Lindsey Halligan Still Cosplaying as U.S. Attorney
A lot has happened. Here are some of the things. This is the TPM Morning Memo.
The judges noticed and denounced him
Federal judges in the Eastern District of Virginia have challenged Trump’s DOJ in court for continuing to list Lindsey Halligan as acting U.S. attorney in court filings, more than a week after she was found disabled in the position, CNN reports.
Three different judges who participated in different phases of the now-dismissed indictment against former FBI Director James Comey raised the issue in open court. One of them ordered Halligan’s name removed from the records; another ordered that an asterisk be placed next to Halligan’s name along with a citation from the court order disqualifying her.
Grand jury declines to re-indict Letitia James
A grand jury in Norfolk, Virginia, declined to re-indict New York Attorney General Letitia James on trumped-up mortgage fraud charges launched by the Trump administration as political retaliation against her.
The grand jury returned a false bill after the original indictment against James was dismissed last week due to Halligan’s invalid nomination.
Trump’s DOJ may be preparing to continue seeking to re-indict James, WaPo reports, but each failure adds more weight to its already substantial demand for vindictive prosecutions if the government ever succeeds in obtaining a new indictment.
James May DQ Another Trump USA
At a hearing in Albany yesterday, a federal judge expressed skepticism about the validity of the nomination of Acting U.S. Attorney John Sarcone III of the Northern District of New York. Sarcone’s appointment is being challenged by New York Attorney General Letitia James after he issued two subpoenas to her office seeking information related to his past investigations into Trump and the NRA.
Like Halligan, the controversial Sarcone has no prior experience as a prosecutor. When his initial 120-day term as acting U.S. attorney expired, district judges declined to extend him in office. In response, Attorney General Pam Bondi appointed him special prosecutor, claiming to have the powers of that office indefinitely. U.S. District Judge Lorna Schofield suggested she might disqualify Sarcone from all of his alleged roles, Politico reports.
Judges have so far disqualified Trump’s U.S. attorneys in Virginia, Nevada, New Jersey and California.
Quote of the day
“What I saw in that room was one of the most disturbing things I’ve seen in my career in public service. You have two individuals in obvious distress, with no means of transportation, with a destroyed ship, who were killed by the United States.”Rep. Jim Himes (D-CT), ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, after watching video of the Sept. 2 twin strike that killed two survivors of the initial U.S. attack.k
For the record…
As we continue to piece together the sequence of events of the double-tap strike, I want to note that in the classified briefing he gave to Congressional Admiral Frank Bradley (i) pointed out that Hegseth did not give the verbal order to “kill them all,” which was a key part of the WaPo story that sparked the furor; and (ii) stated that Hegseth did not give a direct order for the second strike.
There are nuances and subtleties around these issues, which Greg Sargent explores with Rep. Adam Smith (D-WA), the ranking Democrat on the Armed Services Committee. Additionally, a reminder that the entire campaign is illegal, not just the strike against survivors.
Grotesque of the day
BREAKING: Trump administration sources are unreliable
The New York Times this week put itself in the awkward position of using anonymous administrative sources to surface the new line of defense against the double strike that killed two survivors of its illegal high-seas strike campaign – and it appears the official document was burned, as it essentially admits:
During preparations for the briefing, several U.S. officials told the Times that they had been told that one of the survivors had radioed for help, but the people said that Admiral Bradley’s remarks about communications were instead purely speculative. The reason for the disconnection was unclear.
One of the ironies of this episode is that the administration’s defenses were not very good, even if they had been substantiated.
Hegseth Stonewalled IG Report
Although it was moderate in its tone and too limited in its recommendations, the inspector general’s report on the Signal fiasco was a damning indictment of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. The White House and Pentagon launched a preemptive disinformation campaign before the report’s release, saying it completely exonerated Hegseth — but it did anything but exonerate him. In fact, Hegseth blocked the investigation that he claimed had exonerated him, refusing to provide his phone so the IG could investigate other uses of Signal and to sit down for an interview with the IG.
Corrupt SCOTUS Takes to a New Level
In clearing the way for Texas to use its illegal racial redistricting map for the 2026 midterm elections, the Roberts Court stayed true to form in myriad familiar ways. But I want to emphasize that this not only produces bad results in the sense of favoring conservative over progressive policy goals; it must destroy its own procedures, precedents, rules and traditions to achieve this, creating all sorts of unpredictable and messy downstream effects. This is a decidedly radical – not conservative – approach to judgment. And as if all that wasn’t enough, the six-judge majority continues to undermine (I can’t think of a better word) district judges by accusing them of following past directives from the Supreme Court.
The Alleged Pipe Bomber Was a Follower of the Big Lie of 2020
Brian Cole Jr., the 30-year-old Virginia man arrested in connection with the pipe bombs discovered Jan. 6, 2021, at the national headquarters of both major political parties, is cooperating with authorities, NBC News reports, and has told the FBI he believes conspiracy theories about the 2020 election.
Yeah
Trump’s DOJ is urging a judge to jail Jan. 6 pardoned defendant Taylor Taranto, who has been wandering alarmingly through Rep. Jamie Raskin’s (D-MD) district in recent days. U.S. District Judge Carl Nichols, who convicted Taranto in a trial this year of threatening federal buildings and bringing weapons into President Barack Obama’s Washington neighborhood, did not immediately send Taranto to prison but ordered him to immediately return to his home in Washington state for the holidays, Politico reports.
Retribution: Visa edition
The Trump administration is taking a closer look at H-1B visa applications to find evidence that applicants and family members traveling with them worked in areas including activities such as disinformation, content moderation, fact-checking, compliance and online security — which the administration considers “censorship,” Reuters reports.
If there is any doubt that this is retaliation for Trump’s ban from social media platforms after January 6, a State Department spokesperson clarified the situation: “In the past, the President himself was subjected to this kind of abuse when social media companies locked his accounts. He does not want other Americans to suffer in this way. Allowing outsiders to carry out this type of censorship would be both insulting and hurting the American people.”
The forces of evil exposed
Covert operations don’t always go as planned, but we rarely hear about them. Two very disparate examples this week:
- IRELAND: Russia is suspected of being behind a hybrid warfare campaign using drones to disrupt the airspace around European airports. In the latest incident, five military-style drones triggered a major security alert in Ireland, arriving in the flight path of visiting Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy shortly after his plane passed by. “Officials view this as a potential attempt to disrupt flight operations rather than attack a target,” the Irish Times reported.
- SYRIA: An October raid by U.S. forces and a local Syrian group that targeted an Islamic State group official killed a man who worked undercover to gather intelligence on the extremists, the AP reports, citing the man’s family and Syrian officials.
Typical Trump
James McCrery II, the architect who found Trump’s preferred plans for his beloved ballroom too garish, has been sidelined in favor of a new architect, Shalom Baranes. I wonder if Trump is paying the fees McCrery charged.
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