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Mike Johnson warns anti-Trump judges to brace for Congressional action: ‘desperate times call for desperate measures’

March 26, 2025 | | Print Article

House Speaker Mike Johnson warned on Tuesday that Congress has the power to eliminate those federal courts that want to muck up President Donald Trump’s sweeping agenda.

“We do have authority over the federal courts, as you know,” he said during a press conference. “We can eliminate an entire district court.”

“We have the power of funding over the courts and all these other things. But desperate times call for desperate measures, and Congress is going to act, so stay tuned for that,” he added.

Listen:

Johnson later clarified to Jake Sherman of Punchbowl News that he didn’t mean the remarks as a direct threat to the courts.

“I’m trying to illustrate we have a broad scope of authority over the courts,” he said.

The remarks come amid an unprecedented assault on Trump’s agenda by left-wing activist district judges all across the nation.

House Republicans have begun pushing back on this assault by introducing legislation to rein in these judges’ power.

One bill introduced by Rep. Darrell Issa, the “No Rogue Rulings Act,” would bar district judges from issuing nationwide injunctions.

“We have a major malfunction in our federal judiciary, and practically every week another judge casts aside the tradition of restraint from the bench and opts to be the Trump resistance in robes,” he told NBC News on Monday.

“Our bill is the constitutional solution to a national problem, and that’s why it’s on a glide path to the House floor and to the Senate next,” he added.

Issa has also proposed another bill, the JUDGES Act, which would add dozens of new seats to America’s federal courts.

There’s also been chatter about blocking funding for lower-level courts.

“They’re activists trying to stifle his agenda … radical left-leaning nutjobs in black robes trying to stop Trump,” Rep. Troy Nehls said to Politico about the leftist judges, adding that it’s time to “send a message” to these judges by cutting off their funding.

And of course, there’s been chatter about just outright impeaching activist judges, though some conservatives have warned against going this route.

“Unpopular opinion: No judge will be impeached in connection with activist unconstitutional TRO’s & injunctions against the Trump Administration,” attorney Ron Coleman wrote on Twitter/X. “Strategically the Administration would be insane to try.”

Supreme Court Justice John Roberts has also spoken out against impeaching judges.

“For more than two centuries, it has been established that impeachment is not an appropriate response to disagreement concerning a judicial decision,” he said in a statement last week.

But Roberts’ remark did inspire pushback:

One Republican, Rep. Brandon Gill, just outright ignored Roberts and went ahead and filed impeachment articles this week targeting U.S. District Judge James Boasberg.

Boasberg is the judge who recently cried foul over the Trump administration deporting illegal alien gang members to a mega prison in El Salvador.

“Judge James Boasberg, a rogue D.C. judge, has abused his power of the judiciary, weaponized the judiciary, politicized it, to usurp President Trump’s clear plenary, Article II powers as commander in chief,” Hill told CBS News on Sunday.

“Remember, he did this for the purpose of turning a plane mid-air full of some of the most violent, brutal, ruthless terrorists to demand that they come back into our community. That is a usurpation of power, it’s unconstitutional, and it’s wrong,” he added.

“These are people that not only murder and rape little girls in America, but they derive sadistic pleasure in torturing their victims; these are the people that that judge demanded come back into our communities,” he concluded.

Meanwhile, House Judiciary Committee chairman Jim Jordan has scheduled a hearing next week on “judicial overreach.”

Vivek Saxena
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