Former New Jersey Superior Court Judge Andrew Napolitano told Newsmax on Monday that defying judges or ignoring their rulings is the "worst situation" for the Trump administration, adding that the best remedy for decisions that interfere with Donald Trump's presidency is the appeals process.
Napolitano joined "The Chris Salcedo Show" to discuss the uproar spurred by a judge's emergency order over the weekend disallowing the Trump administration from sharing financial data of the Treasury Department with members of Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency.
In light of that, some are encouraging Trump and the administration to ignore the ruling, a la President Andrew Jackson in 1832, who refused to enforce a Supreme Court decision. "John Marshall has made his decision; now let him enforce it," Jackson is purported to have said at the time.
Napolitano doesn't agree.
"If a federal district court judge interferes with your presidency, appeal it to the United States Court of Appeals. If you don't get satisfied there, appeal it to the Supreme Court," Napolitano said. "But defying a judge will complicate the problem and will make it worse."
Separately, a federal judge in Rhode Island on Monday found the Trump administration violated his order to reinstate billions in federal aid to environmental, health, and other programs that Trump had froze.
"A federal judge in Rhode Island has already found that the White House failed to comply with this order; that's the worst situation you can be in," Napolitano said. "The Andrew Jackson quote is a very famous one. We don't know if he actually said it. He was very upset with what the Supreme Court ruled. The 'John Marshall' to whom he referred was the chief justice of the Supreme Court. P.S.: He eventually obeyed the court."
Napolitano added, "Look, judges make mistakes all the time. That's why we have appellate courts."
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