Author: condor

The Savage Texas Razor Wire Barrier Cases Rumble Onward, On Appeal In The Fifth Cir. — US Parties In Texas Dismissed, But Private [Lacerated/Injured] Migrants Remain…

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It has been about five months since we took a look in on Texas SB 4, a law that purports to grant Texas Rangers the right to usurp federal US Border jurisdiction — and erect savage concertina wire barriers, the principal goal of which was to maim people without papers who sought a better life, by swimming the Rio Grande at Eagle Pass / Shelby Park, Texas.

Several of my commenters thought that the fact of a second Tangerine administration would mean the US would simply dismiss the litigation against Texas, and end the matter. What was missed in those suggestions was that private plaintiffs, including people without papers (including several children) had joined the suit, as maimed/injured parties. The Tangerine 2.0 parties cannot foreclose those people’s rights, to a redress of their grievances / injuries.

So the appeal rumbles on. At this point the only modification to the injunctive orders provides that Texas authorities may not be ordered NOT to “cooperate” with federal ICE/DHS agents. They may aid ICE agents — but not directly arrest — any people that they encounter on the US side of the Rio Grande. Of course they may provide humanitarian aid. But there hasn’t been a single instance of that, in over three years. So here is where it sits, according to the ACLU’s latest letter in the Fifth Circuit:

…Defendants [Texas (MAGA) Gov. Abbott; Tangerine 2.0 BoP] note that the Eighth Circuit vacated its opinion in United States v. Iowa, 126 F.4th 1334 (8th Cir. 2025). The court concluded the appeal as to the United States was moot. No. 24-2265, 2025 WL 1140834, at *1 (8th Cir. Apr. 15, 2025). But the court recognized that the appeal as to the private plaintiffs was not moot. See Iowa Migrant Movement for Just. v. Bird, No. 24-2263, 2025 WL 1140762, at *1 (8th Cir. Apr. 15, 2025), vacating 2025 WL 319926, at *1 (8th Cir. Jan. 24, 2025). The same is true here. ECF No. 252 at 2-3.

Nor is vacatur warranted here. In Iowa, the court of appeals had resolved the merits of the appeal in its published opinion. That case therefore involved a typical application of United States v. Munsingwear, Inc., 340 U.S. 36 (1950), as Iowa stood to lose its opportunity to seek further review of the panel’s decision. See 2025 WL 1140834, at *1 (8th Cir. Apr. 15, 2025). Here, Defendants seek vacatur of the Court’s stay opinion, but the time for seeking further review of that is long since past, so Munsingwear is plainly inapplicable. See ECF No. 252 at 3.

Defendants also submit the transcript from a status conference in district court. That discussion underscores Plaintiffs’ position that the court’s January 31 order only confirmed that the “injunction does not bar Texas officials from cooperating with the federal government.” Id. at 7; see Tr. at 11. Defendants suggest that the district court’s comments indicate some change of view on the legality of S.B. 4. Not so. The court’s point was that Texas’s proffered justification — the supposed dereliction of federal authorities“ — has been rectified,” id. at 12-13, further undercutting the State’s rationale for S.B. 4, see ECF No. 252 at 6.

Finally, Plaintiffs note that two more courts have joined the unanimous rejection of laws like [Texas] S.B. 4. See ECF No. 84, Idaho Organization of Resource Councils v. Labrador, No. 25-cv-178 (D. Idaho); ECF No. 67, Florida Immigrant Coalition v. Uthmeier, No. 25-cv-21524 (S.D. Fla.)….

Now you know. Things are generally looking up, here — for the future of ordered liberty, in America. Sanity is making a comeback for everyone not completely (and irrationally) mesmerized by the Tangerine 2.0 cult of personality (which now draws its chalked-up circle… to EXCLUDE Elon Musk’s persona, and his both bad and a precious few good ideas) — and that’s a decidedly good… thing. Trump’s grip is weakening — by the day.

[To be clear, I mean that already (at Day 3!), the Silicon Valley tech bros (and more importantly, their collective PAC and dark money billions) are picking sides. The early returns look like Musk’s biz greed is besting Trump’s irrational tariff- and border- lunacy. So — come 2026 — many of those MAGAts who voted in Congress FOR Trump’s measures… will be sent home / packing. They will be primaried by the tech bros aligned with Elon.] Not perfect; but good. After all, the perfect is the enemy of the good.

Onward, grinning.

नमस्ते

This “War Of The [Orange] Roses” Just Went Thermonuclear: Musk Allegations Against Tangerine 2.0 Are A Multi-Billion Dollar Libel Per Se — If Untrue.

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First — as ever, the caveats: both of these guys are narcissistic little boys, wearing big boy suits. They are both well-known (and very public) liars. But that is why (I suspect) Elon has the goods on Trump here.

If Elon Musk does not have a reasonable basis to believe the truth of his statement (pull quote, below in blue), he could owe Trump tens of billions in a libel per se suit. [Which Trump is now likely to bring no matter what.]

I did not expect that this would escalate so quickly — to become a deadly game, between these two odious trolls. But Tesla stock dropped double digit percentages today, due to Trump’s threats to end electric vehicle subsidies — erasing over $160 billion in market cap, in a day. He also threatened SpaceX’s federal contracts — about 85% of its revenue.

In return, Musk shot back the below. Sure, it could be hyperbole — but if it is not — that leads to a life sentence, since Trump is not likely to live even ten more years. The sentence would involve the felony of statutory rape. And a state level AG (NY, MI or IL or CA, or Colorado or Oregon) might well charge it. The Roberts immunity opinion is off the table here, for acts that predate this current preznit-cy — and have zero to do with running 1600 Penn. The trafficking victim deserves justice. Again, all only if Musk has the goods on him. Damn — what a “mutually assured complete destruction” scenario these two have now created — for each other.

Here’s The Hill’s reporting on it — and a bit:

…[Musk just wrote] “Time to drop the really big bomb. . .” on X, the social platform he owns. “[Trump] is in the Epstein files. That is the real reason they have not been made public.”

Minutes later, he followed up: “Mark this post for the future. The truth will come out….”

I really did not intend to follow this story closely — as I assumed it would be — and remain — fifth grade school yard insults, exclusively. But we are well beyond that now — they’ve both crossed the Rubicon here. Damn.

नमस्ते

And, As Trump vs. Musk Goes Into High Dungeon — And Imperils His Whole Preznit-cy… Mirengoff Prattles On — About [Re-]Naming Navy Ships.

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This is a very telling allegory — in small strokes — of everything broken in the MAGA/GOP world — writ large.

These feckless jokers… name, and rename (and re-rename) bases, ships and features (Gulf of America, anyone?) on the map… all to avoid attention on the racist deportation gulags they are trying to help Stephen Miller, Kristi Noem and Tangerine 2.0 hisself to create. All without colorable due process.

And rather than Trump and Musk debating the MERITS (such as they are) in the wild-eyed and cruel spending bill (with tax breaks for billionaires!), now moving from the House to the Senate… the pair engage in fifth grade name calling on their respective social platforms.

This is what the GOP is now: a pack of “Lord of the Flies” lil’ boys.

Damn, Paul — just stop flatulating — about “sh!t that don’t matter” (much) — and tell your GOP handlers that they are ruining the liberty that once was… America.

What a bunch of ancient, embittered dead end losers these people have become.

Out.

MAVEN Mission Directly Observes “Sputtering” — In The Barsoomian Very Thin Atmosphere — Confirming CU Prof. Curry’s Thesis About Water Loss, There…

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Yes, this is another “palette cleanser” (from Tangerine’s bitter lunacy — now saying Musk “suffers from Trump Derangement Syndrome“; and Musk responding that Tangerine “would not have won in 2024” — without him!). Where was I? Oh, right — the below highlights the decade long work of Dr. Shannon Curry, at the University of Colorado at Boulder — on what happened to Mars’ atmosphere, billions of years ago, now.

Well done, Dr. Curry! Her work is the centerpiece of the video below, and she is the PI (principal investigator) on this NASA mission. Very rarified air, indeed. Do read on:

…Scientists have known for a long time, through an abundance of evidence, that water was present on Mars’ surface billions of years ago, but are still asking the crucial question, “Where did the water go and why?”

Early on in Mars’ history, the atmosphere of the Red Planet lost its magnetic field, and its atmosphere became directly exposed to the solar wind and solar storms. As the atmosphere began to erode, liquid water was no longer stable on the surface, so much of it escaped to space. But how did this once thick atmosphere get stripped away? Sputtering could explain it.

Sputtering is an atmospheric escape process in which atoms are knocked out of the atmosphere by energetic charge particles.

“It’s like doing a cannonball in a pool,” said Shannon Curry, principal investigator of MAVEN at the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics at the University of Colorado Boulder and lead author of the study. “The cannonball, in this case, is the heavy ions crashing into the atmosphere really fast and splashing neutral atoms and molecules out….”


As previously printed, here is a haiku from a few years past — one that traveled on board Maven to Mars, from one student’s submission — one of thousands — one that now seems rather prophetic:

“Mars, your secret is
unknown for humanity
we want to know you…“

Now you know. We do… want to know you. Again.

And so, do go watch this fine video explainer above (featuring Dr. Curry’s narration) — and root for my Buffs, this coming fall — under Coach Prime — again! Heh — but know that UCLA is an away game this year; the best home game (viewable from Dr. Curry’s office window — looking down into Folsom Field) will probably be Arizona, or ASU (in mid November). Onward, grinning….

नमस्ते

My Buddy Ed Silverman Has A Nice Piece — On The Merck/Halozyme Patent Developments (Which Favor Merck)…

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As I’ve repeatedly said, there is much in the wrangling of US patent laws that Rahway can and will undertake, to push the generification out to about 2032 minimum.

Chief among these moves is one called “product hopping”. Merck will introduce a subcutaneous version of pembrolizumab — which only requires four visits a year to a hospital, as opposed to weekly IV drips. Halozyme has claimed its patents cover this tech, but the USPTO has agreed to re-evaluate the breadth of the claims in that patent. This likely means Merck will (at a minimum) owe Halozyme nothing, to produce the subcutaneous version — and stay in the driver’s seat on a perhaps $30 billion a year revenue stream through the early 2030s. Here’s Ed’s fine piece at his subscription only STAT property (and a bit):

…In a boost for Merck, a U.S. Patent and Trademark Office panel agreed to reconsider a patent granted to another company that could affect plans to broaden use of its franchise product, the Keytruda cancer treatment.

The dispute with Halozyme Therapeutics occurs as Merck plans to sell a new [subcutaneous] injectable version of Keytruda that the company is betting will sustain a medicine that has accounted for nearly half of its sales. Patent protection for the treatment, which is currently administered intravenously and generated $29.5 billion in revenue last year….

Nominally, the generics may enter at 2028 — but practically they will be largely thwarted through 2032 or so. There Ed and I diverge slightly in our analysis of the matter. Onward, smiling.

नमस्ते

It ALSO Exhibits (Actually, Re-affirms) Trump’s (Almost Precious) Naïveté, In Matters Of State…

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Aside from its manifest legal infirmities (see, the various Supreme Court opinions on Versions 1.0, 2.0 — and 3.0), his racist penchant on display here again… is going to be idiotically ineffective — at achieving his claimed goals.

After all, if a would-be terrorist is able to find the means to travel across the world (and have the connections to bomb-makers needed), s/he will undoubtedly have the backing of well-heeled terror sponsoring forces. [Doubly so, for would be drug- or sex-trafficking “king-pins“.] These people, in turn, are — without a doubt capable of sourcing very convincing forged passports, from plausible (and non-banned) nations. The terror will slip in on an Egyptian passport/visa — or the like.

Meanwhile, the best and brightest honest students from these nations (all of whom will doubtlessly comply with this goofy “law”) will NOT come to the US — nor will their scientist/engineer parents or aunts and uncles. The best minds — as immigrants have always fueled US life-science advances — will in the main go to the EU, UK or Japan or Australia — to escape the repressive conditions of their place of birth.

And thus, the US economy will be further harmed (on top of his 19th Century tariff lunacies he’s pushing — and reversing, week by week) by the lack of international spending onshore. It is hard to posit a more malignantly “misguided” set of “policies”.

Which would suggest that it is Stephen Miller, the young dyed in the wool racist / avowed misogynist (from Tangerine 1.0), who is whispering all this nonsense in Trump’s ear, each day. Tangerine has always lacked a well-trained and disciplined mind, of the sort that might discern that it all simply makes him look… impotent, before the sentient world community.

Damn. See you in court, Mr. Tangerine 2.0.

नमस्ते

Y A W N. Tangerine 2.0 Comes Up With “Muslim Ban 4.0” — It Will Fail — The Same Way The Other Three Versions Did.

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Tonight the doddering cartoon villain decided to make a fourth run, at banning certain peoples from even being considered for arrival in the US. It all gets rather stupidly repetitive at some point. Yawn.

His other three versions, in the first go ’round (2017-2020), all failed (except for a very limited subset, inside the third one). Then… that third one was rescinded on Mr. Biden’s first day on the job.

The guy never learns. But now, you know. You know bettah.

I’ll likely just watch silently, as the federal courts bang him down — into the dust, once again here.

I won’t say a whole ton more about it — unless he’s found much smarter lawyers to work it for him (i.e., not likely). Out.

नमस्ते

A New Case, Here: Mr. Peter Mosoko Ikome, Struggling To Avoid Being Sent Back (To Torture) For… Some 30 Years. Now Supremes Will Review Fifth Cir. — For Errors.

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Today, the Supremes have agreed to take a new look — at what appears to be a clearly erroneous Fifth Circuit immigration opinion. [They did so by denying a stay, and doing so at the same time they took Mr. Ikome’s case up, for review.]

It is a new one, to us here — but we will follow it, from now on. It concerns a man born on the African continent — Cameroon, specifically — who arrived here in 1992. [He credibly feared torture in his place of birth, as a then-dissident.] Let that sink in: he’s been struggling in the US immigration law system (or non-system, more precisely) for over three decades — to follow our methods to secure a more permanent home for him, here.

To understand the very long convoluted battles — and the tangled, winding nature of his case, you’ll need to read the (errant) appellate opinion, from this particular ultra right wing panel — of the Fifth Circuit (a Circuit often overruled at the Supremes of late), out of New Orleans.

Here’s the errant Fifth Circuit opinion. We will have to wait a beat, to read how the Supremes specifically feel about it.

How the Fifth Circuit thought it was an acceptable / just / even remotely logical answer, to bounce Mr. Ikome, after 30 plus years of proceedings, by only now holding that the courts lacked jurisdiction over his case — all while saying his daughter (age 21 years) didn’t act with “due diligence” — by taking about nine months to file a petition for his continued stay in the US — also after the court’s own on-and-off delays of about 30 years, as well(?!). [Her petition became necessary, because his petitions, previously filed by his second wife (US born)… were failing, due to her lack of cooperation with the process — and her apparent estrangement from him.]

So his daughter — born here — became eligible to petition for him, when she herself turned 21. She did so within nine months, upon learning that the “spouse” petition was likely going to fail. Yet the court / government waited 30 plus years to decide it lacked jurisdiction — all while Mr. Ikome pursued his rights in the courts. Had he been made aware that he was in the wrong court, he could have long ago remedied that defect.

So, forcing him out — due to the court’s own errors (lasting 30 plus years)… seems outrageous. I suspect this is where the Supremes are headed — with this one. Excellent!
नमस्ते

And Mr. Abrego Garcia Will Be Allowed To Argue For Monetary And Other Sanctions, Against Noem / Rubio / Tangerine 2.0 — For Abuse Of Process, In Maryland!

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The losses are gonna’ start really piling up, now. And lead to awards of perhaps seven figures, on each case — cases that Noem has willfully mismanaged. Trampled the detainees’ rights — willfully.

Over two months ago now, the US Supreme Court ordered Noem / Rubio / Tangerine 2.0 to “facilitate” Mr. Abrego Garcia’s prompt return to the USA. He was sent to an El Salvadoran hell-hole in what even Noem admits was a terrible “mistake“.

Yet, as we’ve documented here — in over 20 posts, Noem has been dragging her feet — and more or less ignoring binding court orders. So, it is time for a sanctions hearing. Here’s that — even so, it doesn’t free Mr. Abrego Garcia — to return to his waiting Maryland family (now in hiding, due to MAGA death-threats). Damn:

…Plaintiffs’ request at ECF No. 177 for leave to file a motion for sanctions pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 37 is GRANTED. Plaintiffs shall file their motion no later than June 11, 2025. Defendants shall file their response within seven days of the motion’s filing. Signed by Judge Paula Xinis on 6/4/2025….

This is the sort of lawlessness we might expect from… Vlad Putin (if he ever met a judge willing to enforce the clear Russian laws). Until Trump 1.0 and now 2.0, the US hadn’t seen this sort of corruption since before the Civil War. Yet and still, onward — resolutely.

नमस्ते

It Seems Noem Et Al., Are More Interested In “Padding” Their “Arrest” Stats — Than Moving A Meritorious Defense Of Removal Case Out Of Active Litigation: Chung Matter

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Ms. Chung (the human Noem is trying to pressure to leave the US, for First Amendment protected activity!) has been arrested and detained once already. She has counsel of record. She is no flight risk; she wishes to remain enrolled at Columbia University, as a fine honors student.

And in this letter to the able USDC Judge in Manhattan overnight, the Noem / Tangerine 2.0 lawyers refuse to let her counsel of record accept the notice to appear in court for the commencement of the immigration case, to try to remove her from the US.

The only plausible explanations for this are as follows: (i) Noem’s orders are to be as non-cooperative as possible, and/or (ii) the government is trying very hard to “pad” its numbers (of arrests made, per Trump’s own numerical quotas — which were pulled from thin air, and so are racist on their face).

This way, they can (AGAIN!) “arrest” her in the street, and hand her the notice to appear — as opposed to serving it electronically, on her well known counsel. Damn — here’s the full text of this lateest a$$-hattery — from Noem:

…This Office represents the government in the above-referenced matter. At the hearing held on May 29, 2025, the Court asked whether U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (“ICE”) would agree to serve a Notice to Appear (“NTA”) on Yunseo Chung’s counsel rather than through personal service effectuated after an arrest.

The answer is no. ICE has broad discretion over actions and decisions to conduct arrests and initiate removal proceedings, including the manner in which it serves an NTA. Separately, the Court had asked for a copy of Chung’s NTA. ICE has confirmed that an NTA has not yet been issued for Chung, as ICE typically issues and serves the NTA during processing that occurs after an arrest is made.

While the Department of Homeland Security (“DHS”) is required to serve the NTA on the alien, see 8 U.S.C. § 1229(a)(1), that act alone does not commence removal proceedings. Rather, the commencement of removal proceedings occurs when DHS files the NTA with the immigration court. See 8 C.F.R. § 1003.14(a) (“Jurisdiction vests, and proceedings before an Immigration Judge commence, when a charging document is filed with the Immigration Court by [DHS].”); see also 8 C.F.R. § 1239.1 (“Every removal proceeding… is commenced by the filing of a notice to appear with the immigration court.”); Banegas Gomez v. Barr, 922 F.3d 101, 111 (2d Cir. 2019)….

[This allows ICE to potentially hold her overnight, until a bail hearing can be arranged, as well.] I get the being a hard stick — as against murderers and hardened, violent drug traffickers (whether “fifth-generation born here” Americans, or recent arrivals).

But she is the opposite — a grad student who happened to attend the Columbia protests. No other part of her life even suggests any whiff of criminal behavior. This is… again, abuse of legal process — by Noem. Out.

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