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a game. Enter. Today. Based on

0:31

the arguments today, it seems like. There.

0:33

Are at least. Enough

0:36

justices who are taking Trump's claims

0:38

of immunity sort of seriously. I

0:40

do not think that

0:42

the court is taking

0:44

Trump's. Specific. Claims.

0:48

Of that, he. Is.

0:51

Being mistreated and that he. Should.

0:53

Not be prosecuted for what

0:56

he did as a ledge

0:58

in this indictment. I do

1:01

not think there are five

1:03

votes to sustain Trump's position.

1:11

However, one. And welcome to George Conway

1:13

Explains it all. I'm there a long while

1:15

publisher of The Ball work and because I

1:17

not a lawyer of my good friend George

1:19

Com Weapons Society for the Rule of Law

1:21

to explain the legal news to me of

1:24

which there is much but quickly I want

1:26

to remind folks that we're hosting a live

1:28

taping of this podcast in the Next Level

1:30

podcast at six than I am Washington Dc

1:32

on May fifteenth, tickets are still available to

1:34

huge venue. So Com C S. Or.

1:37

A man who so. The

1:39

nine and news isn't anything happen while

1:42

illegal in is now we lose any

1:44

money in particular. I. I like

1:46

barely know where to start because there's been so

1:48

much. In fact, we had to drop like three

1:50

different topics even though I wanted to cover them

1:52

because we really only have time to talk about.

1:54

The. Oral arguments on the immunity case.

1:57

Trump. Visit. the being in the new

1:59

york or room, which I know you were

2:01

up there. I know you weren't watching that. And

2:03

I also want to get to these indictments in Arizona, just as

2:05

a little dessert at the end, the people who

2:08

got indicted in Arizona. So we're

2:10

going to start on presidential immunity. So to

2:12

remind folks, this is part of Jack Smith's

2:14

January 6 election interference prosecution

2:16

against Trump. We did a deep dive

2:18

into this question when the DC circuit

2:20

issued its favorable opinion for Jack Smith earlier

2:22

this winter, saying the

2:24

presidents are not absolutely immune from criminal

2:27

prosecution, which seems reasonable. So

2:29

the crux of today's argument was about whether

2:31

presidents are immune from prosecution for

2:33

official conduct and where the line

2:35

is between official conduct and private

2:37

action. So a lot of

2:39

the people, like our friend Judge Ludwig,

2:42

I saw him. He tweeted a

2:44

thread. And

2:46

I got to say, I sort of shared his reaction,

2:48

because I listened to the oral arguments. I

2:51

was concerned. I sat there being like, and let me ask

2:53

you this, just as a framing question. To

2:56

me, the question is very simply,

2:59

this guy refused to engage in the peaceful

3:01

transfer of power. He

3:04

asked people to go find votes. He

3:08

encouraged violence on that

3:10

day. And any number

3:13

of, he was pushing

3:15

false electors. The question

3:17

is, can he be

3:19

held criminally liable for

3:21

those actions? To me, that's the only

3:23

question. But what

3:26

the Supreme Court justices and the lawyers were

3:28

debating in this sounded to me like we

3:31

have to make a decision for all time about

3:33

just what kind of accountability

3:36

presidents have. And so

3:38

the lawyers for Trump are

3:40

arguing, you need absolute immunity to the point

3:42

of if Joe Biden decided that

3:44

Trump was corrupt and was going to decided to

3:46

kill him as part of an official action, Trump's

3:50

defense lawyer, or I don't know if

3:52

it's a defense lawyer, but Trump's lawyer said, yeah,

3:54

that would be covered under the official action. And

3:58

to me, I sat there being. like, this

4:01

is insane. Like, a healthy democracy would not

4:03

be having this conversation whatsoever. And yet, as

4:05

I listened to it go on, I think

4:07

this is why Ludwig and why I felt

4:09

pretty unsettled is it felt like they were

4:11

taking it not just seriously. Like,

4:14

I assume they take everything that comes in front of them

4:16

seriously, but it seemed like they

4:18

were, especially that four of the conservative judges were

4:20

like, yes, this has merit.

4:22

I'm deeply concerned about whether or not

4:24

somebody could actually hold the president accountable

4:27

after he leaves office. What

4:29

do you think? Am I ever-reacting? What's happening?

4:32

I tend to think that people are over-reacting.

4:35

OK. And

4:37

let me take a few steps back. I

4:40

didn't see the full thread that

4:43

my friend, Judge Ludic, put out, but

4:45

I did see an initial post

4:48

where he basically said that he

4:50

found it disconcerting that the Supreme

4:53

Court was talking about every

4:55

case other than this one. And

4:58

I agree with that, except

5:01

I'm not sure how disconcerted I

5:03

am or should be. I

5:06

absolutely agree that this

5:09

argument, and I think

5:11

this is what is confusing people and throwing

5:14

people off, and maybe they're right to

5:16

be disconcerted and afraid and

5:18

fearful, this

5:20

argument was pretty much like a

5:22

law school seminar on

5:26

the next 10 cases that

5:29

the Supreme Court might

5:31

see and hear in

5:34

the future over the next 300 years, if

5:37

we have a republic that lasts

5:39

that long, on

5:41

the question of to

5:44

what extent presidents, former

5:46

presidents can be prosecuted for acts

5:48

while in office. And

5:50

I mean, I don't

5:52

think any of those cases are ever going to reach the

5:54

court in our lifetimes. I just think that they're trying to

5:56

answer a

5:59

hypothetical question. with

6:01

a, they're thinking about the

6:03

case in terms of setting a rule that would

6:05

answer, at least some of the justices, that would

6:07

answer all sorts of hypotheticals in the future. And

6:11

there's a limit to what extent

6:13

you can really do that. I mean, there is

6:16

something to be said about what

6:18

we lawyers call sort of the common law

6:20

approach, which is you develop a

6:22

narrow rule to decide a case on a

6:25

particular set of facts, and you don't, you

6:28

think about what the consequences could be

6:30

for future cases, but you don't overthink

6:32

it because the problem with trying to

6:34

set a bright line rule for all

6:36

time is that you

6:39

cannot possibly foresee

6:42

all the different permutations of

6:45

human activity that could possibly result

6:48

in litigation in the future

6:50

in the same subject area. And

6:53

you don't know. Not only do you

6:55

not know how people are going to

6:58

behave on Tuesday, you

7:00

don't know how they're going to behave in September,

7:02

and you certainly don't know how they're going to behave in the

7:04

year 2065. So

7:07

I think that there was

7:09

a little bit of an, there

7:11

was a little over abstraction of

7:13

the case in the Supreme Court.

7:15

But that said, I mean, that

7:18

does happen particularly, you know, in

7:20

appellate arguments, particularly now in

7:22

the Supreme Court, because the Supreme Court

7:24

really does, for a bunch of

7:26

different reasons, view itself as really

7:28

a court that decides,

7:31

you know, not just individual

7:33

cases, but law,

7:36

you know, rules that we're going to, are

7:38

going to govern for all time. That being

7:40

said, they don't always, they don't always do

7:42

that in every case. Like,

7:44

for example, the 14th Amendment case, they just decided we're

7:47

just going to decide this one case, just

7:49

to get it out of the way and decide it with a particular result.

7:53

I think

7:55

this case is one where I

7:57

don't really believe... that

8:00

any of the justices uh...

8:03

and i have a lot of other one of the

8:05

transcript later maybe there's something that will catch my eye

8:07

that will cause me to say i want to know

8:10

i i miss lead sarah which is i would apologize

8:13

don't believe me i've been on the night i'd be

8:15

on the i would not do that i mean that

8:17

i would know how to get these nice products if

8:19

i did that uh... yeah

8:22

i i think that i

8:25

don't think there is any justice would not

8:28

on strictly if they think they were just

8:30

saying yes yay or nay on this case

8:33

with these facts don't

8:36

know that there are any justices who would say

8:38

that trump can't be prosecuted for this i could be

8:41

wrong will find out in a matter of weeks and

8:44

i do really think that they are

8:46

concerned and

8:49

and and not unjustifiably

8:51

so with

8:54

the next case in the case after that and let me

8:56

tell let me tell you why that why i

8:59

think people who are jumping

9:03

it's a criticize the supreme court

9:05

in this particular moment might want

9:07

to reconsider how critical they're being

9:10

and maybe i'm being contrarian and polyannish here but

9:13

you know it is possible

9:17

that there could be and

9:19

unjust and

9:21

unconstitutional prosecution

9:25

of a former president let's say some guy is

9:27

elected i don't know in

9:30

twenty twenty four and takes office

9:32

in on january twenty twenty twenty

9:34

five and isn't he's some

9:36

kind of a narcissistic sociopath

9:39

uh... who cares nothing about the local clear i mean

9:42

you know i i i i i'm not saying this

9:44

could possibly happen but i mean you know

9:47

it's possible there might be somebody

9:49

who fits that description and becomes

9:51

president on january twentieth twenty twenty

9:53

five and he is soul

9:56

mission in life because he doesn't care about

9:58

the country doesn't care about the constant he

10:00

doesn't care about the rule of law and

10:02

only cares about himself and is angry because

10:04

he feels he has been mistreated by everyone

10:07

in society, including people who

10:09

turn the air conditioning too high for

10:12

him in a courtroom in New York City for

10:14

which he's being tried for fraud in his personal

10:16

business. I mean,

10:18

hypothetically, if someone like that

10:21

were to become president of the

10:23

United States, God forbid, he

10:26

might appoint some attorney general who might start looking, you

10:28

know, be a guy, I'm not going to name names,

10:30

but there was a particular name I saw on a

10:32

tweet today

10:35

who could be, you know, who might be

10:37

the type that this person would appoint, would

10:40

start looking at prosecuting anybody

10:43

who has shown political opposition

10:45

to that newly elected president,

10:48

including former presidents. And

10:50

so, you know, there may be, I

10:53

don't think it's unwarranted

10:55

or untoward to consider

10:58

the possibility that

11:01

something bad could happen in the

11:03

future and that you want to

11:05

basically lay down a marker that

11:07

prevents that. And I think there

11:09

are different ways you could do that. I think there has been

11:11

some writing which I actually have been

11:14

persuaded by in the interim period

11:16

since the DC Circuit's opinion that,

11:18

you know, for example, if it may be the

11:21

president doesn't have, the president does

11:23

not have absolute immunity, I believe,

11:26

for criminal acts that he commits

11:28

while in office. I firmly believe

11:30

that. If the president accepts, to

11:33

use a hypothetical that Chief Justice

11:35

Roberts used today, if the president

11:37

accepts a cash bribe in

11:40

order to, I don't know,

11:42

what was it, was it the ambassadorship or was

11:44

it, what was it, he used

11:47

the example of a cash bribe to commit an official

11:49

act. I

11:51

think that should be prosecutable. And

11:54

I think, I don't think

11:56

that anybody on

11:58

the court disagrees. with

12:00

that. I do think though that there

12:02

could be circumstances where I don't know,

12:04

but Congress passes a law that's directed

12:07

at a particular administration

12:10

and somehow it gets over, the veto is

12:12

overridden and it's like if

12:14

the president fails to fails

12:17

to prevent X

12:22

number of people from crossing the border, he

12:25

should he shall be sentenced, he shall be

12:27

tried and convicted for you know

12:30

we can be tried and convicted for you

12:32

know something called grand

12:36

negligence of the highest order and

12:38

be you know subject to execution.

12:41

Okay so I mean you know

12:43

there's you can think of just

12:45

these nightmare hypotheticals and that

12:47

would you know conjure up

12:49

some of the extreme hypotheticals

12:52

that the Trump people have

12:54

been have been putting together and

12:56

I think that it's not crazy to

12:58

want to basically say we're

13:00

not deciding all those

13:03

other cases but this case

13:05

you know we at a minimum

13:07

this. So I don't think the

13:10

discussion today was all that disturbing.

13:12

I think it's going to the question is where

13:15

they actually come out and is there

13:17

some kind of a limiting principle line

13:20

that you know puts

13:22

this case where it should be and

13:24

leaves open for another day or

13:27

protects the presidency from you know

13:30

abusive retribution,

13:32

retributive, retributative

13:36

is that the word? Pop prosecutions

13:38

in the future. Alright let me just say this back

13:40

to you and what I think is normal speak and

13:42

you tell me about that. Okay was that too? No

13:44

it was pretty good because I think I understood

13:46

it. Okay so what you're

13:48

saying is you think the discussion today

13:50

where they wound through all these hypotheticals

13:53

and tested the arguments, kicked the tires

13:55

really hard on both sides of the

13:57

ton of hypotheticals was actually them trying

13:59

to decide whether or not, how

14:01

to think about deciding this question

14:03

in a broad way so that it applies to

14:05

every future case and then thinking through how they

14:08

might narrow that so that it

14:10

doesn't have to be tied to every future case. And

14:13

it could be, and it could be. Sometimes you'll

14:15

see courts engage in these wide ranging discussions

14:17

and not a hint of it shows up

14:19

in the opinion. So why did the New

14:22

York Times come out right after and say

14:24

like, based on the arguments today. You mean the

14:26

fake news New York Times? Yeah, failing New York Times.

14:28

I'm just joking, failing yes, I'm sure. I love the

14:30

New York Times, I'm a subscriber. And they basically said,

14:32

based on the arguments today, it

14:35

seems like there are at least

14:38

enough justices who are taking Trump's claims

14:41

of immunity sort of seriously. Yeah,

14:43

again, I don't think I

14:46

would phrase it that way. Well, I'm probably phrasing it

14:48

wrong, actually. Well, let me tell you how I would

14:50

phrase it. I

14:53

do not think that

14:55

the court is necessarily,

14:57

maybe some justices are, maybe a

14:59

couple are. I

15:02

can't exclude that possibly. I do not think

15:04

they are taking Trump's specific

15:07

claims of

15:09

that he is

15:12

being mistreated and that he should

15:14

not be prosecuted for what he

15:16

did as alleged in this indictment.

15:19

I do not think there

15:21

are five votes to

15:24

sustain Trump's position

15:26

there. I do think

15:29

that in making the

15:31

arguments that he

15:34

should have this absolute immunity,

15:37

he is raising some

15:39

concerns that are legitimate,

15:43

that there could be abusive prosecutions if

15:45

you had the wrong kind of

15:48

president in the future. And

15:51

those are worthy of concern. And

15:54

I guess, I think if I

15:56

had to say, there's

15:58

this old adage that... I'm sure you've,

16:00

I mean everybody's, a lot of people have heard of

16:02

even who aren't lawyers. It's like, I think

16:05

it's something that was like hard cases make bad law.

16:08

Well, I was thinking about it on

16:10

the car ride over here. Um,

16:13

you know, bad people make

16:15

hard law. Bad people

16:17

make hard law. They make it hard. Um,

16:19

and we have a bad person

16:22

and the bad person is both

16:24

on the other side of the V, but he

16:26

also could be on the front other side. He

16:29

could, he could also be the one leading a

16:31

prosecution and dealing with

16:33

a bad person and creating a

16:36

rule, you know, so

16:38

that we can have nice things is

16:40

hard. So, you know, that's what this

16:42

is about. And it's about, it's not

16:44

just about Donald Trump in his capacity

16:47

as a criminal defendant in this

16:50

case or in the Georgia case or in,

16:52

in, in any of these cases, um,

16:55

it is as much about what

16:58

if you had a Donald Trump

17:00

bringing these cases and,

17:02

and, and, and that's a legitimate

17:04

concern. And so I would

17:07

say to people who are, who are

17:09

alarmed by this argument that

17:11

they should be taking some of

17:13

the concerns that justice Alito and

17:15

some of the other justices that

17:17

the some

17:19

of the people in the audience might not

17:21

be as might not be fond

17:23

of taking those seriously because

17:26

those questions that he's asking, you

17:28

know, about corrupt attorney generals, you

17:31

know, that can happen. That

17:33

could happen sooner than you think. So again,

17:35

that's the thing about the law. Um, um,

17:37

I'm not gonna talk for the majesty of

17:40

the law or whatever I'm talking about. The

17:42

thing about the law is when

17:44

you are trying to understand it and

17:47

apply it and make it, you

17:50

have to kind of flip the script sometimes. You

17:53

have to change the

17:55

names and change the characters and

17:57

say, and, and, and change the

17:59

hypothetical. to say, well, okay, what if the shoe

18:01

is on the other foot? What if

18:03

the bad guys are bringing the case and

18:06

the good guys are being prosecuted? And

18:09

is there some kind of rule that

18:11

you can distinguish with that? And that's

18:13

not easy, but

18:15

that being said, you don't have to

18:17

decide in one case, every case that

18:19

could possibly come in the future,

18:22

as I said, because you can't predict the future.

18:24

Okay, so I'm gonna just try to re-state this

18:26

again. Okay, that was very wordy, right? I'm

18:29

gonna try to re-state it again. What you're basically saying

18:31

is, okay, so they're kicking the tires in this thing,

18:33

but they could still easily, narrowly

18:35

rule that Trump is not immune for

18:37

prosecution in this instance. Correct. I

18:41

will concede that a lot of people disagree with

18:44

that now. But I- Yeah, I think people are

18:46

panicked. People are panicked? I think

18:48

they're overreacting. What

18:52

would it be like if they

18:54

granted, I mean, I think, since

18:56

we're all just dealing in hypotheticals here, if

18:59

they granted- We are swimming in hypotheticals. We

19:01

are swimming in a distraction. Because they granted

19:03

residential immunity. First of all-

19:06

That would be bad. Well, yeah, right?

19:08

Like, I think the idea of Donald

19:10

Trump getting elected and feeling untethered to

19:13

the law is profoundly scary,

19:16

but it's also just scary for the country. And it's

19:18

interesting, one of the things you're saying that

19:20

I think is important when you have a bad

19:22

person, right, when people talk about Donald Trump testing

19:24

our institution, this is what

19:26

we're talking about. Yeah, he's testing it every which

19:29

way. Because the thing, the hypotheticals that, those

19:31

existed before. Correct. And those hypotheticals were always

19:33

here. He wanted to prosecute, he wanted to

19:35

prosecute. He was trying to get, Trump

19:38

was trying to get Bill Barr to prosecute

19:41

Joe Biden in 2020, remember? Vaguely.

19:44

Yeah, I mean, there was some, there

19:46

was some, why aren't you going after Biden? I think there

19:48

was a, there were a couple of instances. I remember the

19:50

perfect phone call to Zelinski where he definitely

19:52

was trying to get them to investigate Joe

19:55

Biden. And so,

19:57

yeah, he is testing our institutions. He's forcing

19:59

questions. answered that bad people make

20:01

hard law we hadn't had an occasion

20:03

to really think about but

20:05

I gotta say so this guy John

20:08

Sauer argued for Trump and then this

20:10

guy Michael Drieben argued for the Justice

20:12

Department I mean

20:14

I heard the part where John Sauer made

20:19

I've always thought that one of Trump and then the people

20:21

around him their superpower is just how shameless

20:23

they are and so he was

20:25

able to like argue with a

20:27

straight face when I

20:29

believe it was Sotomayor said so

20:32

Joe Biden like could

20:34

kill Trump as part of an official act

20:36

because he deems him corrupt and you would

20:38

say that that was he's immune I mean

20:40

look that that was the SEAL team six problem they

20:42

had in the DC circuit I mean he they

20:45

are arguing for the broadest like yeah

20:47

they are arguing for the broadest possible

20:49

immunity because

20:52

they need that because

20:54

Trump's conduct while it didn't

20:57

involve actually him ordering or

20:59

causing someone intentionally

21:01

to be killed was

21:04

so extreme they need the

21:07

broadest formulation of

21:09

absolute immunity from criminal prosecution

21:11

that you can imagine because

21:14

once you start making

21:16

too many concessions on that you

21:18

can you can see your client's

21:20

case because it's so extreme and

21:23

that's his problem and that that

21:25

is actually why I'm part

21:27

of the reason why I'm fairly optimistic about

21:29

the case is that there's just no way you

21:32

can let this go if you're the

21:34

Supreme Court and say yeah this this

21:36

shouldn't be prosecuted without letting everything go

21:38

including the SEAL team six hypothetical and

21:40

the murder of a political opponent okay

21:42

so they've got to draw some guardrails

21:45

okay okay that makes me feel sort of better

21:47

okay how'd you think they both I mean you

21:49

want them I mean I don't have any you

21:51

know relaxation pills for you

21:53

trying to do it with my words trying to

21:56

take whatever a real chill pill all day can

21:58

you get a new sponsor for that Yeah,

22:01

if anybody's got some anti-anxiety meds, they want

22:03

to talk, let me know. Big

22:06

pharma comes to our own. Did

22:10

you think Drieben was good? Yeah,

22:12

I think Drieben was all good.

22:14

Drieben is the most amazing advocate.

22:17

I've seen him argue a couple of times in the past.

22:20

He is always prepared.

22:23

His arguments are seamless. He knows

22:26

the facts and the law inside out. One

22:28

of the things that just amazes

22:30

me when you actually watch Michael

22:33

Drieben in a courtroom is all

22:36

lawyers come up with their books and their papers

22:38

and their notebook. And you're up at the Supreme

22:40

Court. The fact of the matter is, and I've

22:42

argued there once, you really don't get a

22:44

chance to flip through your notebook. But it

22:47

feels good to have a piece of paper in

22:49

front of you. I'm not asking the questions that

22:52

are on here. Right, no, no, no, no. But

22:55

Drieben goes up to that podium

22:58

in the Supreme Court with Facing the Nine

23:01

with not anything other

23:04

than his bare hands. And

23:06

he just answers the questions,

23:09

recites cases

23:11

and citations and record

23:13

materials without,

23:16

with nothing to, he just has no,

23:18

not even for as a safety blanket. He

23:20

just goes up there for lawyers.

23:23

It's like not having paper is like being

23:26

naked. And so I

23:28

just have this, I mean, I

23:30

have always been in awe of Michael Drieben. And

23:32

I thought he was his classic self. And

23:34

one of the things about Michael Drieben is that,

23:37

you know, he has argued, I think

23:39

a few years ago before he joined the

23:41

Mueller team, he had argued his 100th case

23:44

in the Supreme Court. So

23:48

he's probably argued 110, I don't know how many. And

23:51

they have such immense respect

23:53

for him. One of them

23:56

is Zauer, the other Trump guy, because they jumped

23:58

at him hard out of the game. Yeah,

24:00

I think, look,

24:03

I think my general

24:06

rule about oral arguments is that the side

24:08

that gets the most questions usually loses. And

24:10

this is a case I think that's an

24:12

exception to that. And

24:14

it's an exception to that because the

24:18

Trump position was so extreme,

24:21

it didn't take much to just say,

24:23

to dismiss it. I think they were

24:25

already dismissive of the extreme position they

24:27

were taking before they got into the

24:29

courtroom. I think that extreme position

24:31

was demolished by Judge Pan a

24:34

couple months ago. So I

24:37

think that, you know, the fact that they

24:39

didn't beat, they did beat up on him

24:41

some, I just think that there

24:43

was sort of no point to beating up. How

24:45

much can you beat up on somebody who's basically

24:47

saying that the president can conduct a coup and

24:50

not be prosecuted unless he's first impeached and

24:52

convicted? I mean, yeah, this is the amount.

24:54

We're gonna pay some bills here. We're gonna

24:56

do one of George's favorites. Our first sponsor today

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sounds like a low low low laboring company. I

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enough times now so you get it. Okay. Nicely done.

27:22

Thank you. We have a clip. Can we listen

27:24

to the clip just to give a sample. But

27:28

he ordered the military to stage a coup and

27:30

you're saying that's an official act. I

27:33

think it would depend

27:35

on the circumstances when there was an

27:37

official act. If it were an official

27:39

act again he would have to be.

27:41

What does that mean depend on the

27:43

circumstances. He was the president. He is

27:45

the commander in chief. He talks

27:48

to his generals all the time and he told

27:50

the generals I don't feel like leaving

27:52

office. I want to stage a coup. Is

27:54

that immune. If it's an

27:56

official act there needs to be impeachment and

27:58

conviction beforehand because. framers viewed the

28:01

red that kind of is

28:04

an official act if it's an

28:06

official act if it's an official and on the

28:08

way you described that hypothetical it could well be

28:10

I just don't know you have to again if

28:12

a context in terms of that answer

28:16

sounds to me and so it's like yeah under

28:18

my attest it's an official act but that

28:20

sure sounds bad doesn't it well it certainly

28:22

sounds very bad and that's why I have

28:24

and that's why the framers have a whole

28:26

series of structural checks that have successfully for

28:29

the last 234 years prevented that very

28:33

kind of extreme hypothetical and

28:35

okay so I mean that was

28:37

pretty much that was sort of

28:39

a shorter and sweeter version of

28:41

the exchange this same lawyer John

28:43

Sauer had with

28:45

with Josh Florence pan two or

28:48

three months ago I know but

28:51

there's no good answer he doesn't have a good answer

28:54

there is no good answer the best

28:56

you can see the instinct is when you you

28:58

know I mean I guess he if he conceded

29:00

it right out front it would have

29:02

been it would have been just as bad so

29:05

he's throwing in there's a little word salad

29:07

a little evasion a little dance to

29:10

the left dance to the right and then finally

29:12

he kind of says probably yeah I guess

29:15

it's like okay that that's the

29:17

weakness of his position and basically

29:21

one of the reasons why there wasn't much

29:23

to I mean he got he

29:25

got a lot of questions but

29:28

there was a limit to what you could ask him

29:30

when he's taking that position because it's like nobody

29:34

none of the nine are

29:36

going to take that position

29:39

okay they're just not it is not going

29:41

to happen and so that

29:43

this is why I say this was sort

29:46

of an exception to the general rule that

29:48

the side that gets the most questions usually

29:52

loses here this guy

29:54

was basically not being that helpful

29:57

because he's not articulating

30:00

a position that even

30:02

a majority of the justices will want

30:04

to take. Whereas you've got

30:08

Michael Trevin, who is representing the United States Department

30:11

of Justice, and it was basically asked at

30:13

one point, although it should have gone

30:15

without saying, you're speaking for the Justice

30:17

Department as a whole,

30:19

yes, with the Solicitor General, they

30:24

use the government to

30:27

educate themselves and to test

30:29

out positions. They really use,

30:32

I mean, there was a book written,

30:34

I don't know, 20, 30 years ago probably,

30:36

at least by, I think, is

30:40

a journalist named Lincoln Kaplan called The

30:42

Tenth Justice, and it was about the

30:44

office of the Solicitor General. And here, he's

30:47

not in the Solicitor General's office, although he

30:49

is. He's not

30:51

now, but he's with the Special Counsel, but

30:53

he was with the Solicitor

30:56

General's office for decades. They

30:58

use the

31:01

government's lawyer at oral

31:03

argument, particularly one as

31:05

experienced as a dream,

31:07

as a seminar leader,

31:09

to talk about the

31:11

things that sort of are interesting to them,

31:13

to try to understand where

31:16

they could go, where they don't want to go, and

31:19

sometimes it does get far afield. I

31:21

mean, you could get just a completely

31:23

abstract discussion in the court. Well, they

31:25

were talking about like independent counsels at one point. Right,

31:27

right, right. What does this have to do with anything? Well, I mean, I didn't,

31:30

yeah, there was one point about the independent counsel

31:32

where Justice Thomas, I thought that was actually a

31:34

favorable question for the prosecution because he

31:37

was saying, you know, well, that's not really

31:40

in this case, is it, counsel? Which means

31:42

it's sort of like, okay, he's clearing out

31:44

the under Russian focusing on what's really an

31:46

issue, which is the immunity issue and not

31:48

giving them the chance to make this BS

31:50

argument that some amicus curia

31:52

are making. But setting that aside, this

31:57

was just sort of, this was a skull session.

32:00

of ways. They just want to say, okay,

32:02

what are the implications of things that we

32:04

could say? And it may

32:06

well be that because they can't fathom

32:08

what those or they don't really see what

32:11

those implications can be, can't clearly foresee them,

32:13

you may end up with a really, really

32:15

narrow opinion notwithstanding the

32:17

fact that this was kind of a wide-ranging

32:22

skull session, midnight skull session in

32:24

a law school dorm room in

32:26

many respects. It sounds like, I

32:29

thought it was interesting or I was told

32:31

by other lawyers that it was interesting that

32:33

Sauer sort of weaved his right to a

32:35

rebuttal. Apparently that's really unusual but it sounds like

32:37

what you're saying is, yeah, like, but there was nothing

32:39

else to say. Yeah, and that's right.

32:42

I mean, I think that the, I

32:44

am here, I am departing from the conventional wisdom

32:46

here and it could be, I'm going to be

32:49

totally wrong, I could be totally, who knows. We

32:51

might need to get another conventional lawyer. Yeah, somebody who's

32:53

sane, right? Somebody who's calmer and sane or doesn't know

32:55

what he's got, doesn't wear

32:58

funny hats and doesn't like to do product placement.

33:00

I don't know, I probably are a very great

33:02

lawyer. Yeah, but there

33:05

was, yeah, normally

33:07

when you're in court and

33:09

you think you're ahead, you

33:12

want to sit down as quickly as possible. I'm

33:15

giving example, the one time I argued before the Supreme

33:17

Court, it was like, okay,

33:20

I was up second because I was the respondent,

33:24

the person opposing the appeal and

33:29

my adversary got the shit kicked out of him and

33:32

there was no question I had at least

33:35

seven votes out of the eight who were sitting,

33:37

so the lawyers were accused and

33:40

so I'm thinking, okay, I want to

33:42

make this short and sweet and I,

33:44

you know, there's this yellow light or

33:46

there's a green light that goes on

33:49

when you start arguing. There's a

33:51

yellow light that goes on when you like have a

33:53

minute or two left and then there's a red light

33:55

that says time's up and they

33:58

used to be a lot stricter with the time. This thing

34:00

went on forever. Yeah, but it used to be

34:02

a lot stricter. I mean, the Rehnquist was just

34:04

totally like, boom, he cut you off in the

34:06

middle of the word. Chief

34:08

Justice Roberts isn't like that. Electric finishes, then it's... And

34:11

they were... But I remember, it's like, okay,

34:13

as soon as I see any light twitch,

34:16

or if I find some stopping

34:19

point earlier, I'm gonna

34:21

stop. Okay? I just remember thinking,

34:23

just get up and get

34:26

down. Now, in Sauer's

34:28

case, I don't think it was that

34:30

he thought that he was going to win on his

34:33

crazy extreme argument. But

34:36

I think he realized there was nothing

34:38

good that could have happened to him

34:40

if he stood up for rebuttal and

34:42

then got worked on

34:45

by Kagan and by Sotomayor and

34:47

by Barrett and

34:49

so on about the extremeness of his

34:51

position. Because they would've just not... It's

34:54

all been aired already and plus, it's the one

34:57

thing you have to always consider in

34:59

court is when lunchtime is. It's

35:02

important because you have to respect... The

35:04

justices lose patience at some point and maybe

35:06

they wouldn't have asked any questions. No, it's

35:09

a hangry. Who wants a hangry? And

35:12

at the same time, it can cut the other way that

35:14

because they want to go to lunch, they

35:16

may not want to ask you questions. But who knows? You

35:18

just don't want to take the risk. So

35:21

I think I wasn't as surprised that

35:23

he waved rebuttal because there was nothing

35:25

else he could have said that he hadn't

35:27

already said and there were plenty of things that

35:29

he could have gotten drawn back into that would

35:31

have been just back

35:33

in the muck again. So I think he made the right

35:35

decision but I think he made it for reasons that

35:38

are different than what a lot of people are

35:40

saying. Okay, last question before we

35:42

do some product stuff. To

35:44

me, it seems like there was a difference

35:47

between the women and men. You just mentioned

35:49

Barrett. Barrett seemed quite incredulous

35:52

of these arguments and whereas,

35:56

like, is it? Am I wrong? But

35:58

were the four women, didn't they seem like maybe they were? Yeah, I

36:00

actually do. I do think, well, I

36:02

don't know whether they were roughly in

36:04

the same place. I'm not sure exactly

36:06

where Barrett is, but I

36:08

really do think there is, we are seeing

36:12

some interesting dynamics among

36:15

the women. I think we've seen that in some of the opinions

36:17

I haven't, you know, I'm not a

36:20

sufficient Supreme Courtologist where,

36:22

you know, I sit there and I

36:24

spend all day dissecting the arguments and

36:26

the, to really pass a judgment on,

36:28

but there is something going on there.

36:30

There is a positive dynamic among the

36:33

women. I think it's shown by the fact that there

36:35

was this, I think we all

36:37

saw that it was on television at once, that there

36:39

was some kind of panel discussion with

36:41

Justice Sotomayor and Justice Barrett and

36:44

they're trying to, you know, they're trying, they're all happy

36:46

trying to get along. And I think, you know, I,

36:49

I, I, you know, I, how much of that

36:51

is gender-based. I, I, you know, someday somebody will

36:53

write a book and we'll figure it all out,

36:55

but I, you know,

36:58

I think I like it. Yeah.

37:00

I'm not trying to, I don't even know why.

37:02

No, it's interesting. I'm just like struck by it.

37:04

No, it's interesting because, you know, look, it's a small,

37:07

hoisted institution of nine people

37:10

and no one's really in charge.

37:12

You have a Chief Justice, but

37:14

he can't really boss the other ones

37:16

around. His power

37:18

is the power that he has, the power

37:21

to assign opinions. But other than

37:23

that, it's

37:26

the power of persuasion and he's trying to

37:28

bring them all along together. So he can't,

37:30

you're dealing with, you know, people have a

37:33

life in the Supreme Court to nine separate

37:35

law firms, you know, with nine

37:37

partners and then there are, there are little associates

37:39

or the law clerks writing opinions and then, and

37:41

then the people typing it up and stuff like

37:43

that. They're like nine little law firms and

37:45

none of them really control each other. And

37:48

it's when you change, when you

37:50

swap one out or

37:53

two, one out, it's like you can change

37:55

the dynamic of the court. You

37:57

know, it's, it's, it's like any small group you've

38:00

ever participated in. You take

38:03

out a member and add someone else, take

38:05

two out, the character of the group can

38:07

change. And it's sort of, this is a

38:09

fascinating dynamic and I think years from now

38:11

people will be writing about it. Maybe not

38:13

too far in the future. Alright,

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one that you love right here and tell them

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we sent you. Sarah and George. Can

40:40

I do it for like my day instead of Mother's

40:42

Day? Yeah, do it right now. Oh, can we just do this

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on the show? Great. That was good. Uh-huh.

40:47

It's refreshing also. Good. You

40:49

look fantastic. Thank you. Do on the

40:52

morning grass. Absolutely. Hey.

40:54

Do you have anything for my hair? I

40:57

don't. Okay. We're looking for

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hair products, sponsors. Okay. Yeah. New

41:02

York Election Interference Hush Money Trial.

41:05

You're there. Yes. What's

41:08

it like? You know, it's a trial. I

41:10

wasn't there on Monday. I was there for,

41:14

I guess, three days of the jury selection

41:16

last. I can't even remember. The days are

41:18

bringing. I wasn't there on Monday when they

41:20

had the opening statements. I was there on

41:22

Tuesday. Yes. No,

41:26

two days ago. Today's Thursday. I

41:28

can't even figure it out. For,

41:31

you know, basically it

41:34

was the gag order argument,

41:36

which took about an hour or two at the

41:38

beginning, and then a good chunk

41:40

of witness David

41:42

Becker's testimony. And

41:45

I don't know what's been going on today

41:47

because thanks to the Supreme Court. But

41:49

it, oh, by the way, which makes me just,

41:52

I just love this fact. They

41:55

had to leave

41:58

court early on Monday. day

42:01

they had to you know they were going to go to two but they

42:03

only went to like 1230 because a juror

42:06

had an emergency dental appointment.

42:08

Yeah, I read that.

42:10

Meanwhile this former narcissist,

42:14

currently narcissistic former president of the United

42:16

States who thinks he's entitled to do

42:18

whatever he wants whenever he wants it,

42:21

wanted to come to Washington today for

42:23

this oral argument which he would have

42:25

contributed absolutely nothing to and

42:29

court said no sorry you're on trial

42:31

here. So juror over

42:34

indicted former president. Yeah, it's just I

42:37

mean I just there's

42:39

something so fitting about that and so appropriate

42:41

in a

42:43

country where we seek equal justice under

42:45

law that I just had to note

42:48

that fact. But anyway so Tuesday the

42:51

gag order argument went horribly

42:54

horribly for Trump's

42:56

lawyer and he just he

42:58

it was it was

43:00

to the point where if there was there

43:03

should be a mercy rule in court sometimes

43:05

it would have come into play there and

43:07

he was basically making I mean Trump

43:09

has engaged in at least by

43:12

the time of this argument ten violations of the

43:14

gag order there were more but I think because

43:16

I think that what happened was the prosecutors

43:19

decided let's just pick these ten and

43:21

go in on those and

43:24

the arguments that that Trump's

43:26

lawyer was making were just

43:28

terrible I mean one was kind of well this was

43:31

a retweet and it's like well it's

43:33

a retweet but he actually changed

43:35

the language of what he was retweeting in some of

43:37

that. And the prosecutors

43:40

pointed out that Trump loves to brag

43:42

about social how it gets his message

43:44

across and it just you know it

43:48

it magnifies everything he has to say and

43:50

he's rep if he's retweeting he's he's

43:52

patent and he's retweeting some nasty thing about

43:54

a witness well he's basically

43:56

adopting that statement so that did the

43:58

judge was not buying buying

44:00

that at all. And the other argument that

44:03

Trump's lawyers seemed to be making was

44:07

that the

44:10

president was merely responding to

44:12

political attacks made against him

44:14

by Michael Cohen, by

44:17

a witness. And it's like, okay,

44:20

there's no exception

44:22

for that in the gag order. It says

44:24

thou shalt not, you know,

44:26

talk about witnesses. And there's

44:29

no exception to that. And then when the

44:31

court tried to press counsel

44:33

on, okay, what exactly

44:36

are you saying that Trump was

44:38

responding to? He couldn't answer, couldn't

44:40

point to a single thing. And it was just like, it

44:43

was just brutal. And it got to

44:45

the point where Justice Mershan said to

44:48

counsel, to Trump's counsel, you

44:51

know, essentially, you're not helping yourself here. You're

44:53

losing all credibility with me. And

44:56

when a judge says that to you, that's like,

44:58

and you, I mean, that's, you're

45:02

getting squashed in a way that is

45:04

just extremely unpleasant and really bad for

45:06

your client. He's a very, he's

45:08

a very straight-laced,

45:11

very disciplined, very even-tempered

45:15

guy. And he's just

45:17

very business-like. I like him a lot. I

45:19

think he's conducted himself in

45:21

an A-plus fashion. I

45:24

think he's a model trial

45:26

judge from what I've seen so far. Well,

45:29

that's good. And then what about the jury? Like,

45:31

were you there for that? Yeah, I was

45:33

there. I mean, I,

45:35

I, I, for jury

45:38

selection, the, the press except for

45:40

like the, the, I was technically

45:42

pressed there because I'm writing for

45:44

the Atlantic, which you

45:46

should all subscribe to. And doing commentary for the court.

45:48

And doing commentary. And doing commentary. And,

45:50

you know,

45:53

the, the, the, the, the, we didn't see

45:55

the jury. We can only hear. It was

45:57

piped into us, the, the, the jury selection.

46:00

And I wrote about that in the Atlantic, and

46:02

what I thought struck me about the jury selection

46:04

was it was

46:06

just really kind of mundane in a lot

46:08

of ways. Yeah, sure, occasionally there'd be these

46:10

interesting answers to questions, but it

46:12

was all very, very orderly and very, you

46:15

know, it was tedious the way court proceedings

46:17

often are and frankly should be, particularly in

46:20

a case where you're trying to be very,

46:22

very careful in making

46:24

sure that the people

46:26

on the jury are fair-minded. And

46:30

then on Tuesday when I

46:33

attended and saw after the

46:37

gag order argument, I watched, they

46:40

had David Becker on the stand and he had not,

46:42

on Monday he had just testified for like

46:44

20 minutes of preliminaries and I got to

46:46

watch David Becker. I didn't have a good

46:49

view of the jury because I

46:51

was on the side of the

46:53

courtroom that the jury was, so I

46:55

couldn't really see all of their faces. They

46:57

were kind of like parallel to my line

47:00

of sight the way they were seated, so I couldn't, I wasn't

47:02

really watching the jury to tell you the truth. But

47:05

I was watching Becker. I had a clear view

47:08

of Becker and I thought

47:10

he was just a tremendously effective witness.

47:13

And you know, it's hard, you know, what

47:16

makes a witness effective is, you know,

47:18

how they answer the questions and how they

47:21

just sort of are even

47:23

when they're answering the questions and

47:26

I just thought he just, he looked

47:29

like a guy who was just telling the

47:31

story the way it happened and he looked

47:34

very credible. That said, we're going to see

47:36

what kind of cross-examination they will have on

47:38

him. But if he has

47:41

the same demeanor on cross, you know, he's

47:43

going to, he'll concede some things that he

47:45

has to concede. He's not going to, I

47:48

don't think he's going to be, he doesn't

47:50

strike me that he's going to play the

47:52

wise guy or get rattled. Did he get

47:54

indicted like why? So he, just for context,

47:57

he is the editor of the

47:59

Inquirer who... doing catching the old

48:01

one Donald Trump. He ran AMI,

48:03

American Media Inc., I think it

48:05

was, and they owned a

48:07

bunch of magazines, including the National Enquirer. Like

48:09

there's garbage magazines at the grocery store. Yeah,

48:11

yeah, they're right. Right. Well,

48:13

you say they're garbage people, you pay good money for

48:15

those. Okay. Wow.

48:18

So anyway, so basically, I mean, the theory

48:21

of the prosecution is, and I think it's

48:23

pretty compelling, is this, the

48:25

payment to Stormy Daniels, which didn't

48:27

involve AMI or the National Enquirer,

48:30

was part of a overall

48:32

scheme that started, you know,

48:34

right after Trump announced

48:37

his candidacy with the presidency that AMI

48:40

would buy stories, would find stories,

48:42

would alert the Trump campaign about

48:45

stories that were negative about

48:47

Trump, and would buy

48:49

the stories so that, and

48:51

not publish them, and then

48:53

somehow he'd get, the AMI would get

48:56

reimbursed by Trump. It's just a flat

48:58

out violation of Federal Election

49:00

Campaign Act, because basically, you

49:02

have an outside entity making

49:05

contributions, and then being

49:07

reimbursed for the contributions by the candidate.

49:09

And you can't do that. That's illegal.

49:12

And in fact, AMI was

49:14

investigated, and Pekka was

49:17

investigated by the United States Department of

49:19

Justice under the prior administration. Who was

49:21

president then? It was Trump.

49:23

Trump, Trump, yeah. So under President

49:25

Trump's Justice Department actually

49:28

investigated this. They, as you know,

49:30

they charged Michael Cohen for violating

49:32

the Federal Election Campaign Act and

49:34

committing offenses that, according to the

49:36

government, in the sentencing memo

49:39

they submitted to the U.S. District Court, were

49:41

at the direction of, and

49:44

for the benefit of, individual one who

49:46

was? Trump. Yes.

49:49

Okay. So they investigated AMI

49:51

for this stuff that's being hashed out

49:53

in court involving, there

49:55

was a payoff to, they

49:57

bought off a doorman who made

50:00

some false allegation against Trump and then

50:02

they also paid off

50:04

Karen McDougal who

50:06

Trump did his

50:09

thing with, whatever you want to call it. Yes,

50:12

gross. And

50:16

they expect to be reimbursed by Trump. They

50:19

entered into what was called a

50:21

non-prosecution agreement with

50:24

the government. Basically conceding they'd done the bad thing

50:26

and they promised not to do it again. And

50:28

Pekka was part of that. So

50:31

what should have happened ideally is that if

50:34

Trump had not been president, he should have

50:36

been prosecuted at that time and Pekka and

50:38

AMI and Cohen would have been witnesses against

50:40

him but he was president and he was

50:43

immune from prosecution because presidents are considered, although

50:45

some courts never rule on this, they are

50:47

considered to be immune from prosecution for anything

50:49

during the time that they are president because

50:51

they've got to be president. They can't be

50:53

in jail, they can't be in criminal court.

50:56

So bottom line is,

50:59

this is what Pekka is testifying to

51:01

all this and it's setting

51:03

the stage for the Stormy Daniels payment because

51:05

what happened was they had this set up

51:08

and then it kind of got blown up

51:10

because first of all, Trump

51:12

didn't pay AMI back. Okay?

51:14

Surprise, surprise. Did he pay the

51:16

bills on these things? Well he ultimately

51:19

did because what happened was he

51:21

didn't pay the bill and then also, I

51:23

don't know whether they got to this testimony today. I

51:25

have not been following the events of the trial today

51:27

because I was watching the Supreme Court and then talking

51:29

about the Supreme Court. There's a lot of cases, there's

51:31

a lot of legal stuff. The other thing

51:33

that happened was I think Pekka and

51:35

got lawyer, got advice from his in-house

51:37

lawyer thing, don't do this, do

51:40

not do this, stop. And so

51:42

basically when Stormy Daniels

51:44

came around, AMI wasn't playing anymore

51:47

so they had to figure out some other way to

51:49

get cash from Trump to

51:53

Stormy to pay her off before

51:55

the election and so

51:58

they didn't have AMI anymore. So Michael Cohen

52:00

took out a home equity loan and then

52:02

got reimbursed later with checks signed by Donald

52:04

Trump when he was president. And

52:08

Pekka, what's great about Pekka for

52:10

the prosecution is he

52:13

sets up the pattern and the

52:15

motivation and the fact that,

52:18

you know, this was basically all about

52:20

the election. And why that matters is

52:22

that it's a crime in New York

52:24

to falsify business records for any reason.

52:27

And it's a misdemeanor automatically, but

52:30

it becomes a felony if you're doing it to

52:33

effectuate or cover up another

52:35

crime. And the other crime here

52:38

is that all of these payoffs

52:40

were basically done for the purposes of

52:42

influencing the election, in which case they,

52:45

you know, they had to be disclosed,

52:47

which they weren't. And instead, they were

52:49

covered up through the use of these

52:51

false invoices and checks that

52:54

were allegedly for a retainer that didn't exist.

52:56

You know, so you've got 35 counts

52:58

of false business records and every single one is a

53:01

felony. Did you see Trump while

53:03

you were? I did see Trump. How

53:05

does he look in there? Doesn't

53:07

look happy. Yeah. This is the

53:09

reporting is that he seems mad at the world. Doesn't

53:12

he did not look happy. He

53:16

didn't look particularly rested or

53:18

healthy. And,

53:23

you know, I mean, I got a couple of good looks

53:25

at him as he walked down. Did he wave or? I

53:28

did not. I didn't want to create a scene.

53:30

And also I and I wasn't within. I don't

53:32

think I was within his field. By the way,

53:35

I think that's correct. Yeah. I, you

53:37

know, I do occasionally exercise good

53:40

judgment. You know, I know it's boring,

53:42

but. We're straight on

53:44

that seems healthy. So

53:46

what do you like? Are you going to go back down

53:48

to the witnesses you want to see? Yeah, I'm going

53:50

to try. I'm trying to go down there

53:52

as much as possible, consistent with my my

53:56

primary job, which is as an Uber

53:58

driver for my. teenage

54:00

girls. But yeah, I'm going

54:02

to try to go down there next week again. I'm going to try to

54:05

make as much of this trial as

54:07

possible and particularly with, you

54:09

know, the more interesting witnesses. And we've

54:12

got probably another month of this trial, right? Yeah,

54:14

I think this trial is going to go through,

54:17

you know, mid-May to

54:19

maybe, maybe Memorial Day at the worst.

54:23

I would not be surprised if

54:25

the Thursday afternoon before

54:27

Friday afternoon before Memorial Day is when

54:29

the verdict comes. Wild. Hey, you know,

54:32

it reminds me though, the timeline of this

54:34

one is just a quick question that I sort

54:36

of forgot to ask about the immunity question, which

54:38

is it does

54:41

seem like there was a piece in Rolling Stone today

54:43

that was interesting to me because they are somebody on

54:45

Trump's team had kind of gone on

54:47

background and said like, yeah, we don't really

54:49

care how they decide the immunity case because

54:51

we've already won because it's kicked the timeline

54:53

of this to a point where it'll never

54:56

go to trial before the election. Do you

54:58

agree with that? I

55:01

have a nuanced view and fundamental I

55:04

disagree. And here's the thing. There

55:08

are two possibilities here. Let's assume the Supreme

55:10

Court takes as long as it can

55:13

possibly take with this case, which would be based up

55:15

to the end of June, June 28, the

55:17

last Friday in June. And the

55:19

term would end no later than that. If

55:25

Trump loses outright, then

55:29

the trial would occur 81 days after that.

55:31

That is basically the period of time that

55:33

the judge has allotted from that

55:36

was previously the original time between when

55:39

jurisdiction was taken away from her for

55:41

the appeals and the original trial date.

55:44

I did the math today in 81 days after June 28th is September 17,

55:46

2024. And I don't see Judge

55:53

Chutkin saying, oh, too close to the

55:55

election. I'm not going to hold this

55:58

trial. I don't see the justice saying,

56:00

oh, please don't hold this trial. I think

56:03

they're going to say, well, that's when the trial is. That's

56:05

when the trial is. So you could end up, yes,

56:07

I do not think the case will be tried

56:10

to verdict. I will agree with the Trump people

56:12

to that extent. I do not

56:14

think that the case will be tried to

56:16

verdict before the election, but I do think

56:18

that you could end up with the government

56:20

putting on its entire case in September and

56:22

October of 2024, which would be quite something.

56:28

What happens then if the verdict comes down and

56:30

he's elected president? If he's

56:32

elected president and the verdict comes down,

56:34

well, you know, he wouldn't serve the

56:36

time during the time he was president.

56:39

But anyway, that's one possibility. The other

56:42

possibility is, and people are talking about this today

56:44

because they can't figure out what

56:46

the Supreme Court's going to do, whether it's going

56:48

to do some kind of possible remand for further

56:50

proceedings in the district court to figure out what

56:53

stuff is prosecutable and

56:56

what stuff isn't and what, you know. And again,

56:58

I think that's all speculation because we actually do

57:00

not know the rule of law that they

57:03

are going to set to determine what

57:05

is an official act that's prosecutable and

57:07

what is not. But assuming

57:10

they remanded for some kind of factual

57:12

findings before the trial, before you could

57:14

decide to have the trial, well,

57:17

the problem that paces for Trump is if

57:20

I'm Judge Chutkin, I'm going to say, okay, well,

57:22

they need me to find facts, come

57:25

back on July 10th at

57:27

9 o'clock and present your

57:29

witnesses. And basically,

57:31

you could easily see that this

57:34

could entirely backfire on Trump, the idea of

57:36

– they think they've stalled it past the

57:38

election. I don't think

57:41

they've either pushed the trial to

57:43

September, and if they pushed it beyond

57:45

that, it's because they're going to have some

57:47

kind of fact-finding beforehand, and that could happen

57:49

in July or August. So

57:52

I actually

57:55

think that we

57:57

may have another situation in politics where –

57:59

in law. law that happens when the dog

58:01

catches the car, I think getting

58:04

what he wants here may not necessarily

58:06

be what he wants. Okay,

58:09

alright. Did that make sense? It

58:11

did, it did. Okay. So,

58:14

just the one thing I want to ask you about before

58:16

we get out of here. Before I do the eyes? Yeah,

58:18

you can do the eyes while you do this. I

58:20

think you're a talented person, you can multitask. The

58:23

Arizona Grinsher invited 18 people,

58:26

including Giuliani, Meadows, and 11

58:28

fake electors, for scheming to prevent the

58:31

lawful transfer of the presidency. What

58:35

about this? It just like came out, came

58:37

down, there's just... Yeah, you

58:39

know, I'm not surprised. I think there may

58:41

be at least one or more investigations. I

58:44

think there's at least one other state that's

58:46

rumored to be doing it. I forget which

58:48

one it is. But

58:51

I mean, what's good, they

58:53

did this in all those states. They submitted

58:55

false electorals. There's

58:57

no reason why they shouldn't be prosecuted under

59:00

state law in any

59:02

of these states. I haven't had the chance yet

59:04

because of the so much legal activity that the

59:06

former president has been causing in courts throughout the

59:09

country. Yeah, you got to get around the telephone.

59:11

They got it around the high tier. Yeah, you

59:13

got to be sure that it's... Yeah, you know,

59:15

the Supreme Court, Manhattan, which isn't really the Supreme

59:17

Court, this is really the trial court, and the

59:19

Supreme Court of the United States. So, I haven't

59:21

had a chance to read the indictment, I confess.

59:23

But yeah, I mean, it's really...

59:25

And they also got, in this one, they charged Boris

59:29

Epstein. He

59:31

got hit on this one too. This

59:35

is going to be going on for a while. These

59:38

cases are going to be... We're

59:41

going to be living with the 2020 election

59:43

for a couple more years at least, regardless

59:45

of what happens in 2024. I

59:48

just can't sort

59:50

of stress enough how

59:53

wild. And by wild, I don't

59:55

mean it in like a... I

59:57

mean it in the worst way you could possibly mean it. No,

1:00:00

absolutely. Come show up on January 6th, we'll

1:00:02

be wild, as in people are going to die and people

1:00:04

are going to try to overthrow the government. We

1:00:07

are just, we are entering into a crazy time, which

1:00:09

is why George, I'm so grateful, thank you, came to explain

1:00:11

the legal news for me and thanks to all of

1:00:13

you for listening. Don't forget to hit

1:00:15

subscribe, leave us a review on your podcast

1:00:17

app, email us at askgeorgeatthebullwork.com, get tickets for

1:00:20

our live show on May 15th in D.C.,

1:00:22

and we will see you next week. Okay.

1:00:26

Bye. Well, George, try to wake

1:00:28

the man we're playing, got to

1:00:30

sit down with Sarah on, well,

1:00:32

take a stand, explain all the

1:00:34

legal problems they're piling high, with

1:00:36

Donald Trump, oh my, oh my,

1:00:38

oh my, oh my. He

1:00:42

said, Sarah, let me break it

1:00:44

down for you, the destruction of

1:00:46

justice, corruption to the legal tangles

1:00:48

and troubles be growing fast. If

1:00:51

the storm is going to last, there

1:00:53

will last. Oh,

1:00:56

can't wait, oh,

1:00:58

well, I, oh,

1:01:00

legal problems can't live without

1:01:02

it. Oh,

1:01:05

let's do the Russian side. Oh,

1:01:09

Sarah, listen close.