A GW law student, Andrew Miller, 23, is being celebrated as a hero this week after he came to the aid of John Rowley, 62. Rowley was attacked by a group of teens in a D.C. Metro station and Miller ran to his aid. Miller suffered a concussion in the incident while Rowley was left with facial swelling and bruises.
Continue reading “GW Student Heralded As Hero After Intervening In Assault Of Lawyer”
The annual GW charity competition between torts and contracts was held this week and I am saddened to report that contracts prevailed on the field of paintball. Each year, the students bid for positions on the two teams and all of the money goes to support public interest work by our law students at George Washington. (The Contracts team is in the back with Professor Greg Maggs in the middle; the Torts Team is sitting in front).
Continue reading “CONTRACTS DEFEATS TORTS IN ANNUAL GW PAINTBALL COMPETITION”
Below is my column in The Hill Newspaper on the chorus of commentators suggesting that the Comey memo is compelling evidence for either a charge of obstruction of justice or an actual impeachment. I have been cautioning against such sweeping assumptions. Obstruction is a crime and crimes have elements. The elements are not satisfied by this memorandum. Yesterday senators revealed that Rod Rosenstein suggested that he was already informed that Comey would be fired before he wrote his memorandum supporting termination. That would not materially alter the legal analysis. Rosenstein’s memo confirms that he believed that Comey should be fired. He had met with Comey and clearly left with reservations over his continued fitness for the position. The fact that Trump may have made what Rosenstein thought was the right decision for the wrong reason is marginally relevant. Comey’s immediate boss was not supporting his retention. Moreover, Trump’s conflicting statements do not improve the case for prosecution. It it true that Trump has contradicted his staff and seemingly himself. Yet, Trump has insisted that he felt Comey was doing a poor job and yesterday he reaffirmed his position that he never asked Comey to drop the Flynn investigation. However, even if he said such an incredibly inappropriate thing, it would not meet the standards of obstruction for the purposes of a criminal charge in my view. In other words, this is a question of law not fact and the law is not on the side of those calling for criminal counts or articles of impeachment.
Critics increasingly sound like my kids when we drive across country and start to chant “are we there yet?” before we are even a block from the house. Many view a criminal charge or impeachment as the only hope for America. However, neither the criminal code nor Article II were meant as post hoc political options for unpopular presidents. Indeed, both are designed to be insulated from public distempers and passions.
None of this means that this is not a valid basis for investigation. It is. Moreover, the White House staff appears encircled like a wagon train on the Plains with no ammunition and no nearby fort. The difference is that they seem encircled by their own president who continued to prevent any movement to better ground. What is fascinating is that Trump appears intent on creating the most self-incriminating appearance without evidence of an actual crime on his part.
Here is the column:
We have been writing about the enculturation of anti-free speech values in college students across the country. The most recent incident occurred at the California State University where assistant professor of public health professor Greg Thatcher is shown on a videotape wiping out the pro-life statements written in chalk by members of Fresno State Students for Life. Thatcher supports his students who destroyed the messages before his arrival (those students said that their teacher gave them permission to destroy the free speech of other students). Thatcher’s attitude and open contempt for free speech is chilling. It is also now the subject of a free speech lawsuit filed against him in his personal capacity.
Below is my column in USA Today on President Donald Trump’s disclosure of highly classified information to the Russians in his controversial meeting after the firing of James Comey. While the Administration issued a series of categorical denials of the underlying stories as “false,” the next day it appeared to acknowledge that Trump did in fact reveal the information. As discussed below, it was a wise decision not to repeat the initially misleading statements to Congress. The intelligence was reportedly generated by Israel, which did not give permission to the President to make the disclosure to the Russians. Since the New York Times and Washington Post did not say that Trump released “sources and methods,” it now appears that the White House is not claiming that the stories were false. It is the latest example of denials from the White House which then lead to embarrassing reversals over the course of the coverage. The only good sign is that the White House saw that the false account was raising serious problems and reversed course the next morning. However, the familiar pattern has taken its toll on the Hill where members were conspicuously absent this time in defending the President.
Continue reading “The Russian Disclosure: Trump’s Game of Truth or Dare”
I have previously been critical of the stance taken by former acting Attorney General Sally Yates. I remained unconvinced that Yates had the ethical basis to order for the entire Justice Department to stand down and not to assist the president in the defense of his first executive order on immigration. I also questioned Yates’ decision to voluntarily testify before the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence. She was testifying as someone who was recently in a prosecutorial position about subjects related to an ongoing investigation where no one has yet to be indicted. Now those concerns have been magnified by Yates’ appearance in the media to talk about matters center to the ongoing investigation at the Justice Department and other related subjects.
Continue reading “Yates Goes On CNN To Declare That Russians Had “Real Leverage” Over Flynn”
Televangelist Rick Joyner appears on the brink of ruining Sunday football for all of us. Joyner said that the world needs prophets who will be able to predict the future, including sports scores. More importantly, Joyner revealed that he already has that ability and knew the actual score of the World series games before the games were actually played.
Continue reading “Televangelist: Bob Jones And I Got The Final Score Of World Series From God”
There has been comparatively little coverage of an allegation voiced by Sen. Rand Paul that another Senator confided in him that he was also subjected to surveillance under the Obama Administration. Paul previously voiced his belief that he may have been the subject of surveillance and asked the intelligence committee for confirmation of any such evidence. The surveillance of members of the Senate would raise extremely serious questions on the abuse of surveillance authority and threat to the independence of Congress. If this is untrue, I would have expected a reassuring denial to be issued. Even if the Senators were not the target of surveillance, it would be highly troubling if the government monitored conversations with members of Congress.
We have been discussing Black Lives Matter and other protests on campuses where students have demanded changes in everything from exam grading to tenure decisions to housing. Many of these demands raise troubling questions about the academic integrity of academic institutions as well as free speech and other countervailing concerns.
University of California Santa Cruz has yielded to four demands from protesters after they occupied Kerr Hall. The school now faces demands for three additional demands and has been given Chancellor George Blumenthal four months to comply over face “more reclamations.”
Last night, my son Jack and I went to see the documentary Men of Steel by photographer Chris Zarconi. Zarconi is a graduate student at George Washington University and set out in his to photograph the rust belt and interview those still living in cities like Youngstown, Ohio. He is an amazing photojournalist and filmmaker. These are his pictures (published with his consent). Zarconi was also one of the plaintiffs in Chang v. United States, the mass arrest case stemming from the 2002 protests of the World Bank and the IMF. I had the honor of representing Chris and the other plaintiffs with my co-lead counsel Daniel Schwartz and his colleagues at the Bryan Cave law firm. Chris was arrested while working as a photo journalist for the award-winning Hatchet university newspaper.
Continue reading “Chris Zarconi Shows Documentary Men of Steel at GW’s Corcoran Gallery”
By Darren Smith, Weekend Contributor
A 2,000 acre organic farm in central Oregon is facing what could be a be an existential threat to its operations after county weed control authorities sent notice mandating that the farm use chemical herbicides, such as Roundup, to eradicate weed growth.
The mandate would bring to an end nearly 18 years of organic farming, placing a significant loss of organic food to the public.
Azure Farms is a certified organic farm located in Moro, Sherman County, Oregon. The farm produces almost all the organic wheat, field peas, barley, Einkorn, and beef for Azure Standard.
Sherman County could issue a court order on May 22, 2017 to quarantine Azure Farms and possibly to spray the entire farm with poisonous herbicides contaminating them with Milestone, Escort, and Roundup.
Such a unilateral action on the behalf of the few individuals representing county government could set a precedent in damaging perhaps one of the few remaining healthy alternatives to mass-market agribusinesses.
Continue reading “Oregon County Mandates 2,000 Acre Organic Farm Sprayed With Chemical Herbicides”
White House principal deputy press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders assured the media yesterday that there was nothing inappropriate with President Donald Trump asking former FBI Director James Comey if he was a target of the ongoing investigation over Russian influence or collusion in the presidential election. She insisted that the White House had reached out to legal experts and “several legal scholars who have weighed in on it and said there’s nothing wrong with it.” She also said that “many legal scholars and others that have been commenting on it for the last hour.” While I cannot speak for all legal scholars, I find it surprising that the White House could find “several” who would sign off on such an inquiry. It was clearly improper for Trump to ask the question and it would have been equally improper for Comey to answer in this fashion.
To make matters worse, Sanders said that, by removing Comey, the White House hoped to bring the investigation to a sooner conclusion. In her defense, I took her comment as meaning that the White House has nothing to fear from the investigation and wants it to come to a conclusion: “We want this to come to its conclusion, we want it to come to its conclusion with integrity. And we think that we’ve actually, by removing Director Comey, taken steps to make that happen.” However, it was another uniquely ham-handed treatment of the controversy from a White House that continues to struggle with maintaining a single coherent message. The overwhelming thrust of the coverage of the Comey termination was that it was meant to bring an end to the Russian investigation. To connect the firing of Comey with the hope for a faster conclusion to the investigation is incredibly daft.
I was at CNN the night of the firing of James Comey. Frankly, it was utter chaos as Washington exploded with the news. (The green room was packed with folks waiting to go on. I left rather than wait all night for an uncertain hit. I was far more interested at that point in the Cubs-Rockies game). I was in other words an “eyewitness” in the crowded green room when White House counselor Kellyanne Conway was interviewed by Anderson Cooper who noticeably rolled his eyes. Some in the green room were thrilled by the demonstration. One person who was not thrilled was Conway herself who leveled a charge of sexism the next morning on Fox News. (For the record, Conway is my former student at GW Law School). For the record, having worked with Anderson for years, I do not believe that he has a sexist bone in his body. That does not excuse the lapse of professionalism and it will magnify criticism of the network as openly anti-Trump.
Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein who wrote the memorandum firing James Comey is back in the news today. Various news organizations are reporting that he allegedly threatened to quit after the White House represented that Comey was fired based on his recommendation. Both the Washington Post and ABC News are reporting that Rosenstein was sufficiently outraged by the White House statements that he was prepared to walk. The reporting is highly disturbing on a number of levels. The White House made a notable change in its account of the decision yesterday — admitting that Trump decided that he wanted Comey gone over a week earlier. Of course, this does not change the fact that Rosenstein recommended the firing of Comey in the memo but it raises serious questions of the veracity of the White House. UPDATE: The White House is categorically denying that Rosenstein threatened to resign. More importantly, Rosenstein has denied that he threatened to resign though it is not clear if he denied calling the White House to object to its portrayal of the facts leading to the termination.
Below is my USA Today column on the testimony of Sally Yates, former acting Attorney General, on her unprecedented order to the Justice Department not to assist President Donald Trump in the defense of his immigration executive order. While the hearing was focused on her warning with regard to former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn, some of us were more interested in how she would respond to criticism over the order that led to her being fired. Both Democratic and Republican lawyers have raised serious ethical misgivings over her decision. The hearing however only magnified the questions over the basis for her actions. Here is the column.