0:01

I'm Brooke Gladstone, on this week's On

0:03

the Media, many of the rulings handed

0:05

down by the Supreme Court start

0:07

with cases brought by the states.

0:10

And one influential conservative group

0:12

is busy working those ramps.

0:15

We're going to have a conversation this morning

0:17

about state attorneys general. And

0:19

this is an issue of great importance to

0:21

the Federalist Society. I think the attorney

0:23

general's offices have gotten more

0:26

interested in national issues in the last 30

0:28

years. A number of them have gone on

0:30

to judgeships, have gone on to other

0:33

high profile positions within the

0:36

judiciary. I was like, solicitor? That sounds like,

0:38

does he wear a wig? What is that?

0:39

For this wonderful conversation about being a

0:42

state solicitor general, the tension,

0:44

the conflicts, the fun, the tears,

0:46

the joy, all of it.

0:47

Like if you're a solicitor general or you work in a solicitor

0:49

general's office, you get to sort of have this national

0:52

practice.

0:54

It's all coming up after this.

1:00

From WNYC

1:03

in New York, this is On the Media. I'm

1:05

Brooke Gladstone. And we're one

1:07

week into the United States Supreme

1:10

Court's new term. The justices

1:12

are returning to the bench under a cloud

1:15

of ethics controversies and with

1:17

public opinion of the court at a historic

1:19

low. About that cloud,

1:22

one news organization has done more than

1:24

most any to expose how some members

1:27

of the bench have violated ethics

1:29

and rejected norms. And that

1:31

organization

1:32

has been our partner in

1:34

the investigation you're about to hear. It's

1:36

part two of our three-part collaboration

1:39

with ProPublica called We

1:41

Don't Talk About Leonard, an investigation

1:44

into the rise of the conservative legal

1:46

movement and Leonard Leo, the

1:48

secret behind its stunning success.

1:52

In this hour, reporters Andrea Bernstein,

1:54

Ilya Meretz and Andy Kroll will

1:56

be our guides.

1:59

Andrea took us back to Leo's

2:02

earliest days. I'm looking for your book.

2:04

His high school in New Jersey. Okay, I've got

2:06

the 83 year book. I'm opening it up. We

2:10

heard from a former classmate about his

2:12

deep interest in the law and

2:14

his convictions. He was always

2:17

passionate about being anti-abortion.

2:20

He was very steadfast in that belief.

2:23

We learned about a college professor who was

2:25

an important early influence. The

2:27

law schools are overwhelmingly

2:30

tilted to the left, certainly in the area of

2:32

constitutional law. And we charted

2:34

the rise of Leo's influence

2:37

on the conservative movement, his

2:39

decades-long association with the Federalist

2:41

Society, an avid promoter

2:43

of conservative legal doctrine, whose

2:46

mantra is, ideas have

2:48

consequences. But more importantly,

2:51

that policy is people. So you have to connect

2:53

those ideas to the right

2:54

people who have access

2:56

to the levers of power.

2:58

We saw how he built a network

3:00

of nonprofits. What you had was

3:02

kind of a daisy chain where donors

3:05

were giving

3:05

money to one group. The group

3:08

didn't have to disclose its donors. They'd

3:10

give money to another group. That group didn't

3:13

have to disclose

3:13

its donors. And finally, how

3:16

Leo shifted his attention from the U.S.

3:18

Supreme Court to the state Supreme

3:20

Court. It's not enough to own a house and own a Senate

3:23

and own a governor. We each kind of own

3:25

the courts, too. So that

3:28

is a power grab. There's no question about it.

3:30

That's the way you control the Court. Leo

3:32

said as much himself. In fact,

3:35

one can very ably argue, I think,

3:37

that state Supreme Courts are, in many

3:39

cases, where the rubber really meets the road.

3:41

In this episode, Ilya, Andrea, and

3:44

Andy will explain how Leo, the

3:46

people-as-policy guy, is busily

3:49

constructing pipelines

3:50

of well-placed legal

3:52

talent in state governments, too.

3:55

Here's Ilya.

3:59

degree from Cornell Law in the late

4:02

1980s, which is where he crossed paths

4:04

with Leonard Leo. Leonard Leo was in my

4:07

law school class. We lived in the

4:09

same dorm first year of law school. Black

4:11

says Leonard Leo stood out. For one

4:13

thing, he looked young.

4:15

He was young. He got his undergraduate

4:17

degree and law degree in just six years.

4:19

I don't even think he was old enough to drink. I don't think he

4:21

was even 21 years old at the time. Like

4:24

other classmates we've spoken with, Black

4:26

remembers Leo for wearing suits to

4:28

class. It was a vibe. He had

4:30

an agenda. He had an ideology. And

4:33

he was very serious about it. Leo

4:35

had founded the Cornell Law chapter of the

4:37

Federalist Society. It was a pretty

4:39

new organization then, and Black didn't

4:41

see them or Leo going far. It

4:44

was all this talk about the original meaning of the Constitution

4:47

at the time the Founders wrote it. It wasn't

4:49

something that I personally

4:51

took very seriously. And frankly,

4:53

I was clearly wrong because I should have taken

4:55

it more seriously. After

4:58

Cornell, Mike Black ended up in Montana

5:00

practicing law. For nearly a quarter century,

5:03

he did not think about Leonard Leo. In 2013,

5:06

Mike Black is working for the Montana Attorney General

5:09

as a career employee heading up the

5:11

Civil Division. The AG just changed

5:13

from a Democrat to a Republican. So

5:16

there are a bunch of new people in the office. And

5:18

Black has something to discuss with one of them. So

5:21

he takes a walk down the hall to speak with

5:23

his new colleague. I went into his office, and

5:25

on his bookshelf were all these bobbleheads. And

5:29

there was like Scalia for sure, and

5:31

I think probably Alito. There were like four

5:33

or five. I don't remember how many there were. And

5:36

then there was this one younger looking guy.

5:38

And I said, well, who the heck is this? And he goes, well,

5:40

that's Leonard Leo. Black

5:43

looks at his colleague, a man named Lawrence

5:45

Van Dyke, the Montana Solicitor General.

5:48

He looks at the bobblehead doll, a miniature,

5:51

someone he used to know. I think I laughed.

5:54

And I told Lawrence that, well, I went

5:56

to law school with Leonard, and I can't believe

5:58

that there's a bobblehead doll. And

6:01

it was clear that Lawrence was

6:03

enamored with Leonard and inserted

6:06

him a friend. And ultimately, I think

6:08

it's been borne out that Leonard Leo was

6:10

a patron of Lawrence Van Dyke. But

6:12

at the time, I just thought it was funny. Leonard

6:14

Leo was on that shelf of bobbleheads alongside

6:17

Supreme Court justices. It's

6:19

a visible manifestation of the work he's done

6:22

to shape the court. But if that's all

6:24

he did, he wouldn't be as influential as

6:26

he is today, because the justices

6:28

would only be hearing those cases that happened

6:31

to get to them. Leo has done something

6:33

maybe more impressive, something not many

6:36

people know about. He's built a system

6:39

that makes it much more likely that the right

6:41

cases get to the high court, the cases

6:43

he and his ideological brethren believe

6:45

are most likely to nudge the law in the

6:47

direction they think it should go. He

6:50

does this by taking an active interest

6:52

in other parts of the legal world. Lower

6:55

court judges, state courts, state

6:57

attorneys general, and solicitors

7:00

general, people like Lawrence Van Dyke,

7:02

the owner of the Leonard Leo bobblehead

7:05

doll. I was like, solicitor,

7:07

that sounds like, does he wear a wig? What is that?

7:09

This is Lawrence Van Dyke, reflecting back on the

7:11

start of his career on a recent podcast.

7:14

I definitely didn't know anything about solicitor generals.

7:17

That was the first time I heard the term, and I

7:19

thought it was a funny term at the time.

7:21

It was new to me too when we started this reporting.

7:24

I got interested after speaking with

7:27

a former Republican attorney general. This

7:29

AG told me that solicitors general

7:31

play a pivotal role in Leo's system.

7:35

In most states, the elected attorney general

7:37

chooses his or her solicitor general,

7:40

and it's the solicitor who argues the

7:42

state's big cases in the Supreme

7:44

Court and appeals courts. The

7:46

Supreme Court struck down President Biden's

7:49

plan to cancel up to $20,000 in student loan

7:52

debt for millions of Americans. Despite

7:54

growing dangers from climate change, tonight

7:56

the US Supreme Court curbing the government's

7:58

power to fight it. An ideologically split

8:01

U.S. Supreme Court has upheld Ohio's

8:04

controversial use-it-or-lose-it voting

8:06

law. It allows the state to automatically

8:08

purge people from its list of registered voters

8:11

if they fail to vote for two consecutive

8:13

elections and fail to return a mailed postcard

8:15

confirming their address. A federal

8:18

appeals court has ruled that the Biden administration

8:20

likely overstepped First Amendment protections

8:23

when it urged social media companies

8:25

to remove misleading or false

8:28

content about COVID-19 and

8:30

other issues like election integrity.

8:32

The U.S. Supreme Court has blocked President Biden's

8:35

vaccine-or-test mandate for large private

8:37

companies. Today it essentially ruled

8:39

that OSHA, the Federal Workplace Safety Agency,

8:41

exceeded its authority with the mandate.

8:44

Six listeners argued and won all of these,

8:47

including the conservative legal movement's biggest

8:49

victory. Roe vs. Wade is

8:52

history.

8:52

That landmark 1973 ruling

8:55

that said a woman had a constitutional right

8:57

to abortion now goes back to

8:59

the states.

9:00

These victories can be traced back

9:02

to the extraordinarily effective long

9:04

game played by Leonard Leo and the groups

9:06

around him.

9:08

It's an effort that unfolded mostly out

9:10

of sight before the first briefs were filed.

9:13

To really see it, you'd need to be plugged in

9:16

to the Federalist Society. We're going to have a

9:18

conversation this morning about state attorneys

9:20

general, and this is an issue of great

9:22

importance to the Federalist Society. This

9:25

is Leonard Leo at a Federalist Society

9:27

gathering in 2015, introducing

9:29

a panel discussion on the role of AGs.

9:32

This coincided with his ongoing push

9:34

for state Supreme Court changes, which

9:36

we heard about in episode one. We're seeing

9:39

an unprecedented amount of activity by

9:41

state AGs, particularly with

9:43

regards to pushback against federal

9:46

overreach that oftentimes comes in

9:48

the form of litigation. By

9:50

this point, Barack Obama is in his second

9:52

term as president. Conservatives

9:54

are fighting the Affordable Care Act and resisting

9:57

new regulations put in place after

9:59

the 2000- financial crisis. Not

10:01

only are there an unprecedented number of

10:03

lawsuits being brought against

10:05

the federal government by state AGs, but an unprecedented

10:08

number of state AGs joining in each of those lawsuits.

10:11

It's a very interesting time. What's

10:14

really interesting is what Leonard Leo was

10:16

doing behind the scenes. One,

10:19

and this is classic Leonard Leo,

10:21

a group he had influence over in an informal

10:23

way was pouring money into a group

10:25

that in turn put money into elections for

10:28

state attorneys general. In 2014,

10:30

the AG's campaign group, the Republican

10:32

Attorneys General Association, became a standalone

10:35

group called RAGA. The first 17

10:38

contributions were each for $350. Then came a contribution

10:40

for a quarter of a million

10:44

dollars. It was from the Judicial Crisis

10:47

Network, a group formerly known as the

10:49

Judicial Confirmation Network, or JCN,

10:52

a Leo-connected entity that among other things

10:55

funnels money into campaigns. Under

10:57

a different name, JCN remains

10:59

RAGA's

10:59

biggest and most reliable funder

11:02

today.

11:03

Two, he was organizing them. RAGA

11:07

has a sister group dedicated to policy.

11:09

The Judicial Crisis Network also funds it.

11:12

They do weekly calls where solicitors share what

11:15

they're doing. The calls are Thursday afternoons.

11:18

There are regular retreats and seminars where

11:20

these days scholars and activists talk about

11:22

issues like election integrity and woke corporations.

11:26

The effect of this is to draw state

11:28

AG's attention and resources into

11:30

national policy issues. Their

11:33

more typical bread-and-butter focus would

11:35

be consumer protection or Medicaid fraud.

11:38

On that podcast, Lawrence Van Dyke explained

11:40

it like this. If you have the right position

11:43

in state government, you get to sort

11:45

of have this national practice. Lastly,

11:48

there's personnel. When a Republican

11:50

AG has an opening, I've been told by

11:52

a former state AG, Leo has

11:54

suggested the names of potential staffers,

11:57

pre-vetted for ideology and skills.

12:00

He won't say, hire this person in

12:02

a bossy way. He'll say, this

12:04

is a good guy. You should check him out. One

12:07

such guy was Lawrence Van Dyke, owner

12:10

of the Leonard Leo bobblehead doll. Montana

12:15

is a state that sometimes has a hard time attracting

12:17

the most highly qualified candidates.

12:20

So when Lawrence Van Dyke arrived, people noticed.

12:22

He graduated magna cum laude from Harvard

12:25

Law. He was an editor on the Harvard Law Review.

12:28

On a podcast recently, Van Dyke said

12:30

that put him on a path. While I was

12:32

in law school, there's a combination of being on

12:34

Law Review and being very interested in religious

12:36

liberties. Made me more interested in the appellate

12:39

legal issues route. After law school, he

12:41

goes to work at a big Republican-oriented

12:43

law firm in Washington under

12:45

the tutelage of the son of a Supreme Court

12:47

justice. I worked very heavily

12:50

with Gene Scalia, doing labor

12:52

stuff, but mostly admin law and of course

12:54

clerking on the DC circuits. More becoming

12:56

assistant solicitor general briefly in

12:58

Texas. But for all those qualifications,

13:02

attorney Mike Black found there were things Van

13:04

Dyke couldn't or wouldn't do. Obviously,

13:06

very bright, writes well, very

13:08

opinionated,

13:10

but he wasn't very seasoned as a lawyer.

13:12

He didn't understand the nuts and bolts

13:14

of what we did every day very well.

13:17

Like establishing the facts of a case through

13:19

discovery and depositions. Not only

13:21

did he not understand the nuts and bolts, he didn't

13:23

seem particularly interested in

13:25

learning what they were. Black says,

13:28

and others in the Montana AG's office told us

13:30

the same, if a case didn't line up

13:32

with Van Dyke's views, he didn't want

13:34

to take it. One example was a Montana

13:36

law that restricted political spending in state

13:39

judicial races. And this was a hard case

13:41

to defend. Don't get me wrong. I mean,

13:43

we were defending a restriction

13:46

on speech in an election, which is a tough

13:48

row to hoe. But at least with respect

13:51

to the history of Montana and

13:53

the culture of our elections, it

13:55

was an important case. Like the law

13:57

or not, Black thought it was Van Dyke's job as

13:59

solicitors.

13:59

to defend it.

14:01

He didn't. I mean, he literally refused

14:03

to get involved.

14:04

Lawrence Van Dyke declined to do an interview

14:07

with us and did not answer a detailed

14:09

list of questions. We

14:11

can tell from his emails from that time

14:14

that what lit Van Dyke up were cases

14:16

about national issues involving religion,

14:18

guns, and out-of-state litigants. For

14:21

example, he recommended that Montana join

14:23

a challenge to New York's restrictive gun laws

14:25

passed after the Sandy Hook School massacre,

14:28

adding as an aside in an email, plus

14:31

semi-automatic firearms are fun to hunt

14:33

out with, as the

14:34

attached picture attests. Smiley

14:37

face. He liked guns. He

14:39

liked shooting guns. He liked talking about guns. He

14:41

thought that concealed carry should be your right.

14:44

While he was solicitor, Van Dyke served on two

14:46

Federalist Society executive committees

14:49

on religious freedom and separation of powers.

14:52

And he communicated regularly with Federalist Society

14:54

officials and allied law professors.

14:57

He persuaded Montana to join

14:59

suits and amicus briefs that mattered

15:01

to this crowd. Like a contraception

15:04

and health care case known as Hobby Lobby,

15:06

it resulted in the U.S. Supreme Court recognizing

15:09

for the first time a private company

15:12

is having religious rights. I think

15:14

he had aspirations, clearly, to do

15:16

something beyond being the solicitor in Montana.

15:19

Van Dyke was older and more experienced.

15:22

Lawrence Van Dyke was young and bright and equal

15:24

to him on the org chart. You could

15:26

chalk up their friction to rivalry or a personality

15:29

thing, but there was something else. They

15:32

seemed to have totally diverging views on

15:34

what Van Dyke was there to do.

15:38

Lawrence Van Dyke arrived in the Montana AG's

15:40

office at a time when his job, solicitor

15:43

general, was dramatically changing.

15:46

Paul Nollet, a political science professor at

15:48

Marquette University, told me that

15:50

just a decade or two ago, not

15:52

that many states had solicitors. It was

15:54

a dead-end job. Something

15:56

that didn't offer a whole lot

15:59

of career advancement. was not a way

16:01

to, you know, elevate one's name in legal

16:03

and political circles. Mainly, solicitors

16:06

argued cases that were being appealed through state

16:08

courts. These lawsuits typically didn't

16:10

attract much attention. Then

16:12

state attorneys general started to use their solicitors

16:15

general differently. They could appoint

16:17

and deploy them to make big moves

16:19

on hot button issues. Even in those smaller

16:22

states like, you know, Nebraska and

16:24

Kansas, these offices, Oklahoma, amongst

16:27

Republican AGs, these offices have been

16:29

some of the strongest pushback against,

16:32

you know, the Obama, now Biden administrations.

16:34

And so these are high profile positions.

16:37

These jobs don't pay anything like what you could

16:39

make at a big law firm. But for

16:42

conservative jurists, becoming SG

16:44

is a form of early career credentialing

16:47

that can pay off down the road. A number

16:49

of them have gone on to, judgeships

16:51

have gone on to other high profile

16:54

positions within the judiciary.

16:57

Welcome to advisory opinions. I'm

16:59

Sarah Isger. They talked about this recently

17:02

on the podcast advisory opinions. It's

17:04

co-hosted by Sarah Isger, a former Trump

17:07

justice department spokesperson and

17:09

former Harvard law Federalist Society chapter

17:11

president.

17:12

And we've had other state SGs

17:14

on the podcast, former state SGs

17:16

who all just rave about it as a job. And I do want

17:18

to. In April, she brought Andrew Brasher, the

17:20

former solicitor general of Alabama, for

17:23

this wonderful conversation about being a state

17:25

solicitor general, the tensions,

17:27

the conflicts, the fun, the tears, the

17:29

joy, all of it.

17:31

Russia gives an insider's perspective on

17:33

the job and how it's changed. I think

17:35

the attorney general's offices have gotten

17:38

more, more interested in sort of national

17:40

issues, national profile over the last, you

17:42

know, 30 years. You know, we're just seeing

17:45

so much litigation driving public

17:47

policy that anybody

17:50

with kind of a good plaintiff, which the states are, in

17:52

the mix to be involved in national issues and

17:55

great public policy.

17:56

States are good plaintiffs. They're

17:58

more likely than private parties. have standing

18:00

to bring a case. The Supreme Court is more

18:02

likely to want to hear the case. And

18:05

if they do, the solicitor making arguments

18:08

may be a familiar face. The current

18:10

crop of Republican state solicitors include

18:13

former clerks to Justices Scalia,

18:15

Thomas, and Alito.

18:17

Sarah Isger had a front row seat

18:19

to this. Her husband was SG in

18:21

Texas and a former Justice Kennedy

18:23

clerk. He too had a Leonard Leo

18:25

bobblehead doll. There's a photo of it

18:27

in the Texas

18:28

Tribune. So, small

18:30

world.

18:31

Let's move a little bit more to the career side

18:33

then. Advice you have for people

18:36

who are listening to this and are like, yeah, me too, dude.

18:38

I want to be a state SG.

18:39

Reshore says you have to know about the

18:41

job, know you want it, and be a

18:43

good networker. The thing is, these jobs,

18:46

they don't get advertised. It's not like

18:48

there's just a bulletin that's like we need a new SG

18:51

in Kentucky or something. You just have to really

18:54

want to do it and to know the

18:56

people who are in the position to give

18:58

you the job.

18:59

Reshore went on to become a federal judge in Alabama

19:03

at age 37. In

19:05

an email, he told us, I'm not aware of

19:07

anything that Leonard Leo did to advance

19:09

my career at any point. In

19:13

response to our questions, Leonard Leo

19:15

said, yes, he cultivated the

19:17

careers of many young lawyers, among

19:20

them Lawrence Van Dyke. He said he

19:22

doesn't remember making phone calls on Van Dyke's

19:24

behalf. He didn't comment on

19:26

one former AG's contention that he, Leo,

19:29

sometimes suggests the names of possible

19:31

new hires. Solicitor's

19:34

general, he told us, are, quote, often

19:36

important because they are on the front lines

19:38

of defending the division of power between

19:41

the states and the federal government, a

19:43

set forth in our constitution. Leo

19:46

became interested in attorneys general. He

19:48

said, quote, upon discovering

19:50

that many of them were not focusing

19:53

on their duty to defend and protect their states

19:55

against unlawful and unconstitutional

19:57

overreach by the federal government.

19:59

Today, unlike in years past,

20:02

this has become a key part of their work." End

20:05

quote.

20:06

Coming up, Leonard Leo

20:08

has very, very

20:09

big plans for Lawrence Van Dyke. But

20:11

first, what do an American

20:14

billionaire, a Supreme Court justice,

20:16

and an Alaskan salmon have

20:19

in common? As we were looking at this, the

20:22

only common thread

20:24

between the prominent guests on that trip

20:26

was that they were all connected to Leonard Leo. This

20:29

is On The Media.

20:39

One

20:59

illustration of how Leo cultivated relationships among

21:01

donors and justices is a fishing trip Justice

21:18

Samuel Alito took to Alaska. It

21:21

happened in 2008, but the world

21:23

didn't learn about it until this year.

21:26

It made a

21:27

splash. A

21:29

new report from ProPublica claimed Samuel

21:31

Alito accepted a lavish

21:33

vacation from a conservative billionaire with

21:36

frequent business before

21:37

the High Court. See the guy

21:39

in the red in the middle of the picture holding the gigantic

21:42

fish. That is Justice Samuel

21:44

Alito. Now in an unusual

21:46

move, Alito is defending himself in the press,

21:49

writing in Wall Street Journal op-ed that

21:51

the seat on the plane on Paul Singer's private

21:53

jet would otherwise have been unoccupied.

21:57

It was our ProPublica colleagues, Justin

21:59

Elliott. Josh Kaplan and Alex Meyer

22:01

Jesky, who broke

22:02

the story. They figured out

22:05

that Alito had taken a flight on a private

22:07

plane paid for by a hedge fund manager

22:09

named Paul Singer. Singer

22:12

and Alito stayed at a fishing lodge

22:14

at the invitation of Californian Robin Arkley.

22:17

He owns a mortgage servicing company. Josh

22:20

says, at first it wasn't clear

22:23

what linked Alito and Singer

22:24

and Arkley. Then

22:27

it came to them. The only

22:29

common thread between the prominent

22:32

guests on that trip was that they were all connected

22:34

to Leonard Leo.

22:35

Singer was a big-dollar Federalist Society donor.

22:38

Robin Arkley provided seed money for the Judicial

22:40

Crisis Network, that Leo-connected

22:42

group.

22:44

Leonard Leo himself was on the trip.

22:48

There's a photo of Leo with other guests holding

22:50

a big fish in front of a seaplane. Another

22:53

guest on the outing was a federal judge named Raymond

22:55

Randolph. Leo clerked for him after

22:58

law

22:58

school. And as we were digging on this, we

23:00

learned that Leo actually helped

23:02

organize it. He played an important role in

23:04

connecting Alito with this billionaire.

23:07

Leo was the one that invited the billionaire Singer

23:09

on the trip. Leo asked

23:12

Singer if he and Alito

23:14

could fly there on the billionaire's jet.

23:17

Leo actually secured these very expensive

23:19

private jet flights across the country

23:21

for a sitting Supreme Court justice.

23:24

That's Josh's co-reporter, Justin Elliott.

23:27

They got their hands on an email chain.

23:28

In which after they

23:30

got back from the fishing trip, Paul

23:32

Singer had apparently expected to

23:34

receive a shipment of salmon. And

23:37

it had never arrived in New York

23:40

where Singer lives. And Singer

23:43

actually sent an email to Leo about

23:45

this, half jokingly saying, the

23:48

salmon, like they've escaped. And

23:50

then Leo, in turn, forwarded

23:52

that along to another donor, Sky Rob

23:55

Arkley, who owned the fishing lodge where they hosted

23:57

Alito, where the fishing trip happened.

23:59

and to take care of it and get

24:02

Paul Singer his

24:02

Samson.

24:04

Justice Alito has acknowledged the trip and

24:07

said there was no need to inform the public because,

24:09

quote, accommodations and transportation

24:12

for social events were not reportable

24:14

gifts.

24:15

If Alito had treaded the plane himself, people

24:18

in the industry estimate, the flight

24:20

alone could have cost him $100,000, one way.

24:23

Singer told ProPublica

24:26

he did not organize the trip

24:28

and did not discuss his business with Justice

24:30

Alito.

24:31

This Alaska trip was the first time Singer

24:33

and Alito met. And Alito must have impressed

24:36

Singer

24:37

because by 2010, he was introducing

24:39

the Justice at a black tie dinner. Deserved

24:41

this evening comes with a lecture by

24:43

one of America's greatest and most

24:45

influential legal minds, the Honorable

24:48

Samuel Alito. Singer

24:50

calls Alito a, quote, model in

24:53

court justice. Thank you all

24:55

very much. Thank you. Thank

24:57

you for the very warm welcome and thank

24:59

you, Paul, for the very

25:01

kind introduction. How's that?

25:04

Can you hear me okay? Alito and Singer intersect

25:06

again in 2014 when Singer

25:08

has a case before the U.S. Supreme Court. A

25:11

unit of Singer's hedge fund had purchased distressed

25:14

Argentinian debt years earlier. Argentina

25:16

is repaying its other creditors, pennies on the

25:18

dollar.

25:19

Singer insists his fund must

25:21

be repaid in full. Argentina

25:24

will default on its obligation to

25:26

bondholders tomorrow if nothing changes. Argentina's

25:29

president, Cristina Fernandez de Kirshner,

25:32

blames the brink's menship on, quote,

25:34

vulture capitalists, picking at the

25:36

bones of Argentina's economy. But

25:38

Paul Singer, the billionaire bondholder

25:41

calling in Argentina's loan, says

25:43

any damage is self-inflicted.

25:46

Singer takes the fight all the way to the

25:48

U.S. Supreme Court, and he prevails.

25:51

Justice Alito votes with the seven-to-one

25:53

majority in favor of the hedge fund.

25:56

There was quite a bit of press coverage at the time.

25:59

Justice Alito has said he didn't know Singer was

26:02

involved, since Singer, as an individual,

26:04

was not a named party to the lawsuit.

26:07

When our colleagues asked Leonard Leo

26:09

about the fishing trip, he said of the justices,

26:13

no objective and well-informed

26:15

observer of the judiciary honestly

26:17

could believe that they, the justices,

26:19

decide cases in order to call favor

26:22

with friends

26:22

or in return for a free plane

26:24

seat or fishing trip. There's

26:27

another way to look at the Justice Alito-Leonard

26:29

Leo-Paul Singer triangle. Getting

26:32

close to a Supreme Court justice, people in

26:34

Washington have told me, is a huge flex.

26:37

Andrea and I spoke to someone who did this, an

26:39

evangelical minister, the Reverend

26:41

Rob Schenk. He was a long-time anti-abortion

26:44

activist, but came to regret some of his

26:46

tactics.

26:47

Reverend Schenk and Leo were not in the same circle,

26:50

though they worked on the same issues. Schenk

26:52

told us how he first got close to Supreme Court

26:54

justices Thomas and Alito. He

26:56

uses the term, feet of clay,

26:59

a biblical reference to weaknesses

27:00

in powerful people.

27:04

It didn't take long for

27:07

me to see their feet of

27:09

clay, but it was my experience

27:13

in pastoral work, in congregations,

27:16

that helped me to appreciate

27:20

that every human is

27:22

fragile. Every human is

27:25

corruptible. Just because

27:28

someone dons a rope, just

27:30

because they are one of a rare nine,

27:33

just because they sit

27:34

so far removed

27:36

from

27:38

average people,

27:39

does not make them superhuman. They

27:42

are human in every way.

27:45

He could use that closeness, Schenk says,

27:47

to appeal to donors. How many people

27:49

do you know who have said a prayer with a

27:51

justice in chambers?

27:54

How many people do you know who

27:56

have taken a

27:58

justice? on a vacation trip

28:02

and talked into the late night

28:04

hours over a drink,

28:06

traded stories. I'm going to guess

28:08

none.

28:10

That's what makes our work unique and

28:12

it makes the impact of our work

28:15

unique. As ProPublica

28:17

has learned, Leo himself

28:20

brought wealthy donors to the U.S. Supreme

28:22

Court, a secretive

28:23

group put together by Paul

28:25

Singer. It was March of 2017.

28:29

This is actually an organized group of rich

28:31

Republican donors who meet twice a year. That

28:34

spring, they were in Washington, D.C. And

28:37

Leonard Leo arranged a private meeting with Clarence

28:39

Thomas inside the court. Afterwards,

28:42

the donors, including Paul Singer, were

28:44

treated to a gala dinner inside the Library

28:47

of Congress, which is a beautiful, historic

28:49

building right next door.

28:51

A year and a half later, this person

28:53

said, when Brett Kavanaugh's Supreme

28:55

Court nomination was running into trouble, Leo

28:58

turned to the group of wealthy donors to

29:00

raise money for an ad campaign

29:02

to counter all the negative press.

29:04

Leonard Leo acknowledged the meeting

29:06

with Thomas at the Supreme Court.

29:08

In an email, he said some of the people

29:10

in the group were not his donors.

29:12

Quote,

29:13

But they are thought leaders who should

29:15

know

29:15

more about the Constitution and the rule of law.

29:18

I was happy to arrange for them to hear

29:20

about these topics from one of the best

29:22

teachers on that I

29:23

know, Clarence Thomas. Coming

29:28

up,

29:29

what Leo did when Congress

29:31

passed a law that one of his donors

29:34

hated.

29:34

This is on the media.

29:47

This is on the media. I'm Brooke Gladstone.

29:49

With more of our series,

29:51

we don't talk about

29:53

Leonard. For the break,

29:55

we learned how Leonard Leo used his closeness

29:58

to some Supreme Court justices. to cultivate

30:01

big donors like billionaire Paul

30:03

Singer and how Leo promoted

30:06

legal talent like Lawrence Van

30:08

Dyke. Those two

30:10

streams, Donor Money and

30:12

Legal Firepower, joined forces

30:15

about a decade ago. Singer was

30:17

angry about policies made in Washington.

30:20

Leo activated his network in the States

30:22

against those policies.

30:26

Here's how it happens. You

30:29

remember the financial meltdown of 2008? Shock

30:32

and panic, evidence on the faces of

30:34

those on the trading floor. In response,

30:36

there was an overhaul of banking rules designed

30:38

to prevent another crisis. These reforms

30:40

represent the strongest

30:43

consumer financial protections in

30:45

history. The new laws spurred a powerful,

30:48

long-lasting counter-reaction. The

30:50

Tea Party, forged in frustration,

30:52

fed up and fighting mad. The

30:55

Tea Party movement embodied the popular outcry,

30:58

but a more targeted campaign came from

31:00

people like Paul Singer. Did

31:02

Dodd-Frank create a safer

31:04

system? No. He created a more

31:06

brittle system. Here he is in 2011.

31:10

Singer chops and pinches the air with

31:12

precision. He rarely cracks a joke.

31:15

He assumes his Federalist society audience knows

31:17

exactly what he's talking about, as he delivers

31:20

a broadside against new powers granted

31:22

to regulators, including the FDIC,

31:25

to dissolve financial institutions on the

31:27

brink of failure. That's

31:29

called Orderly Liquidation Authority.

31:31

Singer uses the acronym, OLA.

31:34

The FDIC can seize companies

31:37

that are in danger of default, not which

31:39

have defaulted. The whole process

31:41

of throwing a company into the OLA

31:44

is very truncated, a day or two. It's

31:46

really unreviewable because of that truncation.

31:49

Before the financial crisis, Singer warned

31:51

about the risks of subprime mortgages. Now

31:54

he says the danger is bad regulation.

32:00

authority will do is create

32:03

a much more intense and

32:05

powerful effect than even 2008 a

32:08

black hole in the next crisis. I do

32:10

not look forward to if and when

32:12

this procedure is

32:15

contemplated or thought to be

32:17

on the horizon. That was

32:19

in late 2011. Singer didn't just

32:22

give speeches. In 2012

32:23

he and Leonard Leo

32:25

scheduled a conference call with the then

32:28

Attorney General of Texas Greg Abbott. He's

32:30

now the governor. Leo actually had

32:32

three meetings on the calendar with Abbott in

32:34

the space of just a few months. One

32:37

of them was described as phone call

32:39

Dodd-Frank issue.

32:41

We know all this from records obtained by the group accountable

32:44

by US. A small Texas

32:46

bank sued to block the Dodd-Frank law.

32:49

Their lawyers were also invited. Not

32:52

long after Texas joined this

32:54

small banks lawsuit as a co-plaintiff.

32:56

Ten other Republican H.E.s went along as

32:59

well. They also added a new

33:01

argument. Orderly liquidation

33:03

authority Paul Singer's bugaboo. They

33:05

said it violated the Constitution on multiple

33:08

points including separation of powers

33:10

and the Fifth Amendment which guarantees due process.

33:14

One of the states that joined the suit was Montana

33:17

which meant Solicitor General Lawrence

33:19

Van Dyke became one of the lawyers on the case.

33:23

A person with knowledge told us that before

33:25

Montana joined Leonard Leo called

33:27

Attorney General Tim Fox. The

33:29

person who worked for Fox was emphatic

33:32

that Montana would not have joined the challenge

33:34

to new banking law without Leo's

33:37

push.

33:42

Fox went on the radio and said it was about standing

33:45

up for Main Street. What we're seeking to do

33:47

is protect Montana's interests and

33:49

the little guy in all of this you know that

33:52

Dodd-Frank bill came out of Congress

33:54

as a reaction to the 2008 financial

33:57

crisis and many have called

33:59

it an overreach of the federal government.

34:02

Others did not see it that way. One

34:04

Republican AG who didn't join the case told

34:06

us it wasn't critical to his state's

34:09

interests. A high-ranking person in Texas

34:11

said, Greg Abbott's office told us they

34:14

didn't believe the suit was well-founded and thought

34:16

it would likely fail. Other

34:18

parts of Leo's network did get active,

34:20

though. In its annual tax return, the

34:22

Judicial Crisis Network reported spending money

34:25

on media, quote, surrounding the filing

34:27

of a lawsuit over the Dodd-Frank law.

34:29

When Indiana's Republican Attorney

34:32

General did not sign on to this lawsuit,

34:34

the Washington Times ran an opinion piece

34:37

by J.C.N.'s Policy Council speculating

34:40

that Indiana's AG may have been

34:42

motivated by, quote, strong alliances

34:45

with Wall Street banks.

34:47

In 2015, the skeptics of this lawsuit

34:49

were proven right.

34:51

A federal judge tossed the challenge to

34:53

orderly liquidation authority, and

34:55

the AGs dropped out of the case. It

34:57

was a law. But consider

35:00

this. The chief legal officers

35:02

of 11 states, and we know states make

35:04

great plaintiffs, opposed a law

35:06

that a billionaire Federalist Society donor

35:09

despised. The argument against

35:11

orderly liquidation authority was considered

35:14

by a federal appeals court, the last

35:16

stop before the Supreme Court. Paul

35:19

Singer did not respond to our questions

35:21

about this. Greg Abbott, the former attorney

35:23

general and current governor of Texas, did

35:26

not respond to a request for comment. Former

35:28

Montana Attorney General Tim Fox declined

35:31

an interview. Leonard Leo wrote in

35:33

response to our questions that he favored

35:35

a challenge to an agency created by the Dodd-Frank

35:37

law, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau,

35:40

quote, because the CFPB violated

35:42

the separation of powers and the checks and balances

35:45

set forth in the Constitution. He

35:48

told us he didn't remember a phone call with Texas

35:50

AG Greg Abbott and Paul Singer. And

35:53

he didn't remember calling Tim Fox to urge

35:55

him to join the suit. A call to former

35:57

aide to Fox to ask about Leo's role in

35:59

the lawsuit. setting policy in that office.

36:02

He declined to go on the record, but before

36:04

hanging up on me, he whispered two

36:06

words. Puppet master.

36:12

By the time the D.C. Court of Appeals denies 11

36:15

states' challenge to orderly liquidation authority,

36:17

the political wins have shifted dramatically.

36:20

Donald Trump is running for president.

36:22

He's well ahead in the race for the Republican

36:25

nomination in February of 2016, when

36:28

Justice Antonin Scalia dies of a heart attack

36:30

while on a quail-hunting trip in Texas. President

36:34

Obama picks what he regards as a safe

36:36

choice, confirmable even for some

36:38

Republicans.

36:39

Today, I am nominating Chief Judge

36:41

Merrick Bryan Garland to join

36:44

the Supreme Court. The

36:46

O's Judicial Crisis Network responds by pouring

36:48

money into radio and television ads attacking

36:51

Garland. Like the ads to support

36:53

Alito and Roberts they ran a decade earlier,

36:55

these messages are meant to define the debate

36:58

before it begins.

36:59

Obama and his liberal allies have been working

37:02

hard to paint Garland as a moderate

37:03

for the Supreme Court. But

37:05

there is no painting over the truth.

37:08

Garland would be the tie-breaking vote for Obama's

37:10

big

37:10

government liberalism.

37:12

The Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms?

37:15

Gutted. Partial birth

37:16

abortion? Legalized.

37:19

The Senate Majority Leader, Mitch McConnell, refuses

37:21

to hold a vote. The next president will

37:24

be making this choice. The people will

37:26

decide who should be the

37:28

appointing authority. So, no, he will not

37:31

be considered by the Senate.

37:34

A decade earlier, Leonard Leo

37:36

sharply attacked the Missouri plan, a

37:38

system for selecting state court judges in

37:40

a nonpartisan way. That effort

37:42

failed. This time, the strong

37:45

army, the willingness to blow up norms

37:47

to achieve goals,

37:49

it succeeds. The choice of the

37:51

next Supreme Court justice will fall not

37:53

to the current president,

37:55

but to the next one.

37:57

With his unloyally racist rhetoric,

37:59

candidate... A lot of people

38:01

in the conservative legal crowd are uncomfortable.

38:04

But Leonard Leo meets with Donald Trump.

38:06

As something happens, Trump emerges

38:09

from that meeting with a list. A

38:11

list of judges he says he will draw from in

38:13

appointing the next Supreme Court justice.

38:16

He brags about it, like he himself has

38:18

just been credentialed. In a way

38:20

he has. And I'm appointing, you know, you

38:22

saw the 11 names I gave, and we're

38:25

going to have great judges, conservative, all picked

38:27

by federalist society. Like this

38:29

list, Leonard Leo, who for so long

38:31

stayed out of the spotlight, becomes a

38:33

character of interest to the news media. And

38:36

he gives interviews. Joining me now, Leonard Leo,

38:39

attorney, judicial adviser to the president.

38:41

Leonard Leo, welcome to Firing

38:43

Line. There's sort of no, you know,

38:45

pulling the wool over the American people's eyes. President

38:48

Trump was quite straightforward. Leonard Leo, can

38:50

you share with us how this list came about and

38:52

how you decide who should make the list?

38:54

Well, the list was the president's idea. I

38:56

told him that no one had ever done it before,

38:59

but it was. I think Leonard Leo made

39:01

a calculated

39:02

choice to come

39:04

out in front

39:05

of this issue in 2016.

39:07

Pomona College Law professor Amanda Hollis-Bruskey

39:10

is the author of a book about the Federalist Society

39:13

titled Ideas with Consequences.

39:15

And I think that

39:18

choice reflects what

39:20

he and other members on the conservative side

39:22

thought was a fork

39:25

in the road

39:26

where if Hillary had won that election and

39:28

filled that Supreme Court seat, we end

39:31

up with perhaps the most progressive court since

39:33

the Warren group. And this kind

39:35

of catastrophic thinking led

39:38

Leonard Leo to make

39:41

the calculation that he would get

39:43

out in front of it because it would benefit

39:46

Trump to have folks who would

39:49

otherwise be never-Trumpers see

39:52

him standing alongside

39:53

the president and know that

39:55

they were voting for the courts.

39:59

Trump himself is sick. the list of judges

40:01

helped him win the presidency, but

40:03

it made some Federalist society insiders

40:05

queasy.

40:06

I saw the repeated

40:09

references to the Federalist society

40:12

list as a kind of existential

40:15

threat to the organization. Andrew

40:18

Redleaf goes way back with the founders

40:20

of the Federalist society.

40:21

They were his close friends in college. I

40:24

mean, that became sort of my primary

40:26

social circle at Yale. Andrew

40:30

Redleaf went on to a successful career

40:32

in finance. In a typical year, he might donate $100,000

40:34

to the Federalist society with

40:37

his wife, Lynn. Sometimes they'd give as much

40:39

as $300,000. You

40:41

can see Redleaf's name right there with Paul Singers

40:44

in the annual list of top donors.

40:47

In 2016, Lynn and Andrew Redleaf

40:49

are seriously questioning their philanthropic

40:52

choices. I was an original

40:55

Never Trumper. So when

40:57

Trump comes out with the list, the Redleafs

40:59

are horrified. Redleaf makes

41:01

a dinner date to see the president of the Federalist

41:04

society, Eugene Meyer, who happens to

41:06

be an old friend. And I suggested

41:08

that they really needed

41:10

to treat this as a PR crisis. And

41:14

I strongly suggested that

41:17

Leonard couldn't really come back. Redleaf

41:20

even offers help in hiring a crisis

41:22

PR specialist to distance the

41:24

Federalist society from Leo's support of Trump.

41:27

The

41:28

Federalist society do not do this. I

41:31

suspect that a significant portion

41:33

of their support now wants them

41:36

to be the organization that

41:38

advocates for the confirmation

41:40

of conservative judges or that

41:43

that's staffing for various

41:46

agencies. And I

41:48

think a significant portion of

41:51

their base is there because

41:53

of Leonard. Redleaf asks that

41:56

his name be removed from the Federalist society

41:58

board of visitors.

42:00

the Federalist Society did not respond

42:02

to our questions. Leonard Leo

42:04

told us in a statement, the Federalist Society

42:07

today is larger, more well-funded,

42:10

and more relied upon by the media and thought

42:12

leaders than ever before, adding,

42:14

quote, so much for Mr. Redleaf's existential

42:17

threat.

42:18

Leonard Leo did sort of step away

42:21

from the Federalist Society to advise President

42:23

Trump.

42:24

Amanda Hollis-Bruskey calls this move

42:27

a Jedi Mind Trick.

42:28

And the Jedi Mind Trick is that

42:31

we're all supposed to believe that he is on leave

42:33

from the Federalist Society and that that is meaningful

42:35

in some way. It means he's not acting

42:39

on behalf of the Federalist Society. It means he is

42:41

not making decisions

42:43

that are consistent with the Federalist Society's

42:46

agenda, principles, and priorities.

42:49

But because we're not subject to

42:51

the Jedi Mind Control, we

42:54

can look with our eyes and see that that's exactly

42:56

what he's

42:56

doing. Leonard Leo, thank you for being

42:59

here. We had a list that you worked on very hard.

43:01

Leo never takes a formal role with the

43:03

Trump administration, but he makes his mark

43:05

early. Even before Trump is sworn

43:08

in, in December 2016, Leo

43:10

sounds out a judge on the Tenth Circuit Court

43:12

of Appeals, Neil Gorsuch, to fill

43:14

the vacant seat on the Supreme Court. He

43:16

was on candidate Trump's second list of possible

43:19

justices. Gorsuch wrote in his

43:21

Senate questionnaire, on about December 2nd, 2016,

43:24

I was contacted by Leonard Leo, who was

43:26

working with the President-elect transition team

43:29

regarding the Supreme Court vacancy. I

43:31

had additional follow-up communications with Mr.

43:33

Leo shortly thereafter.

43:36

After being tapped by Leo, Gorsuch

43:38

is interviewed by incoming White House counsel,

43:41

Don McGahn, who himself is a longtime

43:43

Federalist Society member. Then

43:45

he's nominated and confirmed to

43:48

a lifetime seat on the High Court by the

43:50

Senate.

43:51

The pattern repeats. Leo is influencing

43:53

not only Supreme Court nominations,

43:56

but also the choices for federal judges at

43:58

all levels.

43:59

By the end of 2016,

43:59

In 2020, Trump has appointed 28% of

44:03

all sitting federal judges. More than

44:05

half of these new judges are Federalist

44:07

Society members. President Trump began

44:10

his term having to fill 150 vacancies in the

44:12

federal courts. The

44:14

Senate confirming its 200th judge

44:16

of the Trump administration.

44:17

There has been one constant in

44:20

the Trump administration. A steady

44:22

stream of the president's judicial nominees

44:24

to federal courts from one end of the country

44:27

to the other.

44:27

You know what I got in? We

44:30

had over 100 federal

44:32

judges that weren't appointed. I don't

44:35

know why Obama left that. It was

44:37

like a big beautiful president to all of us. Why

44:39

the hell did he leave that? In 2019,

44:42

Trump makes yet another nomination

44:44

to the federal bench. Thank you Chairman Graham,

44:47

Ranking Member Feinstein and committee members. The

44:49

former Solicitor General of Nevada and Montana,

44:52

bobblehead owner Lawrence Van Dyke. I'm

44:55

deeply honored and grateful to be before this committee

44:57

today. And I want to thank the president

44:59

for the honor of this nomination. His path

45:01

from Montana to here looks like this.

45:04

After complaining that he didn't have enough say over

45:06

what cases to take, Van Dyke quit

45:08

his Solicitor job to run for state Supreme

45:10

Court. Hi, I'm Lawrence Van Dyke and I'm

45:12

running for the Montana Supreme Court. You know,

45:15

most Montanans are understandably fed up with

45:17

an overreaching federal government. The

45:20

Federalist Society hosted the only public forum

45:22

for candidates. Dark money poured into

45:24

the race. Van Dyke lost. But

45:28

he wasn't out of work for long. Leo

45:30

made at least one call to an AG.

45:32

Van Dyke soon became Solicitor General

45:34

in Nevada. There, Van Dyke gets a

45:36

court injunction to block expanded overtime

45:39

pay. He joins a friend of the court briefs on

45:41

supporting religion in the public square and

45:43

against greenhouse gas regulation.

45:46

Much more than in Montana, Van Dyke

45:48

is simpatico with Nevada's conservative

45:50

AG. One former colleague told us Van

45:52

Dyke could have done what he did in Nevada in

45:54

any state with an attorney general who

45:57

happened to want to push a Federalist

45:59

Society.

45:59

agenda. When

46:02

that job ends, Van Dyke goes to the Department

46:04

of Justice briefly in the Environment

46:06

and Natural Resources Division where

46:08

he defends Trump policies undoing

46:10

earlier efforts to limit the emissions

46:12

that caused climate change. This

46:15

is his job when President Trump nominates

46:17

him to the federal bench. To the Senate

46:19

Judiciary Committee, Van Dyke presents

46:21

himself as a Westerner and a bit of an outsider.

46:24

I followed in my father's footsteps and got degrees

46:26

in engineering and management and worked in the family business.

46:29

And it was only later in life, after Cheryl and I

46:31

had children, that we made the momentous decision

46:34

to drive a U-Haul clear across the United States

46:36

to attend Harvard Law School. What

46:38

a culture shock for a family from the rural west.

46:41

He's confirmed the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.

46:43

Thank you all. Congratulations and that will conclude

46:46

the hearing. Once on the bench, Van Dyke

46:48

quickly gets a reputation for abrasiveness.

46:50

The New Republic calls him the rude

46:52

Trump judge who's writing, the most bonkers

46:55

opinions in America. In

46:57

one COVID lockdown case, Van Dyke opines

46:59

that in a crisis, access to guns can

47:01

be considered a, quote, strong moral

47:04

check on government power. I kind

47:06

of thought when I became a judge, you know, the days of

47:08

advocacy are over.

47:10

Lawrence Van Dyke on the podcast, Regulatory

47:13

Oversight. But there's several things

47:15

in our court that I think actually means that your

47:18

days of advocacy are not over when you become a judge,

47:20

at least on the Ninth Circuit. Like, do you think this case is wrong

47:22

and you're trying to convince your colleagues of that? So

47:24

to accept people out there like, you know, I would

47:26

try to become a judge, but I just enjoy advocacy

47:29

too much. Well,

47:29

come to the Ninth Circuit.

47:31

In September of 2020, President

47:33

Trump releases a new list of possible

47:35

nominees for the U.S. Supreme Court. It's

47:38

his fourth. Our chairs' rights are

47:40

at risk, including the right

47:42

to life and our great Second Amendment.

47:45

It's now the height of the presidential race. So

47:47

each of these names is a kind of campaign promise.

47:50

The 20 additions I am announcing

47:52

today would be jurists in the mold,

47:55

Justices Antonin Scalia,

47:58

Clarence Thomas, and Samuel

48:01

Alito.

48:02

Their names are as follows.

48:06

Bridget Bady

48:09

of Arizona, judge

48:11

on the Ninth Circuit... By the time Trump comes to the

48:13

end of the alphabet, more than a third of the

48:15

names are alumni of state attorney general

48:18

offices. Lawrence Van Dyke

48:20

of Nevada, judge on

48:22

the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.

48:25

Lawrence Van Dyke had been a federal judge for

48:27

all of nine months. Now he was being

48:29

talked about for the United States Supreme

48:31

Court. And the first thing I thought was, well,

48:34

I thought of Leonard Leo bobblehead and

48:36

Leonard Leo. Mike Black, Leo's

48:39

law school classmate and colleague of Lawrence

48:41

Van Dyke in the Montana attorney general's office.

48:43

You don't end up on that list

48:45

of potential Supreme Court

48:47

justices put out by President Trump

48:50

without Leonard Leo's blessing. Given

48:53

the position that Lawrence is in, I

48:56

mean, it's deductive reasoning. I

48:58

mean, he got on that list because of Leonard.

49:07

Next week, Leonard Leo moves

49:10

his family to an idyllic coastal

49:12

village in Maine, where his vision

49:14

for American society collides

49:17

with American society. He was

49:19

writing your name on the sidewalk as

49:21

you were jogging by. Yes, yes,

49:24

again, how completely surreal

49:26

is that? That's next week in

49:28

the final episode of We Don't

49:30

Talk About Leonard.

49:34

This series is reported by Andrea

49:36

Bernstein, Andy Kroll and Ilya

49:38

Merritts and edited by OTM

49:41

executive producer, Katja Rogers

49:43

and ProPublica's, Jesse Isengar.

49:45

Molly Rosen is the lead producer

49:48

with help from Sean Merchant. Jennifer

49:50

Munson is our technical director. Jared

49:53

Paul wrote and recorded all the original

49:55

music. Our fact checkers are Andrea

49:57

Marks

49:57

and Hannah Murphy-Winter.

49:59

We'd like to say some thank yous to people who helped

50:02

us to report this series. Anjanette

50:04

Damon, Lynn Dombek, Doris Burke, Justin

50:06

Elliott, Josh Kaplan, Alex Meyer-Jeski,

50:09

Ken Schwanky, John Adams, Mara Silvers,

50:12

David Armiac in the Center for Media and Democracy,

50:15

the Campaign for Accountability, Accountable.us,

50:18

and many, many people from the world Leonard

50:21

Leo has moved in who didn't wish to be

50:23

named. Tracy Weber is the managing

50:25

editor, and Steve Engelberg is the editor-in-chief

50:28

of ProPublica, I'm Ilya Mair.

50:30

And I'm Brooke Jackson.