Pesky Judges

Courts stop DOGE from accessing Social Security Administration data and prevent Homeland Security from deporting Georgetown fellow Badar Khan Suri.

Federal courts on Thursday dealt two blows to the Trump administration's plans, blocking the Department of Government Efficiency's (DOGE) access to Social Security data and the deportation of a Georgetown University fellow.

DOGE gets another nope: In Maryland, a federal court blocked DOGE employees from accessing certain Social Security Administration (SSA) data, for now.

"The American public may well applaud and support the Trump Administration's mission to root out fraud, waste, and bloat from federal agencies, including SSA, to the extent it exists," wrote Judge Ellen Lipton Hollander in her opinion. But "the DOGE Team is essentially engaged in a fishing expedition at SSA, in search of a fraud epidemic, based on little more than suspicion. It has launched a search for the proverbial needle in the haystack, without any concrete knowledge that the needle is actually in the haystack."

"Ironically, the identity of these DOGE affiliates has been concealed because defendants are concerned that the disclosure of even their names would expose them to harassment and thus invade their privacy," Hollander said, adding:

The defense does not appear to share a privacy concern for the millions of Americans whose SSA records were made available to the DOGE affiliates, without their consent, and which contain sensitive, confidential, and personally identifiable information… [which] means information that can be used to distinguish or trace an individual's identity, either alone or when combined with other information that is linked or linkable to a specific individual.

The judge's order also makes it uncomfortably clear how much data the SSA has on all of us—a disturbing thought no matter who has access to the information. It includes "Social Security numbers, personal medical and mental health records, driver's license information, bank account data, tax information, earnings history, birth and marriage records, home and work addresses, school records, immigration and/or naturalization records, health care providers' contact information, family court records, and employment and employer records," Judge Hollander writes.

Amazingly, the broad ruling may also prevent any SSA employees from accessing this data:

Acting Social Security Administration commissioner Leland Dudek told Bloomberg News that Thursday's temporary restraining order was so broad in barring data access to "DOGE affiliates" that it could apply to any Social Security employee—including the agency's IT staff and anti-fraud team. Therefore, he said, he would follow the order by blocking SSA employees from the agency's computer systems—and ask the judge to clarify her order.

Suri can stay (for now): Badar Khan Suri, a Georgetown University postdoctoral fellow and Indian national who was in the U.S. legally, was detained Monday by immigration authorities who apprehended him at his home. The government is accusing him of "spreading Hamas propaganda and promoting antisemitism on social media" and having "close connections to a known or suspected terrorist" (a vague standard if there ever was one). A deportation hearing is scheduled for May 6.

"Seeing our government abduct and jail another innocent person is beyond contemptible. And if an accomplished scholar who focuses on conflict resolution is whom the government decides is bad for foreign policy, then perhaps the problem is with the government, not the scholar," Suri lawyer, Hassan Ahmad, said.

He has filed a habeas corpus petition seeking to free Suri from detention. Documents filed with the court noted that the government has not actually charged Suri with any crimes, and suggest Suri was targeted because of his wife's "identity as a Palestinian and her constitutionally protected speech."

A federal judge ruled yesterday that Suri cannot be deported pending the outcome of his lawsuit.

Will Trump listen? The administration, and President Donald Trump specifically, have been going all in on the idea that democracy somehow means having a dictatorial leader who can unilaterally decide and enact any number of things. They've been trying to portray judicial rulings on executive plans—a fundamental part of our constitutional system and its oh-so-critical separation of powers—as an impermissible affront to presidential power perpetrated by lawless judges.

It's all very Scooby-Doo, "and I would have gotten away with it too, if it weren't for you pesky kids!" Except Trump is determined to get those pesky judges out of the way, calling for their impeachment or otherwise suggesting their will must be circumvented.

"These people are Lunatics, who do not care, even a little bit, about the repercussions from their very dangerous and incorrect Decisions and Rulings," Trump wrote on TruthSocial yesterday. "These Judges want to assume the Powers of the Presidency, without having to attain 80 Million Votes. They want all of the advantages with none of the risks."

This comes following the Trump administration's declaration that it didn't have to listen to a judge's order concerning deportation flights headed to Venezuela. U.S. District Judge James Boasberg demanded a halt to this, issuing an oral order that "any plane containing these folks that is going to take off or is in the air needs to be returned to the United States." This did not happen. Boasberg later issued a written order halting the use of the Alien Enemies Act to deport non-citizens declared (without due process) to be members of the Tren de Aragua gang.

Lawyers for the administration later said they didn't follow the first order because it wasn't in writing, and also claimed that they didn't do it because the planes were already out of U.S. airspace. Boasberg has scheduled a hearing for today to determine what happened with the planes.

Does this constitute the start of a constitutional crisis? Many are saying yes.

"This is not a set of procedural missteps. It is not simple incompetence. It is malice toward our constitutional structure," writes Corbin Barthold, a lawyer with TechFreedom. "Simply put, the Trump administration has begun its defiance of the courts in earnest."

"There are many examples of autocratic leaders constraining the power of the judiciary by packing courts with compliant judges, or by changing the laws that give them authority," said The New York Times. "But it is extremely rare for leaders to simply claim the power to disregard or override court orders directly, especially so immediately after taking office."

Not everyone agrees that we're in crisis yet. Former District Judge Shira Scheindlin "said that in the debate over whether the United States is already in a constitutional crisis, the real red line is if the executive branch defies the judiciary, a move that Trump says he wouldn't take," notes Politico.

But from Trump's rhetoric, it sure seems like he's teetering toward taking that step. Defying Boasberg—and maybe sort of owning it, but also maybe sort of claiming it was an accident—seems like a trial balloon.

Trump signs Department of Education order: Trump's executive order concerning the Department of Education was, as expected, delivered yesterday. You can find it here.

The order asks Department of Education Secretary Linda McMahon "to take all necessary steps to facilitate the closure of the Department of Education and return education authority to the States," while also seeing to the "uninterrupted delivery of services, programs, and benefits on which Americans rely."

The goal is to shut down the department—though as we noted in Roundup yesterday, that would require Congressional action. Barring that, the administration can cripple the Department of Education through staffing cuts and other means.

Some of these actions—like trimming the department's workforce—seem to be a step in the right direction toward trimming federal influence over education. But the same time, this administration seems to want to increase its influence over nationwide educational policy.

In the very order heralding an end to the "experiment of controlling American education through Federal programs and dollars," Trump declares that "any program or activity receiving Federal assistance" must end "illegal discrimination obscured under the label 'diversity, equity, and inclusion' or similar terms and programs promoting gender ideology."

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Scenes from Ohio:

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Quick Hits:

• U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement may have deported someone over a soccer tattoo, reports Reason's Eric Boehm.
• A federal appellate judge offers his dissent via YouTube video, objecting to his colleagues' decision to uphold a California ban on large-capacity magazines. "[Circuit Judge Lawrence] VanDyke said he thought his video would be a helpful visual aid" to his written dissent, notes The Wall Street Journal. "He sought to demonstrate that magazines are like other key gun components, like grips and sights, that can be swapped out and make the weapon function."
• A Republican state senator in Minnesota faces federal charges for allegedly trying to sexually solicit an undercover cop posing as a 17-year-old girl.
• X is seemingly restricting the accounts of Turkish users who advocate protests against the detention of a political rival of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
• "Ohio lawmakers are edging closer to requiring all porn watchers to submit their state ID and other personal information before accessing explicit content," reports WCPO Cincinnati.
• Can a man in a monogamous, heterosexual marriage be "queer"?
• On the resurgence of beef tallow.
• "An Alabama House committee Wednesday held a hearing on a bill that would allow law enforcement to arrest people who direct abusive language at first responders, make obscene gestures or linger at a response scene after being ordered to leave," notes AL.com. "To me, the terms look unconstitutional," Robert Corn-Revere, chief counsel for the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, told the publication. "The constitution protects the right of the public to observe what public officials are doing."