Jack - Bonus - Clean up On Aisle 45 - Series Premier (feat. Joyce Vance)

Episode Date: January 21, 2021

It is this podcast's mission to hold the Biden Justice Department accountable. That means holding the previous administration accountable.AG and Andrew Torrez discuss Merrick Garland, pardons, impeachment, the Senate's "power-sharing arrangement", charging insurrectionists with misdemeanors, and more.

M-S-W-Media. Season 4 of How We Win Is Here. For the past four years, we've been making history in critical elections all over the country. And last year, we made history again by expanding our majority in the Senate, eating election denying Republicans and crucial state house races, and fighting back a non-existent red wave. But the Magga Republicans who plotted and pardoned the attempted overthrow of our government now control the House, thanks to gerrymandered maps and repressive anti-voter laws. And the chaotic spectacle we've already seen shows us just how far they will go to

seize power, dismantle our government, and take away our freedoms. So, the official podcast of the persistence is back with season 4. There's so much more important work ahead of us to fight for equity, justice, and our very democracy itself. We'll take you behind the lines and inside the rooms where it happens, with strategy and inspiration from progressive change makers all over the country. And we'll dig deep into the weekly news that matters most and what you can do about it, with messaging and communications expert co-founder of Way to Win and our new co-host, Jennifer Fernandez-Ancona.

So join Steve and I every Wednesday for your weekly dose of inspiration, action, and hope. I'm Steve Pearson. And I'm Jennifer Fernandez-Ancona. And this is How We Win. how we win. The rule of law is not just some lawyers turn a phrase. It is the very foundation of our democracy. The essence of the rule of law is that like cases are true, like, that there not be one rule for Democrats and another for Republicans, one rule for the powerful, another for the powerless, one rule for the rich and another for the poor or different rules depending upon one's race or ethnicity.

To serve as attorney general at this critical time is a calling I am honored and eager to answer. Hey everyone, this is Andrew Taurus from the opening argument podcast. And this is AG from Mollershi Road and the Daily Beans and welcome to the brand new brand spanking new premiere of the Clean Up on IL-45 podcast. I'm so excited to be here. Oh, I am so excited to be doing this with UAG. It's finally a dream come true. And I'm excited that all of you out there

who are listening, as you know, from all of our many Q&As and promos, we are gonna be covering the Biden Justice Department, the Biden administration more generally, in terms of how do we go about rebuilding in an era post-Trump? Probably the central figure for at least the next year or so is going to be our next Attorney General, Merrick Garland. I was,

A.J. you and I actually talked about Merrick Garland as a potential nominee. And, you know, am I initial, I don't want to say pessimistic thoughts, but, you know, I was sort of looking for a young fire in the belly, go get it, right? Somebody who's as pissed off as you and I and really wants to, you know, bring everybody who's ever touched Donald Trump to justice. I think we got a little bit of that from, from his introductory press conference.

What do you think? Yeah, I concur. I was first a little worried, but when he gave his remarks, and not worried, but just kind of disappointed, I was looking for more of a Sally Yates type attorney general. But when he gave his remarks after he was introduced by Joe Biden as the next attorney general, when he introduced the top four folks in his Justice Department team, I was very optimistic about what I heard Merrick Garland say about applying the rule of law. He mentioned the events of January 6th, the insurrection on our Capitol. He talked about how Justice has to be applied equally. And I just was very encouraged by his remarks.

And it is up to us, we the people, to hold this administration accountable, to hold the past administration accountable. And so I'm looking forward to that as well. And we've been talking about on our separate shows up until this point. So often about people losing faith in the Department of Justice, in its independence, in its ability to do justice, and we could spend hours talking about the failures of Attorney

General Bill Barr, Jeff Sessions, Matthew Whitaker, any number of attorneys general in acting attorneys general that that Trump has had in his tenure as president and so I'm I'm hopeful For the future and what's interesting is we got to talk to I got to speak a little bit to Joyce Vance who has written extensively on this subject about American people losing faith in the institution of the Department of Justice because it stopped doing justice.

Yeah. Well, let's, why don't we cut over to that interview? Yeah, let's listen to it. Joining us today to discuss the future of the Department of Justice and what we need to do to tackle how we move forward is former US Attorney Joyce Vance. Joyce, hi, welcome. Hey, thanks for having me.

I'm so excited to talk to you today because I know you have written extensively, and you and I have spoken extensively about people and the public having lost faith or losing faith in our institutions, specifically the Department of Justice. And, you know, we were always worried about people not having faith that the Department of Justice was doing justice. What are the dangers of that? And how are we going to be able to come back from that? Well like you and I have discussed, our institutions only work as long as people trust them, as

long as they have faith in them. So that's not to pretend that our institutions were perfectly functional before Trump became president. They weren't. People had a lot of distrust for institutions. In the criminal justice context, the specter of racial injustice has never been far away from the legitimacy of those institutions. They were already stress tested. They had a lot of work to do. And then along came Trump. And I think we've discussed extensively for the last four years in real time the way he's damaged those institutions. So the challenge now for DOJ and really for the criminal justice system

is can it meet these dual compromises to its public legitimacy. Can it simultaneously restore the faith that Trump sucked out of the system while addressing the racial injustice that pervades the system and that demands a fix if we're going to have any aspiration to having a fair and just system? So let me give you my short answer. I'm optimistic. I actually have started thinking about the fact that we've faced so many challenges that have pushed the system really towards the brink with so much public attention on it as a real opportunity. And I'm excited to see what the Biden Justice Department will do because with so many challenges that have to be dealt with it, this won't be a time where you can just kick the can down the road and hope it fixes itself. Yeah, exactly. I don't see this justice department being able to kick the can down the road. So it's going to be interesting to see what happens.

And I was wondering what your thoughts were on the nomination of Merrick Garland as Attorney General. So I think nominating Merrick Garland signals a commitment to institutionalism. This is someone who's been in the Justice Department before, been in the DAGs office before, understands what it's like inside of the building.

And look, we all know, right? Inside of an organization, there are different institutional equities that have to be balanced. And if you're in a soft drink company, maybe it's different brands of soft drinks. But if you're inside of the Justice Department, it's maybe balancing the equities in the civil division against those in the criminal division

and making sure that your work reflects all of those different equities. So, under Trump, the Justice Department's equity was supporting the president, right? Bill Barr made very little charade out of the fact Under Trump, the Justice Department's equity was supporting the president, right? Bill Barr made very little shurray out of the fact that he was the president's lawyer. Now, if confirmed, and I feel certain that he will be Judge Garland, we'll have to reset those equities, but we'll also have to make sure that DOJ, in some sense, aggressively markets itself to the public as an institution that can

be trusted, not in an appropriate way, not revelatory of cases that are in progress, but I think DOJ will be called upon to be more transparent about its processes than it's ever before been. And how do you practically speaking go about setting those equities, just practically on a practical level? On a practical level, at least in prosecutions, it's really done in a case by case sort of way. Ferguson is such a good example because in Ferguson, it was so clear that things had

happened that were wrong. And people wanted to engage in the criminal prosecution. And ultimately, evaluation of the evidence demonstrated that DOJ didn't have cases that it could bring where it had available proof beyond a reasonable doubt. So a decision was made not to indict the criminal cases but also to use processes inside of the civil rights division to hold the police department accountable and to fix, so to speak, the police department through the consent decree process. So that's an example of balancing equities. Well, you know, I'm really looking forward to seeing what this

justice department does. I think we're all looking forward to kind of a turn back to, you know, I don't want to say normalcy, but normalcy. And, you know, kind of repairing our institutions and moving forward from here. So I think it's going to be imperative that, you know, we follow these norms and that we work within the confines of the Justice Department to bring equity and justice. I think it's just going to be so important that we follow these things. Look, there's nothing that's that's more important than this. I mean, with with this administration, we've experienced the death of truth and the death of the law, but hopefully they're they're not quite dead. They're on life support and we can bring them back. If we don't, I don't know

what else underlies our democracy. I don't know what else our foundational principles are if they're not truth in the rule of law. They're only mostly dead. Well, thank you so much for talking to us today Joyce. I really appreciate your time. Nice to be with you. Good luck with the new podcast. I think it's going to be great. Former US Attorney Joyce Vance. I appreciate your time. So as you can see, I think Joyce feels kind of the same way that we do about this nomination and and how important it's going to be. And again, I'm very optimistic and hopeful about a lot of people being held accountable. And right now, as we record this, we're on pardon watch.

As we record this, we're on pardon watch. And so it's going to be interesting too, because next week you and I are going to be having a friendly debate with someone who we have a difference of opinion on about the constitutional language, about impeachment and pardon. Yeah. And, I mean, let me, let me book in that, right? Those of you who know me, right, know that I'm coming from a place that is very progressive But that knowing right just like a G I police the arguments on our side that I think are

Stronger or weaker or lack merit and I have to say I am not convinced by the arguments. I had Professor Lawrence tribe when I was in law school, right? He has forgotten more about constitutional law than I will ever know. There's no doubt, right? Like when he's on the other side, I'm probably wrong. But his arguments as to why Trump can't pardon himself are not good and are not persuasive to me. And, and I look, I don't want to be of the mindset that Trump can pardon himself. But I think like that's what the Constitution says and demands. And I don't think we're doing ourselves any favors to try and say it shouldn't apply to Trump because, you know, he's a horrible, Nazi garbage monster game show host. Like that's all true, but the Constitution doesn't have that exception to it.

So... Well, the Constitution doesn't have any exceptions, but that's where we just... That's where we diverge a little bit. I don't think that the President can pardon himself. If there's any limit on the pardon that could be litigated and has a chance of winning, I think that that's it. I think any other limitations, including congressional limitations, which was next by USV Klein or any other sort of limitations on the pardon, like if a president's being impeached, he can't pardon people or if he is impeached, he can't

pardon. I don't, I'm not with any of those arguments, but I think if there is one that could win, it's the self-parten, and that's because of separation of powers, right? It's supposed to be a check on the judicial branch, not on the executive branch, and I think that's like dividing by zero or something. I would have to write the argument up to be cogent, but those are my feelings on it. Well, I think, again, I mean, it's why I let off with saying, on the other side is Lawrence Tribe.

That's not saying, on the other side is Alex Jones and the guy dressed in the Gohorns. It's Buffalo. They were Buffalo Horns. Andrew, come on. All I could think of is the theme song from the 1985 Dragnet with Tom Hanks and... Oh, yeah.

We just like, hey, a dance. Yeah, a streetback. Put on your goat leggings and try to blend in. Yeah. We just like to dance at our goatskin pants around this age. I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, yeah.

People against goodness and normalcy, P-A-G-A-N, pagan, nice work, Joe. Yeah, what a great movie. So we have a few things that we're gonna discuss today. Let's give a little preview before we take a break. What stories did you want to touch on today that I think are very, you know, pressure and relevant right now?

Yeah, so there are two that really came to mind. The first is the reports coming out as to how the Senate will be structured, right? We've got a 50, 50 Senate and that creates, yes, on full floor votes, right? We know that Kamala Harris can is empowered to break ties. But how are committees going to be structured, right? How is the day-to-day business going to operate on the Senate? I wanted to talk about that a little bit and also clear up some really terrible takes

from the far left of our side, which again, it's hard to find somebody more progressive than me, but you know, you already had some of the noisiest folks that we don't need to amplify their particular names, you know, who we're talking about, out there saying this proves that Biden is already capitulating, and no, it proves that you can't do math Kyle, but, so I wanted to talk about that a little bit, and then I wanted to share something really, really interesting that I am trying to dig down and figure out, and that is,

it is an undeniable fact that a large number of these insurrectionist cases are being initially charged as misdemeanors, right? And I've been trying to figure out why I've got some interesting insights, maybe some super space beans, but I think it's worth talking about. So we're gonna get to those stories

and I know you've got something in mind. Yeah, well, we're gonna talk about all of it. I'll put a pin in it to borrow your phrase and she took my super space beans there. But yeah, let's get into it right after this quick break. Thank you so much. I'm so glad everyone's here and everyone's listening. I'm so excited about this show.

We're going to get into those details. Just stick around. We'll be right back. Hey, everybody. It's A.G. in today's episode of Clean Up on aisle 45. It's brought to you by BetterHelp. They provide professional counseling to help you navigate life's challenges. We all face difficulties and stresses, especially now, but the important thing to remember

is you don't have to do it alone. So if you're struggling with anything that's preventing you from living your best life, I recommend BetterHelp. It is not a crisis line and it's not self-help. It's professional counseling done securely online. They'll assess your needs, and they'll match you with a licensed professional therapist, and you can start communicating in less than 24 hours. As you know, I've had struggles dealing with PTSD and anxiety, and I know how important

it is to seek help rather than to try to do anything by yourself. The Better Help services are available for clients worldwide, and they have a broad range of experts in their counselor network, a lot of which might not be locally physically available in your area. And the best thing about Better Help is you can log into your account from anywhere, anytime, and send a message to your counselor and you'll get timely and thoughtful responses. You can schedule weekly video and phone sessions too. Better help is committed to facilitating great therapeutic matches, so they make it easy

and free to change your counselor if you want to, which is really important. It's more affordable than traditional offline counseling and financial aid is available, so visit their website, read some testimonials like Better Help user TA, who says, Dr. Healey is compassionate and present as a counselor. She listens without judgment and creates a safe space for sharing. I feel heard and understood by her. So visit BetterHelp.com slash IL-45.

That's BetterHelp H-E-L-P. And you can join the over 800,000 people taking charge of their mental health with the help of an experienced professional. Special offer for IL-45 listeners, you get 10% off your first month. That's BetterHelp.com slash I.O. 45. All right, everybody.

Welcome back to Clean Up on I.O. 45. It is me, A.G. with Andrew Torres, and we're about to kick off this discussion today. What do you got for us, Andrew? Yeah, so here's the thing. I understand that there is a very large contingent of of us in the Democratic Party that are a little bit skeptical of Joe Biden, right? Maybe he wasn't our first third or seventh choice in the primary. He clearly ran in the conservative institutionalist lane and I get it. And this show will 100% hold

him accountable when he starts to go wobbly, right, to steal a phrase from Justin Walker, who's down on the US court of appeals for the DC circuit. Sorry, that's it. That's an inside baseball reference for those of you who've been with us for a long time. Um, absolutely it is worth calling out. It is worth pointing out that virtually all of the public announcements that Joe Biden has made, particularly those since, uh, Ossoff and Warnoch won their races in Georgia, have come from the progressive wing of the Democratic Party, right?

Just a couple of days ago, Biden announced that the new chair of the Securities and Exchange Commission is going to be Gary Gensler, who was described by Barney Frank and Liz Warren as the toughest regulator in the Obama administration, right? So you know, that's not a terrible sign. So, I was a little... Yeah, but what's... but I think what's been going on here is that there's been some reporting. And it's like they're showing a photo of Joe Biden and Mitch McConnell Huggin and and and shaken hands and and it says, you know, there's a coalition forming or something about how they're doing a Senate leadership deal or some sort of thing and I know a lot of people were kind of

upset by that like F. Mitch McConnell, etc, etc. And you know, we're going to talk about this, but we have to sort of put in the mix that today, Mitch McConnell went on the floor of the Senate and blamed Trump for the insurrection, for inciting the insurrection. And that, I think, is going to cleave the Republican Party into Trump Republicans and OG Republicans, I guess. And so it's going to be interesting to see which way it goes. But I honestly, personally, I don't see there being any kind of a concession here by

Joe Biden to Mitch McConnell. Yeah, no, that's right. So let's unpack all of that. Number one, F Mitch McConnell, right? Like, I mean, like that, you know, there's no love for him in this room, right? And two, yes, like Mitch McConnell reading the political tea leaves, if you ask me, what do I think the odds are that the Senate will vote to convict Trump on the article of incitement of resurrection,

of resurrection, it's have insurrection. It goes up every day and went up drastically today with what McConnell said. Now, is there still room for McConnell, full boom, a callable about it? Of course there is. He's Mitch McConnell. He's an evil turtle.

We know this, okay? So just because you acknowledge that that that that that Mitch McConnell exists does not make you, you know, a quizzling, right? It does not mean that you're Neville Chamberlain. Let me explain the the deal. The reason you have to come up with a set of rules when the Senate is split 50-50 has to do with the number of Democrats that you have.

Right? So, there are certain fixed number of Senate committees. You have to assign Democrats and Republicans to those committees. When Democrats outnumber Republicans or vice versa, then Democrats outnumber Republicans on all the committees, right? And that you can do that cause math, right? But when you only have 50 Democrats to go around, you can either have a situation where we just punt on a couple of committees. There are a few we don't care about and we let Republicans have the majority or every committee will wind up being split evenly between Democrats and Republicans, right? But the chair, the chair, the chairs will be different. Yeah. And so the chairs get to

set the agenda and then the only other real question. There's going to be lots of other stuff and I read this because I'm a total geek who reads Senate procedure stuff. The only thing that matters is what happens as will be the case when there's a tie, right? And the last time that the Senate was divided 50, 50, right, was heading into 2001, right? And in that situation, and that was, unfortunately, George W. Bush, and in that situation, right, it, the same rules that we're talking about were engineered in reverse. And critically, when it was tied, it meant that either the majority leader or the minority leader in that committee could advance legislation out onto the floor, right?

It would clear committee and would then go to the majority leader who is going to be Chuck Schumer. There's no doubt about that, right? To put on the calendar. So the only possible McConnellization victory would be if a tie counted as nothing, right? Like when the Supreme Court was split for four and a tie meant, okay, well, the lower court decision stands and we're doing nothing about it, right? That would be a disaster.

That was the first thing I looked for before I went to go chastise everybody, but no, no particular deal has been struck yet. But the folks saying, I don't understand why we have to strike a deal at all. Well, the reason you have to strike a deal at all is math. You just have to do it with the fact that there will be and the vice president cannot break ties on Senate committee votes. And there was reasonable precedent, okay, in the absence of a special deal to the contrary. That's why I went to that to say a tie vote means not advancing out of committee, right?

If you look at standing rules right now, when there are odd numbers on the committee, it says you must have a majority of the votes, right, under particular conditions, right? Now are those, are those the rules as they exist? Can those rules be changed? So to say that if there is a tie, the tie goes to the runner, for example, like if there is a tie, it advances. Yes, and that's part of what the deal would encompass. I gotcha.

So yes, those are standing rules. Yes, this is why you have to cut a deal with Mitch McConnell. And there is a package, the package that was in place last time in Congress, cut with then set a majority leader, Trent Lot. So you know, just when you think like, we'd never really, you know, go up or down in terms of Republican majority leaders. Like, Trent lot, no prize pig. Less smart, just as evil as Mitch McConnell. So I have another question too, because I guess sort of what I'm wondering is, like,

first of all, I'm interested to know what committees were sacrificed in 2000, because I guess sort of what I'm wondering is, like, first of all, I'm interested to know what committees were sacrificed in 2000, because there seems like there's going to be some, like, yeah, we get intelligence, judiciary, finance, and homeland security. You get grounds and you get gardening and, you know, like, it's not going to be like that simple, right? It can't be like, well, we're the Democrats. We've got the White House. So we're going to say we get to keep the committees we want and we'll give up on these committees. But I mean, McConnell could just say no.

Yeah, that's right. I mean, and the first part, I think is the most instructive part of what you said, which is, right, the Republicans are the party of, oh, yeah, we don't care if we don't have anybody on the education committee or not, right? But Democrats can't really take that approach. So everything I've seen, you know, makes it appear as though we're going to replicate the 2001 deal, which makes total sense, right? It is the outcome that you reach when you look at it and go,

okay, well, everything else is worse. And I assume there will be an outcry when some committees are conceded to the other side. Well, no, I don't, so I don't anticipate that we will wind up conceding any committees, right? But I think what will happen is we will have evenly split Democrats and Republicans on every committee, including the chair and vice chair, or chair and ranking member. So, so it will be part of the deal is that the all of the Democrats will be the ranking members will be that will be the chairs.

Yeah. Right, right, but, but it's like eight Democrats, eight Republicans, and then a Democrat chair and a Republican ranking. Yes. Exactly. Nine and nine. Exactly. Right. Exactly. Well, I think that would be interesting. But yeah, today, this, this, this floor speech by McConnell today, just blew everything up, didn't it? I mean, because I was, first of all, I was still on part and watch. I haven't gotten anything. Yeah, I mean either. I'm still watching but I was very concerned that that Trump would keep some pardon secret or or that maybe he wasn't going to pardon himself or his family members or any insurrectionists because it would, you know, put a nail in the coffin of impeachment conviction, which could then lead to a vote of him never being able to run for office again.

And let's be honest, that's the only way he can make money from from here on out. And so, but with this new announcement from McConnell saying, you know, he incited the mob and it's just, it, my mind was blown, honestly, no no no love to me. He and others let's let's let's make sure we're we're hitting the the the McConnell clarification right because he said her and others right yeah, but I think he meant Rudy Giuliani and but yeah, but might he have meant you know Alex Jones and What have you it if I still it opened the door it opened the door to a conviction zero than it was already yeah then it was already opened.

Why what you absolutely stepped through the door made that in my view a plausible outcome. If you wanted an argument for how McConnell could walk it back, right, would be to say, well, there was this general hysteria that was whipped up by QAnon and Alex Jones and OAN and the president is just an innocent dupe and all of that. And yes, he participated in it, but it's not fair to say he masterminded the whole thing. That would be, if I'm, if I'm channeling my inner Mitch McConnell, which God, I'd never expected to utter that phrase in public, that's the way I would put it. That's gross, first of all.

Sorry. It's an inner Mitch McConnell. So, well, here we are, and it's going to be interesting to see what happens. The impeachment trial isn't going to be starting until after Trump is out of office which is legal so everyone who is that using that as a defense on the side of the Republicans can shut it But that will be their defense It's it's going to be interesting. It's going to be interesting to watch I for for our law-dawful movies We went back and watched the first episode of Rudy Giuliani's

podcast. I don't know if you have seen this. No, why would you do that to yourself after after having an internal Mitch McConnell? No, no, because when watch Rudy Giuliani as as as patrons of this show will come to realize like I'm willing to debase myself for small amounts of money. It's a character flaw. Rudy Giuliani's argument was, and I am, this is as close to word for word as you can get without the transcript, President could only be impeached for four things.

Breibery, treason, high crimes, or misdemeanors, right? And then these two articles of impeachment didn't count because neither were official crimes. And so I'm just sitting there, literally, like I just laughed for an hour and a half, going like, well, if Trump had unpaid parking tickets, it would be totally valid. But misdemeanor is sure.

But we're gonna hear, we are going to hear this argument. Jonathan Turley has already made this argument of if it's not a crime, right, in chapter 18 of the U.S. code, you can't impeach for it. And that's just like, I used to come up with the hypotheticals, right? Like, I used to say like, well, what if the president, you know, decided to just go off and live in the Himalayas and whatnot, but like, you can't come up with a hypothetical worst than what Trump did, right? Like, no. Yeah, it is the hypothetical. Yeah. What if the president is very obviously a traitor and encouraged an armed mob of insurrection as to storm the Capitol? Doesn't quite seem to be a law that prevents that, but you probably would want him out.

And it is going to be hilarious to watch all of the Republicans who lined up and paraded this message because you may have forgotten, but like this isn't a crime, right? This isn't the precise elements of bribery. And so therefore, it doesn't count. That there were 30 or 40 Republicans in the, oh, well, you know, if it's not 18 USC, 2001, then, you know, go fuck yourself. And they're gonna have to walk that back. Yeah. I remember the Wisconsin guy saying, where do we get the cross examinations? They mean they're all, they were treating this like it was a criminal procedure.

And impeachment is not a critical, it's a political process. It's not a criminal procedure. And it was, yeah, that was extremely frustrating. And they'll drag it all out again. It'll be, I don't know who his lawyers are gonna be. Rudy Giuliani has now said he will not be representing the president because he is a witness and he should have said Subject of the investigation

So he says he's not gonna be representing him. Although I think it's because Trump won't pay him and then I mean what that leaves what Lynn would maybe And I mean, that leaves what Lynn would maybe. Sydney Powell is bowing out today from her last election, Kraken thing, lawsuit. And so that just leaves Captain Underpants, Alan Dershowitz. They specifically asked you omitted, but they specifically asked Jenna Ellis, the 27 year old dipshit, right?

Yeah. Who, you know, last worked as a, you know. Traffic court lawyer. Yeah. And she said, no, she would not be handling the impeachment defense, which I begging you, Jenna, please reconsider. Like, there's nothing that would make me happier than watching her lead the president's defense team. I was sort of hoping to watch Rudy Giuliani question

Rudy Giuliani in the proceedings but I guess that I guess we're not gonna listen there wasn't there an episode of Benson like that where Wow deep cut deep cut Andrew I'm going, we already did the old Friday remakes. Yep, all right. Well, we're going to take another quick break. We'll be right back. Everybody, stick around. Hey, everybody, it's A.G.

From Clean Up On Isle 45, and I'm here with Andrew Torres. And we want to tell you about this new app called Stereo Which is a free app you can download and listen in to conversations live and submit questions as they happen So it's like a new social platform for live broadcasting. Yeah, aging and I did four different Interviews leading up to the launch of this show on Stereo get your own little emoji when you're on, it's super cute. But really, what makes the platform is it is designed to maximize interactivity. So if you're listening, you record a

question, it pops up instantly on our screen or on our moderator's screen and we can just click the button and say go ahead and play the question and so you get interactive Q&A Your voice talking to us our voice responding to you in a way that's moderated that you know You couldn't otherwise do with 800 people shouting out loud as they listen So it's been a lot of fun. We're gonna continue to do it. Yeah, so check us out every Tuesday at 5pm Pacific Time 8pm Eastern on the stereo app. Download the app. It's free to download and we're going to play some clips of us from the stereo app after

the end of this particular podcast. So stick around after the end of this podcast to listen for some clips from stereo and tune in every Tuesday at 5pm.m. on the stereo app to listen to us. Thanks so much. Okay, EG. You may have seen what I have seen, which is that while a lot of indictments have come down against folks who've been involved in the January 6th insurrection, a lot of the charges seem pretty thin, right? They are charges of, you know, unlawful entry and violent entry and disorderly conduct on the

capital grounds. The case that dropped today, that most got me searching was US versus Immanuel Jackson. And this is the person who is alleged, I say alleged, there are eight different photos in the indictment. So, you know, it is what it is, of swinging a baseball bat, right? You've seen this where the police officers are armed with the Lexan riot shields. And he's got a full bat and he's hacking away in the in the middle of his crowd.

And so I started asking my friends, why is this person being charged with a bunch of misdemeanors as opposed to really, really serious, you know, valineous assault crimes, right? Right, so far I think everyone's just been charged with the baseline misdemeanors of violent entry into a public space they were where they weren't supposed to be kind of like a trespassing, but on federal, which is because it's different because it's federal. And so just a couple, like two or three, everyone's just sort of being brought up on these

two or three charges. And those are, right, as you alluded, right, 18 USC 1512, that is obstruction of an official proceeding, 18 USC 1752, which is on lawful entry and physical violence on restricted building or grounds. And then a handful and and and Jackson falls under this is also charged with 18 USC 111, which is assaulting an officer of the United States. That sounds serious, but remember assault is just the unwarranted apprehension of someone, right? So like a lot of things fall under assault when you actually physically touch someone

that is battery, right? So I got two different answers back to this question, and both I thought were super interesting, right? I'm gonna give you the less interesting, but, but I put almost certainly more correct one first. And that is the idea is to bring these folks under the ambit of DOJ as quickly as possible, that that way they are going to they will be under DOJ supervision, right? The US Attorney's Office will know where they are. They will be subject to certain

pretrial conditions, right? So even when you're indicted out of misdemeanor, you can say, okay, you'll be released on your own reconnaissance, but you can't travel out of state, right? You have to surrender your firearms, right? So basically gets them into the system, and then you can file superseding indictments, right? And I think the firearm is probably a real motivator here. But then I got a more interesting answer. Again, not sure it's a more correct. Go ahead. Well, because I wanted to say that we watched the press conference,

finally, when the FBI, a deputy director of the Washington Field Office, oddly, came out. And from the Department of Justice, Michael Sherwin, the DC-US attorney, came out. And that was one of the things that, one of the myths he wanted to dispel. He was like, look, we're not just going to charge these guys with trespassing and let them go. We're doing this to charge them, to get them, to arrest them, to put them on the radar and will continue an investigation into these folks for additional crimes, right? I mean, he sort of tried to dispel that myth, but he didn't go into any more specifics about crimes that could be charged or would be charged, although he did mention, you know, sedition conspiracy,

but he didn't have any other specifics besides that. And Michael Sherwin, sedition conspiracy, but he didn't, he didn't have any other specifics besides that. And Michael Sherwin, by the way, jerk, terrible, awful, horrible. He's, he's been the, the DC US attorney that was worked really hard to undo the, what was it, Flynn or Stone or both sentencing, right? Not on Flynn, but yeah, I certainly agree with you, not our friend. So yeah, so he was the one who submitted on behalf of the Department of Justice to the courts about stones sentencing, about reducing the stone sent. He's old, you know, he's, he's, come on, would you put a 66-year-old guy in the prayer? Yeah, if he threatened to kill a witness and kill the witness's dog, yeah, probably.

But anyway, yeah, so that's Sherwin. So going back to the second answer that you got, though, I'm very interested because like I said, Sherwin didn't go into any detail. Yeah, and and and just to To pile on that a little bit, Sherwin was hand picked by Bill Barr for those cases. So when we say no friend of ours, we mean no friend of ours. Here's an additional thought. And two separate people raised this issue to me, including one person who did it in public

in kind of a brief way, Tim Hogan, and then somebody else who wanted to stay anonymous. And it has to do with how criminal cases are processed in federal court. And so what happens is when you file a case, it immediately gets a caption. And you've seen this, right? Like the caption is how I get to on Pacer and find all of the pleadings that I then read and send to you, right? And so it will have, right, a little number and then a colon, right? So let's, let's talk about, let's use Jackson's as an example here. His is case number one, colon 21.

That means it was filed in 2021, dash MJ, where you get back to that in a minute, dash zero zero, one, one, five. That means it's case number 115, dash RMM. That means it's assigned to judge Robin and Maryweather. And judge Robin and Maryweather is a magistrate judge on the US District Court for the District of Columbia. What that means is that's not somebody who has been appointed by the president for life.

That's somebody who has been appointed by the court as a helper judge for a particular term. And that is not to disparage the job of magistrate judges. I have friends who are magistrate judges. Many, many magistrate judges have gone on to become appointed to the bench in Maryland where I practice. We had a longstanding magistrate judge

who was probably like the most respected jurist in the state of Maryland, right? So that's not to say that there's anything that they're not like JV judges, right? But that's what that little MJ means in the caption. Or narrowly, if it's a civil case, that's a CV. If it's a criminal case, it gets a CR. If it gets assigned directly to the Magistrate judge, which is what happens when you were charged with a federal misdemeanor, then it bypasses the criminal docket altogether.

And so the thought process was people are putting together lists, right? We're on pardon watch right now. We're at, you know, T minus about 14 hours. You're part, you're putting together a list of bad guys and villains for Donald Trump to pardon. And you want to pull from the criminal docket. You're probably not pulling from the magistrate judge docket, right? It's a, it's a different search. You might not see it. Almost all of those cases, there's like, I don't even know if you can pardon a DC misdemeanor. I tried to research this. And the only thing I can come up with is somebody tried to pardon one like 30 years ago. It never,

ever happens, right? The reason why it's the president, it's supposedly it's the president who has the power to pardon DC misdemeanors because that, because there is no governor, right? DC doesn't have statehood, right? Because because DC is not a state and the home relative 1973 says that the president gets pardoned for crimes. And why, why, why would this matter anyway when the president can just issue a blanket pardon for insurrectionists without names or crimes? He certainly could, but I think that goes back to your view of the politics and the dynamics

in light of McConnell statement today, right? To do that. And, and, and, and, and let's be very, very clear, he could follow the Jimmy Carter example of blanket pardon to all draft Dodgers in Vietnam, right? But then the president would have to write a piece of paper that says to anyone who was involved in the events in the capital building in Washington, DC on January 6, 2021 are hereby and forever, pardoned in full for any and all crimes committed then in being at the time. Like, that seems an awful lot like an admission of guilt by the president that he incited the insurrection. Right, but he doesn't even have to release that piece of paper to the public,

according to Margaret Love, pardon attorney, from the Department of Justice, which Trump ignores anyway, but he could just write down a pardon for Trump Jr. and hand it to Trump Jr. and not tell anybody about it, right? So, so here's the thing. It, there's been a lot of talk about this sort of secret pardons. And, and, and I'm in general agreement, right, that there is no affirmative obligation to broadcast your pardon. Although, you know, you, you, you would still have to record it with the national archives, right?

It's still a presidential record, right? So it, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, pardon's operating, right, which is think about how Michael Flynn, right, acted on his pardon. He had Sydney Powell attach it to a motion to dismiss, right? You say, Oh, look here, I got the magic paper and the judge looks at it and goes, Yeah, you got the magic paper.

You're out of here, right? So you could understand if the pardon names an individual, how it could be a, you know, pocket pardon or secret pardon, because that individual would at least know and be able to present it. Right. So Buffalo horns guy wouldn't know there's a secret down pardon for him. And of course Trump wouldn't have the list of names of people. Right. So if he's good to go on. He's got to say in public, yep, all those crazy idiots that I've tried to tell you are really secret and Tifa double

dog dare undercover protesters paid by George source. I am partnering each and every one of them. And right to at least get the word out to them to that so that they know that they've been pardoned so that they win there and died. Because otherwise it's no good. Right. To at least get the word out to them so that they know that they've been pardoned, so that they win their indictment. Otherwise, it's no good. Right. Right. If and that's a really important thing to think that like, the pardon isn't magic, right? You have to, this is, you and I broke down the question of like, what it means to accept and accept guilt for it. But, But in practical terms, what it means is you have to take the piece of paper to a judge. You have to know that you've been pardoned.

So he could write down Don Jr. as pardon for anything and all things that I've ever done ever. And we'll rip off the paper and hand it to Don Jr. And no one announces it until we indict Don Jr. And then he'll come out to court and say, I've no one announces it until we indict Don Jr. and then he'll come out to court and say, I've got my piece of paper, I've got my, you know, I've got my note from my mom that says, you can't, and then we'll learn. That's when you learn, right, is in the court proceeding. However, as we know, I don't know that the first indictments against

Don Jr. would be federal. I think they will be coming from the Manhattan District Attorney's office in New York. I think you're right on that one. I certainly wouldn't bet the under on that. Well, this has been super fascinating and I'm so excited about this show. You can tell it, tell everyone where they can find us, find us on Twitter because we want your input. We want this to be your show too. We want to know what you want to hear about as long as it has to do with holding the Trump uh crime syndicate accountable what's going on in the Joe Biden's

Department of Justice moving forward and I would I'm even going to be talking about the um the intelligence community. Oh I cannot wait to pick your brain and take advantage of your experience in those areas. I mean, it's really perfect. Look, like we all want to know how do we rebuild America right now. And I want to echo what you've just said, which is we are doing our best. It's hard to make a podcast a conversation. We are doing our best. It's hard to make a conversation. We are doing our best to do that. So where can you find us on social media?

At IL-45 pod on Twitter, there was a new Facebook group. It's a closed group because that's the way those things work. But it is IL-45 on Twitter. Just search for it and you have to answer like two basic questions to be allowed in. And if you want these episodes, add free. And if you want any other kind of perks, we have so many gifts that we will shower upon me if you become a patron. And can you tell them where they can find us on Patreon? Yeah. So head on over Patreon, p-a-t-r-e-o-n dot com slash I-o-forty-five pod, A-I-S-L-E-4-5-P-O-D. Sign up, throw us a buck, right? And by the way, if you're on the old Mothershi Road

system, this is not, this is this is per episode, right? We do, we do one a week, right? So you know what you're getting. You can cap it if you really want to play us for a second. You can seriously do this. I'm gonna tell you how to cheat the system right now. You go in, you sign up a dollar per episode and then you click on the little thing that says cap my monthly episodes at one, right?

So there you go. You're literally giving us one American dollar, you cheap skate. But, but you will get access to everything in that dollar tier. Um, I, I want to shout out our, uh, our, can I shout out our top six? Yeah, let's do it. Awesome. So our top six right now are Chris Simpson, Charles Jones, Jamil Chohan, Jessica Outbeer, Jay Baker, and Patty B. Thank you so much for supporting us. Again, everybody else, you will not regret this head on over patreon.com slash I-45 pod, throw us a buck and you'll get all the goodies. Yep, and everybody, we will see you next Wednesday and then of course live on the stereo

app every Tuesday and stick around at the end of the credits of this episode and you can hear a little clip from that stereo app as well so you can kind of get the gist of it. So thank you so much I have been AG and I'm Andrew and this is Cleanup on Ile45. Cleanup on Ile45 is written and executive produced by Alison Gillan and Dr. Torres and is engineered and edited by Mackenzie Mazzell in Starburn's Audio, fact checking in research by Alison and Andrew with quality assurance and media by Mullishy wrote LLC, branding design and logo by Starburn's Audio and Joel Reader with Moxie Design Studios, and our copy is written by Jesse Egan. Follow us on Twitter at IO45Pod and listen wherever you get your podcasts. I can't.

My question is, what do we do if the worst happens and the inauguration is disrupted? And it turns out that, you know, the institutions of government do get broken down. What are our next steps in the worst case scenario? Thanks. Andrew, you want to take this one? Sure. If something, if bad things happen on Wednesday, let's say an attack is successful on a inauguration. Yeah. Yeah. If that happens, will be a tragedy and it may supplant, what is, if you can imagine it, just six days ago, right, the first insurrection on American soil in 200 years,

but it will not fundamentally change the structure of our government. Any more so than the fact that these Yahoo's managed to storm the capital and take the counter-factual decision. They might be giants that have been on the road for too long. They might be giants aren't even sorry. Not even sorry. And audiences like the shows too much, too much.

And now they might be giants that are playing their breakthrough album, all of it. And they still have time for other songs. They're fooling around. Who can stop? They might be giants and their liberal rocket gender. Who? No one. Disadvantaged pay for was somebody else's money.

you