Liberal law professor breaks with Obama judge over Trump lawyer crackdown: ‘I refuse to teach’ it

When a liberal law professor says he won't teach a ruling to his own students, that's not a footnote. That's the story. Jonathan Turley has spent years calling balls and strikes on both parties, and when he says a sitting federal judge crossed a line, it's worth asking what exactly Kathleen Williams did that made him say it.

Referring Todd Blanche and other DOJ lawyers to bar associations isn't the same as ruling against them in a case. It's an attempt to attach professional consequences, potential discipline, to lawyers for doing their jobs representing a client the judge apparently doesn't like. That's a different animal from an adverse decision. Lawyers lose motions every day and walk away with their licenses intact. This is a judge reaching past the bench and into the disciplinary machinery, and doing it to Trump's own lawyer, in a case that's obviously political to the bone.

We've heard plenty about "weaponization" over the past few years, mostly from people who thought it was something that only happened to the other side. Here's a case where the label actually fits the ordinary meaning of the word. If judges start referring opposing counsel to bar associations because they're representing an unpopular defendant, every lawyer in the country should be worried, not just the ones working for Trump. That's the part Turley seems to grasp and a lot of his colleagues don't want to touch.

None of this means Blanche's conduct was flawless or beyond scrutiny. But there's a process for that, and it isn't a judge freelancing referrals in the middle of a politically charged case. When even critics of Trump start refusing to normalize a ruling, that should tell the rest of the legal world something about how far outside the lines it actually is.