A federal judge tried to rally anti-Trump resistance with a blistering ruling Tuesday that denounced the president as “scandalous,” found his executive actions have violated the First Amendment rights of immigrants, and called on Americans to “stand up” and defend the Constitution.
In a 161-page diatribe, Senior Judge William G. Young, a Reagan appointee to the court in Boston, unloaded on President Trump, Homeland Security, the State Department and many of the president’s actions.
The judge derided U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement as a runaway agency that lets its officers wear masks to “terrorize Americans into quiescence.”
“To us, masks are associated with cowardly desperados and the despised Ku Klux Klan. In all our history we have never tolerated an armed masked secret police. Carrying on in this fashion, ICE brings indelible obloquy to this administration and everyone who works in it,” the judge wrote.
He added that Mr. Trump has blessed it all, backing efforts of Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem to deport pro-Palestinian immigrants.
“The facts prove that the president himself approves truly scandalous and unconstitutional suppression of free speech on the part of two of his senior cabinet secretaries,” Judge Young wrote.
He approvingly quoted his own wife’s complaints about the president, who said, “He seems to be winning. He ignores everything and keeps bullying ahead.”
And the judge complained about the lack of resistance, pointing to law firms that “cower,” universities that “meekly appease” and media outlets that “mind the bottom line rather than the ethics of journalism.”
He even complained about fellow federal judges “complicit in chilling would-be litigants.”
He offered disgusted acknowledgement of Mr. Trump’s political gifts, calling him the “master communicator of our time” — albeit in service of an evil end.
“If change is a mark of success, President Trump is the most successful president in history,” he said.
But he added: “The president’s palpable misunderstanding that the government simply cannot seek retribution for speech he disdains poses a great threat to Americans’ freedom of speech.”
At another point he quoted President Reagan’s famous line that freedom is “never more than one general away from extinction.”
“As I’ve read and re-read the record in this case, listened widely, and reflected extensively, I’ve come to believe that President Trump truly understands and appreciates the full import of President Reagan’s inspiring message –- yet I fear he has drawn from it a darker, more cynical message,” he said. “I fear President Trump believes the American people are so divided that today they will not stand up, fight for, and defend our most precious constitutional values so long as they are lulled into thinking their own personal interests are not affected.”
Judge Young has become a major adversary for Mr. Trump in the courts, overseeing at least a half-dozen cases challenging executive branch actions.
He has ruled against the administration on its attempt to impose new rules on wind energy projects, its move to create a climate working group to rewrite global warming policy, and its attempt to terminate some National Institutes of Health grants.
That latter ruling was appealed to the Supreme Court, which partially blocked Judge Young, saying his attempt to balance the harms to two sides was flawed.
Tuesday’s case stems from a challenge by academics and activists who said their speech was being chilled because they feared the government would target them with immigration actions.
Judge Young recounted some of the high-profile cases that have played out, including that of Mahmoud Khalil, a Palestinian who has been ordered deported for misleading on his green card application but who is battling that in the courts, and of Rumeysa Ozturk, who co-wrote an op-ed complaining about her university’s ties to Israel.
The judge ruled as a matter of law that noncitizens have the same First Amendment rights as citizens.
And he said those have been violated by the State Department’s move to revoke visas and Homeland Security’s subsequent deportation efforts for those who aligned themselves with the pro-Palestinian cause.
But he declined to rule on a remedy, saying he’s not sure what he could impose. He asked for more briefing.
His denunciation of ICE echoes the rhetoric coming from Democratic politicians, and which Trump officials say has fueled a 1,000% increase in assaults on ICE officers. That culminated with the sniper attack last week on ICE’s Dallas office, where the gunman killed two migrants and wounded a third.
In particular, he questioned the agency’s law enforcement bona fides.
“ICE has successfully persuaded the public that it is our principal criminal law enforcement agency,” he wrote, but added, “ICE has nothing whatever to do with criminal law enforcement and seeks to avoid the actual criminal courts at all costs.”
He said ICE carries out a “civil law mandate.”
That’s only partly true. ICE’s Enforcement and Removal Operations largely focus on arrest and deportation, which is a civil matter. But Homeland Security Investigations, another division within ICE, bring criminal cases, including against gangs, smugglers and child predators.
ICE has also led an effort to track down thousands of illegal immigrant children whom the government lost track of during the Biden administration.
Judge Young began his opinion by quoting from a postcard received in his chambers, where an anonymous writer asked: “Trump has pardons and tanks. … What do you have?”
The judge responded, in his opinion: “Alone, I have nothing but my sense of duty. Together, We the People of the United States — you and me — have our magnificent Constitution.”
• Stephen Dinan can be reached at sdinan@washingtontimes.com.