Last week, the Court of International Trade delivered a blow to Donald Trump’s global trade war. It found that the worldwide tariffs Trump unveiled on “Liberation Day” as well his earlier tariffs pretextually aimed at stopping fentanyl coming in from Mexico and Canada (as if) were beyond his authority. The three-judge panel was surely right about the Liberation Day tariffs and probably right about the fentanyl tariffs, but there’s a better case that, while bad policy, the fentanyl tariffs were not unlawful.
Please forgive a lengthy excerpt of Trump’s response on Truth Social, but it speaks volumes:
“How is it possible for (the CIT judges) to have potentially done such damage to the United States of America? Is it purely a hatred of ‘TRUMP?’ What other reason could it be? I was new to Washington, and it was suggested that I use The Federalist Society as a recommending source on Judges. I did so, openly and freely, but then realized that they were under the thumb of a real ‘sleazebag’ named Leonard Leo, a bad person who, in his own way, probably hates America, and obviously has his own separate ambitions. … In any event, Leo left The Federalist Society to do his own ‘thing.’ I am so disappointed in The Federalist Society because of the bad advice they gave me on numerous Judicial Nominations. This is something that cannot be forgotten!”
Let’s begin with the fact that Trump cannot conceive of a good explanation for an inconvenient court ruling other than Trump Derangement Syndrome. It’s irrelevant that the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, the 1977 law the administration invoked to impose the relevant tariffs, does not even mention the word “tariff” or that Congress never envisioned the IEEPA as a tool for launching a trade war with every nation in the world, the “Penguin Islands” included. Also disregard the fact that the decision was unanimous and only one of the three judges was appointed by Trump (the other two were Reagan and Obama appointees). (The decision has been paused by an appeals court.)
Trump is the foremost practitioner of what I call Critical Trump Theory — anything bad for Trump is unfair, illegitimate and proof that sinister forces are rigging the system against him. No wonder then that Trump thinks Leonard Leo, formerly a guiding light at the Federalist Society, the premier conservative legal organization, is a “sleazebag” and “bad person.” Note: Leo is neither of those things.
But Trump’s broadsides at Leo and the Federalist Society are portentous. Because Congress is AWOL, refusing to take the lead on trade (and many other things) as the Constitution envisions, it’s fallen to the courts to restrain Trump’s multifront efforts to exceed his authority. That’s why the White House is cynically denouncing “unelected” and “rogue” judges on an almost daily basis and why Trump’s political henchman, Stephen Miller, is incessantly ranting about a “judicial coup.”
The supreme, and sometimes seemingly sole, qualification for appointments to the Trump administration has been servile loyalty to Trump. But that ethos is not reserved for the executive branch. Law firms, elite universities and media outlets are being forced to kneel before the president. Why should judges be any different?
Trump has a history of suggesting “my judges” — i.e., his appointees — should be loyal to him. That’s why he recently nominated Emil Bove, his former personal criminal lawyer turned political enforcer at the Department of Justice, for a federal judgeship.
The significance of Trump’s attack on the Federalist Society and Leo, for conservatives, cannot be exaggerated. The legal movement spearheaded by the Federalist Society has been the most successful domestic conservative project of the last century. Scholarly, civic-minded and principled, the Federalist Society spent decades developing ideas and arguments for re-centering the Constitution in American law. But now Trump has issued a fatwa that it, too, must bend the knee and its principles to the needs of one man. The law be damned, ruling against Trump is ingratitude in his mind.
Speaking of ingratitude, the irony is that the Federalist Society deserves a lot of credit — or blame — for Trump being elected in the first place. In 2016, the death of Antonin Scalia left a vacancy on the Supreme Court. Many conservatives did not trust Trump to replace him. To reassure them, Trump agreed to pick from a list of potential replacements crafted by the Heritage Foundation and Federalist Society. That decision arguably convinced many reluctant conservatives to vote for him.
In the decade since, the Heritage Foundation has dutifully reinvented itself in Trump’s image. The Federalist Society stayed loyal to its principles, and that’s why the Federalist Society is in Trump’s crosshairs.
Jonah Goldberg is editor-in-chief of The Dispatch and the host of The Remnant podcast. His Twitter handle is @JonahDispatch.
U.S. President Donald Trump speaks during a“ Steel Across America” event ahead of the 25th anniversary of the Sept. 11th attacks on the Ellipse near the White House on Sept. 8, 2026 in Washington, D.C. President Trump welcomed 9/ 11 first responders to the Tunnel to Towers Foundation’ s“ Steel Across America” event featuring a 16,900- pound, 21- foot steel beam recovered.
For Trump, even 9/11 is an opportunity
There was a reason organizers of the 9/11 ceremony in Manhattan told President Trump he could not speak at this year’s memorial service.
A good one, it turns out.
Because in a speech he gave on Tuesday in Washington, he did exactly what they were presumably worried about — he made it about himself.
According to The New York Times, Trump had wanted a speaking role at the service, but the National Sept. 11 Memorial and Museum, which oversees the site, said no, as they’ve maintained for the past decade-plus that the venue and event should be nonpartisan.
Trump has long used awful tragedies to either puff himself up, trash political opponents, or sell lies to the American people.
He blamed a deadly plane crash at Washington National Airport last year on diversity, equity and inclusion policies. He blamed Puerto Ricans for the devastation they endured after Hurricane Maria in 2017. He reportedly considered withholding disaster relief after the California wildfires based on the way affected regions voted. In an interview on Fox News meant to commemorate the 75th anniversary of D-Day in Normandy, he used the occasion to slam former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi…with graves of the dead behind him.
And now, as we approach the 25th anniversary of what many New Yorkers consider the darkest day in modern history, Trump has done it again.
He told a rambling, nonsensical story — one he’s told before — about going to Ground Zero just after terrorists flew two commercial jets into the twin towers. In the story, which no one has been able to verify, despite multiple attempts, he says firefighters had to carry him out of One Liberty Plaza, also known as the U.S. Steel Building, because they thought it was about to collapse.
As CNN fact checker Daniel Dale notes, there’s no evidence Trump went into this building, especially at a time when NYPD and NYFD had locked down the area. There’s no evidence that building was collapsing — in fact, it was deemed structurally sound and reopened within two months of the attacks. There’s no evidence he was carried out of it by firefighters.
But the lie isn’t even the worst part. Pretend it was all true — why would the leader of our country, and a New Yorker, decide to make that tragic day about himself?
Because that’s who Donald Trump is. He’s a malignant narcissist.
He’s also, incidentally, a terrible and ineffectual president, who’s made ill-fated decisions that he has to keep defending, and there’s nothing he won’t do to make himself look and feel better.
Within the first two minutes of his speech, he was cravenly using 9/11 to justify and promote his dumb war in Iran — two events separated by 25 years and 6,000 miles.
“And I will tell you, we’re right now fighting because we have a certain nation that wanted a nuclear weapon, they were very close to getting it, and now they have no chance at getting it. They will never have a nuclear weapon. Iran will not have a nuclear weapon. And they’ve been punished greatly. As you know, we’ve really taken it to them.”
As a New Yorker who lived through 9/11, still one of the worst days of my life, I’m utterly sickened by Trump’s crass, political, and self-promotional framing of that awful day.
And I’m relieved he won’t be given a platform to do it again on Friday’s anniversary in lower Manhattan.
Because for Trump, everything is his for the taking, and absolutely nothing is sacred.
S.E. Cupp is the host of "S.E. Cupp Unfiltered" on CNN.