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April 11 (UPI) — A federal judge upheld a previous ruling that that a Reconstruction-era federal ban on home distilling of alcoholic spirits is unconstitutional.

The 158-year-old law was aimed at preventing people from skirting tax collectors when it was enacted in an 1868 law that imposed excise taxes on distilled spirits and tobacco that was challenged by a man who wanted to distill bourbon whiskey at home.

The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals on Friday overturned the law that has barred people from producing liquor in their homes because the federal government does not have the right to use its power of taxation to criminalize at-home distilling, FoxDC5 reported.

“The government contends that this prohibition was enacted to prevent tax evasion because ‘[a] distiller can more easily conceal a spirit’s strength (and thus avoid the proper tax rate) or conceal a distilling operation altogether if his still is in his house or connected with it,” the court said in its opinion.

“Congress’s taxing power ‘reaches only existing subjects,’ not activity that may generate subjects of taxation,” the court said. “Put otherwise, preventing activity that lest it give rise to tax evasion places no limit whatsoever on Congress’s power under the taxation clause.”

Although in-home production of beer and wine for personal or family use is legal, producing spirits at any location that is not an Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau-qualified and licensed facility is not legal, the U.S. Department of Treasure, under which the Bureau exists, said on its website.

The lawsuit was brought primarily by Rick Morris who manufactures stills for legally approved distilling operations and wanted to distill bourbon whiskey at his home for his brother and friends.

Upon finding that he could not legally do this, Morris founded the Hobby Distillers’ Association, members of which joined him in the legal battle.

While the ruling does not mean in-home distilling is a free-for-all, it means that people can obtain permits from the bureau to set up a distillery, follow federal regulations and pay applicable taxes, the HDA said in a blog post.

“This is a major victory for the plaintiffs — including members of the Hobby Distillers’ Association — and a turning point for hobby distillers nationwide,” the organization said.

WASHINGTON — Last September, the Department of Homeland Security started advising unaccompanied immigrant children that they could either self-deport or expect to face long-term detention.

But a federal judge in Los Angeles on Mondayordered the government to stop using such “blatantly coercive” language, ruling that the new advisals, as they are known, violated a 40-year-old court order that bans immigration agents from pressuring unaccompanied children to give up asylum claims and leave the U.S.

According to court documents, the legal advisal was given to recently detained immigrant children. Unaccompanied children are those in the country without a parent or legal guardian.

The minors were told they had the option to return to their country, that doing so would result in no administrative consequences and that they still could apply for a visa in the future.

But the children also were told that if they chose to seek a hearing with an immigration judge or indicated that they were afraid to leave the U.S., they could expect to be held at a detention facility “for a prolonged period of time.”

Those who turned 18 while in custody would be turned over to Immigration and Customs Enforcement for deportation, they were told. The advisal, though generally passed on verbally, was written out in court documents by lawyers representing the immigrant children, which the government did not dispute.

“If your sponsor in the United States does not have legal immigration status, they will be subject to arrest and removal,” the advisals continued. “The sponsor may be subject to criminal prosecution for aiding your illegal entry.”

U.S. District Judge Michael W. Fitzgerald said that “such a threat disturbingly mirrors” the testimony of Jose Antonio Perez-Funez, a plaintiff in a 1980s class-action lawsuit challenging the tactics of immigration officers.

Perez-Funez, who was 16 when he was arrested near the Mexican border, testified in 1985 in Los Angeles federal court that he agreed to self-deport because federal officers said he would face lengthy detention if he didn’t return to El Salvador.

Perez-Funez’s case originally led the court to establish due process safeguards for immigrant children, giving them the right to speak with a relative or attorney before signing forms that waive their pursuit of legal protection.

“The Government was thus already on notice that such a statement delivered in this environment is precisely the kind of inappropriate persuasion the Injunction sought to prevent,” Fitzgerald wrote.

Fitzgerald, a judge in the Central District of California, also denied a request by the federal government to end the permanent court-mandated safeguards for immigrant children.

In response to a request for comment, U.S. Customs and Border Protection provided a statement, attributed to a spokesperson who wasn’t named, that the agency is following the law and protecting children. The agency said the advisal document explains to unaccompanied children their options available under federal law.

“Many unaccompanied minors are brought to the border by smugglers and face real risks of exploitation, which is why providing a clear, lawful advisal is essential,” the statement said. “It ensures they understand their rights and options — and for many who were trafficked or coerced, returning home to their family is the safest path.”

Unaccompanied children are first held by Homeland Security before being turned over to the Office of Refugee Resettlement, which is within the Department of Health and Human Services, for long-term housing. Federal law requires ORR to provide them with a legal consultation within 10 days.

“It is difficult to imagine a scenario more coercive than the one faced by [unaccompanied immigrant children] in the 72 hours before they are transferred into ORR custody, particularly for noncitizen children who likely do not know whether they possess any rights at all,” Fitzgerald wrote in his order.

In declarations to the court, children wrote that they felt threatened by the government’s advisals. One minor, identified as D.A.T.M., said the threats to prosecute their parents and of long-term detention caused them to sign voluntary departure papers.

Mark Rosenbaum, an attorney at the pro bono law firm Public Counsel, helped secure the 1986 court order. He said his legal team discovered Homeland Security had changed the advisals only after a government attorney notified him in November that the agency was going to seek to end the court-mandated safeguards.

“I consider this a war on children — the most vulnerable population,” he said.

The government has until Thursday to decide whether it will appeal the judge’s ruling. Regardless, Rosenbaum said, his goal is to establish more aggressive monitoring of unaccompanied children’s cases to ensure their rights aren’t violated again.

A federal judge on Thursday dismissed a lawsuit from the U.S. Department of Justice seeking Massachusetts’ state voter rolls, marking the latest setback in a wide-ranging effort by the Trump administration to collect detailed data on the nation’s voters.

The ruling from U.S. District Court Judge Leo Sorokin marks at least the fifth time a judge has rejected similar attempts by the Justice Department. Sorokin, an appointee of former President Barack Obama, said the U.S. attorney general’s office did not take the necessary steps required to access voter rolls, as outlined in federal law.

“Put simply, the statute requires a statement of why the Attorney General demands production of the requested records,” Sorokin wrote. That statement has to be factual, “not just a conceivable or possible basis.”

In an emailed response, the Justice Department said it “does not comment on ongoing litigation.”

It has said it’s seeking the voter data as part of an effort to ensure election security, but Democratic and Republican officials in several states have refused, saying the demand violates state and federal privacy laws. Some have raised concerns that federal officials will use the sensitive data for other purposes, such as searching for potential noncitizens.

During a hearing last month in Rhode Island, a Justice Department attorney told a federal judge that the department was seeking unredacted voter roll information so it could be shared with the Department of Homeland Security to check citizenship status. Homeland Security over the past year has beefed up the Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements, or SAVE, program, for just this purpose.

“Our intention is to run this against the DHS SAVE database,” Department of Justice attorney Eric Neff told U.S. District Judge Mary McElroy during a March 26 hearing challenging the federal government’s authority to access the voter data.

The Justice Department has sued at least 30 states and the District of Columbia seeking to force release of the data, which includes dates of birth, addresses, driver’s license numbers and partial Social Security numbers.

At least 12 states have either provided or promised to provide their detailed voter registration lists to the department, according to the Brennan Center: Alaska, Arkansas, Indiana, Louisiana, Mississippi, Nebraska, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas and Wyoming.

In the Massachusetts case, the the judge found that the Justice Department failed to follow the requirements for demanding the voter rolls set by a 1960 civil rights law.

That law, enacted as part of an effort to end racial discrimination in elections, says state voter records must be made available for inspection by the U.S. attorney general if the office includes a statement outlining why the information is being demanded and how it will be used.

The department’s letter demanding Massachusetts’ voter data made no reference to the Civil Rights Act and didn’t cite any concerns about the way Massachusetts complied with federal voting laws, the judge said. Most importantly, it didn’t include any factual basis for the demand, Sorokin wrote.

In court documents, the Justice Department said it was demanding the data to check for “Massachusetts’ possible lack of compliance” with federal voter registration list requirements. It also said the Civil Rights Act was designed to be an investigatory tool to identify federal election law violations and argued that the U.S. attorney general can’t be required to prove a violation before seeking evidence of one.

“These arguments miss the point,” Sorokin wrote.

Massachusetts Atty. Gen. Andrea Joy Campbell called the ruling a decisive win for voters and the rule of law.

“The privacy of our voters is not up for negotiation, and I will continue to defend the integrity and security of our elections from the Trump Administration’s cruel and harmful agenda,” she said in a news release.

Four federal judges in other states have dismissed similar lawsuits from the Department of Justice.

A federal judge in Michigan found the laws cited by the Justice Department do not require the disclosure of the voter records sought by the federal government. A federal judge in California said the administration “may not unilaterally usurp the authority over elections,” which the Constitution gives to the states and Congress. A federal judge in Oregon said the federal government was not entitled to unredacted voter registration lists containing sensitive data.

A federal judge in Georgia dismissed a Justice Department lawsuit because he found it had been filed in the wrong city. The federal government then refiled the lawsuit in the city specified by the judge; that case is ongoing.

The Justice Department has appealed the Oregon, California and Michigan dismissals.

Boone writes for the Associated Press. Boone reported from Boise, Idaho. AP writer Kimberlee Kruesi in Providence, R.I., contributed to this report.

April 10 (UPI) — A federal judge has again ordered the Pentagon to restore access to credentialed journalists, ruling the Trump administration was attempting to flout his previous order by disguising it as an interim rule.

“The Department cannot simply reinstate an unlawful policy under the guise of taking ‘new’ action and expect the court to look the other way,” U.S. District Judge Paul Friedman said in his Thursday ruling, obtained by Courthouse News.

The Department of Defense has said it intends to appeal.

The ruling comes in a case filed by The New York Times challenging a policy instituted by the Department of Defense in October requiring all journalists with access to the Pentagon to sign a form acknowledging they could have their credentials revoked for collecting unauthorized information.

Most Pentagon reporters declined and surrendered their credentials.

Last month, Friedman ruled the policy was unconstitutional and ordered the Pentagon to reinstate the credentials of seven journalists with The Times.

As the Defense Department said it planned to appeal the ruling, it unveiled a new revised policy that moved their office space outside the Pentagon building and required credentialed journalists to be escorted by Defense personnel at all times within it.

The Times again challenged the new, revised rule, accusing it of being a Trump administration attempt to defy Friedman’s order.

Friedman on Thursday agreed, finding that instead of returning the credentials to the Times’ journalists and restoring their access to the Pentagon, the Trump administration instead cut off access to all journalists.

“The court cannot conclude this opinion without noting once again what this case is really about: the attempt by the secretary of defense to dictate the information received by the American people, to control the message so that the public hears and sees only what the secretary and the Trump administration want them to hear and see,” Friedman, an appointee of President Bill Clinton, wrote in the 20-page ruling.

“The Constitution demands better. The American public demands better, too.”

After the court rejected the Pentagon’s attempt to restrict the First Amendment freedoms of The Times’ reporters, it invoked a new policy with only slightly different language from the one that was struck down in order to achieve the same unconstitutional end, he said.

“The curtailment of First Amendment rights is dangerous at any time, and even more so in a time of war,” Friedman said. “Suppression of political speech is the mark of an autocracy, not a democracy — as the framers recognized when they drafted the First Amendment.”

Charlie Stadtlander, a spokesperson for The Times, cheered Thursday’s ruling, saying it upholds the paper’s constitutional rights while sending a clear message to the Pentagon.

“Compliance with a lawful order of a court is not optional; it is required in a democracy committed to the rule of law,” Stadtlander said in a statement.

“We are pleased that Judge Friedman saw the revised policy issued by the Pentagon after his last decision for what it was: a poorly disguised attempt to continue to violate the constitutional rights of The Times and its journalists.”

In announcing the Pentagon’s intention to appeal, Sean Parnell, assistant to the secretary of defense for public affairs, argued that they have at all times complied with the court’s original order, saying the revised policy addressed all concerns raised in Friedman’s March 20 opinion.

“The department remains committed to press access at the Pentagon while fulfilling its statutory obligation to ensure the safe and secure operation of the Pentagon Reservation,” he said in a statement.

The Trump administration has been repeatedly accused by critics of taking actions aimed at influencing media coverage, from the October memorandum concerning Pentagon reporters to restricting access to outlets over editorial decisions and seizing control of the White House press pool.

A Utah judge ruled Tuesday that reality TV star Taylor Frankie Paul can have supervised visits with the 2-year-old son she shares with Dakota Mortensen until another hearing for a protective order later this month.

Paul appeared remotely for the hearing Tuesday with on-again, off-again ex-boyfriend Mortensen — the father of Paul’s third child, Ever — regarding his request for a restraining order. Paul had temporarily lost custody of their son when a temporary protective order was awarded to Mortensen last month. Paul and Mortensen are known for their roles on the Hulu reality TV series “Secret Lives of Mormon Wives.”

Third district court commissioner Russell Minas decided on supervised visitation after Paul’s legal team voiced concern over Mortensen’s alleged lack of credibility and his attorneys raised worry over her “volatility,” citing separate incidents from May 2025 and February. Paul was granted up to eight hours a week of visitation.

“I have concerns going both ways, quite frankly,” Minas said, noting Mortensen’s alleged “pushing of buttons to get reaction” and Paul’s “troubling” reactions to the aggravation.

The embattled exes are also ordered to appear remotely at a court hearing April 30 to go over the “merits and entry” of Mortensen’s protective order against Paul. Prior to Tuesday’s hearing, Paul filed her own protective order against Mortensen.

Mortensen filed for his protective order following two incidents in February that involved “grabbing, scratching, shoving, and striking” that allegedly left Mortensen with marks on his neck, according to police documents.

Around the same time, the cast of “Mormon Wives” paused filming for Season 5 and, subsequently, the release of a video of a separate dispute in 2023 led to the shelving of Season 22 of ABC’s “The Bachelorette,” which featured Paul as its heroine. In the video, recorded by Mortensen on his cellphone, Paul can be seen screaming and throwing metal chairs, one of which struck one of her children who witnessed the altercation, according to the criminal indictment. Police body camera footage from that incident was documented in the first season of “Mormon Wives.”

That 2023 incident resulted in Paul being arrested; she eventually pleaded guilty in abeyance to aggravated assault, reducing her sentence, so long as she follows the terms of her probation. A final review hearing scheduled for early August could mark the end of that probation, but it’s unclear if the new allegations — police are also investigating a third domestic violence claim from Mortensen against Paul that took place in 2024 — will affect that.

How the outcomes of these various court decisions will affect “The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives” and the unaired season of “The Bachelorette” is yet to be seen. It has not been announced whether the dating series will eventually air, or if and when “Mormon Wives” will resume filming — and whether Paul will continue on as a cast member. (Both Hulu and ABC are owned by Disney.)

The judge’s order this week is the latest development in the fallout from the domestic violence investigation involving Paul and Mortensen.

Last week brought more collateral damage to Disney’s reality TV universe with the news that Mortensen’s storyline would be edited out of the new season of “Vanderpump Villa,” which follows former Bravo star Lisa Vanderpump and her staff at various luxury European estates. The third season of “Mormon Wives” featured the fallout from an explosive crossover with “Vanderpump Villa” that resulted in “Mormon Wives” stars Demi Engemann and Jessi Ngatikaura getting embroiled in drama with staff member Marciano Brunette, who alleges he had intimate connections with both women. The fourth season of “Mormon Wives” revisits the crossover, with some of the women’s spouses and exes, who call themselves #DadTok, partaking in their own “Villa” getaway that fuels more drama, including between Mortensen and Paul.

Season 3 of “Vanderpump Villa,” which starts streaming April 16, is expected to capture that stay, except now without Mortensen’s storyline. But he isn’t totally off screens. Mortensen is set to appear in “Unwell Winter Games,” a YouTube reality competition series produced by Alex Cooper, that premiered Monday.

SACRAMENTO — A federal judge appears willing to block a $6.2-billion merger of two large TV station groups as he evaluates whether Nexstar Media Group’s takeover of a rival violates U.S. antitrust laws.

At the conclusion of a two-hour hearing in Sacramento on Tuesday, U.S. District Court Chief Judge Troy L. Nunley signaled he was preparing to issue a preliminary injunction that would prevent Nexstar and Tegna from combining operations amid an ongoing legal challenge.

Nunley said he would draft a written order, which is expected by Friday.

Previously, Nunley had issued a temporary restraining order to pause the merger.

Last month, Nexstar raced to finalize its blockbuster purchase of Tegna — despite a lawsuit filed by California Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta and seven other state attorneys general. The state officials, all Democrats, claimed the massive merger would give Nexstar too much control over local TV stations, ultimately hurting consumers by diminishing the diversity and quality of their newscasts.

California Deputy Attorney General Laura Antonini argued that when news consolidates, it results in a loss of diverse viewpoints.

“That’s extremely harmful to democracy and to the citizens of this state,” she said at the hearing.

President Trump has championed the Nexstar-Tegna merger, suggesting it would diminish the clout of the major TV networks, including those he often gripes about: ABC and NBC. Nexstar, based in Irving, Texas, owns dozens of network affiliate stations.

Nexstar, which also owns KTLA-TV Channel 5 in Los Angeles, already is the nation’s largest station group. The deal was expected to reshape the local television industry by extending Nexstar’s reach to 265 television stations, up from 164.

If the acquisition is finalized , Nexstar stations would cover 80% of the U.S. population, exceeding a 39% ownership cap set by Congress.

El Segundo-based DirecTV separately sued, alleging the combination of the nation’s two largest television station groups would do irreparable harm to its pay-TV business by raising prices and potentially increasing programming blackouts.

Representatives of Nexstar, DirecTV and Bonta’s office declined to comment after Tuesday’s hearing.

During the hearing, Nexstar attorney Alexander Okuliar, argued against an injunction, saying the plaintiffs had failed to demonstrate that the merger posed an immediate threat to the public. He said DirecTV and the attorneys general had only offered proposed financial harms.

In court documents, the state attorneys general and DirecTV alleged the deal would give Nexstar multiple TV stations in dozens of markets. That raised concerns about layoffs in an industry that has sustained significant downsizing in recent years as viewers and advertisers migrate to streaming options and social media platforms like TikTok.

Nexstar could “shut down local newsrooms in dozens of markets, reducing the amount, variety, and quality of local broadcast news that Americans rely on for trusted information about their communities,” DirecTV alleged.

For example, Nexstar owns the Fox station in Sacramento, while McLean, Virginia-based Tegna owns the ABC affiliate.

Okuliar pushed back, saying there was no evidence that local newsrooms would be shuttered.

“One of the reasons for this deal is to protect local broadcasters, to protect local journalism,” he told the judge.

Nexstar contends the deal would strengthen TV station economics, allowing stations to bolster their news gathering and expand the number of newscasts. The company cited dozens of awards won by Nexstar journalists, including in Oklahoma City.

In addition to Bonta, the plaintiffs include state attorneys general in Colorado, Connecticut, Illinois, New York, North Carolina, Oregon and Virginia.

Nearly two dozen lawyers attended the hearing on behalf of the other plaintiffs. Eight lawyers represented Nexstar and Tegna.

Nexstar Chief Executive Perry Sook and Chief Operating officer Michael Biard also attended.

In its complaint, DirecTV argued that it would suffer financial harm because Nexstar would use its increased heft to demand significantly higher fees for the rights to carry its network-affiliate stations, which carry local news, primetime shows and professional sports, including NFL football. Such programming disputes can lead to blackouts which infuriate customers.

Nexstar’s lawyers disputed such allegations, telling the judge the merger would ultimately increase the value of content. The company suggested the deal could lower prices for distributors like DirecTV, which has about 10 million customers nationwide.

Nunley recently combined the DirecTV and state attorneys general lawsuits into one.

The judge, who was elevated to the federal bench by President Obama, had already expressed concerns about the merger.

In his March 27 order granting the temporary restraining order, Nunley said DirecTV had demonstrated that it could prevail at a trial due to the merits of its arguments.

He then instructed Nexstar to “immediately cease all ongoing actions relating to integration and consolidation of Nexstar and Tegna.”

Instead, the Tegna unit must continue to operate independently as “an ongoing, economically viable, and active competitor,” the judge wrote.

The Nexstar-Tegna merger took on political overtones in early February after Trump threw his weight behind it, writing in a post on Truth Social that the proposed union was among the “good deals,” because it would provide competition against “THE ENEMY, the Fake News National TV Networks.”

“GET THAT DEAL DONE!” Trump wrote.

The state attorneys general sued to block the merger on March 18, when the transaction was still pending at the U.S. Justice Department, which is tasked with conducting anti-trust reviews, and the Federal Communications Commission, which oversees TV station licenses.

The DOJ and FCC blessed the deal the following day.

Within an hour, Nexstar announced that it finalized the transaction and that Tegna had been disbanded.

“It’s very rare to do what Nexstar did here,” DirecTV’s attorney Glenn Pomerantz said.

Nexstar had asked the judge to require the plaintiffs to post a $150 million bond to compensate it for damages it would suffer from any delays in closing the deal.

WASHINGTON — President Trump spent much of last week railing against the courts. The courts, in turn, spent it ruling against him.

While Trump made history as the first sitting president to attend oral arguments at the Supreme Court, where he stared down justices as they questioned his bid to end birthright citizenship, quieter courtrooms across the country were challenging his agenda.

The challenges came in on immigration, on his White House ballroom project, on his own liability in the run-up to Jan. 6.

“Dumb Judges and Justices will not a great Country make!” he wrote on Truth Social on Monday.

By Friday, judges had served him loss after loss, each finding the administration had taken executive authority too far, too fast.

Immigration rulings

On immigration, the keystone of Trump’s policy platform, he faced a number of setbacks.

On Monday, a federal judge in California took a step that would allow a class-action lawsuit against the administration’s handling of certain asylum claims. The case concerns thousands of asylum seekers who had made appointments with immigration officials by using a Biden administration phone app called CBP One.

In many cases, migrants from around the world had waited months in Mexico for their turn to speak with border agents after securing appointments through the app.

Those appointments were suddenly canceled after Trump took office. The judge certified those asylum seekers as a class that can challenge the administration’s action in court.

In a similar case, a federal judge in Boston ruled Tuesday that the administration had unlawfully terminated the temporary legal status of as many as 900,000 immigrants who entered the country after using the phone app. Tens of thousands of those told by the administration to leave the U.S. “immediately” have since left or been deported.

The judge ordered the administration to reinstate the legal status and work authorization of those remaining.

“Today’s ruling is a clear rejection of an administration that has tried to erase lawful status for hundreds of thousands of people with the click of a button,” said Skye Perryman, president and CEO of Democracy Forward, a legal organization that represented the migrants.

Sanctuary laws

Also Tuesday, a federal judge threw out a Justice Department lawsuit that accused Denver and Colorado of interfering with immigration enforcement and claimed that the city and state’s “sanctuary” laws violated the Constitution.

The ruling found that the federal government had not shown it could override state and local decisions about how to use their own resources. The Constitution, the judge said, does not let Washington commandeer local governments.

“Colorado gets to make a choice: How will our law enforcement operate in Colorado. The federal government, they don’t get to make that choice for us,” Colorado Atty. Gen. Phil Weiser said.

Birthright citizenship

The next day, the Supreme Court justices appeared skeptical of Trump’s claim that birthright citizenship doesn’t apply to babies born in the U.S. to parents who are here unlawfully or temporarily.

Conservative and liberal judges alike questioned the arguments of Solicitor Gen. John Sauer, who represented the administration, saying he relied on “some pretty obscure sources,” including precedents that dated back to Roman law.

Trump, sitting feet from the proceedings, left the Supreme Court building halfway through.

“We are the only Country in the World STUPID enough to allow ‘Birthright’ Citizenship!” he wrote shortly after departing.

Austin Kocher, a Syracuse University professor who studies immigration enforcement, wrote on Substack after the Supreme Court hearing that, on immigration policy, there is always a gap between what an administration says it will do and what the government can actually deliver. That gap, he argued, is particularly evident in the second Trump administration.

“The White House has built its political identity around the promise of mass deportation, and the rhetoric has been relentless: record arrests, expanded detention, military flights, the spectacle of enforcement as governance,” Kocher wrote.

“But over the past several days,” he added, “developments from multiple fronts suggests that the operational foundations of the mass deportation campaign are more fragile than the administration would like anyone to believe.”

Defying judicial orders

In some cases, the Trump administration has been undeterred by judicial orders to stop certain practices. In a March ruling unsealed Thursday, a federal judge found that Border Patrol agents had continued making illegal arrests in California’s Central Valley without reasonable suspicion.

The government’s explanations for the arrests, wrote Judge Jennifer Thurston in Fresno, “rely on unsupported assumptions, hunches and generalizations about the relationship between a person’s apparent status as a day laborer and their immigration status.”

White House ballroom

Trump had kicked the week off March 29 by touting his 90,000-square-foot ballroom project, showing designs to reporters on Air Force One.

“I think it’ll be the greatest ballroom anywhere in the world,” he said. Two days later, U.S. District Judge Richard Leon ordered a temporary halt to construction.

Leon stated that the president is the “steward” of the White House, not its “owner,” and ruled that he cannot proceed with such a massive structural change without express authorization from Congress.

In response, Trump raged on Truth Social: “In the Ballroom case, the Judge said we have to get Congressional approval. He is WRONG! Congressional approval has never been given on anything, in these circumstances, big or small, having to do with construction at the White House.”

His administration filed a motion Friday to block the judge’s ruling.

Jan 6. liability

On the same day, a judge ruled that Trump remains personally liable in a civil lawsuit tied to the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol, allowing those claims to move forward.

It is among the most consequential legal threats he faces.

Trump entered the presidency on the heels of a major Supreme Court win that found former presidents have criminal and civil immunity for official acts during their term.

But Tuesday, U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta deemed Trump’s Jan. 6 speech — in which he directed supporters to march to the Capitol and “fight like hell” — was a political act, not a presidential one, and therefore not shielded by immunity.

“President Trump has not shown that the speech reasonably can be understood as falling within the outer perimeter of his Presidential duties. The content of the ellipse speech confirms that it is not covered by official-acts immunity,” Mehta wrote.

The week ended with yet another setback for Trump when a federal judge on Friday blocked the administration from forcing universities to submit extensive data on applicants and students to prove they don’t illegally consider race in admissions.

Reading the losses

For Adam Winkler, a constitutional law professor at UCLA who has tracked the administration’s legal battles closely, the losing streak had a clear through line.

“It was an awful week for Donald Trump,” he said. “It’s not that the courts are anti-Trump. In fact, he wins a lot. It’s really that he takes such an aggressive approach to policy making that he runs afoul of existing precedents.”

Taken together, last week’s rulings signaled that the courts are insisting that the president is as accountable for his actions as anyone, and that states have constitutional powers he alone cannot override.

“The Trump administration’s recent court losses illustrate that there is still much that the other branches of government can do — in connection with civil society — to uphold the rule of law and mitigate the harms of the administration’s destructive agenda,” said Monika Langarica, deputy legal director at the Center for Human Rights and Constitutional Law.

“They are one more reminder,” she added, “that the administration will not always have the last word with respect to its unlawful and unconstitutional actions.”

April 4 (UPI) — A federal judge has blocked the Trump administration’s attempt to collect data on students on public universities in their attempt to stop them from considering race as part of the admissions process.

Seventeen states had sued to stop the administration from forcing several universities from submitting seven years of data on applicants and admitted students to prove that they have not factored race into admission decisions, Politico and The Los Angeles Times reported.

U.S. District Court Judge Dennis Saylor on Friday night issued a preliminary injunction that will allow universities in California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, Nevada, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, Virginia, Washington and Wisconsin to retain their records until the trial is over.

The injunction said that the administration’s efforts to gather the information are “rushed” and “chaotic,” and moves to shut down the federal Department of Education would not only make collecting and analyzing the data difficult, but it may also become illegal.

“This is not a merely technical issue,” Saylor said in the ruling, explaining that if the department no longer exists, the work “cannot be turned over to States and local communities; they have no authority … to conduct such surveys.”

He added that that only federal agency with that authority is the DOE and its National Center for Education Services, meaning that if the department is shut down, the federal government’s authority to collect and analyze university data “vanishes.”

The Supreme Court in 2023 ruled against using affirmative action — the consideration of race to increase the diversity of university populations — in the admissions process.

The Trump administration has worked to enforce the ruling as part of its antagonistic view of diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) programs. Gathering and analyzing public university data, as well as lawsuits, are among the ways they are doing so.

The federal DOE was created by Congress under President Jimmy Carter in 1979 with the aim of improving coordination and management of federal education programs, but Trump ordered the department to be dismantled in a March 2025 executive order.

Twenty states have sued the administration to prevent that effort, as well.

WASHINGTON — The Trump administration is arguing that a judge’s order to halt construction of a $400-million ballroom creates a security risk for President Trump as it asks a federal appeals court to pause the ruling.

In a motion filed Friday, National Park Service lawyers say that the federal judge’s order to suspend construction of the East Wing ballroom is “threatening grave national-security harms to the White House, the President and his family, and the President’s staff.”

“Time is of the essence!” the lawyers write, citing materials that will be installed to make a “heavily fortified” facility. The ballroom construction also includes bomb shelters, military installations and a medical facility, according to the filing. The ballroom is part of Trump’s plans to remake public buildings and institutions in Washington during his remaining years in office.

U.S. District Judge Richard Leon in Washington on Tuesday ordered the temporary pause of the construction project that has included demolishing the East Wing of the White House. He concluded that unless Congress approves the project, the preservationist group suing to stop it is likely to succeed on the merits of its claims because “no statute comes close to giving the President the authority he claims to have.”

The White House is owned by the federal government, not the president. Even the website of the National Park Service, which filed the motion, makes clear that “the White House is owned by the American people.”

The judge suspended enforcement of his order for 14 days, acknowledging that the administration would appeal his decision.

Leon’s ruling and the appeal come the same week a key agency tasked with approving construction on federal property in the Washington region gave final approval to the project.

In his ruling, Leon, who was nominated by Republican President George W. Bush, suspended enforcement of his order, recognizing that “halting an ongoing construction project may raise logistical issues.”

Leon also addressed national security in his ruling, saying that he reviewed information that the government privately submitted to him and concluded that halting construction wouldn’t jeopardize national security. He exempted any construction work that is necessary for the safety and security of the White House from the scope of the injunction.

Trump lashed out at the ruling, while noting that it would allow work on underground bunkers and other security measures around the White House grounds to continue — even though those will be paid for by taxpayers. Trump has pledged that he, along with private donors, will cover the costs for the ballroom itself.

But the National Park Service argues in its motion that the president has “complete authority to renovate the White House” and the current state of the grounds, which is an open construction site, make it harder to protect the White House.

“Canvas tents, which are necessary without a ballroom, are significantly more vulnerable to missiles, drones, and other threats than a hardened national security facility,” the motion says.

The Trump administration is asking the appeals court to make a decision on its request by Friday. It also asked that the 14-day suspension of Leon’s order be extended by two weeks so the case can be taken to the Supreme Court.

Groves writes for the Associated Press.

April 3 (UPI) — A federal judge on Friday refused a Department of Justice request for him to reconsider his earlier ruling to block grand jury subpoenas it issued to Fed Chairman Jerome Powell.

U.S. District Judge James Boasberg on Friday said he would not lift his block on subpoenas that the Justice Department issued to board of the Federal Reserve regarding the $2.5 billion renovation of the Fed’s complex in Washington, D.C.

The judge had previously blocked the subpoenas because, he said, they had nothing to do with a Justice Department probe about the renovations, but rather were intended to pressure Powell into adjusting interest rates, as President Donald Trump had been chiding him to do for months.

“On March 11, 2026, this Court issued a Memorandum Opinion and Order that quashed the Government’s subpoenas directed to the Board of Governors of the Federal Research System,” Boasberg wrote in a response to the Justice Department request that was filed on Friday.

“The Government promptly moved for reconsideration of that decision,” he wrote. “As its cursory brief neither offers new evidence nor points to any material error, the Court will deny the Motion.”

The DOJ launched its criminal investigation into the Fed’s renovation budget, which Powell at the time called “pretexts” to punish him for not setting interest rates based on Trump demands.

Boasberg, in his response to the Justice when he blocked the subpoenas said that the government “has produced essentially zero evidence to suspect Chair Powell of a crime.”

The Justice Department later acknowledged when appealing Boasberg’s quashing of the subpoenas that it did not have evidence that a crime had been committed, instead saying that there were “1.2 billion reasons for us to look into it.”

Across the country, President Trump has installed handpicked loyalists as top federal prosecutors. Several have been pushed out after legal battles because they lack Senate confirmation to serve as U.S. attorneys.

But in Los Angeles, Bill Essayli wields the power of a top prosecutor under a lesser title: “first assistant.”

Essayli clocked his first full year in office this week. He has survived the kinds of challenges that sunk Trump picks in other states through a combination of legal gamesmanship by the U.S. Department of Justice and a lack of action by judges in the Central District of California.

Essayli has used his position to act as one of Trump’s fiercest legal foot soldiers. He has pursued criminal charges against protesters, activists and immigrants while dropping cases involving administration allies and supporting lawsuits over transgender and environmental policies in California.

After Trump’s firing Thursday of U.S. Atty. Gen. Pam Bondi, it’s unclear how her replacement will handle continuing battles over the legality of Trump’s appointees. Essayli is popular with high-level administration officials, and received a congratulatory post on X from Vice President JD Vance over the filing of fraud cases earlier this week.

A conservative former state Assembly member from Riverside County, Essayli, 40, was sworn in as interim U.S. attorney last April. Around the time he hit that role’s 120-day limit, Bondi made him a “special attorney” and designated him “first assistant.” A federal judge later disqualified Essayli as acting U.S. attorney, finding he was “not lawfully serving” in the top role. But the judge said he had no authority to undo Essayli’s designation as first assistant. With no one above him in the office, that title leaves Essayli as the de facto U.S. attorney.

In other jurisdictions, members of the federal bench have exercised their authority to appoint an interim U.S. attorney. Chief U.S. District Judge Dolly M. Gee’s chambers did not respond to a request for comment about why no similar action has been taken in L.A.

A court spokesman declined to comment. Essayli did not respond to a request for comment. The White House referred questions to the Justice Department.

A Justice Department spokesperson issued a statement that praised Essayli for prosecuting “drug cartels and transnational criminal organizations, sex traffickers, violent street gangs, leftist rioters and domestic terrorists, fraudsters, and child predators.”

“It is a disservice to our prosecutors and the American people when judges prevent the President and the Attorney General from installing qualified and capable prosecutors who will aggressively enforce our laws and make America safe again,” the Justice Department spokesperson said.

The lack of action by Gee, a President Obama appointee, has surprised some legal observers, especially given the swiftness with which judges in other districts have acted. It also has frustrated some former federal prosecutors that fled the office under Essayli’s chaotic tenure.

One former assistant U.S. attorney, who left the office under Essayli and requested anonymity to discuss sitting judges who will likely preside over future cases of theirs in the district, accused Gee and others of “shirking their responsibilities” by not appointing someone to the vacant U.S. attorney post.

Another former Central District prosecutor who left the office before Essayli’s appointment said Gee was being practical, taking a “protective” stance to “keep the court away from the ire and invectives coming out of the White House.”

It is “unfair to say the court is abdicating its authority,” said the ex-prosecutor, who also requested anonymity to speak candidly about the district’s judges.

Under long-standing Senate tradition, individual senators can block a U.S. attorney nominee in their home state by withholding their “blue slip,” which clears a nominee’s path to a confirmation hearing.

Trump has tried to skirt the Senate confirmation process to appoint top federal prosecutors in multiple states, including New Jersey and Virginia, where two of the president’s personal lawyers were named U.S. attorney — who immediately moved to zealously advance the president’s agenda and, in some cases, prosecute his rivals.

In Virginia, Trump replaced U.S. Atty. Erik Siebert, a nominee who was under Senate consideration, with one of his former personal attorneys, Lindsey Halligan. Siebert had refused to prosecute some of Trump’s political enemies and resigned. In her first ever criminal case, Halligan swiftly moved to indict former FBI Director James B. Comey. The prosecution was later thrown out and Halligan’s appointment deemed illegal.

In New York’s Northern District, when judges moved to oust the president’s former campaign attorney — who received the same “first assistant” designation as Essayli — Justice Department officials promptly fired his replacement.

Erwin Chemerinsky, dean of the UC Berkeley School of Law, said Trump’s attempts to bypass the normal confirmation processes are unconstitutional.

“This is very troubling because it circumvents the constitutional procedure of having the president nominate and the Senate confirm. That’s crucial to checks and balances,” he said. “This allows the president to appoint whoever he wants.”

Though Essayli has more law enforcement experience than many of Trump’s chosen prosecutors, he’s still struggled to achieve courtroom victories. His prosecutors have lost nearly all the cases they’ve brought to trial against anti-Trump protesters and abandoned others after grand juries refused to return indictments.

Meghan Blanco, a former federal prosecutor and veteran defense attorney, suggested Gee’s inaction with Essayli might be a clever act of resistance. Rather than picking a fight with the White House, Blanco said, the judges are letting the top prosecutor fall on his face.

“If you’re a judge and displeased with what DOJ is doing and the shenanigans they’re pulling … you let the Essayli appointment play out,” Blanco said. “No one has seen a U.S. attorney’s office lose the way this office is losing now.”

Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) told The Times this week that he is working with Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) to craft legislation to clarify the procedures required to appoint U.S. attorneys and prevent Trump and future presidents from circumventing the Senate.

The legislation, which Schiff did not describe in detail, faces an uphill battle even if Democrats retake the Senate in the upcoming midterms. But the California senator said he is committed to challenging Trump’s maneuvering.

Schiff said Essayli “could not be confirmed and for a reason: He lacks the judgment, temperament and integrity required of a U.S. attorney.”

Laurie Levenson, a Loyola Law School professor and former federal prosecutor, said local federal judges may believe it would be “more disruptive to try and put somebody in when the administration will just fire them.”

But their inaction, she said, has effectively confirmed Essayli as U.S. attorney — and highlights “a real weakness in the system” that demands a legislative fix.

“The bottom line is you have an administration that just doesn’t want to follow the rules,” she said. “There has to be some political will to have Congress do its duty.”

A United States federal judge has once again batted down a pair of subpoenas from the administration of President Donald Trump seeking information about Jerome Powell, the chairman of the Federal Reserve, the country’s central bank.

In a brief, six-page opinion published on Friday, Judge James Boasberg rejected the Department of Justice’s motion to reconsider his earlier ruling rejecting the subpoenas.

“The Government’s arguments do not come close to convincing the Court that a different outcome is warranted,” Boasberg wrote.

On March 13, Boasberg, a judge for the federal court in the District of Columbia, nullified the subpoenas on the basis that they were issued for an “improper purpose”: to pressure Powell into compliance with the president’s demands.

Trump and Powell — an appointee from the president’s first term — have been at loggerheads since the Republican leader returned to the White House in January 2025.

Although the Federal Reserve is an independent government agency, not subject to political demands, Trump has repeatedly called on the bank to slash interest rates, and he has denounced Powell as “incompetent”, “crooked” and a “fool” for not following suit.

For months, pressure had been building from the Trump White House to investigate Powell and push him prematurely from his job as Federal Reserve chair. Powell’s term is slated to expire in May.

Much of the Trump administration’s focus has fallen on renovations to the Federal Reserve’s historic 1930s buildings in Washington, DC, which have gone over budget.

The administration has pointed to the cost overruns as evidence of malfeasance.

Last July, for instance, Trump appointee William Pulte called on Congress to investigate Powell for “political bias” and “deceptive” testimony related to the renovation project.

The following month, Trump posted on his platform Truth Social that he was considering “a major lawsuit against Powell” in response to “horrible, and grossly incompetent” work on the renovations.

The pressure reached a climax on January 11, when Powell made a rare statement announcing he was under a Justice Department investigation over the renovation project. He dismissed the probe as a “pretext” to undermine the Federal Reserve’s leadership over monetary policy.

“The threat of criminal charges is a consequence of the Federal Reserve setting interest rates based on our best assessment of what will serve the public, rather than following the preferences of the president,” Powell said.

The Federal Reserve has since sought to have the subpoenas into Powell’s behaviour tossed.

Boasberg sided with the central bank in his initial ruling, and in Friday’s opinion, he called the Trump administration’s efforts to change his mind insufficient.

The Justice Department had argued that it does not need to produce evidence of a crime to seek a grand jury subpoena.

Boasberg agreed with that point, but he said subpoenas were also subject to a legal standard that bars them from being issued for “improper” purposes.

“The subpoena power ‘is not unlimited’ and may not be abused,” Boasberg wrote, citing court precedent.

He therefore ruled that the lack of evidence overall against Powell was relevant to the legality of the subpoenas.

“The controlling legal question is what these ‘subpoena[s’] dominant purpose’ is: pressuring Powell to lower rates or resign, or pursuing a legitimate investigation opened because the facts suggested wrongdoing,” Boasberg said.

“Resolving that question requires probing whether the Government’s asserted basis for the subpoenas — suspicions of fraud and lying to Congress — is colorable or tenuous. That inquiry, in turn, means asking how much evidence there is to back up the Government’s assertions.”

Boasberg underscored that he has seen no suggestion that Powell committed criminal wrongdoing and pointed to the long list of statements Trump has made attacking the Federal Reserve chair, suggesting an ulterior motive.

“The Government’s fundamental problem is that it has presented no evidence whatsoever of fraud,” he concluded.

Friday’s ruling is likely to set the stage for the Trump administration to appeal. US Attorney Jeanine Pirro has previously denied any political motivation for the investigation.

She has also asserted that Boasberg is “without legal authority” to nullify the subpoenas.

WASHINGTON — Pam Bondi is out of her job after failing to deliver criminal cases against President Trump’s political enemies.

But there’s no guarantee her successor will have any better success at placating the president.

Over the last year, Bondi’s Justice Department has encountered resistance from judges, grand jurors and its own workforce in trying to establish criminal conduct by one Trump foe after another. A new attorney general will confront not only Trump’s demand for political prosecutions — a constant dating back to his first term in the White House — but also the same skeptical court system, and factual and legal hurdles, that have impeded efforts to deliver the sought-after results.

“At the end of the day, it’s not like there were some magic steps that Pam Bondi could have taken to make bad cases look good to grand juries or judges,” Peter Keisler, a former acting attorney general in President George W. Bush’s administration, said in an email. “The problem is that the president is demanding that prosecutions be brought when there’s no evidence and no valid legal theory. A new Attorney General won’t change that.”

Bondi was just the latest Trump attorney general pressed to meet the president’s demands of loyalty and desire for retribution. Trump in his first term called for Jeff Sessions to investigate Democrat Hillary Clinton and ultimately pushed him out over his recusal from the Russia election interference investigation. He berated another attorney general, William Barr, over Barr’s refusal to back his false claims of election fraud in the 2020 contest. Barr resigned soon after.

Bondi arrived at the Justice Department 14 months ago seemingly determined to remain in Trump’s good graces unlike her predecessors had, heaping praise on him, offering unflinching support and embarking on investigations into Democrats and the president’s adversaries — even amid concerns from career prosecutors about the sufficiency of evidence.

Days after Trump implored Bondi via social media last September to prosecute former FBI Director James Comey and New York Atty. Gen. Letitia James, the Justice Department did just that, securing indictments in Virginia.

But the win was short-lived: a judge weeks later dismissed the cases after finding that the prosecutor who filed them, Lindsey Halligan, was illegally appointed. Grand juries have since refused to bring new mortgage fraud charges against James and the Comey case is mired in a thorny evidentiary dispute and statute of limitations concerns. Both Comey and James have vigorously denied any wrongdoing and called the cases against them politically motivated.

Since then, a federal grand jury in Washington refused to return an indictment against Democratic lawmakers in connection with a video in which they urged U.S. military members to resist “illegal orders.” And a federal judge has quashed Justice Department subpoenas issued to the Federal Reserve as part of an investigation into testimony last June by Chair Jerome Powell about a $2.5 billion building renovation.

The judge, James Boasberg, said that the government has “produced essentially zero evidence to suspect Chair Powell of a crime” and called its justifications for the subpoenas a “thin and unsubstantiated” pretext to force Powell to cut interest rates. A prosecutor on the case subsequently conceded in court that the investigation had not found evidence of a crime.

An additional investigation into a Trump enemy remains underway with prosecutors in Florida scrutinizing former CIA Director John Brennan over testimony to Congress related to Russian interference in the 2016 election. That investigation has been open for months, but has not produced charges and it’s not clear that it will. Brennan’s lawyers have similarly called the investigation baseless.

One high-profile Trump critic who could face trial in the years ahead is his former national security adviser, John Bolton, though the investigation that produced that indictment and examined Bolton’s handling of classified documents began before Trump took office.

For now, the Justice Department will be led by Deputy Atty. Gen. Todd Blanche, who has a longstanding relationship with Trump after having served as one of his personal lawyers. Several people familiar with the matter told the Associated Press on Thursday that Lee Zeldin, a Trump loyalist and head of the Environmental Protection Agency, has been privately mentioned by Trump as a possible pick.

Whoever holds the job in the long term will almost certainly be expected to carry out Trump’s retribution campaign with more success, said Jimmy Gurule, a former Justice Department official and law professor at Notre Dame. Blanche appeared to acknowledge as much in a Thursday evening interview with Fox News, saying “I think the president is frustrated, everybody is frustrated ” and that “what we saw happen for the past four years is unforgivable and can never happen again.”

“If she was fired because Trump did not think that she was moving quickly enough in bringing criminal cases against his political enemies, then you would expect that the person that would replace her would probably agree to escalate those efforts,” Gurule said.

Tucker writes for the Associated Press.

BLAKE Lively has broken her silence after a judge threw out most of her claims against Justin Baldoni.

Ten of the 13 claims Lively, 38, filed against Baldoni, 42, were thrown out on Thursday, April 2, by a judge.

The claims relating to harassment, defamation and conspiracy follow conflict while the pair filmed the 2024 Colleen Hoover adaptation It Ends With Us.

The remaining claims against Baldoni’s company Wayfarer Studios, which include breach of contract and retaliation, will move forward to trial.

“This case has always been and will remain focused on the devasting [sic] retaliation and the extraordinary steps the defendants took to destroy Blake Lively’s reputation because she stood up for safety on the set and that is the case that is going to trial,” said Sigrid McCawley, member of Lively’s legal team, told PEOPLE.

“For Blake Lively, the greatest measure of justice is that the people and the playbook behind these coordinated digital attacks have been exposed and are already being held accountable by other women they’ve targeted.

“She looks forward to testifying at trial and continuing to shine a light on this vicious form of online retaliation so that it becomes easier to detect and fight.”

District Judge Lewis Liman said Lively sued under California law but the alleged wrongful conduct took place elsewhere.

He also cited other issues in the cases, such as the fact that Lively had not signed an agreement that would have governed sexual harassment on set.

The judge said the actress could pursue her retaliation claims, among others, against Baldoni’s studio.

“Sexual harassment isn’t going forward not because the defendants did nothing wrong but because the court determined Blake Lively was an independent contractor, not an employee, said McCawley.

Justin Baldoni responds to judge throwing out case

“We’re very pleased the Court dismissed all sexual harassment claims and every claim brought against the individual defendants: Justin Baldoni, Jamey Heath, Steve Sarowitz, Melissa Nathan, and Jennifer Abel,” said Baldoni’s attorneys, Alexandra Shapiro and Jonathan Bach to The Daily Mail.

“These were very serious allegations, and we are grateful to the Court for its careful review of the facts, law and voluminous evidence that was provided.

“What’s left is a significantly narrowed case, and we look forward to presenting our defense to the remaining claims in court.”

Lively claimed that Baldoni kissed her during a scene where the script didn’t call for it and said he entered her trailer while she breastfed.

The actress also claimed that Baldoni tried to harm her reputation after she asserted he had created a problematic work environment.

Baldoni claimed Lively and her husband, Ryan Reynolds, tried to tarnish his reputation, engaged in extortion, and hijacked creative control of the romance film.

Baldoni’s $400 million defamation lawsuit against Blake was dismissed by a judge in November.

The pair will now appear in court on May 18 in New York.

Legal representatives for both have said Baldoni and Lively both plan to testify.

DENVER — A Colorado appeals court ruled Thursday that a former county clerk convicted in a scheme that sought to prove fraud in the 2020 presidential election should be resentenced because a judge wrongly punished her for statements protected as free speech.

Tina Peters is serving a nine-year prison term after being convicted of state crimes for sneaking in an outside computer expert to make a copy of her county’s election computer system during a software update in 2021. A photo and video of confidential voting system passwords were later posted on social media and a conservative website.

Calls for Peters’ release have become a cause celebre in the election conspiracy movement. President Trump has sought unsuccessfully to pardon Peters and pressured Colorado to set her free.

Judges on the Colorado Court of Appeals upheld her conviction in a 74-page ruling that rejected the notion that Trump has authority to pardon her state crimes. But they said a lower court judge should not have considered Peters’ continued promotion of election fraud conspiracies when he sentenced her in 2024.

One of Tina Peters’ lawyers, John Case, said the court’s ruling affirmed the importance of free speech.

“Tina Peters was punished for words that she used to criticize our insecure and illegal voting system,” Case said. “The decision affirms that people are free to speak what they believe in Colorado as well as the rest of the United States of America.”

Case said he would likely ask at resentencing for Peters to receive the approximately 540 days she’s served already. That would allow her to be freed.

Democratic Colorado Gov. Jared Polis, who has been considering granting clemency to Peters, praised the court’s decision for rejecting Trump’s pardon but upholding her free speech rights.

“This case has been very challenging and a true test of our resolve as a state to have a fair judicial system, not just for people we agree with but a fair system for Coloradans that we vehemently disagree with,” Polis said in statement.

Peters was the former clerk in Mesa County, in the far western part of Colorado, and convicted by jurors in the Republican stronghold that has supported Trump.

She was unapologetic when she was sentenced by Judge Matthew Barrett and insisted that she tried to unearth what she believed was fraud for the greater good. He ripped into her, calling her a “charlatan” who had used her position to “peddle snake oil.”

The appeals court found that Barrett violated her rights to free speech by punishing Peters for persistently alleging fraud in the 2020 election. They noted that because Peters is no longer serving as an election clerk, she can no longer engage in the conduct that led to her conviction.

“The trial court obviously erred by imposing sentence at least partially based on Peters’ protected speech,” Judge Ted Tow wrote in Thursday’s ruling.

The court sent Peters’ case back to a lower court for a judge to issue a new sentence.

Trump has threatened to take “harsh measures” against Colorado unless the state releases Peters. In February, Trump said Colorado was “suffering a big price” for refusing to release her.

Colorado Atty. Gen. Phil Weiser, a Democrat who is running for governor, has accused the Trump administration of waging a revenge campaign by choking off funds and ending federal programs over the state’s refusal to free Peters.

Weiser said in response to the ruling that the original sentence had been “fair and appropriate.”

“Whatever happens with her sentence, Tina Peters will always be a convicted felon who violated her duty as Mesa County clerk, put other lives at risk, and threatened our democracy. Nothing will remove that stain,” Weiser said in a statement.

The Justice Department inserted itself into Peters’ bid to be released while her state appeal was considered. The federal Bureau of Prisons also tried to get Peters moved to a federal prison. After both efforts failed, Trump in December announced a pardon for Peters.

However, the appeals court judges said they could find no prior example of a president pardoning someone for a state crime. And they rejected her attorney’s claims that Peters actions had been carried out while “defending a federal interest.”

“We have found no instance where the presidential pardon power has been stretched in such a way as to invade an individual state’s sovereignty,” they said, adding that the president’s pardon has “no impact” on the state’s case against Peters.

The Associated Press left messages with the White House for comment.

She was convicted of three counts of attempting to influence a public servant and one count each of conspiracy to commit criminal impersonation, first-degree official misconduct, violation of duty and failure to comply with the requirements of the secretary of state.

Peters’ lawyers didn’t deny that she used the security badge of a local man she pretended to hire to allow an associate of MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell to make a copy of the Dominion Voting Systems election computer server during an annual software update in 2021.

But they said she only wanted to preserve election data and find out whether any outside actor had accessed the system while ballots were being counted. They said she didn’t want the information made public.

Slevin and Brown write for the Associated Press.

WASHINGTON — President Trump is not immune from civil claims that he incited a mob of his supporters to attack the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, a federal judge has ruled in one of the last unresolved legal cases stemming from the riot.

U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta ruled Tuesday that Trump’s remarks at his “Stop the Steal” rally, held on the Ellipse near the White House shortly before the siege began, “plausibly” were inciting words that are not protected by the 1st Amendment right to free speech.

The Republican president is not shielded from liability for much of his Jan. 6 conduct, including that speech and many of his social media posts that day, according to the judge. But Mehta said Trump cannot be held liable for his official acts that day, including his Rose Garden remarks during the riot and his interactions with Justice Department officials.

“President Trump has not shown that the Speech reasonably can be understood as falling within the outer perimeter of his Presidential duties,” Mehta wrote. “The content of the Ellipse Speech confirms that it is not covered by official-acts immunity.”

Not the first court ruling on presidential immunity

The decision is not the court’s first ruling that Trump can be held liable for the violence at the Capitol and it is unlikely to be the last given the near-certainty of an appeal. But the 79-page ruling sets the stage for a possible civil trial in the same courthouse where Trump was charged with crimes for his Jan. 6 conduct, before his 2024 election ended the prosecution.

Mehta previously refused to dismiss the claims against Trump in a February 2022 ruling that Trump was not entitled to presidential immunity from the claims brought by Democratic members of Congress and law enforcement officers who guarded the Capitol on Jan. 6. In that decision, Mehta also concluded that Trump’s words during his rally speech plausibly amounted to incitement and were not protected by the 1st Amendment.

The case returned to Mehta after an appeals court ruling upheld his 2022 decision. He said Tuesday’s ruling on immunity falls under a more “rigorous” legal standard at this later stage in the litigation.

Mehta, who was nominated by Democratic President Obama, said his latest decision is not a “final pronouncement on immunity for any particular act.”

“President Trump remains free to reassert official-acts immunity as a defense at trial. But the burden will remain his and will be subject to a higher standard of proof,” the judge wrote.

Official capacity vs. office-seeker

Trump spoke to a crowd of his supporters at the rally before the mob’s attack disrupted the joint session of Congress for certifying Democrat Joe Biden’s 2020 electoral victory over Trump. Trump closed out his speech by saying, “We fight. We fight like hell and if you don’t fight like hell, you’re not going to have a country anymore.”

Trump’s lawyers argued that Trump’s conduct on Jan. 6 meets the threshold for presidential immunity.

The plaintiffs contended that Trump cannot prove he was acting entirely in his official capacity rather than as an office-seeking private individual. They also said the Supreme Court has held that office-seeking conduct falls outside the scope of presidential immunity.

Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., who at that time led the House Homeland Security Committee, sued Trump, Trump’s personal attorney Rudolph Giuliani and members of the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers extremist groups over the Jan. 6 riot. Other Democratic members of Congress later joined the litigation, which was consolidated with the officers’ claims.

‘Victory for the rule of law’

The civil claims survived Trump’s sweeping act of clemency on the first day of his second term, when he pardoned, commuted prison sentences and ordered the dismissal of all 1,500-plus criminal cases stemming from the Capitol siege. More than 100 police officers were injured while defending the Capitol from rioters.

The plaintiffs’ legal team includes attorneys from the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law. Damon Hewitt, the group’s president and executive director, praised the ruling as a “monumental victory for the rule of law, affirming that no one, including the president of the United States, is above it.”

“The court rightly recognizes that President Trump’s actions leading to the January 6 insurrection fell outside the scope of presidential duties,” Hewitt said in a statement. “This ruling is an important step toward accountability for the violent attack on the Capitol and our democracy.”

Kunzelman writes for the Associated Press.

April 1 (UPI) — A federal judge ruled that a civil suit against President Donald Trump for his actions on Jan. 6, 2021, can continue.

District Court Judge Amit Mehta ruled Tuesday that Trump’s speech on the Ellipse in Washington, D.C., on Jan. 6 was not covered by the Supreme Court‘s immunity ruling, meaning it could not be considered a core presidential act.

The suit was brought by several Democratic lawmakers and Oakland, Calif., Mayor Barbara J. Lee. The American Civil Liberties Union is also helping with the case.

“President Trump has not shown that the Speech reasonably can be understood as falling within the outer perimeter of his Presidential duties,” Mehta wrote in his decision. “The content of the Ellipse Speech confirms that it is not covered by official-acts immunity.”

Trump has tried to get the case thrown out by claiming presidential immunity for his actions on that day and in the weeks before it.

But Mehta said, “Nearly all the individuals who ran the nuts and bolts of the operation [the Jan. 6 rally] were former Campaign officials, paid staff or consultants, who had concluded their formal work for the Campaign within the 60 days prior to January 6. In fact, on January 4, the President met with [Katrina] Pierson, still a senior campaign advisor only four days prior, in the White House to discuss the Rally’s production elements and speaker list. She — not White House officials — communicated the President’s wishes back to Rally organizers.”

Mehta also declared that Trump’s phone call to Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger asking him to “find” more votes “can only reasonably be viewed as the act of an office-seeker” and was an effort “to alter the outcome of Georgia’s election, not those of an incumbent President acting in his official capacity.”

Joseph Sellers, an attorney for the plaintiffs, said he welcomed the ruling.

“We’re very pleased that the court recognized that President Trump cannot avoid accountability for his conduct on Jan. 6, 2021,” Sellers said in an interview with Politico. “This decision, if it holds up, is going to pave the way to a trial in federal district court on these claims.”

In a statement, Trump’s legal team disputed the judge’s conclusion.

“The facts show that on January 6, 2021, President Trump was acting on behalf of the American people, carrying out his official duties as President of the United States,” Politico reported the statement said. “President Trump will continue to fight back against the Democrat Witch Hoaxes and keep delivering historic results for the American People.”

“Donald Trump thinks he can get away with murder,” Rep. Eric Swalwell, D-Calif., one of the plaintiffs, said in a statement.

“This lawsuit is long overdue for his hand in the destruction of our Capitol and the attack on our democracy on January 6. This case is for my colleagues, the brave Capitol Police officers, Americans everywhere, and the future of our nation. Those who incited and fueled the violence must be held responsible. I’m thankful that we will get some accountability and some measure of closure from that dark day. And that finally, the truth will come to light. We deserve it,” Swalwell said.

A federal judge in Rhode Island ruled on Tuesday that the Trump administration’s effort to dramatically change the criteria to get tens of millions of dollars in funding to aid homeless people was unlawful.

Several nonprofits filed a lawsuit last year accusing the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development of changing the rules for receiving $75 million to build housing for homeless families and individuals. The plaintiffs accused the Trump administration of issuing a new Notice of Funding Opportunity, or NOFO, for the Continuum of Care program to better align with its social policies.

U.S District Judge Mary McElroy, nominated by President Trump, said the department’s “slapdash imposition of political whims” was unlawful and she ordered it to scrap the new policy.

“Once again, this Court is faced with a case in which an executive agency has made a last-minute decision to make major, disruptive changes to grants within its purview, all for the express purpose of accomplishing the current administration’s policy objectives,” McElroy said in her ruling that the NOFO violated the Administrative Procedure Act, a law governing how federal agencies develop and issue regulations.

A spokesperson for HUD did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Advocates for plaintiffs welcomed the ruling.

“For more than three decades, the federal government has supported housing providers and communities through HUD’s programs to help people experiencing homelessness move into stable housing,” Skye Perryman, president and chief executive of Democracy Forward, co-counsel for the plaintiffs, said in a statement. “We are pleased that the court has stopped the Trump-Vance administration from holding life-saving funding hostage to a political agenda.”

Ann Oliva, chief executive of the National Alliance to End Homelessness, said the ruling was “a victory for people across this nation who have overcome homelessness and stabilized in HUD’s permanent housing programs.”

“Today’s news reinforces a fundamental truth: that the work to end homelessness is not partisan, and never should be interfered with for political means,” Oliva said in a statement.

Plaintiffs argued the Trump administration was aiming to upend polices in place for decades to satisfy its political considerations, including whether jurisdictions “support sanctuary protections, harm reduction practices, or inclusive policies for transgender people.”

The Alliance and the Women’s Development Corporation argued that HUD lacked the authority to make the changes, adding that the new award process was “shockingly unlawful” and would “irreparably injure qualified applicants for these funds and the communities they serve.”

In its court filings, HUD argued the new criteria was an effort “to ensure the availability of funding to protect our Nation’s most vulnerable individuals and families from the trauma of homelessness while simultaneously promoting self-sufficiency.”

“Defendants acted reasonably and prudently because the NOFO conditions, focusing on public safety, cooperation with law enforcement and prohibitions on illegal drug use, are sufficiently related to the funding goals of self-sufficiency and reduction of trauma,” HUD wrote.

Casey writes for the Associated Press.

April 1 (UPI) — A federal judge has blocked construction of President Donald Trump‘s $400 million White House ballroom, ruling the New York real estate developer does not have congressional authorization to continue the project.

“The President of the United States is the steward of the White House for future generations of First Families. He is not, however, the owner!” U.S. District Judge Richard Leon for the District of Columbia wrote in the ruling.

Trump has said building a White House ballroom had been a dream of his since before he was president. Construction of the 90,000-square-foot building began with the demolition of the East Wing of the White House in October. Initially said to cost $200 million, the ballroom’s price tag has since doubled. Trump has said it will be financed by private donors.

In December, the National Trust for Historic Preservation sued the Trump administration to halt construction, arguing the project has not been authorized by Congress as required by U.S. law.

In response, the Trump administration has claimed Congress has already given him authority to construct the project, pointing to a statute that Leon, a President George W. Bush appointee, said only permits the president “to conduct ordinary maintenance and repair of the White House.”

Leon said the Trump administration’s understanding of the law assumes Congress has granted “nearly unlimited power to the President to construct anything, anywhere on federal land in the District of Columbia, regardless of the source of funds.”

“This clearly is not how Congress and former Presidents have managed the White House for centuries, and this Court will not be the first to hold that Congress has ceded its powers in such a significant fashion,” he said in the 35-page ruling.

For Trump to continue with the project, he can ask Congress to either appropriate the funds or approve of another funding scheme, he said.

“Unfortunately for Defendants, unless and until Congress blesses this project through statutory authorization, construction has to stop!”

In awarding the National Trust for Historic Preservation an injunction, Leon delayed its enforcement for 14 days in acknowledgment that the Trump administration intends to appeal his decision and that stopping an ongoing construction project may raise logistical issues.

“We are pleased with Judge Leon’s ruling today to order a halt to any further ballroom construction until the Administration complies with the law and obtains express authorization to go forward,” Carol Quillen, president and CEO of the nonprofit organization, said in a statement.

“This is a win for the American people on a project that forever impacts one of the most beloved and iconic places in our nation.”

Trump lambasted the decision on his Truth Social platform.

“He is WRONG! Congressional approval has never been given on anything in these circumstances, big or small, having to do with construction at the White House,” he said in a statement.

In an earlier statement issued after the ruling was made, Trump insulted the National Trust for Historic Preservation as “a Radical Left Group of Lunatics.”

According to the White House Historical Association, Congress has long been responsible for appropriating funds for the care, repair, refurnishing and maintenance of the White House, and Congress approved the Truman-era reconstruction project from 1948 to 1952.

District Judge Richard Leon says construction has to stop until Congress provides statutory authorisation.

A judge has ruled that US President Donald Trump cannot proceed with his planned $400m ballroom on the site of the White House’s demolished East Wing without approval from Congress.

District Judge Richard Leon on Tuesday granted a request for a preliminary injunction filed by the National Trust for Historic Preservation, which sued after alleging Trump had exceeded his authority by razing the historic East Wing and launching construction on the new building.

“I have concluded that the National Trust is likely to succeed on the merits because no statute comes close to giving the President the authority he claims to have,” Leon, an appointee of former Republican President George W Bush, wrote in the ruling.

“The President of the United States is the steward of the White House for future generations of First Families. He is not, however, the owner!” he said. “Unless and until Congress blesses this project through statutory authorization, construction has to stop!”

Leon said the order does not affect “construction necessary to ensure the safety and security of the White House”.

His ruling keeps the 90,000 square-foot (8,360 square-metre) ballroom project on hold while the lawsuit continues.

The judge said he was pausing his order for 14 days to allow the ⁠Trump administration to appeal. Hours later, the Justice Department filed an appeal at the Washington, DC-based US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.

Carol Quillen, president and CEO of the National Trust, welcomed Leon’s ruling.

“This is a win for the American people on a project that forever impacts one of the most beloved and iconic places in our nation,” Quillen said in a statement.

In a social media post, Trump called the National Trust a group of left-wing “lunatics” and said his ballroom is “under budget, ahead of schedule, being built at no cost to the Taxpayer, and will be the finest Building of its kind anywhere in the World”.

The Republican has championed the ballroom as a defining addition to the White House and a lasting symbol of his presidency.

March 31 (UPI) — A federal judge in Washington, D.C., ruled Tuesday that President Donald Trump‘s executive order cutting funding to NPR and the PBS was a violation of their First Amendment rights.

U.S. District Judge Randolph Moss said the executive order signed in May violated the companies’ constitutional rights to a free press because Trump targeted for what he described as liberal views. He described the cut to funding as “viewpoint discrimination.”

“The message is clear: NPR and PBS need not apply for any federal benefit because the president disapproves of their ‘left-wing’ coverage of the news,” Moss said in his ruling.

“It is difficult to conceive of clearer evidence that a government action is targeted at viewpoints that the president does not like and seeks to squelch,” he added.

“To be sure, the president is entitled to criticize this or any other reporting, and he can express his own views as he sees fit. He may not, however, use his governmental power to direct federal agencies to exclude plaintiffs from receiving federal grants or other funding in retaliation for saying things that he does not like.”

Trump’s executive order, called Ending Taxpayer Subsidization of Biased Media, ordered the Corporation for Public Broadcasting to stop funding National Public Radio and the Public Broadcasting Service to the maximum extent allowed by law.

At the time, more than 70% of CPB’s congressionally approved $535 million budget went directly to public media stations through grants.

According to NPR, about 1% of its annual operating budget came in the form of grants from CPB and federal agencies and departments, excluding CPB funding for the Public Radio Satellite System. Its largest funding stream — about 36% — comes from sponsorships, donations, memberships and licensing fees.

According to PBS, federal funding covered about 15% of its revenue.

CPB was founded in 1967 as a private nonprofit corporation to fund public television and radio stations and their programs.

NPR sued the Trump administration later in the month, citing First Amendment and 1967 Public Broadcasting Act violations.

WASHINGTON — A federal judge on Tuesday ordered the Trump administration to suspend its construction of a $400 million ballroom where it demolished the East Wing of the White House, barring construction work from proceeding without congressional approval.

U.S. District Judge Richard Leon in Washington granted a preservationist group’s request for a preliminary injunction that temporarily halts President Trump’s White House ballroom project.

Leon, who was nominated to the bench by Republican President George W. Bush, concluded that the National Trust for Historic Preservation is likely to succeed on the merits of its claims because “no statute comes close to giving the President the authority he claims to have.”

“The President of the United States is the steward of the White House for future generations of First Families. He is not, however, the owner!” the judge wrote.

Leon suspended enforcement of his order for 14 days, acknowledging that the case “raises novel and weighty issues, that halting an ongoing construction project “may raise logistical issues.” He also recognized that the administration is likely to appeal his decision.

The judge ruled that any construction work that’s necessary to ensure the safety and security of the White House is exempt from the scope of the injunction. Leon said he reviewed material that the government privately submitted to him before concluding that halting construction wouldn’t jeopardize national security.

Trump, in a social media post, criticized the trust for suing him over a project that he said is being built at no cost to taxpayers. “Doesn’t make much sense, does it?” he wrote.

The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the ruling.

The preservationists sued to obtain an order pausing the ballroom project until it undergoes multiple independent reviews and receives congressional approval.

The White House announced the ballroom project over the summer. By late October, Trump had demolished the East Wing to make way for a ballroom that he said would fit 999 people. The White House said private donations, including from Trump himself, would pay for the planned construction of a 90,000-square-foot ballroom.

Trump proceeded with the project before seeking input from a pair of federal review panels, the National Capital Planning Commission and the Commission of Fine Arts. Trump has stocked both commissions with allies.

On Feb. 26, Leon rejected the preservationist group’s initial bid to temporarily halt the ballroom’s construction. He said the privately funded group had based its challenge on a “ragtag group” of legal theories and would have a better chance of success if it amended the lawsuit, which it did.

The administration has said above-ground construction on the ballroom would begin in April.

“We are two weeks away,” plaintiffs’ attorney Thaddeus Heuer said during a March 17 hearing. “The imminence is now imminent.”

During the hearing, Leon sounded skeptical of what he referred to as the government’s “shifting theories and shifting dynamics” for its arguments in the case.

“I don’t think it’s a new theory,” Justice Department attorney Jacob Roth told the judge.

Leon expressed frustration at Roth’s attempts to equate the massive ballroom project with relatively modest construction work at the White House under previous administrations.

“This is an iconic symbol of this nation,” the judge said.

The administration argued that other presidents didn’t need congressional approval for previous White House renovation projects, large and small.

“Many of those projects were highly controversial in their time yet have since become accepted — even beloved — parts of the White House,” government attorneys wrote.

Kunzelman writes for the Associated Press. AP writer Darlene Superville contributed to this report.