Leadership Lessons From The Great Books

Hello, my name is Jesan Sorrells, and this is

the Leadership Lessons from the Great Books podcast, episode

number 156.

Now, you will note if you're watching the video of this

podcast, you will notice my

lovely face. And then you will not see the face of

our of our guest today

because he is in the car headed back to the office. So if

you just stick with us for a little bit on the video, on the audio

or not on the audio on the video, you will eventually join us

via video. For right now, we are doing as he said before we got

started here, we're doing radio

to my intro. The month of June is, of course, the month that

comes before the month of July. And in July this year,

as is every year, the Supreme Court of the United States of America

releases its decisions on major court cases to the breathless

reporting of the United States industrial media

complex. And this year, it was no

exception. From decisions around books, education and

parental rights to decisions about what role the judiciary branch has,

in contrast to the executive branch, around injunctions

and executive orders, the majority decisions of the Supreme Court

reflect an attitude the court has taken to the relationship between

the Congress, activists, lobbyists and the culture over the

last few years. And the attitude the court

has taken is focused on, in my opinion, attempting to course correct

a national Congress filled with politicians more focused on having Tony

dinners, fundraising and being popular on Twitter and TikTok that aren't actually

doing the job we all hired them to do, that is making law

and then retiring and returning home to the districts from which they

day came. Fortunately, the court is acting,

at least the current court is acting as a speed governor, a check, a

break on congressional laziness and, quite frankly, moral

turpitude. It remains to be seen how many more decisions

need to be made before Congress actually absorbs

and acts on the lesson.

We will examine the lessons doled out during the most recent

Supreme Court session, as well as discuss the role of the executive

in our system of government by looking at the Federalist Papers

and, of course, the U.S. constitution. With our returning

guest today, just in time for July, de

Rolo Nixon, Jr. Esq.

Hello, de Rolo. How are you doing today?

We're doing lovely.

It's a beautiful day in the neighborhood,

which means Tempe, Arizona, where it's 108.

You know, are there a lot of, are there a lot of Baptists in Arizona?

I've never asked you this question. There are some. There are some.

There's a lot of Mormons. There are some Baptists.

Yep. You see some and different varieties.

But, you know, Arizona's interesting demographically because

effectively, you can separate the state into two parts,

and then you can separate the larger of those two parts

into many segments. Okay. The

two parts are Tucson and

Southeast versus everywhere else.

And everywhere else is Arizona, where I live.

And so I promise you, it's quite fascinating. And

so I'm amazed by how little

intercourse there seems to be between,

obviously, no pun intended, between people who live in Phoenix and

points north with people who live in Tucson and point

Southeast. This is no real intersectional intercourse.

Nothing. So I'm not. And apparently,

culturally, it's a little different. And how it became part of the United

States, of course, is different. Do you remember the Gadsden Purchase of

1853? If I'm not mistaken, that was

how that little Southern bit became part of the United

States. Right. The rest of it came a different way. But anyway,

I digress. Yes. So it is a beautiful

day in the neighborhood, and we are in that part of

Arizona where it is hot and

there are lots of people from. All over the place. Well, from what

I hear, two things. From what I hear is mostly a dry heat,

unlike the state of Texas, where I hail from, where we

have 80% humidity in the shade.

I also hear that the reason why

the Baptists established such a strong foothold in Texas,

and maybe this is the same in Arizona, is because they have

experienced the heat and they are interested in salvation

rather than eternity of sweating.

Well, that would assume that there's water in hell. So, yes,

it probably more accurately put a. An eternity

of roasting. But, yes,

it's possible. I mean, you get people's attention on a really hot day. You're

like, you really want more of this. But let's see, because the last time I

checked this morning, we had 39% humidity, which

is probably double the day before, and we have clouds. So

there's some remote possibility might actually. Rain,

which would actually be really nice. Let's see.

Where. Where are we at? Nope,

it went down 28 humidity. Ah.

Well, there'll be no rain today. All right. No. Well, all

right, well, let's. Let's jump right into

our. To our podcast today, because we are on a. On a

little bit of a tight schedule, which is.

Okay. And I want to jump in here with

quoting directly because I want to ask you. Today, we're going to start

off with this idea of the power of the executive. So we want to start

off with that before we. We flow into the current Supreme

Court decisions in particular the one we're going to focus on today, Trump

v. Casa and

Amy Coney Barrett's reading of the majority opinion

from the bench. And I

quote, by the way, we're going to quote from we're going to read from today

The Federalist Number 69 by

Alexander Hamilton. By the way, if you read the Federalist Papers and you

can check out the links to the Federalist Papers in the show notes below, this

the the player of the podcast

service that you happen to be listening to this podcast on

the Federalist Papers that cover a lot of the

duties, the requirements, or the thoughts that the Founding Fathers had

around what the chief Executive's role would be in a

tripart government with a judiciary, a legislative

body, and an executive. Are federalist

numbers 68 or 69

all the way through 73 or

74. And I might be missing a few in there. And I'm sure all of

you who are listening will correct me when I.

Well, will correct me. I'm sure you will, and I look forward to that correction.

But I'm going to start off with Federalist number 69 by

that great fellow about whom a musical

was made a few years ago, Alexander Hamilton.

And I quote from Mr. Hamilton and de Rollo will appreciate

this to the people of the State of New York, I

proceed now to trace the real characters of the proposed Executive as they are

marked out in the plan of the Convention. This will serve to place in a

strong light the unfairness of the representations which have been made in regard to

it. The first thing which strikes our attention is that the Executive

authority, with few exceptions, is to be vested in a single

magistrate. This will scarcely, however, be considered as a point

upon which any comparison can be grounded. For if in this particular

there be a resemblance to the King of Great Britain, there is not less

a resemblance to the Grand Signor, to the Khan of Tartary,

to the man of the Seven Mountains, or to the Governor of

New York. That magistrate is to be elected for four

years and is to be re eligible as often as the people of the United

States shall think him worthy of their confidence. In these circumstances there is a total

dissimilitude between him and a King of Great Great Britain,

who is a hereditary monarch possessing the crown as a patrimony,

descendable to his heirs forever. But there is a close analogy between

him and a Governor of New York, who is elected for three years and is

re eligible without limitation or intermission. If

we consider how much less time would be requisite for establishing a dangerous influence

in a single state than for establishing a like influence throughout the United

States. We must conclude that a duration of four years for the chief magistrate of

the Union is degree of permanency far less to be dreaded in that office

than a duration of three years for a corresponding office in a

single state. President of the United States would be

liable to be impeached, tried, and upon conviction of treason, bribery,

or other high crimes or misdemeanors, removed from office, and would afterwards be

liable to prosecution and punishment in the ordinary course of law.

The person of the King of Great Britain is sacred and invaluable. There is

no constitutional tribunal to which he is amendable, no punishment to which he

can be subjected without involving the crisis of a national revol Revolution. In

this delicate and important circumstance of personal responsibility, the President

of Confederated America would stand upon no better ground than a Governor of

New York, and upon worse ground than the Governors of

Maryland and Delaware.

Close quote from Alexander Hamilton,

Federalist paper number 69.

The reason I opened up with this today is because due to the current

occupant of the White House, Donald John Trump,

there have been a lot of protests around

the country from disaffected folks on the other side of the political

spectrum, folks who identify themselves as being more

progressive or Democratic or liberal, declaring that

they want no kings in the country. And yet

we have a system that is already set up

where the power of the executive can be checked. And by the way,

there have been attempts during Trump's first administration and even

when Trump was no longer president to, and I quote,

make Donald Trump liable to be impeached, tried,

and upon conviction of treason, bribery or other high crimes and misdemeanors, removed from

office. There were multiple attempts and even after he was in

or out of office, removed by the

voters of the United States of America after the first four year term, there were

several attempts, which is called in our time, lawfare,

to prosecute this man and put him behind bars. By

the way, I do not think that this is an unfair statement. I think we

can look at this on the basis of the facts and appeal to those.

And so, upon coming back and winning the re

election last year in 2024, we are

now having a discussion in our country. And this is where the Supreme Court then

steps in on what the nature of executive power actually is.

Now, executive power has been defined, expanded since the time of the

Federalist Paper's original writing and of course the original drafting of the Constitution

and even abrogated by the other two branches of government

in our Time, the executive branch has become more and more focused on rule through

executive orders. By the way, this started most notably

in the George W. Bush administration and really ramped up

during the Barack Obama administration. And the

counter to these orders has in the last 10 years come from the

judiciary in particularly through district and federal

courts. This leads specifically into the

case that we're going to talk about today that was before the court, Trump v.

Casa, where the supreme court of the US decided in a 6, 3 decision that

they had seen, quite frankly, enough

of this from the judiciary. So the

question to open up today to de Rollo, who is still in his

108 degree vehicle in Tempe,

Arizona, waiting for the rain. The question here is de

Rolo, how exactly? Walk us through with your

fertile mind and your understanding of history, politics and the law. How

has the executive power, how has executive power in the United States been transformed

in the last 20 years, in your opinion? Good

question. So the expansion

has been. So I'll say two things. One, the expansion has

been massive, okay? If we back

up into the 20th century and we look at

post Vietnam, the limited engagements, with one

exception, the limited engagements with which

the US Military was used in different parts of the world, I'm thinking things like

Palma Graneda, right? The Balkans,

okay? These were

relatively minor. They were smaller in scale, they were limited in

scope and in time. The one exception, of course, is Gulf War one,

which was a colossal effort. It was, I think, the largest mobilization

we had since World War II. But obviously there's a congressional

authorization there. Okay? So other than that one, post

Vietnam, we had one picture, okay? And even someone like

President Reagan, famous for his tough stances, there was not that

much non clandestine use of US Military or other types

of forces that bring violence, right. Without congressional

authorization. And then we come into the 21st century and then it's an entirely different

picture, right? Certainly there was a congressional authorization

with respect to, I believe, both Afghan and

Iraq off the top of my head in 2000,

November 15, 2001, because that was

not mistaken. And then I believe in March of 2003 for

Iraq, the second time. But anyway, but then those turned

into, you know, colossal boondoggles that took way, way, way too many

years. And where we can question the effectiveness, I saw a meme

recently where

you've got, you have President slash Vice

President Cheney on one side and then you have President

Trump on the other, and Vice President Cheney is saying, I need half a million

men, $2 trillion and a whole lot of time to accomplish something.

And President Trump in his meme says, I need about 20 guys in 45

minutes, and it will cost you virtually nothing. And of course, it's referring to the

recent engagement in Iran. But anyway, I digress. I

think you see a much broader

scale, certainly longer scale in terms of time, broader in terms of

scope, in terms of use of US Military forces all over the place. Right.

And Congress not seeming. Not seemingly doing

nothing or, you know, some post hoc approval or

whatever, but basically the way it appears is that Congress is

effectively a non entity, and

so almost akin to

Congress's response to tariff changes, which of

course is absolutely nothing. So there you go. Now, here's the

irony for me, and this is the second point.

Given the nature of how the 21st century seems to be

structured, it's a digital century. Forget about AI. We're not even there yet.

It's a digital century. It's the century of now. It's the century where you can

be around the world in half a day with air travel that is

relatively affordable. Okay. And so halfway around the world.

Excuse me, and half a day with airfare that is

relatively affordable. Great. The ability to

respond quickly to threats, therefore, I think

is greater. The ability to be able to foresee

and prepare over a timescale has basically been obliterated

by technology. We need a fast

response, whether it's preemptive or whether it's defensive.

And it's almost like in the

Fourth Amendment context, do I have time to run and get a

warrant? This guy's running from me and he's pulling

out a gun and he ran into a building. Do I have time to go

get a warrant? Or am I just gonna kick in the door and do what

I need to? So he doesn't kill innocent people. Right.

Right. Now, I'm actually against that in the Fourth Amendment

context. Right? Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Yes.

But that's, you know, in general, how I see the lay of the

land playing out in the 21st century. That's how

I see the lay of the land in the 21st century. It's how I see

these issues playing out. Do I think that Congress could

reassert itself? Sure. It's going to be really difficult to do against

this president because of his, you know, great popularity and also

his acerbic personality where he's just going to shoot it down. No pun

intended. But, you know,

on some level. Audit to be done? I would say yes. And

maybe it's just, you know. And how do you gauge which level of

engagement? Let's say it's going to be sub nuclear. And I don't know how you

would guarantee that, but let's just say it's going to be that way. Well,

how much say so do we want beforehand?

How much actually works with our national security given the nature of the threat? I

have no idea. And so it's

tough. But in this digital century, I can't expect

things to reverse course really easily.

Now you said a couple of things there that

I would pull out from there. First off, every single time

the opposing party in the United States

Congress or in the media

has caterwauled in the last, I would say 20

years about whatever the party in the

White House, the executive in the White House that represents that party is doing every

single time. The executive in the White House has expanded the executive

power, not contracted it every single time.

So if Donald Trump's hand picked

successor, whoever that may be, J.D. vance, whoever it is that comes out of the

Republican primary, if that person loses in

2028 to someone from

the rabble that is the Democratic Party currently,

look at you guys. If someone emerges from that chaos to actually

run coherently and rationally and

manages to beat whoever Donald Trump's hand picked successor is,

that person will not reduce executive power. They will

merely take the things that Trump is doing right now and put it more

on steroids. And every single. And the

opposing parties seem to fail to understand this. This

is the first point that I would and, and I

think they fail to understand it for self serving and venal reasons. You know,

being a person who's looking at this from the outside. But I also

think they fail to appreciate or fail to have curiosity

or even a theory of mind about how the opposing party might use

these expanded or these expansions

in executive power in, in a future

administration. That's point number one. Point number

two is this. I agree with you. It is a digital

century and digital includes everything from

Netflix all the way to AI,

Right? And we are going to have more and

more of these types of digital

communication tools be thrust upon us and

maybe even into the physical world in the form of robotics and autonomous vehicles

over the next 80 years of this century. It's, it's going to be

amazing. And I wonder

if the Constitution and the constitutional

understanding of executive power can survive such a

expansion or, or if the nature

of a document that was written in the 18th century

for a slower, agrarian, more thoughtful and more

critical, more critical culture

is exactly what we need. I wonder if that's exactly what we need

in our digital age. Right, right

now, the follow up point to there. And I want to ask you a follow

up question to this. What is Congress's role in checking the executive?

What do you think Congress's role is here in, in this digital

era? The, the 400 and whatever it is, 450 people,

490 people that are between the House and the Senate. And I'm not talking

about the fourth branch of government. Leave those monkeys uncles over there for just a

minute. Just the Congress. What should Congress

be doing? If you had a, not a magic wand, but if you had the

ability to consult with both the Democratic and Republican parties,

not the President, not the head, not the people running the

DNC or the rnc, the, forget those people as well, the

actual people sitting in the seats

from the districts. What's their role in checking executive power?

So, you know, the irony is that they actually have

the central role in the process. Okay? They make the

laws. That's why they're there constitutionally. And of course

the Constitution preceded the current

bureaucratic, administrative, deep state that we deal with. Right.

And so they have, pun intended, the trump

card. If they don't like it, change the law and then

he can't do it, period.

And of course they won't for several reasons. Right, right. There are

political reasons, like fallout from constituents who actually

support what he's doing. Okay? The ability

to actually get elected again. So there's political, there are political

reasons, okay, There may be other reasons, you

know, where they object to something

informed, but in substance they actually agree with what the President is

doing or to put a slight nuance on it,

they were against it until they saw that it

worked and that everybody was happy. And then all of a sudden they were for

it. Right, Right. The onus is on Congress

to act. And they don't. They don't, they, they, they

gripe, they complain, but all they have to do is change the law. All they

have to do is change the law. And if they won't change the law, they

shouldn't complain about it. Literally. Don't complain about

it or try suing over it. Fine,

but don't complain about it. That's how I look at it. They, they,

they're the ones in, they're the ones in the driver's seat. And there

have been periods in our recent enough history, last hundred

years when the leaders of Congress understood that they

were in the driver's seat and they acted like it. When the real king

in D.C. didn't sit at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue

but for, you know, was in the speaker

of The House's chair. Right. Understanding every single

fiscal bill comes from me. Every budget has to start here, period.

Okay. I don't know why I read it to you. Headlines talking about, oh,

the Senate passed the budget bill and then the House's version has to come out.

No, no, no, no. That's not what the Constitution says. They have to

originate in the House. Great. That's the guy in the driver's seat here, Speaker

Johnson. Right. So if Speaker Johnson really doesn't want some of this stuff to

happen, there are things he can do.

Right. And so if they don't do anything,

don't complain about it. They have a

necessary role in checking executive

and checking the use of executive power. Right.

And what it is, is they're the ones who get to determine the channels

through which it flows, certainly domestically. Right.

They determine the channels through which it flows. They determine

which acts allow the president and other bits of the executive branch

to do things. They also fund or don't

fund certain programs.

And so where they're really losing, Haysan,

is that in this

digital age, there's been

effectively a collapse of

the polls of political power

in a way that it's. Everyone is now in one

arena, and whoever has the loudest voice, the biggest

personality, gets to determine everything.

Right. So the ability of a Speaker of the

House to say, no, no, no, no, here's the power we wield and we're going

to start wielding it, and we don't care what you say. That's really difficult to

do. When everything is all in one pot,

It's a massive stew. Right. Or it's a

massive swamp. Okay. Rather than a

buffet or some other.

Some other type of situation where

there's independence between the branches, to put it slightly

differently, because it's getting unwieldy,

though nominally and legally, there is

separation of powers. If all of the politics

upon which that is built is all in one common pot, then there's no real

separation of powers. You follow me? Yes, yes. And I

would. I would assert that. I would assert two things. One that gives

different definition to drain the swamp

or. Or defines frames in a different kind of way. But I would also assert

that this is what our relatively

conservative, currently relatively conservative

judiciary, least at the Supreme Court level,

is actively seeking to do. I think they are

actively seeking, at least I'm seeing this over the last,

I would say five years of. Of decisions, fairly significant

ones, particularly around the Chevron doctrine,

West Virginia versus epa, which was about the fourth branch of government,

and in this, oh, the abortion decision.

And of course, President of the United

States at all, Recasa Inc. Which we're about to read from.

I'm looking at these as the judiciary, particularly if you look at the

language of the majority opinion. The judiciary is

literally yelling at Congress to do their job,

and Congress is failing. That's why I opened up with that when we

started this, this episode today. Congress is failing

to listen. And I don't know

when they're going to start. Like in your opinion, and

we'll go into Trump because here, I'll start reading from, from the majority opinion here

in just a moment. In your opinion, what will it take for Congress

to actually start to drain that swamp or,

or separate out that stew?

So the driver is always political. So right now,

the issue, the way I see it, to the extent that it's actually a problem,

because I'm not necessarily in agreement that is a problem right now,

meaning with the way things are going

with this administration, with very few

exceptions, that the judiciary seems capable of handling quite well.

There's no real issue, but that's because I share

their politics politically for the other side. There's an issue, but

it's a political issue. So I don't see any change happening until

the politics work out such that the party that runs Congress and

the party that placed the president and the White House are different parties.

Then all of a sudden, there's an impetus, a political

impetus to do something different legally

in Congress. And so until that happens, we're in a

situation where, again, we're all, everything is in one pot. It's one big

massive political stew than one party has. And so that's how it is

now because one party, the Republican Party, controls all.

Literally. The two political branches are under the

control of effectively one party that is under the control

effectively of one man. Right, right, right, right,

right, right. I don't think that that is a constitutional crisis,

though. Not that you've asked. I'll try to keep this point narrow and short.

But I don't believe that's a constitutional crisis because at any

moment, any one of those congressmen can say, one, I disagree.

Two, here's what I'm going to do. Three, here are my principles. Four, I'm going

to stay here, meaning I will run for reelection. I'm not going to quit.

I don't have to deal with what happened. Say what you want about Liz

Cheney. Okay. The late. Not late, sorry, my bad. Still,

thankfully, former. That's the word I was after. Former

Representative Elizabeth Cheney from Wyoming.

Right. She still stood for reelection she may have gotten hoed, but she

stood for reelection. She didn't say, oh, I'm retiring. Here's everything I think is

horrible, and I'm out. Leave me alone by him. No,

here's what I think. Here's what should be done. Here's what I'm doing. And the

voters did what the voters are entitled to do. No thanks. You're out of here.

Great. But each part in that

scenario, each party played the part it's supposed to.

The representative was representative and just representative of

politics that a majority of the voters in her district, okay, we're

in violent disagreement with. So,

but each party, each, in that circumstance, each, each

factor involved did his or her part. And so that

to me is unusual. What's usual is, oh, I'm not running for

reelection, then here comes a book about something or whatever. You know what I

mean? Right, right, right, right. The tell all hagiography that

you should have where you should have. You should have released like 10,000 years. Yeah,

yeah, yeah. The nonsense. Yeah, right. Or it's Jacques

here. Here are all my denunciations and who. Everybody did

what. But you're leaving. Okay, right.

And so it's like that actually doesn't serve

us. It doesn't serve we, the people of the United States.

The representatives will only take a principal stand on the way out.

Take the stand while you're in and try to stay in. And

maybe you'll get support. Maybe you will help that stew

congeal into recognizably separate parts

so that they can be then be separated again into different pots,

which is the only way, in my opinion, you effectively get

strong, robust politics. Okay. Everything in one pot, one

big stew. One big beautiful stew. Okay.

Is a bad recipe. Is a bad recipe. It's an even worse

pun, but it's a bad recipe. Okay, well, well,

I'm sure, I'm sure Tom Tillis on his way out the

door. Actually, probably not on his way out the door. I'm sure Thom Tillis,

two to three years from now after the Congress

has switched parties and they are breathlessly trying to impeach Donald Trump,

I'm sure he will release his. To your point, Jacques,

and he will. He will do the podcast and

right wing media complex tour

talking about how he knew it was a bad deal all along.

I agree with that part. Anyway, I've had about enough of that.

Okay, let's, let's pick up a little bit. Let's read.

I'm going to read a long piece here speaking of the

judiciary, because I do think that this is, this is the core, and I want

to stay focused on this today. I do think this is the core of, of

where our challenge is. I think the judiciary is

attempting and even weirdly enough at the district court and

at the federal court level, I think the courts are

attempting to separate out this stew. But because of the nature

of how the judiciary was originally

conceptualized and has, through

the exegesis of the last 250 years,

moved and grown and evolved with the country,

the judiciary is to a certain degree

powerless to do

more than to demand that the Congress take

a particularly larger role, particularly in this conversation that we're having now with the

Rolo, or that the executive put down some of their power

and, and pull out, pull something out of the mix. And you

can see some of this I think you can see some of this in

the, in the majority opinion

from from that was released from the Supreme Court

this June. You can go online and check this out. The case

is Trump, President of the United States et al. V.

CASA Incorporated et al.

The issue before the court was whether or not a district court,

any district court in the United States, but specifically, I believe

district courts in the any of the district

courts in the various districts of the United States, whether or

not judges in those courts can in essence

be compelled or be asked actually not compelled be asked

by plaintiffs against the government, no matter which party the government

currently represents, whether those courts, those

judges can can issue injunctions to stay

executive orders. Now, in particular, this is focused

around the issue currently in front of us that we're a national royal

around immigration, deportation, ICE

raids, all of those kinds of things. And

the question before the court was, or at least the way the

court framed the question before it was not can

the president exactly can the executive

in the United States exercise the ability to boot people

out of the country? Instead, the question before the court

and the majority opinion actually ruled on this 6, 3 in

favor of the particular direction that I'm going in.

The issue before the court was can a district judge

or can a federal court judge stay executive

power? Do they have the power to do that? And so

I'm going to read just a few things here. And again, I would encourage you

to read the entire the entire

case there, the entire decision. And you can go get that on

supreme court.gov I believe is where you can find that.

But I want to read from the majority opinion and it was read, by the

way, from the bench, which is kind of unusual in a case like this by

Justice Amy Comey Barrett Yes. A Trump

appointee. Yes. A very Catholic woman. And yes, I

believe she has something like 14 kids. And

that's neither here nor there. She's just seven. Seven. Something like that.

Okay, seven children. Seven children.

Okay. All right. God bless her and all the ships at

sea. So let me read from the majority opinion here and a quote.

Respondents, meaning those folks who brought the case to the court,

raised several counter arguments which the principal dissen echoes.

First, they insist that the universal injunction has a sufficient

historical analog, a decree resulting from a bill of peace.

Second, they maintain that universal injunctions are consistent with the

principle that a court of equity may fashion complete relief for the parties.

Third, they argue that universal injunctions serve important policy

objectives. The principal dissent focuses on conventional

legal terrain, like the Judiciary act of 1789 and our cases on

equity. Justice Jackson, however, chooses a

startling line of attack that is tethered neither to these sources nor, frankly, to

any doctrine whatsoever. Waving away attention to the

limits on judicial power as a, quote, mind numbingly technical

query, unquote, she offers a vision of the judicial

role that would make even the most ardent defender of judicial supremacy

blush. In her telling, the fundamental role of courts is

to, quote, order everyone, including the executive, to follow the law full stop.

Quote, the function of the courts, both in theory and practice, necessarily includes announcing

what the law requires in suits for the benefit of all who are protected by

the Constitution, not merely doling out relief to injured private

parties. Close, quote. And she warns, if courts lack

the power, quote, to require the executive to adhere to law universally,

courts will leave a gash in the basic tenets of our founding Charter

that could turn out to be a mortal wound.

Rhetoric aside, Justice Jackson's position is difficult to pin down. She might be

arguing that universal injunctions are appropriate, even required, whenever the

defendant is part of the executive branch. If so, her position goes far

beyond the mainstream defense of universal injunctions. We will not

dwell on Justice Jackson's argument, which is at odds with more than two centuries

worth of precedent, not to mention the Constitution itself.

We observe only this. Justice Jackson decries an

imperial executive while embracing an imperial judiciary. Justice

Jackson skips over that part because analyzing the governing statute involves

boring, quote, unquote, legalese. She seeks to answer a far

more basic question of enormous practical significance. May a federal court in the United States

of America order the executive to follow the law?

In other words, it is unnecessary to consider whether Congress has constrained the judiciary.

What matters is how the judiciary may constrain the executive. Justice

Jackson would do well to heed her own admonition. Everyone from the

President on down is bound by law. That goes for judges

too. The principal dissent disagrees, insisting

that, quote, it strains credulity to treat the executive branches irreparably harmed

by these injunctions, even if they are overly broad.

That is so the principal dissent argues, because the Executive

order is unconstitutional. Thus the

Executive branch has no right to enforce it against anyone. Close quote.

The principal dissents analysis of the Executive order is premature

because the birthright citizenship order or

citizenship issue, I apologize, is not before

us. The majority

decided that the judiciary does not have the power, that

a universal injunction does not have the power to stay

the President's or the Executive's hand, and that

to ask it to do such a thing is beyond the pale of the

judiciary. And the majority opinion, if you

read further, also indicated

that the court

itself can only compel Congress to stay

the hand of the Executive.

The Supreme Court holds that lower courts do not have the ability to place injunctions

on executive orders. Now this is all focused around the idea that the

President has authority to police the borders and to enforce immigration law. By the way,

this is what the dissent is in a panic about. From Justice Jackson,

Sotomayor and Elena Kagan.

And I would quote to Ms. Kagan, Ms. Sotomayor and Ms.

Kataji Brown Jackson, the following from Federalist

Number 70. There is an idea which is not without its

advocates, that a vigorous executive is inconsistent with the genius of republican

government. The enlightened well wishers who the species of government must at least hope

the supposition is destitute of foundation, since they can never

admit its truth without at the same time admitting the condemnation of their own principles.

Energy in the Executive is a leading character in the definition of good government. It

is essential to the protection of the community against foreign attacks is not less

essential to the steady administration of the laws, to the protection of property against those

irregular and high handed combinations will sometimes interrupt the ordinary course of justice

to the security of liberty against the enterprises and assaults of ambition, of

faction and of anarchy. Every man, the least conversant in the

Roman story knows how often that Republic was obliged to take

refuge in the absolute power of a single man under the

formidable title of dictator, as well as against the intrigues of ambitious

individuals who who aspire to the tyranny and the seditions of whole

classes of the community whose conduct threatened the existence of all government

as against the invasions of external enemies who menaced the

conquest and destruction of Rome. There could be no

need, however, to multiply arguments or examples in this head. A feeble executive

implies a feeble execution of the government. A feeble execution is

but another phrase for bad execution. And a government ill

executed, whatever it may be in theory, must in

practice be a bad government.

Close quote From Federalist Number 70

by your friend and mine, Alexander Hamilton.

So there's a lot there the majority

pulled on to create its

opinion and that the dissent in Trump v. Casa

objected to. I sent the documents to

deroll. I don't know if he had a chance to look over the case itself

or what familiarity he has with this, the case.

But I'm going to ask him the basic question that was before the court de

Rolo. Can the powers of the executive branch be checked by district

court injunctions?

Oh, without a doubt. It's just.

Solely as they apply against a

party that is actually under the court's jurisdiction

and part of the suit before it. Okay. And in a way,

it touches on the case or controversy doctrine. The

judiciary can't touch anything that doesn't come

before it in the form of a case or controversy. Right.

An actual case filed or perhaps

a petition for relief, which is the technicality, the difference. But

that would be, for example, where someone is being held

arguably without just cause, a petition

for their release. There's your controversy. Right. Rather than

a case. But anyway, so long as the court has jurisdiction

over the person, absolutely. They can grant

an injunction to prevent, or to

temporarily prevent the

judicial, excuse me, the executive from doing something. Right. That

wasn't the issue here. The issue here was

have they issued an injunction that protects anyone

from the enforcement of a law? And

to me, and in my review, but I haven't seen the word yet. But

I admit on the face of it that that's not a comprehensive review.

I have not yet seen the word veto. But how it comes across to be

is a judicial veto of the law.

And that itself would actually provoke a

constitutional crisis. Okay.

So, yeah, it's,

it's, it's interesting. I agree with the reasoning of

the majority. I think Justice

Barrett did an excellent job being

both a

complex Anglophile as well as someone who actually lived in the UK and studied their

laws while in law school for a time. I

like the history. And also being an

originalist, I understand the point that, hey, when Congress grants this

power in 1789 to these courts, this

thing was not done. And thus we are looking to that

grant and trying to determine if this modern usage

actually is

authorized right or not. Not would have

been authorized, but is authorized or not. I think that you know, is

the correct way to begin the analysis. But yeah,

strange because when I read it, I'm also

frustrated against media presentation of things.

Okay, Right, right. This case seems to touch not at all

upon the actual birthright citizenship issue. It's just

addressing whether one person who doesn't work

for the federal government, he's actually part of the federal government.

If he has the power to say this law

is bad and nowhere in these United States may it be

enforced. Right. It sounds like veto.

It is directly analogous to what the President does when a bill comes before

him or her one day, her perhaps, and

then that president gets to say, oh, do I wish this

to become the law of the land or not? If the answer is no, he

knows it. This seems like a post hot

judicial veto of either

executive orders or of enforcement of an

actual law. I mean INS has been the law for more than half a

century. Right. I think it's 1952 when it was passed

in. It's arguably that law is central

to the current composition of the United States of America.

Legal composition of the United States of

America. That law is central to an extremely important law in the

20th century. Okay. And effectively what

the judge is doing is saying no, that, that, that's a bad law. That's not.

That, that cannot be enforced. Who made you king?

Well, let me, let me, let me. From whence cometh that power? Well,

let me, let me steel man the defense. Not from English equity.

Well, but not from English common law. Well, let me, let me, let

me steal man, not the defense. Let me steal man the dissent. Let me do

this for just a moment. Normally I wouldn't do this, but I'm going to put

myself in the, in the mind, in the, in the,

in the, in the argumentation of the dissenters,

Kagan, Sotomayor and

Jackson. What you are saying, De Rolo, is so much

legalese

and I don't have time to get involved in the weeds of the legalese

of what British and the Crown. You said a lot of nice

fancy white supremacist sounding words.

Don't you know? Don't you understand that

that is a mind numbingly technical query? Because what,

what the Executive actually wants to do is what we

should rule on. Because the Executive has shown intent.

Because of the nature of the Executive power as it has grown over the last

hundred years, the Executive has shown continuing intent. And, and

we don't have to know what's in the Executive's mind of either party. All we

have to do is look at the pattern and Predict the pattern into the future.

That's all we have to do. And so don't get me, don't get me pulled

into the weeds of legalese or technical queries.

We need someone because the Congress has

failed in its duty. I agree with you about that. The Congress has failed in

its duty to check executive power. So if the Congress will not do it,

what branch of the government would you propose do it? Because we

can see from the patterns that have been

developed over the course of time that the executive will not stop and we will

have an imperial executive. What say you

to this assertion, which I believe is the assertion,

by the way, that Jackson cake. And this is the core of the assertion, actually

I don't believe it is the core of the assertion that Jackson, Sotomayor and

Kagan are making in the dissent.

It's overblown. Even if I

didn't take issue with how they

divine what someone is going to do,

even if I don't take issue with that, it's

overblown. The imperial presidency and their fears of

an imperial presidency seem entirely to be political.

Not legal and not even constitutional, just political. Meaning

they disagree with what this man is doing, therefore he's a tyrant.

Not the way this man is going about doing what

he's doing is tyrannical. That's just a very different

assertion. And you know,

it smacks of high sounding rhetoric on their part.

Right. But at the end of the day, they can't know what he's

going to do. They can't know what he's going to do. They can

know what a statute authorizes him to do. Right.

And when the federal officials, okay, the officers

of the executive branch, like ice, when they then

actually take action pursuant to what the law allows them to

do and someone thinks that that action itself

was done wrong, there would have you, they can sue, right? And then an injunction

can issue granting some form of relief. But of course it's only going to

be temporary because if the law remains constitutional, well

then you know, the, the law is going

to be executed. You know, they would be better

served by calling on Congress by, sorry, by calling on voters

to vote for different people who will then get a. To Congress and do something

different. But de Rolo Derolo, again, to quote from Justice

Jackson. Actually, no, I'm sorry. To quote from Justice Sotomayor. It

strains credulity to treat the executive branches irreparably harmed by these

injunctions, even if they are overly broad.

Sorry, say that again from, from, from Justice

Sotomayor's opinion In the dissent, it

strains credulity to treat the executive branch as

irreparably harmed by these injunctions, even if they are overly broad.

I don't think it's merely the executive branch who's harmed.

It's a wrong against our constitutional system. Right.

The judiciary doesn't veto the law

in a case or controversy. The judiciary may hold a

law as unconstitutional. Okay, fine. But the

application of that holding is not necessarily going to apply outside of that district.

Normally, this issue is closer

to what the Supreme Court was dealing with. That is,

how far away from a federal courthouse the writ

runs by that judicial official,

how far away does it go? And normally it stays

in the district. And so if you had a real issue change

district, that, of course,

that's part of our freedoms, that's part of how our republic works. Part of how

its structure protects freedom,

is that judicial overreach is limited

geographically, except when it's done by the US Supreme Court. And then it's a very,

very, very specific evil. And there are, you know, awesome

precedents in the law, like Plessy vs. Ferguson that show you what

happens when they screw it up. Right. Thankfully, it takes a while to get

there, and there's, you know, very few instances of that.

But anyway, here, you know, you haven't, you haven't touched

on it yet, but you can look at the numbers. If my recall

is correct, and I know the.

I actually have it up on my computer. And no, I'm not driving

anymore. So let nobody panic, because I am trying to look at a computer

while driving a truck. I'm not in a truck. I'm in an office.

In case anybody. Here we go. The total

number of. So the first universal injunction. Okay. Was made in

1963. As of the end of

2024, there were 127 of them. But

this year, my understanding is there have been 25 of them, and therefore,

the total number of them. Right.

Is152.

Guess what percentage of them are universal injunctions

against Trump administration action?

Out of the 152. 80%.

80%. 0.44

something%. Wow.

Okay. It was 50% as of

the end of last year, and then there's 25 this year. So we're now

at effectively 80%, slightly more

technically than 80%.

A hair, a smidgen for 80% against Trump administration action.

Now, let that be the background for my argument that this

is merely a judicial veto. And now we see what we're dealing with. They are

vetoing what this administration is doing. They cannot stop him getting

elected. So using the judiciary as martinet, or actually a better,

better. A better metaphor.

As tribunes. Right, as

tribunes. To strike down these actions or

to strike down the legitimate

enforcement of lawful and constitutional

laws, you know, it effectively. So the harm,

it's not just that the executive branch is harmed, the rule of law is harmed.

No one elected that judge in Massachusetts. No one

vested that judge with the authority to say, this law is just

not going to be carried out. Nobody, sorry,

this executive order is not going to be carried out. No one vested the judge

with the authority to say that. Now the judge

is vested with the power, as well, demonstrated by, you know,

Justice Barrett, to say in a case or controversy, I'm

going to grant an injunction against the enforcement of this executive order

pending the outcome of this dispute about

the validity of the order and. Or its

enforcement. Follow. Oh, absolutely.

That's perfectly fine. Right. And what I would. What I would. Well, couple of things.

So the, the,

the, the steel man argument from the dissent

comes from a historical understanding of the

Constitution, going all the way back to Woodrow Wilson, that it should be

a flexible document that conforms and comports

to the times, rather than the

originalist position, which, of course, states that

the Constitution says what it says and we should leave it alone.

And in case after case in the course of the

20th century, the court has trended,

whether it has been Republican appointees or Democratic appointees, it seems

to not matter in a more,

shall we say, progressive direction.

And this court seems to be, on the face of it,

and I mentioned several cases already, the Chevron, the overturning of the

Chevron doctrine in the Loper case, the

overturning of Roe v. Wade, even in cases that did not

involve the federal government, the cases around affirmative action

with the University of Michigan and Harvard University, this court

seems to be trending more and more in the direction of originalism.

What. How is that going to jibe

with. Well, two questions. So, one, how is that going to jibe with our digital

future, which seems to favor a progressive,

fluid,

unmoored and untethered kind of posture?

That's the first question. How is this going to jive with our digital future?

And then because, just to say me, Colby Barrett, she's What, in her 40s,

50s, something like that? She's going to be on the court a long time. So

is Brett Kavanaugh. So is

John Roberts, although he's, he tends to waffle back and forth

depending upon which position he's taking on which day.

But then also, you know, you're also going to have

another opportunity for someone else to be introduced to the court, particularly if

Clarence Thomas retires. And underneath this

administration, to add to the. To the gnashing

of teeth of the progressive movement in our country.

How does it originalist. I'll just. Let's focus on this question for just a second,

because I'll ask you the second one after I get the answer to this one.

How do you see this more originalist

conservative court actually functioning over the next

40 years in an increasingly progressive, culturally and

politically progressive culture?

I'm going to assume the increase in

progressivism will continue for the sake of my comments. Sure.

Okay. It's going royally piss them off, right? It is going to

royally piss them off. And

yet there is a rule of reason

that is easy to discern about originalism,

Right. The majority of your listeners, I dare say, will be

participants in a mortgage for their home, where there is a

lender holding a mortgage. And a mortgage, of course, is a security instrument that

they actually give to the lender. They also,

far as I know, never give to the holder of

the mortgage the right to unilaterally reinterpret it,

however the lender sees it, because circumstances, quote,

have changed. Close quote. Period. No, no, no. It doesn't happen. Doesn't happen.

That's just one contractual example to show you why originalism makes

sense. Okay? And on a gut level, makes sense. We

understand it, okay? We understand it, okay? If

you get a winning lottery ticket, okay? And I don't know why you play

the lottery, we'll leave that on the side. You draw a winning lottery ticket, great.

You show up at the, at the state office because this is a state

run fraud. That's what any lottery is, okay? Except people

voluntarily participate in it. So you show up at the office, hey, here's my

winning lottery ticket. Oh, you're right, it was. But we reinterpreted the

numbers. What? Yeah. Somebody else won. He's over there. You would be

incensed.

Incensed. Someone has stolen your

victory by reinterpreting

what in fact was something else. Right? And so

what happens here is our rights get stolen when they can unilaterally

reinterpret what clear,

comprehensive, comprehendable statements

are. Then when they're reinterpreted to mean something, usually it's the opposite.

They're reinterpreted to mean the opposite of what was actually said. It

actually reminds me of Genesis 3.

Did God really say this? And then Eve says

what her husband told her, and then she adds a

Gloss. She adds something that at least when you read

the earlier two chapters, you don't see.

And then Satan pounces. And of course, you can relate to Milton if you

want to. You can relate to the Bible, which I knew because that's where I'm

getting from. You can also relate it to John Milton's poem, right, Paradise Lost.

But then comes the reinterpretation. And fittingly, the

reinterpretation is the opposite of what was actually stated. That's exactly what

progressives do. There we are. They're not going to

be happy now, looking forward with respect

to that digital age. You're right. But it's not merely the Constitution

that could fall, that shall fall foul

of their way of thinking. They're

unmoored, borderless, universal

Catholic without any religious meaning. But the actual use of Catholic.

Okay, Use of power. It's an assertion

to use power wherever, whenever and however

the current holder sees fit. Okay? That is

the. That's actually tyranny. That is the. And it's not merely tyranny.

It's totalitarian and tyranny. Tyranny and surrender, okay? It is

the enemy of privacy, is the enemy of the individual, is the enemy of the

family is the enemy of the nation as well as the nation state.

And so it's a very, very, very important point, okay,

that the mood, because that's what I'm going to call it, is increasingly progressive

and that that mood is both

totalitarian and tyrannical. That's dangerous.

Of course, it's also legal,

okay? It's legal in our free country. Legal. It's

legal for you to think in totalitarian lines and want to see

tyrannical uses of power. And both sides do it.

It's totally legal. It's just detrimental to our

free system of government. It's detrimental.

And when you lose, you have to deal with the fact that the other side

has the ball. The other side is running the ball. You play defense,

okay? You don't shut the game down. Well,

well, well. But you have. You have a voting segment in this country,

an electorate, okay? Who.

And I'll use a small sample size of this electorate

who recently in the New York City mayoral primary

voted for a man who, when asked,

should billionaires exist? Laughed

and said, and I quote, we're going

to seize the means of production from them. Close

quote. Every

single voter between the ages of 18

and 40 in New York City in the Democratic

primary clapped and voted for that guy.

That's what we've got coming down the pike

right at A national level. And

originalism, you're right, will piss

them off. And so the next step above that. By the way, it's

interesting that you brought up mortgages and you didn't talk about student loans,

interestingly enough, because everybody who's 8 between 18

and 40 is most verklempt not about mortgages, but about

student loans, which is also the example of a

promise to pay that cannot be

moved around, interestingly enough, when your

circumstances change.

Okay, my last question here or my next question here. We got to wrap

up. We're rolling around the corner.

In looking at these major decisions since

Ms. Jackson, Ms. Sotomayor and Ms.

Kagan have been appointed to the court.

And looking at the way those their decisions have been written, Sotomayor

strikes me as probably being the sharpest legal mind out of that group,

followed by Elena Kagan and Justice

Jackson. It, it appears now

at least two, if not three times in a row on a dissension

has, if I may be so gentle, out kicked her coverage.

What are the dangers of putting a

purely political appointee on the court?

Well, it's one of the choices. Right. And it's been done before.

There are other and actually arguably

better well known political appointees to the

high bench. Right. And yet at the end of the day,

arguably, when that person takes his or her role

conscientiously, you may get some

beautiful surprises. One of the

decisions that I use in my practice often enough

comes from the pen of Justice Kagan. Right?

I do. Among the things I do are federal Tort Claims act

lawsuits against that government. Okay. The

United States of America on behalf of veterans who have been hurt by VA

employees. Okay. And there is a

strict and strictly construed statutory framework

whose steps are deemed by the high bench to be jurisdictional.

Meaning if they're not done, the court has no power to help you. They're not

done properly before filing suit. The court has

zero power to help you, and that's it.

Your suit cost. So anyway, there

was a question once about whether a six month time

frame was six months or 180 days. And that may sound

stupid, nonsensical. Trust me, as a litigator, that stuff is critical.

Okay. And Justice Kagan's opinion

saying six months is six months, that I actually liked,

that was the first decision of hers. I remember reading and saying, I'm glad you're

there because this is what I want. And what the dissent

said, written by somebody I generally would like

more, I just disagreed with. No, no, I don't. Six

months is Six months. But not all months have the same number of days.

So what, six months is six months. And six months

helped me rather than 180 days. So was

happy as a clam. She wrote the decision. And so. But

yes, generally, and certainly as you change policy areas now, usually

she and I are not opposite ends of the table, so opposite side.

So. But yeah, it's.

Yeah, it's going to be interesting to see how it goes. Oh, and by the

way, Justice Barrett is 53 and they

have seven children. She's been married one time to a man named Jesse, since

1999. Okay. Right, right. I mean, she's going to be on

the court. I mean, at least another. At

minimum, 15 years. Average lifespan

for a healthy woman in America

is 75 to 80.

Yeah. So it's gonna be a long time. Gonna be a long time.

And I just. I look at the way Justice

Jackson's dissent was written, and the writing

reveals a. Reveals a couple of things. And we've been banging on about

this on the podcast the last. The last few months

because I do think it's a genuine problem.

It reveals a lack of

seriousness. I don't mean a lack, and I don't mean

that in terms of professionalism. I don't mean that in terms of knowing

how to use the words. I mean, there's a fundamental spirit

of unseriousness underneath the thoughts that exist in the

mind. To paraphrase from George Orwell, when we have lazy

thinking, we write lazy words.

Now, those lazy words could be four syllable words and five syllable words, but they're

still lazy. And so there's a

fundamental lack of seriousness I see

among the progressive members of the bench at the

U.S. supreme Court level that I find to be

somewhat disturbed. Disturbing.

Yeah. And I'm no jud. I'm no

legal genius, but I can read a document

and analyze it.

Like. I never went to law school. So, you know,

I'm not claiming that, but there should

be some understanding on the part of those three

justices of exactly what the law is. And. And to your

point earlier, what the law is in spite of

political pressures, because I think that's what we want

from. We want from the court.

Okay, well, you know, we actually want from the court. Right.

I can tell you in every case what every single person

wants from the court. Well, in reality,

every single person wants the person in black to say they

were right, the other party was wrong, and you got it. Then

go away. We want to win. We want to win. We want Judge to

say what we want that's what we want. And when the judge does,

we will defend it to the hilt. Right. And when the

judge doesn't, we will decry it forever until

it's changed or overturned. And, of course, I do this for a living. Right.

But that. That's effectively how we all work. And

so there's something, though, to their role,

and it goes throughout the federal judiciary. It's just

as time has gone on and technology and other factors

have come into play. And I also think the homogenization

of the judiciary, the federal judiciary, on the

homogenization of it, meaning find somebody who didn't go to

Harvard, Yale, Stanford, to Columbia. Good luck. Right.

That's the homogenization I'm talking about. Yep. Because

of that, there's less philosophizing, there's less

creative and imaginative endeavor. Endeavor in

determining what the law is. To quote

Chief Justice Marshall and Marbury vs Madison. That's their job. Say what? The law

is. Great. That is philosophical, it is political.

They're unavoidable considerations. But when they're done, well,

among other things, they're limited to that case or

controversy. Okay. And the

exceptions, of course, are when it's the, you know, Supreme Court is striking down

a law holding that a law holding the legal term. Okay.

Concluding this law violates the Constitution, and therefore,

you know, it's not the law. Great. But other than

that, narrower and

narrower as you go down. And so what we have

is now we had an inversion going on, because

as I counted, according to this article, there were

127 of those injunctions from 1963 until

2024. And then another article said there were 25 this year. Great.

That means 80% of them were against Trump

administration action. Obviously, this is not

anything other than political opposition through the judiciary. It is a

veto of legitimate government

action rather than a limited in

terms of geography, limited in terms of persons

affected, temporary measure to preserve

a status quo. So a decision can be made. Right.

I agree 100% with the decision. It does not

touch birthright, anything. Well, and I'm glad you

brought this up here at the end, because I have in front of me my

copy of the Pocket Constitution. Every good member of the republic, whether they

are progressive or originalist, should have a copy of the Constitution and should actually

read the words of the document as it was written. And I

would like to quote from Article 14

of the United States Constitution,

and I quote Section 1, all

persons born or naturalized in the United

States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof

are citizens of the United States. And of the State wherein they reside.

No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the

privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States.

Nor shall any State deprive any person of life,

liberty or property without due process of law,

nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal

protection of the laws.

No question was before the

court this session in

regards to Article 14, Section 1 of the

United States Constitution. Not one, no matter what you've seen in the media,

not one. And

say again. Indeed. And so.

Right. And so. And so. The court cannot and

should not. I would assert, rule

or have an opinion about things that are not before it.

I would, I would, I would dissent from the dissension just merely based on that.

I don't need anything else. I don't need to know that Justice

Jackson is out kicking her coverage and that there may not

be the sharpest legal minds among the dissent. I merely

need to know that that is not the issue before the court. The

issue before the court is can the district court

create a universal injunction to stop something that a

particular political party does not like? Yes

or no. That's it. That was the only thing before the

court. The birthright citizenship

challenge. Can people who immigrated

here, by the way, I would assert born or Naturalized

are the two key words in Article 14, by the way. And if a person

illegally came here and then had a

baby, I'm going to make the bold. I'm going to make the bold challenge.

The person who immigrated here illegally

is not a beneficiary of the

benefits of the United States and of citizenship. The

child might be, but that means that the

mother and the father. Because even in our progressive scientific

age, you still need a man and a woman to have a baby.

That man and that woman probably need to leave the child in America and

go home and get back in line and

come here legally. But that

is a radical position. And who's going to break up

families? Who's really going to send ice to grab some

five year old from some kid hiding in a closet? Although we have done that

before underneath the Clinton administration

with a gentleman. Not a gentleman. He is a gentleman now because he's a

grown up by the time he was a child named Elian

Gonzalez. Yeah, everybody,

everybody forgets that. But I don't because I,

unlike those 18 to 40 year olds that fell asleep in history

class or were never taught it, I actually pay attention to history

and things that happened before the Internet.

All right. I think the birthright

citizenship question will go before the court within the

Next couple of years, I do think that they are going to focus on those

two words, born and naturalized. And I do think there will be a genuine

struggle. I think it's going to be probably a 5, 4 decision. Then. Yes, the

federal government can enforce illegal, can enforce immigration

law against people who are here illegally. And that if parents are here

illegally, they should probably not have children. And if they do have children,

those families can indeed be split up and a riot I

predict will occur at a national level.

Or the Congress could just make some laws like they did in the 80s underneath

Ted Kennedy and solve this problem for us. You

know, actually do their job instead of flouncing around on

tick tock and tweeting stupid things.

Yeah, but again, I'm not a lawyer. What the heck do I know, right?

Final thoughts, De Rolo, on this Supreme

Court session. Because this was probably the most explosive decision that came out

of, of the Supreme Court this session, other than maybe

the one that said where basically parents can

indeed pull their children out of school if they don't like

the books that are pushing certain themes that they don't want their children

to, to hear about. And by the way, I'm in

favor of that as well. My child is the property of the

family, not the property of the state. You don't own

my children, period, Full stop.

But anyway, and I, I was born in the United States.

I am a citizen of this country. Section

1, Article 14 does not apply to a person such

as myself, however.

All right, final thoughts on

this Supreme Court session and, or, or

the U. S. Constitution. Anything you'd like to say to wrap up, De Rolo? Because

we got to get going. It's fascinating because

you know, what you do in the era of mass immigration

with the notion of birthright citizenship, it has an

old and very old pedigree and it's

quasi religious. Right. The sacredness somehow

conferring something on somebody. I think there's actually

something to that that is beautiful and that

I would not want to see destroyed. At the same time, I have to balance

that against the exigency of dealing with

an unimaginable level of illegal immigration. Unimaginable

because technologically it was not possible

40 years ago with what we're dealing with. Sorry. Technologically and

politically it wasn't possible. Much of the

restraints, I would say, on mass immigration,

many of the restraints are political and not merely cultural or technological.

Right. And as the politics eroded, all of a sudden

a people's willingness to unilaterally uproot themselves and move

Just like those Gaulish tribes did when Caesar

decided to invade Gaul. Right.

What are they called? It'll flip my mind, but basically

the Ostrogoth, modern Switzerland. And they

literally picked up sticks because of Germanic pressure and they were moving into

Gaul. And Caesar, of course, not only did not want that, he was able to

use it as a pretext, faith, goal. But anyway, I digress. Right. So, yeah,

it will be interesting to see what they do and who

is they, you know, what the judiciary does, what

Congress does. There's a whole lot of they. Right. But

we're certain we're certainly rightful. But again, to me,

I see this decision as a victory against

that mood, that mood that is totalitarian, that

mood that is tyrannical, that mood that those of us who remember Covid and

the restriction know will come for your

freedom, will come from your. For your freedom and tell you

it's your fault and tell you you're an idiot and tell you to follow the

science. When the notion of science is about challenging

orthodoxy. They will come into that

again. And so I see this decision as a victory against

those forces. Yeah, yeah,

yeah. We can't have the rule. We talked about this in the. In the episode

with Hannah Arendt, episode number 155, where we

covered Eichmann in Jerusalem,

a report on the banality of evil. And she made the point

that Eichmann was a thoughtless little man,

a nobody who ruled and made rules and

enforced rules. Well, not made rules, but enforced rules. But he was a

nobody from nowhere. Right? And that was the most sort of

banal thing about him, thus leading to this idea of

evil being rather than a visceral thing, really a

play come really coming from a place of banality. And

my deep concern, and I talked about this on that. On the podcast episode

with Tom Libby around this. My deep concern is

that our. The gentlemen, strations of our large

language model algorithms will.

Will provide the temptation to humanity, particularly Western

humans who cannot solve the mass immigration problem,

to default to an algorithm and thus to claim

bureaucratic rule of nobody from nowhere, with no one to appeal

to. And that is totalitarian

tyranny at its peak.

Correct. And I am uninterested in living

under a mode of government where no

one, there's no human, where there's no human who can be held responsible,

responsible and accountable, whether that's legally,

morally or ethically, for the decisions

that impact real human beings in the material

world. So that's where I come down on that. And unfortunately, the

progressive mood, the progressive mind seems to be more and more

leaning towards the rule of nobody from nowhere that

can never be questioned. And I think

that that's a deep disease and a deep cancer

in the progressive mindset that that has to

be rooted out and. And excised. And I don't know how to do that.

I don't have the tools.

I hear you. All right, man.

Well, Derolo Nixon on the phone today,

live. This is like an old school radio show. This is great.

So you're going to have to listen to the audio of it. You're going to

love it. But on

this, our July, kicking off our constitutional July, I want to thank Derolo

Nixon for coming on the show. And with that, well,

we're out.

He's out, y'. All.