Federal litigator Eric Lee responded with alarm to The New York Times article ‘Frustrated by Courts, Trump Weighed Suspending a Constitutional Right.’ The Times reported — after reviewing “secret memos” — that the White House “debated last year, to a greater degree than previously known, whether to limit habeas corpus rights for undocumented immigrants.”
Lee wrote on social media: “Trump admin is actively plotting to establish a dictatorship, arrest opponents & detain ppl indefinitely. Anyone who thinks this would be limited to non-citizens is fooling themselves. Whatever remains of democracy is slipping away. Dems downplay, but mass mobilization needed!”
[NOTE: In 2024 Lee argued before the Supreme Court in Department of State v. Muñoz, representing “a Salvadoran man and his U.S. citizen wife separated by three presidential administrations.” Lee’s law firm bio says he has represented clients “fighting deportation, detention, visa denials, employment termination and school discipline based on free speech, association, and false gang membership allegations.”]
Trump admin is actively plotting to establish a dictatorship, arrest opponents & detain ppl indefinitely. Anyone who thinks this would be limited to non-citizens is fooling themselves. Whatever remains of democracy is slipping away.
Dems downplay, but mass mobilization needed! pic.twitter.com/EvDfgvqLDB
— Eric Lee (@EricLeeAtty) June 15, 2026
Lee added: “Staggering that the NYT reports Trump/Miller are plotting to suspend habeas corpus (i.e. end the constitution) & by the end of the day it’s treated as a non-story, not anywhere near top of major news’ outlets websites.”
Staggering that the NYT reports Trump/Miller are plotting to suspend habeas corpus (i.e. end the constitution) & by the end of the day it’s treated as a non-story, not anywhere near top of major news’ outlets websites.
— Eric Lee (@EricLeeAtty) June 15, 2026
When a self-described “non-lawyer” on X asked Lee to “dumb down” his response, Lee replied: “It means the ruling class is erasing 1776 and treating it as no big deal.”
Republican politician Christine Villaverde, who lost in the 2024 GOP North Carolina Secretary of State primary, replied to Lee: “Habeas corpus is not a technicality. It is the legal firewall between the government and the power to imprison people without a hearing. This would mean the executive branch could declare that courts no longer have authority over what it does with human beings in its custody. This should frighten every American.”
Journalist Dave Troy, publisher and editor of America 2.0, also replied, “Desensitization. They threaten this every 20 minutes. When they actually do it, perhaps people will break out the pitchforks. Until then, they are either lying or doing 100 things that are as bad or worse. Attention must be conserved.”