Legal AF by MeidasTouch - Legal AF - 3/15/26

Episode Date: March 15, 2026

Ben and Popok are at the controls of the top rated Legal AF Podcast as they cover breaking news from Iran to the Courts and Congressional Hearing rooms in DC, to the Federal Reserve and Supreme Court, and provide updates on everything from the sex scandals that have imperiled the Administration, to new brand scandals involving pay to play and possible extortion and bribery linked back to Trump and his family. Support our Sponsors: Freedom From Religion: Visit https://ffrf.us/LEGALAF, or text “LEGAL AF” to 511511 to learn more and join. Book By Anyone: Order your book today and enjoy free shipping at https://BookByAnyone.com. Smalls: Smalls: Head to https://Smalls.com/LEGALAF and use promo code: LEGALAF at checkout for 60% off your first order PLUS free shipping! Delete Me: Get 20% off your DeleteMe plan when you go to join https://deleteme.com/LEGALAF and use promo code LEGALAF at checkout. Become a member of Legal AF YouTube community: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCJgZJZZbnLFPr5GJdCuIwpA/join Learn more about the Popok Firm: https://thepopokfirm.com Subscribe to Legal AF Substack: https://michaelpopok.substack.com/subscribe?coupon=c0fc8f5c 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 Cult Conversations: The Influence Continuum with Dr. Steve Hassan: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-influence-continuum-with-dr-steven-hassan The Weekend Show: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-weekend-show The Ken Harbaugh Show: https://meidasnews.com/tag/the-ken-harbaugh-show Majority 54: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/majority-54 On Democracy with FP Wellman: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/on-democracy-with-fpwellman Uncovered: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/maga-uncovered Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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AF that we've got to cover everything there, Michael Popak. So, Where do we start? We got a lot of updates regarding the Democratic oversight investigations into Trump's cover-up at the Epstein matter. There were some actually big depositions. Epstein's money guy was deposed and gave kind of conflicting answers about financial settlements that were paid on behalf of the estate that also may have been involving victims who accused Donald Trump. And so we should talk about that. Obviously, the war. an unlawful war started by Donald Trump, continues to rage on in Iran and the Middle East and

is expanding as well. It's a devastating war. 13 service members had been killed in this war, 200 or so injured, 10 seriously wounded, and you have the Trump regime. Sadly, our government lies about everything, so it's unclear if those are the real numbers, what's really going on. We got to talk about this unlawful war because, you know, it was, I think, launched significantly as part of a distraction from the Epstein files. And now it's basically embroiled the entire world in a war. Let's talk about Donald Trump being handed a massive, massive loss in his attempt to try to criminally prosecute Jerome Powell, the chair of the Federal Reserve, and this scathing ruling by Judge Bozberg.

Yep, Judge Bozberg is back, and he starts this incredible opinion by reading Donald Trump's social media posts. And just when Posberg frames all of these posts that Donald Trump was making, attacking Jerome Powell as like, you know, stupid Jerome Powell, just the way Boseberg framed it. We'll talk about that it was absolutely brilliant,

and he really rejected Donald Trump's ability, to issue these subpoenas to the Federal Reserve, and Bozberg said this is all obviously pretextual. Like, we're not, the judiciary is not going to close their eyes to what you're really trying to do here, Donald. We see current judges finally speaking out against the Trump regime as well. I'll give you an update on what's going on with TikTok

and some of the legal ramifications there as well. It's bringing Michael Popak from Legal AF. And Popak, you know, it's interesting because, you know, Donald Trump has really made the United States look as weak as his failed, bankrupted casinos now internationally. The same pathologically defective and loser mentality is playing out, not having the right types of planning and not listening to experts and not listening to the facts and just continuing to bloviate and spewed deranged nonsense, right?

This is why this guy's bankrupted everything. And we should have, as a country, we did recognize, hey, maybe the guy who had zero planned during COVID and made things much worse and said like a miracle I was all going to wait. Not the guy, not the guy, you know. But here, you know, he's created and he's manufactured, you know, a global crisis, an economic crisis

that gets worse by the second. And as he looks so weak abroad, he just looks so weak at home as well. And I think finally, you know, again, you have judges, you have a lot of people who weren't speaking up saying, this ain't it. This ain't it. This isn't it. This is some, regardless of your politics, this guy's a loser. And he's turned America into a loser nation modeled off his loser, his entire loser life. We need to get rid of this loser and we need to just start bringing back competent and successful people who are smart, who can think, who know what they're doing, who are empathetic, Michael Bhopi.

Yeah, absolutely. What we're watching in year two of the Trump administration is the world and judges, the American voter, all seeing that the emperor has no clothes and fighting back in ways that they were incapable of or unwilling to or in the shock and awe of 200 executive orders and all of the attacks. on the American way of life that happened in the first month of the Trump administration.

But now they are their back. And all we're watching is history, they say history sometimes repeats itself, but if it doesn't repeat itself, it certainly rhymes. We're watching kind of Nixon all over again, but a turbocharged, more criminal version of Nixon. Nixon tried to bomb his way to popularity at home after a failed domestic policy. behind the scenes of criminal presidency where, you know, they were spying on Americans, spying on the Democratic Party, funneling and channeling money into the pockets of the

sounds familiar, into the pockets of friends and cronies of Richard Nixon, calling the Department of Justice to approve deals so that, you know, ITT back in the 1970s, could get a transaction approved. And Donald Trump really saw that as a playbook for him. Nixon had a Cambodia, Vietnam problem, tried to bomb his way abroad, use global policy to fix his failing popularity at home. And Donald Trump, desperate, weekend, all we've been watching is him trying to do the same thing. He looks at the 30%, whatever it is, approval numbers, right direction, wrong direction, consumer confidence numbers, GDP down, a completely,

sterile, jobless economy, doesn't make any jobs. Literally does not make any jobs. If you total up the few jobs he's made with the losses of every month, he's net almost zero in 16 months. He sees all of that. So he says, I got an idea. And this is where he's at war with the American people as well. I'll go to war with Venezuela.

Oh, that didn't really pump me up. I'll go to war with Iran. And you're talking about this lack of executive function in the executive, branch that's writ large here. The primary source of information for Iran is Steve Whitkoff, an inexperienced golf buddy real estate developer friend of Donald Trump's. That's a special envoy to the Middle East, along with Jared Kushner, the son-in-law in chief, both of them with no technical experience to negotiate nuclear issues with Iran, let alone the diplomatic experience to know when they were being played or what Intel was right or wrong.

Donald Trump completely boxed out the CIA, Tulsi Gabbard as the intelligence director, and relied solely on two conflicted friends or relatives of his who are real estate developers. At the same time that Jared Kushner is running around trying to raise $5 billion from the very same people that he's negotiating with in the Middle East for his private wealth fund based in Miami, and you've got Whitkoff and Kushner getting played in Geneva the night before the bombing happened that led Donald Trump to say, oh, I think they're going to fire first. And the small group of decision makers are even worse. And there's not an adult in the room.

J.D. Vance, Marco Rubio, Pete Hanks, I wouldn't let them run a bath, let alone run a war plan. And this was Donald Trump's inner circle. He even rejected the recommendations of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and General Kane, who said, you know, they're going to do a blockade of oil in the world's number one shipping lane, the Strait of Harmoos. You know that, right? Oh, I don't think they will. Based on what?

And it's exactly what's happened. So now, as you said, we've exported the same chaos and failure at home. We've now exported that abroad. And who bailed us out? 37 Western nations led by France and Germany and Canada that came together in Paris to take 400 million barrels of oil from a strategic reserve and dump it into the market to save the American economy. The very same people that Donald Trump bashes and undermines and attacks in NATO, the European Union, Canada, and all that. Who is the first one that came to our rescue? those very same people, because of course, it's in their best interest that America survived the Trump era.

Well, and even that, though, ain't working. I mean, you look at the price per barrel, surgeon again, going to pass $100, you know, it just seems that it's decisions being made based on, as Donald Trump says, don't be a panicking. That's something that people who panic say, because who else says, don't be a panicking. What's last time you ever said that phrase? Who's ever said that phrase? Like during a trial, don't be a panicking anybody where I'm not a panicking right now. I mean, what are we talking about right there? Because, you know, even you put those, what, 400 million barrels into the market and Donald Trump

removed sanctions against Russia allowing not just India to buy Russian oil, but allowing the rest of the world, apparently, to buy Russian oil that Russia's basically has underwent. been unable to sell as a result of these sanctions while the price is so high, even though there's all this, you can't just like release it all at once though, right? Like when you release these strategic reserves. So I think it ends up adding like a million barrels of oil per day into the United States where consumption is over 20 million or so barrels per oil per day. And when you make a move like that, I think the futures markets, which we're thinking, well, we'll get through this. There'll be a taco situation. A Trump always chickens out situations. They come to realize

now when it comes to war, unlike Trump's tariffs against the world, where Trump would claim fake victories in a war situation, it takes two to taco. And Iran has made it very clear that they have no interest right now in surrendering any time soon because they've been emboldened. You do mention those countries like, you know, what France is doing with Italy and others. But they, They're now speaking to Iran bilaterally and saying, can we make deals with you strategically? So maybe we can get our ships through the straight of... Iran is stronger now than it was on February 20th. Like significantly.

Like actually turning Iran into like a mega power within the Middle East, showing the capabilities of its Shahid drones and making America look so much weaker with the fact that our security guarantee, you know, you know, you and I always talk about it. This is a good way to talk about it in the context of the law. You know, these what you and I both believe are these emolument clause violations of the Constitution, you know, where Trump's getting these gifts, especially from these Middle East nations, these quid pro quos you and I have covered in the legal context, which you and I both believe, or have expressed our opinions, I should say, our legal opinions are fraud,

and but for absolute immunity that was granted by the Supreme Court seemed clearly kind of criminal in nature, in our opinion, and, you know, it seemed like bribes in our opinion. But in a pay-for-play scheme, at some point the people who pay want you to play, right? And so the Middle East country, like, hey, we've given your world liberty, financial, the money. We've given this company money.

You wanted the stupid Trump hotel in Doha. You wanted the Trump Riyadh. We gave you those things. But, dude, it's not because we like you. You know, we don't, we think that you're a good guy. The whole point is that you were supposed to provide protection. This is a protection racket. And when you're not providing the protection, the racket ain't working.

And when you ain't playing, we ain't paying. Wait, on that note, the report is the Arab world, the Arab Gulf states, are furious at Trump right now. And he's busy making phone calls because of his own vested interest and Jared Kushner's vested interest in that region, in the very same countries that were like, we were just a peaceful place where people could do business and you could live in Dubai and all.

And you've fpped it up by blowing up Iran and setting the Middle East on fire. So Donald Trump is spending a lot of time. That shows you, as you and I've talked about, the such conflicts of interests between Donald Trump's personal family business interests and those of the Middle East, which warp American policy. That's why when you and I talk about American policy, like, why is Trump doing that? It's always follow the money back to a family trust or business operation of Donald Trump or somebody in his family, and that will explain why that policy has just been passed. has nothing to do with what's right for the American people

or what's going to benefit them or help them in their daily lives. It's only about Trump and Trump dollars. And that was what our founders were worried about, whether you call it the emoluments clause of taking money directly in order to influence American foreign policy or otherwise. That is what we are watching, that Donald Trump does not make daily decisions based on what's right for the American people

in honest public service. decisions based on what is right for his Trump incorporated and those around him. And that's why you have these laws. That's why you have, you know, a constitution that prevents things like these emoluments and why we have laws against bribery. And when those get ignored, it also has these massive national security implications. What we're seeing play out where one man, Donald Trump, made all of these promises that couldn't keep, did not involve our national security apparatus because he was so interested in

enriching himself that it's left the nation really, really screwed. So it has this broad, that's why we build these legal structures. And similarly, there's a reason why we don't want people with very flawed and questionable moral character or worse, oftentimes running organizations, right? So we would never hire somebody who you know was found civilly liable for sexual assault to be a Fortune 500 CEO or run a medium-sized company. Would you hire someone if you knew a jury found that a person was found civilly liable for sexually assaulting a person? And then you've heard the person say, I grab women by their genitals but use the P word because I'm rich and they let me do it or I inspect the girls naked. in beauty pageants, and that's why I buy these pageants. Would you hire that person to lead your organization at any size? Of course you wouldn't, and that person is leading the United

States of America, and it's having a serious implication in the war, Popak, because if you look at the propaganda that's coming out from Iran, I believe it's actually effective. And one of the things they're talking about specifically in addition to the affordability crisis and never-ending wars and all of the things that they're saying is they continue to bring up Epstein class and Trump's connection to Epstein and Epstein Island. And one of the ways they're rallying their people in the war is basically to say, hey, you see Trump and Netanyahu in these videos, they're beaming into, you know, when they hacked into the Iranian TV networks. And you see Donald Trump saying he wants to pick the Ayatollah. What Iran is saying, this is like they're doing videos on

this, Popak, and you see it at their national security advisor level, their foreign minister level, you want the guy who's covering up a child sex trafficking ring, who runs a cabinet of people who hang out on Epstein Island. You want these people running Iran. And so they're framing it as, you know, we may be, you know, you may not have liked us before, but you've got Donald Trump and Pete Hegstiff and all these people saying, we're going to rain down hell and death from the sky, and we're going to obliterate the entire nation, you know, and also Trump's the Epstein guy. You know, he's Epstein's friend. You want Epstein's friend? And so they're usually, he's compromised by those connections from, in my opinion,

being in this leadership position. So it has these national and international implications as well. That's why Popak in the UK, in France, and these other countries, even if you were a degree or two removed from Epstein, right, but you like made an introduction that led to an introduction that led to Epstein. These people are resigning or getting pushed out. Why? Because they're compromised on the world stage. That's also why we talk about, you know, the broader international implications of Epstein

accountability for Donald Trump and his. regime because it compromises us as a nation where they're just like, yeah, whatever, this is what we do. Sure. What else do you expect us to do? We're not doing anything about it. Popak, I want to talk about some of the updates there as it relates to Epstein, you know, because there are a lot of updates this week.

We did a long intro there. So why don't we just take a quick first break? Let's come back. Let's talk all things, Epstein. I want to talk about Judge Bozberg's ruling as well, because Judge Bozberg issued a powerful ruling against Donald Trump, quashing the subpoena regarding the Federal Reserve. By the way, which almost never happens. A district court judge almost never quashes a grand jury subpoena finding the criminal underlying

investigation to be effectively fraudulent. Unprecedented, you know, the word unprecedented sometimes feels overused, but in the Trump regime, it isn't. And it's unprecedentedly bad, bad, bad. Oh, we know we should talk about Janine Piro's press conference. after as well. What the hell was, how bizarre was that? All right, let's take our first quick break of the show. Reminders, subscribe to the legal AF YouTube channel. Subscribe to the legal AF substack. Get that legal AF YouTube channel, two million subscribers in the next few months. I think it's possible. Let's get it there. Let's

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One last time, that's bookby anyone.com. Welcome back to LegalAF. Thank you to our sponsors right there. So Popak, give us some of the latest updates in the Epstein investigation. Obviously, we know that there have been more. Documents that have been coming out, the FBI's been hiding kind of critical docs regarding people who have made serious accusations as well against Donald Trump. We know that the Post and Courier of South Carolina in Charleston, where the survivor

was from the South Carolina area. They've been able to corroborate a lot of elements of the story. They weren't able to corroborate the stuff. The stuff with Trump happened in New York is what the allegations were. that this survivor alleges that, you know, Trump sexually assaulted her in the New York area when Epstein brought her from South Carolina to New York. So the Post and Courier couldn't confirm any of the stuff that was in New York. What they were able to confirm, though, was a lot of the very minute details as it relates to South Carolina. There's very specific stuff. And they said

all of that stuff happened and was true in the South Carolina piece in the 80s in this report. So talk about that one. Then there was another one, Popper. involving a victim who was about 16 years old and this came out in the FBI in some of the new documents that have been released after Pam Bondi was subpoenaed where when Epstein was going into his townhouse he was getting what he called Donald Trump when he was getting a massage and sexually assaulting a survivor a survivor alleges that Trump was on the phone when Epstein was in his townhouse when right around the time she was sexually assaulted and Trump and Epstein called Trump and

like Trump was on speaker phone and so that one came out and then you had the money man the accountant was deposed who gave mixed mixed messages. Try to walk her through it. Yeah, yeah and I'm not I don't feel sorry for Pam Bondi but I am rubbing my hands in glee that all of this new information including a major bombshell about the New Mexico ranch of Epstein by James Comer, of all people, the MAGA head of the Oversight Committee, for a minute, I forgot which side he was on after he went on Jesse Waters and said that he's glad that the state officials in New Mexico are now going over with a fine-tooth comb, this New Mexico ranch,

that Epstein operated, because he said that the Trump administration, first time around under its Department of Justice and Bill Barr, told the New Mexico officials to stop doing their investigation in 2019 of the ranch. Now, soon thereafter, they indicted Epstein. But even Comer on Jesse Waters was like, we got to get to the bottom. What's going on in that ranch? Are there dead girls buried there or not? Yeah, are there dead girls buried there or not?

And that's something, why did the Trump administration help out Epstein by having the New Mexico officials stand down from an investigation that they, Feds did not take over. And that's from Jane, when on your best day, your MAGA leader is throwing you under the bus that tells you all you need to know about Donald Trump's efforts and try to make the Epstein stain and scandal go away. This is all before Pam Bondi.

She must not be, in this military base that she's now living on, apparently, because now they had a mover because of threats against her. Not that she was involved with any of the military operations in Venezuela or Iran, They apparently have to move her into a military base. She's not getting much sleep in there as all of this new information comes out. So you got the New Mexico Ranch information, James Comber. You got Richard Kahn, a little-known guy who is the bookkeeper, estate trustee, and accountant for Jeffrey Epstein. That's a nice way of saying he enabled Jeffrey Epstein's child sex trafficking.

for years by making sure the flow of money among all the properties and the jets and the people and the gifts and everything all flowed properly, you know, kept the wheels spinning there. And, of course, he tried to come off. I only knew about his charge in 2006 in West Palm Beach in Palm Beach. I had no idea that I was, that he was a pedophile. Really? I mean, nobody believed that. In fact, Democrats come out and said he made contradictory.

concerning statements about women who made allegations against both Epstein and Donald Trump. Look, at least one member of Congress who was in the room has said that, again, this is behind closed doors, unfortunately, but we'll be getting into the transcript one day. And a con said that out of the victim survivor fund that Epstein created or the estate created of $120 million, at least one person who made accusations against Dr. Trump was paid off. So we're going to have to wait to get our hands on that transcript, but at least one person who sat through the testimony, took that down as a note and put it up on his social media platform. So you've got the accountant, the money man,

who may or may or may not have lied to Congress about his true knowledge. You've got this Jane Doe number four that you referenced, who has accused the president of abuse. I think that ties back to somebody who's at the, the time, 13 years old that claimed that Donald Trump tried to force her to commit oral sex on him, she bit him, and then he assaulted her. Now, I've always said the following, and I think this is consistent with the Midas Touch and legal AF channels. I don't know if that's true or not, but who also doesn't know if that's true or not? The FBI, the Department of Justice, because they refuse to

conduct any investigations. How is it there are 1,200 victims, including one of my clients, Lisa Phillips. How is there 1,200 victims, acknowledged victims of a child sex trafficking crime ring that has brought down 40 to 50 people worldwide, including a member of the royal family? And there's not one known investigation or prosecution of anybody in the United States by the Department of Justice. Not one. What does that tell you about the corruption of the Department of Justice? It's captured by Donald Trump. It's complete lack of independence. Why isn't there a special council that's been appointed to go over the 3 million or 8 million or whatever pages there are of the Epstein files to bring the predators to justice. Why? Because we have a predator in chief

who's in the Oval Office and who runs and controls the Department of Justice. This is why Pam Bondi's being dragged back in, I'm sure, kicking and screaming. There's no burn book that's going to get her out of this one about her cover-up of the Epstein files and why there's no prosecution. of anybody that has been implicated by it. Yeah, we heard from the accountant, the five, the Rothschilds and the Lex Wester's of the world and the Leon Blacks that gave Epstein billions and billions and billions of dollars and maybe the connections between Epstein and Russia, right?

And then we had new reporting. Get this one. It says a lot about an administration when a cyber hacker has more morals than our own administration. Apparently, in 2023, a cyberhacker, not knowing he was breaking into the FBI, broke into the FBI Epstein database, got to see things that you and I

and the public haven't been able to see, including disgusting photos related to child pornography, in the words of the cyber hacker. The cyber hacker was going to go public thinking he had broken into a pedophiles, database, the FBI, apparently in New York, had to get on with the cyber hacker, convinced them by flashing their badges that they were the FBI and that he had broken into a criminal database of theirs. The fact that he was repulsed or she was repulsed, the cyber hacker, and yet no one in

our government led by Donald Trump seems to be equally repulsed or feel that they have the duty to justice in the American people to go after those that created those pictures that were participated in those events is just depraved. And this is what America, this is why America is rejecting the Trump administration and why we are winning or why the Democrats are winning in race after race after race. It is the indelible stain of the Epstein scandal, which is not the only sex scandal going on in the Trump administration. You got one over at labor, you had one with Christine Nome, over at Homeland Security, you got Donald Trump and everything he does, and then you've got the Epstein matter. And what it means in terms of the lack of character and fitness for those

that serve in this government. And that is the reason why that the other party, the party out of power, is winning 90% out of 280 races that have happened since the beginning of the Trump administration. they've won 90% of them, okay? Or they've overperformed in 90% of them. They're 28 in O in flipping seats, including in weird places. It could be 29 and O, including the Northwest District in Georgia,

that Marjorie Taylor Green. But this is why, because America will tolerate a lot, but they won't tolerate a heartless president, and they won't tolerate a corrupt, morally bankrupt president. And that's what we're watching, as Pam, I don't even know, when does Pam Bondi come in for that hearing?

Whenever they let her out of the military bunker, you know, it's unclear. She's supposed to be deposed pretty soon, but, you know, I bet you that she'll do everything and anything in her power to delay that. That's for sure. Let's just turn to what's going on with Judge Boasberg. Everybody remember Judge Bozberg. And the intersection has. you like to say of law and politics, but the intersection of law and politics here is Judge

Bosberg and intersection of law and criminality and Donald Trump seeking retribution against the chair of the Federal Reserve. So Popak, what went down here as Donald Trump was impaneled this grand jury basically to gin up criminal charges against the chairman of the Federal Reserve, of Jerome Powell. And this case was in front of Judge Boasberg. Tell us why, how Judge Bozberg got this case in Washington, D.C. And then what did Judge Bozberg rule? Yeah. And the reason we're just talking about it now is you don't generally know about what's happening in grand juries because there's a level of secrecy that goes around them to protect the innocent, to protect people that have not yet been charged. You're not supposed to know, although the government often leaks that somebody's a target

of an investigation. Here, they purposely leaked that Jerome Powell, particularly as the chairman of the Federal Reserve, was a target of a criminal investigation, presumably about him, making a statement about the renovation of two buildings that are 100 years old that make up the Federal Reserve of complex in Washington, D.C. in a response to a question by Senator Tim Scott in which he honestly said, there are no opulent golden ballrooms or dining rooms or private elevators. We've kind of re-engineered the project to save money and this is the project. But the project to take 200-year-old buildings with asbestos and old elevators and old HVAC systems, you know, and something called COVID, that impacted the global logistics related to a building material and something called

Donald Trump's tariffs that did the exact same thing. There's no wonder it's a 50% or more cost overrun in developing it. It doesn't make it criminal any more than Donald Trump's ballroom going up 50%. It makes him, well, maybe in his case it does. In any event, Trump has been very public, as is everybody in his administration, that he wants Jerome Powell to cut interest rates to save the Trump failed economic policies. Because who doesn't want cheap money firing out of a fire hose when your own economy is on the skids? And that is the problem, even recognized by economists that work for Donald Trump, you never want the guy in power,

the person in power, who already controls fiscal economic policy to also get his greedy little dirty hands. on the monetary policy and turn on the spigot of U.S. money and have cheap dollars prop up artificially the economy, which would lead to inflation going through. You think it's high now. You think 3.3% year over year at the supermarket, and I think it's higher than that, is bad now. Wait until you see what happens when he starts lowering interest rates or is able to below 2%. And money starts flying out, cheap money starts flying out into the economy. And then he's out of office, right, midterm and beyond. And we're stuck with hyperinflation that the next presidency has to fix, much like Obama having to fix what happened with Bush, much like Biden having to fix what happened with Trump.

It's always a Democrat cleaning up behind the elephant, right? Literally having to fix the economy. Biden, Obama inherited such a terrible economy. We almost lost the auto industry and the banking industry at the same time. Biden comes in after COVID has to restart the heart of the American economy with several trillion dollars of public money in order to save the economy. Okay. And Trump is the beneficiary of all of that, right? Now, he's got no job creation.

He's got zero. He's got a GDP that a manufacturing sector, in America that's slowing to a crawl. He's killed the family farms. Tens of thousands of them have closed. Manufacturing is the one that has lost the most jobs, even under his tariffs to bring home manufacturing, right? And so he wants cheap money.

He keeps beating up Jerome Powell, who is one but a big vote on the Federal Open Markets Committee that sets interest rates on a monthly basis generally, based on they have two goals at the Fed, independent Fed, right? Try to create as much jobs as they can in the economy while keeping inflation low. And those sometimes are difficult to do at the same time. And they calibrate with the only tool they really have, which is interest rates,

they calibrate how to keep job creation, job growth going while also making sure we don't have hyperinflation. Well, Trump doesn't like it. He doesn't like the seven votes. And he's always wanted to have cheap money. So he's been bashing the guy that he appointed to the Federal Reserve back in the first term, Jay Powell, who by the way, his chairmanship is up in May. He stays on the board, but his chairmanship is up in May. But he wanted to, so he said, well, how come I get rid of him?

Well, why don't we do, why don't we try like what we're doing with Lisa Cook, who's on the Federal Reserve? We'll accuse her of a crime. Yeah, that's it. And we'll embarrass. He's a modest man. He'll be embarrassed. He'll resign, won't he? No.

So they went and tried to figure out. whether the cost overrun on the Fed was a crime or not, which is ridiculous. So when Jay Powell doesn't budge and the interest rates aren't being cut by this seven at the speed at which Donald Trump wants, and Donald Trump's bashing constantly of Jay Powell, he's an idiot, he's a dummy, he's a moron, he's costing the American people billions of dollars. That's very self, that sounds like Donald Trump talking about himself. but over and over and over again. When that didn't work, he had Janine Piro,

his political ally and the U.S. attorney in D.C., open a criminal probe investigation against J. Powell around the holidays, and apparently it went to a grand jury, and they got a couple of subpoenas from the grand jury to get all of the construction records related to the Federal Reserve's construction project. Now, as pointed out by Jeff Bozberg, the judge, who as the chief judge in D.C. is responsible for all grand jury proceedings. Okay. But it's very rare for a judge to be asked to quash subpoenas based on improper purpose, basically calling out the Department of Justice as being corrupt. So even Jeff Bozberg said there is an office of Inspector General that is responsible for reviewing whether there is fraud or crime.

crimes related to the construction project, and yet there's no evidence. So the Fed Reserve and Jay Powell, unbeknownst to us because it was sealed, brought a motion to quash the subpoenas issued by Gene Piero's grand jury and to end this folly. And Jeb Bosberg, who is the chief judge and also no stranger to the Trump administration, they've already brought a judicial complaint against them that got rejected. He moved to find them in criminal contempt. twice related to their taking human beings to El Salvador and the torture prisons there over, over court order without due process.

But he's the chief judge. And so he had to make a ruling. He unsealed all the papers so the public would know and he issued this memorandum opinion. And as you said, the first paragraph is not the judge commentary or ruling. It's just line after line of Donald Trump through social media posts, bashing J. Powell in order to change policy, to change interest rates.

There it is right there. And we have a posted on legal AF Substack as well. And he says, and when social media posts failed to cut rates, Donald Trump went to Plan B, which is what he's done, as the judge pointed out, to other political critics like James Comey, the FBI, former FBI director, Letitia James, Attorney General, New York, Adam Schiff, the senator from your home state of California, and now he turned Janine Piro on to go after and sick the dogs on Jay Powell. And the judge says, what I got to look at is whether

this was predominantly for an improper purpose to bring these subpoenas to try to influence policy and get him to resign or lower interest rates. And he's, I love that line. And Bozberg concludes that there is a mountain of evidence, his words, that indicate that this is about Donald Trump trying to get J. Powell to resign, and that there is no credible evidence of any crime in the cost overruns related to the renovation of those two buildings.

In fact, he says in the second and last page of his order, he said, I gave the government the opportunity to show just me in camera. It's called an in-camera or ex parte in-in-camera review. show me the goods. You got more evidence that demonstrates that I'm not aware of that demonstrates the criminality,

the probable cause for criminality, show it to me. And he says, and the Department of Justice in past cases has taken him up on that offer. He says in the hearing, they refused, and post-hearing, they never submitted anything

to show that they had any evidence whatsoever to support a criminal case against J. Powell. This should, subject to what we'll show a clip here from Janine Piro's response, crazy response, but if this is the end of the subpoenas, this should be the end of the criminal case, subject to an appeal. They'll argue that the judge is interfering with the executive branch's investigative function as the prosecutor.

We'll see all appeal up to the D.C. Court of Appeals again. But this should for now give Donald Trump an exit strategy because he can't get his federal Reserve next pick, who he also wants to make the chairperson. He can't get it through the Senate confirmation process because Tom Tillis, the outgoing North Carolina Senator, has said he is not going to vote for the new Fed chair or even the guy coming on to the board at all until the cloud over the Federal Reserve and J. Powell is lifted. Now, if Donald Trump's smart, he'll go, well, I, I wanted to, but a judge won't let me and then get his guy confirmed and make him the Fed chair in May. But Donald Trump, we know he's not. What do you think he's going to do next, Ben?

I don't think he has a plan. I don't think there's, I mean, the thing about all of this, and let's connect it back to the war, he has no plan for everything, for anything. And this has been his entire MO, his entire life. And so I think that Tillis is someone who, while I disagree with him a lot of the things, when he says he's gonna do something, he's gonna put the hold on, and he's not going to confirm Donald Trump's new pick, and then Donald Trump's what,

he's gonna start attacking Tillis. They'll probably launch a criminal investigation into Tillis, right? Like, he'll make the worst possible decision. He'll turn a bad decision into a devastating decision, into a catastrophe, into a bankruptcy. This all follows the same exact pattern. I mean, look who he surrounds himself. Do we have the,

But let's just play the clip of Pira right now. I mean, this is his crew, Popak here. Let's play it. Oh, cut it out. Do you know how many convictions we've got cut it out? You're in one lane. We have cleaned up this city. Yeah, historic, really?

I'll tell you what's historic. What's historic is that I prosecute everything other than 10% of the cases where the United States attorney before me didn't prosecute 67% of the cases. That's what's historic. I'm willing to take a not guilty. I'm willing to take a no true bill because I'll take all the crimes and put them in. Thank you. Thank you.

That's all the time me out. I mean, think about that. That's who's on his team right there. That's Piro. That's who he surrounds himself with. And so, you know, the short of it is Donald Trump will continue to try to appeal. It'll go to the Supreme Court. Then he'll whine that his pick, you know, as the federal chair is not going to be

The economy's already continued to crash because of the disastrous war. We're not going to have a pick for the Federal Reserve. That's what's going to happen, Popak. It seems pretty evident that that's where it's going to go. Let's talk more about it when we come back from our last quick break of the show. A reminder, everybody, make sure you hit subscribe on Michael Popock's YouTube channel, the LegalAF YouTube channel. Let's get it two million subscribers.

Also subscribe to Popop's legal A.F. Substack. Let's keep growing that substack community. there. If you want to subscribe to our YouTube channel here, you can. We'd love for you to do that. But make sure you subscribe to the legal AF ones for sure. And then also make sure if you or someone you know had been injured in a car accident, trucking accident, caused by the negligence of others, if you know someone who's been injured or seriously hurt or if you know a family that may have lost the loved one due to the negligence of others, reach out to Popok. Call or text 877 Popak AF

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Well, I was getting ready to talk about the news and politics today, and my cat Chanel decided she was the headline. She doesn't care about politics, but she has extremely strong opinions about her food. If this show ever runs late, it's because she refuses to let me talk about law and politics until her Smalls cat food is handled first. It's 2026. Do you still feed your cat like it's 1926? This podcast is sponsored by Smalls. Smalls is protein-packed cat food made with preservative-free ingredients.

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The discount codes for those sponsors are in the description below. Jordi and Popak spend a lot of time vetting and going through those sponsors, making sure that they are sponsors that we think that you'll like. So check them out if you can and support them. They support our show. Let's get into it, Popak, here. So, you know, you saw Judge Bosberg scathing ruling. And as I mentioned at the beginning of the show,

as Donald Trump gets weaker abroad, weaker here, you know, you finally are starting to see a lot of judges, you know, really speak out in the most forceful of terms that you never would really think that they'd be talking about it. a United States president, even one as demented as disgusting as Donald Trump. They're basically using finally the language of legal A.F, you know, whereas, you know, a few people may have accused us of being hyperbolic. I just said we're described.

We are painting the picture of what's actually happening. And if the, and in fact, the words that I use and you use sometimes in the titles or in our intros, frankly, don't do it justice. There needs to be, you know, the words. don't fit the moment sometime at all because Trump is truly this this rogue, horrible, disgusting actors. Even as I do it right there, I'm like, how do I describe someone who so doesn't belong in this position and who frankly belongs behind bars who's bringing our nation into this, you know, this, this or this horrific situation or who's brought us there? So Popak, talk to two topics before we,

where we go. One, current judges speaking out. What types of things are they saying? Number two, TikTok, updates there. I know maybe people's attention is not necessarily focused on that one, but I think it's an important one to discuss. Yeah. Yeah, thanks, Ben. I don't know what the opposite of hyperbolic is. Is it bollic?

I think at best we've been bollick. And yeah, let me stay on that for a minute. It's been hard for independent media like us for commentary where the only thing

that goes into our analysis is our own research and thought process. And sometimes you and I bouncing some ideas around with each other about what we're observing and then trying to communicate that the way you and I have in our past careers as successful trial lawyers and how to communicate that to an audience, an educated audience that's concerned of patriot, made up of patriots, and to do it in a way that that transmits the import and the historic nature of the event without being accused of being clickbaity or hyperbolic. I mean, when I said leading into the Bozberg discussion today, that district court judges quashing subpoenas because of finding that there's a Department of Justice criminal investigation that is not in good

faith is remarkable and it is unheard of and so when we talk about it I don't want people to think because it's it's just another segment on legal a.F or another hot take that Pope Buck or Ben made that it's part it's just part for it is par for the course but that it's normal because we can't lose that the the the the understanding or try to put it into a context that what we are watching with is an abnormal aberrational presidency and relationship with the Department of Justice and the American people and we shouldn't allow Trump to gaslight us and convincing us that what we're watching is normal politics politics as usual it's not it's criminality as usual but it isn't and we shouldn't accept it and and

allow him to patronize patronize us talk down to us and demean the American people he could he already calls the American people fools if literally if they don't agree with his Iranian policy or oil pricing or impact on their pocketbook sure because he's in a he's in a trillion dollar cocoon of his own making you know wait do you see the final tally of how much the trump family and donald trump and those around him will have made by the time they leave office i mean we were aghast when we when we learned that Jared Kushner and Ivanka made $700 million while they were in office the first time around. Those numbers are good. That's a rounding error.

That's chump change to what the family is going to make now. We're talking hundreds of billions of dollar, dictator-level dollars of kleptocracy and corruption. And how do we put that into words? So I will take it on the chin for those that think, well, we're just. trying to do is calibrate and to use the appropriate vocabulary and adjectives to demonstrate what's going on here. So when I talk about this next segment about current federal judges, not even X, it's one thing for former judges like Judge Ludick, who I just interviewed. I have a great interview up on Legal IF YouTube right now this morning. It's one thing for Judge Ludig or, you know, Judge Wolfe, who leaves the Massachusetts bench to become an opponent of the Trump administration.

It's quite another for current, active, presiding federal judges appellate and district court level to not only write in their opinions such scathing rebukes against the Trump administration citing to our founders, our framers, the federalist papers, the inaugural speech or the farewell address of George Washington, lyrics by Bob Dylan, you name it. They're like we are. They're struggling to try to communicate to the American people. How aberrational, how unpatriotic, how illegal and unconstitutional what we're watching really is. And so I've said it, and I said it in my interview with Judge Ludick, by 35 years of reading thousands of court decisions.

never seen a judiciary especially in the second year of this administration use the vocabulary and the language and the citations the way they are doing it now against the Trump administration but not just in their writings here's here's something else unheard of the American Bar Association has which is one of the which is the leading national Bar Association voluntary I mean you you join it. I joined it from the day I left law school and I've been a member ever since. But the American Bar Association has these conferences. They're devoted to sub-specialties within the law. Usually there's one in San Francisco for the white-collar criminal defense bar. And just the other day, three judges, an appellate judge on the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals

Federal, a Nevada trial court judge and a California trial court judge federal, got together and talked about effectively the depravity of the Trump administration and the Department of Justice while they're still presiding judges. We thought it was remarkable with Gittanji Brown Jackson during Law Day last year or even now has publicly said during meetings or conferences or Sotomayor has done the same thing, attacking in their own polite way the fellow justices of the Supreme Court in real time, in real life, about things that are having.

happening in the court. But to hear federal judges now kind of getting their groove back, having been flummoxed, having been dropped to the canvas and looking for their teeth after the first year of the Trump administration, they're getting their groove back. And as I joke with Judge Ludig, they're finally waking up to realize that they are federal judges and they have the power. And they shouldn't be concerned about phony judicial complaints against them being brought by the Trump administration or, you know, other attacks on their character or their family's character. They've got to do what's right under their oath for the American people. In fact, here's Judge Lutig, who has become, who's gone from, think about his

evolution. He's gone from rock-rib Republican, not MAGA, conservative icon, like on the Mount Rushmore of conservative icons, who Mike Pence consulted with. to save our democracy, to make Mike Pence certify that election on Jan 2020, it's because Judge Ludig told him he needs to certify the electoral win for Biden of the electoral cap. That, okay, former Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals judge, he should have been the right now, the Supreme Court Chief Justice over John Roberts. He was that close to getting the job. And now he's not only a constitutional.

But he is going out on a regular basis attacking the Trump administration, calling it out for being lawless and unconstitutional, attacking and criticizing the United States Supreme Court. He has said in the past that everybody needs to vote Democrat. I mean, if you would have told me, Michael Lutig would have told me that I got to vote Democrat to save democracy. And he said this is a turning point the way the revolutionary war was a turning point about our re-securing our liberty. Here's a clip for my interview with Michael Luke. Every single lower federal court judge has honored his or her oath to the Constitution of the United States to the letter, honored their oath. And in almost every single instance, those judges collectively have struck down as unconstitutional. essentially every single initiative of this president,

as the Constitution required them to do. So that today, the only, well, today, the only people who can save America are the lower federal court judges of the United States of America, and they are determined to do so simply by honoring their oath in every one of these cases, now of which there are hundreds, every single time Donald Trump opens his mouth or takes an action, the American people are forced to go into court and litigate it. That's the tragic place that America finds itself in today.

But to complete the thought, at this point, it is only the Supreme Court of the United States that is standing in the way of the American people saving their country. So when you put this all together, what are we watching? At least since February, at least in the last month,

federal judges are rising up and grabbing torches and pitchforks, and realizing that they have a job to do, and they've got to do it now. And they're speaking out in court cases and court rulings, speaking to us, the parties, the litigants, and history, and the future and future generations, and they're doing it in conferences and meetings.

And that is encouraging because without the district court judges and the appellate court judges below the United States Supreme Court doing their job, which is basically the justice that most of us are entitled to, then all hope is lost for our democracy. And just to final wrap on Lutig, Lutig has joined with 175 other judges, former judges, to file a brief with the United States Supreme Court

attacking and criticizing their continued use of the shadow docket to benefit Donald Trump and its policies enough. And then use the shadow docket, which is effectively not your normal appellate process. It's not your three briefs, three legal memoranda, oral argument, full record developed below. No, it's two briefs, no oral argument,

48 hours worth of deliberation and a ruling, allegedly not on the merits, only on procedure, but it really is on the merits. and then use that literally one paragraph or less of a ruling, not the normal 50 or 100 pages of a Supreme Court decision, but use that paragraph as a Supreme Court to chastise lower court judges who didn't follow the precedent of that one paragraph, and Judge Ludig, who I think wrote the brief.

You wouldn't admit it during my interview, but he got awful close, is telling the Supreme Court, you can't do that to the district court level, you want to give them guidance and write a proper opinion. But you can't point to a one line or a one paragraph and say, why didn't you follow who are, because you didn't give us any rationale, because you didn't give us any logic. You didn't give us any guidelines. And it's important now to finally take on the shadow docket,

and now you see 175 former judges joining together to go and effectively attack the United States Supreme Court. all very very very important so i wanted to as ben as you might have guessed had had to depart to go handle something really important for the Midas touch in the channel not more important than the podcast but certainly this evening something that he had to attend and i told him just go and i will i will do the rap let me talk about tick talk about tick talk not from the who gives a crap about that platform standpoint but from a money laundering extortion bribery scheme that may be part of what we're watching. Let me explain.

TikTok was banned from the United States by law of Congress supported by the United States Supreme Court because of its propensity controlled by the Chinese government to spy on Americans. I know everybody loves TikTok, right? I love all the little dances and ice box ice bucket challenges or whatever else is going on these days but at the end it's also accumulating a lot of algorithmic and other data that lands in the hands of the Chinese and that was all outlined and Biden signed the law Congress passed the law Trump had been in favor of the law until a buddy of his at a company called Susquehanna investments said, I have a big investment in bite dance, the parent company of TikTok, and, you know, you should

really reconsider. And then Trump started using TikTok to try to get elected, and suddenly Donald Trump became a big lover of TikTok. But here's what happened since. Trump decided he was going to use the TikTok sale to a non-Chinese set of entities as a way to extort money and maybe, follow my logic, maybe use it as a slush fund through a sovereign wealth fund that he's been dying to create since February of 2025, which would give him billions and billions of dollars to use without congressional oversight and funded by a $10 billion payment that apparently is being made or has been made by the buyers of TikTok. Now, let's look at the buyers of TikTok. a minute because they're all in bed with Donald Trump and his companies. Oracle, Larry Ellison,

Big Trump supporter, his son owns Paramount Skydance, which owns CBS, which is about to acquire Warner Brothers, which owns CNN. So CNN and CBS are going to be MAGA right-wing under the Ellison family. Ellison family's reward for that or payment to Donald Trump is. a $10 billion contribution payment to the Trump administration for letting them buy TikTok. Why is that so obscene and really shows you there's a possible extortion or bribery pay-to-play going on here? It's because the $10 billion represents 70% of the value of TikTok. Yes, J.D. Vance, who is responsible for brokering the deal, declared that the deal's enterprise value is $14 billion.

So let me get this straight. Larry Ellison, MGX, which is controlled by the United Arab Emirates in the Gulf states, and Susquehanna, which is controlled by a friend of Donald Trump's that's also in business with him in Truth Social, and MGX owns 49% of Donald Trump's cryptocurrency company. they're going to pay a 70% fee, $10 billion of a $14 billion deal into the government, for what reason? Because Donald Trump obviously told them, you want to be in business with me in the crypto thing? You want to be in business with me? You want CNN?

You want to be in business with me in truth social? You got to pay a $10 billion fee into the government. This parallel to this, Jared Kushner, son-in-law and chief, who said, in 2024 that he was not going to raise money in the second Trump administration because of the ethics conflicts is now suddenly changed course and while he's the Middle Eastern envoy screwing up the Iranian war in Intel is busy raising $5 billion for his private equity firm. He has no experience in private equity, by the way, from the same Middle Eastern Gulf State partners that are involved in TikTok and that are part of the Iranian war and the Iranian war solution.

The Trump family benefiting from foreign policy led by Donald Trump. Donald Trump extorting a $10 billion payment representing 70% of the cost of the value of TikTok from his friends and buddies that he's in business with, including the United Arab Emirates, in order to do what with? it. If anybody thinks that's just going to sit on the ledger of the general treasury as a deposit, you got another thing coming. Because one of the things the Democrats are going to have to do, now, not wait for midterms, is figure out where the $10 billion is and where it's going. My working theory is that the sovereign wealth fund that Donald Trump has been itching to create,

which would give him a fund of money that he is the president alone can control, much like his peace, board and the money generated there, the billion dollar entry fee for the peace board, also under Donald Trump's control, sovereign fund funded by things like a $10 billion fee, exorbitant fee for TikTok, then goes into the slush fund without congressional oversight that Donald Trump can keep doling out to people in his life, businesses that he's related to or others that he wants to curry favor with. A giant carrot he can use to encourage some, some, some content. conduct some transaction that he's in favor of. That's what I believe we're watching in slow motion.

I'll continue to follow it. Where? Here, legal A.F. I'm glad everybody has joined us. Great news about legal A.F. And the Midas Touch Network, legal A.F. Regularly in the top 50, sometimes in the top 30 of all YouTube podcasts. That is a, puts a chilled down my spine.

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Some of you are new today, but we have something in common. We vibrate on the same frequency. We believe in justice in a brand of patriotism that's missing in the White House. And we believe that in learning together, in speaking truth to each other, we will ultimately regain control, secure, re-secure our liberty, and run the bastards out starting at the midterms. I'm Michael Popock. Shout out to the Mid-est Mighty and the Legal A-Fers.