I Spoke to the Fmr. Federal Judges FIGHTING BACK Against Trump

Ajouté : 2026-05-31

[00:00:00]Got to tell you, I have read many thousands of court filings through the years. Perhaps too many. I have never seen anything like the one submitted in the Southern District of Florida. Not even close.

[00:00:11]This remarkable filing from roughly three dozen former federal judges uses language so fiery, so striking, and the filing being made by former federal judges is so provocative. I've never seen anything like it. I'm about to speak with two of the judges who signed their name to this thing. A reminder of the issue, the case of Trump versus his own IRS. This preposterous $10 billion lawsuit he filed against his own agency in January, suing basically his own administration and seeking taxpayer money as an award. You'll recall this case was dismissed at Trump's asking just before a federal judge in Florida was going to ask some tough questions about this lawsuit. the judge was on to something being wrong here. So Trump sought to have the case dismissed. He did and subsequently announced this $ 1.776 billion taxpayer funded pot of money for copers, fraudsters, and convicted criminals.

[00:01:14]Something has seemed off from the jump.

[00:01:16]The filing from the 35 former federal judges asks the court in Florida to reopen this matter, to take a second look. And the language they use, it's wild. They say that the court has been deceived in this matter by team Trump.

[00:01:31]They use words like collusion and fraud.

[00:01:36]One of the federal judges who signed his name asking the case to be reopened is retired federal judge John Jones III, who is now the president of Dickinson College in Carile, Pennsylvania. Here's how Judge Jones explained joining this effort. the president doesn't help himself uh when he makes public pronouncements as he did and I'm paraphrasing at this point, but he said it's almost like I'm suing myself.

[00:02:01]Pretty transparent, right? And and probably something that he shouldn't have said under the circumstances because that's exactly uh what it looks like under the the circumstances. And and again the result uh the the settlement u uh arose after uh this was quietly pulled down by the president and his family. This lawsuit essentially there was no report of a settlement. It was just a discontinuence of the suit and then comes the settlement thereafter. Um, again, calling on my experience, 20 years on the federal bench and my experience in the law generally, you don't do that unless you're trying to keep something from the presiding judge uh, in this case. Now, we don't know what the uh it's important to say what the communications were uh among the parties, but I can be fairly blunt in saying I'm uh sure that if in fact Judge Williams reopens this and allows, for example, some discovery to occur to see exactly what the dialogue was among the parties. And clearly, it's not just judges who have questions about this. I mean, there are any number of Americans by the millions who wonder what happened here. Was this the intent all the way to have a predicate, a legal case to try to reroute money to January 6 riers? Judge Jones says he knows there are bigger and broader questions.

[00:03:30]>> I've never seen anything like this. I mean, I th this is in the annals of juristprudence. I have never seen anybody give away the store like this in this type of a suit. I mean, it it you have a visceral reaction if you love the law and the rule of law and you've sat as I did as a federal judge. And that visceral reaction is bad uh because it because it just doesn't look right uh at all. What we're doing uh is filing in two ways. Uh the one way is essentially to say that as interested citizens, we have standing and and we're moving in effect the judge to reopen the case. The other is simply as uh EMA's filer is saying judge you know you have the power uh on your own and the law is called suisponte of course but on your own to to reopen this do the do the thing that ought to be done uh in this case. So I I I don't have much doubt that under rule 60 the judge has the power whether uh motioned or on her own initiative to open this up. It's going to be you know her call and I'll respect that call either way. of course we all will uh as to whether or not she wants to she wants to do that.

[00:04:44]>> I also spoke with retired federal judge Nancy Girtner who once served in the district of Massachusetts as a US federal judge. Judge Girtner also put her name on this.

[00:04:54]>> We were not saying in our papers that we know that this was a fraud or not. We're saying that this is certainly enough to suggest that she should inquire further.

[00:05:04]We can't leave this alone. And and I mean you it's really so important that uh courts not be sort of empty fronts for um people who really are not using them in the right way. That's really critical.

[00:05:23]>> It's a pretty powerful phrase you just used. We can't leave this alone. We can't just let this go. Why so?

[00:05:32]Well, you know, when I was a judge, you'd sit on a high bench and there would be a flag behind you and you felt very much like you did not want justice to be going through the motions without content and without meaning. And I think that that's what the concern is here.

[00:05:52]Justice can't be just going through the motions without content and without meaning. It has to be used the the court system has to be used for the correct purposes in the correct way otherwise we don't have a system of rules at all.

[00:06:08]>> Got to keep in mind here it's judges who were appointed by presidents of both parties. It is not just judges appointed by say President Biden or Obama who've joined this inquiry. It's appointees from west to east from presidents from right to left. There are big questions looming. It's unclear how fast the district court in Florida, the judge there can navigate all this. A lot of this is unprecedented and there'll be questions about whether the judges have standing to even file an amicus brief and try to get involved here. But among the attorneys, who's also challenging this whole matter is Norm Eisen, Democracy Defenders of America. Norm explains why intervention is necessary.

[00:06:52]I I think you're right to focus on how remarkable it is that three dozen uh former federal trial court judges and appellet court judges uh have asked a series of very tough questions here, Scott, and now we need answers to those questions. The American people uh are calling out for answers to those questions. There's other pieces of litigation that are demanding answers to those questions and um we hope the court will um undertake a process to answer those questions and respond to this unprecedented collection of former federal judges making the respectful request. If you want the entirety of these interviews with the judges and with Norm, please become a member of Scott McFarland Reports. You get access to all of our newsmaking interviews and advanced looks at some of our forthcoming reports. We appreciate the memberships because they help underwrite Scott McFarland reports and all of independent journalism. I also appreciate the members and subscribers who commented on this issue. Uh, Retrof Focus 80, awesome name, says the Trump administration tried to go around the court. The court stated it the withdrawal of the suit but said there is no settlement because the two parties are the same. That's right. The the judge in Florida said we can't settle this thing because the two parties seem to be the same. The judge says she had questions about this because the two parties seem to be the same. It's unprecedented. All of what's happening in this matter is unprecedented. And we become accustomed to things being unprecedented in the Trump administration, but this time it's gotten the attention of a different type of critic. Three dozen former federal judges. We'll see if the judiciary, active or inactive, can have an impact when the executive branch overreaches.

[00:08:53]Thank you for subscribing to Scott McFarland Reports. You know, we're on seven days a week. We're always looking for news. We will stand guard at our post indefinitely. Really want to thank you for watching. You can comment, share, and subscribe for exclusive reporting, breaking news 365 days a year right