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A federal judge is set to hear arguments on Minnesota’s immigration crackdown
Information/Law News |
2026/01/21 20:15
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A federal judge will hear arguments Monday on whether she should at least temporarily halt the immigration crackdown in Minnesota that has led to the fatal shootings of two people by government officers.
The state of Minnesota and the cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul sued the Department of Homeland Security earlier this month, five days after Renee Good was shot by an Immigration and Customs officer. The shooting of Alex Pretti by a Border Patrol officer on Saturday has only added urgency to the case.
On Monday, President Donald Trump said he is sending border czar Tom Homan to Minnesota. The president’s statement comes after Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and Border Patrol Commander Gregory Bovino, who had become the public face of the administration’s crackdown, answered questions at news conferences over the weekend about Pretti’s shooting. Trump posted on social media that Homan will report directly to him.
Since the original court filing, the state and cities have substantially added to their original request in an effort to restore the order that existed before the Trump administration launched Operation Metro Surge in Minnesota on Dec. 1.
Democratic Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison said he plans to attend.
The lawsuit asks U.S. District Judge Katherine Menendez to order a reduction in the number of federal law enforcement officers and agents in Minnesota back to the level before the surge and to limit the scope of the enforcement operation.
Justice Department attorneys have called the lawsuit “legally frivolous” and said “Minnesota wants a veto over federal law enforcement.” They asked the judge to reject the request or to at least stay her order pending an anticipated appeal.
Ellison said during a news conference Sunday that the lawsuit is needed because of “the unprecedented nature of this surge. It is a novel abuse of the Constitution that we’re looking at right now. No one can remember a time when we’ve seen something like this.”
It is unclear when the judge might rule.
The case has implications for other states that have been or could become targets of ramped-up federal immigration enforcement operations. Attorneys general from 19 states plus the District of Columbia, led by California, filed a friend-of-the-court brief supporting Minnesota.
“If left unchecked, the federal government will no doubt be emboldened to continue its unlawful conduct in Minnesota and to repeat it elsewhere,” the attorneys general wrote. |
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A federal judge is set to hear arguments on Minnesota’s immigration crackdown
Information/Court News |
2026/01/20 20:15
|
A federal judge will hear arguments Monday on whether she should at least temporarily halt the immigration crackdown in Minnesota that has led to the fatal shootings of two people by government officers.
The state of Minnesota and the cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul sued the Department of Homeland Security earlier this month, five days after Renee Good was shot by an Immigration and Customs officer. The shooting of Alex Pretti by a Border Patrol officer on Saturday has only added urgency to the case.
On Monday, President Donald Trump said he is sending border czar Tom Homan to Minnesota. The president’s statement comes after Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and Border Patrol Commander Gregory Bovino, who had become the public face of the administration’s crackdown, answered questions at news conferences over the weekend about Pretti’s shooting. Trump posted on social media that Homan will report directly to him.
Since the original court filing, the state and cities have substantially added to their original request in an effort to restore the order that existed before the Trump administration launched Operation Metro Surge in Minnesota on Dec. 1.
Democratic Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison said he plans to attend.
The lawsuit asks U.S. District Judge Katherine Menendez to order a reduction in the number of federal law enforcement officers and agents in Minnesota back to the level before the surge and to limit the scope of the enforcement operation.
Justice Department attorneys have called the lawsuit “legally frivolous” and said “Minnesota wants a veto over federal law enforcement.” They asked the judge to reject the request or to at least stay her order pending an anticipated appeal.
Ellison said during a news conference Sunday that the lawsuit is needed because of “the unprecedented nature of this surge. It is a novel abuse of the Constitution that we’re looking at right now. No one can remember a time when we’ve seen something like this.”
It is unclear when the judge might rule.
The case has implications for other states that have been or could become targets of ramped-up federal immigration enforcement operations. Attorneys general from 19 states plus the District of Columbia, led by California, filed a friend-of-the-court brief supporting Minnesota.
“If left unchecked, the federal government will no doubt be emboldened to continue its unlawful conduct in Minnesota and to repeat it elsewhere,” the attorneys general wrote. |
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A South Korean court sentences former President Yoon to 5 years in prison
Law Firm News/Recent news |
2026/01/16 08:43
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A South Korean court sentenced former President Yoon Suk Yeol to five years in prison Friday in the first verdict from eight criminal trials over the martial law debacle that forced him out of office and other allegations.
Yoon was impeached, arrested and dismissed as president after his short-lived imposition of martial law in December 2024 triggered huge public protests calling for his ouster.
The most significant criminal charge against him alleges that his martial law enforcement amounted to a rebellion, An independent counsel has requested the death sentence over that charge, and the Seoul Central District Court will decide on that in a ruling on Feb. 19.
Yoon has maintained he didn’t intend to place the country under military rule for an extended period, saying his decree was only meant to inform the people about the danger of the liberal-controlled parliament obstructing his agenda. But investigators have viewed Yoon’s decree as an attempt to bolster and prolong his rule, charging him with rebellion, abuse of power and other criminal offenses.
In Friday’s case, the Seoul court sentenced Yoon for defying attempts to detain him and fabricating the martial law proclamation. He was also sentenced for sidestepping a legally mandated full Cabinet meeting, which deprived some Cabinet members who were not convened of their rights to deliberate on his decree.
Judge Baek Dae-hyun said in the televised ruling that imposing “a heavy punishment” was necessary because Yoon hasn’t shown remorse and has only repeated “hard-to-comprehend excuses.” The judge also said restoring legal systems damaged by Yoon’s action was necessary.
Yoon’s defense team said they will appeal the ruling, which they believe was “politicized” and reflected “the unilateral arguments by the independent counsel.” Yoon’s defense team argued the ruling “oversimplified the boundary between the exercise of the president’s constitutional powers and criminal liability.”
Park SungBae, a lawyer who specializes in criminal law, said there is little chance the court would decide Yoon should face the death penalty in the rebellion case. He said the court will likely issue a life sentence or a sentence of 30 years or more in prison.
South Korea has maintained a de facto moratorium on executions since 1997 and courts rarely hand down death sentences. Park said the court would take into account that Yoon’s decree didn’t cause casualties and didn’t last long, although Yoon hasn’t shown genuine remorse for his action.
South Korea has a history of pardoning former presidents who were jailed over diverse crimes in the name of promoting national unity. Those pardoned include strongman Chun Doo-hwan, who received the death penalty at a district court over his 1979 coup, the bloody 1980 crackdowns of pro-democracy protests that killed about 200 people, and other crimes.
Even if Yoon is spared the death penalty or life imprisonment at the rebellion trial, he may still face other prison sentences in the multiple smaller trials he faces.
Some observers say Yoon is likely retaining a defiant attitude in the ongoing trials to maintain his support base in the belief that he cannot avoid a lengthy sentence but could be pardoned in the future.
On the night of Dec. 3, 2024, Yoon abruptly declared martial law in a televised speech, saying he would eliminate “anti-state forces” and protect “the constitutional democratic order.” Yoon sent troops and police officers to encircle the National Assembly, but many apparently didn’t aggressively cordon off the area, allowing enough lawmakers to get into an assembly hall to vote down Yoon’s decree.
No major violence occurred, but Yoon’s decree caused the biggest political crisis in South Korea in decades and rattled its diplomacy and financial markets. For many, his decree, the first of its kind in more than 40 years in South Korea, brought back harrowing memories of past dictatorships in the 1970s and 1980s, when military-backed leaders used martial law and emergency measures to deploy soldiers and tanks on the streets to suppress demonstrations.
After Yoon’s ouster, his liberal rival Lee Jae Myung became president via a snap election last June. After taking office, Lee appointed three independent counsels to look into allegations involving Yoon, his wife and associates.
Yoon’s other trials deal with charges like ordering drone flights over North Korea to deliberately inflame animosities to look for a pretext to declare martial law. Other charges accuse Yoon of manipulating the investigation into a marine’s drowning in 2023 and receiving free opinion surveys from an election broker in return for a political favor. |
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FBI searches a WP reporter’s home as part of a classified documents investigation
Information |
2026/01/12 08:44
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FBI agents searched a Washington Post reporter’s home on Wednesday as part of a leak investigation into a Pentagon contractor accused of taking home classified information, the Justice Department said.
Hannah Natanson, who has been covering President Donald Trump’s transformation of the federal government, had a phone, two laptops and a Garmin watch seized in the search of her Virginia home, the Post reported. Natanson has reported extensively on the federal workforce and recently published a piece describing how she gained hundreds of new sources — leading one colleague to call her “the federal government whisperer.”
While classified documents investigations aren’t unusual, the search of a reporter’s home marks an escalation in the government’s efforts to crack down on leaks. The Post was told that Natanson and the newspaper are not targets of the probe, executive editor Matt Murray said in an email to colleagues.
“Nonetheless, this extraordinary, aggressive action is deeply concerning and raises profound questions and concern around the constitutional protections for our work,” Murray wrote. “The Washington Post has a long history of zealous support for robust press freedoms. The entire institution stands by those freedoms and our work.”
Attorney General Pam Bondi said that the search was done at the request of the Defense Department and that the journalist was “obtaining and reporting classified and illegally leaked information from a Pentagon contractor.”
“Leaking classified information puts America’s national security and the safety of our military heroes in serious jeopardy,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a post on X. “President Trump has zero tolerance for it and will continue to aggressively crack down on these illegal acts moving forward.”
The warrant says the search was related to an investigation into a system engineer and information technology specialist for a government contractor in Maryland who authorities allege took home classified materials, the Post reported. The worker, Aurelio Perez-Lugones, was charged earlier this month with unlawful retention of national defense information, according to court papers. He has not been charged with sharing classified information, and he has not been accused in court papers with leaking.
Perez-Lugones, who held a top secret security clearance, is accused of printing classified and sensitive reports at work. In a search of his Maryland home and car this month, authorities found documents marked “SECRET,” including one in a lunchbox, according to court papers.
An FBI spokesperson declined to comment on Wednesday. The Washington Post said Wednesday that it was monitoring and reviewing the situation. An email seeking comment was sent to lawyers for Perez-Lugones, who is expected to appear in court on Thursday for a detention hearing.
First Amendment groups expressed alarm at the search, saying it could chill investigative journalism that holds government officials to account.
“Physical searches of reporters’ devices, homes, and belongings are some of the most invasive investigative steps law enforcement can take,” Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press president Bruce Brown said. “While we won’t know the government’s arguments about overcoming these very steep hurdles until the affidavit is made public, this is a tremendous escalation in the administration’s intrusions into the independence of the press.”
The Justice Department over the years has developed, and revised, internal policies governing how it will respond to news media leaks.
In April, Bondi rescinded a policy from President Joe Biden’s Democratic administration that protected journalists from having their phone records secretly seized during leak investigations — a practice long decried by news organizations and press freedom groups.
The moves again gave prosecutors the authority to use subpoenas, court orders and search warrants to hunt for government officials who make “unauthorized disclosures” to journalists. A memo she issued said members of the press are “presumptively entitled to advance notice of such investigative activities,” and subpoenas are to be “narrowly drawn.” Warrants must also include “protocols designed to limit the scope of intrusion into potentially protected materials or newsgathering activities,” the memo states.
The aggressive posture with regard to The Washington Post stands in contrast to the Justice Department’s approach to the disclosure of sensitive military information via a Signal chat last spring involving senior Trump administration officials. A reporter was mistakenly added to that chat. Bondi indicated publicly at the time that she was disinclined to open an investigation, saying she was confident that the episode had been a mistake. |
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