Legal AF by MeidasTouch - Trump in PANIC MODE as Jack Smith is on the ATTACK + MORE

Episode Date: December 18, 2022

Anchored by MT founder and civil rights lawyer, Ben Meiselas and national trial lawyer and strategist, Michael Popok, the top-rated news analysis podcast LegalAF x MeidasTouch is back for another hard-hitting look at the wheels of justice in “real time” as they analyze and discuss this week’s most consequential developments at the intersection of law and politics. On this week’s episode, the anchors break-down and analyze: the January6 Committee’s vote to refer at least 3 criminal charges against Donald Trump and others to the DOJ; the possibility that the DOJ will lose its ability to charge and convict Jan6 defendants with the highest Obstruction charge; Trump filing a frivolous defamation suit against the Pulitzer Prize Committee because in a random Florida state courthouse; the $1.6 billion dollar suit by Dominion Voting against Fox reaches a critical final phase with Rupert Murdoch sitting for sworn testimony and Dominion moving for sanctions for Fox’s intentionally lost/destroyed documents; failed Arizona MAGA candidate Kari Lake files her own version of Trump’s frivolous suit in Arizona to try to “find” 17,000+ votes to overturn Katie Hobbs’ election, and so much more DEALS FROM OUR SPONSORS: AG1: https://athleticgreens.com/LegalAF HIGHLAND TITLES: https://www.highlandtitles.com/ — Code “LEGALAF” NUGENIX: Get a complimentary bottle of Nugenix Total T when you text LEGAL to 231-231. GET MEIDAS MERCH: https://store.meidastouch.com 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 Kremlin File: https://pod.link/1575837599 Mea Culpa with Michael Cohen: https://pod.link/1530639447 The Weekend Show: https://pod.link/1612691018 The Tony Michaels Podcast: https://pod.link/1561049560 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Donald Trump files his most frivolous lawsuit yet. This one against the Pulitzer Prize board for awarding the New York Times in Washington Post a Pulitzer Prize in 2018. Popok, what can the legal system do to just stop these frivolous lawsuits from even being filed in the first place? Don't answer now. Don't first place. Don't answer now. Go that I won't answer now. Go.

I'll come at it later in the podcast. Meanwhile, the DC Circuit court of appeals with a panel of two Trump judges and one Biden appoint a judge way a critical, a vital issue in connection with the Department of Justice's prosecution of insurrectionists, and that's whether insurrectionists can be charged under 18 USC 1512, the obstruction charge, and the Trump judges, the Trump appointees seem to be sympathetic to preventing the Department of Justice from using the obstruction charges as they have been using it to convict insurrectionists. Pope, let's talk about it on this episode of Legal AF.

And speaking about 18 U.S.C., 1512, the felony obstruction charge, the January 6th committee is set to meet on Monday to vote on criminal referrals to the DOJ and the subcommittee on criminal referrals is going to submit a report for voting on the referral of Donald Trump to the Department of Justice for criminal charges, including obstruction and insurrection. Does this have any teeth to it at all? It really doesn't, but let's talk about it because it does have symbolic value. Popok and I may have a different take. We will break it down for you here on legal AF. A lot of action in the dominion lawsuit against Fox in Delaware this past week with Rupert Murdoch being deposed and Dominion also filed a spoliation

sanctions motion for Fox's destruction of emails and other text messages of its top reporters relating to the 2020 election and Dominion. Let's talk about what spoliation is and what these sanctions could mean and the impact of Rupert Murdoch being deposed. Let's also talk about these loser, Maga Republican candidates from Arizona who have filed these frivolous lawsuits in the state, very reminiscent in kind of form and content and substance of the conspiracy-laden vexatious and just completely

ridiculous lawsuits that Trump had filed back in 2020. Let's talk about where those cases are right now and let's talk about again just like how do these people, how do they even allow to file these absurd How would it even allowed to file these absurd lawsuits in the first place? And also, it's raining subpoenas from special counsel Jack Smith who has sent subpoenas to state election officials across the country. It seems like every day there is a new one that we learn about. This is legal AF. We talk about the most consequential legal news of the week. I'm Ben Myselis reporting from Washington, DC joined by my good friend,

colleague and co-host Michael Popeye. Michael Popeye, how are you? Ben, I love the rundown. I was going to ask you about, for those that watch on television, I was going to ask you about your location there. I'm glad you're in T.C. I can't think of a better group of people to B and T.C. than you and your brothers right now.

And listening to your rundown, when you and I founded this show, we said there's just this interlinked intermeshing of law politics and litigation, and you just can't uncouple them. And that rundown, the unifying theme there is how suffused law and politics are, but we're gonna break it down for you on this show.

And Popok, I'm in DC, I can reveal. Me and my brothers were at the White House Christmas party on Friday, that's one of the reasons I'm in DC. And so it was really a time to reflect on just how blessed we are, how fortunate we are. We've started with a vision of speaking the truth with literally five followers and all our family members that was about it. I mean, we probably had to convince some of them to join in the first place because they didn't know what we were doing.

Plus I was the plus one. Popock was there when we had about six followers and he goes this is a rocket ship then And I was like, okay, if you say so I appreciate the Compton area. I'm a visionary. Pope box of visionary. And so it was just so blessed that we've come a long way supporting democracy, promoting democracy and being able to be there and see all of the rooms. It's credible and none of it is possible without the support of all of the mightest mighty out there. And of course, you Michael Pope, I can all the others who make this show possible.

Let's talk right about, start by talking about Trump's most frivolous lawsuit yet. I mean, like he's filed a lot of frivolous lawsuits that he's been sanctioned for. How can you choose just one? I mean, we can talk about the one from March where he filed this bizarre rico, this racketeering lawsuit against like 30 individuals, including Hillary Clinton, for saying mean things about him and his connections with Russia.

It was time-barred by the statute of limitations. As the judge described it, the federal judge from the Southern District of Florida, like it was just the rantings and ravings and just collections of a maniac. I don't think the judge used those exact words, but pretty close to it. Trump's lawyer, Alina Habbo, was already sanctioned. That one of the judges said, like literally everything in this is false, including just making up that this guy was like the head of the DNC.

Is that the head of the DNC? You literally just made up everything. You say he lives in New York, he lives in Virginia. And even when one of the litigants would approach Trump's lawyer and be like, I don't live in the state. The response by Trump's lawyer is, well, there's a lot of people with your name in the state,

so we're just gonna keep it that way. I think the last name was Smith. Yeah, Smith. A lot of Smiths. And the guy was like, I don't live in the state. I don't have the job you claimed I had. Like everything else is for what I work. But just to say, everybody understands,

when you and I sign a pleading in federal court especially but in any court as officers of the court we're supposed to have done minimal due diligence to get basic facts correct. Now she wouldn't have gotten sanctioned we're not suggesting that Alina Haba and people know our healthy criticism of Alina Haba but we're not saying that because she didn't get a one or two small facts right or wrong she'd the judge through the book at her. But as you said in 200 paragraphs, the judge said basically everything that you've written here is not credible and is false. So this one, Trump's been talking about Pulitzer, like forever.

He's obsessed with Pulitzer. We did a video on the Midas Touch Network where we show the collection of every time he like in the Pulitzer Prize. I hate the Pulitzer Prize. You know who they should give the Pulitzer Prize to? Dan Bongino. They should give the Pulitzer Prize to Dan Bongino. He also called for in 2015 when he was running for the National Enquires, acquirers story that Ted Cruz's dad killed JFK. He said that the Pulitzer should have given their award to the National Enquire for that story in the press conference where he spread that conspiracy.

By the way, Ted Cruz is like, what can I do for you, Donald? You could call my wife ugly, call my dad, the killer of JFK, say that I'm a murderer. But please, please, please, let me help you overthrow the United States government. But I digress. Hope I'll tell us about this Pulitzer Prize lawsuit that he filed in Okachoby County. I know where it is. That's why I'm throwing it to you. A county of 40,000 people that probably has no relation at all to this case.

It doesn't have any relationship at all. And I have a feeling many, or if not all, of the Pulitzer Prize board that's been individually sued, including some of the most illustrious names and journalism who happen to sit on the board, who have been sued individually, most of which have zero connection with the state of Florida, let alone Okachobi, and will likely be able to have this case dismissed board who have been sued individually, most of which have zero connection with the state of Florida, let alone Okochobi, and will likely be able to have this case dismissed for lack of personal jurisdiction or improper venue, meaning the courthouse. Where's Okochobi County?

Part of me, Ben, I have a little bit of a cough this week. Now, you had it last week, I have it this week. If you go up into a satellite and you look down at the state of Florida, there's a big hole towards the top quarter. That's Lake Okeechobee. You can actually see it from space. This is a county, a relatively rural county that used to get a lot of its revenue in the sugar industry, as you can imagine, has zero connection to Donald Trump, who at best lives in Palm Beach County on the East Coast,

which is 80 miles from the center of Okachaube County. So he has no connection there. He has no property there, no interest there. The law firm that's representing him in the case, and yes, he got another law firm, not the law firm that filed the case against Latisha James in Southern District of Florida now in front of Judge Middlebrook's to stop her investigation. Not that firm. He found another firm in Fort Pierce, which is also not in Okachobi. It's up 95 from West Palm Beach at the top end of it. The obviously wanted to get as far away from Don Middlebrook's, the judge that already threw the book as you so eloqually

outlined at him for filing that other political screed that had, you know, just a enemy's list of political retribution and vendetta's masquerading as a lawsuit. He wants to get away from Don Middlebrook's because when he just filed the case in Palm Beach County State Court, the Circuit Court for Palm Beach County against Latisha James trying to stop her civil fraud case for $250 million against him and the children led by her office, which she's already moved to dismiss for lack of personal jurisdiction because she has no connectivity to the state of Florida for many other reasons. That case got transferred or what we call removed from state court to federal court by a one-page filing by LaTisha James because two citizens of two different states that are

in a lawsuit together, depending upon the amount that's in controversy, a party can remove it to federal court under what's called diversity jurisdiction. And where did it go? It went to Don Middlebrook's. So he does, he wants to get it, he wants to be in Florida, but as far away from the Southern district as possible in case there's a removal again. So Okeechobee lawyers from Fort Pierce, what are they claiming? Some people might be thinking the, the Russia collusion defamation case.

So this is, this is Trump's argument in a nutshell. In when he ran for office, and at least two news organizations, there were dozens of them, but at least the Washington Post and the New York Times did expose in dozens of articles, investigating whether the Russians through trolls on social media, through trying to hack our election system,

basically things that Putin's already admitted that he was doing, tried to throw the election away from a towards Trump and away from Hillary Clinton. It's often referred to under the rubric of the Russia collusion. Trump calls it the Russia collusion, hopes, although everyone in the intelligence community for America, from the CIA to everything related to the elections, has said and has proven

that Putin through a series of hackers and trolls in Russia and otherwise both tried to hack election equipment and databases throughout the country. And we know this to be true, created fake Facebook and Twitter accounts to move the needle politically against Hillary Clinton and in favor of Donald Trump. And they're still doing it. So the Pulitzer was awarded that year for national reporting based on the series of stories to a, it was a, it was a co-award, one to the Washington Post, and one of the New York Times.

And all that happened in 2018. And we're beyond the statute of limitations for defamation related to that. Meaning you have to follow your suit within the limitations period assigned by law. So why are we even here? Because the Pulitzer Prize Board at the request of Donald Trump did open up two investigations to determine whether that reporting was false. And therefore, they should rescind the prize from Washington Post and New York Times. So they listened to Donald Trump, they opened up an investigation, they hired an outside law firm and they did two investigations and they determined after two years of investigation or more that everything

in there was appropriate. There was nothing wrong with the headlines. There was nothing wrong with the reporting. It was proper First Amendment journalism. And they published on their website, we're getting the defamation now, they published on their website a statement in July of 2022 that basically validated their award, said it was appropriate, nothing was wrong, there were no improper facts. They didn't go on to say Trump's a liar, you know, Trump, you know, anything about Donald

Trump particularly, they just said we stand by our prize awarding, we stand by the reporting, we've investigated it, we've looked at it, and we're not withdrawing the awards. Donald Trump says that statement on that website, which made its way through the internet to Florida, and all the way to Okachoba apparently, is the grounds for this defamation case. Let's think about this for a minute. First of all, I'm not even sure, and when you take over Ben, I'm not even sure Donald Trump can be defamed at this point.

He says that his reputational harm to his person, his business, and his property in Florida has been impacted by this one paragraph statement. I defy him at the appropriate time, if this case isn't dismissed before, to prove damage to his reputation. A guy that just went around shilling and grifting on NFT trading cards with his image created falsely by scraping images from the internet and putting his face on top of it and then selling them for millions of dollars. And all the other things that have happened to him and the criminal prosecutions that are happening and will happen and indictments and convictions that is reputation is so in shambles because of a one paragraph Pulitzer prize board saying we stand by our award. I think he's got a connection between potential liability and damage here. I also think this case gets dismissed for lack of personal jurisdiction and venue.

I think it's in the wrong courthouse if it's going to be anywhere, shouldn't be in Okucho B. So that's we're going to see motion practice related to that. And then I think there's going to be an attempt to move the case to federal court. Now one thing on that little inside baseball, one of the Pulitzer Prize board members happens to also live in Florida in Pinellas County, which is near Tampa. Trump allegedly lives in Florida. If that's true, and those parties have to stay in the case, that may destroy diversity jurisdiction because you can't have Florida, Florida,

on both sides of the V in order to remove it to federal court for jurisdiction. But even if it stays in state court, I think the case gets dismissed for lack of personal jurisdiction over any of these board members who have no connection at all to Okachoby. Trump doesn't even have a connection to Okachoby County, let alone these people or to Florida. And we'll see the case dismissed. But that is the entire defamation case. There's not more. It's not like Popeyes holding back.

There's gotta be more. It can't be one paragraph saying, the reporting was fine. It's gotta be something else. And I don't understand, Ben, it's not turn it over to you. I don't understand how this is even to family. It's, it is the Russia,

it doesn't say that Trump cooperated with the Russia in their interference. Trump cooperated with Russia. No, I know that, but the reporting doesn't say that. The reporting says that it's Russia and other foreign agents worked because they thought it was in their best interest to have Donald Trump as president instead of Hillary Clinton. And then they, in the horse race, they picked aside. It doesn't, yes, I agree with you that he was involved, but that's not what the reporting

says. So how is it defamatory? What the, if anything, it's defamitory to the Russians, if it's not true, which we know it is. It's not to Famitory to Trump that he was the beneficiary of it, but that's the entire case. Why he filed it? Because he's not getting enough good publicity lately, so he needs to be on the offensive

and win some news cycle. Well, that's the point. So I'll go in reverse order. So we've talked about this theme a lot here in Legal AF as well, and how the media is just absolutely the worst and doesn't know how to cover it. Because you get your profascist right wing media that coordinates these filings with Trump.

So Trump files, Fox digital rights, their story right away, then New York Post, also earned by Murdoch who will talk about it in a little bit. They then published like a sister piece to it. So now there are two purported journalists, things that call themselves news, which really aren't. They mask great as news. There are two articles that frame this as a real thing.

We've talked about here on legal AF that when these cases ultimately get dismissed, it gets very little coverage anywhere other than here on legal AF. And so what was Trump after here? He was after the headline. And he got the headline. He got a headline that he sued. If you read the articles, it feels like it's a legitimate case. They treat it. They don't treat it like it's this frivolous, vexatious thing. And so, and then the other media network, the bolt sides media, they don't know how to use words anymore. So they don't even know how to address this and call it like vexatious and frivolous. You know, they're too cowardly to address it. They're too afraid that they're gonna get sued by him, even though they would win and get sanctions if you sued them for those things.

So they don't for those things. So they don't use those words. And then the public's left a little bit confused, unless you watch it like here on LegalAF. So the next point, how is it even potentially defatmatory? It isn't. That's why at the top of the show, I called it a frivolous lawsuit, because there's nothing about it that has any basis. If you want to even talk about the Mueller investigation, which resulted in over 30 indictments, Paul Manafort, Trump's actual campaign manager, just think about if the campaign manager of Biden

or the campaign manager of Obama or the campaign manager of George W. Bush was found guilty in two separate federal courts in DC and Virginia for 18 felony counts here and seven felony counts there. That's what happened to Manafort in connection with the Mueller investigation. How about Mike Flynn who pled guilty for obstruction who was also parted like Manafort and so many others in Trump's orbit who were actually found guilty in the Mueller report. Now, Mueller did, I think, a huge disservice to the nation by putting these little cute,

little footnotes and saying, oh, Donald Trump could be prosecuted here and here, but I'm just going to leave it to Bill Barr to make that call because I'm not going to prosecute as sitting president. That's utterly absurd. But if you want to look at Mueller, and frankly, you want to look at the Pulitzer's conduct here, you can't give Donald Trump an inch, because if you give him an inch, he takes your throat. You can't give this sicko maniac a freaking inch.

You got to stomp him. It's the only way you can treat and deal with these like tyrant wannabe despots like that. You crush them immediately, which I hope is what Jack Smith is gonna do. And what I mean by this with respect to Pulitzer that you bring up, Pulitzer, oh, we're gonna do an internal investigation

and hiring outside law firm, because that's what we do when we wanna show a sh**. And I'm sorry I'm cursing, but like, internal investigation and hiring outside law firm because that's what we do when we want to show and I sorry I'm person but like like no you don't I wasn't sure where that was going yeah you know you you you don't do that you don't do that then it makes me angry frankly because when you do that you've now given him an extension of the statute of limitations to file the frivolous lawsuit in the, you know, in the, like that he wanted to file in 2018. So there's no benefit to doing this person. Any favors and people need to learn that. Treat him like a criminal, treat him like a con artist, crush him, and be done with him.

These lawsuits are utterly absurd. And when you want to talk about what the legal system can do to stop these frivolous lawsuits, they really need to disbar these lawyers. Full stop. People like Alina Habba, people like Christina Bob, people like Giuliani, who by the way was at a disparment hearing in Washington, DC, which is a weird hearing to begin with. He had an inactive license in Washington, DC.

Yeah, but when you're, but when your New York license is suspended, the only place you can have a bar license left is DC. Yeah, so, you know, but Giuliani's like, I'm just a lawyer, though, he at the end, just representing a client with an unpopular position. We're not what you charge with. We charge with filing a frivolous lawsuit without complete merit. We need to get rid of these lawyers from having license. On Giuliani, the best comment in that, and you and I covered it in our own hot text,

the best comment in that was he hired two judges to represent former judges in New York to represent him. And they're pretty well considered among the New York bar circles to represent him there. I mean, if I were him, I would have picked up a Washington DC bar former judge to represent him. But okay. And one of the judges, Levin Fall, said to the panel, we got to keep politics out of that. He's charged with trying to overturn a free and fair election by filing improper

things at least in Pennsylvania, non-unmarried about election fraud that didn't happen. How do you remove and drain politics out of the litigation and out of his actions when his very actions was an assault on democracy and on politics to stupid comment? But it shows you, as you said, if you give them an inch, they take, you know, a marathon. A mile. And that's what authoritarians do. They want to exhaust you. They exhaust you and exhaust you. And then you finally say, all right, all right, I'll do it. I'll do it. And then they got you. And that's why you got to stand up to it. You got to stand up. The right. Pope, let's talk about the DC court of appeals. You did a great hot take this week as you like to call them hot takes. Break us, break this down for us

because it's critical. This is so big. It's so important. One of the main tools used by the Department of Justice against these inter-insurrectionists is the 18 USC 1512, specifically C2 of 18 USC 1512, the obstruction charge, which carries with it a 20-year sentence. And so it's a serious penalty. It's been used in addition to a number of the other charges that have been brought against these insurrectionists. And let me just pull up the statute for us right now, 18 USC 1512.

So I could read for you what it is, what's at stake here, and what the opposition to it is. But let me read it for you right now. 18 U.S.A. 1512-C2 says, whoever corruptly, the two, otherwise obstructs, influences, or impedes any official proceeding or attempts to do so shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than 20 years or both

It seems pretty clear in the statute that that means oh That the the naivete of you reading a statute and hoping that it applies to crime the words don't matter You know, but here you look judge Carl Nichols, who's a Trump appointee, who I think has been generally good on his insurrection rulings. This was one of the really bad ones. I guess all of his generally good for this really bad one, like this really bad one probably to qualify all the good, because he ruled that the obstruction charge cannot be brought against insurrection as Pope

Bach, unless it like specifically relates to like the documents. So like if they like tore up the document. The electoral votes get torn up. If they were like tore up the votes. That's not what it says. And it could be a real, you know, it could be a real problem because if you can charge these people with obstruction, you could charge them with some other stuff, but nothing that carries with it, this 20-year sentence of Popeye. What went down in the court just because this was an appeal of Nichols not letting the DOJ bring the obstruction charge.

So this is potentially a devastating setback for the Department of Justice. I don't wanna undersell this. Not only in the current indictments that they have against Jan 6th's insurrectionists of the 900, 300 have been indicted, charged, and some of them already convicted of the highest count in the Department of Justice's arsenal, which is the obstruction of an official proceeding, which you outline right on point, carrying a 20-year term.

As you said, the Department of Justice has other things that they can bring as crimes that don't exactly fit as well and have less penalties in terms of the number of years, more like five to 10 years, which ties the hands of the sentencing judge to sentence these people because you can only sentence them pursuant to crimes that they have been convicted of. And let me just point this out again. There are already Jans X insurrectionists and defendants that have already been convicted of this very count because every judge but judge Carl Nichols in the DC circuit court and other places has

already found that this is a properly applied crime to to fit these facts. He's the only one. But and remember, people have been convicted like Stewart Rhodes and Kelly Megs of the Oath Keepers. The Proud Boy trial that's going on soon has those counts in it. The new Oath Keepers trial that's currently going on has those counts in it. And people have already pled guilty to it. So if this gets ripped out, it doesn't just impact future prosecutions, it changes the game and tilts the playing field in favor of the Gen 6 defendants right now. People that have been convicted of it in plea deals or otherwise would have to have it removed. So if that's the only count, they're now free. Roads and others will argue for new trials because it was such a

part of the trial presentation. They'll argue that the only way to fix it now that that count has been eliminated, if that's what's going to happen by the DC Court of Appeals and the Supreme Court in the future, is to retry the case terrible ramifications for the Department of Justice. And they use it as a giant sledgehammer in their negotiations and try to get plea deals. Why is it on life support? Because of what you and I heard in the oral argument before a three judge panel at the DC Court of Appeals, the three judges that the random wheels selected, although I'm a little bit questionable about how random this is considering one of them. We just talked about judge Katzis and another related case related to Trump that just happened because he worked for Trump. He was

Trump's white house. It's where. So here's the panel. Florence Pan who I who I love. It's one of the amazing picks of Joe Biden. She had been nominated by Obama. It didn't get out of committee before he his his his term was over and Biden eventually re-nominated her. She's the first Asian American to ever be on the DC Court of Appeals and she took Katanji Brown-Jaxons seat when Katanji got elevated to the Supreme Court. But the headwinds, she's in favor of applying this 2002 obstruction count that, yes, Congress created in the aftermath of the Enron scandal.

Everybody forgets that one. That was like one of the major collapses of a company. It's sort of like the FTX of the day. It turns out there was no there there. There was no real revenue being generated by real business practices, despite Enron being allegedly an energy company. And they were not properly cooperating with regulators in turning over documentation. And the law and the books at that time before 2002 didn't seem to fit. So Congress passed a new law. But just because Congress passes a new law, it doesn't say in

the body of the statute that you've read. This will only apply to Enron-like situations where somebody doesn't turn over documents. In fact, they use very broad language, any, if not just tearing up, destroying, altering, mutilating documents. Yes, that is in the statute, but also anything else that otherwise obstructs with an official proceeding, very, very broad. People used to argue that the Racketeer Influencing a Corrupt Organization Act, which we call RICO, only applied to mobsters, only applied to the prosecution of people in the Mafia

or in organized crime, and it's been expanded to, you know, the Trump organization and other organizations that fit the dimensions and the definitions of that statute. Same here with this, with this statute. Although the other two, repump a Trump appointees, which is where this is going to turn, which is Justin Walker, a judge, Justin Walker, 39 to be frank, never tried a case in his life. Never was a judge before he became an appellate judge and is a Kavanaugh apologist. How do I know that? Wani was a clerk for Kavanaugh and two, he gave 117 interviews. I'm not making that number up. 117 interviews to support the Kavanaugh confirmation process when Kavanaugh was on life support because of allegations about sexual assault and abuse by Kavanaugh when he was in college and otherwise. And who was on television constantly? Justin

Walker, who got rewarded with a seat on the DC Court of Appeals, the most prestigious court in America and the feeder program for the Supreme Court, Justin Walker. And Paul Buck, as you said, just, you got to say one more time. Okay. Never did a trial in his life. Was never a judge before he became an appellate judge. Okay, never, I get never a judge, but like never did a trial is like, like could he do a trial? He was he served. He was a cab. I mean, even as a law, I'm saying even when he was a lawyer, he had no experience

of doing things as an actual lawyer. Well, let's do it this way. So people understand, if you go right from college through law school, when you come out and you're a lawyer, you're about 25, you may be a wonder kid like Ben, and maybe Ben was a little bit younger, but I was 25. So by 39, 38 when he was confirmed, you've been a lawyer for 13 years. He was a clerk for Kavanaugh for almost four. He was a clerk for Kennedy. He did a double Supreme Court clerkship.

That took up two thirds of the time that he was out of law school. Then he clerks for, then he was like an associate for a couple years in a law firm, skipped being a judge at the trial level. It went right to being not only appointed by Trump to and a court of appeals, but the most prestigious one, just one notch, half notch below the Supreme Court is the DC Court of Appeals. Okay, everybody comes from it that ends up on the, on the US Supreme Court, including Katanjee Brown-Jackson, Kagan, Merrick Garland had he been appointed, had he been confirmed,

would have come from there. So, just, okay, so what happens at the, at the hour and a half oral argument and why do you and I think it's on life support? First of all, Kat, Katzis, who not only was a Trump appointee, but in the Trump White House as a Trump lawyer, as a Trump deputy White House counsel, he didn't feel he had to recuse himself on anything related to Trump at all. As most of them don't, including the Supreme Court, they get their guidance from the Supreme Court. And if Clarence Thomas isn't going to recuse himself, nobody is. So Greg Katz. And Gregz and right away said, nah, I read the statute.

I think it only applies to corporate crime like N. Ron. And I don't this, this was a lot of things, Jan six, but it wasn't corporate crime. And I think the more you read it out loud, DOJ and the more you argue, the less persuasive you argument is. Okay. So put him on the far extreme. He's going to vote no against reversing judge Nichols, meaning he's going to vote yes to take obstruction

of official proceeding out of the department of justice arsenal and remove it from all the convictions that have already happened. So you got Florence Pan on one side who said, the unprecedented nature of the attack on the Capitol, these facts, you can't fault the prosecutors to try to find crimes that are on the books to fit these facts. And obstruction of an official proceeding, can

anybody doubt that the counting of the electoral votes was the, what, is an official proceeding and the object of their conspiracy or their actions was trying to stop that county? Why else were they there on Jans X? The reason they broke into the Capitol, I mean mean nobody disputes this is because they were trying to stop the count. Yes, they were trying to hang in a murderous lust, they were trying to hang elected officials. That was like the byproduct. That was like for fun and games, what they were trying to do was to stop the electoral vote any way, shape, and form. And that is technically, legally, a violation of that count. So you've got Florence Pan on one side. She's a vote to reverse Judge Nichols,

keep obstruction on the books for the Gen 6. Defendants, great, Katz and so on the other side. So what are you left with? The 39-year-old Kavanaugh Apologist, who's never tried a case, who's also known as Justin Walker. And Justin Walker, first he did a little, what I like to call pearl clutching, where he was like a guest that the advocate

for the Jan 6th defendants, the sky, Nick Smith, argued that this was Jan 6th was the same moral equivalency, factual equivalency as all of the lawyers that descended on Florida in in 2000 in 2000 in Bush versus first up Popeye talk about not knowing your ideas though. I was there. Talk about 10 year wrong argument. All right, so let me make the argument. Then I'll say, but also Kevin was one of the lawyers that was there on the bush side who was doing all of

who was doing all of that stuff. By the way, Michael Lee. Yeah, Michael Popeye was one of the lawyers. I was in I lived in West Palm Beach. I was, I was on the streets and otherwise involved with, with supervising vote counting related to the, what eventually became a five to four decision to give the election to George W. Bush.

But at, in, at the grassroots, it was in the streets in Palm Beach County, primarily where I lived and where I was a lawyer about vote counting. And so lawyers from all these Republican lawyers, including Kavanaugh, went down to Florida and they had the right to do that. The point is that was a lawful exercise of First Amendment rights of the right to counsel. If you're a Republican or a Democrat and you want to jump into the frame to the rugby scrum that was the vote counting process related to Florida and Bush versus Gore, that's great.

For every one of me, there was somebody else on the other side. Okay. He compares that and says, but that would be the equivalent of obstructing an official proceeding and Walker, who clerked for Capitol. And as I said, was a Capitol Apologist said, wait a minute, stop. He didn't say my boss was there. He said, you're not trying to compare the murderous attack on the Capitol

with people with repelling down the Capitol, trying to hang people using weapons and physical violence with the lawful exercise of constitutional rights and first the men that in Florida County votes. Stop, don't even go there. And Florence Pan jumped on them too. But my sense is, and I think you may agree to this, is that clutching of the pearls is not going to like change his eventual vote, which is going to be, because he's the swing vote, it's going to be in favor of, this is where this is really troublesome, in favor of Judge Nichols and against the Department of Justice on the obstruction count. Do you think Walker goes another way despite him being a gas that the comparison? No, I think the best shot the DOJ will have is to request an unbunk hearing, which is get the full DC circuit to step in, have the full panel there.

But even then, it'll go to the United States Supreme Court. At that point, it'll be kind of so high profile that even though I think the Supreme Court's inclination would probably to side with the fact that this isn't obstruction, it's so high profile in the Supreme Court has not wanted to tip the scales in favor of insurrectionists or in favor of Trump. There's a 50-50 shot at the Supreme Court, regardless it is going to the Supreme Court, but Popeyes, one of the arguments that was being made by Katzis

and lots of other right-wingers is, well, this statute wasn't specifically created to address the insurrection. It's like, well, sorry. No one ever expected in American history that you were going to have a sitting president inspire, encourage, and direct the conduct of these extremist terrorists to invade the Capitol building. It's unfathomable.

And it's one thing that I reflected on yesterday as I was doing some of these videos is that our entire legal structure, frankly, was not ready for the insurrection in terms of things these insurrectionists could be charged with because even when I talked about the sentencing of that guy Doug Jensen, where at the highest level of the sentencing for these crimes, Jensen got on the high end of the sentencing schedule, which was like five years. And I'm thinking to myself, like, he's the guy who chased Eugene Goodman, tried to attack the police officer when he stormed into the capital building, he was one of the most active people engaged in all of the insurrection. And he got five years, like to me, that guy should get 50 years.

And there really isn't the right structure in place. And one of the things I think Congress needs to do, but it's going to be problematic because you have a Republican party that wants another one. I don't know how I was to say it, folks. That's the reality. You have the Republican party that wants another insurrection. I mean, I don't wanna get into the whole Twitter file things, you know, and it's like the Republicans are like,

oh my gosh, the FBI is reading tweets. It's like, the FBI are the feds. I don't know how to sew. I was to break it to you. Where have they lived? Where have they lived? Like careful. You're getting coffee. So look, those are all great points. And one of the roles of the Jan 6th committee that we're going to talk about next, and this links greatly, perfectly, to what we just talked about. Because one of the things the JAN-6 Committee is going

to refer criminally, we'll talk about it next, is an obstruction of official proceeding counts against Donald Trump, so even they're using it. So it's really important that we win, that democracy wins on the issue of applying old laws on the books to new crimes that are being developed. That whole principle that you don't have to have a specific, right? The legislature, Congress doesn't have to be visionaries and think about how corrupt will our future presidents be and others

to try to cling to power. Do we have enough laws on the books and you're right. After one of the things that Jan 6th Committee and Congress needs to approach and whether it's this Congress because the 118th Congress is going to be at least for two years on the House side dominated by Republicans so we're not going to get anything accomplished there. But we have to reassess now, take the plane up 10,000 feet and say, what are the guardrails of democracy and liberty?

Did they hold and by and large they did, but are they sufficient to punish appropriately, symmetrically, proportionally, to what happened? Do we have enough crimes on the books? Is the 1880s and 1870s insurrection acts? Is that enough? Are these new laws that some courts are questioning whether they can be stretched to apply to these facts,

the fact that on their literal face, they should be able to. Is that going to be appropriate? But what the Jans X committee was also supposed to be doing, just like the House Ways and Means Committee in getting Trump's tax returns, is recommending policy and bills and law that should be put on the books to address some of the failures of the current legal structure and scheme to punish, reprimand and police, bad conduct and bad behavior, some of which you and I, even doing this show,

as steeped as we are in the daily craziness and machinations and strategy and tactics of these people, we can't even envision, we're not creative enough to think about what some other Trump could do, now being given license to watching Trump, hopefully he'll be convicted, but watching Trump in action. I don't know what the Sanctus is gonna come up with,

but just watching him in action and the little Petri dish of Florida is scary. We gotta make sure we got laws on the books that punish these people appropriately, and but we can only apply the laws that are on the books at the present time. Department of Justice can't just go, let's create a crime right now and apply it. We have to go thumb through the book electronically and say, what are the laws that may have been broken?

This was all done internally as part of the prosecutor's manual, DOJ Manual, to decide which ones to charge with. And yes, they probably had an internal debate about, are we going to get blowback on this because it didn't come out of a corporate crime the way Enron did? And they said, it's on the books. We have to apply it. And they got convictions and every judge but judge Nichols, every judge but judge Nichols

agreed with them. But you're right. It's going to go on bonk to the full panel of the DC circuit, which is just on this side of Democratic appointees. So we might be sort of okay there, but I'm not sure. And then you're right. We're going to have to see what the super right wing of the Supreme Court does as we lead into our Jan 6th segment, right? Let's get into our Jan 6th segment, but before doing so, let me tell you about our next partner. It's Athletic Greens.

I take AG1 by Athletic Greens literally every day. And I gave AG1 a try because I hated taking all of those pills and vitamins and gummies and I wanted to get all of my kind of daily nutrition and to supplement that tastes great and is easy to make in the morning. And so what I do with athletic greens is I take this green powder, I put it in my cup, put a lid on it, put some water in first, shake it up, drink it, it tastes good, it is cheaper than a cold brew habit and you get the energy you need for today, you feel good. Any person who watches legal AF knows how much I really like AG

1 and so it's an honor to talk about it on this podcast. And I've tried a ton of different supplements out there, but this is different and the ingredients are super high quality. And that's how I got started with AG1 is that I was even looking at some of these other supplements I was taking and I was saying it didn't have all of the nutrients I needed in a day and I very quickly noticed that AG1 was helping me with improved digestion, my skin felt great, I got better nights of sleep, I really, really enjoyed it and I found it just to be a really seamless and easy, daily habit to continue each and every day. Athletic Greens, it was also founded in 2010.

It's been part of a millions of mornings ever since, including my morning. And I hope it will become part of your morning routine. I love promoting healthy things on the show. I love when we have sponsors who support our show, but also support daily health. And this is one of the reasons that I think you should try athletic green. So if you're looking for a simpler and cost effective supplement routine, and cost-effective supplement routine, athletic greens is going to give you a free one-year supply of vitamin D and five free travel packs with your first purchase.

Go to athleticgreens.com slash legal AF, that's athleticgreens.com slash legal AF. Check it out. Also got to talk about popo you know as you start getting older your body changes a little bit I don't know if you know that are you pointing are you pointing at me maybe getting a bit of a dad bod but you know it's it's it's all good so when you when you want more energy to counter the negative physical effects of aging, which everybody but Popeyes I think is subject to. I don't know how Popeyes does it. I want

to talk about new genics. He liked that Popeyes. I'm turning this into a very complimentary. It's true though. I just had a birthday. I will mention which one, but I had okay You just had a birthday when you told me a birthday. I was like no way Pope Buck and then you tell me stories that you were a lawyer in 2000 and you were doing And you and you and I was a lawyer in 1991. That's unbelievable That's unbelievable and 1991. I was watching Ninja two teenage teenage mutant Ninja terminals. I was too, that's the sad part. I gotta get through this read. New Genics, N-U-G-E-N-I-X, total T-Testash-Duron booster

with Testifin will help you turn back the clock, re-energize your workouts, get you better results at the gym and help you look and feel like the man you really want to be. Nugenics total T contains man boosting key ingredients like test if in. It's been validated in five clinical studies shown to boost free testosterone levels in men. And while every product, professors, quality, many other products use generic ingredients that are often far less than critical grade.

With Nugentics Total T, you get the same clinical potency levels used in the trials and Nugentics formulation is backed by 10 years of science and research. Now, get a complimentary bottle of Nugenex Total T when you text legal, L-E-G-A-L-2-3-1-2-3-1. Text now to get a bottle of Nugenex thermo. They're most powerful fat incinerator ever with key ingredients to help you get back into shape fast. Absolutely free.

Text legal to 2-3-1-2-3-1. Text legal to 2, 3, 1, dash 2, 3, 1, text legal to 2, 3, 1, dash 2, 3, 1. Texting unrolls you into recurring automated text message. You can set not required to purchase message and data rates may apply. Michael Popak. Michael Popak, tell us about this January, these January six committee potential referrals that are going to be on, they're going to be made Monday. You know, we got the back of the event. Are we doing, are we doing a Midas feed with Tony? We're definitely doing the Midas feed. Are you not, are you not lined up as a, I am Tony text to be while we're on the,

while we're on the recording right now. Nice. Yeah, we are going to be live on Monday right here on the Midas Touch Network, where we'll be covering what the January 6th Committee will be doing in a public hearing on Monday. They will be taking votes. I think that's pretty much what they're going to be doing all day. Just voting on these criminal referrals. You may recall back in November, we heard about this subcommittee made up of a number of January six committee members and so you had like Who'd you have Popeye? Yeah, it's all it's all the lawyers

It's Jamie Jamie Raskin Loughgren from your home state asking Lofgren from your home state, and shift, and shift. That's it. It's the only one of which ever served as a prosecutor, which will, when you get to me, I'll talk a little bit about that.

Let's get to you. Ship was the prosecutor. That's right. It's always calmer. And so what we learned is they've done their work, they've done their homework. They're going to be submitting their report regarding criminal referrals.

There will be votes taken by the full committee about whether to refer. Right? These are, I won't ruin a Pope. I give you, give me that. No, no, no, no. I like your hot take on it. You're trending take on it the other day. Look, the sub, this is like, we didn't really talk about it much.

There is the main committee, then there's like four or five subcommittees that have also been working behind the scenes, focused on different things. One subcommittee was following the money. One subcommittee was following on the money flow. One was following the actual axon on Jan 6th. One was focused on Trump. And one was focused on like potential crimes.

And so the potential crimes committee led by Liz Cheney, who is famous for reading out loud things like the obstruction of official proceeding statute the way you did on this podcast. She did during one of the eight hearings already as she was leading into some new evidence in presentation of the evidence. And the report that's coming out is separate. We're going to get a, it's already circulated. They've already printed a multi-thousand page report that's broken down into seven or eight categories,

which follow along with the same seven or eight prongs of the strategy that Trump used to undermine the fair elections into cling to power and interfere with the peaceful transfer of power from before the election, casting doubt on the, casting doubt on the validity of the election process. So people would lose faith in it, calling it the big lie years before it even started started led by Roger Stone leading to the action. So taking away confidence in the election, attacking it the night of the election, attacking

it from the night of the election all the way through through Jan 6 filing all those lawsuits, the crimes, the violence, all of that. That's all going to be outlined. And then there is this internal struggle about whether they're going to make a recommendation. Now, here's where I take a little different tack to most people. You said it right. This is a non-binding symbolic recommendation that will be voted on on Monday by the Jan 6th Committee. Do I think the subcommittee should make the recommendation if they believe it's proper? Yes, I do. Do I think, though it's symbolic in nature as the final capstone to all of the investigative work, the hard work over two years that this committee has done most of which we've seen the highlights up but not all of it will see more of it in the final reporting. Yes, I do. Do I think it ties the hands of the Department of Justice a bit. Yes, I do.

hands of the Department of Justice a bit, yes I do. Do I also think that the Jan 6 Committee should have been more cooperative with the Department of Justice through this moment in turning over 1,000 plus witness statements and all of the evidence they had accumulated to allow the prosecutors in parallel to do their job? Yes I do. It's publicly known that the Jan 6 Committee has been very territorial over all of their work and has not played nice in the sandbox for the Department of Justice forcing them to send multiple letters, including right before Jack Smith was appointed demanding a turnover of that material. That issue is important and we're going to see it played out over time because there is an argument that the defendants

are going to be given a gift that the chance six defendants are going to be given that if any of the material in the hands of the chance six committee, which is the government, is exculpatory to the defendants, meaning they, we would help them with proving their innocence and it wasn't turned over in a timely fashion. We may have what's called a Brady or a Janks violation because the Department of because the Jansick's committee has been holding their card so close to the vest. Why give them that gift? That's that's one of my issues with it. The last one is they're reporting is already out. You did it. I've seen it through Kyle Cheney that it looks like they're going to make at least three criminal referrals related

to Donald Trump himself, obstruction of an official proceeding, which we just did length talked about why that could be on life support at the appellate level, a conspiracy to defraud the US government, which is obstructing with a guilty mind through dishonest means the election process or this process, and at least one other ones. So that's going to happen.

The problem I have is the standards by which the Jan 6th Committee based on the evidence that's at their disposal is different than what the Department of Justice is going to be doing. A, you don't have a lot of prosecutors on that group. Got a lot of lawyers, I mean, lawyers are smart. I was never a prosecutor. I think I'm pretty okay in the legal world. You are too.

But you don't have the prosecutorial eye that a prosecutor has. Secondly, there has been the development of substantial new evidence that only the Department of Justice has that not even the Gen 6 committee has. It runs both ways. They have developed a body of recent evidence. the Department of Justice has that not even the Gen 6 committee has. It runs both ways. They have developed a body of recent evidence. We're going to talk about it towards the end. Jack Smith, Jack Smith, Jack Smith, it's raining subpoenas, but they've developed through going to the Grand Jury Court, which I'll call it, the Court of Barrel Howell, and getting dozens

of attorneys stripped of their attorney client privilege protection and executive privilege being stripped by members of the West Wing for Donald Trump and having them testify in a way that they never were able to testify or didn't testify at the Jan 6th committee level. So the Department of Justice has more and better evidence in certain areas than even the Jan 6th committee, but the Gen 6 Committee is gonna make a report and recommendation effectively to the Department of Justice based on the static evidence that they've accumulated, which doesn't include

the new evidence that Jack Smith's team has developed. And yes, it's gonna put pressure on Merrick Garland, which is again, proves the genius of Merrick Garland in advance of the Jan 6th Committee's criminal referral, which is by its very nature coming from a political body. You can call it bipartisan if you like, but it is a political body that's making the recommendation. Look at the genius of Merrick Garland to set up a special counsel that it's immune from proper attacks on his partiality or his

partisanship knowing that the Gen 6 committee was going to call for the head of Donald Trump from a political vantage point. I think it's brilliant on Merrick Garland who have done that because think of it the other way, Ben, he doesn't do that. And now it looks like to the average citizen and you know, Trump will pick up that mantle that the, oh, look, the Democrats for political purposes are weaponizing criminal prosecution. They're leaning on the prosecutors and the DOJ improperly.

And I'm just the victim. This puts a nice buffer between that in the form of Jack Smith. Agree with you. And look, as we said earlier, you don't give Trump an inch because Trump is going to, if you give him an inch, he takes your throat. And like even this morning, Trump goes, our country is sick inside, very much like a person dying of cancer, the crooked FBI, the so-called Department of Justice and intelligence, all

parts of the Democrat party and system is the cancer. These weaponized thugs and tyrants must be dealt with or are once great beautiful country will die. I mean, this guy, he's spiraling, he is a maniac, he is completely dangerous. And now you see in a pop-up, they're like, bill bars, a democratic stooge. And Christopher Ray is a democratic stooge that people Trump appointed And these are these are Republicans. I mean Christopher Ray is not a mega, but these are Republican Bill bar is a mega Republican. He just wouldn't go so deep down into conspiracy land where he thought he'd look foolish

but he went pretty far and Spiracy the land where he thought he'd look foolish, but he went pretty far and so when Trump talks about like in 2020 the FBI engaged in all of it. This is your FBI. You were you ran the government like when talking about this is where you are people Anyway, I digress after after this I Need a drink I need a drink but wait, but wait because you love my segues. Have you ever been to Scotland? I have never been to Scotland. I've always wanted to go for a Scotch-tasting, which I'm going to accomplish sometime in my life.

But we have an opportunity, and our viewers and listeners have an opportunity as a novelty to own a small piece of Scotland and get a title for themselves to boot. So we have a legally interesting product from our sponsors. Perfect for legal aft the sponsor is Highland title. Scotland is unusual and see we're learning new law every day then. And that it has legally defined in the Land Registration Act of 1979. A souvenir plot of land.

These plots of land are so small that their value is solely commemorative or sentimental, their novelty, but you can buy them as a gift because these plots cannot be registered with the Scottish land registry. There is no convincing solicitors or land taxes involved. Even though these plots cannot be registered

in the conventional way, customers obtain by owning them a personal right of ownership. This is a valid form of ownership, which can be passed on to future generations. So what can you do with one square foot of Scottish land? Ben, what do you think you can do with it? You tell me, Popeye, what kind of... Highland titles allows you to style yourself as a Lord or Lady of your estate. Lord, my cellists, oh my God, I pinch myself. Each luxury gift pack comes with a personalized certificate, which displays your new style and identifies your unique plot number. And it's not too late for the holidays because you can actually download your personalized certificate after checking out. Use the discount code legal AF to receive

25% off at www.highlandtitles.hightlandtitles.com Pope, I've, I've waited for this day. Lord Pope, God, Pope, let's talk about this dominion lawsuit against Fox things are getting interesting. There's a trial date set for April 2023. It's an existential case for Fox, you know, $1.6 billion is no joke. And a billion with a B one,

yeah, 1.6 billion. And they're facing a ton of other lawsuits to come. So the most recent developments this past week, Rupert Murdoch, was deposed by Dominion. The first time Murdoch's really been under oath in a high profile way since 2011, when he appeared before the British Parliament after his Sunday national inquirer style cabloid there.

Oh, they hacked all the cell phones. Hack cell phones, engage in all this crap. There he threw his son James under the bus. Like James started talking, he's like, James did it. James did it. We haven't seen anything. I'm gonna fix it. Okay, for those that love succession,

which is based on Rupert Murdoch and his family, and these kind of stories, you might think we're talking about a last, a lost episode of succession, but you literally, as Ben just said, they hacked phones of journalists and other people in celebrities, and published it in their newspapers,

the Murdoch family, and then Rupert threw James, who we haven't seen since, under the bus for having done it. Yeah, at the public hearing before Parliament, James starts talking and then Rupert's like, let me talk right now for a second. This is the most humbling experience for me,

and I am going to fix what he did. No, Jonah. This is a session. It's the time. So Rupert Murdoch was deposed, and around the same time, maybe a week before, but right around the same time, we learned about it earlier in the week, was that Dominion had filed what's called a spoliation motion against Fox for their deletion, which appears to be either intentional or certainly very, very, very reckless of like their

key reporters, text messages and emails about Dominion and Popeyes, you wanted to take this through quickly. Yeah, I'll do it. The only issue and why this is so critical and what the sanctions could be here. Yeah, so you got a $1.6 billion case because Fox, and all of its on-air personalities like Barter Romo and Hannity and Dobs and Carlson all promoted these theories and these alleged opinions that Dominion was in bed with the Venezuelan government was allowing its equipment to be hacked to turn the election in favor of Biden and against Trump, you know, basically attacking their business model and undermining their credibility to ever attract another

local government or government to hire them to roll out their election voting machines to strong their business. And they did it all according to Dominion with actual malice, meaning a complete reckless disregard for the truth, knowing that it wasice, meaning a complete reckless disregard for the truth, knowing that it was either untrue or a reckless disregard for whether, we don't care whether it's true or not, we're publishing it or we're allowing it to be on our airwaves.

And as you reported and I reported, they've already, the judge, and this is sitting in a different court that we've talked about usually in Delaware, sitting in the Delaware Superior Court, not the chance to record, Superior Court in front of Chance Record, Superior Court in front of a former colleague of mine, Eric Davis, used to work in a law firm that I used

to work at a million years ago. And it's a rough and tumble courthouse in Delaware, unlike this kind of stayed almost British style system in Delaware Chance Record, where the Twitter case has been and other things we've talked about. In Superior Court, it's like the Wild Wild West. And they've already, and they, okay, they have already, the judges already found that all of the employment contracts for all of these on-air personnel have to be turned over to the other side to see if there's a bonus structure where they get bonuses and more money based

on ratings, turn over all the documents. Everybody's been deposed, all the on-air people have been deposed. Loclyn, Murdoch was deposed last week, Rupert over two days. We're at the very, very top of this thing. Then in the middle of it, you get a motion that they've destroyed documents that should have been preserved and turned over at the appropriate time. If the judge, Eric Davis, who so far hasn't suffered any fools with Fox, and has been sort of annoyed by them and is putting this on a very fast track towards a trial, and

has already denied their motion to dismiss, if he finds that there was intentional spoliation of evidence, destruction of evidence, in order not to turn it over to the other side, there is going to be a penalty to be paid, including an instruction to the future jury that they should make an adverse inference and conclusion about the reason that that was destroyed. So the jury would know about it and the jury would be instructed to penalize Fox News and assume that everything that was destroyed was really bad for them, which is great for dominion and terrible for Fox. So they're going to fight hard against spuliation if that really happens.

In the meantime, this case has gotten so active that the owner of the entire organization, the 85 plus year old Rupert Murdock has had a testify over two days. We don't know the results of it. It will become more public as they file motion practice in court and as we get to the jury. But there is nothing that's going to derail this case, not even summary judgment. This is going to a jury trial,

unless there is a settlement, a huge 9, 10, 11 figure, whatever settlement with Fox News, because I don't think the main you can go away for anything less. You know, when I think the big, one of the big pieces of evidence there is you have Suzanne Scott,

the CEO of Fox News, Dominion was able to find an email shortly after the election where Suzanne Scott, CEO of Fox says, don't give the crazies an inch. And not only did they give the crazies an inch, they let the crazies literally take over the network, which goes to your point,ok the malice and the reckless disregard of the truth. They are speaking of malice and reckless disregard for the truth. Let's talk about these.

Maga Arizona loser candidates, losers in general, losers in the election, losers in how they handle defeat the hat trick of loserville right here in Arizona. You know, you had Mark Finchham who ran for Secretary of State against the Secretary of State, elect Adrian Fountace. Finchham's lawsuit in Maricopa County was just thrown out, put forward all those same conspiracies that Kerry Lake does set aside the vote, appoint me secretary of state. The judge not only rejected all of Finchham's claims, but called them frivolous, wholly unsupported by the record, and fatally flawed, and Finchham would be reaching out to all of the MAGA extremists of the right-wing echo chamber.

Everything's going great in this, you know, the judge totally gets what we're talking about. And then you have a ruling like this, then they just go, the judge is a rhino, the judge is a proxy for the Democratic party. You know, that's their stick. And similarly, you know, with Carrie Lake, just the constant lies in deceit and gaslighting and the way she like even works her own right wing radical supporters and doesn't even explain what's happening like a week ago or two weeks ago she filed the lawsuit

claiming intent and malice and that the 17,000 plus votes it's like Trump find me the 11,000 votes you know that the 17,000 votes were illegal that she lost by it. All of those should be thrown out. Has no basis, has no support. And in that case, the judge set this past week, there was a status conference held on Tuesday. And it just goes to show you why it's important to just talk about the facts and why these magick extremists live in like this alternate universe. And so the judge set at this hearing on Tuesday, he set a expedited dismissal process

where Maricopa County and Katie Hobbs, they've already filed their motions to dismiss governor-elect Hobbs. They've already filed their motion to dismiss. That obz they've already filed their motion to dismiss that's how quick the judge said it and on saturday on a weekend the judge ordered Kerry Lake to respond and what the judge basically said is in the event it's not dismissed we're holding an evidentiary hearing right away and Kerry like show me the 70 go through it all and show me how each 17,000 was it was unlawful which shall never be able to do because it's all based on conspiracy and lies.

And so the objective legal observer who's dealing with reality and data says this judge is not buying at all what carry like is selling and wants to make sure this case is dismissed immediately. And if for whatever reason it's not dismissed on the papers, he's going to hold an immediate evidentiary hearing where Kerry Lake better show 17,000 affidavits or have, you know, bulletproof evidence of what she says, which he's not going to be able to do because it's all based on conspiracy and lies. Now, Kerry Lake and all of our supporters were like, this is big, the judge ordered the deep state

and the democratic leftist communists to go to trial. We're going to trial. This is exactly what we wanted. Just the same stuff that they just lie about over and over again, and the Trump gas lights about in 2020, that they're not living in an objective reality world where anybody who sees what takes place goes, this case is gonna get dismissed in the next five days.

And now as we get dismissed, the judge is gonna probably write an order like this judge did over here in the Finchham case, saying it's frivolous and wholly unsupported by the record and fatally flawed. So we'll keep you updated there, but want to alert you of the existence of those cases and where they are. And finally, Popok, you said it raining subpoenas from special counsel,

Jack Smith, sending it to all these state election officials, state secretary of states as well. So a lot of development there. And to me, it indicates we're moving closer to indictments. Talk to us a matter, Popeye. Yeah, I think that Jack Smith, as we've said before, has let no grass grow under his broken leg. And he's moving full steam ahead. It just shows you by the sheer volume and targeted

focus of the subpoenas where they are with the grand juries, three or four of them that Jack Smith ultimately supervises on the prosecutor side. Of course, it all goes to Barrel Howell as the chief judge in that district to make rulings along the way, secret rulings, but rulings along the way about these grand juries. But you know, they're obviously focused on fake electors. They're obviously focused on interference by Trump, particularly and those around him in the with a local and state election officials. So interference there in the certification, in the fake electors, in everything else

that went to the lack of peaceful, the undermining of the peaceful transfer of power. You see all the names that, those that have been targeted or received the subpoenas, many of them, secretaries of state of various states, local election officials, and the like have revealed to reporters who's on the list. And there's lists of 19 and 20 names starting with Donald Trump and ending with that whole group of lawyers that you've talked about, not Alina Habba, but John Eastman and Jeff Clark in the Department of Justice at the time for Trump and Cleedham

Mitchell and Rudy Giuliani and Sydney Powell and Lynn Wood and everybody else that's been orbiting Trump most of which are on their way to being disbarred if they haven't been already. And so it just shows that for those that wondered a how, how is Jack Smith gonna operate from the Hague while he's recuperating from his leg? The answer is just fine. So, you know, he is on top of a, he's built a team, he inherited a team of prosecutors

that are all career professionals. He's also brought in a number of his own handpicked special prosecutors to work under him. And, you know, because there's a lot of levers here that have to be pulled by the Department of Justice and by Jack Smith, a special counsel. So if I'm Merrick Garland and I'm looking back at my pick, I'm thinking, what a masterstroke, this guy is doing exactly what I wanted at the speed and velocity at which is required and no one can challenge. You can say a lot of things about Jack Smith.

And Lord knows in prior news cycles, Trump has tried to attack his wife as a documentarian and this and that, but you know, he is, he is terminator, he is Robocop. He is, he is a nonpartisan independent career professional prosecutor who when he wasn't prosecuting the mafia was prosecuting work criminals perfect to go after Donald Trump. And look, as we anticipate next week's legal AF in during the

midweek, a lot of bad things are going to be happening to Trump next week. Monday, there's going to be a vote, of course, that we talked about in favor of the general criminal referrals by the Jan 6 committee. But on Monday or Tuesday, as well, House Ways and Means Committee is probably going to vote to release Donald Trump's tax returns to the public. So this next week is going to be another and an increasingly consistent group of shitty weeks for Donald Trump and great weeks for democracy led by, in this case, the led by the outgoing 118th Congress and its two major committees. Good thing that there's a show that addresses all of these legal developments twice a week.

It's called Legal AF with Ben Myceles, Michael Popok and Karen Friedman Agnifalo. We want to thank all of you for watching this today. If you all want to support the MidasTouch network, check us out at patreon.com-midasTouch-patrion. P-A-T-R-E-O-N.com-slash-midasTouch. We have lots of exclusive content. You can only get there, but most importantly, we're not funded by any outside investors at all. 100% accountable to you.

100% crowd funded, 100% independent wherever you are in the world. Check it out. Patreon.com slash might as touch. Also, check out store.mitustouch.com. Store.mitustouch.com for the best. Pro democracy gear out there. Gear up at store.mitustouch.com for the best pro democracy gear out there gear up at store.mitustouch.com. Thank you all for watching this episode of Legal AF. I'm Ben Myceles joined by Michael Popak.

We'll see you next time. Same place. Breaking down the most consequential legal news of the week. Shout out to the Midas Mighty.