“The Obama administration’s lawsuit against the state of Arizona offers a revealing window into the Holder Justice Department. And the picture isn’t pretty,” writes author of the law, law professor, KRIS W. KOBACH.
“Past administrations — both Republican and Democratic — have taken care to insulate these decisions from political forces. The reasons for doing so are obvious. The decision to file civil charges or to file a civil lawsuit should be based purely on the strength of the legal case against the defendant, not on politics. And when it comes to the Arizona law, the federal government’s case is a weak one.”
When one considers the Arizona lawsuit in contrast to last year’s Justice Department decision to drop the voter-intimidation case against the New Black Panther Party, the conclusion becomes inescapable. In the Black Panther case, the defendants had failed to answer the charges against them, and all the Department had to do was ask the judge for a default judgment. But the political appointees of the Holder Justice Department came in and ordered the career department attorneys to drop the case.
So the department dropped a slam-dunk case and yet files a suit that is half-court shot. Neither decision makes sense if the law is guiding the department’s litigation decisions. But both decisions make perfect sense if political calculations are foremost.