Month: August 2023

Ultra-Right Federalist Society Scholars: Fourteenth Amendment Makes Trump Ineligible to Run for Office

Pensito Editors
Ultra-Right Federalist Scholars William Baude, left, and Michael Stokes Paulsen (Photos: Federalist Society)

New York Times: “Two prominent conservative law professors have concluded that Donald J. Trump is ineligible to be president under a provision of the Constitution that bars people who have engaged in an insurrection from holding government office. The professors are active members of the Federalist Society, the conservative legal group, and proponents of originalism, the method of interpretation that seeks to determine the Constitution’s original meaning.

“The professors — William Baude of the University of Chicago and Michael Stokes Paulsen of the University of St. Thomas — studied the question for more than a year and detailed their findings in a long article to be published next year in The University of Pennsylvania Law Review….

“[Baude] summarized the article’s conclusion: ‘Donald Trump cannot be president — cannot run for president, cannot become president, cannot hold office — unless two-thirds of Congress decides to grant him amnesty for his conduct on Jan. 6…’

“Steven G. Calabresi, a law professor at Northwestern and Yale and a founder of the Federalist Society, called the article ‘a tour de force.’”

Texas Lawmanker Seeks to Create God’s Government on Earth

Buck Banks

“You know, people say, ‘Well, the Bible is not a political book, and we shouldn’t be involved,’ and I’m just like, ‘Have you ever read it?’ It’s like every single chapter is like dripping in it!”

— Rep. Michael Cloud (R-TX) told a gathering of Christian nationalists that they have been called by God to establish Christ’s kingdom and government here on Earth.

DeSantis Replaces State Attorney with Federalist Society Judge

Pensito Editors

Orlando Sentinel

To diffuse claims of racism for groundlessly removing Monique Worrell, a Black state attorney who was elected by a two-to-one margin, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis replaced her with a Black judge who is a member of the Federalist Society. But, according to the Orlando Sentinel, Andrew Bain is also not a very good judge:

In his time overseeing criminal cases in county court, Bain received low marks in a judicial qualifications poll by the Central Florida Association of Criminal Defense Attorneys, ranking last among Orange County criminal judges, with respondents describing him as “state-leaning” or prosecution-biased.

At a press conference announcing his appointment, Bain offered a word-salad nonexplanation of why he’s a member of the Federalist Society, a powerful group that is uncannily influential in getting presidents and governors to name conservatives to top judicial posts, including the Supreme Court:

“I am a member simply for this reason: My grandmother was a sharecropper, so when she came time to harvest her harvest in her family and the landowner shorted her, she had no legal recourse because the judges made the laws,” he said. “And that’s purely unfair. And that stuff’s been going on forever.”
[…]