Hi, and welcome back to Trump Watch! It's starting to feel like we can't make it a couple days without a Roger Stone headline. Follow me on Twitter at @jacq_thomsen to make sure you don't miss a single one, and email me at [email protected] about any news I may have missed while floating around in Stone-land.

Trump: Does He Love or Hate The Courts?

President Donald Trump isn't one to stay quiet when things don't go his way, and that approach also applies to court rulings. But how does that square up with his tidal wave of judicial appointees over the past few years?

U.S. District Judge Amy Berman Jackson raised Trump's tweets attacking herself and jurors in Roger Stone's criminal case as potentially causing lasting damage to the judiciary during a Tuesday hearing. She especially seemed concerned about the safety of jurors in the case, some of whom have publicly identified themselves.

"I need to state this clearly, that any attempt to invade the privacy of the jury is completely antithetical to our entire system of justice," she said, after citing Trump's tweets about the case—and specifically the jury's foreperson—as making the "risk of harassment and intimidation of any juror who may testify … extremely high."

"While judges may have volunteered for their positions" and may be prepared for criticism, Jackson continued, "jurors are not volunteers." And she warned that it could prevent Americans from wanting to serve on juries in the future, which could affect people's right to a fair and impartial jury trial.

Trump's actions are also being felt in another court on the other side of the country.

In a piece for the Los Angeles Times over the weekend, reporter Maura Dolan spoke with judges on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit about the impact of 10 Trump appointees joining the bench.

Some of them directed their ire toward at least one Trump appointee to the court, Judge Daniel Collins, who reportedly sought to overturn some panel rulings in a manner that rubbed a few circuit veterans the wrong way. They claimed he also violated a court rule on sending late-night memos (although some ex-circuit clerks debated whether such a rule actually exists.)

But the impact of those judges goes beyond their behavior: As Jonathan Blitzer wrote in the New Yorker earlier this month, courts that regularly used to block controversial Trump immigration policies are now allowing them to go into effect—including the U.S. Supreme Court, which has shifted to the right under Trump.

"The main fight in the shifting legal battle against the Administration's policies now turns on what was once a semi-obscure matter of academic debate: whether it's appropriate for federal judges to issue nationwide injunctions to halt those policies," Blitzer wrote. "The practice has always been fraught, but it has become especially so in the past several years. Since a federal judge can single-handedly stall a national policy, litigants have increasingly opted to file lawsuits in jurisdictions that are ideologically sympathetic to their causes."

That was a point raised during a Senate hearing on universal injunctions this week. University of Michigan law professor Nicholas Bagley highlighted how every judge who ruled in favor of an injunction against the Obama administration was appointed by a Republican, and how almost every judge who ruled in favor of an injunction against the Trump administration was a Democrat appointee.

"The pattern here could not be starker, and it breeds cynicism about the law," Bagley said.

What does this all mean? While many are denouncing Trump's attacks on the judiciary, his grip on the federal courts means that those attacks may actually fall to the wayside—given that rulings go in his favor.

For example, the White House regularly issues statements about court rulings. When a judge or a court upholds a Trump policy, the decision is celebrated. When it goes the other way, the word "unelected" is often among the first included in the statement—an accurate term, sure, but one clearly meant to undermine the ruling.

Seeing a pattern yet? The more judges Trump gets on the bench, the more likely they're going to rule his way, at least on injunctions. Which may mean fewer attacks from the president. But that also doesn't preclude judges, more likely left-leaning ones, from ruling against him. In that case, bring out the popcorn and watch the interbranch fist fight play out.

A Look Ahead

2/28: A federal judge has ordered lawyers representing Concord Management and Consulting in the case of a Russia troll farm indicted by special counsel Robert Mueller to explain by 5 p.m. today why their client shouldn't be held in civil contempt "for failing to comply with the trial subpoenas issued in this case." Judge Dabney Friedrich also ordered a 3/2 hearing on the issue.

3/4: The Senate Judiciary Committee will hold a hearing on judicial nominations at 10 a.m. The list of nominees hasn't been announced yet, but Trump sent a slate of nominees for California district courts to the Senate earlier this month.

3/5: Chief Judge Beryl Howell will hear arguments at 10 a.m. over a motion for a preliminary injunction on the Trump administration's proposed SNAP rule change that could eliminate benefits for some 700,000 Americans. A couple hours later, and in the same courthouse, Judge Reggie Walton will hold a hearing on the Electronic Privacy Information Center's (EPIC) bid to get documents related to the Mueller report.

3/6: Sick of hearing about Roger Stone yet? Too bad! This is the day we could learn more about sealed information in his search warrant applications. Judge Casey Cooper in January instructed DOJ attorneys to file by next Friday, under seal, proposed redactions to the documents, as well as a public explanation of why any of the information should remain under seal.

What We're Reading

>> In Advancing Ukraine FOIA Fights, Lawyers Echo Trump's Impeachment Defense Arguments: "The more than a dozen FOIA lawsuits tied to the Ukrainian-focused impeachment proceedings resulted in swift rulings in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia late last year, including rare preliminary injunctions compelling the government to quickly hand over the records. But those productions often resulted in heavily redacted documents….That means even more legal fights to challenge the redactions and get that hidden information out in the open. And the public records lawyers are turning to an unexpected source in urging the courts to still rule swiftly in the cases: The arguments made by Trump's impeachment lawyers." [National Law Journal]

>> Trump Tweets, Hidden Jurors and 'Public Enemy' Lyrics: Roger Stone's Bid for a New Trial Marches On: "U.S. District Judge Amy Berman Jackson of the District of Columbia started off a Tuesday hearing on Roger Stone's bid for a new trial by reading out loud tweets from President Donald Trump alleging juror misconduct in the criminal case and later made a stunning announcement that the majority of the jury that Stone's lawyers and Trump now claim were tainted were just feet away in the jury room. Hashtags referencing hip-hop group 'Public Enemy' were described on the stand by the foreperson of Stone's jury, and she was asked to explain emojis she had posted on social media in the early morning hours before the Stone verdict came down. Even one of the prosecutors who withdrew from the case over Main Justice's interference in the sentencing recommendation briefly took the stand to describe some pretrial interactions between the trial team and Stone's defense counsel." [National Law Journal]

>> Ninth Circuit Declines to Vacate Joe Arpaio's Criminal Contempt Record, but Defense Declares Victory: "In a 15-page published decision issued Thursday, a three-judge Ninth Circuit panel upheld [U.S. District Judge Susan] Bolton's decision refusing to vacate the verdict, but did note that verdict 'has no legal consequences' going forward. Ninth Circuit Judge Jay Bybee noted that though colloquially guilty verdicts are often referred to as 'convictions,' they don't have the legal consequences of a 'final judgment of conviction' that attaches at sentencing, and thus aren't subject to the so-called Munsingwear rule, which provides for vacatur of cases that have become moot while on appeal." [The Recorder]

>> Top House Intelligence investigator departing Capitol Hill: "Dan Goldman, a former federal prosecutor who played a major role in the impeachment proceedings, is leaving his perch on the House Intelligence Committee….Goldman, who previously worked as a top prosecutor at the US attorney's office in the Southern District of New York, was hired last year at the beginning of the new Congress as a director of investigations on the House Intelligence Committee. And after the House opened an impeachment inquiry last fall, Goldman took the lead in the House in questioning witnesses both in public hearings and behind closed doors." [CNN]

>> Ex-Senator Feingold Joins Fight Over Courts as Liberals Try to Counter Trump: "Russ Feingold, the former Democratic senator from Wisconsin, is assuming the leadership of the American Constitution Society, a progressive group active on judicial nominations and the justice system, signaling that Democrats are planning an aggressive effort to sharpen their focus on the federal courts as a defining issue….Mr. Feingold, best known as a crusader for overhauling campaign finance laws, said he believed the Republican push to stack the federal courts with conservatives, along with mounting questions about political interference at the Justice Department, has led to a crisis moment that called for a heightened response." [New York Times]

Thanks for reading! I'll be back next week with more Trump Watch.