The Rule of Law Brief

In this episode of The Rule of Law Brief , Nate Charles explains a largely unnoticed but deeply consequential move by the Department of Homeland Security: the use of pretermission to deny asylum seekers a hearing altogether. DHS and ICE are invoking an obscure provision of the Immigration and Nationality Act to argue that asylum claims can be dismissed without a merits hearing if a third country i...

Just today, the Associated Press revealed that Immigration and Customs Enforcement has been operating under internal guidance authorizing conduct that is plainly unconstitutional—and has been doing so since at least May 2025. In this episode of The Rule of Law Brief , Nate Charles breaks down: * What the Associated Press reported about the May 12, 2025 ICE memo signed by the Acting Director of ICE...

In this episode of The Rule of Law Brief , Nate Charles examines a question that sits at the center of some of the most consequential legal conflicts playing out in the United States today: When does protest become unlawful interference with government operations? Drawing on a current case being defended by Charles International Law in Pennsylvania—where a client is being prosecuted for repeatedly...

In this episode of The Rule of Law Brief , Nate Charles explains why Greenland has suddenly become a focal point of U.S. national security rhetoric — and why the story is not about real estate, mineral wealth, or diplomacy as usual. The episode breaks down: * Why Greenland actually matters geopolitically, including its rare earth elements and its central role in a rapidly opening Arctic * How clim...

Stars and Stripes is one of the oldest continuously published newspapers in American history. Founded during the Civil War and long protected by Congress, it has served deployed U.S. service members with independent, First Amendment–governed reporting for generations. That independence is now gone. In this episode of The Rule of Law Brief , Nate Charles explains how the Department of Defense quiet...

In this episode of The Rule of Law Brief , Nate Charles responds to claims by the Trump administration that comparisons to Nazism are “hateful rhetoric” responsible for violence against ICE officers. They are not. This video makes a precise, historically grounded argument: at the height of Nazi power, the regime’s domestic security strategy was not genocide — it was denationalization and deportati...

What you’re seeing in viral videos of ICE operations—particularly ICE Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO) —often looks chaotic, intimidating, and lawless. It isn’t lawless. But it does rely heavily on public confusion about what ICE is actually authorized to do. This episode is a plain-English legal primer on encounters with ICE ERO specifically —not HSI, not the FBI, not criminal task forces...

In this episode, I explain why the President’s reported criminal investigation targeting the leadership of the Federal Reserve is not just another political scandal—but a direct threat to one of the most important institutional safeguards in the U.S. system. Most Americans know the Federal Reserve exists, but few understand why it was deliberately designed to be independent of presidential control...

In this episode, I address a recurring misconception I’ve seen in public commentary surrounding the ICE officer shooting in Minneapolis: the belief that the president can simply step in and pardon the officer if charges are brought. That belief is wrong — and understanding why requires a basic grasp of American federalism. I explain the system of dual sovereignty , in which both the federal govern...

In this episode, we unpack the constitutional mechanics behind the federal government’s decision to cut Minnesota out of the investigation into a fatal ICE shooting. We start with first principles. Under the U.S. Constitution, states retain the authority to investigate and prosecute violations of their own criminal laws—even when the alleged conduct involves federal officers. The Supreme Court rea...

The presidential pardon power is one of the broadest and least constrained authorities in the U.S. Constitution — by design. In this episode, I trace the pardon power from its origins in English constitutional law, through the Founding, and into modern American practice. The Framers understood clemency as a political safety valve : a way to relieve pressure after unrest, rebellion, or national cri...

In this episode of The Rule of Law Brief , Nate Charles explains why the Pentagon’s announcement that it intends to reduce Senator Mark Kelly’s retired rank — and cut his military retirement pay — is legally doomed from the start. This is not a close case. Military retirement pay is a statutory entitlement under the Military Pay Act, and unlawful reductions in retired pay are resolved in one place...

In this episode of The Rule of Law Brief , Nate Charles examines one of the most uncomfortable fault lines in U.S. law: the disconnect between domestic criminal jurisdiction and international legality . Drawing on Supreme Court precedent stretching back to the late nineteenth century—including Ker v. Illinois and the Hatfields-and-McCoys case, Mahon v. Justice —Nate explains why U.S. courts have h...

In this short episode, Nate Charles explains why Rule of Law Brief has moved its affiliate links from Amazon to Bookshop.org—and why that decision goes far beyond branding or convenience. The episode begins with a frank discussion of the economic realities of asylum and human rights practice. Most asylum seekers arrive in the United States with nothing and are legally barred from working for their...

In this short New Year message, Nate Charles reflects on the growth of The Rule of Law Brief and explains why scale has never been the primary objective. While the podcast has surpassed 7,500 followers on Facebook and is approaching 9,000 on TikTok, this episode makes clear that viral growth has never been the mission. Instead, the goal has been to raise the quality of public discourse around the...

More to follow as details emerge. Get full access to The Rule of Law Brief at natecharles.substack.com/subscribe

In this episode of The Rule of Law Brief , attorney Nathan M. F. Charles examines the Trump administration’s targeting of Somali nationals holding Temporary Protected Status (TPS), with a particular focus on Minnesota, and explains why the policy is unlawful, pretextual, and fundamentally incompatible with both U.S. law and international human rights obligations. The episode begins with an explana...

In this New Year’s episode of The Rule of Law Brief , I explain why my professional resolution for the coming year is to report more attorneys to disciplinary counsel for clear violations of the Rules of Professional Conduct—and why that decision has nothing to do with personal grievance, politics, or settling scores. Every state in the country has binding, enforceable rules governing attorney con...

In this episode of The Rule of Law Brief , civil-rights attorney Nate Charles examines a disturbing §1983 case arising out of Baltimore County, Maryland—one in which undisputed video evidence shows police officers violently assaulting a man following a minor traffic accident , yet a federal district court dismissed the case at the pleading stage. Charles walks viewers through what the officers act...

In this episode of The Rule of Law Brief , Nate Charles responds to a viewer question that goes to the heart of constitutional enforcement: What do we actually do when the federal government violates the Establishment Clause? Building on his earlier article analyzing DHS’s Christmas social media posts, Nate explains why those posts crossed a constitutional line by affirming Christian theology and...

In this episode of The Rule of Law Brief , we examine a structural failure most Americans don’t even know exists. Immigration judges are federal judges—but they are not Article III judges. They do not belong to the independent judicial branch. They are Article II judges: administrative law judges inside the Executive Branch who ultimately work for the President of the United States through the Att...

In this episode of The Rule of Law Brief , Nate Charles examines the unusually deep, often underestimated level of immigration and security cooperation between the United States and Canada. Drawing from his own connection to the St. Lawrence River and his service alongside Canadian officers in Afghanistan, he explains why the U.S.–Canada relationship is unlike any other—and why immigration actions...

In today’s Rule of Law Brief, we dive into one of the most revealing contradictions in American foreign policy: the United States champions human rights and the laws of war, yet refuses to join the International Criminal Court—and in recent years has shifted from polite non-participation to open hostility. Drawing on the history of the Rome Statute, the post-9/11 security environment, and the evol...

In this episode of The Rule of Law Brief , Nate Charles breaks down one of the most widespread misconceptions circulating online: the idea that Donald Trump “can’t be authoritarian” because critics are still able to post about him on social media. Drawing on operational doctrine—not punditry—Nate explains why authoritarianism is not a binary condition but a spectrum along which countries drift ove...

This episode dismantles a basic—but now politically weaponized—misunderstanding: that the President can use military force simply by designating a group as a Foreign Terrorist Organization under the Immigration and Nationality Act. That claim is legally false, constitutionally indefensible, and is being pushed in bad faith to justify unlawful military strikes , including the recent attacks on drug...