Americans disagree about a lot of rulings. Most of us agree on this: you shouldn’t be able to pick your judge, judges shouldn’t own a piece of the case, and a court order should mean the same thing whoever it binds. The LEVEL Act writes those rules into law for the federal courts, whichever party is in charge.
Lawsuits that challenge a law are assigned at random across the whole district. A ruling that blocks a national policy has to come from three judges, two of them drawn from other parts of the country. Big companies can’t shop for a friendly bankruptcy judge either.
Federal judges and their families give up individual stocks. A different judge decides whether a judge must step aside. Misconduct investigations finish even if the judge quits.
Court orders are enforced with personal fines on officials who defy them, fines no pardon can erase. Defense lawyers get paid even in a shutdown. Immigration judges stop answering to the Attorney General. And every judicial nominee gets a hearing and a vote on a fixed clock.
The federal courts below the Supreme Court, the Supreme Court’s emergency procedure, and the people whose conduct decides whether courts are fair.
You may remember different examples depending on where you sit. The fix is the same.
And both sides remember 131 federal judges hearing cases involving companies they owned stock in. The lesson is the same: every tool one side uses in court today will be used by the other side tomorrow. Rules that bind both are the only rules that protect either.
Most people meet a federal court only once: over a business, a benefit, a family member, an arrest. Whether that day goes fairly depends on rules most of us never see. Here’s what has happened, and what LEVEL would change.
The act has 10 packages that move through Congress as ten separate bills. Together they keep five promises. Tap a number to read the package behind it.
LEVEL is a companion to the Public Trust Act, whose Package 9 covers a Supreme Court ethics code, gift disclosure, a security service the courts control, and personal fines for officials who defy court orders. LEVEL adds everything else and doesn’t repeat it.
Your choices stay in your browser. Use them in step 6 to write to your representatives.
Each one applies the same way whichever party is in power.
These are part of the plan, but each can be voted on separately, so disagreeing with one doesn’t sink the rest.
You’ll hear this proposal praised and attacked. Here is how each side is likely to talk about it, the strongest honest criticisms, and the answers.
Each criticism is stated in its strongest honest form.
Expect different messengers to cheer different packages and attack others. Knowing who stands to gain or lose helps you read the ads.
| Messenger | Likely to support | Likely to attack | What to watch for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Right-leaning cable, talk radio and websites | National-relief panels, the surveillance-court advocate, forfeiture and acquitted-conduct reform, judgeships | The immigration court and summary-removal notice; amicus disclosure | Calling the whole act “soft on immigration” because of one package |
| Left-leaning cable, podcasts and websites | Random assignment, contempt prosecutors, defense funding, the immigration court, the stock ban | National-relief panels as “protecting Trump”; judgeships for the next President | Ignoring that the panel rule also binds the next Democratic administration’s opponents |
| Independent podcasters and creators | Anti-conflict and open-records packages | Anything that sounds like more process | Clips without context; check the bill text in step 7 |
| The federal judiciary and bar associations | Defense funding, judgeships, misconduct fixes, the immigration court | Assignment and recusal rules set by Congress instead of the courts; the stock ban | Judicial-independence arguments against rules that judges already apply to everyone else |
| Corporate bankruptcy bar and districts that attract big cases | Random assignment of large cases | Home-court venue | “Expertise” ads paid for by firms that profit from forum choice |
| Law-enforcement and prosecutor groups | Court-order compliance, judgeships | Forfeiture reform, the surveillance-court advocate, plea-offer data | “Helps criminals” claims about rules that protect people never charged |
| Civil-liberties groups, left and right | Due process, counsel, open courts, the immigration court | Packages they think are too weak | Useful detailed critiques; read them |
Whatever party they belong to. A yes should mean the same thing when their own party’s judges or officials are on the line.
Short, personal messages that name specific reforms get noticed. Your message below uses the reforms you checked in step 4.
Send the page, or copy a one-page summary to paste into an email, a post or a document you can print.
Open any package to see what it does, why, what critics say, and the bill text itself. The packages travel through Congress as ten separate bills, so each can pass on its own.
Created by a deeply concerned citizen with the help of generative AI tools.
This page is the public summary of a citizens’ proposal called the LEVEL Act, formally the Justice Trust Act. It has not been introduced in Congress. The draft legislative text still needs review by lawyers who specialize in federal courts, bankruptcy, immigration and constitutional law, and cost estimates from the Congressional Budget Office.
It is a companion to the Public Trust Act, which sets the same rules for every official, and the STEADY Act, which covers money, debt and prices. LEVEL covers the courts and does not repeat the Public Trust Act’s Package 9. All three work under today’s Constitution.
Content matches the plan draft v0.2 of October 31, 2026. Facts are sourced below; the type of each source is noted so you can judge it yourself.
To every Senator and Representative, of every party:
Your constituents are losing faith that federal courts are neutral. They see lawyers choosing their judges, judges ruling on companies they own, national policy settled by unexplained emergency orders, court orders defied, defense lawyers unpaid, and immigration judges fired. Every one of these problems has hurt people on both sides of the aisle.
The LEVEL Act asks you to fix the rules, not to win the cases. Assign judges by lottery, and let only a three-judge panel drawn from across the country block a national policy. Take individual stocks out of judges’ portfolios and let another judge decide recusal. Let the courts adopt these rules themselves first, with the law as backstop. Give every nominee a hearing and a vote on a clock, and spread new judgeships across three presidencies. Enforce court orders with prosecutors the government can’t dismiss, and fine officials personally only for willful defiance. Pay defense lawyers on time. Make immigration courts independent. Protect a jury’s verdict and a citizen’s property.
Each package can pass on its own. We ask you to co-sponsor them with a member of the other party, to support them when your own party holds the White House, and to tell us publicly where you stand on each one.
Respectfully,
Your constituents
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