Trick question: When is trying to get around unfavorable court decisions a Constitutional crisis?

When Republicans do it, of course! When Democrats do it, it's just healthy politics.

It’s a constitutional crisis. Do you hear me, people?

When the President of the United States brags about ignoring the Supreme Court, it’s a Constitutional Crisis. A CRISIS, ah doooo declare!

What do I mean? You know, like all those times last year Joe Biden proudly explained how he had canceled student debt even though the Supremes had ruled he couldn’t —

Wait. Did you say Joe Biden? That wasn’t a crisis, that was a man of the people standing (okay, stumbling) up to unelected Justices and doing what he had to! The only crisis would have been doing nothing!

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(Ah doooo declare Unreported Truths is the best 20 cents a day you’ve ever spent!)

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The only thing worse than fake media hysteria is fake hypocritical media hysteria.

To be clear: I don’t think Donald Trump and JD Vance should threaten to ignore or impeach federal judges who make rulings they don’t like.

I believe in the federal courts. Judge William Alsup was appointed by President Clinton. Nonetheless, he gave me a huge win in Berenson v Twitter when he ruled against Twitter’s effort to dismiss the case, essentially forcing Twitter (before Elon Musk bought it) to apologize and reinstate my account.

Now Alsup has drawn Republican anger by ruling against President Trump’s efforts to fire probationary federal workers.

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(I know why the caged bird sings)

SOURCE

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Alsup has not said the Trump Administration can’t fire the employees, just that it needs to follow proper procedures, and that it doesn’t seem to have done so. I understand why Republicans are upset, but attacking Alsup will get them nowhere. He’s a balls-and-strikes judge, not overly partisan, and he calls it like it is.

Maybe he’s gotten this decision wrong. In that case, the remedy is to appeal to the 9th Circuit, which oversees him — and if necessary to the Supreme Court.

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The White House and Justice Department understand this reality.

They also understand that their base wants action. They understand that momentum is a real and precious force in politics, that appearing strong creates strength, and that President Trump is trying to make big changes with a small Congressional majority.

So they’re talking tough about judges who rule against them.

The key word there is talking.

The Trump Administration is not openly violating federal court orders. It appears to be going to very edge of what’s legal in responding to the orders. That response may or may not be wise, either politically or legally.

But the White House has the right to play hardball with its opponents and not give an inch past what the courts rule. It also has the right to define its own view of what the rulings mean and to force its opponents back to court if they don’t agree.

I saw all these tactics up close in Berenson v Twitter, and I am seeing them again in Berenson v Biden. I am not surprised to see them in the Trump cases. There are sophisticated lawyers on both sides of these lawsuits. They are doing everything they can both in the courts and the court of public opinion to shape the outcomes.

As they should. The stakes are high. Litigation ain’t beanbag.

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Guess what? The Biden Administration used exactly the same tactics.

How do I know? Because Joe Biden said so, and not just once.

The Biden White House stretched — and outright broke — the limits of its powers, federal laws, and the Constitution on any number of occasions. To name just three: it used workplace regulations to force healthy adult Americans to get mRNA vaccines. It undid basic property rights by preventing landlords from evicting delinquent tenants. And it unilaterally tried to cancel hundreds of billions of dollars in student loans that borrowers owed taxpayers. In each case, the Supreme Court said it had overreached.

The court’s student loan forgiveness ruling particularly annoyed the Biden Administration. Forgiving college debt makes very little sense as a policy. It gives bloated educational institutions even more excuses to pad their costs, while transferring wealth from people without degrees to people with them, even though degree-holders are already at a major societal advantage.

But the Democrats love the idea, which is something close to a straight payoff to a core Democratic constituency — young and mostly female knowledge workers.

So as soon as the Supreme Court struck down the forgiveness plan in June 2023, Biden began to try to get around the ruling. And he wasn’t shy about saying so. In fact, by the standards of late-administration (aka fully demented) Biden, he was remarkably articulate.

On May 29, 2024, Biden told comedian D.L. Hughley, “The idea that the Supreme Court told me I couldn't do it, I couldn't forgive student debt. I found out a way.” Later the same say, in a campaign speech, he said, “The Supreme Court blocked me from relieving student debt, but they didn't stop me.”

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(They didn’t stop me either, though they sure tried. And I still need your help.)

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This doesn’t mean Biden and his functionaries were actually defying the letter of the Supreme Court’s 2023 ruling. They weren’t.

But they were denying the court’s clear intent. They were looking for legal loopholes to satisfy their base and do what they wanted.

Just as Trump is doing now.

The difference is that the media, which either ignored or cheered Biden’s rhetoric, has spent the last month huffing and puffing about how Trump is going to destroy ‘Merica and JD Vance and the Vancettes are going to break down your door next, DO YOU HEAR ME, PEOPLE? THIS IS A CRISIS!

Think I’m kidding? As I write this, the New York Times homepage has this headline:

‘This Is Worse’: Trump’s Judicial Defiance Veers Beyond the Autocrat Playbook

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Just stop, okay? I thought the media had learned its lesson about hyperventilating from the first Trump Administration, but apparently the lesson it learned is that didn’t hyperventilate enough.

Let’s see Trump actually defy — not quasi-defy, like Biden did, but actually defy — a Supreme Court decision. Then a freakout will be justified. But for now, all he’s doing is playing to his base.

Then again, that’s all the New York Times is doing, too.

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Side note:

Judge Jessica G.L. Clarke, a Biden appointee in federal court in Manhattan, is hearing Berenson v Biden, my lawsuit against the Biden Administration and Pfizer officials who orchestrated my Twitter ban in 2021. She seems to be taking our arguments they violated my Constitutional and civil rights seriously. She has been considering the defense motions to dismiss for over three months; there’s no clock on her decision. It could come tomorrow, on in another three months.

Like I said, I trust in our courts, and I hope Judge Clarke will see the merits of the suit and allow it to proceed. It’s all I can do. Keep your fingers crossed, if that’s your thing, or throw up a little prayer, if that’s your thing. If you want to offer more tangible support, you can do so here:

Through GiveSendGo

Through GoFundMe

Or Venmo: Alex-Berenson-3 - last four digits of my phone are 1745.

Or send a check to Envisage Law, 2601 Oberlin Rd #100, Raleigh, NC 27608

As always, I appreciate any support, no matter how big or small. If we get past the motion to dismiss, as I hope, we’ll start discovery, and that will be expensive, and if we don’t, we’re all but certain to appeal, and that will be expensive. Litigation ain’t beanbag, and it ain’t cheap. But many hands make light work.