Embry Kidd confirmed to the 11th Circuit

 Pretty big news regarding the 11th Circuit today. Congratulations are in order for Judge Embry Kidd, confirmed today. He takes Judge Wilson's seat. 

Federalist Society meeting goes off the rails (UPDATED)

UPDATE -- Here's Steve Vladeck's detailed take on the whole thing.

Fifth Circuit Judge Edith Jones went off on Professor Steve Vladeck at a Federalist Society meeting this weekend. But her attack, ironically, was extremely personal. She was upset that Professor Vladeck has been critical of the Shadow Docket and judge-shopping in one-judge venues and equates those critiques with judges needing protection.  

This Law & Crime article has some of the details, although it's hard to summarize just how personal and aggressive Judge Jones appeared.  Here's the video if you'd like to watch.  There's lots to see here, but start at 1:15 some of her most aggressive attacks.  

Judge Jones may not like discussion about areas of the law that seem wrong, but the truth is -- we need law professors to be writing about the courts and exposing these issues so that they can be discussed.  I thought the whole point of the Federalist Society was to have open discussions, not to personally go after those on the other side.  Perhaps that why the Federalist Society had to apologize later that day.  Kudos to Vladeck for standing up to and holding his own against a very hostile judge and panel in an unfriendly environment.

Here's some snippets from the Law & Crime article:

In September, Vladeck, responding to another judge on a popular law blog, argued why he believes this behavior is “problematic.” The law professor highlighted 47 incidents in which Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton sued to stop Biden administration policies.

“Of those 47, zero have been filed where the Texas government is actually located (i.e., Austin),” Vladeck wrote. “[Twenty-four of those lawsuits], including yesterday’s, have been filed in single-judge divisions; another six were filed in divisions where Texas had a 95% chance of drawing a specific judge. And when asked why it keeps filing in these geographically obscure (and unrelated) parts of the state, Texas has publicly conceded that it has nothing to do with that particular forum’s connection to the litigation, but rather is entirely because it wants those judges to hear those cases.”

Jones described this behavior as nothing nefarious — insisting litigants have aimed to choose one judge over another since the period described in the Bible’s book of Genesis.

“Something’s going on here, and it’s very unsavory,” the judge said. “Attacks on the judiciary, I fully agree with the others, are ultimately attacks on the rule of law.”

After that, the panel discussed other matters for a while — but Vladeck steered the conversation back to judge-shopping.

Attempting to inject some levity, the law professor suggested he and the judge should “just go get a beer and have a chat” before stressing that he “never used the term ‘close to unethical’ in describing anyone’s behavior.”

***

Jones, for her part, was unmoved by the argument — or the alcohol-themed entreaty.

“I have studied Professor Vladeck,” the judge said in response — and then theatrically raised a manilla folder with documents askew and poking out. “And this is a file of his articles, amicus briefs, and tweets regarding the process of judge-picking that he criticizes so heavily.”

As she opened the file to rifle through its contents in front of the audience, Jones went on to read several tweets of Vladeck’s, along with the title of one legal article, which she said evidence a series of “attacks” on “the character” of various Republican-appointed judges.

***

“The consequence of all this is that Judge [Mattthew] Kacsmaryk is under 24-hour per day protection,” Jones said — referring to a Trump-appointed judge who hears every case filed in the Northern District of Texas’ Amarillo division. “And he has five kids.”

The implication was clear enough. And the panel grew increasingly tense as the barbs flowed from one to another.

At one point, during the back-and-forth, Vladeck sarcastically thanked the judge for proving his point “about how we’re shouting past each other and not engaging on substance.”

At another point, Jones angrily slammed her hand down on the table to keep the law professor from interjecting.

“I think it’s rather unfortunate what’s happened this afternoon,” Vladeck said in response to Jones’ criticisms. “And I wish that it weren’t so. But I also think that it says a lot about where we are that instead of having a conversation about whether this is a good thing or not, we decide to turn this into a ‘Can I put words into your mouth that make you look bad?’ And it seems like that’s not the kind of debates that I thought the Federalist Society was interested in sponsoring, and I’m disappointed it’s the conversation we’ve had today.”

Jones stuck to her guns.

“The point of attacking these judges is to diminish their reputations, to suggest that the state of Texas and other state attorneys general who filed in these jurisdictions are doing something improper,” she said.

 

Judge Altman to remain Judge for now (UPDATED WITH RESULTS)

Update -- as of 5pm on Thursday, the results are heavily skewed in favor of judge.  88 say judge, 10 say U.S. Attorney, and 3 voted about the same.  Sorry about the results not popping up after you vote.  I tried a new poll and it's not really that good.  

 President Trump decided to go with the likes of Huckabee and Gaetz.

I've also heard talk that he's being considered for U.S. Attorney. Unlike Ambassador and A.G., I'm not sure a district judge would take that slot. But maybe I'm wrong. What do you think:

Who will fill Marco Rubio's Senate seat?

Lots of buzz around town that Judge Roy Altman is being considered for the open Senate seat once Marco Rubio is confirmed as Secretary of State.  There is also talk about Altman being named Ambassador to Israel and also U.S. Attorney. Each of these positions would be truly fantastic for Judge Altman.

The last district judge who held a number of different positions was Tom Scott -- a district judge, the U.S. Attorney, and state judge. 

SCOTUS and Death penalty

 How will Trump's win affect the Supreme Court and death penalty jurisprudence?  Thomas and Alito are likely to retire during the next four years, so Trump will get to replace them.  That will keep the Court at 6-3 for a long long time.  

The big question is what happens with Sotomayor.  Some say she should immediately retire to allow Biden to replace her now (and not have another RBG situation).  Others say it's too late:

Second, the calendar: The Senate is out of session right now, and will not reconvene until Tuesday. They’ll recess for the week of Thanksgiving, return to Washington to speed-run the confirmations of Biden’s lower court nominees, and then adjourn for good on December 20. When the new Congress begins on January 3, Democrats will be out of power, and one of several Republican senators named John will hold the Senate gavel instead. So, if you are doing the math at home, even if Sotomayor were to retire today, and even if the White House had a nominee ready to announce tonight, that leaves Democrats five weeks—41 days total, and 24 days excluding holidays, recesses, and weekends—to get it done.

Another topic to watch is the death penalty:

Throughout his campaign, President-elect Donald Trump signaled he would resume federal executions if he won and make more people eligible for capital punishment, including child rapists, migrants who kill U.S. citizens and law enforcement officers, and those convicted of drug and human trafficking.

“These are terrible, terrible, horrible people who are responsible for death, carnage and crime all over the country,” Trump said of traffickers when he announced his 2024 candidacy. “We’re going to be asking everyone who sells drugs, gets caught, to receive the death penalty for their heinous acts,” he added.


While it remains unclear how Trump would act to expand the death penalty, anti-death penalty groups and criminal justice reform advocates say they are taking his claims seriously, noting the spree of federal executions that occurred during his first term.

“We’re going to fight this tooth and nail, and we’re going to seek to uphold the constitutional principals that do not call for this expansion,” said Yasmin Cader, an ACLU deputy legal director and the director of its Trone Center for Justice and Equality.

At the tail end of Trump’s first term, 13 federal inmates were put to death — even as the pandemic led states to halt executions because of Covid concerns in prisons. The cases included the first woman executed by the federal government in nearly 70 years; the youngest person based on the age when the crime occurred (18 at the time of his arrest); and the only Native American on federal death row.

No president had overseen as many federal executions since Grover Cleveland in the late 1800s, and the U.S. government had not executed anyone for more than 15 years until Trump revived the practice.

Judge Carnes Takes CNN to Task

By John R. Byrne

Yesterday, the Eleventh Circuit reversed the dismissal of a defamation claim against CNN. And Judge Carnes didn't mince words in his concurring opinion. 

To set the stage, the case involved Project Veritas (an investigative journalistic organization) suing CNN because it falsely reported that Twitter had suspended Project Veritas   for “promoting misinformation.” In truth, Twitter had suspended Project Veritas for disclosing a person's home address during a broadcast (Veritas tweeted a video of reporters trying to interview a Facebook VP and you could see a house number in the background).

Part of CNN’s argument to the Eleventh Circuit was that the difference between those two things-- suspension for (accurately) disclosing a home address and suspension for promoting misinformation--was "immaterial."

Judge Carnes's concurrence begins like this: "If you stay on the bench long enough, you see a lot of things. Still, I never thought I’d see a major news organization downplaying the importance of telling the truth in its broadcasts. But that is what CNN has done in this case."

Full opinion excerpted here.

Veritas by John Byrne on Scribd

Watch out for the fake NEFs!

 Your notice from SDFLA:

The Court was notified on November 6, 2024, that attorneys in the Southern District of Florida have received fraudulent Notices of Electronic Filing (NEFs). These notices are not official NEFs and are not sent by the Court. The emails are sent from the following email address: updates2@uscourts.gov.ecf.digital (link sends e-mail)

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Justice Cannon, and May it Please the Court.

Who will be the next U.S. Attorney?

Will Judge Cannon be elevated to the 11th? AG?

Will Alito and Thomas retire?

How long till we get nominees for the open judicial seats?

Will Miami ever go blue again? Florida?

Who will run in 4 years? Vance versus who?

Will Biden issue a bunch of pardons? His son?

What role will Kash Patel have?

What else you got?