Legal AF by MeidasTouch - Jack Smith Makes URGENT DEMAND on Trump Trial Date

Episode Date: December 11, 2023

Special Counsel Jack Smith has told Judge Chutkan to do everything in her power to keep the March 4th Trump trial on track. Michael Popok of Legal AF reports on the latest filing from the Special Counsel’s office and how the judge may use their argument to deny Trump’s demand to stay the case. Thanks to GiveWell: To claim your match, go to GIVEWELL.ORG and pick PODCAST and enter Legal AF by MeidasTouch 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 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 Lights On with Jessica Denson: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/lights-on-with-jessica-denson On Democracy with FP Wellman: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/on-democracy-with-fpwellman Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Michael Popok legal a f as expected jack Smith and the special counsel's office has opposed Donald Trump's efforts to stop the March trial date in the DC election interference case from going forward. He's argued Donald Trump that because he filed an appeal arguing that the judge got it wrong that he does not have presidential or other immunity against the indictment and the indicted conduct that makes up the DC election interference case, the four counts of criminal conspiracy brought against him. He's not immune for that.

So the argument goes. So Judge Chuck and as ruled and yes, as expected, Donald Trump took an appeal to it. As of right now, unknown three judge panel, the DC court of appeals, he's also argued to the judge that she should stay all aspects of the case. Don't move it forward. Don't allow it to progress. He's even gone is so far. Donald Trump is saying he's not going to participate in anything while the motion is pending citing a rule of law based on a case called Griggs. And in the Griggs decision, which is Griggs versus Provident Consumer Discount Company,

for those playing the Supreme Court Press in a home game, a case from 1982, when an appeal is filed, it generally divests the trial court of its jurisdiction about things related to the appeal. Now, Donald Trump will argue, well, everything things related to the appeal. Now, Donald Trump will argue, well, everything is related to my appeal because it has to do with whether I'm immune or not. But as the government pointed out in this three-page filing

on Sunday, timely filed on Sunday, the judge gave him till five o'clock and they timely filed it. As they argued, the government argued, there are lots of things that the trial judge can do to keep the train on the track, keep the wheels on the car to move this case towards the March 4 trial date. For instance, there are motions to dismiss that are currently pending, which even under the case cited by Donald Trump should be promptly denied closed out and denied because of this dependency of this appeal. So in other words, Judge Chuckent clear out all the low hanging fruit procedurally, deny the other motions to dismiss and and and motions that have been filed by Donald Trump right now. And because

Griggs itself, Griggs itself already bakes in a certain limited stay related to the appeal, then there's no, there's no need. The court, the Department of Justice reminded Judge Chukkin to rule on this broader stay of all activity that Donald Trump is requesting. Just stay the aspects of it that relate to the immunity issue and let everything else move forward down the track towards March 4th. Now I've got another argument that I actually thought was going to be raised by the Department of Justice.

I mentioned this on legal AFR leading podcast at the intersection of law, politics and justice. And I thought they'd actually give more support to Judge Chutkin to deny the motion for stay, not on grigs, but on the argument that it is long if she finds that the argument that's raised, there's an it's not likely that Donald Trump is going to prevail on appeal. Right. It's not the likelihood of success is minimal or non-existent. She can deny the motion for stay.

We've seen this in other federal cases involving appeals. We saw it with Judge Jones in the North and District of Georgia, for instance, when Mark Meadows appealed his ruling that he didn't, and he did not enjoy federal officer removal to take the Georgia criminal case state over to federal court. Judge Jones said, I'm not staying any of these proceedings in the, in the state court, for instance, because I not staying any of these proceedings in the, uh, in the state court, for instance, because I don't think you're going to win your, your appeal. And I think that's the road that judge Chutkin is going to go down.

And I'm a little bit surprised that the government in its three pages didn't spend an extra couple of pages. They had plenty, plenty of pages to spare to argue that it was unlikely that Donald Trump was going to prevail on his appeal. Now that there's this brief is in an opposition, there's one more brief that comes on Tuesday with Donald Trump, and then we're going to have a decision relatively quickly Tuesday night, Wednesday morning or so by judge Chutkin on the issue of whether the trial level proceeding should be stayed while we await what happens for full briefing or a argument and decision at the appellate

level. And now as of this particular hot tick, the appellate court hasn't yet gotten together. They haven't formed a panel yet, haven't been empaneled and they haven't set a briefing schedule for the appellate a pellet, um, proceeding that Donald Trump has started by arguing that he is immune. We still are waiting for the judges, the briefing schedule and the like, the clerk on Thursday or Friday did spit out an automatic message that set a date of middle to late December for certain events, but that's not what we're looking at.

What we're looking at is when the panel of the three judges in DC gets put together how they set the briefing schedule. On there, I think we're going to see the Department of Justice weigh in and move on an emergency or expedited basis to have this appeal move very, very quickly, briefed in a very short amount of time or argument in a very short amount of time or argument in a very short amount of time, and a ruling in a short amount of time, so it doesn't delay the March trial. That a March trial that's so important,

that the last court to consider it, most recently, just this past week or so, said in regagging Donald Trump, same court, different three judges said it is very important that the trial not be delayed. That justice didn't, of delayed is justice denied, not just for Donald Trump, but for the American people. And that it is very important that before the election in November, voters know whether

Donald Trump has been acquitted, mistried, hang jury, hung jury, or convicted. And so that was a message from one appellate panel of the DC Court of Appeals as binding precedent on the next panel that's to be established for the issue of the immunity. Have you ever wondered where your donation could have the most impact? In 2007, a group of donors had that exact question. But when they sought out information from charities to help them answer this question, they instead received cute pictures or unhelpful stories. Their experience led them to create GiveWell, an organization providing rigorous, transparent

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To claim your match, go to givewell.org and pick podcast and enter legal AF by Midas Touch checkout. Make sure they know that you heard about Givewell from legal AF by Midas Touch to get your donation matched. Again, that's givewell.org to donate or find out more. Could randomly one of the judges from the appeal on the gag order end up on the immunity panel, maybe, but it would be completely random assignment. So we'll have to see whether judge, Polar judge, Millette, and the other judge that was assigned to the case end up on the new panel and we're going to report on all of that.

What is going on with the final ruling by Judge Chutkin on the motion to stay, the precedent that's been set and the new panel that will be in place to decide the immunity issue and how quickly they're going to decide that immunity issue, and how that impacts the March trial. All eyes are on the March trial. And if you need to code a ring on what Donald Trump's trying to do, everything he's trying to do in DC is to delay the March trial and avoid the March trial if he can.

For him, it's a numbers game. How many days are there between the March trial and the November election? And how many of those days can he eat up waste, burn, in order that the trial doesn't happen? So for him, you're looking at March, April, May, June, July, you're looking at eight months. He's got a burn eight months. You can do that by late filing motions to dismisses, which is what he recently did. File them very late in the game at the very end.

Make judge Chutkin have to make rulings on them, then file appeals on them, then full briefing on appeals, then leave open the door for Supreme Court intervention or involvement. And suddenly your eight months that you got to kill is down to a month or two or less. And that's what we're watching with Donald Trump. And we'll report all of it right here on the Midas Touch Network only on their YouTube channel. You're here already. Keep watching and all the content that we provide legal AF is where I do all my work

by legal analysis and political analysis. It's on the Midas Touch Network. It's on Wednesdays and Saturdays at 8 p.m. Eastern time. I co-founded the show and I co-anchor it on those two days. And then pick it up on audio podcast platforms where wherever you like wherever you choose. We're on all of them. If you like this kind of hot take thumbs up. It really does help. You're making a difference. It helps with the ratings and keeps me on the air. So until my next hot take, until my next legal AF, this is Michael Popak reporting. At Midas Touch, we are unapologetically pro democracy

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