Originally published at: Trump Admin Defies Court Order To Provide Basic Info On Man It Wrongly Deported - TPM – Talking Points Memo
GREENBELT, MARYLAND – The Trump administration defied a court order on Friday, telling a judge in writing and verbally that it could not provide information about a man that it admitted it wrongly deported to an El Salvador prison. At the court hearing, U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis for the District of Maryland repeatedly asked…
Fine, they’ve admitted they have no control of the situation and cannot rectify their mistakes to wrongly detain and exile people…. Then halt them from sending people to a hellhole.
Mr. Garcia was not “wrongly deported.”
He was kidnapped and disappeared.
We are becoming Brazil post-1965 or 1970s and 1980s Argentina. The time for turning back is now.
Look, Judge, the problem is that airlines ask you to check bonesaws, so the specialists we hired from Saudi Arabia to locate Mr. Garcia were delayed because their luggage was lost. So we are trying to locate him just as the Supreme Court instructed, and will provide you with his location or locations as soon as that happens.
$5 million a day, everyday until he is produced.
It’s cute the way everyone is humoring the judges and acting as if the Courts are still relevant.
Then they continue to deport and so what? The courts issue a sternly worded order?
Bad faith is a social hedge for these born asswipes.
This is called “building a record.”
Should have thought to order counsel for Abrego Garcia to be included on every single communication with anyone in El Salvador regarding their client, whether in writing, by telephone, by video, or otherwise. Order them to produce records of all such prior communications too. There’s no attorney-client privilege for communications with people who aren’t the government.
Oh, and they should be required to produce the contract under which Abrego Garcia is being held. There is a very good chance that it has provisions regarding their release, either prohibiting it or providing for it. There’s no way it’s just silent.
And in the meantime, sue every last one of the motherfuckers responsible for his illegal rendition to a foreign torture facility. They’re going to find civil discovery a LOT more unpleasant that just playing dumb and helpless in the habeas case. Maybe even painful enough to cough up the prisoner after all.
I have no experience with the law, but I have to imagine that if a lawyer is doing their job competently, they will prepare for multiple outcomes from a judge’s ruling. If the judge rules the defendant can tell the plaintiff to pound sand, you have one briefing ready. And if the judge tells you to comply with the plaintiff’s demands, you prepare for that outcome as well.
It seems clear that Trump’s attorneys only care about the outcome they want and if they don’t get it, they are caught completely flatfooted (if they even try to pretend to care).
I have a horrible feeling that the real reason they can’t disclose his whereabouts is because the grave is unmarked.
“Deputy Assistant Attorney General Drew Ensign, you shall be incarcerated until such time as someone with the knowledge requested responds to this court.” Bailiff, take him into custody and immediately remove him from my courtroom.
And then when they do whatever to try and get him out, refuse to release him because they don’t have knowledge where he actually is.
He might end up dead, but there’s virtually zero chance he’s dead already. If he were dead, the government would just file a notice of the death and the case would be over.
Civil suits are just as meaningless. Money means nothing to these slime. They’re looting the treasury. They’ll issue an EO to print money if they have to, after they’ve appealed any civil proceeding for two and a half years. We have learned that laws written by well-meaning people that aren’t enforced with extreme violence have no meaning whatsoever to those whose sole purpose in getting out of bed each day is to do harm to others.
The contempt meter has hit 11 and it’s still rising. Just how far up the chain can Judge Xinis go?
Jailing Ensign would not work because he is not the person withholding the information from the court.
The judge should have questioned Ensign as to who he had spoken to about the matter and his knowledge or understanding of who they were speaking to. Run it all the way up the chain until the inevitable answer that it’s Pam Bondi and Stephen Miller who are responsible for the decision to just do contempt.
Welcome to the Constitutional Crisis. America is essentially dead.
When do people start going to jail?
After lesser sanctions have been assessed and proven to be inadequate to secure compliance with the court’s order.
I think you might be on to something. The supreme court gave Trump immunity not his henchmen. Go after the henchmen. Make them pay.