WorldNetDaily absolutely hates judges who won’t bend to President Trump’s whims, but there’s one judge it despises above all others: James Boasberg, who ruled in a couple cases involving President Trump. He was initially praised for dismissing a defamation lawsuit Ray Epps filed against Fox News — but when he blocked Trump’s order deporting undocumented immigrants, the hate machine cranked up. Joe Kovacs complained in a March 16 article:
Members of President Donald Trump’s Cabinet are firing back defiantly against a federal judge’s order to block deportation of dangerous Venezuelans who are members of the notorious Tren de Aragua gang.
D.C. District Judge James Boasberg, an Obama appointee, ordered Saturday an immediate stop to deportation flights for TDA members, and even demanded planes already in flight turn around and return the violent criminals back to America.
“Any plane containing these folks that is going to take off or is in the air needs to be returned to the United States however that is accomplished,” Boasberg said, according to Politico.
“Make sure it’s complied with immediately.”
Despite the ruling, officials in the Trump administration refused to comply.
Trump refused to comply? that doesn’t reflect well on his commitment to the rule of law.
A couple days later, Bob Unruh detailed Trump’s war on Boasberg:
On Truth Social, Trump cited the activism of James Boasberg, a federal judge in Washington who was appointed by Barack Obama, who had demanded that terrorists being deported by the Trump administration be returned to the U.S.
That order was unsuccessful in that situation, because over the weekend the planes loaded with deportees he wanted back in the U.S. already were in international airspace, so his ruling had no effect.
Further, investigative journalist Laura Loomer revealed there appears to be a huge conflict of interest for Boasberg, suggesting he should have, under ethics standards, removed himself from the case.
That alleged “conflict of interest” involves his daughter working for a firm that offers legal advice to undocumented immigrants. But it has not been established that the firm worked on this particular case. Unruh continued to whine:
The White House has argued a federal judge lacks the authority to control the president’s decisions regarding when a country is being invaded under the law, or how to defend it.
The unprecedented work by trial court judges to block Trump’s agendas, including deporting criminal aliens, eliminating fraud, waste and corruption in the executive branch spending, and more, already is being described by analysts as a constitutional crisis for the country.
Unruh (and Trump) lashed out again at Boasberg in a March 19 article:
WND has reported that the judge criticized by Trump is James Boasberg, in Washington.
[…]Boasberg interfered in Trump’s responsibilities to make sure the U.S. is secure by opposing the president’s decisions to deport a number of criminal illegal aliens, including some affiliated with a Venezuelan gang, Tren de Aregua, whose members are considered terrorists.
Over the weekend, Boasberg ordered a halt to those deportations. Further, he claimed the authority to order planes carrying those deportees that already had taken off, and were in international airspace, to be returned to the United States.
[…]Boasberg is continuing his agenda this week, demanding the Trump administration answer his questions about why it didn’t order the airplanes to turn around mid-flight, exactly what time they took off, and more.
Unruh served up another attack on Boasberg, with a little help from another right-wing publication, in a March 21 article:
It is the Federalist that confirmed in a report “Rogue judges are turning judicial review into judicial rule.”
“President Donald Trump made headlines this week by continuing deportation flights of illegal immigrants, including members of the violent Tren de Aragua gang, despite a federal judge’s ruling that attempted to halt the practice,” the report said. “U.S. District Judge James Boasberg, an Obama appointee, issued an order barring the administration from carrying out deportations to El Salvador. The White House called the decision ‘lawless’ and said the order was moot because the flights had already left and crossed into international waters. It has stopped further such flights for now.”
Trump repeatedly has been attacked by leftists in the judiciary for doing his Executive Branch responsibilities. “As an attack on the rule of law,” the report said.
As if Trump was not attacking the rule of law through his imperial presidency.
WND’s columnists got in on the anti-Boasberg campaign as well. Andy Schlafly wrote in a March 20 column:
Yet District Court Judge James E. Boasberg ordered the Trump administration to provide details by noon on Tuesday about the deportation of Venezuelan gang members, including flight information. But the Department of Justice (DOJ) announced on Tuesday that it would not comply with Judge Boasberg’s demand for more information.
Attorney General Pam Bondi and other DOJ attorneys told Boasberg “there is no justification to order the provision of additional information, and that doing so would be inappropriate” because DOJ feels Boasberg’s “oral statements were not independently enforceable.” Trump’s DOJ has already appealed and stated they “should not be required to disclose sensitive information bearing on national security and foreign relations until that motion is resolved.”
Trump’s DOJ had requested immediate reassignment to another judge because of his “highly unusual and improper procedures – e.g. certification of a class action involving members of a designated foreign terrorist organization in less than 18 hours with no discovery and no briefing from the Government.”
Wayne Allyn Root used his March 22 column to launch his own tirade at Boasberg, under the mistaken belief that popularity and what’s legal are the same thing:
Federal judges like James Boasberg, who is so desperate to keep violent illegal alien gangbangers in the USA at all costs that he even tried to force the Trump administration to turn around the planes in midair carrying these violent gangbangers back to El Salvador.
How could anyone be this desperate to help the worst scum of the earth?
[…]We need to be asking publicly and loudly if Judge Boasberg is on the take from China, the CCP and the Mexican drug cartels.
Could this judge be receiving millions of dollars from the groups who need the border open, the human trafficking, drugs and fentanyl to flow, and the violent gangs like MS-13 and Tren de Aragua to stay in the USA to carry out this vast criminal conspiracy?
I believe many federal judges are on the take.
Neither Root nor anyone else have offered evidence that Boasberg is “on the take.”
Thje same day, Josh Hammer took a swipe at Boasberg in attacking Chief Justice John Roberts’ arguably naive view that judges are merely umpires:
Roberts’ most recent outburst is even more absurd given the specific legal context of Boasberg’s standoff with Trump. In this instance, Boasberg ruled against the president’s ability to enforce the nation’s immigration laws. But the “plenary power doctrine” of constitutional law has long held that the judiciary has no business getting involved when the political branches wish to secure our sovereignty. As the notes to the U.S. government’s official online Constitution, available at Congress.gov, state: “(T)he Supreme Court’s jurisprudence reflects that … the Court will accord substantial deference to the government’s immigration policies, particularly those that implicate matters of national security.”
It seems Boasberg and Roberts need a remedial legal lesson or two.
In none of these articles and columns was Boasberg permitted to rebut any of the claims made.