Legal AF by MeidasTouch - Legal AF Full Episode 3/1/2025

Episode Date: March 2, 2025

Ben Meiselas and Michael Popok are back on the top rated Legal AF podcast and discuss: the Trump Administration lying to Federal Courts about DOGE and who is in charge and how Federal Courts are fighting back; Trump expanding his Jan6 pardons to include crimes that didn't happen on Jan6; Trump using the phony "Epstein Files" release to distract from his failing presidency, the Supreme Court steps in on the USAID aid crisis, and so much more at the intersection of law and politics. Support our Sponsors: Uplift: Elevate your workspace and energize your year with Uplift Desk. Go to https://upliftdesk.com/legalaf for a special offer exclusive to our audience. Sundays For Dogs: Get 40% off your first order of Sundays. Go to https://sundaysfordogs.com/LEGALAF or use code LEGALAF at checkout. Mud Wtr: Start your new morning ritual & get up to 43% OFF your @MUDWTR by going to https://mudwtr.com/LEGALAF #mudwtrpod Fatty 15: Get an additional 15% off their 90-day subscription Starter Kit by going to https://fatty15.com/LEGALAF and using code LEGALAF at checkout. Remember to subscribe to ALL the MeidasTouch Network Podcasts: MeidasTouch: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/meidastouch-podcast Legal AF: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/legal-af MissTrial: https://meidasnews.com/tag/miss-trial The PoliticsGirl Podcast: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-politicsgirl-podcast The Influence Continuum: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-influence-continuum-with-dr-steven-hassan Mea Culpa with Michael Cohen: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/mea-culpa-with-michael-cohen The Weekend Show: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-weekend-show Burn the Boats: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/burn-the-boats Majority 54: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/majority-54 Political Beatdown: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/political-beatdown On Democracy with FP Wellman: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/on-democracy-with-fpwellman Uncovered: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/maga-uncovered Coalition of the Sane: https://meidasnews.com/tag/coalition-of-the-sane Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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As he was getting the mail, and the mail said Pennsylvania, which is the Commonwealth that he lived in. That's what the government is doing with Doge. As Michael Popok and I predicted on Legal AF, the reason that the government, that Donald Trump's regime, is not saying what Elon Musk's actual position is, is because they kind of want to hide him in the Oval Office, in the executive branch, to assert all of these privileges and immunities so they could not be transparent. Remember a few weeks back, Michael Popock and I said,

what they're going to do when they get FOIA requests is they're gonna say he's a special advisor to Donald Trump and they're not going to be transparent and they're not going to provide documents. Sure enough, we're seeing that in a ton of court filings this week where they're basically saying as a result, USDS, which is what they're calling it, the United States Digital Services is not subject to FOIA.

And they're saying that because it's in the executive branch under Presidential Records Act, under various executive immunities, they're saying they don't have to turn over the records. And federal judges are getting fed up and they're basically saying, who is the person who is leading the complete wrecking ball that is hitting our federal government

and taking away all of these positions. And not only that, but the cruelty with which it is being done, where people are being not just stripped of their jobs, but stripped of their dignity and falsely told it's because of their performance, which is also preventing individuals who are being terminated for cause from getting unemployment benefits,

and it's really screwing with their lives. We're gonna talk about efforts, about how some of these lawsuits have been addressing the probationary employee firings as well, but I figure at the top of the show, let me show you basically what's been going down, where Caroline Leavitt, the propagandist, AKA, the press secretary of the White House, was asked,

she was saying, at a press conference, who's the administrator of Doge? Who is running Doge? Let me show you what her answer is, let's play. Hey, thanks, Caroline. I wanted to ask about, a federal judge yesterday was saying that they didn't know who the Doge administrator was and was asking the lawyer for the administration who it was and the lawyer responded I don't

know the answer to that can you tell us who the administrator of Doge is? Again I've been asked and answered this question. Elon Musk is overseeing Doge. There are career... there are... no Elon Musk is a special government employee which I've also been asked and have answered that question as well. There are career officials at Doge. There are political appointees at Doge. I'm not going to reveal the name of that individual from this podium. I'm happy to follow up and provide that to you,

but we've been incredibly transparent about the way that Doge is working. John. We've been so transparent, Michael Popak, that we're not just going to tell you who it is and we're so transparent we're going to deny Freedom of Information Act requests. One more thing I want to show you though because then 24 hours after that they named this lady Amy Gleason who wasn't even in the country when they named her and they said she's the

head of DOJ, Amy Gleason. I'm not fully sure Amy Gleason knew that she was the head of Doge, nor am I confident that she knows what that entails, that now she'll be someone who's going to get grilled over and over again if indeed the courts compel that, because again, I think they're going to try to hide her as well and say that she's not subject to having to explain to the American people what's going on, right? The most transparent in history. I mean, it's all just ridiculous propaganda. But here,

like literally, I think like 24 hours or so after, Caroline Levitt was like to the press, your hounds. Why are you all such hounds? Everybody knows it's Amy Gleason. You all know that you hounds. Here here play this clip. Apparently, you announced her position to the rest of the Doge staff. Everybody knew and we said who she was to all of you because you are hounds in the media who are so obsessed with this for some reason. So in the effort of transparency,

we told you who that person is. There are so many bigger things in the world than who the doge administrator is But for some reason everybody in the press corps is so obsessed with this that you were excessively asking so we thought okay We will be transparent. So now you know who it is any further questions Michael popak is critical faa jobs are being cut as individuals working at the CDC and NIH who are working on the next flu vaccine as they're losing their jobs, as people who are working at the National Oceanic Administration

are getting fired, who work with marine life and try to forecast weather disasters before they happen and kill people, as they're getting fired as people from the Department of Education, Department of Labor, Department of Agriculture, the National Parks, I could go on and on. As all these people are losing their jobs, I'm sure they'll be very thankful to know that Caroline Levitt says that nobody cares about these issues at all,

as who's actually doing these terminations. Welcome to Legal AF, Michael. It's a good pass. You know who cares about who's leading Doge besides this 53-year-old Tennessee healthcare worker that just got picked out of a hat while she was in Mexico to be the paper leader of Doge when we all know that it's Elon Musk, because he's the one that addressed the cabinet. He's the one that gets patted on the back by Donald Trump. They put up an executive order that gave Doge and effectively Elon Musk superpowers, more

superpowers, then they took it down, then they put it back up. But you know how we're going to get to the bottom of it, the good old fashioned way, a little bit of shoe leather and a lot of court appearances. The problem that the Department of Justice and the Trump administration ultimately have is we have over 90 cases that have already been filed. Let's just take that number for a minute. Let's say after four weeks of fever litigation activity in all of those cases, there have been at least, and I'm just rounding this off as a federal practitioner, at least let's

just say 10 entries in the dockets of each of those cases. That means we've got 90 times 10, we've got a thousand pieces of paper that have been filed, many of which are inconsistent with each other, with the positions that the Department of Justice and the Trump administration are taking. And the federal judges are onto it. The plaintiffs, lawyers, some of which are the same in these 90 cases, some of them are different, are doing a clearinghouse among each other. Just security is one of the places for a repository of all of these documents. And they're saying, all right, there's already been, let's say, a thousand pieces of paper.

Half of them are some version of sworn statements, affidavits, things under oath. Okay? And then they don't match up. And when you don't match up things in court, we have a name for that, it's called perjury. And judges, well, let's just say the judge is wearing the black robe or a little bit allergic to perjury and they have a solution for that.

And it's called, let's have discovery. Why don't you all go take depositions and put all y'all, that's one of my favorite movies, a white man can't jump said, but all y'all, as one of my favorite movies, White Man Can't Jump said, put all y'all under oath. And why don't we, why don't you come back to me as a federal judge after sworn penalty of perjury statements are made about what is Doge, who is running Doge, who are the tech bros working for Musk

that are countermanding the agency head's decisions on funding, you've already done hot takes on that, bring them all to me at my bench in a week or in two weeks. In fact, some judges are saying, I'd like to see some live testimony from some people who are claiming to be the heads of the Office of Personnel Management, which is being used as a puppet by Elon Musk and Doge that connectivity between the Office of Personnel Management OPM and

Elon Musk needs to burst out into the open and Courts are very good at a number of things and one of their things that they're very good at is being the trier of fact and getting facts out of witnesses under penalty of perjury and documents and granting requests for limited discovery on key issues so that they can prepare a proper record. And so when in order to promote the Trump administration's obvious strategy of plausible deniability, we've now moved into completely implausible deniability. See, the one hand doesn't know what the other hand is doing in the Trump administration.

The Doge administrator or Doge doesn't know what OPM is doing, doesn't know what Carolyn LeVette is saying, doesn't know what Pam Bondi is saying or what Donald Trump is saying on purpose because they think they'll be able in that way to point the finger at the other person as you put up your Charlie picture from Always Sunny and say, well, I can't figure it out. You know, he's going to figure it out. The plaintiffs' lawyers that are skilled at doing this, You know who's going to figure it out? The plaintiffs' lawyers that are skilled at doing this,

the federal judges who are now reached the point of being beyond finding the statements of the Trump administration lawyers, the Department of Justice, incredible, uncredible, unreliable, and verging on contempt. We had one judge, we'll break down as we get into the podcast, one judge in we'll break down as we get into the podcast, one judge in particular

in DC, because we had a back to back rulings in DC about depositions that need to be taken, and then in San Francisco about similar issues. The judge basically threw up his hands and said, I'm three weeks at this with this case. I've had multiple filings made, including inconsistent filings by the Trump administration. And to this moment, Doge and what it is, who it is, what are its powers, who's running it, is opaque. And I'm going to make it stop being opaque, which is the opposite of transparent. Donald Trump says to the world and all of his executive orders, the reason he's consolidating power and putting his greasy thumb on top of every cabinet

and every agency and every department, even the bipartisan ones, even the ones that are completely independent by Congress and by Supreme Court precedent is because he's making them more accountable to the American people. Yet at the same time, as you outlined here, we'll do more of it later, at the same time, we have the opposite.

We have Carolyn LeVette saying, why do you want to know this information? Aren't there more important things? I don't know, like what? Like handing out phony binders about Jeffrey Epstein to right-wing podcasters, so that you have ish. That's more interesting. Giving a pardon to Pete Rose, the baseball player, that's more interesting. No, the fundamentals of how you're taking, as you referred to it, Ben, the wrecking ball and using Musk through Doge, through Office of

Personnel Management to fire tens of thousands of people that make you and me and our audience more insecure at every moment, that's what's important. Call me a hound, I'll gladly take that compliment because we're gonna continue to call it out here on My Destruction on Legal AF. Look, we don't work as much as they want us to work for them. We the people don't work for Donald Trump

We don't work for Elon Musk. We don't work for Caroline Levitt. They work for us They work for us where their boss and we the people I don't care what political party you're from We deserve answers. In fact, our system of governance demands that we get the answers. Transparency is in posting things on a social media platform, laundering lies to attorneys that work for Donald Trump and the DOJ, and promoting conspiracies that become

criminal cases on Social media platforms like ex and truth social. I mean, that's not what our system is But that's what Elon Musk and Donald Trump are turning it into I mean you look at this United States attorney from Washington DC Ed Martin who's the US attorney? It's the top position. He was never a federal prosecutor before. Zero federal prosecutorial experience becoming one of the top federal prosecutors in America, the same way Trump appointed a Fox host to become

our secretary of defense. And he's taking information from accounts like at amuse, which spreads a lot of right-wing disinfo. Obama's team, including Blinken, Victoria Nuland, Susan Rice, Vindman, advised Zelensky to reject Trump's deal in violation of the Logan Act. And then Ed Martin goes, concerning, this is the top federal prosecutor in DC,

concerning no one is above the law top federal prosecutor in DC, concerning no one is above the law. And he's been starting criminal investigations based on messages he gets from these like wacko right-wing accounts on Elon Musk's social media platform. That's not how it works, the way it works in our system. And again, this is where I don't care what political party you're from if you're not political at all, you should want Elon Musk and whoever else is at Doge to show up in front of Congress which is a co-equal branch of government in the House of Representatives for example or even the Senate and they should ask questions. Why did you do this? Why did you do that? Why'd you do that?

Why'd you fire the people who are overseeing Ebola? Why'd you fire the people who are overseeing our nuclear weapons? Why'd you fire the NIH, CDC, and why'd you shut down the working group people who are working on the next flu vaccine as we have record flu deaths? Why are you shutting down research into a pill form of the COVID vaccine that would make it easier for people to avoid COVID? Why is all of this happening? And then Elon Musk, if he wants to sit there in front of Congress, the way he showed up at CPAC and go, it's a meme, I'm a meme,

it's my change, I'm a meme man, you mean? You know, then let the American people judge that and let we the people decide, I'm a meme everybody. You know, it's ridiculous, it's ridiculous. And I don't care. And if you like that crap, then just be honest, be like, I hate America if that's how you feel just be like I don't like democracy I like weirdo fascism idiocracy North Korea just just say it if that's you if that's what you're into

okay be be you but be proud that you hate democracy and you hate the system of which America was found that I I hear during a three-hour preliminary injunction hearing in the lawsuit alleged, this one's from Maryland, that Elon Musk and Doge are violating the Appointments Clause. A federal judge, Judge Chung, grew frustrated with the government council's inability to answer questions about Doge's chain of command and Musk's role. Judge, who was the head of Doge before Amy Gleason, government lawyer? I can't answer that. I don't know judge I mean that seems like a knowable fact doesn't it government lawyer? I'm sure it's knowable. I just don't know it I'm very conscious of being accurate with the court. I just can't I just can't make a representation judge

Have you asked anyone? Government lawyer, I don't I don't't actually, yeah, I asked someone previously. I couldn't get an answer. Judge, are you saying there was an administrator before Ms. Gleason or that there was nobody until this new person Gleason was named, as you saw there, by Caroline Levitt? Government lawyer, I'm not saying either

because I just don't know. Judge, is there a piece of paper like an appointment paper? Is there one that says, Elon Musk, senior advisor to the president? Is there anything in writing? A government lawyer, sorry. Now you're talking about Elon, not the Doge administrator? Judge, the plaintiffs are saying

Elon Musk was the head of Doge You're saying he was not but we can't tell you who was which admittedly is highly suspicious I'm not saying that you're not being candid, but the whole operation raises questions There's an affidavit saying he's a senior advisor to the president but there's a strange disconnect where he has referred to himself in public as affiliated with Doge and not a senior advisor to the president until recently after these lawsuits were filed. Having some backup documentation would seem to be useful. Judge Cheng again, why do we get a declaration from this person, Peter Morocco, but there's

really no documentation of anything there. Morocco says every decision was approved by Secretary Marco Rubio. I've got no documentation, a letter, an email showing that the secretary approved anything right. And then this lawyer, I think it's important that everyone understands the context here. Since January 20th, we have received approximately 80 lawsuits, and our staff

at the Justice Department's Federal Program Branch, we've been cut in half. We don't have enough lawyers. We have about half the number of staff we had in November, and we're working really hard on these expedited schedules, Judge Chung. Morocco could have provided more. It wouldn't have taken extra work on your part

to seek more documentation counsel. If it really was a decision by USAID, there should be a piece of paper or an electronic message from Secretary Rubio himself saying, I'm approving this. Morocco said he had the authority. Morocco would have had access to anything he signed. Why don't we have that lawyer? I'm not trying to be obsequious, obsequious.

We're doing the best we can to get as much information as possible, Judge. You're saying that the Justice Department isn't taking this case seriously? That they're not staffing this case sufficiently? Is that what you're saying, Counsel, the lawyer? It's the opposite. I haven't had a day off since January 20th.

We're working day and night, junk junk. I understand that. They're cutting people across the government. If you're saying you don't have enough people at the Department of Justice, maybe that's part of the problem. I mean, if USAID can't respond to lawsuits, maybe they need to get more people.

Michael Popak, I wanna get your response to all of that because there's a lot to unpack there. But before doing that, I wanna remind everybody about your new law firm, the Michael Popok Law Firm. Popok, I know you took a big risk starting your own firm. You've been getting a lot of big cases into your firm from the Midas Mighty and from all the legal AFers out there. I know you've been literally getting thousands of cases.

And so I know that what you wanna focus on are these big catastrophic injury cases, trucking accident cases, car accident cases, employment cases, sexual abuse cases. I know a lot of people approach you with a lot of these government related cases. There are a lot of other lawyers who are handling those types of cases right now.

And we're helping some of those lawyers out as well. But for what your firm is doing, you're just trying to help individuals who are going through kind of individual issues like that or families who lost a loved one in a wrongful death situation in a horrible accident. I know you're you're representing people who are on the on the devastating plane crash over D.C., for example, and other people who were involved in horrible accidents. So how can they get in touch with you, Popak? Yeah, and that's two good examples.

We're representing the family of a flight attendant on the flight that went down over the Potomac, American Airlines Black Hawk crash, and representing another family. You know, somebody got hit by a supermarket truck along the side of the road. I mean, these are the types of things we wanna step in and help and you can reach me at www.thepopokfirm.com

and I made it easy on the 1-800-1877-POPOC-AF. We'll do the free case review for you. It's a contingency fee type practice, meaning we don't get paid unless you do. But those are the kind of cases that you've outlined Ben that we're focused on. Proud of you, Popak. We'll throw a link in the description below as well.

Let's take our first quick break. A lot to unpack there, Popak, before the break. And so we'll talk about it. Let's take our break. Physio, chiropractic, and massage therapy are all great resources for when you need them. But going to these appointments every few months does not give me the ultimate results I'm looking for

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Again, just wanna say how proud I am of you, Popok, for you starting that firm. I know it was a life goal that you always had, and it's great to see that you're getting so many cases your way right away. Wanna thank our pro-democracy sponsors out there who helped with this show. It's been a big week for the Midas Touch Network. We're on our way to five million subscribers here.

Michael Popok's YouTube channel, the Legal AF YouTube channel's crushing it as well. Still the number one podcast in the United States, the Midas Touch Show, Midas Touch podcast, and still the number one YouTube channel in the country as well, also in a number of other countries, like Canada, elsewhere as well for the podcast. All right, Popok, exactly what you and I predicted

was going to happen, which is that the, remember, you go back two or three weeks also, just as we predicted what was gonna happen with the FOIA request, we also were saying they're not gonna have the lawyers to handle these cases, and the reality is is that you probably right now are at about five to seven percent of the cases That are gonna be filed. I think in the next

180 days like we're not even so the fact that that lawyer on the record was whining about the size of The law firm in this case, the DOJ, I can't even express to people how unprecedentedly embarrassing that. I can't even fathom myself when I was a practicing lawyer and you are still practicing Popeye,

but going into a federal court, the judge asking the most basic questions like, who's your client? Who's running the company? And you saying to a federal judge, Judge, I've been working so hard. I just, I don't have enough staff to find out who's in charge.

How embarrassing, Popak. Yeah, that's just an example. I mean, like when you and I prepare to go to court, I wanna know the answers to basic and fundamental questions. Department of Justice under Donald Trump has lost all credibility and gets no benefit of the doubt in front of federal judges in these cases, which in the short term and the long term will lead to the demise of the Department of Justice and the positions that they're

taking. Does it mean the Supreme Court, we'll talk about it a little bit later, isn't going to try to bail them out here and there on various orders as they get their arms and minds around certain things. But in terms of the workaday federal judges who meet out most of the justice in this country, they're not buying what the Department of Justice, beleaguered lawyers as they may be, are selling. And I don't buy that, I think it's an act. I don't, just as, you know, we'll maybe touch on later the Zelinsky setup in the White House Oval Office, it's an act by the lawyers,

because when we prepare to go to court, I wanna know the answers to these questions, they don't. Or they've been told by their superiors, it's not important. We'd rather you not have the complete file, not have the complete answer, not take a position in the courtroom that'll screw us up somewhere else.

So just run along and go into court and do your best with the limited knowledge that we're providing you. We know that people within in Donald Trump's own mind, in Stephen Miller's mind, in the inner inner sanctum of Donald Trump, they know exactly how the Elon Musk, Doge, Doge Bros, there are Doge people that are assigned to each cabinet level position, each agency, each department, and each bureau has a Doge person.

Could be six like at Health and Human Services, it could be one like Treasury, it depends, but each one has one. You and I could make out the organogram, the organic chart right now. Musk is at the top. He controls the Office of Personnel Management. He has his own email address. He's co-opted HR at OPM.gov. Nothing says I'm a coward like sending out firing emails

and firing people's careers by way of an anonymous HR email, which we know is controlled by Elon Musk. He then has Doge, where he gets to sit, as Carolyn LeVette called it, the special employee of the government. He sits over here with Donald Trump and he controls actual government departments and agencies like the Department of Digital Service,

and then forces them, and that's where all the lot of that, we have a dozen lawsuits involving Elon Musk, forces through either the Office of Personnel Management or other memos, forces them to fire probationary employees, which is the lifeblood, as one judge just recently said, the lifeblood of our civil service, which is bringing in people from the bottom at very low paying jobs, train them up, give them expertise and have them have careers

within our government serving the American people. And so they wanna just get rid of thousands and hundreds of thousands of probationary employees. So the lawyers are purposely kept in the dark, which violates their obligation of candor to the court, which is an ethical issue for the lawyers. Judges are getting fed up. Chang, the lawyer, the judge in Maryland

that you just talked about, he's about this close to finding lawyers in contempt and have violated their oath to the, they're, they take an oath, we all take an oath as lawyers when we get sworn in to uphold the constitution, the laws of where we operate and all of that. But this is all done on purpose. This isn't like, I don't believe she knows it. I believe she's been told, you don't need to know this. But the problem that they are rapidly finding themselves in as a government, as a Department of Justice,

is that when you take the 90 cases and you take now the hundreds of affidavits, declarations and depositions that will be taken in short order, and you find these inconsistencies, judges are either gonna get it out of these depositions in the record, or they're gonna force people like Elon Musk to be ordered to show up in court, then we're gonna have a whole nother constitutional crisis

as Donald Trump tries to assert some sort of executive privilege to stop Elon Musk from being brought into court. We're rapidly heading towards this. This Amy Gleason person, this 53-year-old telehealth person who works for... She works in Tennessee at present, but used to work in the old Doge service, when she worked on COVID-19 response and communication messaging for the Trump administration. She now works for a

healthcare entrepreneur in Tennessee, who's working on Doge with Musk. So they looked around, this is like we're doing movie references today. This is like weekend at Bernie's. She is just, I mean, they just dress her up, put some lipstick on her, drag her around. This poor person, although, you know, she could have said no, but she's going to be the face of Doge? While we know the Wizard of Oz, we know that Elon Musk is really running things. I can tell you this is not going to go over well with federal judges. And we're going to have this constitutional crisis that you and I predicted because we're

rapidly moving towards Donald Trump saying, executive privilege, Musk is never going to testify in a courtroom without a fight, which is going to end up at the United States Supreme Court. You know, I just had a deja vu moment, which I didn't remember from my law practice, but I have a perfect analog where in my practice, I was suing a lot of big banks for violating the SCRA, the Service Member Civil Relief Act, when individuals were on active deployment, you couldn't foreclose on their homes, and a lot of banks were foreclosing on the homes of service members abroad and really causing a great deal of harm to the family members. And I remember when I was handling that case and I was doing discovery, oftentimes you'd have a senior person who would be signing off on all of these foreclosure documents as required under the existing banking laws at that time,

which I'm also sure Trump probably has got it already in the past, whatever, many weeks, 40 days or so. And the people who would have titles like president or like a very senior title, when you'd call them in to finally sit for a deposition, they would know absolutely nothing about the company. I mean, quite literally, their only job was to sign and it would often be robo signatures and not even their real signatures. And this way there was technical compliance, but they would hide, the banks would be hiding

what they were doing behind the scenes and it did not play well in court once you went through discovery and there were very successful results, I believe in those matters as a result that it compounded matters once you were able to expose it. Popak, in terms of the contradictory internal inconsistencies and lies from the DOJ, while you have certain lawyers going into court and saying, hey, we're just so busy

that we don't know, we can't ask basic questions, you've got other sections of the Department of Justice really working super hard to help out the January 6th insurrectionist, because apparently it wasn't just good enough that they received the pardon for the insurrection acts. But the issue was because of the way Donald Trump drafted that pardon, anything related to the January 6th events, now a lot of the insurrectionists are saying, well, related

to should be interpreted broadly and if we were investigated by the FBI for say owning illegal grenades or owning weapons that we shouldn't have had or other crimes that we were involved in, but if the investigation into us started because we were insurrectionists, well, all these other acts, vile, despicable, other criminal conduct, that's technically related because the term in the law is the fruit of the poisonous tree, that it all basically flows from this one event

and everything is inextricably intertwined. So a few weeks back, we first saw the DOJ taking the position of like people who were saying, you have to dismiss my grenade charges, you have to dismiss my other violent act charges, you have to dismiss my other crimes. You know, some people at the DOJ were saying, no, no, that's not January 6th.

And then a lot of the people, though, were arguing in court, no, no, no, you said related to the events, related to it arose out of the investigation. We're pardoned, we're good, motion to dismiss. So, over the past week or so, the DOJ has abruptly broadened its view of Trump's January 6th pardons.

Even this Trump appointed judge was like, what the hell are you, what are you doing? But the, for example, US District Judge Dabney Friedrich in one of these cases was a Trump appointee, was like, what are you trying to do? And the DOJ is basically saying, hey, we don't need to tell you judge why we're doing this at all.

But if someone was caught with grenades or weapons in violation of the terms of their release or anything, it's related to, they deserve to be released and they're seeking to dismiss all of these cases. So remember how last week we talked about the corrupt New York Mayor Adams, how the DOJ is rushing to dismiss that case

without prejudice and some people wouldn't file it and then it led to mass resignations, but the federal judge still wanted answers. Like you're putting like, the goal of what the DOJ is supposed to be is to stop crime, not promote crime. So now we're having the DOJ officials also say here, you know, these are,

these DC federal judges were pissed to begin with that Trump pardoned these insurrectionists who these judges know were the worst of the worst. A lot of them were some of the biggest scumbags imaginable who were, who pose incredible threats. As Donald Trump says, they're releasing the criminals into the streets. Trump is quite literally releasing the criminals

into the street. And then these federal judges in DC are like, wait a minute, now you're saying there are other crimes? If they could form some nexus, should be dismissed as well? What are you doing? That's how the DOJ spending their time as well. And also we learned, we reported on it two or three weeks ago that the Tate brothers,

and Andrew and Tristan Tate who were in Romania, and they were arrested in Romania for sex trafficking charges, also involving minors, that the people in the Trump administration are big fans of theirs. Alina Habba was on a video with one of the Tate brothers saying, I'm such a fan, I'm such a fan of yours, I'm so glad to see you.

I mean, I'm like literally like that. It was literally vomit inducing in my own view. Well, anyway, they're back in the United States of America, apparently, and welcomed back by the Trump administration. And then you have someone who was covering the Ghislaine Maxwell trial, who was there at the Ghislaine Maxwell trial wearing free Ghislaine Maxwell gear. A lady was wearing free Ghislaine Maxwell shirts.

She was one of the people who was invited to the White House to get these like fake Epstein binders that they gave these MAGA influencers Epstein binders. And they said, and they called these little tiny binders. They called them, they're like, here it is the Epstein files. We gave it to you. Here it is.

And it's a little tiny binder and it's his list of like phone contacts. Trump's name is in it. They like redact most of it. We've had those records since 2021 because there were some records that were released in the Ghislaine Maxwell trial, which shows Trump was on the flights at least seven times.

Trump's is in the deposition. We know, although we don't have the grand jury testimony, we don't have the testimony of this victim, but a 14 year old girl did say that she was brought to Mar-a-Lago by Epstein who'd be introduced to Trump. We don't know more of that, but Jane Doe testified at the Ghislaine Maxwell trial. That's the type of documents that I think we'd want to

see as part of the release. But they then had these people, one who wore free Ghislaine shirts previously, you know, hold up the binders and like dance. Like they obtained victory. And then they all like posted the same message popok like victory we've got the files and first off those aren't the files those are something that's been produced before if you want to know what the files are they in law we can tell you they involve grand jury testimony, witness statements, police reports, photographs, videos, emails, text messages. It's not even tens of thousands. It's probably millions of records in all of the various cases

that they said they were going to release, but they gave people a little binder to distract from all the other mess that they're doing as they are, Michael they're doing as they are, Michael Popak, as they are pardoning these January 6th insurrectionists and dismissing the cases on other charges. Well, the Gallame, the Jeffrey Epstein thing is just a total distractive, nonsensical thing that the government should not be focused on.

It just shows you the weird stew of a brain that we're watching with Donald Trump. When you and I, let me take it back for a minute. When you and I talk about a failing presidency, normally, normal, normally, in the first hundred days, a presidency is able to point to some sort of accomplishment, okay? Not what the record after almost less than six weeks is for this administration, which is financial markets not only roiled, but the American economy is starting to be turned off,

it's engine turned off in a tariff war of Donald Trump's making. At the same time that he cut all, he cut federal workers who are consumers and their paychecks. At the same time, he entered this trade war with our 40% trading partners, China, Canada, and Mexico, at the same time that he tried to cut off federal spending

at the state not-for-profit and foreign aid levels, which again, every one of those dollars has an American job behind it. And to do, how about not doing all those things at the exact same time? To do that all at the exact same time, the Dow Jones and any measure of stock market health is in the trash since January 20th. The cryptocurrency market, which he touted, we're gonna be the head of the cryptocurrency legion in the world, is in the trash, down 30%. And the US dollar, which usually people are like,

the dollar's strong, that sounds like a good thing, it's a terrible thing. So the dollar is up, the treasury notes are wrong, he's figured out that the only group he can't attack because he'll really tank the American economy in the first hundred days is the Federal Reserve and the Federal Reserve Chairman, Jay Powell, who's the only thing stopping you and me and our audience from a Great Depression right now for me is Jay Powell running the Federal Reserve and not the rest

of the people around Donald Trump's cabinet. And I haven't even touched on the 92 cases, the 50 temporary restraining orders, preliminary injunctions, the two cases at the United States Supreme Court. And while all that's going on, you have this performative art of, why do you want to know who Doge is? And look at these phony binders about Jeffrey Epstein and I just pardoned Pete Rose and the gun charge for the Jan six guy that was unrelated to Jan six.

We're going to pardon that too. How does this help? And I'm one American who voted for Donald Trump or those that didn't in any way, shape or form. We are watching in my view, I've been on this planet for 59 years, we are watching the worst start to a presidency in the history of America.

And it's not gonna get any better because he's not going to change his ways. And the people around him are meat puppets and enablers. What we watched in the White House, in the Oval Office of the attack of an ally, the attack of the victim, playing into the hands of Putin, is not the sign of a coherent foreign policy. It's the sign of a deranged madman, who we see

in domestic policy and approach, fiscal, monetary, and everything else. And everybody that I've spoken to, and I speak to a lot of people, including Republicans, they want their vote back because this is not what they voted for. And the Democrats are finally maybe led by Midas T maybe led by what we've been doing here on legal AF but the Democrats in Congress Hakeem Jeffries and those Those in the Senate in the house the new Democratic National Committee chairperson are starting to finally Finally find their footing on how to oppose successfully find their footing on how to oppose successfully Donald Trump and make a message to the American people that we are

for freedom, that we are for justice, that we are for economic security for people, not the other people, and I applaud them. Things that are happening in Congress, statements that are being made under oath there are being used in the court system. So kudos to the Democrats who are leading the cross-examination of witnesses from the government there.

And again, it all comes back to federal judges who are going to get to the bottom of this one way or the other, or people are gonna are going to get to the bottom of this one way or the other or people are going to be going to jail. The Jeffrey Epstein thing, I did a hot take on it recently, all of the stuff that is there except for one small raid they did in 2019 and a small batch of documents are out in public, have been since the Jusane Maxwell trial. You and I covered that two and a half years ago with the docket entries and all of that.

The masseuse list, which Pam Bondi, this is the masseuse list that is linked to Pam Bondi's. That's it. You see the black, that's it. There is no client list for Jeffrey Epstein. I know that because the reporter for the Miami Herald who broke the Jeffrey Epstein story and has been a dogged reporter on it for the last 15 years says there's no list.

So they're all waiting for like, oh, here it is. Al Gore, Bill Clinton. You know who's on the list? The flight logs that have been released? Donald Trump, his first wife Marla Maples, Tiffany Trump, Eric Trump, they're all on the list. They all went to the island. They all got on the plane.

Does that mean that they raped underage girls along with Jeffrey Epstein? There's no evidence of that. And the victims here are the ones that are being victimized once again. When you've got Laura Loomer joining with our Ron Filipkowski to say that it's wrong, you know it's wrong. To hand out phony binders, there are still victims that are suing the FBI.

There are still victims that are suing the estate of Jeffrey Epstein. Thank God he left some money behind. And others that were around in that, that went after Prince Andrew. And no, but for Donald Trump, it's just another way to capture a news cycle, hold it up. Here's our binder.

Hold it up a pony binder of material. And then you've got this other phony theatrical thing, which is the Pam Bondi, this breakout battle between Pam Bondi and Kash Patel at FBI with her writing on, there it is, a nasty letter which she posted on her website. I only got 200 pages. I didn't get the, I understand there's more. I mean, I'm sorry, were you living under a rock

during Jusane Maxwell's trial? As you said, there's tens of thousands of pages. You thought the 200 pages that got delivered to you by the FBI was the entirety of the file? I mean, God is in that- I wanna talk to you more about the Pope. We gotta take our final break of the show because if you're the attorney general

and you're handed like 20 pieces of paper and you go, I guess I got it all. I mean, you're the attorney general. You have to understand that in a single case there will be tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, terabytes, millions of records. When you deal with 800 entries in a case like just Zane Maxwell, what are we talking about? She got it through. I guess I got the list. Everybody. I mean, it's, it's ridiculous and it's an idiocracy,

but it's a dangerous one. I wanna remind everybody about Michael Popak's law firm because look, it is a good segue to talk about it. I know Popak handles some of the biggest like sex assault, sex harassment cases, people who are sexually assaulted or harassed by employers or by government officials, by police officers, you know,

you've handled those types of cases, Catholic priest cases, people in positions of power who have sexually assaulted people, you've handled employment cases where people have been the victims of discrimination, you know, and I don't want, you know, look, I don't want people to think that you can't reach out

to Popok, he will take your car accident case. He will take a case involving trucking accident cases. Now Popok handles, you know, ones that have real catastrophic injuries, you know, and I won't get into all the details of like the gory details here, but like the big bad catastrophic cases, those are the cases that Popak handles the most, but feel free to reach out to his firm.

Popak, what's the number? Yeah, it's 1-877-POPAK-AF, and you can go to the website, which is set up for you really. I made it as easy as possible, thepopakfirm.com. As people know, you and I together litigated some very high profile cases in obtaining justice. We had the first hashtag Me Too case involving a teenage boy.

You and I obtained a major verdict on that. Millions of dollars. Millions of dollars against a Hollywood person. You and I went against Kanye West on behalf of a group of young black business people in Philadelphia. This is why you and I got into the law and now I'm doing it as a proper extension of all the work we've done on Legal AF.

And I'm a law professor and a YouTuber. So you see how the world, everybody hit subscribe. Let's get to 5 million subscribers here. Check out Michael Popak's YouTube channel, the Legal AF YouTube channel. Trying to get to 500,000 in the next week. Let's get there and let's take our last quick break of the show.

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Get 40% off a two week trial of Sundays. Go to sundaysfordogs.com slash LegalAF or use code LegalAF at checkout. Welcome back to LegalAF. Popak, we were just talking about like, in any federal case, even a case that's not like a, like a big federal case, but you know, I don't know, they're all big, but you'll have huge amounts of documents.

So let's just be clear, when they're talking about releasing the Epstein files, just so we all know what would actually exist, there will be police reports, there will be police supplemental reports, there will be body cam footage, there will be surveillance footage, there will be videos, there will be body cam footage, there will be surveillance footage, there will be videos, there will be emails, there will be text messages for each single witness.

So if you had 500 witnesses, you'll have all of those documents which could be 100, 200 pages per witness times 500. I mean, you're gonna be talking about photographs, you're gonna be talking about grand jury testimony,'re going to be talking about grand jury testimony. You're going to be talking about deposition testimony. You're going to be talking about audio recordings. You're going to be talking about calendar entries and emails and text messages

and all of, you know, and all of the above. And if you're talking about over a, you know, over decades of time, that's all going to be there. But look, we know Trump's on the flight log, so we've seen the flight log already. We know that Trump's mentioned in the depositions that have been released, because we see his name actually mentioned. We know he's on Epstein's phone list.

Not only that, like- He rented the plane during the campaign, Epstein's plane. He rented the plane, he was on the plane. So release all that data, that's what it means. They're not going to ever release the data. They're focused more on this, Michael Popak. Newly installed FBI director Cash Patel proposed enhancing the FBI's ranks with, drum roll please,

UFC fighters, da da da da da. They are gonna have a UFC FBI give the UFC a major contract. You know, Dana White's a big donor to Donald Trump. And now the FBI is going to become the UFC while they get rid of the FBI agents who are experienced agents who have been dealing with the terrorism investigations, the drug traffic, the sex trafficking investigations, bring in the UFC with the terrorism investigations, the drug traffic, the sex trafficking investigations. Bring in the UFC fighters, Michael Popeye.

He, okay, all right. So he brought in as, and when they made Cash Patel FBI director, 44-year-old guy, no intelligence experience, no FBI experience, had been a public defender, then got into the MAGA kind of route, got blocked from all intelligence positions by people who know what they're doing in the first Trump administration,

hung around long enough to become the FBI director. I thought, well, at least the number two, the one who like really run the show, will be a seasoned FBI or intelligence person or investigatory person. Dan Bongioni, podcaster. Bongino, Bongino.. Dan Bongioni, podcaster. Bongino, sorry, podcaster, right? I mean, listen, you and I are very successful podcasters,

but I don't think I'm qualified to run the FBI. I had a friend of mine say, well, he was in the Secret Service, there's pictures of him next to Hillary Clinton and Obama. I said, that makes him deputy director of the FBI only in the Trump world. Now look, just to show you how, and our audience to show you how completely bonkers Donald Trump is, which is the reason why, because we got the guy at charge who has no executive function for the

executive branch, if you know what I mean. Elevator's not all going up to the top floor. He decides that while Carolyn Levitt, the world's youngest press secretary, I think her title is, while she says in front of people, why do you ask me questions? I mean, we're trying to be transparent. I told you this already. American people don't care who's the Doge director as hundreds of thousands of federal workers are fired

and services are being compromised. What is Donald Trump concerned with? He actually took time out of his day as the president of the United States to make sure that the boxes of classified documents that were taken out of Mar-a-Lago that are at the heart of the criminal prosecution at Mar-a-Lago got returned to him

and were seen loaded into Air Force One. This is part of his great concern that he gets all of his top secret mementos back. I mean, look, there are many signs of a demented presidency that you and I will talk about, the intersection of law and politics being among them. But, you know, what do we do? You know, we always do a call to action

at some point in the show. What do we do about it? Oh, look, first thing we gotta do is, we're doing what we're doing. We're talking truth to each other in order to speak truth to power. You gotta start here. We gotta call out all of the federal judges

and how they are trying to hold the feet to the fire of the Department of Justice under Donald Trump and how it's rapidly spinning out of control for the Department of Justice and they're eventually going to be called on the carpet. As the Supreme Court, which we haven't touched on yet, has started, because when you've got 50 temporary restraining orders and preliminary injunctions and there's starting to be appeals, we're now moving into the Supreme Court phase. You wanna touch base on that one, Ben?

The Supreme Court decision that just came out? Yeah, talk about the Supreme Court decision. I mean, look, and this is how Trump weaponizes his own negligence, and this arises out of the USAID own negligence and this arises out of the USAID funding case where money was appropriated to go to these programs where the United States as the leader of the free world would have lots of contracts this was a win-win deal it's why Republicans loved USAID Republicans loved USAID until Donald Trump and Elon Musk said it's woke and you shouldn't love it Why because it was great for farmers and American businesses that would get all of these contracts with USAID

Especially because in the first Trump administration his trade wars Screwed over a lot of these farmers who had surplus crops and a lot of other producers of stuff. So you'd give it to USAID and then there would be starving people abroad, whether it was in Africa or other areas, and America would provide aid in the form of medical services and food services and all of these services, surgeries, procedures, this was started also by President John F. Kennedy because he recognized that if you don't do this, a lot of people can become terrorists and then attack the United States

and soft power, being diplomatic, doing the types of things that China's now doing with its Silk Road II program, building bridges, building roads, investing in places, builds goodwill, and then you don't have to use all your military might to kind of keep a stable world order. Well, we know from Donald Trump's- That's why it's in the State Department.

That's why it's in the State Department. But we know from Donald Trump's meeting with Zelensky that Trump's just basically Putin's not basically He's Putin's puppet laundering Russia talking points that Donald Trump wants to destroy the world order because essentially that's what? Putin wants to do and you know what Trump attacks Europe attacks NATO attacks, Canada attacks, Mexico Are they gonna be tariffs? They're not gonna be tariffs He obviously despises that detests Zelensky and shout out to the courage Zelinsky showed by the way in that in the Oval Office meeting but but in any way part of the gutting of American power is getting rid of USAID but there were already contracts where this food was supposed to

go so basically the doge efficiency plan was even though the food was ready, just let it rot. Just let it rot. Even though the ships were paid for, don't bring the food there. And at first Doge tried to lie in court with those DOJ lawyers that we were telling about and said, no, no, no, the cuts just relate to future stuff, not the past contracts. Right. That was their first lie. And then the lawyers who were fighting for this aid to get where it was supposed to said, no, no, no, no, no, that's a lie. It's actually for the four contracts that are already done and made. And now this stuff has to get delivered. Just deliver the stuff that's already there because the food's gonna literally

rot and then people are gonna die, or people have medical procedures, where they're going to die if they don't get the procedures done, or people have medical devices, like inside their bodies, and there needs to be a checkup or something, or they're going to die because we did things to try to keep, experimental procedures to try to keep them alive or whatever,

whatever it was, you know, or we owe certain or we have people stranded in locations in foreign countries. So just make good on the past contracts Congress appropriated them. So the federal judge, once he diced through the Doge law, I said, well, that makes sense. I suppose the Trump administration in the future with Congress can set new future priorities, but the contracts that are done, get those to their final destination points. And he said, you got to do it in 36 hours. Why?

Because people are literally going to die. Babies are going to die. Kids are going to get HIV AIDS If the mother doesn't get the the the medication, you know, you're going to screw people's lives Isn't a game. This isn't like when Elon Musk is uh, you know at CPAC and goes I'm a meme I'm a meme, you know and what Elon had his 14th kid, this is in addition to the one with, you know,

Ashley St. Clair, you know, 14 kids, 15 kids, however many kids with five baby mamas or four baby mamas, whatever it is, you know, and maybe it's all a game to these freaking billionaire oligarchs, but like innocent kids across the world are gonna be freaking dying because of these decisions. So anyway, there was a big win at the district court, a big win at the court of appeals to get these resources

on the ship that are already there. And again, I'm making this distinction, not the future stuff, just the stuff, why let the food rot? But the Trump administration was saying, let the food rot. Kill the babies, kill the people. And I'm using direct terms because that's what they're fighting for. Do not let the stuff that's already supposed

to get there, get there. We wanna crush the future stuff and the past stuff. Let's not pay the contractors. By the way, many are American contractors. Let's not pay the contractors. By the way, many are American contractors. Let's not pay the people for the services that they've already done, screw them. So it's not just the, it's you're also screwing American farmers

and Americans screw the contractors. Sound familiar? The guy who screwed contractors his whole life, screwing the contractor. Yeah, screw the contractors. It's why when I see these unions support the guy or like union members got the guy literally he loves screwing contractors almost the way he loves attacking Zelensky like I'm not sure contractors Zelensky for Donald Trump or a close one or two of people

who he absolutely hates Ukraine and contractors but he loves Putin and firing contractors equal love and hate relationship. So then the Trump administration rushes to the Supreme Court, kill the babies, kill the babies, kill the people, let them die, don't deliver the food. And Justice John Roberts issues a stay that stops the food from getting to its destination, that stops the medication, that stays or stops the district court order which said in 36 hours

Trump administration you've gotta You've got to fund what you are what the Congress already said you are required to fund you have to faithfully Execute the law now just as John Roberts was like look We're gonna do expedited briefing here. I take this very seriously. And the Trump administration's argument is that they don't have the resources because of all of their firings to get, even if they wanted to, to comply with the 36-hour deadline.

So when I said they were weaponizing their own negligence, the main argument for the Trump administration is saying, look, we need the actual status quo is not giving the contracts to where they're supposed to go. Because when we talk about injunctions, it's about the status quo. They're saying the status quo right now is we're not capable of even complying with those orders.

We need your help intervene because we don't have the staff to even now deliver this. Now, he should have been delivering it because if you faithfully execute the law, this should have been done months ago at this point, 40 days ago. This should not have been a contrived crisis. But Justice John Roberts steps in, orders a stay,

blocks the order that required that the funding take place for a short period of time, and now there's been expedited briefings submitted but in this expedited briefing, the Trumps also fired the people who compile the data, but how many kids have died? How many people have died? How many people have died? How many people are starving? How many kids have got AIDS now and HIV because of this? How many people are suffering? How many people are starving to death right now? How many people have gotten diseases? And that to me is the heart of all of this cruelty. Wrapping this episode together,

with kind of the final bow that we do at Legal AF is that this is not a game. And perhaps in Elon Musk and Trump and these tech oligarchs who are so detached from the day-to-day lives that we Americans have to deal with where paycheck to paycheck is an issue. When prices are surging, that's a problem. When housing is less affordable, when Trump lies and says he's gonna make IVF free

and for people that is the most important thing in their lives and you said you're gonna make IVF free and then you lie about it and you rug pull free IVF. When you rug pull no tax on tips and you lie to the, you know, this has real impact on human beings' lives and it's not a game. And with social media rage algorithms, with propaganda media, with Elon Musk and Trump

and their propagandists, they've like, they've gamified life and they've tried to make life so worthless and so insignificant and so meaningless. And while they go and pursue this fascistic agenda, that's helping billionaires. Popeyes is a long ramp, I'll give you the last word on the show.

Okay, let me collect my thoughts there for a minute. Yeah, look, let me bring it back to the law and politics, which is the focus of our show. The Supreme Court stepping in at the last minute and John Roberts through the shadow docket, putting a pin in it without recognizing or caring about worldwide suffering and the undermining of American diplomacy,

which is the result. As I only half joked, there's a reason USAID is in the State Department and not the Department of Defense. It's because you're trying to turn, you're trying to both do humanitarian things which are aligned with American values, which are wholly missing from this administration. There's just a divorce between what we consider, if you were to ask the average American to define American values, if you were to ask the average European to define American values without reference to Trump, you got to do it without

referencing Trump, and you then look and try to map those values onto what we are watching with the administration, you would see a completely morally and value bankrupt administration. morally and value bankrupt administration. And when you, so you've got that going on. When you have the Supreme Court stepping in with its shadow docket and just saying, well, we'll just do as a matter of course, let's do a briefing schedule, see you guys all in a month or two,

without a recognition that this will undermine American values, American democracy as a shiny beacon around the world, and turn people from suffering who were receiving humanitarian aid, and turn them towards the East, towards the Chinese and the Russians. See, all I've been watching is Donald Trump playing into the hands, willingly, into the hands of the Russian

and the Chinese and the North Koreans. He is doing what they could never imagine that they would be able to accomplish. They couldn't accomplish, with all the trolling and misinformation and cyber attacks, they would never be able to accomplish in such short order what Donald Trump has accomplished for them right now. I mean, can you imagine the champagne

quarks being popped over how our ally, our Democratic ally, the victim of a war, Zelensky, leading a country at war, how they're celebrating in Russia over how Donald Trump took the bait and decided with with Elon, with JD Vance, his his pit pole lap dog to go after an ally in that way. All that's done is galvanized support for Zelinsky around the world, not only unified Democrats against Donald Trump,

but Republicans too. And then they trot out Lindsey Graham to try to argue that Zelinskyky should step down from his post where all fair-minded people think this was the end, the beginning of the end for Marco Rubio, that Marco Rubio should resign his post immediately because of the failed diplomacy on full display in the Oval Office. But this is all symptomatic of a complete hollowing out of values and American values at the Trump administration.

We just see it in many different, it's acting out in many different formats. The meltdown in the Oval Office, the position taking in courts, the attack on our own economy by an American president. This is all the sign of, I'm sorry, the attack on our own economy by an American president. This is all the sign of, I'm sorry, a deranged and unstable failing presidency. We will always be here at the intersection

of law and politics. To answer the question for those that are new to our democracy, new to the show, 90 cases filed in the first six weeks is not normal. 50 temporary restraining orders and preliminary injunctions in which judges have found it is more likely than not that this administration has violated the Constitution, the Administrative Procedures Act, the First Amendment,

two process rights of people having already found that because it's very, you wouldn't know it from watching the results. It's very hard to get a preliminary injunction in a temporary restraining order. I've probably done it less than a dozen times in my life in 35 years, okay? So this 90% batting average, this 900 batting average

that the lawyers that are bringing these cases are accomplishing. And we haven't even talked about, let me do the last word with this. Finally, the Democrats, as I said earlier, have found their footing. And they just filed a lawsuit, the Democratic National Committee, that just got filed yesterday against the Trump administration, Donald Trump, Pam Bondi, the head of the Federal Election Commission and all of that,

because of Donald Trump's efforts to take independent, bipartisan organizations who by their very statutory existence by Congress in the wake of things like the Watergate scandal, right, cannot and should never be listening to what the president's interpretation of law is, which is what his executive order says. Only Pam Bondi and I will tell you how you interpret regulations. That's exactly the opposite

of the Federal Election Commission Act, which says that those commissioners, all six of them, have to make independent decisions with reference to law by their own in-house general counsel. And this is now a place where Donald Trump is trying to take the umpire of the game between the Democrats and the Republicans and make that person a Republican where he controls the umpire for

the game. And the Democrats are saying, wait a minute, the Federal Election Commission was purposely created after Watergate when donation checks for the reelection of Nixon were being used to break into the Democratic National Committee in the Watergate Hotel, that's how we got the name, and we're supposed to have an election committee that when we go to them, we feel like they're not biased. They're supposed to be bipartisan.

Yes, they're picked by the executive branch. Yes, they're confirmed by the Senate. But they are supposed to have our interest and a fair and balanced playing field at heart. How do you do that when they now have to look to Donald Trump? How do we interpret this regulation against the Democrats? Tell me.

All right, so we have that lawsuit going on, a perfect lawsuit now for the Democrats to file their first, the Democratic National Committee to file their first case against Donald Trump. Tune in every week to the Midas Touch Network, to Legal AF, we do the show twice a week. We got hot takes that you and I do at the intersection of law and politics,

with some others, about every couple of hours on the Midas Touch Network. We got the Legal AF YouTube channel, which is about to hit 500,000 in the first six months. And that's all because of you. That's yes, I'm curating it, I'm bringing together Court Accountability Action, Dina Dahl, Shan Wu and others,

and some new contributors I'm working on right now to cover the things we can't even cover them by such network in collaboration with them. But we need you, and we need you over there as well. So thanks for that last word. Michael Popock, let me say one more time how proud I am for you to start your own law firm and it's off to an incredible, incredible start.

I know you're picking up a lot of clients at the firm. I wanna remind people, yes, if you have car accident cases, Popock does those, trucking cases, Popock does those. The ones he focuses are in the more kind of catastrophic, wrongful death, injuries that require serious surgeries. He's a very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very,

very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, like priest abuse cases, situations where a lot of the- Airplane crashes. You are handling the airplane crash case over DC. And thank you for handling that case, Popak. That's really an important one to be focused on. Our heart goes out to the family as well. And we know that they watch and listen to Legal AF. And it's great for you to be able to help and reach out to our viewers and listeners.

What's the website and number if they wanna get in touch with you? I made it as easy as possible, mainly for me. Thepopacfirm.com, just the way it sounds, P-O-P-O-K is the Popac side, and then an 800 number that I thought our audience would enjoy, which is 1-877-POPOC-AF.

There you have it, everybody. Thanks for watching Legal AF. You know, this is a major part of the opposition, the resistance, and going on the offense is understanding your rights, understanding the strategy behind these cases, understanding what's going on, understanding the Trump behind these cases, understanding what's going on, understanding the Trump lies and propaganda, unpacking it, and then you all sharing it with people that

you know. You're a major part of this because once you have the info, you got to let other people know to subscribe to this channel, share with them the true facts. We appreciate it so much and thank you to our bots, thank you to the Midas Mighty and all the Legal AFers. We're on a rocket ship to 5 million subscribers. I think we'll actually get there pretty soon. Really thank you all from the bottom of our heart.

We're so grateful. We're so grateful for you. I will see you next time on Legal AF. Shout out to the Legal AFers and shout out to the Midas Mita.