by Jordan Rubin | Aug 7, 2026 | Deadline: Legal Blog
The criminal case against former Olympic canoeist David Hearn is now officially dismissed. But there’s still a crucial question that remains open: Will the dismissal be permanent, or will the Justice Department be allowed to try to revive it in the future?
In moving to dismiss the indictment she had touted at a press conference just last month, U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro said her initial allegation that Hearn vandalized the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool was marred by her office’s subsequent discovery that the damage to the landmark was actually due to a botched installation.
Yet even though her motion drew President Donald Trump’s ire and called her future as the District of Columbia’s top prosecutor into question, it didn’t seek a permanent dismissal. Rather, Pirro sought to drop the case “without prejudice,” meaning she moved to dismiss it in a way that would leave her free to revive the charges later.
Hearn’s lawyers responded that the dismissal should be “with prejudice” because of what they called “the extraordinary circumstances of this case.” They said the indictment was “motivated by political considerations and devoid of adequate factual support” from the very start, and that a permanent dismissal is needed to prevent the risk of “harassment and bad faith” by the government.
On Thursday, Superior Court Judge Todd Edelman entered an order dismissing the case but without resolving whether to do so with or without prejudice. The judge observed that both parties agreed the case should be dropped, even if they disagreed about how. “Given the positions of the parties, the Court discerns no reason why this felony case should remain pending against Mr. Hearn
by Jordan Rubin | Aug 6, 2026 | culture, Deadline: Legal Blog
Rachel Leviss’ lawsuit can move forward against her former “Vanderpump Rules” reality television castmate Ariana Madix, after a California appeals court rejected Madix’s bid to strike the suit that stems from the “Scandoval” controversy.
Leviss had an affair with their fellow former castmate Tom Sandoval, who was Madix’s boyfriend at the time. Madix found sexually explicit videos of Leviss on Sandoval’s phone. Madix then recorded the videos and sent them to Leviss, who sued Madix in turn.
Wednesday’s appeals court ruling against Madix upheld a trial judge’s rejection of her motion to strike. The appeals court said Madix failed to meet her burden of showing that Leviss’ claims against her arose from constitutionally protected activity.
Madix had argued that her alleged conduct concerned an issue of public interest about an individual in the public eye. But the appeals court said Leviss’ status as a public person doesn’t make every aspect of her personal life a matter of public concern.
The court noted that the case was about video recordings of Leviss engaging in a private sexual act at a private residence during a private FaceTime call with Sandoval. Even if the affair was known at the time, the court said public interest in it wouldn’t extend to private recordings depicting the most intimate aspects of the relationship.
The appellate panel cited another celebrity sex story that made its way into a California court, from the 1990s, when Bret Michaels and Pamela Anderson Lee tried to block an adult entertainment distributor from publishing a videotape of them having sex. In that case, the court rejected the distributor’s argument that their public statuses as a rock star
by Jordan Rubin | Aug 3, 2026 | Congress, Deadline: Legal Blog, White House
Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche’s latest attempt to secure the job full time raises more questions than it answers, including one that should sink, rather than save, his confirmation: Has he already made his most brazen pro-Donald Trump moves in an effort to secure his confirmation, or has all of this only been an appetizer of what’s to come if he is confirmed?
The latest chapter suggests the latter.
It stems from new documents Blanche posted regarding the “anti-weaponization” fund that was poised to pay Trump supporters (including violent Jan. 6 rioters), and the separate tax immunity deal for Trump and his family. My colleague Steve Benen noted that among the questions Blanche’s move generated are its unknown legal effects and whether it will assuage enough skeptical GOP senators.
We’ll learn whether Blanche has the votes soon enough. It looks like he will, including that of the previously skeptical Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, even though Blanche didn’t go as far in the documents as Cornyn previously noted would have been required to truly modify the IRS settlement, namely because these new documents don’t contain a written agreement between the parties.
The political effects of the documents will become known soon; Blanche will either be confirmed or he won’t. The legal effects will become clear only in the context of any future events that could require courts to examine, for example, how much tax protection Trump and his family really have from the deal. That was unclear when it first came out and still is.
But while the minutiae of how much the Trump family can continue to profit from his presidency in the context
by Jordan Rubin | Jul 30, 2026 | Deadline: Legal Blog
A Nevada judge has dismissed a defamation lawsuit brought by FBI Director Kash Patel because the California blogger he sued didn’t have enough of a connection with the Silver State to establish jurisdiction there.
Patel, a Nevada resident, sued Jim Stewartson in 2023, accusing him of spreading “pernicious lies,” including that Patel “attempted to overthrow the government,” “planned 1/6,” is “guilty of sedition,” is a “Kremlin asset” and that he and his foundation paid people to “lie” to Congress.
The FBI director said those claims were “lies,” and “self-serving and self-promoting” ones at that, because Stewartson “has a financial interest in gaining publicity for his podcast and Substack, for which he sells paid subscriptions.”
Patel won a default judgment last year after Stewartson did not defend against the suit. Nevada’s chief federal trial judge, Andrew Gordon, awarded damages of $200,000 to Patel and $50,000 to his foundation.
But then Stewartson moved to set aside the judgment and dismiss the case, arguing that Patel never properly notified him and that the Nevada courts lack jurisdiction. Stewartson said he learned about the judgment from a CNBC article rather than any official court process.
“The Constitution’s guarantee of due process prevents Plaintiffs from availing themselves of Nevada’s courts for claims against Mr. Stewartson,” he said, referring to Patel and his foundation.
Gordon agreed with Stewartson in a July 25 order.
“I grant Stewartson’s motions because he did not have minimum contacts with Nevada sufficient to establish personal jurisdiction,” the Obama appointee wrote.
“Tagging Patel, who happens to be a Nevadan resident, in posts that have nothing to do with Nevada activities or entities does not target a Nevadan audience, and therefore
by Jordan Rubin | Jul 29, 2026 | Deadline: Legal Blog
Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., said Wednesday that Dr. Anthony Fauci has no rights under the Fifth Amendment because Fauci was pre-emptively pardoned by then-President Joe Biden. Yet the longtime public health official repeatedly invoked the right against self-incrimination during his Senate appearance, as Hawley and other Republicans sought to elicit damning testimony regarding his handling of the government’s Covid-19 response.
The precise scope of Fauci’s rights in this situation is something that only the courts can answer, if it gets to that point. Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., who chaired the hearing and has been a top Fauci antagonist, suggested it would get to that point.
Fauci said in his opening statement that he would be invoking the constitutional protection due to what he called Paul’s unhinged obsession with him and the fact that the senator had repeatedly called for Fauci’s jailing. He said the sole reason Paul called the hearing was to achieve that carceral goal.
But if, as Hawley pointed out, Fauci has been pardoned, what prosecution could the former official have to fear?
There are at least three possibilities.
One stems from the fact that pardons are backward-looking. They aren’t get-out-of-jail-free cards forever into the future. When it comes to Fauci’s pardon from Biden, that means it only covers him up until when it was issued, in January 2025. Anything after that is unprotected, including any potential perjury charges that the Trump Justice Department may be tempted to pursue from his testimony. The DOJ has been targeting political opponents in President Donald Trump’s second term, which we were just reminded of by former FBI Director James Comey’s motion to dismiss his latest charges
by Jordan Rubin | Jul 24, 2026 | Deadline: Legal Blog, Supreme Court
President Donald Trump has been trying to get E. Jean Carroll to return the $5 million (plus interest) that she finally received this month from the case in which a jury found him liable for sexual abuse and defamation. Trump argued for clawing back the funds because he has a pending rehearing petition at the Supreme Court, where he’s again trying to convince the justices to take up his appeal in the case that resulted in that jury award.
After the justices declined to review his initial petition in June, the federal judge in New York who presided over the case ordered the funds released to Carroll earlier this month. Trump’s attempt to halt the judge’s order is pending in a federal appeals court.
But the Supreme Court just signaled that it could soon issue an order that brings a truly final resolution to the matter.
The Supreme Court docket shows that, on Thursday, the court “distributed” Trump’s rehearing petition to the justices, which is a routine step before they decide whether to grant or deny review. Though the court is on a summer recess before the next term starts in October, the justices publish order lists over the summer that mainly contain petition denials. They issued such a list earlier this week.
According to the court calendar, the next list is scheduled for release on Aug. 17, so we could see action on Trump’s rehearing petition then.
That action would most likely be a denial.
As the trial judge noted in his July 8 ruling rejecting further delay, successful Supreme Court rehearing petitions are “rare birds.” On that note, Carroll’s lawyers said that, as far
