President Donald Trump launched a fresh attack Wednesday on Judge Beryl Howell as “a highly biased and unfair disaster.” Howell’s actions in and out of the courtroom support Trump’s claims.
Trump and Howell, a senior judge in the U.S. District Court of Columbia, have traded barbs before. On Wednesday, Trump refreshed his attacks on Howell when announcing he was suing Democrat-aligned law firm Perkins Coie, posting on Truth Social:
I’m suing the law firm of Perkins Coie for their egregious and unlawful acts, in particular the conduct of a specific member of this firm, only to find out that the Judge assigned to this case is Beryl Howell, an Obama appointment, and a highly biased and unfair disaster. She ruled against me in the past, in a shocking display of sick judicial temperament, on a case that ended up working out very well for me, on appeal. Her ruling was so pathologically bad that it became the ‘talk of the town.’ I could have a 100% perfect case and she would angrily rule against me. It’s called Trump Derangement Syndrome, and she’s got a bad case of it. To put it nicely, Beryl Howell is an unmitigated train wreck. NO JUSTICE!!!
Howell, an Obama appointee, is a registered Democrat in Washington, DC, who has a history donating to Democrats (as does her husband, also a registered Democrat) and has a history of anti-Trump conduct.
One instance in 2023 led Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY) to file an ethics complaint against Howell for “partisan speech and illegal election meddling” after Howell insinuated that reelecting President Trump would lead to fascism in America.
Yet despite this history, Howell previously refused to recuse herself from a case reviewing Trump’s executive order against Perkins Coie – the firm at the center of the Russia hoax, drawing Trump’s ire.
In her decision against recusal, Howell lambasted the Trump administration for its “rhetorical strategy of ad hominem attack,” ignoring her own conduct.
“This strategy is designed to impugn the integrity of the federal judicial system and blame any loss on the decision-maker rather than fallacies in the substantive legal arguments presented,” she said.
Howell has a record of ruling against Trump and enabling the lawfare waged against him.
In 2023, Howell ruled to allow Jack Smith to sidestep attorney-client privilege protections to force President Trump’s lawyer, Evan Corcoran, to testify before a federal grand jury. And in October 2019, Howell endorsed the “legality and constitutionality of Democrats’ impeachment proceedings” regarding the Russia hoax.
Howell also has a history of ruling against the Trump administration.
In 2020, she ruled that then-US Agency for Global Media CEO Michael Pack acted unconstitutionally in investigating “deep-seated bias against President Trump” in the agency. That same year, Howell ruled to reject the Trump administration’s attempt to reform food stamps.
Trump’s allies are not safe from Howell either. In 2023, Howell ordered Rudy Giuliani to immediately pay nearly $150 million to election workers as part of a defamation lawsuit.
Before her appointment by Obama, Howell was paid well over half a million dollars to lobby on behalf of the Recording Industry Association of America.
Bradley Jaye is Deputy Political Editor for Breitbart News. Follow him on X/Twitter and Instagram @BradleyAJaye.
