Objectivity Rules: Department of (In)Justice
The DOJ is ignoring the rule of law to please their boss and threaten prosecutors
Objectivity Rules: February 15, 2025
In this edition of Objectivity Rules:
Turmoil at the DOJ
The NFL makes a change
Mixed messages on Ukraine
PLUS: Impeachment threat, DeSantis hits his expiration date, complaining complainers
TURMOIL AT THE DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE
You could see this sort of thing coming.
On Tuesday, the Department of Justice ordered corruption charges against New York Mayor Eric Adams dropped, an action that smells worse than a skunk in summer.
Despite Trump’s campaign promise not to politicize the DOJ, he just did, and the department admitted it. Emil Bove, the acting U.S. deputy attorney general, said in a memo that the charges made it hard for Adams to tackle two Trump priorities, “illegal immigration and violent crime.”
That’s interesting since New York is a sanctuary city that prohibits its police from cooperating with immigration law enforcement (except in certain instances like violent crime), and the city that never sleeps continues to be plagued with high-profile instances of crime.
Bove, in a head-scratching assertion, then tried to pin the charges against Adams on the Biden administration. It “cannot be ignored that Mayor Adams criticized the prior Administration’s immigration policies before the charges were filed,” the memo noted.
By Thursday, at least four prosecutors resigned in protest after they refused the DOJ order. The DOJ ripped the prosecutors as being insubordinate, and —- get this —- has now threatened to investigate them for, I guess, having principals.
The DOJ’s action should alarm everyone, regardless of party. Political prosecution happens in Venezuela, Russia, and Iran, and we should be better than that. The DOJ’s actions show we’re not.
It appears more likely that the DOJ dropped the charges after Adams went to Mar-A-Lago and showed proper fidelity to Trump. In doing so, Adams has made a trade he will eventually regret. The DOJ noted that it could refile the charges at any time. If Adams falls out of line, he’s in trouble again.
The Biden administration used the DOJ against Trump and you know what they say about payback. But when you talk about a potential constitutional crisis around the rule of law, this is close to it. Presidents should not decide who gets prosecuted and who doesn’t based on their whims. It’s a dangerous precedent and it needs to stop.
And it doesn’t stop there ………
Representative Andrew Clyne announced he’s drafting articles of impeachment against U.S. District Judge John McConnell Jr., who had the nerve to issue a ruling against Trump. McConnell ruled that the White House didn’t have the power to freeze federal grants and loans and ordered the administration to make the funds available. He later said the government was ignoring his order.
That infuriated Clyne, who claimed on ‘X’ the judge should be impeached because he’s guilty of being a “partisan activist.”
This is an intimidation tactic that won’t (shouldn’t?) work. First, an impeachment won’t happen since two-thirds of the Senate would have to agree. Besides, there are specific reasons judges can face impeachment —- treason, fr example —- and being a partisan activist (even if true) isn’t one of them.
SUPER CHANGE AT THE SUPER BOWL
Before the (very boring) Super Bowl, the National Football League announced it would remove its “End Racism” slogan in the end zone to “Choose Love.”
That sent the right and left into a frenzy. The right took it as proof that Team Trump’s anti-DEI posture forced the country’s most powerful sports league to its knees, meaning that others would soon follow. The left decried the move as a capitulation to racist views that seek to disenfranchise people of color.
There’s another, more objective, explanation.
Like other businesses across the country, the NFL has changed the words while keeping the intent.
NFL commission Roger Goodall said so.
"We got into diversity efforts because we felt it was the right thing for the National Football League and we're going to continue those efforts," Goodell told reporters before the Super Bowl.
This is the DEI push and pull. Team Trump has strongarmed companies like GM, Pepsi, and Amazon to eliminate or scale back mentions of DEI and various cultural observances, like Black History Month.
But, Costco, Apple, Microsoft, and others have taken the opposite tact and issued statements supporting DEI.
Last week, I wrote in my Dayton Daily News column that the anti-DEI hysteria will pass. (That’s a Press Reader link so it’s free to read). Throughout history, American society has denigrated Native Americans, Italians, Black Americans, interracial marriages, and whatever else society objected to. Over time, society came to see those as intolerant positions and moderated its views. For example, in 1958, just four percent of the country approved of interracial marriage, according to Gallop. Today, only 4 percent disapprove.
It takes a while, but, eventually, the anti-DEI stuff will go the way of other objections.
RIGHT HAND LEFT HAND
My friend
[1] says covering the Trump administration is one of the most difficult jobs in journalism, and he’s right. With so many moving parts, it’s hard to tell what to chase, what to put on the back burner, and what developments mean something significant.Ukraine is a case in point. I’ve rewritten this section four times now (hence the latestness is getting today’s edition published.) I won’t review all of the rewrites, but the last one was titled, “Pete Hegseth is right” for his remarks on Ukraine.
But it’s now “left hand, right hand” because the administration seems lost on its Ukraine messaging.
First, Hegseth showed his inexperience by making stunning public remarks at NATO headquarters when discussing the Russia-Ukraine war. He said in any peace deal, Ukraine wouldn’t regain the land it lost and that Europe must increase its commitment to maintaining peace. In the biggest bombshell, he noted Ukraine wouldn’t join NATO. Oops. He walked that back the next day, saying Trump would negotiate the details.
Then, late Friday, vice-president J.D. Vance told the Washington Post that the U.S. could hit Russia with sanctions or —- gasp —- “military tools” if Putin doesn’t agree to a peace deal that includes Ukraine's independence.
As with everything Team Trump, it’s hard to tell whether this bluster is a “left hand, right hand” issue of purposeful confusion to keep allies and enemies alike off balance; or just the “see what sticks” approach that the president often uses. (It’s also important to mention that Vance said “military tools,” not “military action,” as some media has inaccurately written.)
All of the Ukraine developments this week mean one thing —- when it comes to his attention, Trump has the world off-balanced and guessing, just the way he likes it.
[1] Mark has a terrific subscriber-only newsletter and a new media platform, 2Way, in which the audience can ask questions of his A-list guests. You can read more here. I strongly recommend checking out 2Way.
ODDS AND ENDS
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has reached his expiration date. The powerbroker and wanna-be president once had an iron grip on the Sunshine State’s politics. Not anymore. Now a lame duck, the state legislature strongly rejected DeSantis’ plan to deputize the highway patrol to perform immigration officer duties. At the height of his power, DeSantis would have easily gotten his way. Not anymore… Americans once complained about a bloated federal government, deficits, America trying to be the world’s policeman, and being embroiled in the Middle East quagmire. For better or worse, Trump’s trying to fix those problems, and people complain about his tactics, grating as they are. Will they complain if he succeeds at just one or two of those vexing issues?…One thing that people don’t understand about Trump — he’s a 78-year-old president who can’t run again (as far as we know), keeps his own counsel, and could care less what people think. That’s either a dangerous combination or one that can produce out-of-the-box thinking —- or some combination of the two. It’s too early to determine which is more true ….
MY OTHER WRITING
This coming Sunday, in the Dayton Daily News, I’m writing about the need to change the discussion around the death penalty. As with any complex societal issue, simply saying “yes” or “no,” misses the point … I’m writing a piece for
and that looks at the best point guard tandems in NBA history. West/Goodrich? Frazier/Monroe? Steph/Thompson? If you like hoops, Knicks Film School provides the smartest NBA coverage around … I’m headed to Beam Distillery at the end of the month to pick a barrel of Knob Creek cask strength, and I’ll review that in the ….Ray Marcano has more than 40 years of experience as a reporter, editor, executive, and leader. He’s worked for some of the country’s biggest brands, including CNN, ESPN’s Andcape, and USAToday. His award-winning column appears each Sunday in the Dayton (OH) Daily News, and he’s a frequent contributor to the Columbus (OH) Dispatch. He’s the former national president of the Society of Professional Journalists, a two-time Pulitzer juror, and a Fulbright Fellow.
I don't want to be thought of as a DEI hire.
Does that mean I don't want diversity and equality in hiring at my work? Goodness no. But me, Jessica Elsener, got my job due to my hard work in school, my hard work as an intern, and my other qualifications.
In the Focus Group podcast, by former conservative Sarah Longwell,is pretty amazing. While it can be painful from time to time to hear negative things from people, I think it can be extremely illuminating. On a recent episode where participants discussed DEI, many of the loudest opponents were Black people. The interesting thing, no one seemed to be against the idea of diversity and being inclusive in hiring. Most responses talked about either not wanting qualified jobs taken away from people for the sake of diversity (a bugaboo that some talk about happening, but I'm not sure hie often it actually happens in practice). Or the respondents mentioned not wanting to be accused of having got their position unfairly, over someone more deserved.
Now, we can know as rational people, that due to the history of racial injustice, and lack of polices to make sure states couldn't discriminate due to race.
But, there's something about "affirmative action" that certain conservatives have never forgiven. You see the way people frame learning American history being "woke" because myths and untruths about Columbus and the founding of this country started to get erased. A certain segment wished the other side had won the Civil War, those types exist. But the myth of the "inequality of affirmative action" has had a conservative blowback that you make a straight line to the current DEI gripes.
I think there's no perfect program, there's no perfect way to combat racism or inequality. People are fallible, people make policies, policies are imperfect. Affirmative action wasn't perfect, DEI policies aren't either. But they aren't evil.
Getting us marginalized folks to fight while the rich do what they want, is not a novel or innovative strategy. But it's effective. As a Trans person, I don't want to get hired for that reason. All of a sudden, all my hard work, my struggle, my worth as a worker, all of a sudden are undermined because "I just got hired because they needed to fill a trans quota".
I don't think anyone wants that. Which is where the pushback coming from Black people in this focus group. It's not DEI, it's being perceived as getting a job you don't deserve.
So we can all agree, this purposed situation is bad. But is it happening for real? From what I've read, the biggest issue with DEI programs was they didn't achieve much DEI success, because executives didn't follow their own policies. Like you pointed out, adding alot of these policies were not mandatory, the6 were financial choices. Nothing more. All the companies rejoicing the "death" of DEI, these were the people who crafted alot of this crap because they thought it would make their companies more appealing.
We Trans people didn't ask everyone to stuff pronouns in every email and zoom, for example. The CEOs and companies chose alot of this, without asking Black people, or Queer people, or Hispanic people, so did Democrats, in such a hurry to appear accepting, they didn't bother to meet others where they were at. Right or wrong, it took decades for Gay marriage Rights. You know what I think did it. Decades of getting to know openly gay people. Trans issues need time, there will always be bigots, but there's people we can reach, like you say in the article. Course corrections happen.
Which full circle, brongs us to the irony of my initial statement, I know my skin can play a factor in my getting preference even if my Transness doesn't, and I don't want it too, but it often does. But until it doesn't, for real, we'll need things like DEI, just worded differently. I think alot of backlash is conservatives realizing DEI has been happening, but it's for unqualified people like Hegseth that really reap the awards. Sorry for this novel sized comment. Ohio is fortunate to have you, Ray.
want to comment on greatest NBA guard team.
All four great, I cannot rate any one the greatest?