Legal AF by MeidasTouch - Breyer, Affirmative Action, Seditious Conspiracy Trials, & the Death Penalty

Starting point is 00:00:00 Welcome to Midas Touch Legal AF. If it's the weekend, it is Legal AF. Ben Myceles, Michael Polpock breaking down the critical legal issues of the week in digestible ways that you could understand. Some have called this Legal AF university. We are not an accredited law school, but we do feel that we are teaching you the law, the nooks and crannies, the nuts and bolts, the popoqian, everything, Michael Popoq, how are you doing this weekend? For easing, huh? It's crazy. We're the Thomas and the English muffins of law schools. We do the nooks and the crannies. Yeah, we got it.

Starting point is 00:00:50 We're getting, we're on our way to a foot of snow with Manhattan. But it did not stop me from, as people know from the tweet this morning, did not stop me from heading into the office wearing ski goggles and digging my way out to make it to my podcast studio, IE, my office so that I could spend another Saturday night with you. Popoq, you don't know this, but I have some business meetings that are scheduled this upcoming week in New York. So I may be seeing you in person, but that blizzard out there or that bomb cyclone as it's being called is it's certainly giving

Starting point is 00:01:25 me some pause. Should I come? Should I not come? I think you should, A, you should come. B, we need to see each other for various reasons. If you're in town long enough, maybe we do a live podcast, although we still have the mask man going on in New York right now. But yes, come, it's going to be, we're New Yorkers. This thing gets cleared out by tomorrow and we're up and running. I took a, I took an Uber here through the snow this morning. So don't worry about that. And before we move on, talking about Sartorial things, loving the baby Yoda shirt for those that are watching us tonight and on YouTube in the future.

Starting point is 00:02:00 What is that all about? Well, it was a gift that was given to me from my girlfriend, Sochi, she got this for me, but it's because my nickname as a young trial lawyer was young Jedi was what the trial lawyers, the only trial lawyers called me, which is funny because not to fully digress and we'll get into the law in a second. When I was growing up and I went to a day camp, they were giving out names of Star Wars characters. And I didn't know really anything about Star Wars

Starting point is 00:02:32 when I was six or seven years old. And they called me Yoda. Very big eyes. And at the time, my ears didn't really fit the size of my head. Your head grew into your ears. And so I felt very cool cool. I'm like Yoda, you know, he whys and he's the leader. And then I went home and I watched Star Wars and I saw what Yoda looked like. And I started crying. And I was like, why are they saying Yoda? They

Starting point is 00:02:56 think I look like Yoda. And, but it's funny that it went full circle. And then as a trial lawyer, it was young Jedi on this show. I'm OB OB one Kapo Puck. OB one popo pop up. Open self the popo key. And let's get into the law. And let's talk about a popo. I mean, I think we have to be even handed when it comes to members of Congress who are, you know, apparently in legal jeopardy here, you know, there is a congressman out in

Starting point is 00:03:27 Texas, Henry Quayar representing the 28th district of Texas for those who don't know about the 28th, the covers, LaRato, Mission Rio Grande City and San Antonio. So a very kind of prominent district in congressman, Quayar, very powerful congress Congressman. His home was rated by the FBI this past week. We don't have much information about what the reason for the rate is. And Henry Quay are he's in contested primary against a popular progressive democratic candidate as well. Congressman Quay are says he's still going to be running.

Starting point is 00:04:05 He says that he's innocent, although we don't know what he's really being accused of. But Popoq, what do we know about this raid? And maybe you can even walk us through a little bit like when we hear about these FBI raids. The FBI's, does the FBI usually announce it? Do they just kind of show up unexpected? Tell us about that. This is our second raid since you and I have been together in April. We talked about the dawn raid of Rudy Giuliani that was executed by the FBI on behalf of the Southern District of New York, which they grabbed 18 personal electronic devices. Here we have, and you're right, we need to be even handed, we have a representative that obviously is the target of an investigation being led. I presume either by main justice out of Washington or by the local

Starting point is 00:04:51 U.S. Attorney's Office in Texas concerning his and maybe his wife, Ilmelda, Quayar, involvement with the country of Isar Bayjant, which for geography buffs out there. And we have a lot of them on our global following is sits on the Caspian Sea. It was formerly part of the Soviet Union. And it is bordered by Iran, Armenia, Georgia, and Russia. And it is oil rich. Well, what else is oil rich in this story so far? Ben, Texas. So for some reason that I don't exactly know why.

Starting point is 00:05:30 Um, Quayar has a very close relationship with the business and political community of Azerbaijan, even going so far as to be the co-chair of the Congressional, Iser Bayjon caucus. I don't think Quayar is Iser Bayjani, but somehow he has gotten so involved with them that he actually heads a caucus in Congress, which of course is a, is where lobbyists go who want to promote Iser Bayjani. Problem with Iser Bayjani is that it's on the CIA list for being a supremely corrupt oligarch or oil agarque running there and the true relationship between Quayar and whether he who knows what he's done that has made him the target of a criminal investigation. His wife, Amelda, has a bunch of media companies, the press has reported that also have connectivity

Starting point is 00:06:22 toizer by john. And, you know, he's been known to take graduates or undergraduates at Texas AM, AM International to izer by john for a week or two. So we're going to get to the bottom of us. He gave a 90 second tweet video that said he's got nothing to hide and he'll be totally cleared.

Starting point is 00:06:43 And of course, as you noted, he's in a dogfight of a dog fight of a primary fight for his seat. So this is something that we will keep our eyeballs on and we will follow as things develop. And the fight for a seat, the progressive challenger. Her name is Jessica Szaneros for everybody who wants to check out her views and her policies. Jessica Szaneros. And as we're talking about Congress, Popak, I'd be remiss if we didn't just quickly talk about Matt Gaetz and what's gone on over there this week.

Starting point is 00:07:13 And as many people know, Joel Greenberg, who was basically Matt Gaetz's right hand in this sex trafficking ring of raping underage girls. He pled guilty Joe Greenberg who was facing a life sentence. If you recall, he was the former tax collector of Seminole County in Florida. I lived in Seminole County for a minute and a half in the mid 90s. Really? I practiced in Orlando for a short time. So with

Starting point is 00:07:45 respect to Joel Greenberg, he had pled guilty to sex trafficking, another individual who was within that sex trafficking ring or a witness to the sex trafficking and Orlando area sports radio host named Joe Alacot. He's cooperating with the U.S. Justice Department's

Starting point is 00:08:04 investigation into Florida representative Matt Gates and Ellicott is pleading guilty in a separate bribery scheme, not to the sex trafficking and also to supplying people with huge amounts of Adderall. But apparently Ellicott was in the room where Joe Greenberg had reached out to Matt Gaetz and had told Matt Gaetz that they had raped an underage girl and that Ella Cutt had witnessed that. So we'll keep everybody updated on that. Back to your neck of the woods, Popok with Sarah Palin. Sarah Palin's in the news again. Well, she's in the news. I saw because she had COVID

Starting point is 00:08:47 and she was out with her family spreading COVID. It's beyond wild that. But her family, her boyfriend, former Ranger great Ron Dugay. And so she's there with her boyfriend with COVID going out to restaurants. She previously said she was never going to get vaccinated over her dead body, but apparently she doesn't care about other people's dead bodies.

Starting point is 00:09:10 In which case, former Congresswoman Michelle Bachmann went on Fox News and applauded Sarah Pellan for going out and saying that that was great that she went out with COVID. That's what everybody should be doing going out with COVID. I mean, it's beyond parity and sick, Popak. This is why Michelle Bachman is no longer the public eye comments like that. I thought she was, I was actually surprised she was still around when you mentioned Michelle Bachman. She had so fallen off the radar.

Starting point is 00:09:39 But Popak, here's the thing. What Michelle Bachman was saying there is kind of mainstream Republican views now. They really believe in spreading COVID like, you know, she was on Fox News, the Fox News host let her speak and had that stupid grimace on his face as she was, you know, Michelle Bachman was applauding Sarah Palin. But Pope Box Sarah Palin wasn't just in New York to spread COVID, but actually in New York, because she had a federal case, she has a lawsuit that's been going on against the New York Times for defamation for quite some time. Tell us about that case and what stage is it? Yeah, and then I'll end it with a discussion of Ilya's restaurant, which is in my

Starting point is 00:10:20 neighborhood, and I know well, including, including, including, Meetball Wednesday, which, which they're actually known for. I'm not surprised she ended up there. What I am surprised is she told the federal judge in this case, in this case, Jed Rackoff, Rackoff, was a very well-known Southern District, New York federal judge for, in his former life, a very well-respected white collar criminal defense lawyer. They're at the point in her five-year-old trial against the New York Times for libel. And just to bring everybody up to speed on that case, she filed a case against the New York Times because in an editorial piece that the New York Times ran in 2017, the editorial writer made a link between Sarah Palin running on her website, a gun

Starting point is 00:11:10 site logo with the Gabby Gifford shooting that killed six people and horribly injured Gabby Gifford in 2011. So in six years later, I don't know exactly why I had read the piece, but The New York Times was writing an editorial that sort of made a linkage between the crosshairs, mailer and that particular shooting. Now everybody- Yeah, because there was the shooting in 2017 that injured congressman Scalice. Right. And so that's why they were writing about it in 2017. And then they were talking about the 2011 shooting of Gabby Giffords.

Starting point is 00:11:48 And they were saying that one of the causes of the shooting was, and it was intimating that it was because of the crosshairs and Sarah Palin's promotional make. You got it exactly right. And the why is that important? Because in a libel or defamation case, A, it has to be false, whatever, whatever's being said about somebody. But if they're a public official or have celebrity, which Sarah Palin arguably does or is or was the in order to, in order to succeed on a case of defamation, there's a heightened standard for a public official to win that kind of case. They have to prove that the person that made the defamatory statement did so with what's called

Starting point is 00:12:30 actual malice, which is a term of art, which ironically comes from a case from 1964 that involved the New York Times, right, New York Times. New York Times. New Seleman. Exactly, which is we, we walk out of law school, whatever we went to law school, and that's what other cases, Right. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York Times. New York the Supreme Court, it hasn't been changed. It's precedent to clear that a public official cannot recover damages for defamation unless it has proven that the statement was made with actual malice, which means knowledge that the statement was false or a reckless disregard for whether it was false or true. Now, the editorial writer had already testified at a preliminary hearing in front of Judge Raykov that he personally did not know that that was false. He believed it was true. Therefore, in at least the view of the trial judge at the time to feeding actual malice,

Starting point is 00:13:37 and Judge Raykov actually dismissed the case, you know, three years ago. And he was reversed by the second circuit court of appeals saying that he was wrong to credit that testimony alone and that she had, that she had the right to a day in court. Well, that day in court, including because of COVID, got pushed out to like now, like this week. So judge Raycoff is ready with defense lawyers and the plaintiffs lawyers for Sarah Palin and Sarah Palin to go into a live courtroom and pick a jury. Well, Sarah Palin took a rapid test and came down with COVID. She's also publicly declared that she's proudly not vaccinated. And so Judge

Starting point is 00:14:18 Raycoff in his own way sort of snarky said, well, I've just been informed that that the plaintiff Miss Palin is has COVID. And of course, she's not vaccinated, you know, he kind of gave her a little dig on that. And he then gave the plaintiffs lawyers and Palin, a various ways to not delay the trial. He said, let's pick the jury without Miss Palin present. The lawyers do the picking anyway. They said, no. They said, let's do it by Zoom, let her zoom in while we're picking the jury. And she said, no. So she said no to zoom. She said no to doing it without her, which does, you know, happens sometimes. But she did say yes to spaghetti and meatballs at Ilios. So while she was killing time waiting for a trial to happen that she wants to judge Judge Raykov has pissed off with tapping his foot.

Starting point is 00:15:05 She's out not once, but the New York Post has reported twice. She's going back to Ilios once inside, which just to bring everybody up to speed, New York is still under an indoor vaccination requirement. You have to show a vaccine card and ID to go eat indoors. And you got to wear a mask for that portion of moving to your table or moving to the bathroom. You can eat outside. You can eat outside. And she did eat out.

Starting point is 00:15:31 Apparently she did eat outside the second time. So crazy case, the fundamentals of the case and whether she wins or loses on actual malice, which a lot of journalists are watching with faded breath, especially with this Supreme Court. Because who knows what they're going to do with precedent? As you and I have talked about in dozens and dozens of other cases, it's a crap shoot right now. As to whether they're going to side in favor of journalists, the first amendment and find actual malice not found here based on testimony, or they're going to like rewrite the rules and change the game in the midstream,

Starting point is 00:16:04 which this Supreme Court has done throughout this term. So you and I will continue to follow. This Supreme Court is keen on overturning precedent. Of course, later in the podcast, we're going to talk about two cases, one in North Carolina, one in Massachusetts relating to Harvard, where Massachusetts relating to Harvard where it's apparent that this Supreme Court is going to overturn any type of affirmative action or waiting diversity as a factor in admissions procedures in college. I want to bait that a little bit with you. I want to, you and I, maybe on the same page of this, we may not be, but I, but clearly they took up the case of the Harvard and University of North Carolina affirmative

Starting point is 00:16:50 action because this current right wing majority wants to do something about affirmative action in a way that that even as recently as 2016, which is the last decision, wasn't, wasn't done to their liking. So you're right. But we'll get to that later this evening. And the Times editorial writer, who who's at issue in the case, as someone names James Bennett, James Bennett's brother is Michael Bennett, a senator of Colorado, which is one of the things that Sarah Palin's team argued, satisfied the actual malistender that there is a family connection and personal animosity. Ben had also worked at the Atlantic, which had written stories that said that there was no connection or that there had been no

Starting point is 00:17:36 obvious connection between Sarah Palin's post and the shooting. So that was the evidence that the court of appeals relied on to overturn Rakeoff dismissing the case. I agree with Rakeoff. This case should be dismissed and should have been dismissed. But nonetheless, it goes to trial and February. He made one last ruling before we leave it then. He made one last ruling on on Bennett. Bennett was was then dismissed. I don't think related to this, but I'm not sure. I'll, I'll look at it and tweet about it later, but he was dismissed by the New York times. And of course, Palin's team wanted to bring that in to the jury and let them know, oh, he's

Starting point is 00:18:15 a bad guy and he got fired, but Raycoff having heard the evidence on a motion in lemonade, which you and I and Karen, KFA and I have talked about, denied that, is barring that evidence from coming in subject to any tour opening. So the jury's not gonna learn that Bennett was ultimately fired by the New York Times as well. When you say motion eliminate for all those legal AFers,

Starting point is 00:18:39 it literally, it's Latin, it translates for a motion at the start is what the terminology actually means. And these are pre-trial motions that are filed, basically saying certain evidence should be excluded. Often the case law basically says, you can't unring the bell. So once someone talks about something in an opening statement, it's already out there. So lots of motion eliminates are saying, you can't mention this in an opening statement, it's already out there. So lots of emotional limonets are saying, you can't mention this in an opening statement

Starting point is 00:19:07 because maybe it's not relevant, maybe it is relevant, but the prejudicial nature. Well, I'll give you an example. I'll give you an example of one. And hopefully our microphones are working well. Sometimes our followers and listeners think we're saying motions in lemonade, which is delicious, but not the concept we're talking about.

Starting point is 00:19:25 I once filed, just because I know they like when we talk about our own cases. I filed, or actually the other side in a construction case that I handled before a jury filed a motion in lemonade to keep out of the jury, the information that in a prior series of cases, not involving my client, which was a city down in Florida, that they had done similar bad stuff in building their building and had done a similar lawsuit on similar grounds. I was going to use it to argue, you know, this is their MO, they get behind on the contract, they overcharge the owner and then they claim all sorts of problems that the owner created. And they've done this four times in the past. I wanted to bring that in. The judge weighed the balance of equities and prejudice

Starting point is 00:20:10 and said, it's relevant. It's probative. But the prejudice here, the jury will, it'll blow the jury's mind, let them focus on the facts of your case, Mr. Popeye. I said, okay, great. So I lost the motion and limited it until I decided to go the other side and to maybe opening the door on that issue and allow me to bring that evidence in. So in my opening, I pointed the finger time and time again at the contractor and said he's the bad people, bad reputation and all this other stuff. And you know, you're going to hear from a hundred years of experts are going to tell you this guy's terrible.

Starting point is 00:20:44 Well, he took the bait. And when he took the stand as the first witness in the case, he tried to rehabilitate himself because he thought he had taken a hit in the opening. And so when the middle of rehabilitating himself, he started telling the story of his resume. And the resume story included all the prior projects that I wanted to bring in, but his lawyer had successfully kept out. So at a break, we all wrote it down and we looked at each other, my team, then I looked at each other and we went to the judge when the jury was dismissed for the lunch. And we said, you're on it. We have a door opening issue. And the judge was on it and said, you absolutely do, Mr. Pope, the door is now open. Have at it. The motion in limine that I granted, the other side has

Starting point is 00:21:26 violated it themselves. Popok, sharing those war stories as we like to call them. I agree with you, Popok, the Popokians really like to hear that. And one thought I have for the next legal AF, I'm making an executive decision that I'm neither told you nor have I told Jordy about. We are going to be making limited edition popoqian shirts. I'm not sure how many yet because I've just thought of this idea right now for just no reason whatsoever. But it's either going to be 100 to 250 popoqian shirts. We're going to put them on there for a limited period of time.

Starting point is 00:22:05 And all the Popokians can, when they hear those war stories, they could be wearing. Maybe it's a jersey, maybe LB, a number. We'll get into that more. I like the idea. And I'm totally, and I'm down for at least 50 of those 150. But all kidding aside, when I listen to other podcasts, and sometimes I do, that do sort of do what you and I do. I don't think as well. The thing that's missing, and the thing that you and I bring

Starting point is 00:22:31 week after week, is that you and I practice law for a living. We're in courtrooms, we're in arbitrations. We've argued appeals. We've handled constitutional and first of them, and issues. So we're giving it not from a journalist standpoint, not from an academic, IV tower standpoint, but because you and I practice it every day. We have real clients.

Starting point is 00:22:54 So I think that's one of the things that gives us a competitive advantage and that resonates with our followers and listeners. What do you think? I agree. We try to break it down in digestible forms. And Popak, you know who else breaks it down in digestible forms? That is blinkest. Of course, 2022 is all about empowerment. Our key point here at legal AF is to empower you to grow personally and

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Starting point is 00:23:54 But it allows you to get to the essence, the crux of these books. And I don't always have the time to read a 500, 1000 page book. And sometimes I want to read about the key points before reading the book. And Blinkist allows me to do both. And so on Blinkist, the two books I've read recently on Blinkist, one was the 5 a.m. club by Robin Sharma, and the other was the five second rule by Mel Robbins. And both Blinkist versions of those breaking down those key components. I got the whole book. I got the whole essence of the book in those 15 minutes. So check out

Starting point is 00:24:34 Blinkist. I want you to have those same experience because there's just so much knowledge out there, but we can't always spend the time reading books for, you know, 25, 30, 50, a hundred hours sometimes. You know what I like it to? You do it in one way. You do it as it sounds like almost like a substitute for reading the entire book. And that is definitely one approach. You can get and absorb the meat of the book in 15 minutes or less.

Starting point is 00:25:00 I do it for that. And, you know, before I invest in buying a 400 page or 500 or 800 page novel or book, I'll do the blinkest version of it. See if I'm into it. See if I'm into the subject matter, the author, the voice, and all of that. And if I am, then, because I invested 10 or 15 minutes in blinkest, I go out and actually buy the book or the audio and enjoy it that way. Right now Blinkist has a special offer just for our legal AF audience.

Starting point is 00:25:30 Go to blinkist.com slash legal AF to start your free seven day trial and get 25% off a Blinkist premium membership. It's incredible. That's Blinkist spelled BL, INK, IST, blinkist.com slash legal AF, get that 25% off and a seven day free trial. That is blinkist.com slash legal AF. And so we go from New York, now we're in the state of Alabama. And a three-judge panel

Starting point is 00:26:10 ruled that the Republican-led state legislatures redistricting map is unconstitutional. The ruling stated, quote, black voters have less opportunity than other alabamians to elect candidates of their choice to Congress based on this current map. The judges found the plan new map for the district that includes a large amount of black voters likely violated the Voting Rights Act. Now, what's interesting, Popok about this is that there was a huge Supreme Court ruling,

Starting point is 00:26:47 which really kind of harmed in major ways, the Landmark Voting Rights Act. And that case was Shelby County versus Holder. In 2013, it was a five to four decision. The right wing was the five in that decision. And that related to the constitutionality of two provisions of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, when you go into the Voting Rights Act, there's Section 5, which requires certain states and local governments to obtain federal pre-clearance before implementing changes to their voting laws.

Starting point is 00:27:27 So what does pre-clearance mean? You'd either have to go to the DOJ or go to this federal judge panel to clear it before you could even implement it because state legislatures were having these incredibly racist maps. Well, in that five-four decision, they ruled that section 4B, and I know we're getting in the weeds here, but section 4B contained a coverage formula that determined which specific jurisdictions and areas would be subject to section 5, which was the pre-clearance requirement. And so it found that section 4B was unconstitutional and that 4b couldn't be implemented,

Starting point is 00:28:08 which for all purposes destroyed section 5 because if you couldn't even determine the formula over which jurisdictions would be subject to 5 pre-clearance, you can't do pre-clearance in the first place. So there's been lots of talk over the past years. We need to get pre-clearance and update section 4B. And of course, the Republicans don't want to do that. And so now on the heels of this, though, you still have now this going to this three judge panel. And Pope, I want you to tell why is it in front of three judges. But this was still good news here

Starting point is 00:28:45 that this three judge panel without there being preclear and so said that this was a racist map that was being drawn. And this is one other quote. While black people are about 27% of Alabama's population, they are only represented in one of seven or 14% of congressional district. That's what the ACLU noted, but also

Starting point is 00:29:07 what the court adopted in its findings. So tell us more about this, Popeye. So legal a furs pull close. We're going to talk about two concepts, the three judge court act. That's a new, we've never done that before. And we're going to talk about the concept that Ben has touched on. That's called gerryering, which is voter map and redistricting that leads to anomalous but purposeful prejudice against either parties or minorities. That's what's happened. Where does Jerry Mandering come from? First time you and I have talked about it. Comes from a L. Dridge Jerry, a Jerry, L. Dridge Jerry,

Starting point is 00:29:53 who was vice president of the United States at the time, but was governor of Massachusetts in 1812, and he created on a map a partisan district in, in order to sideline the federalists, right? He was a Jeffersonian Republican, literally. He wanted to sideline the federalists, and so he drew a district that ran its way through Massachusetts that looked like a salamander. And so the political cartoonist at the time lit up on that and hopefully we'll have a graphic tonight that'll show sort of this cherry-mander salamander. And ever since when a political party in power here, the Alabama legislature draws a map in order to cut out a group of people for being empowered. In this case, black,

Starting point is 00:30:46 blacks and the black belt, which is something that's referred to in Alabama itself, and to dilute their voting power by drawing it in strange ways so that you split neighborhoods, you split towns to reduce their power. That is referred to as Jerry Bannering and what the Voting Rights Act and the Supreme Court decision in 2015 which is Shapiro versus McManus said is that when a When there is new a new map is drawn by the legislature There's always sort of a John Dostoy towards that especially when it's politics So in this case the Republican State House in Alabama decided to redraw the map. Of course, when they redrew it, it came out with that statistical anomaly.

Starting point is 00:31:32 And anomalies are on work as it was done intentionally to lower the voting power of black people. So now they're only represented, as you said, by 14% of the districts there. That has to go, percent of the of the districts there, that has to go according to the Supreme Court and the three judge court act to a generally to a three judge, federal trial level court, not appeals. You and I talk a lot about three judge panels of this court of appeal or that court of appeal. This is a three judge panel of a trial level, non appeal. This is a three judge panel of a trial level non appeal. And they on a preliminary injunction motion brought, as you mentioned, by the NAACP, the Birmingham Alabama ministries

Starting point is 00:32:13 of churches, the ACLU decided that that map failed under the Voting Rights Act that it was improperly and intentionally discriminatory and gave them a requirement that they return with a map that added at least one more predominantly black district. Once that ruling from that three judge panel automatically can go to an appeal to the Supreme Court of the United States. In rare circumstances, it can be handled by one judge, but only if the constitutional issues in play are found to be so frivolous that it shouldn't go to the three-judge panel. So almost all of these go to a three-judge panel. This might be our, I think it's our second time you and I've talked about a three judge trial panel overlooking voting rights act things. So that decision, I'm sure will now be appealed to the US Supreme Court. And now we're going to see what this

Starting point is 00:33:14 group of, of jurists is going to do with this level of gerrymandering that so race prejudice that even Alabama federal judges found it to be violentive of the Voting Rights Act. One other interesting thing to point out as we discuss these voting rights cases, an individual by the name of Edward Blum. He's a former stockbroker. He is, if you Google him,

Starting point is 00:33:42 when you look up his Wikipedia, he's not a lawyer. He's just referred to as litigant. And he jins up all of these lawsuits to try to pursue a radical right wing agenda, to bring him through Federalist Society judges, and to basically create these radical legal conditions in our country. So Edward Blum was actually one of the challengers in Shelby County versus Holder, which got the pre-clearance requirement struck down

Starting point is 00:34:12 in that case. We're gonna talk about Edward Blum because his group, students for fair admission is what he calls the group, is behind these efforts to overturn affirmative action. And the Supreme Court has taken these cases. We're also going to talk about the fact that Clarence Thomas's wife is Virginia Thomas. She is on a board of a group that works with students for fair admissions to overturn affirmative action in a case that's going to be her. Yeah, she will get there later tonight, but she's on the board of directors of a BS scholars

Starting point is 00:34:50 group. She's on, I mean, she, she is so entangled with so many right wing overly arch conservative organizations. You almost can't keep track. It's the first time really in the history of the Supreme Court that a spouse of a sitting justice is so involved on one side of the other of politics and involved with cases that come before that particular Supreme Court. So we're going to talk about recusal again with him because in the case that you're referring to, her group has submitted a friend of the court brief, an amicus brief in

Starting point is 00:35:26 support of finding that Harvard violated the US Constitution equal protection in how it does its admissions policies. But we'll get there. We will get there. But where we're going to go next is we're going to take you from Alabama to Pennsylvania where a Republican led Pennsylvania lower court has deemed that mail-in voting, which is sometimes referred to as no excuse voting or no excuse mail-voting, this court ruled that it is unconstitutional.

Starting point is 00:35:58 What this relates to was in 2019-2020, the Pennsylvania State legislature passed with bipartisan supporters, actually, in 2019, with bipartisan support, no excuse mail voting. This became known as Act 77. But based on the big lie that's been spread by Republicans, even though this was given, was supported by partisan support Republicans challenged it. The panel of was three Republican judges, two Democrats on the panel, and the Republicans sided with Republican challengers and ruled that no excuse mail-in voting act 77 was prohibited by the state's constitution, specifically Article 7 of the state's constitution. Now, when you did, I've read this 50 plus page opinion, and it is the most absurd opinion in the world of this Republican panel trying to mince words and claim that somehow Article 7 prohibits Act 77, which is what the thrust of their ruling is.

Starting point is 00:37:10 But Article 7, Section 4 of the Pennsylvania Constitution, states the following, all elections by the citizens shall be by ballot or by such other method as prescribed by law, provided that secrecy in voting be preserved. That is what Article 7 Section 4 says. But this panel, this Republican panel, I mean, to me, it's obvious. To me, it is such other methods as may be prescribed by law. Well guess what? The legislature on a bipartisan basis passed the law that said no excuse mail voting, which has secrecy and it's sealed. Then that seems to be the end of the inquiry.

Starting point is 00:37:59 But this Supreme, not this lower court goes on to make this ruling that somehow it has to be in person. And that's what the Constitution really meant. And not even giving deference to the bipartisan legislature. So we know what's going on here, Popeye. I mean, it's completely bullshit. But this doesn't go in effect. Governor Wolff said Tom Wolff, who is Democrat on Pennsylvania says quote,

Starting point is 00:38:30 the administration will immediately appeal this decision to the state Supreme Court, and today's lower court ruling will have no immediate effect on mail-in voting pending a final decision on the appeal. I just note this also, Popak, which is interesting because the Pennsylvania legislature is Republican. But their governor is a Democrat, their attorney general, Shapiro,

Starting point is 00:38:57 who Joradi's playing a one-on-one basketball game with mid-February, and he's running for governor, is a Democrat, but that also kind of goes to the Jerry Mandarin point though, because at the aggregate, people want in the state like Pennsylvania Democrats to run, yet you have Republicans who are in control of their legislature who are also pushing these wildly fascistic lawsuits and Republican courts embracing the Republicans are lost. Well, they don't have a compass. They don't know which way is up there at sea.

Starting point is 00:39:32 Black is night without a sextet. They don't know what they're doing. You got one to this law in 2018. That's my point. You got bipartisan pre-biden support for bipartisan, meaning both parties, for making it easier to vote without excuse by mail. We all do mail-in voting. I've done mail-in voting in the last 10 years,

Starting point is 00:39:54 probably half the amount of time, appropriately absentee balloting for various reasons. And by the way, so is Trump, so is everybody else. I agree with you. The most interesting thing about the opinion by this intermediate appellate court Not the highest court in Pennsylvania as you mentioned Which was three Republicans and two Democrats. So this was a five-judge panel And it went three to two with the Republicans ruling is even in their own opinion

Starting point is 00:40:18 They commented that the people of Pennsylvania likely want this absentee or mail-in voting without excuse. And if there was a constitutional, Pennsylvania constitutional amendment, it would likely pass. But that's the way it's got to go. It can't go by finding that this law is consistent with the Pennsylvania Constitution. Totally whacked. It's like the will of the people. We're going to talk about the will of the people when it comes to different things today, including when we get to the Supreme Court and death penalty later. But one thing I've noticed in the last couple of segments, both on the intricacies in which you have dove in to both voting rights act, cherrymandering, and now mail-in voting and constitutional. I mean, you're normally really alert and really on it, but you seem extra focused in alert today.

Starting point is 00:41:10 Why is that? Yeah, well, I'm always focused on my daily performance. And if you notice in 2022 in particular, it's all about feeling good and trying to improve the way I think and the way I act. And so I have this new product and this podcast is sponsored by it. It's called Super Specialeoso. Let me kind of tell you what it is.

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Starting point is 00:42:00 I went ahead, I ordered some. I get hooked up a little bit with some of the stuff because they're partners of the podcast, but I went to the website also and the website is called GetSuperLeaf.com, G-E-T-S-U-P-E-R-L-E-A-F.com. And I went there, I chose Super Special, so because all of their products come with certified lab reports, and you know me by now, legal aaffors, if I'm putting anything in my body, I want to know what's in it. And I want to know for sure that I am getting high quality product.

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Starting point is 00:44:16 leaf.com slash legal a f promo code legal a f for that 20% off. I'd be remiss, Pope, if we didn't start, if we didn't follow up on Stuart Rhodes, he's the leader of the terrorist organization referred to as the oath keepers. He wears a patch on his eye because he shot himself in the face. I think he was supposed to be a gun instructor also. I mean, as we talked about on the Midas Touch podcast,

Starting point is 00:44:45 these GQ peers are the worst of the worst. The gun, he works at a gun range and shoots himself in the face. He says good at gun safety, as he has been in political discourse. So again, the judge here, the magistrate, again, out of Texas, I believe, ordered pre-trial detention, explained to us again what that means, pre-trial detention, and Stuart Rhodes,

Starting point is 00:45:13 why was he ordered back in? Right. And this is the second one, two weeks, you and I have talked about one of the 11, there's 20 total, one of the 11, I'll call them the oath breakers because they're not oath keepers of any kind. One of the oath keepers, there's, there's one half of that group, including Stuart Rhodes, the leader of the founder, who have been brought up on the highest level of charge that the US government, a Department of Justice is bringing related to Jan 6, which is seditious conspiracy with a 20 year, up to 20 year federal count. There's another charge for obstruction that the other half of the group is being tried for.

Starting point is 00:45:54 And the judge, the actual trial judge separate from the magistrate, I'm gonna talk about next, who's doing the procedural issues. The actual trial judge is Judge Amit Mehta in the District of Columbia federal court who has already set, Ben, I'm not sure you caught this, has already set April 19th as the first oath keeper trial for at least half of them who don't have the seditious conspiracy count against them. He's going to go forward in April with everyone who's been charged with the obstruction charge, which is also up to a 20 year. It just doesn't have that same bang for the buck that seditious

Starting point is 00:46:35 conspiracy does. He said, the same judge has said they're going to do roads and the group that is being charged with seditious conspiracy, they're going to do those trials in July and September. So Ben, you and I are going to have to plan our vacations to make sure we're not out when roads and company go to trial. So we got two sets of trials, one judge, judge, Mata. But wherever these people were arrested and arraigned in their various home states, in this case Texas for roads. That's where you make your appearance. And that is where a magistrate judge who is not a US constitutional article three judge,

Starting point is 00:47:14 but handles in working hand in hand and assigned to a judge to handle things like discovery matters, arrangements, pretrial detention. Those are the types of things that these non-lifetime appointment magistrates do. And so, you know, this is now a lesson to everybody out there. If you're charged with seditious conspiracy, okay, you're probably not going to go out on bail. You're probably going to be pretrial detained because of the very nature of the indictment

Starting point is 00:47:45 against you is that you organized a violent attempt to overthrow the government or to stop peaceful transfer or to hinder or delay through violent means the execution of law. You're probably not going home. Even home confinement with an ankle bracelet is not going to work. And this is now two for two, two indicted co-conspirators up, two have been sent back to jail to wait to await their trial. And in the road's case, they'll be sitting in jail for six or seven months. Seditious conspiracy is not often used by the government. And it's and it's and it's hard to prove, but not when it comes to Jan 6th, just so our listeners and followers have some sort of historical

Starting point is 00:48:30 context. The last two times the dishes conspiracy was used successfully by the government. One had to do with with the shake Omar, Abel Raham, who was known as the blind chic, who was involved with a group of other people and a conspiracy to blow up federal buildings. He was not part of the World Trade Center bombing. United Nations. Yeah, but he was with the United Nations and other federal buildings. He was convicted.

Starting point is 00:48:55 He died in jail, having been convicted with a bunch of other people in seditious conspiracy. And something we haven't really talked about. We keep saying, you know, Jan S, Chad sex is an attack on the Capitol. It was, there was a group in the 1970s of Puerto Rican independent activists who wanted to see Puerto Rico be independent, who stormed the Capitol and actually brought guns and fired guns in the Capitol and hit five Congress people and wounded them. Didn't kill any of them, but wounded them. They were convicted of seditious conspiracy and they sat in jail until President Carter commuted their sentence in 1979. So it's a powerful tool that the prosecutors don't often use, but I can't think Ben, can you

Starting point is 00:49:39 of a better case to bring seditious conspiracy than against oath keepers roll in Jad sex. No, I think it's very strong. The code section is 18 USC or US code section. 2384 literally called seditious conspiracy. Popok, you gave the definition. I'll just read it one more time. If two or more persons in any state or territory or in any place subject to the jurisdiction of the United States conspired to overthrow, put down or to destroy by force the government of the United States or to levy war against them or to oppose by force the authority thereof or by force to prevent hinder or delay the execution of any law of the United States or by force to seize, take or possess any property

Starting point is 00:50:27 of the United States contrary to the authority thereof, they shall each be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than 20 years or both. That's the statute. And you mentioned two successful prosecutions, but other seditious conspiracy cases as have fallen apart once they've gone to trial. One of the most recent was an attempt to use seditious conspiracy in 2012 as a charge where prosecutors alleged that nine members of a Christian far right group called the Hattari militia, committed seditious conspiracy. And in that case, this group's lawyer said, they had no intent. It was just them speaking.

Starting point is 00:51:10 It was this fantastical plot that never happened. What makes that different than Jan Sixth is, we have all of their messages about, hey, we want to overthrow the government. That's literally what they brought weapons into the Capitol. Weapons to do it. And they actually engaged in the government. That's literally what they brought weapons into the Capitol weapons to do it. And they and they actually engaged in the conduct. I mean, I don't have to belabor all of the things that we saw, but this is a strong, seditious

Starting point is 00:51:33 conspiracy charge. And as we've told our legal a efforts as Merrick Garland works his way up, up, up, that seditious conspiracy charge to me is very obviously applies to Donald Trump. And when we learn more about what's been going on with the fake electoral slates, and that these were done at the behest of Trump attorneys, Giuliani and others who coordinated these fake electoral slates. We've talked in detail about these on prior legal apps. You can go back and listen to them, but I think that's the dishes conspiracy charge. Here's what I predict,

Starting point is 00:52:12 that January 6th is going to make the case, the January 6th committee is going to make the case that Trump engaged in, seditious conspiracy. It will be for the DOJ to prosecute, but the DOJ is working its way. And then my commentary to that is, I agree with everything you just said, except that

Starting point is 00:52:31 last part. I don't think, I don't, it's not just Merrick Carlin. I don't think the US attorney or the, or the Department of Justice Attorney General is going to bring a vicious conspiracy against Donald Trump. I just don't. I think they may try to find him on other crimes. I don't think they're going to use it. So politically charged, it is so having him already been impeached. I just don't think it's such a time bomb for, um, to detonate. I just don't see it happening. Although technically and under the elements that you've described and the

Starting point is 00:53:03 evidence that's being adduced by the Jan 6th Committee and I'm sure the Department of Justice, they're going to be able to check every box for the element. I just think that from a prosecutorial discretion standpoint, they're not going to bring that charge against Trump. That's my prediction. Yeah, I mean, I think that would be the safer prediction, but here's what the January 6th, unfortunately, but here's what the January 6th, unfortunately, but here's what the January 6th Committee needs to do.

Starting point is 00:53:28 As the January 6th Committee begins to hold these public hearings, there will need to be a certain amount of showmanship in how this evidence is presented to the public. A mightest touch style video, the ones that we did a coup in plain sight. The Jan 6th Committee is going to need to avail itself of those types of marketing strategies and tactics to make the compelling case. The facts are there. The evidence is there.

Starting point is 00:54:00 But the Jan 6th Committee is going to need to lay it out. So there is a public ground swell of we need to hold Trump and these Seditionists and terrorists Account you're right. And for 50% of the in for 50% of the country Jamie Raskin's powerful powerpoint presentation Will be must-watch TV and will leave you and I and our followers with nothing left but the conclusion that Trump was a seditious conspirator. But the rest of the country is not going to feel that way.

Starting point is 00:54:34 And so the other half of the country is not going to feel that way. So it's going to be powerful and there's going to be no doubt. I mean, I know from just the little dribs and drabs that Jamie Raskin and Benny Thompson and Liz Cheney and others on morning news, morning news shows, a Sunday morning news shows have come out with. I'm sure it's going to be unlike anything we've ever seen, even Watergate, because Watergate, you know, it was a different time. It was the 70s and it didn't have the ability to, to, to put up trial graphics and visuals and video clips the way this one will. But I just don't think it's going to come down to the American Arlord Department of Justice

Starting point is 00:55:13 in Diting Trump for that. He'll go down, hopefully, for other things that we're going to talk about next, but I don't think he goes down for stiches conspiracy. We're going to work in our own way. Although we should work in our way from Alabama to Pennsylvania to New York, although we've made a little pit stop there in Washington, DC, if you will, where Judge Mehta was going to be hearing this seditious conspiracy case. Now we head to New York.

Starting point is 00:55:43 What's going on with this? We've talked about it before, you know, Trump filed this frivolous lawsuit. I mean, it's absurdly frivolous against Tish James. I'm not even sure what the cause of action is, but just saying that she was mean to him. She was mean to him. She, you know, is pursuing a witch hunt against them, all the standard Trump bullshit and that somehow she should be restrained and prevented from engaging in the civil lawsuit against them and from cooperating with the Manhattan DA's investigation and criminal investigation into the Trump organization, but Tish James filed in court motions to dismiss this saying it's completely frivolous. Popo, what's going on? Yeah. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:56:31 This is just something that we're going to watch. We talked about that for three years, this probe led by Latisha James, this New York Attorney General Office has been ongoing since 2019. And it really was the fuse was lit. And if you remember, by Michael Cohen's federal congressional testimony in which in part of it, he basically said that the organization commits loan fraud, pardon me, by inflating the valuation of its real estate properties and other assets when they're borrowing money and they need to show high balance sheet and deflating them when they want to pay taxes.

Starting point is 00:57:12 And so Latisha James' office heard that and launched her probe. So for three years, Trump and the family had no problem with Tis James' jurisdiction or authority to conduct this until three weeks ago when she tried to subpoena Donald Trump himself and Don Jr. and Ivanka to come in and through subpoena and testimony cooperate with the investigation or if they're not going to cooperate be ordered to buy a judge. So we talked about two podcasts ago that her office filed, she filed 140 pages of a petition with a New York State Supreme Court judge, and which she basically laid out the three years of her evidence that she has in 10 different categories of crimes that the Trump family led by Donald

Starting point is 00:58:03 Trump have committed. And we talked about the reason why she did that because she's tired of people saying, you don't have anything. She has plenty. She's gone through one million pages of documents. She's had dozens of witnesses, including current and former Trump employees who have testified. She's indicted, well, she hasn't indicted. The parallel investigation by the Manhattan DA's office

Starting point is 00:58:25 has indicted two of the Trump organization and the organization itself has been criminally indicted. So look, let's not say she hasn't done anything or she's been asleep at the switch. Now Trump for a really oppressed release purpose filed in the Northern District of New York, which is Albany, a federal court in upstate New York. He is filed with his lawyer of choice, this four person law firm out of New Jersey, who by the way, I went and checked, listing New York address for their office, and it's inside of like a wee work or a regis. So they have a wee workspace. She files the lawsuit and he says she's been mean to me. Tis James been mean to me. She's biased.

Starting point is 00:59:14 She ran on a platform that she was going to bring me down. She's brought me down before with Trump charities and other things. And she should be recused or disqualified. And the investigation stopped in its tracks. She filed a motion to dismiss that lawsuit on the grounds that the court doesn't have jurisdiction to do that. There's no good cause for that. There's no statute that allows for that. And that her prosecution should is continuing on Fed her. There's no injunction in place. The federal judge that case that case was filed by Trump in December We're almost two months later the judge didn't file didn't order an injunction didn't say to her office remove the attorney general for the state of New York and have somebody else do it This is all BS and so but she she can't leave it out there. So her office filed a motion to dismiss and we'll follow.

Starting point is 01:00:06 We'll follow what happens next. They'll be hearing. I'm sure in the next 60 days that you and I will report on. Popak, tell us. I mean, you seem incredibly busy right now as well, but you are somehow managing to do the legal a f's. You dig in deep into two legal a f's to legal a s we should give a shout out to Karen Friedman Agnifolo as you like to say on the intro pop a f a s i vances number two at the Manhattan DA office we are so lucky to have her as a co-host with you on the midweek legal a f's on Wednesday. But Popo, how are you managing all of this together? You're a very organized guy, but still, this is a lot.

Starting point is 01:00:50 I am, but I can't do it the old school way. I've got to use, I've got to use technology. And one of the great ways is Smith.ai or Smithai. Clients demand an instant response. I mean, I'm on the go, as you know, I travel as our followers and listeners know. But now more than ever, I'm spread more thin than I ever was at any point in my career. I give that as a compliment to you, forgetting me involved with podcasting and mightest touch and the mightest mighty. If you're, if you're losing

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Starting point is 01:03:47 and be sure to use our code legal, ledgl, a f to save $100 on sign up. Don't let another day go by. Try Smith. AI. Popak, your ad reads are popaki and they are incredible. They're unique. No, they're very good, popaki. But definitely all the legal aifers, make sure you do check out that mid week episode. Make sure you subscribe as well to this legal AF podcast so you can get all the updates and all the breaking news podcasts. That'll be sent to you. Subscribe on the YouTube. We have a lot to talk about still. So don't you worry there's a lot

Starting point is 01:04:32 of law left in this legal a time. I want to be a little maybe a little after half time. But time, but I want to talk about the Supreme Court's decision this week to take two cases involving what's commonly referred to as affirmative action or just the role of race in the college admissions process. So in a very brief order, the justices have agreed to take up two cases that would potentially overrule a landmark 2003 decision, Grutter versus Bollinger. These cases are students versus fair admissions, versus President and Fellows of Harvard College, and students for fair admissions, versus University of North Carolina. You'll, it's not a coincidence that these are both brought by the group called students for fair admissions.

Starting point is 01:05:31 This is a astroturf group. It is a group that's created by a radical right, neo-conservative as he likes to refer to himself as, but I'm sure turf meaning knock grass roots, fake grass. Yeah, just exactly. His name is Edward Blum. As we talked about, he was the one who overturned pre-clearance in voting rights to really delve into this. And by the way, the case that I had just mentioned, the gruder versus Bollinger case that involved the use of race as one of a number of factors in admissions in the University of Michigan law school, but let me rewind just a little bit and maybe just talk about some of the key cases in this affirmative action jurisprudence. And so going back to 1978, the first case, that's really, that the Supreme Court really ruled on,

Starting point is 01:06:32 in a meaningful way, in affirmative action, is Regents of the University of California versus Bach. I think it's Bach, I think it's Bachy. It versus Bachy. The Supreme Court ruled in that case that a racial quota system itself that was used by a university did in fact violate the Civil Rights Act and that Mr. Baki should be admitted. But what it did also say though, in the opinion for the majority is that the state though did have a legitimate

Starting point is 01:07:06 interest in considering the race of applicants and that a diverse student body could provide a compelling educational benefits to the school. And that case established the court's position on affirmative action really up until Gruder versus Bologna. One other important point in the Regions versus University versus Baki case, it established that the university, a state university would have to meet the standard of judicial review known as strict scrutiny. And so I'm unpacking a lot of law right here, but when a court finds that a law infringes on a fundamental constitutional right, it applies a strict scrutiny standard to hold that

Starting point is 01:07:58 the law or policy would be valid if the government can demonstrate in court that the law regulation is necessary to achieve a compelling state interest. And the government must also demonstrate that the law is narrowly tailored to achieve the compelling purpose and to use the least restrictive means to achieve that purpose. So breaking all of that down, what it really means is that if an area of law or a policy could potentially restrict a major constitutional right, the Supreme Court or courts in general are going to like extra, extra, extra close

Starting point is 01:08:39 that it's really being done in a way that is not going to really infringe on that right in any meaningful significant way and that the right kind of will hold up in general. So, Strix scrutiny would be what ultimately is applied there. So, you then go to this 2003 case in Bruder versus Bollinger, that's when Sandra Day O'Connor was still on the bench. And there's interesting Dicta, because there they upheld the policy of University of Michigan to allow other race factors as one of a myriad of factors

Starting point is 01:09:20 to be considered. And so it allowed University of Michigan's policy, but in kind of Dictus, Anger Deo Connor said, in the next 10 or 20 years, I'm not sure we're going to need to even have this policy, which a lot of right wing people have latched on to that language. And so by the way, you know, it's very wrong, completely wrong. But that said that basically times up, we don't need to, you know, we don't need to do anything. And then finally, there was a 2016 more recent case that tried to challenge

Starting point is 01:09:51 affirmative action in the University of Texas. It was an interesting case because Elena Kagan at that point was appointed by Obama, but she had handled affirmative action cases. So she had to recuse herself the way Clarence Thomas should recuse herself. Kagan actually did recuse herself. Well, that's, that's an interesting case for two reasons. And before you leave, I know you're going to talk about that. I was going to say also that Justice Scalia had died. It was a four to three. There was only seven people that heard the case. Kagan having been a solicitor general, having recused herself and Scalia having died and not been replaced.

Starting point is 01:10:26 Cases still get heard when people die. If you have a quorum, which is not hard to have when you have died people. So, this was a four to three, which is very rare, but four to three, which upheld the University of Texas right to use race-based issues in selecting their class who was brought by a white woman who was twice rejected from the University of Texas and her position was with her credentials. If she was a minority, she would have gotten in. So because of the strange positioning of the court there, by a four to three decision in a majority opinion authored by Justice Kennedy and joined by

Starting point is 01:11:06 Justice Ginsburg, Brian Sota, Mayor, the majority upheld the lower court and upheld Texas's policy. But it should be noted, right, that you had Clarence Thomas, there you had Alito and you had Roberts, who were dissenting. And now you add to that that you've got Kavanaugh, you've got Amy Coney Barrett, and you've got Gorsuch. So you've got, there's your six. So I think the writings on the wall, Popak, but talk about those cases. And the writings on the wall,

Starting point is 01:11:39 meaning that affirmative action, as we know it, and any race-based considerations are not going to be allowed. Affirmative action in higher education is a hot button issue for a long, long time. It's personal to me because I come from an ethnic group that had been historically discriminated against that the Ivy League's forever. Ivy Leagues did not allow in the 30s and 40s and 50s even many Jewish Americans to be admitted. On purpose, they just excluded them. Pardon me, which then led to Jewish Americans

Starting point is 01:12:20 founding their own university, some of their own universities to compete. Eventually that got changed. Asian Americans, or as you said, this guy, Blum, using Asian Americans as a proxy to defeat affirmative action, are claiming that with their board scores and their academic success and their their bios, they should be let in into the class. And they're being excluded by Harvard and Carolina and other universities at large numbers. And look, you know, let's just talk, let's just talk through this. If a school was only taking and only cared about in building and cultivating a student body,

Starting point is 01:13:08 who had the highest board scores and other boxes that were checked, you could have a school that was filled with nothing but Asian Americans, nothing but Jewish Americans, nothing but fill in the blank Americans. Is that what you want higher education to be? Or do you want as a fundamental, and this is what a society has to question and has to struggle with as part of its moral precepts? Do you want higher education to be a diverse environment? Because that's also part of the education process. I personally wanted to go to a university where I was surrounded by people from different countries,

Starting point is 01:13:53 different worlds, different life experiences, socioeconomic backgrounds, and disadvantaged backgrounds, and disadvantaged backgrounds, both because that made me a better human being and a better scholar and a better now lawyer. I'm sure you feel the same way. There are schools that are parochial that you can go to. If all you want to be with is other fill in the blanks. I agree with you, Pope. Yeah. Yeah. So in the, so in the, the case that said bar to answer your question that you're begging when you gave the description of the case law. What is changed since 2016 in this country that would change the law of affirmative action?

Starting point is 01:14:34 Nothing, absolutely nothing. The only thing that's changed is that the Republicans got a president and two presidents who were able to put on more conservative justices, more right wing justices, to re-examine the precedent around affirmative action. You know Clarence Thomas because he set it out loud. It's not quiet. Wants to eliminate affirmative action in in higher education. I would like them to astral project what they think colleges and universities will look like if admissions offices can't focus on things other than the highest board score and highest GPA in selecting their class.

Starting point is 01:15:17 I do not want to live in that world. I'm hoping that some aspect of affirmative action is preserved. And the worst part of this current debate, Ben, I'm sure you caught this, is that they are using the fact that in the same week that the US Supreme Court elected to take up the case of affirmative action, signaling that they're going to make a change in that area. Obviously, it's the same week that our president announced that to fill the opening that you and I are going to spend the entire back part of the pods and I talking about for for for justice prior retiring.

Starting point is 01:15:53 He's already announced drawing the line in the sand that it will be a black woman, the first on the Supreme Court in 230 plus years. They're saying, aha, another example of affirmative action, not only suggesting implicitly that the candidate that he'll select is not as qualified as somebody who wasn't black, which is crazy. They actually sanded out loud. You have somebody at a Georgetown, hopefully he'll be fired, but he's a professor at Georgetown running one of their institutes who came out and said straight out that whoever he picks among the candidates who will talk about each leading candidates is inferior to other candidates. And they're being the beneficiary of affirmative action. Of course, now all the Republicans have lit on that. Isn't that disgusting, Ben? Yeah. And really, in the same week, just the Stephen Breyer announcing his retirement, as you say, and it's not a coincidence.

Starting point is 01:16:54 The Supreme Court, that was not a surprise to the Supreme Court. I'm sure a week before, two weeks before Stephen Breyer had told his colleagues that this was something that he was going to do. And so the insidious nature of them taking up that case at that timing should be viewed in the context of open. You're so good. I hadn't thought about it that way. That's such a good and probably true observation and a really unfortunate one. And speaking of kind of just unfortunate and ghoulish decisions that are coming from this current Supreme Court, their most recent one on the death penalty.

Starting point is 01:17:37 The death penalty case law arises out of the Eighth Amendment. The Eighth Amendment states, quote, excessive bail shall not be required nor excessive fines imposed nor cruel and unusual punishment inflicted. So the body of case law that analyzes death penalty and the methods for death penalty are always kind of the cruel and unusual punishment style cases. In 2002, the Supreme Court held in a decision called Atkins versus Virginia that quote, death is not a suitable punishment for someone with an intellectual disability, but in a 2021 decision, an individual in a case done versus Reeves, the Supreme Court voted along its party lines to prevent Reeves who was shown to have certain educational disabilities. They allowed his execution to go forward. Now this most recent decision that was handed down, it also involving the same individual reefs,

Starting point is 01:18:47 hand the reefs involves the requirements and the timing for an individual to be able to select the form of death that will be administered to them or how the form of execution that will be administered to them or how the form of execution that will be administered through to them. One of the issues is that with lethal injection, which was the three drug combination, one of the drugs, the initial drug that's injected, which is the anesthetic, which is supposed to prevent the inmate from feeling the effects of the drugs.

Starting point is 01:19:25 It's been banned in the European Union. And the most important of the three if you don't want it to be cruel and unusual. Exactly. So that's been banned in the European Union, the European Union forbids companies from exporting the drug. So there's not a significant supply of that drug. And so other drugs were being used, which were not effective. And so many have, and this is what Sotomayor wrote in a 2015 opinion, that these new unreliable execution drugs

Starting point is 01:19:55 leave death row inmates, quote, exposed to what may well be the chemical equivalent of being burned at the stake. The words of justice, so to my or. So in this new decision that was handed down, Reeves who suffers from educational disability, it's not a disputed fact that he does. One of the things the court's offer individuals now because of the shortage of the anesthetic is to choose

Starting point is 01:20:25 their execution method. But to do that, they have to read the forms. And so one of the things that Reeves is saying is, I'm not really competent to read the forms and to even adequately make the decision about how I can be executed. And basically, you could break it down a little deeper, the Supreme Court, and I'm giving you more layman's term, the Supreme Court's too bad, too sad, you know, if you don't understand the documents, we're going to execute you, the state's going to execute you. However, the state's going to do it.

Starting point is 01:20:53 Yeah, this one is so troubling for so many reasons, not including the Sutta Mayer is very eloquent, but scary description of what being put to death in this way means. And let me, let me start off. We're back in Alabama for all the wrong reasons with this case by saying, Mr. Reeves has already been executed by lethal objection. So let's start the discussion in the segment with the recognition that is attempt to die by another less painful means. In this case, nitrogen, nitrogen, hypoxia, which is a fixation, which sounds also terrible, but apparently is a more painless way to die. His request that he be allowed to do that, which is on the approved list in Alabama as an alternative to lethal injection, was denied him by Alabama because he didn't fill out

Starting point is 01:21:51 the form 30 days before the scheduled execution, three and a half years ago. And Alabama, because it's Alabama, decided that even though he was late and had decided and who cares when he decided that he wanted to die a certain way. And as long as it's on the approved list, who cares that he missed the fine print because he's intellectually disabled and wasn't accommodated through the ADA to the Americans with disabilities act properly, because it's at it's written on the 11th grade level and the evidence was that he read at the Second grade level who cares the guy is going to be put to death. I want to make sure everybody's clear about this case. There was no argument that he didn't commit the murder. There was no art when he was 18. There was no argument that he was going to be put to death. There was no argument that he was going to be put to death. The only issue before the US Supreme Court this time around was whether they were going to stop his execution with a midnight phone call to the governor, if you will, so that he could be, he could be put to death by his chosen method already on the Alabama list.

Starting point is 01:23:00 And the two bad two said comment is so frightening because you had five justices, even Amy Coney Barrett could inside with her conservative right wing brethren. She switched over and sided with the three liberals, even she couldn't do it on this panel. But they said, yeah, I mean, it is a less painful way to die, but he missed the 30-day marketing and fell out the form. He didn't check the box. So let's kill him the old fashioned way with drugs that don't really work properly. Who cares?

Starting point is 01:23:35 This is how sick this Supreme Court has gotten and how sick Alabama has gotten that they felt like they had a protect and preserve their policy of the form within the 30-day period, rather than killing the guy in a way that wasn't cruel and unusual. It's just a sick result. But you started it right. I want to make sure everybody, because we haven't talked about the death penalty. I don't think in 43 episodes. We talked about it like in the early, early months. We touched on it maybe once. Maybe I think you're right about that. So as a reminder, it is not even though we use the term

Starting point is 01:24:14 in layman sense, it is not cruel and unusual punishment under the analysis of the Supreme Court dating back hundreds of years. It is not cruel and unusual punishment to use a death penalty to punish somebody for a capital crime. There's exceptions to that when it is found to be cruel and unusual. You touched on it. The problem is Reeves didn't apparently reach the level of intellectual disability or

Starting point is 01:24:40 intellectual development disorder, IDD, in order for the trial court to have found that it would have been cruel and unusual to apply it to him. I guess second grade level at 40 is not enough to find that you have mental incapacity and so we shouldn't put you to death. And minors are generally not subject. If they committed the crime under the age of 18, Reeves failed that test too. He committed his murder when he was 18. So the only issue was whether, can we let him have his choice of death if you missed the 30 day mark? That's how sick it has been. No, there's no doubt about it. And

Starting point is 01:25:18 it's just so interesting too. I mean, like the United States is in a group of countries that still have the death penalty that includes like Iran and Saudi Arabia. And, you know, it's pretty much banned in all of Europe. I mean, I think Belarus may still have it. I think there's two countries in the world. I think we're the only civilized democracy that still uses execution as a method of punishment for a crime. And if you wanna think through like how the Supreme Court reaches conclusions that have no logic, yet they're still considered the Supreme Court,

Starting point is 01:25:55 the case, the holding in a case in 2015 called the Golasup versus Gross, was one of several Supreme Court decisions that confronted the shortage of reliable anesthetics in executions. And this is what was written in Justice Alito's opinion, quote, because it is settled that capital punishment is constitutional, it necessarily follows that there must be a constitutional means of carrying it out. Such a non-sequitor of a sentence

Starting point is 01:26:32 because we, the Supreme Court, are pronouncing that it is not cruel and unusual punishment, then there must be in science or some other means a way to execute people in a way that's not cruel and unprocute. Because we said it's circular logic. It makes no sense and that's what is hoisting up this case law is statements like that. And so we'll keep an eye on that case and I'll tell you directly where I stand,

Starting point is 01:27:06 League of Legends, I am against the death penalty period. And I'm against the death penalty because I know that our justice system for better or worse is a human system and that the decisions of when to use the death penalty are often very political decisions. There's no, I do think that there are clearly certain crimes that I think, wow, in that situation, that person committed the most dastardly act, I think that person deserves to die. I feel it.

Starting point is 01:27:43 I feel it, that's how I feel. But then I also know it is a political system. And so for every time that situation takes place, there are other times where it's being used as a bargaining chip to coerce plea agreements. It's being used to send messages that are racial. It's being used against innocent people. And I can't support a system even where someone deserves to die gets away with it where

Starting point is 01:28:11 people who don't deserve to die are being killed. You have to, yeah, I agree with you for very similar reasons. Here's how I put it. In order for you to accept the death penalty in society, you also have to accept and hold in your mind this other concept that there or more people who are innocent are put to death, then you could be okay with the death penalty. Here's how I put it. The judicial process is a very gray process.

Starting point is 01:28:56 I don't want a black and white ending to a gray process because if we're wrong, I can't recover the person that we have killed. And so for all the reasons that you said, because of racial disparity, because of inappropriate allocation of judicial resources and lawyer resources, because defense lawyers at the state and federal level have hundreds and hundreds of files and can't devote the resources or don't have the resources to devote to exonerate their clients, to track down leads, to do testing, to get expert witnesses. I can't have and I can't abide by having the state, the government kill, murder a person.

Starting point is 01:29:42 No matter how heinous the crime is, that doesn't mean that if it happened to me and my family, what I want to personally do that myself, maybe probably, but I don't want the state doing it coming out of that great judicial process. We have a lot more to discuss on legal AF. We're going to talk about Jan six updates, updates updates. We've got updates on Jan six updates, updates, updates, we've got updates on Jan six. And of course, we're going to talk about the retirement of Justice Stephen Breyer and the implicate.

Starting point is 01:30:11 Is he retiring? He is retiring. And we're going to talk about who may be the individuals who will be replacing them or the individual who's replacing them. But who's on the short list? Who's not on the short list? Stay tuned for more. But first, I want to talk about athletic greens,

Starting point is 01:30:26 athletic greens, you've seen me drinking it this whole episode. So the proof is in the green, okay, that I like it. Maybe that's a new slogan that we'll see. The proof is in the green. I like that one. But before athletic greens, I was taking all these vitamins and gummies, yes, Pop Popak, I took gummies. And I would try to basically give myself what I thought I needed in the day to give myself

Starting point is 01:30:52 the energy and make myself feel good, but it was not working. But with A.G. 1, all I do is take one scoop of the green powder. I put it in this cup, I shake it up, I put water in it, and it contains 75 minerals and whole food sourced ingredients, including multivitamin, multimineral, probiotic, green superfood blend, and more in one convenient, daily serving, the special blend of high quality bioavailable ingredients in a scoop of AG1 work together to fill the nutritional gaps in my and your diet supports energy and focus and aids with gut health

Starting point is 01:31:32 and digestion and supports a healthy immune system effectively replacing multiple products or pills with one healthy, delicious drink as the research changes so does AG1. Well, most nutritional products that come to the market never evolve.

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Starting point is 01:33:46 Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco says in an interview this week that the DOJ is investigating those fake elector slates that were supporting Trump in the 2020 presidential election. We've talked about this on prior legal a F's all these GQ peers, these radical right extremists who are supporting the terrorist attack on the capital building. They created these literally forged documents. We talked about how the Michigan Secretary of State had made a referral to the DOJ. Other states have followed seven states in total are involved in this. And then not only do we have the DOJ investigating,

Starting point is 01:34:31 but then we have the January 6th is now subpoenaing people whose names appeared on these fake electric slates, individuals who were involved in the fake electric slates. And so these are people like, you know, GOP chairpersons in Arizona of the Republican party and secretaries of states of the Republican parties. And just all these GQ peers who are involved and Benny Thompson, who is one of the co-chairs of the panel,

Starting point is 01:35:00 says we believe the individuals we have subpoenaed, have information about how these so called alternate electors met and who was behind the scheme. We encourage them to cooperate with the select committee's investigation to get answers about January 6th for the American people and helping sure nothing like that day ever happens again. We will keep you updated on those investigations. We learn also with the January 6th committee, Popeye bill bar has apparently been speaking to the January 6th committee. We'll see what he's told about that. You know, I like about those two stories. You just told it, it is a response and a retort to all those people in the Twitter verse who say, Garland's not doing enough. We haven't heard about it. It hasn't leaked. It must have leaked leaks. There would

Starting point is 01:35:51 be leaks. We would know about these things. No, you wouldn't. Barg gave it informal statement or has been talking and cooperating with the witnesses, probably not under oath. That's why it was referred to as informal. Lisa Monaco opens up an investigation of sure it's been ongoing. And I watched her on, I think it was CBS face to nation. It wasn't just, it wasn't just that she's going to go after the fake electors. It's that she's going to follow the conspiracy wherever it leads into the highest levels. Say what you want about Americarick Garland, but they are running a not leaky tight ship

Starting point is 01:36:28 about their investigations at every level you and I report on what we can based on what we read, what we learn about, what other people are exploring investigatively. But that's like 10% or less of what the DOJ and each

Starting point is 01:36:43 individual US Attorney's Office is doing. And I'm glad about that. So everybody just be patient. We're starting to get little bits and pieces of things that are coming out about investigations. We'll know more when we see indictments. And a federal judge in California is indeed ramping up pressure on John Eastman. Eastman was a university professor. He's no longer there. He's not a dean of a law school. Chapman University, which is right here in California. Judge Carter is a judge in the central district. He's in the Orange County Federal Court. I was I was I was an ask you about. Tell me about him. What's he like? No nonsense. He starts his court really early.

Starting point is 01:37:26 Sometimes, like, he'll, if he, you know, is pushing a case through, he'll have you show up at 7 a.m. in the morning. He is all about also like believing in rehabbing, like prisoners and people who want a second chance and talks about like removing their tattoos and he tries to spend a lot of times. He cares about our justice system.

Starting point is 01:37:51 I'll go back and read his background. I believe he's a military vet as well, but just a no nonsense judge, incredibly well respected, but the least judge you wanna try any bullshit about whatsoever. And so Judge Carter, he's already rejected Eastman's claim. Eastman has like 19,000 documents in his or emails in his Chapman University email account. Judge Carter is kind of cutting through all of Eastman's bullshit attorney client privilege claims. Eastman's like I was Trump's attorney on Jan 6th. So you

Starting point is 01:38:29 can get my emails because everything I've done is in furtherance of my representation. And the crime. And out there it would you know we've talked about attorney client privilege the crime fraud exception as one of the exceptions against turning over these documents. But the quick and short of what's happening here is like judge Carter's like start turning them over now. First trance of documents go. Next trance of documents go. He set out a tight schedule. So Eastman is not wiggling his way out of this. And those documents are going to go before the January 6th committee. And judge Carter said in his order a lot of very positive things about the work of the January 6th committee.

Starting point is 01:39:11 And when you know Judge Carter, he's a true rule of law and order type of person in the trueest sense of what law and order means, not January 6th. There's an example of documents that will not only go these emails, not only go to Jan 6th, but it will be made available to the Department of Justice that the Department of Justice didn't have to do a darn thing to go after. So they're the beneficiary and they're and they're drafting like a good bicyclist, like a good palaton. They're drafting behind the Jan 6th committee

Starting point is 01:39:45 and the Jan 6th committee's throwing the documents over and Department of Justice is like, thank you very much. Didn't have to subpoena, didn't have to go through a criminal process, didn't have to go through a judge. You got it in your process, but we'll use them. Judge Carter was appointed by President Clinton. He in fact served in Vietnam more where he fought at the Battle of Kisan, He was appointed by President Clinton. He in fact served in Vietnam more where he fought

Starting point is 01:40:05 at the Battle of Kisan receiving a bronze star for valor in 1968 and was medically discharged as a first lieutenant after receiving a purple heart. His background also has an assistant district attorney with the Orange County District Attorney's Office in 1972. He became a senior district attorney, deputy district attorney in the office is homicide division, a trial lawyer. Exactly the, yeah, exactly the type of person you want. But speaking of appointments, Popo,

Starting point is 01:40:35 what all the legal affers have been waiting for, just to Stephen Breyer announces his retirement. There was a press conference with him and Biden, all the radical right extremists tried to like pull a clip out that Biden said, like, I'm not going to take any questions at all. But it was, he said, in the presence of Justice Breyer, I don't think that I should be answering those questions directly in front of him.

Starting point is 01:40:57 I want to respect his retirement announcement. But tell us who are the likely candidates and how big and important is this pop up? Yeah, and we'll back up a little bit about procedure because that's come up as well. And just as you had an announcement about special edition, popaki and t-shirts, I guess, that we're going to be printing, I have an announcement. We're, because we only have, you know, we have a limited period of time for you and I to talk about this. Karen, KFA and I, all we're going to talk about on Wednesday's

Starting point is 01:41:26 podcast is Breyer, his legacy and the future pick. So tune in on Wednesday, 8 p.m. for KFA, Popok, talking about this in even more detail. But let's do our special Ben Popok spin on it. Let's start with what's going on. Breyer announced he's going to stay in his seat until the end of this term, which is just before the summer break. Some people commented, oh crap, he needs to leave his chair for the confirmation process to start. We got to do this before the midterms. No, he doesn't. The confirmation process will start really quickly. Biden has already said that by the, I think, is it been as a middle of February? He's going to have his nominee up and running. I think that's

Starting point is 01:42:11 right. They're moving expeditions mid February. Now count, count on your hands and on your toes. 27, how many days was it for Amy Coney Barrett? 37. I think she was announced though after like four days. All right. But I mean, 37 days, the confirmation, we're going to do it faster. But with the before middle of March, well before the midterms, well before we lose control, well before, don't say that, my colonel, don't say, hey, I got to jump you there. No, no, no, you don't know what you can't jump yet. You can't jump yet. You said, way before not losing control. Well, that's true. I thought I was going to jump me until I get the full point. No, don't. I don't want to. We'll lose in control. I just said midterms way before where I was going with it before I got jumped is that

Starting point is 01:42:59 McConnell will come up with some crazy McConnell doctrine that when you're 27 days and Jupiter is aligned with Saturn and you may or may not and the polling shows that this I'm not going to confirm your nominee. That's not none of that is going to be relevant. This I'm going to bring optimism optimism to our legal a furs and our might as mighty. This nominee is getting confirmed and everybody knows it from Lindsey Graham to McConnell. So now let's get to the, so that's going to happen. So the confirmation will happen. But the actual seating of that person will be the day after prior steps down from the current term. So it won't happen during the term, the confirmation will happen

Starting point is 01:43:44 before this term is over. Now some people said, well, what if it's Kamala Harris? It's not going to be Kamala Harris. Yeah. That theory is not happening. It's a real personal flow to that not happening. That's a Republican theory to distract you and I and Democrats from what's at stake. And then people are like, well, what if she can she break her own tie? Yes, she can, but no, that's not going to happen. That there's, there's three or four main candidates because he's already in Biden's already announced it's going to be a black woman. We've had black men, they're a good Marshall first, Clarence Thomas second. We have never in 230 years plus of the US Supreme Court ever had a black woman.

Starting point is 01:44:26 It's time. So he's announced it's going to be a black woman. All supremely qualified, all with amazing resumes and pedigrees, none of it affirmative action-based. And let's start with the first one that you mentioned on your podcast that you thought it was. and I actually thought it was too, although I'm now drifting a little bit. Katanji Brown Jackson, 51 years old, a connection to Florida, which you think is my home state, a graduate of Miami Palmado High School, where Jeff Bezos also went, a clerk for Justice Breyer, important. A lot of times, the replacement likes to be a clerk for somebody that that steps off a DC a current a recent DC circuit or DC appellate court judge put on by Biden. And related by marriage to former Congressman Paul Ryan of all things, she has been considered to be the leading candidate for this, even though

Starting point is 01:45:25 she just got elevated to the appellate court in the District of Columbia, which is the feeder stream to the US Supreme Court. It doesn't matter that she just got appointed. They could elevate her at any time and it looks like they're going to do that. That's one. Second one is very interesting, I think, fascinating, candidate is Leandra Krueger on the California State Supreme Court, your home state. She was also, she's always been a rock star at every level in her career, just as Katanji Brown Jackson has been. She was the first in over 200 years, editor-in-chief of the Yale Law Review. You think about how many people went to Yale Law School. She's the first black person, person of color,

Starting point is 01:46:10 or black person, who to become the editor in chief. She has an interesting background. Her one parent is Jamaican, the other parent is Jewish. And she clerked for Justice John Paul Stevens, also a left, left of center justice. She had been the acting solicitor general of the United States under Obama and argued 10 or 12 cases before the US Supreme Court. She's young.

Starting point is 01:46:36 She's the youngest of the three. She's 45, eminently qualified. And the one that's the little bit of a wild card, and you and I went back and forth a little bit on our texts, in advance is Michelle Childs at Obama, with a link to Obama. She's on the DC court, I'm sorry, she's on the district court for South Carolina, which is a Clyburn's state, right?

Starting point is 01:47:07 And she was until two days ago, was going through a confirmation process to be on the DC, uh, pellet court, along with, with Katanji Jackson, with Katanji Jackson. But her nominee, her nomination was pulled by the Democratic led Senate Judiciary Committee because it's been announced that she is on the short list for being a Supreme Court justice and they don't want to put her through double confirmation processes. If she's going to be put up in two weeks to be the nominee to the Supreme Court, let's

Starting point is 01:47:41 not put her through a process now of an intermediary court that she's never going to serve on. And the Clyburn connection is really interesting because recall. And as I know, you know, almost better than anybody in your brothers. If it wasn't for South Carolina and Clyburn and the black population and electorate there, there would be no president Biden because he would not have won the primaries if he didn't turn the tide in South Carolina. And the vote wasn't delivered by Clyburn and black churches and the black electorate there. So Clyburn is on record as saying, not only does it need to be a black woman, he said it needs to be Michelle Childs. What do you

Starting point is 01:48:19 think about all that? Well, here's a Jim Clyburn quote, who's also the whip for the Democratic, the majority whips. And he's been that since 2019 quote, I don't like people telling me how important I am. You got to show me. It's such a classic Clyburn's. Well, it's such a Clyburn's endorsement is the reason many credit and rightfully so that Biden won South Carolina and went on to become the president. So a Jim Clyburn endorsement of this specific judge, you know, is meaningful.

Starting point is 01:48:56 I mean, the reason that I thought it was going to be Katanji Brown Jackson, she had gone through a confirmation process before very recently and because she's gone through that process It she's tested she's battle tested. It's the same people who are gonna be voting on it And if they vote differently, it'll just show you know how partisan and silly it is, but we know that she could get confirmed You know, but then the J. Michelle child's piece of it But then the J. Michelle child's piece of it is very, very interesting because of the way that the climate holds. And if the climate says, I need you to do this for me, that could possibly tip the scale there. Yeah, she's also the only one to the extent that this matters to people.

Starting point is 01:49:40 And I think if you're looking for diversity, educational diversity, she's also a non-IV leager in the sense that she didn't go to Harvard and Yale like the other two candidates or really almost well not everybody on the Supreme Court went to Harvard and Yale. She went to University of South Carolina law school and got her masters in law from Duke University. So I like her. masters in law from Duke University. So I like her. Nice. Well, we will keep you updated there, but that is big news that Biden is getting that nomination. We'll talk Wednesday about it. We're going to spend the entire half an hour on Wednesday talking about Briar and the pick. So we covered a lot on this issue of or this addition of legal AF. I mean, a ton of topics that we that we had covered. I mean,

Starting point is 01:50:28 just thinking about it, we covered the FBI raved on Quair, we talked about Palin's lawsuit, we talked about Alabama, Jerry Mandering, we talked about the Matt Getz case, we talked about Pennsylvania courts on, on, on, ruling on the, um, uh, no excuse voting. We talked about steward road's detention. We talked about litigia james. We talked about these affirmative action cases. We talked about the death penalty. We talked about Jan six updates. And we talked about briar retiring and action packed legal. You know, you know, what I liked about that list. There were many, many first and last names in there. And you got many of them right. That's guy. I always try to get as many writers again, special things to our sponsors, Blinkist, super special, so Smith AI and athletic greens, make sure

Starting point is 01:51:22 you support our sponsors. And I think it's always worth mentioning, Pope, that you and I are practicing lawyers. And so, you know, if we, if you have a case, you know, we do, you know, bad catastrophic injuries, big contract disputes, big business disputes, of the types of cases we handle. If you or someone you know has been injured or they've been, you know, we do sexual harassment cases, sexual assault cases. We represent victims of sexual assault and sexual harassment all the time in civil cases. And so if you have friends or you know anybody, you can reach out to us. You have my email. It's banatmitistouch.com. Banatmitistouch.com. You have popox mpopock at zplaw.com. You have popaks m popak at zp law.com.

Starting point is 01:52:08 Reach out to us and we'll look into it and we'll have people at our office look into it and see if there's any way that we could be helpful. Thank you so much for listening to this week's Legal AF the weekend edition with Ben Myceles and Michael popak if it's the weekend, it is Legal AF Always an honor to be with you. Last words, Popok. You may be really excited and happy to know that you may be in New York and that you and I

Starting point is 01:52:34 can get together again. And if you do, there will be proof of life photos of you and I. Well, let's again, enjoying each other's company live and in person. Absolutely. And shout out to the Midas Mighty. See you next time.

Legal AF by MeidasTouch - Breyer, Affirmative Action, Seditious Conspiracy Trials, & the Death Penalty

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