You almost have to admire the speed.
Less than 24 hours after a gunman was tackled outside the ballroom at the Washington Hilton during the White House Correspondents’ Dinner, the Department of Justice had already drafted a letter addressed to Greg Craig of Foley Hoag demanding the firm drop its case against the administration for redesigning the White House without any congressional approval. Acting AG Todd Blanche subsequently posted this letter to X with the six-word summary: “It’s time to build the ballroom.”
That’s… a lot of hustle for a Sunday morning.
To be clear about what actually happened Saturday night: the suspect, a California teacher and engineer, rushed a security checkpoint and ran toward the ballroom where the black-tie dinner was being held, armed with a shotgun, handgun, and knives. He exchanged gunfire with law enforcement and was tackled to the ground. One Secret Service agent was hit in his bulletproof vest, treated, and released.
No one was killed. The shooter was arrested. A scary incident, genuinely, and one that could have been catastrophically worse. We can all agree on that.
But the Trump administration did not wait to agree on that and move on. Instead, Assistant AG Brett Shumate fired off a letter to the National Trust for Historic Preservation’s outside counsel demanding the Trust voluntarily dismiss its lawsuit against the White House ballroom by 9 a.m. Monday, or the DOJ would move to dissolve Judge Richard Leon’s injunction and kill the case itself. “Your lawsuit puts the lives of the president, his family, and his staff at grave risk,” Shumate wrote. “Enough is enough. Your client should voluntarily dismiss this frivolous lawsuit today in light of last night’s assassination attempt on President Trump.”
The letter then argued that the shooter targeting Trump “at the Washington Hilton, the only ballroom in Washington, D.C., suitable to host large gatherings for the President” proved the White House ballroom was “essential for the safety and security of the President, his family, his cabinet, and his staff.”
Strong language… just a few not-so-minor details that prevent it from landing. Like how the White House Correspondents’ Dinner is not a White House event, but rather hosted by the White House Correspondents’ Association. And that attending is a presidential choice — indeed Trump has skipped out on every other Correspondents’ Dinner he was invited to. Plus the administration did not even designate the event as a National Special Security Event, a classification that would have required a higher threshold of security measures.
So… Trump voluntarily attended a non-White House event, the Secret Service chose to skimp on security measures, and because something bad happened there — that the Secret Service still successfully thwarted — the president should be afforded unilateral authority to throw a tumorous ballroom onto a national landmark? Maybe we shouldn’t be surprised, the administration has been calling everything a national security necessity since the East Wing came down (Judge Leon already had occasion to note that “national security is not a blank check to proceed with otherwise unlawful activity”). It’ll be interesting to see how Judge Leon — the same George W. Bush appointee who has been watching this administration make increasingly strained arguments for the better part of a year — reacts to this one.
The DOJ letter is also, to put it charitably, in significant tension with the position this administration has staked out in every other gun-related tragedy in recent memory. When children are murdered in their classrooms, the answer from this crowd is invariably: thoughts and prayers, mental health, it’s too soon to talk about policy. But shots fired in the vicinity of GOP politicians and suddenly something needs to be done by 9 a.m. Monday? The whiplash would be funny if it weren’t so grotesque.
And then there’s the part that the administration has, seemingly, not thought through at all: the optics of this move are doing absolutely nothing to tamp down the false flag speculation that immediately erupted online after the shooting. Now, to be clear, there is no credible evidence this was a false flag. The suspect sent his family a note about 10 minutes before the attack apologizing to his parents, colleagues, and students for what he was about to do, writing, “I don’t expect forgiveness.” That is not the behavior of a government plant. The shooter appears to be exactly what he appears to be.
But false flag theories don’t survive and thrive on evidence. They’re built on the appearance of suspicious opportunism. And the DOJ — less than 24 hours after the shooting — publicly calling on the plaintiff’s attorney to drop a specific ongoing lawsuit that directly benefits the president, using language like “I hope yesterday’s narrow miss will help you finally realize the folly” of your lawsuit… is not a great look for an administration trying to project good faith.
Kathryn Rubino is a Senior Editor at Above the Law, host of The Jabot podcast, and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. AtL tipsters are the best, so please connect with her. Feel free to email her with any tips, questions, or comments and follow her on Twitter @Kathryn1 or Bluesky @Kathryn1
The post Good Job DOJ, Now The Conspiracy Theorists Have A Point appeared first on Above the Law.
You almost have to admire the speed.
Less than 24 hours after a gunman was tackled outside the ballroom at the Washington Hilton during the White House Correspondents’ Dinner, the Department of Justice had already drafted a letter addressed to Greg Craig of Foley Hoag demanding the firm drop its case against the administration for redesigning the White House without any congressional approval. Acting AG Todd Blanche subsequently posted this letter to X with the six-word summary: “It’s time to build the ballroom.”
That’s… a lot of hustle for a Sunday morning.
To be clear about what actually happened Saturday night: the suspect, a California teacher and engineer, rushed a security checkpoint and ran toward the ballroom where the black-tie dinner was being held, armed with a shotgun, handgun, and knives. He exchanged gunfire with law enforcement and was tackled to the ground. One Secret Service agent was hit in his bulletproof vest, treated, and released.
No one was killed. The shooter was arrested. A scary incident, genuinely, and one that could have been catastrophically worse. We can all agree on that.
But the Trump administration did not wait to agree on that and move on. Instead, Assistant AG Brett Shumate fired off a letter to the National Trust for Historic Preservation’s outside counsel demanding the Trust voluntarily dismiss its lawsuit against the White House ballroom by 9 a.m. Monday, or the DOJ would move to dissolve Judge Richard Leon’s injunction and kill the case itself. “Your lawsuit puts the lives of the president, his family, and his staff at grave risk,” Shumate wrote. “Enough is enough. Your client should voluntarily dismiss this frivolous lawsuit today in light of last night’s assassination attempt on President Trump.”
The letter then argued that the shooter targeting Trump “at the Washington Hilton, the only ballroom in Washington, D.C., suitable to host large gatherings for the President” proved the White House ballroom was “essential for the safety and security of the President, his family, his cabinet, and his staff.”
Strong language… just a few not-so-minor details that prevent it from landing. Like how the White House Correspondents’ Dinner is not a White House event, but rather hosted by the White House Correspondents’ Association. And that attending is a presidential choice — indeed Trump has skipped out on every other Correspondents’ Dinner he was invited to. Plus the administration did not even designate the event as a National Special Security Event, a classification that would have required a higher threshold of security measures.
So… Trump voluntarily attended a non-White House event, the Secret Service chose to skimp on security measures, and because something bad happened there — that the Secret Service still successfully thwarted — the president should be afforded unilateral authority to throw a tumorous ballroom onto a national landmark? Maybe we shouldn’t be surprised, the administration has been calling everything a national security necessity since the East Wing came down (Judge Leon already had occasion to note that “national security is not a blank check to proceed with otherwise unlawful activity”). It’ll be interesting to see how Judge Leon — the same George W. Bush appointee who has been watching this administration make increasingly strained arguments for the better part of a year — reacts to this one.
The DOJ letter is also, to put it charitably, in significant tension with the position this administration has staked out in every other gun-related tragedy in recent memory. When children are murdered in their classrooms, the answer from this crowd is invariably: thoughts and prayers, mental health, it’s too soon to talk about policy. But shots fired in the vicinity of GOP politicians and suddenly something needs to be done by 9 a.m. Monday? The whiplash would be funny if it weren’t so grotesque.
And then there’s the part that the administration has, seemingly, not thought through at all: the optics of this move are doing absolutely nothing to tamp down the false flag speculation that immediately erupted online after the shooting. Now, to be clear, there is no credible evidence this was a false flag. The suspect sent his family a note about 10 minutes before the attack apologizing to his parents, colleagues, and students for what he was about to do, writing, “I don’t expect forgiveness.” That is not the behavior of a government plant. The shooter appears to be exactly what he appears to be.
But false flag theories don’t survive and thrive on evidence. They’re built on the appearance of suspicious opportunism. And the DOJ — less than 24 hours after the shooting — publicly calling on the plaintiff’s attorney to drop a specific ongoing lawsuit that directly benefits the president, using language like “I hope yesterday’s narrow miss will help you finally realize the folly” of your lawsuit… is not a great look for an administration trying to project good faith.
Kathryn Rubino is a Senior Editor at Above the Law, host of The Jabot podcast, and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. AtL tipsters are the best, so please connect with her. Feel free to email her with any tips, questions, or comments and follow her on Twitter @Kathryn1 or Bluesky @Kathryn1
The post Good Job DOJ, Now The Conspiracy Theorists Have A Point appeared first on Above the Law.
