The Forgotten Lawsuits Targeting Trump’s Worst Abuses

Summary

Amicus with Dahlia Lithwick: "The Forgotten Lawsuits Targeting Trump’s Worst Abuses"

Podcast: Amicus with Dahlia Lithwick
Episode: The Forgotten Lawsuits Targeting Trump’s Worst Abuses
Original Release: December 20, 2025
Host: Dahlia Lithwick
Guest: Lee Gelernt, ACLU attorney

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Brief Overview

This episode zeroes in on a series of lesser-known but high-stakes legal battles challenging the Trump administration’s aggressive use—some would say abuse—of executive power to target immigrants, especially under the Alien Enemies Act (AEA). Host Dahlia Lithwick and guest Lee Gelernt, lead ACLU attorney in several of these cases, unpack the legal history, court showdowns, human consequences, and ongoing resistance efforts to safeguard due process and hold the executive branch accountable.

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Main Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Trump Administration’s Draconian Immigration Tactics

• Lithwick opens by describing Trump’s recent ramp-up of violent, inflammatory anti-immigration rhetoric and aggressive enforcement tactics, including mass arrests and secret detentions that harken to dark historical moments. She references public outcry over the treatment of migrants (01:17–04:00).
• Gelernt frames the administration’s legal posture as an effort to “eliminate due process”—not merely target criminals but strip entire classes of people of legal protection, demonstrating open contempt for judicial oversight (01:17, 24:25).

“They have done everything they can to avoid scrutiny by the courts… That’s the whole game for them, eliminating due process."
—Lee Gelernt (01:17)

2. The Alien Enemies Act — Its History and (Mis)application

• Gelernt gives a primer on the Alien Enemies Act, passed in 1798: intended for use only during actual wars or military incursions by nation-states (07:43–10:24).
• Historically used just three times (War of 1812, WWI, WWII), most infamously in Japanese internment.
• Trump has used the AEA for the first time ever in peacetime, to designate a Venezuelan gang (“TDA”) as a foreign invader—a stretch far beyond congressional intent.

"I think probably the administration has been surprised about how much pushback they've gotten across the ideological spectrum."
—Lee Gelernt (10:08)

3. The Secret Invocation and Lightning-Fast Litigating

• Trump signed an executive order secretly designating TDA as a terrorist threat and invoked the AEA, swooping up Venezuelan men for mass deportation, often based solely on tattoos (11:36–17:40).
• Gelernt and the ACLU moved overnight to challenge the action, relying on tips from lawyers and whistleblowers. They filed legal action in the middle of the night to halt deportations, leading to a dramatic emergency hearing (12:23–17:40).

"We were lucky to hear from immigration lawyers that their clients had been moved to Texas. Otherwise, it was very clear the Trump administration intended to do this in secret without any court supervision."
—Lee Gelernt (17:20)

4. Who Was Targeted — The Flimsy Criteria and Lack of Due Process

• The criteria for detention were arbitrary—often just the presence of tattoos regardless of real gang involvement. People with no substantive connections to crime (makeup artists, soccer players) were swept up (19:43–22:45).
• Due process was eliminated: Attorney General Bondi issued a memo saying detainees had no right to any review. Gelernt fought in Supreme Court for meaningful hearings and won stopgap injunctions (19:43–22:45).

"These men were given no chance... The government had zero evidence against any of them."
—Lee Gelernt (22:05)

5. Escalating Contempt for the Judiciary

• Lithwick and Gelernt highlight a profound escalation in executive contempt for the judiciary, especially compared to Trump’s first term. Officials openly flouted and misread court orders, refusing to cooperate even in the face of judge’s explicit instructions, resulting in ongoing contempt proceedings (22:45–30:54).

"It’s as if they don’t feel like we have three branches of government... just treating the courts as an annoyance."
—Lee Gelernt (25:00)

• Judge Boasberg’s pointed admonishments and the administration’s repeated evasions raise existential worries about the rule of law.

6. What Happened to the Deported Men

• Some deported men spent months in the notorious Sicot prison in El Salvador, suffering torture and abuse—before being returned to Venezuela, the country from which they fled. The government’s indifference to this suffering deepens the stakes of the legal fight (28:08–30:54).

"The abuse was absolutely horrific… these men spent three months essentially in hell."
—Lee Gelernt (29:42)

7. The Political and Narrative Impact — “Worst of the Worst” as Cover

• The administration continually frames its actions as focused only on “the worst of the worst,” using crisis rhetoric and militarized language (53:02–54:44), but records show ordinary people are routinely caught up.
• Lithwick: Once the government targets groups via martial rhetoric, the template can be endlessly expanded, justifying ever-broader abuse.

"It pulls together a whole bunch of the themes… using this locution of battlefields and war in a domestic policing situation, you can't unroll this. Once you've planted the idea that you're at war domestically..."
—Dahlia Lithwick (51:17)

8. Litigation Tactics and The State of Play

• Habeas corpus actions had to be filed in multiple jurisdictions, urgently, to block secret removals. All are now consolidated for a pivotal 5th Circuit hearing in January 2026 (46:29–50:27).
• The Supreme Court has blocked further AEA use for now. The next appellate decision is likely to shape whether the law can be used at all outside of real warfare.

9. The Broader Lawlessness and What Comes Next

• Lithwick and Gelernt agree: Trump’s first term had troubling policies, but the second term brings open contempt for legal limits and the judiciary—accelerating threats to basic constitutional structure (56:18–60:39).

"We are going to see one draconian policy after another... I don't know that there's going to be one point [of public outrage]... It's just gonna be a slog, a day to day slog, where we just have to keep pushing back and not get dispirited."
—Lee Gelernt (58:17)

• Gelernt emphasizes the importance of not succumbing to despair, urging listeners to “keep fighting and keep their head up and go from there,” however exhausting the grind (62:03).

"Things are bad, but they're not hopeless. And the fighting has produced real gains."
—Lee Gelernt (62:22)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• "They have done everything they can to avoid scrutiny by the courts… That’s the whole game for them is eliminating due process."
  —Lee Gelernt (01:17)

• "What we didn't know at the time, only suspected, is that almost all of these men, perhaps all ... were picked up based on essentially, tattoos."
  —Lee Gelernt (19:50)

• "[Judge Boasberg] said, ‘You have only one thing when you go out there and be a lawyer, and that's your integrity and your truthfulness. I hope you at the Department of Justice recognize that.’... a remarkable thing for a federal court judge to have to say to the Justice Department."
  —Lee Gelernt (24:49)

• "I think people understand if you're accused in any area of life, you just want the opportunity to say, Wait, can I please tell you what happened?... That's all that due process ultimately boils down to."
  —Lee Gelernt (29:28)

• "It’s not going to be one moment. Just this is what it means to fight for social justice. It's a grind. It's a day to day grind."
  —Lee Gelernt (58:40)

• "One thing that litigation can do is provide a platform to tell what’s happening, to tell the story of what’s happening on the ground."
  —Lee Gelernt (62:03)

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• [07:43] — Explaining the Alien Enemies Act’s history and explicit limits
• [12:23] — How the secret invocation of the AEA was discovered and challenged
• [19:43] — Selection criteria for deportees and the elimination of due process
• [24:25] — Administration’s contempt for the judiciary and differences from Trump 1.0
• [28:08] — What happened to the deported men in El Salvador’s SICOT prison
• [35:49] — The obstruction and legal maneuvers in contempt proceedings
• [44:39] — Challenges in representing and locating the deported class
• [46:29] — Details on the legal strategy against future use of the AEA
• [50:27] — The dangers of militarized rhetoric and “enemy within” framing
• [58:17] — The ongoing struggle against a lawless regime, and why to persevere
• [62:03] — The value of storytelling through litigation and hope for continued resistance

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Conclusion

This episode is a bracing look at how obscure legal tools, once weaponized, can devastate lives—and threaten the very scaffolding of the rule of law. Through meticulous reporting and firsthand advocacy, Lithwick and Gelernt illustrate the importance of relentless legal challenge, public narrative, and solidarity in the face of executive overreach.

Key takeaway: Victory in court matters beyond winning a single case. Each fight preserves due process, draws public attention to injustice, and keeps alive the possibility of a just, lawful society—even (especially) when those in power aim to snuff it out.

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Host sign-off:
"Lee, you keep winning, I will keep telling the stories."
—Dahlia Lithwick (62:34)

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For more details and ongoing legal updates, see the ACLU’s coverage and join Amicus Plus for extended analysis.

Transcript

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See Amazon.com amazonprime for details.

[A]

This is Amicus Slate's podcast about the courts, the law and the Supreme Court. I'm Dahlia Lithwig.

[B]

They have done everything they can to avoid scrutiny by the courts. That's the whole game for them is eliminating due process. We have never been invaded. This is the worst thing that frankly, in my opinion the worst thing that the Biden administration did to our country is the invasion at the border.

[A]

Full on Nazi shit was how one commenter characterized President Donald Trump's primetime address to the nation on Wednesday night.

[B]

The last administration and their allies in Congress brought in millions and millions of migrants and gave them taxpayer funded housing while your rent and housing costs skyrocketed.

[A]

Eleven months into his second stint in the White House, as his administration hit new lows in the polls and his chief of staff gossiped about the predilections of his inner circle to Vanity Fair, the US President opted to dial the racist, anti immigrant rhetoric up to 11. In a speech made of equal parts boasting and falsehoods, over 60% of growth.

[B]

In the rental market came from foreign migrants. At the same time, illegal aliens stole American jobs and flooded emergency rooms getting free health care and education paid for by you, the American taxpayer.

[A]

He claimed that an army of 25 million immigrants invaded the United States between 2020 and 24. He blamed those born outside the US foreigners for everything from rising rents to emergency room overcrowding to law enforcement costs increasing, quote, by numbers so high that they are not even to be mention mentioned. He claimed that the year before his election, quote, all net creation of jobs was going to foreign migrants. But since he took office he said 100% of all net job creation has gone to American born citizens. The President told the American people that he's fixed everything, that you've never had it so good. Meanwhile, U.S. border Patrol Chief Gregory Bovino and his roving border agents are back in Chicago in battle fatigues and people Memphis and New Orleans and Washington D.C. and Minneapolis continue to pull out their phones to bear witness to mass government agents snatching up their neighbors off the streets. This is Morning in America raids on work sites and in neighborhoods and outside schools and places of worship. Folks shipped to detention centers God knows where for God knows how long without formal procedures or protection, subject to scapegoating and lies. The overwhelm is real and on this week's show we wanted to move from the wide shot to a close focus on a case we have all been watching since mid March that is now set for a very important hearing next month and is a test case for that which has followed the mass renditions of hundreds of men to the infamous SICOT prison in El Salvador to which they were disappeared, abused and then declared invisible for purposes of American law. The litigation now sprawls into several lawsuits across multiple jurisdictions and some of it has gone up and down the ladder to the Supreme Court. Now, right after this show, Slate plus members have access to our Amicus plus bonus episode. That's where Mark Joseph Stern and I loosen our ties, pour a long drink and dive into the details of some of the legal stories we couldn't get to here on Maine. This week we're talking about a major order from a federal judge that indicates that maybe, just maybe, Congress can regulate the executive branch and flagging ways in which Democrats, even in the minority, using the power of words, can start to do damage control in Trump's America. We'll also talk about a Trump appointed federal judge calling out the Department of Homeland Security for treating immigration detainees in a way that shocks the conscience. If you've been thinking about a Slate plus membership, now is a really good time to join us because we are running a special 50% promotion for Slate plus membership, but you only have until the end of the year to grab it. This deal is exclusive to slate.com amicus+ at checkout. Enter the promo code amicus50 for a year of full access to all of Slate's content for just $59. That's a whole year of ad free listening across all Slate podcasts, unlimited reading on Slate.com and the Slate app every Slate game and extra amicus from me and Mark. If you join now, you'll be able to listen to our members only end of the year shows and you'll be able to help pick the worst of SCOTUS 2025. Jumping on a discount is a smart move in any economy, especially this one. But most of all, you will be supporting Slate's independent journalism. We're in a moment when independent voices really need all the help they can get. As institutions cave to the administration and platforms in AI and algorithms gut our ability to support our work through advertising, Slate plus members simply make our work possible. Go ahead and unlock this [e-mail] amicusplus when you enter the promo code amicus50 at checkout. But now on to the main show. This is a story of men rounded up on the basis of their tattoos, denied any legal process, and catapulted into hellscape prisons. And it exemplifies what happens when Donald Trump and the people who work for him get the final say and the only say about who receives the privileges of law and who lives outside its protections. Lee Gillaert is a lawyer at the ACLU's national office in New York. In recent years, Lee has argued some of the country's highest profile cases and is widely recognized as one of the country's leading public interest lawyers. Lee has argued dozens of major civil rights cases, including at the U.S. supreme Court and 10 federal courts of appeals. He is representing the class of Venezuelan men renditioned to the SICOT prison in El Salvador in violation of a judicial order. Lee, welcome to Amicus.

[B]

Thanks so much for having me.

[A]

I think I want to go through this step by step, if we can, because there's just a lot of statutory language and this case has gone up and down through the courts and multiple judges have had their hands on it. Can we maybe just start with the Alien Enemies act? Because this is a statute that dates back to the 18th century. It's been invoked, as I understand it, only on three occasions. So can you start by telling us what it provides on its own terms and how it's been used in the past?

[B]

Yeah. So the Alien Enemies act is an obscure law that I think very few people knew much about before President Trump invoked it. It was passed in 1798 by Congress to give a very specific but extraordinary power to the president to be used only in very narrow circumstances. And what it basically says is if we're at war with another country or we're being Invaded by another country, we're or there's a predatory incursion by another country. You can declare all the nationals from that country to be enemy aliens. So that's an extraordinary power, but it's cabin. And Congress did not give the president authority to use it whenever he wanted. It said, only in those circumstances where there's a war, essentially a military invasion, and only where it's a foreign government or nation engaged in that invasion. And so, not surprisingly, it's been used only three times in our country's history, all during major declared wars, the War of 1812, World War I and World War II, and infamously during World War II to round up Japanese noncitizens. And so no one ever thought it could be used against a criminal gang during peacetime. President Trump has now invoked it against the gang, the Venezuelan gang Trent Agua, known as tda, and said, tda is invading our country because there's a lot of migrants coming and there's drugs. It is so far afield from what Congress intended. And I think probably the administration has been surprised about how much pushback they've gotten across the ideological spectrum. We've been challenging it, and we've won overwhelmingly in the courts. And the court's reaction has been, well, wait, drugs, migrants, you know, those may be bad things, but that's not what this statute was intended for. This was intended for a military invasion. And so I think what we see is essentially the Trump administration trying to trot out any law they can, including an extraordinary military law to go after immigrants.

[A]

Is it necessary that it be a declared war, Lee? I mean, in the prior times, it was in fact a war. Does it matter for purposes of the aea that not only is this not a war, it's not been declared a war. Nobody thinks it's a war.

[B]

Well, so no, the Alien Enemies act can be used for an invasion or predatory incursions short of a declared war. And the reason for that is because back in 1798, Congress didn't say it all that often. So if we were attacked, the President had to be able to use it until Congress got back in session and declared war. But it has to be, as the 5th Circuit panel said, it has to be a military type invasion or predatory incursion. This use of it against a criminal organization during peacetime is, as I said, so far afield from what Congress intended. And ultimately, I think that the administration's real play here is to say the courts can't scrutinize what the President does, because I think Once there's scrutiny of this and whether the President acted in a conformance with this law, I don't think anybody can really say, oh, this is what Congress meant. Gangs selling drugs in the United States.

[A]

In February of this year, Trump signs this executive order. He designates Trenda Ragua as a terrorist organization. And then in secret, I think, in March, then the AEA gets invoked. It's not done in some public way. You knew it was coming. And I'm very curious how it is that you found out, because this all happened in a really compressed, like, a matter of days and hours, that this invocation of the AEA was gonna be used to go after alleged gang members. Can you just talk us through how you all figured out that this was gonna happen the way it happened, especially since it was kind of a secret invocation initially.

[B]

Yeah, you're absolutely right to raise that. And the fact that they tried to pull it off in secret and ultimately defied the court's order in March is part of contempt proceedings going on now. But I think it's part and parcel of the way the Trump administration has gone about things. So during the campaign, he had talked a lot about the Alien Enemies Act. So we spent a long period of time, roughly 10 months before the election, getting up to speed on the Alien Enemies act, doing the historical research, so we would be ready if he invoked it. He didn't invoke it for the first two months of the second administration, but we had been hearing rumors. We then heard rumors getting particularly strong in mid March, and I was down in D.C. for a hearing about Guantanamo the night before. So that hearing was on Friday, March 14, the Guantanamo hearing on Thursday. We began hearing rumors from the press that he was going to do it in the next 48 hours or so. I went to my hearing, argued that Guantanamo case, came back to my hotel, and not only were the rumors very strong from the press, but we began hearing from immigration lawyers around the country that their clients, Venezuelan men, had been picked up from around the country and brought to Texas, to Southern Texas in a detention center. So we therefore decided we can't wait, because who knows if they invoke it in secret and just shovel the men out of the country. And, you know, just to your point, D, the Alien Enemies act specifically says that any invocation, a proclamation, shall be quote, unquote, public. Well, of course, we ultimately found out that he signed it in secret on the afternoon of Friday, March 14th. So we stayed up all night, and around 1:32 in the morning, filed, I believe, that was around the time filed a challenge to it. Unbelievable. Unbelievably, the Trump administration said, oh, we're just speculating about it, even knowing that they had already signed it and presumably that lawyers knew, unless they were kept in the dark, which is another move by this administration. So we filed it. And the next morning, Chief Judge Boasberg in D.C. got the case, and he stayed the removal under the Alien Enemies act of our five named plaintiffs. But he didn't issue a wider injunction for the entire class of Venezuelan men we were representing. He was going to hold a hearing on Monday. And this is a remarkable aspect of the case that we've just revealed, is that the Justice Department asked for the hearing to be on Monday rather than Saturday night, which is when we were asking for. Because we knew there might be planes on the way. We had been hearing from immigration lawyers. Monday would have, of course, been too late. And so we convinced Chief Jez Boasberg to hold a hearing at 5pm Saturday night. The lawyer for the Justice Department said, well, I don't know if there's any planes. We said we were hearing people being brought to the planes. He then said, let's take a break for 45 minutes. You, the lawyer for the Department of Justice, find out whether they're planes. The lawyer came back and said, I still don't know. Which is just remarkable. And we now know from whistleblower evidence that he did in fact know that there were planes going. We convinced Chief Judge Sposberg to issue an order staying the transfer of people to El Salvador, and if the planes were in the air or landing in El Salvador, not to hand the people over to El Salvador so that he could figure out what's going on. Because it was clear at a minimum, they had no due process. The people were still handed over to El Salvador. And we have this famous tweet from the president of El Salvador saying, oopsie, too late. And that being liked by high officials in our administration. So we are now involved in three aspects of the Alien Enemies Act. One is to stop it from being used ever again. And that's now gonna be heard en banc, which means the full court of Appeals in the 5th Circuit on January 22nd. The second aspect is to get the men back who were sent to seekot that notorious El Salvador prison who now were transferred to Venezuela, but to get them back because they were sent without any due. The third is what Chief Judge Boasberg has initiated on his own is contempt proceedings for violating his order. The Justice Department remarkably, has said, well, we thought the order just meant we have to bring them back if they're still in US Airspace. And once they're out of US Airspace, we thought your order didn't matter anymore. It wasn't applicable, which is just completely disingenuous. Chief Judge Boebert couldn't have been clear. I don't want the men handed over to El Salvador because then you may argue, I have no power to bring them back. Which is exactly what they ended up arguing. So we were lucky to hear the rumors that it might happen, and we were lucky to hear from immigration lawyers that their clients had been moved to Texas. Otherwise, it was very clear the Trump administration intended to do this in secret without any court supervision.

[A]

More in a moment with legalernt. The warning signs are all around us. Record breaking temperatures, extreme floods, wildfires and other natural disasters. Animals like polar bears and whales vanishing before our eyes. And the Trump administration is making it worse, rolling back protections and sacrificing the planet that future generations will inherit. All for corporate but when people come together, they can make an impact. Backed by 3 million supporters, NRDC, the Natural Resources Defense Council, leverages the full power of the law to challenge corporations or government agencies that would illegally destroy our environment. They won nearly 90% of lawsuits they filed against the first Trump administration. Now, as their caseload grows, they need your support. Help stop oil and gas drilling in pristine wilderness, protect endangered wildlife from extinction, and safeguard our planet's climate for future generations. Make your gift today. Donate and your gift will be matched five [e-mail] Amicus this podcast is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Do you ever think about switching insurance companies to see if you could save some cash? Progressive makes it easy. Just drop in some details about yourself and see if you're eligible to save money when you bundle your home and auto policies. The process only takes minutes and it could mean hundreds more in your pocket. Visit progressive.com after this episode to see if you could save Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. Potential savings will vary. Not available in all states. More now with Lee Gillearnt of the aclu. Can you just tell us for one second, Lee, who was on these lists? How they were chosen? What was the system? We know? As you said, they were just plucking people off the streets and sending them down to Texas. What did their list consist of? Because they kept claiming these were the worst of the worst of the worst of the worst.

[B]

Yeah, I'm glad you asked that because I think what we saw in the Alien Enemies act was that they were not the worst of the worst. But that's a larger theme that I hope we'll talk about. The Trump administration constantly saying they're only going after the worst of the worst. What we didn't know at the time, only suspected, is that almost all of these men, perhaps all, but right now we don't know because the government's never given us a complete list of who were on those planes, were picked up based on essentially, tattoos that they rounded up Venezuelan men based on a scorecard and then decided they were gang members. You know, a certain amount of points for tattoos, a certain amount of point for other sort of meaningless things. And what experts have now said is, and looked at the tattoos, these tattoos are meaningless. Plus, this gang, tda, unlike some other gangs, doesn't actually use tattoos as a criteria for membership. And they're not really all that coherent of formalizing. So we just essentially see them picking up Venezuelan men. And that evidence has emerged over the months as we found out about who actually was sent. We know that there was a makeup artist who had nothing to do with gang members, a soccer player just down the line, people who had nothing to do with a criminal organization. And it's, I think, clear now that essentially, if you had a tattoo when you were a Venezuelan man, you got put on this list. And so what's remarkable and I think has caught people's attention on both the left and the right, is the lack of due process. I mean, we think fundamentally, whether you were a gang member or not, they cannot invoke this military law during peacetime, and that should be the end of it. But even assuming they could, there has to be due process. And you see people on the right and the left, including Joe Rogan, saying, well, wait, what if they're not a gang member? You gave them zero time to contest that. And I think that's a concept that most Americans understand is you're accused of something, you have to be given a chance to contest that. These men were given no chance. What we now know is that Attorney General Bondi issued a memo the day the President signed the proclamation saying the men are not entitled to any review whatsoever. They ultimately took that position in the court. We pushed back, and we won two different cases in the US Supreme Court saying they were entitled to due process. The first case, the court said they're entitled to meaningful notice and due process. That was called the JGG case. Unbelievably, the government responded saying, well, we'll give them 12 to 24 hours notice. We went back to the Supreme Court and got an injunction at one in the morning where the Supreme Court said, that's patently unreasonable. When we said meaningful, we meant meaningful. And so they have done everything they can to avoid scrutiny by the courts and get these men out. That's the whole game for them is eliminating due process.

[A]

And you've made this point, but I think it's really worth making that at every turn. When the government in this case can make some kind of nuanced, split the baby, meet you halfway position, they take a maximalist position. And I guess that is in keeping with this unitary executive. The president can do what he wants. Fact finding is not a matter for the courts on issues of national security. But in some sense, that maximalist position, You've said this too, Leigh keeps turning around to bite them, because no judge wants to be told that you have absolutely no authority, and no judge wants to be told that everything I say is irrelevant. And Judge Boasberg reacted more than any judge, I think we've seen to date incredibly badly to the representations both that, like, well, we weren't lying. We just didn't know what was going on. And then afterwards, oh, we didn't read your order to say turn the planes around. We read your order to say, once they're out of US Airspace, you're perfectly happy with these renditions. Judge Boasberg becomes sort of an early avatar of somebody who's not just saying, here's my order, you know, best of luck. But, no, I'm going to hold you to account for this. I wonder what your thoughts are on the ways in which the administration continuously, up until this week, responds to that by continuing to say, we don't have to listen to you at all. I mean, the contempt under the contempt, if you will, is really powerful.

[B]

Yeah, that's a good way to put it. The contempt under the contempt. You know, I've been doing this for a long time, and you obviously have as well. I have never seen the United States Department of Justice be this disrespectful to courts. I mean, not even close. You know, and one thing that's interesting is people always ask me to compare the first Trump administration to the second Trump administration. And one of the things I say is, you know, we were challenging a lot of draconian policies, and, you know, in particular, for me, the family separation policy, but I didn't see that kind of disrespect to the courts. They argued zealously for positions that we thought were extreme, but they weren't disrespectful to the courts. This time around, I'm seeing just outright disrespect in the tone and the arguments they're making in the defiance of orders. And, you know, Chief Judge Boasberg actually, at one of the hearings in the Alien Enemies act, said, you know, to the Justice Department, I tell my clerks, after the year is up with them, look, you have only one thing when you go out there and be a lawyer, and that's your integrity and your truthfulness. I hope you at the Department of Justice recognize that. I mean, that's a remarkable thing for a federal court judge to have to say to the Justice Department. But he was absolutely right. I mean, the tone in which they're taking. It's as if they don't feel like we have three branches of government. It's as if they're just treating the courts as an annoyance. They're doing extreme things, and then they're getting mad when the courts say, well, wait, hold on. I don't know what to make of it. I think. And Judge Boasberg in this case, is really going to portend potentially what goes on in the future, because it's very clear to me, and I think most observers, that they intentionally defied his order and that they misled him or, in fact, outright lied to him. They are saying he needs to drop this contempt proceeding. They've gone to the D.C. circuit. This is the second time they've gone to the D.C. circuit. We'll see how the circuit reacts. And I don't know whether they'll ultimately go to the Supreme Court, but I do think this is a real test of whether the Supreme Court and the courts of appeals are going to have the back of the district courts who are struggling to keep the government in line and obey their orders. You know, no one says that the government can't appeal when they think the district court judge got it wrong. But that's very different than the kind of outright disrespect we're seeing or just deciding they're not gonna comply with orders. There's a lot of big issues out there, a lot of big, substantive issues. But at the end of the day, this transcends all of them, because if there's not gonna be compliance with court orders, we're in a whole different world than we should be.

[A]

Lee, you said up top you wanted to get back to this issue of due process and why it matters, that there be some meaningful modicum of due process. And I think the thing that's always convey is, but for Due process, formalized fact finding, and formalized adjudication. This could happen to any of us. And we've heard this throughout these cases. I need you to talk for a minute about what happened to these Venezuelan men at seacot. Because while we all saw the initial video, the footage of the heads being shaved and these guys being, you know, ritually humiliated, and as you say, you know, the administration really chortling about that and seeing it as a flex, I just would love for you to catch us up on the stuff we didn't see on video.

[B]

Yeah, I'm glad you asked about that. Because, you know, one thing that Judge Boasberg said just recently, in the last few days is, look, the defiance of my order is not some kind of academic issue that we should be, you know, debating. In that sense, it had real life consequences for these men. You know, obviously, it's about the rule of law more generally, but in this particular case, it was the difference between getting a hearing in the United States and being sent to what everyone understands to be one of the most notorious prisons, essentially a gulag in El Salvador. And so we now know from interviews with the men, from reports that effectively they were tortured in this prison. The abuse was absolutely horrific. And so we got there in time. We got to court in time through no help of the government. The government didn't say, look, we're going to invoke this novel law. It says to do it in public. We're going to do it in public, and I'll let the courts decide before we send anybody there. They tried to sneak people out. We got into court. Nonetheless, they defied the order, and then these men spent three months essentially in hell. They've now been transferred through a prisoner swap to Venezuela. The government's trying to act like all's well that ends well. But of course, that doesn't erase the three months that they spent in this torture prison. They are completely traumatized. But the other thing people forget is they fled Venezuela because they feared persecution in Venezuela, and now they're back in the place they fled. So the government's suggestion, well, what's the big deal? Is obviously doubly wrong because they spent three months being tortured, and now they're back in danger again. For the lawyers listening, of course, due process is something everyone throws around, and sometimes it feels like a complicated concept to people and non lawyers, but at the end of the day, it's fairly simple. And I think people understand if you're accused in any area of life, you just want the opportunity to say, Wait, can I please tell you what happened? Or that's not me or something? That's all that due process ultimately boils down to. That's why the government didn't want them to have hearings before they were sent. Because had they been able to walk into court, it would have been clear that these men, or most of these men, or maybe almost all of them, were not actually gang members. The government would have pointed to the tattoos. We would have called experts to say those have nothing to do with anything. And the government had zero evidence against any of them. But they wanted to make a big showing and have all these men on the plane and did it without any due process whatsoever, any chance for these men to show who they really were.

[A]

What you're saying is really a good sort of material way of saying that on the one hand, we should be really, really protective of due process because it could happen to me. On the other hand, the administration was making a show of saying, and it could happen to the next guy and the next guy, and every single person in America who might be subject to removal for any who might have a tattoo should be as scared as your clients were. And I think that that is the double edged sword here, that that messaging. And it's one of the reasons, as you said, that Secretary Noem kept doubling down, doubling down in the face of all evidence to the contrary, that every single one of these was a vicious, hardened animal. Because it's a way of saying we will get to decide who is a vicious, hardened animal and you will have no recourse.

[B]

Oh, absolutely. And what was remarkable is that Secretary Noem went to the prison in El Salvador for, you know, sort of photo ops and theatrics, which is, of course, what they're always doing. But she did not even stand in front of the Venezuelan men who were the subject of the litigation because apparently they didn't think they looked scary enough. And they don't. She stood in front of Salvadoran gang members. That had nothing to do with it because they looked much scarier. We know that they were Salvadoran gang members because they all had 13 tattooed on them, which stands for Ms. 13, that gang. And so the whole thing has just been theatrics. The same with Guantanamo. And that's been the administration's whole M.O. and I think that's why I think we should talk about their constant refrain that they're going after the worst to the worst, because that's their way of trying to get out from under the pushback.

[A]

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Helping Planned Parenthood protect access to care when it vows matters most. Don't wait. Donate [e-mail] defend time for some life talk. Life insurance talk, that is. You probably have it. But do you know how much you're paying for it and for how much you are being covered? There's a good chance you may be paying too much for too little. And did you know if you receive life insurance through your job and you're unexpectedly laid off, you could suddenly be covered for nothing. Scary to think about, but simple to get right. So check out Select Quote today in as little as 15 minutes. Select Quotes Licensed agents compare policies from top rated carriers to find you the best fit for your health and your budget. It's important to protect your family and your health, and life insurance can provide that peace of mind. Get the right life insurance for you for less and save more than [e-mail] Amicus save more than 50% on term life [e-mail] Amicus today to get started. That's SelectQuote.com Amicus let's return now to my conversation with the ACLU's Legalearnt. We've referenced but haven't unpacked what happened in Judge Boasberg's court. As you said, they left, they were flown away. And then in April, he said, no, I want to have a hearing. And I'm not saying there is criminal contempt, but I'm saying I want to know what happened. And in April, he said, you know, it looks like there's probable cause to find that the Trump administration, lawyers in the Trump administration may be found to have criminal contempt. And I want you to walk us through because that was months ago and that case has been one step forward, two steps back, three to the side, and is still this week, as you and I are speaking, not able to discern, not even we're not talking about prosecutions for contempt, just findings of fact about what happened. And I'd love for you to just walk us through the ups and downs of that.

[B]

This is taking way too long. And because the administration is constantly appealing everything. So he gave the administration a chance to explain themselves of why they handed these men over to El Salvador despite the order. They refused to do so. And then they finally came up with this idea that, well, we didn't think you were saying, don't hand them over. We just thought, if the planes are still in US Airspace, completely contrived. So he then finally got frustrated and issued an opinion saying, I think there may be probable cause for criminal contempt, but I want to be prudent here and just find the facts. I feel like I have to understand what's going on, and I just want to do some investigation and find the facts. The administration immediately appealed, and I think we now know why they are appealing is because, of course, the facts are damning. So they appealed. It sat in the court of appeals for months and months, which is its own sort of problem. Finally, there was an opinion by a panel saying different rationales, but effectively, Judge Boasberg had overstepped. We then sought the full court review at the full court review was denied, but in a way that made clear that Judge Boasberg could go ahead with fact finding. A majority of the judges wrote opinions saying, we don't need to take this en banc, but we're making clear that he can go ahead because all he's doing is finding facts. And if the judge can't find facts, then essentially the Justice Department can get away, the executive branch can get away with defying any order, and they're home free if the judge can't find facts. So they sent it back to Judge Boasberg. He then asked for affidavits. They put in affidavits from Secretary Noem. She said, I made the decision, and from high level DOJ attorneys. Each affidavit was two sentences, which was a slap in his face to begin with, said nothing. He then understandably said, well, look, these affidavits are obviously deficient. I want to start calling witnesses. And the first witness I want is Mr. Rouvaney, who in the interim had filed a whistleblower complaint, saying that the lawyer who had argued that Saturday night emergency hearing had lied to Judge Boasberg, that he had told his superiors the order was clear not to hand anything over to El Salvador. And he also notably said there was a meeting with now Judge Bovey On March 14, when the president issued the proclamation, where now Judge Bovis said, we may have to say f you to the courts if they try and stop us. So all that's out there. And Judge Boasberg said we need to start calling witnesses because they're obviously not going to comply with my request for meaningful affidavits. The Justice Department has yet appealed that again, so it's now sitting in the Court of Appeals once again. And what they've said is, look, you have two options. You can drop the whole thing or you can refer us for criminal prosecution. I think everyone knows the reason they are willing to have it be referred for criminal prosecution is because they would immediately drop the prosecution and it would end so effectively. As you said, they are just simply saying you cannot find facts about what happened. If that is the ultimate result, we are on very, very dangerous ground because it means they can do what they want and there's no ability to find facts. And that would be. I mean, it would be remarkable in any case. But now with the whistleblower complaint telling us what actually happened and the fact that it was so clear cut that he didn't want people handed over to El Salvador, I think this is as big an issue as there is out there, again, as I said, transcending any particular substantive issue. I don't know ultimately what the appeals court will do or whether the government will go all the way to scotus. But I know I'm sort of stumbling here, but that's sort of how remarkable the situation is that, that every observer looking at this objective observer knows that they just intentionally defied his order and misled him. And I think it shouldn't be a partisan issue. It's dangerous for anybody on any side to have the United States Department of Justice, executive branch or any litigant be able to defy a court order. The other thing to sort of keep in mind is that it's the Department of Justice. They are not supposed to win by any means at all cost. They are supposed to vigorously argue their cases and represent their client, but they're supposed to ultimately do justice. You know, and that's not what's happening here. They are doing anything they can, even if it means misleading a judge or defying a court order. And so there's a lot at stake. The other part of it is that I don't know a single serious lawyer, much less the United States Department of Justice, who, when the stakes are this high, if they genuinely think there's ambiguity in what the Judge has ordered, wouldn't go back immediately to the judge. In some ways, I think that's the most telling thing. I can't imagine not going back to the judge or any Justice Department under any president I've ever seen who would not have said, look, our senior lawyers assigned to the case are saying, the order is clear cut. Don't hand these men over to El Salvador. If the political appointees actually thought there was ambiguity in the order, and I don't think they genuinely thought that, but if they genuinely thought it, if they were trying to do the right thing, they would have told the lawyers assigned to the case, please get Judge Boasberg back on the phone and ask him to clarify the order for us. They didn't do that. I think that's extremely telling.

[A]

You're reminding me of a conversation I had on this show a few weeks ago with Mimi Rocca, who said to us, this is the first thing you learn at the doj. If you make a mistake, you go into court on bent knee, you cop to it, you beg the judge, you correct the record. If you say those planes are taking off, I'm so sorry, I didn't know. I mean, it has to be because of the sort of reputational interests of the department as you're saying that if you make an error, you correct it. And so when you get these two sentence declarations that are like shrugie emoji, it's a way of saying, we don't actually feel bound by your authority. We don't actually accept that we even have to phone in. Like you said, this is different from Trump 1.0, the pretense of abiding by your authority. Because what we're doing is just, just saying, make me. And because you can't make me, or at least haven't been able to make me thus far, we're not even going to put the patina of respect and regard. And so I think it's that thing that you're capturing which is at every turn. And Judge Boasberg has been generous. Right. About giving opportunities to correct the record time to figure out what's going on. I mean, he has been very careful to say, if you want to get, get straight with this, like, I'm all ears. And the answer, as you say, continues to be the back of the hand. I wonder if I can ask you just a very lawyering question that I've been wondering about, which is, how are you keeping in touch with and keeping track of this class of Venezuelans that you're representing? Because as you said, they're there. Many of them want to come back to the United States. Venezuela is a country the United States is maybe or maybe not going to be in a war with. And I've heard you say in other contexts, some of these men are terrified to get on the phone. They are terrified to have open and honest conversations with their counsel. And as you noted earlier, they're traumatized from what has happened to them. And I just would love to know, because I think most of us, even the lawyers among us, have the sense of what it's like to represent clients in trouble. You are representing clients under many, many multiple layers of an in to help you give them the best representation you can.

[B]

It's not been easy. And we have not been able to speak to every one of them. It's hard to find them all. Some of them are in hiding. And we've also decided that there's a limit to how often we should be talking to them because we have heard that their phones are being surveilled and that they're very scared about talking to anybody. So we have talked to lots of them, but it's not easy. Ultimately, if the judge rules that they have a right to come back or at least get due process, perhaps remotely, we're gonna have to track everyone down and see. But a lot of them are very, even though they're feeling in danger in Venezuela, are also scared to come back to the US because they could be sent to seekot again in their mind. And we cannot guarantee that something bad will not happen to them at the hands of the Trump administration, because the Trump administration has shown no willingness to exercise any kind of humane discretion in any situation. So it's a very difficult conversation we're having with them about what's in their best interest, what they should do. Right now, we're fighting for an order so that they can either come back or get due process remotely in a hearing. We'll see how that plays out. But it's. It's been difficult. It's been difficult because as much as we want to talk to them and get as much information, we also don't want them to put them in danger in Venezuela. And a lot of them are so traumatized that they don't want to talk about it, and they're feeling so nervous about doing anything that could put them in additional jeopardy. So it's different than almost any other case we've had in that sense.

[A]

You mentioned that you're also litigating to ensure that the AEA isn't invoked again. Can you talk a little bit about that?

[B]

Yeah. So ultimately, the Supreme Court said, look, you need to do these cases in what's called habeas corpus, meaning in the place where individuals are actually detained, which is what the Justice Department wanted, the administration wanted, because it would mean that we would have to file all over the country. So during the spring, every time we got word that someone might be put on a plane under the Alien Enemies act, we had to rush to file a habeas corpus petition. And we ended up filing them all over the country. Pennsylvania, Colorado, three different places in Texas, often in the middle of the night to avoid the government trying to rush people out of the country. And in one instance, we found out about it, it only hours before and ultimately got a ruling from the US Supreme Court at one in the morning to stop the buses were on the way to the plains. All those cases around the country have now been put on hold for one test case, and that's a test case in the fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, the fifth Circuit Court of Appeals. Originally, the three judge panel ruled in our favor and said, look, the Alien Enemies act is a military law. We are not not being invaded in any military sense. Drugs and migrants coming to the country are not what Congress meant and ruled that the Alien Enemies act cannot be used again. We had thought the government was going to take that directly to the U.S. supreme Court. And the reason we thought that is because the US Supreme Court had issued a stay in the case saying, you can't use the Alien Enemies act till it comes back to us in the Supreme Court. And the government had been running around the country telling courts this is an absolutely essential tool. We need it immediately. So we assume that since they couldn't use it until they got back to the Supreme Court and won in the Supreme Court, they would go immediately to the Supreme Court. Instead, they asked the Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit to hear it en banc, which the Court of Appeals is gonna do. But I think one thing about the fact that they went to the Court of Appeals again is that it sort of of puts the lie to their claim that they need it immediately. And it's such an essential tool because now they're going to spend another six months in the Court of Appeals where the U.S. supreme Court's stay is still in place and they can't use it. So we're going to have argument on January 22 in the court of Appeals and that's going to present the same issue that we've been arguing around the country that this is not what the law it was intended for. It was intended for wars and military invasions, not to stop a criminal organization. And one thing we've stressed in the original panel stressed is that this is not a situation where you either allow these men to stay in the country or you have to use the Alien Enemies Act. The immigration laws allow for their removal if they've committed crimes or they're genuinely a danger. And so the only thing the Alien Enemies act really does for the administration, or at least what we think the reason they want to use it is because it eliminates due process, allow people to apply for things like asylum or get a hearing to show they're not gang members. And so that's why the administration wants to use it. So this is an enormous test case, obviously, because if ultimately the administration can use it for gangs, I think we're gonna see it go nation by nation by nation, every gang. And we've said, you know, think about the implications of that. Every ethnic group in this country has been associated with some gang throughout history. You know, one of the things I said in is, well, could they have invoked it against the mafia in the 50s, Irish gangs, Jewish gangs? And so there's an enormous amount at stake going forward about whether they can use it. So that'll be the test case. And I think whoever loses will ultimately probably seek Supreme Court review. Undoubtedly.

[A]

It's interesting that when I cast my mind all the way back to March, one of the things that was so kind of tricky about designating gangs as foreign invaders under the AEA is then it becomes of a piece with an entire template of we're at war with an enemy within. Right. This becomes, in some sense, the basis for sending in the National Guard using ICE to do, you know, policing. In a weird way, it is, first of all, like, a perfect tautology to say we are gonna designate without any war or invasion who is among us illegally, and then we are going to put troops on the ground in order to say that it's a war, because now it looks like a war in America. And it's kind of a perfect circle of argumentation. It pulls together a whole bunch of the themes. And I do really appreciate you starting with reminding me. And you've said it twice now. You really want to express why this claim about. But these are the worst of the worst is so, so pernicious. So I don't know if you have, like, more to add to that. You've said it's important, and I think you've just identified what it is that using this locution of battlefields and war in a domestic policing situation, you can't unroll this. Once you've planted the idea that you're at war domestically with groups of people based on tattoos and that the government's telling you they're violent and dangerous, there's nowhere left to go. Except more of the same, right?

[B]

Yeah, no, absolutely. And I think it's important legally, for all the reasons you've said, that it leads to unlocking all these powers, including sending the National Guard. I also think that obviously it's critical politically and from a narrative standpoint, when he was elected this time and up through the inauguration and immediately after the inauguration, I was constantly being asked, especially by the media, well, so now he has this mandate, there's really going to be no way for you to fight back and push back. And what I said then was I think what the American public, public voted for was sort of some vague abstraction about they wanted more immigration enforcement. And truthfully, I think they did. But what I said then is I don't think that they're going to want what's coming. And I predicted that what we're going to see is not them limiting themselves to going after the worst of the worst, serious criminals, national security threats. You're going to start seeing families separated again. You're going to start seeing families who have been here decades without criminal convictions being tarred, targeted children being removed. And that's, of course, what's happened. And I think you do see the American public now pushing back and saying, well, wait, that's not what we thought you meant. And I constantly get calls from people saying, I didn't think they meant the custodian in my son's school, he's the best guy. And so you now have this pushback. They're still claiming they're going after the worst, worst, but there is overwhelming evidence that that's not what's happening. You see the American public pushing back, and I just hope that people continue to document who actually is the subject of these raids, of all these actions, because at some level, it goes beyond sort of complicated immigration policy issues. And all the American people, I think, just have a basic sense of fairness. They don't want to see children pulled out of an apartment in the middle of the night in their pajamas being removed. They don't want to see separations. You know, at first they believed that it was going to be the worst of the worst, but now, of course, it's not. And as much as the Legal challenges are critical. It's absolutely essential that everyone document who actually is being targeted, because I don't think that the American public really wants a war against immigrants.

[A]

We are going to take a short break. This show is brought to you by BetterHelp. The holidays are a time of traditions. Now is the perfect moment to reflect on what they mean to you or to rewrite them. Therapy during the holidays could be a new tradition, one where you take time for yourself during what can be a joyful but sometimes hectic and lonely season. If you're thinking of starting therapy, consider trying BetterHelp to close the year with clarity rather than chaos. With over 30,000 therapists, BetterHelp is one of the world's largest online therapy platforms, having served over 5 million people globally. BetterHelp does the initial therapist matching work for you so you can focus on your therapy goals. A short questionnaire helps identify your needs and preferences. But if you aren't happy with your match, you can switch to a different therapist at any time from their tailored recommendations. This December, remember, start a new tradition by taking care of you. Amicus Listeners get 10% [e-mail] Amicus that's betterhelp.com Amicus President Trump doesn't know what.

[B]

To do with courage, but we do. I'm Sky Perryman, president and CEO of Democracy Forward. Since Inauguration Day, our lawyers have been.

[A]

Fighting for people and communities challenging the.

[B]

Trump Vance administration's unlawful agenda.

[A]

We've won legal victories already, but this.

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Fight isn't just ours. It belongs to the people. And we know the cost of silence is greater than the cost of action.

[A]

So join us.

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Add your courage to the [e-mail].

[A]

I want to end with this question. We started by talking about the president, talking about immigrants. And even though I think a lot of folks heard that as an administration in decline and tanking polling numbers, and as you said, a rising tide of people who said, oh, I didn't want any of this, but what I worry about, and partly I'm listening to you talk and I'm remembering you say these sentences about family separation not that long ago. Lee I'm listening and I'm knowing that, that the more the tide turns, the more a flailing regime is going to double down and double down again. And so just now, we're seeing a push to denaturalize citizens. We're seeing a new travel ban. We're seeing quotas for denaturalizing citizens. The ICE funding is gonna kick in, and we're gonna see A huge burgeoning private detention and deportation machine the likes of which I don't think you and I ever imagined. And I would love to just ask, in concluding this, which has been a really troubling interview in a lot of ways, but this is the water you swim in. You litigated this through the first Trump administration. You and I have both said 2.0 is going faster. There's no braking mechanism, there's not much respect for the law. I would love to hear what, in this vast array of things that are coming, you're focusing on and how you're thinking about the possibility that this is just the beginning of a kind of ferocious contempt for the law that we just have not seen before in our lifetimes.

[B]

Yeah, well, that was depressing.

[A]

Sorry, sorry. That's my brand.

[B]

You know, I think you're right to point out that we're nowhere near the end and we are going to see one draconian policy after another. During Trump won with family separation, obviously you and I spent a lot of time talking about that. With me litigating and you commenting on it, it was sort of a flashpoint. That was a particular moment when the country said, wait, what is going on here? And they took to the streets and you had worldwide condemnation, not just national condemnation. I don't know that there's going to be one point. I think there has been so many things that have been so bad, it's hard for me to envision one specific thing happening where the whole country says, well, wait, this is way. I think it's just gonna be a slog, a day to day slog, where we just have to keep pushing back and not getting dispirited, where there's not gonna be just sort of one moment where we say we won. Particularly for young people, I'm trying to, to get them to realize it's not going to be one moment. Just this is what it means to fight for social justice. It's a grind. It's a day to day grind. And also for them not to feel overwhelmed and feel like, well, I can't solve these big problems, so I'm not going to do anything. And that goes young people or older people, just that any little thing you do matters. If you, you write to your congressman, if you engage in a march, if you're a lawyer or someone who just helps one family, I think that's what we're looking at. It's just people staying optimistic and hopeful and pushing back. Given where we came from, from the moment he was elected till Now I think we see that people are gonna be receptive, but it really is just gonna be one of those fights that's every day to keep your head up and keep pushing. As you said, it's sort of a tricky. But it's when you want to make people realize how bad things are to get them motivated. But if you keep saying they're so bad and it's hopeless, then I don't think people continue fighting. I think that's where we are trying to navigate is between making people realize it's bad out there but not making it seem hopeless and that there's nothing for them to do.

[A]

Yeah. And I want to add, just because now I, I, it feels like you've, like, caught my despair. And that is in no way what the mission was. But I actually want to add that one of the things I think I've learned this year is that winning and winning and winning in the district courts and at the circuit courts actually materially makes a difference. And it doesn't just make a difference in terms of you just won and your clients are not at seacot. It makes a difference, Lee, because it tells a story. And it really, I think, physicalizes and concretizes that, which is, as you said, due process is an obstruction. Right. The Alien Enemies act is an abstraction. And I think that the ability to tell people stories that horrify them is almost the only power that lawyers have and courts have in this moment. And as somebody who wins and wins and wins, I think, like, I really wanna say, not just that the young people need to understand it, but, like, we all need to understand the absolute abundant power of pushing back. Pushing back, pushing, because I think it is lighting a path to both what could be and really showing people what pushing back looks like. So I'm gonna, I think I'm gonna end there, unless you wanna accept that it's not as dire as I just suggested.

[B]

What I wanna pick up on to end is what you mentioned about storytelling. I think a lot of people feel like if you lose the case, it was of zero value. But one thing that litigation can do is provide a platform to tell what's happening, to tell the story of what's happening on the ground. So I think we're on the same page. Things are bad, but they're not hopeless. And the fighting has produced real gains. And people just need to keep fighting and keep their head up and go from there.

[A]

Legalernt is a lawyer at the ACLU's national office in New York. Over the last couple of years. He's argued some of the country's highest profile cases, is widely recognized as one of the country's leading public interest lawyers. Lee, you keep winning, I will keep telling the stories. I wish you and yours a happy new Year. And I really am incredibly, incredibly grateful for the work that you do and for taking the time to be with us. Thank you.

[B]

Thank you for having me.

[A]

And that is all for this episode. Thank you so much for listening. On today's Amicus plus bonus episode coming up right after this one. Mark Joseph Stern and I are digging through the legal headlines of the past week with more news from district courts standing up for the rule of law and more news of the Trump administration obfuscating or in 2025 terms, lying to avoid being being held accountable. Join us now if you want to take advantage of that 50% discount. That offer is only valid through the end of this year for a whole year of slate plus membership and all its benefits for just $59. Go to slate.com amicusplus and enter promo code amicus50. That's am I C U S50 to get access wherever you listen. That episode is available for you to listen to right now. We'll see you there. And thank you so much for your letters and your questions. Keep them coming. We are always reachable by [e-mail] you can find [e-mail] Amicus Podcast. You can also leave a comment if you're listening on Spotify or on YouTube or rate us and review us on Apple Podcasts. Sara Burningham is Amicus as Senior producer. Our producer is Patrick Fort. Hilary Fry is Slate's Editor in chief, Susan Matthews is Executive editor, Mia Lobel is executive producer of Slate Podcasts and Ben Richmond is our Senior Director of Operations. We'll be back with another episode of Amicus next week. Save over $200 when you book weekly stays with VRBO this winter if you need to work, why not work from a chalet? If you haven't seen your college besties since, well, college you need a week to fully catch up in a snowy cabin. And if you have to stay in a remote place with your in laws, you should save over $200 a week. That's the least we can do. So you might as well start digging out the long johns because saving over $200 on a week long snowcation rental is in the cards book [e-mail] Discover Mercer Labs Museum of Art and Technology in New York City, where creativity meets innovation. This holiday season, Immerse yourself in a world of interactive exhibits, digital masterpieces and unforgettable experiences. Whether you're with family, friends or exploring solo, Mercer Labs invites you to see art and technology in a whole new light. Get your tickets [e-mail] and redefine your museum experience.