The most serious Trump indictment yet – a criminal law scholar explains the charges of using ‘dishonesty, fraud and deceit’ to cling to power

  The Justice Department announced its second federal indictment of former president Donald J. Trump on Aug. 1, 2023. The charges are groundbreaking and not just because a former president is facing multiple criminal charges.

  It’s because these are the first federal charges alleging a former president effectively attempted a particular kind of coup, called an auto-coup, in which he attempted to keep himself in power by illegal means.

  The indictment lists four felony charges. All of them rely on the same facts and boil down to the same set of five allegations, many of which have been previously reported.

How the exposure of highly classified documents could harm US security – and why there are laws against storing them insecurely

  When Donald Trump pled not guilty on June 13, 2023, to federal criminal charges related to his alleged illegal retention of classified documents, it was his first opportunity to formally answer charges that he violated the Espionage Act.

  The Justice Department alleges that, after his presidency, Trump held, in an unsecure location, documents about some of the nation’s most sensitive secrets, including information about U.S. nuclear programs as well as U.S. and allies’ defense and weapons capabilities and potential vulnerabilities to military attack and that he repeatedly thwarted efforts by the National Archives to retrieve them.

The Alabama Legislature needs to care about the prison crisis

  Something Rep. Marcel Black said has stuck with me for years.

  We spoke a decade ago about Alabama’s endless prison crisis. It seemed as far away from resolution then as it does today. I asked Black, a longtime House Judiciary Committee chair, why it proved so intractable.

  Black gave me this example. Suppose the state builds a new prison. Is an Alabama state legislator going to use it in a campaign? Will you open your mailbox and find a flyer of your representative or senator, smiling in front of fencing and barbed wire? 

Three under-the-radar executive actions for the Biden administration’s criminal justice reform agenda

  President Joe Biden began his administration with a barrage of executive orders designed to undo his predecessor’s most dangerous and harmful policies, including those relating to criminal justice reform. With the goal of advancing racial equity throughout federal policies and institutions, President Biden reinstated an Obama-era policy that prohibits the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) from entering into new and renewed contracts with private prison companies. Additionally, acting U.S. Attorney General Monty Wilkinson reinstated the DOJ policy that prosecutors should use individualized assessments when making charging and sentencing decisions instead of automatically prosecuting cases to obtain the lengthiest and harshest sentences possible.

Trump’s politicization of the justice system

  Since the vast majority of Republican senators failed in their constitutional duty to be a check on serious government corruption, President Donald Trump has repeatedly exhibited his willingness to abuse the power of his office. But involving himself in the U.S. Department of Justice’s (DOJ) recommended sentencing of Roger Stone, a convicted federal criminal—and Trump’s close political ally—was perhaps the most flagrant display of how little respect Trump’s administration has for American democracy.

Steve Flowers: Inside the Statehouse - Legislative priority will be resolving prison problems

  The 2020 Alabama Legislative Session, which began last week, will be the second session of Gov. Kay Ivey’s administration. For the second straight year, she and the legislature will be facing a major obstacle.

  The prison problem is the paramount issue for the year. The state must address and resolve this dilemma, or the federal authorities will take over our prisons.

Trump’s school safety commission recommendations would make schools less safe

  The Federal Commission on School Safety—established by President Trump following the tragic school shooting in Parkland, Florida, and led by Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos—released a report Tuesday that recommends withdrawing the 2014 Department of Justice and Department of Education legal guidance on discriminatory discipline.

  The commission’s recommendations threaten to make our nation's schools and students less safe; ignore settled law; ignore both evidence and evidence-based solutions; and ignore progress made towards safe, welcoming, and healthy schools for all students.

Ensuring the special counsel’s independence if Rosenstein is fired

  President Donald Trump has repeatedly threatened to take drastic action to undermine special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into the Trump campaign and Russian interference in the 2016 election. His latest target is Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, who oversees Mueller.

  If Trump seeks to undermine the investigation and obstruct justice by firing Rosenstein, there would be serious concerns about the impartiality of any political official at the U.S. Department of Justice who replaces him. These concerns are heightened by Trump’s repeated demands that the Department of Justice protect him from accountability for his actions. The only way to repair the trust of the American people in the integrity of the investigation would be to follow past precedent and ensure the special counsel is truly independent.

Voter purges prevent eligible Americans from voting

  On January 10, 2018, the U.S. Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in Husted v. A. Philip Randolph Institute, et.al., a case that will determine whether states can remove individuals from voter rolls for simply failing to vote in previous elections. Every American has the fundamental right to vote, but from 2011 to 2014, Ohio removed a reported 846,000 registered Americans from its voter rolls for infrequent voting over a six-year period. This removal was in violation of the National Voter Registration Act.

Tales and truth in the Masterpiece Cakeshop arguments

  In July 2012, Charlie Craig and David Mullins went into Masterpiece Cakeshop to buy a wedding cake. The store owner, Jack Phillips, refused to sell the same-sex couple a cake. The Colorado Civil Rights Commission and state courts have agreed that Phillips’ refusal to serve Craig and Mullins violated Colorado’s anti-discrimination act, which bars businesses such as Masterpiece Cakeshop from refusing service based on characteristics including religion, race, and sexual orientation.

  Last week, the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments in Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission and will decide whether Phillips’ has a constitutional right to discriminate under the First Amendment. At stake is whether nondiscrimination laws will continue to provide meaningful protection against discrimination, not only for LGBTQ people but potentially for other protected classes as well.

SPLC prompts 50 Alabama cities to reform discriminatory bail practices

  Fifty cities in Alabama have changed their bail practices to ensure that poor people charged with minor offenses no longer languish in jail when they can’t afford to post bond – reform that comes after the Southern Poverty Law Center urged municipal courts across the state to end practices that unfairly punish the poor.

  The 50 cities collectively account for 40 percent of the state’s population.

  Instead of incarcerating people who don’t have money to post bond for minor infractions such as loitering, littering, disorderly conduct, and driving with a suspended license, the cities are either releasing them with a court date or taking into account their ability to pay before imposing bond.

The Ongoing battle to protect the precious right to vote

  The story of the civil rights movement sometimes overlooks the individual stories that collectively helped to ensure the right to vote. The story of Fannie Lou Hamer, who was jailed, physically abused, and degraded all because she wanted to register to vote. The story of now-Rep. John Lewis (D-GA), who was beaten nearly to death on the Edmund Pettus Bridge as he marched across Alabama to ensure full access to voting rights. These stories of suffering, pain, indignity, and perseverance—along with countless others of poll taxes, lynchings, beatings, and degrading interactions—paved the way to the Voting Rights Act. The story of the Voting Rights Act should not be relegated to the pages of children’s history books but instead lifted up as a legacy of triumph that should be protected and maintained.

Tackling the real scandal behind the Panama Papers

  The Panama Papers leak exposed to the world the offshore holdings of world leaders and their families. Iceland’s prime minister, Ukraine’s president, and the king of Saudi Arabia, as well as close associates of Hosni Mubarak, Bashar al-Assad, and Vladimir Putin, were among those exposed when names linked to the Panamanian law firm Mossack Fonseca were leaked to the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung.

  But, while big names captured the headlines, it wasn’t just the impunity of a powerful few that caused the scandal. The more disturbing revelation is the tangled web of financial flows—both licit and illicit—that made such impunity possible in the first place. Despite the rise of a global anti-corruption movement and technologically driven advances in transparency that have made privacy all but impossible in other spheres, hiding money for illicit purposes is nearly as easy today as it was 25 years ago. The real scandal of the Panama Papers is not that corruption continues to exist; it is that many of the methods that kleptocrats and criminals use to hide dirty money remain perfectly legal.

David L. Hudson Jr.: Government surveillance threatens First Amendment freedoms

  Mass governmental surveillance impacts First Amendment freedoms in profound ways, chilling speech and even thought.

  We tend to think of such surveillance under the rubric of the Fourth Amendment, which prohibits the government from engaging in “unreasonable searches and seizures.” But, surveillance also negatively impacts freedom of speech, assembly, association – and even thought.

Katherine Green Robertson: Federal government backs down on obstruction of school choice

  In 2008, under the leadership of Governor Bobby Jindal, Louisiana launched an educational scholarship program in New Orleans. The Louisiana Scholarship Program, similar to Alabama’s new scholarship program created by the Accountability Act, is designed to provide low-income students zoned for underperforming schools with opportunities to attend qualified private schools within the state. In 2012, Governor Jindal prioritized expansion of the program which is now available to students anywhere in the State. Over 5,000 students took advantage of the program in its first year.

Marshall Yates: President Obama's politically selective Constitution

  Inside the Oval Office, President Obama is playing political games with the rule of law in America. While the Supreme Court has declared itself the final arbiter of the Constitution, the Constitution itself requires each branch of our federal government to act in accordance with our nation's highest document. However, President Obama has tried to have his constitutional cake and eat it too.