How does one judge make policy for a whole nation?

0:00 Speaker 1 Well, Sunday morning, is our country going to have a constitutional crisis? Who is in charge? Is that the President of the United States, the United States Senate, the United States Congress, or the Supreme Court, or seven hundred individual federal judges with us today is a professor of law from Berkeley. His name is John You. A wonderful friend,

0:29 a wonderful, very intelligent individual. John You. How is the weather out in Berkeley?

0:38 Speaker 2 Oh? Stormy? Just like the rest of the country.

0:43 Speaker 1 I think many things are going to be stormy. Are we going to be in the middle of a constitutional crisis where the President says that I’m not going to listen to those federal judges. They don’t have the right to tell me that. I can’t, you know, fire people.

1:03 Speaker 2 For I don’t think we’re in the middle of a constitutional crisis yet. I think what we’re seeing is just the normal give and take, the normal fighting between the branches. That’s the founder’s intents they wanted. They designed the separation of powers on purpose so that the President and Congress and the courts would constantly be fighting. So I think

1:24 they will. Shouldn’t worry that we’re in some kind of dreaded constitutional crisis. This is not Watergate, this is not the Civil War, this is not FDR’s fight against the courts. During the New Deal, God said, I think we have a constitutional conflict over Hower. President Trump was elected, won a big victory, and he has an agenda. Part of

1:45 that agenda is downsizing the federal government, making it work efficiently, ending fraud, waste, and abuse. But at the same times, all the people who lost the elections, the people who are resisting President Trump, they’re running to part right away.

2:01 And some judges, I think have read their mandate too far to allow them to stop all federal government policies at once in an effort to hold some of the things President Trump’s trying to do illegal or unconstitutional.

2:19 Speaker 1 There’s talk in Congress that Congress might come up with something to limit a federal judge’s power to a certain region in which they, versus an individual federal judge in San Francisco, can’t dictate to the whole country. What say you on that.

2:39 Speaker 2 I think it’s a great idea. First of all, we should be clear, I think that judges right now don’t have this power. I don’t think a federal single federal judge has any power outside of his or her courtroom.

2:51 Someone shows up and says, the government’s doing something bad to me. The judgement say government stop doing something bad to this pointiff right here in front of me, Judge Candid, therefore, then go and say, and federal government stop everything you’re doing on this policy nationwide with regard to everybody else.

3:09 I don’t think they have that power. The Supreme Court could make that clear if it wanted to. And if the Supreme is, of course not going to do it, then I think it’s a great opportunity for Congress to step in and clarify. I think what the law already revives, which is that only the Supreme Court should be there

3:27 to say this is blocked, or this can go forward for the entire federal government, for the whole country at once.

3:35 Speaker 1 Now, let me straighten out with our constitution. In the Constitution is the Supreme Court. But in nowhere in the Constitution does it talk about federal judges. Is that correct?

3:48 Speaker 2 That’s right. Only only time it’s mentioned is when it’s said the Constitution says Congress can create the lower federal courts. Congress creates them, decides how many of them, decides their powers, decides whether they should have this power to have nationwide injunctions or not understood.

4:07 Speaker 1 We got a minute left. Is there anything you want to tell the American people. We got a lot of people listening this morning, and they’re trying to get unconfused.

4:17 Speaker 2 I think what’s important to realize is that, yes, there are district judges who I think are going too far. I don’t think it’s wise to call for their impeachment. I think that’s destabilizing too. I think though, that the Trump administration, what they’re doing is appealing through the normal system, and that’s the right thing to do. President Trump is

4:37 made clear there’s to be no talk of defying a judicial order. There’s only one time in history of judicial order I think has ever been defied by a president, and it’s Abraham Lincoln at the start of the Civil War, when the author of Dredd Scott tried to get them to release Confederate prisoners right at the start of the war.

4:55 And I think Lincoln wisely refused to listen to him. But we’re nowhere. That’s what is constitutional crisis talk, I think is way over blood. We’re nowhere near those kinds of conditions right now. I think President Trump is wise to keep pushing forward, appealing, trying to get to the Supreme Court.

5:12 Speaker 1 Shown you a professor of law and of the University of Berkeley in California. Thank you so much for you know, straightening out for the average American person. And God bless you and God bless America.

5:30 Speaker 2 Thanks thanks for having me on and I’m always happy to come back. Thank you.