iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 09/10/2026

it's funny you say that bc I am currently lounging in a shirt I received from Strict Scrutiny as a thank you for coming on an episode a couple years ago

photo of me, currently, sitting on the couch with a fuzzy red robe draped behind me and my laptop on my lap as I give a thumbs up. im wearing a tshirt from Strict Scrutiny that says "TIME FOR SOME BAD DECISIONS." my hair is a little bed heady but don't worry about that

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 09/10/2026

also an opportunity for me to look cute 😎💅🏾

Selfie of me smiling in that fuschia dress, with a pearl pendant necklace and earrings. lips glossin, curls curlin, eyebrows present and accounted for

Full body mirror selfie that allows the viewer to see the enormity of the billowy sleeves on the fuschia dress. Im smirking slightly

Mirror selfie of me in a white button down shirt and bright blue professional pants. Simple, but put together and it works I think. I also wore blingy jewelry to spruce it up a bit. I'm doing another lil smirk

Now I'm really shuzhing up the fit by adding my fun light pink overcoat. Im smiling broadly, curls and lipgloss are all doing their thing

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 09/10/2026

v grateful for @nwlc.org giving me time and space this week to actually - think and talk about gender justice and democracy w people I don't get to have those conversations with - talk my shit with @chrisgeidner.bsky.social in person! ♥️ both of these are too rare opportunities tbh

Photo of me and Chris after the panel we were on together! I'm wearing a fuschia dress with big billowy sleeves, and black stockings and boots; and Chris is wearing a grey blazer with a light green patterned shirt and brown pants. We're standing in front of empty chairs with microphones on them, and a slide indicating that it's the lunch break now

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 06/10/2026

truly it's absurd how much time the oil companies' lawyer and DOJ spent being like 'this one municipality wants to regulate GLOBAL greenhouse gas emissions' when Boulder was repeatedly and explicitly like, we just want you to help pay for what you did to us tbh ballsandstrikes.org/scotus/sunco...

screenshotted excerpt from the linked article reading as follows:

Back in 2018, Boulder County filed a lawsuit in a Colorado state court against fossil fuel industry giants Suncor Energy and Exxon, alleging that the companies caused extensive—and expensive—alterations to Boulder’s climate. Boulder alleged that the companies knew that their unchecked production and promotion of fossil fuels would “result in dangerous changes in the climate,” but continued such activities anyway, and engaged in a decades-long campaign of “concealing” those dangers and “misrepresenting” them to the public.

As a result, the complaint says, instead of snow in the winter, Boulder gets more “high-intensity, short-duration rainfall events” that overwhelm its drainage systems and cause flooding. Instead of rain in the spring, Boulder gets more droughts that “have substantial implications for agriculture, wildfires and water availability.” And instead of warm days in the summer, Boulder gets more heat waves that lead to “premature deaths” and “adverse economic impacts,” particularly on outdoor labor sectors like agriculture and construction.

Boulder has already spent over $100 million repairing damage related to climate change, and expects to spend over $100 million more in order to adapt its infrastructure over the next 25 years, as it attempts to mitigate the effects of flooding, droughts, wildfires, and other harms. “Taxpayers cannot pay the full costs,” says the state’s complaint, “nor should they.”

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 02/10/2026

friends! if you like the things I write for Balls and Strikes--or tbh if you don't like the things I write and would like the site to have more money for freelancers--we now offer a subscription! new stuff will remain free but the subscription gets you the full archive ballsandstrikes.org/register/

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 02/10/2026

oh this is gonna be an interesting read to be clear tho, when rightwingers start screaming "a judge said you can't punish noncitizens who vote illegally?!", no, that's not what a judge said storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

screenshot of the opening of the linked opinion, which reads as follows:

MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER
ON DEFENDANT’S MOTION TO DISMISS THE INFORMATION

This is an unusual criminal case. It rests upon a forty-year-old federal statute, 18 U.S.C. § 611, that prohibits the act of voting in a federal election by a non-U.S. citizen. Until very recently, no federal court has been presented with the following question about that statute: Did Congress have Constitutional authority to enact it? That’s unusual, all by itself.

But this case is even more unusual than that, because the Government’s principal defense of the statute’s constitutionality invokes a single Supreme Court case that is very, very weak. Let me say that a different way. The leading case cited by the Government to uphold the statute is of “minimal precedential value” (that’s not my characterization, it’s Justice Scalia’s; we’ll get to that), and the
application of other binding precedent shows that the Government’s leading case simply does not control this one. So why does the Government lead with such a weak hand? Because it’s the best
hand it can play. And why is that? Because the text, structure, and original public meaning of the Constitution show that *Congress does not have the constitutional power to enact this statute.*

screenshot of the bottom of p. 29 and top of p.30 of the linked opinion, which reads as follows, with internal citations omitted:

The Court does not set aside the application of a statute passed by Congress lightly, so let’s end by underscoring what this unusual case does *not* decide or even touch upon:

1. Can the State of Florida prohibit and punish the exact conduct Defendant Cox allegedly engaged in here? This has already been decided elsewhere and is not addressed here: Florida can and does.

2. Does the federal government have the power to remove the Defendant from the United States for engaging in the exact conduct alleged here? The undersigned must wait for a live case, but
a different federal statute, embedded in Title 8, states that “[a]ny alien who has voted in violation of any Federal, State, or local constitutional provision, statute, ordinance, or regulation is inadmissible.” That statute on its face rests on Congress’s immigration power and does not depend upon setting a federal voting qualification. This case doesn’t address the Government’s power to remove a non-U.S. citizen who engages in the same conduct.

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 01/10/2026

I would also argue that the primary purpose isn't even influencing another state's policies, as Republicans are trying to do It's protecting their own states' residents, as they have a right to do ballsandstrikes.org/law-politics...

Screenshot of a paragraph excerpted from the linked Balls and Strikes article. Excerpt reads as follows:

It is also the first direct test of New York’s shield law, which state lawmakers enacted in 2023 to protect doctors like Carpenter. After Dobbs, Carpenter cofounded Abortion Coalition for Telemedicine so that patients in need can access abortion care regardless of their ZIP code, and ACT has worked with states like New York to strengthen legal protections for providers of these telehealth services. So far, New York politicians are standing by Carpenter: “I will never under any circumstances turn this doctor over to the state of Louisiana under any extradition request,” Governor Kathy Hochul said in a video posted on social media. Attorney General Letitia James also released a statement on Friday, saying, “This cowardly attempt out of Louisiana to weaponize the law against out-of-state providers is unjust and un-American.” There are currently interstate shield laws in 18 states and the District of Columbia, and following the issuance of the warrant for Carpenter’s arrest, New York began further tightening its protections.

Screenshot of the subsequent paragraph excerpted from the linked Balls and Strikes article. Excerpt reads as follows:

The charges against Carpenter were spurred by a state’s refusal to recognize bodily autonomy, and the indictment has put the doctor in the middle of an interstate legal battle, with one state demanding delivery of a person for conduct that is lawful in the other state. This is awfully familiar, and emphasis on the awful: Pre-Civil War disputes over the Fugitive Slave Act, when northern states that enacted “personal liberty laws” refused to return Black people to the slave states from which they escaped, provide the clearest precedent for the conflict over laws that aim to shield abortion patients and providers from other states’ legal clutches. Then and now, people opposed to using their state’s resources to assist in another state’s injustice passed laws that made it harder, costlier, and slower for a less free state to get a person out of a freer one. This is a particularly dark chapter of the country’s history. The Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs is making the country go through it again.

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 30/09/2026

I wrote about the Supreme Court's nonstop lawless cruelty ballsandstrikes.org/scotus/ketan...

Screenshot of a paragraph excerpted from the linked article, with the text highlighted in green from the word "But" onwards. Excerpt reads as follows:

In places like Thursday’s speech and Friday’s dissent, Jackson has continuously sought to call attention to the deeply perverse ways that the Court is exercising its equity jurisdiction on the shadow docket. Under the Court’s precedents, emergency applicants are supposed to show that they’re “likely to succeed on the merits” of their appeal from a lower court’s ruling, that they will be “irreparably injured” without immediate relief, and that the balance of the equities tilts in their favor; in other words, fairness is both the explicit purpose and the explicit standard. But the Republican justices have repeatedly abandoned those standards in service of their own purposes. And when the people empowered to wield equitable jurisdiction are actively hostile to the concept of equity, they produce injustice instead.

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 29/09/2026

if i send you this, it means im feelin wrong and strong

image of Senator Schmitt of Missouri with a dumbass smirk on his face, full of unearned confidence that's about to come crashing down

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 28/09/2026

KBJ is this close 🤏🏾 to referring to Chief Justice John Roberts as Chief Justice Save-A-Ho ballsandstrikes.org/scotus/ketan...

screenshot of two paragraphs excerpted from the linked article. excerpt reads as follows:

At a public appearance in March 2026, Jackson attributed the spike to a corresponding “uptick” in “the court’s willingness to get involved.” Indeed, the Court has granted more than 70 percent of the administration’s requests. In her speech on Thursday, Jackson talked about what those grants look like in practice. She specifically highlighted the Court’s shadow docket orders allowing Trump to slash the Department of Education’s workforce, cancel hundreds of millions of dollars in government grants, and, as she put it, authorize “roving ICE patrols to conduct race-based searches and seizures of Latino residents in Los Angeles.”

With these grim examples, Jackson illustrated how transforming the emergency docket into a “special avenue that certain privileged litigants can use selectively” puts people in danger, and compromises both the functioning of the judiciary and the Court’s credibility with the public. And in Friday’s dissent, she similarly rejected the idea that the government is injured and requires emergency response services from the Supreme Court “whenever it is prevented from violating the law.”

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 25/09/2026

federal judges only do this when they are extremely fuckin tired of your shit and you needed to quit playin in people's faces days ago like oh my God www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/25p...

screenshot of a paragraph excerpted from the linked opinion, with the final sentence of the paragraph highlighted. excerpt reads as follows:

This Court’s September 10 stay order meant that the
2022 map would be used in the 2026 congressional election
in Missouri, absent further order of this Court. And the
election has now begun under the 2022 map. But on
September 21, 11 days after this Court’s most recent order,
the U. S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit ordered
the District Court to enter a permanent injunction in effect
requiring use of the 2025 map instead of the 2022 map in
the 2026 election. Given this Court’s two prior orders in
this litigation, our conclusion that this was error should
come as no surprise.

Screenshot of the beginning of a paragraph excerpted from the linked opinion, with the second sentence highlighted. Excerpt reads as follows:

The Purcell principle applies with even greater force
here. The election is not merely upcoming; it has already
started. Ballots using the 2022 map have been printed and
mailed. Absentee voting has already begun, as has military
and overseas voting. According to local election officials in [page ends there]

screenshot of the final paragraph of the linked opinion, with the final two sentences highlighted. Underneath "Per Curiam" and three asterisks, the paragraph reads as follows:

For those reasons, the application for stay presented to
JUSTICE KAVANAUGH and by him referred to the Court is
granted. The September 21, 2026, mandate and September
22, 2026, order entered by the U. S. Court of Appeals for the
Eighth Circuit in No. 26–2797, and the September 21, 2026,
and September 22, 2026, injunctions entered by the U. S.
District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri, No.
4:26–cv–01424, ECF Docs. 57 and 60, are stayed absent any
further order of this Court lifting such stays. The prior stay
entered by this Court on September 10, 2026, likewise
remains in effect pending any further order of this Court
lifting that stay. The District Court and Court of Appeals
should not enjoin or otherwise prohibit the use of the 2022
map in the 2026 congressional election in Missouri. And
the District Court and Court of Appeals should not order or
otherwise require Missouri to use the 2025 map in the 2026
congressional election in Missouri.

"It is so ordered" then appears in italics, in the bottom-right corner of the page

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 24/09/2026

they're working on it! ballsandstrikes.org/law-politics...

screenshot of a paragraph excerpted from the linked article, with the final sentence of the paragraph highlighted in green. excerpt reads as follows:

Like Hawaii’s statute, this ballot initiative is tailored to avoid running afoul of existing law. The proposal, dubbed the “Montana Plan” by its supporters at the Transparent Election Initiative and the Center for American Progress, would not prevent any person from exercising their speech rights. All it would do is specify which powers the state chooses to grant to the artificial entities its law creates. Legislation similar to the Montana Plan is now pending in over a dozen other states.

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 24/09/2026

There's what DHS said...and then there's reality ballsandstrikes.org/law-politics...

Screenshot of the first three paragraphs of the linked Balls and Strikes article, reading as follows:

On the morning of Sunday, September 20, police officers in the Chicago suburb of Evanston responded to a 911 call about a confrontation in the street. When the officers arrived, they found a man on the ground who reported injuries to his head, neck, and teeth. Soon, the officers learned that the injured man was a U.S. citizen, and his assailants were federal immigration agents.

The Department of Homeland Security put out a statement on Tuesday claiming that the beaten man “resembled the target” of an immigration enforcement operation, and that he was “not cooperative” with agents’ investigation. “Once the individual finally identified himself,” said DHS, immigration officers “left the scene without further incident.”

A video of the incident shows that immigration officers pinned the man to the ground while he repeatedly yelled, “I’m a fucking U.S. citizen,” and while concerned witnesses asked why the agents were “fucking him up.” Eventually, the agents drove off without rendering medical aid. People tried to comfort the man, who remained motionless on the ground.

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 24/09/2026

Lmao sitting at the dinner table with the in-laws and this lil bugger wants some ice cream SO BADLY

Photo of an elderly couple sitting at a dinner table with some open tubs of ice cream on it, looking down at the black cat that has popped up between them, desperately wanting some ice cream

Very zoomed in photo of the kitty's hilarious plaintive face, with her lil paws propped up on the table and her little ears up and alert as she wants some ice cream so badly

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 23/09/2026

this feels like one of those things that you just gotta mention whenever their name comes up, even if the article is not actually about that for example,

screenshot of the opening paragraph of an article Elie Mystal wrote about the Voting Rights Act a couple years ago (link at end of alt text), with his first mention of a particular Supreme Court justice highlighted. text reads as follows:

I regret to inform you that the future of the Voting Rights Act, and the immediate question of whether Southern states can gerrymander away the political power of Black citizens, now rests squarely on the shoulders of alleged attempted rapist Brett Kavanaugh. That’s because the state of Alabama’s latest attempt to defy the 15th Amendment, and the Supreme Court’s own rulings, is inspired by a decision Kavanaugh wrote that explicitly asked for plaintiffs to file a case that could help him kill the VRA once and for all.

available at: https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/voting-rights-brett-kavanaugh-alabama/

screenshot of a paragraph excerpted from an article I wrote last year about conservatives feeling betrayed by Amy Coney Barrett (linked below), with my mention of a named rightwing media personality highlighted in green. excerpt reads as follows:

Much of the conservative backlash has linked Barrett’s purported failings to her identity. “As a female who leans right, I’m kind of sick,” said Megyn Kelly, a former Fox News anchor who said Santa and Jesus are both white. “Get somebody with some rhetorical balls.” Other conservative media creeps latched on to the idea that Barrett’s appointment was the product of diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives—within the first Trump administration, apparently. “Amy Coney Barrett. DEI Judge,” one tweeted; “Amy Commie Barrett,” another replied.

available at: https://ballsandstrikes.org/law-politics/amy-coney-barrett-dei-conservative-backlash/

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 23/09/2026

yes more of this please ballsandstrikes.org/law-politics...

screenshot of two paragraphs excerpted from the linked article, with the final sentence of the first paragraph highlighted in green. excerpt reads as follows:

In response to Venegas’s lawsuit, the Trump administration contended that the government had a reasonable suspicion to detain him, and that this argument was supported by Kavanaugh’s concurrence in Noem v. Vasquez Perdomo. Basically, Kavanaugh said that agents detain and question people when they have reasonable suspicion, and since agents detained and questioned Venegas, they must have had reasonable suspicion to do so. In a September 21 order, though, Trump-appointed district judge Jeffrey Beaverstock wrote that the government offered “no factual support whatsoever” as to why its suspicion was reasonable, and that he was “simply not inclined to take the Government’s word for it.”

Beaverstock also wrote that Kavanaugh’s concurrence offered no help to the administration, because the immigration stops they carried out looked nothing like the immigration stops that Kavanaugh imagined. “Venegas was not promptly released,” said Beaverstock. “Instead, the officers disregarded the veracity of his documentation and continued to detain him.” Beaverstock concluded that the administration’s warrantless raid and detention policies are likely unconstitutional, and issued an order temporarily blocking them.

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 23/09/2026

im only a bit into this longread and it's already a brutal accounting of the Reconstruction rollback being carried out by the neoconfederates on the Court like, this is a deliberate effort by opponents of multiracial democracy to disempower and degrade--again. different century but same shit

screenshot of a three-paragraph excerpt from the quote-skeeted article, with the final sentences of the third paragraph highlighted in grey, from "and now" onwards. excerpt reads as follows:

When he appeared before the state Senate that day to testify against the new redistricting plans, he was joined by three other veteran Black politicians. Although Fields, a 63-year-old lawyer, has a reputation as an even-keeled consensus builder, he grew emotional as he spoke.

“To me, it is personal,” he told the Senate committee. “Since Reconstruction, Louisiana has elected four African Americans to Congress. And you’re looking at all of them. Four.” Even though nearly a third of Louisiana’s population is Black.

“You said something very profound,” state Sen. Gary Carter Jr., an African American Democrat from New Orleans, told Fields. “From the 1870s all the way through [the] present, just you four gentlemen—that’s it. And now this body wants to reduce that. ‘We want to cut it. That’s too many.’ How do we not be outraged?”

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 22/09/2026

decided to take a look, it's an honor just to be nominated 🫡

Screenshot from the 38 most influential Bluesky users site, showing my search for "Madiba," which revealed that I clocked in at 650th with 18 votes 😂♥️

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 20/09/2026

I sent my family group chat the school choice article for their thoughts and I am amused at the speed and intensity with which the parentals were like, ain't no way, ain't no fuckin way

Screenshot of a text exchange, prompted by me sending FamBam the "In Fighting for Every Black Child, Did I Betray My Own?" article

Me: Whew, I'm reading this article and I'm curious about yalls thoughts

idk that I coulda kept my child in that school

[Link]

Mommy: I started reading it earlier and there's no way I would have kept my kiddo there.
I didn't finish the article though

[I exclamation point react]

Screenshot text exchange continued

Dad: You cannot put your child into a bad school to make a political point. Your first obligation is toprovide your child with the best learning environment.

[I exclamation point react]

Me: What do you make of her hope that, with her resources, she could make the school better?

Mommy: I will have to read that part. I stopped reading very early on because I thought it was silly

[I laugh emoji react to this bc lmao]

Dad: Unless she had millions of dollars to pour into the school or hundredsof thousands of dollars for political advocacy on behalf of the school, she had little chance of changing the school. And she can do all of this WITHOUT denying her child the best learning environment she can.

Jesus died on the cross for us. So dey say.

She does not have to be Jesus...and especially her child.

[I exclamation point reacted to this, but also lol]

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 19/09/2026

I'm 35! Also hilariously and completely coincidentally, The Husband and I went out for my birthday dinner and were seated right next to....family members?? For a big city New York can be surprisingly small 😅

Photo of me and The Husband, standing and smiling in front of a brownstone and a tree with fairy lights on it. He's wearing a nice blue chambray shirt and a grey blazer, and the straps of my white-based dress are visible

Full body pic of me on the sidewalk of an NYC street as the sun is beginning to set in the background. I'm wearing a form-fitting dress with a white base but multicolor flowers and thorns and snakes all across it. The body is bodyodyodying, and I'm smiling bc I know it, and bc it's my birthday!

Group photo of me, The Husband, my half sister, and her sister seated next to each other at dinner! In the background is a woman who is not here for our shit at all lmao

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 17/09/2026

looking for something in one of my old articles and rediscovered this gem lol (im not above laughing at my own writing) ballsandstrikes.org/legal-cultur...

screenshotted excerpt from the linked article, with piece one sentence highlighted, beginning after the word 'vengeance.' excerpt reads as follows:

Sam Alito isn’t the only member of his household with a grudge against journalism, either. In another recording released by Windsor, also from the Supreme Court Historical Society event, Alito’s wife Martha-Ann suggested she is biding her time until her husband retires and she can sue members of the media for reporting on her (?) flag fanaticism. “There’s a five-year defamation statute of limitations,” she said with a laugh. “I’m gonna get them.”

[embedded tweet of an undercover audio recording of Martha-Ann Alito, which includes her saying "I want a Sacred Heart of Jesus flag because I have to look across the lagoon at the Pride flag for the next month."]

Martha-Ann also launched into a spiel from an Inglorious Basterds deleted scene about how her national background has prepared her for vengeance: “Look at me. I’m German, from Germany,” said Martha-Ann, who is from Kentucky. [editor's note: lmao] “My heritage is German. You come after me. I’m gonna give it back to you.”

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 17/09/2026

i thought this was neat ballsandstrikes.org/ethics-accou...

Screenshotted excerpt from the linked article, with the final two sentences highlighted in green, reading as follows:

Courts have an array of options for punishing noncompliance and compelling the administration to follow court orders. The most glaringly underutilized tool judges have at their disposal is the power of contempt, which allows judges to compel testimony and to impose penalties like escalating fines or even imprisonment. Sometimes, the mere threat of contempt is sufficient to trigger remedial action: In January, for instance, after the administration failed to release a habeas petitioner from immigration detention as directed, a federal district court ordered the acting director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement to “appear personally before the Court and show cause why he should not be held in contempt.”

In its order, the court acknowledged that compelling an agency head to testify was “an extraordinary step,” but reasoned that “the extent of ICE’s violation of court orders is likewise extraordinary,” and that “lesser measures have been tried and failed.” Within hours, the government released the petitioner. Members of the Trump administration had no desire to follow the law, but they had even less desire to explain themselves under penalty of perjury.

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 13/09/2026

whenever an admiral (badmiral) shows up in Star Trek, I know there's bout to be some shit then on top of that the badmiral is Papa Pope? Oh I KNOW there's bout to be some shit

image of actor Joe Morton guest starring on Star Trek Strange New Worlds as Admiral Simon Reeger. he's wearing a blue command uniform with gold trimming on the shoulders, and is in front of a gold curtainy-lookin background, looking slightly puzzled as to what in God's name made you think you could question his authority

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 08/09/2026

Much of the talk was about how constitutional meaning has always been contested, and as I was digging up examples, I was delighted to come across a resolution adopted by Maine's state legislature, going off after Dred Scott enjoy! blackfreedom.proquest.com/wp-content/u...

Screenshotted text from the resolution, reading:

Resolved, That the extra-judicial opinion of the Supreme Court of the United States in the case of Dred Scott is not binding in law or conscience upon the government or citizens of the United States, and
that it is of an import so alarming and dangerous, as to demand the
instant and emphatic reprobation of the country.

Resolved, That the Supreme Court of the United States should, by peaceful and constitutional measures, be so reconstituted as to relieve it from the domination of a sectional faction, and make it a tribunal whose decisions shall be in harmony with the Constitution of the
United States and the spirit of our institutions, and at whose hands all classes of persons in the United States, without regard to race or locality, shall receive even and exact justice.

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 08/09/2026

Alert alert we have received unreserved praise from mama!

Screenshot of a text exchange in my family group chat. I sent two pics of myself and said "I've just been retrieved to go talk to some law students, and yo, my ride is legit lol this ain't a Lyft, this a chauffeur" [Nneka heart emoji reacted to this]

I then said, "Dude was waiting for me in the lobby with a tablet that had M. DENNIE on it. He takes my bags for me while I drop off my hotel key. I step outside and he's holding the door open of a giant black suburban. He tells me there's a bottle of cold water for me if I would like. Like what lmao" [Nneka laugh emoji reacted to this]

And then, to my pleasant surprise, Mommy said "Now that's how you dress!!!" [I heart emoji reacted to this]

One of the photos I sent to the group chat--a full length hotel mirror selfie. The mirror is a little odd (it has some black lines on it) but you can see I'm wearing a form fitting navy blue dress with tan-ish paneling on the sides that make me look extra snatched. I'm also wearing black pointy-toed sandals, and a large pearl pendant necklace with dangly pearl earrings. I have one hand on my hip and am smiling broadly. My suitcase/CPAP are beside me, in front of a multicolored polkadot rug

Another hotel mirror selfie of me in the same outfit but with brighter lighting and with me only visible from the waist up, since I'm in front of the sink. I have a hand on my hip and am smiling broadly again

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 03/09/2026

must stress that i was not joking about the fire ballsandstrikes.org/ethics-accou...

screenshotted excerpt from the linked article (1/2) reading as follows:

The judicial branch, however, is not subject to the same kind of regulations. Currently, Supreme Court justices have sole discretion over whether and when their documents are retained or released. When Justice Thurgood Marshall retired in 1991, for example, he gave his papers to the Library of Congress; when he died two years later, the Library granted the public unrestricted access. Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg also had her papers sent to the Library of Congress upon her death in 2020, but subject to the same condition that Scalia’s family imposed: that no case files be opened during the lifetime of another justice involved in the case.

screenshotted excerpt from the linked article (2/2) reading as follows:

In contrast, in 1986, Justice Byron White bought a shredder and enlisted his clerks to help him “clean up the place” by destroying case files. Shortly before his death in 1971, Justice Hugo Black directed his son to set his papers on fire so that their contents couldn’t harm the Court or his colleagues—a Viking funeral that Black’s wife referred to as “Operation Frustrate-the-Historians.”

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 03/09/2026

yea I think they're gonna loathe this one lol (reskeeting with alt text) ballsandstrikes.org/ethics-accou...

screenshotted excerpt from the linked article reading as follows:

Harboring concerns about confidentiality may seem reasonable in the abstract. It becomes much less reasonable, however, when considered alongside the Court’s aggressive use of the shadow docket to implement right-wing policies without explanation, and its pressuring of Court employees to sign a nondisclosure agreement about the Court’s inner workings. It becomes even less reasonable when one considers the justices’ frequent refusal to testify before Congress, their spurning of calls for a binding ethics code, and their unconcealed loathing of critical news coverage.

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 03/09/2026

ok I had to force down a tear with this one reskeeting with alt text

Image of a page in a book with text reading as follows

THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED TO:

Dr. John Sharpe of London, who in 1957. a decade before physicians in England could legally perform an abortion for any reason other than the health of the woman, took the considerable risk of referring for an abortion a twenty-two-year-old American on her way to India.

Knowing only that she had broken an engagement at home to seek an unknown fate, he said, "You must promise me two things. First, you will not tell anyone my name. Second, you will do what you want to do with your life."

Dear Dr. Sharpe, I believe you, who knew the law was unjust, would not mind if I say this so long after your death:

I've done the best I could with my life.

This book is for you.

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 02/09/2026

reskeeting with alt text extremely embarrassing, or at least it would be if Jones Day had any capacity for shame

screenshot of Jones Day Managing Partner Greg Shumaker's response to an email expressing concern that the firm just enthusiastically hired Yaakov Roth, who advanced all kinds of truly terrible arguments at Trump's DOJ, reading as follows

Dear Patriot: We could not be happier that Yaakov is returning to our Firm. He is a wonderful lawyer and better human being. I wish you luck with your crusade. - Greg Shumaker

[editor's note: citation fuckin needed on that wonderful lawyer and better human claim]

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 02/09/2026

I wrote a little about yesterday's whistleblower report on mail ballots--and a lot about the Supreme Court's strategy for helping Trump just keep breaking the law namely: delay delay delay ballsandstrikes.org/scotus/trump...

screenshot of two excerpted paragraphs from the linked article, with the final sentence of the first paragraph highlighted in green. excerpt reads as follows:

The chaos surrounding the mail ballot orders is illustrative of what Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson described, in her standalone dissent from the unsigned California order, as the Court’s “Catch-Me-If-You-Can approach” to Trump’s policy agenda. It’s not clear exactly when the right time is for plaintiffs to challenge unconstitutional acts. It’s not clear when courts can issue rulings to stop them. And all the while, the administration does not need to defend the legal merits of its actions—it can just say the time isn’t right to do so.

Jackson said that this strategy empowers the administration to prolong unlawful conduct as long as possible. And she criticized the Court for opting to “greenlight significant harms,” rather than recognize a “red flag.”

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 02/09/2026

was chatting with one of my homegirls this morning about sandwiches and we stumbled into what I think is the policy agenda for Dems to take back Congress

screenshotted excerpt of a text exchange between me and a bestie

screenshot picks up in the middle of my sentence which read in full: "I also one got brunch at this...I wanna say maybe Thai fusiony place? I forget what exactly. Point is I got an eggs benedict and instead of bread they used a scallion pancake. Mind blowing"

Friend replies: Omg that sounds incredible!!
Scallion pancake is just better. So you should always replace bread with it [I double exclamation point emoji react to this]

me: Right?! Genius

Friend: I had a sandwich using garlic bread once and was like why don't they all come like this

Me: Omg
This is the kind of innovation this country needs

Friend: Mhmmm!!
More breads less data centers [I double exclamation point emoji react to this, too]

me: Winning policy platform!! [friend heart emoji reacts to this]

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 31/08/2026

I discuss the abortion request at length in the article see, e.g., ballsandstrikes.org/law-politics...

screenshotted excerpt from the linked article, reading as follows

After signing the agreement, Gilkar and Ahmed had their embryo transferred into West’s uterus. Gilkar held West’s hand during the implantation process.

For several months, West’s pregnancy went smoothly. On April 7, lawyers for the parents and the surrogate filed a joint petition in an Alaska state court to make sure Gilkar and Ahmed would be recognized as the legal parents.

Days later, a 20-week anatomy scan revealed that the fetus had a critical congenital heart defect. If the child was born, he would require at least three major surgeries within the first few years of life in order to have any chance of survival. Roughly three in 10 children who get the surgeries still die before the age of five.

Heartbroken, Gilkar and Ahmed had a difficult decision to make. They wanted the child more than anything. But they worried about whether they could afford the treatment, and if, even with the surgery, the child would only know a brief life of suffering.

screenshotted excerpt from the linked article, reading as follows

Under the terms of the surrogacy agreement, Gilkar and Ahmed retained the right to request a termination of the pregnancy upon detection of a fetal abnormality. So, after considering the issue as a couple and consulting doctors, they asked West to get an abortion.

In the agreement, West indicated that she had “carefully considered” the possibility of abortion, and agreed that she would end the pregnancy if the parents requested in writing that she do so. She scheduled an appointment for early May, and the lawyers dismissed the legal parentage petition that was filed in Alaska the month before.

But as the appointment date approached, West changed her mind. She told Gilkar and Ahmed that, at her job as a nurse, she’d seen patients make remarkable recoveries, and that she had a friend whose teenage daughter has the same heart condition as their child. She urged Gilkar and Ahmed to reconsider their request. She also told them that if they did not, she would give birth to their baby anyway, and either put him up for adoption or raise him herself.

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 29/08/2026

reskeeting with alt text bc this is a funny as hell way to dismiss someone's dumbass argument to their face

Screenshotted excerpt from a conversation transcript, reading as follows

Cottle: My guess is that you then completely reject the idea that we wound up with this wretched administration in part because of the backlash to the excesses of woke, especially alienating young men, who were told they were the problem, just generally speaking.

Bouie: [this line is highlighted] I completely reject that for simple reasons of linear time. This administration was elected in 2024. At peak woke, when Nancy Pelosi was wearing kente cloth, Democrats won a trifecta, right? At the--

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 27/08/2026

i've been sayin, these are Trump Toilet Tweets caliber court filings ballsandstrikes.org/law-politics...

screenshotted excerpt from the linked article, with the final sentence highlighted in green:

It would be easy to chalk up the filing as the work product of a Justice Department that’s been hemorrhaging qualified attorneys and replacing them with loyalist hacks. But that only scratches the surface of a deeper rot. Fully understanding DOJ’s latest filing requires acknowledging the conservative legal movement’s longtime solicitousness for an expansive view of executive power teetering on authoritarianism. For decades, they’ve argued that presidents must have total control to direct the work of executive agencies. Congrats, now, legal motions filed by the government sound like Trump wrote them on the toilet.

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 27/08/2026

and then there's my mom (I immediately got a flashback to this text during my virtual book launch event for The Originalism Trap 😂)

Screenshot of texts from my mom, sent on June 4, 2024, reading as follows:

Take small sips of water during your talks instead of big gulps.
Use a glass or cup instead of the big water bottle

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 26/08/2026

oh, yep, decades! more of an old-but-once-fringe bullshit SCOTUS thing that went mainstream here's something I wrote last year that connects the dots a bit on how it started/how it's going ballsandstrikes.org/scotus/nlrb-...

screenshotted excerpt from the linked article reading as follows:

The unitary executive theory began to find its voice on the Court in Morrison v. Olson, a 1988 case that upheld federal ethics law limiting the attorney general’s power to remove independent counsels who are investigating corruption allegations. Justice Antonin Scalia dissented, arguing that Article II of the Constitution, which vests the president with executive power, “does not mean some of the executive power, but all of the executive power.”

No other justices joined Scalia’s opinion in Morrison, but as the Court grew more conservative—and as conservative activists and academics churned out scholarship in support of executive power—adherence to the unitary executive theory became table stakes for any Republican lawyer who aspired to a federal judgeship.

screenshotted excerpt from the linked article reading as follows:

The Court’s promotion of the unitary executive theory doesn’t just limit Congress’s ability to design and structure new agencies. It also concentrates power in a single individual—and to make matters worse, that individual is currently Donald Trump. The unitary executive theory dresses up a dictatorship in constitutional language, and it is no surprise that Trump has embraced it.

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 22/08/2026

precisely Big Oil's own arguments show why Alito's argument is full of shit ballsandstrikes.org/ethics-accou...

Screenshotted excerpt of two paragraphs from the linked article, reading as follows:

In response, a spokesperson for the Court told NBC News that Alito’s recusal is “not required” in Suncor Energy because, unlike related cases in which he recused, Alito “does not have a financial interest” in any of the parties involved in Suncor Energy. The argument here is basically that, even though Alito is entangled with oil and gas generally, he doesn’t own stock in Suncor or Exxon specifically, so he has nothing to gain or lose by the outcome of the case.

The oil industry understands that this argument is nonsense. In September 2025, for instance, the American Petroleum Institute filed an amicus brief urging the Court to take up Suncor Energy, and arguing that the Court’s decision would have “broad implications for the entire petroleum and natural-gas industry,” since state climate lawsuits threaten to “destabilize the whole sector.” In a 2022 filing, Suncor and Exxon Mobil explicitly argued that the case was the “best approaching opportunity” for the Court to decide whether *any* state climate lawsuit may proceed without running into “recusal issues.” In other words, Alito’s hands would appear slightly less dirty, but he would still be able to put a thumb on the scale.

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 21/08/2026

Hairdresser's dog put his lil bone on my lap which allowed me to get a couple delightful action shots

Photo of an extremely adorable smol dog (some kind of couture dog like a cockapoo I think) standing with one paw on my knee, about to make a leap for the lil bone in my hand. I am also visible in the photo, by way of the salon mirror I'm seated in front of. I'm wearing the lil salon cape thing over a blue shirt and matching pants and laughing

Slightly blurry in-motion photo of the pup jumping and getting, like, just a tooth onto the lil green bone I'm holding

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 12/08/2026

lmao ok wait, what would your $6 million dumbass passion project be?

screenshot of the final paragraph of the NYT article about the fired Forbes editor (link at end of alt text), reading as follows:

"Mr. Lane is now focusing on his own projects. In 2023, he co-founded the National Thoroughbred League, a competitive horseracing association. And this summer, he mounted a rock musical he wrote about Benjamin Franklin titled “The Sound of America” in Philadelphia that cast the founding father as “America’s first rock star.” It finished its debut run this month."

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/08/12/business/forbes-editor-fired.html

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 11/08/2026

ooh, an addendum im happy to see [tho i woulda preferred to see it before i published my article 😅]: the plaintiffs from the birthright citizenship ruling filed a new "motion to clarify" today which is basically the lawyer way of saying uh wtf is this shit storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

screenshotted excerpt from p.1-2 of the linked motion, reading as follows, with internal citations omitted:

That should have been the end of this issue. But on August 6, after the Supreme Court’s mandate issued, President Trump signed a new executive order. Despite the Supreme Court’s clear direction, the President continues to claim for himself the power to “identify categories of children” whose citizenship he intends to deny.

This new Order violates the Court’s existing preliminary injunction, as it purports to strip birthright citizenship from members of the provisionally certified class despite the Supreme Court’s recent decision. To avoid any doubt in this regard, the Court should underscore that the government may not strip away class members’ citizenship through any executive orders or other similarly flawed assertions of Executive power over birthright citizenship. Accordingly, Plaintiffs respectfully request that the Court now clarify that its preliminary injunction currently forbids any denial or infringement of class members’ constitutionally guaranteed citizenship or, in the alternative, modify its injunction or issue a new preliminary injunction to explicitly so provide.

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 10/08/2026

When @nneka.bsky.social asked me if I had any wedding reading requests, I think my first answer was a line from a 2013 NYT essay by Tim Kreider lol: "If we want the rewards of being loved we have to submit to the mortifying ordeal of being known" I later added an excerpt from Einstein on the Beach

screenshotted excerpt from Einstein on the Beach (1 of 2) reading as follows:

The day with its cares and perplexities is ended and the night is now upon us
The night should be a time of peace and tranquility
a time to relax and be calm
We have need of a soothing story
to banish the disturbing thoughts of the day,
to set at rest our troubled minds,
and put at ease our ruffled spirits
And what sort of story shall we hear? Ah, it will be a familiar story
a story that is so very, very old, and yet it is so new
It is the old, old story of love

Two lovers sat on a park bench with their bodies touching each other, holding hands in the moonlight
There was silence between them
So profound was their love for each other,
they needed no words to express it.
And so they sat in silence, on a park bench, with their bodies touching,
holding hands in the moonlight

Finally she spoke
"Do you love me, John?" she asked
"You know I love you, darling," he replied.
"I love you more than tongue can tell
You are the light of my life
my sun, moon and stars.
You are my everything.
Without you I have no reason for being"

screenshotted excerpt from Einstein on the Beach (2 of 2), reading as follows:

Again there was silence as the two lovers sat on a park bench,
their bodies touching, holding hands in the moonlight.
Once more she spoke.
"How much do you love me, John?" she asked
He answered, "How much do I love you? Count the stars in the sky
Measure the waters of the oceans with a teaspoon
Number the grains of sand on the seashore
Impossible, you say.
Yes and it is just as impossible for me to say how much I love you
My love for you is higher than the heavens,
deeper than Hades, and broader than the Earth.
It has no limits, no bounds
Everything must have an ending except my love for you."

There was more of silence as the two lovers sat on a park bench
with their bodies touching, holding hands in the moonlight

Once more her voice was heard
"Kiss me, John" she implored
And leaning over, he pressed his lips warmly to hers in fervent osculation

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 08/08/2026

did one of my semi regular Goodreads checks to see how The Originalism Trap is doing and this recent review pleased me: "plenty of footnotes (if you're into that) and snark (i'm really into that)" das right bookshop.org/p/books/the-...

Screenshot of Goodreads user Sandra Fish's 5-star review of The Originalism Trap reading as follows:

If you're into politics/current events/justice/equality this is a great read - excellent examples of the U.S. supremes bending the constitution to their advantage with plenty of footnotes (if you're into that) and snark (i'm really into that)... also, potential solutions and examples of same from the past.

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