Articles of Impeachment Filed Against U.S. District Judge

A federal judge has once again stepped into the Trump administration’s immigration agenda, and this time, some Republicans in Congress are reaching for the impeachment lever.

Rep. Andy Ogles of Tennessee has filed an impeachment resolution against U.S. District Judge Allison Burroughs after she temporarily blocked the administration from ending Temporary Protected Status for Somali nationals.

Because apparently, in Washington, even the word “temporary” now comes with an asterisk, three appeals, and a federal injunction.

Burroughs, who serves on the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts, issued a stay Friday preventing the Trump administration from terminating the protections while a lawsuit moves forward.

The lawsuit, brought by African Communities Together, alleges that the administration’s decision was motivated by racial discrimination.

That allegation has not been proven.

The Department of Homeland Security, meanwhile, says Burroughs is standing in the way of lawful executive authority.

“There is no serious debate about what is going on in these cases—defiance, obstruction, and delay,” DHS General Counsel James Percival wrote on X.

Well, that is not exactly the language of a department thrilled with the judge’s reasoning.

Ogles was even less diplomatic.

His impeachment resolution accuses Burroughs of having “defied the authority of both Federal law and the Supreme Court.” He argues that the judge tried to sidestep a recent Supreme Court ruling that limited the power of lower courts to block decisions involving Temporary Protected Status.

The Supreme Court ruling came in June and significantly narrowed the ability of federal judges to interfere with TPS terminations.

But here comes the legal fine print.

The plaintiffs amended their complaint after that ruling, and Burroughs based her latest order on the revised allegations. In other words, the Supreme Court closed one door, the challengers found another, and the district court decided to hold it open.

Ogles called those allegations “spurious” and claimed Burroughs was using them to get around the Supreme Court’s decision.

“In issuing this stay, Judge Burroughs attempted to get around the Supreme Court’s ruling in Mullin v. Doe by entertaining spurious allegations of racial and national-origin discrimination against an Administration that has chosen to not renew a single temporary protected status designation,” the resolution states.

Then Ogles put the matter plainly.

“This judicial activist’s obstruction of the people’s will must be stopped,” he told Fox News Digital. “Judge Burroughs must be impeached.”

No cautious Senate-style throat clearing. No twelve-paragraph statement about “grave concerns.” Ogles wants her removed.

TPS is a federal humanitarian program that allows certain foreign nationals to remain in the United States when conditions in their home countries make returning unsafe. Those conditions can include war, natural disaster, or other severe disruptions.

The dispute is not over whether Congress created the program. It did.

The dispute is over how temporary the protection really is, who gets to end it, and whether judges should be able to block the executive branch from doing so.

That last question has become a recurring source of fury among Trump allies.

During the president’s second term, several Republican lawmakers have introduced impeachment measures against federal judges accused of obstructing administration policy.

Most of those efforts have gone nowhere.

A previous push against U.S. District Judge James Boasberg collapsed after senior House Republicans concluded that impeachment was not the most practical way to deal with judges they viewed as overreaching.

Translation: It made for great headlines, but counting the votes was less exciting.

Still, conservatives have not dropped the issue.

Fox News Digital previously reported that Republican lawmakers planned to renew efforts against judges they describe as activists. Burroughs now appears to be the latest target in that campaign.

She was appointed to the federal bench in 2014 by then-President Barack Obama, a detail Republicans are unlikely to overlook as the fight intensifies.

The Massachusetts district court had not publicly responded to Ogles’ impeachment threat at the time of the report.

And let’s be clear about what happens next.

Filing an impeachment resolution is easy. Actually removing a federal judge is not.

The House would have to approve articles of impeachment, and the Senate would then need a two-thirds vote to convict. That is a steep climb under almost any political circumstances.

But Ogles’ resolution is about more than one judge.

It is a warning shot in the broader conflict between the Trump administration and federal courts over immigration authority.

The administration says elected officials are trying to carry out the policies voters supported. Its critics say judges are enforcing legal limits and protecting constitutional rights.

That argument is not going away.

For now, Burroughs’ order keeps the Somali protections in place, the lawsuit continues, and Republicans have added another judge’s name to their growing list of alleged judicial obstructionists.

The program may be called Temporary Protected Status.

The court battle appears to have no expiration date.

Fox News

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