Trump Presidency

[easyrider16]

More spin from the GOP Trump defenders:

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), speaking on his podcast on Wednesday, accused U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan of being “relentlessly hostile” to Trump and claimed that she has “a reputation for being far-left, even by D.C. District Court standards.”

But Cruz voted to put Chutkan into her seat on the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia in June 2014. So did every other Senate Republican when she was unanimously confirmed, 95-0.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics ... r-AA1eKRLa

Don't believe them when they try to tell you she is some far-left judge. They're lying.

[deadheadskier]

"Judge Upadhyaya said the most important condition of release is not committing any new crimes while on release, which could lead to him being detained and could add to the sentence he may eventually face. She told Trump that it is a crime to "influence a juror or try to threaten or bribe a witness or retaliate against anyone" connected to the case. Trump said he understands."

Wonder how long before the judge issues a gag order on Trump or threatens jail for him.

[XtremeJibber2001]

IANAL, but why would Judge Cannon reveal the existence of another, previously unknown, Grand Jury?

Judge Cannon asks about legality of using DC grand jury in Florida-based Mar-a-Lago case
https://www.cnn.com/2023/08/07/politics ... index.html

[easyrider16]

What do you mean? I don't think it's a secret that there was another grand jury in D.C. Grand jury proceedings are normally sealed, primarily to protect the grand jurors and the witnesses, but often parts of them are disclosed to the defense. Here the special counsel asked to file a motion under seal in the FL case because it presumably contained references to what happened before the grand jury, but Judge Cannon won't allow them to file it under seal. Without seeing more of the motion and her reasoning it's difficult to evaluate.

The order cited in the article looks pretty routine. She's asking the lawyers to address arguments raised in a motion by the special counsel, one of which is the propriety of an out-of-district grand jury continuing to investigate matters that occurred in the FL district. It doesn't suggest that she will rule one way or the other on the issue. This all stems from the Special Counsel moving to disqualify one of the defense attorneys for conflicts of interest. It's mostly a lot of boring legal minutiae.

[Bubba]

What do you mean? I don't think it's a secret that there was another grand jury in D.C. Grand jury proceedings are normally sealed, primarily to protect the grand jurors and the witnesses, but often parts of them are disclosed to the defense. Here the special counsel asked to file a motion under seal in the FL case because it presumably contained references to what happened before the grand jury, but Judge Cannon won't allow them to file it under seal. Without seeing more of the motion and her reasoning it's difficult to evaluate.

The order cited in the article looks pretty routine. She's asking the lawyers to address arguments raised in a motion by the special counsel, one of which is the propriety of an out-of-district grand jury continuing to investigate matters that occurred in the FL district. It doesn't suggest that she will rule one way or the other on the issue. This all stems from the Special Counsel moving to disqualify one of the defense attorneys for conflicts of interest. It's mostly a lot of boring legal minutiae.

Fox News interpretation...

Federal judge comes out swinging against DOJ special counsel in Trump classified docs case

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/federa ... -docs-case

[XtremeJibber2001]

What do you mean? I don't think it's a secret that there was another grand jury in D.C. Grand jury proceedings are normally sealed, primarily to protect the grand jurors and the witnesses, but often parts of them are disclosed to the defense. Here the special counsel asked to file a motion under seal in the FL case because it presumably contained references to what happened before the grand jury, but Judge Cannon won't allow them to file it under seal. Without seeing more of the motion and her reasoning it's difficult to evaluate.

The order cited in the article looks pretty routine. She's asking the lawyers to address arguments raised in a motion by the special counsel, one of which is the propriety of an out-of-district grand jury continuing to investigate matters that occurred in the FL district. It doesn't suggest that she will rule one way or the other on the issue. This all stems from the Special Counsel moving to disqualify one of the defense attorneys for conflicts of interest. It's mostly a lot of boring legal minutiae.

Fox News interpretation...

Federal judge comes out swinging against DOJ special counsel in Trump classified docs case

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/federa ... -docs-case

Comments section is spicy. Would make a nice honeypot

[easyrider16]

When I visited that article I got a link to this one:
"Legal experts slam Jack Smith for bringing 'lousy' case against Trump: 'Disinformation indictment'"
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/legal- ... indictment

If you read the first half of that article, you get two guys, both regular Fox news contributors, saying the case is weak. The substance of their criticism is what I addressed earlier, that this is a "disinformation indictment" which, if you actually read it, it is clearly not. They also raise issues with the definition of fraud, but Trump isn't being charged with fraud, he's being charged with conspiracy to defraud the U.S., and to disrupt and obstruct an official proceeding. It's a different set of statutes than the one addressed in the May Supreme Court case (Percoco) that this expert is talking about. Again, either they didn't read the indictments, or they are deliberately trying to mislead.

Probably to avoid being sued again, Fox did include, in the second half of the article, an opinion from Laurence Tribe, a professor of Constitutional Law at Harvard, who said smith brought an "airtight" indictment. I agree - I think it is solid, and the only question is whether the allegations can be proved beyond reasonable doubt. Like I said earlier - if there were legal problems with this indictment, Trump's team will file a motion to dismiss. That they haven't, and don't appear to be preparing one, says all you need to know about the validity of this indictment and the opinions of Fox's so-called "experts" who say there are problems with it.

I believe Fox is once again spreading deliberate misinformation. This is all part of the spin campaign to delegitimize this case.

[easyrider16]

Trump's recent comments about the Georgia prosecutor:

“They say there’s a young woman — a young racist in Atlanta — they say she was after a certain gang and she ended up having an affair with the head of the gang or a gang member. And this is a person who wants to indict me […] wants to indict me for a perfect phone call,” Trump told supporters.

Dude, unless he's got a reliable source, that's a defamation lawsuit.

https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/p ... 234802922/

[easyrider16]

Pretty good NYT article detailing some of the evidence the prosecution has gathered against Trump. The most striking aspects of this to me are that it was clearly Trump's people who came up with the fake electors scheme, and it was Trump's people who sought to enact it. It also seems pretty clear that the intent of this scheme was to defraud and/or disrupt the official proceeding of counting the electoral votes, which is the actual crime he's charged with.

A lawyer allied with President Donald J. Trump first laid out a plot to use false slates of electors to subvert the 2020 election in a previously unknown internal campaign memo that prosecutors are portraying as a crucial link in how the Trump team’s efforts evolved into a criminal conspiracy.

The existence of the Dec. 6, 2020, memo came to light in last week’s indictment of Mr. Trump, though its details remained unclear. But a copy obtained by The New York Times shows for the first time that the lawyer, Kenneth Chesebro, acknowledged from the start that he was proposing “a bold, controversial strategy” that the Supreme Court “likely” would reject in the end.

But even if the plan did not ultimately pass legal muster at the highest level, Mr. Chesebro argued that it would achieve two goals. It would focus attention on claims of voter fraud and “buy the Trump campaign more time to win litigation that would deprive Biden of electoral votes and/or add to Trump’s column.”

The memo had been a missing piece in the public record of how Mr. Trump’s allies developed their strategy to overturn Mr. Biden’s victory. In mid-December, the false Trump electors could go through the motions of voting as if they had the authority to do so. Then, on Jan. 6, 2021, Vice President Mike Pence could unilaterally count those slates of votes, rather than the official and certified ones for Joseph R. Biden Jr.

While that basic plan itself was already known, the document, described by prosecutors as the “fraudulent elector memo,” provides new details about how it originated and was discussed behind the scenes. Among those details is Mr. Chesebro’s proposed “messaging” strategy to explain why pro-Trump electors were meeting in states where Mr. Biden was declared the winner. The campaign would present that step as “a routine measure that is necessary to ensure” that the correct electoral slate could be counted by Congress if courts or legislatures later concluded that Mr. Trump had actually won the states.

...

Three days later, Mr. Chesebro drew up specific instructions to create fraudulent electors in multiple states — in another memo whose existence, along with the one in November, was first reported by The Times last year. The House committee investigating the Jan. 6 riot also cited them in its December report, but it apparently did not learn of the Dec. 6 memo.

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/08/us/p ... -memo.html

[XtremeJibber2001]

Pretty good NYT article detailing some of the evidence the prosecution has gathered against Trump. The most striking aspects of this to me are that it was clearly Trump's people who came up with the fake electors scheme, and it was Trump's people who sought to enact it. It also seems pretty clear that the intent of this scheme was to defraud and/or disrupt the official proceeding of counting the electoral votes, which is the actual crime he's charged with.

A lawyer allied with President Donald J. Trump first laid out a plot to use false slates of electors to subvert the 2020 election in a previously unknown internal campaign memo that prosecutors are portraying as a crucial link in how the Trump team’s efforts evolved into a criminal conspiracy.

The existence of the Dec. 6, 2020, memo came to light in last week’s indictment of Mr. Trump, though its details remained unclear. But a copy obtained by The New York Times shows for the first time that the lawyer, Kenneth Chesebro, acknowledged from the start that he was proposing “a bold, controversial strategy” that the Supreme Court “likely” would reject in the end.

But even if the plan did not ultimately pass legal muster at the highest level, Mr. Chesebro argued that it would achieve two goals. It would focus attention on claims of voter fraud and “buy the Trump campaign more time to win litigation that would deprive Biden of electoral votes and/or add to Trump’s column.”

The memo had been a missing piece in the public record of how Mr. Trump’s allies developed their strategy to overturn Mr. Biden’s victory. In mid-December, the false Trump electors could go through the motions of voting as if they had the authority to do so. Then, on Jan. 6, 2021, Vice President Mike Pence could unilaterally count those slates of votes, rather than the official and certified ones for Joseph R. Biden Jr.

While that basic plan itself was already known, the document, described by prosecutors as the “fraudulent elector memo,” provides new details about how it originated and was discussed behind the scenes. Among those details is Mr. Chesebro’s proposed “messaging” strategy to explain why pro-Trump electors were meeting in states where Mr. Biden was declared the winner. The campaign would present that step as “a routine measure that is necessary to ensure” that the correct electoral slate could be counted by Congress if courts or legislatures later concluded that Mr. Trump had actually won the states.

...

Three days later, Mr. Chesebro drew up specific instructions to create fraudulent electors in multiple states — in another memo whose existence, along with the one in November, was first reported by The Times last year. The House committee investigating the Jan. 6 riot also cited them in its December report, but it apparently did not learn of the Dec. 6 memo.

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/08/us/p ... -memo.html

IANAL, but wouldn't all these lawyers understand what they're doing is illegal? All these relatively prominent attorneys committing crimes for the former guy is just mind blowing. What's the value prop?

[easyrider16]

I don't really get the value prop, either. Most lawyers I know would not risk their career over one case. But I also know a few lawyers who are willing to play fast and loose for a buck. I can only suspect that Trump's lawyers here were motivated by a combination of money and the lure of the power and influence they might gain in representing a President of the United States. There's a good chance these guys get disbarred, whether or not they end up in prison.

What's interesting is that the article cites to some who were approached by Trump's people to be alternate electors and refused to participate, saying that this was illegal and perhaps treasonous. And of course you have Pence and his lawyers, who outright rejected participating in this scheme. So it's not like there weren't plenty of people who saw this for what it was at the time it was in progress.

[XtremeJibber2001]

Special counsel obtained search warrant for Donald Trump’s Twitter account
https://www.cnn.com/2023/08/09/politics ... ium=social

The special counsel investigation into Donald Trump secured a search warrant of the former president’s Twitter account, @realDonaldTrump, according to a newly unsealed court filing.

The search was so secret that Twitter was initially barred from telling Trump the search warrant had been obtained for his account, and the company, now known as “X,” was fined $350,000 because it delayed producing the records sought under the search warrant.

TOPSHOT - US President Donald Trump speaks to supporters from The Ellipse near the White House on January 6, 2021, in Washington, DC. - Thousands of Trump supporters, fueled by his spurious claims of voter fraud, are flooding the nation's capital protesting the expected certification of Joe Biden's White House victory by the US Congress.

The search warrant special counsel Jack Smith obtained sought “data and records related” to Trump’s account, and ultimately, the platform was allowed to share some information about the search warrant with the former president.

The special counsel’s office, which is now working on the criminal case against Trump in DC District Court related to his efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election, sought the warrant in January 2023.

Twitter ultimately produced the records, according to the filing, now public in the US Circuit Court of Appeals.

[easyrider16]

Deshowitz doesn't like the indictment. He's claiming the indictment is about the first amendment, disagrees with Barr's (and my) observation that it is actually not, and claims the indictment is based on "lies". It kinda makes me think he's lost his fastball.

As I noted above, the indictment explicitly states that it is not going after Trump for what he said. The whole indictment is based on the fake electors scheme. Did Deshowitz read this thing? As for his claim about lies, he doesn't point to any actual misrepresentation. He just says that the indictment cites Trump's Jan 6 speech when he told people to protest, but leaves out that he also told them to protest peacefully. But this really misses the mark, because these facts are not what the indictment is based on. Again, the indictment is based on the fake electors scheme, and Trump's Jan 6 speech is only cited as a means to pressure Pence into going along with that scheme. That he told them to protest peacefully really doesn't change the purpose of the protest, which was to pressure Pence into going along with the fake electors scheme.

https://thehill.com/regulation/court-ba ... ndictment/

The more I look at this indictment, the more impressed I am with how well this was done. It's a really solid piece of legal work, and it really focuses directly on what Trump actually did with the fake elector's scheme. Smith is very, very good at his job.

[XtremeJibber2001]

Deshowitz doesn't like the indictment. He's claiming the indictment is about the first amendment, disagrees with Barr's (and my) observation that it is actually not, and claims the indictment is based on "lies". It kinda makes me think he's lost his fastball.

$02 he's part of the MAGA machine and has been for several years.

[easyrider16]

Another reason the Georgia state case is a huge problem for Trump:

Unlike many other states and at the federal level, in Georgia, the governor cannot himself issue a pardon upon a convict. Instead, that power is vested in a separate state board, and by law a pardon cannot be granted until five years after the convict has served his time and paid restitution.

https://www.foxnews.com/media/trumps-ge ... prosecutor

If a Republican gets elected to the Presidency, all those federal cases go away. But it looks like no politician can help him with this Georgia case - it's up to the law and the jury, and he has no means to escape if he's found guilty.

I've heard some criticism from some quarters that Georgia should have deferred to the federal case because it's based on the same conduct. But there is no legal reason a state can't charge someone for the same conduct involved in a federal case if what he did violates the state law. Here, I think there are some very compelling reasons for the state case. First, it is far less politically charged as the prosecutor was not appointed by the administration of Trump's main political opponent in the upcoming election. Also, if the GOP wins the presidency, the state case might end up being the only way to hold him accountable for his conduct.