Fox News Politics: 100 Days of Court-ing Conflict

Welcome to the Fox News Politics newsletter, with the latest updates on the Trump administration, Capitol Hill and more Fox News politics content.

Here's what's happening…

-Revenge porn bill backed by Melania Trump heads to president's desk after overwhelming House vote

-Trump nabs 30K illegal immigrants, 1,100 gang members in 100 days: 'Crime will go down,' ex-FBI agent says

-Promises made, promises kept: How Trump's first 100 days stack up against Inauguration Day pledges

President Donald Trump has spent the first 100 days of his second White House term signing a flurry of executive orders aimed at delivering on his policy priorities: slashing government spending, cracking down on illegal immigration and eliminating many diversity and equity initiatives enacted under the Biden administration.

The more than 150 executive orders Trump has signed far outpace those of his predecessors. But they have also triggered a torrent of lawsuits seeking to block or pause his actions, teeing up a high-stakes showdown over how far Trump can push his Article II powers before the courts can or should intervene. 

It’s a looming constitutional clash spinning like a top through the federal courts; a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it set of hearings and appeals and emergency orders that deal with weighty issues of due process and First Amendment protections guaranteed by the Constitution…Read more

'EXTRAORDINARY WORK': White House takes 100-day victory lap on reforming key agency amid fierce pushback

FIRST HUNDRED: Trump steams ahead on these campaign promises as he reaches 100 days in office

CAPTURED ON CAMERA: Trump 100 Days Photo Gallery

TRUMP IN OVERDRIVE: Trump marks 100-days in office embroiled in trade battles, deadly wars and hard-pressed deals

'FRIGHTENS ME': Michelle Obama says fear for immigrants under Trump admin haunts her at night: 'keeps me up'

TRUMP'S BREAKNECK EXECUTIVE PACE: Trump’s executive order blitz: What he's signed and what's changed

'NUMBER ONE CHOICE': Trump jokes he'd like to be pope, 'Number 1 choice' — then names a real contender

'WOKE AND DIVISIVE': Hegseth undoes Trump-era women's program at DOD

'UNSUSTAINABLE': Tariffs could cost China 5-10 million jobs, 'onus' on Beijing, Bessent says

'SCRAMBLE ISRAELI POLITICS': Officials in Biden admin worked to undermine Netanyahu after ceasefire talks collapsed, former aide says

CHINA POST FILLED: David Perdue confirmed as Trump's top China diplomat after key Senate vote

2026 WATCH: Vulnerable House Dem rakes in thousands of dollars from Pelosi despite past criticism

TOSS-UP TROUBLE: Minnesota House Democrat jumps into open Senate race, GOP aims to flip her seat

'CLEAR AND PRESENT DANGER': House Democrat announces articles of impeachment against Trump:

'VERY PESSIMISTIC': Walz 'very pessimistic' on Democrats retaking the Senate

SEEING RED: Stefanik undercuts Mike Johnson in stunning public House GOP spat

PAPERS, PLEASE: Why Congress passed this requirement in 2005

SPENDING BLOCK: Dems slam Trump admins over alleged $436B spending block

ON THE BOOKS: Some fentanyl dealers would be charged with felony murder under new bicameral bill

CATCH AND RELEASE: Suspect in Noem purse snatching accused of similar crime in NY weeks before

MASK OFF: Gov. Hochul, New York lawmakers agree on criminal charge for wearing mask while committing crime

DRAMATIC ESCAPE: Man drops gun, flees charging polar bear by hopping on snowmobile, video shows

'PART OF THE PROCESS': Eric Adams unfazed by ruling against his plan to combat migrant crime

VANISHED: New York political candidate vanishes, clothes found on beach

SEE IT: Maryland governor says he won't travel to El Salvador for Abrego Garcia

'OUR OWN GREENLAND': Red state official touts readiness to unleash energy across US

'OUT OF TOUCH': Potential 2028 hopeful accused of 'inciting violence' after call for 'mass protests' against Trump

Get the latest updates on the Trump administration and Congress, exclusive interviews and more on FoxNews.com.

100 days of injunctions, trials and ‘Teflon Don’: Trump second term meets its biggest tests in court

President Donald Trump has spent the first 100 days of his second White House term signing a flurry of executive orders aimed at delivering on his policy priorities: slashing government spending, cracking down on illegal immigration and eliminating many diversity and equity initiatives enacted under the Biden administration.

The more than 150 executive orders Trump has signed far outpace those of his predecessors. But they have also triggered a torrent of lawsuits seeking to block or pause his actions, teeing up a high-stakes showdown over how far Trump can push his Article II powers before the courts can or should intervene. 

It’s a looming constitutional clash spinning like a top through the federal courts; a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it set of hearings and appeals and emergency orders that deal with weighty issues of due process and First Amendment protections guaranteed by the Constitution. 

Trump’s critics argue the fast-paced strategy is meant to confuse and overwhelm his opponents. His supporters counter that it allows him to strike with maximum precision and sidestep a clunky, slow-moving Congress as the president pursues his top priorities.

TRUMP ADMINISTRATION ASKS SUPREME COURT TO REVIEW EL SALVADOR DEPORTATION FLIGHT CASE

In his first 100 days, administration lawyers have gone to bat in courtrooms across the country to defend Trump's early executive orders and halt a wave of lawsuits and emergency restraining orders aimed at blocking them. 

Trump, meanwhile, has steadfastly maintained that he would "never defy" the Supreme Court as recently as in an interview last week. 

"I'm a big believer in the Supreme Court and have a lot of respect for the justices," Trump told Time Magazine.  

Critics say he already has.

"The second Trump administration has taken the guardrails off of the norms that historically governed the rule of law and is undertaking steps to enhance the perceived power of the executive branch to the detriment of the two other co-equal branches," Mark Zaid, an attorney who has gone toe-to-toe with the Trump administration in several court cases this year, told Fox News Digitial.

APPEALS COURT BLOCKS TRUMP ADMIN'S DEPORTATION FLIGHTS IN ALIEN ENEMIES ACT IMMIGRATION SUIT

"These actions threaten the fundamental notion of our democracy, particularly as the Administration seeks to eliminate due process protections in a quest for power."

The biggest fights so far have centered around the Trump administration's use of the Alien Enemies Act, a 1798 wartime law, to deport certain migrants to El Salvador. Another major case to watch will be challenges to Trump's executive order ending birthright citizenship. 

Two separate federal judges, in D.C. and Maryland, have suggested they could move to begin possible contempt proceedings against some Trump officials for refusing to comply with their orders.

In one case, a judge issued a scathing rebuke against Trump officials for failing to return a Maryland resident and alleged gang member who was wrongfully deported to El Salvador this year. Separately, U.S. District Judge James Boasberg said there was probable cause to find Trump administration officials in criminal contempt for defying his order to return deportation flights to El Salvador on March 15.

The Trump administration has fought back, questioning the authority of lower courts to stop his agenda. The Supreme Court agreed to hear oral arguments on a challenge to some of the nationwide injunctions, beginning with a birthright citizenship case in early May.

Meanwhile, White House officials have railed against the "activist" judges who they say have overstepped and are acting with a political agenda to block Trump's policies. They’ve blasted judges for pausing Trump’s transgender military ban, reinstating USAID programs and blocking Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) from accessing federal offices.

Some congressional allies have threatened impeachment against judges who defy Trump, but so far Congress has not advanced any impeachment articles.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt declined this week to rule out the arrest of federal judges, including Supreme Court justices.

Asked at a press briefing about the hypothetical on Monday, Leavitt referred the matter to the Justice Department but said a judge in New Mexico was arrested in "a clear-cut case of obstruction."

"And so anyone who is breaking the law or obstructing federal law enforcement officials from doing their jobs is putting themselves at risk of being prosecuted, absolutely," she said.

Jonathan Turley, a law professor and Fox News contributor, told Fox News Digital that he sees Trump's early actions as getting ahead of the 2026 primaries and moving with maximum force to implement his agenda.

Trump "knows that he has no alternative but to push ahead on all fronts if he is going to make meaningful progress on his promised reforms," Turley told Fox News. 

"The midterm elections are looming in 2026. If the Democrats retake the House, he knows that he can expect investigations, impeachments and obstruction. That means that he has to expedite these cases and establish his lines of authority in areas ranging from migration to the markets."

House Democrat announces articles of impeachment against Trump: ‘Clear and present danger’

Rep. Shri Thanedar, D-Mich., announced on Monday that he introduced seven articles of impeachment against President Donald Trump.

"Donald Trump has repeatedly demonstrated that he is unfit to serve as President and represents a clear and present danger to our nation’s constitution and our democracy," Thanedar said in a news release.

The articles allege wrongdoing by Trump including "Obstruction of Justice and Abuse of Executive Power," "Usurpation of Appropriations Power," "Abuse of Trade Powers and International Aggression," "Violation of First Amendment Rights," "Creation of an Unlawful Office," "Bribery and Corruption," and "Tyrannical Overreach"

SENATOR JOINS GROUP OF FAR-LEFT LAWMAKERS WHO THINK TRUMP HAS — AGAIN — COMMITTED IMPEACHABLE OFFENSES

"His unlawful actions have subverted the justice system, violated the separation of powers, and placed personal power and self-interest above public service. We cannot wait for more damage to be done. Congress must act," Thanedar said of the president.

Fox News Digital reached out to the White House for comment but did not receive a response by the time of publication.

CHUCK SCHUMER DODGES ON WHETHER DEMOCRATS WILL LOOK TO IMPEACH TRUMP IF THEY WIN BACK CONGRESS

The impeachment push will almost certainly fail to go anywhere in the GOP-controlled House of Representatives.

The House impeached Trump twice during his first term in office, but in both cases the respective Senate votes failed to reach the threshold necessary for conviction — the second impeachment took place just before Trump left office, with the Senate acquittal coming after his term was over.

DEM REP. AL GREEN, BOOTED FROM TRUMP'S ADDRESS TO CONGRESS, DOUBLES DOWN ON IMPEACHMENT

Thanedar was born in India and became an American citizen in 1988, according to his House website. 

He has served in the U.S. House of Representatives since early 2023.

The untold story of how Ed Martin ghostwrote online attacks against a judge—and still became a top

By Jeremy Kohler and Andy Kroll for ProPublica

The attacks on Judge John Barberis in the fall of 2016 appeared on his personal Facebook page. They impugned his ethics, criticized a recent ruling and branded him as a “politician” with the “LOWEST rating for a judge in Illinois.”

Barberis, a state court judge in an Illinois county across the Mississippi River from St. Louis, was presiding over a nasty legal battle for control over the Eagle Forum, the vaunted grassroots group founded by Phyllis Schlafly, matriarch of the anti-feminist movement. The case pitted Schlafly’s youngest daughter against three of her sons, almost like a Midwest version of the HBO program “Succession” (without the obscenities).

At the heart of the dispute — and the lead defendant in the case — was Ed Martin, a lawyer by training and a political operative by trade. In Missouri, where he was based, Martin was widely known as an irrepressible gadfly who trafficked in incendiary claims and trailed controversy wherever he went. Today, he’s the interim U.S. attorney in Washington, D.C., and one of the most prominent members of the Trump Justice Department.

In early 2015, Schlafly had selected Martin to succeed her as head of the Eagle Forum, a crowning moment in Martin’s career. Yet after just a year in charge, the group’s board fired Martin. Schlafly’s youngest daughter, Anne Schlafly Cori, and a majority of the Eagle Forum board filed a lawsuit to bar Martin from any association with the organization.

After Barberis dealt Martin a major setback in the case in October 2016, the attacks began. The Facebook user who posted them, Priscilla Gray, had worked in several roles for Schlafly but was not a party to the case, and her comments read like those of an aggrieved outsider.

Almost two years later, the truth emerged as Cori’s lawyers gathered evidence for her lawsuit: Behind the posts about the judge was none other than Martin.

ProPublica obtained previously unreported documents filed in the case that show Martin had bought a laptop for Gray and that she subsequently offered to “happily write something to attack this judge.” And when she did, Martin ghostwrote more posts for her to use and coached her on how to make her comments look more “organic.”

Ed Martin exchanged emails with Priscilla Gray, who had worked in various roles for Phyllis Schlafly, about how to attack Judge John Barberis.

“That is not justice but a rigged system,” he urged her to write. “Shame on you and this broken legal system.”

“Call what he did unfair and rigged over and over,” Martin continued.

Martin even urged Gray to message the judge privately. “Go slow and steady,” he advised. “Make it organic.”

Gray appeared to take Martin’s advice. “Private messaging him that sweet line,” she wrote. It was not clear from the court record what, if anything, she wrote at that juncture.

Gray told Martin she would direct message Barberis after she was blocked from commenting on his Facebook page. 

Legal experts told ProPublica that Martin’s conduct in the Eagle Forum case was a clear violation of ethical norms and professional rules. Martin’s behavior, they said, was especially egregious because he was both a defendant in the case and a licensed attorney.

Martin appeared to be “deliberately interfering with a judicial proceeding with the intent to undermine the integrity of the outcome,” said Scott Cummings, a professor of legal ethics at UCLA School of Law. “That’s not OK.”

Martin did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

Martin’s legal and political career is dotted with questions about his professional and ethical conduct. But for all his years in the spotlight, some of the most serious concerns about his conduct have remained in the shadows — buried in court filings, overlooked by the press or never reported at all.

His actions have led to more than $600,000 in legal settlements or judgments against Martin or his employers in a handful of cases. In the Eagle Forum lawsuit, another judge found him in civil contempt, citing his “willful disregard” of a court order, and a jury found him liable for defamation and false light against Cori.

Cori also tried to have Martin charged with criminal contempt for his role in orchestrating the posts about Barberis, but a judge declined to take up the request and said she could take the case to the county prosecutor. Cori said her attorney met with a detective; Martin was never charged.

Nonetheless, the emails unearthed by ProPublica were evidence that he had violated Missouri rules for lawyers, according to Kathleen Clark, a legal ethics expert and law professor at Washington University in St. Louis. She said lawyers are prohibited from trying to contact a judge outside of court in a case they are involved in, and they are barred from using a proxy to do something they are barred from doing themselves.

Such a track record might have derailed another lawyer’s career. Not so for Martin.

As a presidential candidate, Donald Trump vowed to use the Justice Department to reward his allies and seek retribution against his perceived enemies. Since taking office, Trump and his appointees have made good on those pledges, pardoning Jan. 6 rioters while targeting Democratic politicians, media critics and private law firms.

As one of its first personnel picks, the Trump administration chose Martin to be interim U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, one of the premier jobs for a federal prosecutor.

A wide array of former prosecutors, legal observers and others have raised questions about his qualifications for an office known for handling high-profile cases. Martin has no experience as a prosecutor. He has never taken a case to trial, according to his public disclosures. As the acting leader of the largest U.S. attorney’s office in the country, he directs the work of hundreds of lawyers who appear in court on a vast array of subjects, including legal disputes arising out of Congress, national security matters, public corruption and civil rights, as well as homicides, drug trafficking and many other local crimes.

Over the last four years, the office prosecuted more than 1,500 people as part of the massive investigation into the violence at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. While Trump has pardoned the Jan. 6 defendants, Martin has taken action against the prosecutors who brought those cases. In just three months, he has overseen the dismissal of outstanding Jan. 6-related cases, fired more than a dozen prosecutors and opened an investigation into the charging decisions made in those riot cases.

Ed Martin speaks at the Capitol in June 2023.

Martin has also investigated Democratic lawmakers and members of the Biden family; forced out the chief of the criminal division after she refused to initiate an investigation desired by Trump appointees citing a lack of evidence, according to her resignation letter; threatened Georgetown University’s law school over its diversity, equity and inclusion policies; and vowed to investigate threats against Department of Government Efficiency employees or “chase” people in the federal government "discovered to have broken the law or even acted simply unethically.”

Martin “has butchered the position, effectively destroying it as a vehicle by which to pursue justice and turning it into a political arm of the current administration,” says an open letter signed by more than 100 former prosecutors who worked in the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia under Democratic and Republican presidents.

Already, Martin has been the subject of at least four disciplinary complaints with the D.C. and Missouri bars, of which one was dismissed and the other three appear to be pending. Two of the complaints came after he moved to dismiss charges against a Jan. 6 rioter whom he had previously represented and for whom he was still listed as counsel of record. (The first complaint was dismissed after the D.C. bar’s disciplinary panel concluded that Martin had dismissed the case as a result of Trump’s pardons and so did not violate any rules.) The third was filed in March by a group of Democratic lawmakers in the U.S. Senate. The fourth was submitted last week by a group of former Jan. 6 prosecutors and members of the conservative-leaning Society for the Rule of Law. It argues that Martin’s actions so far “threaten to undermine the integrity of the U.S. Attorney’s Office and the legal profession in the District of Columbia.” If Martin has responded to any of the complaints, those responses have not been made public.

Trump has nominated Martin to run the office permanently. Senate Democrats, meanwhile, have vowed to drag out Martin’s confirmation, demanding a hearing and setting up a fight over one of Trump’s most controversial nominees.

Martin stepped off the elevator into the newsroom of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch newspaper. He was angry at a reporter named Jo Mannies, one of the city’s top political journalists. At a conference table with Mannies and her senior editors, he accused Mannies of being unethical and pressed the paper’s leadership to spike her stories about him, according to interviews.

Mannies said later she believed he was trying to get her fired.

“He was attacking her,” said Pam Maples, who was managing editor at the time. “He was implying she had an ax to grind, that she wanted to get some big story and that she was not being ethical. And when that didn’t get traction, it was more like ‘this isn’t a story.’ It wasn’t that he said anything about a fact being inaccurate, or he wanted to retract a story; he wanted the reporting to stop.”

Mannies had been covering a scandal dubbed “Memogate” that started to unfold in 2007 while Martin was chief of staff to Missouri Gov. Matt Blunt. In that role, Martin was using his government email to undermine Democratic rivals and rally anti-abortion groups. But when reporters requested emails from Blunt’s staff, the governor’s office denied they existed. Media organizations joined a lawsuit to preserve the messages and recover them from backup tapes.

An attorney for the governor, Scott Eckersley, later said in a deposition that Martin tried to block the release of government emails and told employees to delete their messages. After Eckersley warned that doing so might violate state law, he was fired. He sued the state for wrongful termination and defamation and settled for $500,000. Martin resigned as chief of staff in 2007 after just over a year on the job, and Blunt’s office would eventually hand over 22 boxes of internal emails.

In a 2008 email to the Associated Press, Martin dismissed Eckersley’s lawsuit as a “desperate attempt” to revise his story after he was fired, citing Eckersley’s own testimony that not all emails are public records.

The Memogate incident was telling — and Martin’s efforts to have Mannies fired were never reported. “His claim was we were misrepresenting what the law was and what he was doing,” she told ProPublica. “I mean, he can get very hyper. He can get very emotional.”

When Martin launched a bid for Congress in 2010, he acted as if Memogate was ancient history. He made himself available to Mannies, she recalled, always taking her calls. Years later, he even appeared, lighthearted and bantering, on a St. Louis Public Radio podcast Mannies co-hosted. She said Martin could be outlandish and aggressive, but he could also be disarmingly passionate about whatever cause he was pursuing at the moment, often speaking in a frenetic rush. “He just wore people down with his enthusiasm,” she said.

Ed Martin speaks to supporters at his election watch party Tuesday, Nov. 2, 2010 in St. Louis.

Martin allowed a different St. Louis reporter to shadow him during his 2010 run for Congress. The reporter asked about the St. Louis election board, a dysfunctional organization that, by all accounts, Martin had helped turn around in the mid-2000s. Martin had fired an employee there named Jeanne Bergfeld, and she later sued for wrongful termination. The board settled the lawsuit.

As part of the settlement, Martin agreed not to talk about the case and the board paid Bergfeld $55,000. Martin and two others issued a letter saying she had been a “conscientious and dedicated professional.”

But talking to the reporter covering his campaign, Martin said Bergfeld enjoyed “not having to do anything” and “wasn’t interested in changing.” The day after the story was published, Bergfeld sued Martin again, this time for violating the settlement agreement. Martin denied making the comments, but the Riverfront Times released audio that proved he had.

Martin agreed to pay Bergfeld another $15,000 but delayed signing the settlement for a few months. The judge then ordered Martin to pay some of her legal costs, citing his “obstinacy.”

Martin lost his 2010 congressional bid. He ran for Missouri attorney general two years later and lost again. After his stint as chair of the Missouri Republican Party, he went to work as Schlafly’s right-hand man. Martin grew so attached to Schlafly that a lawyer for the Eagle Forum jokingly called him “Ed Martin Schlafly.”

As the 2016 presidential campaign ramped up, Martin supported Trump even though Eagle Forum board members, including Cori, supported Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas. Cori described Trump at the time as an “egomaniacal dictator.” (Today, she said she supports him.) Cori and other board members were stunned when Schlafly endorsed Trump, with Martin standing by her side.

A few weeks later, a majority of the Eagle Forum’s board voted to oust Martin as president; a lawsuit filed by the board cited mismanagement and poor leadership and described his tenure as “deplorable.” Martin has maintained that he was Schlafly’s “hand-picked successor” and has characterized his removal as a hostile takeover.

“Every day, they are diminishing the reputation and value of Phyllis,” he said in a 2017 statement. She died in September 2016.

Cori and the board’s lawsuit sought to enforce Martin’s removal and demand an accounting of the forum’s assets. That’s the case that wound up before Barberis.

On top of his efforts to direct Gray’s posts on Barberis’ Facebook page, Martin prepared a separate statement, according to previously unreported records from the case. The statement called Barberis’ ruling to remove him as Eagle Forum president “judicial activism at its worst” that “shows what happens when the law is undermined by judges who think they can do whatever they want.”

Martin emailed the statement, which said it was from “Bruce Schlafly, M.D.” — the name of one of Schlafly’s sons — to himself, then sent it to two of her other sons, John and Andy, court filings show. Martin said the statement was a “declaration of war” and urged the Schlaflys to “put something like this out to our biggest list.” (It’s unclear if the message was ever sent.) Bruce Schlafly did not respond to requests for comment.

In a 2019 sworn deposition, Cori’s lawyer asked Martin questions about the posts on Barberis’ Facebook page and the letter he drafted for Bruce Schlafly. Because of the possibility that he could be charged with criminal contempt of court, Martin declined to comment, on the advice of his own lawyer, though he acknowledged that lawyers are barred from communicating with judges outside of court or engaging in conduct meant to disrupt proceedings.

Eagle Forum’s office in Alton, Illinois.

Andy Schlafly, a lawyer and former Eagle Forum board member who supported Martin in the leadership fight, said “no court has ever sanctioned Ed for his engagement of First Amendment advocacy” and likened the controversy to liberal attacks on conservative judges. He dismissed concerns about Martin directing Gray to contact the judge, saying she “speaks for herself” and had every right to voice her outrage. He compared Martin’s style — then and now — to Trump’s. He said he did not believe the email Martin drafted for his brother Bruce had ever been sent, but if it had been, it would have been no different from Trump posting on Truth Social, which he considered normal behavior in political battles.

“What would Trump do in that position?” Andy Schlafly said of Martin’s current role in Washington. “I would say Trump would be doing just what Ed’s doing. Elections do have consequences.”

Gray declined to comment. She was not part of the lawsuit.

When Cori’s lawyers uncovered the emails, they asked a new judge, David Dugan — who had taken over the case after Barberis was elected to a higher court — why Martin should not be held in criminal contempt for “an underhanded scheme” to “attack the integrity and authority” of the court with the Facebook comments about Barberis, according to court records.

Dugan declined to take up the criminal contempt motion. But he later found Martin and John Schlafly in civil contempt of court for having interfered with Eagle Forum after Barberis had removed them from the group. John Schlafly appealed the contempt finding and mostly lost. He did not respond to requests for comment. It’s unclear if Martin appealed.

Cori told ProPublica she also filed an ethics complaint against Martin with the Missouri Office of Chief Disciplinary Counsel, which investigates ethics complaints against lawyers. She said she was told her complaint would have to wait until her lawsuit concluded. The office said it could neither confirm nor deny it had received a complaint.

Anne Schlafly Cori won a defamation claim against Martin in 2022.

In 2022, when part of Cori’s lawsuit went to trial, a jury found Martin liable for defaming her and casting her in a false light — including by sharing a Facebook post suggesting that she should be charged with manslaughter for her mother’s death. It awarded her $57,000 in damages and also found Martin liable for $25,500 against another Eagle Forum board member.

Martin argued that the statute of limitations had expired on the defamation claims and that many of his statements were either true or vague hyperbole not subject to proof. He also claimed he could not be held liable because he didn’t write the offending post — he had merely shared something written by someone else.

In a post-trial motion, he also leaned into protections that make it harder for public figures to win defamation cases. Under that higher legal standard, it’s not enough for a plaintiff to show that a statement was false. Cori also had to prove that Martin knew it was false or acted with reckless disregard for the truth, and he said she didn’t prove it.

But while he’s wrapped himself in First Amendment protections when defending his own speech, he’s taken the opposite stance since being named interim U.S. attorney by Trump, threatening legal action against people when they criticize the administration.

For instance, after Rep. Robert Garcia called DOGE leader Elon Musk a “dick” and urged Democrats to “bring weapons” to a political fight, Martin sent Garcia a letter warning his comments could be seen as threats and demanding an explanation.

With the start of Trump’s first presidency, Martin and his family moved to the Northern Virginia suburbs near Washington, D.C. Martin had no formal role in the new administration, but he turned himself into one of the president’s most prolific and unfiltered surrogates.

CNN hired him in September 2017 to be a pro-Trump on-air commentator, only to fire him five months later after a string of controversial on-air remarks. He attacked a woman who had accused Alabama U.S. Senate candidate Roy Moore of molesting her as a child, praised Trump for denigrating Sen. Elizabeth Warren as “Pocahontas,” and described some of his CNN co-panelists as “rabid feminists” and “Black racists.”

Unbowed, Martin went on to make more than 150 appearances on the Russia Today TV channel and Sputnik radio, both Russian state-owned media outlets, first reported by The Washington Post. On RT and Sputnik, Martin railed against the “Russia hoax,” criticized the DOJ investigation led by special counsel Robert Mueller and questioned American support for Ukraine after Russia’s invasion by saying the U.S. was “wasting money in Kiev for Zelensky and his corrupt guys.” The State Department would later say RT and Sputnik were “critical elements in Russia’s disinformation and propaganda ecosystem.” The Treasury Department sanctioned RT employees in 2024. The DOJ indicted two RT employees for conspiracy to commit money laundering and conspiracy to fail to register as foreign agents.

Martin’s flair for fealty set him apart even from fellow Trump supporters. He cheered the Maine Republican Party for considering whether to censure Sen. Susan Collins for her vote to convict Trump during the second impeachment trial. He singled out Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska in a radio segment titled “America Needs to Go on a RINO Hunt.” He accused Sen. John Cornyn of going “soft” on gun rights after Cornyn endorsed a bipartisan gun-safety law after the Uvalde, Texas, mass shooting that left 19 children and two teachers dead.

On Jan. 6, 2021, Martin joined the throngs of Trump supporters who marched in protest of the 2020 election outcome. He compared the scene that day to a Mardi Gras celebration and later said the prosecution of Jan. 6 defendants was “an op” orchestrated by former Rep. Liz Cheney and law enforcement agencies to “damage Trump and Trumpism.”

During an appearance on Russia Today, Martin said then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi “weaponized” Congress’ response to the Jan. 6 riots by ramping up security on Capitol Hill, comparing her to the Nazis. “Not since the Reichstag fire that was engineered by the Nazis have we seen behavior like what Nancy Pelosi did,” he said.

As an attorney, he represented Jan. 6 defendants, helped raise money for their families and championed their cause. Last summer, Martin gave an award to a convicted Jan. 6 rioter named Timothy Hale-Cusanelli. According to court records, Hale-Cusanelli held “long-standing white supremacist and Nazi beliefs,” wore a “Hitler mustache” and allegedly told his co-workers that “Hitler should have finished the job.” (In court, Hale’s attorney said his client “makes no excuses for his derogatory language,” but the government’s description of him was “simply misleading.”)

After hugging and thanking Hale-Cusanelli at the ceremony, Martin told the audience that one of his goals was “to make sure that the world — and especially America — hears more from Tim Hale, because he’s extraordinary.”

In his three months as interim U.S. attorney for D.C., Martin has used his position to issue a series of threats. He’s vowed not to hire anyone affiliated with Georgetown Law unless the school drops any DEI policies. He vowed to Musk that he would “pursue any and all legal action against anyone who impedes your work or threatens your people.” He publicly told former special counsel Jack Smith and Smith’s lawyers to “[s]ave your receipts.” And in another open letter addressed to Musk and Musk’s deputy, Martin wrote that “if people are discovered to have broken the law or even acted simply unethically, we will investigate them and we will chase them to the end of the Earth to hold them accountable.”

More often than not, Martin’s threats have gone nowhere.

A month into the job, he announced “Operation Whirlwind,” an initiative to “hold accountable those who threaten” public officials, whether they’re DOGE workers or judges. One of the “most abhorrent examples” of such threats, he said, were Sen. Chuck Schumer’s 2020 remarks that conservative Supreme Court justices had “released the whirlwind” and would “pay the price” if they weakened abortion rights.

Even though Schumer walked back his incendiary comments the next day, Martin said he was investigating Schumer’s nearly 5-year-old remarks as part of Operation Whirlwind. Despite Martin’s bravado, the investigation went nowhere. No grand jury investigation was opened. No charges were filed. That the probe fizzled out came as little surprise. Legal experts said Schumer’s remarks, while ill advised, fell well short of criminal conduct.

In another instance, when one of Martin’s top deputies refused to open a criminal investigation into clean-energy grants issued by the Biden administration, Martin demanded the deputy’s resignation and advanced the investigation himself. When a subpoena arrived at one of the targeted environmental groups, Martin’s was the only name on it, according to documents obtained by ProPublica.

Kevin Flynn, a former federal prosecutor who served in the D.C. U.S. attorney’s office for 35 years, told ProPublica that he did not know of a single case in which the U.S. attorney was the sole authorizing official on a grand jury subpoena. Flynn said he could think of only two reasons why this could happen: The matter was of “such extraordinary sensitivity” that the office’s leader took exclusive control over it, or no other supervisor or line prosecutor was willing to sign off on the subpoena “out of concern that it wasn’t legally or ethically appropriate.”

And when the dispute between the environmental groups and the Justice Department reached a courtroom, federal Judge Tanya Chutkan asked a DOJ lawyer defending the administration’s actions for any evidence of possible crimes or violations — evidence, in other words, that could have justified the probe initiated by Martin. The DOJ lawyer said he had none. “You can’t even tell me what the evidence of malfeasance is,” Chutkan said. “There are still rules that even the government has to follow, last I checked.”

Martin’s tenure has caused so much consternation that in early April, Sen. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., put a hold on Martin’s nomination. Typically, the Senate Judiciary Committee approves U.S. attorney picks by voice vote without a hearing. But in Martin’s case, all 10 Democrats on the committee have asked for a public hearing to debate the nomination, calling Martin “a nominee whose objectionable record merits heightened scrutiny by this Committee.”

Even the process of submitting the requisite paperwork for Senate confirmation has tripped him up. According to documents obtained by ProPublica, he has sent the Judiciary Committee three supplemental letters that correct omissions about his background. In an earlier submission, Martin did not disclose any of his appearances on Russian state-owned media. But just before The Washington Post reported that Martin had, in fact, made more than 150 such appearances, he sent yet another letter correcting his previous statements.

“I regret the errors and apologize for any inconvenience,” he wrote.

Sharon Lerner contributed reporting.

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Wisconsin judge’s arrest blasted by Democrats who previously claimed ‘no one is above the law’ in Trump cases

Several Democrats who have argued that "no one is above the law" in President Donald Trump’s cases are now condemning the arrest of Wisconsin Judge Hannah Dugan, warning it could threaten the rule of law.

"This is not normal," Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., tweeted of Dugan’s arrest by the FBI on proceeding obstruction charges for allegedly shielding an indicted Mexican migrant from ICE agents. 

"The administration's arrest of a sitting judge in Wisconsin is a drastic move that threatens the rule of law," Klobuchar added, saying it's a "grave step and undermines our system of checks and balances."

During Trump’s 2019 impeachment, Klobuchar said his first impeachment case marked a "somber day for our country."

FBI ARRESTS JUDGE, ALLEGING SHE OBSTRUCTED ARREST OF ILLEGAL ALIEN

"In America, no one is above the law, and the American people deserve to hear evidence and witness testimony during a full and fair trial in the Senate. If the president has any facts to present in his defense to the articles of impeachment, we should hear them," she said.

After the 2022 FBI raid on Mar-a-Lago, Klobuchar said, "The law is king, and the former president isn't."

Sen. Tina Smith, D-Minn., also condemned Dugan’s arrest, saying, "If [FBI Director] Kash Patel and Donald Trump don’t like a judge, they think they can arrest them.

"This is stunning — we must stand up to this blatant power grab. Republicans: How is this not a red line for you?"

AG PAM BONDI OUTRAGED AT WISCONSIN JUDGE ARRESTED FOR OBSTRUCTING ARREST OF ILLEGAL IMMIGRANT

Commenting in 2020 on her vote to remove Trump from office over abuse of power allegations, Smith said she took her constitutional oath seriously and that "to condone corrupt behavior such as this undermines the core value that we stand for as a nation -- that no one is above the law, including and most especially our president."

Smith said she pored over presentations and evidence to reach that conclusion.

Rep. Gwen Moore, D-Wis., who represents Dugan’s county, lambasted the White House, saying its "willingness to weaponize federal law enforcement is shocking and this arrest has all the hallmarks of overreach."

"I will be following this case closely and facts will come out. However, I am very alarmed at the increasingly lawless actions of the Trump administration, and in particular ICE, who have been defying courts and acting with disregard for the Constitution."

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Rep. Ro Khanna, D-Calif., commented on an apparently deleted tweet from Patel, writing on X, "Donald Trump and JD Vance are arresting judges now. Deleting the tweet won't undo the constitutional crisis you have just thrust us into."

In a 2023 interview with radio host Hugh Hewitt, Khanna said of the Trump impeachment, "You can't just say, 'OK, because someone was president or someone is a candidate, that you're above the law.' Everyone is under the law, and that allegations, the evidence needs to be pursued."

When reached for comment by Fox News Digital, Khanna said of the contrast that Trump has "waged war on the judiciary" and that there is no public evidence yet regarding Dugan, but "it is deeply concerning given the administration’s attacks on the courts."

"Even Chief Justice Roberts has rebuked Trump’s conduct toward the judiciary," Khanna added.

Rep. Mark Pocan, D-Wis., said norms were being violated on the immigration and legal fronts for Dugan’s arrest.

In a statement obtained by Fox News Digital, Pocan laid out the differences he sees between the Dugan and Trump cases: "Judge Dugan’s arrest is outrageous and a fear tactic to our independent judiciary. Trump has always thought he was above the law, but now he’s enabling his goons to push that limit as far as it can go. His reckless deportations and flaunting of the Constitution will fail," Pocan said.

"This is stuff I expect from Third World countries," he told Axios.

In a December 2019 statement after his vote in favor of impeachment, Pocan said Trump was "never held accountable for his actions" over his 70-plus years of life.

"Today, Democrats sent a clear signal to this president and all future presidents: No one is above the law."

Fox News Digital reached out to the offices of Klobuchar and Smith for comment.

Senator joins group of far-left lawmakers who think Trump has — again — committed impeachable offenses

Sen. John Ossoff of Georgia has become the latest Democrat in Congress to signal that President Donald Trump deserves to be impeached, even though he has only been in the White House this term for less than 100 days. 

During a town hall Friday in Cobb County, Georgia, Ossoff took questions from the audience, including from a fired-up local mother who questioned Ossoff about why there has not been a more concerted effort to impeach Trump. 

"Why are there no calls for impeachment?" Ossoff was asked. "Do something more!"

‘BIDEN EFFECT’ HITS THE SENATE: WAVE OF RETIREMENTS CLEARS PATH FOR YOUNGER DEMS

Ossoff told the woman at the top of his response that "there is no doubt" Trump has exceeded the standard for impeachment.

"I saw just 48 hours ago, [Trump] is granting audiences to people who buy his meme coin," Ossoff said. "There is no question that that rises to the level of an impeachable offense. And the reality is that that's just one of many [examples] — defying a federal court order, for example. So, I agree with you."

Ossoff's remarks make him the latest Democratic lawmaker in Congress who has either explicitly called for Trump's impeachment or signaled their willingness to support such a move just 100 days into his presidency. While most Democrats have been willing to publicly admit the country is facing a constitutional crisis under Trump, most of them have refrained from going so far as to use the "I" word. 

DEMS FUME OVER ‘DUE PROCESS’ FOR ABREGO GARCIA DESPITE LONG HISTORY OF PARTY BUCKING THE LEGAL PRINCIPLE

Some though, such as progressive Sen. Al Green, D-Texas, have not shied away from supporting calls for impeachment. He was the first congressional lawmaker to call for it just weeks into the president's second term. Green's calls have been supported by other Democrats, such as Reps. Suzanne Bonamici and Maxine Dexter of Oregon; Sam Liccardo and Maxine Waters of California; Ilhan Omar of Minnesota; Shri Thanedar of Michigan; and Hank Johnson of Georgia, all of whom have gone publicly on the record regarding their support, according to NBC News. 

"Right now, it's 218 to 215, so if you can find me two Republicans, I'll go to work tomorrow," Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., who led impeachment efforts against Trump during his first term, told a reporter when asked about the matter.

Trent England, a presidential elections expert and founder of the nonprofit Save Our States, bashed Democratic lawmakers for "claiming to be all about democracy," but when they don't get what they want, "suddenly democracy is not what they're all about."

"It really undercuts Democrats' message about elections when as soon as they get an election result they don't like, they're out challenging it through impeachment. Especially when Democrats claimed after 2016 that part of their issue with Trump was that he only won the Electoral College," England added. "Well, now he's won a resounding popular vote, in addition to winning the Electoral College. And, yet, they're still out there trying to impeach him at the very beginning of his administration."

REPORTER'S NOTEBOOK: IMPEACHAPALOOZA IS HERE TO STAY

England also opined that the calls for impeachment were an easy way for Democrats to help boost their fundraising efforts. 

"Efforts like this show how a lot of members of Congress are really operating as personal fundraising machines, as opposed to legislators," England said. "They're not trying to get things done. They know that using platforms like Act Blue, they can fly the impeachment flag and raise a lot of money from left-wing donors without ever believing that any of this is going to have any effect."

The first-term Democratic senator is facing re-election later this year, as his term ends early next year. Ossoff's office declined to comment for this story. 

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In a statement to Fox News Digital, National Republican Senatorial Committee Chairman Tim Scott said Ossoff's push for impeachment illustrates "the desperation of his re-election campaign." 

"Not even 100 days into President Donald J. Trump's terms, and Ossoff is already pushing impeachment," Scott said. "His obsession makes clear just how out of touch he is with Georgia voters. The desperation in his re-election campaign is already showing."

Here’s how Democrats can take back the House

Democrats face hard math in retaking the Senate. But in the House, it’s another story.

Democrats hold 213 House seats to Republicans’ 220, with two vacancies in safely Democratic districts that will be filled through special elections later this year. If all goes as expected, Democrats will have 215 seats, three shy of a majority in the chamber.

Three also happens to be the exact number of Republican-held districts that Democrat Kamala Harris won in the 2024 presidential election, according to a Daily Kos analysis of data from The Downballot, the election-tracking site formerly known as Daily Kos Elections. This shows a promising path for Democrats to retake the House in next year’s midterm elections. 

Though Harris won two of those districts—New York’s 17th and Pennsylvania’s 1st—by less than 1 percentage point, she was also the first Democratic presidential candidate in 20 years to lose the popular vote. In fact, according to The Downballot, President Joe Biden pretty handily won both districts in the 2020 election, taking Pennsylvania’s 1st by 4.6 points and New York’s 17th by a whopping 10.1 points.

That said, because Republicans still won those seats last year, they are by no means a sure flip for Democrats in 2026. The party will also have to defend Democratic-held seats in 13 districts that President Donald Trump won last year, four of which he won by more than 5 points—a ticket-splitting feat that Harris didn’t manage to pull off anywhere.

But there was one feat that Democrats did manage last year: They picked up two House seats on net, despite Harris’ shoddy performance at the top of the ticket. Better yet, they are very likely to improve in 2026.

How do we know that? Historically, the party not in the White House picks up seats in a midterm. In only two midterm elections since 1946 has a president’s party gained House seats: 1998 and 2002. Both midterms were rocked by major news events: one by Republicans’ overreach in their impeachment of President Bill Clinton, and the other by the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks under President George W. Bush. 

Excluding those two midterms, the worst result since 1946 for the party not in the White House was a gain of just four House seats, according to 538. And flipping four seats next year would put Democrats back in the majority.

In all likelihood, Democrats will flip more than four seats. The Trump administration has been chaotic and destructive, leading to mass protests and GOP lawmakers getting viciously booed during their rare town halls

The Democratic Party has also become very good at overperforming in low-turnout elections. In 2025 special elections so far, Democrats have beaten Harris’ 2024 margin in those seats by an average of 11 points, according to data from The Downballot.

Democrats are unlikely to outperform Harris by 11 points in every House district in the 2026 midterms, which will have higher turnout than these special elections. But if they somehow managed it, Democrats would flip 30 seats.

The last time Trump faced a midterm, in 2018, Democrats flipped 40 seats on net. While there are many reasons why the 2018 and 2026 midterms will be different—for one, district maps were redrawn between those elections—Democrats don’t need to pick up an additional 40 seats. Or even 30.

They need three.

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