A Trump-appointed judge also said Americans have no “constitutional right to truthful information” during a public health crisis.

On Friday, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed the dismissal of a lawsuit against the city of Jackson, Mississippi, which alleged the city knowingly let residents drink lead-contaminated water.

The lawsuit, first filed in 2022, says the contamination violated Jacksonians’ constitutional right to bodily integrity. Donald Trump-appointed judge Kurt Engelhardt disagreed. “The Constitution does not provide redress for every governmental wrongdoing,” Engelhardt said.

“Defendants’ actions allegedly deprived Plaintiffs of clean water and guileless information. These deprivations, while grievous, do not infringe upon any deeply rooted constitutional right.”

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[+] 105 points 2 months ago (22 children)
  • [–] 68 points 2 months ago (1 child)

    Money money money. This is when I can say America is finally in the medieval era. Healthcare for the kings/lords, diseases in everything including food and even the water can be poison. Just like the old days.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 months ago

    Nah, for judges I really think money is just a good extra. It's about feeling powerful, the kinds of power people want are different so some become cops, some politicians, some influencers, and some judges etc. The importance of the money aspect in all those varies as much between each kind and each person. I think many begin with mostly money in mind but the need for power over others quickly takes over.

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  • [–] 15 points 2 months ago (14 children)
  • [–] 11 points 2 months ago (13 children)

    By other spineless, soulless morons.

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  • [–] 2 points 2 months ago (12 children)

    Given there's no apparent resistance I lack evidence of an opposing group.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 months ago (11 children)

    Because the political system intrinsically defaults to a two party system making it very easy to entrench the two parties and create controlled opposition, which then works to squash actual resistance.

    You can see it in action right now within the democratic party where a certain group of people would rather see them lose elections than support candidates who are looking to oppose the status quo.

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  • [–] 0 points 2 months ago (10 children)

    Only an asshole could look at this situation and come up with a post blaming Democrats.

    I would suggest you do better but let's face it, you can't and likely never will.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 months ago (9 children)

    I'm sorry, is the entire American political system "Democrats"? I said the entire system is rotten. I only used democrats as an example because that's literally the most recent example. I could've used the tea party as a republican example but why use a 15 year old example when there's an example happening right now?

    Perhaps instead of telling me to do better you should be telling that to the establishment democrats who are not just against the DSA but also Abdul El-Sayed, who isn't even a socialist. Perhaps the one who should be doing better is you?

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  • [–] 0 points 2 months ago (8 children)

    OK now you're just making shit up.

    The first thing that happened after Abdul won his primary was the entire fucking establishment endorsed him.

    So you're either a liar or completely misinformed. Let us know which, thanks.

    Not that it matters because you'll just fucking lie about that answer, too.

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  • [–] 2 points 2 months ago (7 children)

    So there's no push to slander Piker and use his association with El-Sayed as a way to sabotage his campaign by trying to alienate the Jewish voters or the young voters who Piker rallied?

    I guess I'm just making up the scrutiny El-Sayed receives for being associated with one of the biggest leftist voices in America.

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  • [–] -1 points 2 months ago (6 children)

    No, you're just once again pretending that the ignorant and vile shit Republicans say is somehow on the Democrats.

    So like I said, you're either a liar (aka a Republican) or an idiot. Doesn't really matter which.

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  • [–] 2 points 2 months ago (5 children)

    Just because you don't know what the fuck I'm talking about doesn't mean I'm lying. And you know what I've been cordial enough. I'm not even going to educate you on this matter, fuck off. It's not my job to tell you about the AIPAC democrats who did a coordinated attack against Piker and it's not my job to explain to you why El-Sayed needs to make a public statement about how he's not looking to condemn Hasan. You want to gurgle on the dems balls, go gurgle.

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  • [–] 0 points 2 months ago (4 children)

    There's that GOP bullshit I knew was at your core.

    Thanks for playing!

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  • [–] 2 points 2 months ago* (3 children)

    I'm further left than you you dumb fuck, which you'd know if you had ever bothered to ask. But do continue proving how little you actually know or care to find out and how much you spend thinking you know better than others.

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  • [–] 0 points 2 months ago (2 children)

    All we have to go on is your word, and so far, you've proven yourself utterly unreliable, but sure, keep throwing temper tantrums because no one believes your bullshit.

    "I'm so far left that all I do is shit on Democrats" means you might as well be a fucking Republican, ya fuckin potato.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 months ago (1 child)

    No, everyone else got what to look for, it's only you who is not capable of anything more than attacking me. I already told you to fuck off, I don't care about you desire to live in a "everyone who doesn't agree with me is my opposition" world. There's nothing to discuss with someone who has such a narrow view of the world.

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  • [–] 12 points 2 months ago (3 children)

    Not to defend a trump judge, but it sounds like the ruling is simply that the constitution doesn't guarantee the particular right in question. Which is true. There's nothing in the constitution about this.

    It's a matter of environmental law, sanitation, public health, etc. I'm sure there are laws that this situation violated, but the fact is that the laws it broke weren't in the constitution. So the plaintiff's lawyer kinda messed up by making this case about some made-up constitutional right and not the specific laws that are on the books at the state or federal level.

    The case shouldn't be over. They just need to focus on laws that actually exist instead of some AI hallucinations about the constitution.

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  • [–] 4 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

    This is similar to my take on roe v wade. The supreme Court looked at the constitution and said "oh, there's abortion, right there". It was inevitable it would get overturned because it's not actually in the constitution anywhere. The Dems had 50 years to pass an actual federal law and failed.

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  • [–] 2 points 2 months ago

    The heritage foundation has literally been pushing to influence the political leanings of judges since the early 70s, and every single conservative supreme court justice has ties to them. Conservatives and corporations have been working on this for decades

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  • [–] 61 points 2 months ago

    Well if judges had the right to not be harassed and have their houses burned, it would be in the constitution too!

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  • [–] 46 points 2 months ago (5 children)

    Elections have consequences, everyone who stayed home and allowed Trump to be elected to two terms has enabled this.

    I honestly don’t know if the US will actually be able to recover from those 6 (and counting) years, as an Aussie it feels like we’re watching the equivalent of the Fall of Rome in real time.

    That bastard has managed to isolate you from your allies, line his pockets with billions of dollars, nearly bankrupt your country, destroy your military credibility, pollute your water, air & food, roll back your rights, and so much more.

    It will take at least a generation to undo this damage, and I don’t think there’s enough political will to do what would need to be done to arrest this decline.

    You will likely fall into oligarchy, to become another Russia in my lifetime. Just another regional brute, living off the fear and intimidation you were able to impose on your glory years.

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  • [–] 12 points 2 months ago (3 children)

    I think it depends on how you define "recover". America will never be what it was.

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  • [–] 5 points 2 months ago

    "old" america is never coming back. it never was. and by 'old' i mean like cold war or obama era, not racist sexist 30's/40's/50's america.

    this 'new'/currrent america might stick around for a bit, but it will be strained. it will get to a point where this new america fully breaks and ceases to exist (full civil war 2) and the country will be broken up. either into 2 new countries or breaking completely and all the states becoming their own country, which will invoke more war as states (and even other countries) fight each other for land and resources.

    'mostly' world paece was amazing while it lasted. but billionairs didn't make enough money

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  • [–] 37 points 2 months ago (1 child)

    "We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America."

    Opening line of the Constitution. Pretty sure anything bold could be applied to safe, clean drinking water.

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    [–] 32 points 2 months ago*

    the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals

    The judges there regularly issue decisions so far right even SCOTUS won't get on board. "Fifth Circuit" really ought to be in the headline of articles about their ridiculous decisions. It's the Fifth Circuit doing Fifth Circuit things.

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  • [–] 32 points 2 months ago

    In some parts of the world, people are thinking about UBI.

    In other parts of the world, having safe drinking water is put into question.

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  • [–] 59 points 2 months ago* (11 children)

    Says right here, "Life, liberty, pursuit of happiness."

    Without clean water there's no life. With no life, there's no liberty, and no pursuing happiness.

    How do you "promote the general welfare" with filthy, poisonous water?

    This is like the most fundamental thing, even Rome provided clean water. We've been surpassed by ancient Rome.

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  • [–] 18 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

    Yes, but- Someone forgot to transfer that line to the constitution. We’re all going to die or become bonded corporate slaves because of an administrative oversight.

    Edit: on second thought, maybe the first one was a well-written a call to arms and they knew exactly what they were doing when they wrote the actual charter.

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  • [–] 7 points 2 months ago (6 children)

    Not sure why I have to be the person in this thread to explain basic civics to everyone, but "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness" is from the Declaration of Independence, it is not in the US Constitution.

    The Declaration is not law, it was just a declaration. You can't cite it like this, that's not how it works.

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  • [–] 2 points 2 months ago (5 children)

    It's actually in section 1 of the 14th amendment:

    All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

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  • [–] 2 points 2 months ago (4 children)

    Life, liberty, or property. No pursuit of happiness to be found.

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  • [–] 4 points 2 months ago (3 children)

    You still can't have any of those if you don't have drinkable water.

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  • [–] 2 points 2 months ago* (2 children)

    Look, I'm not going to defend this bullshit decision, but humans survived millennia without regulated, clean, drinking water. Yes, some of the lucky ones had life, liberty, and maybe even some property.

    They were drinking low % beer because it was safer. For literally thousands of years.

    It was an absolute nightmare, and anyone with a working understanding of history knows exactly why we need regulated, clean, drinking water.

    But unfortunately, here we are. A legislature that has abdicated it's responsibility in prostrate to a mad king. With a Supreme Court with at least four justices, off the top of my head, that will have no issue poisoning our drinking water. And two more who could go either way.

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  • [–] 3 points 2 months ago (1 child)

    The problem here is that things like beer will protect you from water born disease, but it will not offer any protection against lead, mercury, and many other heavy metals. Many of these pollutants are either new, or never occurred in as significant amounts as they do now. Also our world is getting hotter, and as a result, dehydration will become even more dangerous than before. The last thing you will want to drink during a heatwave is alcohol, even in small quantities. If you're unlucky like me and can't have alcohol, are especially sensitive to some of these metals, and dehydrate especially easily, then you're royally screwed.

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  • [–] 0 points 2 months ago (2 children)

    The preamble to US constitition has zero legal bearing on the US. There has never been a legal case in the US where "preamble based natural justice" was accepted as a legitimate basis for complaint. If your complaint was only based on the preamble, normal judicial practice would be to dismiss it as frivolous, and force you to pay defendants' court costs.

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  • [–] 5 points 2 months ago

    Well it does explain that the enumerated rights are a non-exclusive, non-exhaustive list. So while it doesn’t have any direct legal weight, it certainly explains how they expected the document to be interpreted

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  • [–] 59 points 2 months ago (4 children)

    "Oh look at me, I'm an entitled American. I want water to drink and to not be lied to. Wha Wha Wha"

    You give people this and they'll start asking for healthcare next instead of just dying in the street with pride.

    Bunch of greedy entitled fucks.

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  • [–] 29 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (9 children)

    What exactly do Americans have the right to...?

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  • [–] 7 points 2 months ago (1 child)

    Nothing unless it's in the constitution. Judge is technically correct.

    We should probably change that.

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  • [–] 3 points 2 months ago

    Well, yes and no.

    Technically, several rights not listed in the constitution are guaranteed to the States or the people by the 10th Amendment. Which, I guess by default makes it in the Constitution?

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  • [–] 27 points 2 months ago

    If only the US had integrated the Universal Declaration of Human Rights into law. It's only 78 years old. Guess they haven't had time yet.

    Article 25

    Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services,

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  • [–] 19 points 2 months ago (1 child)

    Oh, it was a conservative deciding this. This tracks.

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  • [–] 18 points 2 months ago
    [–] 17 points 2 months ago (2 children)

    Then what is the point of governance?

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  • [–] 15 points 2 months ago*

    Ofc not. This colony was founded by literal enslavers. It's hard to enslave a comfortable population with their basic needs met. No water, no food, no shelter, no healthcare... Instead it's "freeze peach" and corporate personhood.

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  • [–] 15 points 2 months ago (2 children)

    Do Americans have any rights anymore?

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  • [–] 11 points 2 months ago

    Sooooo... Abortion is cool, right? Either they're humans and not entitled to the necessities to live, or they're not humans and can have separate constitutional rights.

    Or maybe there's a third option here? Is there something special about people from Jackson, Mississippi that would preclude them from enjoying constitutional/human rights?

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  • [–] 11 points 2 months ago

    they want flint to be repeated in every state.

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  • [–] 10 points 2 months ago (1 child)

    What about the water youre paying for that had the implied value of being safe. Being defrauded by a group selling the water is a crime and every customer should have access to what they are paying for.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 months ago*

    Mississippi law provides civil immunity to cities for certain liability, including negligence. So I assume they brought the constitutional claim because they couldn't bring a negligence claim. But if you think that is bad, consider how much more immunity law enforcement has.

    Edit: also, fraud is usually a legal term in most states, relating to altering business documents like contracts, receipts, and ledgers with intent to profit.

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  • [–] 10 points 2 months ago

    It shouldn’t have been a “right to safe drinking water”, it’s an assumption of risk issue. The default setting in the US for a few generations is that the tap water is safe to drink. This reeeally smells like a malicious ruling.

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  • [–] 19 points 2 months ago (1 child)

    Yeah lets wrap this US gov up at this point. No right to clean water and the truth lol.

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  • [–] 9 points 2 months ago

    Because fuck the common good, right?

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  • [–] 9 points 2 months ago

    Land of the Free motherfuckers!

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  • [–] 8 points 2 months ago

    When some rights you should have aren't given to you, you need to do something to make sure you take them.

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  • Buy some top tier filters, people, you're going to need it!

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  • [–] 6 points 2 months ago

    That is some 3rd World shit right there. Hire a plumber to reroute that asswipe's water supply.

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  • [–] 6 points 2 months ago

    Spirit of bill of rights, even if it didn't say so explicitly, would include "Government shall not kill you for no reason, or tell you that killing you is good for you". Bill of rights is weak, because, rightfully speech that "falsely yells fire in a crowded theater" should be infringed/persecuted. But speech where the government/puppet media tells you "this is fine, when theater/contry is on fire" is far more dangerous, when entire oligarchy/zionist stooge establishment reinforces the lies.

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  • [–] 5 points 2 months ago (1 child)

    US citizens are unwittingly time travelling back to a palaeolithic style of life. You want the government to provide clean water? “F**k you!” replies Uncle Sam

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  • [–] 5 points 2 months ago (2 children)

    This absolutely needs to be the next amendment added to the Constitution.

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  • [–] 5 points 2 months ago

    Foreshadowing

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  • [–] 8 points 2 months ago (4 children)

    This is pretty fucking obvious to anyone who has received a water bill.

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  • [–] 4 points 2 months ago

    our public utility used to include reports from regular testing in with the bills.. they make them available online now (cost saving, it was a specially-printed multi-page insert before), but it's still public information.

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  • [–] -2 points 2 months ago (2 children)

    A water bill is so the treatment plants can continue running at utmost capacity.

    Should that just be tied into municipal taxes? Maybe. You're not paying for clean water, you're paying for the system and the people who help keep it clean.

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  • [–] 3 points 2 months ago (1 child)

    You are paying for wealth extraction. Ftfy

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  • [–] -1 points 2 months ago

    I mean, I own my home and I don't have a water bill so I'm personally not paying for anything. But it's the same as power, your Internet, etc. You're paying for not only the item you're receiving but also for the service it gets to you, and the service to keep it up and running.

    I pay for a plumber to come and fix my pipes. The money I pay them doesn't just pay for the service I received, the company also uses some of that to hire more people, improve their training, upgrade their equipment, etc.

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  • [–] 2 points 2 months ago

    Not great but honestly not suprised.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

    Well, he's sorta right. It's not explicitly in the text (though, one could argue it would maybe come from the 9th Amendment). The basis for the Clean Water Act and the EPA would arise out of Congress's power to promote a general welfare combined with regulating interstate commerce.

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  • [–] 2 points 2 months ago*

    It falls under the life part of consti rights, he's obtuse.

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