Law and Chaos

DOCKET ALERTS:

Washington Post opinion writer Karen Attiah, who was fired for her remarks after the death of Charlie Kirk, has been reinstated to her job after winning in arbitration.

Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook responded to Trump's latest effort to fire her by pointing out that multiple members of Trump's own cabinet made the same paperwork error she did on a mortgage application, and no one is accusing them of fraud.

Judge David Hittner, an 87-year-old Reagan appointee, struck down Texas's drag ban, finding that it would necessarily criminalize a lot of performances that are not obscene … including ones by Dolly Parton.

DOOFUS OF THE DAY:

Mike Lindell, the crackpot pillow pumper, lost his bid to be the Republican gubernatorial candidate in his home state of Minnesota. And he missed the deadline to pay for a recount. But he's not letting that stop him! He's suing everyone in sight demanding they surrender proof that the entire thing was rigged.

MAIN SHOW:

Florida Republicans are embroiled in a massive corruption scandal involving $10 million in taxpayer dollars for children's prescriptions, laundered through First Lady Casey Desantis's charity, and used for partisan political purposes, including defeating a marijuana legalization referendum. CBS in Miami got the grand jury report.

Judge Fernando Rodriguez, Jr. rebuffed Minnesota's motion to force Texas Gov. Greg Abbott to extradite ICE agent Christian Castro. Castro shot a man in Minneapolis and then lied about it, including filing a false police report. He was indicted in Minnesota, but Texas refuses to sign an extradition warrant, and now Castro has been released from jail.

Judge Cooper held a hearing today on the future of the Kennedy Center, after the board voted again to chisel Trump's name into the marble on the front of the place.

Judge Indira Talwani ordered the state plaintiffs to file an amended complaint in their effort to block the Trump administration seizing control of mail-in voting pursuant to Trump's executive order. Last week, the Supreme Court's conservatives blocked Judge Talwani's prior injunction on the theory that the states hadn't yet been harmed when they filed their original complaint.

SUBSCRIBER BONUS:

Update on Tuesday's hearing in our FOIA suit to get the evidence in the DOJ's ethics complaint against Judge Boasberg.

The Washington Post Fired Me. I Fought—and Won My Job Back.

https://karenattiah.substack.com/p/the-washington-post-fired-me-i-foughtand

Extragrams LLC v. Paxton [TX drag ban]

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/67660604/extragrams-llc-v-paxton

Walz v. Abbott [S.D. Tex. extradition case; docket via CourtListener]

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/74662182/walz-v-abbott/

Trump v. California [Supreme Court order re: voter lists EO]

https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/25pdf/26a124_hgci.pdf

League of Women Voters v. Trump [D. Mass. voter list case before Judge Talwani; docket via CourtListener]

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/73133197/league-of-women-voters-of-massachusetts-v-trump/

Grand jury finds DeSantis administration "misappropriated" $10 million in taxpayer money to Hope Florida

https://www.cbsnews.com/miami/news/grand-jury-report-hope-florida/

Res Ipsa Media LLC v. DOJ

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/71236135/res-ipsa-media-llc-v-department-of-justice/

Show Links:

https://www.lawandchaospod.com/

BlueSky: @LawAndChaosPod

Threads: @LawAndChaosPod Twitter: @LawAndChaosPod

DESCRIPTION:

It's a special episode today. We'll spend the whole show diving into the debacle of eBay, a $50 billion company, launching a harassment campaign against a middle-aged couple in Massachusetts. Come for the corporate bigwigs sending live roaches by mail, stay for the national security kerfuffle. It's a wild story, and it even has a happy ending.

Steiner v. EBay

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/60073359/steiner-v-ebay-inc

US v. Baugh

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/18602070/united-states-v-baugh

Show Links:

https://www.lawandchaospod.com/

BlueSky: @LawAndChaosPod

Threads: @LawAndChaosPod Twitter: @LawAndChaosPod

DOCKET ALERTS:

US Attorney Jeanine Pirro wants to leave the door open to re-charging David Hearn for damaging the reflecting pool, although she concedes that literally everything she said in her original indictment was a lie.

Pirro is also doing her darnedest to keep a lady locked up for the high crime of spraypainting.

Judge Reed O'Connor is trying for a third time to allow manufacturers to sell ghost guns, no matter what the Supreme Court says.

We're still waiting on the Supreme Court to say whether Trump can keep building his ballroom, or will have to cease above-ground construction as lower courts have ruled.

MAIN SHOW:

FCC Chair Brendan Carr is trying to burn down ABC for crimes of woke. But after he demanded that the ten local affiliates owned by the network renew their licenses early — likely a prelude to putting them out of business — ABC's parent company Disney swung into action. They sued the agency for retaliation in violation of the First Amendment.

The DOJ's "8647" indictment of James Comey is circling the drain. The government filed its responses to various motions today, and they are … creative! They quote at length from Comey's novel and his appearance on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert.

In January, ICE agent Christian Castro shot Minnesota man Julio Cesar Sosa-Celis and then filed a false report claiming that Sosa-Celis attacked him with a snow shovel. The charges against Sosa-Celis were quickly dropped, and in May state officials charged Castro with second-degree assault and one count of falsely reporting a crime and court issued a warrant for his arrest. By then, Castro was in Texas, where Governor Greg Abbott — the Law and Chaos DOOFUS OF THE DAY — has refused to extradite him to Minnesota as mandated by the Constitution's Extradition Clause. And so now Minnesota has sued Texas in federal court.

US v. Hearn Reply In Support of Motion to Dismiss Without Prejudice [via Marcy Wheeler]

https://legacy.www.documentcloud.org/documents/28565563-260818-hearn-dismiss-reply

US v. Farris [spraypaint lady]

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/74650269/united-states-v-farris/

Vanderstok v. Blanche [ghost guns]

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/64886994/vanderstok-v-garland

National Park Service v. National Trust for Historic Preservation [SCOTUS Docket]

https://www.supremecourt.gov/search.aspx?filename=/docket/docketfiles/html/public/26a203.html

ABC v. FCC

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/74661956/american-broadcasting-companies-inc-v-federal-communications-commission/

US v. Comey [docket via CourtListener]

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/73256624/united-states-v-comey/?order_by=desc

Walz v. Abbott

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/74662182/walz-v-abbott/

Show Links:

https://www.lawandchaospod.com/

BlueSky: @LawAndChaosPod

Threads: @LawAndChaosPod Twitter: @LawAndChaosPod

DOCKET ALERTS:

The Supreme Court denied Trump's motion for rehearing in the first E. Jean Carroll case. Time to pay up, creep!

Federal Judge Lynn Winmill invalidated Idaho's abortion ban insofar as it contains no exception to preserve the health of the pregnant person — including mental health. Along the way, he took apart the Supreme Court's hack historical analysis in Dobbs.

DOOFUS OF THE DAY: Josh Autenrieth, who bombed spectacularly on his first and only outing as an expert witness. During deposition, the plaintiffs lawyer Daniel Moye caught Autenreith fabricating his entire report exonerating 3M with the help of ChatGPT. Then Moye forced to testify for the plaintiffs at trial. On the stand Autenrieth discovered that there was a public link to all his chats live on the internet. Shout out to 404 Media for this wild story.

MAIN SHOW:

US Attorney Andrew Boutros in Chicago continues to embarrass himself and demean his office. The New York Times reports that his office has been harassing the family of Justice Juan Merchan, who presided over Trump's false business records case in Manhattan. Merchan's daughter worked for a political firm in Illinois, and so Boutros decided he would use this as a lever to try to shake loose all kinds of political communications. And it turns out the same lawyers who worked on the Broadview 6 case, Matthew Skiba and William Hogan, had their prints all over this one.

Luigi Mangione pled guilty in federal court to two counts of stalking. But he did so in such a way as to make it much harder for the state to prosecute him for murder. Was this done with the connivance of the feds to get back at Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg?

Seyb v. Members of the Idaho Board of Medicine

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/68527351/seyb-v-members-of-the-idaho-board-of-medicine/

'Show How 3M Is 0% at Fault:' Expert Witness Used ChatGPT to Write Report Defending Company in Deadly Explosion Lawsuit

https://www.404media.co/show-how-3m-is-0-at-fault-expert-witness-used-chatgpt-to-write-report-defending-company-in-deadly-explosion-lawsuit/

Prosecutors Examined Firm With Tie to Judge in Trump Hush Money Trial

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/08/15/us/politics/prosecutors-examined-firm-with-tie-to-judge-in-trump-hush-money-trial.html

US v. Mangione [federal court docket via CourtListener]

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/69908890/united-states-v-mangione/

Luigi Mangione Pleads Guilty To Stalking, Admits To Murder Anyway, Argues This Makes Trial Double Jeopardy

https://abovethelaw.com/2026/08/luigi-mangione-pleads-guilty-to-stalking-admits-to-murder-anyway-argues-this-makes-trial-double-jeopardy/

Show Links:

https://www.lawandchaospod.com/

BlueSky: @LawAndChaosPod

Threads: @LawAndChaosPod Twitter: @LawAndChaosPod

DOCKET ALERTS:

The Kennedy Center board of trustees is back on its BS. After being ordered to take Trump's name off the side of the building, they've now voted again to put it back on. They also voted to close the facility for two years. Rep. Joyce Beatty, who brought the lawsuit that forced them to back off the first time, vows to fight on.

Meanwhile musician Chuck Redd was just awarded $252,000 in attorneys fees after the Center sued him for breaching a contract he never signed.

Judge Roy Altman is Aileen Cannon-balling it up in Trump's trollsuit against the BBC. This week he allowed Trump to amend his complaint yet again for "good cause." What good cause could there be to sue a company which never broadcast the supposedly defamatory documentary in the US?

MAIN SHOW:

The Washington Post reports that Jeanine Pirro, the US Attorney for DC, has empaneled a special grand jury. Corruption incoming!

The DOJ has amended the indictment of the SPLC again. This time they've added a former employee who ran its Intelligence Project and managed its paid informants. The case is no less preposterous with an extra defendant and a couple more charges.

The Ninth Circuit issued a hugely consequential ruling on Section 230 immunity for websites, and Liz and Andrew do not agree at all about it.

SUBSCRIBER BONUS:

Judge Richard Stearns in Massachusetts swatted down the DOJ's effort to shout "antisemitism" and steal $950 million from Harvard.

Trump v. BBC

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/72040010/trump-v-british-broadcasting-corporation/

Pirro, in rare move, convenes special grand jury in Washington

https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2026/08/12/pirro-convenes-unusual-grand-jury-dc-that-can-focus-single-case-issue-report/

US v. Southern Poverty Law Center

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/73223865/united-states-v-southern-poverty-law-center-inc/

Colorado v. Meta [9th Circuit opinion]

https://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2026/08/10/24-7265.pdf

US v. Harvard

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/72520538/united-states-v-president-and-fellows-of-harvard-college/

Show Links:

https://www.lawandchaospod.com/

BlueSky: @LawAndChaosPod

Threads: @LawAndChaosPod Twitter: @LawAndChaosPod

DOCKET ALERTS:

Todd Blanche was confirmed as permanent attorney general after Louisiana Senator Bill Cassidy remembered that he's an unprincipled hack.

Trump's lackey Will Scharf is being promoted from staff secretary to White House Counsel in advance of the midterms.

The White House is once again trying to fire Federal Reserve Board Member Lisa Cook after the Supreme Court blocked it the first time.

DOOFUS OF THE DAY: Senator Mike Lee, who vowed to block the Senate going into recess until it passed the SAVE America Act. He did not. Instead Majority Leader John Thune made him preside over the session, ensuring that he could not object.

MAIN SHOW:

On Friday, the DC Circuit affirmed the trial judge's order blocking Trump's tacky ballroom — at least the above-ground portion. The government tried to shield this project from judicial review by claiming that the Office of the Executive Residence, which manages floral arrangements and routine maintenance of the White House, was actually superintending the $600 million construction project. But the appeals court nixed it.

The administration hopes to use a similar ONE WEIRD TRICK to slap white paint all over the Eisenhower Executive Office Building. It claims that the project is being overseen by the White House Office of Administration, rather than the General Services Administration. TBD whether Judge Dabney Friedrich lets them get away with it.

Airlines hate Skiplagged.com, which tells consumers how to save money by hopping off flights at the layover. They've failed to shut the site down using various tort claims, and so they tried copyright and trademark.

SUBSCRIBER BONUS:

After the Supreme Court blocked him in June, Trump is once again trying to end birthright citizenship by executive order.

National Trust for Historic Preservation v. National Park Service [DC Circuit Docket]

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/73239730/national-trust-for-historic-preservation-v-nps

National Trust for Historic Preservation v. National Park Service [Trial Docket]

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/72028010/national-trust-for-historic-preservation-in-the-united-states-v-national/

Cultural Heritage Partners v. Trump

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/71918245/cultural-heritage-partners-pllc-v-trump/

American Airlines, Inc. v. Skiplagged, Inc.

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/67699985/american-airlines-inc-v-skiplagged-inc/

United Airlines' Contract of Carriage

https://www.united.com/en/us/fly/contract-of-carriage.html

Trump EO: "Ending Birth Tourism"

https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2026/08/ending-birth-tourism/

Trump EO: "Continuing to Protect the Meaning and Value of American Citizenship"

https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2026/08/continuing-to-protect-the-meaning-and-value-of-american-citizenship/

Show Links:

https://www.lawandchaospod.com/

BlueSky: @LawAndChaosPod

Threads: @LawAndChaosPod Twitter: @LawAndChaosPod

DOCKET ALERTS:

Todd Blanche advanced out of the Judiciary Committee and faces a vote by the full Senate on whether to confirm him as Attorney General. Will Republicans defy—JK,LOL.

Journalist Katie Phang's lawsuit against Blanche for failing to disclose all documents required under the Epstein Files Transparency Act hit a snag when the government just plum forgot to file an answer to her complaint. The DOJ also failed to provide unredacted documents to Judge Emmet Sullivan for review in chambers. Judge Sullivan ordered Blanche to personally appear in court on August. 13.

DOOFUS OF THE DAY: Third Circuit Judge Jennifer Mascott, who spent the first six months of her judicial tenure moonlighting as the head of a PR firm which solicited MAGA clients.

MAIN SHOW:

Trump's multitudinous trollsuits do much better in front of his own appointees than in front of normal judges. Judge Roy Altman has utterly beclowned himself in Trump's lawsuits against Capital One and the BBC. But his cases against the Wall Street Journal, JP Morgan, and the New York Times faced a much cooler reception.

Charges against the Broadview 6 for "conspiracy" to protest were dropped months ago. But the case goes on, as the former defendants ask Judge April Perry to appoint a special counsel to investigate and potentially prosecute the US Attorneys Office in Chicago for contempt of Court. Prosecutors counter that any investigation can be handled by the DOJ's Office of Professional Responsibility, which has been conveniently neutered under Trump.

And we're back on our Buc-ee's BS — can't get enough of those beaver nuggets! Has the convenience-store-on-steroids chain gone too far with its lawsuits against every animal mascot on earth? One plucky teddy bear is fighting back.

SUBSCRIBER BONUS:

Can John Oliver sell parody Buc-ee's merch? We consult a talking squirrel and the greatest amicus brief of all time!

LINKS:

Phang v. Blanche

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/73246595/phang-v-blanche/

US v. Rabbitt [Broadview 6]

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/71795281/united-states-v-rabbitt

At Trump's DOJ, watchdogs gutted as misconduct complaints soar

https://www.reuters.com/legal/litigation/trumps-doj-watchdogs-gutted-misconduct-complaints-soar-2026-08-06/

'Is she even allowed to be doing this?': Inside a federal judge's side gig running a PR firm

https://www.politico.com/news/2026/08/06/jennifer-mascott-federal-judge-adfero-pr-firm-01025871

Buc-ee's v. Teddy's Market [docket via CourtListener]

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/73290962/buc-ees-ltd-v-teddys-market-llc/

THE GREATEST AMICUS BRIEF OF ALL TIME

https://www.acluwv.org/app/uploads/2017/08/2017-08-17-Amended-Amicus-28File-Stamped29.pdf

Show Links:

https://www.lawandchaospod.com/

BlueSky: @LawAndChaosPod

Threads: @LawAndChaosPod Twitter: @LawAndChaosPod

Andrew is flying solo today. He's got three stories about the petty incompetence of this administration. First, we start off with the likely impending confirmation of Todd Blanche as Attorney General after the DOJ finally put in writing that the $1.8 billion "Anti-Weaponization" slush fund is dead. The Trump tax giveaway is still alive, though, and that means so is Judge Williams's investigation as to whether the President committed a fraud on the court.

Next, we delve into the unraveling of DC US Attorney Jeanine Pirro's ham-handed efforts to try and indict a former Olympian for vandalizing the Reflecting Pool in Washington. Turns out, the problem was the contractor all along. Who knew? (We all knew, including Pirro.)

Finally, we take a look at a trio of motions filed by James Comey in his criminal case, all of which involve the central claim that the mafia uses the term "86" to mean "kill." Turns out, Comey secured an affidavit from the world's foremost expert on mafia code words, and he thinks that argument is "preposterous." How do all of these fundamental mistakes keep making their way into criminal indictments? Comey is the latest defendant who thinks prosecutors may not have been entirely candid with grand juries.

Trump v. IRS [SDFL Docket via CourtListener]

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/72207870/trump-v-internal-revenue-service/?filed_after=&filed_before=&entry_gte=&entry_lte=&order_by=asc

US v. Comey [docket via CourtListener]

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/73256624/united-states-v-comey/?order_by=desc

John Gleeson affidavit

https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.nced.227449/gov.uscourts.nced.227449.40.3.pdf

Show Links:

https://www.lawandchaospod.com/

BlueSky: @LawAndChaosPod

Threads: @LawAndChaosPod Twitter: @LawAndChaosPod

It's our semiquincentennial! And we're celebrating with a long-form interview with Zach Everson, research director of the Trump Accountability Project. Zach joins us to discuss how cryptocurrency powered Donald Trump's massively successful grift of billions of dollars, and what we can do about it. Along the way, we also discuss the proposed CLARITY ACT, and how the fake ethics provisions added by Republicans were so bad that the bill itself is likely to die on the vine.

Thank you for being with us for 250 episodes!

CLARITY ACT- HR 3633

https://www.lummis.senate.gov/wp-content/uploads/Clarity-Act.pdf

Show Links:

https://www.lawandchaospod.com/

BlueSky: @LawAndChaosPod

Threads: @LawAndChaosPod Twitter: @LawAndChaosPod

DOCKET ALERTS:

The Paramount-Warner Bros. merger is on hold well into next year. The parties stipulated that the merger would not go through pending trial in the antitrust case brought by twelve state AGs, despite massive financial penalties for Paramount if the deal is delayed. Meanwhile, the Writers Guild of America has filed a similar antitrust action, which has also been assigned to Judge Araceli Martínez-Olguín.

Trump's newest tariff scheme, based on findings of anticompetitive use of forced labor by our trade competitors, drew multiple legal challenges. Learning Resources v. US, Take 3!

Fired US Attorney for the Western District of Washington, Roger Rogoff, is suing to get his job back.

MAIN SHOW:

In March, Trump put out an executive order instructing DHS to compile a list of voters. The states would then be forced to submit all mail-in ballot recipients to a portal and supply each with an individual bar code. The Post Office was instructed to refuse to deliver ballots to anyone not on the list. That order is now being litigated in the US District Court for the District of Columbia, the DC Circuit, the US District for Massachusetts, the First Circuit and, as of today, the Supreme Court.

James Comey has moved to dismiss the two-count federal indictment against him for posting an instagram photo of seashells that spelled out "8647." We discuss the "true threat" doctrine and the administration's larger war on freedom of speech when it comes to his critics and journalists.

Speaking of which, in the subscriber bonus, we discuss the case of Atlanta "Stop Cop City" protester Sam Tunick, who was charged with destroying evidence when he tricked CBP agents into bricking his phone.

California v. Paramount-Skydance

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/73606877/the-state-of-california-v-paramount-skydance-corporation/

Writers Guild of America, West, Inc. v. Paramount Skydance Corporation

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/73614167/writers-guild-of-america-west-inc-v-paramount-skydance-corporation/

Fact Sheet: USTR Section 301 Action in Response to the Failure of 60 Economies to Ban Imports Produced with Forced Labor

https://ustr.gov/about/policy-offices/press-office/fact-sheets/2026/july/fact-sheet-ustr-section-301-action-response-failure-60-economies-ban-imports-produced-forced-labor

Learning Resources v. US [Section 301 tariffs]

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/73668290/learning-resources-inc-v-the-united-states-of-america/

Burlap and Barrel v. Greer [Section 301 tariffs]

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/73667352/burlap-and-barrel-inc-v-greer-in-his-official-capacity-as-united-states/

Rogoff v. Trump

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/73647676/rogoff-v-trump

California v. Trump [Mail-in ballots, First Circuit]

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/73568304/state-of-california-v-trump/?order_by=desc

League of Women Voters v. Trump [Mail-in ballots, D. Mass.]

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/73133197/league-of-women-voters-of-massachusetts-v-trump

NAACP v. US [Mail-in ballots, D.D.C.]

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/17461792/national-association-for-the-advancement-of-colored-people-v-united-states

NAACP v. USPS [Mail-in ballots, DC Circuit]

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/73595574/naacp-v-usps/

Trump v. California [Mail-in ballots, SCOTUS]

https://www.supremecourt.gov/Search.aspx?FileName=/docket/docketfiles/html/public\26a124.html

US v. Comey [North Carolina criminal indictment for 8647; docket via CourtListener]

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/73256624/united-states-v-comey/?order_by=desc

US v. Tunick [Georgia criminal indictment for bricked phone; docket via CourtListener]

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/71998357/united-states-v-tunick/

Show Links:

https://www.lawandchaospod.com/

BlueSky: @LawAndChaosPod

Threads: @LawAndChaosPod Twitter: @LawAndChaosPod