Thanks to Trump and the Supreme Court, we're facing a legal emergency

[marmar]

Thanks to Trump and the Supreme Court, we’re facing a legal emergency
Thanks to SCOTUS, Trump is now a president with few legal — or constitutional — constraints

By Heather Digby Parton
Columnist
Published October 14, 2025 9:25AM (EDT)


(Salon) Over the past ten years we’ve seen countless letters signed by experts and former officials decrying something President Donald Trump has said or done. Whether it’s scientists, economists, national security and intelligence veterans or doctors, just to name a few, thousands of people with impeccable credentials and decades of experience have put their reputations on the line by publicly sounding the alarm about the Trump administration’s illiberal, destructive policies. None of it has seemed to make any difference.

But those five-alarm warnings are still important and necessary, if only to maintain an historical record of dissent should we manage to emerge from this dark time with some shell of our nation intact. Legal scholars, former judges and law professors are having a collective heart attack over what the administration, particularly the Justice Department and Supreme Court, are doing to the rule of law and the Constitution. Right now, the only bulwark appears to be the lower courts.

....(snip)....

Even so, some who had previously worked with Trump vouched for the Justice Department’s inherent integrity, stressing that, given the department’s structure, it would be very difficult for its employees to act in bad faith. And since Trump preferred appointees with elite credentials, they assumed he would only hire qualified and experienced people. When the Times recently caught up with these former officials, their hair was on fire.

“Eight months into his second term,” they reported, “Trump has taken a wrecking ball to those beliefs. ‘What’s happening is anathema to everything we’ve ever stood for in the Department of Justice,’ said another former official who served in both Democratic and Republican administrations, including Trump’s first term… The responses captured almost universal fear and anguish over the transformation of the Justice Department into a tool of the White House.”

....(snip)....

A number of lower court judges have expressed concern about the high court’s terse orders on these shadow docket rulings, most of which have overturned their judgments to favor the president’s position — and leaving them vulnerable to threats from right-wing commentators, and even the White House. White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller recently posted on X that judges who rule against the president are committing “legal insurrection” and claimed: “There is a large and growing movement of left-wing terrorism in this country. It is well organized and funded and it is shielded by far-left judges, prosecutors and attorneys general. The only remedy is to use legitimate state power to dismantle terrorism and terror networks.” ..............(more)

https://www.salon.com/2025/10/14/thanks-to-trump-and-the-supreme-court-were-facing-a-legal-emergency/