Legal AF by MeidasTouch - Trump Wakes Up to Morning Smackdown from Supreme Court

Episode Date: March 5, 2025

In a “stunning” set back to the Trump Administration, in a 5-4 decision led by Chief Justice Roberts and Amy Coney Barrett, the Supreme Court has ordered the release of $2 billion dollars in funds for humanitarian aid, as Justice Alito along with the rest of the court, issues a scathing dissent declaring that he is “stunned,” and criticizing the majority of the court and the federal judge who issued the order. Michael Popok explains what this means for future funding cases before the Supreme Court and how the televised pat on the back Trump gave Chief Justice Roberts may have backfired. Thanks to Miracle Made! Head to https://trymiracle.com/legalaf and use the code LEGALAF to claim your free 3-piece towel set and save over 20% off! Remember to subscribe to ALL the MeidasTouch Network Podcasts: MeidasTouch: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/meidastouch-podcast Legal AF: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/legal-af MissTrial: https://meidasnews.com/tag/miss-trial The PoliticsGirl Podcast: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-politicsgirl-podcast The Influence Continuum: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-influence-continuum-with-dr-steven-hassan Mea Culpa with Michael Cohen: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/mea-culpa-with-michael-cohen The Weekend Show: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-weekend-show Burn the Boats: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/burn-the-boats Majority 54: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/majority-54 Political Beatdown: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/political-beatdown On Democracy with FP Wellman: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/on-democracy-with-fpwellman Uncovered: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/maga-uncovered Coalition of the Sane: https://meidasnews.com/tag/coalition-of-the-sane Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We got breaking news and it is stunning. Are you sitting down? That word is going to be used a lot during this hot take. The United States Supreme Court has ruled against the Trump administration on a major issue about the Trump administration cutting off the fuel supply to $2 billion worth of funding for humanitarian aid through US aid. And now the United States Supreme Court in a five to four decision, led by Chief Justice Roberts apparently,

has decided against the Trump administration requiring Judge Ali to go back through the record and set an appropriate set of deadlines for the payments to be made. But those payment spigots must be turned back on according to the United States Supreme Court, even while the larger appeal may be going on at a later date. This is a tremendous win for democracy and for the rule of law and a blow to the four members of the Supreme Court, led by Judge Alito, who said that they were quote unquote

stunned by the decision of the majority to side with a rogue federal judge against the Trump administration and against sovereign immunity. I'm Michael Popock. I'm going to break it all down for you right here on the Midas Touch Network and on Legal AF. I've got in my hands the Supreme Court decision. Let me tell you how we got here that I'm going to read from the order. We got here because Judge Ali in DC, a Biden appointee after hearing argument and briefing about the Department of State and brought by a set of public interest groups led by AIDS Vaccine

Advocacy Coalition. Because Donald Trump, through Elon Musk, turned off the fuel supply and stopped funding overnight for humanitarian groups, most of them US-based humanitarian groups, where US consumer paychecks are behind and workers and jobs are behind each one of those dollars. He turned it off without any notice whatsoever. Didn't even give those people time to transition to help people who were dying around the world. The reason that US aid existed, and the reason it's an arm of the State Department,

it used to be part of our diplomacy. It's the ways that we keep people looking to the West, looking to the United States, keep them out of the clutches of the Russians and the Chinese, help build their roads, their water purification plants, get them food, make sure they don't die from hunger and AIDS, make sure they're literate and they can thank the United States brand of

democracy for it, but not under the Trump administration. It's just a dollar. Let's get rid of it. Who cares who dies? Well, Judge Ali cared and he brought everybody together and said I'm gonna order on a temporary restraining order that this money get paid. It became what we call in the business a mandatory injunction, a mandatory restraining order. Then they get paid. It became what we call in the business, a mandatory injunction, a mandatory restraining order. Then they went to a series of hearings about the fact that the Trump administration had done nothing to comply with the temporary restraining order.

And so Judge Ali got annoyed and there was a motion for contempt. And Judge Ali finally drew the line in the sand and said, here, here's how I'll make it simple for you. You need to turn on the money and pay those contractors the $2 billion by 1159 PM one minute before stroke of midnight three days ago. Well, the Trump administration didn't like that. So it ran to the United States Supreme Court and I did some reporting on it already.

And I said that the Chief Justice Roberts had stepped in and done an administrative stay for a short amount of time to allow for full briefing and had set last Friday as a period in which the other side to this U.S. aid could file their opposition to the application. In other words, he it was really a time buyer by Chief Justice Roberts, not on the merits. Well, the AIDS coalition filed their brief and they walked through so convincingly that five members of the United States Supreme Court in this new decision have ruled in their favor and have told Judge Ali, get back to figuring out how and when to turn on the spigots of that Monday on that money for the $2 million because we as the United States Supreme Court

majority, we're not going to stop it. Let me explain how we got here. Then I'm going to read to you from Judge Alito, Justice Alito, joined by who else? The Kavanaugh, Gorsuch, Alito, and Thomas all joined together behind Justice Alito, who wrote literally, I am stunned by the majority decision here and the fact that they have violated the Supremacy Clause because they're allowing this money to be paid out because of a rogue federal trial judge. Yeah, I don't think so. Let's go through the ruling of the majority, which is again, Roberts joining with Amy Coney Barrett, which we have said is the swing vote to watch this term and in the future, joining with Kataji Brown Jackson, Kagan, and Sotomayor.

Here's the ruling. On February 13th, the United States District Court for the District of Columbia entered a temporary restraining order, that's Judge Ali, in joining the government from enforcing directives pausing disbursements of foreign development assistance funds. And then from there, after the federal court on February 25th, the district court ordered the government to issue payments for a portion of the pause disbursements, two billion. There was a lot more money pause. It was tens of billions of dollars, but two billion needed to go out immediately to stop the harm and suffering.

Those owed for work already completed before the issuance of the district court's TRO. In other words, the judge, the the judge was just ordering two billion dollars worth of payments be made for work already done, not for future work, but it still amounted to two billion dollars and was important. The district court gave a deadline of 1159 p.m. on February 26th. work, but it still amounted to $2 billion and was important. The district court gave a deadline of 1159 p.m. on February 26. Several hours before that deadline, so right before the February 26 deadline, the government filed this application to vacate Judge Ali's February 25th order and requested an immediate administrative stay.

That is the lowest level of stay any federal court or appellate court can grant. It usually lasts for a very short amount of time, could be hours, could be days, could be weeks, doesn't usually go a month. And it was that short amount of time that Justice Roberts, as the judge over all things DC, Chief Justice Roberts made that decision. Now, after the full briefing, because the judge asked to have the brief opposing the application filed by Friday, which it was by US aid, the application is denied, meaning we are not going to interfere with Judge Ali's decision to force the payment of the $2 billion. Given that the deadline in the challenged order has now passed, I mean they're recognizing that time advances, right? So we've already lost the deadline.

And in light of the ongoing preliminary injunction proceedings, in other words, you're going to be doing a bigger proceeding about preliminary injunction, the district court, this is direction now to the district court, Judge Ali, should clarify what obligations the government must fulfill to ensure compliance with the temporary restraining order with due regard for the feasibility of any compliance deadlines. Let me unpack that legalese. Your nighttime bedroom temperature has a huge impact on your sleep quality.

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You got a whole briefing and hearing there. Recalibrate and reset your deadlines with due regard to that briefing and give the government enough time to meet your deadline and we will support it. At least five of us will support it. But if you give like a too fast deadline requiring too much too soon, you may not have the five votes. That's the subtle hint there from Justice Roberts or to the majority to the district court. The order here for entered by the Chief Justice, that was the administrative stay, is vacated.

Now here's the big news is how Alito in a scorching dissent, took on his majority, just turned in fire on Roberts and the rest and Amy Coney Barrett. Here's what he had to say, joined by a Gorsuch and Cavadop and Thomas, Justice Alito, dissenting. Does a single district court judge who likely lacks jurisdiction have the unchecked power to compel the government of the United States to pay out and probably lose forever $2 billion of taxpayer dollars?

The answer is that question is an emphatic no, but a majority of this court apparently thinks otherwise. I am stunned. I'm stunned that you're stunned because I think your analysis is all full of water, is all washed up. His argument, which I'll read from in a minute, is that the decision to pay and to fund using taxpayer dollars is reserved to the executive branch with sovereign immunity, and that you can't order the executive branch to make payments at a mandatory injunction without violating sovereign immunity.

Nobody else sees it that way. There's a violation, a constitutional violation of the spending clause, impoundment, which Alito doesn't even talk about, the violation of the separation of powers because Congress already funded this money. This money was already contracted by and was already obligated to be paid

by the federal government. So it gets out from under sovereign immunity issues. We have to look at impoundment in the abelian separation of powers issues, which of course, Alito ignores completely. Here's the other part. Alito says, even if the majority is unwilling, this is on page four, is unwilling to vacate

the district court's order, it should at least stay the district court's enforcement order until the government has time to appeal, has time to issue a writ of certiorari, right? He then says we got to look to sovereign immunity. Again, I think that is, he completely ignores the impoundment aspect of it. And then we have this kind of summary on the page 8 over to 9. Today this is a lido, but for the four in minority, the court makes a most unfortunate misstep that rewards an act of judicial hubris, that's Judge Ali, and imposes a $2 billion penalty on American taxpayers. The district court has made plain its frustration with the government and respondents raised

serious concerns about nonpayment for completed work. But the relief ordered is quite simply too extreme a response. A federal court has many tools to address a party's supposed nonfeasance. Self-angrindisement of its jurisdiction is not one of them. He's really going after Ali here. He's saying, you're taking on jurisdictional power that you don't have, son, and we're the Supreme Court and we're taking you out to the woodshed. Unfortunately, to take somebody out to the woodshed at the federal court level, you got to have five people to do it and he only had four. I would chart a different path than the court does today,

so I must respectfully dissent. There's nothing a different path than the court does today, so I must respectfully dissent. There's nothing really that respectful about the dissent, but that's how that came down. So what does it mean? It means Judge Ali is a lifetime appointed judge. He's going to continue to make rulings like this. The majority was fine in principle with what Judge Ali, his analysis, his thought process, his support for all of this is fine. They just want him to recalibrate the timing and the rest because they see that money that the judge already took a major step. He already said, you know, there's $30 billion of USAID. I'm only talking about $2 billion that relates to services already rendered, supplies already

generated, money that has to go to them. There's no argument that there's fraud in any of that There's no evidence that there's any fraud. There's no evidence in the record There's any fraud so of course the the judge was right You know the judge said I'm not going to administer your program for you If you want to go on a case-by-case basis and figure out whether there's fraud and determine not to make payments That's up to you. That's an executive branch function, but you are just stopping the funding and That's an executive branch function. But you are just stopping the funding, including for work already completed on contracts.

That seems arbitrary and capricious under the Administrative Procedures Act and an illegal impoundment under separation of powers. So we know there's at least, this is now the divide we're going to see going forward. Watch Amy Coney Barrett. We've said it before here on Midas Touch Network Legal AF. I've said it on my new show, Unprecedented, following the Supreme Court. Watch Amy Coney Barrett. She might be right, right of center, but she is the swing vote.

When she votes with the majority, that's the decision. When she votes for something, that's the decision. Chief Justice Roberts kind of goes back and forth. Listen, we just saw Chief Justice Roberts basically get a fist bump from Donald Trump during the joint address to Congress last night. Won't forget you. Good job, whatever.

I mean, but that didn't help. I think the more you make Trump, you make Roberts look like your puppet, the more he's going to rebel against that and he's going to end up issuing orders like this one. I'm going to continue to follow it all. You're on Midas Touch Network. Hit the subscribe button for Midas Touch, number one YouTube channel out there.

Help Legal AF continue to grow its pro-democracy channel. We're going to hit 500,000 this weekend all because of you. And then of course, we've got Legal AF, the podcast at the intersection of law and politics every Wednesday and Saturday at 8 p.m. Eastern time, right here on this YouTube channel and on podcast platforms of your choice. I'm Michael Popock and I'm reporting. In collaboration with the Midas Touch Network, we just launched the Legal AF YouTube channel. Help us build this pro-democracy channel where I'll be curating the top stories, the intersection

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