President-elect Donald Trump’s sentence of “unconditional release” for violating a New York law that prohibits falsification of business records entails neither jail nor probation. But unless Trump successfully challenges his 34 felony convictions on appeal, he will suffer a lifelong penalty that should trouble civil libertarians across the political spectrum. Because Trump’s convictions involved crimes […]
This week’s featured article is “‘The Constitution Is Not a Suicide Pact’” by Jacob Sullum. This audio was generated using AI trained on the voice of Katherine Mangu-Ward. Music credits: “Deep in Thought” by CTRL S and “Sunsettling” by Man With Roses The post The Best of Reason: ‘The Constitution Is Not a Suicide Pact’ appeared […]
Lord knows it’s probably not smart to hold politicians accountable to their campaign promises. But President-elect Donald Trump is no typical politician and at least one of his campaign promises was both uniquely specific and uncontroversial enough to expect—or demand, really—follow-through. “If you vote for me, on day one, I will commute the sentence of […]
I was looking at a list of law journal articles published since 1990 that were most heavily cited by courts (generated using HeinOnline), and saw that #10 on the list was a student-written Note, Powers of Congress and the Court Regarding the Availability and Scope of Review (Harv. L. Rev. 2001), cited by ov Read […]
Some men in the “incel” (involuntary celibate) community want the state to intervene in their dating lives. These sexually frustrated men believe that society is biased against them, so they should be given a “government-issued girlfriend.” Incels have attracted attention from the authorities—just not in the way they would like. This week, the California Specialized […]
In the time between his two presidential administrations, Donald Trump was famously the subject of four separate criminal indictments, two of which were spearheaded by Special Counsel Jack Smith. Given that Trump will soon be in charge of the Department of Justice, Smith ended both cases in November. This week, Smith’s report pertaining to Trump’s […]
After a meeting with President-elect Donald Trump at Mar-a-Lago, Alberta Premier Danielle Smith told reporters that she does not expect Canadian goods to gain any special exemptions from the tariffs Trump plans to levy soon after taking office. Smith had pitched Trump on exempting Alberta’s crude oil exports from the 25 percent across-the-board tariffs that […]
Jack Smith isn’t the only game in town. Attorney General Garland also released a 278-page report from Special Counsel David Weiss concerning Hunter Biden. Because President Biden gave his son a full, complete, and preemptive pardon, Weiss did not discuss any other potential uncharged conduct. But Weiss spent several pages responding to President Biden’s comments […]
Happy Tuesday, and welcome to another edition of Rent Free. This week’s newsletter takes an extended look at the Los Angeles–area fires and the alleged link between bad zoning, land use, insurance, and environmental review policies and the damage done by the fires themselves. The Los Angeles Fires and the Overblown Role of Public Policy […]
Attorney General Merrick Garland has released Volume I of Jack Smith’s report, which focuses on the January 6 prosecution of Trump. Smith addresses one of the lingering questions: why did he not charge Trump with violating the federal insurrection statute (18 U.S.C. § 2383). In early 2021, Seth Barrett Tillman and I wrote an article […]