All posts tagged "James Boasberg"

The Trump administration's defiance of federal judges is starting to backfire as a contempt case is revived, according to a legal expert.

Former U.S. Attorney Joyce Vance wrote in a Tuesday piece for her Civil Discourse Substack about a long-running fight over the March 2025 deportation of Venezuelan men to El Salvador's CECOT prison.

Chief U.S. District Judge James Boasberg ordered the planes carrying the Venezuelan men to turn back and return the men, but the Trump administration landed the planes and handed the men over anyway, Vance recounted....

A federal judge Monday said he is pushing forward with a contempt inquiry over whether the Trump administration intentionally disregarded his order in March to stop deporting more than 100 Venezuelan men to an El Salvador prison.

James Boasberg, the chief judge of the U.S. District Court in Washington, has now demanded that two of the Justice Department lawyers who were part of the March 15 deportation operation appear for questioning next week, Politico reported. One of the lawyers has reportedly been fired for opposing some of the Trump administration's methods.

Boasberg said it was "premature" to recommend a criminal prosecution of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, who admitted she gave the order to turn the 100 Venezuelan men over to authorities in El Salvador after administration attorneys advised her to do so. ...

A Republican lawmaker is pushing to impeach President Donald Trump's latest enemy — a "radical activist" judge the DOJ has previously targeted — but failed after a clerical error put a stop to the attack.

Rep. Brandon Gill (R-TX) announced Tuesday in a social post that he filed articles of impeachment against U.S. District Judge James Boasberg and his alleged role in the FBI's "Arctic Frost" investigation under former special counsel Jack Smith. Boasberg reportedly issued nondisclosure orders in Smith's investigation.

"Judge Boasberg abused his power by weaponizing the judiciary against critics of the Biden Administration," Gill wrote. "As part of the Arctic Frost Investigation, Judge Boasberg signed off on frivolous nondisclosure orders to conceal the fact that sitting US Senators were being surveilled. Not only was this action egregiously improper; it was a gross violation of the separation of powers.
Judge Boasberg is guilty of high crimes and misdemeanors, is unfit for office, and should be impeached."...

President Donald Trump took to Truth Social Friday to rant at the judicial system during an ongoing clash with U.S. District Court James E. Boasberg.

It's Trump's latest attack since his administration allegedly ignored Judge Boasberg's order to turn around a plane full of Venezuelan immigrants being flown to prison in El Salvador.

On Thursday, Judge Boasberg issued an "angry order," according to The New York Times, telling the administration "to explain why he should not find that officials had violated his instructions for the flights to return to the United States."...

Federal judges have ruled that the current administration has defied the law in more than a dozen cases, including three major rulings this week, in the short time since Trump has taken office, according to reporting in The Washington Post.

Senior political reporter Aaron Blake wrote, "The total works out to one such finding about every four days," that the administration was found to have "either has violated the law or has probably done so."

The findings are for a variety of cases, including "Trump’s efforts to freeze federal funding, fire federal workers, restrict diversity efforts, overturn birthright citizenship and, most recently, limit transgender rights and deport certain immigrants without legal review."...

Republican Rep. Tim Burchett (R-TN) aimed his anger toward the news media when CNN's John Berman asked about the constitutional powers of federal judges on Tuesday.

Berman's question had to do with the attacks the Trump administration has aimed at U.S. District Judge James Boasberg, who ordered planes carrying Venezuelan migrants to return to the United States instead of onward toward a prison in El Salvador. At issue was the Constitutional right to due process, which the detainees did not receive before being loaded onto the planes.

The administration ignored the judge's order, then publicly mocked him and refused to answer his questions at a Monday evening hearing. ...