the government action that 0:04:58.040 --> 0:05:02.080 was being challenged. We see this attack upon the judges 0:05:02.120 --> 0:05:07.799 in a way that is increasingly problematic. It is personal. 0:05:08.240 --> 0:05:11.960 It calls them things like corrupt or traders, or that 0:05:12.000 --> 0:05:16.360 they've committed treason. It promotes or implicitly encourages violent It 0:05:16.400 --> 0:05:19.320 has caused threat and by the way, these are comments 0:05:19.360 --> 0:05:22.680 that have been raised by people who are both Democrats 0:05:22.680 --> 0:05:25.040 and Republicans. So I think that we are at a 0:05:25.240 --> 0:05:30.840 very significant point in our country where the scope and 0:05:30.880 --> 0:05:34.719 the tone seems to have gotten so extreme, and we 0:05:34.839 --> 0:05:37.400 have to take all reasonable steps that we can take 0:05:37.440 --> 0:05:41.120 to speak out in defense of our constitutional structure and 0:05:41.160 --> 0:05:46.599 to condemn unfair attacks on the judiciary as an institution 0:05:47.040 --> 0:05:48.640 or individual judges. 0:05:49.480 --> 0:05:54.560 It seems like one of the worst aggressors is Elon Musk, who, 0:05:54.640 --> 0:05:57.240 by the way, has more than two hundred million followers 0:05:57.279 --> 0:06:00.760 on x. I mean, he has called several judges corrupt, 0:06:01.279 --> 0:06:05.640 call for their impeachment, and he's also reposted photos of 0:06:05.720 --> 0:06:10.039 at least three judges who ruled against Trump policies. And 0:06:10.080 --> 0:06:13.080 I'm wondering in light of the fact that the US 0:06:13.200 --> 0:06:16.880 Marshal Service says that serious threats to federal judges have 0:06:17.000 --> 0:06:22.159 doubled since twenty twenty one, whether anything else should be done, 0:06:22.200 --> 0:06:24.880 whether there should be more security, I think. 0:06:24.720 --> 0:06:27.000 The simple answer is yes. First of all, what's the 0:06:27.040 --> 0:06:30.359 old expression that the best protection against tate speech is 0:06:30.400 --> 0:06:33.479 more speech. We need more voices talking about this, all 0:06:33.600 --> 0:06:35.880 reasonable steps that we can take to speak out in 0:06:36.040 --> 0:06:41.200 defense of our constitutional structure and why it's important to 0:06:41.240 --> 0:06:46.560 let it operate the way that it operates, and to 0:06:46.920 --> 0:06:54.160 call out and to condemn unfair attacks on the judiciary 0:06:54.200 --> 0:07:01.080 as an institution or on individual judges. I would love 0:07:01.120 --> 0:07:04.720 to see an open letter signed by retired judges because 0:07:04.760 --> 0:07:08.760 they could speak more freely. Professors, faith leaders, to the press, 0:07:08.880 --> 0:07:13.120 business leaders. Can you imagine spending a billion dollars on 0:07:13.200 --> 0:07:16.360 a new pharmaceutical and then someone steals the information on it, 0:07:16.360 --> 0:07:19.160 It gets your intellectual property and gets a judgment, and 0:07:19.200 --> 0:07:20.960 someone says, well, I'm just going to ignore it that judgment. 0:07:21.000 --> 0:07:22.160 We don't care what that judge said. 0:07:22.480 --> 0:07:25.080 Signed by all of these people talking about the importance 0:07:25.200 --> 0:07:29.200 of these core principles separation of powers, rule of law, 0:07:29.840 --> 0:07:34.560 judicial independence, and the importance of recognizing that the rule 0:07:34.560 --> 0:07:37.440 of law only functions when the public is willing to 0:07:37.480 --> 0:07:40.000 accept the decision that they disagree with. And when you 0:07:40.120 --> 0:07:42.840 have someone that has as big a megaphone and can 0:07:42.880 --> 0:07:46.920 reach millions and millions of people and post pictures where 0:07:46.960 --> 0:07:50.360 any reasonable person would say that the result of that 0:07:50.680 --> 0:07:55.280 is to focus threats of harm or coercion or intimidation 0:07:55.440 --> 0:07:58.760 or pressure on a government official, any government official trying 0:07:58.760 --> 0:08:01.280 to do their job. That's something that we should say 0:08:01.600 --> 0:08:05.520 is going too far. That's beyond fair criticism. That's an 0:08:05.560 --> 0:08:09.520 attack on an institution. And we need to have every 0:08:10.200 --> 0:08:15.360 important component of our society that believes that the framework 0:08:15.400 --> 0:08:18.880 of our government is important to maintain, to speak out 0:08:19.320 --> 0:08:22.600 to say that that level of personal attacks is wrong 0:08:22.800 --> 0:08:24.080 and cannot be tolerated. 0:08:24.680 --> 0:08:27.040 There's been a lot of discussion about whether or not 0:08:27.120 --> 0:08:30.760 we'll reach the point where the Trump administration decides to 0:08:31.320 --> 0:08:36.400 defy a court order. But yesterday, after taking some shots 0:08:36.440 --> 0:08:41.120 at Judge Paul Engelmeyer, who had temporarily blocked Musk's team 0:08:41.720 --> 0:08:46.120 from accessing some Treasury Department information, Trump said he will 0:08:46.120 --> 0:08:49.640 obey court orders. Should that give us some comfort that 0:08:49.720 --> 0:08:52.640 a constitutional crisis can be avoided. 0:08:53.120 --> 0:08:55.960 Well, it's better than saying that he's not going to fall. 0:08:56.520 --> 0:08:59.200 I'll say that what I think is important is to 0:08:59.200 --> 0:09:02.200 try to reach the public because when you have social 0:09:02.200 --> 0:09:04.559 media hitting people, you know, do we think that we're 0:09:04.559 --> 0:09:08.600 going to personally dissuade someone with as strong a will 0:09:08.800 --> 0:09:11.880 as some of the people who've spoken out against the judges. 0:09:11.960 --> 0:09:14.960 Are we going to persuade them? Perhaps not really, but 0:09:15.200 --> 0:09:17.840 if we have enough voices joining in saying this is 0:09:17.880 --> 0:09:20.319 why this kind of talk is dangerous and it should 0:09:20.320 --> 0:09:23.120 not be engaged in it to help change minds, and 0:09:23.200 --> 0:09:25.040 I like to look at it as an opportunity where 0:09:25.040 --> 0:09:29.080 we should be trying to generate light but not heat. 0:09:29.800 --> 0:09:31.880 And let me give you an example of that. You've 0:09:31.920 --> 0:09:33.560 got someone that comes out and say, well, we don't 0:09:33.600 --> 0:09:37.800 think any judge should be in favor of corruption. Okay, 0:09:37.800 --> 0:09:40.920 well what judge is in favor of corruption? Well, if 0:09:40.920 --> 0:09:44.600 you said that the decision that was issued by Judge 0:09:44.960 --> 0:09:48.360 Inglemeyer was a judge that was in favor of corruption, 0:09:49.200 --> 0:09:51.520 then what I would say is have you read that decision? 0:09:51.760 --> 0:09:55.199 And I have. Judge Inglemeyer was sitting as a chamber's 0:09:55.320 --> 0:09:59.360 judge when a temporary respanding order came in and it 0:09:59.440 --> 0:10:02.360 was the next part say motion for restraining order, which 0:10:02.360 --> 0:10:05.520 the rules allow, and he was not even a judge 0:10:05.520 --> 0:10:08.719 assigned to the case. That's judge bargains and he had 0:10:08.760 --> 0:10:11.600 to act on that, and he issued a five day pause. 0:10:11.800 --> 0:10:14.800 He said, for five days, i am ordering that the 0:10:14.880 --> 0:10:19.240 doged adulge people can't have access to this information because 0:10:19.520 --> 0:10:24.160 the filing show that they may not have had background checks, 0:10:24.200 --> 0:10:27.360 and they may not have had training in preventing hacking, 0:10:27.520 --> 0:10:31.360 and millions of people's confidential financial information may be exposed 0:10:31.360 --> 0:10:33.200 and there may be a danger of hacking. And so 0:10:33.440 --> 0:10:36.720 for five days, I'm ordering that only Treasury people who 0:10:36.760 --> 0:10:39.079 have these safe graudu and protections in their training can 0:10:39.120 --> 0:10:41.280 have access to it. It was issue on the eighth. 0:10:41.480 --> 0:10:44.280 The government was given until the eleventh, and the plaintiffs 0:10:44.480 --> 0:10:48.120 nineteen attorneys general were given until the fourteenth. And now 0:10:48.120 --> 0:10:50.360 it's going to judge bargain. You'll decide on the merit. 0:10:50.480 --> 0:10:52.360 If you put it that way, say what exactly did 0:10:52.360 --> 0:10:54.640 the judge do that show that the judge was in 0:10:54.760 --> 0:10:56.920 favorite of corruption And the answer is no, one in 0:10:56.920 --> 0:10:59.440 the right mind, if they look at those facts, would 0:10:59.480 --> 0:11:02.880 say that there is a legitimate basis for criticizing what 0:11:02.920 --> 0:11:05.920 that judge did. But how do you direct the narrative 0:11:06.160 --> 0:11:08.959 so that people will take a step back and say, oh, 0:11:09.120 --> 0:11:11.480 that's what happened. I mean, if you took a poll 0:11:11.600 --> 0:11:14.280 right now and ask people, you know, if they knew 0:11:14.320 --> 0:11:16.240 what it was the bothly this judge did, that, you 0:11:16.280 --> 0:11:19.320 would get any kind of an accurate response. Answers probably know. 0:11:19.720 --> 0:11:21.760 So how do we have that dialogue? And we can't 0:11:21.760 --> 0:11:25.840 have that dialogue unless institutions and individuals who still command 0:11:25.880 --> 0:11:28.439 respect within the community speak out and say we've gone 0:11:28.480 --> 0:11:32.400 too far, because that's only way we can change opinions. 0:11:32.880 --> 0:11:35.880 Coming up next, for the first time, a judge says 0:11:35.920 --> 0:11:39.920 that Trump administration failed to obey an order. Remember you 0:11:39.960 --> 0:11:42.120 can always get the latest legal news by listening to 0:11:42.160 --> 0:11:45.600 our Bloomberg Law podcast. You can find them wherever you 0:11:45.640 --> 0:11:48.920 get your favorite podcasts. I'm June Grosso and you're listening 0:11:48.920 --> 0:11:49.559 to Bloomberg. 0:11:52.679 --> 0:11:57.400 This is Bloomberg Law with June Grosso from Bloomberg Radio. 0:11:57.760 --> 0:12:01.199 I've been talking to former federal judge Paul Grimm, director 0:12:01.240 --> 0:12:04.640 of the Bolt Judicial Institute at Duke Law School, about 0:12:04.679 --> 0:12:09.000 recent attacks by Trump allies on judges because of their rulings, 0:12:09.080 --> 0:12:13.840 blocking some Trump orders, at least temporarily. So on Monday, 0:12:13.880 --> 0:12:16.600 for the first time, a judge said that the Trump 0:12:16.679 --> 0:12:21.160 administration disobeyed an order that was Rhode Island Judge John 0:12:21.240 --> 0:12:24.720 McConnell Junior that White has had defied his order to 0:12:24.760 --> 0:12:28.480 release billions of dollars in federal grants. So the White 0:12:28.480 --> 0:12:31.560 House is appealing that. But what can a judge do 0:12:32.120 --> 0:12:35.720 if an administration defies an order? I mean, does a 0:12:35.800 --> 0:12:37.880 judge have any real power? 0:12:38.559 --> 0:12:41.640 Well, it's interesting. Judges can act in the way in 0:12:41.679 --> 0:12:44.440 which judges have authority to act at a circumstances. They 0:12:44.440 --> 0:12:47.120 can find an individual that has disobeyed an order that 0:12:47.200 --> 0:12:50.920 was subject to their jurisdiction, or an entity like a 0:12:50.960 --> 0:12:56.079 government agency in contempt. They can impose monetary fines for 0:12:56.200 --> 0:13:01.199 contempt to try to coerce compliance with the order. If 0:13:01.240 --> 0:13:07.040 the contempt lasts long enough and raises to certain levels 0:13:07.080 --> 0:13:11.640 that constitute criminal contempt, then then they have other sanctions 0:13:11.640 --> 0:13:14.440 that they can issue as well. And the question that 0:13:14.480 --> 0:13:18.480 becomes are those tools those limited tools, but existing tools 0:13:18.520 --> 0:13:20.920 that the courts have to deal with people who are 0:13:20.960 --> 0:13:23.640 found to be in contempt and non compliant with orders. 0:13:23.880 --> 0:13:27.800 Are they likely to be effective? Well, the answers probably, 0:13:28.280 --> 0:13:31.960 in this instance, not too effective. If you held the 0:13:31.960 --> 0:13:35.600 president and contempt of court, the president would certainly appeal 0:13:35.679 --> 0:13:38.320 that and it would it would play out. It's not 0:13:38.360 --> 0:13:43.360 going to cause immediate compliance unlikely. So the tools that 0:13:43.400 --> 0:13:46.839 the judge has, you know, would range from giving another 0:13:46.840 --> 0:13:50.000 opportunity or trying to identify some way of purging the 0:13:50.040 --> 0:13:54.080 contempt and hoping that there's compliance and if not, you know, 0:13:54.200 --> 0:13:57.199 if they felt that they continued to be a contempt, 0:13:57.280 --> 0:14:00.000 to to walk down there in issue orders in that direction. 0:14:00.480 --> 0:14:02.800 Whether that would be effective, whether it be complied with 0:14:02.960 --> 0:14:06.040 is anybody's guess. So there are limited tools within the 0:14:06.120 --> 0:14:08.280 judicial arsenal that could be used. You can have a 0:14:08.320 --> 0:14:11.840 monetary find that continues to increase over a period of time, 0:14:12.240 --> 0:14:16.600 and if that doesn't induce compliance, then there are other 0:14:16.679 --> 0:14:18.880 levels of contempt that could be issued as well, But 0:14:19.000 --> 0:14:21.080 there's not a lot of arrows in the quiver at 0:14:21.080 --> 0:14:24.200 that point for they judge the issue. If you've got 0:14:24.400 --> 0:14:27.640 a government or a government figure that says I'm not 0:14:27.800 --> 0:14:28.920 going to comply. 0:14:29.840 --> 0:14:32.600 Finally, there's been a lot of talk about a constitutional 0:14:32.640 --> 0:14:36.520 crisis and the White House Press secretary said that judges 0:14:36.560 --> 0:14:42.880 are causing constitutional crisis by blocking illegally blocking Trump's agenda. 0:14:42.960 --> 0:14:46.000 So that's where they're coming from. But at what point 0:14:46.440 --> 0:14:49.080 do we say we have a constitutional crisis. 0:14:50.000 --> 0:14:51.720 Well, if you read the papers in the last week, 0:14:52.560 --> 0:14:54.760 people are already saying that we have it. But I 0:14:54.840 --> 0:14:58.880 worry that we've let the taglines run the narrative. There's 0:14:58.880 --> 0:15:03.200 a heightened level of rhetoric esteem used in the language 0:15:03.200 --> 0:15:05.720 of the people who are attacking the judicial actions and 0:15:05.800 --> 0:15:07.880 in the language of the people who are talking about 0:15:08.320 --> 0:15:12.320 whether it's the constitutional crisis. You have an alarming set 0:15:12.320 --> 0:15:18.120 of circumstances in which there have been challenges to executive action, 0:15:18.800 --> 0:15:23.760 which is very assertive and not fearful of pushing the 0:15:23.800 --> 0:15:30.760 boundaries of what past parameters of presidential authority have been. 0:15:31.320 --> 0:15:35.560 You have individuals and organizations that feel that they've been 0:15:35.600 --> 0:15:38.080 agreed by that who bring losses. You've got judges that 0:15:38.200 --> 0:15:41.480 have to respond to it. And we don't get into 0:15:41.520 --> 0:15:45.160 the details of the particular lawsuit or what the nature 0:15:45.320 --> 0:15:49.240 of the challenge to the lawsuit was, or understanding the 0:15:49.280 --> 0:15:53.480 circumstances of the judges ruling. Instead, we get immediately to 0:15:53.640 --> 0:15:57.560 this the judges are causing it. No, the executive is 0:15:57.600 --> 0:15:59.960 causing it. I would rather have this be a moment 0:16:00.040 --> 0:16:03.080 where we are trying to talk about what's the structure 0:16:03.080 --> 0:16:06.520 of this government that has served us well as well 0:16:06.560 --> 0:16:08.800 as it can for the last two hundred plus years, 0:16:09.360 --> 0:16:13.080 and that's based upon these foundational principles of separation of powers, 0:16:13.720 --> 0:16:16.640 and why separation of powers is important, why it ties 0:16:16.640 --> 0:16:19.760 into the rule of law while judicial independence is there, 0:16:20.520 --> 0:16:25.640 and that if these protections are not there, then no 0:16:25.720 --> 0:16:29.720 one's rights and liberties are safe, No business can prosper, 0:16:30.200 --> 0:16:33.480 no religion is free to be exercised the way that 0:16:33.520 --> 0:16:36.720 their believers think it should be. And so all of 0:16:36.760 --> 0:16:39.040 these things that we value as being sort of the 0:16:39.040 --> 0:16:42.360 defining nature of our rights and liberties in this country 0:16:42.400 --> 0:16:44.800 are at peril on that. And that's not a discussion 0:16:44.800 --> 0:16:50.200 that I hear. Instead, I hear slogan like a constitutional crisis. Well, 0:16:50.440 --> 0:16:52.800 I guess what I would say is, at one point, 0:16:53.360 --> 0:16:56.000 if you've got a president that that takes actions that 0:16:56.840 --> 0:16:59.720 under the law would be perceived as being beyond the 0:17:00.120 --> 0:17:04.639 order of that president to act, and if the judiciary 0:17:04.680 --> 0:17:08.240 says it's violation, and if the president disregards it, and 0:17:08.320 --> 0:17:11.520 if Congress doesn't take action, and the public itself does 0:17:11.560 --> 0:17:13.960 not feel alarmed by that, they're not bonded by that. 0:17:14.400 --> 0:17:16.680 But I guess you wake up one morning and what 0:17:16.680 --> 0:17:18.159 what we thought we were in the country is not 0:17:18.200 --> 0:17:21.080 what we are now because the people don't care. How 0:17:21.080 --> 0:17:22.480 do you get the people to care? You got to 0:17:22.520 --> 0:17:25.560 have a dialogue to talk about what's important about these 0:17:25.600 --> 0:17:28.800 government structures. Then at least make the effort to try 0:17:28.840 --> 0:17:33.000 to understand the positions of both sides in anterrational way. 0:17:33.960 --> 0:17:36.480 Set out the frozen cons so that people who are 0:17:36.520 --> 0:17:40.720 open minded at least have the opportunity to understand what's 0:17:40.720 --> 0:17:43.959 the stake and decide what they think is important. And 0:17:44.000 --> 0:17:46.959 that's what we don't see and fanning the fire by 0:17:47.000 --> 0:17:51.000 saying constitutional crisis and one side of the equations say well, 0:17:51.040 --> 0:17:52.680 you're causing it, and the other ones saying that you're 0:17:52.720 --> 0:17:56.520 pausing it. That's not advancing anything. That's just flaming the fire. 0:17:57.000 --> 0:17:59.159 A lot of talking going on and not much listening. 0:17:59.560 --> 0:18:02.040 Thanks so much for joining me on the show. That's 0:18:02.040 --> 0:18:05.280 Paul Grimm, director of the Bash Judicial Institute at Duke 0:18:05.359 --> 0:18:06.000 Law School. 0:18:06.560 --> 0:18:10.800 Because of President Donald Trump, this is a new era 0:18:11.520 --> 0:18:12.320 at the Southern border. 0:18:13.000 --> 0:18:16.520 That's Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth during a trip to the 0:18:16.600 --> 0:18:20.160 southern border last week. And it's not only a new 0:18:20.240 --> 0:18:23.480 era at the southern border, but also a new era 0:18:23.600 --> 0:18:28.320 in the military. With heg Seth executing Trump's executive orders, 0:18:28.760 --> 0:18:30.080 the lawfloorders. 0:18:29.480 --> 0:18:32.119 Of the President of the United States will be executed 0:18:32.119 --> 0:18:36.160 inside this Defense Department swiftly and without excuse. 0:18:36.640 --> 0:18:40.320 Under new rules released by heg Seth, transgender people who 0:18:40.359 --> 0:18:43.440 want to join the military will be blocked from enlistment, 0:18:43.880 --> 0:18:48.040 and transgender troops already serving will be blocked from receiving 0:18:48.119 --> 0:18:52.479 some gender related medical care from military physicians. Joining me 0:18:52.560 --> 0:18:55.480 is Josh Castenberg, a professor at the University of New 0:18:55.520 --> 0:18:58.639 Mexico Law School. He served as a lawyer and a 0:18:58.720 --> 0:19:02.119 judge in the US Air Force. Josh is the next 0:19:02.160 --> 0:19:06.920 move kicking out transgender people who are currently in the military, Well, 0:19:07.000 --> 0:19:08.119 not now. 0:19:08.240 --> 0:19:11.399 I mean that's the possibility in the future, but not now. 0:19:11.560 --> 0:19:16.160 And one thing to consider about that is that there's 0:19:16.240 --> 0:19:19.040 no right to serve in the military. There's a right 0:19:19.119 --> 0:19:22.240 to not be discriminated against on the basis of race, 0:19:23.040 --> 0:19:27.720 national origin, creed, religion, and the like. But for years, 0:19:28.440 --> 0:19:32.000 when the government argued to keep gay, openly gay and 0:19:32.119 --> 0:19:35.080 lesbian men and women out of the military, they would 0:19:35.119 --> 0:19:37.800 make the argument, there's no right to serve in the military, 0:19:37.840 --> 0:19:40.359 which is ironic because we still have a draft on 0:19:40.480 --> 0:19:43.560 the books, and so there's sort of an imbalanced The 0:19:43.600 --> 0:19:47.639 reason I bring that up is that the administration is 0:19:47.720 --> 0:19:51.800 willing to bring back on active duty service members who 0:19:51.840 --> 0:19:56.560 refuse to take the COVID vaccine, thereby violating the commander 0:19:56.640 --> 0:20:00.679 in chief, you know, President Biden, and vac orders have 0:20:00.800 --> 0:20:04.359 always been lawful since the days of George Washington in 0:20:04.359 --> 0:20:08.480 the smallpox vaccine. So they're going to let people who 0:20:08.520 --> 0:20:11.439 have the marker of disloyalty come back in, but not 0:20:11.600 --> 0:20:14.879 transgendered persons who may very well be the most loyal 0:20:14.920 --> 0:20:17.840 of American citizens are being barred from coming in. And 0:20:17.960 --> 0:20:19.040 that's the disconnect. 0:20:19.240 --> 0:20:23.760 In this memo, he said individuals with gender dysphoria who 0:20:23.840 --> 0:20:26.679 have volunteered to serve our country will be treated with 0:20:26.800 --> 0:20:30.320 dignity and respect by other members of the armed forces, 0:20:30.600 --> 0:20:35.080 but he puts severe limits on their medical care. 0:20:35.760 --> 0:20:40.359 Well, that's exactly right. And so here's another aspect of 0:20:40.359 --> 0:20:44.080 what may be nothing more than double speak, the military 0:20:44.119 --> 0:20:47.280 has to be very cautious, including the Secretary of Defense, 0:20:47.560 --> 0:20:51.160 about not engaging in something known as unlawful command influence, 0:20:51.160 --> 0:20:56.160 which not only permeates the criminal aspects of military service, 0:20:56.200 --> 0:20:58.639 meaning though you see uniform cut of military justice and 0:20:58.680 --> 0:21:04.119 court martial enforcement, but also the administrative mechanisms on giving 0:21:04.160 --> 0:21:08.920 people clearances or taking them away, and promotions, demotions, other 0:21:08.960 --> 0:21:13.119 administrative actions and the like. So what he's basically said 0:21:13.240 --> 0:21:16.560 is you're going to comply with the law that's in 0:21:16.640 --> 0:21:19.719 place of equal treatment. If he hadn't said that, there 0:21:19.720 --> 0:21:22.840 would be a slew of court cases for people who 0:21:22.840 --> 0:21:26.440 were being you who believe they were wrongfully denied promotion, 0:21:26.720 --> 0:21:29.960 or people who were being administratively discharged. 0:21:29.359 --> 0:21:30.320 And the like. 0:21:30.960 --> 0:21:34.400 So I wouldn't look at that as being something like, oh, 0:21:34.440 --> 0:21:37.600 out of the goodness of their heart or to show reasonableness. 0:21:37.960 --> 0:21:40.439 They have to do that in the unique way that 0:21:40.520 --> 0:21:44.240 military law works. However, and this is the big however, 0:21:44.400 --> 0:21:47.840 you have a president who's thought nothing about crossing the 0:21:47.880 --> 0:21:52.520 line into unlawful command influence, because even though for example, 0:21:52.960 --> 0:21:56.880 Bowie Bergdahl in the first administration was a deserter and 0:21:57.119 --> 0:22:00.640 in all likely it deserved to be court martialed commander 0:22:00.680 --> 0:22:06.320 in chief expressing an order, essentially an order that Bergdaal 0:22:06.359 --> 0:22:09.639 should be treated like a trader and given the maximum punishment, 0:22:10.000 --> 0:22:13.080 ironically coming from a president who dodged the draft when 0:22:13.119 --> 0:22:15.800 he was called into service. But there it is. So 0:22:16.160 --> 0:22:18.399 you have to have some sort of barrier against this 0:22:18.560 --> 0:22:22.360 unlawful command influence. And that's all I read into that memo. 0:22:22.840 --> 0:22:26.199 So, a twenty eight year old transgender service member is 0:22:26.320 --> 0:22:29.080 suing a lleging that she was told that she had 0:22:29.080 --> 0:22:32.320 to either be classified as a man or be separated 0:22:32.359 --> 0:22:35.320 from the military, and said she was required to leave 0:22:35.359 --> 0:22:39.240 the sleeping area for female troops and sleep by herself 0:22:39.280 --> 0:22:42.400 in a classroom. That doesn't seem to be the respect 0:22:42.480 --> 0:22:46.679 that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth talked about. Where does this 0:22:46.760 --> 0:22:47.200 fit in? 0:22:47.880 --> 0:22:51.959 Well, it fits into the administration's policy. And you know, 0:22:52.520 --> 0:22:55.200 you have to understand, speaking from someone who has served 0:22:55.200 --> 0:22:59.400 twenty four years in uniform, the constitutional rights of service 0:22:59.480 --> 0:23:02.119 members do not have the same force and effect that 0:23:02.200 --> 0:23:06.199 the constitutional rights of ordinary citizens do. And if the 0:23:06.240 --> 0:23:10.720 military wants to have separation policies based on gender, they 0:23:10.720 --> 0:23:13.240 can do it. And it falls into the Commander in 0:23:13.320 --> 0:23:16.040 chief to do unless and this is the big un 0:23:16.119 --> 0:23:19.879 less Congress acts by passing a law to prevent it. 0:23:20.359 --> 0:23:23.040 But you know, I look at this as part of 0:23:23.080 --> 0:23:30.240 an overall sweep of the military to basically not just 0:23:30.400 --> 0:23:35.159 curb the freedoms of service members, but to shape the 0:23:35.200 --> 0:23:40.040