Judge tosses Trump-linked lawsuit targeting Chief Justice Roberts, dealing setback to Trump allies
A federal judge on Thursday dismissed a lawsuit filed by a pro-Trump legal group seeking access to a trove of federal judiciary documents, including from a body overseen by Supreme...
By Fox News · Fox News
A federal judge on Thursday dismissed a lawsuit filed by a pro-Trump legal group seeking access to a trove of federal judiciary documents, including from a body overseen by Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts – putting an end to a protracted legal fight brought by Trump allies seeking to access key judicial documents. U.S. District Judge Trevor McFadden, a Trump appointee assigned to the case earlier this year, dismissed the long-shot lawsuit brought by the America First Legal Foundation, the pro-Trump group founded by White House policy adviser Stephen Miller after Trump’s first term; Miller, now back in the White House, is no longer affiliated with AFL. McFadden ultimately dismissed the case for lack of jurisdiction, saying Thursday that two groups responsible for certain regulatory and administrative functions for the federal judiciary are an extension of the judicial branch, and therefore protected by the same exemptions to federal laws granted to the judiciary. "Nothing about either entity’s structure suggests the president must supervise their employees or otherwise keep them ‘accountable,’ as is the case for executive officers," McFadden said. TRUMP'S EXECUTIVE ORDER ON VOTING BLOCKED BY FEDERAL JUDGES AMID FLURRY OF LEGAL SETBACKS The lawsuit by AFL was first reported by Fox News Digital earlier this year. It named both Chief Justice Roberts in his capacity as the official head of the U.S. Judicial Conference, and Robert J. Conrad, the director of the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts, and sought access to a trove of judicial documents from both bodies under the Freedom of Information Act. AFL accused both groups of performing regulatory actions that the lawsuit argued exceeded the scope of the "core functions" of the judiciary, and which it argued should subject the groups to the FOIA requests as a result. AFL cited recent actions the Judicial Conference and Administrative Office had taken in 2023 to "accommodate" requests from Congress to inve…