Judge John J. McConnell Jr. was threatened with impeachment. The Obama-appointed judge had presided over an explosive case with profound national security implications.
Now, here he is, weeks later, standing in the way of the Trump administration's petition for an emergency stay, hearing the appeal of immigration activists who are pleading for him to deny it.
In July, Judge McConnell upheld his ruling blocking the Trump administration’s freeze on processing asylum applications from a total of 39 countries.
Two Providence-based nonprofits, Dorcas International Institute of Rhode Island and Refugee Dream Center, had brought forth the lawsuit.
Judge McConnell made a remark in his ruling that cuts to the core of the problem.
“The evidence before the court is that the choosing of these 39 countries that the government is stopping people from seeking legal positions in this country is totally arbitrary and capricious,” McConnell said.
READ MORE: Obama-Appointed Judge Faces Impeachment After Outrageous TPS Ruling
The administration argues that these are foreign policy and national security judgments committed to the Executive Branch — not ordinary agency decisions for judges to second-guess under the APA's "arbitrary and capricious" review standard. One might argue that those terms more aptly describe McConnell's own ruling.
It all started when President Trump issued a set of executive actions early into his second term. The thrust of these actions is abundantly clear and firmly rooted in the President's Article II constitutional powers:
During my first Administration, I restricted the entry of certain foreign nationals into the United States to prevent national security and public safety threats from reaching our borders. The Supreme Court upheld these restrictions. I reinstated these successful policies in Executive Order 14161 of January 20, 2025 (Protecting the United States From Foreign Terrorists and Other National Security and Public Safety Threats), and Proclamation 10949 of June 4, 2025 (Restricting the Entry of Foreign Nationals To Protect the United States From Foreign Terrorists and Other National Security and Public Safety Threats).
It is the policy of the United States to protect its citizens from foreign nationals who intend to commit terrorist attacks, threaten our national security and public safety, incite hate crimes, or otherwise exploit the immigration laws for malevolent purposes.
However, McConnell instead reframed the dispute as one about the rights of foreign nationals rather than the President's authority over immigration and national security.
A glimpse at the Obama-appointed judge's history reveals a familiar pattern: one tied to Democrat activism and party politics.
He won the potentially lucrative job with the help of Democratic Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, then Rhode Island Attorney General. Whitehouse had good reason to help out: McConnell had long been treasurer of the Rhode Island Democratic State Committee as well as a heavy contributor to the party, according to campaign finance records and a 2020 investigation by Roll Call.
McConnell and his wife contributed more than $700,000 to Democratic causes up until he joined the federal bench, Roll Call reported.
It should also be of no surprise that McConnell once worked with an NGO that received federal grant money.
As a judge, McConnell has proven a committed foe to the Trump Administration. In January, he issued a temporary restraining order preventing the administration from freezing billions of dollars in federal grants, prompting vociferous attacks from conservatives including Elon Musk, who said: "Impeach this activist posing as a judge!" on his X platform.
Georgia Republican Rep. Andrew Clyde introduced an impeachment resolution in March, saying the judge “knowingly politicized and weaponized his judicial position to advance his own political views and beliefs.”
The representative cited a report by America First Legal, a conservative nonprofit law firm, accusing McConnell of having a conflict of interest because he had long served as chairman of Crossroads, a Rhode Island charity that received federal grant money through the state.
McConnell's spending freeze order is yet another example of the activist judge's habitual line-stepping.
A second federal judge on Thursday indefinitely stopped the Trump administration from enforcing a broad federal spending freeze outlined in a January memo from the White House’s budget office.
In a 45-page order, U.S. District Judge John McConnell — a Barack Obama appointee in Rhode Island — granted a preliminary injunction in favor of 23 states that sued the federal government over the controversial funding directive. He found that the freeze threatened constitutional fundamentals, like separation of powers and checks and balances, since it aims to block funding already approved by Congress.
BREAKING: Obama Judge Blocks Trump Administration’s Freeze on Federal Funding
— Kyle Becker (@kylenabecker) February 10, 2025
In a sweeping decision, a federal judge has blocked the Trump administration from freezing any federal funding, dealing a significant legal blow to the White House’s efforts to withhold funds that are… pic.twitter.com/SIxkVNf7h7
McConnell thus had a role in snuffing out DOGE and is now blocking Trump's immigration policies. In June, there was another impeachment attempt launched against the judge.
House Republicans introduced multiple impeachment resolutions this month targeting two federal judges appointed by former President Barack Obama.
Representative Greg Steube, a Republican from Florida, filed a resolution on June 9 to impeach John McConnell Jr., the chief judge of the United States District Court for the District of Rhode Island, over a ruling that struck down a Trump administration immigration policy framework.
Congress' inability to remove McConnell has only emboldened him and rogue judges like him.
He has already rejected the Trump administration's request for a stay pending appeal of his immigration ruling. The immigration activists' opposition to a similar motion pending before the 1st Circuit Court of Appeals leans heavily on emotion rather than the law.
Plaintiffs and the public would be severely and irreparably harmed if the Court granted a stay. The district court documented the extensive harms inflicted on Plaintiffs, their members, and their clients. Many of Plaintiffs' members "have lost jobs, lost income, and lost the ability to care for their families." Some "have been separated from their family members for prolonged periods of time." Others "have fallen out of legal status" and "have expressed fear of being arrested and detained … and being removed from the United States."
The public interest similarly counsels against a stay. The consequences of the Challenged Policies have been felt in every corner of the country. The breadth of the harms is evidenced by the volume of related litigation. Courts around the country have held that the Challenged Policies irreparably harmed immigrants, their families, employers, and communities. Granting a stay would perpetuate these harms to Plaintiffs, to immigrant communities, and to the public at large.
These immigrants are not American citizens. Their legalized status in the United States is a privilege, and not a right. The president has the constitutional right to manage the foreign policy interests of the United States, including his potential determination that asylum seekers from particular countries constitute a national security concern.
The president is being obstructed from carrying out his core constitutional duties by unelected judges intruding on his executive powers. While activists masquerading in black robes invoke legal doctrines and bureaucratic procedures to justify that interference, the administration argues those tools cannot override the President's constitutional authority over national security and foreign affairs. But that is precisely what one judge did.
This judge has taken it upon himself to set national security policy, substituting his own authority for that of the President of the United States. This is not how a Constitutional republic operates; in the absence of determined action, it is increasingly doubtful that the American people can keep it.
