The case that may break the Constitution

Alan Dershowitz Predicts Gavin Newsom’s National Guard Lawsuit Against Trump Will Go Down In Flames

Constitutional scholar Alan Dershowitz said on Monday that Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom of California’s lawsuit seeking to halt President Donald Trump’s deployment of the National Guard to Los Angeles would eventually fail.

Newsom and Democratic Attorney General Rob Bonta of California announced the lawsuit Monday, claiming Trump’s Saturday order to deploy the National Guard to respond to the riots in Los Angeles following a raid by United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) at a Home Depot was illegal. Dershowitz, on “The Dershow,” expressed doubt that the Supreme Court would “second-guess” Trump’s decision to call out the National Guard. 

“The Supreme Court will not second guess the President of the United States on this issue,” Dershowitz said. “They will say, whether right or wrong, the president had the authority to make this decision and he had the authority to make it over the lack of consent of the governor,” Dershowitz continued. “Let’s be clear, there was violence. You can see it on television, there were bombings, fire bombings and burnings of Teslas and other self-driving cars. There were rocks being thrown at ICE officers. There were threats against ICE officers, threats against their families. Was it a full-blown insurrection? No.”

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Dershowitz said the Supreme Court would not have much choice but to rule against Newsom, pointing to cases where the National Guard was federalized to protect civil rights.

FWIW:

This is where things could get interesting: what if a federal judge issues an injunction and refuses to stay his order? So far, Trump has obeyed every judicial injunction while appealing them, even those that weren’t stayed during appeal. Wil he do so in this case, if the riots are still going on? People on both ends of the political spectrum have been waiting for Trump to have his Andrew Jackson moment: “John Marshall has made his decision, now let him enforce it.” This could do it.

“My prediction is: the lawsuits will fail. They’ll work in the federal district court,” Dershowitz said. “You’ll get, you know, the governor of California will find a federal district judge probably one he was involved in appointing and you’ll get some district court judge saying, maybe even issuing an injunction saying, the president of the United States can’t do this.” 

“It’ll be appealed immediately, but when the case gets to the Supreme Court in the United States, they would have no choice or little choice, but to hold that the judiciary cannot interfere with the discretionary judgment of the executive head of the executive branch. the president, about the necessity for sending in troops,” Dershowitz added.

A wise judge would go cautiously here and not force Trump to choose between obeying a ruling that will be overruled as soon as it hits the Supreme Court but would let cities burn for the days or weeks during that period, or ignoring the claimed authority of a federal judge. A wise judge would stay his ruling, but the judiciary is not exclusively comprised of such people, and Newsom and the other leftists will select their vessel carefully.

Interesting times.