MAGA bits: Weaponizing the rule of law; Christian greed; Toons;

MAGA elites are now attacking legal tactics they supported when Obama and Biden were in office. A LA Times article discusses a changing Republican stance on judicial practices, particularly nationwide injunctions and judge-shopping. MAGA authoritarians supported these legal actions when they were used to block policies under Biden and Obama. MAGA judges issued nationwide injunctions to halt Biden's student debt relief program and challenged long-standing progressive policies like the Affordable Care Act. But now that these practices now being used against Trump-era policies, MAGA elites flip-flopped, calling them unconstitutional. MAGA elites now advocate for laws to prohibit legal actions that can be used to against illegal activities by djt and MAGA elites.  

MAGA elites are targeting nationwide injunctions, which allow federal judges to extend decisions beyond specific plaintiffs, effectively blocking policies nationwide. MAGA elites previously celebrated this but now criticize it as undermining policymaking when applied against Trump policies. Also targeted is the practice of judge- or forum-shopping. Judge shopping involves filing cases in jurisdictions likely to yield favorable rulings. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton did this during Biden's term by targeting single-judge divisions with high probabilities of drawing Trump judges. Elite MAGA authoritarians were silent on this issue when it benefited their agenda but now they whine that is "sleazy" when Democrats use the same tactics.

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TNR reports that the USSC looks set to give Christianity and other religions more tax breaks than they already have:

The Supreme Court appears likely to side with a group of Catholic charities over an exemption from Wisconsin’s unemployment insurance program, but the justices did not signal in oral argument on Monday how broad its potential decision would be.

The state Labor and Industry Review Commission denied the exemptions, arguing that the group’s activities did not serve a “primarily religious” purpose under the state law in question. Catholic Charities and its allies sued in state court, arguing that the agency’s denial of the exemption violated the First Amendment’s religion clauses.

Wisconsin’s religious-purpose exemption uses identical language to the Federal Unemployment Tax Act, which shapes unemployment insurance programs nationwide. Forty-six other states have adopted that common statutory language either wholesale or in large part. As a result, if the Supreme Court sides with Catholic Charities on constitutional grounds, it could [absolutely will!] have much broader implications for unemployment benefit programs outside of Wisconsin.

The Trump administration filed a friend-of-the-court brief that argued in favor of resolving the case in Catholic Charities’ favor on statutory grounds and urged the justices to avoid “serious constitutional questions.”

Oh Dog forbid the USSC getting involved in “serious constitutional questions.” Goodness gracious, we can’t have the final arbiter of what is constitutional dealing with serious constitutional questions, could we?  /s

That is a matter of djt telling the USSC to stop being the USSC. Un-fracking believable. 

For context, the charity here does secular work helping people with physical and mental disabilities. Its work is not religious, but it is a “Catholic Charity.” Now, the charity claims it is religious and argues religion to avoid paying unemployment insurance. Catholic Charities contends that the state is improperly judging what constitutes "religious" activity and discriminating against organizations with complex structures that separate governance from direct church oversight. In essence, our completely broken USSC** is set to expand the definition of religious freedom to something so broad that big non-profits can claim they are religious organizations and also exempt from paying unemployment taxes and all other kinds of taxes religion is now exempt from.

** Broken because it appears that at least one of the three Democratic Party judges is sympathetic to this argument for tax relief. Un-fracking believable.

The important thing: A decision in favor of Catholic Charity would lower the threshold for proving religious purpose, allowing organizations to claim exemptions based on their mission statements or motivations rather than overt religious practices like proselytizing. That blurs the line between secular and religious activities, enabling nonprofits—even those loosely affiliated with faith—to argue their work is inherently religious and thus tax exempt.

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