Legal AF by MeidasTouch - Legal AF - 5/2/2026

Episode Date: May 3, 2026

The award winning Legal AF pod, helmed by Ben and Popok, breaks down the breaking legal and political news coming out of DC, Delaware, California, Florida, Alabama, Louisiana, and the United States Supreme Court. Support our Sponsors: Qualia: Go to QualiaLife.com/legalaf for up to 50% OFF! HoneyLove : Save 20% Off Honeylove by going to https://honeylove.com/LEGALAF! #honeylovepod Cheers: Get 20% OFF your order by using code: LEGALAF at https://CheersHealth.com Smalls: Head to https://Smalls.com/LEGALAF and use promo code: LEGALAF at checkout for 60% off your first order PLUS free shipping! 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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Today. Offer ends May 10th. Terms apply. We've got a lot to cover on today's episode of Legal A.F. you have California Governor Gavin Newsom's lawsuit against Fox in Delaware is going to proceed a $787 million lawsuit. But I think what Newsom is most excited about in his defamation case is getting all of this discovery now that this case has been allowed to proceed by the judge. We'll break down what's going on there and how this discovery could have a number of bombshells, including the relationship behind this. scenes between Fox and Donald Trump in terms of how they communicate messages with the White House. Newsom is going to be able to get all of that in discovery. So pay attention there. Also,

pay attention to the fact that Donald Trump's $10 billion lawsuit filed in January 2026 against the United States government against we, the people, against the taxpayers for $10 billion. That lawsuit has been stalled. Now, we previously reported how a federal judge has been sent, look, I'm deeply concerned whether I even have jurisdiction, whether the parties are adverse to each other since it seems like it's a collusive lawsuit that you are the executive branch, suing another executive branch department that you control, and you're just going to force the Treasury Department to settle with yourself, Donald Trump. So a court doesn't have jurisdiction over that.

I'm not going to rubber stamp fraud and collusion, but the judge did something else this past week where she appointed three of the top law firms in the country in order. to really analyze and delve into what's taking place here and to provide their advice, their guidance as Amicus Curai will explain the import of this order. Also, Donald Trump running scared now that discovery is technically open in the J6 civil cases against Donald Trump. Now Mayor Lee of Oakland, who was then a Congresswoman Lee, is the main plaintiff in this case. But it involves lots of members of Congress and Capitol police officers and Metro Police officers who sued Donald Trump alleging his conduct regarding the January 6th insurrection.

Trump tried every trick in the book, immunity, this, that, the other, and he lost. This lawsuit was filed in 2021. So here we are five plus years later. And finally, Judge Mehta, the federal judge in D.C. says, discovery's open. Let's go. And what does Donald Trump do? Donald Trump says, no, I can't sit for discovery. I'm the president. I'm too busy for litigation. I'm focused on all of these things. I'm having imaginary

negotiations with Iran. I'm speaking at the villages and bragging about piracy in Palm Beach and then Americans are a bunch of pirates now. That's what we've turned the Navy into. I'm too busy. I'm making sounds in front of the senior citizens in the villages going, how could I possibly sit for discovery? And then Donald Trump, proving, I think, the other Judge Williams' point about collusive behavior, he then has the DOJ intervene and say, he's too busy. He's the president. He can't be saddled with discovery like this, really? Because he seems to have filed a new lawsuit in his personal capacity every damn week,

whether it relates to the Epstein files or whether it relates to his feelings being heard or whatever the hell his new lawsuit is. He seems to be a vexatious litigant, in my opinion. And so I think he should be able to sit for discovery. We'll talk about that. We'll talk about what's going on in the SPLC, the Southern Poverty Law Center, indictment where it seems that there was a lot of grand jury misconduct that may have taken place. In Alabama, the Southern Poverty Law Center is saying, you've made all these like allegations that we've kept our informant program of paying certain people

in extremist group secret. And you're saying that we've promoted it to promote racism to then stop racism. to then stop racism, and that somehow constitutes wire fraud and we're misleading donors. Oh, hello, you know the prosecutorial office that has brought these criminal charges against us? Yeah, we work with you for like the past 30 years. We've been working with you. You know what we're doing and we're passing on the information from informants for your prosecutions. We work with the FBI.

We work with local law enforcement. You should know this because like we're partners in this and like you should know about that. But even if you didn't know that we were partners in this, we sent you the information before you indicted us. Did you tell the grand jury or did you conceal this from the grand jury as part of a plan to grab the headline? And then ultimately, now you're exposed. We'll talk about that. James Comey, of course, was indicted for the second time now because he made a social media post 8647, which Donald Trump says, that's a mob hit. That's a mafia hit.

Really? I mean, it's a restaurant term for get rid of some. somebody. But Donald Trump says that that's a death threat to him. And so they filed criminal charges against James Comey for that. And James Comey's like, all right, I guess they filed the Seashell loss criminal case. All right. I guess I'm going to fight this one now. I mean, so utterly embarrassing. We'll talk about the big Supreme Court voting rights decision, the six three decision, right wing extreme Supreme Court, gutting section two of the Voting Rights Act. And if you've been watching Legal AF, you know that we, since Legal AF was started, we've been voting Rights Act

Hawks. We've been focused on it, reporting on it, reporting on Section 4, Section 5. We've been talking about the Shelby decision, Shelby County versus Holder in 2013, which got rid of the preclearance requirement, which kind of began this process of right-wing, Federalist Society, people gutting the Voting Rights Act. We're going to talk about all of this and more. Let's bring in Michael Popak, who's here on LegalAA. Popak, it's so great to see you. Me too.

I just wanted to say this is one thing before I lose the threat and the point, though. When we talk about the Voting Rights Act, I want to remind our viewers, this was a bipartisan piece of legislation that was passed in the 1960s, meaning Democrats, Republicans, came together. And they said, here's what we need to do to make a better country. And now in 2026 to have the Supreme Court gut it, that's not what the Supreme Court should be doing. Similarly, Popak, when you talked about Citizens United and all of these important and critical decisions that, you know, Citizens United overturning critical pieces of legislation, that is, like McCain Feingold, which stopped all of this corporate money and created campaign finance reform and help the system for the better. Then the Supreme Court goes, oh, looks, Democrats and Republicans working together to stop. corporations polluting and perverting our elections. No, we're going to stop that also. Let's call

corporations humans and that they can speak whatever they want to do and there could be no limitations. And I bring that because this is why we created legal AIF, Popak to educate people on what's really happening and how these right-wing forces, the Supreme Court, Trump and others are just destroying the justice of what we can do to fight back. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, the Voting Rights Act is a prime example. we'll talk about it a little bit later, but, you know, the, the, there we're going to be talking a lot about constitutional amendments that came out of the Civil War or Reconstruction era. Right now we're talking about the Voting Rights Act later in the show today. In the next week or two, month or two, we're going to be talking about birthright citizenship, the 14th Amendment. Today we're going to talk about the 15th Amendment.

And it took America 100 years to move from the 15th Amendment and Equal Protection Clause in 1865 to 1965, if it was a minute, for the civil rights movement to come together led by Martin Luther King Jr., Medgar Evers, Malcolm X, putting pressure on Lyndon Johnson after the assassination of JFK, to pass the Civil Rights Act, which was anticipated 100 years earlier

by the amendment, which said there'll be a congressional statute, which will govern in this area. And then they finally did it, and all John Roberts has been doing since he's been the Chief Justice of the United States, and as soon as he got the numbers, was to chip away brick-by-brick at the Voting Rights Act.

He chloroformed it. He got rid of Section 1, Section 2 is now beyond on life support dealing with actual the rights of somebody to vote, and as it maps on to congressional maps. And it's easy what your point that you turn it over to me on is exactly right. That's not what the United States Supreme Court should be doing, legislating from the bench about these key issues. And then they have a very convenient little trick that, again, when we get to the segment, we'll talk about. And I knew we were in trouble, not this week. I knew we were in trouble in 2019 on cases that you and I reported on when the Supreme Court said that partisan party gerrymandering, drawing up of congressional districts was not only was it okay, but you would not be

able to come, even come into court. They were locking and chaining the door of the courthouse to even have somebody come in and argue that a map drawn to basically draw away Democrats in the South, let's say, that that is a violation of the Voting Rights Act or our Constitution. Oh, no, no, that's a political issue. That's not justiciable, meaning you can't even come into the courthouse. As soon as they said red and blue redistricting is okay, even if it impacts black and brown people. As I heard that, I was like, uh-oh.

And then they've combined it now with the Voting Rights Act that we will get to. And the thing that really calls me, so much calls me, but the thing that really calls me is Friday was May Day, which is celebrated in different ways around the country, around the world. It's either International Workers Day. It's also known as the Rule of Law Day in America, starting with Eisenhower in 1958 and codified in 1961 by Congress. And it's a time for lawyers, like the ones on Legal AF, and the judiciary and other people, other civic-minded people, to celebrate what makes America different from the tyrannical despots of the Cold War

and in the current era. And this year, the American Bar Association, who I think we'll touch on later, declared the theme rule of law and the American dream. Donald Trump, who's busy capturing, hijacking these concepts of American values, and then contorting them for his own purposes, that's all we've been watching, right? You go on the website now for the White House. First, you have to click through. I think I'm on some sort of, I've landed on some sort of vendor on YouTube.

I've got to click through the Golden Era, email capture. Once I get through there, this is what he said about, or somebody wrote for him about Law Day. He said, under my leadership, we are in the new golden age of America. Who feels that way? One that remains firmly rooted in respect for our laws, reverence for our Constitution, and an unwavering commitment to the eternal truths that have guided our nation for two and a half centuries. Is that what we've been watching over the last 16 months, a respect for our rule of laws, for our judiciary, for our United States Supreme Court?

And it gets worse. The Justice Department, led by Todd Blanche, Donald Trump's former criminal defense lawyer, his a partisan hack by the name of Hartmeet Dillon who runs Civil Rights Division. This is what they said about it. That the Department of Justice, we are deeply aware that the rule of law is not an abstract principle,

but a living foundation upon which our society is built. Listen to this, Ben. This law day, we reflect on the dedicated public servants, legal professionals, judges, and law enforcement officers who work tirelessly to uphold these principles and are committed to strengthening these institutions. That's the openly defiant Department of Justice that on a regular,

hourly basis violates court orders, tells them in effect to go F themselves, attacks them in social media posts as Marxists, radicalists, criminals, along with their family that sits idly by as the self-proclaimed chief legal officer of America, Donald Trump, the criminal in chief, as he goes after even his own appointed United States Supreme Court justices. That's right before he brings them into a state dinner so they can have a champagne-soaked dinner wearing white tie and white tails or whatever it is just before dropping the Voting Act decision. So this disconnect or this gaslighting of America, forget about the golden age of America, it's the gaslighting of America about Donald Trump and his Department of Justice.

They crap on the rule of law and the institutions that you and I hold dear as professionals every hour of every day. And this is, this is, I think, the moment, the reason that you and I founded Legal A.F. Six years ago, having seen the tail end of the first Trump administration, and not that you and I were brilliant in our crystal ball about, he could get elected again one day. I mean, we were both shocked when he still had political viability after Jan 6th. But this has always been a break-the-glass moment for our... for and validates, you know, not only us creating it, but the audience and the fellowship that we've been building on the other side of the microphone. And I really have just so, I was so honored to

take my oath again, which is up on Legal AF Substack on May 1. I've been, I've been a lawyer for 36 years and just to renew my vows to my profession and to the, into the public, publicly was just so cathartic, especially now. But, you know, it, It just galls me. It's eye-popping to read on the White House post, the DOJ post, how they are. Great supporters of the rule of law. We'll talk later about what they're doing against the ABA and law schools as this podcast progresses. Yeah.

And corporate news will take that press release and they'll regurgitate it and say, here is what they said. How many times do we hear? Here's what Trump said. Here's what the DOJ said. And you have to look at it and say, is, are these things that they are saying? Is that true or is it false?

Do we republish it? Do we become the stenographer and the propagandists? Or do we speak with truth? And do we speak with fearlessness and courageousness? And I think that's what's needed at this moment. You think about the other headline from this morning, Popak, that it's official Spirit Airline, is now bankrupt. They had 17,000 employees, I think around 7,500 were remaining. And so all of those

employees lost their jobs. And what does Donald Trump and Sean Duffy and right-wing media do immediately? They blame Biden and say it's Biden's fault because Biden brought antitrust proceedings against JetBlue and Spirit Airlines in 2024. It is, everything is a Biden thing, a Biden, this about Donald. Wait, wait, before you move on, finish that point out, but I want to say something about Spirit. The point is that Donald Trump said he brought in $21 trillion or $18 trillion, depending on which metric of lies that you use, that we're living in a golden age, that everything's more

affordable, including apparently jet fuel should be as well, that all of our businesses are thriving right now. And the buck stops with the person in charge right now. That's Donald Trump. May of 2026. We're recording this the evening of May 2nd of 2026. What Biden did or didn't do in 24, these things weren't happening under Biden. Look, if, you know, Spirit Airlines went bankrupt January of 2025, oh, you know, maybe, you know, February of 2025, all right. I mean, you're in charge now. But, you know, Donald Trump, Mr. The government's going to do this and I can do

all of that. You know, it's your fault. It's your fault. You're the one in charge. You can keep on say, oh, the Democrats are responsible for the gas prices. The number that does that. And whenever you heard him speak like he's speaking in Miami, you know, at Palm Beach and he was speaking at the villages, you know, his whole thing is that he blames Biden for all of the bad. And then he takes credit for all of the things that he thinks, you know, you know, was good. And it's just, that's lame. Like, that's not, that should not be what our policy is. Let me do the real contrast here. Donald Trump, using his Commerce Secretary and Transportation Secretary, Howard Lutnik and Sean Duffy, could not figure out a way to bail out a problem of their own creation with the Iranian war, which doubled jet fuel prices, spirit error, which frankly has not turned to profits since 2019.

Under Donald Trump's original, if you want to blame somebody, they haven't turned to profits since Donald Trump's second to last year in office. but it wasn't helping them in bankruptcy to come out of bankruptcy and to still be a low-cost provider for American consumer and travel public and put pressure on the Jet Blues and the United Airlines and the American Airlines who are all literally rubbing their hands in glee that their competitor went out of business. Here's the sharp split screen contrast. Trump, using his Commerce Secretary, couldn't figure out a way to bail out 17,000 jobs. and keep Spirit Air alive.

Go back to Obama. He saved an auto industry and a banking industry working closely with Tim Geithner, his Treasury Secretary, who previous to that had been a chief economist and worked in the Fed, so knew what he was doing. And working together, Geithner and Obama saved two major industries,

and we got all our money paid back from those bailouts. Fast forward, he puts Howard Lutnik, the Commerce Secretary, with the Treasury Secretary, nowhere to be found. Scott Bessett, not that he's qualified either, but nowhere to be found, he puts Lutnik, the dealmaker, back in. Oh, the guy that cut the deal with U.S. Steel and Intel and all the other investments with our money that the Trump administration has made all of these sketchy investments.

But when it comes to saving a major segment of an industry, upon which our economy relies, we're coming into the summer travel season, the billions of dollars that would have been a part of the GDP of our country, and business travel, which is back, you know, you have to now attend meetings. You can't just zoom them in anymore. And they just blithely, well, we tried. We're the dealmaker. They caught Donald Trump a day or so ago, well, you know, if the deal's not right, I'm not going to go for it. That's 17,000 jobs. Even Lutnik report, reportedly told him, this is political viability for you.

You can brag about 17,000 jobs in the Midwest or wherever it is. If you, you know, during the midterms, nope, folded. And that's it. You know, that's another victim of Donald Trump's Iranian war because jet fuel prices have gone up double. And anyway, I just wanted to contrast. If you want to go back and say whose stewardship should be admired and who should be despised, look at Obama did versus what. Donald Trump just did at a similar moment.

You know, and that's why often what we talk about in the courtroom and outside the courtroom, though, is steady leadership, steady hand, qualifications. We might as well talk about the ABA briefly here because, you know, the ABA, the American Bar Association, plays a major role as a kind of a broader governing body regarding, you know, the rules of professional responsibility, putting forward model ethics rules, model rules regarding legal claims, and then there are state bar associations that, you know, often utilize those model rules, and, you know, then you have state bar associations that work to regulate the practice of law and to ensure that qualified people become lawyers, and that they're the

ones who ultimately are able to, you know, practice in a way that is, that follows rules of professional responsibility and has done at the highest level. And Popak, you know, we should talk about this right now at the outset because one of the things the Trump regime has done is attack state bar associations, to attack the American Bar Association, and to call things that have never been viewed as partisan. And no one would ever look at the ABA and go, oh, the A.B. A.A is a lefty organization. As a lawyer, that's like the craziest thing for me to even think about somebody calling the ABA, which looks at judges, for example, and says whether a judge is qualified or not qualified

to become a federal judge, that this is some sort of like radical extreme organization. It's like the furthest thing from it. But Donald Trump, in his attack on science, on his attack on qualifications, on his attack, and this whole regime who are people who really didn't make it in their fields. They're kind of losers. And so they are now in these positions and they want to entrench their whole group of losers and they don't want governing bodies that deal with qualifications. And so you have the DOJ, like it's the most wild thing for lawyers.

Popak, you can maybe be extremely better to me. to have the DOJ making social media posts and filing lawsuits that basically try to get rid of the American Bar Association and get rid of state bar associations and just have basically it be a free-for-all. It would kind of be like, you know, you know, you, I'm trying to think of a good example. Like you're at a restaurant and then, you know, your waiter's like, what would you like to eat? You know, and it's like the waiter's like, well, in addition to the menu, if you like, I could be, you're a cardiovascular surgeon. Like, I'm happy to perform.

It's like, what, what are you talking? I do that on the side, you know? It's like, okay, both by. Well, yeah. So the American Bar Association, just to give people a quick tutorial, when lawyers like Ben and me became lawyers, you go through an accredited, credentialed law school that prepares you both to be a member of the profession.

We are a profession to take that oath of office, that we talked about to uphold the Constitution, to be candid to the tribunal, to not lie, to help the underprivile depends on your state. And then you don't have to be a member, you're not regulated for your license standpoint by a bar association. You are licensed by depending upon your state, whether it's a unitary bar or not, either by the Supreme Court of your state or an appellate division of your state or like in Florida where I'm also a member, actually is a thing called the Florida Bar. They're very big on the the Florida Bar. And that's a unified thing that sits in Tallahassee and that regulates. That's how you get that's how you keep your

ticket to practice. Then there's voluntary bar associations which are about the profession, the improvement of the profession, model rules of professional responsibility, continuing education courses, lobbying on behalf of the profession, being an intermediary between the legal profession and society, civic involvement, courts, the bench, bench and bar events, that type of thing. And then, you know, it starts, if you want to do the funnel, if you will, there's kind of the national organization, the American Bar Association, which has always been apolitical and it's not a lefty Marxist organization,

especially since its founding. And then you have sort of other bars that promote the values and interests of different people, usually around, we call them specialty bars, county bars, state bars, city bars, and then these specialty bars. Let's say you're a Caribbean American, the Caribbean Bar Association, Black American, the Black Bar Association. I mean, literally in Miami where I live, I am a member of the, and I have been for 36 years, at least for the ABA, the American Bar Association, the Miami-Dade County Bar Association,

the Coral Gables Bar Association. I'm not even Cuban, but I'm a member of the Cuban American Bar Association, Caba in Miami, and so on. Okay? And I've been to all the events for the Caribbean Bar Association and different things. Because they have, while they're all in favor of the profession, they also have individual interests for their members depending upon what those interests, you know, where they're from or what their commonality is.

At the American Bar Association, they're much broader, right, macro. And they do things that Donald Trump hates, like ranking and rating the qualifications of judges. And almost all of Donald Trump's judges, especially in this first term, and now especially that he's putting on a whole series of election, deniers are being put up for life or have been confirmed for lifetime appointment in federal judge positions. At least eight former, recently former criminal defense lawyers for Donald Trump have been put up for or confirmed for federal judge positions at the appellate level like Emil Bovi. But not just able Bovary. We just had a guy from Sullivan and Cromwell who's handling Donald Trump's

appeals in New York, he's just got nominated for the Second Circuit and so on and so on. But depending upon their background and their expertise or their body of work, the ABA would rate you. Acceptable, not acceptable. And Donald Trump is always on the wrong end of that rating because he picks people that aren't qualified. Like if you ever picked Alina Haba and try to kick her upstairs to a federal judgeship, I predict she's going to be unacceptable to the ABA, not because of her politics, but because of her lack of independence, her lack of mature, you know, qualities that are necessary to be a reliable, independent, apolitical, trusted, neutral, which is what a federal or any kind of judge needs to be. Trump's been going after the ABA since he's been back in office.

He's tried to defund them. And that's led to lawsuits. The ABA is fired back and has sued the Trump administration when all of those law firms were getting blacklisted by Donald Trump to have their security clearance has taken away to cut off their livelihood, their ability to handle client matters before the federal government. The ABA brought one of the early cases. So they're no shrinking violet either.

They know that it's an existential threat to the legal profession and to the ABA, and they have been fighting back. Now it's gotten down to a few days ago an executive order where Trump's going to try to go after the ABA for their sole role or the sole ability to be the accredited, to give the credentials. It's called accreditation for law schools. You can go to a law school that's not accredited, but it doesn't mean you're automatically going to be able to sit for the bar. So you go to, like you want your doctor, for your prior example, you want your doctor to go to an accredited medical school. You know, listen, I don't know where that is.

It could be outside the country, but you wanted to be accredited. You want him to pass his boards. You want him to be board certified in an area. And the same thing with law. Now, Trump would love to make a whole, crop of MAGA lawyers who go through some sort of MAGA curriculum and are not diverse, not involved with equity or inclusion, just a whole bunch of white, deeply red MAGA lawyers. We already have a law school like that, by the way. It's called the Antony and Scalia Law School

at George Mason. If you want to be right, right wing, or you want to go to a Catholic university like Amy Coney-Barratt was a professor at Notre Dame, I'm not, bemoaning that, but they've got to be accredited. And the problem Trump has is that the Bar Association, as an independent First Amendment rights, the ABA is saying to be accredited, you've got to be focused on equity, diversity, and inclusion. And those are four-letter words for Donald Trump, because there's value in American society to have somebody like you and me come out of law schools where we were surrounded by people of diverse backgrounds. Even 30s. even 40 years ago when I started law school.

Wow, almost 40 years. It started law school. It was reasonably diverse. You know, I went to Duke Law School. We had a huge international student population that came over for master's degrees. So people from China and from eastern and central Europe and Central and South America.

And then we had a, I wouldn't say it was an overwhelmingly large black student population. But in fact, I just recently ran into, at my reunion, one of my classmates, Mo Green, who's now the superintendent of all schools in North Carolina. He ran for office. But he reminded me there were only eight men, black men in my class. I was like shocked that it was that low. But anyway, we tried for diversity. And that is important as we take up our role in society as counselors, as lawyers. for the downtrodden, for the underprivileged.

Not everybody goes into corporate law. People are also on the right side of the angels and do civil rights and constitutional law and other things. And some do it for free and pro bono to represent people who are the most disadvantaged in society. And that's important. And the legal system, if we've learned anything on legal AF, is so important to the day-to-day lives of people,

whether it's an accident case or a civil rights violation or what Trump is doing, or your constitutional rights, I think people now understand that a good lawyer is a necessity in this country. And this is a fight now for the heart and soul of what our legal profession is about. So shout out to the ABA. We love you and support you here on Legal AF, and we will do whatever we can to platform these issues here so people know what is happening. But this is what's happening. He's trying to yank the ticket of the ABA to make law schools. When we come back, I want to talk about the Newsom lawsuit proceeding to discovery, Trump's $10 billion lawsuit backfiring in his face, and Trump trying to block discovery into depositions, his role regarding the January 6th insurrection.

We'll talk about these major developments, why you've got to fight in litigation. It's why you got to make sure you're always pushing back and look, these Trump tactics that we're going to be. talking about, you know, are always, you know, things that are certainly discouraging, but there's a way to win, the way is to fight, to be relentless, and the way Newsom did, you know, Newsom sued Fox. There were lots of people who said, ah, did he file that lawsuit? Why file it? Now he's going to get a treasure trove of discovery as a result of this big win in the initial motion to dismiss phase.

All right. Let's take our first quick break of the show, a reminder. If you or somebody who knows has been injured in a car accident, a trucking accident, if you've been injured by the negligence of somebody else, reach out to the Popak law firm. Michael Popak has lawyers across the country, and he's got a team ready to take your phone call. Call or text 877 Popak AF or visit the Popak firm.com.

They're available 24-7. The consultation is free, and also make sure you subscribe to the LegalAF YouTube channel and the LegalAF substack. Check that out. Let's get those to continue to climb the charts. We'll be right back after our first quick break of the show. All right, let's be real.

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Please support our show and tell them our show sent you. Welcome back to LegalAF. Thank you to all of our sponsors. They help support this show, help support our sponsor, support the show. Discount codes are in the description below. And Michael Popock and Jorny. spend a lot of time with those sponsors, working with them to ensure we get you good products, good services, good discounts, good discount codes. All right, let's talk about three big cases

that are happening. And they kind of all relate to, I think, Donald Trump running scared, Donald Trump blocking discovery, the importance of discovery in litigation, why it's important to fight back and to make sure, you know, we assert ourselves with formal authority, legal authority, and never, you know, and never back down from a fight. So let's talk about California governor Gavin Newsom's lawsuit against Fox. He sued Fox for $787 million. He sued in the Delaware Superior Court system there. Why did he sue in Delaware?

We'll talk about that. What was the ruling by this Delaware state court judge and the ruling, an important one in terms of opening up discovery? We'll talk about that. Let's talk about the $10 billion lawsuit that Trump filed against the government or against really the taxpayers. He sued the United States government. He wants to take our taxpayer money. It's really against us, right?

And he sued for $10 billion. He was trying to enter into a collusive settlement, basically with himself. We previously reported how a federal court raised the issue of whether there's even jurisdiction in the first place because there has to be adverseness to have what's called Article III standing, Article III of the Constitution, requires there be a case in controversy, an actual plaintiff against an actual defendant, instead of like two partners who just want a judge to rubber stamp a settlement. And so the judge said, I'm not sure I have jurisdiction.

The judge ordered briefing before anything can continue in that case. But then the judge made a very significant move this week, appointing certain law firms to help guide her in the case. We'll talk about that. And then let's talk about what's going on in the J6 cases. Yep, those are still around. The civil cases brought by members of Congress and Capitol police officers and metropolitan police officers against Trump.

Trump dragged this thing out for five years, trying to make every claim of immunity, staying the case. You went to every level. He lost by claiming that he should be entitled to all of this immunity for his involvement in the insurrection on a civil case, that is, in the civil case. And that case is proceeding. Judge Mata opened up discovery. And then Donald Trump rushed emergency order. We need an emergency order. And then he had the DOJ make filings. Emergency, Judge, emergency. Stop the discovery right now. Donald Trump is way too busy. He's doing too many things. You can't force the president of the United States to have to sit through all of this discovery. So Popak, I think that's a nice bundling of those three topics. I'll let you take them in any order. But let me pass it to you to break down those three developments. I like the order you set him up. And let's start with Gavin Newsom.

I always love the suit. I always get tickled when we start talking about the $787 million. For those that are joining the story late, he purposely picked that number because that is the amount of the settlement that Fox News, the same defendant in his case, paid to Dominion voting systems in a defamation case in Delaware, before another Delaware Superior Court judge, for their platforming the big lie through Sidney Powell and Rudy Giuliani and others.

And so he picked it on purpose. And the heart of Governor Newsom's case was about a phone call and the timing of a phone call between Donald Trump and him just before Donald Trump sent in the jackbooted National Guard into California. And depending upon the timing of the phone call, if it was accurately reported, that would be one thing. But the way it was reported by Fox, John Roberts and Jesse Waters,

it not only made Gavin Newsom look almost complicit with like he agreed to the National Guard being called out, but actually went further when Jesse Waters did his show and had a Chiron at the bottom, you know, the call it the lower third at the bottom of the screen that said, Newsome lies about phone call with Donald Trump. And that is untrue.

That is untrue. And the question is whether actual malice has also been properly alleged in a complaint, the initial thing that kicks off a lawsuit, yes or no, because Gavin Newsom is obviously a public figure and you have to prove actual, you have to allege actual malice. Eventually you gotta prove it. We're only at the motion to dismiss stage.

So Fox filed. a motion to dismiss. First piece of paper in a lawsuit is always the same thing. It's a complaint. That's what we call it. Broken down by claims or causes of action and you have to have operative facts to support it. Depends if you're in state or federal court. Here we're in the Delaware courts, but it's always a complaint. The next piece of paper is either an answer or it's a motion of some sort. Motion to dismiss, motion for judgment on the pleadings, maybe right to summary judgment, you know, depends. Usually a motion to dismiss. And in the motion to dismiss, the other party, in this case, Fox argues that the elements are not present on the face of the complaint, because you

have to accept everything on a motion to dismiss, you have to accept everything as true that's alleged. If I wrote in a complaint that the sky, you know, the moon is made out of cheese, for the purposes of that motion to dismiss, it has to be accepted as true. I might be in trouble later on for making false statements, but that has to be accepted as true. And then the complaint is also reviewed in the light most favorable to the party that filed the complaint. So you get two benefits of the doubt. Fox comes in with suit should be dismissed. We accurately reported. The issue was not about the time of the phone call. It was about whether a phone call took place or not. And forget the Kairon that said Gavin Newsom is a liar. It's opinion. It's fair reporting.

You can't make out a defamation case. And actual malicism isn't made out. Their first argument was wrong court. Don't sue us in Delaware. Or apply a different body of law. Not California's apply Delaware's or New York or whatever. The judge quickly dispatched the motion to dismiss. He said, first of all, you're a Delaware corporation. So suing you in your home state of a corporation can never be a hardship for you. That's one. And secondly, he said, we're going to apply the Delaware procedural law. Okay, great. Now let's get to the merits. Here's the timing. On June 6th, it's hard to believe it's almost a year ago, this is a fact.

Gavin Newsom has a 16-minute phone call with Donald Trump. About, we don't know the content of it, but we know it took place. On June 10th, Trump is interviewed in the White House and says, yesterday, meaning the ninth, I had a phone call with Gavin Newsom and leaves the implication that because that was the rollout of the National Guard that almost like Gavin Newsom was okay with it. The problem with Donald Trump's story is the phone call took place three days earlier, but when Trump, when Fox reported it and John Roberts reported it, John Roberts apparently got Trump on the phone on Air Force One and he showed him his call log

to try to show that the call took place the day before, except the call log was for this three days before. But Roberts reported it as, we've talked to the president, he's shown me his call logs, proving that the phone call took place as the president said it did, meaning the day before, which made Gavin look bad.

Jesse Waters then runs with it. Now we're like, you know, this is telephone game. He runs with it, and they actually are ballsy, and they put a line of the, the bottom of the screen, Gavin Newsom, why is Gavin Newsome lying about the phone call? Gavin Newsom admits there was a phone call for 16 minutes. He just says it happened on the 6th, and there's proof of that. And Fox ran with it happened on the 9th. In the motion to dismiss, they said, it doesn't matter when it happened. We thought Newsom was upset because he said there was

no phone call. And so we reported that there was a phone call. The judge said, no, the issue at the heart of the defamation is that you misreported when the phone call took place and you branded him a liar and that's a statement of fact that's untrue at least as alleged and i'm letting the suit continue as for actual malice he said for now in the pleading stage all the things that gavin newsom wrote in his pleadings about how fox has it out for him fox has a political agenda against him fox has animus against him and knew or should have known that the call took place three days earlier and yet ignored all of the countervailing facts to run the story, Judge says that's enough for circumstantial evidence that there's actual malice. We'll get down later on whether that's actually proven at trial.

Now, what is putting aside all the inside baseball about how a motion to dismiss works? What's the importance of this? It's that the floodgates of discovery now open, meaning, The thing that led Fox to settle for $787 million against Dominion is that they had lost the motion to dismiss against Dominion suit, were forced into depositions and to have all their emails, all the insider emails between on-air talent and each other, producers at each other, executives and on-air talent, about all those issues, all got produced. They then got used in a motion for summary judgment by Dominion. That got filed on the court docket.

They never anticipated this. I don't know why. And all of the emails came out in the open. You and I had a field day. We had content for months of the emails of Tucker Carlson, calling Rudy Giuliani crazy, but also saying, we need to keep them on the air because it sells products. et cetera, et cetera.

We're now in that same moment. Emails about the relationship between Donald Trump and Fox, John Roberts, the phone call, the messaging, what they said internally before they went on the air, is all now fair game. To answer the question that inevitably will come up, can the Trump administration take an appeal?

I've done Delaware practice before. It is very difficult to get what's called the interlocutory appeal on a motion to dismiss to stop the case, meaning it's not going to be appealable or stop the discovery process right now. And so Fox's loss is Gavin Newsom's gain in terms of his suit.

Now, is he going to be able to ultimately prove $787 million with the damages? I don't know. That's for another day. But for right now, discovery is open. We're going to talk a lot about discovery and what it means when Donald Trump sues in a case and ultimately is going to have to pay the price

and sit in a chair and not argue that he's the president of the unit. You can't be both a plaintiff in a lawsuit and argue you're too busy and too important as president to participate in the process that you started. So this is where a lot of in Trump 3.0, this is where a lot of this is going to go as the Trump administration has been trying, hard and has been successful so far in dodging having its key people sit for deposition.

Pam Bonnie sit for deposition, she gets fired. Todd Blanche sit for deposition in a case involving Abrago Garcia, we're not going to put him on the stand at all. You know, we'd rather lose the case to put him up on deposition. Todd Lyons for a deposition, oh, no, he's no longer the acting director of ICE. So this is an Achilles heel for the Trump administration and Donald Trump. He does not, he knows he doesn't do well in depositions. or as witnesses in a witness box.

And just one last thing, Ben, it reminded me, and as a reminder to Donald Trump, Elon Musk just had a terrible day testifying up in your neck of the woods, the Northern District of California in a case involving chat GPT, where he took the stand and was cross-examined. At one point, I'll just leave this on this anecdote,

because this would be Donald Trump. At one point, he didn't like the question that was being asked of him by the opposing lawyer. And Musk himself said out loud, leading objection, leading question, to which the federal judge presiding over the case said, Mr. Musk, repeat after me, I am not a lawyer. And he said it out loud. And then he added, because he can't help himself, he has got to get the last word in. He said, but I did take Law 101 technically. and everybody in the courtroom burst out laughing.

Trump's not going to do any better in those situations. You and I have seen him in deposition and in testimony in various cases. And so the more we can get closer to that moment, the better it is for justice. And that moment is truth. That moment is discovery. It's under oath. It's actually the reality, not the bending of reality that exists on propaganda TV. It's why you and I became lawyers ultimately and why we started this program and this network.

It's not cheerleading a particular political party or specific politician, though it's cheerleading the truth and the facts. And in a court of law, the rules of evidence govern. You can't just throw anything in a courtroom. There has to be evidence that is credible. It can't just be hearsay or rumors or innuendo. And there's ways to assess. Is the evidence credible?

Or is this evidence purely speculative in nature? And if it is speculative in nature, then make it credible before it gets to a jury. And in this case, the audience, the American people, when we had a somewhat healthy for the state, there was a filter. There was a credible evidence check. And then Trump and MAGA and corporate news bending the knee and a broader authoritarian movement internationally kind of broke that and spread their propaganda using, you know, these various outlets. and it's time we flood the zone with the truth and get that in front of the people.

So it's a good example, though, Popak, because with Newsom v. Fox, that shows that these parties are clearly adverse, right? They're fighting each other, right? You know, in a courtroom, right? Fox wants to have the case dismissed. Fox wants it thrown out. Newsom is pushing to assert his rights to get before a jury. There's conflict.

There's a controversy, right? Contrast that to what's going on in this ten. billion dollar debacle where Donald Trump sued the government, the taxpayers for 10 billion dollars. And then Trump requested of this federal judge in Florida that he get 90 day extension for the defendant who's also basically Trump, the Treasury Department, Bessent and the IRS, which is under the Treasury Department, so they can spend 90 days to settle. Judge, we're going to try to do a little settlement here. Can you just allow this, you know, let's give a number.

90-day extension. The judge is like, I was waiting to see if the defendant was going to respond because in a normal case, they would do what Fox did in a Newsom case. They would fight. And when Trump's suing them for the government for $10 billion, there's so much defenses that exist, especially with the government entity, immunity, statute of limitations, just failure to state a claim in general. And the judge is like, no, I'm not going to bless a collusive settlement in a case that probably is in a case at all. So we previously reported on the Midas Touch Network how the judge said, I can't proceed right now until there's jurisdiction. So I want Trump as an individual and the defendants, the Treasury Department, separately brief the issue that there's truly separation

and that I have jurisdiction. In the meantime, the judge says, I'm going to hire three of the top law firms in the country that are well skilled in the most complex areas of, of law and they're going to give me guidance. So Popak, talk about this because, you know, these appointments, I think, were noteworthy, the fact that it was three law firms, not one law firm, the fact that the judge is doing an amicus curate. It's what you and I said. Go to the back of the episode.

It's exactly what you and I said should happen. The judge is now doing it. Talk to us about it, Popak. Absolutely. And to your point about adversary process, if you're lucky enough to go to London, I'm I'm on our audience, and you go and do a tour of Legal London, and you go to the royal court. That the entrance of the royal court carved in stone since the 1800s, we'll try to put a photo up, is a dog fighting with a cat on the way in. And it was done as a whimsical reminder of the adversarial nature of the suit

that is supposed to be administered by the Royal Courts of London. You can't have two cats. You can't have two dogs. Well, I guess you're going to have two dogs, but that is what we're talking about. So when, and I know Judge Williams well, when Judge Williams in the Southern District of Florida and Miami, who's not to be, most of the federal judges are not to be trifled with, and she's, you know, just really, really brilliant. And had been the long time how she got there, She had been the longtime federal public defender for years in Miami and also in Orlando in the middle of the state. That was her background before she and one of the few federal public defenders that actually has been has taken the bench.

And as you and I said, she figured out right away that I don't have two adversary parties here. I've got Trump on one side and his IRS on the same side. And that is a problem. The problem for Trump is, if there is not a real legitimate lawsuit, then there can be no settlement of the lawsuit because there's no exchange of consideration, which means if he wants his $10 billion, he's going to have to rob the IRS

to do it because there won't be a lawsuit to use as a cover for settlement. That's why he's fighting so hard to keep this lawsuit. Some people might be asking, why does he just have the IRS, stroke him a check? Because that is just broad daylight robbery at that point. That's just grand theft auto. So he has the lawsuit brought by his, he brings against his own entity. So she wants to get to the bottom of it.

Now, the you and I had covered before, for instance, the inherent authority of a federal judge, when they sense that the fix is in, to bring in an outside party to advise. Judges do it in different ways. We talked last week or so about Judge Ho in New York, who when he sensed there was a problem with the dismissal of an indictment against Mayor Adams of New York

that he didn't have an adversary party on the other side with the Department of Justice coming in to dismiss it. And people arguing, that they're doing it in order to coerce Mayor Adams into following their immigration policy, he said, you know what? I'm going to bring in a special counsel to advise me and write a brief to me about whether this indictment should be dismissed or not. And he did. He appointed a former Solicitor General under the Bush administration to handle that. In Florida, and under Florida law, they also recognize another method, equally as good, I think, which is that a judge can appoint

friends of the court, we call them amicus curai or amici, to advise the court. Now, when you're in a regular lawsuit, a judge doesn't have to invite amicus briefs. They just come in on important topics. And they could have just come in on this important topic. Or she could take the lead and the initiative. to say, I want briefs to guide me. And she didn't just say one, like the way Judge Ho said, I'm going to appoint, you know, this former Solicitor General. She said, I want to, I want a broad spectrum. And she was smart.

I know these firms and so do you. Devovois in Plympton, major white shoe firm out of New York, a boutique firm that's very well regarded in Salenda Gay, which I've litigated with before. And they were, they all spun off from another major firm, but are very, very well respected in this area. And then a third firm. And they're going to, they have a deadline.

She still has an obligation. She still has made it an obligation of the IRS and Donald Trump to do their own briefs. Don't do a joint brief. That would be, that would be the death, that would actually prove the point. But now she's going to have the benefit of the wisdom of three law firms that don't have an axe to grind that are not, connected to Donald Trump or to the IRS or to the judge to give her independent evaluation. The interesting thing is going to be these three firms, I participated in a situation where my firm and another firm were up for a beauty pageant to see if we were going to be selected.

That's what it used to be called for a to handle a client. And to test us, they wanted both sides to each firm to submit a, kind of a white paper about how they would handle the case. And I saw the other sides after. But these three are going to be working completely independently. They're not going to be sharing. They're not going to be setting drafts around. And it's going to be interesting to see how the three come out in terms of can a president

while he's in office sue his own executive branch agency for money damages or otherwise. Now, if I'm a betting man, I think it's going to come up three cherries against Donald Trump on the slot machine. I think they're going to find that that's not appropriate and that it would never survive Supreme Court review. But we'll have to see it. It'll be very interesting. This is the first time, just to put us in context, first time in six years that you and I've been doing the show that we've ever had this method be used by a judge concerning a Trump issue. And I think you and I are both curious and slightly excited to see what the result's going to be. And then what Judge Williams said.

She'll have five total briefs, right? She'll have the one from Trump, the one from the IRS. She'll have the three amicus briefs. You don't get an opportunity to comment on the amicus briefs. And the way she set them, I don't matter. I have to look at the deadlines. I don't think Trump's going to have the benefit of them. So she's going to have five briefs giving her some opinion.

But she's the one in the black robe. She's going to make the ultimate decision. but what hangs in the balance, and I don't want to make this to, I don't want to lose the point. If she rules that he can't sue, he just lost his lawsuit subject to an appeal, and he just lost his ability to shake down the IRS for billions of dollars. And look, I think that we all know that that's what he's doing. I think what the federal judge is doing right here is making sure she does due diligence and that if ultimately that's the decision that's reached, she gets a number of

perspectives and she can make a record that when this goes to the 11th Circuit or to the United States Supreme Court, which is what Trump will inevitably do, that there is a significant record because there isn't a record when there's no adversity. There normally would be a record when plaintiff sues defendant and they fight each other and they're trying to get in front of the judge, the law, the facts, the evidence, and they're trying to persuade and convince and have all the information. exist. So if the judge just says, I don't have jurisdiction, then that's going to allow Donald Trump to try to use that and go, ah, you just are partisan and you're an Obama appointee, and that's why you're doing it. And the judge, I think, is going to say, look, I've brought in this wealth of knowledge

and I think she's going to make the ruling appeal proof. And that's what I think is happening. Now, since we all know what Donald Trump is doing, Trump is on video and audio bragging about settling with himself and that there is no adversity and that he's already won the case before it started. He's on audio saying that. And that's how Donald Trump and dictators and authoritarian want the system to look like. It is foregone conclusion, the outcome because you're on both sides of the case. Just very, very briefly because I've touched upon in the first segment, I've touched upon it right now as well. Those J6 cases that were filed against Donald Trump for his involvement in the insurrection, civil cases they were proceeding. Donald Trump using the justice to

to try to block discovery there. He's saying that he's too busy. There's so much going on that the proceedings need to be stayed. He's kind of recycling arguments that he already made where courts have found that he's not entitled to immunity for purposes of this case. And, you know, I just think it's worth noting here that Donald Trump, who's brought so many lawsuits in his individual capacity, including a $10 billion lawsuit that was brought against the government, whether he wants the taxpayers to pay in a number.

normal situation. You bring a lawsuit, you're subject to discovery. You have to sit for deposition. You have to go through the process. You don't get to file a lawsuit and go, now you don't get to question me because I'm the president of the United States. No, you brought in an individual capacity. You're being sued in the J6 cases as an individual capacity. Just sit for a deposition and stop being pathetic. You know, you go in front of, you do these weird speeches across the country where you make your noises and you grunt and you lie about everything. You call up state regime media where you lie about everything. Tough guy. Go under oath. No one wants to be deposed. It's not fun to having your deposition taken or being involved in litigation, but you're in it now. So sit there. Stop whining.

Stop complaining. Shut up. And just let the facts be what the facts be. You know, and it just, again, as a former practicing lawyer, somebody who watches, it's just so pathetic to see someone like that who acts all tough and sues everybody. Then he squirms and refuses to even sit for a deposition. But that's him, a paper tiger. You hear him always saying paper tiger, paper tiger, this is a paper, NATO's a paper tiger. NATO's not a paper tiger. What are you talking about? NATO defended the United States after 9-11. NATO has been the opposite of it. Your whole life is being a paper tiger and having people bail you out and you're exposed right now once again in front of the American people and in front of the world, frankly, with this naval blockade that you think is working in Iran,

which isn't as oil prices at record hides. All right, let's take our last quick break of the show. When we come back, I want to talk about the voting rights ruling by the Supreme Court. And then I want to combine the topics of the Southern Poverty Law Center and the Comey indictment into one, because to me, what it's really showcasing, and this will be the way we frame the topic, Popak, is acting Attorney General Todd Blanche trying to endear himself to Donald Trump to become the Attorney General by bringing prosecutions that even Pam Bondi wasn't going to do. I mean, this idea of indicting Comey for a social media post of seashells. Bondi didn't want to bring that.

Similarly, the Southern Poverty Law Center case wasn't brought for a reason under Bondi. I mean, and she brought some horrific cases because the Southern Poverty Law Center was working with the prosecutor's office, working with the DOJ to get the bad guy. So in order for you to indict, you'd have to essentially lie to the grand jury and say that the Southern Poverty Law Center wasn't doing that. And that's apparently what they did. They showed up apparently to a grand jury and told them incorrect information. We don't have the grand jury information yet, but Southern Poverty Law Center is saying, federal judge, we should now get, even though normally their secrecy, we should be getting this because we should be getting this grand jury information

because the only way they could have indicted on these facts as if they lied, because it's just not true any of the things that they're saying and they know it. Or let's take our last quick break of the show, a reminder, if you were somebody who know I've been injured in a car accident, trucking accident, auto accident, negligence of others. Make sure you reach out to the Popok firm. You can call or text 877 Popak AF or visit the Popak firm.com. You may know someone who's been injured or another family

or someone who had a tragic thing happen. Reach out to the Popak firm and see if you have a case. Also, subscribe to the LegalAF YouTube channel and the LegalAF substack. All right, thanks, everybody. We'll be right back after our last quick break of the show for the home stretch. Look, the magnesium, it's something much. Most of us lack, and if you're taking that drugstore variant, you're still not getting the full picture. Industrial farming, chronic stress, and everyday aging all make it worse.

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That's 60% off your first order plus free shipping and free treats. for life when you head to smalls.com slash legal a.F. Welcome back to legal a.F. Thank you to all of those sponsors. Two topics left. We need to discuss number one, attorney general or acting attorney general, Todd Blanche, wanting to become the attorney general, brought that Comey indictment against former FBI director for posting seashells. Then the week before bringing that case against the Southern Poverty Law Center in Alabama saying that they They basically kept informants with extremist groups but didn't disclose it.

And that constitutes wire fraud because people were giving money to the Southern Poverty Law Center to fight racism and to fight extremist groups. But I guess the theory of the case is that the Southern Poverty Law Center, they were the racists and they were the ones promoting the extreme. They were the extremist groups. They were promoting them and then saying, look, we're fighting the extremist group. And when that criminal case, when that indictment dropped, I was like, this makes literally zero sense, but I want to wait for Southern Poverty Law Center to respond. And of course,

Southern Bodies Law Centers. And what are you talking about? Everybody knows about our informing program in the FBI and DOJ and local law enforcement because we work with you. We work with this prosecutor's office that brought these charges. We help you find the bad guys. And then people donate to us because we work with you to help find the bad guys. That's like what we do. And so the Southern Poverty Law Center is now saying as it relates to, you know, the grand jury proceedings, which are usually supposed to be kept secret under Rule 6E that we have to pierce the veil of secrecy as it relates to this grand jury. This is a theme we've been seeing with a lot of Trump grand juries, including Comey's first indictment where Comey got his hands on the grand jury testimony.

And it turned out there was egregious misconduct taking place there. The Southern Poverty Law Center is saying, it's impossible that you got an indictment based on these facts unless you literally lied to the grand jury. And just for those to remember those to note, in a grand jury, there's no judge in the room and there's no defense counsel in the room. The grand jury is just the DOJ and the grand jury members who rely on what the what the DOJ tells them. There's no objection. There's really no rules of evidence. And it's based on the ethical behavior of the DOJ, you know, bringing meritorious cases because if you bring a case that's not meritorious in the past one, you'd lose your job. It would shatter the credibility of the DOJ.

It wasn't, yes, did the DOJ overreach in the past? They'd bring some bad cases. Can you say that there was like there was never misconduct before? Of course, there was misconduct before. It happened. But the systemic level and the egregious nature, you know, that we see under the Trump regime is truly unprecedented. So that was Southern Poverty Law Center's responses. We think that this grand jury proceeding was tainted by false.

false information and the Southern Pauvin Law Center saying, we gave you all, we gave the DOJ the information also that shows we work with you. Even if you want to just ignore it, we put it in front of you anyway that we work with you. Then you had the James Comey indictment by this DOJ based on a thing he posted a year ago where he posted 8647 with seashells and Trump and the DOJ is. And 86 was a threat on Donald Trump's life by using the number 86 and 86. is a restaurant bar term, get rid of. You know, you 86 somebody from a bar, you get them out of the bar, you get them out of the restaurant. But there's a criminal case that's filed on this basis.

So Popak, talk about this. Then let's pivot quickly to the Voting Rights Act. I know you and I have covered the Voting Rights Act extensively. So I don't need to redo a whole rehash of that ruling. But talk about, you know, Blanche making his move right here, why these cases are going to collapse. Then you can just pivot right to Voting Rights Act, if you like it. And voting rights act is simple. We'll get there at a minute. Rather than do the top line, which we'll do it a second. It's what's happening since. It's the starter pistol that got fired for the race to the bottom. But Democrats fighting back as well. We'll get to gerrymandering in a moment.

On the Comey indictment, he and Patrick Fitzgerald, his lawyer, used to be the Chicago U.S. attorney, should be lighting candles and saying novenas, because if this is the indictment, the best they can come up with is seashell formations on a beach in North Carolina. And having worked in restaurants, including in diners, 86 means remove. It means remove it from the menu, like 86 the coleslaw, 86 the onion rings. It doesn't mean take the onion rings out in the back and assassinate them. And this has always been the problem. There's new reporting that this indictment was so flimsy that even Pam Bondi, yes, Pam Bondi. Yes, Pam Bondi did not go forward with it and apparently the only thing stopping it from being let out of

the cage was was Pam Bondi. Now Todd Blanche was already demonstrated there is no depth he will not sink in order to try to obtain the permanent role of Attorney General sacrificing all whatever ethics or shred of credibility he had before is now completely out the window. That's why we're seeing a ramp up of all the political enemies of Donald Trump in indictments since Pam Bondi has left the building. So the Seashore indictment is likely not going to make it past a motion to dismiss, as we've talked about before. There's a body of law out of the United States Supreme Court that defines what a attack on a threat, a criminal threat on a president and what it sounds like. And this ain't it. This is a parody. This is sarcasm. This is

hyperbole, this is rhetoric, this is core protected First Amendment speech, but it ain't a crime. And Donald Trump screwed up his own case anyway when a reporter for CNN in the White House during this kind of wide-ranging Oval Office presser asked, Caitlin Collins asked, were you afraid for your life last May when you saw the Insta photo of a shell formation by the shells? Well, I don't know. It's hard to tell. I'm not sure.

Well, hard to tell. I'm not sure. That does not a assassination attempt make. See, this administration also exploits any opportunity they have rather than try to bring the country together or otherwise. You know, a person breaks in a floor below Donald Trump at a White House press dinner, White House correspondence dinner with malice. his heart, that's an excuse to build a ballroom. And to go after James Comey for a year earlier,

or a seashell formation of 8647, forgetting that every other right-wing podcaster has used the term 86 and Biden, 8646 in the same reference. Or to go after Jimmy Kimmel again because of a joke he made two days before the White House correspondent's dinner about Melania Trump and the age difference with Donald Trump. So he never lets a tragedy or an averted tragedy go unexploited. But we're on to him now. I mean, we know the MO. We know the blueprint here.

I think the judge up in North Carolina, who's a George W. Bush appointee, is going to make quick work to get rid of that indictment. And Lord knows what was said in that grand jury room. See, normally you don't get the transcripts of a grand jury. They are secret to protect the grand jury. Even defendants don't get them unless you have a good faith argument that something awry went on inside, like the Southern Poverty Law Center, or James Comey, given the timeline

here of their initial attempt to indict him having failed. And now vindictively, at least the argument goes, going after him. him again. There's last reporting here, Bev, before I turn over to the last story, that even Trump thinks this is not, this narrative of the Seashell indictment is so laugh out loud that even Trump's upset about it. And apparently, Eastern District of Virginia prosecutors are working overtime to try to bring him on charges, Comey on charges of, again, the classified documents that he already admitted in 2017, he declassified and sent to the New York Times in memos, which he already admitted to eight years ago, or what we like to say is three years after a statute of limitations is run.

So even, but Trump, again, let's just say the obvious. Trump doesn't care about the conviction. He cares about the press news cycle and that there was a news cycle that said, James Comey indicted, Adam Schiff, subject of mortgage fraud probe. Letitia James, subject of mortgage fraud probe. He got what he wanted. And now we know he's got the attention span of a gnat of a fruit fly. So he's moved on already in his mind. But those around him have done his bidding as they try out for attorneys general or judges or Supreme Court justices.

It's a lot of tryouts going on right now that you and I capture and analyze. synthesize. So you want to move to voting rights? Yeah, because look, this initial dopamine hit of the headline that gets out there, everybody's like, oh my God, he got indicted. You know, that commands the first 12 hours. And those are your best 12 hours in a case like that. That's been Donald Trump's entire life. You know, you then have to follow it up with with a plan and you should start with a plan, but that's your best day. And then everything else after that is bad headline, bad headline because the other side in an adversarial process going to adverseness, they have a say

in the matter too, right? Like Iran, they're not going to agree that your fake negotiations are happening. They're not giving up the straight of whore moos. In a litigation, Comey's not just going to be like, okay, I guess I guess I'm just going to, what, plead guilty to the Seashell case. No, so they're going to fight. And then what you have to do is you get into this fraudulent escalation, where you know where you keep on doing the next headline to cover up this headline and the next one and the next one and next one and then you're flooding the zone with all of these bad moves and you know a simple you know I mean just think I was going to say like a a really bad thing becomes a catastrophic thing I mean Trump lost the first Comey case he could have just moved on right I mean think about it I you know you had Lindsay Halligan she got bailed out with ways that she probably doesn't doesn't realize because if all of the grand jury stuff came out that she was doing, the best thing probably for her was that she was an unlawful prosecutor who didn't belong in the room to begin with. Because if you went into her conduct, stuff was going to get really real very quickly about our behavior. So you could have just moved on, but he does it again on seashells.

And then it just looks so, you're bringing a case over seashells. And then you shatter what the FBI is doing, what the DOJ is doing long term. And you think about other cases that the DOJ and FBI supposed to be prosecuting. And the lack of credibility the DOJ and FBI speaks with when they show up in federal court on all the other cases that they're dealing with, sex trafficking cases, drug cases, extortion cases, you know, major federal crime type cases. They have no credibility before judges and juries right now. And that's a problem.

And finally, though, Popak, it's like the Supreme Court's enabling this when they eventually, when they make these rulings like gutting the Voting Rights Act. But you and I, we talked about at the beginning, this is a bipartisan piece of legislation along with other civil rights legislation from the 1960s where Democrats and Republicans did the right thing and came together. And then to 2026, you have Supreme Court justices and this right-wing MAGA movement saying, yeah, Congress did all of that. but in the 1960s, but at the end of the day,

that's not, all of that stuff is unconstitutional. You know what's really racist? It's racist to focus on creating majority black congressional districts to block the racism of a state that tries to dilute the black vote. The racism, what the right-wing Supreme Court justice said, is ensuring that there aren't racist maps by allowing there to be basically proportional representation of states to black populations or Latino populations. Factoring that in, the Supreme Court says, that's being racist.

And it's not being racist to actually do the racist map, but call it political gerrymandering. Then you get away with it. That's what the ruling boils down to. Just call racist maps political gerrymandering, the Supreme Court essentially says, and you can do whatever you want with the map. feel free to dilute the vote of black voters. And if black voters step up and say, whoa, whoa, whoa, this is racist. There's 35% of the population's black.

And now we don't have a single Congress member from the black community. What does the Supreme Court say, whoa, you're being racist. The whole, why are you talking about race? We've moved beyond racism in this country. We've cured racism. And you're talking about black representation. You're being right. That's the gaslighting and the,

sociopathic nature of this ruling. And that's why Justice Alito wrote for the majority, because that's his whole shtick. There is no racism except people who call out racism, and they're the ones who are racist. And it's so nefarious to have Alito give lip service to our racist past. He has to acknowledge it first, the virulent racism in America. But as you said, good news, everybody as he wrenches his shoulder, patting himself on the back. We're in a post-racial world now. And with computers, we can rely on to do maps. We don't need to protect minority representation, especially in the South. Why would we? And that he actually, he almost said, I'm sure it was in a draft. This is a country that had elected Barack Obama twice. He came close. He said in the opinion,

in Louisiana, for instance, in two out of the five presidential elections, black participation in voting was higher than white participation. I'm thinking to myself, are you talking about the two years, the two terms of Barack Obama ran for in any event, then they do the lip service, and then they say, we don't need it anymore. Things have changed. And the major thing that changed is in 2019, which is they are making a ruling that you could never come to a federal court and argue that we have too many Republicans.

districts. You can because it's not just issueable. It's a political question. So they, they barred the door literally to the courthouse to anybody to come in and make that argument, which, as you said, gives license to everything to be couched in terms of red and blue instead of black and brown. Now, there's an interesting data set here that I wasn't aware of until I started really diving into these voting cases. And I had Sarah Brennan, who's the deputy director, the Voting Rights Project, the ACLU, on with me this week. You can find it up on the ACLU playlist on Legal AF. And she said, look, I know there's people, and they're bipartisan and nonpartisan and all that.

And she said, she acknowledges a group of people who believe, as Barack Obama once did, that we shouldn't have any gerrymandering at all, which is like computers, design all the districts, let the chips fall where they may, little equal boxes, all good, right? She said, here's the reality. There are 19 seats in the South that are held by primarily black representation because of gerrymandering, because of district creation, to give, to make sure there are minority, majority districts, like the one that was drawn in Louisiana that was at the heart of this second time around case, which drew a gerrymandered district that stretched 250 miles

in distance with Alexandria and Shreveport and other places. The reality, she said, is if we go to neutral, maybe you get six of those seats, but not 19, anywhere near it. So if you're like, let's just do nonpartisan gerrymandering, like some states have and some people who are running for office have said, you also have to recognize that there is a dirty underbelly of that, which is it could actually lose black representation where it's needed most,

which is in the deep south. We may have it all read generationally. I mean, we just saw Donald Trump brag last week at another press conference about if we can get rid of the filibuster, which even his own party, knowing that he's going to get shellacked at the midterms, does not want to get rid of, which is the only power a party in minority has, a minority party meaning the party that's not in the majority. has to stop a law is to threaten to filibuster or to procedurally filibuster. You take that away,

and Trump said, take it away and will be in power for 50 years. Talk about saying the quiet part out loud. Holy shit. So that's where Trump and Maga want to be. They want maps to embody it. But then, fortunately, even though Alabama's already run to court to try to get maps that were thrown out, waiting for the Calais decision, the Supreme Court decision to come out, to get those racist maps back up and running. That's all the South is doing right now in places like Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana. They're all trying to shove. It's gone so far that in some states, they had a primary that has already started. Like, balloting already went out. People have already voted, and they're trying to extend the time. So there's no May primary deadline,

it off until June and July so they can remap. But what's good for the goose is good for the gander. And this is where dummy mandering comes in, which is a great term of art the Democrats have come up with, which is, A, we can do it too. So let's squeeze out five more seats here and there in all of our districts, if that's what you want. But dummy mandering also refers to the law of unintended consequences, where you spread, if you're the Republicans, you spread the Republicans, you spread the red so thin of voter concentration that what was once secure districts become less secure and more purply because you've spread them out to try to create and seed new districts. And when you have a very thin concentration of Republicans that make up a district meeting a blue wave tsunami

election, which is what we're predicting with people voting and their interest in midterms, catastrophic things can happen. It give you one example in a state that I live in. In Florida, before even waiting for the Supreme Court to rule DeSantis, who's back to the tryout theory from our episode, trying out to be Attorney General of the United States or head of the Department of Defense or labor or something because he's out of a job soon. Curry favor with Trump went into special session and got a map approved that is 24 Republican districts and five or less Democrats. But that could backfire because of the shift in demographics and support for Donald Trump, like the Hispanic vote, which has completely abandoned him, especially the Hispanic Catholic Pope Leo vote.

And if that happens, then it doesn't. It's not 24 Republican and 6 or whatever. It's more like 16 and 12 or whatever. Even where they think they're getting and creating new seats, they're not because they're pissing off the electorate and they're underestimating changes in just the last year reflected in polling against MAGA and Republicans. So if that blue wave, that tidal wave election,

meets this kind of last-minute, half-baked redistricting, good thing, and then redistricting by the Democrats, actually good things could be happening. But again, this is the floodgates that have, the Pandora's box that's been opened by United States Supreme Court that does not care about civil rights, and John Roberts finally getting what he wanted from the very beginning of his term as Chief Justice,

which is to completely chloroform and put out of its misery, or our misery, the voting rights act. There you have it, folks. My dogs couldn't agree more there with you, Michael Popak, as if on cue, we'll be covering this and more throughout the coming weeks, months, years here on the Midas Touch Network. Thank you, everybody, for watching and listening to this week's legal A, F, a reminder, if you or anybody you know has been injured in an auto accident,

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