Does anyone know if there are legal practices with expertise on immigration law in multiple European countries that could provide legal assistance without me having to hire a different attorney for each country where my family might wish to seek permanent residency?
@mapache@hachyderm.ioFor legal reasons I am forced to say this is a joke.
'It took only seconds for the judges on a New York appeals court to realize that the man addressing them from a video screen — a person about to present an argument in a lawsuit — not only had no law degree, but didn’t exist at all.'
https://apnews.com/article/artificial-intelligence-ai-courts-nyc-5c97cba3f3757d9ab3c2e5840127f765
Any legal firm which doesn't have the spirit to fight extortion from Trump doesn't have the spirit to fight in court for their clients.
#legal #trump #justice #courts #resistance
#politics #ElonMusk #legal #lawsuits
'A former canvasser for Elon Musk’s America PAC operation—which mobilized voters to sign a sketchy “petition” during last year’s presidential election—has sued the billionaire, accusing him and his political organization of failing to pay him at least $20,000.'
#Arkansas #legal #children #InternetAccess
'A judge in Arkansas has shut down the state’s law requiring some social networks to verify the ages of those in the state to create an account and ensure that minors have parental permission. Judge Timothy L. Brooks ruled the law, dubbed the Social Media Safety Act, was too broad as to violate the First Amendment rights of internet users and was so vague it was unclear which social networks the law would cover.'
He thinks he is king. The Constitution and Lsw mean nothing to him.
Looks like Exhibit A to me.
@ancient_catbus
Don't be in a rush! They canceled
"Coyote vs. Acme".
[Realistic courtroom dramas don't do big box office, anymore.]
But we don’t live there anymore. We live in a country where the fed govt allies itself w/Russian & South American #dictators while taking sides against #democratic #allies. A country that threatens its neighbors w/annexation. A country that views the #GenevaConventions as namby-pamby suggestions that only apply to suckers & losers. A country that uses #SecretPolice.
And perhaps most importantly, a country where the regime no longer abides by rulings from the existing #legal system.
Another standard of liberal governments is that people who present themselves through #legal pathways as #refugees fleeing #oppression are vetted & provided #DueProcess, not disappeared into foreign gulags.
And yet, here we are.
AP: Mangione asks for laptop to prepare for legal case while awaiting trial in killing of UnitedHealthcare CEO
After securing the craven surrender of high profile liberal law firm Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP without even entering a courtroom, an emboldened Downmarket Mussolini has ordered his comically corrupt Attorney General, Pam Bondi, to seek disciplinary actions against lawyers who are "filing frivolous claims designed to cause delays." What's a "frivolous claim?" Only Trump and Bondi know, but the note about delays makes it clear that Der Führer is angry that his fascist agenda is being blocked by numerous judicial restraining orders and hopes to do an end around the courts by threatening lawyers and law firms into not even filing suits to halt the regime in the first place.
Trump ramps up retribution campaign against legal community
"The memo, as a result, created a formal mechanism for Trump to unilaterally decide whether to impose politically charged sanctions through executive orders that strip lawyers of the security clearances they need to perform their jobs or prevent them from working on federal contracts.
Multiple legal experts suggested the memo would theoretically allow Bondi to decide a particular lawsuit that triggered a temporary injunction was causing an unnecessary delay, and refer the firm that filed the suit to face the effects of a punitive executive order.
That could cause a chilling effect and lead to the volume of litigation against the Trump administration to decline, the experts said. Even if the lawsuits are in fact for a legitimate purpose, there’s fear that their representation could put them in the president’s cross hairs and endanger their legal practices.
Trump also directed Bondi to open a review into the “conduct” of lawyers and their respective law firms in litigation against the federal government reaching back to the start of his first term in 2017 – and recommend whether it warranted additional punitive actions.
The memo comes as Trump in recent weeks has used executive orders targeting law firms to great effect."
Frankly, I don't have much to add here that we didn't already look at when I wrote up the Paul Weiss surrender situation we discussed a few days ago. The fact is that Trump has no legal authority to harass and punish lawyers for bringing cases before a judge to stop the Trump regime's often illegal, and frequently unconstitutional activities. Providing a check to the executive branch's power when it violates our civil rights, exceeds the President's authority, or is just straight up criming, is literally the prescribed role of the judiciary branch in the American system of government; the lawyers filing suits to stop Trump's fascist agenda aren't doing anything wrong, they're in fact doing their job as defined in the US Constitution. Trump just doesn't give a shit, and if he can't break the judges ruling against him, he'll happily try to further his authoritarian agenda by using his Department of Justice to harass the lawyers filing against his actions, and starving the law firms of federal access and contracts.
The good news here is that unlike some of their cowardly brethren in white shoe DC law firms, numerous legal advocacy organizations more closely associated with civil rights litigation, are openly stating that they have no intention of backing down. Groups like the ACLU, the Center for Reproductive Rights, the American Immigration Lawyers Association, and Democracy Forward, have all issued statements pushing back on Trump's claims and promising to not only continue the fight, but also to keep bringing more cases against an overreaching Trump regime now acting unlawfully pretty much every day.
I'm not sure how much faith I have in the lawyers and the courts to stop fascism; after all, none of these folks have an army or a police force at their disposal to enforce court orders against a fascist regime and a president already granted virtual legal immunity by a 6-3 fascist high SCOTUS. But as I mentioned elsewhere, you can't win if you don't fight, and it is impossible to install a fascist dictatorship without a whole lot of collaboration, cowardice, and capitulation by the society the fascists are trying to dominate. Win or lose, fighting back is the first step towards stopping fascism, and as a society our best hope of resisting remains acting in infinite ways, across every sector, to make it cost more in time, effort, money, and if necessary in blood, to impose fascism, than the folks doing so stand to benefit from that fascism. Saying "no" is at least a start.
In July 1936, for example, Fraenkel won a case for employees of an association taken over by the #Nazis. A few days later, he learned that the #Gestapo had seized the money owed to his clients & deposited it in the government’s coffers. Over time, the prerogative state would distort & slowly unravel the #legal procedures of the normative state, leaving a smaller & smaller domain for ordinary #law.
AFP: Albania to shut down TikTok in coming days. “Albanian authorities said Thursday they were moving to shut down TikTok in the coming days, following through on a ban announced in December.”
https://rbfirehose.com/2025/03/23/afp-albania-to-shut-down-tiktok-in-coming-days-2/
Academic in tone, The #DualState sketches a template of emerging #tyranny distilled from bloody & horrifying experience.
As Fraenkel explained it, a #lawless #dictatorship does not arise simply by snuffing out the ordinary #legal system of rules, procedures, & precedents. To the contrary, that system—which he called the “normative state”—remains in place while dictatorial power spreads across society. What happens, Fraenkel explained, is insidious.
Fraenkel offered a simple, yet powerful, picture of how the #constitutional & #legal foundations of the Weimar Republic eroded, & were replaced by #strongman-style rule in which the commands of the #Nazi Party & its leader became paramount. His perspective was not grounded in abstract political theory; it grew instead from his experience as a Jewish lawyer in Nazi Berlin representing #dissidents & other disfavored clients.
#Trump said he would move #StudentLoans "out of the Dept of #Education immediately" & that #KellyLoeffler & her staff are "all set for it. They're waiting for it. It'll be serviced much better than it has in the past. It's been a mess."
~8M federal #StudentLoan borrowers are in #legal limbo, not making loan payments, as #Biden-era repayment plans were frozen by a judge for being *potentially* illegal. Borrowers also can't currently enroll in the govt's income-driven repayment plans….
Should I Stay or Should I Go Now? 30 Days Until Martial Law...?
By Jessica Wildfire • 20 Mar 2025.
https://www.the-sentinel-intelligence.net/should-i-stay-or-should-i-go-now-30-days-until-martial-law/ (Kind of a salacious title, but unfortunately not impossible either.)
And she links (Safe Travel Trans Americans Passport Policy) https://19thnews.org/2025/03/safe-travel-trans-americans-passport-policy/
(TGNC Checklist under Trump) https://lambdalegal.org/tgnc-checklist-under-trump/
(Travel State gov page on passport help with sex marker) https://travel.state.gov/content/travel/en/passports/passport-help/sex-marker.html
(Reddit thread A Guide for Americans to Leave) https://www.reddit.com/r/AmerExit/comments/urwlbr/a_guide_for_americans_that_want_to_get_out_of/
(SF Chronicle on the Insurrection Act) https://www.sfchronicle.com/opinion/openforum/article/insurrection-act-president-trump-20201819.php
"Meanwhile, corporate media asks, “Can he do that?” These stories are engineered to distract the public with technicalities. While everyone’s debating what they can and can’t do, they are doing it.
We know this administration’s pattern of loose interpretation when it comes to law and historical precedent. There’s no reason to believe he’ll stop here, instead using this act to use force against anyone his administration considers a threat, regardless of their status or what they’re protesting.
You also have to remember this country has a long, established history of censoring speech and leading witch hunts. During WWI, god help you if you didn’t buy enough liberty bonds or called yourself a pacifist.
We’re the land of moral panics.
Every single one of this administration’s actions have been building toward this moment, when the president suspends our civil and human rights. It explains why they’ve taken such aggressive action toward federal agencies, firing tens of thousands of workers and purging their ranks of anyone who might say no. They’ve already been testing boundaries, daring courts to stop them as they shut down government operations and kidnap U.S. citizens."
(some bullshit from an insecure asshole puppetted for power) https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/01/declaring-a-national-emergency-at-the-southern-border-of-the-united-states/
(How to move out of the USA) https://www.forbes.com/sites/laurabegleybloom/2024/11/04/how-to-move-out-of-the-us/
