Society for the Rule of Law
@chkbal
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We are conservative and libertarian lawyers standing up for the rule of law. RTs are not endorsements; views expressed may not be those of all members.
United States of America
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If you couldn't join us in person in DC last week for our discussion with
@AEI
's Yuval Levin on restoring our Constitutional and civic culture, you can see the replay here.
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JUST NOW: Former Deputy AG under Bush 41, Donald Ayer, to House Judiciary Committee:
"The drumbeat of [Bill Barr's] misbehavior is accelerating as we get closer to the election. I don't know what's next, but I'm scared to think about what it might be."
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@judgeluttig
: “American democracy is in greater peril today than it has ever been in American history.”
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US Attorney Berman has made clear that Attorney General Barr’s attempt to fire him implicates ongoing criminal investigations. And apparently Berman’s office has been investigating the president’s personal attorney and possibly other matters potentially affecting the president.
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"Barr has committed to Trump warts and all, but the warts are in fact suppurating sores, and he is now fatally infected." A compelling read from Charles Fried + Ed Larson of
@chkbal
via
@TheAtlantic
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NEW VIDEO: Two senior Justice Dept officials from George HW Bush administration explain the importance of witnesses in the Senate impeachment trial. A trial is a search for the truth. No senators should want to hide or ignore the facts.
@chkbal
members
@dbatrout
&
@stuartmgerson
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Checks and Balances and some likeminded constitutionalists have issued a statement calling for the immediate removal of the President of the United States:
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“Throughout the Clinton impeachment, Judge Starr consistently opposed the invocation of executive privilege and called for all the witnesses to come forward. Trump will have a hard time squaring that...” --Checks & Balances member
@RosenzweigP
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@judgeluttig
: "The former president and his administration pushed beyond the boundaries of the Constitution and the laws of the United States, into democracy itself."
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We are a group of conservative and libertarian lawyers standing up for the rule of law. Our mission statement is here:
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We accordingly urge Congress to immediately require Barr and others to testify under oath about Barr’s reasons for attempting to remove Berman, and about why Barr sought to do so at this time.
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@gtconway3d
: “The Constitution is concerned with protecting the presidency, not the person who happens to be the president. That’s because no one in this country is above the law.”
President Trump has taken his case to the Supreme Court.
He will lose — or should.
@gtconway3d
explains why:
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Our statement today on
@realDonaldTrump
’s abuse of his office and impeachment proceedings:
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We’ve issued this statement in response to Attorney General Barr’s recent address before the Federalist Society:
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NEW: Former GOP Officials and attorneys demand accountability
Senate should hold "a President of their party to account for this unprecedented mayhem at our Nation’s Capitol and attack on our Constitutional order."
Read the full statement:
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Congress and DOJ attorneys must take whatever actions they can to ensure that sensitive criminal investigations will not be obstructed or terminated for political reasons or for the personal benefit of any public official, no matter how high that official may be.
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Former Deputy Attorney General Donald Ayer: "We have known all along that there are a number of people who can shed light on what the President did, and two of them are John Bolton and Mick Mulvaney" via
@Newsweek
interview
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NEW STATEMENT: 19
@chkbal
members including former GOP Administration lawyers: "The election is not over until every legal ballot is counted, & our State officials responsible for conducting the election will not allow any candidate to steal the election"
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"The attorney general’s apparent goal is to turn DOJ into an arm of the president’s personal interests. He seems to have no regard for the department’s independence, and is doing long-term damage to the fabric of American justice."
@RosenzweigP
of
@chkbal
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From our own
@thetrevorpotter
, former Bush 41 appointee to and chairman of, the Federal Election Commission:
Trump’s and Barr’s claims about mail-in voting are “baseless and harmful to our democracy.”
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Stuart Gerson, AAG under Bush 41, on Barr's attempt to fire Berman: "The upshot of all of this is that the administration is subverting the rule of law...in a clear attempt to favor associates of the president and insulate his own misconduct from scrutiny."
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NEW STATEMENT by current and former R's: "We are dismayed that most Congressional Republicans...continue to be silent in the face of the President’s conduct & to abet his false narrative that he won an election that is being stolen from him"
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We’re proud to say that John Bellinger is a founding member of Checks & Balances!
@chkbal
Never Trumper Republican John Bellinger, represents Never Trumper Diplomat Bill Taylor (who I don’t know), in testimony before Congress! Do Nothing Democrats allow Republicans Zero Representation, Zero due process, and Zero Transparency....
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Under HW Bush, Donald Ayer preceded Barr as Deputy AG.
Today, Ayer writes: The "unprecedented pattern of conduct by the nation’s chief law-enforcement officer has brought a question to the minds of many people: Why does Bill Barr do the things he does?"
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@gtconway3d
: "What is Donald Trump's understanding of treason?"
@AmbJohnBolton
: "It's anybody who gets publicity he thinks he ought to get. It reflects that his understanding of treason is entirely personal. It's not treason against the country. It's treason against Trump."
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What’s more, a great deal of other conduct by Attorney General Barr during the past two years has improperly politicized and jeopardized the impartial administration of justice.
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A story from a time when a Republican president understood the rule of law and his duties to the nation.
James Baker memo from 1992: “They wanted us to contact the Russians or the British to seek information on Bill Clinton’s trip to Moscow. I said we absolutely could not do that.” via
@PeterbakerNYT
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“Finally, a message for any government employee or contractor who believes they have learned of or observed unethical, wasteful, or illegal behavior in the federal government. The American people deserve an honest and effective government. ...”
JUST IN: Striking new statement from IC inspector general Michael Atkinson, who was fired by Trump on Friday. “It is hard not to think that the President’s loss of confidence in me derives from my having faithfully discharged my legal obligations...”
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The need to defend the Constitution transcends political differences & competing legal philosophies.
The question is now about first principles: Will you put the rule of law over partisanship?
We are living thru a Constitutional emergency. We must act like it.
Via
@gtconway3d
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"It's time for a new conservative legal movement."
@judgeluttig
on
@Morning_Joe
talking about what it's going to take to rebuild a healthy, pro-democracy ecosystem on the right.
Lawyers need to take the lead in upholding the rule of law—not undermining it. It's our job.
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"Trump’s lawyers complain that no witness talked to Trump about the linkage between the aid and the investigation. Well, here’s Bolton, ready, willing, and able to testify."
-
@gtconway3d
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“Mr. Gerson echoed that sentiment. ‘It’s important for conservatives to speak up,’ he said. ‘This administration is anything but conservative.’”
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A letter to the
@washingtonpost
from our own Charles Fried, former Solicitor General of the United States:
“White House counsel Pat Cipollone does not understand the constitutional system for the removal of a president.”
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If Senators vote against hearing witnesses, “they will have sacrificed their own oaths to protect their own electoral prospects” -
@gtconway3d
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@AmbJohnBolton
on a 2nd Trump term:
"As he says frequently, this will be a retribution presidency. The retribution, he says, will be on behalf of his supporters, not about him personally.
That's ridiculous. Of course it's about Donald Trump personally. Everything is to him."
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Some of our co-founders and additional members have issued a statement:
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@judgeluttig
on
@Morning_Joe
: "We decided it's time for a new conservative legal movement that will preserve, protect, and defend American democracy, the Constitution, and the rule of law in the years ahead. And that's what we intend to do."
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“Mr. Fried [elaborated:] ‘Conservatism is respect for the rule of law. It is respect for tradition. ... The people who claim they’re conservatives today are demanding loyalty to this completely lawless, ignorant, foul-mouthed president.’”
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"The courts are free to determine on their own what is an insurrection and whether the facts meet that.
A judge found that Trump engaged in insurrection by clear and convincing evidence.
And there's no basis to challenge that finding."
@gtconway3d
on
@Morning_Joe
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RIGHT NOW: Donald Ayer before the House Judiciary Committee: "Barr’s central goal is…to systematically dismantle the system of checks and balances that stand between this President and unchecked power."
Read Ayer's full statement here —
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NEW: We've issued this statement responding to President Trump's firing of Michael Atkinson, Inspector General of the Intelligence Community:
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@gtconway3d
: "You can't look at Trump through the lens of a normal human being. People like to attribute strategy and foresight to him as though he is playing, as the phrase goes, multidimensional chess. Is he at all capable of that?"
@AmbJohnBolton
: "No."
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NEW: Statement from 26 of us at
@chkbal
about the importance of CONFIDENCE in our ELECTION. Read the full statement 👇
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Bravo.
Opinion: We are entering a dangerous period, 44 former senators write in The Post. The Senate must again stand in defense of democracy.
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"While a president has the authority to nominate and select officials in his administration, he does not have the authority to make a mockery of the Appointments Clause of the Constitution, statutory mandates and Senate confirmation"
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@AmbJohnBolton
with
@gtconway3d
: "Nixon was crushed and resigned because he knew he would be impeached.
You know what Trump would say about that? He would say Richard Nixon is a loser.
You can't treat him like an ordinary person. He doesn't react the same way."
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“They are counting on you to use authorized channels to bravely speak up—there is no disgrace in doing so. ... Please do not allow recent events to silence your voices.”
JUST IN: Striking new statement from IC inspector general Michael Atkinson, who was fired by Trump on Friday. “It is hard not to think that the President’s loss of confidence in me derives from my having faithfully discharged my legal obligations...”
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@RosenzweigP
on AG Barr's legacy: "He will be remembered, if at all, for the destruction of important protections against prosecutorial abuse."
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The Constitution is under active threat. The legal community has a special obligation to protect it. And pro-democracy conservative lawyers especially.
@judgeluttig
understands the magnitude of the crisis. It's incumbent on people of conscience from all over to follow his lead.
The time has come for a new legal movement committed to American Democracy, the Constitution, and the Rule of Law, without regard to partisan politics and partisan political party affiliation, and
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“With Bill Barr, on an amazing number of occasions … you can be almost 100 percent certain that there’s something improper going on” -former Deputy Attorney General under HW Bush &
@chkbal
member Donald Ayer
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"From a conservative standpoint, it’s clear to me that the President is offending the rule of law generally and the Constitution specifically." -Stuart Gerson, former head of DOJ's Civil Division under HW Bush
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Statement from
@chkbal
’s founders:
All should condemn the president’s racist tweets, especially those in office, and regardless of party. By attacking elected members of Congress based on ethnicity, he undermines our nation’s basic values and its system of checks and balances.
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@AmbJohnBolton
with
@gtconway3d
: "I'm still amazed that he's about to get the Republican nomination for president.
We all made a mistake in releasing our breath on January 20, 2021. We should have started on January 21 to worry about it."
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"This is a victory not just for members of the border and immigrant communities, but also for the rule of law — and it’s an example of patriots working across partisan lines to defend the Constitution. Congress should take note."
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Thank you,
@JohnWDean
!
VERY GOOD NEWS: Conservative lawyers to launch Society for Rule of Law to counter Maga movement. This is basic to protecting our democracy!
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@judgeluttig
discussing threats to the rule of law on
@Morning_Joe
: "What do we do about it? We need, frankly, Republicans to join the chorus that our very democracy and our rule of law in America are in peril."
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"I always read dissents first. If Trump is going to win in the Supreme Court, he has to come up with some better arguments that these dissents have."
@gtconway3d
on why he thinks the Colorado Supreme Court got Anderson v. Griswold right. Via
@Morning_Joe
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A must read in
@TheAtlantic
by
@dbatrout
, who served as Deputy Attorney General under George HW Bush. "The fundamental problem is that [Bill Barr] does not believe in the central tenet of our system of government—that no person is above the law."
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An excellent piece by our own Stuart Gerson, former Acting Attorney General: "many citizens both inside and outside Dept of Justice are asking whether DOJ stands for the rule of law or for the rule of an authoritarian administration." via
@just_security
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"President Trump is playing a shell game with the American people and rejecting the founding principle of this nation: We have a president, not a king." Donald Ayer of
@chkbal
+
@GovCTW
+
@RepTomColeman
via
@latimesopinion
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“... In the meantime, don’t accept the argument that ‘Trump is cooperative.’ Call me when he gives blood.”
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Former Acting AG
@stuartmgerson
: "These people style themselves, and the press unfortunately styles them, as conservatives. There's nothing conservative about them."
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@gtconway3d
on
@cspanwj
: "The mission is to protect the rule of law at a time when it is seriously under threat.
We are trying to get the message out about the dangers that we face."
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Seriously, though, the Chief Justice is reflecting the same concerns that led us to create Checks and Balances to defend vital constitutional principles from attack. We urge others to speak out to defend the judiciary. Justice must transcend politics.
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"We will be in continuing crisis turmoil, chaos, perhaps amounting to Constitutional problems throughout a second Trump term.
Because he will begin where he left off on Jan. 20 at noon, 2021. And he'll just pick it up again as if the intervening four years had not happened."
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"Republican senators threaten the ultimate cheapening and trivialization of Congress’s constitutional obligations: holding a “trial” that would be nothing but a sham"
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“Anyone who has carefully read Volume II of the Mueller report knows that it offers a very readable account of repeated acts by the president carefully tailored to interfere with and disrupt the investigation, ....”
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“Members of [Checks & Balances] have sharply denounced what they described as abuses of power by Mr. Trump .... The speech by Mr. Barr ... , in which he argued that the president had never overstepped his authority, so alarmed them that they felt compelled to push back publicly.”
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”All such acts are the very essence of the abuse of power, the corrupt use of power, and it is precisely for that that the power of impeachment was ordained.”
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“These vicious attacks on the judiciary and the federal court are unprecedented in American history by anyone, let alone a president of the United States. They represent a grave threat to the judiciary and the independence of the courts.”
—
@judgeluttig
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“How in God’s name could so many lawyers get involved in something like this?”
@JohnWDean
's question is as true today as it was in 1973.
Those who laid the legal foundation for Trump's attempted coup must be held accountable—otherwise they'll do it again.
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From our own
@RosenzweigP
:
“Clinton sat still one evening while the White House physician drew his blood, in the presence of an FBI agent and a prosecutor from Starr’s office. .... [He] must have understood—he simply must have— ....”
"Prior presidents understood that respect for the rule of law means, in the end, complying with the law, no matter what the cost," argues
@RosenzweigP
. "I should know—I was a member of Independent Counsel Ken Starr’s team that investigated him."
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"History will judge the Senate as much for how it handles the impeachment trial as how it resolves it. A fair trial will add credence to the result." Lessons from the Scopes Monkey Trial by Checks & Balances member Ed Larson in the
@Tennessean
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@gtconway3d
: "When you left the White House, if you could have spoken to yourself when you took the job, what would you have said?"
@AmbJohnBolton
: "The first thing I would have said is: you're an idiot. But the second thing I would have said is: do it anyway."
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The former president’s claim of absolute immunity "has no basis in our constitutional text, structure, or history" and "cannot be squared with the Constitution’s text or history."
Read the latest amicus brief signed by
@gtconway3d
and
@thetrevorpotter
:
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Intemperate or threatening verbal assaults on the judiciary—whether district judges or Justices—by leaders of any political party have no place in a nation that lives by the rule of law. However politically polarized the times, responsible politicians should consider how ....
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“ ... He needs to be more direct about what the investigation found. And there seems little doubt that an unambiguous direct statement by Mueller of his own prosecutorial judgment based on the work of his team and their assessment of the law— ...”
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This, coauthored by one of
@chkbal
’s founding members,
@gtconway3d
👉
"It is high time for Congress to do its duty, in the manner the framers intended."
Trump has done plenty to warrant impeachment. But the Ukraine allegations are over the top, write
@gtconway3d
and
@neal_katyal
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"Trump’s beef has always been not merely with individual federal judges who don’t bend to his will, but with the idea of an independent judiciary generally."
@gtconway3d
of
@chkbal
via
@PostOpinions
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“... Recall that Trump denied that there were ever any contacts between his campaign and the Russians. He denied it categorically. That was a lie. There are at least a hundred contacts between Trump campaign associates and the Russians.”
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How do you spend $70k on haircuts? Is that actually deductible?
Tax policy expert
@mirandaperrygrl
discusses on this week's pod with
@JWVerret
&
@RosenzweigP
Full episode:
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“John B. Bellinger III ... said that the statement from the chief justice was unusual, but appropriate. ‘Chief Justice Roberts was expressing the same concerns about the president’s attacks on important American institutions that motivated us to form Checks and Balances.’”
Among Conservatives, Some Measured Support for Chief Justice’s Rebuke of Trump
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"Trump incited, and therefore engaged in, an armed insurrection against the Constitution’s express & foundational mandates that require the peaceful transfer of executive power to a newly-elected President."
Read our new amicus brief in Trump v. Anderson:
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Read
@AndrewFeinberg
's excellent exclusive piece in the
@Independent
about our re-launch, and plans for protecting the Constitution and democracy in the difficult times ahead:
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"People question how exactly the retribution would take place. Because, after all, Trump is going to have to go through the Justice Dept.
So the Justice Dept. will be—along with the Defense Dept. and the intelligence community—bearing the brunt of the retribution presidency."
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From
@chkbal
's own Peter Keisler:
"Although the First Amendment’s guarantee of freedom of speech limits ... criminal prosecutions and tort suits, it does not limit any of the separate removal and disqualification powers conferred by the Constitution."
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Last week we brought together hundreds of lawyers, legal scholars, law students & concerned citizens for the first Rule of Law Summit in DC!
Thanks to our speakers:
@judgeluttig
,
@BarbaraComstock
,
@gtconway3d
,
@HeathMayo
,
@DonaldAyer6
,
@stuartmgerson
,
@acraul
& more
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