Happy New Year GLRL Members!

As we enter 2026, we want to thank the more than 700 Georgia lawyers who have joined Georgia Lawyers for the Rule of Law in support of our efforts to speak out in defense of judges, lawyers and a justice system that has been under relentless attack. This has been an eventful year for the rule of law in our country to say the least. The Department of Justice has been weaponized to seek revenge against political opponents of the current administration. At the direction of the President, indictments were obtained against his political opponents over the objection of career prosecutors. As a result of these developments, we witnessed the erosion of the traditional independence of the DOJ from political interference. The DOJ also suffered a loss of the presumption of regularity, the tradition of judges assuming that what Justice Department lawyers say in court is true, because of repeated egregious conduct including outright lying to judges. For the first time ever, the Attorney General sued an entire District Court’s bench because she did not like their rulings against the administration and, in another unprecedented development, she threatened to open an investigation against a judge she disagreed with. The DOJ also gutted units devoted to prosecutions of major tax evaders and enforcement of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act which prohibits bribing foreign officials. Additionally, the Securities and Exchange Commission, which previously had a long and storied reputation as an independent agency, now defers to the whims of the President.

In other areas, we witnessed unprecedented violations of people’s rights. Immigration enforcers have violated the due process rights of thousands of people in their zeal to ramp up deportations. For example, on September 30, shortly after midnight, an entire apartment building in Chicago was raided by 300 agents from the Border Patrol, FBI, and other agencies. SWAT team rappelled from a helicopter. The agents knocked down doors and hurled flashbang grenades, terrifying the occupants of the complex. 37 immigrants were arrested in the raid, many of whom were in the country legally, and agents also zip-tied and, for several hours, detained many U.S. citizens. Thousands of people have been grabbed off the streets by masked men bearing no identifying insignia simply because they looked like they might be here illegally. Hundreds of men were deported without due process to a notorious prison in El Salvador where they were subjected to torture, sexual assault, and brutal beatings. The Secretary of the Department of Defense has ordered extrajudicial killings on the high seas of over 100 people, and counting, because they were suspected drug runners while the former President of Honduras who was convicted by a jury in a court of law of importing over 400 tons of cocaine to our country and received a 45 year prison sentence was pardoned by the President and is now a free man. This year, we saw major law firms threatened with utter destruction because they represented people the administration did not like and, while some law firms who were attacked bent the knee, others fought back and have so far been successful in thwarting the attempts of the administration to dictate whom those law firms can represent.

For our part, we have been writing articles, several of which were published recently in the Atlanta Journal Constitution. Our Communications Committee of 12 lawyers and 5 retired journalists continues to work on important articles detailing assaults on the rule of law. This month, we had a panel of two retired federal judges and two prominent lawyers appear at the recent Georgia State Bar ICLE Corporate Counsel seminar to talk about such matters as death threats against judges and attacks on the rule of law. We had a very successful mixer at the Lawyers Club in Atlanta attended by more than 60 lawyers. We have regularly posted content to our social media sites and to our web site and have tried to keep in regular touch with our supporters. Finally, we have started reaching out to lawyers around the State to invite folks to join us and spread our message. For example, we have in-person mixers this month in Savannah and Macon, and we anticipate holding similar events in other cities throughout the State. We are also planning events at law schools in Athens, Atlanta, and Macon, and our Speakers Committee will continue to seek venues for our lawyers to address rule of law issues that concern all of us.

Going forward, it looks like there will be many opportunities for GLRL to speak out. While there is much fear in the country with many people afraid to speak out in opposition to this administration’s excesses, at GLRL we are not afraid. We will continue to speak out and stand up for justice, due process of law, and the rule of law. We also continue to believe in our country and are optimistic that the rule of law will ultimately prevail.

If you have any friends or colleagues who you think might support our efforts, please encourage them to go to our web site and join us. https://georgialawyersfortheruleoflaw.org/

We hope you all have a happy, healthy and prosperous New Year. Thank you again for your support.

Georgia Lawyers for the Rule of Law