Legal AF by MeidasTouch - Trump LOSES in Appeals Court on KEY TRIAL ISSUE

Episode Date: May 14, 2024

Trump’s own cases he has lost in the past are now being cited as precedent by other other courts to rule against him, again. Michael Popok reports on breaking news of a NY appeals court upholding Judge Merchan’s gag order in the NY election interference case against him, citing to the FEDERAL appellate court that gagged him in the DC election interference case, AND relying on arguments raised by E Jean Carroll’s lawyers in his sex assault and defamation case, for good measure. Upgrade your closet with Rhone and use LEGALAF to save 20% at https://www.rhone.com/LEGALAF Visit https://meidastouch.com for more! Join us on Patreon: https://patreon.com/legalaf Remember to subscribe to ALL the MeidasTouch Network Podcasts: MeidasTouch: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/meidastouch-podcast Legal AF: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/legal-af The PoliticsGirl Podcast: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-politicsgirl-podcast The Influence Continuum: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-influence-continuum-with-dr-steven-hassan Mea Culpa with Michael Cohen: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/mea-culpa-with-michael-cohen The Weekend Show: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-weekend-show Burn the Boats: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/burn-the-boats Majority 54: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/majority-54 Political Beatdown: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/political-beatdown Lights On with Jessica Denson: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/lights-on-with-jessica-denson On Democracy with FP Wellman: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/on-democracy-with-fpwellman Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This is Michael Popak, Legal AF Breaking News. The appellate court in New York has denied Donald Trump's attempt to overturn the trial judge's decision to gag him in the New York criminal election interference case. The First Department Appellate Division in a five page unanimous decision has decided that Donald Trump did not put forward a clear right

to have any aspect of the extended gag order that stops him from going after witnesses, going after the family of the judge, going after certain members of the prosecution team. None of it impinges on Donald Trump's Sixth Amendment right to a fair trial. And having not established that there's been a violation of his Sixth Amendment right to a fair trial, and having not established that there's been a violation of his Sixth Amendment rights, the court ruled against Donald Trump. But there's two aspects of the order that I think are remarkable.

One of them is the fundamental basis for the New York State Appellate Court in making its ruling was relying on the federal court decision upholding Judge Chutkin's almost identical restraining order in the DC election interference case, a federal case. So Donald Trump's own precedent, US versus Trump in the Chutkin case is now being used against him and cited as precedent against him in the New York State case.

The New York Appellate Division First Department ruling unanimously that the balancing that was done on the First Amendment rights versus Sixth Amendment rights, First versus Sixth of Donald Trump, was properly done by the D.C. Court of Appeals in their unanimous ruling in the Chutkin case, the case presided over by Judge Chutkin. That's one interesting anecdote

before I get to the reading of portions of the order that I think are very important about Donald Trump's behavior and conduct that this appellate division is not gonna tolerate. The second interesting thing is, and I hadn't known this until the new order came out, is that E. Gene Carroll's lawyers, Robbie Kaplan, in the E. Gene Carroll case

where Donald Trump lost twice, they filed a friend of the court brief, which was also relied upon by the Appellate Division in rendering its decision against Donald Trump. See, again, Donald Trump creates his own opposition and his own case law to be used and cited against him when a appellate division now rules on him. I mean, you could just cite without recitation

of any other cases, case after case after case where Trump is in the name of the case. US versus Trump, Trump versus US, state courts, federal courts, civil cases. In this case, Robbie Kaplan coming in for E. Jean Carroll to file their brief. Now let's get to the bottom line here of what the appellate division has just ruled.

And I'm gonna read to you from the order itself. We go to page two of the order and it lays out what the appeal is that Trump is challenging the order issued, the two orders issued by Judge Bershaw that prohibited him from responding to purported attacks by two witnesses, Michael Cohen and Stormy Daniels, limited Trump's ability to make public statements

about senior prosecutor Matt Colangelo. He works for the Manhattan DA, used to be in the Biden administration in the Justice Department, and limited Trump's ability to make public statements about Justice Marchand's daughter, which was unanimously denied and the proceeding has been dismissed without costs.

They then go into the sort of the nitty gritty of the particular procedural rule used by Donald Trump, what we call in the state of New York, an Article 78 proceeding. It won't bore you with the details there, but it is a writ of prohibition where you actually try to restrain a trial judge from exceeding its powers. But the appellate court didn't found that Judge Mushan did not exceed his powers at all. And in order for Trump to have prevailed on his appeal, which he did not, he'd have to show that he has a clear

legal right to have the gag orders overturned because the court had exceeded its powers. And that they found that the judge did not exceed his powers. They particularly cited, as I said before, the United States versus Trump case down at the, related to the federal restraining order, which was nearly identical to the restraining order here.

And what it says on page three is that the federal restraining order and the jurisprudence that they rely on from the DC court of appeals to render their decision here in the state appeal properly, this is on page three properly found that the order was necessary under the circumstances holding that Trump's documented pattern of speech and its demonstrated real time, real world consequences poses a significant and imminent threat to the functioning of the criminal trial process.

Trump's conduct is an imminent threat to the functioning of the criminal trial process. How many times have we heard before that Donald Trump's main strategy is to try to undermine the institutions of our democracy in order to win? Most clothes are uncomfortable, They're too tight or never actually the size you really are, not to mention the annoyance of trying to put a good outfit together.

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and use code LegalAF. It's time to find your corner office. Particularly, the court went on on page three over to page four that the circuit court, Judge Chutkin, concluded that Trump's directed statements at potential witnesses concerning their participation in the criminal proceeding, posed a significant and imminent threat

to their willingness to participate fully and candidly, and that courts have a duty to shield witnesses from influences that could affect their testimony and undermine the integrity of the trial process. In particular, the court says that yes, this court recognizes that Donald Trump has a First Amendment right. And so what they said on page two, for instance,

is that it is well established that although litigants do not surrender their First Amendment rights at the courthouse door, those rights may be subordinated to other interests that arise in the trial setting, citing United States versus Trump, the federal case I just told you. So at the end, after doing all of this analysis and pointing out that at no time did Donald Trump argue that his Sixth Amendment right to a fair trial was somehow undermined by his ability to go out on the street and in an extrajudicial outside

the courtroom processes go after his perceived enemies. That's not the reality of what's going on inside the courtroom. Once you're inside the wood paneling of the courtroom with a trial judge there, the only concern is the fair administration of justice, not how many times you can get retribution and bash and dox and attack those that you don't like inside the courtroom. That is not the role of the Sixth Amendment. And that is not your right

under our United States Constitution. They concluded that we find that Justice Mershon properly weighed petitioners' First Amendment rights against the court's historical commitments to ensuring the fair administration of justice in criminal cases and the right of persons related or tangentially related to the criminal proceedings from being free from threats,

intimidation, harassment, and harm. They then granted the motion to file an amicus brief, the friend of the court briefed by E. Jean Carroll's lawyers, and then they entered their order just today. Now the reality is Donald Trump's not gonna take no for an answer. And we know his next role, his next goal is to file an appeal at the next level, Court of Appeals, which is the Court of Appeals in New York.

We don't have a Supreme Court in New York. The Supreme Court in New York is our trial level. The Court of Appeals is the highest court. He can try going there, but I'm telling you, this first department appellate division, which is the Manhattan Appellate Court that sits over the trial, is rarely wrong and rarely overturned at the court of appeals level. And this trial will be over before they get around to this appeal. It'll be muted, it'll be mooted, as they say,

because the trial will be over. At the rate that this trial is continuing. With the prosecution concluding, or likely early part of this week, turning it over to the defense for whatever case they plan to put on and whatever witnesses they plan to call or recall. I don't think one of them will be Donald Trump, by the way.

And then a rebuttal case by the prosecutors, we're gonna be probably two and a half to three weeks away from the jury getting this case. There's not enough time to take this case up, even if they tried an emergency application, which I think will be denied at the court of appeals level. But the headline is what I just read. Donald Trump is lost again.

I think this is about his ninth time losing at the appellate court. He blames the trial courts. He blames the democratically elected Manhattan district attorney for his troubles. He blames judges who happen to be Democrats for his troubles and their daughters. He blames prosecutors that used to work as prosecutors

over on the federal side. He's now gonna have to blame all of these other New York appellate judges, right? Everybody's against Donald Trump. All of the grand jurors in all four of the places that he was indicted, all of the special purpose grand jurors, all of the jurors in the civil cases and in the criminal cases that have convicted

or judged against him, they're all wrong. And the only one who's right is the man of the people, Donald Trump, election interference 2024. I mean, that's really what it's been reduced to. Now, look, I'm gonna end it on this way, because we sit at the intersection of law and politics here. I don't know why traditional polling is not picking up that Biden is gonna win this election. I don't know why traditional polling is not picking up

that Biden is gonna win this election. And despite the economy roaring and despite the infrastructure investments and despite being on the right side of clean energy and being on the right side of having to manage a foreign policy around the world, Joe Biden seems to be at at least at polling level, statistically tied with a person who's about to get convicted

of crimes in New York. I can't explain it other than to tell you, I think there's a lot of overpolling going on. And I just think some of the traditional democratic strongholds for voting are not getting picked up in the polling. I don't think you know that some of the statistics that I've seen are gonna be borne out by

likely voters come November 5. But hopefully this kind of hot take, this network might as touch Legal AF, our podcast on Wednesdays and Saturdays, gives you truth not fiction, no smoke, no sunshine. We just tell you the truth to get you motivated to get democracy. And our democracy is a contact sport. It's a participatory democracy. You've got to get off the sidelines.

Watching us on YouTube is the first step, but then leaving, hopefully being fired up to help with voter registration, to help with voting, to go bring people to the polls, to get souls to the polls, that's important. And we're hoping with our engaged audience and our audience engagement and their passion for what we do at the intersection of law and politics,

that's gonna translate into a successful campaign and voting in November. If you like what we're doing here, Midas Touch Network, free subscribe, help them get the 3 million before the November election, and then follow me, Michael Popok. You can pick me up on Podcast Legal AF on Wednesdays and Saturdays at 8 p.m. Eastern time, and then on podcast platforms of your choice. Give me a thumbs up and leave a comment here. It really does help. Otherwise, I really wouldn't ask for it. So until my next hot take and until my next Legal AF, this is Michael Popak reporting.

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