D.C. Circuit Judge Reggie Walton recently caused a stir in Washington after doing an interview with CNN in which he rebuked former President Donald Trump for his criticism of judges and their family members. Now, Judge Walton has been criticized by the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia for a surveillance order of the computer of a January 6th defendant to detect any spreading of “disinformation” or “misinformation.”
Critics charged that Walton’s interview with CNN ran afoul of Canon 3A(6) of the Code of Conduct for United States Judges, which states: “A judge should not make public comment on the merits of a matter pending or impending in any court.”
The issue of these public statements by Trump is currently pending before both state and federal courts, including proceedings in the District of Columbia. At a minimum, Judge Walton’s interview showed poor judicial judgment and only reaffirmed the distrust and suspicion of many over the independence of the court system in addressing these controversial cases.
Judge Walton previously called Trump a “charlatan,” and said that “I don’t think he cares about democracy, only power.”
I have previously criticized Trump for public comments against judges and believe that such matters should be primarily raised in court filings. Nevertheless, I have serious objections to the scope of these gag orders on free speech grounds, particularly before an election that could turn in large part on allegations of the weaponization of the legal system. Moreover, we now have a judge who feels the same license to make such criticisms in the media despite the ongoing litigation of these matters.
That alleged transgression, however, pales in comparison to a failure to protect the rights of this defendant from the abusive or unsupported surveillance of the government.
The order reflects the utter impunity shown by the Justice Department in its pursuit of January 6th defendants. Justice Department official Michael Sherwin proudly declared in a television interview that “our office wanted to ensure that there was shock and awe … it worked because we saw through media posts that people were afraid to come back to D.C. because they’re, like, ‘If we go there, we’re gonna get charged.’ … We wanted to take out those individuals that essentially were thumbing their noses at the public for what they did.”
Sherwin was celebrated for his pledge to use such draconian means to send a message to others in the country. (Sherwin has left the Justice Department and is now a partner at Kobre & Kim).
The surveillance of the computer shows that the Justice Department continues to act with a sense of utter impunity, particularly when judges are willing to blithely sign off on such orders.
The case involved Daniel Goodwyn, 35, of Corinth, Texas, who pleaded guilty on Jan. 31, 2023, to one misdemeanor count of entering and remaining in a restricted building or grounds without lawful authority. That is a relatively minor offense but Walton imposed a 60-day jail sentence in June 2023.
Walton reportedly noted that Goodwyn spread “disinformation” during a broadcast of “Tucker Carlson Tonight” on March 14, 2023 and ordered that Mr. Goodwyn’s computer be subject to “monitoring and inspection” by a probation agent to check if he spread Jan. 6 disinformation during the term of his supervised release.
As a condition for supervised release, the Justice Department was reportedly seeking evidence on the defendant’s political opinions and Walton felt that that was fine. The appellate judges (Gregory Katsas, Neomi Rao, and Bradley Garcia) did not: “The district court plainly erred in imposing the computer-monitoring condition without considering whether it was ‘reasonably related’ to the relevant sentencing factors and involved ‘no greater deprivation of liberty than is reasonably necessary’ to achieve the purposes behind the sentencing.”
The order indicates that Judge Walton ignored long-standing precedent from 2010 on justifying such surveillance. He could reissue the order in compliance with the precedent, but will have to establish a record and rationale for allowing the government to conduct this search.
We previously discussed judicial orders that conditioned bail for January 6 defendants on their not listening to certain conservative figures. Defendants were asked to publicly declare that they no longer believed certain conspiracy theories or ideological viewpoints, a condition that raises troubling free speech questions.
The Walton order to monitor “disinformation” or “misinformation” is particularly chilling given the controversy over such terms. What people consider to be disinformation is often heavily laden with political judgments and subjectivity. Moreover, allowing the government to monitor communications to detect alleged disinformation creates a perfectly glacial chilling effect.
The Walton order indicates that the government is still demanding to monitor the political readings and communications of January 6th defendants — and to condition their release on avoiding exposure to certain viewpoints.
I don’t know about anyone else, but I am extremely tired of debating just how polluted our government is with prog/left lethality. Like my father used to say “either sh*t or get off the pot”. Talking, debating with ourselves and tsk-tsking the dems is a waste of time at this point. I would rather be discussing the actual means to disinfect our nation of a plague far worse than Yersinia pestis. The logisitics of removing this stain is staggering.
whimsicalamama said: “I would rather be discussing the actual means to disinfect our nation of a plague far worse than Yersinia pestis. The logisitics of removing this stain is staggering.”
It is a dilemma to me. We seem to be approaching a point where the only way to change political direction is violent revolution. I see two serious problems with that idea.
First is the rather poor chances of success. In the original American Revolution, our side enjoyed a number of tactical advantages, the most important of which was that we were defending our backyard against an enemy whose home was in excess of a month’s sail away. Also, while there was a disparity in arms between sides, it was of nowhere near the magnitude that currently exists. We also had allies in the French military who lent valuable support to our cause.
Second, even if we did manage to stage a successful revolt, what would happen after that? In 1776 we had a number of well-known statesmen of high character and integrity, who were willing and able to formulate a working government quickly, and to then institute a permanent governmental system that did a very good job of guaranteeing essential individual liberties for the next ~200 years. Frankly, I see few, if any, persons of great prominence who currently fit that mold.
#6 look to history – there have been violent revolutions in the past – very few actually worked very well – the US revolution being a notable exception.
But there have also been non-violent revolutions – Solidarity in Poland, East Germany, the fall of the Berlin wall the collapse of the USSR.
Most americans are not revolutionaries. It takes time to persuade them of the magnitude of the threat. Further revoltuion has MOSTLY been the domain of the left – though they are quite bad at it.
In the US we started to see something new with the Tea Party – middle aged and middle class people protesting. That almost never happens – and when it does – THINGS CHANGE.
But the middle class and those of middle age are not natural revolutionaries.
They are slowly learning the tactics that those on the left have had decades to perfect.
Trump is a watershed political shift – not ideologically – he is a realitively centrist republican in terms of policies. What is different is that he has embraced the same successful tactics as those on the left.
He has read and applies “rules for radicals” – and that is why the left hates him so much.
That is also why the great determination on the part of the left to make sure that nothing like J6 ever happens again.
The left is correct – 10,000 left wing nuts could descend on washington and we would barely notice.
But 10,000 plumbers and marines, and grandmothers, and firefighters descend on Washington and that will cause change.
J6 was a tremendous danger to the left – not because it was a riot, or illegal or unconstitutional.
But precisely because it was actually legal and constitutional and could have worked.
And even if it did NOT work, it could in the future.
10,000 protestors in the halls of the capitol could have persuaded enough congressmen to decline to certify the election.
And if they could do that – what next – protestors getting a balanced budget amendment ? Term Limits ? A border wall ?
THAT is the real danger of J6 – the danger is what might happen if something like that did NOT turn violent, turn into a riot.
And preventing THAT is what all the J6 prosecutions are actually about.
Trying to make sure that middle class, and middle aged people are too affraid to protest again.
I beleive they have been successful in that.
But winning a skirmish is not winning the war.
Other tactics will be found.
I beleive we are well into the midst of a civil war, a new revolution.
And it COULD turn violent, but I do not think it actually will.
I beleive that we passed peak woke in 2020.
But that does not mean these are not dangerous times – the left is losing power and they are desperate.
At the same time – the failure, the disempowerment of the left is inevitable. The most fundiment reason ? Because their ideology FAILS.
whimsicalmama said: “There is not mandate that we utilize such new products. We gladly give them access to us through our own actions.”
Those products can be avoided, and such internet interaction as is required for basic existence can be monitored and filtered to avoid most, if not all, intrusive scrutiny. The problem is that we, as a people, have become far too lazy to take even rudimentary action in that direction, because it is somewhat inconvenient. I suspect that even the majority of posters on here who are pissing and moaning about constantly being spied on by corporatists and the government meet that description.
iowan2 said: “President Trump will soon be the power that determines what is misinformation. locking up the on air talent of msnbc will be sweet.”
I won’t begrudge you your potential vengeful gloat (I would share in it, at least briefly), but if all that changes is that we flip from Left Fascism to Right Fascism, we will have gained nothing truly of value. In fact, we could find that we have squandered our best hope to return to a more ethical society.
The only way to get the ship righted is to use the newly found tools to advance the right ideas.
whimsicalmama said: “I will not donate a penny to any Republican until they clean their house of rinos and weak willies. Take a stand like our founding fathers and get done with this before it is too late”
I question the backbone and motivations of even many of those who stridently claim to be on “our side”. They all seem to be swamp-tainted to a high degree. For example:
Conservative House Freedom Caucus members secured over $900 million in earmarks
“The amount of the Freedom Caucus earmarks are more than progressive members of the so-called ‘Squad’ sponsored $220 million of earmarks.”
https://justthenews.com/government/congress/conservative-house-freedom-caucus-members-more-950-million-worth-earmarks
One more unqualified black person on the bench. There is no shame among Democrats. Read the NYT comments. Read Ketanji-Jacksons statement about the 1st Amendment given publicly during a case. See what we’ve done. Judgement Day on the USA is here. Romans 1 16-32. The results of God turning away.
Pagans destroy the things that build strong men and women.
What if the plague was sent to us in the form of illegals, transgenders and progressive elites? I do think judgement is already here and we need heed that and take action.
That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted…
Hint: Not to infringe rights. That’s what criminals are for. But no. Our government has been expanding their criminality to the point we are running out of real estate. Some states are simply no-go jurisdictions for the security of rights. When they gobble up SCOTUS, it will be game over.
Meanwhile, speaking of j6 defendants, Jake Lang is spending his 4th birthday behind bars, today, with no trial. How is that legal? How is it constitutional? Answer: it’s not. Now, they have thrown Jake into the general prison population, apparently in retaliation for his pending case before SCOTUS.
There has been a general feeling among democrats and many Republicans that somehow, j6ers do not enjoy the same legal protections as, say, Jeffrey Dahmer or the Boston bomber. What they did (or what people have been told they did) is so far beyond the pale that it’s fine to lock them up and throw away the key. They are routinely deprived of their rights with nary a word of protest from anyone because everybody is too afraid to associate themselves publicly with this new caste of subhuman Untouchables who happen to be our fellow Americans.
This is not how the American legal system is supposed to work.
“This [the U.S. Constitution] is likely to be administered for a course of years and then end in despotism… when the people shall become so corrupted as to need despotic government, being incapable of any other.” ~ Benjamin Franklin
One of many reasons I will vote for Trump is that he will pardon most of the J6 defendants. They are clearly political prisoners.
Why didn’t he pardon them before he left office?
So a higher court slapped the hand of a lower court….. so what!,,,,,, this crap will continue until the higher court starts holding these corrupt judges to task and removing this cancer from the bench
Sounds great, what’s the plan to accomplish this? Through the corrupt courts or through the corrupt elections or through the corrupt media?
Are we going to have to have a Judges Trial like was held after the main Trial in Nuremberg. Otherwise known as the 3rd subsequent trial. That was clearly needed to adjudicate cases of judges using overt political means to crush the people. They were extralegal and advanced the Nazi manifesto for the “Good of the State”, obviously not the good of the people.
We already had our period of activist judges that started with FDR who overtly threatened to “pack the court” but was dissuaded by cooler heads in his own party. Unfortunately FDR ended up replacing 7 of the 9 Supreme Court Justices and we suffered under the rule of activist judges for decades.
While the activists were exceptionally good in the protection of civil rights and the ending of segregation, their accomplishments outside that narrow area was certainly mixed and they virtually emasculated protections against the taking of property and the rights of property holders and basically legislated from the bench.
And then we have Obama’s shell game of having NGO’s, environmental activists and others sue the Federal Government and then have the Justice Dept (who are in on the game) suddenly fold and basically overturn laws set up by the Congress. In effect removing an act of Congress, simply by not showing up to defend the law .
You know Congress does have the right to expand or contract the number of judges, determine the number of districts and their boundaries.
It is time for term limits of judges, congressman and senators.
I agree, now how do we do this with such a polluted infrastructure as we have – where do we begin ?
“misiformation”, “malinformation”… when the government starts putting into place controlls and regulations, on what “information” we, a free thinking society, are allowed to hear, that is truly Orwelian thought control.
Of course politicians are corrupt but judges are a brighter light for freedom. You gave a wonderful post. Judges must meet a higher standard. Review the Norenberg trials on judges lowering their standards for truth and freedom. Great post
Thank God for the appellate court’s sound oversight.
Judge Reggie Walton was appointed to the bench by Republican presidents Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush. Before that, he served as deputy director of ONDCP. His long life of public service is drawing to a close as he enters the senior years and senior status of the court. His comments about Trump are unfortunate for the two have more in common than either may realize. The very notion that judges are somehow above reproach is anti-democratic. Unlike politicians, judges in the federal judiciary are appointed not elected. That, some think, takes them out of the critical review of the people and immunizes them from public criticism. Not so. If anything, because they are unelected, their behavior in office, including their official duties, should be open for greater critical review by the public simply because the public has no power to elect or un-elect them. Democracy can be ugly at times but it’s always democracy. Judge Walton would do well to realize this and also to realize his own imperfections, which the rest of us can even if he cannot or will not. This rebuke by his liberal colleagues will only reinforce his obstinacy and cloud his view of “democracy” even more.
Well and good, but exactly how, and with whom, can this be accomplished?
The judge has it backwards: It’s the Democrats that care only about power.
It appears that it has in fact happened here and that Big Brother is watching
If you bought a new car recently, you know that Big Brother is watching.
Nissan and its Business Partners are spying on me, and Nissan won’t tell me who its business partners are. I wonder if the executive branch of the US Government is one of its business partners?
Also read the small print on smart TVs and etc.
By buying, you give permission for them to watch and record you.
So yes, some microwave ovens are spying on people.
There is not mandate that we utilize such new products. We gladly give them access to us through our own actions.
Eventually we will all need new products. As with the cigarette companies, a permanent warning label needs to be put on the product in clear sight with large print saying, “The manufacturer of this product is gathering information you and providing this information to its business partners”.
A wise company would also tell you that you are not being monitored by our product.
“A wise company” wants to make profit, not protect you from yourself and those warning labels on cigarettes were mandated by democrats, I doubt if they will do the same for monitoring devices. Just only purchase what is safe and by-pass what is dangerous. Only the smart will do this and the others..; oh well, survival of the fittest is my creed.
https://foundation.mozilla.org/en/privacynotincluded/categories/cars/
And mozilla itself is spying on you via Firefox. Mozilla is owned by Google.
Brenda said: “And mozilla itself is spying on you via Firefox. Mozilla is owned by Google.”
Do you have an authoritative cite, or other solid evidence, of your ownership claim? There is certainly nothing of the sort at the page you linked to. Mozilla Foundation is organized as a public, non-profit, corporation.
Another example of the coordination between the Executive and Judicial Branches of the United States to ignore and thus destroy the Constitutional Republic. Add this to the FISA/FISC blatant violation of the 1st, 4th and 14th Amendments and a clear pattern emerges. Add that to the Missiour v. Biden and Berenson v. Biden cases weaving their way through the Judicial System and their is little hope the Constitution survives.
“This [the U.S. Constitution] is likely to be administered for a course of years and then end in despotism… when the people shall become so corrupted as to need despotic government, being incapable of any other.” ~ Benjamin Franklin
Judge Royce Lamberth recently publicly criticized people who called the J6 defendants “political prisoners” or “hostages”. But isn’t it true?
Q. Are the fleshing-out of individuals through their actions (Student Activist, Activist Judges, Activist Persecutors, Activist Political Advocates, etc.)
the flushing out of the bushes the counterinsurgency to identify (List) individuals whom are a threat to the State?
-TRA
Answer
President Trump will soon be the power that determines what is misinformation. locking up the on air talent of msnbc will be sweet.
You mean the same Trump who said he was going to ‘lock her up’ and didn’t? Don’t hold your breath.
I have a notion that if he could have sent the Praetorian Guard to lock her up he would have. I think he didn’t realize the deep mire of obstruction pre-built into a partisan bureaucracy and only realized the true limits of his capabilities after he took office. No one person is going to solve this and placing your hopes on one man, whomever it is, to fix this is a lazy way of dealing with the plague that is killing this nation.
Trump called Clinton shortly after the election and told her that no one was going after her.
That was the correct thing to do.
Trump has already said that his administration will be focused on restoring good governance, fixing the border, ending the endless wars. restoring prosperity. That he will have no time for vengeance.
That is proper .
But there are things that need to be done. That is why I have proposed a “Truth and reconcilliation commission”.
Essentially it is a giant amnesty plan – in return for the Truth.
Much of the evil that the left has done is going to be hard if not impossible to prosecute.
Especially in places like DC.
What is most important is to get the truth on the record through voluntary confession under oath.
Come forward and testify truthfully under oath and you get immunity.
That is one way to get everything out in the open.
-iowan2 re:
Vivek Ramaswamy seems to be the perfect Hatchet Man for the job,
The office of the OMB (Office of Management and Budget) would suit him well in the new Administration.
-TRA
Democrats are fighting a CIVIL WAR…republicans aren’t! This is Democrats 2nd Civil War by the way!
Yes ! And if Trump happens to win narrowly or there is a 269-269 tie, I expect the Democrats to stage a “color revolution”.
EXACTLY. Which is why I will not donate a penny to any Republican until they clean their house of rinos and weak willies. Take a stand like our founding fathers and get done with this before it is too late.
“disinformation” is where you expose DEMOCRAT LIES? Time to END cut federal power…MONEY! Cut 50% of Federal Spending. End all federal aid to cities, states, non-profits and colleges
Let Democrats FUND their own failure…and TAKE AWAY THEIR power to ENRICH their crony criminals!
time to start jailing these criminal judges!
Correct – Now just who are you going to get to do this? the DOJ? Even if a Republican wins the white house there is still thousands of partisans working to destroy that presidency from within the bureaucracy. Fumigating the bureaucracy and the media/education industry must be done first – by whichever means we need utilize.
We used to condemn Communist China for its treatment of dissidents. We haven’t executed any yet so Biden can draw a bright line there.
Solidarity confinement, suicides, beatings by guards, I believe we’ve already crossed the line into execution territory.
Birmingham said: “We used to condemn Communist China for its treatment of dissidents. We haven’t executed any yet so Biden can draw a bright line there.”
“We haven’t executed any THAT WE CAN CLEARLY DOCUMENT yet”. FIFY
Actually, I am uncertain about even that qualified claim. Does assassination of a sitting President for his dissent from the hidden agenda of the national security apparatus, and his intention to implement that dissent in official policy, count as “executing a dissident”?
Politics and poker. Impartiality on the part of the bench is hopeless, particularly in this new age of tribalism where the Black female coach of a championship bound women’s basketball team publicly supports the notion of transgender players on her roseter, she may already have set in motion not only her own demise, but that of the team’s. Surely there’s some fool, who couldn’t ‘make it in NY’, just waiting for the opportunity to go South.
Don’t send them south, we don’t want them!