The Justice Department has asked for two judges at the heart of anti-Trump rulings to be kicked off the cases, saying they are showing an increasing level of personal “hostility” to the president and his agenda.
The demands, both of which came last week, mark the latest escalation in what’s quickly becoming an all-out war between President Trump and the lowest level of federal courts, which have emerged as the major stumbling block to his attempts to remake the government.
The two targets are Judges James Boasberg and Beryl Howell, both Obama appointees to the district court in Washington, who are overseeing at least eight challenges to Mr. Trump’s policies, including a deportation case and a case involving Mr. Trump’s attempt to punish political enemies.
Justice Department lawyers said Judge Boasberg, who tried to stop deportation flights to El Salvador a week ago, is trampling on core presidential powers. They said Judge Howell has a disturbing history of anti-Trump sentiments.
“Defendants deserve a court proceeding free from concerns about impartiality,” Deputy Associate Attorney General Richard Lawson said in a request Friday to Judge Howell to take herself off a case where she had blocked Mr. Trump’s attempt to punish a Democrat-connected law firm that spread disinformation about him during the 2016 election.
The judges are giving back just as good.
Judge Boasberg slammed Mr. Trump’s lawyers at a hearing Friday as “intemperate and disrespectful” and said he’d never seen a judge treated that way.
He also warned he would impose “consequences” if he decides his March 15 order to ground the deportation flights of Venezuelan gang suspects were intentionally defied.
“I will get to the bottom of whether they violated my order,” he vowed in a contentious hearing Friday.
Attorney General Pam Bondi fired back this weekend.
“This is an out-of-control judge,” she said on the Fox News program “Sunday Morning Futures.”
Two months into Mr. Trump’s second term, he has already faced more than 150 distinct legal challenges to his actions. His record is mixed, though he’s lost more than he’s won in early rulings.
Liberal activists have cheered the judges on, saying they are stepping up where congressional Democrats have failed in stopping Mr. Trump.
In Seattle, a judge has blocked the president’s attempt to limit birthright citizenship, accusing Mr. Trump of subverting the law “for political or personal gain.” In California, another judge halted his firing of tens of thousands of probationary employees, suggesting the administration was hiding witnesses who would have exposed the White House’s deceit.
But it is Judges Boasberg and Howell who are at the center of things.
Judge Howell earlier this month blocked Mr. Trump’s attempt to rein in Perkins Coie, which in 2016 helped construct false claims about Mr. Trump and Russia in the unsubstantiated Steele dossier.
That information helped spark the now-discredited Russia collusion probe.
Mr. Trump ordered the administration to cease doing business with Perkins Coie’s lawyers to the extent possible.
Judge Howell blocked most of the executive order, saying it “sends little chills down my spine.”
The Justice Department said her new ruling, combined with her past rulings about Mr. Trump, show a “hostility” that cannot be allowed.
“Defendants deserve a court proceeding free from concerns about impartiality. In order to remove the possibility of any impartiality to these proceedings, defendants respectfully request that this court recuse itself,” Deputy Associate Attorney General Richard Lawson said in asking Judge Howell to boot herself from the case.
If anything, the deportation case is bigger, with conservatives saying Judge Boasberg has spawned a “constitutional crisis.”
The judge earlier this month ordered Homeland Security to ground airplanes that were flying to El Salvador carrying more than 200 deportees the Trump administration says are members of Tren de Aragua, the notorious Venezuelan gang.
Two planes were already in the air and the Trump administration refused to bring them back. A third flight took off after the judge’s order.
Judge Boasberg has demanded answers about the operations of the flights but the administration has now said it may invoke the state secrets doctrine to block him from that information.
The judge kicked off a tense hearing Friday with a new scolding, demanding to know why the planes kept going.
“Did you tell them that it was an order from me to turn the planes around, or in whatever fashion you could, to bring people back to the United States?” he demanded of Deputy Assistant Attorney General Drew Ensign.
He said Mr. Trump’s claims of power were “awfully frightening.”
Mr. Ensign said Mr. Trump is acting under his core presidential powers, especially on foreign policy and national defense, and that the courts should butt out.
Mr. Trump has taken the case personally, saying Judge Boasberg is defying the will of the voters.
“He didn’t run for president. He didn’t get much more than 80 million votes,” the president said. “I won on the basis of getting criminals out of our country that were let in.”
On Sunday, he highlighted a post on social media that said Judge Boasberg, in a 2023 speech to law students, “openly admitted that he didn’t think harsh enough laws existed on the books to punish J6 defendants.”
Judge Boasberg, according to the X account “Insurrection Barbie,” thought the laws that were used to imprison hundreds of the U.S. Capitol rioters, many in his court, failed to meet the gravity of the attack.
“But he doesn’t mind if criminals come into our Country,” Mr. Trump said on Truth Social. “He is a Constitutional disaster!”
