Trump Has Filed His Papers To Modify The Flores Consent Decree, Overnight. They Are... Entirely Orwellian.

[First -- the positives: As I've often written here, I relish the first rays of light, at dawn -- they render all they reach. . . luminous -- yet somehow, inexplicably clear(er) -- to slightly modify Norman Maclean's immortal turn of phrase. This is one of those mornings -- graphics shortly.] Let's get to it, then:

In a land not bounded by truth or justice or a half century of the American Way. . . 45's political appointee and Acting Assistant Attorney General, Chad Readler [he, of the losing side's fame (ignominy) in the DACA Cases, the Muslim Bans 1.0 and 2.0 -- 0 for 22 or so]. . . in short, a land existing only inside the lost minds of the crisis actors who are Trump's surrogates, do we read such preposterously-illogical memos of law, animated by an Ayn-Rand-ian inversion of the truth, like the below.

Mr. Readler, for Messrs. Sessions and Trump, tells us that it would be a "manifest injustice," (HAH!) one worked against the US government, if the able US District Court Judge Gee, sitting in Los Angeles, California does NOT modify the existing law of the case, in Flores (1998), to henceforth allow the government to hold entire families hostage, without a hearing, essentially indefinitely.

I won't repeat the pretzel logic by which Mr. Trump claims that it is NOT a "manifest injustice" to separate families, incarcerate babies, and deny good-faith seekers of asylum here in the US a right conferred by our laws for a half-century. You may read it for yourself, some 30 pages worth -- here.

I won't dignify it, in that way. I will, however quote the accurate legal standard Judge Gee will apply:

. . . .The rule generally is “used sparingly as an equitable remedy to prevent manifest injustice.” United States v. Alpine Land & Reservoir Co., 984 F.2d 1047, 1049 (9th Cir. 1993). . . .

Let that sink in. And while you do, consider this: the US government (at Trump's direction) wants Judge Gee to exempt it from complying with state safety and health requirements for facilities housing minors, while it locks whole families up, in converted Wal-Mart warehouses, run by donors affiliated with the Trump campaign, under no-bid federal contracts that now approach a billion dollars in payouts.

This is not the America we want (nor is it countenanced by existing constitutional law). The able Judge Gee will rule correctly, I predict, that the Flores consent decree was/is operating to swiftly release families seeking asylum (on a signature bond), pending a full hearing on asylum. That is a right conferred by due process under the 14^th Amendment (after Flores), to all persons seeking asylum at our border, or inside it -- in good faith. That it takes a long time to adjudicate that right, is not the fault of the asylum seeker (or his or her children).

Finally, I must note that Mr. Readler points to the spike in arrests of families at the southern border as an "exigency" requiring this modification.

That subterfuge is breath-taking: for we all know it is Mr. Trump's "Zero Tolerance" policy -- arresting people (whole families; babies) who, even in the most stretched definitions of Flores have committed at most a misdemeanor (like jay-walking, but endless imprisonment awaits, for doing so near the border?!), that has led to the spike in arrests.

There is a maxim at law and equity that holds one may not use the force of the courts, to benefit from one's own prior bad acts (arresting jay-walkers, and complaining that the jails are so full of jay-walkers, that we can't get hearings scheduled for them in a timely manner -- so we must hold them all. . . essentially forever). The force of law will not allow such a. . . subterfuge. This is a prime example of that, in operation. Bub-bye, 45.

Everyone else? Happy Friday -- the first one of the summer, officially! Middle son's tri-, come Sunday. . . on the road!

नमस्ते