Trump vs. the Judges: The Explosive Battle You’re Not Hearing About
/A New Level of Resistance
We are entering a new phase of outright revolution against President Trump’s attempt to gain control of the illegal immigration that has ravaged the country for far too long. With the border effectively closed to turn off the flood of illegal border crossings, the Trump administration through the Department of Homeland Security began phase two of immigration enforcement. The problem they are having toward carrying out the mission is that they are being road blocked and hamstrung by state and local politicians and anti-government marauders. And if that is not enough to slow things down, a new layer of interference has entered the resistance.
Numerous federal district court judges and some appeals courts are overstepping their authority and rising up over the executive branch's authority to execute the law. They are acting like a super legislature instead of a co-equal branch. There is no doubt that politics is playing a role in that many of the decisions that are handed down against the Trump administration are being done by Democrat appointed judges. I say that because it has been reported that former President Obama deported somewhere in the range of 2 million illegals during his time as commander in chief. He even took on the nick name of deporter in chief, and he had nowhere near the interference by the courts. Former President Biden on the other hand ignored immigration law and that he made up rules that allowed nearly 20 million immigrants into the country. We did not see federal courts exercise the same judicial activism against Biden or Obama that they have with President Trump.
I find it peculiar that during the challenge to the 2020 presidential election, federal courts showed great restraint when suits were filed. They refused to even schedule hearings to listen to testimony or examine evidence on the challenges and repeatedly finding that the complainants had no standing to sue. Now however, any claim that is made against the Department of Homeland Security and the Trump administration as they go about the business of finding illegal aliens and detaining them under the law pending a deportation hearing, is either met with an injunction prohibiting the administration from carrying out the law or a ruling that what Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents are doing is unconstitutional.
Another instance of judicial interference is that now federal judges have become experts on running detention facilities. Detention facilities especially makeshift ones are complex institutions. It is an executive branch function. Unless these judges are inside those facilities to first-hand see what is going on, they should defer to the people running those facilities. It is fine for them to ask for reports as to what is going on but it is another to rely on accusations made by anti immigration opponents who also are not inside the facility to make personal observations. These are usually outrageous unsubstantiated claims. ICE officials have denied in writing any of the claims of abuse. During the Biden administration, illegals were housed in hotels. Maybe that is what the expectation is for illegals in encampments awaiting deportation.
Here is a sample of the judicial interference going on in the federal courts. One judge ordered the release of 600 illegals back into the Chicago area community. Another approved a consent decree on these detention facilities that was not only drafted by the illegal immigration supporting American Civil Liberties Union, but it makes the decree binding on future administrations. Another decision from the federal bench ruled that detainees could be released on bond. How many do you think will return to court for future hearings once released? Another judicial ruling states that the detention of a Chicago area day care worker was illegal. Really? She is in the country illegally not to mention that it is illegal for anyone to employ her.
Congress made these laws and what is important to point out is that it is not Congress who is challenging how the Executive Branch is carrying out the immigration laws that they passed. It is some third party using the courts as a mean to block immigration enforcement. Opposing the Trump administrations efforts and means of carrying out immigration enforcement is a political issue not a legal one and is better left to the voters at election time to display their approval or disproval. Trump promised when he ran again in 2024 that he was going to do precisely what he is doing. He made similar attempts in his first term.
The other element of this is the resistance is being put up by people who have taken lawful protest to a new level. They are not just standing on sidewalks and street corners with signs; they are becoming more violent. Now they are physically blockading ICE vehicles, vandalizing them, blockading and vandalizing ICE detention facilities and attacking ICE agents. One DHS statistic indicates that assaults against agents is up 500%. Death threats are being made against agents and their families. In Chicago recently ICE agents were shot at in drive-by fashion. In another case, a convicted felon threw a Molotov cocktail at a hotel that was housing ICE agents. This is untenable in a constitutional republic. This type of resistance has not been seen in this country since the nineteen-sixties Vietnam war demonstrations. Very few of these incidents are being reported on or covered by local or national media.
How can a President execute the laws with the judicial branch preventing him from doing so at every turn? He cannot. It is time to ask if we are now being ruled by unelected people wearing black robes who have no accountability to the voters?
My advice to the federal judicial branch is this. Stay in your lane. The Founders intended the Judicial branch to be the weakest, not the strongest.
Sheriff David A. Clarke Jr. is former Sheriff of Milwaukee Co, Wisconsin, President of America’s Sheriff LLC, President of Rise Up Wisconsin INC, Board member of the Crime Research Center, author of the book Cop Under Fire: Beyond Hashtags of Race Crime and Politics for a Better America. To learn more visit www.americassheriff.com
