{"id":145785,"date":"2026-03-11T15:54:11","date_gmt":"2026-03-11T23:54:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/2026\/03\/11\/ed-martin-loses-mind-catches-bar-complaint\/"},"modified":"2026-03-11T15:54:11","modified_gmt":"2026-03-11T23:54:11","slug":"ed-martin-loses-mind-catches-bar-complaint","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/2026\/03\/11\/ed-martin-loses-mind-catches-bar-complaint\/","title":{"rendered":"Ed Martin Loses Mind, Catches Bar Complaint"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\u201cEagle\u201d Ed Martin has done a lot of crazy stuff in his career, but fighting a bar complaint by demanding to speak to the judges of the DC Circuit <em>mano a mano<\/em> may be the craziest!<\/p>\n<p>This is a guy who <a href=\"https:\/\/www.columbiamissourian.com\/news\/state_news\/update-fines-sought-against-gov-blunt-for-sunshine-law-violation\/article_49cf53dc-2620-5819-ac10-a76c6f49fac0.html\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">refused to comply<\/a> with the state\u2019s Sunshine laws and cost Missouri almost $2 million.<\/p>\n<p>He blew up Phylis Schlafly\u2019s Eagle Forum and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.propublica.org\/article\/ed-martin-trump-interim-dc-us-attorney-secret-judge-attacks\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">got her sued<\/a> by her own family.<\/p>\n<p>He led the Missouri Republican Party in 2012, a year in which Democrats swept races for governor, secretary of state, attorney general, treasurer, and US senate.<\/p>\n<p>And that was before he got to Washington DC! <\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-twitter wp-block-embed-twitter\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"500\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">I\u2019m at the Capitol right now. Abd I was at the POTUS speech earlier. Rowdy crowd but nothing out of hand. Ignore the <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/FakeNews?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">#FakeNews<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Eagle Ed Martin (@EagleEdMartin) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/EagleEdMartin\/status\/1346907779492143106?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">January 6, 2021<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<p>After descending on the nation\u2019s capital on January 6, Martin was nominated as US Attorney for the District of Columbia \u2014 a position he only held for four months because the Senate refused to confirm him. <\/p>\n<p>Do you know how crazy you have to be for <em>this Congress<\/em> to block you as Republican? These people blessed Robert Kennedy as Secretary of Health and Human Services!<\/p>\n<p>But no matter, Trump shuffled him over to Main Justice and gave him a stack of titles. He\u2019s the pardon attorney. He\u2019s a special attorney for mortgage fraud. He\u2019s associate deputy attorney general. He\u2019s director of the DOJ\u2019s \u201cWeaponization Working Group.\u201d And he still finds time to creep around New York Attorney General Tish James\u2019s house in his trench coat with a camera crew in tow.<\/p>\n<p>He seems to have finally gotten himself banished to the provinces after <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cnn.com\/2026\/02\/04\/politics\/ed-martin-review-improperly-handled-grand-jury\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">sharing grand jury information<\/a> about the investigation into California Senator Adam Schifff<\/p>\n<p>But before that, he managed to write so many letters! To Democratic politicians for speech or debate crimes. To the Journal of the American Medical Association, the New England Journal of Medicine, Obstetrics and Gynecology, and CHEST, which is published by the American College of Chest Physicians, for various DEI violations. To medical marijuana vendors. To Wikipedia for poisoning AI scrapers with woke copy. <\/p>\n<p>But it was his pen pal at Georgetown University Law Center that got him in trouble with the DC Bar. <\/p>\n<p>A year ago, Ed fired off a letter to Dean William Treanor demanding that the school immediately cease all DEI initiatives and proactively informing the school that none of its graduates would be considered for positions at the DOJ. Treanor <a href=\"https:\/\/abovethelaw.com\/2025\/03\/georgetown-law-to-ed-martin-f-all-the-way-off\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">spanked him<\/a> for being a bad lawyer and a bad Catholic and a bad American \u2014 check, check, and check! \u2014 and Martin wandered off to piss into the wind somewhere else.<\/p>\n<p>But that wasn\u2019t the end of the story, because retired California judge Phillip Argento (GULC \u201975) was so incensed that he fired off a complaint to the DC Board of Professional Responsibility. At which point Ed Martin LOST HIS DAMN MIND.<\/p>\n<p>From the <a href=\"https:\/\/districtofcolumbiabar.sharepoint.com\/:b:\/r\/sites\/BPRCaseManager\/Shared%20Documents\/Cases%20of%20Public%20Interest\/In%20re%20Edward%20R.%20Martin,%20Jr.,%20Board%20Docket%20No.%2026-BD-013\/2026-03-06%20Specification%20of%20Charges.pdf?csf=1&amp;web=1&amp;e=wsShej\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">Specification of Charges<\/a>:<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p>Instead of responding to Disciplinary Counsel\u2019s letter, on March 31, 2025, Mr. Martin sent, ex parte, a letter to the Chief Judge and the Senior Judges of the District of Columbia Court of Appeals. In that letter, he stated that he would not be responding to Disciplinary Counsel\u2019s inquiry, complained about Disciplinary Counsel\u2019s \u201cuneven behavior,\u201d and requested a \u201cface-to-face meeting with all of you to discuss this matter and find a way forward.\u201d He copied the White House Counsel \u201cfor informational purposes because of the importance of getting this issue addressed.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>And although the judges told him immediately that ex parte communications were inappropriate and he should continue with the process, he kept on firing off notes to the court <em>two more times<\/em>, all the while ignoring letters from the Disciplinary Counsel. Notably, Martin cc\u2019d the White House Counsel on the first nastygram, which raises some interesting questions about the ethical advice David Warrington is giving the administration.<\/p>\n<p>So now Eagle Ed has <em>two charges<\/em>, one for violating the First Amendment and punishing GULC for its protected speech, and one for communicating ex parte with a judge during a proceeding. Perhaps this is why Attorney General Pam Bondi has been desperately trying to <a href=\"https:\/\/abovethelaw.com\/2026\/03\/bondi-says-shes-the-bar-now\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">take over state bar complaints<\/a>!<\/p>\n<p>Meanwhile at DOJ, they\u2019re trying to pretend that this is all political, rather than a spectacular fuck-up by an incompetent nitwit who should never have been let in the building.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-twitter wp-block-embed-twitter\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"500\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">The DC Bar is such a blatantly Democrat-run political organization. Thank God I\u2019m not a member, and trust me, I never will be. <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/XfRkVzOdgv\" rel=\"nofollow\">https:\/\/t.co\/XfRkVzOdgv<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Todd Blanche (@DAGToddBlanche) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/DAGToddBlanche\/status\/2031393408258834576?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">March 10, 2026<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<p>Wow, that sounds like a dare to the New York Bar, doesn\u2019t it?<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\">\n<p><em><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/bsky.app\/profile\/lizdye.bsky.social\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">Liz Dye<\/a>\u00a0produces the Law and Chaos\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.lawandchaospod.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">Substack\u00a0<\/a>and\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/podcasts.apple.com\/us\/podcast\/law-and-chaos\/id1727769913\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">podcast<\/a>.<\/strong><\/em>\u00a0<em><strong>You can subscribe by clicking the logo:<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.lawandchaospod.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"300\" height=\"153\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/abovethelaw.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2025\/06\/law-and-chaos-logo-liz-dye-300x153.jpg?resize=300%2C153&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-1163974\" title=\"\"><\/a><\/figure>\n<p>The post <a href=\"https:\/\/abovethelaw.com\/2026\/03\/ed-martin-loses-mind-catches-bar-complaint\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Ed Martin Loses Mind, Catches Bar Complaint<\/a> appeared first on <a href=\"https:\/\/abovethelaw.com\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Above the Law<\/a>.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"post-single__featured-image post-single__featured-image--medium alignright\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"300\" height=\"200\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/abovethelaw.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2026\/03\/ed-martin-GettyImages-2259365328-300x200.jpg?resize=300%2C200&#038;ssl=1\" class=\"attachment-medium size-medium wp-post-image\" alt=\"\" title=\"\"><figcaption class=\"post-single__featured-image-caption\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t(Photo by Al Drago\/Getty Images)\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>\u201cEagle\u201d Ed Martin has done a lot of crazy stuff in his career, but fighting a bar complaint by demanding to speak to the judges of the DC Circuit <em>mano a mano<\/em> may be the craziest!<\/p>\n<p>This is a guy who  with the state\u2019s Sunshine laws and cost Missouri almost $2 million.<\/p>\n<p>He blew up Phylis Schlafly\u2019s Eagle Forum and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.propublica.org\/article\/ed-martin-trump-interim-dc-us-attorney-secret-judge-attacks\" id=\"https:\/\/www.propublica.org\/article\/ed-martin-trump-interim-dc-us-attorney-secret-judge-attacks\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">got her sued<\/a> by her own family.<\/p>\n<p>He led the Missouri Republican Party in 2012, a year in which Democrats swept races for governor, secretary of state, attorney general, treasurer, and US senate.<\/p>\n<p>And that was before he got to Washington DC! <\/p>\n<p>After descending on the nation\u2019s capital on January 6, Martin was nominated as US Attorney for the District of Columbia \u2014 a position he only held for four months because the Senate refused to confirm him. <\/p>\n<p>Do you know how crazy you have to be for <em>this Congress<\/em> to block you as Republican? These people blessed Robert Kennedy as Secretary of Health and Human Services!<\/p>\n<p>But no matter, Trump shuffled him over to Main Justice and gave him a stack of titles. He\u2019s the pardon attorney. He\u2019s a special attorney for mortgage fraud. He\u2019s associate deputy attorney general. He\u2019s director of the DOJ\u2019s \u201cWeaponization Working Group.\u201d And he still finds time to creep around New York Attorney General Tish James\u2019s house in his trench coat with a camera crew in tow.<\/p>\n<p>He seems to have finally gotten himself banished to the provinces after <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cnn.com\/2026\/02\/04\/politics\/ed-martin-review-improperly-handled-grand-jury\" id=\"https:\/\/www.cnn.com\/2026\/02\/04\/politics\/ed-martin-review-improperly-handled-grand-jury\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">sharing grand jury information<\/a> about the investigation into California Senator Adam Schifff<\/p>\n<p>But before that, he managed to write so many letters! To Democratic politicians for speech or debate crimes. To the Journal of the American Medical Association, the New England Journal of Medicine, Obstetrics and Gynecology, and CHEST, which is published by the American College of Chest Physicians, for various DEI violations. To medical marijuana vendors. To Wikipedia for poisoning AI scrapers with woke copy. <\/p>\n<p>But it was his pen pal at Georgetown University Law Center that got him in trouble with the DC Bar. <\/p>\n<p>A year ago, Ed fired off a letter to Dean William Treanor demanding that the school immediately cease all DEI initiatives and proactively informing the school that none of its graduates would be considered for positions at the DOJ. Treanor <a href=\"https:\/\/abovethelaw.com\/2025\/03\/georgetown-law-to-ed-martin-f-all-the-way-off\/\" id=\"https:\/\/abovethelaw.com\/2025\/03\/georgetown-law-to-ed-martin-f-all-the-way-off\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">spanked him<\/a> for being a bad lawyer and a bad Catholic and a bad American \u2014 check, check, and check! \u2014 and Martin wandered off to piss into the wind somewhere else.<\/p>\n<p>But that wasn\u2019t the end of the story, because retired California judge Phillip Argento (GULC \u201975) was so incensed that he fired off a complaint to the DC Board of Professional Responsibility. At which point Ed Martin LOST HIS DAMN MIND.<\/p>\n<p>From the :<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p>Instead of responding to Disciplinary Counsel\u2019s letter, on March 31, 2025, Mr. Martin sent, ex parte, a letter to the Chief Judge and the Senior Judges of the District of Columbia Court of Appeals. In that letter, he stated that he would not be responding to Disciplinary Counsel\u2019s inquiry, complained about Disciplinary Counsel\u2019s \u201cuneven behavior,\u201d and requested a \u201cface-to-face meeting with all of you to discuss this matter and find a way forward.\u201d He copied the White House Counsel \u201cfor informational purposes because of the importance of getting this issue addressed.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>And although the judges told him immediately that ex parte communications were inappropriate and he should continue with the process, he kept on firing off notes to the court <em>two more times<\/em>, all the while ignoring letters from the Disciplinary Counsel. Notably, Martin cc\u2019d the White House Counsel on the first nastygram, which raises some interesting questions about the ethical advice David Warrington is giving the administration.<\/p>\n<p>So now Eagle Ed has <em>two charges<\/em>, one for violating the First Amendment and punishing GULC for its protected speech, and one for communicating ex parte with a judge during a proceeding. Perhaps this is why Attorney General Pam Bondi has been desperately trying to <a href=\"https:\/\/abovethelaw.com\/2026\/03\/bondi-says-shes-the-bar-now\/\" id=\"https:\/\/abovethelaw.com\/2026\/03\/bondi-says-shes-the-bar-now\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">take over state bar complaints<\/a>!<\/p>\n<p>Meanwhile at DOJ, they\u2019re trying to pretend that this is all political, rather than a spectacular fuck-up by an incompetent nitwit who should never have been let in the building.<\/p>\n<p>Wow, that sounds like a dare to the New York Bar, doesn\u2019t it?<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\" \/>\n<p><em><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/bsky.app\/profile\/lizdye.bsky.social\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">Liz Dye<\/a>\u00a0produces the Law and Chaos\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.lawandchaospod.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">Substack\u00a0<\/a>and\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/podcasts.apple.com\/us\/podcast\/law-and-chaos\/id1727769913\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">podcast<\/a>.<\/strong><\/em>\u00a0<em><strong>You can subscribe by clicking the logo:<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.lawandchaospod.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"300\" height=\"153\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/abovethelaw.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2025\/06\/law-and-chaos-logo-liz-dye-300x153.jpg?resize=300%2C153&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-1163974\" title=\"\"><\/a><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>\u201cEagle\u201d Ed Martin has done a lot of crazy stuff in his career, but fighting a bar complaint by demanding to speak to the judges of the DC Circuit mano a mano may be the craziest! This is a guy who refused to comply with the state\u2019s Sunshine laws and cost Missouri almost $2 million. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":145786,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-145785","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-above_the_law"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/xira.com\/p\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/law-and-chaos-logo-liz-dye-300x153-twQsjG.jpg?fit=300%2C153&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/145785","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=145785"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/145785\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/145786"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=145785"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=145785"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=145785"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}