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From the long opinion today by Judge Alvin Hellerstein (S.D.N.Y.) in People v. Trump:
Defendant Donald J. Trump, President of the United States, moved for leave to file a second notice of removal. I denied his motion, but the Court of Appeals vacated and remanded and, on remand, I was directed to consider (1) whether then former President Trump demonstrated good cause for filing an untimely notice of removal after the Supreme Court issued its decision in Trump v. United States (2024), and diligently sought removal; (2) whether removal under 28 U.S.C. §§ 1442(a)(1) and 1455(b)(1) is available at this stage of the state court proceedings; and (3) whether Trump's prosecution is for or relating to an act under color of federal office and whether he raises a colorable federal defense.
To remind people of the prosecution:
On March 30, 2023, a New York State grand jury indicted then former President Donald Trump on thirty-four counts of falsifying business records in the First Degree in violation of N.Y. Penal Law § 175.10…. The New York County District Attorney's Office (the "People") alleged that from August 2015 to December 2017, Trump orchestrated a scheme with others to influence the 2016 presidential election, by suppressing negative information about him to benefit his electoral prospects.
As a part of this scheme, the People alleged that, at Trump's request, a lawyer who worked for the Trump Organization as Special Counsel to Trump, Michael Cohen, "covertly paid $130,000 to an adult film actress shortly before the election to prevent her from publicizing a sexual encounter with" Trump. Cohen, following Trump's instructions, proceeded to pay the adult film star, Stephanie Clifford (aka Stormy Daniels), using a shell corporation. After the election Trump reimbursed Cohen, disguising each check "as a payment for legal services rendered in a given month of 2017 pursuant to a retainer agreement." …
On December 16, 2024, the New York Supreme Court denied Trump's motion to dismiss the indictment and vacate the jury's verdict, filed in light of Trump v. United States. On January 10, 2025, the N.Y. Supreme Court sentenced Trump to unconditional discharge, and entered judgment. Trump's appeal to the Appellate Division, First Department, is pending….
Those who want to know more about removal, timeliness, presidential immunity, and more need to read the opinion.
A new Ninth Circuit ruling raises a number of hard issues.
Yesterday, a divided Ninth Circuit handed down Richards v. Newsom, rejecting a facial challenge to a California law, California Penal Code Section 26806, which requires federally licensed firearms dealers to maintain digital recording systems on their business premises. The law was challenged on First Amendment, Fourth Amendment, and Fifth Amendment grounds. I wanted to focus on the Fourth Amendment issues in this post, as I'm not sure the majority's reasoning was right.
I hadn't heard of this law until yesterday, so my apologies if I'm getting the details wrong. But as I understand it, the law requires federally licensed firearms dealers (which I'll just call "gun shops" for short, if that's not too inaccurate) to have 24/7 video surveillance of "interior views of all entries or exits to the premises, [a]ll areas where firearms are displayed[, and] all points of sale, sufficient to identify the parties involved in the transaction." They have to store the video for at least a year, and agree to turn over video records in response to a search warrant or other court order.
From a Fourth Amendment perspective, this is a hard law school exam question. For starters, you have to figure out what to make of the order to have the system. Is the requirement of installation and use (to the extent a particular shop doesn't already have such a system) forcing the gun shop owner to act as a state actor, installing the device? If so, what exactly is searched, and whose interests are implicated— those of the gun store owner, or the customers and others in the gun store? Does this fall within the famously murky record-keeping framework of California Bankers Association v. Schultz, or is it more like an order to compel records as in Carpenter or Chatrie?
But wait, there's more. Under Maryland v. Macon, there's no reasonable expectation of privacy in a store open to the public, but here the surveillance is 24/7, and you don't know what might get recorded after work hours. So would there be Fourth Amendment rights in the video itself, or would it depend on which time window of video the government later tries to compel? And which of these issues can be addressed in a facial challenge, and how might the closely regulated industries exception apply or not apply, under City of Los Angeles v. Patel?
I don't have time for a long post to do the case justice, unfortunately. But here's one part I want flag that strikes me as at the very least incomplete, if not likely wrong: The state action analysis. At one point in the case, the panel discusses the plaintiffs' argument that the law made gun shops state actors under the Fourth Amendment. Here's what the court says:
Unable to articulate any physical intrusion or actual access of audiovisual recordings by the government, Plaintiffs instead argue that Section 26806 transforms FFLs into state actors for purposes of the Fourth Amendment. To support this argument, Plaintiffs argue that they satisfy three tests discussed in Brunette v. Humane Society of Ventura County for determining when a private party has engaged in state action under 42 U.S.C. § 1983: (1) the "joint action" test, (2) the "symbiotic relationship" test, and (3) the "public functions" test. See 294 F.3d 1205, 1210 (9th Cir. 2002). Again, we disagree.
This seems odd.
First, Fourth Amendment state action is generally an agency test that looks at whether the private party was acting as the government's agent, which in turn looks to knowledge, acquiescence, and the like. The Ninth Circuit has sometimes instead in Fourth Amendment cases tried to summarize state action analysis from outside Fourth Amendment law, which is what the panel is doing here, and was doing in Brunette. But even if you try to apply the different "tests" from outside Fourth Amendment law, the 2002 Brunette case did not purport to provide a comprehensive list of theories of state action.
Of particular relevance, Brunette did not ask the court to consider the "state compulsion" test. As the court put it in Children's Health Defense v. Meta Platforms, quoting Supreme Court caselaw:
As we have explained, the Supreme Court has identified four tests for when a private party "may fairly be said to be a state actor": (1) the public function test, (2) the joint action test, (3) the state compulsion test, and (4) the nexus test. Lugar, 457 U.S. at 937, 939, 102 S.Ct. 2744.
The Supreme Court in Lugar rooted this test in Adickes v. SH Kress & Co., which held that a restaurant would be a state actor if it refused service to a customer because of a state-enforced custom of segregating the races in public restaurants. Adickes noted:
For state action purposes it makes no difference of course whether the racially discriminatory act by the private party is compelled by a statutory provision or by a custom having the force of law—in either case it is the State that has commanded the result by its law.
I wonder, why isn't a gun shop turned into a state actor by a statutory provision requiring action under this state compulsion test? Maybe the resulting act wasn't a search or seizure, and maybe it's not an issue that can be address in a facial challenge. But I'm not sure why whatever action is compelled wouldn't be state action.
Fabricated identities, fictitious daycares, and made-up laws.
Please enjoy the latest edition of Short Circuit, a weekly feature written by a bunch of people at the Institute for Justice.
New case! IJ clients Charles and Eli Copley own 50 wooded acres in Roxbury, Conn., where they've always welcomed hikers for a small hourly fee, an absolutely harmless use that is not visible to the neighbors. But the town says that might violate the zoning code—just not any part of the code that is written down—and the Copleys haven't been able to have any hikers for a year. Outrageous! Click here to learn more.
New on the Short Circuit podcast: Our #12Months12Circuits series makes it to the Eighth. There's irreparable harm and contractor speech.
From today's decision by Judge Kyle Dudek (M.D. Fla.) in Noshirvan v. Couture (for a 2023 decision stemming from the same incident, see Plaintiff Sues Defendant, Alleging Defendant's "Niche Is Cancel Culture"):
This case begins with a viral video. Plaintiff Danesh Noshirvan is a citizen journalist who built a social media following by exposing bad behavior in public spaces. In January 2022, he posted a video of Defendant Jennifer Couture confronting a young woman in a Dunkin Donuts parking lot. The video caught fire, resulting in criminal charges for Couture and public backlash. Couture and her now-husband, Defendant Dr. Ralph Garramone, allegedly decided to get even.
According to Noshirvan, Couture and Garramone—acting individually and through Garramone's various business entities—hired a convicted computer hacker named Joseph Camp to retaliate. Camp, in turn, connected the couple with Defendant Patrick Trainor, a New Jersey lawyer who operates the Anti-Doxing League. What followed, Noshirvan alleges, was a retaliatory conspiracy by these defendants to systematically destroy his life and livelihood.
Trainor responded to Noshirvan's lawsuit with counterclaims for defamation and civil conspiracy. According to Trainor, Noshirvan used his social media account to falsely brand Trainor as a "Nazi," a "White supremacist," and a "pedophile."
8/28/1958: Cooper v. Aaron is argued.
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Bloomberg News (Jordan Fischer) seems to have broken the story. Culver is also accused of impersonating an NSA agent, a Supreme Court Special Master, and "the Director of Tailored Access Operations ('TAO'), a purported intelligence agency."
From the long opinion in Rokhvand v. Herzfeld, decided by D.C. Court of Appeals Judge Roy McLeese, joined by Judges Corinne Beckwith and John Howard:
This case arises from three incidents that occurred on three separate days in March and May of 2024 during demonstrations in front of the Israeli embassy….
Ms. Rokhvand and Ms. Barmada were engaged in a multi-month demonstration in front of the Israeli Embassy in Washington, D.C. in protest of Israel's recent military actions in Gaza…. The protesters used a designated area outside the embassy to set up their display of flags, tents, and signs and to engage in "noise demonstrations," during which they spoke into megaphones, played Palestinian music, or used noise machines. They displayed large signs with messages against Israel's military actions in Gaza, as well as a sign offering earplugs to passersby, along the sidewalk.
Rabbi Herzfeld is the rabbi of a Washington, D.C. congregation and the founder and leader of a Jewish school. During his tenure in D.C., Rabbi Herzfeld has been involved in the wider community and worked with other local faith leaders and elected officials. Rabbi Herzfeld has close relationships with family and friends in Israel and was "devastat[ed]" by the October 7, 2023, Hamas attack on Israel. Rabbi Herzfeld did not know of Ms. Barmada or Ms. Rokhvand before his interactions with them at the Israeli embassy. Likewise, neither Ms. Barmada nor Ms. Rokhvand had heard of or met Rabbi Herzfeld before their interactions with him during the embassy demonstrations.
The first incident occurred in the middle of the day while Ms. Barmada and a few other protesters, not including Ms. Rokhvand, were at the protest site. According to Ms. Barmada, a group of men including Rabbi Herzfeld approached the protest site and began slowly walking through the demonstration and "intensely … looking around." Ms. Barmada heard Rabbi Herzfeld call her a "Hamas supporter" and a "terrorist" who supported "raping women" and "beheading babies." Another man in the group called Ms. Barmada a "Nazi bitch" and said that she should "go to the concentration camp."
Rabbi Herzfeld began speaking about the protesters, pointing at Ms. Barmada and referring to the protesters as the "wicked people" that "we will defeat." The group of men again approached the protesters and walked back and forth in front of them, during which time Ms. Barmada and Rabbi Herzfeld exchanged a couple of remarks and Rabbi Herzfeld took something out of his pocket and stood near Ms. Barmada with his group. Ms. Barmada perceived the interaction to be a threat designed to "intimidate" her. She felt "scared" and "harassed" and that the incident was "violating."
In Goldstein v. CUNY, a Jewish Israeli professor at the Borough of Manhattan Community College—part of the City University of New York system—sued for discrimination and harassment over various actions (which started in Mach 2023) at BMCC that stemmed from the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Today, Judge Jeannette Vargas (S.D.N.Y.) rejected Goldstein's claim; the opinion is long, and to keep the excerpt manageable I will exclude the long statement of facts, and rely on the judge's account of the facts within the analysis:
Plaintiff's claims under Title VII, the NYSHRL, the NYCHRL, and Section 1983 are largely premised upon expressions of political speech regarding Israel, Zionism, and the Palestinian conflict that the [Complaint] characterizes as antisemitic. This raises a preliminary question as to what extent such expressive conduct, no matter how personally offensive or hateful to individuals based upon a protected characteristic, can be actionable as workplace discrimination or harassment under federal or state antidiscrimination laws.
Title VII prohibits "harassment so severe or pervasive as 'to alter the conditions of the victim's employment and create an abusive working environment.'" Abusive and offensive speech, no less than abusive conduct, can undoubtedly cause a multitude of psychic harms that would render a workplace hostile.
Antidiscrimination laws do not create a categorical "'harassment exception' to the First Amendment's free speech clause," however. "[T]he Supreme Court has consistently held that expression motivated by bias, hatred, or bigotry falls within the First Amendment's protection." "[I]f there is a bedrock principle underlying the First Amendment, it is that the government may not prohibit the expression of an idea simply because society finds the idea itself offensive or disagreeable."
Accordingly, while there is "no question that non-expressive, physically harassing conduct is entirely outside the ambit of the free speech clause," it is equally clear that "[w]here pure expression is involved, anti-discrimination law steers into the territory of the First Amendment."
Some excerpts from Judge Jacqueline Becerra (S.D. Fla.) today in Khorashi v. Beer; the analysis strikes me as correct:
This is a state-law tort action arising out of an online "doxing" incident that preceded Plaintiff's termination from her prior employer, Chartwell Law Offices LLP ("Chartwell"). Defendant Gadi Beer helped launch Chartwell in 2002 and served in senior leadership roles before leaving the firm in early 2023. Plaintiff alleges, upon information and belief, that he retained an equity interest in the firm and remained in regular contact with its founding partners. Defendant Beth Beer, Gadi Beer's wife, is a licensed attorney who served as a Regional Director in the U.S. Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights during the relevant period.
Plaintiff, a Muslim woman of Pakistani origin, was employed as an associate attorney in Chartwell's Miami office from 2018 until her termination on February 29, 2024. Throughout her employment, Plaintiff maintained a public Instagram account, "thatlawyermomlife," using her real name and the same profile picture that appeared on Chartwell's website, but her Instagram page did not include any reference to Chartwell or her place of employment.
After the October 7, 2023 attack on Israel, Plaintiff began posting prolifically in support of the Palestinian cause. She alleges she was "well-aware" that her posts "could be misconstrued by some people as antisemitism" and therefore consciously avoided negative references to Jews or Judaism, directing her criticism instead at Israel's government, the IDF, and Zionism. Her account was known to coworkers, some of whom followed and engaged with her content.
Beginning in late November 2023, Plaintiff alleges that an account using the handle "Beth Margot" attacked nearly every one of her posts about Gaza. The comments became "increasingly obsessive, vile and hateful," so Plaintiff blocked the account. Plaintiff later determined that "Beth Margot" was a pseudonym used by Defendant Beth Beer.
Just came across this in Justice Stephen Field's opinion as Circuit Justice in Ho Ah Kow v. Nunan (C.C.D. Cal. 1879):
We have, for instance, in our community a large number of Jews. They are a highly intellectual race, and are generally obedient to the laws of the country.
Thank you, Justice! (Recall that this was a time when "race" was used to include what we would today call an "ethnic group," such as Norwegians, Italians, and the like.) Meantime, the broader context of the case, which isn't about us at all (not everything is about us):
The plaintiff is a subject of the emperor of China, and the present action is brought to recover damages for his alleged maltreatment by the defendant, a citizen of the state of California and the sheriff of the city and county of San Francisco. The maltreatment consisted in having wantonly and maliciously cut off the queue of the plaintiff, a queue being worn by all Chinamen, and its deprivation being regarded by them as degrading and as entailing future suffering.
It appears that in April, 1876, the legislature of California passed an act 'concerning lodging-houses and sleeping apartments within the limits of incorporated cities,' declaring, among other things, that any person found sleeping or lodging in a room or an apartment containing less than five hundred cubic feet of space in the clear for each person occupying it, should be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor, and on conviction thereof be punished by a fine of not less than ten or more than fifty dollars, or imprisonment in the county jail, or by both such fine and imprisonment. Under this act the plaintiff, in April, 1878, was convicted and sentenced to pay a fine of ten dollars, or in default of such payment to be imprisoned five days in the county jail. Failing to pay the fine, he was imprisoned.
The defendant, as sheriff of the city and county, had charge of the jail, and during the imprisonment of the plaintiff cut off his queue, as alleged. The complaint avers that it is the custom of Chinamen to shave the hair from the front of the head and to wear the remainder of it braided into a queue; that the deprivation of the queue is regarded by them as a mark of disgrace, and is attended, according to their religious faith, with misfortune and suffering after death; that the defendant knew of this custom and religious faith of the Chinese, and knew also that the plaintiff venerated the custom and held the faith; yet, in disregard of his rights, inflicted the injury complained of; and that the plaintiff has, in consequence of it, suffered great mental anguish, been disgraced in the eyes of his friends and relatives, and ostracised from association with his countrymen; and that hence he has been damaged to the amount of ten thousand dollars….
From U.S. v. Anderegg, decided Tuesday by Seventh Circuit Judge John Lee, joined by Judges Doris Pryor and Joshua Kolar:
Steven Anderegg is charged with producing, distributing, and possessing visual depictions of minors engaged in sexually explicit conduct and transferring such material to a minor under the age of sixteen. According to the government, Anderegg produced these images using Stable Diffusion, a generative artificial intelligence ("GenAI") software that allowed him to create hyper-realistic images of prepubescent children engaging in sexually explicit acts.
The appeal in this case deals only with Anderegg's challenge to the home possession charge, not to the production or distribution charge. Here's the court's analysis:
Obscenity, along with certain other categories of speech, has historically fallen "outside the scope of the First Amendment." And, although the precise meaning of "obscenity" is difficult to pin down, the Supreme Court has offered the following articulation: "[S]peech is obscene to the public at large—and thus proscribable—if (a) 'the average person, applying contemporary community standards[,] would find that the work, taken as a whole, appeals to the prurient interest'; (b) 'the work depicts or describes, in a patently offensive way, sexual conduct specifically defined by the applicable state law'; and (c) 'the work, taken as a whole, lacks serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value.'" Miller v. California (1973).
At the same time, "[t]he Constitution extends special safeguards to the privacy of the home." The Supreme Court addressed the clash of these two principles—the government's interest in proscribing obscenity and an individual's privacy in one's home—in Stanley v. Georgia (1969)…. Acknowledging that the government retains "broad power to regulate obscenity," the Supreme Court held that the State's "power simply does not extend to mere possession by the individual in the privacy of his own home." "If the First Amendment means anything," the Court explained, "it means that a State has no business telling a man, sitting alone in his own house, what books he may read or what films he may watch." …
From yesterday's decision by Judge Thomas Thrash (N.D. Ga.) in Winer v. Mohammad:
This action arises out of alleged defamatory statements that Defendant Umaymah Mohammad, a student at the Emory University School of Medicine, made about Plaintiff Joshua Winer, a physician and professor at Emory….
Mohammad wrote about Winer that, among other things,
one of the professors of medicine we have at Emory [apparently referring to Winer -EV] recently went to serve as a volunteer medic in the Israeli Offense Force [sic] and recently came back. This man participated in aiding and abetting a genocide, in aiding and abetting the destruction of the healthcare system in Gaza and the murder of over 400 healthcare workers, and is now back at Emory so-called teaching medical students and residents how to take care of patients.
She and CAIR Georgia and CAIR Foundation, plaintiff alleged, used this and similar statements to "call[] for Emory to investigate him and/or terminate his employment."
Plaintiff sued for defamation; see this post for more details on that claim, which the court allowed to go forward in part. But the court also allowed plaintiff's federal civil rights conspiracy claim to go forward, as to the claim that defendants conspired to violate his rights under Title VI:
To state a claim under § 1985(3), a plaintiff must establish that the defendant has
(1) conspired … (2) for the purpose of depriving, either directly or indirectly, any person or class of persons of the equal protection of the laws, or of equal privileges and immunities under the laws, (3) taken or caused an action to be taken in furtherance of the conspiracy's object, and (4) injured an individual's person or property or deprived her of exercising any right or privilege of a United States citizen….
Some excerpts from the opinion yesterday by Judge Thomas Thrash (N.D. Ga.) in Winer v. Mohammad:
This action arises out of alleged defamatory statements that Defendant Umaymah Mohammad, a student at the Emory University School of Medicine, made about Plaintiff Joshua Winer, a physician and professor at Emory. Mohammad, who is Palestinian, sent an email to the entire School of Medicine student and faculty body on January 17, 2024, in which the Plaintiff alleges she "praised terrorism against Israel, expressed her hatred towards Israel and the United States, and stated that Israel, the United States, and Emory are perpetrating a genocide against Palestinians in Gaza."
Nearly two months later, in March 2024, the Plaintiff published an op-ed piece in an Israeli news publication sharing his decision to travel to Israel to volunteer as a physician in the Israeli Defense Force ("IDF") following the October 7th Hamas attack on Israel. The Plaintiff identifies as Jewish and maintains dual American and Israeli citizenship. He is a surgical oncologist at Emory Winship Cancer Institute, a professor in the Department of Surgery, Division of Surgical Oncology at the School of Medicine, and serves as the School of Medicine Surgical Clerkship Director.
In April 2024, Mohammad participated in an interview for a news organization called Democracy Now!. In the interview, Mohammad was asked about the email she sent and was asked to explain the importance of the issue to her. As part of her response, Mohammad referenced Winer by stating that
one of the professors of medicine we have at Emory recently went to serve as a volunteer medic in the Israeli Offense Force [sic] and recently came back. This man participated in aiding and abetting a genocide, in aiding and abetting the destruction of the healthcare system in Gaza and the murder of over 400 healthcare workers, and is now back at Emory so-called teaching medical students and residents how to take care of patients.
Mohammad was ultimately suspended from the School of Medicine for one year based on her comments in the Democracy Now! interview. In November 2024, Mohammad participated in a podcast hosted by the International Union of Scientists in which she made similar statements about the Plaintiff.
8/27/1948: Chief Justice Charles Evans Hughes dies.

What’s on your mind?
"The characteristics of the school as a place of learning reinforce that administrators cannot favor one side of a debate involving parental speech on an issue of prominent public concern, and which, in those parents' views, concerned the safety of their children."

Some excerpts from the longish opinion today in Fellers v. Kelley, written by First Circuit Judge Sandra Lynch, joined by Judge Jeffrey and Howard:
On September 17, 2024, [plaintiffs] were instructed by Bow High School officials to remove pink "XX" wristbands they wore in protest while watching their daughters (in [one plaintiff's] case, granddaughter) play in a girls' soccer game against a team with one transgender athlete. Further sanctions followed…. [W]e conclude that appellants have established a likelihood of success as to their viewpoint discrimination claim arising from the sanctions imposed on them for their passive speech in wearing these wristbands….
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