0:02

Wake up Donald or put

0:04

on a jacket or something

0:06

because we're through week two

0:08

of the Trump criminal trial.

0:10

Donald Trump is falling asleep

0:12

in court and complaining that

0:14

he is too cold in

0:17

the courtroom, but things are

0:19

indeed heating up. Three witnesses

0:21

have testified so far. Opening

0:24

statements are complete. The

0:26

prosecution filed another contempt

0:28

motion for which there will

0:31

be a hearing next Thursday.

0:33

Michael Popock and I will

0:35

break it down. As Donald

0:37

Trump was in a courthouse

0:39

in Manhattan for the criminal

0:41

trial, there was oral arguments

0:43

before the United States Supreme

0:46

Court where Trump's lawyer argued

0:48

that Donald Trump could steal

0:50

and sell nuclear secrets, launch

0:52

coups against the country, order

0:54

the military to assassinate his

0:56

political opponents, and of course

0:58

submit fake electors slates claiming

1:01

those are all official acts.

1:04

What's the Supreme Court going to

1:06

do? We will break it down.

1:08

Also, it should be noted that

1:10

Trump's former Attorney General Bill Barr

1:12

gave an interview following that Supreme

1:15

Court oral argument where

1:17

Barr said that there was numerous

1:19

occasions where Donald Trump had talked

1:21

about executing his political opponents. Bill

1:23

Barr said, oh, he always says

1:25

things like that. I think it's

1:27

important to view those things collectively,

1:29

and we will talk about that.

1:32

Also, all of that was going

1:34

on. Let's not forget about some

1:36

proceedings still taking place in the

1:38

E. Jean Carroll defamation case. Donald

1:41

Trump has filed an appeal

1:43

there. We know that, but

1:45

he had also filed a

1:47

motion for new trial before

1:49

federal Judge Lewis Kaplan in

1:51

a scathing order, federal Judge

1:53

Lewis Kaplan described in detail

1:55

the sexual assault committed by

1:57

Donald Trump, his defamatory conduct.

2:00

conduct against his assault

2:02

victim and the level

2:04

of egregiousness that Judge

2:07

Kaplan observed based

2:09

on Trump's conduct which Kaplan said

2:11

is even unprecedented in his judicial

2:13

career. We will break it all

2:15

down and then while all of

2:17

that was going on, if that's

2:20

not enough, indictments handed

2:22

down in Arizona against the

2:24

fake electors and others in

2:27

Donald Trump's inner circle,

2:30

we will talk about that indictment,

2:32

the implications of that indictment. So

2:34

in other words, a

2:37

fairly busy and historic week again

2:39

and there's no one else I'd

2:41

rather break this down with than

2:44

my co-host Michael Popock and no

2:46

one else I'd rather be with

2:48

than you, Legal AFers. Let's

2:50

get in it. We've got a lot

2:52

to discuss. Popock, how you doing on this historic

2:55

weekend? Yeah, I never

2:57

thought we'd be talking about week two of

3:00

a criminal trial of a former president, a

3:03

Supreme Court bending

3:06

over backwards to help a criminal

3:08

president, an Arizona

3:10

attorney general who along with

3:13

other attorney generals are

3:15

doing the right thing and showing that

3:17

they have brass ones to

3:19

now indict almost

3:21

Donald Trump but a series of other people around

3:23

Donald Trump, including a number of them that I

3:26

was shocked and so were you that they

3:28

had skirted by without being indicted to this moment

3:31

but now they can no longer say they've not

3:33

been indicted. And we'll talk about whether Donald

3:35

Trump will join them as an

3:37

indicted co-conspirator in those

3:39

places and then Judge

3:42

Kaplan in the Eugene Carroll case always

3:44

keeps it real by reminding everybody

3:46

who and what Donald Trump

3:48

is that they are voting for in November,

3:50

what he did, what the jury

3:52

observed and why he doesn't deserve a new

3:54

trial or to have any of the damages

3:56

up to $83.5 million reduced. because

4:00

the jury did the right thing and Judge

4:03

Kaplan called him out. It was

4:06

in a Petri

4:08

dish in a nutshell, it sums up where

4:10

we are with Donald Trump. Those

4:13

that want to vote for him in November have

4:15

to ignore all of

4:17

this evidence of wrong

4:20

conduct, misconduct, sexual misconduct,

4:23

and election interference in order to pull the switch

4:25

for him. And that's okay as long as you

4:27

acknowledge that you're doing that. For the

4:29

rest of us that live and reside on planet Earth,

4:32

facts like these matter and

4:35

juries, grand juries, and judges

4:38

are not demonstrating

4:41

animus or bias against

4:43

Donald Trump. They're just doing their jobs and

4:45

weighing the evidence that's presented to them. And

4:48

we as thinking human beings,

4:50

sentient human beings should take

4:53

it in as data as we're trying to select

4:56

the next president of the United States. You

4:58

mentioned a Petri dish, you know what

5:00

grows in a Petri dish? Bacteria.

5:03

And when you see Donald

5:05

Trump sitting there, it does

5:08

kind of look like bacteria

5:10

growing in a Petri dish.

5:12

And when you see what

5:14

he has spawned across the

5:16

country, whether it's in Arizona,

5:18

what his lawyer was arguing

5:20

before the United States Supreme

5:22

Court, some foundational principles

5:25

that were, I always

5:27

thought, self-evident here in the

5:29

United States of America, that

5:31

this is a country of

5:33

we the people, not kings,

5:35

not authoritarians, that we are

5:38

a people of decency, that

5:40

we are a people who

5:42

love democracy, that we are

5:44

a people of law and

5:46

order. Popak, we see

5:48

the ultimate stress test in our

5:50

body politic, and we see the

5:52

ultimate stress test in

5:54

these courts as there are

5:57

prosecutions for violations of the

5:59

United the law. Period,

6:02

it's that simple. And on

6:04

the other hand, you have justifications

6:06

for it that are

6:09

extrajudicial that

6:11

frankly, based on all of your

6:13

experience as a lawyer, all of

6:15

my experience as a lawyer, all

6:17

of the experience of Karen Friedman-Igniffalo

6:19

and the other great former

6:21

federal prosecutors and state prosecutors

6:23

who we have on this

6:26

network, these are unprecedented times.

6:28

But in these unprecedented times,

6:30

it is incumbent upon us

6:33

to continue to defend and

6:36

preserve and protect our Constitution

6:38

and to not run away

6:40

from it, to not get

6:42

disenchanted. That's what this

6:45

show is about. Let's talk

6:47

about everything that happened in

6:49

the Manhattan District Attorney criminal

6:51

case against Donald Trump this

6:53

week. Recall it's for Donald

6:55

Trump's falsification of business records

6:58

to interfere with the 2016

7:00

election. Three witnesses testified this

7:02

week. That's an image of

7:04

Donald Trump in the court. You see

7:06

Justice Mershon, the judge who's

7:09

presiding over the case. In that

7:11

photo, you see on Donald Trump's

7:13

left Todd Blanche who gave the

7:15

opening. You see Emil Bove on

7:17

Donald Trump's right. There you see

7:19

David Pecker, one of the witnesses

7:21

who testified. The most compelling witness

7:23

thus far, that's Trump. And again,

7:25

Emil Bove who did

7:27

the cross exam of David Pecker

7:29

each day. We've been creating a

7:31

scorecard here of the events taking

7:34

place on each day of

7:36

trial. We might as well start with the

7:38

last day of the second week of the

7:40

Trump trial, which was day

7:42

eight. David Pecker, the former head

7:45

of AMI, which owned the

7:47

National Enquirer, finished his testimony. We

7:49

then heard from Ronna Graff, Ronna

7:52

Graff, Donald Trump or the Trump

7:54

Organization's personal assistant for

7:56

many decades. Then you had

7:59

Gary Fauci. a banker

8:02

who was familiar with some of these

8:05

shell companies that Cohen was setting up

8:07

to make some of these hush money

8:10

payments and then more of Donald

8:12

Trump whining how cold he is

8:14

in the courtroom and multiple observers

8:16

talked about how Donald Trump would

8:18

continue to fall asleep near REM

8:21

sleep full-fledged naps it was described

8:23

and I think Karen Friedman-Angnifolo said

8:25

it best when she said I

8:27

worked in that courthouse for 30

8:30

years it is a government building I've

8:32

never heard people whine about the temperature

8:34

I mean sure the building may be

8:36

cold it's a it's a government building

8:38

but that's just life that's that that's

8:41

what it means when you don't sit

8:43

on a golden toilet your whole life

8:45

maybe you don't get the temperature that

8:47

you like but this whining this complete

8:50

whining. I like where Sean's comment to

8:52

him he said you got two choices

8:54

mr. Trump you can either be boiling

8:56

hot or you can be freezing cold those

8:59

are that's it's binary in this courtroom so

9:01

we chose cold and you can adjust accordingly.

9:04

Well boiling hot witness and David

9:07

Pekker for sure certainly

9:09

exceeded my expectations as well

9:11

of what a credible

9:14

historian he was on the

9:16

facts talking about the deal

9:18

he made with Donald

9:21

Trump multiple in-person meetings with Donald

9:23

Trump where Trump thanked him for

9:25

making the hush money payments thanked

9:28

him for handling the McDougal situation

9:30

paying off Karen McDougal who Trump

9:33

had a sexual relationship with while

9:35

Melania was pregnant and had given

9:37

birth thanking him for handling the

9:40

doorman situation where they paid off

9:42

a Trump Tower doorman who ended

9:45

up not having credible info but

9:47

they thought he did at

9:49

first inviting Pekker

9:51

to the White House holding a thank

9:54

you dinner for him knowing that the

9:56

cast of characters like Sarah Huckabee Sanders

9:58

and Hope Hicks while they

10:01

were in the White House

10:03

were still involved in trying

10:05

to extend some of these

10:08

hush money agreements and non-disclosure

10:10

agreements. We

10:12

heard testimony from Pekka

10:14

about what Trump was

10:16

saying about Michael Cohen, Trump saying,

10:19

you know, don't worry about it.

10:21

I'm going to take care of

10:23

Michael Cohen for handling the other

10:25

hush money payments that were

10:27

made. You know, I thought

10:29

it was a very kind of credible

10:32

testimony. But Popak, if you

10:34

can break down your observations

10:37

from week one before

10:39

we go into like the contempt hearing

10:41

and things like that, just the three

10:44

witnesses, what'd you make of it? What'd

10:46

you make of the defense strategy? And

10:48

where do you think we are right

10:50

now? If you were evaluating the jury,

10:53

where do you think they are? Take

10:55

it away. I'll start with

10:57

that one. The prosecution is way up on points.

11:00

The jury, as I've said

11:02

before, another hot takes, jury science tells us that

11:04

juries make decisions very quickly. It doesn't matter how

11:07

long your trial is, six, eight

11:09

weeks, 10 weeks, six months, juries

11:11

make rapid decisions about who they

11:13

trust, both as advocates and as

11:15

witnesses and as a case and

11:17

who they don't. Meaning after

11:19

the opening statements, which I thought went well for

11:21

the prosecution, did not as

11:23

well for Todd Blanche. I

11:25

thought his chuckling and laughing

11:28

and being insincere about the

11:30

quote unquote conspiracy and

11:32

in other ways he was trying to show

11:35

his disdain actually backfired, would have

11:37

backfired for this jury. And

11:40

then I think that the

11:43

perfect roadmap witness, you and I talked about

11:45

it last week, you and I had a little bit of a

11:47

debate about what the first witness would be. I

11:49

said it's going to be powerful. It's going to be a roadmap type

11:51

witness. And I said it may be Pekker. So

11:54

Pekker, the reason I thought it was going to be him is

11:56

he's the only person that Donald Trump, he spent so

11:59

much time and energy. coming after Michael Cohen. And

12:01

I always thought Michael Cohen is what we call

12:03

a sandwich witness. He's in the middle somewhere. He's

12:06

down the road. He's after his

12:08

testimony has been reinforced and bolstered

12:10

by numerous documentary witnesses and testimonial

12:12

witnesses and roadmap witnesses. But if

12:14

you have anything close to a

12:16

roadmap witness, you have to put

12:18

it on first because you have

12:20

the jury's rapt attention after the

12:22

opening statements. And now you don't

12:24

wanna waste that reservoir of goodwill

12:26

and energy that you have by

12:28

starting with bringing on

12:30

Ronna Graf and

12:34

talk about the fact that Donald

12:37

Trump has Stormy Daniels and Karen McDougal

12:39

in his Rolodex. I mean, that's like,

12:41

okay, that's interesting. And yes, they'll tie

12:43

it together. She served another

12:45

purpose. I'm gonna talk about Ronna Graf in

12:47

a minute. But if you can start off

12:49

with somebody that maybe doesn't have every page

12:51

of the hymnal but has a lot of

12:53

it, then that's

12:56

what you use. And Pekka, there's only

12:58

three people that are in the

13:01

Trump power conspiracy, the TTC,

13:04

the prosecution presented in their opening statement. One's

13:07

called Donald Trump, one's called

13:09

David Pekka, and one's called Michael Cohen. And

13:12

we know what Cohen and Pekka are gonna say.

13:14

And who cares what Trump says after that? He

13:17

gets outvoted in front of the

13:19

jury, two to three, about those

13:21

fateful meetings in which the conspiracy

13:23

was established for the Catch and

13:25

Kill program. And everybody's role was

13:27

established. What role Michael Cohen was

13:29

gonna have in terms of calling

13:31

on behalf of Trump to encourage

13:33

terrible stories to be placed in

13:35

the National Enquirer, not a legitimate

13:37

media outlet, one that practices in

13:39

David Pekka's words, checkbook journalism, you

13:42

know, and published many things on

13:44

behalf of Donald Trump, not because it benefited America

13:47

Media Group or the National Enquirer,

13:49

but only because they were, it

13:52

was consistent with this conspiracy agreement

13:54

that was created at Trump Tower.

13:57

So Pekka was perfect, and he got to tell the

13:59

story about that. the first two of

14:01

the three targets, almost had victims

14:04

of the Catch and Kill program. You

14:06

know, so Juden, the

14:08

doorman with his out of

14:11

wedlock child story about Donald Trump, that

14:13

was their test run. That

14:15

was $30,000 payment by David

14:17

Pekka killed the story, didn't see the

14:19

light of day. Second

14:22

was Karen McDougall. David Pekka testified

14:24

at length about it in

14:26

ways that it's almost been, I almost,

14:28

I was shocked

14:30

by his testimony. We knew from what

14:33

he was involved with that where the, actually

14:35

nothing that he said shocked me. What

14:37

shocked me is how cordial

14:39

and friendly he was to

14:42

the lawyer who was asking questions for the

14:44

prosecutor. It was almost like they're having a

14:46

cup of coffee and having a conversation, which

14:48

is exactly what you and I love when

14:50

we're doing a deposition or an examination in

14:52

court. This was not pulling teeth. Maybe

14:55

because there's a non-prosecution or deferred prosecution

14:57

that he's still sort of subject to

14:59

related to his prior bad acts with

15:02

the prosecutors. But in

15:04

any event, he was just jovial, he

15:06

was happy. You

15:09

never heard about David Pekka out of Donald

15:11

Trump's mouth. He spent all of his resources,

15:14

his lawyer, him on social media bashing

15:16

Michael Cohen. Michael Cohen, Michael Cohen, Michael

15:18

Cohen. Michael Cohen is not the

15:20

only witness in this case. He's a sandwich witness. It's going

15:22

to come much, much later. Text

15:25

messages, emails, check report,

15:27

check runs, business records.

15:30

That's what's going to hang Donald Trump. Recorded

15:33

conversations that Michael Cohen took with

15:35

Donald Trump, which he's heard and

15:37

the jury will hear. That's going to be a

15:39

shocking day when that happens. David

15:41

Pekka did great for the prosecution

15:44

because he established both.

15:46

He established everything they needed in

15:48

one witness's mouth. The conspiracy,

15:52

the rolls in the conspiracy, the checks

15:54

that were written, why Pekka

15:56

didn't handle Stormy Daniels because he

15:58

didn't get paid. for Karen

16:00

McDougall, how upset Michael Cohen was,

16:03

and that is what, if it

16:05

wasn't for that falling out on

16:07

that issue about payment to

16:09

the target, then there

16:12

possibly would not be a Hush

16:14

Money Cover-Up felony here, because

16:16

it would have been coming out of David Pecker's bank

16:18

account at National Enquire directly

16:20

to sign an NDA

16:22

directly, but because he wouldn't do it anymore, because

16:24

he didn't get paid the 150,000 that

16:28

he had laid out for Karen McDougall, he

16:30

wasn't gonna do it again for Stormy Daniels, especially he

16:32

said he didn't wanna be involved with a porn star.

16:35

I guess Playboy Playmate was okay. So

16:38

Michael Cohen was upset, but Michael Cohen had

16:41

a report back to the boss that we're

16:43

gonna have to do it, which is where

16:45

the audio recording is gonna come in later.

16:47

The other advantage to David Pecker is that

16:49

he reinforces and corroborates Michael Cohen before Michael

16:51

Cohen even takes the stand. And

16:53

we've all acknowledged, and both sides have acknowledged, that

16:56

Michael, as a witness in this case, I'm

16:58

not talking about him as a podcaster on

17:01

the network, as a witness in this case

17:03

is, well, I'll paraphrase the prosecutor, complicated, slightly

17:05

compromised, got some issues, you gotta acknowledge it

17:07

up front, otherwise the jury's gonna, you know,

17:09

otherwise you give the narrative

17:12

over to the defense. So

17:14

they both talked about Michael Cohen, but by

17:16

the time Michael Cohen takes the stand, much

17:19

of what he's gonna testify to is already been

17:21

established in the court of law. So

17:24

that's another advantage of David Pecker, he helps

17:26

Michael Cohen down the road on key facts.

17:30

Next witness, Ronna Graf.

17:33

Ronna's been with Donald Trump for 35 years. She

17:36

is referred to as his right-hand man,

17:38

right-hand person, or Trump whisperer. Everybody knows

17:40

if you wanted to get to Trump,

17:42

you gotta get to Ronna. She didn't

17:44

wanna be there, she acknowledged she didn't

17:46

wanna testify, which made her testimony

17:48

even more powerful in front of the jury because

17:50

she had to give it up, but she didn't

17:52

really wanna be there. And what did she establish?

17:55

She introduced a new witness

17:57

that'll be coming down the road who

17:59

is an ex- executive assistant who's

18:02

going to be testifying later. So that name was mentioned

18:04

a lot. Madeline, the name will come to me in

18:06

a minute. So they talked

18:08

about her training Madeline and Madeline's role working

18:10

for Donald Trump. Why? Because

18:12

that's a witness that's coming down the road and they want

18:14

the jury to hear that, ring the

18:16

bell on that. That's one. Two,

18:19

they wanted to establish that in

18:21

the Trump organization database was the

18:23

phone numbers and contact information for

18:25

Stormy and Karen McDougall. Yeah,

18:27

that's normal. You normally have a playboy

18:30

playmate and important star in your

18:32

database for phone numbers, for

18:34

contacts. And she established in

18:36

advance of Stormy Daniels arrival as

18:38

a witness because she's testifying that she

18:41

did see or hear that Stormy

18:43

Daniels was in Trump Tower for a meeting with

18:45

Donald Trump. She presumed for

18:47

the celebrity apprentice, which matches up

18:49

perfectly with Stormy Daniels future testimony,

18:51

because we know what that's from

18:54

her documentary, that he, Trump dangled

18:56

the opportunity of, of, of a

18:58

celebrity apprentice as a carrot to

19:00

try to get in Stormy Daniels

19:02

pants. I mean, I, there's

19:04

no other way to put that. So

19:06

that is another confirming factor. So even

19:08

though Ronna paled by comparison to a

19:11

witness like David Pekka, she served an

19:13

important purpose and that will pay dividends

19:15

later on for the prosecution as they

19:17

bring in new witnesses. And then the

19:20

jury will go, ah, that's why we

19:22

talked about Madeline, the executive assistant. That's

19:24

why we talked about the

19:27

cell phone numbers and what's in the database.

19:29

That's why we talked about, you know, uh,

19:31

these, these other items. And then, then

19:33

you had the sort of boring witness cause

19:35

they only had like an hour. So they,

19:37

they wanted to shove one more witness in.

19:39

So they brought the first Republic bank, former

19:41

banker in to talk about Michael Cohen, his

19:45

banking, the, the different

19:47

shell companies that Michael used and how he

19:49

took out a loan. I guess that's where

19:51

that was going. I took out a loan

19:53

that was ultimately used to, uh, for the

19:55

hush money for Stormy Daniels. I learned something

19:57

new. Michael Cohen and I bank. at the

20:00

same bank, at the same branch. That was

20:02

also interesting. I didn't

20:04

have that particular banker. So it

20:06

was a masterful presentation by the

20:08

prosecution. It was almost a master's

20:10

class on how to present all

20:13

of your witnesses, some that are super

20:16

exciting and interesting and riveting, and others

20:18

that you need to establish basic information

20:20

in order to pay dividends later on

20:22

and to bolster Michael Cohen's testimony. That's

20:24

not coming next week, by the way.

20:27

I don't know when exactly Michael Cohen

20:29

is testifying because now he's gone on

20:31

lockdown. He won't speak about it

20:33

until his trial, until he testifies. I

20:36

don't think it's next week, Ben. I want to hear from

20:38

you. I think it's going to be a more

20:41

corroborating bolstering of people like

20:43

Michael, and then they bring Michael

20:45

in as if it's like a fait accompli about

20:47

his testimony and the rest. I

20:50

think Michael would either go in two

20:52

weeks or I don't

20:55

think he'll even agree with you. To the

20:57

extent he goes next week, I think

20:59

it'll be the end of next week.

21:01

A reminder, there's no court on Monday.

21:04

So that only really gives

21:06

what? Tuesday, Wednesday's dark, Thursday,

21:08

Friday. That gives three days of testimony.

21:10

So I don't see Michael going that

21:12

week. Then the next week,

21:16

week four, I could imagine

21:18

Cohen going, if anything, towards the

21:20

end. If I was betting, I

21:22

would say he's probably a week

21:24

five testimony late

21:29

May. Do you agree that I

21:31

call him a sandwich witness? You

21:34

don't lead or end with him recency and

21:36

primacy. You stick him sort of in the

21:38

middle after this bolstering. That's why I agree

21:41

with you. You don't think they end with Michael

21:43

Cohen, right? No, they won't end with Michael Cohen.

21:45

They'll put him, I think, three fourths of the

21:47

way done. I don't think they'll put him directly

21:49

50%. I think they'll put him

21:51

like 70% and

21:55

then they'll probably have four

21:57

or five more witnesses.

22:00

to kind of further corroborate after

22:02

that. That would be my suspicion. But they are thinking,

22:04

we'll just talk trial strategy here for a minute, and

22:06

we do more of this, of course, on our Patreon.

22:08

We're doing a lot of that now. They

22:11

are thinking, this isn't random.

22:14

I want people, nothing is random about

22:16

the presentation of a trial

22:18

by either team. The order

22:20

of operation, the order of witnesses, now sometimes you

22:22

have to, you know, in the fog of war,

22:24

in the fog of litigation, you know, the best

22:26

laid plans go, you know, poof. Or

22:29

as Mike Tyson used to say, you know, everybody's got

22:31

to plan it until you get punched in the face.

22:33

And sometimes you get punched in the face during the

22:35

trial, and you got to like adjust. Oh, wait a

22:37

minute, we got to move up a witness here because

22:39

something's happened. But assuming that you do map out, you

22:41

and I, when we do trials, we map out

22:44

every week and every day. So they know,

22:46

the prosecution knows, even though you and I

22:48

are doing a little bit of kibitzing

22:50

here, they know who they want

22:52

to end the trial with, and

22:54

for what reason they want to do that

22:56

before the jury goes off and deliberate. It'll

22:58

be a powerful witness. It'll be a bookend

23:01

to Pekka. I'm not sure who exactly that

23:03

is. I agree with you, it's not Cohen.

23:05

I don't even think it's Stormy Daniels. It'll

23:07

be somebody else we haven't thought of yet

23:10

as we get going closer to end with.

23:12

And then everybody else sort of sequences in

23:14

a way, sometimes in order, sometimes you're able

23:16

to, oh, we did checks, so let's do

23:19

bank accounts and do the other side of

23:21

the transaction, or sometimes not. It also depends

23:23

on witness availability and who's actually available

23:25

at any moment. But there is a storyboard

23:28

that the prosecutors who have

23:30

the case right now are

23:33

following in the movie that they're

23:35

presenting to this jury. And so

23:37

far, I gotta tell you, as

23:40

producers and directors, they gotta be thrilled

23:42

with the rushes so far, because right

23:44

now, you could, if anybody had told

23:47

the prosecutors that Pekka would go as

23:49

well as he did and would be

23:51

cross-examined as weekly as he was by

23:55

the defense. And

23:57

same thing with Ronna. I would say I'll take it

23:59

in a... What do you think? I

24:01

couldn't agree more with you. I want to

24:04

talk though about this contempt hearing, another

24:07

application for contempt that was

24:10

filed. Why do you

24:12

think Justice Morshawn has not yet ruled

24:14

on the first application for contempt?

24:17

What's going on there? Let's

24:19

talk about that in a

24:22

little bit. I want to

24:24

remind everybody you mentioned it,

24:26

Michael Popak, about the Legal

24:29

AF Patreon community, patreon.com/legal AF,

24:31

p-a-t-r-e-o-n dot com slash legal AF.

24:33

If you ever wanted to take

24:35

a deeper dive down some of

24:38

these issues and see what it

24:40

was like to be in a

24:42

law lecture with Professor Popak or

24:44

myself, that's the

24:46

destination where we really geek out

24:48

on some legal minutia and we

24:51

really get into the weeds. One

24:53

of the lectures that I'm

24:55

going to be doing on legal AF is

24:58

about class actions. I always get all the

25:00

time, can we the people file

25:02

a class action against Fox? Can

25:04

we the people file a class

25:06

action against Donald Trump or people

25:08

in his administration? I

25:11

want to do a breakdown of

25:13

class action law, what the Supreme

25:15

Court has ruled over time about

25:18

how class actions can be formed,

25:20

arbitration provisions, class

25:22

action waivers. So if all of

25:25

them sounds too geeky for you,

25:27

then don't join. But if you

25:29

like that kind of stuff, it's

25:31

patreon.com/ legal AF. We've got a lot

25:33

more show. Let's take our first quick break.

25:36

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those sponsors. That's

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something that I'm proud that we do here. Getting

29:06

back into the analysis on the

29:08

criminal trial in Manhattan against Donald Trump

29:10

and I'm not going to spend that

29:12

much time talking about how Donald Trump

29:15

lines every single day and he says

29:17

how cold he is and he falls

29:19

asleep. And just a whole kind of

29:22

bizarre, just very

29:24

bizarre. But in some

29:26

of these press conferences and some of his

29:28

posts, although the posts have... Although

29:31

they've been fairly inflammatory

29:33

in the past few days,

29:36

I don't know in the past few days

29:38

if they've run afoul of the gag order,

29:41

but they certainly were at the outset of

29:44

this trial. The district attorney brought

29:46

an immediate application for contempt. There

29:48

was a hearing that was held

29:51

right away and then the district

29:53

attorney brought another application earlier in

29:55

the week as well for more

29:57

statements that Donald Trump had made

29:59

at the end of the previous

30:01

week, including saying that the jury

30:04

was unfair, it's 95% Democrat, which

30:06

isn't even true. And

30:08

so there's another hearing that's gonna

30:10

be taking place on this Thursday

30:12

on that. But

30:15

Justice Mershon hasn't yet ruled

30:17

on the first application

30:21

for contempt Popak. Do you think

30:23

he's doing that to kind of

30:25

just hold this over Trump's head

30:27

and as Trump has not yet

30:30

violated it again recently, it's kind

30:32

of a carrot stick approach waiting

30:35

to see what may happen for the

30:37

next hearing on Thursday. What

30:40

do you make of it? It does this, I

30:43

see some people saying, look, why do

30:45

you have gag orders if a judge

30:47

isn't going to enforce

30:50

it, does this make Justice

30:52

Mershon look weak that he

30:54

hasn't immediately issued these sanctions

30:56

against Trump, but Trump does

30:58

appear granted while he's

31:01

sleeping in court and whatever, he's

31:05

not treating this court proceeding like

31:07

he did with Ingoraan or even

31:09

with Judge Kaplan. And so there

31:11

is a little bit of that going

31:13

on. So what do you make of that? I

31:16

have a slightly different take on it, although I think

31:18

we come to the same place when it comes to

31:20

Mershon. To answer your initial

31:22

question, judges don't

31:24

have to act immediately. It's the prerogative

31:26

of a judge and

31:29

they're like a crocodile. It looks like they're sleeping, but if

31:31

you get too close to them, you lose your leg. And

31:34

with judges, they just let all

31:36

the bad acts accumulate. And when they

31:38

get around to it, and he'll get around to it

31:40

within a week or two after the initial motion

31:43

was filed, he'll then, and he'll have Donald

31:45

Trump, he issued an order to show cause

31:47

to require Donald Trump to make sure he's

31:49

in the courtroom. They

31:51

were gonna do it on Wednesday, the dark day, but

31:54

then Donald Trump complained about that. So the judge moved

31:56

it to another day, although you wouldn't know

31:58

it to listen to Donald Trump. Donald

32:00

Trump in the courtroom because he's going to be sanctioning

32:02

Donald Trump. There's no other way to put it. The

32:04

fact that it's a week or two after some of

32:06

these events happen, I think a

32:09

judge like Judge Marchon who's been on the

32:11

bench for a long time who's seasoned veteran

32:13

sophisticated unlike let's say Judge McAfee down in

32:15

Georgia has been on the bench for a

32:17

year. Judge Cannon down in Florida been on

32:20

the bench a year and a half. This

32:22

judge knows what he's doing. A

32:24

judge will give you as much rope as necessary

32:26

for you to hang yourself and then the judge

32:28

will hang you. And so that's what

32:30

he did. I mean I think there were two things.

32:32

He's either going to see

32:35

Donald Trump continue to demonstrate a lack

32:37

of self-restraint and a lack of contemptuous

32:39

or contumacious conduct in violation of the

32:41

gag order that will be used against

32:44

him or as you said it'll be

32:46

a carrot

32:48

to hang over his

32:50

head during this period. Although the reason I said I

32:52

disagree with you a bit, I don't think he's been

32:54

on his best behavior. The interview

32:57

that he gave that you ran a clip on during

32:59

one of your hot takes just

33:01

happened this week. The prosecutor's jumping

33:03

up and down on Thursday about six

33:05

more or five more violations on

33:08

top of the original seven or eight. We're now up to

33:10

12 or 13 violations. And

33:13

just to put this in perspective for our audience, I've

33:16

never had a client or myself be found

33:18

in contempt ever in 33 years let alone

33:23

a 12 different examples of

33:25

clear violations. And the prosecutors are

33:27

doing what they need to do.

33:29

They're saying Donald Trump, everything

33:31

you've told him he can't do he continues

33:33

to do. And

33:37

the good news about that is

33:39

in the hearing over this, we

33:41

already had one hearing about this,

33:43

that's where Todd Blanche lost whatever

33:45

was left of his shred of

33:49

credibility with the judge went

33:51

out the window because the judge told him

33:53

you've lost all credibility with me. And the arguments

33:55

that you're making, it's not it's not Karen, I

33:57

think midweek said, well, they were just making. They

34:01

were just making arguments in zealous advocacy of their

34:03

client. I think I went beyond that. And the

34:05

judge was like, no, now you've lost me. And

34:08

that version of losing

34:11

credibility with the

34:13

trier effect, the judge, the jury

34:16

is going on. It's something we

34:18

haven't talked about. It's the little love language. It's

34:21

the little decoding and coding that's going on

34:23

in the courtroom. Please

34:26

watch everything in a

34:28

trial. How you button your jacket,

34:31

how the defendant wipes his brow,

34:33

what tie he's wearing, smirks on

34:35

their face, disrespect for the judge,

34:37

the jury, eye rolling, smiling. And

34:41

Donald Trump, of course, is not properly trained, doesn't want

34:43

to be trained on how to operate in a courtroom.

34:45

And either are his lawyers. And so they have,

34:47

they have, we talked about

34:49

what the testimony was in the first

34:51

part of this segment on the trial.

34:53

But we didn't talk about the

34:56

impact on the jury of

34:58

the, you know, I'll split it

35:00

up this way, hard skills and soft

35:02

skills. Hard skills for me in

35:05

this example is the information

35:07

coming out, testimonial and

35:09

documentary. That's the evidence. Soft

35:12

skills that are going on in there,

35:14

soft issues are how the jury feels

35:16

they're being treated or mistreated. The eye

35:19

rolling, the laughing. And Donald Trump smiles

35:22

at Ronna and

35:25

frowns at or doesn't have

35:27

a facial expression for David Pekka or

35:29

scoffs or tries to fake sleep or

35:31

real sleep, whatever he's doing. The jury's

35:33

watching and they're making their own conclusions

35:35

about what an a-hole, but

35:37

that's a legal term, that Donald

35:40

Trump is acting like in the

35:42

courtroom. And they can smell a

35:44

fraud and inauthenticity a mile away.

35:46

Right? It's like it's talk about

35:49

odors in the room or let this

35:51

thing come to odor or whatever you said

35:53

before, one of your hot takes. They are

35:55

watching this. This is a sigh. This is

35:57

another thing that's going on there. the

36:00

judge, he's going to sanction

36:02

him. The question is, does he

36:04

start progressively with $1,000 a day for, you know,

36:09

in the past and then in the future, and

36:11

then warn him one more

36:14

time that I got one last thing

36:16

left in my arsenal, Mr. Trump, Mr.

36:18

Defendant, and that is putting

36:20

you in jail for hours or days to

36:23

make you stop. Um,

36:25

and even though Donald Trump,

36:27

some of his followers were like,

36:29

do it, that'll make him more of a martyr. The

36:32

reporting out there is Donald Trump

36:34

is very, very worried about, um,

36:37

pushing this too far and ending up in some

36:39

sort of jumpsuit and they don't

36:41

want that to happen, but all this other

36:43

stuff, then it will report

36:45

on what happens with this double contempt thing next

36:48

week when it happens, but all this stuff where,

36:50

you know, and you guys are

36:52

doing, I might as well do it a

36:54

great job reporting on it. You know, Donald

36:56

Trump staring and glaring at reporters and Maggie

36:58

Haberman and this one and that one, it's

37:00

not lost on the jury. I mean, if

37:02

that's the jury's out of the room at

37:04

that moment, but they are watching everything

37:07

that's happening in that room and

37:09

they're also watching. I'll leave it on this. They're

37:11

also watching all of the checks

37:14

that the defense are writing that they'll

37:16

never be able to cash in a,

37:18

in a case about cash checks about

37:20

promises that they're making about the evidence

37:22

that's not consistent with the evidence that's

37:25

coming into the record. I'll leave you

37:27

with one example. Blanche said

37:29

in his opening, which was 20 minutes

37:31

long, I guess if you got nothing

37:33

good to say, don't say anything that long, he

37:36

said that the national

37:38

inquirer was, he basically suggested it

37:40

was a legitimate news organization that

37:43

made journalistic decisions like the New

37:45

York times or something else cut,

37:48

cut right to that same

37:50

day, David Packer saying, we,

37:52

we practice checkbook journalism, we'll

37:55

publish anything. Uh, we,

37:57

we buy stories and we only

37:59

ran all these. because Donald Trump wanted us to, to

38:01

help him with the campaign. The jury's

38:04

got to be eye rolling,

38:06

at least in their minds, about the

38:08

promises that were made and what really

38:10

happened. And I thought it was remarkable

38:12

that he, knowing that Pekka was going

38:15

to be the first witness, that Todd

38:17

Blanche did very little, almost nothing, almost

38:19

nothing, to go after Pekka in advance of

38:21

his testimony. I thought, and

38:24

I can say this now because he crosses

38:26

over on Pekka, so I would hate to

38:28

ever be blamed of, like, giving them guidance

38:30

on how they should have done the cross

38:32

on Pekka. I thought it

38:35

was an absolute disaster on cross.

38:37

I mean, you should have showed

38:39

Pekka all of his articles about

38:41

aliens are real. You should have

38:43

showed him Bigfoot is alive. And

38:45

you should have made him look

38:47

like, you know, look, you

38:50

just published the stupidest stuff anyway. Like, you're

38:52

not even a real serious person. Like, like

38:54

you're a clown. That's how I

38:56

would have done the cross. And I

38:58

specifically did not

39:00

give that hot take because I did not want

39:03

to give that guidance. But he couldn't do it,

39:05

Ben, because he said in his opening, I agree

39:07

with you, but then you have to do that in

39:10

your opening. Instead, they said they were legitimate news organizations.

39:12

And that's to me where I

39:14

think they made a massive defense

39:17

blunder. And I'm not one to

39:19

ever try to give them

39:21

the strategy. I'm often asked, like, what would you

39:23

do if you were representing him? I'm like, I

39:25

never represent him, number one. And number two, I'm

39:27

not going to give him any guidance or strategy.

39:29

But after they screwed it

39:31

up, I'm happy to explain how they

39:34

screwed it up. And it's something that

39:36

they can't clean up at this point.

39:38

Otherwise, they'd even lose more credibility if

39:40

they now pivoted and change their whole

39:43

defense theory. Andrew Weissman

39:46

talked about some potential options

39:48

that Justice Mershawn has on this

39:50

gag order issue in addition to obviously

39:53

finding Donald Trump or throwing him

39:55

into jail right away. And there's

39:57

one that's fairly close by to

39:59

the court. like right down the

40:01

hall as KFA described it to us.

40:03

You could put a monitor over his

40:05

use of social media posts. You can

40:08

hold the sentence on a contempt finding

40:11

until after the trial. You can

40:13

advise Trump that his contempt of

40:15

gag order can be considered as

40:17

sentencing upon conviction to add

40:20

to his prison term in addition to

40:22

the other options. I thought that list

40:24

there is interesting as well and I

40:26

hadn't heard that really being talked about

40:29

in other places

40:31

other than Weissman's analysis. So I

40:33

thought it was worthy of sharing.

40:35

Michael Popak I do want to

40:37

talk about briefly though while we're

40:40

in Manhattan, we're obviously talking about

40:42

state court criminal proceedings. Why don't

40:44

we go to federal court though

40:47

and talk about federal civil proceedings

40:49

where Trump we obviously know was

40:51

previously hit with an 80 plus

40:54

million dollar civil judgment for defamation.

40:56

Trump's appealing that but

40:59

he also filed a motion for

41:01

new trial before federal judge Lewis

41:03

Kaplan that was denied this past

41:06

week and I want to

41:08

use the language that a well respected

41:12

federal judge Lewis

41:14

Kaplan. Judge Lewis Kaplan was

41:17

also the same judge who

41:19

has handled mafia cases. He's

41:21

handled some of the

41:24

most high profile big cases out there.

41:26

He's been a judge since 1995. You

41:30

know from being a member of the

41:32

New York bar. I mean he's a

41:34

legend. He's no nonsense. He's law and

41:36

order. No one's ever accused

41:38

Kaplan of being like a political hack.

41:40

The guy is freaking brilliant

41:43

and no one's

41:46

ever doubted that no matter what side

41:48

of the case

41:50

you're on. Here's what he said in

41:52

denying Donald Trump's motion for a new

41:54

trial. The jury in

41:56

a closely tried. The

42:00

jury in a closely related

42:03

case tried previously found that

42:05

Donald Trump forcibly sexually abused

42:07

plaintiff Eugene Carroll in the

42:10

mid-1990s and maliciously defamed her

42:12

in an October 2022 statement.

42:16

In this case, another jury awarded Ms.

42:18

Carroll $17.3 million in compensatory and $65

42:20

million punitive

42:24

damages against Mr. Trump for defaming her

42:26

in two other statements that Mr. Trump

42:29

issued from the White House on June

42:31

21 and 22 of 2019. Mr.

42:36

Trump now moves for a

42:38

new trial or alternatively for

42:41

judgment as a matter of

42:43

law dismissing this case. Well,

42:45

Judge Kaplan goes on to

42:48

say, Mr. Trump's malicious and

42:50

unceasing attacks on Ms. Carroll

42:52

were disseminated to more than

42:55

100 million people. They

42:58

included public threats and personal

43:00

attacks and they endangered Ms.

43:03

Carroll's health and safety. The

43:05

jury was entitled to find

43:08

that the degree of

43:10

reprehensibleity of Mr. Trump's

43:12

conduct was remarkably high,

43:15

perhaps unprecedented.

43:18

It goes on to say,

43:20

castigating Carroll from the loudest

43:22

bully pulpit in America and

43:24

possibly the world through

43:27

Donald Trump's courtroom

43:29

demeanor and conduct,

43:32

Trump put his hatred and

43:34

disdain on full display.

43:37

Think about that. As we

43:40

go talk about in our

43:42

next segment, Donald Trump's claim

43:44

of absolute immunity to launch

43:46

coups against the country and

43:48

kill political opponents and

43:50

steal nuclear secrets and sell them

43:52

to whoever he wants. I

43:55

mean, Popak, when we see what's going

43:57

on, we can't be numb to

43:59

this. type of finding.

44:02

This is not okay. This

44:04

is not acceptable behavior for

44:06

anyone, yet alone, someone in

44:08

a position like this. So,

44:10

we'd love to hear your

44:12

thoughts on Judge Kaplan really

44:14

dropping the hammer powerfully there.

44:17

Yeah, I mean, I think Luke Kaplan is the

44:19

perfect person, as you outlined, to do it. He's

44:22

presided for the last three years

44:24

over both Eugene Carroll cases. He

44:26

watched a nine-person

44:29

jury, because this was federal

44:31

civil, for more information go to our Patreon,

44:34

as opposed to 12-person criminal case

44:36

in New York. He watched two

44:38

nine-person juries vote

44:40

against Donald Trump, so

44:42

18-0 against Donald Trump

44:45

finding technical rape. I say

44:47

technical rape because of New York's

44:49

very unique rape statute at the time,

44:52

basically rape, constant

44:57

incessant defamation and attacks

45:00

on Eugene Carroll, and then punitive

45:03

damages, 5.5 million

45:05

in the first one, and then the second one, the

45:07

$83.5 million. Donald Trump was trying to

45:10

reduce the $83.5 million, both

45:13

the actual damages and the punitive

45:15

damage award, acting that they were

45:17

not consistent with the facts or

45:20

the law that were developed. He argued

45:22

that the judge gave the jury the

45:25

wrong instruction on the burden of proof

45:27

that was required for, let's say, punitive

45:29

damages when the judge... And

45:32

just as we segue into our later

45:34

segments today, yes, Alina Haber

45:37

and Cliff Robert were on the brief,

45:39

but John Sauer, who was the advocate

45:41

at the immunity argument before the United

45:43

States Supreme Court had been brought in

45:46

for appellate purposes, and he was on

45:48

the brief. So they got New York

45:50

law wrong. New York law says it

45:52

is only a preponderance of the evidence,

45:55

which means balanced scales of justice with

45:57

a feather on one side, ever so

45:59

simple. slightly tipping in favor of the

46:02

burden of proof rather than not, not clear

46:05

and convincing, which is a much higher standard

46:07

to prove it. They also said that they

46:09

got the wrong standard wrong for putative damages,

46:11

that it has to be, it's

46:14

not common law malice, it's actual

46:16

malice as that term is understood in

46:19

constitutional precepts and it's not. So the

46:21

judge, you know, the middle of the

46:23

brief or the order was a lot

46:26

of, you know, arcane, technical New

46:28

York stuff. But at the end

46:30

and at the very beginning, it

46:32

was you were a rapist that

46:34

was adjudged by two juries and

46:37

they watched your reprehensible conduct, which

46:39

forms the basis, this is a

46:41

judge now, which forms the basis

46:43

of the punitive damage award in

46:46

the courtroom in real time

46:48

while you continued to manufacture

46:50

bad reprehensible facts while the

46:52

trial was still going on

46:55

and they watched your behavior

46:57

in the courtroom, the jury

46:59

did before they rendered

47:01

your decision of putative damages.

47:03

For instance, the judge reminded

47:05

Mr. Trump, for

47:07

instance, in the middle,

47:09

in the beginning of the closing

47:12

argument for the female attorney, Robbie

47:14

Kaplan representing Eugene Carroll, talk about,

47:17

talk about lack of irony

47:19

and misogyny on full display

47:22

and disrespect. He got up, Trump

47:24

got up and the judge reminded this

47:26

in his order, he got up as

47:29

the advocate started her closing, buttoned

47:32

his jacket and walked out of the

47:34

courtroom in front of the jury. But

47:37

then returned later when his lawyer, I don't

47:39

know if Alina Haber did the closing, I

47:41

can't remember, but when his lawyer did the

47:44

closing, came back for

47:46

that. He said in his order, that

47:48

kind of conduct, that kind of acting

47:50

out, There's

47:54

no doubt that the jury factored things

47:56

like that in real time to find

47:58

you and hold you. You accountable in

48:00

the judge went through a bunch of a

48:03

decisions in New York where the jury award

48:05

if you run it forward to twenty twenty

48:07

four dollars was almost was met with whoop

48:09

it was within the heartland they but the

48:12

jury did hear it in try to give

48:14

a measure of dignity back as but best

48:16

as they could to Egypt Carol in the

48:18

form of the Future of Damage award or

48:21

is kind of fell with right away with

48:23

those cases but if Donald Trump who tussle

48:25

doctor were in will get talk about it

48:27

at the mid week and next week about.

48:30

The What Happened to The Contempt Hearing. He. Tussled

48:32

with with awkward locally. Here.

48:34

He Kappa Kappa would say i know you

48:37

know like this decision that I'm making right

48:39

now and and he would yell back it

48:41

looked up on not with the the jury

48:43

is in the jury in the ropes just

48:45

like he took on Judge Angoras. He does

48:47

it to your point and your credit earlier

48:50

the purchase. He doesn't take on Marshawn like

48:52

that in the courtroom. Everything that we're going

48:54

to be talking about his contributions, behavior of

48:56

his has been outside of the courtroom, in

48:58

podcast and social media, in rallies and all

49:01

the other stupid things that aren't or that

49:03

he does but that's by Luke. Kaplan I

49:05

think and I was the reminder wanted to make of

49:07

the begin the podcast. As

49:09

people are making their decision, To.

49:11

Stunted they still aren't. Apparently the police as

49:13

a solar about who should be given the

49:15

honor of being leader of the Free World

49:18

being in the Oval office again. I.

49:20

Don't know how. You. Can

49:22

ignore. It. Out of eighteen

49:24

jurors in New York finding as Donald

49:26

Trump and Luke Kaplan fighting against him

49:28

as powerful as he just did. You.

49:30

Know I have. This.

49:34

Unfortunately, I think my analysis is

49:36

accurate, although feel so stupid articulating

49:38

it. So I guess that well

49:40

as I would tell my law

49:42

students, there's no stupid question. so

49:44

perhaps there's no stupid theories. So

49:46

I'll just give a d outs

49:48

and and I have data points

49:50

for it. i think

49:52

that donald trump treats justice marshawn

49:54

a little bit differently is because

49:57

donald trump things that justice marshawn

49:59

as is a good looking man and a

50:01

handsome man, and that Donald

50:03

Trump's all like looks and appearance based

50:06

that he views Justice Mershawn as having

50:08

this like distinguished look of what

50:10

Trump thinks a judge should look like

50:12

and that gets into Donald

50:14

Trump's like, like,

50:17

like, pig brain. And

50:19

if you look at past posts that

50:22

he's made, Trump said things like, although

50:24

he's a very distinguished looking man, he

50:27

is still a Trump hating whatever. And

50:29

I think that frazzles him in the

50:31

courtroom. And I know that may sound

50:33

like a totally like, like talking about

50:35

Ben, give me the legal one. I've

50:39

studied the guy's pathology now in these

50:41

speeches. And I think there's, I think

50:43

there's something to it. When

50:45

we come back- Well, wait, wait, before you leave,

50:47

before, so people don't think you're totally crazy. There's

50:51

new documents came out in Mar-a-Lago, we're not

50:53

gonna talk about Mar-a-Lago today, in

50:55

which witness number 16, and we'll

50:57

figure out who that is when they finally testify against Trump, said

51:00

that Donald Trump picked lawyers based on their

51:02

appearance, that he saw a trustee dressed

51:04

up nice on some television show and picked him, that

51:06

a woman lawyer that he picked, and I think we

51:09

can figure out who that is, he

51:11

liked the way she dressed. So I

51:13

don't think you're off-kilter in your analysis.

51:16

Yeah, and those documents that were released in

51:19

the Judge Eileen Cannon Mar-a-Lago

51:21

document case where Trump willfully

51:23

retained national defense information, they

51:25

talked about, witness 16

51:28

or person 16 talked about how one

51:31

of the lawyers would kind of walk

51:33

in front of Donald Trump dressed a

51:35

certain way at Mar-a-Lago, so that

51:37

she, or that he, or whoever we think

51:39

this person may be, could be

51:41

getting more cases and

51:44

more involvement in the cases by doing

51:46

that. That was absolutely devastating what person

51:48

16 said and broke that. This was

51:50

someone who was in the Oval Office

51:52

with Donald Trump, who pointed out very

51:55

specifically that this person

51:57

16 had told Donald Trump, you're violating the

51:59

law. return the boxes, these

52:01

don't belong to you. What in the

52:03

world are you doing? And then talked

52:05

about all the other crazies in Trump's

52:08

world who were knowingly violating the law

52:10

and giving Trump unlawful information. But Trump's

52:12

argument is that he's immune from everything,

52:15

that there is no such thing as

52:17

criminal cases that can ever exist if

52:19

someone holds the office

52:21

of the presidency. His lawyers

52:24

made some of the most, I

52:26

think, gross and outrageous arguments I've

52:28

ever heard period, I

52:31

wanna talk about that. Then we'll

52:33

talk a little bit about the Arizona indictment. Let's take our

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right there, everybody. Fantastic. Let's talk

56:49

about these oral arguments before the United

56:52

States Supreme Court. Look, as far as

56:54

I always knew, this is a very

56:56

important country.

57:00

This is a country of we the people. This

57:02

is a country where no one is above

57:04

the law. This is

57:07

a democracy. This was a constitution,

57:09

a revolution that was fought for that

57:11

as a reaction

57:16

to the very

57:18

concept of absolute immunity. Absolute

57:20

immunity existed. It was called

57:22

kings and authoritarians and despots.

57:24

That's what America was a

57:27

reaction against that, so

57:29

we created a government by the people for

57:31

the people. That's what we did. These concepts

57:35

shouldn't be, to me,

57:38

overcomplicated or confusing. If they

57:40

are, it's because people with

57:43

agendas are trying to create

57:45

complicated issues to justify a

57:47

dictator, to justify an authoritarian.

57:50

It's not lost on me,

57:52

Michael Popock, that just recently the

57:55

Supreme Court found that President Biden

57:57

did not have the authority. to

58:00

forgive student loan debt. That

58:03

that was not within the executive power,

58:05

that the executive power was

58:08

overreaching by forgiving student

58:10

loans. That's what the right wing

58:12

Supreme Court held. On

58:15

the other hand, the Supreme

58:17

Court appears to be seriously

58:19

contemplating the fact that while

58:21

President Biden can't forgive student

58:23

loan debt, Donald Trump

58:25

can launch coups and kill

58:28

political opponents. Donald Trump can

58:30

submit fake electors. Donald Trump

58:32

can sell nuclear codes. It

58:35

doesn't make any sense. It's freaking

58:38

outrageous. And every single

58:40

person, regardless of what political party,

58:42

should be outraged about that provided

58:44

you care about democracy and a

58:46

government by we the people. There's

58:48

no one who should be above

58:51

the law. Not President Biden, not

58:53

Donald Trump, not Obama, not any

58:55

future president, that should never exist.

58:58

If the president commits a crime, they

59:01

should be prosecuted. And why in

59:03

our history has that happened before?

59:05

Well, the one time it came

59:07

close with Nixon, there was a

59:09

pardon. Why was there a

59:11

pardon? Because it was widely understood that

59:14

if the president committed a crime, you could

59:16

be criminally prosecuted. Why else would there be

59:19

a pardon? But other than that, we hadn't

59:21

had a situation like this. Donald

59:23

Trump tried to overthrow the results of

59:25

a free and fair election. It happened

59:28

in plain view. Yes, the

59:30

January 6th committee laid it out,

59:32

but we all saw it. It's

59:34

not a disputed fact what went

59:36

down, no matter how many times

59:38

MAGA Republicans wanna talk about how

59:40

it is peaceful and patriotic. That's

59:43

not what took place on January

59:45

6th. And let me

59:47

just share with you just a few

59:49

video clips and then Popak, I'll let

59:51

you give your analysis. But let me

59:53

just set the stage like this. And

59:56

first, let me set the stage by showing you

59:58

an interview that Bill Barr just gave. with

1:00:00

CNN where he like laughs and jokes that,

1:00:02

you know, Donald Trump did tell me he

1:00:05

wants to execute people, but that's just Trump

1:00:07

being Trump. Here, let's play that clip first.

1:00:10

But Alyssa Faragriffin, who was

1:00:12

Trump's communications director, posted yesterday

1:00:14

and said that you were present

1:00:17

at a moment when Trump suggested

1:00:19

executing the person who leaked information

1:00:21

that he went to the White House bunker

1:00:23

when those George Floyd protests were happening outside

1:00:25

the White House. Do you remember

1:00:27

that? I remember him

1:00:29

being very mad about that. I actually don't remember

1:00:32

him saying executing, but I, you know, I wouldn't

1:00:34

dispute it. You know, I mean, it doesn't

1:00:36

sound. The president would

1:00:38

lose his temper and say things like that.

1:00:40

I doubt he would have actually

1:00:42

carried it out. I don't, you know, but he

1:00:45

would say that on other occasions. The

1:00:48

president, you know, the president had, I

1:00:51

think people sometimes took him too literally and,

1:00:53

you know, he would say things like similar

1:00:56

to that in occasions to blow off

1:00:58

steam, but I wouldn't take him literally

1:01:00

every time he did it. Why

1:01:03

not? Because at the end of

1:01:05

the day, it wouldn't be carried out and you could talk

1:01:07

sensitive. But just because it's not carried out and

1:01:09

you could talk sensitive, doesn't that still mean

1:01:11

that the threat is there? You

1:01:15

know, and then there was January 6th. I mean,

1:01:17

that person was the former

1:01:19

attorney general. Now, when you make a

1:01:21

statement like that, how dare you ever

1:01:23

say you care about law and order

1:01:25

again? I'm not going to show you

1:01:28

all of these clips of Donald Trump's

1:01:30

lawyer, John Sauer, making, you know, the

1:01:32

arguments. I'll show you one

1:01:34

example of it so you get a

1:01:36

flavor for it. But let me be

1:01:39

very clear what he said. He argued

1:01:41

that assassinating a political opponent would be

1:01:43

an official act. You'd receive

1:01:45

immunity. Staging a coup

1:01:47

with the military would be an official act.

1:01:50

You would get immunity. Selling

1:01:52

nuclear secrets, Trump's

1:01:55

lawyer said, if structured as an official

1:01:57

act, those that see the exact language.

1:02:00

Structure As an official act I'm

1:02:02

you'd be able to get a

1:02:04

community. Or

1:02:06

fraudulent slates of Electors? Is it

1:02:08

plausible that you can submit fraudulent

1:02:11

slaves of Electors? Know what? Let

1:02:13

let let me show you that

1:02:15

clip. I was gonna do the

1:02:17

one with assassination, but yeah, I've

1:02:19

heard that one before. Let me

1:02:21

show you the one where Justice

1:02:23

Sotomayor asks Trump's lawyer on what

1:02:25

about creating fraudulent slates of electors?

1:02:27

Do you get immunity for that

1:02:29

And Trump's. Lawyer says. Absolutely.

1:02:32

Absolutely was the answer. And.

1:02:34

Then he talks about some tortured

1:02:36

view of history with president. Granted

1:02:38

isn't even answer the question, it's

1:02:40

a bunch of word salad how

1:02:43

my and and and just a

1:02:45

Sotomayor is like. You're.

1:02:47

Saying fraudulent you can submit

1:02:49

fraud The Electors. To.

1:02:51

Overthrow An Election. Your play this

1:02:53

clip. By. It's as the allegations.

1:02:56

Hear what is plausible

1:02:58

about the President. Is

1:03:01

seen in three days

1:03:03

A. Week

1:03:07

as a little candidates. A

1:03:10

similar except the facts of the complaints on

1:03:12

their face. Is

1:03:15

that possible that that with the within

1:03:18

his rights to. Do absolutely right that

1:03:20

we have this sort of present. We sat

1:03:22

in the lower courts have risen glance sending

1:03:24

Federal troops always had and Mississippi and eighteen.

1:03:28

Republican electors got certified those suitcases.

1:03:32

Case as quickly as.

1:03:36

We supported based on the face of this indictment

1:03:38

or even. Knowing that the sleep is. Knowing

1:03:42

that this fleet his faith that

1:03:44

they weren't actually a less is

1:03:46

that they weren't certified by the

1:03:48

says he knows. All those things.

1:03:50

The indictment itself. Six.

1:03:57

the so called fraudulent or lectures images and

1:03:59

words fraudulent, but that's a complete mischaracterization. On

1:04:01

the face of the indictment, it appears that

1:04:03

there was no deceit about who had emerged

1:04:06

from the relevant state conventions, and this

1:04:08

was being done as an alternative basis. What

1:04:11

are you talking about? What

1:04:13

are you talking about?

1:04:16

I'll throw it to you,

1:04:18

Popak. The very fact that

1:04:20

this argument taking

1:04:23

place in the

1:04:25

United States Supreme Court brings

1:04:28

so much shame to

1:04:30

our country. You and I have such

1:04:33

a big international audience. I

1:04:35

always get emails from people in

1:04:37

Australia, in the UK,

1:04:39

in Germany, across the world,

1:04:41

South America. We

1:04:47

get emails every day from people. They're

1:04:50

looking at this and saying, what?

1:04:52

Seriously? Popak,

1:04:58

what did you make of it? Well,

1:05:04

I think I agree with Lawrence Tribe that the stain

1:05:06

on the Supreme Court, based on where I think this

1:05:08

ruling is going, and I'll give you my view of

1:05:10

where I think this ruling is going, is

1:05:13

going to be worse than Bush versus Gore. I

1:05:15

can break that down for you.

1:05:21

I've given the decoder ring in

1:05:23

the midweek edition. When

1:05:26

you hear the right-wing conservatives, Kavanaugh,

1:05:30

Gorsuch, and Alito, and

1:05:32

even Roberts, using the

1:05:35

following phrase or version of it, let's

1:05:37

forget the facts of the case. Let's

1:05:39

talk about it in the abstract.

1:05:41

I don't care about the indictment

1:05:43

against Donald Trump. I'm worried about

1:05:45

the future and legacy. When you

1:05:48

hear those judges say that, especially

1:05:51

knowing that each of them was either in the Department

1:05:53

of Justice or in the White House, at

1:05:56

the time that this concept of the

1:05:58

Unitary Executive Branch, or the

1:06:00

supremacy of the presidency held

1:06:04

sway. And that is obviously

1:06:06

something that Kavanaugh has

1:06:08

always been referred to as a

1:06:10

political hack. Gorsuch and

1:06:13

Alito and Thomas believe that

1:06:16

not only is the president the

1:06:18

sole occupant of one of the branches of

1:06:21

government, but the occupant of that office. It

1:06:23

always happens to be Republican whenever they

1:06:25

make pronouncements like this. Never Democrat who's in

1:06:27

office. Bush versus Gore, they side with Gore.

1:06:30

Trump, Trump v. U.S., they're going to side with

1:06:32

Trump. Even though they're saying, we

1:06:34

don't care about the facts of this case. Well,

1:06:37

first of all, you have to care about the

1:06:39

facts of the case. That's what Satya Moyer, when

1:06:41

you played her clip, is trying to bring this

1:06:43

back and ground it in the live case or

1:06:46

controversy that is before the court. Because otherwise, what

1:06:48

are we doing here? This isn't, as I joked

1:06:50

before, not even joked, as I said before, this

1:06:52

isn't chat GBT. You just plug in facts and

1:06:55

ask for a law of the land to be

1:06:57

cranked out. This is supposed to be

1:06:59

based on the indictment. They never mentioned

1:07:01

the indictment on the right wing of

1:07:04

this court during the oral

1:07:06

argument. They rarely mentioned the issue

1:07:08

that was supposed to be on

1:07:11

appeal, which was as a former

1:07:13

president, enjoy immunity for official conduct.

1:07:15

Although Roberts got the

1:07:17

lawyer for the Department of Justice sort of

1:07:20

wrapped around its axle on the issue of

1:07:22

whether as I said

1:07:24

before, the DC Court of Appeals got

1:07:26

it right or wrong on the fundamental

1:07:28

issue that even in

1:07:30

official acts, there can be

1:07:33

criminality that needs to be prosecuted. Roberts

1:07:36

doesn't like that. He said it

1:07:38

out loud. We don't like that. And

1:07:40

we're going to have to make a change there,

1:07:42

because I don't like that tautology of it's a

1:07:44

crime because it's a crime. And we're going to

1:07:46

we're going to figure it out. So this is

1:07:48

where I think it goes after all of this

1:07:51

thought experiment about assassinations and

1:07:53

coups and fake electors all

1:07:56

being official conduct. And

1:07:58

to paraphrase justice. Audrey Brown

1:08:00

Jackson who continues to impress

1:08:02

me as becoming the intellectual

1:08:04

heavyweight on that court

1:08:06

in only her second year. And

1:08:09

she said, why are we even

1:08:11

talking about trying to divide things

1:08:13

between official conduct and private conduct?

1:08:15

Why does it matter if what

1:08:17

we're talking about are moral

1:08:20

and moral crimes that are

1:08:22

so obvious that it

1:08:24

automatically takes it out of official conduct?

1:08:27

And why are we talking about immunity in those terms?

1:08:31

Totally agree with her. Here's how I think

1:08:33

this comes down, based on five or six

1:08:35

votes of

1:08:37

the right wing. As I think Amy Coney

1:08:39

Barrett gets sucked over to the right although

1:08:41

she seemed to dance in the middle during

1:08:44

the oral argument. I think they're going to

1:08:46

send it back down to

1:08:49

either the DC Court of Appeals or

1:08:51

likely Chutkin to figure out and

1:08:53

look at the indictment now

1:08:56

they're going to look at the indictment. They didn't

1:08:58

look at it at all, care about it during

1:09:00

the hypotheticals on their

1:09:02

oral argument answers, questions and answers.

1:09:04

But now they're going to tell

1:09:06

them, go through the indictment, the

1:09:09

overt acts and the acts that

1:09:11

underlie each of the counts, the

1:09:13

four counts against Donald Trump and

1:09:15

divide that world into private for

1:09:18

personal gain on one

1:09:20

end and official

1:09:22

core presidential conduct on the

1:09:25

other end and

1:09:27

then get high bread, things that

1:09:29

started as official conduct or with

1:09:31

in official conduct and became private,

1:09:33

like bribery of an ambassador appointment

1:09:36

as some of the justices talked

1:09:38

about. And then they're going to

1:09:40

rule that if it falls into

1:09:42

the bucket of official conduct, no

1:09:45

matter that it moved into criminality

1:09:47

or as Katanji Brown Jackson said,

1:09:49

what I'm worried about is

1:09:51

not that the making

1:09:54

something criminal that even a president at

1:09:56

the time can be held accountable

1:09:59

to have a chilling effect

1:10:01

on that president's exercise of his

1:10:03

powers, I'm worried that without it,

1:10:06

the White House becomes the seat

1:10:08

of criminality. That's Katanji

1:10:10

Brown Jackson, and she got it dead right.

1:10:13

So what they're going to say is if it's official conduct,

1:10:15

absolute immunity. That's going to be the new law of the

1:10:18

land coming out of this 5 to 4, 6 to 3

1:10:20

ruling. If it's

1:10:22

private, and many of the things that are in

1:10:24

there, campaigner in chief, trying

1:10:26

to cling to power, that's not

1:10:28

an Article 2 thing. Donald

1:10:31

Trump doesn't want to leave office thing. And

1:10:33

that could be categorized as private.

1:10:37

That's not going to get immunity. And

1:10:39

then you've got this world of the hybrid with

1:10:42

whatever guidance is going to come out of this

1:10:44

written decision written by Roberts or

1:10:46

Alito or one of them that's going to

1:10:48

say, if it's a hybrid, then on a

1:10:50

case by case basis, you have to do

1:10:53

this analysis. And maybe there's absolute immunity and

1:10:55

maybe there isn't. And all the great things

1:10:57

we heard from Sotomayor Kagan and Katanji Brown

1:10:59

Jackson are going to be vigorous dissents that

1:11:02

are going on. I am making this prediction

1:11:05

and we'll have to hopefully we'll still be on

1:11:07

the air 20 years from now. As history looks

1:11:10

back on the stain

1:11:12

of this court and

1:11:14

what the Roberts court did, in

1:11:17

much the way, Karamatsu, the

1:11:19

decision to intern Japanese Americans

1:11:21

was seen as a stain

1:11:24

on the court. Decisions

1:11:26

about education and

1:11:28

black Americans was seen as a stain

1:11:30

on the court until those things were

1:11:32

fixed and other things related

1:11:34

to slavery. This is going to be a stain on the court

1:11:36

that's going to have to be fixed. And they're going to go

1:11:39

back to the dissents of, I hope

1:11:41

each of them writes one. And they're going to

1:11:43

say, those people got it right and

1:11:45

history is going to judge the

1:11:47

majority of opinion as being

1:11:49

you're letting a president commit a

1:11:51

coup or assassinate someone in the

1:11:53

interest of official conduct. And you

1:11:55

gave that person immunity. As

1:11:58

you said, what kind of world are we? The

1:12:00

now in. And whole

1:12:02

park, there is always been

1:12:04

this doctrine that they teach

1:12:06

you in law school and

1:12:08

how the United States Supreme

1:12:11

Court one of their core

1:12:13

doctrines is constitutional avoidance right

1:12:15

Where they can avoid making

1:12:17

sweeping statements that could have

1:12:19

massive, detrimental constitutional impact, That's

1:12:21

what they'll do. So.

1:12:24

Why wouldn't they go in

1:12:26

the direction that you say

1:12:28

which I agree is were

1:12:30

city are gonna go to

1:12:33

allow authoritarian and dictators to

1:12:35

essentially take root in the

1:12:37

White house vs just addressing

1:12:39

the conduct he'll. Wait,

1:12:42

While. Only. Justice Sotomayor in

1:12:44

the clip that we show. that's why

1:12:46

I wanted a play. That one that

1:12:48

may have been one of the only

1:12:50

times and her and maybe could just

1:12:52

as good as Zebra Jackson were actually

1:12:54

talking about this case. This.

1:12:57

Case. What? Occurred on

1:12:59

January Six. What occurred here

1:13:01

of a collector Slates what

1:13:03

Trump did to try to

1:13:05

overthrow our democracy which by

1:13:07

the way supreme courts would

1:13:09

have been led to the

1:13:11

overthrowing of likely you. As.

1:13:14

Well and would have just lead to

1:13:16

a dictator. I word we talking about

1:13:18

the case. Same thing when it came

1:13:20

to the disqualification case that went before

1:13:22

the supreme court's They refused to talk

1:13:25

about the insurrection. They. Refused to

1:13:27

even talk about the conduct.

1:13:29

That. Took place. That

1:13:32

and why we're even

1:13:34

having this discussion is

1:13:36

not some hypothetical law

1:13:38

school academic exercise. It's.

1:13:41

A real saying that occurred

1:13:43

to try to overthrow our

1:13:45

democracies. It exists. Your job

1:13:48

as a judge. Is

1:13:50

to just. Judge. The

1:13:52

thing that's happened that are you cool with

1:13:55

it? Are you not cool with it? That

1:13:57

to me. Is. is that is

1:13:59

a very basic principle. That's

1:14:01

why you're in trouble and I wanted our audience to

1:14:03

know it. When you're listening, because I

1:14:05

want them to be as you do

1:14:07

too and so does everybody else on our

1:14:09

network, educated consumers of this information. We don't

1:14:11

just host the live stream for

1:14:14

oral arguments in the United States Supreme

1:14:16

Court for no good reason and to

1:14:18

serve as our community. But we also

1:14:20

do it in our analysis to let

1:14:22

you know in advance, I'm

1:14:25

just telling you right now, this is easy. This

1:14:27

is the tell of the United States

1:14:29

Supreme Court in the right wing. When

1:14:31

they start talking about, we don't want to talk

1:14:34

about the facts of the case. We

1:14:36

don't want to get embroiled in the facts. I've

1:14:39

heard them say it during the

1:14:41

religion separation of church and

1:14:43

state arguments. When you

1:14:45

hear that, run. Run

1:14:47

as fast as you can because

1:14:49

the next thing, and it wasn't just one this

1:14:51

time, it was Alito. Let's

1:14:54

talk about it in the hypothetical

1:14:56

because we don't want to get

1:14:58

bogged down the facts. Kavanaugh, same

1:15:00

thing. Gorsuch, same thing. Roberts in

1:15:02

his own way, same thing. Look

1:15:04

out, here comes the judicial activism.

1:15:06

That conservatives, look at you and

1:15:08

I, you defending conservatism, not as

1:15:11

a, but just

1:15:13

as a principle, because they're not.

1:15:16

This isn't conservative. This is judicial

1:15:18

activism for which they attack Democratic

1:15:21

appointed judges when all they're doing is

1:15:23

they, look, they came onto that oral

1:15:25

argument and they wanted to reverse engineer

1:15:28

with a position that they wanted to take. They

1:15:30

knew they were going to take it and they

1:15:32

wanted to throw all the distracting facts out of

1:15:34

the way. And the problem the advocate for the

1:15:36

Department of Justice had, who I

1:15:38

thought did a fine job, did an okay job. You

1:15:40

know, he came in, shock,

1:15:43

you know, poor guy. He came

1:15:45

in wanting to debate the lower

1:15:47

court decision as a related to

1:15:49

the appellate question that was framed

1:15:51

for the appeal based on the

1:15:53

indictment in front of him. But

1:15:56

he, what he ran into was

1:15:58

the headwinds and the turbulence. of

1:16:01

right-wing justices that wanted to make

1:16:03

new law, so

1:16:06

he's for the Republican president for some reason, and

1:16:09

just one last thing on that,

1:16:14

so we wanna call them out, to say

1:16:16

we don't care about this president, we're making

1:16:18

a statement for the future, the history and

1:16:21

the legacy, no you're not. Yes you are,

1:16:23

because we're gonna be stuck with this terrible,

1:16:25

terrible decision. And if Katanji Brown Jackson is

1:16:27

right, I think she is, can

1:16:29

you imagine what Trump 2.0, without

1:16:33

this threat that he

1:16:35

could be found in criminal conduct

1:16:37

for something that he does in office,

1:16:39

what he'll do, or worse,

1:16:41

what the next occupant

1:16:44

of the office does with this now

1:16:46

as the precedent? At least Nixon, knowing

1:16:48

that he could be prosecuted, he did

1:16:50

really bad things. But could

1:16:52

you imagine what he would have done had

1:16:54

he thought that he'd have no criminal liability,

1:16:57

and that's not even dystopia,

1:17:00

it's not even apocalyptic what Katanji Brown

1:17:02

Jackson said. Of everybody that said something

1:17:04

on that panel, that was the one

1:17:06

that resonated most with me. We're gonna

1:17:08

convert the White House into

1:17:10

the seat of criminality when it's occupied

1:17:12

by the very wrong person like Donald

1:17:14

Trump. You know, and what I

1:17:16

think needs to happen in response is

1:17:20

one, pro-democracy voting, but

1:17:23

two, there's got to be

1:17:25

legislation that gets passed that

1:17:28

has to affirmatively say, every

1:17:30

single law that exists here, the

1:17:34

president shall be held criminally responsible

1:17:36

to then I wish, I guess,

1:17:38

if you play that out in

1:17:40

the hypothetical, then that gets challenged

1:17:42

as a separation of powers constitutional

1:17:45

challenge. But in any

1:17:47

event, if you look at these rulings,

1:17:49

and again, just take the

1:17:52

same thing with Dobbs where they didn't

1:17:54

wanna address the facts even before it,

1:17:56

and they expanded it, the Dobbs decision,

1:17:58

Popak, was not the question. before

1:18:00

the court was not to you

1:18:02

overthrow Roe v. Wade, it was

1:18:05

whether this law in Mississippi was

1:18:07

valid or not valid. And then they used

1:18:09

that to overthrow Roe

1:18:11

v. Wade, to overthrow super

1:18:14

precedent, and then they

1:18:17

completely demolished massive

1:18:20

precedent by answering a different question than the

1:18:22

one that was before it. It

1:18:25

goes against everything that

1:18:27

you were taught at Duke Law

1:18:29

School, everything that I was taught

1:18:31

at Georgetown, everything that we grew

1:18:34

up learning about the law. You

1:18:37

have these people in the Supreme Court,

1:18:39

the right-wing justices, and they've been working

1:18:41

to create this for decades and decades

1:18:44

and decades, and they've been using

1:18:46

the gas-lighting terms of, oh, we have to

1:18:48

stop the activists, we have to stop that.

1:18:50

Then they get on, and what do they

1:18:52

do? They're the most

1:18:55

activists, they torture and destroy

1:18:57

the Constitution, and ultimately,

1:19:00

they're creating the downfall of themselves,

1:19:02

too, as the Supreme Court. It's

1:19:05

so naive, it's so dystopian, because if

1:19:07

you're going to give the authority to

1:19:09

a dictator, the first thing

1:19:11

they're going to do is get rid of you. It's

1:19:16

really a horrific thing. Can I make one point before

1:19:18

we move on to the last segment? I

1:19:20

always hate to end on a dour note, and

1:19:22

I want to tie it to what you've said,

1:19:24

and I've said throughout this podcast and throughout LegalAF,

1:19:28

what you can do about it. Look, six

1:19:30

to three right now, the

1:19:34

super precedent that you talked about that used

1:19:36

to be so enshrined

1:19:39

in constitutional analysis that

1:19:41

something, a case that had been affirmed

1:19:44

over and over again, like Roe

1:19:46

versus Wade and the underpinnings of it, would

1:19:48

not be easily disturbed. That's going out the

1:19:50

window. What that means

1:19:52

for me is if Biden gets

1:19:54

back in, which we're working hard to have

1:19:57

how that happened, and the next president is

1:19:59

also Democrat. There could easily

1:20:01

be two vacancies. Trump

1:20:04

got three. There could easily be two

1:20:06

vacancies. If there's two vacancies, we won't

1:20:08

get into how vacancies happen, but there

1:20:10

are two vacancies. It becomes a five

1:20:12

to four court the other way. And

1:20:14

a five to four court the other

1:20:16

way could revisit Dobbs and

1:20:18

revisit all of this crazy stuff that's going on

1:20:20

right now and say, what's super precedent? We just

1:20:22

did it, I don't know, four years ago, three

1:20:24

years ago. We need to fix it. And

1:20:27

they could fix it because what

1:20:29

the Republicans have done on that

1:20:31

panel, on that court, is signal

1:20:33

that precedent and super precedent, it's

1:20:35

stare decisis, don't matter. So if

1:20:38

they don't matter, then when the Democrats get back

1:20:40

into power, and if it goes five to four

1:20:42

the other way, with just two votes going the

1:20:44

other way, then we can fix the state of

1:20:46

the scourge on the history. And we don't have

1:20:48

to wait 10, 15, 20,

1:20:51

30 years. I'm just going to leave that

1:20:53

out there. That means voting matters. That means

1:20:55

November 5th matters, down ballot and otherwise. And

1:20:57

that means getting the right person into

1:21:00

the occupancy of the Oval Office, really

1:21:02

matters. I have left

1:21:04

my friends who were sort of apolitical

1:21:06

or neutral in the past. I've said,

1:21:08

I don't care if you care about

1:21:11

anything else, but you have to

1:21:13

put the right person in to pick the United

1:21:15

States Supreme Court, or you're not going to like

1:21:17

the result. I said that 10 years ago. I

1:21:20

said that five years ago, and look at the

1:21:22

landscape we're in right now. Paul

1:21:25

Pogba, we should do, or I'll do a

1:21:29

class on constitutional avoidance,

1:21:32

as well on patreon.com slash

1:21:34

legal AF. So we have a

1:21:37

class action course, and

1:21:39

a constitutional avoidance course. I'm

1:21:41

giving myself some weekend homework,

1:21:44

right, or Sunday homework. Finally, Paul Pogba,

1:21:46

briefly, let's talk about Arizona. We've done

1:21:48

a bunch of hot takes, so I

1:21:50

don't think we need to make that,

1:21:52

you know, really go into depth here,

1:21:54

other than the fact that you had

1:21:56

these fake electors, as well as others

1:21:58

in Trump's inner circle. circle indicted, those were the 1, 2,

1:22:01

3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10,

1:22:03

11 fake electors. And

1:22:07

then there were seven redacted names of

1:22:10

people in Trump's inner circle. And we know who

1:22:12

they are and that some of the people

1:22:15

who were not indicted in the other cases,

1:22:17

some overlaps as well. Um,

1:22:19

but Popak, why don't you tell us what happened in Arizona? Yeah,

1:22:22

you and I did a very quick breaking, uh,

1:22:24

hot take. Um, I jumped into the parking lot

1:22:26

of a restaurant. We like doing that. Cabs, restaurants,

1:22:29

you know, whatever we do and news hits, we

1:22:31

got to jump on it. Um, but there's some

1:22:34

new information and confirmation now that I got my

1:22:36

hands on the actual indictment and it

1:22:38

matters. Let me answer a question that I know is

1:22:40

coming up in the chat. Then come up in the

1:22:42

past. What's taken the attorney general so long? Why are

1:22:44

we four years out from 2020 and

1:22:46

we're just indicting fake electors and people in

1:22:48

Donald Trump's inner circle and why wasn't Donald

1:22:50

Trump indicted this time around? Let me

1:22:52

answer it this way. Don't blame the attorney generals.

1:22:55

They did the right thing. They sat mainly

1:22:57

because they had to while the Jan

1:22:59

six committee did its work for over

1:23:01

a year while the feds waited nine

1:23:03

months before they appointed a special counsel,

1:23:06

uh, in Jack Smith. And they sat

1:23:09

waiting for the feds to do their

1:23:11

job. When then the feds did their

1:23:13

job and indicted, it was sort of

1:23:15

a narrow indictment of Donald Trump alone

1:23:18

on four counts with a bunch

1:23:20

of unindicted co-conspirators at Jack Smith's

1:23:22

case. Some of which overlap

1:23:24

with now the indicted co-conspirators

1:23:26

in Arizona. Uh,

1:23:29

then the attorney generals got to work, you know,

1:23:31

they threw the fire, they threw the wood into

1:23:33

the fireplace and they got, they got pumping. And

1:23:36

now they're playing a little bit of catch up. Arizona,

1:23:38

we're not surprised. You and I reported on

1:23:41

it six months ago that they were getting

1:23:43

close to indictments. We knew

1:23:45

who they were interviewing. We knew

1:23:47

that Ken Chesprow unindicted co-conspirator number

1:23:49

four in the Arizona case was

1:23:53

cooperating. He already had been convicted of

1:23:55

felonies in Georgia and now Michigan and

1:23:57

Nevada, uh, well you and I are going

1:23:59

to reporting on. that, they're coming up in

1:24:01

the rear and they're going to be

1:24:03

indicting as well. And

1:24:06

so the attorney generals aren't

1:24:08

to be blamed. They're doing the right thing by

1:24:10

their voters of their states to

1:24:12

bring to justice those

1:24:14

that try to conspire to overthrow

1:24:16

the will of the people of the

1:24:19

individual states. The

1:24:21

people that we should focus on

1:24:23

that are in the indictment is,

1:24:27

some of it's just interesting like

1:24:29

another indictment for Giuliani, okay? But

1:24:32

Mark Meadows, who for some

1:24:34

reason skated by with Jack Smith,

1:24:36

but got indicted in Georgia, indicted

1:24:39

again, and people that I want to

1:24:41

focus on for just a second, that

1:24:44

have skated by by the skin

1:24:46

of their teeth until now, much

1:24:48

to my chagrin, finally got indicted,

1:24:50

Boris Epstein. I've been saying

1:24:52

for the last year, how has this

1:24:55

guy who's been the insider consul Yerry

1:24:57

for Donald Trump, who shows up at

1:24:59

his arraignments, who ran the fake electors

1:25:01

team on behalf of the campaign, along

1:25:04

with Mike Roman, and

1:25:06

is currently Donald Trump's inside lawyer, who

1:25:08

brought in Todd Blanche, just to wrap

1:25:11

our show together in one big loop

1:25:13

from the beginning segment in New York.

1:25:16

How has it been avoided so

1:25:18

far that he has avoided

1:25:21

being indicted? Well, he can't claim that

1:25:23

any longer. Co-conspirator number,

1:25:25

an unindicted co-conspirator number, I

1:25:28

can't even remember in Jack Smith's

1:25:30

case, Boris Epstein is indicted here.

1:25:32

Christina Bob, she's

1:25:34

been skating by under the radar for

1:25:36

so long that she had time to

1:25:39

be involved with another criminal act down

1:25:41

in Mar-a-Lago, where she was the lawyer

1:25:43

that signed the now infamous folder that

1:25:46

said, we looked everywhere, we could only

1:25:48

find 38 pages of classified

1:25:50

documents in Mar-a-Lago. Thank you, Christina Bob.

1:25:52

She had time to have a career

1:25:55

on Newsmax and everything. She's now indicted,

1:25:57

along with Jenna Ellis, who, you know,

1:26:00

The A got a misdemeanor indictment

1:26:02

and conviction and in Georgia so

1:26:04

there's a little bit of an

1:26:06

overlap with Georgia which is much

1:26:09

more sprawling investigation and an overlap

1:26:11

with some unindicted coconspirators in ah,

1:26:13

in knob the Dc Election Interference

1:26:16

case, but now Boris Epstein branded

1:26:18

indicted coconspirators along with Christina Path.

1:26:21

But. Just burrow. Keep it, I just

1:26:23

broke. We know that he's on a

1:26:25

daily coconspirators number, for it's obvious the

1:26:27

weights listed of the indictments we know

1:26:29

he cooperated with Michigan in Nevada as

1:26:31

well, although he had some weird wobbly

1:26:34

moments where some of what he said

1:26:36

to the seem to be exactly true.

1:26:38

I will see how that plays out,

1:26:40

but Unindicted Coconspirators Number One. Is

1:26:42

Trump. Said. Answer the question why we

1:26:45

did. It's ah interim in or middle and

1:26:47

during the weekend with broke the story and

1:26:49

I agreed with you which is. She.

1:26:52

Got six or seven years to bring that

1:26:54

indictment against him. Slip A couple of these

1:26:56

people. You know, can't

1:26:58

just burrow. Also not out of the

1:27:00

woods yet he still added died a

1:27:02

coconspirators before and others slip some of

1:27:04

these fake collectors. Who. Donald Trump

1:27:06

is it is claimed to be the leader

1:27:08

of the conspiracy related to it. Are they

1:27:10

the ones that all even of this? The ones

1:27:13

that aren't going to flip that are true

1:27:15

believers that have taken the red or blue

1:27:17

pill and are never going to flip on Donald

1:27:19

Trump are as follows: Bike Robin. Who.

1:27:21

Got indicted again. Here is indicted in

1:27:23

Georgia. He's the guy to try to

1:27:25

take down forty well as with his

1:27:28

motion to disqualify arriving early, ship with

1:27:30

a thud way. he's never coffee to

1:27:32

give a give it up and flip

1:27:34

on Donald Trump. Mark Meadows different story.

1:27:36

Giuliani True Believer Never going to flip

1:27:38

John Eastman Never going to flip. I

1:27:40

be shocked but Meadows he's week and

1:27:42

I think he could. Philip Morris Epstein

1:27:45

is never going to flip on Donald

1:27:47

Trump. So there's a couple in their

1:27:49

that Jet Alice is going fight if.

1:27:51

She. Hasn't already flip by the time we

1:27:53

recorded this, I'd be shocked she's ready to

1:27:55

flip. So. She: they're going

1:27:58

to get a Chris maze. the attorney

1:28:00

general for Arizona is gonna get some of these people to

1:28:02

flip and Ken Chesbrough. And then she can

1:28:04

go for whatever they do in Arizona,

1:28:07

superseding indictment or amended indictment, whatever it's

1:28:09

gonna be, or a separate indictment against

1:28:11

Donald Trump. And do we need another

1:28:14

trial that Donald Trump can point to to

1:28:17

try to stop the current trials from

1:28:19

happening? Probably not. Let's get past this

1:28:21

period. Let's get into post-November. If Trump

1:28:23

loses, he'll just have to face the

1:28:26

music in all of these cases. Michael

1:28:29

Popock, there you have it. I'm

1:28:32

excited to do more classes

1:28:35

at patreon.com/legalaf. We

1:28:39

try to find fun ways to

1:28:41

grow this media platform and media

1:28:43

company as we don't have outside

1:28:46

investors. One of the fun ways

1:28:48

to do that is through patreon.com/legalaf.

1:28:52

My semester

1:28:54

is now complete as a

1:28:56

professor at USC Law School.

1:28:59

So I can now start

1:29:01

focusing on teaching everybody on

1:29:03

the Patreon. I'm

1:29:05

not gonna say what the USC tuition is,

1:29:08

but if you ever wanted to be in

1:29:10

one of my classes, I think the Patreon

1:29:12

deal is a good one. I'll just leave

1:29:15

it at that without a one-to-one comparison on

1:29:17

tuition fees. It's not a

1:29:19

real law school though. I'll give you that disclaimer, which

1:29:24

I may have to legally,

1:29:26

but you'll nonetheless get the

1:29:28

similar types of legal classes

1:29:30

that I teach Patreon, slightly

1:29:33

shorter, patreon.com/legalaf. That's

1:29:35

patreon.com/legalaf. Thanks to

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1:29:39

as well. They really play a

1:29:41

big part also in helping

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1:29:49

build the staff some way. It's

1:29:51

cool that there are pro-democracy sponsors with

1:29:54

cool products and services that want to

1:29:56

be on shows like this. this.

1:30:00

So we're grateful for that and of

1:30:02

course we're most grateful for you

1:30:04

all of the legal AFers for

1:30:06

making our trial coverage and

1:30:09

our coverage here on Legal AF

1:30:11

the most watched legal coverage not

1:30:13

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1:30:15

on the day to

1:30:17

day legal developments at the

1:30:19

intersection of law and politics

1:30:22

in the United States of America. I haven't

1:30:24

tested if it's the world so I won't

1:30:26

make that I won't

1:30:28

make that claim yet but at least

1:30:31

in the United States of America pretty

1:30:33

sure the world but making the illegal

1:30:35

analysis the most watched in the United

1:30:38

States that's thanks to you so let's

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keep on growing this community together day

1:30:42

by day tell your family friends co-workers

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1:30:47

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1:30:53

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1:30:55

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to grow this together thank

1:31:01

you thank you thank you

1:31:04

Popak always a

1:31:06

pleasure to co-host these with

1:31:08

you and a reminder to everybody

1:31:11

watching as well each morning on

1:31:14

a trial day so they were off

1:31:16

on Monday but trial is Tuesday Karen

1:31:18

Friedman Agnifolo and I before

1:31:20

trial starts we give about a 20

1:31:23

to 30 minute review of what to

1:31:25

expect that day and then as soon

1:31:27

as trial ends for the day Friedman

1:31:29

Agnifolo and I KFA and

1:31:31

I then do a summary of everything

1:31:34

that went down that day and additionally

1:31:37

Popak myself Karen some of the top

1:31:39

former federal prosecutors state prosecutors that we

1:31:41

have on this network give those daily

1:31:44

hot takes to give you better insight

1:31:46

than I think you'll get anywhere else

1:31:48

we've got great sources in the courtroom

1:31:51

you see a lot of them on

1:31:53

on the network as well so you

1:31:55

know that they have the experience to

1:31:58

really break the down and they're not

1:32:00

just talking heads who are just trying

1:32:02

to, you know, you know, just just

1:32:05

come up with a position. Research matters,

1:32:07

evidence matters. And that's what Popak, myself

1:32:09

and our team here know

1:32:12

is most important. And we hope that that's

1:32:14

what you appreciate about this. Thank you. See

1:32:16

you next time. Shout out to the legal

1:32:18

AF first. Shout out to the Midas mighty

1:32:21

one more time patreon.com/legal a F. Thank you,

1:32:23

everybody. Shout out to the Legal

1:32:30

AF.