I'm not sure. Trump and Hegseth are already firing top uniformed leaders for perceived insufficient personal loyalty. If they complain about these events, we have no reason to think Trump/Hegseth will back down rather than replace the complainers with politicized hacks.

The White House updated it: "No money shall be drawn from the Treasury but in consequence of a social media post by the President."

My latest on why Sen. Thune does not simply end the government shutdown by eliminating the filibuster.
Balkinization: The Government Shutdown and the Filibuster share.google/UAYPuhzdrug1...

Kind of ironic: The reason why the government is shut down right now is because Kyrsten Sinema and Joe Manchin saved the 60-vote rule.

My latest, on the government shutdown. Turns out it is a lot harder to make a deal when you (a) refuse to negotiate, and (b) openly violated the last deal you made.
Balkinization: Shutdown, You’d Better Take Care share.google/EsKosGQkqiyV...

My latest, on the government shutdown. Turns out it is a lot harder to make a deal when you (a) refuse to negotiate, and (b) openly violated the last deal you made.
Balkinization: Shutdown, You’d Better Take Care share.google/EsKosGQkqiyV...

As a reminder, doing the work necessary to conduct RIFs during a shutdown is illegal

I’m becoming more and more concerned that people at high levels of public discussion cannot identify the difference between a genuinely viral conversation vs a bunch of bots making noise.

Yup. Yet a lot of the media is treating it as meaningful for no coherent reason.

Abigail Jackson saying: Democrats, calling your political opponents Nazis has consequences. Study: Left-wing terrorism climbs to 30-year high And posting a graph from Axios that shows WAY WAY WAY more right wing terrorism, and showing a very slight increase in left wing terrorism this year that would still have it lower than basically every other year of right wing terrorism.

White House Deputy Press Secretary seen here posting data showing how much more prevalent right wing domestic terrorism is than left wing domestic terrorism... while thinking she's showing the reverse.

Apparently she can only read headlines, but not the actual graph with the data.

What we might refer to as a "Kavanaugh Stop"

The Court also says it is concerned about whether mandamus is available in this case. If the Court ultimately finds no remedy, it effectively reverses Clinton v. NY, a 6-3 decision in which Justice Thomas (and then-Chief Justice Rehnquist) were in the majority. That would be a huge capitulation./End

All that being said, the Court takes seriously two arguments that are deeply unserious. It says the Administration has a possible argument that the Impoundment Control Act precludes litigation against impoundments, a position initially taken but then abandoned by the conservative D.C. Circuit panel.

That leaves open the result in challenges to domestic impoundments. There is none of the truculence we have seen in other recent shadow docket decisions favoring the Administration. And, again, most of the impounded funds will flow as they are outside the stay.

Appropriations Law is complicated, and S.Ct. appropriations cases in recent years have recognized that. The Court repeatedly emphasizes that this is only a preliminary result, grounded primarily in a balancing of the equities in favor of the President's foreign policy powers.

Deeply disappointing order from the Supreme Court in the USAID impoundment case. The Court grants a stay for something under half of the impounded funds, letting the district court's order stand for the majority of the money. A short 🧵.

He is definitely NOT O.K. with having Trump endorse his primary opponent. The rest follows.

So what it is saying it will do has nothing to do with a government shutdown. If it thinks politically it can do without these employees, it will illegally RIF them shutdown or no shutdown. And if it doesn't, this is all a big bluff. Either way, it should change nobody's calculation about a shutdown

In addition, federal civil service law provides procedures for RIFs, including notice, with which this clearly doesn't comply. So these are illegal RIFs. The Administration has illegally RIFed federal employees before, without any threat of an appropriations lapse.

In an appropriations lapse, it is unlawful for the Administration to take any actions not otherwise funded except to shut down the government or to protect life and property. RIFing federal employees is not necessary to shut down the government: furloughs have always proven sufficient.

Some are being misled by OMB memo on RIFs in the event of a government shutdown. It's a pure smokescreen, meant to distract from the Administration's intransigence. It's also almost certainly unlawful. A short 🧵.

People here will rant and rage against the "Democratic Consultant Class" for being too dependent on polling, and then in the next post will cite the most specious possible polls for whatever they're preferred positions are...

Trump Signs Order Targeting Antifa Movement

Dwight D. Eisenhower was a militant antifa.
www.nytimes.com/2025/09/22/u...

If you, like me, are the parent of a neuro-atypical child dreading this autism press conference, please remember: These are the people hurting our kids. Not us. They are the ones stigmatizing and pathologizing them. They are the ones peddling untested science. And we should be very, very angry.

If too many liquids are going into people, can we start with removing the bleach (or was it Lysol?) that Trump suggested might help with the coronavirus in his first term? Very, very bad liquids! I don't wish those liquids well!

Ah, I see, shadow docket *plus* rocket docket for whatever Trump needs.

Reminder that the emoluments clause case filed by Maryland & DC started June 12, 2017 and then was stalled for so long that SCOTUS dismissed it in January 2021 without a decision because Trump losing made it moot.

Beyond cost, states have a finite number of safe, supportive foster placements. Filling the system with children whose loving parents are just unable to afford better housing endangers both them and children who really do need to be taken from their homes in sketchy placements.

on a human level I feel for Erika Kirk. The look on her face here. Heartbreaking. My heart goes out.

This is exactly what we don't need at this time: turning an external threat into an excuse to attack one another. We will not get out of this without the help of many people who took a while to recognize the problem and get ready to act. Anyone offering positive messages should be welcomed. Period.

This is so messed up.