Five years ago, I wrote about a federal judge who, in my view, had discarded any resemblance of judicial restraint and judgment in a public screed against Republicans, Donald Trump, and the Supreme Court. The Wisconsin judge represented the final death of irony: a jurist who failed to see the conflict in lashing out at what he called judicial bias in a political diatribe that would have made MSNBC’s Lawrence O’Donnell blush.
His name is Lynn Adelman.
I was wrong in 2020. Irony is very much alive.
This week, a judge was randomly selected to preside at the trial of Milwaukee County Circuit Judge Hannah Dugan. A critic of Trump’s immigration policies, Dugan is accused of obstructing federal law enforcement and facilitating the escape of an unlawful immigrant.
The judge assigned to the Dugan case? You guessed it. Lynn Adelman, 85.
A judge is expected to come to a case like this one without the burden of his own baggage. Judge Adelman is carrying more baggage than Amtrak in Wisconsin.
The selection of Adelman shows how political commentary by judges undermines the legitimacy of the court system. Now, in a case that has divided the nation, the public will have to rely on a judge who discarded his own obligations as a judge to lash out at conservatives, Trump, and conservative jurists.
Adelman was a long-standing Democratic politician who tried repeatedly and unsuccessfully to run for Congress during his 20-year tenure in the Wisconsin Senate. For critics, Adelman never set aside his political agenda after President Bill Clinton nominated him for the federal bench.
Adelman was sharply rebuked for ignoring controlling Supreme Court precedent to rule in favor of a Democratic challenge over voting identification rules just before a critical election. Adelman blocked the law before the election despite a Supreme Court case issued years earlier in Crawford v. Marion County Election Board, 553 U.S. 181 (2008), rejecting a similar challenge.
The United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit issued a stinging reversal, explaining to Adelman that in “our hierarchical judicial system, a district court cannot declare a statute unconstitutional just because he thinks (with or without the support of a political scientist) that the dissent was right and the majority wrong.”
Adelman, however, was apparently undeterred. In 2020, he wrote a law review article for Harvard Law & Policy Review, titled “The Roberts Court’s Assault on Democracy.”
Adelman attacked what he described as a “hard-right majority” that is “actively participating in undermining American democracy.” He also struck out at Trump as “an autocrat… disinclined to buck the wealthy individuals and corporations who control his party.”
Adelman was later admonished by the Civility Committee for the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals for his public political attacks as “inconsistent with a judge’s duty to promote public confidence in the integrity and impartiality of the judiciary and as reflecting adversely on the judge’s impartiality.”
The costs of such extrajudicial commentary became vividly clear this week. Judge Dugan is being called a “hero” by Democratic politicians and pundits for helping an individual evade federal arrest. At least one judge has pledged to do the same in her courtroom. On the other side, many are appalled by Dugan’s conduct as fundamentally at odds with the role of a jurist in either the state or federal system.
There are weighty issues in the case and the public has a right to expect a fair trial with a judge who will not be swayed by his own political viewpoints. Dugan already had the advantage of a trial before a jury taken from one of the most liberal districts in the country. She will now have a judge who was himself sanctioned for political statements and reversed for ignoring controlling precedent.
You know that he’s going to make his ruling to dismiss, then promptly announce his retirement. And won’t give one care about doing so – he’ll collect a paycheck for the rest of his life.
Assuming this judge will find a way to help Dugan, the DOJ should bring a case helpful to talking points about the law, illegals’ crime, historical precedents, and give plenty of opportunity to reveal judicial bias to America. This judge is obviously weak on the law. Prove the bias, not the case!
if there was ever a case that demanded a change of venue, this is it
More of the same. As if the people selected in the Special Counsel investigation of Russia, Russia, Russia were not suffering from Gain of Function TDS. Democrats are circling the toilet bowl.
Strange how that random assignment worked out. Who would have ever thought that it would happen.
That literally is the fox (a grizzled old grey one at that) guarding the henhouse.
The Federal Attorney should demand immediate recusal of the judge and appeal a refusal to do so.
If this is ends in an acquittal then it will just be another nail in the coffin of judicial restraint and fairness. I don’t like to prejudge cases and try to keep an open mind just like when I have served on juries but we saw New York justice and it was found seriously wanting. I expect to see the same here but lightning can strike and justice be served.
Maybe Trump can strike a deal with the senate and house. Suspend the filibuster, pass a bill reassigning judges or expanding more positions, offer a lucrative retirement bonus to those District Court judges who quit in the next 6 months . Those that don’t retire could end up in new districts in Alaska “Point Barrow”, Shreveport La, midtown Detroit and Chicago, Fargo Ga just outside the Okefenoke Swamp, Everglades swamp, Atchafalaya Wildlife Refuge, Dry Tortugas in Florida, Midway Atoll in Hawaii.
Congress gets to determine what the Appeals Courts and District Courts do since they created them. Nothing in the constitution says that they cannot reassign them since they are already senate approved. Supreme Court is another matter entirely.
That might move some people around and change the talk in DC.
There are all sorts of legal things that can be done. Need some imagination.
No one can really be surprised, can they? I doubt there are any judges in Milwaukee who are not Leftist activists.
Why would that be? Did Trump make no appointments there? Did the Bushes not make any either? Reagan?
It looks like the only hope for justice is a not-overly-insane panel of the 7th Circuit reining in this left-wing politician in judge’s robes.
(P.S. Not “reigning in” – that doesn’t make sense, just saying, since I see that a lot these days)
So why hasn’t this guy been removed? More and more we see biased, even radical judges appointed by both sides. They offer no justice for the people according to our constitution only for the benefit of their ideology. Something must be done to prevent them from continuing to pervert the law. Right now a duly elected administration was elected overwhelmingly by citizens of the United States to correct the damage inflicted by an addled President, only to be hobbled by Democrat appointees. Something must be done.
Hannah already knew the statistics of getting the “judge of her peers” in the greater Milwaukee. Hence, she went all-in with Clement hoping that the trial will be argued in SCOTUS.
We have the greatest legal system in the world . . .
With the Left’s political corruption of the law, shouldn’t that be: we had the greatest legal system in the world?
I thought that judges were not supposed to legislate from the bench? But that is all they seem to do. . .
Hilarious that Turley is tone deaf enough to put up this push piece garbage to appease his magats like Aileen Cannon never happened.
Nice spin… keep trying
Anonymous makes a valid point. Turley completely overlooked the clear bias of Judge Cannon in favor of Trump. This hypocrisy makes Turley’s opinions feel more like pointless rants.
He also failed to mention that the same committee that criticized the judge recognized the comments as protected political speech. Additionally, he didn’t point out that the judge had already apologized for the remarks. Instead, Turley seems to be trying to persuade his audience by suggesting that the upcoming trial will be unfair. It would be more rational for him to wait until after the trial and the evidence is presented before jumping to conclusions about bias for his uninformed readers. We all know he is obligated to push the narrative so Fox News can use his opinon to attack the judge and the trial as a sham.
As usual. Pure BS george.
Try harder
“We all know” no such thing. As Ayanna would say – – – get that phrase outta yo’ mouth! You’ve been sucking at the teat of the MSM so long you can’t fathom Fox News having anything truthful to say. Yet Fox was the only outlet reporting the Biden mental decline in real time. Took your boys until after the debate and election defeat to admit that Joe’s mind is geriatric mush.
“Turley completely overlooked the clear bias of Judge Cannon . . .”
Suppose that’s true.
How is that relevant to the validity of his argument in *this* case?
Sam: because Turley only sees the bias he is PAID to promote.
Kettle, meet pot.
Judge Dugan is in a state that by law is supposed to minimize cooperation with immigration enforcement officials. She protected a criminal case she was overseeing from interference by DHS. It was the proper thing to. She is a hero.
DHS’s went to DOJ after the fact to try to punish the judge. So now, federal officials are carrying out an attack on federalism itself.
As the Left keeps saying: nobody is above the law. She violated federal law (concealing an individual to prevent arrest, and obstruction of justice). If you don’t want to do the time, don’t do the crime.
I don’t believe for a minute that state law required her actions. Even if it did, it wouldn’t matter. Federal law trump state law. It’s called the Supremacy Clause.
Amen to the Supremacy Clause. She hedged her bet by hiring the Paul Clement, the former solicitor general in Bush administration and the lawyer with the high percentage of winning at SCOTUS.
Dugan aided and abetted a known criminal illegal evade federal law officers from doing their duty. She is no hero.
But I am sure you think this guy is a hero, ICE captures illegal immigrant wanted for allegedly killing mother in DUI crash
“The August crash, in which German Adriano Llangari Inga allegedly had a blood alcohol content “twice the legal limit,” killed mother Victoria Eileen Harwell, and hurt her teenage daughter and sister, according to DHS and local media outlets.
“Despite a lack of cooperation from local Minnesota authorities, ICE arrested criminal illegal alien German Llangari Inga. This criminal illegal alien has been evading prosecution for vehicular homicide that resulted in the death of Minnesota mom, Victoria Eileen Harwell,” Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement on Tuesday.”
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/ice-captures-illegal-immigrant-wanted-allegedly-killing-mother-dui-crash
She assisted a fugitive to evade arrest. That is a felony. Being a judge doesn’t change that. And no state law can change it either. Federal law is the supreme law of the land, and overrides all state laws and state constitutions that contradict it.
It is amazing that left wing nuts keep getting “randomly assigned” to Trump cases.
Roberts needs to let go of this idiot nonsense that we can trust the judiciary.
We can NOT.
Either the Supreme Court reigns them in.
Or something more drastic will have to be done.
Why would that an issue. Cannon was “randomly assigned” to Trump’s classified document’s case and she still made every effort to help Trump.
It’s the ignorance of Trump supporters like yourself that seems to be the problem. The majority have no idea how courts work or how the rules that seem unfair have helped many a conservative in the past.
It’s only whey things are not going the way conservatives want that they damand changes and preferential rules and outcomes. If a judge doesn’t rule as they expect it’s immediately an activist judge or a biased judge. That’s why the judicial branch is not a democracy. Because mobs like the far-right and MAGA nuts bully those who are not aligned with their preconceived outcomes.
george
Why would that an issue. Cannon was “randomly assigned” to Trump’s classified document’s case and she still made every effort to help Trump.
Nope she used the rule of law.
You not so much.
Rose-colored glasses would be the correct hue for your view of everything that happens in American politics. I’ve come to find out that I can come to Turley’s comments and find George’s posts to always confirm what I suspect about the feral hive-mindedness of the Left. You are a perverse blessing, George.
Too many rabidly leftwing political judges thanks to the Left’s determination that their politics are the only valid politics and when it’s their turn they appoint judges accordingly.
Unfortunately for the nation, we have been asleep at the wheel for decades while partisan universities have pumped the minds of future judges with the concept that ideology trumps the rule of law.
Until we shed this notion from the minds of half of this nation, we will not survive as a nation of laws.
The fact that a partisan has been placed in charge of a fellow traveler in a court room is a prime example of the problems that will continue to plague any administration whose goal is to restore this nation to its original moorings.
I really haven’t been able to comprehend what the platform of democrats is. It’s simply destroy what is. The vocations for half the people is robbery basically. Dugan and Alderman seek to rob people like dogs that snatch food from an unprotected dinner table.
That’s the basic summation.
“When you don that robe…” one shouldn’t become a mob Don.
But that is not what is taught at universities now. The unwashed mind as a freshman is now showered with progressive ideology and never is a sharp line drawn between ideology and logic, reason and the rule of law.
The flaws start at the education level and they are enhanced by a media that has been set on the same path by the same universities.
The problems of this nation start at the university level – these are the Augean Stables that must be cleaned before this nation can be saved.
The beast, in it’s death throes, lashes out, caring not if it hits friend nor foe, only that something pays for it’s self-transgressions.
_Rabble
“Res ipsa loquitur” applies here.
I’ll take a wild guess here.
The charges will be dismissed by the judge.
Noone
He will buy this idiotic Judicial immunity argument for actions having nothing to do with official duties.
Regardless, this judge should provide plenty of article about judicial bias for the next year.
The answer is to file vrs. Judge Duggan in federal court , especially if Professor Turley believes dismissal is likely .
Huh? You’re not making any sense.