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lakebrody.bsky.social
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The state secrets privilege assertion is off the rails here. It does not give the government the right to withhold the information from the court. In every instance the government has ever asserted the privilege, it has provided the national security information to the court ex parte in camera.

This is exactly right. And importantly, the state secrets privilege operates only as to a case/claim brought against the United States — not as to a collateral matter, such as this, where a judge has asked the gov to provide information concerning whether the gov violated a court order.

This is preposterous, of course, because even when the gov invokes the state secrets privilege it provides the sensitive national security information to the judge ex parte for in camera review in every instance. That was true even for the highly classified Bush Terrorist Surveillance Program.

Trump directs DOJ to file these recusal motions. His view is that if the judge does not recuse, the motion itself will cause the judge to go easier on him lest people think the judge is biased.

"We all learned long ago, perhaps on the playground, that giving in to a bully only makes things worse." #Opinion from Dean Erwin Chemerinsky via @latimes.com: Capitulation to Trump spells inordinate danger www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

He wasn’t complaining when those judges issued record numbers of nationwide injunctions against the Biden and Obama administrations. So hypocritical.

Classic Trump. Claim ownership when it sounds like such a good thing. Blame someone else when it doesn’t sound like such a good thing.

Classic Trump. Claim ownership when it sounds tough. Blame someone else when trouble comes.

And the court should forthwith sanction the government to the extent it takes any steps in contravention of the court’s order.

But even if the government invokes state secrets privilege, it still always gives a court the national security information ex parte in camera to establish its claim of privilege. Invocation of the state secrets privilege by the gov here would miss the mark.