Wednesday, January 22, 2025. Annette’s News Roundup.
Let’s keep score.
Day 1. A Beast entered the White House.
Day 1. Resistance began.
The first lawsuit against Trump took place minutes after he was sworn in.
Bravo: Public Citizen filed a lawsuit against Donald J. Trump just moments after he was once again sworn in as president of the United States. We need more of this energy
— Amazon Piss Jugs (@amazonpissjugs.bsky.social) 2025-01-20T20:22:13.952Z
Then quickly there were four lawsuits, all about the so-called Department of Government Efficiency and Musk.
Advocacy Groups File Four Lawsuits Against Musk-Led DOGE
Within minutes of Donald Trump’s inauguration as the 47th president of the United States, various advocacy groups filed four lawsuits related to the operations of the “Department of Government Efficiency,” also known as DOGE, a quasi-governmental initiative led by Elon Musk that advises the White House on potential budget cuts.
Three of the suits, filed in the United States District Court for District of Columbia, allege that the so-called DOGE violates federal transparency law established by the Federal Advisory Committee Act (FACA). The 1972 law requires a federal “advisory committee” to follow certain rules and procedures related to its establishment, staffing, and disclosure practices.
The three suits challenging DOGE’s activities under FACA each seek to shut down the Elon Musk-led panel until it complies with federal transparency rules.
One of the three FACA-related suits was brought by a coalition of public interest groups, including the American Public Health Association, VoteVets Action Fund, and Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington. The other cases were filed by National Security Counselors, a non-profit public interest law firm, and Public Citizen, a nonprofit consumer advocacy organization.
A fourth lawsuit, filed by the Center for Biological Diversity against the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), seeks to compel the disclosure of certain DOGE-related records under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). The complaint alleges that OMB has, to date, failed to disclose requested records concerning interactions between OMB employees and DOGE representatives during the presidential transition. The litigants request a court order enjoining OMB from withholding responsive records. (Lawfaremedia.org)
According to the Associated Press, 24.6 million TV viewers watched the Inauguration, smallest audience since 2013. (Thanks to Roundup consultant Linda Wharton for AP and other coverage.).
Day 2. Trump was in the White House.
Yes, the brown shirts he released from prison the night before were roaming the streets, but still the sun rose, and resistance continued.
Trump and Vance and their wives went to church and were greeted by a brave woman.
The Episcopal Bishop of DC confronts Trump during sermon at inaugural prayer service
During a prayer service at Washington's National Cathedral Tuesday, the Episcopal bishop of Washington directly confronted President Trump while he and Vice President J.D. Vance were seated in the front row.
"Let me make one final plea, Mr. President," Bishop Mariann Budde said in her 15-minute sermon. "Millions have put their trust in you. And as you told the nation yesterday, you have felt the providential hand of a loving God. In the name of our God, I ask you to have mercy upon the people in our country who are scared now," said Budde, as she appeared to look towards the president.
There are gay, lesbian and transgender children in Democratic, Republican, and independent families, some who fear for their lives."
This came just one day after Trump issued a slate of executive orders, including one which has a section dedicated to "recognizing that women are biologically distinct from men," one that declared a national emergency at the country's southern border and issued several others related to immigration, including one attempting to do away with birthright citizenship.
Budde challenged these orders and much of the rhetoric that has surrounded them.
"The people who pick our crops and clean our office buildings; who labor in poultry farms and meat packing plants; who wash the dishes after we eat in restaurants and work the night shifts in hospitals, they – they may not be citizens or have the proper documentation. But the vast majority of immigrants are not criminals. They pay taxes and are good neighbors," said Budde.
Budde has long criticized Trump, and made headlines for doing so in 2020 when Trump took a photo outside of a boarded up St. John's Epsicopal Church holding a Bible. Law enforcement had used chemical agents to disburse racial justice protesters, and Budde was outraged. The Washington Post reported at that time that Budde said, "Everything he has said and done is to inflame violence… We need moral leadership, and he's done everything to divide us."
After the service on Tuesday, Republican U.S. Representative Mike Collins from Georgia posted a video clip on X of Budde's sermon along with the text, "The person giving this sermon should be added to the deportation list."
Towards the end of her sermon Budde said, "I ask you to have mercy, Mr. President, on those in our communities whose children fear that their parents will be taken away. And that you help those who are fleeing war zones and persecution in their own lands to find compassion and welcome here. Our God teaches us that we are to be merciful to the stranger, for we were all once strangers in this land."
Asked about the service on Tuesday, Trump told White House reporters that he, "didn't think it was a good service."(NPR)
Watch Bishop Budde.👇
The rest of Trump’s 2nd Day didn’t go well either.
24 Democratic states and cities sue over Trump’s bid to end birthright citizenship
Two dozen Democratic-led states and cities are challenging President Donald Trump’s bid to end birthright citizenship in court, a major constitutional challenge to one of the White House’s signature policies.
The lawsuits allege that a Trump executive order signed Monday violates the 14th Amendment of the Constitution, which gives a constitutional right of citizenship to all children born in the United States.
Despite a President’s broad powers to set immigration policy, however, the Citizenship Stripping Order falls far outside the legal bounds of the President’s authority,” states a lawsuit from 18 states, Washington, DC, and San Francisco.
The case could end up becoming the first major Supreme Court showdown for Trump’s second-term agenda. The 18 states filed in a Massachusetts federal court, which means any appeal of a ruling from that court will come up through the First US Circuit Court of Appeals, where all the judges are Democratic appointees.
The Supreme Court has upheld birthright citizenship in the past and there is also a federal law passed by Congress, predating the 14th Amendment’s 1868 ratification, establishing that children born on US soil are entitled to citizenship.
“The president’s entitled to put forth a policy agenda that he sees fit,” New Jersey Democratic Attorney General Matthew Platkin, who is co-leading the new lawsuit, told CNN.
“When it comes to birthright citizenship – something that’s been part of the fabric of this nation for centuries, that’s been in the Constitution for 157 years since the Civil War, that’s been upheld by the Supreme Court twice – the president cannot, with a stroke of a pen, rewrite the Constitution and upend the rule of law,” he added.
Also Tuesday, the attorneys general of Washington, Arizona, Oregon and Illinois brought their own lawsuit on the west coast. It was filed at a federal court in Seattle that is within the 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals, a traditionally left-leaning court that has become less liberal in recent years.
Both suits are also seeking a preliminary order blocking the policy before the Trump administration can take steps to implement it. (CNN)
Worry less. Do more.
See you tomorrow. I can’t wait to see what we do next.
Can you?