This month, the U.S. Judicial Conference issued new ethics guidelines, a publication that rarely attracts attention beyond a small circle of legal nerds. These guidelines, however, are not just the usual tweaks on rules governing free meals or travel. They include a new policy that could materially alter the character of the American courts, allowing judges to engage in commentary to rebut what they deem “illegitimate forms of criticism and attacks.” It is not just injudicious, it is dangerous.
Over two centuries ago, the Framers had to sell the Constitution to skeptical states leery about yielding power to a central government, including federal courts. In Federalist #78, Alexander Hamilton sought to put these fears aside and assured the states that the federal judiciary is “the least dangerous to the political rights of the Constitution; because it will be least in a capacity to annoy or injure them.”
One can certainly disagree with Hamilton whether history has borne out his prediction that the court would have the least capacity to “annoy” others in our system. However, Hamilton’s pitch would later be reinforced by the adoption of apolitical ethical standards in our courts that separated them from political activities and commentary.
It did not begin that way. Early federal judges, including Supreme Court justices, were often openly partisan. Federalist judges took active roles in hunting down Jeffersonians under the infamous Alien and Sedition Acts.
That changed as the nation embraced a new model of judges who would stand apart from politics. While judges often reflect the ideological views of the presidents who nominated them, they have largely followed rigid rules that have prevented them from engaging in political commentary. Judges are expected to address the legal issues in their opinions and leave political commentary to others regarding the implications or basis of those opinions.
It has not been a perfect system. Recently, some of us have criticized judges who have made overtly political statements in their opinions or in public. The deviation from the traditional line of judicial silence has grown in recent years.
I previously wrote about this pattern of extrajudicial commentary, including inappropriate commentary in court statements and opinions. These comments often undermined the integrity of the court and the public’s faith in the neutrality of our judges.
District Court Judge Tanya Chutkan, an Obama appointee, was criticized for failing to recuse herself from the Special Counsel’s case against President Donald Trump after she made highly controversial statements about him from the bench. Chutkan lashed out at “a blind loyalty to one person who, by the way, remains free to this day.” That “one person” was still under investigation at the time, and when Trump was charged, Chutkan refused to let the case go.
Chutkan later doubled down when asked to dismiss a case due to Trump pardoning Jan. 6 defendants. After acknowledging that she could not block the pardons, she proclaimed that the pardons could not change the “tragic truth” and “cannot whitewash the blood, feces and terror that the mob left in its wake. And it cannot repair the jagged breach in America’s sacred tradition of peacefully transitioning power.”
One of Chutkan’s colleagues, Judge Beryl Howell, also an Obama appointee, denounced a Trump policy as “a revisionist myth relayed in this presidential pronouncement.”
Then there is Judge Amit Mehta, another Obama appointee, who has been criticized for conflicted rulings in Trump cases and his bizarre (and ultimately abandoned) effort to banish January 6th defendants from the Capitol. He called Trump’s policies “shameful.”
D.C. Circuit Judge Reggie Walton called Trump a “charlatan.”
U.S. District Judge Robert Pratt of the Southern District of Iowa made public comments calling Trump a “criminal.”
Other federal judges have made other public statements denouncing Trump and Republican priorities. Even before this change, these judges felt that they could engage in such political declarations.
Even Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson declared publicly how she sees her position as a judge “as a wonderful opportunity to tell people in my opinions how I feel about the issues, and that’s what I try to do.”
Last year, the Supreme Court condemned U.S. District Judge William Young, a Reagan appointee, for his attacks on Trump as a bully bent on “retribution.” He also accused the administration of “racial discrimination” and “discrimination against the LGBTQ community,” and asked in one order, “Have we no shame?”
There is no paucity of such criticism in our country. Many pundits have leveled such attacks against the President, but this was a sitting judge. These judges are using their offices to amplify their personal outrage over policies. The result is that they are erasing the distinction between our courts and our politics.
Given these increasingly injudicious comments, one would think that Chief Justice John Roberts and the Judicial Conference would seek to tighten, not loosen, the limits on judicial commentary.
I am not suggesting that these past statements would be viewed as acceptable under the new rules. However, I fail to understand, in light of such controversial statements, the Conference elected to relax the rules at this time. I fail to see why it is so intolerable for judges to leave such commentary to others as the cost of holding one of these privileged Article III positions in our system.
In this “age of rage,” it is more important than ever that our judges stand above the political debate and distemper. The public needs to look to one branch that is detached and deliberative, rather than participants in our national pandemonium.
I have long admired Chief Justice Roberts and have been sympathetic to his efforts to defend the courts, including his response to personal attacks on judges by the President and others. I have also opposed calls to impeach judges such as James Boasberg despite my strong disagreement with some of his past opinions.
However, this ill-conceived change could not come at a worse time. Just as federal judges are raising eyebrows over their extrajudicial comments, the Conference is giving them a green light for such commentary.
What the new advisory opinion calls “measured defense” of the judiciary is so vague that the most irresponsible judges are likely to pour into the breach. They can now speak out against any threats that they deem are “undermining judicial independence or the rule of law..regardless of whether these comments rise to the level of persecution.”
In 2024, Chief Justice Roberts spoke of activities that “either threaten the judges themselves,” including “Violence, intimidation, disinformation, and threats to defy court orders.”
Many of us supported him in those comments. The Chief Justice has historically spoken for the bench on such threats.
Now, however, he and the Conference have enabled other jurists to engage in such commentary to the detriment of the judiciary as a whole. They will now face a slippery slope on what constitutes a “measured defense” by judges eager to further push the envelope on allowable commentary.
The added freedom afforded to judges to engage in commentary will do little to change the debate. It may, however, greatly erode the trust in what was once considered “our least dangerous branch.”
Jonathan Turley is a law professor and author of the New York Times bestseller “Rage and the Republic: The Unfinished Story of the American Revolution.”
Here are the new guidelines: New Judicial Guidelines
Georgia: Lost Not Stolen
Hours after the FBI’s Georgia stunt, Trump posted some conspiracy theories, including — speaking of the exotic — this: China coordinated the use of Italian military satellites to cause U.S. voting machines to flip Trump votes to Biden.
Someone should read to him “Lost, Not Stolen,” a 2022 report by eight conservatives (two former Republican senators, three former federal appellate judges, a former Republican solicitor general, and two Republican election law specialists). They examined all 187 counts in the 64 court challenges filed in multiple states by Trump and his supporters.
Twenty cases were dismissed before hearings on their merits, 14 were voluntarily dismissed by Trump and his supporters before hearings. Of the 30 that reached hearings on the merits, Trump’s side prevailed in only one, Pennsylvania, involving far too few votes to change the state’s result. Trump’s batting average? .016.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2026/02/18/trump-election-stolen-biden/?itid=hp_mv-top-stories_opinions_p001_f01
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Federal judges have good reason to be leery of Trump.
Wash. Post is your source?
You’ve just “posted some conspiracy theories” yourself anon.
The above was written by George Will. If you think it’s incorrect, tell us which part.
^ Paid DNC troll. Ignore. ^
The American Founders generally imposed by state these voting restrictions: Male, European, 21, 50 lbs. Sterling, or 50 acres.
They most certainly required ID at the polling place.
Similar restrictions have been in place in democracies since their inception in Greece.
We know how the poor will vote; they will vote themselves other people’s money.
One-man, one-vote democracy IS nonviable communism.
One-man, one-vote democracy is not only impossible, it is insane.
Oh, and so are people who quote the inoperative or defunct Washington Post.
The reason judges are given lifetime terms is so they will provide strong checks & balances against wanna-be-dictators like Dick Cheney, George W. Bush and Trump.
The federal Judicial Branch abandoned Americans in Minnesota or those illegally blacklisted for life by Bush and Cheney (Unitary Executive Theory).
Since they abandoned us, why should they serve lifetime terms? It’s been more than 20 years without even an official apology. Maybe term limits would protect us better?
^ Delusional left wing cultists like this always say the opposite of the truth ^
Wanna be dictators like Bill Clinton, Obama and Biden that illegally targeted and attacked their political opposition. They all belong in prison plus the judges that enabled the coup against a sitting President of the US.
After complaining Trump would seek retribution and has not, they are now announcing they will seek retribution for Trump upholding the laws of the US.
Spot on.
Biden set up the orwellian Ministry of Truth. Trump dismantled it.
Biden sicced his FBI on traditional Catholics, concerned moms at school board meetings, and pro-lifers praying near abortion clinics. Trump has done nothing like that.
Biden used his secret police to persecute American citizens whose political opinions differ from his own. Trump uses ICE to arrest child rapists, murderers, drug traffickers, child sex traffickers, and violent gang members.
Under left-wing rules, that makes Biden freedom lover and Trump a dictator.
Here’s a question for Turley:
There are almost 1500 federal judges in the USA.
Each individual judge (out of nearly 1500 judges) might have unique experiences not found in 9 justices.
Why couldn’t a single judge (or group of judges) essentially file a legally non-binding amicus brief. A group of judges offering an opinion.
Just opinions from other judges with unique expertise on that particular issue?
The U.S. Supreme Court could completely ignore those opinions and those opinions would have no legal mandates.
This is U.S. Supreme Court allowed Bush officials to violate Ronald Reagan’s torture treaty (also federal law).
Remember when Bush said he detained the “worst of the worst” then released 86% without any charges? Many weren’t even captured on a battlefield.
Worst yet, this U.S. Supreme Court allowed several thousand Americans to be covertly-blacklisted for life! In 2026 these innocent Americans haven’t even received an official apology.
Covert Blacklisting sounds harmless but it destroys innocent Americans for life! Many likely suffer premature death.
We need a real U.S. Supreme Court that actually protects the rights of Americans. They need as many opinions as they can get!
I just see jumbled allegations but not point to it all.
Like they protected US Senators ftom.illegal phone surveillance? Or like they protected victims of Lois Lerner? Yeah right.
The Fourth Amendment is likely the clearest constitutional right in both letter and spirit.
This 21st Century Judicial Branch allows ICE officers (constitutional officers) to adopt foreign “General Warrants” not legal in the USA.
That unconstitutional “fishing expedition” (also a federal crime) is then used to drag legal U.S. citizens out of their homes in their underwear in frostbite conditions (harmful to their health). Without a judicial warrant. Then they drive their illegal prisoner around the block then release them without an apology.
Pam Bondi knew it was blatantly unconstitutional and illegal.
Maybe the U.S. Supreme Court needs to hear other legal opinions?
One thing I recently learned was any federal judge can disbar any attorney, including federal attorneys. It’s not just the legal bar associations, judges can suspend attorneys committing malpractice also.
All, quite a mouthful. ” not legal in the USA.” Now prove it.
Lots of generalized assertions with no specifics. Try naming an incident in which the Fourth Amendment was violated, and a reviewing court signed off on it. That’s something we could discuss, unlike highly generalized and unsupported descriptions. Until then, you lack credibility.
Hey ole timer, see you made it to the keyboard today. Yeah, you tell em ole timer.
Who suspends judges when they engage in malpractice?
ICE Sweeps Overwhelming Federal Courts
Federal judges across the country have been grappling for months with ICE’s decision to dramatically expand the number of people the agency locks up in detention facilities while their deportation proceedings are pending. This “mandatory detention” push — an unprecedented reinterpretation of decades-old laws — has resulted in thousands of people, most without criminal records, being detained, even if they have lived in the country for decades without incident.
That has led to a deluge of emergency lawsuits brought by individual detainees, thousands of whom have challenged their detention as illegal and unconstitutional.
From Today’s Politico
Cry harder Gigi, we can’t hear you.
And wtf does that have to do with Professor T’s article, moron?
Got proof. See no quotes or sources.
It is not a reinterpretation. If it was it would have been challenged large scale.
Instead their have been only a few cases, and those have resulted in losses on appeal.
The BIG deal here is that illegal immigrants are entitled to a hearing before an artlcie II immigration court.
If they lose they have 90 days to appeal – that is “due process”
But if thy do not show up – they lose 100% of the time. DHS then waits for time to expire on appeals, and the deportation order becomes final.
At that time the ONLY remaining due process open to illegals is a Habeaus hearing and just about the only basis for a habeaus claim is “I am not the person in the deportation order.
People are being held varying between 48hrs and 30 days depending on the fderal circuit fotr a habeaus hearing – that they will lose, and then they will be deported.
The fact is the law requires that if you entered the US illegally you must be deported.
There are myriads of means to delay that process – especially if the executive branch is in no ruch to deport you.
But deportation is inevitable so long as the executive seeks to enforce the law.
The only way to immigrate to the US to have any hope of staying is legally.
Even asylum requests MUST be made before entering to be assured of an assylum hearing – and even then 95% of assylum requests are turned down.
As soon as one see your name dude, first response is: Got proof?
One more illustration of how the Left ruins everything it touches.
There are illustrations in the article.
What exactly did they break?
Federal Judges Decry Treatment Of Pregnant ICE Detainees
Federal judges are sounding alarms about the Trump administration’s treatment of pregnant and nursing detainees in ICE custody — and the administration has given the courts conflicting, unclear answers about whether it is following its own policies that sharply restrict those detentions.
Against that uncertainty, courts are being confronted with harrowing stories about women being separated from their nursing infants or housed in cramped and ill-equipped ICE facilities while pregnant, in conditions that threaten their health and have, in some cases, been followed by miscarriages.
From Today’s Politico
Cry harder George-Svelaz, we can’t hear you.
Easy solution would have been don’t come here illegally.
Question: Could Trump and Hedgeseth be impeached for using taxpayer-owned aircraft to intimidate legal First Amendment activity.
Assuming we had a legitimate justice system, could they be impeached for that?
If Trump cured cancer, the Dems would impeach him for that.
If Trump were a God …. oh wait, he is. God is great!
I remember when the MSN put a halo on O-dumbers head…
Get lost …
H-e-g-s-e-t-h. Hegseth.
Whiskey Pete