by
Chip
Somodevilla/Getty
Images)
Attorney
General
Pam
Bondi
is
like
every
prior
Trump
AG
rolled
into
one.
She’s
got
Bill
Barr’s
charm,
Jeff
Sessions’s
cheerful
ignorance
of
the
law,
and
Matthew
“Mongo”
Whittaker’s
dedication
to
physical
fitness.
As
for
integrity,
well
…
she’s
in
a
league
of
her
own.
Bondi
has
steered
the
Justice
Department
into
a
couple
of
trollsuits
against
Illinois
and
New
York
over
the
blue
states’
refusal
to
carry
out
federal
immigration
regulations.
Or
as
she
put
it
when
she
announced
the
suit
against
New
York,
the
DOJ
was
“charging”
Governor
Kathy
Hochul
and
New
York
Attorney
General
Letitia
James
with
violating
federal
immigration
law.
“We
did
it
to
Illinois,
strike
one.
Strike
two
is
New
York.
And
if
you
are
a
state
not
complying
with
federal
law,
you’re
next.
Get
ready,”
she
snorted.
With
respect
to
Illinois,
Bondi
is
GRRRR
SO
MAD
about
state
and
local
ordinances
barring
law
enforcement
from
holding
immigrants
on
civil
detainer
warrants
and
from
expending
state
and
municipal
resources
to
detain
immigrants
at
the
request
of
the
feds
absent
a
criminal
warrant.
But,
as
the
Illinois
defendants
pointed
out
in
their
motions
to
dismiss
filed
yesterday,
it
is
black
letter
law
that
states
do
not
have
to
support
federal
law
enforcement.
Indeed,
some
of
those
black
letters
were
written
in
prior
challenges
to
the
very
statutes
at
issue
here.
For
instance,
in
2017,
two
conservative
counties
(McHenry
and
Kankakee)
challenged
Illinois’s
ban
on
local
governments
contracting
with
federal
immigration
officials
to
hold
immigration
detainees.
A
three-judge
panel
from
the
Seventh
Circuit,
including
two
Trump
appointees,
rejected
the
government’s
preemption
and
intergovernmental
immunity
claims
and
tossed
the
case
on
Tenth
Amendment
grounds.
As
the
state
notes
in
its
motion
to
dismiss,
Illinois
law
hasn’t
changed
since
then.
Nor
has
Congress
modified
8
U.S.C.
§
1373
and
§
1644,
the
statutes
relied
on
here
by
the
DOJ,
much
less
abolished
the
Tenth
Amendment:
The
federal
government
has
failed
to
identify
any
“valid
statute
enacted
by
Congress”
reflecting
a
“clear
and
manifest
purpose”
to
conscript
Illinois
into
assisting
with
federal
immigration
enforcement.
Yes,
the
federal
executive
has
changed.
But
there
has
been
no
intervening
change
in
federal
law
that
disturbs
Illinois’s
sovereign
choice
to
opt
out
of
assisting
in
federal
immigration
enforcement.
And
yes,
Illinois’s
choice
may
“frustrate”
implementation
of
“[f]ederal
schemes,”
like
the
current
federal
executive’s
avowed
commitment
to
conduct
the
largest
mass
deportation
in
American
history.
But
this
frustration
is
not
obstacle
preemption
when
the
Tenth
Amendment
protects
Illinois’s
sovereign
right
not
to
cooperate
in
the
President’s
schemes.
Bondi’s
solution
to
this
problem
is
to
whine
in
a
generalized
way
that
states
are
“obstructing”
federal
law
by
refusing
to
enforce
it
themselves.
Or
perhaps
that
they
are
discriminating
against
the
federal
government
under
the
intergovernmental
immunity
doctrine.
But,
as
Cook
County
points
out
in
its
motion
to
dismiss,
“any
contention
that
the
County
Ordinance
runs
afoul
of
that
doctrine
is
frivolous,
having
been
foreclosed
by
binding
Seventh
Circuit
precedent
the
United
States
simply
ignores.”
All
the
defendants
have
asked
for
a
dismissal
with
prejudice.
The
case
is
before
US
District
Judge
Lindsey
Jenkins,
a
Biden
appointee.
So
when
she
inevitably
yeets
this
dumb
turkey
into
the
sun,
Bondi
can
try
to
save
face
by
claiming
it
doesn’t
count
because
FAKE
NEWS
LIBERALS
…
at
least
until
the
Seventh
Circuit
weighs
in.
But
by
then,
she’ll
have
moved
on
to
arresting
California
for
failure
to
issue
free
parking
permits
to
ICE
or
some
such
idiocy.
US
v.
Illinois
[Docket
via
Court
Listener]
Liz
Dye lives
in
Baltimore
where
she
produces
the
Law
and
Chaos substack and podcast.