No One Is Above the Law – Except When Democrats Say So

We all heard them say it a million times. We all read their sanctimonious articles and posts on social media: “No one is above the law.”

But now liberals have a new amended version of one of their favorite attack lines against Donald Trump. “No one is above the law except liberal judges who break it to protect illegal aliens from deportation.”

Of course, Democrat self-righteousness about holding those in power accountable was always obvious. Joe Biden – or whoever was running his social media – posted “no one is above the law” on May 31, 2024 in the midst of the left’s lawfare crusade against Donald Trump in New York. Readers will well remember that those charges were so patently ridiculous that even CNN legal analyst Elie Honig called the whole thing a “Frankenstein case,” in which prosecutors “contorted the law in an unprecedented manner in their quest to snare their prey.”

And who could forget the former president’s 11th-hour pardon of his son, Hunter, for all crimes he “may have committed” going all the way back to 2014? Apparently, we can add anyone with the last name Biden to the list of individuals who are above the law, according to Democrats. Other figures who openly admitted to undermining President Trump during his first term – and by extension the U.S. Constitution – like Dr. Anthony Fauci and Gen. Mark Milley also made that list.

But the recent arrests of a pair of judges – and the left’s reaction to it – is perhaps the most revealing example yet of just who Democrats believe is really subject to “the law.”

The Justice Department announced on Friday that ex-Judge Jose Luis Cano and his wife, Nancy, “were arrested yesterday for evidence tampering offenses related to the federal investigation and prosecution against Cristhian Ortega-Lopez, a Venezuelan national residing unlawfully within the United States and with alleged ties to transnational criminal organization Tren de Aragua, a U.S.-designated Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO).”

Cano, who retired in March from his position on the Dona Ana County (New Mexico) Magistrate Court, and his wife owned property on which Ortega-Lopez and other illegal immigrants were living. They destroyed incriminating evidence, including Ortega-Lopez’s phone, which Cano thought “contained incriminating photos and videos of Ortega with firearms.” As it was, other recovered devices also had incriminating evidence.

Just hours later, news broke that Milwaukee County Circuit Court Judge Hannah Dugan had been arrested “for her alleged interference with a federal law enforcement operation and unlawful concealment of an individual subject to arrest.”

The case against Judge Dugan is that, on April 18, agents of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and other federal law enforcement agencies attempted to execute an administrative removal warrant for Eduardo Flores-Ruiz, a Mexican national who had already been removed from the U.S. once and was in Dugan’s court for domestic abuse charges.

According to the DOJ, Judge Dugan decided against holding the hearing on Flores-Ruiz’s criminal charges, despite the fact that the victims were present in court, and “instead personally escorted Flores-Ruiz and his attorney through a restricted ‘jury door’ exit not typically used by defendants or attorneys.”

According to the affidavit filed, this action allowed the defendant and his lawyer to exit the court and temporarily get past the federal agents. After a short chase on foot, however, they apprehended him.

In other words, Judge Dugan actively and knowingly aided a criminal defendant in evading federal law enforcement.

Both judges face prison time if convicted.

Media and political flacks desperately tried to portray these arrests as attacks on the American judicial system, as if they happened because the Trump administration disagreed with their rulings. New Mexico Democratic Senator Martin Heinrich’s post on X about Judge Dugan was representative of a thousand others: “Arresting a state judge for her judicial actions is a gross abuse of power and a dangerous escalation in Trump’s war on our constitution and the rule of law. It cannot stand.”

Wisconsin Democratic State Representative Ryan Clancy, who believes the DOJ’s account of Judge Dugan’s actions to be accurate, told reporters that this flagrant violation of the law was in fact justified. “What Judge Dugan apparently did was what all of us should be doing.”

Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers, meanwhile, released a document instructing state employees to effectively obstruct ICE by not answering any of their questions or allowing agents into “non-public areas.”

The problem with all this dishonesty and misdirection is that we know that judges are not above the law. Even more than the rest of us, they should be the most punctilious about obeying it.

It’s not just judges, however. Former Arizona Department of Agriculture employee Joshua Castro was just arrested for human smuggling after he was caught with two men determined to be Mexican illegal aliens on April 9 while wearing his state uniform. They told investigators that they had paid hefty sums of money to be smuggled into the United States. Castro was fired after the arrest.

It’s not just immigration, either. There is ample evidence that Democrats think they are above the law on plenty of other things, too – especially on the racist policies they have been getting away with until Trump took office. Washington State just passed a law giving $120,000 in forgivable loans to first-time black homebuyers. You read that right – only black homebuyers. Not white, not Asian, not anybody else.

Meanwhile, in Hennepin County (Minneapolis), Soros-backed County Attorney Mary Moriarty has now begun requiring that prosecutors consider a defendant’s race when they offer plea deals.

Moriarty herself recently showcased blatant political favoritism in two cases involving felony vandalism of cars that resulted in two different deals. When it came to “Dylan Adams, 33, a fiscal policy analyst for Minnesota’s Department of Human Services, who allegedly keyed six Teslas and caused more than $20,000 in damage,” Moriarty’s office chose not to pursue charges, instead putting Adams into a diversion program. But when handling the case of a 19-year-old woman who keyed a co-worker’s car, causing $7,000 of damage, Moriarty’s office charged the woman with a felony.

Neither offender had a prior criminal record. But Moriarty chose to throw the book at a teenager and not the 30-something state employee who should be more mature and who did more damage. The difference was obvious: Adams is a Democratic activist, so she got off with a slap on the wrist.

This column could go on for much longer since the stories – mostly in blue states – are all the same. Democrats do not think they need to follow the law. And they definitely do not think they should face stiff penalties if they get caught.

This kind of approach cannot be tolerated. Elie Honig of CNN is still as forthright as he was last year about the Frankenstein case against President Trump. Speaking of the case against Judge Dugan, he said, “Let’s strip the politics out of it — this is a crime. If they can prove what happened here, it is a crime… That is textbook obstruction.”

Like their “No one is above the law” schtick, Democrats like to intone that “This is not normal.” Both are correct statements. Violating the law and defending those who do, refusing to cooperate with legal administrative orders, discriminating against certain races and political viewpoints in prosecutions—none of this is normal. Both statements apply to the liberal side of the aisle much more than they apply to conservatives.

Until their actions match their rhetoric, look for the sinking polling for Democrats to continue.

David P. Deavel teaches at the University of St. Thomas in Houston. A past Lincoln Fellow at the Claremont Institute, he is a Senior Contributor at The Imaginative Conservative. Follow him on X (Twitter) @davidpdeavel.