To a Candid World
Law Day Reflections on American Liberty at the 100-Day Mark
The Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights are the Charters of Freedom of our republic. They hold a place of honor and permanent display in the Rotunda of the National Archives. At rallies across the country on Saturday April 5 and April 19, I and other patriots proclaimed that these founding documents are not simply museum pieces. In standing up for them, we champion a vision common to two of our most inspiring modern presidents.
In his 1961 inaugural address, John F. Kennedy declared that we, the American people, would “pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe to assure the survival and the success of liberty.” Twenty years later, Ronald Reagan assured Americans of our role as “the exemplar of freedom and a beacon of hope for those who do not now have freedom.”
The first 100 days of the current administration have made clear a wrenching reality: The president of the United States imperils the survival and success of liberty in our very own country. This is not an abstraction. The danger is real.
I know that very many people – including valued friends – do not yet agree with this. To prove it, echoing the Founders in the Declaration of Independence, I submit “to a candid world” the facts below. While they by no means encompass the entirety of the attack upon our freedom and Constitutional order, these examples illustrate an already present threat that may only grow more dangerous.
Section 1. Due Process
The Founders incorporated into the Constitution a set of ten amendments known as the Bill of Rights. The due process clause of the Fifth Amendment reads as follows: “No person shall be…deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law.” The federal government has been acting in open contempt of the Fifth Amendment. Listed below are representative examples, the details of which appear further below.
Understand that in these cases the government did not merely deport its targets to their country of origin but rendered them to a brutal prison in El Salvador, which that country’s dictator is operating under contract with the United States. El Salvador denies the prisoners any contact with the outside world, including lawyers. Understand as well that the government has been acting in these cases in defiance of the U.S. courts, including the Supreme Court.
The founders adopted the Fifth Amendment precisely for the purpose of preventing this sort of arbitrary punishment. The significance of these unconstitutional acts goes far beyond a group of people one does not know and who, on the basis of unsubstantiated government allegations, one may be predisposed to dislike. In an April 17 order in connection with one of these cases, Judge J. Harvie Wilkinson (a Reagan appointee) made the following statement:
If today the Executive claims the right to deport without due process and in disregard of court orders, what assurance will there be tomorrow that it will not deport American citizens and then disclaim responsibility to bring them home? And what assurance shall there be that the Executive will not train its broad discretionary powers upon its political enemies?
Scroll down to Section 6 for detail about:
1A) Kilmar Abrego Garcia
1B) Andry Hernandez Romero, Jerce Reyes Barrios, Neri Jose Alvarado Borges (and over 200 others)
Section 2. Freedom of Speech and Press
The Founders incorporated into the Constitution a set of ten amendments known as the Bill of Rights. The free speech clause of the First Amendment reads as follows: “Congress shall make no law…abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press.” Although the First Amendment references Congress as opposed to the executive branch, the Supreme Court has consistently interpreted the protection against curtailment of these essential freedoms to apply to all of government. In a 1972 decision, the Supreme Court put it this way [emphasis added]:
But, above all else, the First Amendment means that government has no power to restrict expression because of its message, its ideas, its subject matter, or its content. ... To permit the continued building of our politics and culture, and to assure self-fulfillment for each individual, our people are guaranteed the right to express any thought, free from government censorship. The essence of this forbidden censorship is content control. Any restriction on expressive activity because of its content would completely undercut the "profound national commitment to the principle that debate on public issues should be uninhibited, robust, and wide-open."
The federal government has been acting in open contempt of the First Amendment. Listed below are representative examples, the details of which appear further below. Whatever one might think, perhaps on the basis of faulty information about the targets of government action, it is impermissible for the government to violate the protections of the First Amendment with coercive and punishing actions.
Scroll down to Section 6 for detail about:
2A) Rümeysa Öztürk, Mohsen Mahdawi, Mahmoud Khalil
2B) Weaponization of Government Against Media
2C) Attacks upon Harvard and other Universities
Section 3. Attacks on Law Firms
The rule of law in the United States requires that lawyers are at liberty to operate free of coercion and/or intimidation. Through a series of memoranda and executive orders that punish law firms that he perceived to have worked in opposition to his private and personal interests, the president has directly undermined the rule of law. In granting a temporary restraining order (TRO) in the case of one of the targeted firms, Judge Loren AliKhan decried “a shocking abuse of power” and warned that “allowing the government to coerce private businesses, law firms and lawyers solely on the basis of their views is antithetical to our constitutional republic.”
Scroll down to Section 6 for detail.
Section 4. Power of the Purse
The Appropriations Clause (Article I, Section 9, Clause 7) of the Constitution reserves to Congress the “power of the purse” – the authority to determine how the funds of the United States are to be spent. Congress does this through the passage of appropriations bills or continuing resolutions that set spending levels for different purposes. Article II, Section 3 of the Constitution directs the president to “take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed” – meaning in the context of spending that the executive branch must make expenditures as Congress directs it to do in the appropriations and continuing resolution laws that it passes.
The current administration, in brazen disregard of its Constitutional obligations, has been slashing spending on programs and services that Congress has specifically directed it to provide. It has been undertaking these unilateral actions primarily through a so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) that it established by Executive Order 14158 on January 20 and through a series of follow-on DOGE-related executive orders (EO 14210, EO 14219, and EO 14222).
A lawsuit that a coalition of parties filed on April 28 under the coordination of legal advocates Democracy Forward argues that the administration unconstitutionally usurped Congressional authority when it undertook major reorganizations of the federal government implemented pursuant to EO 14210 (“Implementing the President's "Department of Government Efficiency" Workforce Optimization Initiative”).
It is crucially important that the American people, through their elected representatives in Congress, exercise control over the programs and services of the federal government. The executive branch is charged with executing the laws that the people enact, not take such power upon itself arbitrarily.
Scroll down to Section 6 for detail.
Section 5. Concluding Thoughts
Today, May 1, is Law Day. Both the United States Courts and the American Bar Association provide resources for a richer understanding and commemoration of it. To my mind, the best commemoration of it, for the remainder of this month and for many months to come, is to open one’s imagination, recognize the danger, and do what one can in support and defense of the rule of law under our Constitutional republic.
What one can do will differ from person to person. It may mean communicating about the danger with family, friends, and neighbors. It may mean communicating these concerns to one’s elected officials and challenging them to make bolder and more concerted efforts to address the danger. It may also mean lending support to organizations, such as those that appear in the detail below and others, that are championing the cause of liberty.
Most urgent of all, especially for those who do not yet agree about this danger, is to remain curious and attentive to all that is happening around us and to resist the temptation to either accept or reject it simply on the basis of habits of political thought and comfort in the company of those who share them. It is essential that we come together as a large, politically diverse community that takes responsibility for the health of our republic and our civil society.
Please read through the facts in detail below.
Section 6. Facts in Detail for a Candid World
6-1. Due Process
6-1A) Kilmar Abrego Garcia
Kilmar Abrego Garcia is married to a U.S. citizen and is the father of three U.S. citizens. A native of El Salvador, when he was 16 years old his family sent him to the United States to escape a vicious gang that was extorting his family. In 2019 Maryland police arrested him in front of Home Depot on suspicion that he was undocumented. In the course of his immigration proceedings, authorities entered into his record an unsubstantiated accusation that he was an MS-13 gang member. However, he never faced a criminal charge. Indeed, as a result of this encounter, he received a work permit and a form of legal status that protected him against deportation to his country of citizenship, El Salvador, on account of continuing danger from the gang that had threatened him and his family.
In the years since, he complied with the requirement that he check in annually with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). He was working as a sheet metal apprentice and following all of the rules when this past March 12 ICE arrested him purportedly on the basis of the long ago, unsubstantiated accusation that he was a member of MS-13. The government proceeded to whisk him away to El Salvador’s notorious CECOT prison, which is under contract with the United States.
Lawyers acting on Abrego Garcia’s behalf filed a motion for his release and after a hearing on Friday April 4, U.S. District Court Judge Paula Xinis granted it. She noted that the government had acted in violation of applicable law “and without any legal process” and ordered his return by midnight Monday April 7. Judge Xinis followed up April 6 with a legal opinion that went through the relevant facts of the case and concluded that the government had acted against Abrego Garcia “without notice, legal justification, or due process” and that “there were no legal grounds whatsoever for his arrest, detention or removal.” With respect to Abrego Garcia’s putative gang membership, Judge Xinis noted that at the hearing the government did not even officially make this accusation:
Defendants did not assert—at any point prior to or during the April 4, 2025, hearing—that Abrego Garcia was an “enemy combatant,” an “alien enemy” under the Alien Enemies Act, 50 U.S.C. § 21, or removable based on MS13’s recent designation as a Foreign Terrorist Organization under 8 U.S.C. § 1189. Invoking such theories for the first time on appeal cannot cure the failure to present them before this Court. In any event, Defendants have offered no evidence linking Abrego Garcia to MS-13 or to any terrorist activity. And vague allegations of gang association alone do not supersede the express protections afforded under the INA, including 8 U.S.C. §§ 1231(b)(3)(A), 1229a, and 1229b.
Furthermore, Judge Xinis quoted the government in its filings and at the hearing having conceded that it removed Abrego Garcia in error:
“Through administrative error, Abrego-Garcia was removed from the United States to El Salvador. This was an oversight…”...“This person should -- the plaintiff, Abrego Garcia, should not have been removed. That is not in dispute.”
And yet, notwithstanding the admitted baselessness and lawlessness of its mistreatment of Mr. Abrego Garcia, the government refused to correct its dire mistake, claiming that it had no authority to intervene in his imprisonment in the El Salvadoran prison with which the government has contracted expressly for the purpose of imprisoning people it arrests in the United States. In a ruling that affirmed Judge Xinis, the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals wrote, “The Government’s actions in this case most assuredly violated the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution.” The Supreme Court unanimously agreed, noting that “The order [from Judge Xinis] properly requires the Government to ‘facilitate’ Abrego Garcia’s release from custody in El Salvador and to ensure that his case is handled as it would have been had he not been improperly sent to El Salvador.” In a statement attached to the Supreme Court’s April 10 opinion, Justice Sonya Sotomayor wrote [emphasis added]:
The United States Government arrested Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia in Maryland and flew him to a “terrorism confinement center” in El Salvador, where he has been detained for 26 days and counting. To this day, the Government has cited no basis in law for Abrego Garcia’s warrantless arrest, his removal to El Salvador, or his confinement in a Salvadoran prison. Nor could it…Instead of hastening to correct its egregious error, the Government dismissed it as an “oversight.” Decl. of R. Cerna in No. 25–cv–951 (D Md., Mar. 31, 2025), ECF Doc. 11–3, p. 3. The Government now requests an order from this Court permitting it to leave Abrego Garcia, a husband and father without a criminal record, in a Salvadoran prison for no reason recognized by the law. The only argument the Government offers in support of its request, that United States courts cannot grant relief once a deportee crosses the border, is plainly wrong. See Rumsfeld v. Padilla, 542 U. S. 426, 447, n. 16 (2004); cf. Boumediene v. Bush, 553 U. S. 723, 732 (2008). The Government’s argument, moreover, implies that it could deport and incarcerate any person, including U. S. citizens, without legal consequence, so long as it does so before a court can intervene. See Trump v. J. G. G., 604 U. S. ___, ___ (2025) (SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting) (slip op., at 8). That view refutes itself.
On April 17, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit issued a unanimous order. The author of the order, Judge J. Harvie Wilkinson, had served as deputy assistant attorney general for President Ronald Reagan before later being confirmed as President Reagan’s nominee to the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals, where he has served continuously since. Judge Wilkinson’s order, which in part echoes a warning from Justice Sotomayor, bears extensive quotation [emphasis added]:
Upon review of the government’s motion, the court denies the motion for an emergency stay pending appeal and for a writ of mandamus. The relief the government is requesting is both extraordinary and premature. While we fully respect the Executive’s robust assertion of its Article II powers, we shall not micromanage the efforts of a fine district judge attempting to implement the Supreme Court’s recent decision.
It is difficult in some cases to get to the very heart of the matter. But in this case, it is not hard at all. The government is asserting a right to stash away residents of this country in foreign prisons without the semblance of due process that is the foundation of our constitutional order. Further, it claims in essence that because it has rid itself of custody that there is nothing that can be done.
This should be shocking not only to judges, but to the intuitive sense of liberty that Americans far removed from courthouses still hold dear.
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The Supreme Court’s decision remains, as always, our guidepost. That decision rightly requires the lower federal courts to give “due regard for the deference owed to the Executive Branch in the conduct of foreign affairs.” Noem v. Abrego Garcia, No. 24A949, slip op. at 2 (U.S. Apr. 10, 2025); see also United States v. Curtiss-Wright Exp. Corp., 299 U.S. 304, 319 (1936). That would allow sensitive diplomatic negotiations to be removed from public view. It would recognize as well that the “facilitation” of Abrego Garcia’s return leaves the Executive Branch with options in the execution to which the courts in accordance with the Supreme Court’s decision should extend a genuine deference. That decision struck a balance that does not permit lower courts to leave Article II by the wayside.
The Supreme Court’s decision does not, however, allow the government to do essentially nothing. It requires the government “to ‘facilitate’ Abrego Garcia’s release from custody in El Salvador and to ensure that his case is handled as it would have been had he not been improperly sent to El Salvador.” Abrego Garcia, supra, slip op. at 2. “Facilitate” is an active verb. It requires that steps be taken as the Supreme Court has made perfectly clear.
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“Facilitation” does not permit the admittedly erroneous deportation of an individual to the one country’s prisons that the withholding order forbids and, further, to do so in disregard of a court order that the government not so subtly spurns. “Facilitation” does not sanction the abrogation of habeas corpus through the transfer of custody to foreign detention centers in the manner attempted here. Allowing all this would “facilitate” foreign detention more than it would domestic return. It would reduce the rule of law to lawlessness and tarnish the very values for which Americans of diverse views and persuasions have always stood.
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The Executive possesses enormous powers to prosecute and to deport, but with powers come restraints. If today the Executive claims the right to deport without due process and in disregard of court orders, what assurance will there be tomorrow that it will not deport American citizens and then disclaim responsibility to bring them home? And what assurance shall there be that the Executive will not train its broad discretionary powers upon its political enemies? The threat, even if not the actuality, would always be present, and the Executive’s obligation to “take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed” would lose its meaning.
Also on April 17, U.S. Senator Chris Van Hollen of Maryland – the state in which Kilmar and his citizen wife and children live – met with Kilmar in a Salvadoran prison, as The New York Times reported. On April 18, the White House mocked Judge Wilkinson’s order, Sen. Van Hollen, the Supreme Court, and the rule of law when it taunted in a post on social media (see below) that Kilmar is “NOT coming back.”
In an April 29 interview with ABC News, the president made clear that he did not intend to honor the Supreme Court’s order:
TERRY MORAN: You could get him back. There's a phone on this desk. You could pick it up, and with all the power of the presidency, you could call up the president of El Salvador and say, "Send him back," right now.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I could. And if he were the gentleman that you say he is, I would do that. But he's not.
6-1B) Andry Hernandez Romero, Jerce Reyes Barrios, Neri Alvarado Borges, and over 200 others
On March 15, under the claimed authority of the Alien Enemies Act of 1798, the federal government flew planeloads of detainees to El Salvador for indefinite imprisonment in the notorious CECOT prison, which is under contract with the United States. Among the over 200 whom the government consigned to this fate were two individuals – Andry Hernandez Romero and Jerce Reyes Barrios – whose asylum claims were in process at the time. A third, Neri Jose Alvarado Borges, had been expected at a February 13 hearing in his asylum case when ICE detained him on February 4. He having missed the scheduled hearing on account of his detention, a judge ordered him deported. All three and hundreds of others had been arrested and then were rendered on the basis of flimsy claims that they were members of the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua (TdA). None was afforded the basic due process right to a proceeding to determine the validity of the accusation.
In advance of the flights on March 15, legal representatives of five detainees whom the government designated as members of TdA filed an emergency petition for a temporary restraining order (TRO) to prevent their deportation. Judge James E. Boasberg of the federal District Court for the District of Columbia called an emergency hearing, during which he gave an oral order and afterward issued a written order for the government to cease and desist from flying the detainees out of the country and to call back any planes already in flight. The government ignored this judicial order.
In a motion for a preliminary injunction that they filed on March 28, these same legal representatives (among other points) contested the legality of the government’s invocation of the Alien Enemies Act, pointed out the illegality of its implementation absent protected rights to due process, conveyed the irreparable harm that the government’s actions cause the plaintiffs, and requested that the court prevent further removals under the Alien Enemies Act. That document highlighted the cases of Andry Hernandez Romero, Jerce Reyes Barrios, and Neri Alvarado Borges.
In an order that it issued on April 7 (24A931 Trump v. J. G. G. (04/07/2025)), the Supreme Court made clear that while litigation of the challenge to the government’s practice of removing people under the Alien Enemies Act continued, the government could undertake such removals only on condition that the government afford detainees adequate notice of the removal decision and opportunity to contest it by filing a petition for habeas corpus. In defiance of this, according to an April 18 emergency appeal (Docket 24A1007 A.A.R.P., ET AL. V. TRUMP) to the Supreme Court, the government took steps to remove additional Alien Enemies Act detainees without having afforded any of them their due process rights. Before 1 a.m. on Saturday April 19, the Supreme Court issued an order (24A1007 A.A.R.P., ET AL. V. TRUMP (04/19/2025)) barring the government from any further removal of Alien Enemies Act detainees until further notice from the Supreme Court.
The government having already defied the order that the Supreme Court issued on April 7, it remains to be seen whether ultimately it will honor the one that the Supreme Court issued on April 19. Further, in a May 1 ruling, U.S. District Judge Fernando Rodriguez, Jr. – whom the president appointed to the bench in his first term – ruled that the president’s invocation of the Alien Enemies Act (AEA) was improper. Judge Rodriquez wrote:
[T]he President’s invocation of the AEA through the Proclamation exceeds the scope of the statute and, as a result, is unlawful. Respondents do not possess the lawful authority under the AEA, and based on the Proclamation, to detain Venezuelan aliens, transfer them within the United States, or remove them from the country.
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[The government has] designated or will designate [the plaintiffs] as alien enemies under the Proclamation, subjecting them to unlawful detention, transfer, and removal under the AEA. As a result, J.A.V., J.G.G., and W.G.H. [the plaintiffs] are each entitled to the granting of their Petition for a Writ of Habeas Corpus, and a permanent injunction prohibiting Respondents from employing the Proclamation and the AEA against them. The certified class warrants similar protection. The Court will issue a Final Judgment with the appropriate relief.
6-2. Freedom of Speech and Press
6-2A) Rümeysa Öztürk, Mohsen Mahdawi, Mahmoud Khalil
Rümeysa Öztürk held a student visa, under which she was pursuing a PhD at Tufts University on a Fulbright scholarship. In March 2024, the student newspaper The Tufts Daily published an op-ed in which Öztürk and three fellow students urged the university “to meaningfully engage with and actualize” resolutions that the student government (the Tufts Community Union Senate) had passed with respect to the conflict in Gaza. On the basis of this op-ed and despite having determined that no evidence existed linking her to antisemitism or terrorism, the government canceled her student visa without telling her and then on March 25 sent masked, plainclothes agents to arrest her for being illegally present in the United States. As of this writing, Rümeysa Öztürk remains in detention. The ACLU maintains legal documents and other information about her case here.
Mohsen Mahdawi was a lawful permanent resident of the United States (a green card holder) and was on track to receive his master’s degree in philosophy from Columbia University in May 2025. On April 14, Mahdawi went to an office of the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) for an interview that USCIS had represented would be his final step to become a naturalized citizen. Instead, ICE agents ambushed him at the office and arrested him.
In taking this action, the authorities relied upon a misapplication of the Immigration and Nationality Act. Under 8 U.S.C. § 237(a)(4)C) and 8 U.S.C. § 1182(a)(3)(C), the United States may not exclude or deport aliens for their “beliefs, statements, or associations…unless the Secretary of State personally determines that the alien's [presence would or does] compromise a compelling United States foreign policy interest” or “would have potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences.” The Secretary of State did not fulfill a requirement under the law that he submit the relevant determination and supporting evidence to Congress.
Mahdawi’s U.S. representative, Becca Balint, along with 66 other members of the House, addressed these issues in an April 16 letter to the Secretary of Homeland Security. It reads in part:
On April 30, acting on an April 22 motion from Mahdawi’s legal team, Judge Geoffrey W. Crawford released Mahdawi on bail. In his ruling Crawford reportedly stated, “This is not the first time that the nation has seen chilling action by the government intended to shut down debate.” The ACLU maintains legal documents and other information about Mahdawi’s case here.
Mahmoud Khalil was a lawful permanent resident of the United States (a green card holder). On March 8, ICE arrested him on the basis of his having led student protests at Columbia University in 2024. On April 9, the Secretary of State submitted to immigration court an official determination asserting Khalil’s deportability under section 237(a)(4)C) of the Immigration and Nationality Act (corresponds with 8 U.S.C. § 1182(a)(3)(C)). The document conceded that Khalil’s activities were “otherwise lawful” but asserted that his presence nevertheless “would compromise a compelling U.S. foreign policy interest” in that he purportedly did and would promote antisemitism. Khalil’s legal representatives contest both the government’s assertion itself and the appropriateness of it as grounds for his removal; the ACLU maintains a repository of legal filings in his case here.
6-2B) Weaponization of Government Against Media
The government is harassing media outlets in a clear attempt to coerce favorable coverage. The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE) laid out some of the contours of this unconstitutional abuse in comments it formally submitted to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) on April 11 (emphasis added).
There is perhaps no greater tension in the Communications Act than the FCC’s authority over broadcast content that is exercised by virtue of its licensing authority. Given the principle established at our nation’s founding that “Congress shall make no law . . . abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press,” government licensing of broadcasters is an anomaly. This tension was acknowledged in the Act itself, which expressly withholds from government the power to “interfere with the right of free speech by means of radio communication.”
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Under the current Administration, the Commission and its Chairman have announced a number of formal and informal investigations spurred by real or imagined deviations by the media from the government’s preferences.[3]
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[T]his is precisely the kind of abuse of regulatory authority the Supreme Court unanimously condemned last term in NRA v. Vullo, 602 U.S. 175 (2024). The Court reaffirmed that the “‘threat of invoking legal sanctions and other means of coercion . . . to achieve the suppression’ of disfavored speech violates the First Amendment.”
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This year the FCC reopened a previously dismissed complaint involving the editing of a 60 Minutes interview with then–Vice President Kamala Harris. As FIRE noted in its formal comments, the underlying complaint failed to allege any deliberate falsification or provide extrinsic evidence of distortion, as the Commission’s own precedent requires. The proceeding, nonetheless, moved forward, in parallel with other forms of regulatory scrutiny, including review of a proposed merger involving the broadcaster’s parent company. In this context, the investigation bears all the hallmarks of unconstitutional regulatory pressure. See Vullo, 602 U.S. at 180.
Similarly, Ars Technica in an April 7 article described actions the FCC has taken with respect to several broadcasters and cited constitutional warnings that Republican and Democratic former chairs and members of the FCC as well as liberal and conservative advocacy groups made in official submissions to the FCC (emphasis added):
The FCC has regulatory authority over broadcasters with licenses to use the public airwaves. But [FCC Chairman Brendan] Carr's two immediate predecessors—Democrat Jessica Rosenworcel and Republican Ajit Pai—both said that punishing stations based on the content of news programs would violate the First Amendment right to free speech.
Rosenworcel and Pai's agreement continued a decades-long trend of the FCC easing itself out of the news-regulation business. Two other former FCC chairs—Republican Alfred Sikes and Democrat Tom Wheeler—have urged Carr to change course.
Carr has multiple probes in progress, and his investigation into CBS over the editing of an interview with Kamala Harris has drawn condemnations from both liberal and conservative advocacy groups that describe it as a threat to the Constitutional right to free speech. One plea to drop the investigation came in a March 19 letter from conservative groups including the Center for Individual Freedom, Grover Norquist's Americans for Tax Reform, and the Taxpayers Protection Alliance.
On April 13, the president urged FCC Chairman Carr to punish CBS with fines and removal of its broadcast license because he did not like the content of that night’s edition of 60 Minutes. The FCC also held leverage over CBS through its parent company, Paramount, which requires FCC approval for an $8.4 billion merger with Skydance Media. On April 22, the producer of CBS 60 Minutes, Bill Owens, resigned. As NPR reported:
The longtime head of CBS' 60 Minutes resigned Tuesday, as the network's parent company contemplates a settlement with President Trump over his lawsuit focusing on an interview the show did with then-Vice President Kamala Harris last fall.
In an emotionally charged meeting Tuesday afternoon, and again in a note to staff released publicly shortly after, the show's executive producer, Bill Owens said he was departing after 37 years with CBS News following months of heavy-handed treatment of the show by corporate leaders.
Owens, only the third leader of the show in its more than half-century history, did not explicitly cite Trump. But the president's open rancor toward 60 Minutes looms over all. Corporate parent Paramount and its controlling owner, Shari Redstone, are seeking the approval of federal regulators to sell it to the son of Oracle founder Larry Ellison. The billionaire software mogul is a friend of Trump who visited the president at the White House earlier this year.
"Over the past months, it has also become clear that I would not be allowed to run the show as I have always run it. To make independent decisions based on what was right for 60 Minutes, right for the audience," Owens wrote. "So, having defended this show – and what we stand for – from every angle, over time with everything I could, I am stepping aside so the show can move forward."
6-2C) Attacks upon Harvard and other Universities
In an April 11 letter to Harvard University (which superseded an April 3 letter), the government demanded that Harvard undertake wide ranging reforms or face termination of existing funding for medical research. The demands upon Harvard echoed similar demands the government made upon other universities, including Columbia, with regard to purported tolerance of antisemitism, ideological imbalance, and embrace of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) policies. On April 14, the government announced that it had frozen over $2.2 billion in multi-year grants and contracts. On April 15, following a post from the president on social media, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) began preparations to revoke Harvard’s non-profit status. In response, on April 21 Harvard filed a lawsuit, in which it made a First Amendment argument:
3. On April 11, 2025, citing concerns of antisemitism and ideological capture, the Government identified ten conditions Harvard must satisfy to receive federal research funding already committed to by the Government and relied on by Harvard, its researchers, and its affiliates (the “April 11 Letter,” attached as Exhibit A). Ex. A at 2, 4. The Government dictated that Harvard “reform and restructur[e]” its governance to “reduc[e] the power” of certain students, faculty, and administrators. Id. at 2. It required that Harvard hire a third-party to conduct an “audit” of the viewpoints of Harvard’s student body, faculty, and staff. Id. at 3-4. Then, based on the results of this university-wide viewpoint audit, Harvard must “hir[e] a critical mass of new faculty” and “admit[] a critical mass of students” to achieve “viewpoint diversity” in “each department, field, or teaching unit”—to the Government’s satisfaction as determined in the Government’s sole discretion. Id. And the Government has demanded that Harvard terminate or reform its academic “programs” to the Government’s liking. Id. at 4. All told, the tradeoff put to Harvard and other universities is clear: Allow the Government to micromanage your academic institution or jeopardize the institution’s ability to pursue medical breakthroughs, scientific discoveries, and innovative solutions.
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7. Defendants’ actions are unlawful. The First Amendment does not permit the Government to “interfere with private actors’ speech to advance its own vision of ideological balance,” Moody v. NetChoice, 603 U.S. 707, 741 (2024), nor may the Government “rely[] on the ‘threat of invoking legal sanctions and other means of coercion . . . to achieve the suppression’ of disfavored speech,” Nat’l Rifle Ass’n v. Vullo, 602 U.S. 175, 189 (2024) (citation omitted). The Government’s attempt to coerce and control Harvard disregards these fundamental First Amendment principles, which safeguard Harvard’s “academic freedom.” Asociacion de Educacion Privada de P.R., Inc. v. Garcia-Padilla, 490 F.3d 1, 8 (1st Cir. 2007). A threat such as this to a university’s academic freedom strikes an equal blow to the research conducted and resulting advancements made on its campus.
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12. Defendants’ actions threaten Harvard’s academic independence and place at risk critical lifesaving and pathbreaking research that occurs on its campus. And they are part of a broader effort by the Government to punish Harvard for protecting its constitutional rights. In the days since Harvard rejected the Government’s unconstitutional demands, the Government has launched multiple investigations and other actions against Harvard. Although the Government has indicated that it has made several attempts to contact the University, at no time has it rescinded the draconian demands laid out in the April 11 Letter. Indeed, the Government has only ratcheted up cuts to funding, investigations, and threats that will hurt students from every state in the country and around the world, as well as research that improves the lives of millions of Americans.
13. Plaintiff President and Fellows of Harvard College (“Harvard”) brings this civil action under the Constitution of the United States, the Administrative Procedure Act, and Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, as amended, 42 U.S.C. § 2000d-2, to enjoin Defendants from exceeding the bounds of their legal authority and to protect Harvard’s constitutional rights.
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72. On April 14, 2025, Harvard declined to accede to the Government’s demands. In a letter to the Government, Harvard’s lawyers said, “Neither Harvard nor any other private university can allow itself to be taken over by the federal government.” Ex. B at 3. Because the April 11 Letter “presents demands that, in contravention of the First Amendment, invade university freedoms long recognized by the Supreme Court,” the response said, “Harvard is not prepared to agree to demands that go beyond the lawful authority of this or any administration” and “will not accept the government’s terms.” Id. at 2-3.
73. President Garber, in a statement to the Harvard community, wrote, “Although some of the demands outlined by the government are aimed at combating antisemitism, the majority represent direct governmental regulation of the ‘intellectual conditions’ at Harvard.”45 He also explained, “No government—regardless of which party is in power—should dictate what private universities can teach, whom they can admit and hire, and which areas of study and inquiry they can pursue.”46
The judge in the case set July 21 as the date for the first hearing in the case
6-3. Attacks on Law Firms
Between March 6 and April 9, the president issued five executive orders, each nominally “Addressing Risks” purportedly presented by a named law firm: EO 14230 – Perkins Coie LLP, EO 14237 – Paul Weiss, EO 14246 – Jenner & Block, EO 14250 – WilmerHale, and EO: 14263 – Susman Godfrey. Additionally, a February 25 memo instructed an array of departments and agencies to suspend security clearances of personnel at and terminate contracts with the law firm Covington & Burling LLP. None of the targeted firms has been found to have engaged in wrong-doing. Below are a few examples.
The president targeted Covington & Burling for having “assisted former Special Counsel Jack Smith during his time as Special Counsel.” On January 14, before the president’s inauguration, the Department of Justice released Volume One of Special Counsel Smith’s report on the investigations and prosecutions he undertook in connection with the criminal conduct that the president allegedly committed during and following his first term of office.
Volume One concerns the then-president’s schemes – culminating in the January 6 attack on the Capitol – to overturn the 2020 election and remain in office. In August 2023, a grand jury indicted the former president and in August 2024 handed up a superseding indictment in connection with this crime. In addition to presenting evidence and arguments, Volume One explains that, although "the admissible evidence was sufficient to obtain and sustain a conviction at trial," Department of Justice policy prohibits prosecution of a president elect.
The president targeted Jenner & Block and WilmerHale for having hired Special Counsel Robert Mueller and members of his team, prominently including Andrew Weissman. From May 2017 to March 2019, Mueller and his team investigated Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election and possible coordination of those efforts with the successful Trump campaign. On account of Department of Justice rules that prohibit criminal prosecution of a sitting president, the investigation did not seek to prove criminal conduct on the part of then-President Trump. As outlined with quotes and citations by the American Constitution Society and CREW, the Mueller Report (Volume I and Volume II) did present evidence that he personally – and many of his associates as well – obstructed the investigation. As a consequence of that obstruction, the investigation was unable to establish to the standard of prosecution that anyone associated with his campaign had criminally participated in Russian interference in the 2016 election.
SUSMAN GODFREY
The president targeted Susman Godfrey because it represented Dominion Voting Systems in defamation lawsuits against Fox News, Newsmax, and allies of the president who spread his often repeated falsehood that the company rigged the 2020 election to engineer Joe Biden’s victory. In March 2023, while presiding over the lawsuit against Fox News, Judge Eric M. Davis rendered a summary judgment in which he stated it to be “crystal clear that none of the statements relating to Dominion about the 2020 election are true." The next month, just as the trial was about to begin to determine whether the Fox News false statements emerged from malice toward Dominion, Fox News announced its agreement to pay Dominion $787.5 million to settle the suit. The executive order targeting Susman Godfrey, which barred it from so much as entering a government building, came out on the very eve of a trial in which Susman was to represent Dominion in its lawsuit against Newsmax.
The Susman Godfrey case is representative of the set of cases in which the president has abused his power to exact retribution on law firms he perceived as his enemies. The firm maintains on its website a page of official documents related to its case. One can find there the April 15 temporary restraining order that Judge Loren AliKhan issued and the hearing transcript containing the remarks below from the judge (emphasis added):
The government has sought to use its immense power to dictate the positions that law firms may and may not take. The executive order seeks to control who law firms are allowed to represent. And this immensely oppressive power threatens the very foundation of legal representation in our country.
The adversarial process lies at the heart of our judicial system and maintains that all individuals, regardless of beliefs, are entitled to representation. As the court wrote in Velazquez: "An independent judiciary requires an independent bar." Here, the executive order specifically targets lawyers because of the clients that they represented. The executive order is based on a personal vendetta against a particular firm. And frankly, I think the framers of our Constitution would see this as a shocking abuse of power.
We've already seen the effects of similar executive orders against other law firms. Law firms across the country are entering into agreements with the government out of fear that they will be targeted next, and that coercion is plain and simple. And while I wish other firms were not capitulating as readily, I admire firms like Susman for standing up and challenging it when does threaten the very existence of their business.
[...]
[A]llowing the government to coerce private businesses, law firms and lawyers solely on the basis of their views is antithetical to our constitutional republic and hampers this Court and every court's ability to adjudicate its cases. Because this executive order attacks a core principle of client representation and threatens to punish both Susman and the legal industry as a whole, the Court finds that the public interest weighs in favor of granting a TRO.
6-4. Power of the Purse
Legal advocates Democracy Forward coordinated an effort among a team of attorneys (including also from Altshuler Berzon LLP, Protect Democracy, Public Rights Project, and State Democracy Defenders Fund) to prepare a lawsuit that challenges the administration’s unconstitutional usurpation of Congressional authority over spending. Below is how Protect Democracy explained the lawsuit (AFGE et al v. Trump et al), which it and its legal partners filed on April 28:
On February 11th, President Trump signed Executive Order 14210 (“Implementing the President’s ‘Department of Government Efficiency’ Workforce Optimization Initiative”), directing plans for mass layoffs, known as Reduction in Force (RIFs), and the reorganization or consolidation of most federal agencies.
This is not a power that belongs to the President. It belongs to Congress.
When presidents have wanted to restructure the government by reorganizing both between and within federal agencies, they have obtained Congressional authorization to do so. President Trump does not have authority to restructure the government, nor has he asked Congress to grant it to him.
The lawsuit seeks to:
Declare these acts of the President unconstitutional, unlawful, and otherwise in excess of any constitutional or statutory authority;
Hold unlawful and set aside the acts of agencies implementing his orders;
Issue an injunction stopping the reorganization of the federal government without legislative authority.
President Trump’s effort to remake our federal government as he sees fit by circumventing Congress cannot be taken lightly. Our entire system of governance rests on these powers being separated, not consolidated under one person. The hundreds of thousands of workers who have dedicated their careers to serving the American public and the countless people who rely on critical services from federal agencies are paying the price of President Trump’s unlawful overreach.
This case is about preserving the separation of powers principle that is foundational to our nation and woven into our constitution. The case, AFGE v. Trump, was filed in the United States District Court for the Northern District of California.
This is so detailed and so true. It is frightening to see what can happen in just a hundred days. Thank you for your insight and recapping our history. A history that was for the people.
Thank you for the detailed, comprehensive description about the Trump administration's abuse of US law. You entreat us to "recognize the danger, and do what one can in support and defense of the rule of law under our Constitutional republic."
I am.
Thank you for what you do.