A Florida Judge Tried To Strip Me Of My Law License

Why I need your courage now more than ever to combat injustice in our legal systems and protect due process of law for All people in the United States

I wish I didn’t have to write this article, but it is one of the most important pieces I’ve ever published. And I am publishing this on Labor Day to emphasize the importance of worker solidarity against intimidation and injustice.

As I watch major law firms capitulate to Trump’s fascism—some offering up $100M in free legal services to appease him—I am making a conscious decision to refuse to bend the knee to intimidation. Thus, I write this at critical risk to my career as a lawyer. Because I know this will eventually reach the desk of the judge who already tried (twice) to end my legal career—and I have little doubt that he may try again a third time. But I’ve decided that remaining silent, especially as our Constitutional and due process rights are ripped to shreds, is just not an option.

My hope is that you will read this, recognize the urgency of now, and support my human rights advocacy. That you will see that despite the immense external pressure, some of us will never relent in our oath to uphold the U.S. Constitution, absolute justice, and universal human rights. And finally, that you will see why I cannot do this work alone, and need your trust, support, and partnership. Let’s Address This.

A recent lecture on international human rights, Palestine, and due process of law.

A First-Class Letter With a Judicial Complaint

It all started when a Florida Chief Judge filed a formal bar complaint against me for my alleged ‘misconduct’ of criticizing an unjust judicial ruling on my Substack and Twitter.

On May 12th I received a daunting First-Class mail letter, the likes of which I had never before received. An official warning from the Virginia State Bar (“VSB”) informing me that a Judge had filed a bar and ethics complaint against me. The complaint called on the VSB to investigate me and determine, effectively, whether I should be allowed to continue to practice law.

I read the sentence repeatedly, hoping each time I had misread what was obvious. Worse, I only had 21 days to respond. For context—between undergrad, LSAT prep, law school, and working as a licensed attorney, I have invested 25 years of my life into my legal career. And now, I risked losing 25 years of my life in just 21 days.

The complaint came from Francis J. Allman, Chief Judge of Florida’s Second Judicial District. (NOTE: No one reading this should attempt to contact him or address him for any reason. That is not what I seek, nor will it help me in any way). But now I was even more confused. I am licensed to practice law in Illinois and in Virginia. I have never appeared before any judge in Florida, much less handled any Florida case or client.

Why was a Florida Judge filing an attorney misconduct claim against an Illinois based attorney by going after my Virginia law license?

Analyzing the Complaint Against Me

To answer that question, read what Chief Judge Allman wrote in his complaint.

Apparently, Judge Allman found the time to scour millions of daily tweets and Substack posts, somehow arrive at my social media, where he found a tweet and Substack article he didn’t like, and then wrote a detailed bar complaint calling on the VSB to effectively end my legal career and livelihood. What was so indefensible about my post that angered a chief judge? Read for yourself and see:

And here is a link to the Substack article in question with a screenshot of the headline.

Here’s the relevant part from the above article:

In Florida, 20-year-old Juan Carlos Lopez-Gomez was held in Leon County Jail. His crime? Allegedly entering the state as an “unauthorized alien.” But here’s the twist—Lopez-Gomez is a U.S. citizen. Born in the United States. He showed the judge his U.S. birth certificate. The judge didn’t care. He remained in jail anyway. In a healthy democracy, judges don’t detain citizens of the United States for having the wrong skin color or last name. But we are no longer in a healthy democracy. We are watching fascism unfold in real time.

Experts at the American Immigration Council estimate that under the previous Trump regime, ICE deported as many as 70 U.S. Citizens, mostly of Latino ethnicity. Knowing this, I loudly spoke up for Mr. Lopez-Gomez’s due process rights. And based on my comments vehemently objecting to the unlawful arrest and detainment of a U.S. Citizen of Latino ethnicity, Florida’s Chief Judge Allman filed an official complaint to the VSB. A complaint that threatened to strip me of my hard earned livelihood, how I feed my family, and how I fight for human rights and democracy—including the right to due process and free speech.

And then I read the rest of the Chief Judge’s complaint. It is jaw dropping.

Refusing to Cite Actual Violations

Chief Judge Allman continued his complaint:

There is so much to unpack here.

First—while claiming “he believes” I had violated “several” Virginia Bar Rules—throughout his lengthy complaint, Judge Allman cited exactly zero allegedly violated rules. Not one. Apparently, because “he believes” I violated the Bar Rules, that warrants an investigation into my livelihood and right to practice law.

Quoting Internet Randos

Second, Judge Allman’s next claim was even more perplexing. He wrote:

Mr. Rashid's post almost immediately resulted in a response post from a person who advocated that "these judges" and their families be held accountable.

Here is the screenshot Judge Allman included in his complaint.

Unsurprisingly, Judge Allman neglected to explain why or how an Internet comment by an account—which may or may not be a bot—named “Kallie [black cat emoji] Maddie [white cat emoji] Kitty [rainbow emoji]” means that I have violated the rules of the VSB? I have no idea who this person is. The first time I saw said tweet was when Judge Allman shared the screenshot he or his clerk took at 10:36 and forgot to crop.

Sadly, the bar complaint gets even more confusing from here.

Addressing Claims of “Misrepresentation”

Third, Chief Judge Allman defends the decision to detain a U.S. Citizen by claiming I “misrepresented the case.” I did no such thing. But for the sake of argument, let us assume I was wrong in my legal assessment. Do we want a country where lawyers can lose their law licenses for publicly disagreeing with a judicial ruling? Does this mean we shut down every legal blog on the Internet that critiques the Supreme Court? The free speech harms would no doubt be fascistic untenable.

But also, let’s look at the facts. In his full complaint:

• Judge Allman first admits that the court found “no probable cause” as to the charge against Mr. Lopez-Gomez. I agree.

• Judge Allman then admits that the court accepted that the birth certificate was authentic and Mr. Lopez-Gomez is in fact a U.S. Citizen. Again, I agree.

• Judge Allman finally claims the court was powerless to release Mr. Lopez-Gomez because when “ICE as a federal agency puts a hold on someone, the court does not have authority to release the federal hold.” I wholly disagree.

And I disagree because his claim is patently false. And as ICE fascism rapidly expands—with a budget that now makes it the 11th largest military in the world—it is critical every person in the United States understands why the Chief Judge is wrong.

ICE Detainers Belong in the Trash, not in the Courtroom

Understand this fact: ICE detainers have zero legal authority. None. Law students learn this in their 1L year. I learned this in my 1L Civic Procedure class from Professor Jack Preis. It is irrelevant that ICE is a federal agency, whether or not it has a 287g agreement with local police, or believes in the flying spaghetti monster—a person’s rights are not contingent upon an ICE detainer, but upon due process of law and a judicial warrant. And this is true not just in this case of Mr. Lopez-Gomez in Florida, but also everywhere nationwide. ICE detainers have the legal authority of my 9-year-old scribbling on a napkin that she’s allowed to have ice cream for breakfast. In fact, as the ACLU of Florida explains, ICE detainers are demonstrably unconstitutional:

[I.C.E.] detainers are not arrest warrants. In fact, an I.C.E. “detainer” does not resemble an ordinary criminal detainer in anything but name, since criminal detainers pertain to pending charges approved by a judge. I.C.E. detainers also exceed statutory authority and violate due process, a right guaranteed by the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments of the United States Constitution. Our constitution requires that police do their investigation first, then make an arrest if there is sufficient evidence – it does not allow the arrest first and the investigation later.

Yet, this is precisely what the court enabled, and what the Florida Chief Judge still defends. And he’s still wrong. I accurately reported the court’s flawed ruling, period.

And still, the Chief Judge complained:

Mr. Rashid has hundreds of thousands of followers on "X," Instagram, TikTok, and more.

This is also incorrect. I have millions of social media followers on “"X," Instagram, TikTok, and more,” and I will continue to speak truth and justice to all of them, and more. Indeed, the court’s decision to wrongly detain a U.S. citizen of Latino ethnicity was roundly criticized by judges, lawyers, and politicians nationwide, and especially in Florida. In my formal response to the VSB, I cited judicial opinions, public interviews, law review articles, and public statements by literally thousands of legal scholars, condemning the denial of due process as “authoritarianism” and enabling fascism.

Yet, while ignoring all those voices, many of them in Florida—the Chief Judge instead targets an immigrant of color Muslim American human rights lawyer halfway across the country for a tweet and Substack article that had no bearing on the case.

Does this seem strange to anyone?

In my Substack article—that Judge Allman also complained about—I wrote as follows:

But here’s the point that should send a chill down your spine: They are no longer just targeting immigrants. They are targeting American citizens. If you are brown or Black in this country, your citizenship is not a shield. It is not respected. It is not real in the eyes of the fascists running this system. If you’ve been waiting for the big red flag—the moment when it’s “official”—you’ve missed it. It already happened. This is what fascism looks like: the state weaponizing law enforcement against its own people, based not on what they’ve done, but on who they are. What starts with immigrants always ends with citizens. What starts at the border always spills into the streets. They told you it was about "illegals." Then it was about DACA recipients. Then it was green a few card holders. And now it’s birthright citizens. They are coming for Black and brown Americans next. Not for what they’ve done. But for what they look like.

Note, I wrote this without knowing that as I hit publish, the Chief Judge would cite it in his complaint against me, a U.S. citizen of color, to potentially have me disbarred from the practice of law. How sadly astute and sadly accurate was my warning? And that is exactly why we cannot be silent.

Lawyers Are The Last Line—We Cannot Be Silent

In a recent ruling rebuking the Trump regime, Judge Beryl A. Howell cited William Shakespeare’s famous “kill all the lawyers” line and wrote:

Eliminating lawyers as the guardians of the rule of law removes a major impediment to the path to more power.

Here’s the truth. It is in the best interest of the American experiment that lawyers are able to criticize rulings they view as unjust. My word choice of “fascism” to describe a U.S. citizen of Latino ethnicity being arrested and detained without probable cause, without due process, without a judicial warrant, and without charge, is not only not a violation of the Virginia Bar Rules— but the Rules require me to speak up. The Virginia Code of Professional Responsibility Preamble explicitly declares that, “it is a lawyer’s duty, when necessary, to challenge the rectitude of official action.” That same Preamble further declare that:

A lawyer should seek improvement of the law, the administration of justice and the quality of service rendered by the legal profession. A lawyer should be mindful of deficiencies in the administration of justice and of the fact that the poor…cannot afford adequate legal assistance, and should therefore devote professional time and civic influence in their behalf. (Va. Sup. Ct. R. Part 6 § 2 Preamble.)

Is that not what I did here? Are you not entertained? This is also why the First Amendment exists, and why the Supreme Court ruled in R.A.V. v. City of St. Paul, 505 U.S. 377, 429 (1992) that:

We have long recognized that when government regulates political speech or the expression of editorial opinion on matters of public importance, First Amendment protection is at its zenith.

My decision to speak up for Mr. Lopez-Gomez is what every lawyer should be doing in this country, every time due process is denied, because denial of due process for one person, is denial of due process for every person. So I implore my fellow lawyers, let us continue to use our law degrees for their most important purpose—to protect and defend the humanity and rights of all people in this country, bar none, even if it means putting our bar licenses at risk.

Justice must be for all, or democracy will assuredly fall.

In those 21 immensely stressful days I reached out to my old law school Dean, Michelle Rahman, a Jewish woman who has always treated me like her son. With her help, I interviewed, then hired a seasoned attorney. We crafted a comprehensive point by point rebuttal to the Chief Judge’s complaint. And after nearly $10,000 in legal fees and personal costs—for which I will not be reimbursed by Judge Allman, the VSB, or malpractice insurance—the VSB ruled.

And the VSB ruled in my favor.

I breathed a sigh of relief and gratitude, but it was short-lived.

In response to losing his complaint on every count, Judge Allman filed an appeal, demanding the VSB reconsider to ensure I face “appropriate consequences.” Fortunately, the VSB ruled in my favor for a second time.

Let me re-emphasize an earlier point. I do not want anyone reading this article to contact Chief Judge Allman in any way. I wrote this because the public deserves to know what we face as human rights lawyers and activists when we speak up for the rights of the marginalized. We face threats to our lives, our livelihoods, and our licenses to practice law. Thus, his failed attempts to silence me represent the broader issue to which I call your attention—the need for courage and unity.

Closing Thoughts

A recent essay published by three political science scholars in the New York Times asks, “How will we know when we’ve lost our democracy?” The short answer—when we have to ask if speaking up against government injustice puts us in danger, and have to debate whether it is easier to appease than oppose? This is the line we as Americans are quickly approaching, and I for one, will not appease.

Because the bottom line is this.

I could have stayed silent when I saw the U.S. government deny due process of law to Mr. Lopez Gomez.

Instead I chose to speak up.

I could have retracted my Substack article and tweets condemning the denial of due process, and bent the knee to intimidation—as the wealthiest and most powerful corporate lawyers across the country already have.

Instead I chose to stand firm.

I could have remained silent now, hide this unjust attempt to strip me of my livelihood and human rights advocacy, and hope to get by in the future by ‘toning it down.’

Instead I choose to double down.

I refuse to appease. I refuse to capitulate to injustice. And you have my promise that I never will.

Yes, $10,000 is a lot of money. (I mean that really stings). And yes, the past several months of stress have been a heavy, heavy, burden. Despite this, I recognize how fortunate I am to have the amazing support of my wife Ayesha, the ability to afford a lawyer this time, and the priceless life lessons from my late parents. Lessons to remain relentless in the fight for justice, no matter what.

Listen, I know what it means to struggle. I am an immigrant, an American Muslim, a person of color who grew up in Section 8 housing and on food stamps. I know firsthand the weight of poverty, of living paycheck to paycheck, of systemic barriers, of being told that people like me don’t belong. But I also know the power of resilience, the promise of this country, and the courage it takes to keep fighting against the odds.

I know that I’ve come too far to stop now. I’ve seen too many of our communities—immigrant, Black, brown, Latino, Indigenous, poor, working-class, and more—suffer in silence. With this platform, I have a responsibility to fight for justice, and I will not back down. What the world needs now more than ever are people with the courage to stand up against injustice, stand united against injustice, and remain relentless in that fight for justice.

Finally, I know this truth—I cannot do this alone. Alone, success it is impossible. But together, success is inevitable. I need your support—not just today, but continually.

If we are going to win this fight for justice, it will be by working together. Stand with me. Invest in me. Trust that I will never compromise my commitment to human rights and democracy, no matter the cost. Subscribe to elevate my human rights advocacy, share this with your networks, and let’s grow this movement into the force it must be.

Because at the end of the day, this fight is about all of us. It’s about the courage to build a country of working class solidarity, where justice is not reserved for the powerful, but guaranteed for all. After all, isn’t that what Labor Day is all about? Together, if we have the courage to stand united, we can and we will overcome fear, intimidation, and yes, even fascism.

Together, let us have the courage to ensure that justice prevails.

Happy Labor Day.