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Was There Anything I Could Do?
The rule of law is thwarted but the opposition is asleep at the switch
mister mix
March 10, 2025
This happened:
NEW YORK (AP) — Federal immigration authorities arrested a Palestinian activist Saturday who played a prominent role in Columbia University’s protests against Israel, a significant escalation in the Trump administration’s pledge to detain and deport student activists.
Mahmoud Khalil, a graduate student at Columbia until this past December, was inside his university-owned apartment Saturday night when several Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents entered and took him into custody, his attorney, Amy Greer, told The Associated Press.
Greer said she spoke by phone with one of the ICE agents during the arrest, who said they were acting on State Department orders to revoke Khalil’s student visa. Informed by the attorney that Khalil was in the United States as a permanent resident with a green card, the agent said they were revoking that instead, according to the lawyer.
Nobody, including his 8-month-pregnant wife knows where he is.
I’m not a lawyer, but there’s a thing called “due process,” which I believe Khalil was denied.
So we have yet another breakdown in the rule of law, and we may have a breakdown in the opposition. Roll Call thinks that Republicans will be able to pass the continuing resolution without any Democratic votes, probably because Trump has endorsed it. Part of the issue is that Dems have two guaranteed absences, which gives Pastor Mike a little more breathing room: Raul Grijalva, who is being treated for lung cancer and hasn’t voted all year, and Sylvester Turner, who died the day after Trump’s address to Congress. Turner replaced Shelia Jackson-Lee, who died of pancreatic cancer last year. Turner had been treated for bone cancer in 2022.
If Roll Call is right, then it’s up to the Senate. But apparently, Senate Democrats aren’t ready to vote against the CR — their votes are needed because 60 yea votes are required for the CR to pass. Josh Marshall:
[…] Republicans are saying: vote for it or a shutdown is on you. Democrats are always too willing to think what the GOP says goes. But if you’re going into this fight you have to have laid the groundwork for it. If you won’t provide the votes what are you demanding exactly? What’s necessary to get the votes to open it back up? I hear vague references to the “power of the purse”? I don’t think that’s going to cut it. I think you need to say, Elon’s got to go. He’s unpopular. Everyone understands what that means since they hear about him every day. But they just haven’t been making that case. And without that case it’s probably not sustainable politically. Of course, you might not lay that groundwork if you weren’t planning to go to the mat over it anyway.
So, the one good opportunity for leverage, to try to claw back a little bit of the rule of law, might not happen because apparently enough Democrats in the Senate aren’t willing to leverage a government shutdown to get something they want. Do I need to say that if the tables were turned, the Republicans would leverage the shit out of that vote?
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