Joseph Mead
@josephwmead.bsky.social
Principal and Deputy General Counsel at Washington Litigation Group. Former law professor, DOJ, etc. Views are my own. https://washingtonlitigationgroup.org/.
NEW: We’ve spent a year tracking ICE’s massive expansion of detention for people with years-long ties to the U.S. It has strained courts, wrecked lives and been widely deemed illegal. Our report, based on interviews with judges, detainees and attorneys: www.politico.com/news/2026/08...
NEW: President Trump is taking aim at birthright citizenship again, this time with a narrower order aiming to deny citizenship to four groups of children. This new order is far less sweeping than the original, but may also violate the Constitution. www.whitehouse.gov/presidential...
Continuing to Protect the Meaning and Value of American Citizenship
By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, it is hereby ordered: Section 1. Every child deserves a safe and nurturing home where they...
whitehouse.gov
For months, the Trump administration has refused to pay lawyers and organizations that represent unaccompanied kids. Groups like the Defending Our Neighbors Fund are stepping up to fill the gaps and support trusted legal groups, but many kids face the real and tragic risk of facing court alone.
Trump Has A Tactic To Make It Easier To Deport Children
“We know what happens when children go to court without an attorney,” a lawyer said. “One word: deportation.”
huffpost.com
Today's break from the horrors of constitutional law involved a trip to a pelican colony to collect data from pelican chicks. Not every day you get to hold a pelican!
BREAKING: STATEMENT ON DOJ’S DISMISSAL OF CRIMINAL CASE AGAINST DAVEY HEARN
The opinion from the judge confirms what we already knew: ICE violated the law and arrested our clients illegally. Unfortunately, we are living in a world where documented human rights violations alone are insufficient to compel court action to stop them. https://ow.ly/Oqub50Zq984
We're hiring! If you are (or will be soon) a recent law school grad who's interested in starting your career by doing really interesting #SCOTUS & appellate advocacy in support of progressive causes, apply now for our Douglas T. Kendall Fellowship!
CAC@myconstitution.bsky.social · last mo.CAC is looking for our next Kendall Fellow to start Fall of 2027 to support our work to advance the progressive promise of the Constitution. Learn more about this internally funded fellowship for recent law school graduates: www.theusconstitution.org/douglas-t-ke...
Statement from Counsel for Olympian Davey Hearn:
Katie Phang@katiephang.bsky.social · last mo.Jeanine Box-o-Wine Pirro right now doing a press conference to justify why her office has indicted three-time U.S. Olympian, David Hearn, for destruction of federal property. Per Pirro: Hearn “ripped a piece of recently installed sealant on the bottom of the Refecting Pool...He damaged the pool!!!"
Very thankful for this letter to Becky Pepper-Jackson (the 16 year-old trans girl SCOTUS ruled against yesterday) from James Dale, a gay man whose expulsion from the Boy Scouts was upheld by the Supreme Court in 2000.
To the Trans Girl Who Just Lost at the Supreme Court: So Did I 26 Years Ago
A letter to Becky Pepper Jackson about her trans sports case defeat at SCOTUS yesterday
medium.com
I see a lot of “so-and-so is a birthright citizen” because their parents weren’t citizens when they were born on American soil. But the truth is, we’re all birthright citizens, unless we have been naturalized.
After 18 years as our beloved companion, I held Nightingale as she died today. The only member of our household to attack a federal judge (and draw blood!), she was feisty to the end to those who invaded her space, but adored those who brought her food. She was part of the journey and will be missed
The Birthright Citizenship argument is easily resolved by text, history, precedent, or whatever other valid legal reasoning tool you choose. But some of these more granular legal arguments miss the big picture, the core of the debates on citizenship. (We debated all this before.)
![The Senator from Indiana r r. HENDRICKS] yesterday, I think, assailed this proposition as one calculated to degrade the great right of American citizenship, a right which he seemed to think should be held exclusively to the use and behoof of the nobler and loftier races of the world. It degrades, does it, sir, the character of American citizenship to admit all men to it who are born and reared upon American soil? Mr. President, I dissent from that idea altogether, and I was surprised to hear it fall from the lips of the Senator from Indiana, of all men in the world. I thought he was a Democrat. I thought he boasted himself the champion of equal rights. I thought that was the bread and the meat and the drink of his political creed. I did not think lie belonged to that class of nobility that measure their exaltation by the number of negroes they have under their heels. I did not suppose he felt it necessary to stand upon the necks of human beings in order to secure his patent of nobility; and I was surprised to hear this sentiment fall from his lips. I differ from it so widely and so radically as this, that I say there is no one proposition in the proposed amendment, and nothing in the Constitution as it stands, which will do so much to elevate the character and the dignity of American citizenship as that simple proposition. Nay, sir, I go further, and I tell you you will never have occasion to boast but you will always have occasion to blush for American citizenship until the time shall come when you can say to all the world that American institutions do not raise a man that is not worthy to be an American citizen and is not clothed with its panoply. I will vote for this proposition, and I shall not fear that American citizenship will be degraded by incorporating this clause in the Constitution](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:w45g2ajbacksyxyh4w5xqczq/bafkreib2o2mt7v3fxwpsyonqsfhcodoacfp3xbv7is3gddwdha3rlw2vw4)
"The government will repeal the Vagrancy Act on Monday 29 June 2026, ending nearly two centuries of legislation that has criminalised rough sleeping and begging" www.gov.uk/government/n...
Rough sleeping no longer a crime as Vagrancy Act repealed
The government will repeal the Vagrancy Act on Monday 29 June 2026, ending nearly two centuries of legislation that has criminalised rough sleeping and begging.
gov.uk
The Supreme Court Summer Institute is at the Supreme Court for decisions today. We covered Wolford, Trump v. Barbara, and Trump v. Slaughter earlier this week, and so there's a decent chance they'll be in the courtroom for a decision in a case that we studied.
OPM’s proposed governmentwide NDA would make it harder for public servants to speak out about abuse they witness from the inside. Justice Connection submitted a public comment urging OPM to reject it. Join us to weigh in before June 26: justiceconnection.substack.com/publish/post...
Maybe the Constitution should give a role to Congress in declaring wars and consenting to treaties
Solum & Crema on Originalism and Personal Jurisdiction Lawrence B. Solum (University of Virginia School of Law) & Max Crema (Georgetown University Law Center) have posted…...
Solum & Crema on Originalism and Personal Jurisdiction
Lawrence B. Solum (University of Virginia School of Law) & Max Crema (Georgetown University Law Center) have posted Originalism and Personal Jurisdiction: Several Questions and a Few Answers on SSRN. Here is the abstract: The modern constitutional law of personal jurisdiction is largely the product of living constitutionalism. International Shoe’s minimum-contacts and fairness standard was not derived from the constitutional text, and it cannot be supported by the original meaning of the Due Process of Law Clauses of the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments.
legaltheoryblog.com
In response to a suit from a Christian charity, a judge has blocked the city of Phoenix from enforcing a new ordinance that would limit groups from giving food out in public parks without a permit: www.phoenixnewtimes.com/news/judge-p... That means I get to post the meme again
My essay on the many ways that state courts interpret state constitutions in lockstep with federal doctrine is now live on the @statecourtreport.org! statecourtreport.org/our-work/ana...
The Many Versions of State Constitutional Lockstepping
The practice of interpreting state constitutions identically to their federal counterpart is often criticized in blanket terms. But the ways state courts lockstep vary widely.
statecourtreport.org
When I saw law profs making absurd arguments to “shift the Overton Window” by way of misinforming the public on birthright citizenship...I was incensed. If you are going to the public with historical work to change the rights a country of 350 million gives children, you should at least be right.
Pleased to post my draft article, “Discovering the Historical Anglo-American Constitution.” I study the history of birthright citizenship from the 1100s to the 1700s. The English common-law rule of natural-born subjects was always tied to territory and jurisdiction. papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....
First day on the job and you want respect? Go right up to the most recognizable and respected guy in the newsroom and have him yell at you until you cry. Then it's time to send him a weepy email telling him how disappointed you were that he did all that. Shouldn't have any trouble after that.
Here is our response to these intimidation tactics. washingtonlitigationgroup.org/news/washing...
| Washington Litigation Group
washingtonlitigationgroup.org
Joseph Mead@josephwmead.bsky.social · 2mo agoWe filed a lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of a state law. The next day, the Tenn AG's office threatened us with "consequences beyond this litigation," citing a felony statute, if we didn't immediately end our "association" with our client and drop our representation. Completely absurd.
Brown and Epstein on Autocratic Judging Rebecca L. Brown (USC Gould School of Law) and Lee Epstein (University of Southern California) have posted…...
Brown and Epstein on Autocratic Judging
Rebecca L. Brown (USC Gould School of Law) and Lee Epstein (University of Southern California) have posted Autocratic Judging on SSRN. Here is the abstract: Autocratic regimes, now governing 70 percent of the world’s population, often come into power by democratic means but then use their authority to undermine the very institutions that sustain democracies, including representation and participation in elections, protection of minority rights, the rule of law, and checks and balances.
legaltheoryblog.com
It’s early, but still safe to say that this is one of the most important articles about constitutional law that will be published this year, and I wouldn’t be surprised if it ends up being the most, full stop. yalelawjournal.org/feature/the-...
Excited to see this Article out in print at the @stanlrev.bsky.social. Many thanks to the wonderful editors there for their outstanding work!
The Administrative Law of McCarthyism | Stanford Law Review
stanfordlawreview.org
