I updated my post with new information from the updated article, and in the context of that I think you're pretty much right. It sounds like the judge basically said "you need permission to arrest someone in the middle of my hearing, go get it" and then didn't change anything about the process of their hearing while that permission was being obtained.
This was definitely not them being helpful, but I'm incredibly doubtful that they could be successfully prosecuted for this.
The fact the FBI participated in this arrest is chilling. ICE being a proto secret police seems to be perceived already. The FBI now? There’s question whether the ICE agents even had legal grounds to demand arrest regardless, whether they had a warrant, etc - and the facts established are pretty clearly not prosecutable. So this is pure intimidation, going after the judicial in what will likely be a flagrantly abusive way, yet doing it proudly and across the media - this is a shot across the bow telling judges at all levels they are next. And if there’s anyone that knows being arrested changes your life forever, it’s judges.
I am not alarmist or hyperbolic by nature, and I don’t say this lightly, but this is the next level and the escalation event that leads to the end game. The separation of powers is unraveling, and this is America’s Sulla moment where the republic cracks. The question remains did the anti federalists bake enough stability into the constitution to ensure our first Sulla doesn’t lead to Julius Caesar.
The accused is accused of violating federal law, so it's normal that a federal agency would make the arrest. FBI seems to make more sense than DEA or ATF, no?
It’s not that the agency is wrong; it’s that the agency would do it. This is the agency that since J Edgar Hoover has very carefully rebuilt its reputation and is very guarded in it. This act is entirely reminiscent of the political corruption of the FBI of old. That regression, that fast, is frightening.
ICE being shady is by many people accepted, the DEA, ATF even. But the FBI has built itself a pretty strong reputation of integrity and professionalism, and resistance to political pressure and corruption. In some ways I at least viewed it as a firewall in law enforcement against this sort of stuff.
ICE, ATF, and CBP has always been the house for the dregs of federal LEO. It is for the people that fail to get into anything else.
FBI is prestigious because they get the most qualified tyrants, who are smart enough to lie and deceive in ways that are airtight enough that those at ICE take the heat. The surprising thing here isn't the fact that they did it, but that they didn't do the normal way of digging or manufacturing something else to pin on the judge.
US Marshalls IIRC is also the hardest to get into. If I recall they have like one day a year they accept applications and they all (only certain # accepted) get filled within seconds. (I'm probably embellishing but not by much).
For most of its life the FBI has been a hand of the federal government to quell dissent, this new perspective on the FBI being professional and non-partisan is pretty new.
This might be the largest problem with the US government, most of what we used to take for granted isn't really enshrined in law anywhere, it was mostly a gentlemen's agreement that "you just don't do that, it's ungentlemanly" and not really law or anything enforceable.
The fact you can just fire the whole federal government (yes, i understand the probation thing) and there's *nothing* that blocks it is just completely bonkers to me. All you really needed was a bad actor that had no respect for the norms, because there's no real consequence to breaking them.
>The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
You can't just arrest someone for nothing. You need probable cause. The question is whether a judge going about their day, doing nothing illegal, is probable cause. It's very likely not.
> The fact the FBI participated in this arrest is chilling
Even more frightening is that there was a federal judge that was willing to sign off on an arrest warrant for a fellow jurist, based on what is clearly political showmanship (they didn't need to arrest her at all to prosecute this crime!).
There were a lot of Rubicons crossed today. This ends with opposition politicians in jail. Every time. And usually to some level of armed revolt around/preventing transfers of power.
There's one effective sentence, if gained, which avoids this. I'm ordinarily #NotAFan, and that's another Rubicon once crossed presents massive peril, but in cases of flagrant constitutional violation I'm increasingly open to arguments in favour.
If that sentence cannot be attained, options are even more parlous.
This is certainly not the first autocratic act of the FBI under Patel. They have been thoroughly compromised and lost integrity even before this arrest.
people think the Musk administration is dumb and incompetent, but this is incredibly clever. ICE is the prefect cover for a new unaccountable secret police.
anybody can be disappeared under the excuse of illegal immigration. if there's no due process, they can come for you and you have no recourse.
plenty of MAGAs are so ready to shout "but they're criminals" - and they still don't understand that it could be them next.
"All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws."
How is this being followed? Specifically,
"nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws."
This is what people are upset with, not your (loaded language) "violent immigrants"
This is the key is that the president presides over the execution of the law created by the legislature under the framework of the constitution as judged by the judicial. The president being elected by a vast majority l to do X isn’t license to achieve X under any method - let alone by a minority of the electorate. The presiding over the execution under the law is by constitutional construction an administrative role, and the political promises made to be elected are not justification to break the constitutional order of the republic. The promises made must be executed legally and constitutionally, and when the law and the constitution prohibits that execution, the president must break their promise to the electorate. That’s the order of things and it’s entirely intentional. I expect this from any elected president regardless of party, promises made, or any other details of the situation. Anyone who doesn’t see this is either a) not particularly committed to the American system of government, b) not particularly literate of the system, or more often than not likely both.
So, yeah, “Trump promised to do X so he’s doing it by any means necessary” doesn’t hold water. And it’s specifically shocking coming from people who have been howling about the “other sides” overreach. I just can’t understand if it’s just hypocrisy, if it’s naked ambition to overthrow the democracy and replace it with a single party system, blindness to the overreach - but it’s probably the most disturbing part of all of this. If the “others” did these things and that was a problem, why is it ok for your guy to do it too ?
The way I read it is that US citizens have a right to not be murdered or assaulted by people who enter the country illegally.
So it seems like a Judge would have an obligation to prevent someone accused of being in the country illegally and accused of a violent crime to not leave the courthouse and instead turn that person over to the federal authorities who are outside the court waiting for the proceedings to finish.
Being accused of a violent crime is not the same as being guilty of a crime. She has obligation to conduct her court in an orderly fashion that ensures due process and compliance. Police marching into proceedings of the court administering due process and trying to arrest people in front of the court without even providing a warrant violates all sorts of laws - including the fact the judge has say over the events in their court and the disposition of the accused during the session. This is crucial because if people who are at risk from arrest by federal authorities are routinely arrested when they appear before the court, people will stop appearing before the court. This means the administration of justice breaks down fundamentally and victims have no real opportunity to press their cases. If someone is a murderer or committed assault we should absolutely NOT deport them. We should send them to prison and punish them; then deport them. However this structure of ICE using the courts to make their burden of finding people easier breaks that system for the expediency of ICE, but our system isn’t built for the expediency of the police but for the expediency of justice.
I assume you can understand that the 'illegal' part is found as a result of the 'due process' part.
Otherwise, do you have any proof that you're not an illegal criminal? Is there any reason why I should not turn you in for crimes against the state and have you deported?
> On one hand I find the current administration's approach to deportations too heavy-handed, but on the other hand it seems almost necessary because of the level of obstruction at the judicial level compared to the Obama era
This is just "ends justifies the means" via hand waving. If you claim to have principles at least stand by them.
Not really. I want law and order to be upheld for the benefit of the broader society. If this can't happen due to systematic obstruction, then it's not a violation of my principles to be less critical of toeing a line I'd otherwise not like to see breached. If we all had hard lines drawn in the sand that never moved around, this wouldn't even be a conversation, because 15 years ago mass deportations were uncontroversial.
It would help to discuss this using the same terms. This is not different from the "due process" that others talk about. I would presume you don't think that due process is needlessly obstructive but you also seem to think this obstruction is needless. If I'm wrong, what am I wrong about? If I'm not wrong, why do you think this obstruction is needless?
The idea is that the justice system should work in a reasonable way so that victims and potential victim rights are protected.
For example, someone who allegedly beat their wife, has a right to a trial. But if activist judges make decisions that cause the trial to not take place for 10 years that is obstructive and the alleged victim doesn't get justice or protection from future assaults. So if that person is deported before the trial you could complain about lack of "due process" but you would be ignoring the rights of the victim.
In my understanding, the Obama administration expelled 2.5 million illegal immigrants under the same emergency powers now being invoked by the Trump administration and did bypass standards of "due process" being raised today to block deportations. If it's practically impossible to expel the illegal immigrants allowed in via open border policies over the previous term, that's dysfunctional and the standards should be relaxed.
This case is particularly egregious, as the judge personally helped a violent illegal immigrant evade law enforcement outside of her jurisdiction, which explains the arrest; but "systematic obstruction" refers to the injunctions being issued constantly to block executive actions, suggesting that the Trump administration's attempts to reverse open border policies are subjected to a much higher standard than Democrats were under Obama just 15 years prior when they correctly viewed illegal immigration as a problem.
> In my understanding the Obama administration expelled 2.5 million illegal immigrants under the same emergency powers now being invoked by the Trump administration
The last time the Alien Enemies Act was invoked was about two decades before Barack Obama was born.
> If it's practically impossible to reverse open border policies that let in a flood of illegal immigrants for almost 4 years
The US hasn't had anything like open borders policies for more than a century (more precisely, since the original national origin quota system was adopted in 1921.)
It's probably easier to discuss policy in this area if the premises are something resembling facts rather than partisan propaganda fictions.
"You can beat the rap but not the ride" is phrased like the judge actually did anything wrong. That seems very doubtful. This administration has shown they are not entitled to the presumption that they are acting in good faith.
I don't think it implies the judge did anything wrong. If you're arrested, you're going to experience whatever the cops want to do to you, regardless of whether they can convict you of it.
"You can beat the rap but not the ride" is an indictment of the cops, not the arrestee.
Imagine that someone is being charged with shoplifting and literally at trial. Some other law enforcement agency shows up to the trial and wants to arrest them for jaywalking.
It seems dysfunctional that the court would release them when they know a different law enforcement agency is literally in the building and wanting to arrest them.
Is this how it works when the FBI comes to a county court looking for someone the county cops have in custody?
Talk to the cops, not the judge who is in a proceeding? Go talk to the chief justice?
The idea that the judge did anything wrong here, based on the description given by the FBI themselves, is absolutely beyond the pale. There's zero reason for ICE agents to barge into court and demand to take somebody.
They didn't even leave one of the multiple agents in the courtroom to wait for the proceedings to end. To blame the judge at all in this requires making multiple logical and factual jumps that even the FBI did not put forward.
Edit: the Trump administration has also been attacking the Catholic Charities of Milwaukee, which this judge used to run:
> Before she was a judge, Dugan worked as a poverty attorney and executive director of Catholic Charities of the Archdiocese of Milwaukee.
It seems pretty clear that this is a highly politically motivated arrest that has zero justification.
Oh, I’m certainly not endorsing the arrest of the judge.
But wouldn’t the bailiff hold the person?
Is it typical for the FBI to lose a suspect in this manner? If so, this seems dysfunctional as if someone is in the court system then jurisdictions need to coordinate to just operate efficiently. It needs fixing so if ICE wants someone and a local courthouse has them in custody that ICE can pick them up.
But arresting judging is not going to help fix this bureaucratic silliness.
On what grounds would the bailiff hold the person?
I'm not sure why the courthouse should hold someone for ICE, it wasn't even necessary here they still got the person. All they had to do was stay where they were.
What federal warrant was there? I don't see any mention of one but the best that ICE could issue is not a judicial warrant and does not meet most of the requirements under the 4th amendment for detainment of a person.
Generally state and local law enforcement and courts have no legal requirement to enforce most federal arrest warrants. This is due to our dual sovereignty system. Of course they also can't actively interfere with federal law enforcement or lie to federal officers, but it doesn't seem like that's what happened in this incident.
> The US is not yet at the level of dysfunction where jurisdiction is settled with gunfire, but ICE seem to be determined to move that closer.
I don't think they intended to imply that the judge did anything wrong. Rather, they're saying that if you live in a world where the FBI or ICE or other official agencies can rough you up regardless of whether you're guilty or innocent in the eyes of the law, disputes are going to get settled with violence. After all, if the police are just going to make life difficult for you when you're arrested (the "ride") regardless of whether you're guilty in the eyes of the law (the "rap"), what's the logical response when you see a policeman coming to you? You shoot them. Don't let them arrest you because you're gonna have a bad time anyway.
Various marginalized communities (in both other countries and parts of the U.S.) already function that way - violence is an endemic part of how problems are solved. And going back to the threadstarter, that's why police departments have instituted sanctuary city policies. They don't want to get shot, and so they try to create an incentive structure where generally law-abiding (except for their immigration status) residents are unafraid to go to the police and help them catch actual criminals, rather than treating all police as the enemy.
That's certainly one interpretation of it, and a pretty reasonable one. However, I typically interpret it as "if the police think you've committed a crime, you are going to jail and almost nothing is going to stop that." In that incredibly famous "Don't Talk to the Police" talk[0], the attorney asks the former-cop-turned-law-student if he's every been convinced not to arrest someone based on what the suspect said. Not a single time in his entire law enforcement career.
This is also sort of the crux of the talk - if nothing you can say will convince the police not to arrest you, and things you do say can make things worse, your best bet is to just shut up and talk to an attorney if it gets to that point.
I think we're all agreeing here. "You can't beat the ride" means that if the cops want to arrest you, lock you up, etc., you can't do anything about it. Doesn't matter if you're guilty, innocent, or just a random bystander, you're not going to stop them from taking you and doing whatever they want in the process.
ICE should’ve been reformed after Trump 1, but at this point we’re going to need to unwind the whole organization when we get that man out of power. They’ve shown themselves to be pretty disinterested in laws, democracy, etc.
This is the reform of ICE. Trump was elected explicitly promising to do much more arrests and deportations of illegal immigrants, which is instantiated by having agents of the federal government do things like arrest and deport illegal immigrants on trial for unrelated crimes and actually charge citizens like this judge who interfere with this process with crimes, in order to induce them to not interfere with the arrest and deportation of illegal immigrants.
GP wasn't saying that one leads to another in a causal sense - simply that there are levels of dysfunction and this step is closer to the dysfunction of gunfire than the previous level.
The first time someone uses an impossible to trace drone to take out a law enforcement officer in the US is going to change everything.
The status quo has been that law enforcement can operate in an openly corrupt way with impunity because they can absolutely positively find someone who fights back.
But all the pieces are there for people to fight back with equal impunity. The technology is mature and deployed and has been tested in Ukraine and Syria for several years now.
It's just a matter of time before someone takes out a corrupt cop or ICE official and they get away away with it.
It will have a chilling effect on this kind of behaviour.
After Hinckley and especially after 9/11 I didn't think it would be possible for someone to successfully assassinate a US president with a firearm. I was shocked at how trivial it was for two people to almost pull that off last year with Trump. It was pure luck that it didn't happen, and I'm skeptical that the Secret Service has fundamentally changed how they protect people in a way that will permanently prevent even something as mundane as assassination by firearm let alone drones.
If they can't stop someone from killing the president with a gun how could they possible stop someone from using a swarm of these to do the same?[0]
And how can law enforcement protect themselves from something like this? Like honestly, what is a counter to this kind of attack that scales up to provide protection for the hundreds of thousands of law enforcement officers in America?
The only thing I can see scale to that level is reform of behaviour. If people respond to abuse of authority with these kinds of tools then the only viable method of prevention is to stop abusing authority.
> The only thing I can see scale to that level is reform of behaviour. If people respond to abuse of authority with these kinds of tools then the only viable method of prevention is to stop abusing authority.
I think that presumes that only "good" people will use drones (etc) that way.
You've got a bunch of people who you see as* "openly corrupt … with impunity", and a new tech that lets people attack with impunity. The result is that the same cops you're paying attention to* just change from wearing a badge to controlling a joystick.
* I'm phrasing it like this because while I know what 1312 means, I don't buy the "all" part.
It's not so much that I see subjectively see them as openly corrupt and operating with impunity, it's that there are objectively corrupt officials operating openly with impunity[0]. Every institution has corruption -- it's just a matter of degree.
I'm not suggesting that only 'good' people will use drones that way, far from it. What I'm suggesting is that a moderating force that hasn't existed for a long while due to asymmetry in police ability vs. the ability to resist them will return. The return of this moderating force will eliminate those few 'bad apples' eliminating their ability to abuse their authority, create fear in other law enforcement officers who would do those kinds of things or at least tolerate them, and would see some sort of law enforcement effort to crack down on corruption.
I'm sure you're right that corrupt police will find new and exciting ways to terrorize innocent people with technology as corrupt police will always continue to be corrupt but there will just be less of them because they'll be struck down by vigilantes and there will be more official efforts made to clamp down on them out of necessity.
You can probably model this like population dynamics with predator and prey populations in the wild.
The allegation is that the judge got upset that ICE was waiting outside the courtroom, sent the law enforcement officers to the chief judge's office, and then adjourned the hearing without notifying the prosecutor and snuck the man with a warrant out through a non-public door not normally used by defendants.
If those facts are accurate, it sure sounds like obstruction. Judges have to obey the law just like everyone else.
You are basically saying that everybody has to help ICE for free and on occasion do the job of ICE for free. That’s very totalitarian.
At the same time, it is settled law that a police officer cannot be held liable for not protecting citizens or not arresting someone. So you have more obligations than a police officer yet getting none of the pay or legal protections
Imagine you were a private tutor, in a private school on private land. ICE barges into the class trying to arrest one of the kids, but their paperwork is not in order so they promised to come back in 20 minutes
Do you imagine it will be possible to continue with the lesson as normal after such an event?
It is your discretion, when to start or stop a lesson, you work for yourself.
Do you imagine you should be obligated as a teacher to continue the lesson as if nothing has happened?
And if children want to leave to hold them by force?
why is it your problem That ICE isn’t competent and can’t get their shit right the first time?
ICE had a warrant. They were being courteous to the court by waiting until after the hearing instead of scooping the guy up on his way in.
And no, you don't have to help ICE, you just can't obstruct them. Sneaking a suspect out a back door while you stall the police is textbook, classic obstruction.
You're downvoted because ICE did not have a warrant.
ICE prints pieces of paper which they call "administrative warrants." Those were never reviewed by a judge and are internal ICE documents. An administrative warrant is not an actual warrant in any meaningful sense. It's a meaningful document (contrary to what you might read; it's not something one can just print on a laser printer and called it a day), but the "administrative" changes the meaning dramatically.
It seems like there were plenty of errors all around, in this situation, both on the judge's side and on ICE's side. However, I can't imagine any of those rose to the level of criminal behavior.
Sneaking a suspect out a back door while you stall the police is textbook, classic obstruction, but that changes quite a bit when it's a government employee operating within their scope of duty. Even if they make a mistake.
Schools don't want students scared to be there. Courtrooms want to count on cases not being settled by default because people are scared to show up. There is a valid, lawful reason for not permitting ICE to disrupt their government functions. That's doubly true when you can't count on ICE following the law and might ship someone off to El Salvador.
Asking an LLM, whether or not the judge broke laws is ambiguous. It is unambiguous that they showed poor judgment, and there should probably be consequences. However, what's not ambiguous is that the consequences should be through judicial oversight mechanisms, and not the FBI arresting the judge.
As a footnote, a judge not being able to rely on ICE following lawful orders significantly strengthens the government interest argument.
> incredibly doubtful that they could be successfully prosecuted
Strongly agree. But, as I’m sure we both know, some other less-politically-connected people will be a bit more afraid of getting arrested on ridiculous grounds because of this. So, mission accomplished.
> It sounds like the judge basically said "you need permission to arrest someone in the middle of my hearing, go get it" and then didn't change anything about the process of their hearing while that permission was being obtained.
This is untrue if the FBI affidavit is believed. The judge adjourned the case without speaking to the prosecuting attorney, which is a change to the process of the hearing regarding three counts of Battery-Domestic Abuse-Infliction of Physical Pain or Injury.
Later that morning, Attorney B realized that FloresRuiz’s case had never
been called and asked the court about it. Attorney B learned that
FloresRuiz’s case had been adjourned. This happened without Attorney B’s
knowledge or participation, even though Attorney B was present in court to
handle Flores-Ruiz’s case on behalf of the state, and even though victims
were present in the courtroom.
A Victim Witness Specialist (VWS) employed by the Milwaukee County District
Attorney’s Office was present in Courtroom 615 on April 18, 2025. The VWS
made contact with the victims in Flores-Ruiz’s criminal case, who were also
in court. The VWS was able to identify Flores-Ruiz based upon the victims’
reactions to his presence in court. The VWS observed Judge DUGAN gesture
towards Flores-Ruiz and an unknown Hispanic woman. [...] The VWS stated that
Judge DUGAN then exited through the jury door with Flores-Ruiz and the
Hispanic woman. The VWS was concerned because Flores-Ruiz’s case had not yet
been called, and the victims were waiting.
Successful prosecution isn't needed, the harassment and incurring high legal fees will discourage a dozen other judges who might be less than boot-licklingly helpful to the autocrat.
That's the reality less equal animals have had to live under since basically forever.
I have a hard time seeing it as a bad thing that state and local authorities would have to view the feds the way we have to view all three because it brings our incentives more in alignment.
But they were successfully arrested for it. The level of naïveté displayed in the HN comments here seems like willful ignorance of autocratic behavior.
Considering the ongoing due process deprivations this is the most concerning aspect to me. This is a sitting judge which is a significant escalation against the judiciary.
I was talking to someone earlier about how we in America, today, are not entitled to anything. Just in the last hundred years, people lived under secret police, dictators, state-controlled media, occupation, you name it. Hundreds of millions of people lived their whole life under the KGB or Stasi. Hundreds of millions live in autocracy even today. Some straight up live in a warzone as we speak. The idea that "we" can't be going through this is beyond entitled. Nothing is guaranteed to us. We are being shown how fragile this all is by the universe.
I expect America to be a beacon of light and I will fight for it. We all need to fight for it, especially the people who frequent this message board because we are among the most privileged and capable. It’s disappointing to me how many of our tech leaders forget what made them great in the first place and abuse us all in the pursuit of personal wealth.
For people who don't live in crazy town, this would be considered an oppressive action, arresting a judge for following procedure simply because it inconvenienced you.
Ah, but: freedom for "me". The libertarian HN posters are in favor of unlimited freedom for themselves and a police state for everyone else, especially non-Americans who dare to exist in America.
And yet many people calling themselves "Libertarian" signed themselves up for full-throated support of this fascist wannabe dictator. Their supposed interest in "freedom" doesn't extend past their own interest in oppressing others. The dynamic is especially pronounced in the surveillance industry, where digital authoritarianism gets a pass by appealing to the individual fantasy of creating your very own digital authoritarian startup.
I'm not saying it's good, for sure. But I don't think it's a sign that the push for autocratic authoritarianism is winning, either.
My optimistic take is that this is the sort of stupid overreach that works to turn other arms of government against the executive. The judiciary tends to be prickly about its prerogatives, and Trump's far from the point where he can just push stuff through without some cover.
The fact that HN is letting political posts stay on the front page after months of suppression shows that we are past the point of denying the authoritarian road we are on.
We've been heading this direction with hardly a pause, let alone step back, since the '70s.
Authoritarianism was winning for 50+ years. Nobody with power meaningfully tried to stop it, and voters didn't give enough of a shit to elect people who would. Where we're at now, is that it won.
> My optimistic take is that this is the sort of stupid overreach that works to turn other arms of government against the executive
This is your take given the blatant corruption and clear constitutional violations of this administration? Sure, let's hope that norms and vibes save us against an executive ignoring due process. Those other branches don't even have a way to enforce anything; the executive are the ones who arrest people.
The power of the executive is constrained, ultimately, by what people let them do. Including people inside the executive branch -- the people who're doing the arresting, transporting the prisoners, gunning down the protesters, etc. There's a lot of people involved who aren't committed to some authoritarian project, they're just... doing their job. They can be swayed by vibes, and general unpopularity of the regime.
The alternative to this view is either giving up or preparing for armed struggle. It's certainly possible that we could get there, but I don't think it's guaranteed yet.
(I acknowledge that this position is quite the blend of optimism and cynicism.)
Like this judge they're being ousted for the smallest pushback and are being replaced by project 2025 people, they even set up a system that you can apply to do exactly this. Trump (or Vance that is fully in with Thiel) will have full control over all agencies where all low level employees are on board with this Christo fascist takeover and the judiciary will be powerless.
Trump is calling for the Fed's Jerome Powell to be fired for not lying and saying everything will be fine as a result of tariffs. He pulled the security clearance of former CISA Director Chris Krebs, and anyone associated with him, for not lying about the result of his cyber security investigation of the 2020 election. He also pulled security clearances for political rivals including Biden, Harris, and Cheney as well as the Attorneys General involved in his civil case for fraud, which he lost and was ordered to pay $355 million.
This is blatant and unambiguous. "If you cross me, I will use executive power to destroy you". There is no optimistic view of this.
If it turns autocratic then there's no discussion to be had. Judge will waterboarded in Gitmo and Trump is de-facto king. We are no longer a nation of laws, the USA is renamed to Trumpopolis and we all have to get government mandated orange spray tans.
So assuming that doesn't happen, this is an action by a non-autocratic executive meant to have a chilling effect on low level judges who don't want to spend a few days in lockup just because. A knob that the executive is (mostly) allowed to turn but that is considered in poor taste if you wish to remain on good terms with the judiciary. The bar for arrest is really low and the courts decide if she committed a crime which she obviously didn't.
Autocracy comes in shades. Arresting judges who do things you don't like is yet another shade darker than we've seen so far... And things were already pretty dark.
You seem to be quite blasé about the possibility of autocracy. But yes, there is a risk that Trump becomes a dictator and we're no longer a nation of laws. It depends on how people like us react to consolidations of power like this, or the illegal impoundment, or cases like Kilmar Abrego Garcia's. The law only matters insofar as we and our representatives can enforce it.
I'm not so much blasé about it, more just nihilistic because I am the last person with any kind of power to stop it. I imagine most of HN falls
into this bucket of people with no real political power or influence. My realistic option if it happens is to move.
Protest! People power is the best way to resist autocracy especially in the early stages when resistance has a chance of success. Don’t ignore the fact that protests are happening. Musk is fleeing Washington because the backlash successfully tanked Tesla. That’s a big win right there!
Consider just how much more inconvenient/shitty/tragic it will be for you and the people you know if you are indeed forced to move, as compared to successfully pushing back right now.
I'm also making plans contingency plans to move, but I may not be able to. Individually, no, we don't have power, but if everyone actually protested, we would - the Ukrainian revolution[1] started out as just mass protests (Euromaidan), for instance. The problem is that not enough of us are doing it, maybe because too many people are apathetic, uninformed, or don't take the possibility of autocracy seriously.
This was definitely not them being helpful, but I'm incredibly doubtful that they could be successfully prosecuted for this.