Photo: Kidfly182, via Wikimedia Commons. File photo of the federal courthouse in Manhattan, not a photo of Friday's hearing.
A federal judge on Friday ordered the Trump administration to pull three taxpayer-funded advertisements from television, government websites and social media, ruling that the spots appeared to have been made for political or propaganda purposes days before the midterm elections.
U.S. District Judge Jennifer L. Rochon, sitting in New York, sided with a coalition that includes the nonpartisan watchdog Common Cause. She ordered the government to remove the advertisements from official channels, including social media sites such as YouTube and Instagram, and to cancel any slots, placements or arrangements for airing them through authorised third parties, including President Donald Trump's flagship super PAC, MAGA Inc.
The ruling expands a temporary restraining order Rochon issued two weeks earlier, when she banned a series of ads that glorified Trump and echoed his political messaging going into the midterms. The White House has defended the advertisements as public service announcements.
The three ads at issue
The three advertisements ordered removed are titled "$5,000 to Americans," "Every Democrat Voted Against No Tax on Tips," and "Cost of Socialism." The first promotes Trump's claim that every American will receive $5,000 if Republicans keep control of the House and Senate in the midterm election, which will be held on Tuesday, November 3.
The plaintiffs had asked the court to remove at least 13 advertisements, but Rochon declined to pull several others, at least for now. She said she could reverse herself and restore the three ads, or ban additional ones, after hearing more evidence in the coming weeks.
Why the judge acted now
Rochon ruled during a hearing on expanding the earlier restraining order. She said irreparable harm could result to the plaintiffs if she did not ban the ads while the case proceeds, and she stressed the urgency because the advertisements could still affect voters before Election Day.
After issuing the order, she noted that she was doing so on a Friday afternoon and that the government would have no excuse to delay taking the ads down immediately.
According to the Campaign Legal Center Action, which brought the case with co-counsel on behalf of clients including Common Cause, the Service Employees International Union Local 32BJ and a candidate for state House in Alabama, the court found the plaintiffs were likely to win their argument that the government was using public money improperly to pay for the ads. The group said the ruling protects Congress's constitutional power over federal spending and prevents the misuse of public funds in elections.
How the case reached this point
The legal fight began when the court first enjoined the ads from running on television. The Campaign Legal Center Action says the government then posted videos of a political nature on White House social media pages, and MAGA Inc. ran some of those videos as political advertisements on television. The coalition returned to court and asked the judge to block the additional ads and to have the White House remove them from official government websites and social media.
Friday's order covers both tracks: the ads must come off government-run sites and social pages, and third-party airings must be cancelled. Rochon was nominated to the court by then-President Joe Biden, a Democrat, and once served as a law clerk for Trump's sister, the late Maryanne Trump Barry, a longtime federal appeals court judge.
What happens next will depend on whether the administration complies immediately, as ordered, and on further evidence in the case. For now, the ruling is a temporary block while the litigation continues, not a final judgment on the merits — but with the election days away, its immediate effect is to take the three spots out of circulation.
Sources: The Associated Press; Campaign Legal Center Action.