Trump loyalists lashed out at the federal judiciary Tuesday after a judge ruled against one of the president’s hand-picked prosecutors.
Senior U.S. District Judge J. Michael Seabright disqualified Bill Essayli on Tuesday from serving as first assistant U.S. attorney for the Central District of California, Fox News correspondent Matt Finn reported on X. Finn noted the ruling does not take effect immediately.
“We respectfully disagree with the court’s order,” Essayli said in a statement Finn shared. “The President and the Attorney General have every right to select supervisors within the Justice Department.”
Essayli added that the order is automatically stayed while the government seeks a full stay pending appeal, insisting, “This question will be decided by the Supreme Court, and I look forward to serving in my current role until then.”
Tuesday’s ruling set off Trump’s online allies.
Jennifer Van Laar, managing editor of RedState, sarcastically wrote, “We don’t have activist judges here, no, sir,” before demanding that Senate Majority Leader John Thune scrap the blue slip custom, which lets home-state senators block nominees. She called the situation “INFURIATING.”
Political columnist Brian Cates had a blunter reaction. “What the actual f—?” he asked.
Ed Martin, the Trump loyalist who led the Justice Department’s weaponization working group, went further. “Impeaching Judges is Necessary at Times,” he declared.
Not everyone was upset. National security journalist Marcy Wheeler mocked Essayli, quipping that it turns out he “was playacting.”
The ruling comes after the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a lower court’s order disqualifying Nevada prosecutor Sigal Chattah, a decision Loyola Law School professor Laurie Levenson predicted would lead public defenders to “reinvigorate their challenge” to Essayli.
Tuesday’s ruling escalates a fight that began last fall. Seabright ruled in October 2025 that Essayli, a former California Republican state lawmaker, had been serving unlawfully after then-Attorney General Pam Bondi named him first assistant days before his 120-day interim term ran out, CBS News reported. That order still let Essayli stay on as first assistant, effectively keeping him atop the office.
Seabright himself had signaled discomfort with the earlier ruling. He wrote last year that he shared concerns the outcome “appears to be little remedy at all,” Bloomberg Law reported.
So immediately after he enters a stellar argument at the TRO hearing, this happens? Of course.We don’t have activist judges here, no, sir.Hey @LeaderJohnThune how about getting rid of the blue slip “tradition”? INFURIATING — Jennifer Van Laar (@jenvanlaar) October 28, 2026
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