WEDNESDAY: We've been hearing statements which almost sound...

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 16, 2025

..."sociopathy adjacent:" Maybe he didn't mean the statement the way it could possibly sound.

We refer to Scott Jennings. He's a "Sensible Republican" now "Gone Wild" on the 10 p.m. weeknight program, CNN NewsNight with Abby Phillip.

Phillip herself is thoroughly capable. Every night, she's forced to frame the program in the manner shown:

"Americans with different perspectives aren't talking to each other. But here, they do."

In fact, Americans with different perspectives are more often talking over each other on this particular program. That has been especially true when the seemingly reinvented Jennings sometimes might almost seem to be inviting disputes on this show.

Last night, the gang was overtalking each other about the bungled rendition of Kilmar Abrego Garcia into a Central American hellhole. More to the point, they were overtalking each other about the administration's refusal to try to get the wrongly rendered Abrego Garcia back.

Abrego Garcia has been sent to a dystopian hellhole—possibly never to be heard from again—through an admitted "administrative error." In the midst of all the wrangling, Jennings came up with this:

JENNINGS (4/15/25): What is the compelling reason to put this person back in the country?

To our ear, that was a remarkable question. Maybe he didn't intend for it to sound the way it almost does.

What would be the compelling reason to try to get Abrego Garcia back? In our view, Judge Paula Xinis taught it flat and taught it round in her initial order concerning this case.

Yesterday, Judge Xinis presided over the latest fruitless court session involving the foot-dragging Trump administration. This morning, in a front-page news report, the New York Times quoted what Judge Xinis said in her initial order about the need to retrieve Abrego Garcia:

Judge Rebukes Administration’s Efforts to Return Wrongly Deported Man

A federal judge scolded the Trump administration on Tuesday for dragging its feet in complying with a Supreme Court order that directed the White House to “facilitate” the release of a Maryland man who was wrongly deported to a prison in El Salvador last month.

“To date nothing has been done,” the judge, Paula Xinis, told a lawyer for the Justice Department. “Nothing.”

[...]

In her initial order directing the White House to bring Mr. Abrego Garcia back from El Salvador, Judge Xinis found that the Trump administration had flown him out of the country “without notice, legal justification or due process.”

Moreover, she chided government officials for having made “a grievous error” by deporting him, adding that the White House, by then refusing to retrieve him from one of the most “inhumane and dangerous prisons in the world,” had exposed him to harm that “shocks the conscience.”

In the absence of anything resembling due process, the Trump administration had sent him to a vicious "prison" from which he might never return. They've admitted that the rendition was done, in violation of a standing court order, through "administrative error."

Since then, the administration has made no attempt to bring Abrego Garcia back. This web of behavior "shocks the conscience," Judge Xinis simply said.

What's the reason to bring this person back? The degree of harm to which he's been exposed "shocks the conscience," this federal judge simply said. 

The whole thing strikes us that way too. That said, it's often said that a certain category of disordered or afflicted human being may perhaps lack a conscience.

As a matter of colloquial shorthand, it's often said that "sociopaths" don't actually have a conscience. With respect to the matter at hand, we'd say a fair number of people have been engaging in conduct on cable TV which can almost seem to be "sociopathy adjacent."

One of our favorites comes to mind. Here was Greg Gutfeld, co-host of The Five, on last evening's show:

GUTFELD (4/15/25): ...Biden opened the border, millions came in, and surely murderers and rapists were part of that. Now we’re deporting hundreds of thousands, and surely one or two might not be criminal. 

However, compare the error. In one of these errors, Americans don’t die. At worst, a guy gets sent to a country he doesn’t want to go to. You know what? I can live with that.

Already, note the way this unusual fellow has finessed the facts. In his construction, Abrego Garcia has merely been "sent to a country he doesn’t want to go to!"

He may have been sent to the south of France! Greg Gutfeld can live with that! 

At any rate, hat's "the worst" situation that Gutfeld was prepared to imagine. When Jessica Tarlov inserted a reality check, Gutfeld went all adjacent:

TARLOV (continuing directly): Into a prison camp? Not just out into the wild—

GUTFELD: Look! I’m sorry, Jessica. I understand your concern, but I refuse to care about one person who is an illegal alien when the mental shelf space I have is now reserved for victims of crime, which I’ve been talking about for years. 

The fellow went on from there. Meanwhile, alas, poor Gutfeld! He has a finite amount of "mental shelf space." He can't manage the tiny bit of space it would take to say something like this:

Actually, yes! Given their grievous error, the Trump administration should be trying to get this person back.

"One or two" people might be innocent, the TV star acknowledged—but he said he can live with that! Beyond that, he said he currently lacks the mental space to worry about this one person. He said he "refuses to care."

"I refuse to care about one person who is an illegal alien?" No one says he should actually care, or that he has to care a lot. But there he was, saying he chooses not to be concerned about the possibility that one of those people who aren't vicious criminals might have been sent, for life, into a dystopian hellhole.

He isn't even willing to say that Abrego Garcia should be brought back. In fairness, his refusal could simply reflect the fact that he's being paid to avoid such statements.

As you know, a basic question lurks behind the scene of this case. That question goes like this:

It's true that Abrego Garcia entered the country without authorization (illegally). Also, he didn't then seek asylum. 

That said:

Is it true that he was, or that he still is, a member of MS-13? To our ear, dueling observers from the two Americas have had their thumbs on the scale in dueling ways regarding that basic question. 

That brings us back to yesterday's question. Did Pam Bondi shock the world by making an accurate statement? We refer to what she said when she addressed President Trump at that recent cabinet meeting.

In yesterday afternoon's report, we laid out this basic question. Tomorrow, we'll link you to the two court sessions the attorney general cited.

For today, we'll close with this:

It "shocks the conscience," Judge Xinis said. But according to pop psychology, a certain percentage of adult males may not exactly have one—and the press corps has agreed that such questions can't be discussed. 

Does Marco Rubio have a conscience? Given what he said at that recent cabinet meeting, inquiring minds might occasionally want to see such questions discussed.

Tomorrow: Just because two judges said it, that doesn't mean it's true