Legal AF by MeidasTouch - Trump GETS CRUSHED by Jack Smith with NEW CHARGES and MORE TO COME

Episode Date: July 30, 2023

Anchored by MT founder and civil rights lawyer, Ben Meiselas and national trial lawyer and strategist, Michael Popok, the top-rated news analysis podcast Legal AF is back for another hard-hitting look... at the most consequential developments at the intersection of law and politics. On this weekend’s edition the anchors discuss: 1. The new Mar a Lago indictment indicating new insider testimony and evidence against Trump including allegations that he gave the order to delete surveillance video to hide his tracks regarding the espionage act violations, and that the DOJ has in its possession the “Iranian war document” Trump showed a group at Bedminster Golf Club; 2. a meeting between Jack Smith and Trump’s criminal defense team before the next indictment; 3. New evidence of the criminal mind of Trump developed by Jack Smith’s team as they move toward their next indictment; 4. Rudy Giuliani’s bizarre rantings about not cooperating with Jack Smith while taking steps to settle his defamation case brought by two Fulton county election workers; 5. A new attempt by a young lawyer for Trump to have a Florida federal judge reverse his decision to sanction Trump and Habba $1 million dollars citing the “Durham Report,” 6  Another Trump Florida federal judge, dismissing his case against CNN for defamation “with prejudice” and so much more. DEALS FROM OUR SPONSORS! LIQUID IV: Get 20% off when you go to https://Liquid-IV.com and use code LEGALAF at checkout! EIGHT SLEEP: Go to https://eightsleep.com/legalaf and save $150 on the Pod Cover! NOM NOM: Go Right Now for 50% off your no-risk two week trial at https://TryNom.com/LEGALAF SUPPORT THE SHOW: Shop NEW LEGAL AF Merch at: https://store.meidastouch.com Join us on Patreon: https://patreon.com/meidastouch Remember to subscribe to ALL the Meidas Media Podcasts: MeidasTouch: https://pod.link/1510240831 Legal AF: https://pod.link/1580828595 The PoliticsGirl Podcast: https://pod.link/1595408601 The Influence Continuum: https://pod.link/1603773245 Kremlin File: https://pod.link/1575837599 Mea Culpa with Michael Cohen: https://pod.link/1530639447 The Weekend Show: https://pod.link/1612691018 The Tony Michaels Podcast: https://pod.link/1561049560 American Psyop: https://pod.link/1652143101 Burn the Boats: https://pod.link/1485464343 Majority 54: https://pod.link/1309354521 Political Beatdown: https://pod.link/1669634407 Lights On with Jessica Denson: https://pod.link/1676844320 MAGA Uncovered: https://pod.link/1690214260 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Starting point is 00:00:00 With all eyes on Washington DC last week to see what the grand jury was going to do, and as Trump's lawyers met with special counsel Jack Smith as the indictment against Donald Trump for the insurrection and other criminal conduct relating to the 2020 election is imminent a bombhell dropped. Special counsel Jack Smith brought a super-seating indictment against Donald Trump, his co-defendant Walteen Nauta, and a new co-defendant, Carlos De Olivaria, the head of maintenance at Mar-a-Lago regarding the theft of the thousands of government records. The new charges relate to a conspiracy to destroy surveillance footage at Mar-a-Lago to try
Starting point is 00:00:55 to cover up the fact that Donald Trump was keeping these classified and other national defense information. We will break down this superseding indictment. And as I just mentioned, an indictment against Donald Trump for criminal conduct relating to the 2020 election is imminent. It could have happened as early as last week, that same time that we talked about
Starting point is 00:01:19 the superseding indictment breaking. That's when we thought the other indictment is breaking. When I say imminent, I mean, and I wanna to get your take, Pope, Ockin a little bit, any day now, I think we're going to have a breaking news story on the Midas Touch network. That Donald Trump has been charged with hundreds of criminal counts relating to his conduct in 2020. Let's discuss the meeting that Trump's lawyers had with special counsel, Jack Smith. Let's talk about some of the remaining pieces of key evidence that special counsel, Jack Smith. God has he concluded the criminal investigation like former top DOJ Trump official testimony,
Starting point is 00:01:59 testimony about an unreported February 2020 meeting and other key testimony. We will break that all down. Also, Rudy Giuliani, Donald Trump's lawyer embroiled in the 2020 election interference case by Trump also just filed a declaration in federal court in Washington, D.C. In the defamation case brought against him by Georgia election workers, Ruby Freeman and Shea Moss in this declaration. Rudy Giuliani admits to liability. He admits that he defamed Ruby Freeman and Shea Moss. It breaks down each and every element of a defamation case in this declaration.
Starting point is 00:02:43 So why did Rudy Giuliani file this declaration? And why is he now claiming that he didn't say what he said in the declaration? Well, that last question is probably obvious because Giuliani is a complete and total liar, but stick around and we'll break down the former for you and its implications. And finally, in Trump frivolous and vexatious litigation news, I guess that's every single week at this point, Donald Trump had a second year lawyer or a year and a half lawyer file a motion to reopen the case in the Southern District of Florida where a federal judge had already sanctioned Donald Trump and Alina Habba close to $1 million. Y'all remember this case?
Starting point is 00:03:34 That's this purported Rico case that Trump filed against Hillary Clinton and 30 other individuals alleging that they all framed him for the investigation into his connections with Russia. Remember how the federal judge said that the complaint Donald Trump filed was basically like cut and paced, ranting and ravings of a madman said every single claim was frivolous and even suggested that Alina Habas should be disciplined by the state bar for filing such a vexatious case. Yes, that case. So Trump had this second year lawyer try to reopen the case, file a motion to reopen the case arguing that the John Durham report, which essentially made no
Starting point is 00:04:22 recommendations at all. John Durham is the special counsel appointed by Bill Barr who went over to in the trials that he brought in connection with his failed investigation. That somehow that report provides new evidence to reopen the case. Oh my gosh, Popoq, this second year associate just threw away his career and then some breaking news the earlier in the day, a Trump appointed judge in the Southern District of Florida, also just dismissed Donald Trump's $475 million defamation case against CNN, where Trump said that when CNN referred to his conduct as the big lie, that was defamation. No says the federal judge, that Trump appointed
Starting point is 00:05:08 will break all of this down. We've got a big legal AF today and starting with this superseding indictment, Michael Popak, Busy Week, Busy Week. Busy Week, photos, texts, video clips, at least four insiders testifying against Donald Trump in a really, really important timeline. Put her all together in a pot of jambalaya. You come out with a superseding indictment, and you and I can't wait to unpack it for our audience. So if you've been watching Legal AF, which think all the Legalifers have been here, although there's some people new to legal AF
Starting point is 00:05:49 We've been following Carlos Dale LaVaria, this maintenance worker, his conduct, his Conversations with the grand jury obviously we could only speculate what they were because of grand jury secrecy But we've been talking about Carlos Deoliveria, right? So for the legal a efforts, that name, this head of maintenance at Mar-a-Lago is not a shocker, right? We also talked about other individuals, like we get granular here, right, Popeyes? So we talk about usal-tavaris, who is identified only by the Nomenclature employee number four in the superseding indictment here as well.
Starting point is 00:06:32 And Yusselt-Varis is the head of IT. And so on the last legal AF and the legal AF before that one of the things that you and I were speculating was not if there was going to be a superseding indictment. It was really, who's cooperating and who isn't? And you and I really broke down that we thought ultimately usalt to veris the head of IT was the cooperating witness and that Carlos De Oliveira was the likely target. And, you know, the only thing that I think was surprising to us
Starting point is 00:07:04 is that it probably wasn't all that surprising. We were focused on, was Trump going to be indicted in Washington, DC for his conduct relating to the 2020 election. And when I heard that the magistrate had basically the magistrate judge in DC, who would be responsible for the arrangement and kind of proceedings after charges are brought had had packed up for the day. I thought that I could pack up for the day. And so for a 30 minute period of the whole day from doing breaking news hits, I had to drive somewhere to pick something up.
Starting point is 00:07:36 And I said, I'm good. I'm good. And within about 25 minutes of the drive, I get a call from my younger brother, Brett. He's like, did you hear? Did you hear? I said, what happened? He goes, they brought a superseding indictment. So now I'm in the car. I'm not near, you know, where I would normally do the hot takes. I don't have my mic because I've left for, you know, 20 minutes of my day.
Starting point is 00:07:59 That's how much breaking news is happening. How dare you? How dare you? Fortunately, I found a studio nearby, you studio nearby after making a few phone calls. So, it was a new background. You and I were able to do the hot take on it. But break, break down, Popak, the superseding indictment. What are the new key allegations about the destruction of this surveillance footage, the new co-defendant here. And also, if you can flesh out too, there's that new allegation as well or new additional information regarding when Trump was showing that classified material to the individuals
Starting point is 00:08:36 in July of 2021. In the initial indictment, right, it talked about that it didn't mention specifically what he was showing them. So then Trump went out and lied. It said, I was just showing them magazines and papers. But now in count 32 and in the allegation, it's clear that these were the war plans. So how big is that? Break it all down for us. Yeah, huge. Whether, whether changing oxygen sucking, new indictment, there's a reason that prosecutors wait until they have all their ducks in a row to go back in front of a grand jury and ask them to do an amended one in there. Molly Michaels, who is the long time right hand assistant for Donald Trump and her involvement and her being mentioned as employee number two, Trump employee number two
Starting point is 00:09:38 in the indictment. I will talk about her as well. There's a number of different ways that you can explode and do an explode or explain her about the new indictment and you and I did it on a hot take. But one way to do it is with the timeline. And the timeline has a momentum and a power of its own. And it gives you an idea of how how Jack Smith both developed the new information for the indictment, knows that he has Donald Trump by the short hairs or other anatomical parts,
Starting point is 00:10:08 and is ready to go to trial on this case. And again, we're just seeing the tip of the iceberg of the weight of the evidence that will ultimately be presented because you don't have to put everything in an indictment. And of course, Jack Smith hasn't, but what he has is mind blowing. Let's do the timeline.
Starting point is 00:10:25 And I'm going to do, there's really two timelines that are important. They intersect, they intersect in one spot. But the two timelines are the ones related to the Department of Justice, finding out that there are surveillance cameras at Mar-a-Lago during a June 3rd of 2022 visit, them subpoenaing them and what Donald Trump did in a conspiracy to delete the evidence obstruct justice after that. And then the Iranian war planning document, which as you said, great in a hot take, Jack Smith laid a trap. And as always, Donald Trump stepped right into it about the existence of the document
Starting point is 00:11:09 because again, common theme, asymmetrical informational warfare between a prosecutor who has it all, witnesses that the defense doesn't even know about, cooperating witnesses, insiders, employees who are telling the truth for dear life to avoid indictment, not lying, as Donald Trump says, telling the truth for dear life. They have all of that arrayed against the individual like Donald Trump who, you know, never can tell the truth and even misleads his own lawyers.
Starting point is 00:11:42 And so there are automatically at a disadvantage because they say X happened and Jack Smith has seven or eight different data points that said that's a lie. And then he just lets him walk into that trap. This is the reason is you so eloquently put it then. Donald, uh, Jack Smith doesn't want to gag Donald Trump. Jack Smith wants Donald Trump to keep going on television and using that those new lies and those new Information against him in indictments and in in court rooms. Let's start with the timeline January of 2022 Don Donald Trump buy himself and without lawyers
Starting point is 00:12:23 Donald Trump by himself and without lawyers sends back 15 boxes to the national archive and says, okay, that's all there is National archive and the Department of Justice knowing that that's a lie from their insider information But we do know from testimony by Molly. We believe by Molly Michael Who's the right hand administrative assistant for Donald Trump? She's the one that went in the White House in the Oval Office. Donald Trump would yell out Molly get blank on the phone for me, right? She's like the Betty Curry for Clinton, if you will. The Rose Lincoln for Nixon or whatever.
Starting point is 00:12:59 Same thing. That's Molly and she was everywhere. She was there on Jan 6th in the Oval Office She she knew a lot of things at Mar-a-Lago She was helping the return of the document. She was texting with the lawyers about getting Donald Trump to pay attention and return the boxes And she gave evidence we believed to Jackson it that completely countered that which the lawyers were telling for Donald Trump We're telling Jackson it which is our guy had no involvement at all with picking out the boxes or the files that went back to the National Archive. That's a lie. Donald Trump personally, because they were his,
Starting point is 00:13:31 their mind, I don't want others searching through them. He went through the boxes. He self-selected the 15. So he's up to his neck in that, which is great for the prosecution. They go back January of 2022. Then the Department of Justice later issues a because they can't get the documents voluntarily back from this guy. They issue a subpoena, they get a subpoena issue, which is ultimately in order of a federal
Starting point is 00:13:58 judge. This is before the search war, we're at the beginning of the summer of 2022. In May 11th, June 3rd, based on notes of Evan Corcoran, the lawyer for Donald Trump, who took 50 pages of copious notes that had been turned over to the Department of Justice. He said that he told Donald Trump you got to return these things. You got to comply with the subpoena. Donald Trump originally did not want to comply with the subpo, he said, why do we have to? And he said, couldn't you also just make some documents disappear? This is an Evan Corcoran's notes. Evan Corcoran then made a fate, fate, fatal mistake. Sorry, a fatal mistake or he did it on purpose, which is he turned
Starting point is 00:14:38 his back on Donald Trump for a full week in May, late May of 2022. And said, I'll be back next week, Mr. President, to go look through that storage room for those confidential documents. Donald Trump heard, I got a week to go hide documents from my own lawyer so he doesn't turn them over to the Department of Justice. And so, starting on the 17th of May, and through the 24th of May, we've got the video of Nowta Walt Nowta moving boxes in and out of the storage room 50 60 at a time bringing them to Donald Trump for his personal review and then returned to the storage room then we've got
Starting point is 00:15:20 June the second the Final gasp of moving the shell game of documents by Donald Trump to keep them away from the department of justice because June third is going to be a meeting with Jay Bratt and his lawyer and he knows it. So he does this last gasp, pulls 30 more boxes out of there through Walt Nowda. Evan Corcoran then goes into a room that he doesn't know has been staged for his arrival and spends 30 minutes looking at documents and comes out with 38 sealed in an envelope and gives them to Jay Bratt, the lawyer for the Department of Justice. Jay Bratt looks around with his team and sees video cameras in and around the storage areas and soon thereafter, in the beginning, at the end of June 22nd of 2022, there's a
Starting point is 00:16:04 new subpoena by the Department of Justice for the camera footage, which leads now to the infamous call in the new indictment, which I now have said, this is the, this is, I assure you, in the history of America, this is the longest call between an ex president and a maintenance worker in history. It's 24 minutes long, Donald Trump took Carlos D. Olivera, his former valet, now head of maintenance. The same guy that flooded the server room with with with the pool at the same place. And on the 24th of June, they have a 24 minute call. We don't know the content of that call as of yet, but on the 25th, Walt Naughtder returns to Mar-a-Lago, has a meeting with D'Alavera and
Starting point is 00:16:46 they start searching for the video cameras with flashlights that it's caught on video, trying to find them. Now to make a phone call to Matt Kalamari, the COO of Trump Organization who's responsible for security about the video cameras, and we already know that because Matt Kalamari testified to Jack Smith. And then on the 27th of June, there's now the thing that's going to hang Donald Trump. When Walt Nada says to Carlos Diolivera, the boss, Donald Trump, wants the server deleted for the video surveillance information.
Starting point is 00:17:20 They bring in a third party witness who's the insider cooperating who is Tavaris who is the IT director who fains ignorance about how to delete a server I assure you the IT director knows how to delete a server because I don't know how to delete a server Which is good that he didn't delete he's cooperating with Jack Smith and that's where a lot of the photos text and other information came from with a boss telling his employees to destroy evidence, is called consciousness of guilt evidence. It's the gold standard platinum standard for a prosecutor because nobody who's innocent does the things Donald Trump is doing like telling his people to delete the server.
Starting point is 00:18:00 Then you have the actual video, less some deleted video turned over at the end of July to the Department of Justice, which leads them in August, August 8 to execute a search warrant, because now they know that Donald Trump is not only lying to them, but he's destroying evidence, threatening to destroy evidence, and they convinced the federal judge to do that. That is, before I talk about Iran, why don't you comment on that, Ben, and then I'll take a break and talk about Iran next.
Starting point is 00:18:31 You know, as I reflect on the timeline that she gave, and I think you broke it down so eloquently and perfectly there, but what I reflect on is the legal counsel representing usal taveiros, representing Carlos De Oliveira, and representing Walteen Nauta, and the people who are representing them are all hired by Donald Trump. Trump's political action arms, which are all being criminally investigated by special counsel, Jack Smith, for money laundering, for wire fraud, for other criminal campaign finance related violations. Those are the entities
Starting point is 00:19:14 that are paying for counsel for Day All of Area, use of Tavares, Waltine, now to... There's such compelling information right there. and and Pope the timeline you constructed is very similar to the one that special counsel Jack Smith conducted and the question is well how do Jack Smith get all this information and it's because that's what the Department of Justice does when they work effectively and that's what the FBI does you know they have cooperating witnesses who voluntarily provide statements about the timeline. And then you have subpoenaed records, cell phone records.
Starting point is 00:19:53 If people aren't being cooperative, you have to issue search warrants to seize information. One of the hot takes you did, Popok, is how in connection with the Mar-a-Lago investigation, there was about seven or eight other search warrants, and that doesn't necessarily mean that they were search warrants on property, that could have been, I mean, the actual land itself like Mar-a-Lago,
Starting point is 00:20:14 it could be search warrants for phones, it could be search warrants for laptops, when people don't voluntarily respond to this subpoena, that's what the action special counsel, Jack Smith had to take now. If, you know, and as well for surveillance footage, uh, subpoena for surveillance footage, and then a search warrant for surveillance footage of stuff isn't being turned over. And so if you were competent counsel and truly independent representing Walty now to, um,
Starting point is 00:20:43 and Carlos D. Olivearia, you would be saying, hey, you need to have a proper session, you need to cooperate, you need to enter a guilty plea, or there's going to be very serious charges against you, or you're going to be charged in the first instance. Now they're going to have to enter a guilty plea. I've been reading a lot on this Carlos day All the very individual I think he's an immigrant from Portugal showed up here You know is one of the first jobs that he ended up getting worked his way up to become you know the head of maintenance at Mar-a-Lago And there are quotes from his family members saying like you know Carlos day all theira is a maintenance worker and doesn't know the
Starting point is 00:21:25 intricacies of the law here, doesn't know anything like that. And he's being represented by lawyers that Trump hand picked. And they're all being walked into this, you know, this criminal conduct. Now, I think at some point, I get your take on this Pope, they're going to wake up, they're going to hire, you know, they're going to fire those lawyers or they're going to figure this situation out that they're in a lot of trouble. Or they're going to keep digging the whole, you know, keep undying the whole bigger here. But that's one of the things that I'm reflecting on as you give that, as you give that timeline. But we could talk about the other portions. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And just on that, I, you that, you and I always see I'd eye on a lot of things.
Starting point is 00:22:07 De Oliveira and I joked with you to chat. I'm not joking. Trump likes to exploit immigrants. Poor Walty Nauta, who came here from Guam, petty officer in the Navy and looked at his entire reputation and career is laying in tatters in the history books as well. De Oliveira. These are the very fine people that Donald Trump likes. a career is laying in tatters in the history books as well. They all are Vera. You know, these are the very fine people that Donald Trump likes the signal that he protects. DeLavera, just to show the continued conspiracy, as soon as the search warrant was executed,
Starting point is 00:22:36 the kind of holy shit moment for Donald Trump, wow, I got FBI agents pounding down the door here in August. I guess all my attempts to play cat and mouse with the Department of Justice and spoon feed them documents and not turn them all over has gone slightly awry. He then had Susan Wiles, part of his pack, reach out on a DM platform, which Jack Smith has a copy of, and say to him, hey, classic mafia speak organized crime speak, the big guy or whatever he said, the boss wants to just check to make sure Carlos is loyal and let Carlos know
Starting point is 00:23:13 we're gonna get him a lawyer. So now Carlos, right, there's a search warrant executed. Now Carlos, the maintenance guy's got to get a lawyer paid for by Trump. Why is that? Because Donald Trump knows what Carlos St. Olivera did or tried to do at his behest. And that's another conscious to see a consciousness of guilt. Now, the Iranian war documents is another TikTok timeline.
Starting point is 00:23:39 But there's an overlap I said at the beginning. And that is remember that date of January 2022, Donald Trump on his own without keeping an inventory apparently. And without lawyers involved, sends 15 boxes back to the Department of Justice. I mean to the National Archive. In that box was the Iranian war document that he claims he never had, never saw, wasn't talking about a real document, and he doesn't know what the Department of Justice is talking about. Hold that in your head. How do we get to the Iranian war document? It starts, as always, with Trump trying to retaliate against somebody. That somebody is General Mark Milley, the chairman then of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who gave an interview that was published in the New Yorker magazine on the 15th of July of 2021
Starting point is 00:24:28 by Susan Glasser, entitled, You're Gonna Have a Fucking War. This is the quote from the New Yorker magazine. Colin, Mark Millie's fight to stop Trump from striking Iran. Donald Trump didn't like that article. And so six days later, literally at Betminster, at his office near a pool, he loves pools and offices.
Starting point is 00:24:49 He had a group of people in his office to talk about Mark Meadows' future memoir, which has its own sweet irony all to itself that Mark Meadows thought people were going to be reading his memoir, and he wasn't going to be in jail. So during that meeting, he starts showing off. We hear the audio because we've heard the audio since the original indictment, in which with a group of people,
Starting point is 00:25:10 including Margot Marks, one of his assistants, the one that kind of looks like Malani, if you're going to look for her on Google, and a writer and an author, he starts pulling out a document and unfurling it in front of the group because you can hear it. And he says, isn't this incredible? This was highly classified.
Starting point is 00:25:27 I could have declassified it when I was president. I can't do it now. But just look, look, it was him, meaning Mark Milley, not me. It was him about Iran. It was him, not me. Isn't this amazing? Look, it's right here. Okay.
Starting point is 00:25:41 That, of course, Jack Smith already has the testimony obviously from the other four people in the room, none of which had top security clearance, of course, as the president clung to this document from the time he left the White House all the way until July of 2021 to pay back Mark Milley for the New Yorker piece. Okay, and he yells for coax in the middle of it. Hey, bring in some coax. Great. Now, Donald Trump then goes on Brett Baer in a town hall
Starting point is 00:26:08 and with Jack Smith sitting there kind of like this for those that are not watching us on video. I'm just sitting here with a Cheshire cat smile for Jack Smith and saying, let's see what he does next. And what he did next was he denied the existence of the document. He says, I don't know what they're talking about. It was a pile of things about Iran, which by the way also translates to national defense information. That's a espionage
Starting point is 00:26:30 act. You know, Popak, one of the things I want to do is I want to actually show. I want to show that video of the interview with Brett Baer to show our audience how incriminating it is and we're going to do that. But first, let's take a quick break. As you know, I'm a trial lawyer and when I'm not breaking down the latest legal filings the day for you on legal AF, I'm jumping from courthouse to meeting to meeting and it can be exhausting and frankly dehydrating. That's why I started using liquid IV. Liquid IV is the number one powdered hydration brand in America and is now available in a sugar-free option. With three times the electrolytes of the leading sports drink, plus eight vitamins and nutrients
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Starting point is 00:30:57 We are back live on legal AF, a special shout out to our sponsors there. I love our sponsors. And by the way, that eight sleep has like revolutionized my sleep. Like I truly mean that. I talk about eight sleep all the time. It tracks my sleeping patterns and it kind of wakes you up right after the REM sleep. So it wakes you up at the perfect time. Anyway, it's great. I could go on and on and on. Okay. But where we last left off, Popoq, you were talking about
Starting point is 00:31:24 that meeting that was that that took place in July of 2021. That's mentioned in the No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, of the joint chiefs, I have Mark Milley like, are I the greatest? Doesn't this make me the winner? That's actually what he is saying. But in the original indictment, what it doesn't specifically say is that those documents are one of the counts that Donald Trump is being charged with, and it doesn't specifically state what those documents are. So Donald Trump, as I mentioned in one of the hot takes,
Starting point is 00:32:03 like walked right into the trap, because clearly you would know if you were represented by competent white collar criminal defense, they would say, do not, this is why you have the right to remain silent. Assume that they have that document and that record. Do not do this. And this is exactly what Donald Trump said when he went on Brett Baer. We're going to play the video right now. Before you run it, before you run it, before you run it, the Department of Justice after hearing that tape before before Donald Trump's denial, subpoenaed
Starting point is 00:32:35 Donald Trump to turn over that document, knowing that they have the document already. That's so good. That's such a good. And wanting to see what this is Jack Smith going. I want to do a special level of torment now on Donald Trump and his lawyers. I'm going to ask him for the document and a subpoena and see what he says. He's going to say no such document. And then we have the interview that's so you you are so right. Jackson it had the document the whole time and then separately sent to subpoena for the document just to screw with Trump and to see how Trump would respond. So good.
Starting point is 00:33:09 I never even thought about it like that. You're so right. You're play this clip of Trump's interview with Brett Baer shortly after the original indictment was brought. Play the clip. I don't want to dwell on it. But according to the indictment, you were here at Bedminster on July 21, 2021, after you're no longer president. And you were recorded saying that you had a document
Starting point is 00:33:29 detailing a plan of attack on another country that was prepared by the US military for you when you were president, the Iran attack plan. You remember that? Ready? You were recorded. It wasn't a document. OK. I had lots of paper. I had copies of newspaper articles.
Starting point is 00:33:43 I had copies of magazines. I know. This is specifically, I had copies of magazines. This is specifically, quote, your quote on the recording saying the document was secret adding that you could have declassified it while you were president. But quote, now I can't. You know this is still secret, highly confidential. And the indictment sites, the recording and the testimony from people in the room saying you showed it to people there that day. So you say on this on Taser, is the opposite. That you can declassify. So why have it?
Starting point is 00:34:08 When I said that I couldn't declassify it now, this because I was in president. I never made any bonds about that. When I'm not president, I can't declassify it. That's what you said. You did say declassify it. I said no, no. I said I couldn't.
Starting point is 00:34:22 I could have declassified it. But that declassified it. There was no document. That was a massive amount of papers and everything else talking about Iran and other things. And it may have been held up or may not. But that was not a document. I didn't have a document per se. There was nothing to declassify.
Starting point is 00:34:38 These were newspaper stories, magazine stories, and articles. I'm just saying what the indictment says. Well, they're reporting and the people in the room who testify. These people are very dishonest people. They're thugs. They're thugs. If you look at what they've done to other people, what they've done, and overturned in the US Supreme Court, these are thugs.
Starting point is 00:34:57 The suggestion was that you wanted this because evidence that the military, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs, General Milley, had preemptively sent you plans for a possible attack on a run and that you didn't order that to happen That's the suggestion I never ordered it to happen. No, but that's why you wanted the document I don't I don't think I've ever seen a document from millie millie frankly was incompetent the last one I'd want to attack with as my leader would be millie that I can tell you But notice there when he's actually hit with the facts, the thing that he does, which he always does,
Starting point is 00:35:27 their thugs incompetent, you know, he just goes right there and their thugs, their liars, they're horrible people, these are disgusting people, but Popoq, you have that interview and then take us through now, the superseding indictment line and count 32. So in the actual, just to unpack the interview for just one second, great job, I prep bear it by the way.
Starting point is 00:35:51 He actually says in a moment of Freudian slip in his own way, telling the truth for a moment in Washington, he said, I may have held it up, I may not have. Well, how do you hold up a document or not if it doesn't exist? So he got tongue tied because when you're not telling the truth, it's hard to put a chromatically proper sentence together. And we're watching Donald Trump there. I don't know if you could see the flop sweat, but I'm sure there was flop sweat because nothing he
Starting point is 00:36:17 was saying was just filled with non-sequiturs and didn't make any sense. I had the right to declassify right, but your point is you hadn't, and you were showing it to other people. Right, I had the right. I mean, it's literally not following the continuity of this thought at all. The reason that that Jack Smith wanted to nail down Donald Trump and issue a subpoena is because he had already located Jack Smith's team in the box of doc 15 box, a cent the national archive by Trump alone without apparently an inventory. I'll tell you why that's important. That means the Trump's lawyers, whoever they are at the particular moment, Parliamentary, Corcoran, Bob, you know, anybody else, they don't know what he sent back. So they can't. It's hard to fight the government when they have the information and you don't
Starting point is 00:37:07 know what your own client sent back. That's where Donald Trump left his lawyers. Not only does he keep them in the dark, take documents away from them, talk to them about conspiracies to commit fraud, but he also doesn't give them the information they need to do their job. And so Jack Smith had already obviously shown the document that they believed to be the Iranian War document to plan two Margot Marx and to the others in the room to confirm, is this it under penalty of perjury? They said, yes, yes, it is, Mr. Smith.
Starting point is 00:37:37 But they wanted to make sure there wasn't another document. So they said, okay, maybe he's got another document. Give us your document. Nope, there's no document. OK, well then we know then. Then the one we showed the witnesses and we've corroborated is actually the war document. And so we then have the new set of allegations. I don't know if you want to put them up on the screen pen. You have them in front of you. Yeah, I mean, the new allegations, it's count 32.
Starting point is 00:38:04 It's on eight, you know, and then so that's really the main one. And it just adds that one kind of piece of it that they've got what the, that they have the record and it has a war plan. It's top secret, no foreign meaning no foreign intelligence. Exactly. It had the hooks, as you said earlier, Ben, the hooks for this count was already embedded, like a ticking time bond against Trump in the earlier indictment. But now, after they ran through this last cycle, including watching him hang himself on television,
Starting point is 00:38:34 they then nailed him in the indictment. And the timing back to timing again, the timing of the superseding indictment is so exquisite for Jack Smith, who, again, I think enjoys his job. Okay. I mean, let's just leave it at that. I mean, he enjoys his job. And so in the morning, when he's busy having the perfunctory audience with Todd Blanche and the new lawyer John Laura, John Laura from from from from yeah, from Tampa in his offices in Washington on the on the moment before what we thought was going to be the indictment later that day. He said okay great.
Starting point is 00:39:11 I had a meeting. Okay. Thank you. What's your presentation? Yeah. Okay. Thank you. We'll get back to you on that one.
Starting point is 00:39:19 He already knew that he was that he had already given the green light to have the superseding indictment. Shot down in Miami. You know that had been returned already. So that filing of that indictment shot down in Miami, you know, that had been returned already. So that filing of that indictment, he did not, I'm sure, tell the lawyers for Donald Trump in that morning meeting. Hey, by the way, you got another, another fish on the barbie there. We're, we're superseding the indictment with new evidence.
Starting point is 00:39:39 But that's, that's, that is what you have to be prepared for. And Donald Trump is not, because he's outmatched and outwitted by Jack Smith and his team, because the evidence is overwhelming, as Ty Cobb, one of his lawyers once said just recently, Ty Cobb said the original indictment was pressure tested to last for 100 years. The new indictment will last until an antiquity. That's the former lawyer for Donald Trump, Ty Coup. So not only do you have, it's hard enough as you and I have been on the defense side
Starting point is 00:40:09 in case it's involving the federal government. I will tell you it is hard enough to box with them when you're basically outmatched in terms of information and asymmetry, but when your client is lying to you and your client is misleading you and your client is not telling you about documents that exist or things that he returns. You're making it almost really impossible for any defense to be mounted for you.
Starting point is 00:40:34 You know, let's talk about that meeting that Donald Trump had kind of right before the superseding indictment hits. You have Trump's now two lead lawyers. You got Todd Blanche and John Loro. Loro is a new lawyer on the team who apparently is only dealing with the issues related to Donald Trump trying to overthrow our democracy, but we'll see there. The interesting thing is that Trump actually has a very competent lawyer. You know, that may upset people to hear that, you know, when I'm calling one of Trump's
Starting point is 00:41:09 lawyers competent, but it's the reality. The last remaining competent lawyer on Trump's team is this Christopher Kice, who is the former solicitor general in Florida. Christopher Kice was given about a $3 million retainer and brought in because of his qualifications, but ultimately Chris Kice doesn't look like he fits the part. He's not out of central casting the way John Laura is. And so Trump's sideline, Christopher Kice, Kice back in September of 2022, wanted to arrange basically a settlement between Trump and Merrick Garland and the DOJ where Trump would admit to taking the documents,
Starting point is 00:41:55 apologize, say it was a misunderstanding, and that was before Special Counsel Jack Smith was appointed. And Christopher Kice's advice was followed and Trump didn't further entrench himself in more criminal conduct and obstruction. There could be a very different situation regarding the criminal case against Donald Trump, regarding the theft of these records and the willful retention of national defense information. But now he's got these blowards. You had John Laura go on
Starting point is 00:42:25 the Fox and all the right wing media and do the thing that they always do with the accordion hands where they just talk about, you know, they gaslight the American people. These are the individuals who met with special counsel Jack Smith there. And at the same time, that meeting took place where special counsel Jack Smith said, get ready and indictment is imminent regarding the case against Donald Trump for trying to overthrow our democracy, January 6th insurrection, all the related crimes there. Additional information was starting to get reported about some other key evidence that special counsel
Starting point is 00:43:05 Jack Smith had developed. A meeting that took place in February of 2020 between Donald Trump and some of his top officials where they were praising the efforts by the Department of Homeland Security and some of the related divisions within the Department of Homeland Security for protecting election integrity and for having the safest and most secure elections ever and Trump wanted to hold a whole press conference where he wanted to take the credit for all of the work that they did to make this the safest and most secure election in history. And then a month later, he basically, you know, realizes, whoa, if I lose this thing, I need to blame them.
Starting point is 00:43:48 So I'm not going to do that, but that meeting is important because it goes to intent. And then also a meeting with a former top DOJ official. So Popeyes, break down these other pieces of evidence that we are now learning about regarding the case that we expect an indictment to hit next week regarding Trump's conduct and overthrowing our democracy. Yeah, and they all go, as you said, Ben, to continuing to build the case for that element
Starting point is 00:44:17 of a crime that every prosecutor, it's what keeps them up at night, proving willfulness, criminal intent, what we call men's raya. And you have to do it through circumstantial evidence because nobody ever admits on tape. I did it. And certainly Donald Trump has come close
Starting point is 00:44:34 to acknowledging that he knew that he lost the election and actually set it out loud to at least Alyssa Farah who was his communication director at the time. But that was the last time he ever said it. And then after that, it was fraud, fraud, fraud, fraud, fraud at every turn, including recently. Like, I can't wait to get into a witness stand. This is what he tells his supporters at rallies.
Starting point is 00:44:55 I can't wait to take the stand and bring all the, you know, and prove, prove wrong while the people that said there was in fraud in the election can't wait. I got news for everybody, whether you, you're going to vote for him or not. He is never taking the stand in any of these cases at all. So that will never happen. But the new evidence that goes to mens rey and criminal intent as they try to answer the
Starting point is 00:45:18 question, where did this guy trump the tracks in terms of claiming fraud. It starts with New testimony about a February 2020 oval office meeting, which again, similar to the Mark Milley, New Yorker article, retaliatory meeting on the Iranian war document, something lit the fuse and the thing that lit the fuse for the meeting to talk about election security in in which Donald Trump crowed about, this is going to be the most secure election ever in history. And I want the FBI and the Homeland Security Director to go to the airwaves and give everybody assurances that unlike in the Hillary days, this is going to be really safe and secure. And then a month later, he's off campaigning against the election in advance saying it's going to be filled with fraud.
Starting point is 00:46:10 Where did that happen? And of course, they can use the evidence of that particular meeting, who obviously was attended. If I had to put together a list of who was there, I would suspect it was Chris Ray, the FBI director, Ken Kuchinelli, the acting director of Homeland Security, Chris Krebs, the cybersecurity head for all things election, the Trump eventually fired because he said exactly that, that the election was fair and integrity was protected and Mark Meadows. So you got that group of which a number of them have already gone in and testified to
Starting point is 00:46:42 the grand jury or are cooperating with Jack Smith. And, but that was in response to a other employee or a to Donald Trump, who had given an interview in which he gave credence to the Russia interference that led to Hillary Clinton's not getting elected. He didn't like that. And so the counter to that was this February 2020 Oval Office meeting, which obviously we have so much detail about it because the other participated participants in it have
Starting point is 00:47:13 all given testimony or a cooperating with Jack Smith. That goes to criminal mind. You said it once it once was fair, what happened? If you really want to go back, talk about timelines for this running, running theme of our legal AF today, go back to 2017 and 2018. That's where Roger Stone invented the concept of stop the steel. They were using stop the steel before Trump beat Hillary Clinton. So I guess they stopped the steal because he won. But they've been saying stop the steal and they were going to use that in any place where the Republican candidate, in this case, Trump was behind in the polls as to try to cast doubt on the election and the integrity of the
Starting point is 00:47:55 election. Hey, they used it in the Republican primary. They use it in the people forget they use it in the 2016 primary when Trump would not win a state You know in some of the earlier states in the primary that that's what they said they said it was rigged And that's what they continued Roger stone is the mastermind is the evil genius behind stop the steel You can look it up He learned his tricks from the best tricky Dick Nixon, Richard Nixon, you work for him. And that's this is that genealogical line that we can trace from one fraudster, president all the way to another one in Donald Trump and with people along the way that helped. Then we have the other meeting that Richard Donaew, who you and I really shouldn't be talking
Starting point is 00:48:39 about in history, I defy you to tell me who the acting deputy attorney general was and any other administration. But we know who they are here because as Donald Trump doesn't get the right answers from his attorney general, as he continues to try to interfere with the election results and cling to power, he fires them. So Bill Barr goes, and even though there's like days left on the clock for the administration, he puts in acting attorney general, Jeff Rosen, and so everybody moves up a notch.
Starting point is 00:49:08 And Richard Donaue becomes the acting deputy attorney general for like the waning days, the mid-December till Jen's, you know, seven at midnight. And that's when things are really going, hey, wire, because now Donald Trump realizes all of his efforts to date have failed, and he's going to have to leave office in 20 days or whatever it is. So he has a meeting that Richard Donnelly takes notes about, and we actually have a picture of the notes because they've been revealed,
Starting point is 00:49:35 and he takes notes. There they are. There's one page of Richard Donnelly's notes. He takes notes about a meeting he had in, with his boss, turning General Jeff Rosen and Donald Trump, in which Donald Trump said to Jeff Rosen, just do me a favor. Have the Department of Justice just declare that there's some sort of fraud that they're investigating in the election. And me and the Republicans in the House will take it from there. Richard Rosen told him, and I'm paraphrasing, no F and way. Are you going to weaponize the Department of Justice and use us that way? That is not happening in Richard Donaue as a good scribe is writing this all down in his notes and
Starting point is 00:50:14 testified. We know Richard wrote, we know that Richard Donaue testified this way because he was one of the key witnesses that we got to see in the Jan 6th Committee, not just in giving interviews with them, but he was actually live and testified live with Adam Kinsinger in the Jan 6th Committee, and which one of my favorite moments is when he told Adam, the representative of Kinsinger, that one of the theories that Donald Trump and Mark Meadows had and was pushing with the Department of Justice is that there were Italian satellites that were flipping votes from Trump to buy using Italian satellites, just like the Venezuelan
Starting point is 00:50:53 software, just like the Chinese, bamboo, written ballots that were being stuffed into boxes, flipping votes. I mean, this is how, you know, as Bill Barr said, it was like playing Wackermall with Donald Trump with all these crazy fraudulent theories, none of which held water, which is why Bill Barr took to the airwaves at one point and said, this was a full and fair election. And there was nothing that there was no fraud to overturn the outcome of the election. There's always fraud in an election. Sorry, there is. There's people that double vote. They vote the mother-in-law's ballot who died. They vote in the wrong precinct. But it doesn't overcome the electoral advantage of a president like Biden who won by seven
Starting point is 00:51:34 million votes or 10,000. By the way, the incidents that we've seen have tended to come from Trump voters. Trump voters, right? They're like, get grandma's ballot. Here we go. Right. So the, but why are we hearing about this stuff now? Karen and I had a little bit of a disagreement on Wednesday. She thinks, Jack Smith is completely leak proof. There's no way this is coming out of his office
Starting point is 00:51:58 and I disagree. We're getting strategic leaking in my view for a reason because it's putting pressure on Donald Trump and his lawyers, and ever changing, and ever changing cast of lawyers, welcome John Loro, fellow Florida bar member. You know, you know, keep an eye on your bar license, my man, because, you know, as one Trump lawyer recently said, it's a suicide mission to represent Donald Trump.
Starting point is 00:52:20 For all the reasons you and I have outlined today and on prior, on prior podcast. So that's sort of where we are. The indictments come in, you and I don't get paid. It's a dime more by getting the date right. We've gotten it wrong more than we've gotten it right, but we got the range right. The question I have for you is based on some photos of barricades going up in Fulton County, Georgia, who do you think is going to, who do you, which horse is coming in first? Fonies or Jack Smith's second indictment?
Starting point is 00:52:50 I think they're going to happen within 48 hours or 72 hours of each other. So I don't know, but I would disagree with you. I don't think we've got it wrong more than we've got. I would say that we, I would, I would put our batting average Pretty high with all of these predictions. Maybe we don't get the exact date, but within Oh, no, I mean that I just mean the trial date. I don't mean anything else as I say on my my profile from one social media Things that I co-anchored the almost never wrong legal I love it But someone who is always wrong, Rudy Giuliani admitting to engaging in defamation.
Starting point is 00:53:28 We'll talk about why he did that in a federal court case brought against him by Georgia election workers. Trump had a second year associate lawyer file what is like a kind of kamikaze legal mission before a federal judge in the Southern District of Florida trying to reopen a case where Trump was already sanctioned almost $1 million for such a frivolous case. And Trump just lost a big CNN defamation case that he brought, we told you, he was going to lose
Starting point is 00:53:59 that case from the outset. And a Trump appoint a judge just ruled that Trump's defamation case is dismissed with prejudice. Let's talk about those final issues after this quick break. Your pets a member of the family, my lily certainly is, don't feed them like they're in the doghouse, give them no-no-m. No-no-m delivers fresh dog food with every portion personalized to your dog's needs, so you
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Starting point is 00:55:17 at trinome.com slash legal AF. Spell trin-n-o-m.com slash legal AF for 50 50% off try gnome dot com slash legal a f. We're back alive on legal a f let's talk about this declaration that Rudy Giuliani filed in a federal defamation case brought against him by Georgia election workers Ruby Freeman and Shea Moss. We've talked a lot about this case on LegalAEP, Giuliani and his co-conspirator Donald Trump made up these incredibly racist, misogynistic, disgusting attacks on these two Georgia election workers. Basically compared them to drug traffickers, implied or outright stated that they have a history of committing crimes
Starting point is 00:56:07 and that they're criminals and that they trafficked and harvested ballots the same way they harvest drugs that was basically the statements that they were making some sick, sick, disgusting, defamatory stuff. A lot of that was played at the January 6th committee hearing where they were both A lot of that was played at the January 6th Committee hearing where they were both witnesses and some of the most compelling testimony there. They ended up filing a defamation lawsuit against OAN and Rudy Giuliani. OAN settled the case. Giuliani we've talked about his failure to turn over documents and records and not participating in discovery and he was sanctioned over 80 or close to $80,000 for his discovery
Starting point is 00:56:50 violations in the case and then the judge basically said hey if you don't turn over these records You're going to be held in contempt and so I think Giuliani probably either assume the records are worse than just stipulating to all of the actual evidence itself or Giuliani destroyed the records. Either way, special counsel Jack Smith had a proper session with Rudy Giuliani. So to be clear, special counsel, Jack Smith has this knowledge, special counsel, Jack Smith knows one way or another and one of the reasons that Giuliani may have agreed to file this declaration as if he already told special counsel Jack Smith these facts they're gonna come out anyway and he doesn't want to
Starting point is 00:57:32 undercut his proper agreement with special counsel Jack Smith by lying in one form and saying the other thing to special counsel Jack Smith. So whether it was just to stop the bleeding from discovery Jack Smith. So whether it was just to stop the bleeding from discovery sanctions and potential contempt before the federal judge or because he didn't want to harm his proper agreement or both Giuliani submitted this declaration where he admits to liability. He admits he did it. So if you admit that you do it and you admit to all the allegations in the complaint, the plaintiff really doesn't need discovery anymore. You don't need the documents because you're the person's admitting to the all of the claims, all of the charges, all the civil claims that are brought.
Starting point is 00:58:16 And so that's what Giuliani did. So the case will basically become all about damages. How much should the jury award, Ruby Freeman and Shay Moss, because Giuliani stipulating that he did everything that he is accused of doing in the complaint. Now, this is why on Legal AF, it's so critical that we show you the documents and we show you the evidence because MAGA exists outside of evidence and outside of facts. So first I want to show you what Rudy Giuliani said in this video that he made of himself. That's promoted to the MAGA base.
Starting point is 00:58:53 And then I want to show you the facts and the evidence. I want to do a comparison there. So here is the video that Giuliani made shortly after filing this document in court where a court document is under penalty of perjury and has implications that are not attendant to making a video of yourself that's posted on Donald Trump's social media platform. Play this clip of Giuliani. Number one, Giuliani is cooperating against Trump. Untrue, Giuliani is telling the truth, which is that Trump is entirely innocent.
Starting point is 00:59:29 Fake news number two. Giuliani admitted that he lied. No. Uh, Giuliani, in a lawsuit, in order to reach some merits of the lawsuit, didn't contest the earlier portion of it, with a clear statement that that was no admission, that it was true or false. Happens all the time in lawsuits. It's called admission-argumento, and of course only the most dishonest and cheapest of
Starting point is 00:59:55 reporters deliberately misunderstand it. So let's make it clear. I have not admitted that I lied at any point. I have it. And of course, I'm not cooperating against Donald Trump because there's nothing to cooperate about. The man is innocent and they're framing him. Let me tell you something. We're Rudy Giuliani. I mean, what a weird video. Number one, number two, it's just simply not the case. Admission, our guuendo is not really a thing, okay? It's not a thing.
Starting point is 01:00:26 And that doesn't happen all the time in litigation. Maybe in a personal injury lawsuit where someone gets into like a car accident and there is admitted liability because there's tape of somebody getting into the car accident. So it makes no sense to fight the liability portion. It's just going to piss off the jury. So you just go to damages. In that situation, maybe you have a stipulation of liability and you just talk about damages.
Starting point is 01:00:52 In a defamation case, it's essentially unheard of to admit to the defamatory statements. That doesn't happen ever, ever. But let's take a look at Rudy Giuliani's declaration that he filed and let's test what he just said based on what he actually said in court. Because when you look at it, it says, if you go to number one, it says defendant Giuliani can see solely for the purposes of this litigation before the court non-appel. That defendant Giuliani made the statements of and concerning plaintiffs, which include all of the statements detailed and plaintiffs amended complaint
Starting point is 01:01:27 And he does not dispute for purposes of this litigation that the statements carry meaning that is defamatory per se so all of the Allegations that are alleged in the complaint by Ruby Freeman and Shay Moss here Giuliani says yes They carry with it a defamatory meeting too Defendant Giuliani for purposes of this litigation only, publish those statements to third parties. He transmitted it to third parties. That's another element of a defamation claim. Three, defend in Giuliani for purposes of this litigation only, does not contest that to the extent the statements were statements of facts and otherwise actionable that such actionable
Starting point is 01:02:04 statements were false. He does not contest that the statements that he made were false. In other words, the statements that he made were false. And then number four talks about him stipulating to liability on all the other claims like intentional and fliction of emotional distress. So it's in the declaration. It's right there. You filed it. And that's where Michael Popack, it's not a Democrat thing or a Republican thing. And this is where the media
Starting point is 01:02:34 gets it all wrong. It's just a fact thing. This is what you said. And how offensive it is. It truly offends me to the core when these mega Republicans just lie like that viciously gaslight. Cause what they're saying to you, they're saying, you're stupid. And I'm going to take advantage of you, F you, screw you. That's what they are saying. That's why we got to do this show to show the facts. I know I took a lot of that topic. I got two things I want to say. No, I got two things I want to say in response. Well, one of them is you, you, you ask, you asked a question in the beginning, why would he do this? And I'll give my answer. Why would he enter into a stipulation on many aspects of liability, but not all. I will talk about that in a minute. He left himself some defenses, even on liability side, and then he'll fight on damages.
Starting point is 01:03:34 So on the why would he do that? Because if he doesn't have the documents that support his case, either because he's lost them hasn't retained them. He's lost them, hasn't retained them. What the judge could do and what he was staring down the barrel at of, with barrel howl, the former chief judge of the DC Circuit Court, who was basically fed up with Rudy Giuliani and his lawyers and was getting increasingly more upset. When you make a federal judge upset, you end up getting more sanctions, more fines, and they start to escalate, right? They start to build on one another and eventually you get to contempt and dispositive sanctions like default judgments against you.
Starting point is 01:04:13 He was awful darn close to having a default judgment on liability, retaining no defenses, whatsoever. So he sort of kind of cut in and half and said, I'll give you a stipulation. I'm going to reserve a couple of defenses on liability, which I'll talk about for one second, and then we'll go fight over damages. And the lawyers said we can either keep litigating this and see what the judge does, or we can take the step. And basically we're not afraid of any of his defenses and we'll go right to money damage. How much damage do these two poor election workers
Starting point is 01:04:52 suffer at the hands of being mercilessly attacked, defamed, maligned, with malice. Doesn't have to be actual malice, just malice and ill will putative damages included including them being doxed including them having to move out of their house and all of that how much is that that there's a couple of defenses he reserved for himself and what I assume he thinks was a good deal to cut first is getting a sanction against some of its of a liability of Found by the federal judge in a sanction, is he kept a statute of limitation and he kept the argument that some of his statements were constitutionally protected.
Starting point is 01:05:33 And the plaintiffs team was probably like, okay, you're not going to win those. You want to still litigate over that? Okay, we'll take all the other stipulations where you admit to every paragraph of our complaint that what we said was true. The most concerning thing about that clip you played then, though, is what it's going to do to Jack Smith's team, who he's met with twice, Julie and Annie in two separate meetings, and we've been told, is been trying to angle himself for a more fulsome immunity deal. He only got a queen for the day immunity,
Starting point is 01:06:06 which is you tell us the truth right now and don't let me. And we will, we won't prosecute you based on your words this day if we get the information independently. It's a different story. If I'm the team I'm going to paraphrase you earlier, fuck you, Giuliani, with your continued defense of Donald Trump. You want to continue to do that. You can do that with your name on the other side of the V in an indictment. And I think that does not help him.
Starting point is 01:06:33 And it just shows you how in another world, a MAGA universe that he is orbiting, because you would never allow your client and you'd leave the case. If your client just did what he did, while you were trying to negotiate behind the scenes for an immunity deal. Couldn't agree more with you, and it's because they operate in this made up world where they don't hold hearings in official places.
Starting point is 01:07:09 They don't submit official electoral certificates, right? They go to the, you know, whatever, the four seasons construction yard or whatever, whatever that was, right? Like next to the adult film shop and that's where the land landscape before season's landscaping. That's where they all, they do hearings and hotel lobbies and they pretend they're actual hearing. They're not existing in, they're not for law in order. So the projection and confession that they always do
Starting point is 01:07:38 is that when they say that Democrats are not for law in order, Democrats are going through the court system, through a jury system. Democrats are existing in a system where evidence matters. And that shouldn't be unique to Democrats. Like that should just be, okay, what's the evidence? If you say that there are 17 audio recordings
Starting point is 01:07:59 of President Biden engaging in bribes, if you make that, show me the audio, bring it because that would concern me. I don't care if I'm a Democrat, independent, none. If that's real, show it to me. But when that turns out to be a lie, or that a whistleblower is actually an unregistered agent of China, or another whistleblower doesn't exist,
Starting point is 01:08:22 or the documents don't exist, or the Russian oligarch you're relying on don't exist, or the Russian oligarch you're relying on. One, it's a Russian oligarch to begin with, but two, I didn't say that, that's not an accurate representation, and then you go, well, that's sufficient basis for impeachment inquiry. It's like, what are you talking about? What are you talking about? And that compare and contrast that you do so well in your hot takes between Biden and Trump. Look at the compare and contrast here. Biden's let it be known through his press secretary that he is not going to pardon
Starting point is 01:08:52 Hunter Biden. Regardless of what however those chips play out, further investigations be damned, and compare that to Donald Trump who's going to pardon everybody, including himself, if he gets back into office. Yeah, and I interviewed Democratic Congress member, Roger Christianomorthy, and I asked him, I said, look, because he's Harvard Law guy. I said, if you, if you, if you as a licensed lawyer made up to a court that you had audio recordings that didn't exist, you lose your license.
Starting point is 01:09:22 It's unfathomable. Yet you have Jim Jordan, who's not a licensed lawyer leading the Judiciary Committee doing just that. You have James Comer, Maga Republican leading the House Oversight Committee, who's doing just that. It is offensive and despicable. All right, back on track, though, two other things that are offensive and despicable. I want to talk just about these two real frivolous cases, one that just got dismissed. Another one that was dismissed months ago and Trump was sanctioned, but it just goes to show you, popoq, like how desperate, how vexatious, how frivolous these cases are that Donald Trump is bringing.
Starting point is 01:10:04 Everyone remembers now that case that Donald Trump and lawyer Alina Habba filed against Hillary Clinton Over a year ago alleging that there was a massive conspiracy. They sued her and 30 other individuals Saying that they're to blame for the Russia investigation, which by the way is a valid investigation where many people were actually convicted, including people closest to Donald Trump, who are very high up, who he later pardoned. But he said that somehow constitutes a Rico or racketeering case and defamation. And the courts like it was filed in federal court. Judge Middlebrook's was like, what are you even, what are you talking about here?
Starting point is 01:10:43 Like, the statute of limitations, you've blown, these aren't real allegations, you're not even, so you're just saying the word rico. And like he said, every allegation is false. Everything you're saying is wrong here. Dismissed the case, gave Donald Trump the hint on the first complaint that was filed that he was gonna sanction him,
Starting point is 01:11:03 but Trump filed and amended complaint with Habba. And it's one of the most powerful sanctions emotions, I mean sanctions orders by Judge Middlebrook's I've seen here, pull up the order by Judge Middlebrook's here where Judge Middlebrook's basically says, essentially every allegation was wrong. He goes, this case should never have been brought. It's inadequacy as a legal claim was evident from the start. No reasonable lawyer would have filed it intended for a political purpose. None of the courts of the amended complaint none of the counts of the amended complaint stated a cognizable legal claim. 31 individuals and entities were needlessly harmed
Starting point is 01:11:39 in order to dishonestly advance a political narrative. A continuing pattern of misuse of the courts by Mr. Trump and his lawyers undermines the rule of law portrays judges as order to dishonestly advance a political narrative. A continuing pattern of misuse of the courts by Mr. Trump and his lawyers undermines the rule of law, portrays judges as partisans and diverts resources from those who have suffered actual legal harm. And then there was another part of that sanctions order where he basically recommends disciplinary proceedings for Alina Habba.
Starting point is 01:12:02 He goes, so who's responsible for this case and others like it? The rule of law is undermined by a toxic combination of political fundraising with legal fees paid by political action committees reckless and factually untrue statements by lawyers at rallies and in the media and efforts to advance a political narrative through lawsuits without factual basis
Starting point is 01:12:22 or any cognizable legal theory. Lawyers are enabling this behavior, and I am pessimistic that rule 11 alone can effectively stem this abuse. Aspects may be beyond the purview of the judiciary requiring attention of the bar and disciplinary authorities. Additional sanctions may be appropriate, but legal filings like those at issue here should be sanctioned under rule 11, both to penalize this conduct and deter similar conduct by these lawyers and others, other lawyers. So that doesn't stop, you thought it would end there, right?
Starting point is 01:13:01 A million dollars or close to a million dollars in sanctions, the cases dismissed. But out of nowhere, there's a new filing on this docket. And I'm like, who's filing on this docket? And it's called plaintiffs' motion for indicative ruling based upon new evidence. And I'm like, who's this guy? Jared Roberts, I never heard of this guy before. And then I looked him up, Jared Roberts, there he is. Jared Roberts hasn't even been a lawyer for two years yet. His experience is basically internships. And then he joined this law firm, and he's now practicing, and he goes practicing political and constitutional law.
Starting point is 01:13:44 And he's the one who filed it. And he actually go into this filing as well. One of the things he says is he calls out the judge in footnote 1 for being biased and says that we're going to demand your disqualification. The second your lawyer is calling out federal judge Don Middlebrook's and he's an idiot this second year lawyer because they already try to disqualification motion. Alina Habafile, the disqualification motion against Middlebrook's. This was before anybody knew who Judge Eileen Cannon even was because it was before the August 2022 search warrant issues.
Starting point is 01:14:22 And months before that, I think it was actually in May of 2022 in the disqualification order, middle Brooks is like, you're trying to disqualify me so you can get in front of Judge Eileen Kevin. That's what he says that in the order and called them out. So a disqualification emotion was already brought, was already denied. And what now this second year associate is trying to claim is that the Durham report,
Starting point is 01:14:52 where no recommendations were actually made in the Durham report, the only actual criticism from Durham when you get through all the kind of BS, he says the FBI, Durham says, and this is the Bill bar appointed prosecutor, that the FBI should have first opened an initial inquiry before opening the full inquiry. That's what they said, but didn't recommend any recommendations. And then Durham was 0 for 2 in his prosecutions against the people he prosecuted. 0 for 2. To put that in perspective, Merrick Garland has prosecuted nearly 1,000,
Starting point is 01:15:26 January 6th insurrectionist, and has never lost a single jury trial. Never lost, a single jury trial. What perfect record? Like 1,000 for 1,000. Basically, when it comes to whatever it is in jury trials, compare that to Durham, over two. So they're saying the Durham report
Starting point is 01:15:46 means that they should reopen this case. And they filed it in front of middle bricks. Popoq, I think another rule 11 sanctions motion is going to be brought. There's 30 people who now have to file a motion. I think they're going to bring a rule 11 against this guy. I think the judge is going to sanction the second year associate and the law firm for even bringing this thing, for making people respond. Touch on that and then bring us out with what happened in the CNN defamation case. Yeah, poor Jared.
Starting point is 01:16:17 Here's my artist rendering of what happened. He's the only Florida bar member in the Virginia law firm that's now representing Donald Trump, the Spinelli law firm. We saw this guy before actually, Ben, you've just blotted it out of your memory because he filed something a while ago in the appeal. Now, the Durham report came out in pardon me, in May. By my calendar, it's almost August. So they waited for May to August to claim new evidence because they were somehow vindicated by the Durham report. And in the May, June and July period, which is more than enough time, no senior lawyer or partner in their law firm thought it
Starting point is 01:16:57 was worthwhile to move for special admission so they could practice law in front of this court that they just attacked the judge on once again So they called up Jared on the intercom Jared come down here. Okay. Can you just read this and sign it please We have to file it today. Well, what does it say? Okay, let me tell you how ludicrous this is first of all they want the judge to take judicial notice of the Durham report that has no conclusion and no recommendations whatsoever, because I don't know, it's on some fancy paper that says special counsel. I mean, that doesn't, that's not the grounds for recognizing something
Starting point is 01:17:35 with judicial notice so that you don't have to have it presented into court. That's one. Secondly, I'm just going to show, but one example, and I'm sure every part of our audience is gonna know what the problem is. And this is the best example, I think, that's in the Durham, that's in the new filing in which they're telling the judge, you were wrong, you shouldn't have dismissed the case,
Starting point is 01:17:57 you shouldn't have sanctioned us, and your findings judge that things were just incredible and not an absurd and not to be believed. You're wrong, judge. Let me give you an example. This is from their brief. Quote, to begin with, this court called it implausible and categorically absurd that defendant, Comey, that's James Comey, the FBI director, would have conspired with defendant Clinton, that's Hillary Clinton, to harm President Trump.
Starting point is 01:18:27 Stop right there. James Comey, who blew the election for Hillary Clinton because she announced he was looking into her emails a week or two before the election. Their theory was he was conspiring with Hillary Clinton in order to throw the election in favor of Hillary, who lost the election. Okay. Let's go on. They say the Durham report, however, found that at least some high-level actors,
Starting point is 01:18:53 not leadership, not Komi actors, within the FBI, unnamed. Central to the Crossfire Hurricane investigation, that's Russia collusion, had a, quote, clear predisposition against President Trump, which was not shared in their investigation or lack of investigation of Clinton, Durham report at 47. How does that, even if that is a lift from the Durham report, how does that prove that the judge was wrong,
Starting point is 01:19:25 that it was implausible and categorically absurd, that Comey conspired with Hillary Clinton? A couple of FBI guys didn't like Donald Trump. Okay, that is like one of their best examples in their brief. This judge is going to deny this within the next week or two. We'll do a hot take and or show on it. There's going to be a motion for sanctions that he will invite. And this poor kid is going to get well, I don't feel I don't know sorry for him. He signed it. He's a Florida bar member, just like me. He took an oath to be an officer of the court and not mislead the court. While separately parallel, there is a very there's an appeal going on at the 11th Circuit. They had a post a $1.3 million cash bond.
Starting point is 01:20:08 They love posting those cash bonds against the sanctions order. And so that's going on. But no, they don't want to wait for the 11th Circuit. They want to use the Durham report as a press release, so they shove it back to middle Brooks. So that's where we are with that. We can stay in the in the Southern District of Florida with a whole nother judge that that was handling a case that you and
Starting point is 01:20:30 I touched on several months ago, but sort of, you know, let's let's be frank, all the indictment fever sucked the air out of the room. We didn't really continue to follow it. There weren't any really new developments. Other than Donald Trump sued CNN for about $700 million because he doesn't want to back to him. 475. All right. What's a few hundred million between friends, man? 475 million claiming that because they compared him to Adolf Hitler and how he abuses the media
Starting point is 01:20:58 and some other things, aha, I've been defamed. And the federal judge in the Southern District of New York, who is a Trump Federalist Society judge. There's not many of them in the Southern District of Florida, but there is one. I never appeared in front of him. He was a long time state court judge in Fort Lauderdale, who got appointed by a governor, Scott, and he got elevated to the feds by Trump. They actually talked about him being because he's also Indian American. He would kind of fill a need there a niche for the Florida Supreme Court. He didn't get that job, but he got the job of federal judge. And even he, even though he didn't know easily, took some pot shots at CNN, Ben, maybe you can,
Starting point is 01:21:38 you like talking about those things. He then ruled against Donald Trump, didn't only dismiss the complaint for defamation at the pleading stage, meaning no discovery, no depositions, no evidence, no trial, right now just on the pieces of paper. But he dismissed it with prejudice, meaning, I'm not even going to give you the opportunity to amend because the facts are clear. This is the clip. This is the statement.
Starting point is 01:22:02 It's either actionable in defamation at law or it is not or it's protected or privileged and I don't even want to see you in my courtroom again. Now Donald Trump's going to have to try to appeal that to the 11th Circuit. But I know you took issue and rightly so with some comments that this particular judge made in his ruling. You want to talk about those? So, Trump basically was alleging that when CNN referred to what Trump did as the big lie, referring to it as the big lie implied the big lie that Hitler told. And the judge said, well, you know, like that's an opinion and that's not defamatory, but what the judge said about that, you know, was
Starting point is 01:22:46 going to CNN statements while repugnant. This is at the very end of the ruling when the motion to dismiss is granted. CNN statements while repugnant were not as a matter of law defamatory. The case will therefore be dismissed with prejudice. Accordingly, it is here by order that it's dismissed with prejudice. Okay. Okay. Is what's repugnant about that? Like, Trump tried to overthrow our democracy, and he consistently lied. There's nothing repugnant about that. But the judge did the right thing in dismissing the case. But you see how, you know how these jurists who call themselves, so I'm a conservative jurist.
Starting point is 01:23:28 I mean, it is so repugnant for a media and there's a lot of repugnant things that CNN's done lately. This is not one of the references that David, it is so repugnant for them to refer to January 6th as insurrection. How such a repugnant thing to call out Donald Trump trying to overthrow our democracy. What would that judge say about, we could spend an entire show
Starting point is 01:23:56 which we're not going to. All the things Donald Trump said about prosecutors and their families. Jack Smith's a crackhead. Jack Smith is a closet Jew and everything else. That's not reputant. And just so people know, when Donald Trump does that, it's when he says,
Starting point is 01:24:11 Jack Smith, if that's even really his real name, that's the implication that Donald Trump's made. Yeah, that that that Jack Smith changed his name, but yeah, no, and that's the thing. I mean, let's just face it, that's not a conservative position to call out Someone who's calling out an insurrection and saying that that's a repugnant. I'm sorry. It just isn't and
Starting point is 01:24:36 what we have to do is Both a short term and long term, right? There's short-term goal of reacting to what's happening and providing the accurate news because there's such a swarm of disinformation out there. But the long-term process here has to be a generational task that we're all committed to. You know, because you mentioned the Federalist Society, what these mega Republicans did even before they were MAGA, starting in the 70s, was building the media infrastructure, the judicial infrastructure, the state and local infrastructure that completely caught everybody off guard, but they were building it, you know, and you could see it as they were building it. And then Maga kind of took it over, use the trappings that they created
Starting point is 01:25:27 to frankly entrap our democracy. And we have to now reverse that trend by now making sure we build the infrastructure for pro-democracy, for truth, for evidence-based approach. And that's what needs to prevail. And so that's what we're committed to doing here on the Midas Touch Network. Yes, short term objectives, building what we're doing, brick by brick, responding to the breaking and daily news, but generationally making sure that in the future, there ain't people saying that, oh, it's so repugnant that you would criticize
Starting point is 01:26:06 what happens on January 6th. No, anyone who participated in the January 6th insurrection is a traitor, is a criminal committed treason. And we shouldn't have to mince words when looking at that and saying and calling it out for what it is. Popoq, we've got new legal AF merch to talk about. We've spent a long time making this merch,
Starting point is 01:26:30 Karen Friedman and Nifles specifically was involved in the design process. You were heavily involved in the design process as well, but a lot of time was spent on this. So make sure you check out store.mitustouch.com. That stuff looks good. By the way, that's a famous logo designer who volunteered because he believes in democracy too.
Starting point is 01:26:55 Oh, yeah, a lot of time, a lot of attention here. Go to store.mitustouch.com. Get your legal AF gear right now. Gear up with all of the minus touch gear, 100% union made, 100% made in the USA, store. MidasTouch.com. Definitely check that out right now. Also, make sure you're subscribed to our YouTube channel, YouTube Watchers. Make sure you are subscribed to the audio of legal AF. It really goes a long way to help. So,
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Starting point is 01:28:53 that goes a long way to help thank you everybody for watching this episode of legal a f legal a f's thank you this community seeing everybody in the chat. I know I'm starting to recognize all the people in the chat now too and seeing everybody continuing to come here. Thank you. This community is such an honor for me and Michael Pope, and Karen Friedman, and Nifolo and all the other commentators at this network to be a part of this community with you. So thank you for all of the work that you do. We'll see you next time on Legal AF. I'm sure it'll be a historic and exciting one. Shout out to the Midas Mighty.

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