Legal AF by MeidasTouch - Trump hits NEW LOW as Jack Smith and Manhattan DA PUSH Forward

Episode Date: March 26, 2023

Anchored by MT founder and civil rights lawyer, Ben Meiselas and national trial lawyer and strategist, Michael Popok, and joined for today’s episode by co-anchor and top former NY prosecutor Karen Friedman Agnifilo, the top-rated news analysis podcast LegalAF is back for another hard-hitting look at the most consequential developments at the intersection of law and politics. On this week’s edition, the anchors discuss: Trump’s threats against Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg as the grand jury resumes its work next week on Trump’s possible indictment for the Stormy Daniels hush money coverup; the Chief Judge of the DC Circuit Court in charge of all grand juries ordering that Mark Meadows and other key Trump West Wing officials testify to the Grand Jury with no “executive privilege” protection, and Evan Corcoran, stripped of any attorney client privilege, testifying for 3 hours before the Mar a Lago grand jury; a NY Federal judge presiding over the E. Jean Carroll civil rape case against Trump finding that Trump’s attacks on judges, prosecutors, law enforcement and jurors, imperils the jury to be picked on 25April, and decides to keep their identity anonymous during the trial; and Judge Engoron denying Trump’s efforts to postpone for six months the NY Attorney General’s $250+ million civil fraud case against Trump, his children and his executives, and keeps the 2October trial date etched in stone, and so much more. DEALS FROM OUR SPONSORS! RHONE: Head to https://rhone.com/legalaf and use code LEGALAF to save 20% off your entire order HENSON SHAVING: Visit https://HensonShaving.com/LEGALAF to pick the razor for you and use code LEGALAF for 2 years worth of free blades! SUPPORT THE SHOW: Shop LEGAL AF Merch at: https://store.meidastouch.com Join us on Patreon: https://patreon.com/meidastouch Remember to subscribe to ALL the Meidas Media Podcasts: MeidasTouch: https://pod.link/1510240831 Legal AF: https://pod.link/1580828595 The PoliticsGirl Podcast: https://pod.link/1595408601 The Influence Continuum: https://pod.link/1603773245 Mea Culpa with Michael Cohen: https://pod.link/1530639447 The Weekend Show: https://pod.link/1612691018 The Tony Michaels Podcast: https://pod.link/1561049560 American Psyop: https://pod.link/1652143101 Majority 54: https://pod.link/1309354521 Political Beatdown: https://pod.link/1669634407 Lights On with Jessica Denson: https://pod.link/1676844320 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to legal AF. We are still on Trump indictment watch here on legal AF. The Manhattan criminal grand jury did not meet last week as was expected. They are expected to meet this upcoming week. What was the reason for the delay? What will happen this upcoming week? We will discuss. Donald Trump continue to threaten Manhattan district attorney Alvin Bragg this week calling Alvin Bragg an animal, human scum, a devil and anarchist and Trump posted a photo of himself that he later removed depicting himself hitting Alvin Bragg with a baseball bat in addition to other posts of Trump telling his followers, quote, you aren't going to take it anymore,

calling for death and destruction. If charges are brought and questioning why people should be peaceful if he is criminally indicted, he has not deleted those other posts. Is this another crime and will there be consequences? Also, a big week for Special Counsel, Jack Smith, in the federal criminal investigations into Trump's election interference, and into Trump's theft of thousands of government records, and obstruction of justice, Special Counsel, Jack Smith won some major court battles that could spell very big trouble for Donald Trump will discuss and noting Donald Trump's

despicable behavior, the New York federal judge in E. Jean Carroll's civil rape and defamation lawsuit set to go to trial on April 25 next month. Took the rare step, which is usually reserved for mafia leaders or cartel leaders like El Chapo of ordering an anonymous jury in the civil case where Donald Trump is a civil defendant. What does this mean? What are the implications? We will break it down here. Also, Donald Trump's playbook of delay, delay, delay was exposed and rejected in New York by Judge Arthur and Goron this week in the civil fraud lawsuit brought by New York attorney general Latisha James, where the New York AG's office is seeking at least $250 million in damages and injunctive relief, which would effectively put the Trump

organization out of business in New York. Justice Arthur Engoran said the current trial date of October 2, 2023 is etched in stone, which is a major blow for Donald Trump. We will discuss what took place at the hearing, including the fact that there was a bomb threat that temporarily delayed that hearing and a number of actual threats taking place as Donald Trump continues to threaten

the New York Attorney General and the Manhattan District Attorney and all these prosecutors. This is legal AF. I'm Ben Micellis joined by my co-host Michael Popak and Karen Friedman Agniflo. You have all three of us here today, at least on the first segment where we break down. What's going on in Manhattan? Michael Popak, great to see you.

Great to see you. We are so pleased to have Karen with us for the first one. She's once again, I believe, jumping off to do some national media tour later this morning, but exclusive on legal AF is our co-anchor and friend Karen Friedman-Cnippalo. Karen, how are you? I'm great. How are you guys? We're doing great.

Always a pleasure on legal AF when we get the full group of us together and when we can get your incredible insight. So let's just get into a car and first and foremost, what happened in Manhattan this week? So this week we know on Monday that Bob Costello testified on behalf of Donald Trump and we were waiting to see what would happen Wednesday and Thursday to see whether or not they would charge the grand jury which means tell them what the law is and then ask them to vote. But that didn't happen. And so what's happening right now in Manhattan is whatever Bob Costello said it wasn't a big surprise because you know all really what he was saying was that Michael Cohen

is somebody who can't be trusted, he's a liar, basically a maligning Michael Cohen, but Michael Cohen was known to the District Attorney's Office, they know about his prior convictions, and they know about his prior inconsistent statements. And so that was no surprise, but to the extent that there was anything that he said that resonated with the grand jurors,

the D.A.'s office is going to seriously consider the possibility of putting in what's called a rebuttal witness or somebody who can rebut some of the specific things that Bob Costello said. Now, they're weighing whether they need it or not, because if he didn't make any big dent to their case, then you don't need to put someone in. But if he did, or they think it's something that's important

to shore up, then they will put someone in. And who knows, it could be Michael Cohen again, or it could be someone else who can corroborate Michael Cohen, which I think would be the most powerful and impactful type of testimony. The other thing they could do is put in evidence that would show who Bob Castello is, right? And we know that he is very much connected to Trump and Giuliani and he was all over the Mueller report. So, you know, he, there are many different things that the DA's office will be weighing whether or not to present to the grand jury. Now, they meet on Monday,

Wednesdays and Thursdays. And it's a special grand jury, which means it's a long-term investigation. And there's always one or two special grand jury is going on at the DA's office. That is not unusual because the Manhattan DA's office does lots of long-term investigations that wouldn't fit into a normal grand jury, which sits for two or four weeks usually. So when you ask for a special grand jury, what you do is you apply to the court and you ask the court to order a new special grand jury and you'll say it's for four months or six months or 18 months, whatever you think you need for your case.

And normally it'll be for one or two or three cases that will be specified or investigations is better way of putting it than cases that you specify in the order because sometimes these investigations don't result in charges. Sometimes you gather information, you investigate a case, and you determine, you know what, although I thought there was a crime, there isn't a crime. So these special grandaries go on for long periods of time and hear more than one case. And that is what appears to be going on there as well, not unusual.

Again, like I said, that's business as usual. And to those who thought that, well, the grand jury didn't meet, they were called off. Is that strange? What's going on? Are they having cold feet? These are all the grand jury by its nature, by law, is a secret proceeding.

And so these are the things that go on every day at the DA's office that no one knows about and no one hears about. So, although it looks unusual to the viewers who see why didn't they call the grand jury, why did they call it off, you know, all the questions, it actually is not unusual to have these things happen. You know, for example, you might have a rebuttal witness that you wanted to call on Wednesday, but that person was unavailable Wednesday. And to have these things happen. For example, you might have a rebuttal witness that you wanted to call on Wednesday, but that person was unavailable Wednesday,

and they weren't available till the next week. So you would not bring the grandgers in for no reason, and you would say, okay, you don't need to come in. So that's what's been happening this week. In addition to that, we know that the Manhattan D.A.'s office is coordinating with law enforcement about when would be a safe time to have Donald Trump surrender, because there are lots of considerations, right? There's the Secret Service. They have, we'll have opinions about how and when to bring Donald Trump into New York City, into the criminal courts building,

and into court. And so they will, and of course, Donald Trump has a schedule, right? He's in Waco, Texas this weekend, having a rally, raising millions of dollars off of Alvin Bragg, and all of the other criminal investigations that he is under. And so his schedule matters. The court's schedule matters. You ask the court, what are good days for you?

And of course NYPD FBI and the JTTF, the Joint Terrorism Task Force and the court officers will also be involved in determining what is the safest way and the safest day and time to bring Donald Trump in. Because, you know, this isn't the first high-profile person that has come into the DA's office and the, or I should say, has been surrendered into the DA's office and been arrested. And there are many ways you can quietly bring someone in and keep them safe. You know, there is a proverbial back door to the office. But Donald Trump is going to make sure that he perp walks himself, right? No one else is going to do a perp walk. He's going to make sure he perp walks himself into the office and

makes a big stink of it. And he will absolutely use this as a media stunt. So the law enforcement knows this, they're going to take that into consideration and they're gonna come up with a tech plan or a tactical plan, frankly. The way they do when they're going to go out and arrest a big mafia boss or something or a drug dealer.

They come up with a tact plan. They're gonna have to have a tact plan on how to deal with Donald Trump with all different law enforcement considerations. They're gonna have traffic considerations. They're gonna block off streets so that the motorcade is able to get from point A to point B. They're gonna have,

it's gonna be scripted down to the most minute detail. Where he's going to come from, what the route is going to be, they will block off streets, they will make sure they might even close down the FDR drive so that there are no other cars in his motorcade when he comes because they're worried about his safety. You just never know. The NYPD knows how to do this because we have dignitaries and you know heads of state come to New York all the time because the United Nations is located physically in Manhattan. So we have kings and and presidents and prime ministers from all over the world and the NYPD and all of that law enforcement,

they know how to do it, they keep everybody safe. They get, you know, sitting presidents who come to New York, they get them in and out safely. So they can easily do this, but they are planning, right? It's a coordinated plan. And so one of the things that is happening, Alvin Bragg, as the head chief law enforcement officer in Manhattan, he is coordinating with law enforcement to determine when is the safest day to bring the indictment because you want that indictment to be as close as possible

to the surrender date so that Donald Trump doesn't have too much time to whip up violence, chaos, destruction, which he is clearly trying to do. And so that takes us to where we are now, which is Donald Trump crossed a bright line this week. He has gone from his first amendment right to free speech, which we all have. You have first amendment right to say whatever you want, essentially, until it crosses the line from speech to action. It crosses the line from speech to conduct. And that is what Donald Trump has done. He has now entered the realm of criminal conduct through his speech. So he did two things that put him over the line to me.

And this is where I jumped into prosecutor mode again. It's amazing how easy you can slip right back into, okay, you know, this guy committed a crime and looks to figure out which one it is. He committed, so what do you do with that? Before you go in there, I just want to remind all of our new viewers about your background being the former number two at the Manhattan District Attorney's Office. You worked as a DA in the Manhattan District Attorney's Office for basically 30 years and you were

and sometimes even the acting Manhattan District Attorney there essentially the top position in the Manhattan District Attorney's Office and you even the acting Manhattan district attorney there, essentially the top position in the Manhattan district attorney's office and you supervise essentially all of the lawyers there. So when you're talking right now about the charging decisions that you would make if you were in that office, I just want everyone to know that context. I'll throw it back to you. Thanks, Ben. Yeah, look, it's very much, like I said, as a prosecutor, you're used to defendants who act like trapped animal,

who's panicked, and they lash out. That happens all the time. They say terrible things, they do terrible things, and that will happen. But at a certain point it it it crosses a line from speech to conduct and and that's what Donald Trump did this week And he did it by doing two things. So number one he posted a Picture of him holding a baseball bat with next to Alvin Bragg's head. Okay? There is no doubt what he is doing there and what he is showing there.

Okay? He is essentially threatening Alvin Bragg with a baseball hat and what will his followers, what will they see that is? They will see that as a call to action. They will see that is a call to action to Commit violence against Alvin Bragg He also called him an animal. He called Alvin Bragg an animal Which is a in my opinion? It's very it's a racist

Comment where he's trying to whip up his white supremacist followers to kind of say, you know, look look at this black animal over here We can't let him do this to you and that's what he always does He throws it back to them. He's like they are trying to prevent you from having your president and they are trying to put you in jail And hold you you know, they're trying that he does that. And it's an us versus them. And by calling out of a bragging animal to me, again, that is just more of his call to action, call to violence to individuals. But what really put it over the edge was when you couple both of these things with his truth social post where he said, he literally said that by bringing this case, that you know there was that known that potential death and destruction in such a false charge

could be catastrophic for our country. That is his way of calling for violence. That is his signal to say cause, death, and destruction. He could just as easily have said, you know what? I can take this. This is a bullshit charge. I can take it like a man. I will go in and I will fight this like a man in court the way everybody else does, right? He's dead, he is, he is terrified and he is a coward. And so what does he want? He wants his, he wants to whip his people up into death and destruction. And it's that language that has crossed over to a crime. And I think there are three potential crimes that he's committed. Unfortunately,

there are only misdemeanors at this point, which I couldn't believe it. I had to ask all my my smart wizards, you know, legal wizards that I ask, and they all agree there's only misdemeanors. But there are three potential misdemeanors. And to me, the clearest one that he has committed is something called aggravated harassment in the first degree. And that's in violation of penal law section 240.30, sub division one. And that reads, that reads basically that you communicate, hold on, let me get the language up here. 240.30, subdivision one means that when you communicate with the person, it's likely

to cause annoyance or alarm, and clearly that is what he has done here. He's causing annoyance and alarm, right? So that's to me a clear violation of that statute. But the statute that I like the most for this is inciting a riot in violation of New York penal law section 240.08. And a person is guilty of inciting a riot when he urges 10 or more people to engage into molchewis and violent conduct of a kind

likely to create public alarm. And the reason I think this is a good charge is there's a concept in the law called Mollano. And that is something that normally when you bring evidence of a crime, you're not allowed to bring in evidence of other bad acts that you've committed or other uncharged or charged crimes because the defense attorney would say that you're using that to show that he has a propensity to commit a crime. And obviously that can be overly prejudicial. That can be overly prejudicial because just because you did it before doesn't mean you did it here. And so most of the time you cannot bring in prior

bad acts evidence unless it's to show motive or intent or, or modus operandi, you know, like the same MMO, you know, similar pattern, you know, there are different exceptions to that. And that's what the MOLO rule is. It allows you to, and that's based on a case, you know, where MOLO is the name of the case. And so that, that, that's why it's called that. And it's M O L I N E A U X or something that's spelled like that for anyone who wants to look it up. And and so and so I would argue that I would try to mollano in Jan 6, okay, because there he could have easily called for peaceful protesting, but he didn't, right? He instead, you know, brought everyone on the, he brought everyone on the ellipse and, you know, he told everyone to come and march and, you know, there, and it will be crazy. And all the language he used there that was a clear, you know, stand back and stand by all the language that he uses,

that is a clear indication to his followers to incite violence. He knows what his words do, and I would use that against him to show his intent. I would use that to show his intent when he said there will be death and destruction. He intends to send a signal to his followers to create mayhem. And that is what I think he's doing here. And so that is the second crime that I would want to use. And again, like I said, I would use Gen 6 as evidence of that.

And then the third crime that I think is a possibility here is penal law section 195.05 obstructing governmental administration in the second degree. And I want to give Professor Popak credit for coming up with this one. He came up with this one yesterday and he said, what about this crime? And I dismissed it pretty quickly saying no, because that's not when it's usually charged, when it's usually charged because the law's usually charged, because the law requires some kind of physical action. So if you've got peaceful protesters, for example, who refuse to leave a particular area and just sit down,

the laws won't let you charge those individuals. They have to actually fight back or handcuff themselves. They have to do some kind of physical action to be charged. And so at first I thought that doesn't apply here because Donald Trump didn't do anything physical. But then I reread it and it says, you know, obstruction of governmental administration in the second degree, when he intentionally

obstructs or perverts the administration of law or other governmental function, or attempts to prevent a public servant from performing an official duty like Alvin Bragg from bringing a case, by means of intimidation. And I would argue, you know, Pocock, you're right that this is by means of intimidation. So I think you can you can try that one. It's not as clean in my opinion as the other two, but I do think there's an argument there. Now, whether or not the DA's office will charge any of these misdemeanors, so I'll tell you exactly what's going through their mind right now. First of all, number one, there are usually not

joinable on the indictment of the Stormy Daniels case because they are separate, so you'd have to bring that separately, so they are considering that, right? Is it worth it? Is it worth arresting him from misdemeanors in addition to these felonies now, I would say yes, but they're gonna make that calculation about whether or not they think it's worth it. The other thing, because like I said, they're going to make that calculation about whether or not they think, you know, it's worth it.

The other thing, because like I said, they're not joinable, you know, or they'd be severable if they were joined, you could sever them. But the other thing they're thinking about, like I said, is it worth it, you know, is it worth bringing these misdemeanors? Again, I would say yes it is, but we will see. But I guarantee, based on this conduct, they are considering it right now. And that's what they are doing. It also goes to why they are considering bringing the indictment much closer in time to when the surrender is.

Because you have to factor public safety into this. Not that they're being intimidated or bullied, but they have an obligation to protect the American people and to protect, you know, because who knows where he's going to create mayhem, it could be in Florida, right? He could say, you know, I'm surrendering, I'll of course, I'll agree to surrender. Hopefully, wink, wink, you know, all my followers, hopefully you won't prevent me from doing that, right? But he's already the whole discussion of creating a moat around Maralogo.

I'm sure he would love to have all his people around him saying, I would come in, I would cooperate, but these patriots, these wonderful Americans who are patriotic, they don't want their president to be dragged into New York where that animal is going to lawlessly prosecute me. And so, and I'm sure I could see him dragging it out for a period of time. Is it a coincidence that he's in Waco, Texas this weekend where the branched videons were in a standoff with the FBI

refused to come out? He loves that. He loves that kind of thing. He's thinking about that at Mar-a-Lago for when he's going to say that he's surrendering, but that they won't let him. And by the way, if he says he's going to surrender, that he wants to muck up the whole, you know, the whole like extra-dition. There is no coincidence to me that he's in Waco this weekend. He wants to remind people of, you people of what it's like to fight back and stand your ground because that's who Donald Trump is.

And Karen, it's not a coincidence that the Republicans held a hearing attacking the ATF right before Donald Trump went to Waco as well this week. I think that was all coordinated. So unequivocally, it sounds like that. You're my enemy, you know, you're my enemy, you. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're my answer. You're a hearing. You must come in and we want to hearing about this case and any other federal funding that you have, which, and Alvin Bragg's excellent general counsel, Leslie Duback wrote a three-page letter, basically telling them that this is unprecedented, this is lawless, you have no right.

First of all, there's a concept called federalism. You have no right to come and Ask us about what we are doing here, and this is a pending case and it's a political stunt and so so they're fighting back hard on that which they should. It is unprecedented You there is no they don't they don't do J doesn't come in and talk about pending investigations or pending cases That is not appropriate and that is not an appropriate separation of powers and it actually could jeopardize a case. So that's the other term that's... Karen, if you're leading the office, you would charge Donald Trump for these additional

crimes. 100%. Michael Popov. Because you have to make, you have to stop this madness. It's one thing to disagree about issues, right? But when you are creating, when you are inciting violence, which is exactly what he's doing here and threatening a prosecutor, the rule of law matters. Committing a crime matters.

And at a certain point, you have to, enough is enough. This has become normalized. We have become, I listened to political commentators who I actually really respect, who are going on some of these these news shows saying, why is this case going? It's not that serious. The other cases are more serious. Yes, the other cases are more serious than the Stormy Daniels case, but think about it. How can anyone say this is not a serious case? This case, okay, when you

think about it, why did he pay Stormy Daniels off and then hide it? Because it was the first time he tried to influence a presidential election, right? He tried later, four years later, on Jan 6th, and with, you know, with, with, find me 11,780 votes and, and trying to stop Pence from counting the electoral votes. And, you know, that was the, that was a more obvious time when he tried to influence the election, you know, but the first time he tried to influence a presidential election was when he made these payments. Number two, make no mistake. He made 11 payments where they falsified business records.

He wrote in there that it was for a legal retainer, which it was not. He did that while sitting in the Oval Office. We had a sitting president committing a crime 11 times that we know of, right? While he was trying to be president of the United States, committing a crime, and he says, because I didn't want Melania to find out, well, I'm sorry, one was the last time Melania Trump looked at the books and records of the Trump organization to see what payments were being made. That is a ridiculous defense.

So anyone who tries to say this is not a serious case, in my opinion, this is an extremely serious case, and it is, this is an extremely serious case and it is worth bringing, it needs to be brought and he needs to be stopped and held accountable for his violent, irresponsible actions. And Karen, you charge him for the threats as well. In addition to the Stormy Daniels felony, you'd also charge him for the threats that we've been talking about with his posts. Yes, I would. All right, I got to hear from Pope, ox take. Pope,

ock has been anxiously waiting to share his take. We will share Pope, ock's take right after these messages. And thank you so much. Karen Freeman, I nifola for sharing with us your truly excellent expertise. There's no one in the world who knows more than you about this topic and also letting us know what your

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Michael Popeyes to an old pack with the with the read so Pope I want to hear your take on what's going on in the Manhattan district Attorneys investigation the grand jury Specifically also though about Donald Trump's recent threats and if you think those constitute crimes and then Why don't we just hear from you go right after that, because it's been a big week for special counsel Jack Smith in the federal investigation. So would want to have your take on both, Popeye. Yeah, let's start with the with the Manhattan DA. You've got a a criminal future criminal defendant and Donald Trump who has become virtually unhinged on social media. Let's just remind everybody, he frequently attacks judges. He's attacked barrel howl who we're going to talk about next in the DC Circuit Court.

He's attacked judge and goreon who we're going to talk about with the New York Attorney General case. He's attacked Judge Middlebrooks in Miami who ruled against him and find him in a series of cases he brought against Hillary Clinton. He's attacked Judge Carter in the Central District of California who found it was more likely than not that he committed a crime. That's judge how as judge barrel howell also has. He's attacked jurors and grand jurors in Georgia. He's attacked jurors in the stone, uh, Michael Stone, uh, uh, uh, uh, stone investigation and prosecution. He's gone after the Department of Justice and attacked Jack Smith, Merrick Garland, Mueller before them. And he's gone after prosecutors

and other people in law enforcement like Latisha James, Fony Willis, and now Alvin Bragg. And I agree with, that's a long list. And I agree with our co-anchor, Karen, that at some point it crosses the line. When he chose in his social media to take a photo of him, I think it's a real photo of him swinging a baseball bat when he was in the White House and putting it directly next to Alvin Bragg's head in the context. And there it is in the context and in the stream of his other posts in which he used racist tropes that are straight out of birth of a nation, straight out of, you know, probably the most virulent movie ever made of birth of a nation. When you call a black prosecutor, a degenerate sociopath, those are code words that are usually used

against black men historically. When he ties into George Soros in an anti-Semitic attack also, saying that he's a Soros back. People are mimicking Donald Trump like DeSantis. They don't even understand what they are mimicking and the vocabulary that they are using. It is racist. It is anti-Semitic. It's an attempt to create, to call Alvin Bregg the other in order to

justify him being beaten and attacked. And Alvin Bregg got an assassination letter with a white powder in it two days ago. That is, that is one that we've heard about. I'm sure there are others. And when we first saw this article that salty our producer was putting up here, we only heard about the powder and a quote unquote threat. We know now the threat was an assassination threat to kill him, to kill Alvin Bragg. This will not be the first New York city

and the NYPD is on high alert from last week, all the way through the coming week, where we think the indictment is finally going to come out about Donald Trump. Donald Trump continues to have his social media backfire on him and used by judges and prosecutors against him. And he has no one to blame but himself. We're gonna talk about Judge Kaplan in making a decision to keep the jury anonymous

for their own protection in the E. Jean Carroll case. That's based on social media posts that even predated the one that we're showing here about his proposed attack on Alvin Bragg with a baseball bat. That was based on other things that he said earlier in the week about the indictment that the federal judge pointed to as the rationale for having an anonymous jury. So when you tie all this together, this attempt to, let's just call it for what it is,

lynch a black man who is a prosecutor. And that's the other thing. Most of the prosecutors in law enforcement he goes after happen to be black and to give himself cover for doing so. He calls them racist, of course, not understanding how racism works. Calls them racist because they're going after him,

I guess because he's a white Republican former president as opposed to somebody who commits crimes. So I agree with Karen. I don't think, you know, it's gonna take a lot of gumption for Alvin Bragg to look the other way and allow this line crossing, as Karen called it, with the baseball bat next to his head, because it's not just Donald Trump now.

It's Donald Trump in the future. It's others worse than Donald Trump that think they can get away with threatening law enforcement on the front page of their social media and get away with it. It rises to the level of crime. It's now going to be up to Alvin Bragg to decide whether in addition to Stormy Daniels, he's going to take on Donald Trump and the mega world and charge a crime that just got committed. So that's where we are. I think everything else we've covered. What else do you got to say about Manhattan? That those posts made by Donald Trump that we've just talked about on social media, I think can

also be used by special counsel Jack Smith in the election interference case. Now when we're talking about the January 6th insurrection, what took place on January 6th? When Donald Trump tries to say, oh, I never said death and destruction, you can now point to these other posts as well as part of a pattern and practice of what he was actually calling for as well.

So I think in addition to potentially now being another crime that can be charged by the Manhattan District Attorney's Office, this is an exhibit that's going to be used by Special Counsel Jack Smith. And Special Counsel Jack Smith is on the proverbial role, week after week after week, winning major court battles. And so I want to hear from you about some of these major court battles that Jack Smith was in, some of the major court victories that he had. It's been a busy

week for Jack Smith, Boba. Yeah, it's been a tremendously productive week. I'm blowing all giant holes in the battleship of Donald Trump's defense and his likely indictment by Jack Smith in at least one, if not all three grand juries. Barrel Howell is the gift that keeps on giving even in her final days of being literally final day at her seven year term of being the chief judge of the DC circuit court overseeing all things grand jury. She gave, she didn't give Jack Smith earned, I want to rephrase that, Jack Smith in the Department of Justice earned major victories about key witnesses that are now going to be or already have as of this recording today on Saturday, testified, brought back to the grand jury, provided documents and continued more evidence against Donald Trump. Let's start with Evan Corcoran.

M. Evan Corcoran is up to his eyeballs in possible criminal prosecution himself, but on the issue of whether he can use the attorney client privilege to prevent testimony. That was answered on Thursday by, well, it was answered on Tuesday, the prior week by Barrel Howell.

She ruled that not only does the attorney client privilege not protect him, and he has to testify before the grand jury about everything related we think tomorrow, logo, and the subpoena and the discussions Evan Corcoran had with the Department of Justice and the lies that were told to the Department of Justice and the FBI about the extent of the classified documents that were hidden at Mar-a-Lago and all of that and him being M-M Evan Corcoran being the boss of Christina Bob who signed a fraudulent statement to the Department of Justice testifying that there were only 36 classified documents that existed and they were all in that envelope, knowing or should have known that there was 100 more

behind at least one lock door or unlock door at Mar-a-Lago. He gave her the directions related to that. So we had a very, very quick. It was a microwave rapid fire day and a half from barrel house order to an appeal to the briefing related to the appeal, the party submitting their papers. And then an ultimate ruling by a three judge panel of the DC Court of Appeals, three democratically appointed judges, tube were appointed by Biden. One was appointed by Obama, and they set a very quick briefing schedule, all like Department of Justice, you've got,

you know, or Trump, you've got seven hours. Department of Justice, you've got nine hours, and then they ruled six hours later. The whole thing was done, and almost less than 24 hours. And it was against Donald Trump, and it upheld the trial court. In this case, the, um, barrel house decision that, that it was more likely than not.

In other words, there was prima facie proof that Donald Trump committed a crime related to the Mar-a-Lago documents, both stretching back to his initial discussions with the National Archive for presidential records, which the judge said was the beginning of the scheme, the criminal scheme led by Donald Trump all the way to how he either duped his own lawyers or they were willing participants in a criminal conspiracy about the documents and the subpoena negotiations that we all know what happened when the subpoena negotiations that we all know what happened when those subpoena negotiations went awry and the Department of Justice and FBI realized that they were being duped by Donald Trump and his lawyers because they

had other witnesses and they had video evidence. They then got the search warrant and executed that last August. So all of that, that decision by Barrel Howell, that it was more likely than not the Donald Trump committed a crime. The second time a federal judge so far has said that it was more likely than not the Donald Trump committed a crime. Judge Carter a year ago said that Trump and John Eastman, the architect of the whole fake electors scheme, likely also committed a crime in stripping the attorney client privilege away from John

Eastman when he was producing documents to the Jan 6th committee. Now you got Barrel Howell saying same thing here with Mar-a-Lago and it's Donald Trump. She didn't apparently based on the reporting against secret hearings because secret grand jury. She, we're not sure that she took a position as to whether Corcoran was duped as the lawyer or was a willing participant making him a target. But either way, I thought and I did a hot take on this one that based on Trump's track record and his blueprint, that he was going to try to take an emergency appeal to the Supreme Court after he lost at the DC Circuit Court on Thursday. I, if I was a betting man, I would have bet dollars and donuts that he was going to do that. And he did not.

So here's another, another interesting moment where Donald Trump's legal team decides, we're not even going to go to the Supreme Court, a Supreme Court that we all believe at least on non-presidential records things is in his pocket that the right-wing maga on the on the Supreme Court rule in his favor more more times than not on key issues. But even they, the lawyers for Donald Trump said, this is going to be a dead out arrival appeal to John Roberts, who would be the first judge that I'm going to have to deal with this as the circuit judge over the DC circuit.

That's a cheap job. Also, Popeye, I have Trump were to lose that it doesn't fit his narrative. His narrative is you've got a DC circuit court, gone rogue. You got these DC federal judges who are ruling against me. He knows he would, we know that's not true. We know that he's violating the law. He'd lose in front of the Supreme Court, and let's remember, he's not pursuing normal defenses that people who are in these situations would.

He's posting photos of himself with baseball bats depicting himself bludgeoning a prosecutor. His defense is to try to create another insurrection. Toss it back to you. That may be, but it's still inconsistent with his delay strategy because he would have at least got another two or three weeks. What happened instead is that Evan Corcoran went in and testified on Friday for three and a half hours, along with his lawyers. Sometimes Evan Corcoran is in court and representing Donald Trump the same week that he's giving

testimony presumably against Donald Trump. This is the world Donald Trump now lives in. Sometimes his lawyers are testifying against him in front of the grand jury with no attorney client privilege to protect them. And sometimes they're actually making appearances in court. But that wasn't the only interesting thing about the grand jury this week. It the Tim Parletor, who is another lawyer that we've talked about in the past that apparently voluntarily went into the grand jury in December, although we're just learning about it now.

He went, he went in front of a podium when Corcoran was being deposed, apparently, because he got pushed in front of it by the Trump Republicans, like, hey, we need to distract from the fact that Corcoran's testify, go do a press conference. And Parletor said, oh, I went in in December because the reason he went in is because there needed to be a records custodian for all things in all Trump locations.

Mar-a-Lago, Bedminster Gough, of course, a presidential office at West Palm Beach. Apparently, there's no records custodian. There's no one person that's responsible for all those records on purpose. Tim Parletor volunteered to be the records custodian to tell the grand jury and ultimately the judge about the search that was done in all of these places. Remember that there were two more even after they said everything was taken out of Mar-a-Lago and that's it. We're done. They found two more classified documents. And Tim Parletor is the one that testified that sometimes Donald Trump used as a to cover a night light,

to cover his clock in his bedroom, a evening briefing classified document folder. That's where we learned it from. But now, parlator is on the attack. And parlator, obviously, a script written by the people around Donald Trump said that he thinks that the Department of Justice is committing prosecutorial misconduct the way he was treated in the grand jury. They tried to get around attorney client privilege and acting like it didn't matter.

And to Tim Parlator, who nobody ever heard of before, you and I started talking about him on the Midas Touch Network. All of a sudden, he's the great commenter on all things Department of Justice. It's obvious that that was done to run interference while Corcoran gave the real testimony for three and a half hours in front of the Grand Jury. Now, that's not the only bad ruling for Donald Trump that came out last week. We're getting it a little bit spoon fed to us and drips and draps. Some people might say, well, if it happened last week, why are we just hearing about it now? Because again, secret

proceedings and we're getting reporting based on, you know, people talking to people involved and what now has come out is that another barrel howl final moments ruling before she, before she left the position as chief judge. Don't worry. She's still a judge on the DC circuit court. She's still handling cases like the Giuliani defamation case brought by the two Georgia election workers, a mother and daughter. She's still a judge. She just stepped down from being chief judge and Jeb Bozberg stepped into the position, a, also a democratically appointed judge. So I don't think we have much to worry about there. But the last rulings that she made also were that a whole list of others in the West

wing are also going to be required to testify. And she stripped away all of their executive privilege. So Mark Meadows, who we haven't heard from lately, and you and I speculated might be cooperating with the DOJ anyway, who did not testify to the Jan 6th committee putting up executive privilege, although he did curiously give them thousands of text messages before he stopped

cooperating with them. Now, so his testimonyies never been heard from. So the Department of Justice was able to get barrel howl to force Mark Meadows to go back to the, to go into the grand jury for the first time, now stripped of executive privilege. Now, he might put up that the amendment privilege because he was involved with a crime like burning documents

in his office fireplace, but Mark, we're gonna hear for the first time from one Mark Meadows, but that's not all. We're gonna hear for the first time from one Mark Meadows, but that's not all. We're gonna hear from Dan Scavino, the deputy chief of staff. He's been forced now to go into the grand jury without executive privilege. Steven Miller, one of my favorite enemy types within the Donald Trump group, who was responsible for many of his most racist, misogynist policies.

Steven Miller, also chief spokesperson, he's going to be going in without executive privilege and Ken Kuchinelli, the acting deputy, you know, Homeland Security person is going to director is going to go in as well. So you got this long list of people that are now going to be paraded before the grand jury giving testimony because of this ruling by barrel howl. The last one that you and I covered, but yet there's no, there's no, um, it wasn't able to get wrapped up under barrel howl's tenure is Mike Pence. Mike Pence continues to argue that he, he's covered by either speech and debate immunity

because he stands there with the gaville for a few minutes while he asks the clerk of the house and the senate to give him the electoral count and therefore he's a make-believe senator that has speech and debate but I nobody cares about what happened on the floor at that moment. They only care about all the other stuff when he was vice president and dealing with Donald Trump and almost getting hanged. So that's not covered by immunity. But that fight over speech and debate, which I think is a dead bang loser based on prior rulings, including the Northern District of Georgia about Lindsey Graham and all of that. That's going to be decided by Jeb Bozberg, who you and I are

now going to talk a lot about, like we used to talk about Barrow Howell, because he's the new chief judge as of, I think Monday of the, of the DC circuit court. So he's now responsible, takes over on all of those grand jury. So his decision about Mike Pence is the one that you and I are going to follow. You know, the very interesting thing that's going to happen with Mark Meadows. And I get here's my prediction. Mark Meadows is going to invoke his fifth amendment right against self-incrimination. Then Jack Smith and his team are going to have a very important decision to make there.

Are you going to give Mark Meadows derivative use immunity? And I think ultimately they are going to decide to give Meadows immunity the same way they gave cash Patel this derivative use immunity which basically just means you can't charge them with crimes based on the testimony that they provide before the grand jury. If you have independent sources and independently from the testimony, you can still charge them with those crimes, but you can't charge them based on things they say or things that are derived from it. Of course, if they commit perjury, you can still charge them there.

But that is what I predict is ultimately going to happen over the next few weeks or within the next 60 days or so. And when we make these predictions, it's not just like I'm wildly, you know, at random just saying things like you see sometimes on the large media networks. My basis for that is that Mark Meadows invoked the Fifth Amendment in the Fawni Willis Special Grand jury. So I assume he's going to follow suit now

before the federal criminal grand jury in Washington, DC and do the same thing. And then Special Counsel Jack Smith, who already has a treasure trove of messages from Mark Meadows will probably make the decision. What's the downside of giving derivative immunity here? We already have the independent basis to charge him with crimes anyway and so let's compel the testimony and force him not to invoke his fifth amendment right but we'll be able to roll back this tape on a future legal AF

when I think that prediction will be accurate, but we will see. And I still want to talk, of course, about this anonymous jury in the E. Jean Carroll Civil Deformation trial, which is set to go to trial. April 25th, there's been a lot of bad reporting on the E. Jean trial, okay, on the E. Jean Carroll defamation case. On the EG gene carol defamation case.

Many people think this case is not going to trial. It is. It's just the first defamation case isn't, but the second defamation case and the civil rape case is going to trial on April 25th. And then Donald Trump's big loss before Justice Arthur and Goron in the New York Attorney Generals civil lawsuit seeking at least $250 million in damages will break that down right after this quick break. Oh, hey, I didn't see you there.

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razor. Just make sure to add them to your cart. That's 100 free blades when you head to h-e-n-s-o-n-s-h-a-v-i-n-g.com slash legal AF and use code legal AF. And now back to the video. We are back here live on the weekend edition of legal AF earlier in the show. We were joined by Karen Friedman, Agnifalo, the former number two at the Manhattan District Attorney's Office. Now it's me and Popak. We've been breaking down topics such as the Manhattan District Attorney's Criminal Investigation. We've talked about

updates in the special counsel, Jack Smith, multiple criminal investigations and big wins there. This civil defamation and civil rape trial brought by E. Jean Carroll is going to trial in April 25th to use the term by Justice and Goron, who's not the federal judge, in that case, it's the judge in the New York State case, but I like in Goron's term, come hell or high water, or it's etched in stone,

seems to also apply here to this federal case brought by E. Jean Carroll. And the federal judge there, not in Goron, it's Judge Lewis Kaplan from the Southern District of New York made a rare ruling. I'd say it's it's it's big implications, but also rare ordering an anonymous jury. Popeye, what does this mean? Why'd he order an anonymous jury? Yeah, we thought it was bad last week when the judge was considering whether to do the anonymous jury, which he did on his own. This was not by either side. This was the judge looking around the social media world, knowing the defendant that he had in front of him, knowing all the list of things that I did with you

in the first segment, all the people and law enforcement, for instance, the Donald Trump has attacked often violently in language on his social media, knowing that, not having blinders on to who's in front of him, right? Justice is blind ultimately, but the judge isn't, and he knows who he's dealing with. And so he said, you know what, I got an idea, it's unusual, but I think we should keep the jury.

It's their professions, their addresses, their identities, anonymous for their own protection. What do you guys think? Turning it over to the lawyers. And neither, this was interesting that came out after the reporting. Neither Trump's lawyers, who apparently is either Alina Habba

and or what I've now referred to as the translucent Joe Takapina because he's nowhere to be found. I can't see the guy. He's only on media. He's never, he's never on anything that he files in the case. They file in the case for Donald Trump in this particular case for E. Jean Carroll civil rape case. You don't see Joe Takapina's name. Although the order that came out with Judge Kaplan, I'm going to talk about next did have Joe Takapina's name on it. But those lawyers did not object. I would have, I would have at least tried to argue that it was unnecessary, that it was

tainting the defense before they even stepped into the room, that it was putting into the mind of the jury that this was a bad guy and all of that. By the way, he is a bad guy. The jury does need to be protected, but I'm trying to make the argument for Donald Trump's lawyers. They didn't even make that argument. In fact, the only entities that opposed the judges request for information about whether he should or shouldn't order the anonymous jury were

two media entities, including associated press. So they were the only ones that said, no, we want to know who the jurors are. The rest, you know, sort of laid down. Now, you'd think maybe, maybe, maybe what Trump's lawyers, and I may be giving them too much credit here, Ben, is that they didn't want an order from Judge Kaplan attacking their client before it even began. But if that was their thought, that's not what happened. So the judge entered his ruling, finding that there were proper grounds for an anonymous

jury. And when he wrote his order, I'm just going to read a couple of lines from it. He says right in the first line of his order, the Donald J Trump is accused in this and a closely related civil case of having raped E. Jean Carroll in the mid 1990s and making public statements about that. Now that's how it started. The order didn't get any better for Donald Trump as it went on because it talked about his own conduct, especially in social media, in which he has attacked judges, jurors and others. So here's a judge that his people, the law clerks around them and himself have gone and done their research to quote Judge Kaplan in his order.

It bears mention that Mr. Trump repeatedly has attacked courts, judges, various law enforcement officials and other public officials and even individual jurors in other matters, dropping a footnote to cross reference all of that. Now I'll remind everybody that order that came out was before the Alvin Bragg baseball bat late night series of truth social tweets or whatever they are. So this is even before that. This would only reinforce and strengthen the judge's hands. So after going over all the bad things in misconduct, Donald Trump is done as the rationale for

having an anonymous jury, the judge then set the conditions. And this jury bed is going to be well protected by the US Marshal service. They are going to move as a group from the courtroom to the deliberation room where they hang out for a bit to lunch together all under the watch, fall eye of the US, US Marshal to their cars or their modes of transportation together protected with like vans. So even though they're not going to be sequestered,

which means the jury's not going to be put up on a hotel with, with, with the no contact to the outside world, they're going to go home to their families and friends every night, but they are gonna be protected, which I wanna hear it from you, Ben. What do you think that does to the jury's psyche? I've dealt with juries for a long time. What do you think does to the jury's psyche?

That they're being told that for your own protection, and they will be told this, they are going to be anonymous as to their professions, to their identity, and their identity and otherwise, from the moment they are selected and have to decide a whether Donald Trump raped E. Jean Carroll. What do you think that does to their psyche? I think they will very quickly understand the seriousness and solemnity of the job which

they have been picked to do. I think they will obviously have questions already in their mind, well, this must be a very dangerous person if we're being provided this protection. And I'll just say this, why I think Donald Trump ultimately was okay with an anonymous jury. I think what he's hoping for is that there is a runaway juror that there may be some trumper who makes their way on this jury and where that could normally be found, perhaps on someone's social media. If you know the identities of the jurors,

I think what trumps hoping for with an anonymous jury is maybe it's not appropriately filtered during the Voidier jury selection process. In addition to your take, Popok, which is I think they want to avoid the bad order, but that's why I think Trump was ultimately okay with the anonymous jury as well. But I think the jurors are going to have very serious questions about Donald Trump's behavior, the behavior of any defendant in a case like that, where they have to be protected for their own safety. And by the way, not only is this very rare in criminal cases,

this is a civil lawsuit for defamation. It's almost, I'll have to go and look back if this has ever happened in a civil defamation case before, but I would venture to get never has. It has. It has. It has. It has. It has.

It has. It has. It has. It has. It has. It has. It has. It has.

It has. It has. It has. It has. It has. It has. It has. It has. social media like, isn't rape criminal? Why aren't we in why aren't we in criminal court? Or a criminal process? Because the Statue of Limitations in New York ran on the criminal side. It's been extended now, but it doesn't help EG and Carol because of when she claimed she was raped. But she did get the benefit of a new adult survivors act statute passed

by Governor Hoko, who which gave a one year window to anyone who was claims that they were sexually assaulted or abused, who, which gave a one-year window to anyone who was claims that they were sexually assaulted or abused, who are now adults, to be able to file a claim against their perpetrator. But you don't need, in a civil case, civil federal case, a unanimous jury the way you do in federal criminal. So he'd need more than one runaway juror because this is civil. She just has to get the vast majority of the jurors to go along with her case as presented by Roberta Kaplan.

And you and I are gonna have to follow, who is gonna be, I mean, I'm still questioning in my own mind who is gonna be the lead lawyer that's gonna show up on the 25th of April, which is less than a month away, who's going to do the opening, who's going to do the jury selection, which is very important, even in federal court. We call up the Void Deer process for Donald Trump. And who is going to cross examine E. Jean Carroll for the Trump side?

Isn't it elite? It's got it can't right now. There's no chance for another lawyer. For a while there, I thought they were, they bring in like somebody else. So it's gotta be Joe Takapina, should he decide to walk into the courtroom, or Alina Haba. You think it's Alina Haba that's gonna be the lead trial

lawyer in this case? I still think they've tried to bring in another lawyer to parachute in last minute, whether it's Jim trustee or Christopher Kice, the only people who are actually kind of real lawyers on the team. I had it really known much about Takapina, and he kind of proved that Mark Twain expression correct, which is, you know, better to be thought of a fool than open your mouth and remove all doubt because that was just one of the more bizarre mediators I've seen,

but Taka Pina, I think, would be worse than Habba. Habba definitely... Habba doesn't know how to try a case. Right. Like, at the most fundamental level, she doesn't even know how to do a trial like this. And frankly, I'm not sure Taka Pina does, to be honest. And you've got a very well experienced team in Roberta Kaplan's team. So it's going to be interesting that case. And of course, we'll be covering it here on legal AF.

And then, Popoq, we got to get to, though, this topic because, you know, Donald Trump's delay, delay, delay strategy here was rejected by Justice Arthur and Goron in a New York state court. This is a New York attorney general, Latisha James, civil lawsuit seeking at least $250 million in damages. This could be in the billions of dollars in damages when all is said and done. There's also an injunctive relief component of this case, which would effectively stop the Trump organization, Donald Trump and his adult children

from ever doing business again in the state of New York, which could effectively stop the Trump organization from doing business, period. And this case has was filed in September of 2022. So for those basically saying these cases take a really long time, I've never seen ever in New York, in Popoq, you're from the New York, I've never seen a case move this quickly from a September filing to a October 2023 trial.

I was in court on Friday in the same court, how 60th Center Street where judge and Goron sits in the business court. It's actually the court that Donald Trump wanted to be in for whatever reason. Although we'll talk about in Goron, I think giving him a poke back in his ruling about which court he's in.

But there is a business division or a commercial part. And I was there for a settlement conference with a judge. By the way, this building is empty post-COVID. If there were two other trial attorneys on the whole entire floor I was on, I'd be surprised at that moment. But having said that, there is just no way this would go this fast.

That case I was there on was filed in 18, 2018, and it is not likely to go to trial until 2024 at the earliest. That's fast. There's cases that are set for trial 10 years after they're filed in New York. We're talking months here, seven and eight months. I mean, Trish James, Tish James listed for the judge in her, one of her letters, that they produced in just that short amount of time, from the time that the case was filed. We talked a lot about the case before it was a case because as the New York Attorney

General supervised by Judge Angoran, she was doing her investigation and making frequent reports about whether she was going to ultimately file a civil fraud case. That's why some people might think, well, you guys been talking about this for like even longer than that. It wasn't a case then. It was an investigation supervised by Angkoran. Didn't stop Trump from going to federal court and all different appellate courts to try to stop the investigation, again, racist the tax on Latisha James. But the filing of the case till now to trial is like eight months. And she said in her recent letter that the New York Attorney General provided 56 witness transcripts to the other side and 1.7 million documents that they've had for over seven or eight months, comprised of tens of tens of millions of pages of documents.

So that means we're ready to go. And you're the plaintiff and and Ben you and I are plaintiff lawyers on occasion. The luck thing we love to say and puts a chill down the defense team's spine is when the judge says, are you ready for trial? And the plaintiff says ready. And let's see James is ready and the judge is ready. And now kicking and screaming, the defense is going to have to be ready again. Alina Habba, I think this time joined by Chris Keiss.

Yeah, I think, you know, here, delay, delay, delay. Trump's team saw it a six month delay here. Previously, Justice Arthur and Gauron said, come hell or high water. This case is going to trial October 2nd of 2023. What New York Attorney General, Leticia James did an excellent job here at doing. The moment she filed this lawsuit back in September of 2022, she warned the judge exactly what Donald Trump was going to do. She said, look, Judge, this is a case where there doesn't need to be any delay because all of the records that are relevant here

are records that Donald Trump has. It's records, Trump and Trump's adult children and the Trump organization created. It's their statement of financial conditions. It's their appraisals. It's their valuations. And by the way, during the special proceeding when Latisha James questioned Donald Trump in a deposition, Donald Trump invoked the Fifth Amendment over 400 times, which is an

adverse inference in a case like this, in a civil case. Invoking the Fifth is not an adverse inference in criminal cases. You can't even bring it up in a criminal case that a defendant is invoking the Fifth Amendment. That would violate their constitutional rights. But in a civil case, New York attorney, the general attisha, James Ken, and already has, when she filed a preliminary junction and she will, when there's a jury, say, look, Donald Trump had the opportunity to answer very basic questions.

He's a bragged, docious person who wants to tell everyone how big his properties are and what his valuations are and how much money he has. Well, we brought him in. What you'll say to the deputy, what you'll say to the jury and closing arguments. Well, we brought him in for a deposition, and we asked the most basic questions, ladies and gentlemen of the jury. And if you are innocent, these are kind of questions you'd get answer, right? So we asked them, what's the valuation of Mar-a-Lago? What's the valuation of Bedminster? What's the valuation of Trump Tower? What's the valuation of these

apartment complexes that you own? What was the appraised value? Can you explain the difference between the appraised value and the valuations? And what did you tell this taxing authority? What did you tell this insurance company? What did you tell this lender? And for each and every question, Donald Trump raised his hand and invoked his fifth amendment rights against self and crimination. So ladies and gentlemen of the jury,

from that you can infer adversely against Donald Trump that the reason he didn't want to answer is if he answered the question, he would be admitting to the conduct that we are accusing him of, here in this lawsuit, and you ladies and gentlemen of the jury can make that finding because he refused to answer

that he engaged in that wrongful conduct. Remember that. So I think the closing argument is gonna go like that. Like that's the opening, that's also the opening. You can do it. She can do it in opening as well. Yeah, although, and then close it as argumentative as I as I did it. But for sure, do it in the opening. But here, Justice Arthur and Goran says, it shall be etched in stone that the trial date will be. But my favorite, my favorite, Engor on did it on your, on one of your podcasts, still ready before this one, is his comment, it was a dig at Donald Trump

and it was just a turn of a phrase that you and I both, both tickled us. The, the jab at Donald Trump in his order saying, F that you're gonna try, I told you you're gonna try on February, you're gonna try October 2nd, and I don't wanna hear another thing about it. You've had plenty of time to do all the witnesses

you wanted to depose and all the documents you wanted to review. What were you doing for the last seven months or eight months? So no. And he said, look, this case, this is the judge now. He said, this case is complex, but it's not complicated. And then he outlined the case and he said, as Rabbi Hillel once said,

though all the rest is commentary. And the complex comment was a direct dig at Donald Trump, is I know people that know Angkoran, and he's got a sense of humor, because Donald Trump has always argued, including in social media posts, I'm in the wrong court, I'm not supposed to be with Judge Angkor on.

I'm supposed to be in business court and business complex court, which is what he's always asked. And here's Angkor on telling him, yeah, this case might be complex, but it's not complicated. And the rest is just commentary. Well, I love this guy. I'm in fun with his job. Yeah, and then quoting,

Rabbi Halal, because nothing probably sets Donald Trump or off like a Jewish Talmudic scholar. No, it was a good, good dig. But folks, that's what we have for you. This week, another busy week in our courts, another week though, where the wheels of justice move in the right direction. I think we all had thought this week, we'd probably get more of a substantive update on what

was taking place within the Manhattan District Attorney Grand Jury's deliberative process. And while there was some big updates there, the bigger updates actually came from Special Council, Jack Smith's investigation, the E. Jean Carol order, what took place in Justice Arthur and Gauron's Court in the New York Attorney Generals, civil lawsuit, and Donald Trump not knowing the law of holes because he just keeps on digging and digging and digging with these posts

where he likely committed more crimes. And I think it was a real important thing to have Karen Friedman and Defolo, our midweek co-host on one of the main co-hosts of legal AF, to speak to the fact that she previously was one of the main leaders of the Manhattan DA's office. She would have charged Donald Trump on these additional counts for his threats that he made. One of the things everybody for watching this week's episode of Legal AF, we are marching to 1 million subscribers here on the Midas Touch network. We may just hit it this weekend.

So please hit the subscribe button. Help us get to 1 million in the month of March. Please do this as well wherever Wherever you get your audio podcasts, also download and subscribe to legal AF on your audio podcast device. That goes a long way to help the growth of the show. So if you're just a YouTube live watcher of this or you just watch these on YouTube please please it's very helpful please go to your audio podcast device and subscribe to legal AF there if you are just an audio listener please go on the YouTube and subscribe to the YouTube channel and another major way you help this show is by sharing it

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