Legal AF by MeidasTouch - Federal Judge Stands Up to Trump and Refuses Dismissal

Episode Date: February 21, 2025

In breaking news, a federal judge has appointed a special counsel to investigate whether the Trump DOJ entered into a corrupt bargain with NYC mayor Eric Adams that should be sanctioned by not having his indictment dismissed as requested by Trump to get Adams to play ball on immigration policy. Michael Popok celebrates the decision but criticizes the choice of the special counsel. Get 40% off your first order of Sundays. Go to https://sundaysfordogs.com/LEGALAF or use code LEGALAF at checkout. Remember to subscribe to ALL the MeidasTouch Network Podcasts: MeidasTouch: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/meidastouch-podcast Legal AF: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/legal-af MissTrial: https://meidasnews.com/tag/miss-trial The PoliticsGirl Podcast: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-politicsgirl-podcast The Influence Continuum: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-influence-continuum-with-dr-steven-hassan Mea Culpa with Michael Cohen: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/mea-culpa-with-michael-cohen The Weekend Show: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-weekend-show Burn the Boats: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/burn-the-boats Majority 54: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/majority-54 Political Beatdown: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/political-beatdown On Democracy with FP Wellman: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/on-democracy-with-fpwellman Uncovered: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/maga-uncovered Coalition of the Sane: https://meidasnews.com/tag/coalition-of-the-sane Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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to get him to play ball in immigration in return for a partial dismissal of his indictment. Judge Ho wants another side to the story. Doesn't want to just hear from Emil Bové, Donald Trump's former criminal lawyer and now number two or number three in the Department of Justice. So he's appointed a former Solicitor General of the United States, Paul Clement. Yes, that Paul Clement, the one that's an arch conservative, has now been appointed by a Democratic judge appointed by Biden in order to argue the other side.

Why did Democrats and Democratic judges have to appoint arch right-wing conservative special councils and other things when they want to show that they're being fair and impartial? When are we going to start playing by the rules? I'm Michael Popak, you're on Midas Touch and Legal AF. Let's jump to it. We had a hearing a couple of days ago in which a lot of fair-minded people, former prosecutors and the like,

urged Dale Ho, the judge in New York, not to dismiss the case against Eric Adams based on a nine page letter that the acting interim US attorney for Manhattan, Danielle Sassoon wrote, in which she said it is an unethical borderline of crime to dismiss this case, to try to force an elected official to do your bidding in return

for the dismissal of his indictment. That that unholy alliance, that quid pro quo is the reason that she resigned, even though she's right-wing Federalist Society person and a shining star for the Republicans. She has moral conviction. Then they got a lawyer in the office, a older lawyer in the office,

to try to save the reputations and the careers of other assistant US attorneys. Ed Sullivan, he signed the motion, but he wasn't argued by Ed Sullivan. Emil Boves from Washington showed up in Dale Ho's courtroom a couple of days ago to argue for the dismissal of the indictment, or the nullprost, we call it, of the indictment, except he was the only one there and nobody was arguing the other side, right? So you had this unholy group of Alex Spiro, who represents Mayor Adams, who's friends with Emil Beauvais,

who's also the lawyer for Elon Musk in court, standing shoulder to shoulder with the government to argue that it needed to be dismissed for public service because they're not gonna get Eric Adams focused on immigration if he's got the indictment hanging over his head, right? The guy should go to jail. I mean, Michelle Sassoon put in her letter of resignation very noisily. Not only does she not agree with the dismissal of the indictment, she had already asked the Department

of Justice under Donald Trump to re-indict, supersedingly indict, Eric Adams for lying to the FBI and corrupting evidence. So she resigned. So now what? Bunch of former prosecutors stepped forward, you know, including Mark Pomerantz and Kerry Dunn. They were in the Manhattan DA's office when they noisily resigned because Alvin Bragg wouldn't go after Donald Trump. The same group got

together and told Judge, oh you got to appoint somebody to argue the other side. I went further in my hot takes. I said the judge has inherent authority under a case called Young versus Louis Vuitton back in the 1990s to appoint a special prosecutor to continue to prosecute the case. But first he's gonna hear from the other side. Now, here's the bad part of the hot take. He picks Paul Clement. Now, Paul Clement was appointed by George Bush

to be the Solicitor General of the United States and served in that role as the Solicitor General of the United States from 2004 to 2008. He was also the Acting Attorney General of the United States at one point,. He was also the acting Attorney General of the United States at one point, which sounds good on paper. He has his own firm. Now, he left the prior firm, Kirkland and Ellis, because they didn't want him to continue to take pro-Second Amendment against gun regulation cases any longer. So he left and he formed his own firm. He is an arch right-wing conservative. I wouldn't call him MAGA, but he is Federalist to the core.

He's been on the wrong or hump side of every issue he's ever argued when he was the Solicitor General. He was against gun control and controlling the Second Amendment. He was against same sex marriages. He was against the Obamacare Affordable Care Act. He defended George Bush's use of terrorism, waterboarding and the like.

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This reminds me of Merrick Garland, the Biden Attorney General, bent over backwards when he needed to appoint a special prosecutor against Joe Biden about the handling of classified documents and he picked Robert Herr, a right-wing Federalist conservative. Why? Just pick somebody who's unassailable but is playing on the right team. I am tired.

I've said this before. We have to go to the lengths and depths of our opponents. I'm not saying doing anything unethical, but there are plenty of Democrats who served as Solicitor Generals if that's what you wanted to check the box. You know, it looks like Dale Ho, who had worked for the ACLU, who had worked for the NAACP, is bending over backwards to be so deferential and independent that he's actually undermining his own position. Let me predict it now.

Paul Clement, arch conservative, MAGA defender is not going to find that it's inappropriate to dismiss the indictment against Eric Adams. I'll come back here and I'll tell you I was shocked if it happens. And then what? I get that he needs an advocate on the other side, but this is not the one that anybody wanted, Judge Ho. Pick the right special counsel to advise you and go further. This is my urging component of the hot take. Go further Further, this is my urging component of the hot take, go further and appoint a special counsel to prosecute the case against Eric Adams.

Did you read the nine page letter from Diane Sassoon on the way out and all the reasons and all the evidence against Eric Adams? Don't let this dirty deal that stinks to high heaven, continue to undermine our and the public's respect for the judiciary and for our criminal justice system. You have a shot here. I don't wanna say he blew it,

because I don't wanna be that harsh on him, but let me just put it this way. Paul Clement would not be the guy that I would pick to do the other side of the argument. It's like, it's like he got two, who do the other side of the argument. It's like you got two, who's the other side? It's like same side. So now I got Alex Spiro, the lawyer, Emil Bové for the corrupt Department of Justice, and Paul Clement, who's the darling of the conservative and right wing, alt-right movement, all arguing, what, different positions? No, the same positions.

You know, what this points to is not what happens to the rise and fall of Mayor Adams in New York, which most people in America don't care about. This has to do to the existential threat to the Department of Justice and what it appears to stand for in front of the American people, which is very little. Yeah, which is very little. Yeah, which is very little. The Department of Justice is corrupt, led by Pam Bondi. No,

forget that. Led by Donald Trump. That's who's leading all of his agencies in his unified, unitary presidential model. Yeah. How do we like that? Polling says we hate it. Well under 50% of America likes what Donald Trump is doing. It's like 43, 44% his approval ratings in the trash. It's not wildly popular, he's wildly unpopular already. And this is supposed to be the honeymoon period. Judge Ho, I understand why, and I'm glad you exercised under the rules and your inherent authority.

I know I'm glad you exercised and you put somebody in there to advocate, but why Paul Clement? Not the right person for the moment, but I'm going to continue to follow it right here on Legal AF and on the Midas Touch Network. We got the show, the podcast, Five Years in the Making, Legal AF. If you didn't know why we called it that, now you do. it's every Wednesday and Saturday at 8 p.m. Eastern Time and then on audio podcast platforms of your choice come on over to legal AF the YouTube channel hit the free subscribe button there we're trying to get to half

a million in the next two weeks we can do it with your help I really believe that and that'll be our six month birthday we found it in September but standing on the shoulders of all the work we've done here together on Legal AF and Midas Touch. So until my next reporting, I'm Michael Popak. In collaboration with the Midas Touch Network, we just launched the Legal AF YouTube channel. Help us build this pro-democracy channel where I'll be curating the top stories, the intersection of law and politics. Go to YouTube now and free subscribe at LegalAFMTN.

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