"This Clinton appointee — you knew it was going to be a Clinton appointee; you knew this — Clinton appointee ... It's one federal judge who, like I say, happens to be a Clinton appointee — what a surprise ... this Clinton appointee ... "h/t James Rowen (who deserves a medal for enduring this blather).
Indeed, what a surprise.
How about the Reagan/Bush 43 appointees?
Jeff Wagner further consoles his afflicted followers:* "It's not even a ruling on the merits."** Strictly speaking, that's true. A ruling on the merits — that is, on the question of whether the challenged provisions of S.B. 1070 violate the federal Constitution — is yet to come. But you don't win an injunction unless you can establish a likelihood of succeeding on the merits, which is what the feds demonstrated. So it isn't as if the merits aren't considered.
* In the course of guaranteeing them a win in the U.S. Supreme Court without once saying how or why, apart from "this Clinton appointee."
** Republican Senator Jon Kyl, J.D. of AZ apparently begs to differ:
"[Judge Bolton] said that portions of [S.B. 1070] — the bulk of it — needed to be enjoined because of her view that it was pre-empted by federal law because it created undue additional burdens on the federal government."Them's the merits right there. (Sen. Kyl overstates the case. If that was her view then she would have granted a permanent injunction.)
eta: At the Volokh Conspiracy, Prof. Jonathan Adler writes: "As Orin [Kerr] noted, Bolton held these provisions are preempted by federal law ... " No she did not. Surely this professor of law knows better.
She held only that the United States was likely to succeed in showing that those provisions are preempted by federal law. Big difference.
Judge Bolton was not even tasked with answering Adler's question.
Which reminds me ...
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