Jamie Raskin Tees Off On GOP's 'Patently Absurd' Bill To Restrict Nationwide Injunctions

2 days ago

During debate on the House floor, Rep, Jamie Raskin (D-MD) spoke in opposition to HR 1526, the No Rogue Rulings Act.

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Transcript

00:00Thank you, Madam Speaker. Mr. Issa, I rise in opposition to H.R. 1526. I heard the majority

00:07was bringing legislation forward to clean up a major policy crisis taking place within the first

00:13100 days of the Trump administration, and that sounded pretty good to me because we're drowning

00:18in crises. The problem is that this bill does not address any of the real major policy crises of the

00:25first 100 days that Trump has caused for America. They are wasting our time with this bill by

00:31misdiagnosing and mislabeling the judicial response to these crises as a crisis itself.

00:39The whole country is reeling right now from the economic disaster Trump has plunged us into. He

00:45destroyed more than $10 trillion in American wealth in a single week, and then he went golfing and

00:52bragged to America about winning the tournament at his own golf course. That's like bragging about

00:58being endorsed by your own campaign manager. So much winning. The country can hardly stand how much

01:04winning Trump is doing for himself and Elon Musk and his billionaire cabinet. Perhaps he could have

01:10yelled four on the greenway so tens of millions of Americans could have taken our retirement savings

01:15out of the stock market before he hit us in the head with a golf ball. Trump's ruinous tariffs have

01:22crushed our relationships with democratic allies and loyal trade partners like Canada, Mexico, the UK,

01:29Germany, France, while delicately carving out an exception for Trump's friends in the home office

01:36back in Russia. When asked why Putin uniquely escapes the wrath of Trump's global trade war,

01:43we're told it's because Trump doesn't want to interfere with the negotiations taking place

01:47between Russia and Ukraine for a ceasefire, an explanation that might have somewhat more force

01:54if Trump had not made sure that the tariffs do apply to Ukraine as they do. The basis for this most

02:04imbecilic and destructive trade war in the history of the world is the profound economic research and

02:10policy writings of one Ron Vera, a completely fictional economist conjured up by Trump advisor

02:18Peter Navarro, a real person who Elon Musk just called, quote, a moron and dumb as a sack of bricks.

02:26Navarro's last name, delightfully, is an anagram for Ron Vera. You can try this yourself at home.

02:35Navarro turns into Ron Vera. Navarro figured that out himself, perhaps the greatest achievement of the

02:43Trump administration so far. What an enchanting and clever basis upon which to crash the economy of the United

02:52States of America. Well, despite the fact that Congress, not the president, has the power to regulate

02:58international commerce and legislate tariffs, our GOP colleagues don't even want to have

03:04one hearing on the breathtaking economic folly and wreckage of this fling into the abyss of trade war

03:13with the world. Much less do they want to do anything to reverse this policy nightmare for tens of millions

03:19of business people, farmers, workers, retirees, and consumers being throttled by this historic self-inflicted

03:28wound. No, today they want to talk about the real emergency, which is the power of United States

03:35district courts to issue universal injunctions rather than just injunctions that apply to the specific

03:42parties in the case. It seems like a rather boutique and esoteric issue to raise in the middle of an

03:48economic catastrophe that they just foist upon America, but there's a method to the madness.

03:55You see, federal judges have issued at least 68 court orders that block or pause the administration's

04:03lawlessness to prevent irreparable harm in the country from his unconstitutional actions. The judges

04:10deciding here were appointed by five different presidents, both Democratic presidents and Republican

04:16presidents, in 11 district district courts across seven circuits. The judges have explained in painstaking

04:23detail what is unlawful about Trump's executive orders and actions. Trump has offered no substantive critique

04:31of their legal reasoning, but he and Musk still want the judges impeached. They say they should be removed from

04:38office simply for striking down the president's illegal policies, which is odd given that Trump and his party

04:45demanded for four years that federal judges strike down President Biden's policies like student loan forgiveness

04:52or immigration policies or EPA action on climate change. They seem to embrace Marbury versus Madison and judicial

05:01review of Democratic presidential actions, but not of Republican actions. Well, they say that's because Trump just won an

05:09election. He beat Kamala Harris by 2 million votes. Well, guess what? Joe Biden beat Donald Trump by over 7 million votes. And that

05:18didn't stop them from suing to stop numerous Biden policies they thought were unlawful. Sometimes they won, sometimes they lost. It's the same now. Nearly 160 cases have been

05:30brought against Trump and Musk's actions. Trump's won some and he's lost some. But our colleagues protest that Trump is

05:37different because the courts have issued relief in at least 57 different cases. A record number of cases in American

05:44history at record speed. True. But if it seems like an incredible number of cases to lose in less than 100 days, recall that Trump is

05:53engaged in a record number of illegal actions at a breathtaking velocity never seen before in U.S. history.

06:02As of today, he's already issued 111 executive orders in less than 100 days. Biden issued 162 in all four years. Trump can issue as

06:12many as he wants, but he's got to make them constitutional because if they're not, they're going to get struck down. And when Trump denounces the

06:19judges as radical left judges and lunatics who've gone rogue, like Judge Bosberg, he's just advertising

06:27his complete ignorance of the federal bench. Judge Bosberg is the chief judge of the U.S. District Court,

06:33first nominated the bench by President George W. Bush, who was Justice Kavanaugh's roommate at Yale and a

06:40pillar of the conservative bar. We've impeached only 15 judges in U.S. history, always for serious misconduct,

06:48like taking bribes, embezzlement, corruption, habitual drunkenness on the bench. Never because

06:54of a doctrinal disagreement. Never because of a judge's legal ruling. As Chief Justice Roberts said

07:00a few weeks ago, the proper response in our democracy to a judicial decision that you disagree with

07:06is to appeal the ruling, not impeach the judge. And Donald Trump has gotten some relief in some of his

07:13cases already. The system's working. We don't need to turn the whole world upside down to distract from

07:18the economic calamities they've brought upon us. And all of this would be fun and games except

07:23the rhetorical assault by Trump and Musk and our colleagues against the judiciary has turned into

07:29something far more sinister in some quarters. Death threats, bomb threats, online intimidation and

07:35harassment of judges. These judges are currently targets of an onslaught of social media taunts and

07:41attacks that call for their exile to Gitmo or label them a national security threat or traitors. Even

07:47worse, this campaign of vilification has spread to their families, including attacks on a federal

07:53judge's daughter who had her photo in place of work posted on a social media site by Elon Musk to

07:59his 290 million followers. These threats followed an actual bomb threat targeting the sister of Supreme

08:07Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett. It's a dangerous situation. Well, now our colleagues want to pass

08:13the No Rogue Rulings Act, which would effectively ban federal district courts from providing nationwide

08:18relief against unlawful actions by the administration. Litigants could request injunctive relief only with

08:25respect to themselves. So, for example, if the president establishes a church or bans newspapers or imposes

08:32martial law, each citizen in America would have to bring his or her own case because the courts would

08:39not be able to rule to strike down unconstitutional action generally. That is patently absurd and we're

08:45going to be able to explain how this legislation is a massive distraction from the issues that are really

08:51facing America. We reserve. Members are reminded to a friend.

Jamie Raskin Tees Off On GOP's 'Patently Absurd' Bill To Restrict Nationwide Injunctions

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