Legal AF by MeidasTouch - Bannon Contempt, Trump's Pump & Dump, Updates on SB8, and More!

Episode Date: October 24, 2021

The top-rated weekly US law and politics news analysis podcast -- LegalAF -- produced by Meidas Touch and anchored by MT founder and civil rights lawyer, Ben Meiselas and national trial lawyer and strategist, Michael Popok, is back for another hard-hitting, thought-provoking, but entertaining look in “real time” at this week’s most compelling developments.  On this episode, Ben and Popok take on: 1. Trump’s “pump and dump” SPAC scheme to prop up his “Truth” social media company using innocent investors’ money. 2. The US Supreme Court’s decision to grant appellate review, but not to stay the Texas Abortion Ban on abortions after 6 weeks, while it considers the case at a November 1st hearing and what happens in December when SCOTUS hears the Mississippi “ban all abortions after 15 weeks” case. 3. The Criminal Contempt case against Steve Bannon for refusing to turn over documents to the Jan6 Select Committee about his interactions with Trump, the Proud Boys, Oathkeepers, Alex Jones and others leading up to Jan6, and what happens next. 4. Trump’s lawsuit to stop the Jan6 Select Committee from obtaining his documents and records. 5. New DOJ “Main Justice” lead prosecutors specializing in sex crimes and public corruption added to team against Matt Gaetz. 6. The federal conviction of Lev Parnas related to $200k of foreign money funneled to a Trump PAC. And so much more! Support the show! Go to https://BetterHelp.com/legalaf and try BetterHelp today with a 10% off discount your first month! Affordable, private online therapy with BetterHelp. Anytime, anywhere. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to Midas Touch Legal AF. If it's Saturday, it is Legal AF Live. If it is Sunday, it is Legal AF. Ben, my cellist, joined by Michael Popok, the Popokian who's already laughing and in a good, humorous, pop-up, the intro just cracks you up before we even get into the law. No, it's the pre-stuff you and I do before we do the intro that gets me jovial. So let's, let's look, they always have how many lawyers does it take to screw on a light bulb. I'm not even going to repeat what the punchline is there, but how many lawyers does it take to actually produce a podcast? And I just want everyone out there to know this. The production team pretty much here is Ben Myceles, Michael

Popok the Popokian. We've got Jordi Myceles who let's be clear. It's great at a lot of things, but it's no tech whiz. He's not Brett Myceles. And we've got one editor who does an incredible, incredible job. Are you suggesting that salty? Are you suggesting that Jordy is the arm candy of all production? I'm suggesting that Jordy is talented as a marketer. Jordy is talented as a strategist. As a tech person, I would not put Jordi in my top 10% of tech people who I work with, but Popo, this has been an exciting week for me personally on a lot of fronts.

I like to always share some things that take people through the journey of myself and Midas Touch. On the Midas Touch site, I'm not sure if you saw the trailer. Might as touch is doing a movie called The Supporters with the Good Lires. It comes out November 4th. It follows two fictional characters. Derek and Dale as they have interactions with real politicians and they find themselves

in the cult of Trump and how to, let's just say exit that cult of Trump. So I'm excited about that, Popak. Yeah, that one, you showed me the trailer last week. I had a little private viewing with you. And I just laugh out loud, funny. It's the borat of the Trump administration and all the other crazies like Marjorie Taylor Green and others. Really, really great. I'm glad you did it. Thank you. In this Friday, we have on Netflix,

Colin in black and white. It's been one of the most rewarding professional experiences, representing Colin Kaepernick as his attorney. We've worked super hard on this Netflix show and proud to bring it to the world this Friday on Netflix October 29th, Colin in black and white. So it's been a busy two weeks there, but the law doesn't slow down at all. We have lots to talk about on legal AF. And let's get into it right away. Rudy Giuliani's former associate, Lev Parnas was convicted

on six counts of Influence Buying, Campaign, Finance schemes. And Lev Parnas was a guest on the Midas Touch podcast. And in full disclosure, I've grown to develop a friendship with Lev as Lev has changed his tune over time, as Lev has helped expose a lot of the conduct of the GQP in recent times, a mea culpa, if you will. But these charges and allegations, though, relate to a time period before Lev's mea culpa. And look, despite the fact that Lev came on the Midest touch podcast as a guest, I think did an admirable job talking about his experience as a what he went through. We had to talk about the law popo, you know, on this show, you know, regardless of if

someone comes on the podcast or not. And this is an important legal case as it relates to Rudy Giuliani and Trump. So Pope, I'll tell us what happened in this in this verdict where Manhattan jury came back relatively quickly and found Mr. Parnas guilty on all counts. Yeah, I think it demonstrates that we just have to bring it each week regardless of who's in front of us. And even if we happen to like the people that are in the criminal justice system, I just think you and I have a commitment to our followers and listeners to talk about developments and this is in the news. So I don't know which is more interesting than the conviction and how

it went down or the evidence and the information and the people that were left out of the trial because of decisions made by the prosecutor, decisions made by the judge, and decisions made by the defense team for Mr. Parnas. So Mr. Parnas was on trial for who's a Ukrainian businessman, lives here in the United States, for influencing for influencing US elections improperly through foreign contributions, which is a no-no and a crime. Basically $200,000 of money that he peddled or influenced or directed came in through

and into the Trump pack in violation of federal law and then he was also charged with lying to the Federal Election Commission about that. And it really focused on a very narrow, I thought slightly less interesting issue about his involvement with Giuliani and with Trump. It really focused only on his attempt to help a Russian business person enter the legalized marijuana business through money and donations directly to the Trump campaign with Lev and his business partner at the time, Igor Fruman, who already pled guilty and avoided a trial, sort of as the middleman.

And, man, you know, Lev's defense was basically, I don't really know the law that well. I'm from the Ukraine originally. I don't really understand all of the election law intricacies. And so therefore, I could not have done something what's called in the criminal system willfully or with criminal intent. I couldn't form criminal intent because I didn't really understand the laws of this country and it's very complex. And Popeyes, I haven't even kind of break it down for you like this. I think Leves Defense and the most basic blame in terms is, look, I'm a business man. I started this company. Companies are allowed to take investments from foreign vehicles. I mean, within reason, I mean, yeah,

there are rules around that, but you could take far and money to help you launch an investment business as seed capital and investment capital. And as part of our budding business, when we wanted to rub shoulders with politicians at these swanky events, we donate money to political action committees that are around these types of politicians, because one of the things that we tell our investors is that we have this close relationship with the politicians, and at that time these are politicians that I was close to, but it wasn't like a direct quid pro quo to influence them or push legislation.

I'm thinking that's the defense. That's the defense. I mean, I mean, the 12 jurors eight men and four women didn't buy this defense. Ultimately, no one made it as articulate as that. Yeah, they need it to hire the law firm of my Salis and Popeyes. Bring them in special for the openings and the closings. But look, what was left out, the thing that I found interesting, is this was not a case where they were trying against Rudy Giuliani influence peddling improperly, which is a separate criminal prosecution. Nor was it about Rudy Giuliani trying to influence the removal of the Ukrainian, the US ambassador to the Ukraine, which Lev Partis was also involved with. In fact, the names Giuliani and Trump and others were not even

mentioned in the courtroom because I'm sure of the fear by the judge and the parties that bringing them into the courtroom would make this less about the defendant and more about them and that prejudice would outweigh the probative value of any of that information. So literally this jury, unlike our listeners and followers, we're not told the whole story about Leves association with Rudy Giuliani, and therefore the Trump involvement. In fact, the only connection I can see in the transcripts that was the jury was led to believe existed is in photos that they showed of Igor Fruman and Lev Parnas

hobnapping with all these people that you just identified at these various events and parties. So the jury sort of had blinders on intentionally only focused on this legal marijuana business and what Mr. Parnas did to channel money or funnel money from one to the other and to the Trump pack and got convicted very reasonably quickly. Now, he'll take an appeal. The judge did not remand him to the custody of the US marshals, meaning he did not have

to leave the courtroom. Take off his belt in the shoes and go with marshals and go sit in federal detention, awaiting sentencing and ultimately on his appeal. They did let him go home. And I'm sure he will appeal and try to stay out on bail or bond in the interim. But, you know, this is, again, people within the world and the ambit of Giuliani and Trump

who are getting convicted of crimes. Absolutely. And look, I think my overall assessment is, you know, it's, it's, it's a tough thing when you know you heard that verdict for me, because, you know, I've grown to, I've grown to, you know, really, really, really, respect what Lev has done post kind of getting out of the Trump cult. I appreciate the accountability that he has brought and recognized the mistakes that he had made. He's been outspoken about that.

He's provided a lot of accurate information that's been helpful in shedding light on that time period. And I think history will ultimately look very kindly on left for what he's doing and will be doing post the Trump world. You have a lot of these lingering things though that happen while he was in Trump's orbit as kind of a theme of legal AF. And this is something that everyone always needs to know. Anything that Trump touches other than himself will ultimately, you know, have serious ramifications, have serious legal ramifications.

It would be fair to say anything Trump touches dies basically or anything in his orbit does. It almost is cartoonish in a way that even still to this day and we're going to talk about it with the Trump SPAC later in the show. It's like Trump is a beacon for greed the way a light attracts flies. And people think each time for whatever reason, no, no, this time is different. This time I'm going to, I'm not going to be scared. You are all going to be scammed every single fucking time.

You do anything with this guy because he is the biggest crook, not in the history of the United States, in the history, I think, of all humankind. Popuck. He's the, to paraphrase Trump in his own language. He's the most criminal of any politician that we've ever had. He's probably proud of that. Look, he proves the adage every day of PT Barnum. He is PT Barnum incarnate.

There is a sucker born every minute was PT Barnum's business model. And Trump has adopted it because when we talk about the new truth social bullshit and the SPAC and the public investment that's gone along with it towards the end of tonight's recording. People are going to see that it's the reverse mightest touch. Everything he touches turns to shit. Yet he gets suckers to try to follow him and to try to make money.

And he all he does is lend his name to things He doesn't actually take any responsibility or put his own money into anything None of that he's never been a developer. He's never built a building in his life He slapped his name on buildings. He's never manufactured a thing in his life He slaps his name on things that have been manufactured, but he you know, he's done He's done an amazing job at taking a brand, the name Trump, and turning it into cash. And he gets people to go along for the ride

because they confuse branding with reality or substance. And that's how we got into the White House. Absolutely, also this week, former president Trump defended Republican congressman Jeff Fortenberry in a statement Tuesday night shortly after the GOP or GQP lawmaker was indicted by a federal grand jury. Fortenberry was charged with one count of scheming to conceal material facts and two counts of making false statements to federal investigators after allegedly concealing information about illegal contributions to his 2016 campaign. is actually a statement that is made from a former president of the United States, which is vomit-inducing. He writes or says, quote, isn't it terrible that a Republican congressman from Nebraska just got indicted for possibly telling some lies to investigators about campaign contributions contributions when half of the United States Congress lied about made up scams. Trump said in his statement, Popeye.

This constant attempt to create some sort of false moral equivalency between every investigation and prosecution that goes on after his presidency and anything else that ever happened in the world, which what you and I call in the business, the what about defense, which is, yeah, I might have done something really bad. But what about the other guy or the other person? What does that have to do with Fortenberry hiding the fact that a Nigerian business person, a Nigerian billionaire. I thought for a minute I was watching a Ted Lasso episode, a Nigerian billionaire named Gilbert Shaguri donated $30,000 to Fortenberry's Nebraska campaign, which he's not allowed to do because as a foreign national, you can't donate to US campaigns directly or even indirectly. And Trump's response is, yeah, he lied to the investigators

about it. And he tried to structure because the 30,000 actually went beyond the limit for donations. So he even structured it for it and variant his campaign to avoid detection. But that's okay, because what about Hillary and those emails? Who gives a rat's ass about a other events, and is that an excuse not to prosecute people for the crimes that they commit? It's just maddening. It's just maddening. And here's what it's about, Popak. It is about undermining the rule of law, creating and injecting such chaos in a system that many of us took for granted, that

we thought was orderly and based on norms, based on traditions, based on respect for the rule of law, but someone with these fascistic tendencies who has a cult following of millions. It's undeniable that Trump has a cult following of tens of millions of people who have Trump flags, who inject clorox, you know, who, you know, when he hears the funny thing about that movie that we're doing, the supporters. Derek and Dale is a parody of Trump supporters and what they're like, two podcasters. They're in their wife's band. One of the podcasters you'll find out in the movie,

may or may not have stolen money from his daughters college trust accounts so that he could buy podcast equipment so that he could become a Fox News anchor. I mean, the set up, but many people, I could say the set up is incredible. But many people look at that and they gone to me. They've said to me, they go, do you know these Derek and Dale people? Why are you doing a movie with these trumpers? I go, they're a parody. No way because these, because you know, it's really what it is. It's almost you can't. It's almost you can't parody. It's like war of the world. You are like Austin, you and your brothers are like the Orson Wells of 2021 because, you

know, he put on war of the worlds on CBS radio back in the 1930s and late 1930s, early 40s. And everybody thought that New Jersey and America was under attack by, you know, by aliens. You're doing the same thing. People watch this because it's so close to reality that the parody is lost. And why, you know, I can't wait to talk about this Trump pump and dub spack scheme that Trump is running because it's just so obvious what he's doing. The ban and popok prediction is going to 100% come true. It's just a matter of when it's going to come true, but he's going to go and he's going to try to destroy all of the rules that keep our financial system in place when you can make financial disclosures, when you can make press releases, how you can talk when you

have public markets to keep orderly public markets. He's gonna try to come in there and just destroy our financial markets. And we'll talk about that in a bit. But first, let's talk about how he is manipulating executive privilege, how he is attacking a principle that was supposed to protect the deliberations, the private deliberations of the president of the United States.

That is what executive privilege at its core is supposed to be. The law, it borrows some really interesting and unique principles from England, from the common law. When you learn law school and you start reading it up, from, you know, the common law, when you learn law school, and you start reading it up, opening up law books, one of the strangest things is you start like reading about like the Magna Carta, and you start opening up books, and you start learning about cases that involve hunting and property rights, you know, from 1400s. And you're like, whoa, I thought I signed up for law school, not a history lesson.

Have you been to runnyme meat in England to see where the signing of the magna card took place? I have. Well, I haven't done that, but when I worked on Capitol Hill, Popuck, I would give tours of the Capitol building and one of the remaining copies of the magna card when I was giving the tours was in the rotunda. It was a copy of it, but it was a, you know, and I would give the tour. Wait, wait, I want to get this straight for our listeners. You gave a tour of the Capitol and there was no insurrection.

I gave tours of the Capitol when I interned for Congressman Steve Israel and Senator Hillary Clinton back in 2004 to 2007-ish giving the capital tours were my favorite things because I got to interact with the constituents. So I would give the tours, I would talk about the retunda, talk about the apotheosis of George Washington and why he was holding the hands of 13 virgins on the top of the ceiling, which is a little bit weird that that's how they were. I was some strange stuff on the rotunda, but I would give those tours. I'd walk through the crypt. It was always really humbling experience because when the constituents would come in, they

really would rarely get to interact with the Congress members. So their interaction with you would be a reflection of the Senate or the Congressman. Anyway, I digress, but there's my Magna Codder story for you. So talk to us about Trump filed a lawsuit this past week to try to keep the records that are being subpoenaed by the January 6th commission. records that are being subpoenaed by the January 6th commission after a president leaves office, those records, you know, whether it's tweets, right, whether it's internal communications, from any of the internal systems, which you're supposed to use all of those internal communication systems. I'm fairly confident, though, that Trump and his lackeys also use encrypted devices that they weren't supposed to use, but we'll find that out at a later time. But all of that goes to the National Archives. So when the January 6th

commission says we want all of these records to show what Trump's involvement was in the January 6th insurrection, they want a subpoena of the National Archives and the National Archives holds all of these records, even records for example from the Secretary of Defense. Remember last legaleff we talked about maybe the collusion that was taking place between the chief of staff who Trump installed, who was really running the defense department and the reasons why for example the National Guard wasn't called until late afternoon after the insurrection had already basically pummeled the Capitol building. And so the January 6th commissions after all of this,

we previously have discussed the legal AF that it's the DOJ's position and should be anyone's position of common sense that the January 6th insurrection has nothing to do with being a president, has nothing to do with the executive privilege running an insurrection is the antithesis of what a president's duties are. But Donald Trump has sued to keep these records privileged asserting that he and not Biden has the right to assert executive privilege.

Biden said no executive privilege. Popock, what's going on here? Yeah. So we went through a few podcasts episodes ago, the process, the Gen 6 select committee, subpoena documents, it goes through, first, the sitting president of the United States holds the executive privilege, not the past president. That has been Supreme Court precedent for time immemorial. It's gonna be tested here. As you said, one of our themes today is, continuing to test the guard rails around democracy, around our financial systems, et cetera. So he's going to test this one. But Biden who holds the privilege, because

he is the existing or the current occupant of the White House has already said he's going to generally wave on a case by case basis, the executive privilege to allow for the production of these documents. But there's a process, and it started about a month ago when the documents were first collected by the National Archives. They were reviewed by the Biden administration. The Biden administration looked at the documents, basically. I think there was a couple of categories they were comfortable with, but overall

waived the executive privilege. But there is a process for the former president to also review the documents and try to either assert privilege or some other reason why they shouldn't be produced. So they went over to the Trump campaign or the Trump people and they looked at the documents and said, whoa, executive privilege. All my conversations about Jan 6th and what was happening on Jan 6th even though it led to an insurrection are somehow covered by privilege. A privilege ban, which is interesting because it is one that is found nowhere in the literal

text of the US Constitution, which doesn't really matter to you and I because there's lots of privileges and laws which aren't in the literal text of the Constitution, but are protected by the Constitution and the US Supreme Court based on law, precedent, analysis, interpretation, but to the Federalist Society and the right wing conservatives on the Supreme Court, if it doesn't, if it doesn't exist in the literal text of the US Constitution, it shouldn't be given any kind of value or enforcement, well, except when they wanted to, except here where the executive privilege is important to them in the hands of the former president. Now suddenly the federalists are going to say, oh, it's okay. It's not the text of the US Constitution. So this picking and choosing what they want to find in the Constitution or what they don't is certainly maddening but consistent with their approach.

So look, now we have a federal judge sitting in DC. And again, judges matter. We've talked about that in the past. And he and Trump pulled a terrible judge for him. He pulled Tanya Chutkin. Tanya Chutkin, a sitting federal judge. She is the one I'll call her Hangham High Chutkin because she's the one that's been throwing the book at every Jansick's insurrectionist that's come before her.

She's even gone beyond the recommendations of the Department of Justice and given these people more jail time. So she is, my gut is based on her approach. She's not going to be that receptive to Trump trying to exercise executive privilege as a former occupant of the White House, but she's called for a full briefing and a hearing on November 4th, which you and I will cover there after about whether and the fundamental issue that she's going to have to decide that will probably make its way to this, this Supreme Court is whether a the Gen 6th committee has

gone beyond their legislative purpose. I don't think they have. I think they have the right to get to the bottom of everything related to Gen 6th and all the back. You mean that the legislative purpose that Congress wants to figure out who is trying to kill it and just write that's going to be one issue because he's right because he's raised that issue. But I'm not saying they're going to win these issues. I'm just saying that's going to, that's going to be an issue. And the second issue is whether fundamentally an ex-president can even, can even exercise executive privilege and whether this is covered by executive privilege.

But the thing that pissed me off the most, what pissed you off the most? Yeah, what pissed you off? Yeah. You and I talk about it you primarily, I noddle, I nod a lot. You and I talk about the fascist tendencies of the of the Republican party and the GQP. And you know what they're, you know what they're come back as always? Because this was the quote from the Trump spokesperson about this particular lawsuit. He said or she said that the Pelosi communist style attempt to silence and destroy America and the patriots, the patriots that participated on Jan 6th. Look at the Orwellian change in vocabulary. The communists are on the democratic side. The insurrectionists are patriots that

are trying to be silenced. Did you see what Trump this week actually said about the difference between the election and Jan 6th? Did you see how he framed that? I'm going to have you frame a pope. He said the insurrection didn't take place on Jan 6th. The insurrection took place on election day. Jan 6th was just a protest by patriots. Yeah, I mean, these people are the true essence of evil incarnate. I mean, it's really what's at stake. It's why we started Midas Touch, you know, at some point you can't sit on the sidelines. It's why we do this legal a F, you know show, you know, it's

You can't sit on the sidelines. It's why you as a listener of the show can't just, you know, it's not okay anymore. Honestly, look I want you to like the show. I want you to listen to the show So I was about to say it's not cool if you just listen to the show and do nothing with the show, but we're, that's fine. But try to do something with the knowledge that we're empowering you with because one of the things that we've seen over the past few weeks with legal AF also is lots of people have emailed us privately, DM does privately, reached out to us directly on Twitter and said, you know what? After that last legal AF, I decided to get off my Twitter and said, you know what? After that last legal

AF, I decided to get off my seat and do something about it. And you can do something about it. You know, these crazy GQ peers, they're out there, you know, gaslighting at the school board meetings. And they're out there every single day being annoying fuckers because they want to overthrow our democracy. And as I always say, it's very easy to sit in the living room and to, you know, have a weekend where you just go to, you know, you go to Costco, you go and you do your, you do your routines, you go home, you watch a movie, you put on Netflix, you go to sleep, you redo it again. Okay. But they're trying to do to us what these crazy GQPers want to create,

they're going to try to make this country look like what we saw when the, you know, when the Taliban takes over, no, no exaggeration, they're going to try to do what, what make our cities look like, what an ISIS city looks like. That's where these psychotic individuals really want to take it. They are, I'll give them credit. They have incredible energy, focus, and strength. It's almost like superhuman. Because they don, but two because a lot of them, they don't give a fuck about life or death. They're like, they legitimately are like suicide political bombers where they're sacrificing their life because they're zombies and they're mesmerized by the cult that they're trapped in at the end of the day. Let me tell you, let me give you an example of exactly what you're talking about.

One, yes, it was very heartwarming to see. Even, I said, if we could even touch just one person to get off their couch, so to speak, get off their YouTube and go do something effectively about protecting democracy. And we got more than one person that, and I know there's others that are more silent and private about their affairs, but we had more than one person that that and I know there's others that are more silent and private about their affairs. But we had more than one person that said, I'm now running for office.

I'm going to run for school board. I'm going to run for one was I'm running for Lieutenant governor. I mean, there were people that were just like, they've had enough. But I'll tell you what I'll tell you what's missing, the energy that's missing. I see the energy you and I have the energy, your brothers have the energy and the people around us do. But I don't mean to call people out. And I know you started to say,

I don't wanna call out our listeners and followers. But where are the protests in the streets about the abortion law in Texas? Where was the energy when we had the women and men wearing pink hats marching on Washington, which seems like a lifetime ago, three or three years ago, who said, I'll never happen in this country, women will be heard, women's rights will be heard.

Where are they? Where is we did have a good mark? I mean, there was a good march in the past few weeks, that was, but where is that sustained momentum every single day? And I'm with you, you know, we need to, we need to channel our outrage into productive ways that saves our democracy. And we can't be, we can't sit on the sidelines and watch as these GQ peers go after our democracy.

I'll give you a law lesson in one minute or less. So you're ready for this pop up? The law creates privileges. What privileges mean is that really what the law won't allow is people to dive into confidential communications that often exist within a privilege. These either exist in codified law, meaning it's actually written law, or over common laws. Popok and I discussed over hundreds of years, these concepts have developed. We just talked about executive privilege, keeping those executive communications confidential.

There's also what's called a marital privilege, a privilege between married individuals. There's an attorney client privilege, a privilege between attorneys and their clients where those communications should remain confidential. There is a doctor patient privilege keeping medical information confidential. There's also a priest penitent privilege to keep those communications. And these very in different states what the scope is, and they all have exceptions to it.

But basically all of the cases, you can't use any of these privileges as a shield to engage in illegal conduct. You can't use the privilege to commit the crime and then hide behind the privilege when the privilege creates criminal activity and things like that. Well, they're almost never what you're saying is they're almost never absolute privileges. And that's why I think we're going to turn to ban and tonight. That's why these assertions by non-presidents, like the bannons of the world, the mark meadows of the world, and everyone

else who's being investigated, Scevino, by the January 6th committee, to, to, you know, they, it wasn't even a dog whistle. Trump sent them a letter and instructions that said, you are not to violate my executive privilege by testifying and providing documents to the Gen 6 committee. It's public. It wasn't a dog whistle or something. Only they hear. We heard all this. And so the question is whether the Department of Justice is going to find that obstruction.

We're going to see it. In the meantime, Banan is going to take that. And his lawyer, Castello, has already written back to the committee and said, what am I supposed to do? The former president says it's all covered by executive privilege, even though I left the White House in 2017. So what does that have to do with Jan 6, 2021? But, you know, but I think it goes beyond that. I think ban and we're going to talk about them next. I think I'm just talking about them. Just talk to them. All right. Let's get into it. I think that's a reason. All right.

Banan, who's just got who two things just happen or three things just happen. As you and I predicted and outlined it, what I like to say these days is you know what happened, but come on legal left to find out what happens next. Here's what's going to happen next. Criminal contempt vote happened. Good thing. Immediate referral to not just to the Department of Justice. That's a nuance that's been lost in the

media report. As the statute to USC 192, which covers criminal contempt of Congress requires, Nancy Pelosi made a referral after the vote that night on Thursday. I got hand delivered to the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Columbia, which is led by Channing Phillips. The Department of Justice, main justice, is also involved, but the first call about taking this to the Grand jury. And I do not read the statute, nor any of the case law around the statute, to say that there's any prosecutorial discretion. I think Channing Phillips has to take this case mandatory to the grand jury. And that grand jury will begin paneled hopefully

within the next month. And once in panel, that grand jury is going to hear the charges against ban and it is refusal to provide documents and is refusal to testify. I think that happens relatively quickly, separately from that and parallel to that. The Department of Justice led by Merrick Garland can bring its own prosecution. But the process of criminal contempt of Congress is going to go right, has gone right to the US Attorney's Office, DC, to the grand jury, and the grand jury, I think is going to be presented sufficient evidence to indict. But there's no fast track to the criminal prosecution. That trial of Bannon, if that doesn't, if that's not a wake up call to Bannon to comply, which I don't think

it's going to be based on his podcast comments where he's looking forward to spending time in jail with Rudy Giuliani so that he can be a martyr. Good. They're going to give it to him. But I want to get our listeners and followers prepared. That's like a two year process. The indictment will happen in the next three months or less. If he doesn't cough up the documents and testify, then there's going to be a trial, but

the trial is not going to be on a fast track. It's going to be on a normal track, which is a two to three year track, which means if we lose the midterms, it could have an impact on the prosecution. It's the Trump playbook that they're all adopting, which is extend delay, delay, extend time is on my side. Maybe the political wins of forchinal change, and it'll help me, or maybe a new president who's a Republican will get an office and be Biden, and will just parted me all over again, which is what happened

to Bannon for his build the wall bullshit. So look, the thing that was most disheartening, although not surprising, is that in the vote for criminal contempt, that only nine Republicans out of 211, sided with the Democrats, to find that willfully flouting in order and a subpoena by the Congress. And if you would have repercussions, the rest were like, we're fine with it. And he went because it were political because they're not statesmen or states people, because

it didn't matter to them because they liked bad and they liked and they're scared, shitless of Trump. So they're not going to vote to hold bad and accountable. And they don't care about the next witness. They'll deal with that another time. House voted 229 to 202. Pretty much right down party lines to find former Trump advisor Steve Bannon in criminal contempt of Congress after he defied a subpoena from the committee investigating the January 6 attack on the Capitol. Just saying that sentence should always reinforce a common theme on legal AFA,

common theme on Midas Touch, which is the following. The Republican Party is no longer a democratic political party. Small D. They're no longer care about democracy, period. They no longer care about representative government in any form, period. What they want to create is an authoritarian regime in the United States. They want to model it after Putin, after Kim Jong-lun, they want to model it after what takes place in communist China, all of their projection with China, they want to have a one party, one state situation, they're willing to cheat, they're willing to steal, they're willing to commit crimes, and Popok, which you said specifically, the Trump playbook is to push all of these things out into the future

and let me tell you why it really at its core. They want to break your spirit. They want to crush you. They want you to say, you know what? I give up. I thought that justice was coming. I don't even want to be an advocate anymore. And that, that moment when you are weak and vulnerable, bam, they got you. They got you. That is how Hitler takes over. That is how Mussolini takes over. That right there is the dictator playbook. The moment you just wave that white flag for that second, because you're like, you know what? The system's just moving a little too slow for me. Bam! You got eight off Hitler and here you got, you got fuck face Hitler and Donald Trump.

You're going to turn this thing into a sh thing into a true shit hole country and you're gonna have the worst of the worst. So you better stay vigilant out there, Popeye. Yeah. You also just described the playbook for the devil, by the way, if we want to get into religious items. I want our followers to understand what was in the subpoena for a moment because we just throw around terms like, oh, there was a subpoena.

He was called to testify. But when you and I lay out what was in that subpoena, you know, eyes are going to pop open. The committee wants all of Bannon's information around Jan 6th, but specifically his interactions with the proud boys, the oath keepers, Alex Jones, Jenna Ellis, the loser lawyer for Trump, Giuliani. She got farting on by Rudy. Right. Giuliani, Sydney Powell, a guy named Boris Epstein. And specifically, as podcasters, we can appreciate this.

They want his podcast in which he talked about anything leading up to Jan 6, including the one that he did. I don't know if you caught this on Jan 5. He said, Bannon, that all hell was going to break loose tomorrow at the Jan 6th protest, and that's exactly what happened with 140 injured and five people dead. Popok, I don't think we talk about this enough. This Jenna Ellis was farted on by Rudy Giuliani.

And I don't want to gloss over it. We talk about a lot of serious things on Midas Touch Legal AF. I don't want to forget the fact that Jenna Ellis was farted on by Rudy Giuliani and not just farted on it because I want people to truly understand what a parody, what a fucking circus this GQP is

because after losing an election by over seven million votes what a parody, what a fucking circus this GQP is, because after losing an election by over seven million votes, after losing it over 70 cases, Rudy Dutie Giuliani with his hair dye dripping down his face in a hotel lobby, in a hotel lobby that they rented out, because they were losing in court put on a fake hearing with other GQP legislatures, state people have one witness called after another. The witnesses are drunk. You remember these witnesses? They literally drunk. They're slurring their words. They're drunk. They're like. Okay, that is the point. I'm trying to make Popeyes. This podcast is sponsored by better help, not fully sure if after that rant, it will be in the future.

But currently we are sponsored by better help. I'm joking. Better help is a great sponsor. If there is something interfering with your happiness or preventing you from achieving your goals, we all go through issues on a daily basis, being a lawyer, very stressful job, but all jobs out there are stressful. You know, existing in this world post COVID, no matter what you do is or how you do it, it's stressful. There's a lot of trauma out there. And it's helpful that we have that mental health reset and talk to true professionals better help will assess your needs and match you with your own license, professional therapists. You can start communicating and just under 48 hours. Popeyes. Yeah, it's not a crisis line. It's not self help. It's

professional therapy done securely online. And there's a broad range of expertise available, which may not be locally available in many areas. The service is available for clients worldwide. You can log into your account any time and send a message to your therapist. You'll get timely and thoughtful responses back. Plus, you can schedule a weekly video or phone session so you won't have to sit in an uncomfortable waiting room as with traditional therapy. I agree with you, Popoq. Better Help is committed to facilitating great therapeutic matches. So they make it easy and free to change therapists if needed. You know what I like about it? It's affordable and it's more affordable than traditional offline therapy.

And even financial aid is available. Better help, that's better, H-E-L-P like Popuck, wants you to start living a happier life today. Absolutely. So I want everybody to go to betterhelp.com. Slash reviews, if you don't believe us, check out the reviews for yourself. These are people who have went there

and have experienced true help, who have gotten the help they needed. And we want you to go to betterhelp.com. Slash, legal AF, that's better, H-E-L-P and join over 2 million people who have taken charge of their mental health with the help of experience professionals. In fact, so many people have been using better help. They are recruiting additional therapists in all 50 states. And guess what? Special offer, special offer for new jingle, new jingle. So offer for legal AF listeners, get 10% off your first month at betterhelp.com slash legal

AF, go to betterhelp.com slash legal AF. Good. Ad read right there. Now Pope, I've been looking forward to this part of the show. I'm not looking forward to the outcome of what I'm about to tell everybody, but I'm looking forward to educating everybody about this Trump truth social media scam that he's employing. We heard that this Trump entity merged with a company. It's on the stock market. The shares started trading at 300, that 300%, 500%, a thousand percent above its initial where I was trading at initially in the day before the merger was announced. And so what is going on here? Let me be very clear from the outset. This is a scam.

This is a pump and dump scheme. People are going to lose millions of dollars, thousands of dollars, tens of thousands of dollars, hundreds of millions of dollars. People not named Trump. People not of dollars. People not named Trump. People not named Trump. People not named Trump. Trump is going to potentially make millions, potentially billions, but retail investors,

the magas supporters, the people reading the bullshit, being spewed on these Reddit message boards who don't understand the way the stock market works, who think that the fact that this stock is trading at $34 and another stock is trading at $32 shows that the Trump stocks doing better but have no sense of what market capitalization is and what the have stocks even work. They're praying on their own supporters in ability to understand the stock market. So let me rewind. We've heard that this was done via a SPAC.

A SPAC is a special purpose acquisition company. A SPAC is basically a public holding company. The way a SPAC work says, a sponsorship group. Supposedly, sophisticated investors get together the same way they would with like a private equity fund, but here this is going public. And this group of investors, they go out to the market and they raise millions of dollars. In this case, hundreds of millions of dollars, 293 million dollars was raised by this entity, this SPAC, and the SPAC was called Digital World Acquisition Company. That money that they've raised from large sophisticated investors, from hedge funds, from mutual funds, from all these different funds out there,

goes into this trust account, and then this SPAC goes out and has about 18 months to two years to make a merger with a private company and bring the company public. So when that $292 million went into the trust account, there was no statement at that time that that entity was going to merge later with the Trump entity. Really, all that initial spax that is it would be merging with some sort of digital company. That's the only message that was put out there. They would be merging with some sort of digital company. That's the only message that was put out there. They would be merging with some sort of digital company. Well, they said Fentech or financial services.

Yeah. And so that company then goes out to try to find a merger. Now, in the normal course with SPACs, you would find a company that has a track record, that has a history of being a company. You would want to merge with the private company that has a past of financials so that you can look back and say, well, here's how the company did in 2019.

Here's how the company did in 2020. Here's how the company did in 2019. Here's how the company did in 2020. Here's how the company did in 2021. And here's why we think they are going to be future projections. And here's why we think that the market's going to respond positively to this. You have the data behind it. In this case, this Trump media entity doesn't exist. It's not a real company.

It doesn't have any nuts and bolts. It has some beta testing. It's a concept of what a company could be, right? A company that's already been hacked. It exactly. It has no proof of concept whatsoever. When the SPAC starts, all SPACs will begin trading at $10 a share. That's just the standard SPAC.

You don't normally see any great deals of fluctuations with that $10 a share. Upon the merger, what's supposed to happen is it's viewed as like, you know, an IPO, the two entities, the SPAC, merges with this private entity, takes that private entity public. And what's supposed to happen is if you have an accurate valuation, the stock should react in normal course, not dragantically high, and there'd be less or more, but it will be reflective of the financials and the records behind it. Here, this was pumped on Reddit. This was pumped on message boards.

Frankly, it was pumped by the press release issued by Trump talking about fake media, and these are the types of publicly facing statements that the SEC warns against not to do because of the fear of tricking retail investors who don't know about the stock market to buy these vehicles that don't have any financial history or financial records or financial backing like the Trump case. And so here you have, based on the Trump press release,

based on all of the Reddit message boards, this stock being pumped to levels that are wild. A thousand percent increase. The stock was trading at some points last week at $179, $180 a share from $10 a share. It then dropped to around $100. It's now trading at $94, the after hours trading now puts it around $80. But this is a highly volatile stock. And here's what's going to happen. At some point, when you have these mergers, the SEC laws require holdback periods within which Trump and insiders are in supposed to trade their shares.

Already we know that there was a significant potential for insider trading as the trading volume right before the press release announcement, skyrocketed to levels where only geniuses would know, like not geniuses, I mean, like you have to be able to predict the future to be able to know that the stock was about to go in that direction before the press releases came out. But there's supposed to be this holdback period with an inch with when within which insiders can't trade. But what will likely happen is Trump will try to jack the stock up until which he can dump all of his stock

or he will have conduits by the stock and sell it for him to try to avoid the insider trading stuff even though that's insider trading and try not to be caught. And then the retail investors are going to be shellacked here. Shellacked. That's what this is. This is a pump and dump scheme by Donald Trump. It's just so obvious to watch. And here's what he's going to say, Pope, when the SEC engages in their normal course enforcement mechanisms against them, he's going gonna say, oh, it's a political thing, and the Biden SEC is coming after me. He's gonna violate every SEC law that exists to keep the public markets a safe place.

And he's just going to claim it's a political witch hunt, and he's gonna try to do what we did before. Dragon on for 10, 20 years, and try to break your spirit. Popo, all truths. All truth. But let me add on. So in my past, I was the global head of litigation for a Wall Street firm that was

very involved with SPACS, one of the major SPAC sponsors in 17, 18, 19, 20, and to date. And the reason that these are so dangerous, and the reason why most of them are not successful, most SPACs are not successful. That's just the track record. You look at independent analysis, is because it is a way for a company, in this case, the WAC, which nobody's ever heard of, founded by a guy who has a company in 2012 out of Miami, a guy named Patrick Orlando, which nobody's ever heard of. Founded by a guy who has a company in 2012 that a Miami, a guy named Patrick Orlando, which nobody's ever heard of. He worked at Deutsche Bank, which was a lender for Trump back in the day. That's one connectivity, who's formed a couple of SPACs,

including with Chinese company based in Wuhan, China. A company called Yunheng International, but they never made the acquisition that the SPAC is required to do because if the SPAC in raising its money, in doing its own IPO, the advantage, why do people, why do you SPACs? Because the SPAC company is a blank check company that has no assets, and therefore has very limited information that it has to disclose through the SEC to the investing public. Other than their aspirational goal

of what they would like to use the investor's money for, maybe we'll go here, maybe we'll buy restaurants, maybe we'll buy gaming, maybe we'll get into the wind farm business, maybe we'll get into satellites, but there's no real requirement that they use the money for any of those things. What the, what the recourse is for the investor who put the $10 in per unit or per share, is that if they don't like the investment, they can get their money back. They can get their $10 back with interest if the investment is not made, or if they want

to depart from the SPAC, there's a way for them to get their money back. But if they want to go along for the ride, they put their trust in what's called the SPAC sponsor, who is the person that puts the SPAC vehicle together, and then lets them raise money based on a wing and a prayer, but institutions make investments. Hege funds make investments in this. That's where the $300 million came from. They looked at Patrick Orlando, who had almost a very limited track record. And they said, okay, he seems like a guy I want to give $300 million to. This is where the SEC comes in because you're not allowed as the SPAC sponsor to make any contact with the target acquisition. In this case, the truth company, the Trump company, while you're raising your IPO money,

while you're raising your initial public offering money. Because that would totally violate SEC regulations. If you knew what you were going to acquire, when you raised your SPAC money, hey, give me money for my SPAC, I'm gonna go out and buy about 40 McDonald's, then you'd have to do a whole nother height and level of disclosure. So there is a requirement in SPAC. I'm going to go out and buy about 40 McDonald's. Then you'd have to do a whole other heightened level of disclosure. So there is a requirement in SPAC law that says the sponsor cannot be in contact with the acquisition company at all during the time they do their IPO.

Well, let's do the math. The SPAC in this case, DWAC, went public in September. They announced their acquisition of the Trump organizations media company in October. That gave them less than 30 days to locate the target, do the financials around the target, cut the deal, sign the deal and close the deal. And pop up the financials that do diligence process would normally be an extensive, tedious. You've got rooms of hundreds, not an exaggeration, hundreds of bankers, lawyers, financial analysts, CPAs, combing through documents in the normal course to ensure the financial integrity of the data that's being given. That is the process. Here, the process that you described was it one zoom call? Yeah. Was it one zoom call? Hey, hey, this bottle of trouble,

what a do is back. Okay, great. Okay, do a spack. All right, let's fucking do it. They raised, I always loved your artist rendering voices for these people. So this company that has no track record at all itself, this is where you are going in your lead into this. This company, for lead by Patrick Orlando, who nobody's ever heard of, has no track record of success in the world of spacks

is somehow without raising the name of Trump. And that's again, the SEC's gonna have to look into that got investors, including major hedge funds like Sabah and other hedge funds led by legitimate people to invest $300 million to give them a blank check so that within 30 days without having ever identified the acquisition target or spoken to them or had a conversation with Trump bought, you know, identified, evaluated due diligence acquired and closed in a 30 day period. It's almost inconceivable that that happened. It's almost inconceivable. It is actually inconceivable. It is actually

impossible. And we have these great protections on our financial markets specifically to deal with things like this. And the issue when a past president of the United States, like a bull in a china shop just goes, fuck it, fuck it. This is an attack truly on our financial markets. It's why when I'm seeing the reporting on this digital world acquisition company and what's going on, knowing the work of great professionals in this space, who do good work every day to try to help our economic system,

to build businesses, and then everything Trump touches, he destroys and this is a deeper implication than just even the Trump stock. Because that is a foregone conclusion, 100%, just a matter of when that stock just completely withers and you Popeyes, you talked about the hedge funds, the retail investors right now, the ones who don't even know what they're

doing, who are the ones buying this at, you know, 150 and now it's at 80. They're going to buy it at 80. Here's the loss. They buy the unit for $10. That's their backstop. The stock backed by no real assets other than the fantasy and fiction of Trump's mind where he declared in his SEC filing the exact same one paragraph press release that you publicized on the Midas Touch

Twitter, Twitter feed is exactly what he filed with the SEC, which is I believe, this is because I'm smoking dope. I believe that my company is worth $875 million enterprise value and could be up to $1.3 billion. What is that based on? Absolutely nothing. It's based on Trump's declaration of value that he files with the SEC and then the Reddit and other retail investors who don't know what he better say, hey, the company's worth $875 million. Well, what is that based on? That's based on Trump's pipe dream to pump it, as you said, to pump it before he dumps it. And now the stock floats

up or rockets up to $100 a share, that $90 difference between what you bought it at a hundred and what the SPAC is at $10 or here's another concept a warrant that goes with the stock which is also traded separately in a SPAC. So there's a DWAC stock and there's a DWAC stock warrant which gives you the which trades separately which is usually at about $11.11, $11.50 a share. That's now at a hundred and your loss is going to be the $90. When this whole parade and charade collapses, that's what's going to be left in the dust as Trump pockets, the three or four of $500 million at least to set up and a, a Twitter alternative that we know is going to be as successful as the

other from the desk of Donald Trump bullshit that also failed. He's never going to get, he's never going to get enough of these cult followers to go to him to support a social media platform that makes any money. And look, so far the filing that you talked about was the 8K filing. The 8K is a type of public disclosure, but that just talks about the merger in those absurd, Trumpian kind of terms that one paragraph, two paragraphs.

I'm Donald Trump, here's what I believe the value is gonna be. I wanna do that. I wanna do that. Legal A, by the way, I'm legal AF's enterprise value. As of right now, based on our performance today, I believe Ben is 1.3 billion. What do you think? It's basically no different than what Trump did.

And, you know, just think about it this way. Sometimes when an earnings report comes out and an Amazon earnings report, right? And let's say it only reported like a 10% increase in profits. And the market was expecting a 20% increase in markets and profits. The stock will go down sometimes. Like, you know, it didn't meet Wall Street expectations. What is going to happen when the first financial report is filed here? And literally, it's not a company. It doesn't exist. It is going to, you know, and what's going to happen? The moment the SEC initiates the investigation, which it will, people are

going to lose a lot of money. It's very disturbing and I hope our legal AF listeners got some better sense of this area of the law regarding Spacks public companies, but really why what Trump doing here is is too much to two more two last comments on this for frost because we're going to you and I are going to continue to monitor this. One is do you know who the CFO of DWAC is we know Patrick Orlando is the sponsor and the chairman do you know who the CFO of that company is no who's the CFO he is a member of the Brazilian presidents national congress he's a Congress person from Brazil who's associated and closely tied to ball of snarro in Brazil, who's the CFO of this company. We know how Trump loves ball of snarro. So the fact that they're going to sit in front of an SEC investigator one day and tell them that we had no idea we were going to buy the Trump business less than 30 days after we went IPO

and violated all those rules, you know, it's just total bullshit and shocking. And the, and go ahead Ben. I was going to say too, you know, one thing that'll be interesting also when we see the S4 and other public filings, you know, you're under a lot of scrutiny when you go public. And like this, so you have to disclose past bankruptcies, you have to disclose past litigation, past lawsuits, you have to probably do for Trump a more thorough background check. Then he would have had to have done as running for president in the United States where there's no background check that's required. But there's a very robust background check for people. So when I'm also curious to see in the future filings, is what role Donald Trump is actually going to have directly because as a board member, you

would assume he'd be a board member of his company, right? Chairman right now, which is a non a not it's a made up title. Right. And that's what I want to watch for because you'd expect to be a board member. If this was really his company, which would make him a fiduciary and would also subject him to additional insider trading potential obligations because he would be he would get exclusive non public information from the company. And so that would also handicap his ability to sell shares if he was a board member. But I also want to see his involvement in this because it's likely that we're going to see that he's really not going to say he's involved because he can't make the disclosures

of past litigation past bankruptcies because he's disqualifying. He can't do it based on his debt. And just to draw a line under this, because I know we've got a lot more to cover tonight and we need to move on. But one last thing, for those that think that the stock is really valuable and the underlying business model is valuable, unlike most spacks, and a lot of them are not successful. But unlike most spacks, there was not one, what they call a pipe, PIP, there was not one public investor in private equity, not one major institutional investor, other than hedge and private equity funds, not one university endowment, not one charitable endowment that

invested in this SPAC. And that's usually a warning sign at the SPAC is a fraud. And let's explain just why it is a warning sign that it's a fraud because part of setting an accurate valuation of the company would be going to the pipe market that you just described, raising additional amounts. In addition to, for example, here, the $293 million, you'd probably based on the valuation that they had of the company, maybe raise an additional $100 to $200 million pipe in this specific circumstance, but you would go to these institutional investors. You would show them your financials and they would make

that assessment, but here there were no financials to show them. So this was a pump and dump directly to retail investors to try to trick people into buying the stock and it's precisely what they've done and they've created that confusion, which is why this is a pump and no. Yeah, it's the Reddit game stop AMC theaters, you know, crowd. Absolutely. And popuck, I think you teased our listeners that there's a lot more in the show. I hate to disappoint them.

We only got one more topic. It's one more update that I want to share with our listeners. The other will be to be continued. And this is the update on S.D. eight, Pope, I want to talk about what is going on with the anti women anti child bearing person bill in Texas. This is the bounty hunter or well, the law that is essentially banned abortions in the state of Texas by delegating a private cause of action to private citizens to sue for about $10,000

or more for anyone who aids in a bet's or who engages in assisting in any material way, or even in material way, an abortion. So it basically outlaws abortion in the state of Texas. We've talked about the decisions at the district court level, reminding our listeners. There was a Obama appointed judge at the district court level who sat in the Western district court of Texas,

113 page opinion explaining why this was a constitutional right. Popeyes and I have discussed the constitutionality of the right to choose dating back to Roe V. Wade going through the case law with Casey. It is a fundamental right and shrined in the Constitution, although not expressly, stated in the Constitution, and it has become Supreme Court precedent for decades and decades and decades. This law obviously would be in a front

to that Supreme Court precedent. We then talked about the fifth circuit court of appeals after the district court issued an injunction stopping this Texas law from being enforced, from going into place. Texas appealed it to the fifth circuit court of appeals, the fifth circuit court of appeals basically said to the district court, no, no, no, you can't issue that injunction right now. The status quo will remain in place while we hear the broader arguments at issue. Then there was an emergency appeal to the United States Supreme Court, the United States Supreme Court,

you know, basically said, look, we are not going to stop the law immediately from being in effect. Therefore, the law still exists in Texas, but they granted cert. There were four votes that allowed this to be heard in oral argument in a full hearing that will take place on November 1, Popeyes. What's going to happen here? What's going on here? Yeah. Again, you've heard what happened, but let's hear what happens next.

So what happened is we've got two cases from Judge Pittman, who is the Austin judge who cited against, of course, SBA and found it to be fundamentally unconstitutional under all the case law that you cited. We've got the earlier whole women's health case, also that went to Judge Pittman, which was brought by abortion providers and clinics attacking SB 8. But then you had the DOJ or the US versus Texas case that was filed by Merrick Garland. And those two cases have now been brought up together to be heard on November 1 in an

expedited hearing. Now the court, as you've acknowledged, did not have the votes, did not have the five votes at the moment to stay the enforcement of SBA while the court considers the underlying merits. The other thing, I want to manage expectations here. The issue on November 1st is not directly the constitutionality or unconstitutionality of SBA. It's been framed in the one paragraph decision that came out yesterday by the Supreme Court as only addressing whether the United States, in this case, the case brought by Marik Arlen, the US itself as a federal government may bring a suit in a federal

court to obtain a injunction or declaratory relief against a state, a state court judge, a state court clerk or private parties concerning SBA. Yes or no. And why is that important? Because one of the issues that the fifth circuit and many on the Supreme Court have been troubled by, right or wrong, is whether in the earlier case, whether whole women's health, the abortion providers have proper standing to prosecute the case, you know, and looking for the injunctive relief that they were looking for.

The federal government in US versus Texas, bringing the suit themselves, hopefully, as Pittman observed in his ruling, it's 113-page ruling, has solved that problem because when the US brings a case, it's almost an automatic exception to the sovereign immunity doctrine, which was expressed in X Parti Young, a famous Supreme Court case that you and I learned in law school. But there's an exception to the general rule that a state is sovereign in its own operations, even from interference from the federal government. If there's a federal interest at stake and the US government brings the suit, that's an automatic exception. One that was not acknowledged by the Fifth Circuit in their whole in their US versus

Texas ruling. And one that the US Supreme Court is now going to have to grapple with. But on November 1, even though they've expedited briefing, all briefs have to be in by the 27th of October, including Amicus Curie briefs, friends of the court briefs, by other people who have interests, but aren't named parties. All briefs have to be in by the 27th of October for a full oral argument on 111. But the only issue is this one issue that the Supreme Court seems to be grappling with, which is can the US enjoy the state actors that have been empowered by the bounty law under SBA? Yes, or no, they'll make that decision on the stay. And then they're, I think they're

going to my, I'm going to make a prediction. There, there is a school of thought that things they're going to overturn SBA, potentially, if they can get the five votes to do it. But then when the Mississippi case gets heard in December, which is still on track, which is Jackson, which is going to deal with weather abortions at at 15 weeks or or older 15 weeks of a viability or more can be outlawed that they're going to take a strong position and really limit and gut Roe v Wade at that point. But the six week rule, which is what is at the heart, no pun intended of SBA, they're going to say,

all right, we don't like the total ban at six weeks. And they're going to take it on full frontal in December when the 15 weeks of viability is really what's an issue. What do you think about that then? Go back and listen to the last legal AF. It was a ban and popaki in prediction, which is they are coordinated. It appears even with the fifth circuit, slow rolling this so that the Supreme Court has its opportunity to overturn Roe v Wade with the Mississippi case where oral arguments will be heard December 1. And as I said, I don't think they're going to say in the ruling, we are overturning Roe

v Wade and that is no longer precedent. I don't. They're going to do it in a more sophisticated and sly way. It's going to be a very long opinion. The descents, the Sotomayor, the Kagan descents are going to make it very clear that the effect and impact of the ruling serves to ban Roe v Wade, the same way in Texas, they didn't directly say we're going to ban

Roe v Wade in the, but do you think they overturn S be eight and then take it on in December with Mississippi? Yes. Okay. That's what I agree with that. I do. I agree with that too. I do. And, but I think the way they deal with the Mississippi law is the practical impact of what the ruling is gonna do. And there's gonna be a lot of concurring in parts, dissenting in parts, you know, types of decisions, but the effect of it's going to be overturning

row the way, popoq. I know you wanna hit this mad gates thing. I know you want to hit this Matt Gates thing. I know you looked at me when I said I have one thing. I'll give you a few minutes to wrap up on the Matt Gates update with the new prosecutor. I know you want to do it. I know you want to say it. So give us the update on Matt Gates quickly.

It's not just me. As you know, I posted on my Twitter feed, a legal A F's Twitter feed, is there anything you guys want to talk about? Let us know, you know, as we get into recording and, you know, Matt Gates came up with people, I'm the man of the people, but you're eating into that two minutes now with the bill. All right. No, here we go. What two minutes? Our sponsors like long shows. So look, Matt Gates is the worm has turned once again against Matt Gates. Not only has the judge agreed to roll off until March, the sentencing of Joel Greenberg,

who is his singing his tune against Gates left and right as a co-conspirator in the child sex trafficking charges related to a 17 year old girl who was paid for sex and raped as a result. So he is cooperating with the authorities against Gates. His sentencing has been rolled off to a march. And what has the prosecution done in the meantime? They have beefed up their prosecution team, which is based in, I think, the Northern District of Florida, so that so not at main justice, not in Washington, DOJ, but now Washington, DOJ, main justice has now assigned two career prosecutors who all they do is public corruption and child exploitation cases.

In fact, Todd Ghee, who's the deputy chief of public integrity sitting in Washington has now been assigned, I assume he'll take the role potentially as lead prosecutor on this. Again, Gates is facing as his Greenberg a 10 year mandatory sentence. If he is, if he is successfully prosecuted and convicted of the crime of child sex trafficking. Gates also lost his legal license because he failed to pay dues of $200,000. successfully prosecuted and convicted of the crime of child sex trafficking. Gates also lost his legal license because he failed to pay dues of $290.56. Florida bar. Yeah, just think about that.

Just think about what a clown this individual is. He forgot to pay or just didn't pay his dues payment to keep himself as a member of the bar. Just, yeah, just not paying $250. You know where his, but he has tremendous brass ones because he's taking again a page out of the Trump playbook. He had an opportunity this past week to ask questions of Merrick Garland, who is the lead prosecutor at the top of the Department of Justice as the attorney general, whose team is ultimately leading the prosecutions against gates.

And knowing that Paul Guy had been assigned as the lead prosecutor, he actually went after Guy, went after Merrick Garland and said to Merrick Garland, do you think it's appropriate that people who have partisan leanings are assigned to the public integrity unit. What is he referring to? Like 20 years ago, Paul Guy assisted the Democrats on the Homeland Security Committee. So I guess Gates has now made the assumption that the prosecutor is somehow a Democrat and why is a Democrat prosecuting him? That's not how public integrity and public corruption unit at Department of Justice works.

And I think he's just cooking his own goose. But look, he follows the lead of Donald Trump. Why am I shocked by that? The GQP wants to break your spirit. Do not let them break your spirit. That is why you listen to legal AF. That is why you listen to Midas Touch and the cadre of Midas Touch podcast on the Midas Media Network. So great spending this hour plus with you breaking down these legal issues. Popo, it's always a pleasure to get to do this show with you. It's like a dream come true that get to talk about law with a great friend and have people

listen to it. You can't beat it, huh? No, again, I'm thrilled. Somebody wrote us, I won't mention who it is particularly, but somebody wrote us a DM a couple of people have. And you know, when I read them, I told them, and this was very sincere, I said, if there's ever a moment of doubt, when we think you and I think that the effort that we put into this show, the enthusiasm that we bring to it, and the professionalism in our approach is ever not appreciated, or like, why are we doing this? I'll just read these one or two things that

have come our way, which, and it all comes clear. Because sometimes when you and I are sitting in these four by four boxes, we're doing this recording it on a Zoom platform, it's hard to, we do it live and all, but it's hard to remember that we are and you and your brothers are touching and resonating with so many people and it's rewarding in a way that I never envisioned a year ago when you and I talked about doing this show. Popoq well said special thanks to our sponsor better help go to better help dot com slash legal a f appreciate you joining us Ben micelle is here signing off with Michael popoq if it's Saturday it is legal a f live if it Saturday, it is legal A F live. If it's Sunday, it is legal A F.

See you next week. Shout out to the Midas mighty.