Free Republic

Some Senate Democrats are urging President Joe Biden to “use” the 14th Amendment to raise the debt limit by executive decree. For example, Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) stated:“The 14th Amendment is not anyone’s first choice. The first choice is that the Republicans raise the debt ceiling because the United States government never, ever, ever, ever defaults on its legal obligations. But if Kevin McCarthy is going to push the United States over a cliff, then it becomes the president’s responsibility to find an alternative path.”As a former law professor and a senator for more than 10 years, Warren almost certainly knows...

Senator Ed Markey (D-MA) said Thursday on MSNBC’s “Katy Tur Reports” that President Joe Biden should use the 14th Amendment to address the debt ceiling if Republicans are not reasonable. Markey said, “I would ask when you put up that poll that you also put up the identical poll on tax breaks for millionaires and billionaires and trillions of dollars that have been given to them over the last five years.”

Ben Werschkul·Washington Correspondent The support on Capitol Hill for what was once a fringe legal theory is growing by the hour as the debt ceiling talks head into their final days. On Thursday, a group of of 11 progressive senators led by Sens. Tina Smith (D-MN), Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) and Bernie Sanders (I-VT) released a new letter to President Biden calling on him to prepare to cancel the debt ceiling by invoking the 14th amendment. The increased adoption of an idea that could roil markets is a reflection of growing Democratic anxieties that the White House could be preparing for...

Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press” that President Joe Biden can not invoke the 14th Amendment to address the debt ceiling under the current circumstances. Anchor Chuck Todd said, “Does the 14th Amendment fall under the category of extraordinary measures?”

Earlier this month, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen warned the U.S. could run out of money to pay its bills by June 1 if Congress does…

Representative James Clyburn (D-SC) said Tuesday on MSNBC’s “José Díaz-Balart Reports” that President Joe Biden can invoke the 14th Amendment to end the debt ceiling stalemate if necessary. Clyburn said, “I don’t know how long it’s going to take. I think that we all recognize that Janet Yellen made it very clear to us that something needs to be done by June 1st. I think it will get done.” He continued, “What I am saying is I think we ought to stop playing chicken and recognize the realities. 51-49, Republicans in the House, 51-49, Democrats in the Senate. Whatever we...

On August 30, 2022, a three-judge panel in the Third Circuit Court of Appeals unanimously ruled the Pennsylvania government violated the Takings clause, the Second Amendment, and the Fourteenth Amendment when they refused to return a gun collection of the parents of a man who was convicted of murder. The parents never committed a crime. The state never used the parents’ gun collection as evidence. From a list of properties, I estimate 47 guns, accessories, computers, and other items valued at $40,000 or more were taken.The State refused to return the parents’ property under the rule of force: we have...

How intellectually impoverished is the argument that the 14th Amendment prevents Donald Trump from running for president? So much so, in fact, that a Barack Obama-appointed judge swiftly dismissed a lawsuit from a group arguing the former president shouldn’t be able to appear on the Florida primary ballot because of the events of Jan. 6, 2021. According to the Palm Beach Post, Judge Robin Rosenberg didn’t rule on whether the 14th Amendment could apply to Trump’s 2024 candidacy. “Instead, Rosenberg ruled that the plaintiffs, Boynton Beach attorney Lawrence Caplan and two others, lacked ‘standing’ to bring the challenge,” the outlet...

Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics (CREW) in Washington told former President Donald Trump on Thursday that if he tries to return to the White House or runs for any other political office in 2024, the D.C.-based watchdog will, using the 14th Amendment's anti-insurrectionist clause, attempt to disqualify him for fomenting last year's deadly right-wing riot at the U.S. Capitol. "By summoning a violent mob to disrupt the transition of presidential power... you made yourself ineligible to hold public office again." “Should you seek or secure any future elected or appointed government office including the presidency of the United States," CREW...

The three jurors who voted against the death penalty for Parkland killer Nikolas Cruz did so based on “mitigating circumstances” from Cruz’s life. They made the wrong call, but their rationale is superior to the reason many will agree with the sentence: a blanket opposition to the death penalty. Public support for capital punishment has slid over the last 30 years, remaining a majority opinion but barely so. Those who oppose death as a punishment often have kind, even noble intentions. Yet their well-meaning beliefs do not translate into justice or the common good. The death penalty is consistent with...

Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson argues the framers of the 14th Amendment adopted it "in a race-conscious way," a position some legal experts say is subject to debate. Jackson, the first black woman on the Supreme Court, began her first two days on the nine-member bench by speaking more than any other justices , in addition to a full four-minute statement in which she said the 14th Amendment used "race-conscious" remedies to make freedmen equal to white citizens. The issue at hand involved a challenge to Alabama 's 2021 congressional district map, which a lower court held was a...

For the liberal media elite, carrying a weapon is reserved for important reasons. You know: like for protecting politicians. It's not for ordinary folks wanting to be able to defend themselves. That was the clueless and condescending opinion expressed by Jonathan Capehart on his MSNBC show Sunday. Capehart was commenting on the Supreme Court's recent decision in the Bruen case, in which the Court found that the State of New York's requirements for obtaining a concealed carry permit were unconstitutionally restrictive. Under New York's regulations, applicants had to demonstrate "proper cause"—and wishing to protect themselves or their property was deemed...

An obscure portion of the 14th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution says that public officials cannot serve in any future federal, state, or military office if they engaged in “insurrection or rebellion.” Would that apply to people who participated in the Jan. 6 attack on Congress? Some legal experts say the clause could be used against former officeholders — up to and including former President Donald Trump — who supported the events of that day. In a notable test case, plaintiffs in North Carolina are seeking to apply the clause to GOP Rep. Madison Cawthorn, who spoke at the rally...

A group of North Carolina voters told state officials on Monday that they want Republican congressman Madison Cawthorn to be disqualified as a congressional candidate, citing his involvement in the 6 January attack on the Capitol. Cawthorn questioned the outcome of the presidential election during the “Save America Rally” before the Capitol riot later that day that resulted in five deaths. At the rally, Cawthorn made baseless claims that the election had been stolen from Donald Trump, and has been accused of firing up the crowd, many of whom went on to storm the Capitol. Lawyers filed the candidacy challenge...

Far-left Attorney Marc Elias was involved in the Steele dossier which was the garbage report created to slander candidate and then President Trump and tie him to Russia. They knew it was all a lie. Democrats, the FBI and US Intelligence agencies used the slanderous document to run a continuous coup against President Trump throughout his administration. (snip, following from Elias' Twatter post)) Marc E. Elias @marceelias My prediction for 2022: Before the midterm election, we will have a serious discussion about whether individual Republican House Members are disqualified by Section 3 of the 14th Amendment from serving in Congress.We...

A federal judge in New York has dismissed a lawsuit filed by a “Christian” wedding photographer who demanded that the state’s nondiscrimination law be overturned, lest she be forced to photograph same-sex weddings. The woman, Emilee Carpenter, of Elmira, filed suit earlier this year, claiming that New York’s nondiscrimination law violates her First Amendment rights to free speech and free exercise of religion, and her Fourteenth Amendment right to due process. Carpenter claims to believe that marriage is a union between one man and one woman, and that weddings are meant to be “inherently religious and solemn events.” As such,...

Voters should prepare to wear a mask at their polling places this spring and summer, according to the governor. “I think that if you refuse to wear a mask, we’re not letting you in, it’s that simple,” Gov. Phil Murphy said at Wednesday's state briefing. It's the same policy that was in place, without any reported issues, at a very light day of school board elections last week on April 20, in just six districts around the state. The governor was asked about whether mask wearing would be required at polling places and whether voters could be prohibited from entering...

Here’s the secret banks in Indiana don’t want Hoosiers to know. Big banks discriminate. They do it all the time and they’re fighting hard to make sure that doesn’t change. Banks have been openly discriminating against businesses they feel have fallen out of political favor. The firearm industry knows this all too well. This has been happening since the Obama administration, when then-U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder instituted Operation Choke Point. It was an illegal scheme contrived to use the muscle of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, which backs banks’ assets with taxpayer funds, to force banks to deny banking...

The Department of Justice is looking into whether federal charges can be brought against Seattle Mayor Jenny Durkan over her failure to crack down on a so-called “autonomous zone” controlled for weeks by rioters. Attorney General William Barr has tasked the DOJ’s civil rights division with investigating whether charges can be brought against Durkan, The New York Times reported on Wednesday evening citing two people familiar with the discussions. Barr has also asked federal prosecutors to consider charging rioters with sedition and insurrection against the United States government, according to The Wall Street Journal. Rioters took over several city blocks...

The English department at the University of Chicago believes that Black Lives Matter, and that the lives of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Tony McDade, and Rayshard Brooks matter, as do thousands of others named and unnamed who have been subject to police violence. As literary scholars, we attend to the histories, atmospheres, and scenes of anti-Black racism and racial violence in the United States and across the world. We are committed to the struggle of Black and Indigenous people, and all racialized and dispossessed people, against inequality and brutality. For the 2020-2021 graduate admissions cycle, the University of Chicago English...