The MeidasTouch Podcast - DOJ Files POWERFUL Response to Trump Mar-a-Lago Search Warrant Motion

Episode Date: September 1, 2022

On The Mighty, we feature some of the most impactful responses, reactions, narratives, musings, and rants of Meidas content creators. New episodes of the traditional MeidasTouch Podcast drop every Tuesday and Friday morning. The rest of the week, we deliver The Mighty! Late Tuesday night, the Department of Justice filed its response to Trump’s Motion for Judicial Oversight. In short, DOJ slammed Trump’s frivolous legal arguments and pointed out that the documents at issue don’t belong to Trump and any request to return the documents now are moot because the DOJ has already reviewed all the records and any potentially attorney-client privileged records have been separated by the DOJ filter team. MeidasTouch co-founder and resident legal expert, Ben Meiselas, breaks down the filing and gives his comprehensive analysis. Shop Meidas Merch at: 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

Hey there, this is Jordy Mycelis, co-founder of Midas Touch, and you are listening to The Mighty. On The Mighty, we feature the most impactful responses, reactions, narratives, rants, and musings of Midas content creators. Don't worry. New episodes of the podcast I do with my brothers, The Midas Touch Podcast, will doze up every Tuesday and Friday morning. The rest of the week, it's The Mighty.

Look, the more we hear about the FBI's search of Mar-a-Lago, the worse things get for Donald Trump. And the more Trump tries to lie, cover up his crimes, and gaslight America, the deeper the hole he digs. Late Tuesday night, the Department of Justice filed its response to Trump's motion for judicial oversight. Put simply, the DOJ's filing is an absolute bombshell. In it, the DOJ slammed Trump's frivolous legal arguments and pointed out that the documents at issue don't belong to Trump at all. Moreover, the DOJ said that any requests to return the documents now

are moot because the DOJ has already reviewed all the records and any potential attorney-client privilege records have already been separated by the DOJ filter team. This DOJ motion is so damning that it could essentially be copy and pasted as an indictment. And it's not only Trump who should be concerned anymore, but his attorneys as well, who now appear to be criminal targets in the DOJ's investigation. Midas Touch co-founder and resident legal expert Ben Mycelis read and analyzed the entire DOJ rebuttal. Now, take a listen to his comprehensive breakdown. Ben, take it away.

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and see why it's never ordinary at Bet365. Must be 19 or older, Ontario only. Please play responsibly. If you or someone you know has concerns about gambling, visit connexontario.ca, T's and Z's apply. This has been my cellist from the Midas Touch Network, and this is a breaking news alert. This is the alert we've been following all day, which is the Department of Justice has formally responded, and it's public.

It's a public response to Donald Trump's motion for judicial oversight and additional relief in connection with the search warrant executed at Mar-a-Lago on August 8th of 2022. You will recall that Donald Trump did not file anything before the magistrate judge who signed the search warrant on August 5th. It was executed on August 8th. Two weeks passed on August 22nd. Instead of filing before Judge Reinhart, the magistrate judge who signs off on warrants in the Southern District of Florida, Trump opened up a new case before Judge Eileen Cannon. It's a random drawing of federal judges. She just so happens to be a Trump-appointed judge from 2020. And so he filed this motion for judicial oversight there. Legal observers,

including myself, said we'd never heard of what's a motion for judicial oversight there. Legal observers, including myself, said we'd never heard of what's a motion for judicial oversight and additional relief. Is he requesting an injunction? Is he requesting some return of property under federal rule of criminal procedure 41? What's he specifically asking for here? Judge Cannon, the federal judge there, asked for him to file a supplemental response by August 26th. Trump filed the response in 26th, and it was still rather unclear. Regardless, Judge Cannon, which perplexed many legal observers, said she was inclined to hire a special master, which is unheard of in a case like this, but gave the federal government an opportunity to file its pleadings, which were due on August 30th.

The federal government filed their briefing on August 30th. Before the federal government filed, also a group of former federal prosecutors filed what's called an amicus brief, which just means a friend of the court brief, which is rare in federal court. We usually see that in Supreme Court, but in high profile cases, sometimes you see these friends of the court, which just means outside groups that file to tell the judge how they feel. And this group of bipartisan federal prosecutors basically said, we've never heard of any motion for judicial oversight and additional relief. There's no grounds for a special master. That set the stage for the DOJ's response. DOJ previously requested excess page limits. They requested

40 pages. They used 36 pages and had exhibits A through F. I'm going to walk you through now all that's been said in this motion, the key points of this motion. So let's get into it. And so one of the things the motion says from the outset, the federal government, the DOJ in its 36-page motion, tries to decipher what it is that Trump is asking for. And the DOJ says, look, all of these claims are kind of baseless and meritless, and the recitation of facts by Trump is completely false. But what it looks like plaintiffs trying to say is they're asking for three issues. One, whether Trump is entitled to the return of any property. Two, whether Trump is entitled to injunctive relief.

And three, whether a special master should be appointed. And the DOJ says, not only does the plaintiff lack standing to raise these claims at this juncture, but even if Trump's claims were properly raised, Trump would not be entitled to the relief that he is seeking. So let me go through these issues for you. So first, with respect to standing, the Department of Justice says Donald Trump does not have standing under the Fourth Amendment or under federal rule of criminal procedure 41, specifically G and E, which deal with either the return of property or suppression motions, although we're not at the point of a suppression motion because there's no indictment yet, but in terms of the return of property. And Donald Trump doesn't have standing for a very simple reason. He's no longer the president of the United States. In Donald Trump's motion,

he says that these records were created while he was the president under the Presidential Records Act, which is defined in this motion filed by the DOJ, all those records belong to the government. And all these records, especially in this case, the government says when we're dealing with national security information, national defense information, top secret sensitive compartmented information, these records do not belong to former presidents. He doesn't own it. And because he doesn't have a possessory right, because they don't belong to him, he can't ask for things back that he doesn't own it. And because he doesn't have a possessory right, because they don't belong to him, he can't ask for things back that he doesn't own or he doesn't claim to own. He doesn't have the right to it.

So, Judge, he has no standing to even make these claims. Second point the Department of Justice is making is, although it's not clear if Trump's even asking for an injunction, if you assume for the sake of argument that Trump is asking for an injunction, there's no irreparable harm here. There's no probability of success of the merits. An injunction has very specific criteria that you have to establish. And how do you know there's not this irreparable harm or this immediacy, right? An injunction is usually done, especially a temporary rejunction, a preliminary injunction,

requires some sort of like emergency thing to happen. And one of the things the government points out is just look at Trump's conduct. Setting aside the fact that he doesn't have a probability of success on the merits because these governments don't belong to him, Trump waited over two weeks before filing anything. The fact that he waited all of this time is evidence that there is no emergency issue here.

And also, at this stage, there's nothing an injunction can do because the Department of Justice has already reviewed all of the records. The Department of Justice here points out that in the search warrant itself listed the process of a filter team or a taint team that would go in and review privileged records, separate those and segregate those, and then the investigative team would look at non-privileged records, which is already completed. It's already done, judge. So there's literally nothing an injunction could do to change the status quo because the status quo is the government's reviewed all of the records and anything that's potentially attorney-client privilege has already been segregated and moved to another pile. And the investigative team hasn't looked at that.

With respect to these documents that are attorney-client privilege, the warrant also sets out the process of how the filter team would deal with those documents, which they would then give Trump an opportunity to review them, make potential privilege claims as they relate to attorney-client privilege documents, and that they would go through that process. But that's pursuant to the warrant. But all these other documents are now in the possession of the FBI and the Office of Director of National Intelligence, who's conducting an analysis and has been conducting an analysis of how the records at issue harmed our national security. So that's the second argument. There shouldn't be an

injunction. The third argument, there should not be a special master appointed. First of all, because these documents do not belong to Trump again. There's no need for a special master when we're talking about documents that belong to the executive branch. You don't need a special master to make rulings on executive privilege where the law is so clearly established that executive privilege does not apply where the current administration is not making an assertion of executive privilege. The past presidents don't have an executive privilege claim over documents that belong to the current administration and the current executive branch.

So what's a special master going to do? Second, a special master is going to impede on the investigation at issue because these documents are such a national security threat that Trump did that our office of the director of national intelligence and our top national defense advisors are reviewing these documents as we speak to make sure and to determine what the fallout is from Trump possessing these documents in the form and fashion he did and what he could have done with these documents. So to have a special master interfere with this process, in other words, could cause people's, can cost lives. Like this is life or death stuff and there's no need to

mess around with a special master. Third, one of the bases that Trump is asserting to have a special master is what's called on an equitable grounds, citing equity. And what the government says here is that you can't make a claim towards equity when you stole records. That's not equitable. Theft.

You don't get the benefit of an equitable decision when you go and you steal documents that don't belong to. I'm going to talk about it in a minute, but the government does a very detailed factual recitation, which is so damning. This factual recitation that the Department of Justice does in this motion, as I've said on Twitter, this can literally be copy and pasted into an indictment. The bottom line is Trump is guilty. The indictment is there. It's basically stipulated liability at this point based on the facts that we have. I'll explain what I mean there in a second. But as it relates to the equitable portion, the government's saying, you can't invoke a special master for equitable grounds when we're dealing with a criminal here. And then finally, they say special masters are only in very unique circumstances. Really,

when the government is doing a search warrant on a law firm that has multiple clients who are being investigated. And there's this entanglement of the documents themselves that are so intertwined of what are valid law firm documents and what belongs to potentially the attorney-client privilege is held by the client, not the lawyer. And so you don't want to infringe on these multiple clients who may be the ones who have their records searched in the rare instances where attorneys have their law firms searched pursuant to a warrant. And so only in those circumstances, very limited, an attorney client privileges the issue, is that type of special master warranted? And here what the government

says is we're not dealing with the potential universe of attorney-client privilege documents is so small. The filter team has already done its work. They've already reviewed the records. There's no need for a special master. We can go through the process set forth in the warrant where the privilege team will tell Trump's team the documents that they have, the privileged filter team. But the other records are already with the Office of Director of National Intelligence, and they're being now vetted, one, pursuant to the criminal investigation, and two, on the fallout to our national security. So we don't need a special master. Instacart has all your groceries covered this summer. So download the app and get delivery in as fast as 60 minutes. Plus enjoy $0 delivery fees on your first three orders.

Service fees, exclusions, and terms apply. Instacart, groceries that over-deliver. And then the government also cites to like the Michael Cohen case where they said, even in like the Michael Cohen case or in other cases where special masters were invoked, what the remedy should have been, what Trump should have done if that's what he wanted, was immediately the day of the search warrant, maybe day after or two days after, you rush into court immediately and you make that request. You don't wait two weeks if ultimately what you want is a special master.

But finally, what the government says is, okay, to the extent, judge, you're just going to not follow the law here. To the extent you're going to disregard all precedent, you're going to disregard everything, and you use a special master, the government lists a very sensitive protocol that needs to be followed. Most importantly, that the special master has top secret sensitive compartmented information clearance. Because one of the things we've learned from the factual background is that when the FBI searched Trump's residence on August 8th, the documents were so top secret, such sensitive compartmented information, that even the FBI agents who had those records

were not allowed to look at them. They needed to give it to other agents who had higher levels, the highest level of clearances because of the sensitive nature of those records. And so you'd have to find a very unique special master. But special masters, there's no precedent at all for a special master to make calls of executive privilege. The law has been established. The one time it was really brought up in a context in any meaningful way was Nixon, and it's well-established law that executive privilege only exists with the current administrations, not past administrations. Now, I thought one of the most damning things in this motion, in addition to the law I just gave you, is that the government basically says to the judge, judge, we understand that you're not the magistrate judge. We understand that Trump filed this frivolous, bogus BS factual scenario. So let us tell you what the real facts are here and not these BS facts that Trump puts out that are intended for radical extreme TV.

The government didn't use those words. I did, but they use much smarter words, but that's essentially what they're saying. I'm breaking it down for you in layman's terms. And one of the things that we've learned here, we knew there was top secret sensitive compartmented information that was found at Mar-a-Lago on the August 8th search, but how much? How much?

Here's what we've learned. During the August 8th execution of the search warrant at the premises of Mar-a-Lago, the government seized 33 boxes, containers, or items of evidence, which contained over 100 classified records, including information classified at the highest level. Here's one of the things I love about the motion too. Exhibit F.

Exhibit F shows a photograph of just some of the records that they found at Mar-a-Lago during the search that has the bearing of top secret classified information. I'm going to pull this up right now on the screen for those who are watching this on YouTube. And for those watching this on an audio podcast, you can check out the YouTube to see this photo of the top secret of one of the photos of the top secret sensitive compartmented information that was found. What the government does in its facts section is it gives a very detailed recitation of after Trump leaves the White House in January of 2021, how the National Archives identified that he stole these records. They keep asking for it throughout 2021. Finally, they get these 15 boxes back in early January of 2022.

They identify within here top secret documents that are shredded, documents that are just kind of intermingled and intermixed with magazines and newspapers. And so they conduct a review. They forward this stuff to the FBI and they go, there's top secret sensitive compartmented information like red alert, red alert, red alert. The investigation continues. Donald Trump here has a lawyer who basically claims that they make this claim here that NARA and the DOJ can't look at it. DOJ and NARA say, well, we're going to look at it. Trump doesn't file anything.

Like at that point around April or May of 2022, if Trump was concerned, he could have filed a motion in court for executive privilege. The DOJ points that out. He filed nothing. In fact, one of the things the Department of Justice says in their motion is that even to this day, even currently as we speak, while Donald Trump talks about potential privilege records, he hasn't actually made a filing ever that says, I hereby declare executive privilege over certain records, which is something that you have to do. You can't just divine executive privilege.

Then they talk about what happens on June 3rd of 2022 in the motion, and they show the very specific declaration that one of Trump's lawyers signed. And we believe that this declaration was executed by Christina Bobb. It doesn't specifically say Christina Bobb's name on there, but many commentators believe it's her, which basically says that we've returned all of the records. On June 3rd, they gave one more red weld over to the Department of Justice that has other top secret documents in it. At no point to did Trump ever claim these documents are declassified. So that's never happened at all until like very recently and only to the radical extremist

papers. There's no, uh, radical extremist media. There's none of that actually in any of these filings themselves to make a declaration of declassification. It certainly didn't happen on June 3rd of 2022. And so one of the other representations that were made is that the only documents that ever existed were in the storage room. We now know that to be false because one of the things we've learned from this motion as well is they found classified documents within Donald Trump's office itself. They found very classified records there,

so we know that they're also lying. And while the DOJ says in this motion, we're not going to reveal our sources and methods that we used and who our witnesses are, who could be potentially confidential informants and witnesses who let us know, we knew that he was moving these records around outside of the storage room, which they claim the only documents that could exist in the storage room. In fact, one of the things that we've also learned, right, is that the DOJ, when they arrived, their top counterintelligence officials on June 3rd, Trump and his lawyers showed him the storage room, but wouldn't let him actually look inside the boxes and then claim there is no more confidential records, but wouldn't let him look inside the boxes. Well, there were hundreds of classified information in those boxes where

the DOJ was lied to. And we know now from this motion conclusively that Trump was moving these records around at Mar-a-Lago to different areas. And so all of that conduct all precipitated finally the search warrant that was sought on August 5th, signed on August 5th, executed on August 8th. And when I said it's like essentially stipulated liability at this point, what I mean by that is that we now know that from this motion, that obstruction did take place. We know that lies were made to the DOJ. Lies were made to the FBI. We know that they found the classified records, top secret, sensitive, departmented information, and that all of these efforts were made to hide and conceal

and mutilate and destroy these records, all of the above or some of the above there, and prevent the government from having access to them. And so now the investigation is also what is the damage? What is the fallout? Did this cause people's lives? What security threats has this caused our nation? And what we do know though, is that this is again stated in the motion, the highest, most top secret, sensitive information that exists. So much so that the FBI agents with security clearances couldn't themselves look at it. They had to have people with even higher levels

of security clearances look at these records in order to kind of determine what happened here. So that's the overall summary of this 36-page motion. Exhibits A through F. Just to go over one more time, just the key arguments here. There's no standing. These documents do not belong to Donald Trump. They belong to the government. He is not the president. He can't claim that he has these records. There shouldn't be an injunction. Is Trump even asking for an injunction, number one? But he certainly can't establish a probability of success. He can't establish irreparable harm. He can't establish any kind of emergency or immediacy.

There are other elements too, but when you focus on the countervailing interests of the government here, for example, like the government's involved in a national security and criminal investigation into Trump. So an injunction would not make sense here at all. And then when you talk about a special master, the third argument, there's no grounds at all for a special master here. This is not a case involving a search warrant of an attorney's office. And again, these documents do not belong to Trump. There'd be no basis for a special master to come in and do anything as it relates to documents that clearly just belong to the federal government. And a special master can impede our national security interests. And the government overall has already reviewed all the records. So all of these issues are moot. The government has reviewed it.

So that's the big takeaways here. But an explosive motion and truthfully explosive to learn that it's hundreds of documents that were found, top secret sensitive compartmented information found in that August 8th search, that it was also found in Trump's office. The actual declaration that Trump's lawyers signed, you actually get to see it in this motion. That's a revelation. So whoever signed that, if that is Christina Bob, I mean, needs to lawyer up immediately. And the conspiracy there of who else aided and abetted what Trump's conduct is, is also going to be looked into. Who are the other players here? But the question isn't if Trump will be

indicted at this point. The question is when will Trump be indicted? Thanks, Ben. Wow. I mean, I have the chills down my spine processing all of this. Let's be clear, there is no both sides here. Donald Trump is a traitor. His Republican accomplices are traitors. The house of cards is collapsing before our very eyes. Make sure you check out our YouTube channel after you listen to this to see the photo of the top secret documents in Mar-a-Lago for yourself. Horrifying. Thank you so much for listening to this episode of The Mighty and for being on the side of truth and democracy. Please make sure to subscribe now to the Midas Touch podcast channel and leave a five-star review. Also, please check out store.midastouch.com for the latest and greatest Midas Touch merch, including our best-selling Convict 45 gear, our person, woman,

man, camera, prison tees, I made that one, rovember tember tease v-necks pins and much more thank you so much for listening again and as always shout out to the mightest mighty