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Strict Scrutiny

We Need To Talk About Trump’s Maritime Murders

68 min episode · 2 min read
·
Rebecca Ingber

Episode

68 min

Read time

2 min

Topics

Fundraising & VC, Philosophy & Wisdom, Science & Discovery

AI-Generated Summary

Key Takeaways

  • Maritime Strike Legality: Trump administration conducted 87 killings across 22 strikes since September, targeting suspected drug traffickers without congressional authorization. Legal experts classify these as murder, not lawful military action, because transporting drugs does not constitute armed conflict under international law requiring combatant status.
  • War Crime Evidence: September 2 strike survivors were bombed 40 minutes after initial attack while waving for help in water. Under Uniform Code of Military Justice and international law, firing on shipwrecked individuals constitutes manifestly unlawful order that soldiers must refuse, regardless of superior commands or claimed national security justifications.
  • Crisis Pregnancy Center Standing: First Choice seeks immediate federal court access to challenge New Jersey subpoena without awaiting state court proceedings. Supreme Court justices appear sympathetic despite weak factual record of state hostility, potentially expanding nonprofit rights to preemptively challenge investigations based on claimed First Amendment donor privacy concerns similar to NAACP protections.
  • ISP Copyright Liability: Cox Communications faces over one billion dollars in jury damages for user copyright infringement through file sharing. Justices express concern that broad secondary liability could force internet service providers to terminate service to entire universities, military bases, and communities to avoid crushing financial exposure from user actions.
  • Immigration Judge Review: Federal courts must defer to Board of Immigration Appeals factual determinations about whether undisputed events constitute persecution for asylum purposes. Supreme Court signals this mixed question contains too much factual content for independent judicial review, limiting federal court oversight of administrative immigration decisions despite legal components.

What It Covers

The episode examines Trump administration's maritime bombing campaign killing suspected drug traffickers, featuring legal expert Rebecca Ingber analyzing war crimes allegations, plus Supreme Court arguments on crisis pregnancy centers, internet service provider liability, and immigration law.

Key Questions Answered

  • Maritime Strike Legality: Trump administration conducted 87 killings across 22 strikes since September, targeting suspected drug traffickers without congressional authorization. Legal experts classify these as murder, not lawful military action, because transporting drugs does not constitute armed conflict under international law requiring combatant status.
  • War Crime Evidence: September 2 strike survivors were bombed 40 minutes after initial attack while waving for help in water. Under Uniform Code of Military Justice and international law, firing on shipwrecked individuals constitutes manifestly unlawful order that soldiers must refuse, regardless of superior commands or claimed national security justifications.
  • Crisis Pregnancy Center Standing: First Choice seeks immediate federal court access to challenge New Jersey subpoena without awaiting state court proceedings. Supreme Court justices appear sympathetic despite weak factual record of state hostility, potentially expanding nonprofit rights to preemptively challenge investigations based on claimed First Amendment donor privacy concerns similar to NAACP protections.
  • ISP Copyright Liability: Cox Communications faces over one billion dollars in jury damages for user copyright infringement through file sharing. Justices express concern that broad secondary liability could force internet service providers to terminate service to entire universities, military bases, and communities to avoid crushing financial exposure from user actions.
  • Immigration Judge Review: Federal courts must defer to Board of Immigration Appeals factual determinations about whether undisputed events constitute persecution for asylum purposes. Supreme Court signals this mixed question contains too much factual content for independent judicial review, limiting federal court oversight of administrative immigration decisions despite legal components.

Notable Moment

Secretary Hegseth retweeted requests for boat strikes as if taking murder orders on demand, posted Franklin the turtle memes about killings, then deflected responsibility to unnamed military officers while simultaneously claiming credit, exemplifying the administration's casual approach to extrajudicial executions at sea.

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Episode Transcript

This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. It's the holidays, which isn't exactly a stress free time, but it is a time to start some new traditions, good ones. Therapy can give you the space to create new meaningful traditions, providing clarity amid the holiday chaos. And BetterHelp is a great place to go to find quality therapists. BetterHelp therapists work according to a strict code of conduct and are fully licensed in The United States. BetterHelp also does the initial matching work for you so you can focus on your therapy goals. You just fill out a short q and a to identify your needs and preferences, and they leverage their more than a decade of matching experiences and industry leading match fulfillment rate to find you the right therapist. They typically get it right the first time, but if you aren't happy with your match, you can switch to a different therapist at any time from their tailored recommendations. With over 30,000 therapists, BetterHelp is one of the world's largest online therapy platforms, having served over 5,000,000 people globally. And it works with an average rating of 4.9 out of five for a live session based on over 1,700,000 client reviews. This December start a new tradition by taking care of you. Our listeners get 10% off at betterhelp.com/strict. That's better,help,.com/strict. Mister chief justice, may it please the court? It's an old joke, but when I argue man argues against two beautiful ladies like this, they're going to have the last word. She spoke not elegantly, but with unmistakable clarity. She said, I ask no favor for my sex. All I ask of our brethren is that they take their feet off our necks. Hello, and welcome back to Strict Scrutiny, your podcast about the Supreme Court and the legal culture that surrounds it. We're your hosts. I'm Leah Littman. I'm Alyssa Murray. And I'm Kate Shaw. And we are halfway through the court's December sitting, so we've got some argument recaps for you. But we're gonna start with some legal news. So news, then recaps, and we will end with some court culture. We are not going to cover last Thursday's outrageous Supreme Court shadow docket order greenlighting Texas' racially gerrymandered maps. We couldn't wait until Monday to rage cast that one, so we dropped an emergency episode last week. It's in your feed if you haven't had a chance to listen just yet. Instead, we are going to start with another enormously important story. As you may know, listeners, Pete Hegseth, although we are now increasingly referring to the secretary of war as Haegseth, because he seems to have no idea how things work at The Hague, and we are going to be covering Haig Seth's murder strikes. And the story, of course, involves the increasingly urgent set of questions that have been raised by the administration's bombing campaign against boats in The Caribbean and now The Pacific. And we have discussed this issue before, but now …

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