The MeidasTouch Podcast - Trump DIGS his Legal Grave and PANICS in Court

Episode Date: December 8, 2023

On this episode of the MeidasTouch Podcast, we discuss: Trump’s surprise appearance at the NY court; Trump’s major mistake in the Florida case and his baffling motion in his DC case; The indictment of 6 Nevada Republican fake electors; McCarthy’s retirement; MAGA’s rage over Taylor Swift; The Republican debate; President Biden’s actions on drug prices and student debt relief; and more! Ben, Brett and Jordy break it all down. DEALS FROM OUR SPONSORS: AeroPress: Visit aeropress.com/meidas to save up to 20% off! Rhone: Head to rhone.com/meidas and use code MEIDAS to save 20% off your entire order! Miracle Made: Upgrade your sleep with Miracle Made! Go to TryMiracle.com/MEIDAS and use the code MEIDAS to claim your FREE 3 PIECE TOWEL SET and SAVE over 40% OFF. Manscaped: Get 20% off plus free shipping with code MEIDAS at manscaped.com 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

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please contact Connex Ontario at 1-866-531-2600 to speak to an advisor free of charge. BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with iGaming Ontario. Donald Trump took a surprise visit to court today in the New York Attorney General civil fraud case a day after his son, Eric Trump, who was supposedly running the Trump organization, backed out of testifying in his direct examination in the defense case. Trump was there to apparently watch his expert witness who was paid over $550,000 to testify, $550,000. And boy, did Donald Trump get a show when his expert witness testified, quote, there's no question that the price was inflated with regards to at least one of Donald Trump's properties. With experts like that, wow. overthrow the results of the 2020 election, Donald Trump filed a notice of appeal to Judge Tanya Chutkin's order denying his motion to dismiss the indictment on presidential immunity

grounds. Trump also filed a motion to stay the entire district court proceeding and its deadlines and all of the obligations imposed pending the D.C. Court of Appeals resolution of the appeal. Donald Trump cited the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals case from last week involving Donald Trump denying Trump's appeal from civil lawsuits related to the insurrection on presidential immunity grounds as the basis for claiming there should be some automatic stay derailing the district court proceeding. Don't worry if that makes no sense to you because it makes no sense at all. Trump also stated he was going to proceed with his understanding that the case would be stayed pending a court order from Judge Tanya Chutkin. So Judge Tanya Chutkin immediately issued an order, basically ignoring what Donald Trump

was saying, setting a briefing schedule, an expedited one in the next few days on Trump's stay request. We'll break that down. In Florida federal court before Judge Eileen Cannon, Donald Trump filed an unusual motion, a motion to request that his lawyers intervene in and participate in the hearing over SEPA Section 4 classified document withholdings by the Department of Justice. Look, it is well-established law that defense counsel in criminal cases like this do not and cannot attend these ex parte hearings as a matter of national security, but that didn't stop Donald Trump from requesting it anyway. I would expect that Judge Eileen Cannon will do the complete wrong thing here,

which may finally allow Jack Smith to take an appeal because it will finally be an appealable order to the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals. A lot of legal cases so far in this intro, and I've got more for you. Donald Trump's lawyers argued in Colorado Supreme Court on the appeal in the disqualification case under the 14th Amendment Section 3 that there are essentially no limits to people seeking the presidency. In essence, arguing that the Constitution allows basically for a dictatorship. We will show you the videos. It's not mere rhetoric by me. Trump's lawyers argued that, for example, Confederate President Jefferson Davis would have been able to run for

the presidency and that the Democratic Party could conceivably nominate Barack Obama for a third term. And then Trump's lawyer basically said, yeah, you know, I'm making this all up, but isn't everybody just making all of this up? No, people follow the law and the Constitution, which you apparently don't. bye-bye. MAGA Republicans are attacking Taylor Swift again after she was named Time Magazine Person of the Year. The Republican debate last night was pure insanity. Nevada fake electors were indicted. We didn't start the fire, but it sounds like it. And in normal world, President Biden just announced a massive plan to end big pharma price gouging by allowing the government to license drugs to new manufacturers if they aren't being sold at reasonable prices. And President Biden told Congress, pass Ukraine aid right now.

Do not let Vladimir Putin win. I'm Ben Micellis. This is the Midas Touch podcast, joined by Brett and Jordy. We've got a lot of ground to cover today, a lot going on. But I do want to highlight this theme that we talk about over and over again, that this election in 2024, this is about democracy over dictatorship, democracy over dictatorship. And it really is that binary right there, folks. Yeah. And other times we could really rely on the minutia of policies of candidates. This is literally about the ability to even vote in an election again. And I know for years now we've been saying this is the most important election of our lifetime, but it has been, especially since Donald Trump has taken the stage and has co-opted this Republican Party and has made it an overtly autocratic party.

Ben, I am very excited for this episode. I feel like you just did a workout by naming all those things. You mentioned We Didn't Start the Fire. We Didn't Start the Fire covered like a long period of time, like from 1948 to 1989. Your intro right there covered a lot of ground and it was all in the past, what, 24 hours? 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Pacific. 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. So that's the kind of news cycle that we're living in right now. And we wonder why so many people have anxiety.

We're here. We're here to go break it all down and make sense of it. Exactly. That's why I love that we do the show live, live, because it allows us to literally work up until we hit play on this thing to get the latest breaking news out to the Midas Mighty. A hundred percent. And you know, when Ben says we got a SIPA ruling, Ben, I've never seen somebody get more excited over anything than a SIPA. Ben goes, ooh, SIPA ruling. Anytime a SIPA ruling. Ben loves the nuance of SIPA

more than anybody loves anything. I've never seen anything like it. Almost as much as he loves SPACs, but he's a big SIPA guy these days. Way more than special purpose acquisition companies. But I've given the rundown on SIPA so many times that in the comment section, when I do SIPA breakdowns, people are like, Ben, we get SIPA. Shut up. Stop telling us. We know what SIPA is already. You know what? I'm just, for all of our new watchers,

I just want to explain that it stands for the Classified Information Procedure Act, what it does in criminal cases, and why it is important in the case both in Washington, D.C. and in the Southern District of Florida federal case. But I want to start off again with this idea of democracy over dictatorship. And first, I want to show Donald Trump's interview, which is a softball interview, a softball as you get with Hannity. They call it a town hall. It's a propaganda piece. It's pre-edited.

It's pre-taped so that there's no more defamation, even though they don't do a good job at that. And Hannity is giving the softest of soft balls to the ball-less Donald Trump right here. And he's basically just telling Donald Trump, look, just say you're not an authoritarian. The American people really are going to be voting on the basis of democracy over dictatorship. So can you just say you're not going to be a dictator? And Donald Trump's incapable of doing that when he's asked the question at this town hall. So I want to show you first two clips from the town hall. And then I want to go to what Donald Trump's lawyer was arguing in the Colorado Supreme Court in the disqualification case because it mirrors each other. It's the same arguments.

They are actually talking about dictatorship and authoritarianism. So in this first clip, Hannity's asking Donald Trump, so you would never abuse power as retribution. And then Donald Trump responds, except for day one. Here, play the clip. You would never abuse power as retribution against anybody. Except for day one. Except for? He's going crazy. Except for day one. He's going crazy. I just said I'm going to be a dictator. He's going crazy. What's going on here,

people? Here's the next clip of Donald Trump again. Kennedy then goes back to it again and tries to get Donald Trump to answer that question, not the way he just answered it. And here's what happens. I want to be very, very clear on this. To be clear, do you in any way have any plans whatsoever, if re-elected president, to abuse power, to break the law, to use the government to go after people? You mean like they're using right now? So in the history of our country, what's happened to us, again, has never happened before. Kennedy has to feed him the questions like he is teaching a newborn how to speak. Say daddy. Do you know how to say?

Can you say daddy? No, no. Say daddy. I mean, that's what it's come to. And again, what we are observing there, what we are watching is not normal behavior. So we'll take you there from that bogus so-called town hall, which whatever that even was. Let's take you, though, to the Colorado Supreme Court, where the appeal on the disqualification case to remove Donald Trump under the 14th Amendment, Section 3 was argued. The trial court judge held that while Donald Trump engaged

in insurrection, that because Donald Trump under the trial court's ruling is not an officer, because the presidency is not an officer, which makes absolutely no sense at all that Donald Trump therefore could not be disqualified. Makes no sense. So this is the disqualification case that now goes to the Colorado Supreme Court. And I want to share with you what the lawyer argued, because when I saw this, I had to do a double take. And it's rare to get this insight into these oral arguments as well. This is why everything should be covered here. This is why all trials should have cameras in them as well. So here, Donald Trump's lawyer is arguing that under the 14th Amendment case law, that President Jefferson Davis could be able to run. Obama could run for a third

term because he says presidents are not officers, so they can basically do whatever the heck they want, if we can play that clip right now. If the entire nation chooses someone to be president, can that be an insurrection or is that democratic choice can you know remember the president is a little bit different everyone in the country has an opportunity or should have an opportunity go ahead i don't think anyone here is is suggesting and i don't take the petitioners to have been arguing that the election of a person as president is an insurrection. I think that what the insurrection might have been is a different question. So I'm not sure where you're going with that argument.

I'm going with the broader context of the president is different. And if everyone in the country chooses a particular person as a president. So if everyone chose an insurrectionist, Jefferson Davis, let's use that example. If Jefferson Davis ran a while ago and the electors who were not themselves insurrectionists chose to put him into the presidency, that would be fine under Section 3. And that would be consistent with the purposes of Section 3. That would be the rule of democracy in work. But the rule of democracy, there are limits. I mean, the president can't be under 35 or can't be someone who wasn't born in this country. So you could, I mean, the argument, if you take your argument to the limit,

it would say we can elect Governor Schwarzenegger or my 27-year-old kid. I don't think it goes that far. It's that rule embodied in the text of Section 3. Now, there are plenty of anti-majoritarian measures in the structural Constitution, and there are these qualifications. No one argues that. But when we're interpreting anti-majoritarian measures in the structural constitution. And there are these qualifications. No one argues that. But when we're interpreting Section 3 of the 14th Amendment, and we look at the history behind that and the context and the language they used,

they used office. Look, to satisfy the conditions of Section 3, you have to be at office under the United States. You have to hold the office under the United States. And you have to be an officer under the United States. And you have to take a note. You have to have all four of those items in place. Any one of them, Section 3 does not apply.

Stepping away from Article 3, though, though for a second and sticking with the constitution could the democratic party put president obama up for on the primary ballot could that happen I haven't done a full analysis of that particular provision I'm really sort of focused more on section 3 but could they do it

conceivably I think it's an open question if you look at the political question analysis of the article more on Section 3, but could they do it? Conceivably, I think it's an open question. If you look at the political question analysis of the Article 2 courts, the weight of authority was that states could not prevent that. If I understand your democratic process argument, that would seem to be the logical conclusion. I'm just trying to make sure I understand the breadth. The breadth is confined to Section 3, Your Honor. But stepping away because you were focused also on the Constitution. Look, I'm focused on the structural Constitution.

To look at the language, the officer of the United States is used four times in the structural Constitution. And each time it does not apply to the u.s president well go ahead i mean not once does it apply no i know you didn't answer my question but that's okay i'm not gonna you i want to let you use your time the way you want to use your time so i feel like please feel free to take another run at me your honor i do want to be responsive yes sir yeah use your time to argue for just a complete dictatorship. By the way, his lawyer, Scott Gessler, argued in the summary of argument before the Supreme Court right there. I mean, here's what it says. It's highlighted right there. It can't be made any more clear

than what I'm about to read for you. This is what Donald Trump's argument is before the Colorado Supreme Court, why the disqualification clause of the 14th Amendment, Section 3, does not apply to him. It goes, the framers excluded the office of president from Section 3 purposefully. Section 3 does not apply because the presidency is not an office under the United States. The president is not an officer of the United States and the president does not take an oath. And he goes, and president Trump did not take an oath quote to support the constitution of the United States. President Trump did not take an oath to support the constitution of the United States. President Trump did not take an oath to support the Constitution of the United States. It could not be more clear what their argument is.

How, as a former president, do you argue you did not take the oath of office? That's what it's called, an oath of office because you are an officer. It is called the office of the presidency because you are an officer. And if you want to look at the text of the 14th Amendment, Section 3, it is very clear in what it says. No person shall be a senator or representative in Congress or elector of president and vice president or hold any office or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States or under any state who, having previously taken an oath as a member of Congress or as an officer of the United States or as a member of any state shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same. These are what the words are, or hold any office.

So we're saying that the presidency is not an office. And by the way, when people drafted that 14th Amendment Section 3, the idea was that any office was the catch-all, was a catch-all to everything. And so it is such a disturbing argument, but the pattern here that we're breaking down, here's what Donald Trump said on Hannity. Here's what his lawyer argued before the Colorado Supreme Court. Here's what they argued in their brief. This needs to be repeated every single day to let people know what's up, Brett and Jordy.

Yeah, I don't even understand how these cases aren't just open and shut cases. It really is completely baffling to me as a layman, as a non-lawyer of the group. It's completely and utterly baffling to me. And I really hate the precedent that it sets, because what it is essentially saying, if Donald Trump gets away with these things and these disqualification cases, if you say, yes, insurrection, then you could do anything you want. The new game is screw elections, screw anything, right? Do anything you want while you're still in office. And if it doesn't work out, you tried, right? You tried, but you weren't an officer, so we can't do anything about it. However, if you do win that way, then that's legal. That's fine. There's so many times during the Constitution where it does refer to it also as the office of the presidency. And even you would think, you know, somebody who's probably considers himself a strict

constitutionalist. I know Ben likes to mock a lot of these people for calling themselves strict constitutionalists. Now finding this kind of just reading between the lines of what did they actually mean when they said office? Maybe they didn't mean that office like they just parse words. But even if you look at the 22nd Amendment, which he seems to confront, you know, right there and blow right past, which says that no president could be nominated, be elected for more than two terms. You would think that would set off a red flag when the guy says, oh, yeah, of course, Obama could run for a third term. Of course, that's a possibility. And I think also the subtext there is let's take it a step further, right? The arguments that Donald Trump, if he ever were to take power in this country again, these would be the same arguments that he would use

to run for a third term. He would say, what? Nothing in the Constitution prohibits me from being president three terms, right? I'm not an officer. That doesn't apply to me. I mean, it could not be clearer that it applies to you. It's completely and utterly baffling. And by the way, I have no hope that the judges will disqualify him from any ballot. I just personally, I do not. But I think it's maybe, I don't know why though, because they're too afraid to actually make that maneuver. I truly couldn't tell you. If they said, this is an insurrection, if you read the text of the constitution, you should be able to come to that conclusion. But I guess they're just too scared.

I don't know what the deal is. And here are the things with the games that you could play with any section of the constitution and how dangerous it is. I'll are the things with the games that you could play with any section of the Constitution and how dangerous it is. I'll give you an example. Ready? What does Article 2, Section 1 of the Constitution say? The executive power shall be vested in a president of the United States of America. He shall hold his office during the term of four years and together with the vice president chosen for the same term be elected as follows. So if you're playing these fascistic games with words, you can take any word right here, right? And it says, well, it says he shall hold his office, but he is not an office holder. He is not an officer. So even though it says during a term of four years,

what that actually means is that physically within the confines of his specific office space, but in terms of his powers, it's actually limitless. You see, the word office was actually referring to just a room where the president lives, like a library. And he could only have that library for four years. But with regard to his overall powers, you see the Constitution is silent. You see how dangerous it is, what I just did there? That is what they were doing, Brett, And that's what makes you and others so angry, including me. You can manipulate, you could give me any section of the constitution and say, come up with the most nefarious meaning for these words. And if you torture the words and you don't

give them their actual plain meaning, you could basically come up with anything. And that's what these MAGA Republicans have done and the Federalist Society has done with everything, right? You go to the, what, the Second Amendment, you talk about the right to bear arms. You go, oh, it says a well-regulated militia. Those words don't matter. There's a comma. There's a comma. So just delete the words well-regulated militia and just read the right to bear arms. And that's it. They do this with everything. Oh, I'm an originalist now. Oh, I'm a strict textualist now. Oh, I am a structuralist here. No, it's all BS. Y'all are making this up. And there was this one moment, Brett, where Donald Trump's lawyer, basically under questioning, admitted, I'm just making this up. Aren't we all just making it up? And he kind of gave away the game right there. Because the answer is no, no, there actually is a constitution and these words should have very basic meaning of what the words actually say.

Play this clip where Donald Trump's lawyer basically gives away the game. Play it. Why don't you focus, because your time is limited, on the one the district court adopted. I mean, any public use of force or threat of force by a group of people to hinder or prevent the execution of the Constitution. What's wrong with that definition? Way too broad. I think the petitioners actually admitted that a group of people threatening a mailman and preventing him or her from executing their constitutional duties, because that's one of the constitutional powers that Congress has, would constitute an insurrection. What if we narrowed it to say prevent the peaceful transfer of power of the United States government? Would that be an insurrection?

To prevent the peaceful transfer? I don't think so, and I'm not sure, Your Honor. Look, if you look at historically in the context of how insurrection was used, it has to be for a substantial duration, not three hours. There has to be some geographical scope. There has to be a goal of nullifying all governmental authority in an area. I guess I'm not sure where you said it has to be, where the temporal provision, where is all that coming from? Webster's Third New International Dictionary defines it as an

act or instance of revolting against civil authority or against an established government. So you've added a whole lot of conditions there. I'm not sure where they came from. I would urge you. I think probably the best exposition of that was the state attorney general's briefs and the authority that they provided. But I think also if you look at sort of the historical record. Now, you're going to tell me, Mr. Gesser, you're making it up. And I'm going to say, well,

so did the judge. And I'll say, we're all sort of making it up at the end of the day. And yes, I just want to jump in on this point of how I don't know that we have to come up with a test that's going to necessarily address all circumstances. I guess the question, at least as to insurrection, you know, setting apart whether President Trump engaged in insurrection. But as to insurrection, why isn't it enough that a violent mob breached the Capitol when Congress was performing a core constitutional function? In some ways, that seems like a poster child for insurrection. Why is that not true? Well, I think what you're sort of saying is the famous quote I don't know. I don't know a definition of it, but I know it when I see it

You know that we don't have a workable standard, but we think in this instance there probably it doesn't feel good And it just seems well, it's more than it doesn't feel good I for purposes of this case What we need to do is figure out whether what happened on January 6th, one of the things we need to do is figure out whether what happened on January 6th constituted an insurrection. We don't need to come up with a definition for all times and all circumstances. I know it when I see it is actually a line from Justice Stewart, former Supreme Court justice, who says, I know it when I see it, referring to pornographic obscenity, not insurrection. And I mean, Trump's lawyer saying an insurrection can't be short. Like, what are you even talking? An insurrection has to be

multiple days. In an insurrection, you have to say the magical words, this is an insurrection. Well, Ben, there is a correlation here because if your insurrection lasts more than three hours, you should probably call a doctor. You're such a jerk. But the thing is, this insurrection did last more than three hours. So I don't even understand his point and him making it up and him saying, aren't we all just making it up? It sounds like somebody who just came off like a shroom trip or something. And they're like, isn't life just a construct, man? Isn't everything just made up at the end of the day? Aren't words just made up? It's like, what are

we talking? We have established rules and norms here. We're in the court of law. Why are they questioning, Ben? Sorry, Ben. Why are they being so lenient with him, I guess? Why did they give him such a long rope? That's the problem, that there is asymmetrical warfare going on. You've got MAGA Republicans acting like complete and total maniacs. And then you have the pro-democracy community being very polite. And I just want to ask you a question as the MAGA Republicans are like, arrest Taylor Swift. It's like, what? And by the way, the media is terrified by the MAGA

Republicans. It's so much easier for the media to run some stupid story. People are feeling that the economy is not doing good today, or even though the economy is doing good, or President Biden's wearing new sneakers today. Oh, he must be old. They'll write any stupid story knowing, though, that President Biden, pro-democracy community people, Democrats are kind of focused on the issues that they don't want to engage and get kind of dirty in that mud. And the media even knows that too. And they're worried that with these MAGA Republicans, oh, I write a story about them. Oh, what are they going to do? They're going to engage in stochastic terrorism against me. I don't want to have to deal with what justice and Gorons

dealing with and Jackson. They're going to, They're going to put my name out on their 4chans and on their social media, and I'm going to get all of these. I'm just going to write some story and say, people feel a certain way, or lots of people are saying this, and this may be the case, and go after the pro-democracy community, ignore the data, because, Jordi, it goes to that point right there. That's just the tough thing because, look, I don't want to lose the qualities of the pro-democracy community of being compassionate and empathetic. I want to stick to the facts. I don't want to punch down.

I don't want to punch down. I don't want to bully. But then at the same time, you have to acknowledge these MAGA Republicans view that as a weakness and try to exploit it and then try to prey on the lack of information that's getting to the people with their flood of disinformation and the incentive structures for the pro-democracy community, you know, having to stick to the facts and deliver for the people versus MAGA Republicans, whatever the dumbest thing they possibly say, they get rewarded and get to go on Fox or right-wing media. And then they get promoted by Trump and they grift and sell their books. It's just a different incentive structure. So it's a long- winded answer, Jay, but it strikes at the core kind of issues right here. And I don't know, when I see that lawyer and the Federalist Society like lawyers, it reminds me of like the kids who

showed up in high school who just BS and make up everything. And to your point, Jordy, it's like, okay, you have the student who studies, who goes over everything, who focuses on all the lessons. Then they kind of come in and just make it up. Well, you see, it does say office, but what really is an office? The office of the president. What really is an insurrection? An insurrection can take place in a temporal, and I'll use big words. You didn't have a printer in the office.

Offices have printers, right? I don't see a printer in the Oval. So let's be real here about what an office is. I'll just use the word temporal to say. Temporally and structurally, what we need to do, Your Honor, is we need to totally deconstruct the reductivism in the divisibility of the word insurrection. You see, Your Honor, there is a plethora indubitably. You know what I mean? It's like, okay, it's hard to imagine why people hate lawyers, Ben. Hard to imagine. All right. Speaking of which, I want to talk about what went down in the New York Attorney General Civil. Fraud case, Donald Trump makes a surprise appearance. His expert says no question about it. Prices were inflated. Great work paying that guy $550,000. And of course I want to announce as well that we will be having our zoom meeting

on our Patreon. It will take place December 12th at 8am Pacific 11 Eastern. We can talk all about the interview we did with President Joe Biden. You can ask us questions. We're so excited to meet you all again. Join our Patreon. That's patreon.com slash MidasTouch, P-A-T-R-E-O-N.com slash MidasTouch. We don't have outside investors here at the MidasTouch network. We build this network through emojis on our YouTube, our pro-democracy sponsors, and our Patreon. There you go, patreon.com slash Midas Touch. We'll be right back after our first quick break. If you're like me, morning coffee is non-negotiable, but I was tired of either waiting in line for an overpriced cup or settling for gritty,

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Welcome back. We are live. This is the Midas Touch podcast. Thank you to our pro-democracy sponsors. Great ad reads there by Brett and- Wonderful, man. Morty. Wonderful. Wonderful. Wow. I want to talk about- The link's, by the way, in the description of the show on YouTube and in audio.

Just click them, use our promo codes. Helps the show. Helps you out too. You get some cool products at a discount. Let's talk about what went down in the New York Attorney General civil fraud trial today. Day 41, we're heading towards the end of the trial. Donald Trump's expected to testify next week. We'll see about that. He claims he's testifying. Eric was supposed to testify yesterday. He did not testify. Donald Trump posted that it was unfair and he wanted to spare his little child to having to testify. It was like such an embarrassing

statement. He goes, I told my wonderful son, Eric, not to testify tomorrow at the rigged trial brought about by Attorney General Letitia James. And he goes on to say that his young life has already been unfairly disturbed and disrupted enough on this corrupt witch hunt. That's Donald Trump's exact words. His young life. Weird. Has already been. He's 40 what?

40 years old? 41 years old? He's the same age or older. He's 39. Yeah, he was 39 years old? Yeah. He's 39. Alina Haba is also 39.

He's two years. I guess they're both little children it's so weird for him to hire a child lawyer weird weird move by donald trump to hire a little toddler as his little toddlers running around um but donald trump showed up his uh expert witness eli bartov testified Eli Bartov previously testified in a case involving the same New York Attorney General statute back in 2019. He was actually a witness for the New York Attorney General's office, but did such a bad job. I don't think they ever used him again. The case was against Exxon. And he said, he kept on calling it Enron in his 2019 testimony, calling Exxon Enron, not a great thing right there when you confuse who the defendant was. But by the way, that 2019 case was also brought under the same statute that Donald Trump is being sued under. So you know,

when Donald Trump says, no one's ever had a case like this brought against him. Well, your expert testified in a case just like this in 2019. I want to show you this clip when Donald Trump came into court here. Donald Trump claims that he has already won the case. And as I was saying in the show I was doing with Michael Cohen, political beatdown at this point, you know those wind-up dolls where you just wind them up? Trump's basically a fascist wind-up doll at this point. You wind it up, and then he basically says the same lines over and over again. This would be the worst Christmas gift right here. Imagine, open up your present, you get the fascist Trump wind-up doll, and then you go, what does it say? You pull the string and Brett play the first clip.

This is a witch hunt, the likes of which probably nobody has ever seen. We put on a case that is absolutely 100%. There's not a judge in the country that wouldn't have given us a total victory, but there's not a judge in the country that would have even taken this case. This is a witch hunt, and it's a very corrupt trial. We won this case at the appellate division. Most of it. We cover about 90% of the case. We won this case at the appellate division,

and this judge refuses to acknowledge the appellate division. He said very specifically, we're going forward because there's something wrong here. We won this case. Remember this. And this judge refuses to acknowledge the division. Because we won the case at the appellate division, which he didn't. But even if you accept his words, then he goes, 90% of it. So even if you accepted his words, wouldn't that mean that you lost 10% of it?

That's a good point. And that 10% should go to trial. So you didn't win at all. And also, that's just not what the appellate division said. Donald Trump's arguing that if he committed fraud 20, 30 years ago, that starts the statute of limitations. The statute of limitations, he argues, doesn't keep on continuing if he keeps on committing the fraud. The very first time he commits the fraud, that's it. But if he uses the fraudulent documents from 20, 30 years ago, or even 10 years ago. More currently,

he's like, I'm immune. First time the fraud happens, that's it. And obviously that's not what the law is at all. If there's continuing fraud, each new act of fraud, even if you use an old fraudulent document, becomes a new act of fraud that you could be sued under. And the only reason Ivanka got out of the case is she argued that she was not affiliated with the Trump organization during the time period where those older fraudulent documents were used again within the statute of limitations period. She basically threw her family under the bus or they allowed her to. And she said, I didn't have affiliation with the Trump organization during this period. I wasn't working for it. I wasn't part of it. I wasn't a trustee like Eric and Don Jr. was or that Donald Trump was. I wasn't involved in it.

That was her argument. And that's how she got out of the case. But it's just an absurd claim. All right, let me do another windup right now. I'm not going to do more than this windup though. I'll do one more. Let's do the windup about the $1.8 billion though, Brett, where he keeps saying that the judge appraised the house. Let's do that one. So you wind up your fascist, annoying Trump doll, you pull it and then. So we're going in now, we have an expert witness, one of the great experts in the country, and I hope you'll all be able to listen to him. Why don't it just be another day?

If you look at the case, we did nothing wrong. There were no victims. The bank loves us. The bank testified. They love us. We did absolutely nothing wrong. We never even defaulted. We never had a default letter sent to us.

The bank said we were a perfect customer. The bank didn't even know why they were here. And yet there are people being murdered outside. All over the streets they're being murdered. This violent crime. And this Attorney General, who's crazy. She's a lunatic. The Attorney General sits here because she knows that she has a judge, and no matter all the evidence, that judge is going to rule in her favor. He ruled against me before the case even started. The case hadn't started, he knew nothing, and he ruled against me. The other thing is this. He vacuumed the car logger Beach, Florida, because that was good for her case, at a value of $18 million, when in fact it's worth anywhere from 50 to 100 times that amount. Nobody's ever seen anything like it, but just remember what I said at the beginning. We wanted the appellate division, and this judge refuses to honor that victory or that decision or that demand. You did not win at the appellate division. I mean, every single thing he says is a lie over and over again. But here's the thing, Jordi, as I was talking about that asymmetrical

kind of warfare that's taking place over information, it is a constant barrage, nonstop, with really no repercussion at all, over and over and over again. And if you had any Democrat do any of that conduct at all, at all, see you later, you're out, goodbye. Or anything that even has a whiff of that, see you later, you are out right there. And again, the judge is not coming up with appraisals. The judge isn't creating the valuations. The judge is saying the Trump organization says that Mar-a-Lago is a commercial property, that it is a club. Why? Because the Trump organization wanted to and did pay less taxes on a valuation of under $27 million. They did not pay property taxes on a property worth $250 to $300 million because it was not a residential property. There's no way the property is ever valued at $1.5 billion or whatever Donald Trump says, but

you can have me believe that the property, if it was a residential property, would be valued at $1.5 billion or whatever Donald Trump says. But you can have me believe that the property, if it was a residential property, would be valued at $250 to $300 million. Fine. But that means you've got to pay property taxes on that, which Donald Trump did not do. And the comps would be other residential properties. But that's not the case. They called it a commercial property, not a residential property. And again, it was to pay lower taxes. So they would tell the taxing authorities, here's the value. They would tell the lenders, not only is this the value, but this is a residential property.

And it was not. And then they ran that over and over again. When it came to the triplex, they would just make up numbers and say, yeah, it's 30,000 square feet when it's actually 10,000 square feet. And by the way, Trump's own expert who testified, Eli Bartov testified that Trump more than doubled the value of his triplex apartment on a statement of financial condition from $80 million to $180 million between 2011 and 2012. Quote, the price was inflated. There is no question about it.

But Bartob would call all of these issues, he would say, these were mere errors. These were mistakes. This isn't actually fraud. They're just misclassifying it as residential when they said it was commercial. He didn't mean to say it was 30,000 square feet. The ignorance defense. Look, Your Honor, they were just a couple of whoopsie daisies. It wasn't fraud. It was just a few whoopsies, and then that was it. I insert that into the record. It's the craziest argument on the planet. And the fact

that they're doing it, I like also that even like this whole entire case is predicated on Donald Trump falsely valuing his properties and inflating the value of his properties. And every time he comes out, he comes up with a new valuation for his properties to the camera. And even in that swing, like that's a pretty large swing to say it's worth 50 to 100 times that. You just said a range of between $900 million and $1.8 billion on Mar-a-Lago. Like it's quite, I understand like 25 to 30 bucks. Like that's a range. $900 million to $1.8 billion, both of which are ridiculous numbers. Ben, expert witnesses, in your experience, do they get paid up front? So is he seeing that $500,000 as part of in your experience, or is it he's got to wait and Donald Trump has to be okay with the testimony that he gives? Usually the expert witness will be paid up front before their testimony or the bulk of the payments will have been made because you don't want an expert to basically show up and then testify.

Usually it's not convincing if they go, I haven't been paid yet, or I expect to get paid. Usually you do have them say, I've been paid. Here's the amount of money. And I think he's been paid. I think at his deposition, it was $515,000. So by now it could even be more than 550550,000. It could be $600,000. And he ultimately is not addressing what the case is ultimately about, how Donald Trump was

keeping separate sets of books and misclassifying his properties to get tax breaks and beneficial loans and beneficial insurance policies when it suited him. And he would run this fraud over and over again. That's why there is undisputed evidence. Because even if you look at Trump's own documents, you see the separate sets of books that were being kept. And then we go from New York to Washington, D.C., let's talk about the Donald Trump motion to try to stay the entire case in Washington, D.C. And Donald Trump basically said he's just going to go by his own understanding of what he thinks the law is. So first, Donald Trump filed a notice of appeal earlier in the day, and he said

that defendant Donald Trump provides notice that he appeals to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit from the memorandum opinion and order of the district court, that's Judge Tanya Chutkan, dated December 1, 2023, where she denied his motion to dismiss the indictment on presidential immunity grounds. And she said that in a criminal case, former presidents are not kings. Presidents are not kings. You don't have absolute immunity in criminal cases. Period, full stop. The structure, the text, the history of the Constitution is a response to monarchs and abusive kings who abused

power. It would make no sense that the Constitution would allow absolute immunity for presidents and former presidents to act as kings. So that was Judge Chutkin's order. Remember, on the same day Judge Chutkin issued that order, the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals in a case called Blassingame v. Trump ruled that in a civil case involving Donald Trump being sued for his injuries caused to D.C. police officers and members of Congress during the insurrection, that Donald Trump did not have absolute presidential immunity in civil cases, finding that his conduct constituted significant, significant election activity and not anything else. It was not presidential activity. It was all his conduct relating to the election and therefore it was

not Article II power. So here's what Donald Trump filed right here. Trump's opposed motion to stay proceedings pending appeal. And Donald Trump is basically saying shut down the criminal case in Washington, D.C. set for trial on March 4th, 2024, involving Trump's attempt to overthrow the results of the 2020 election. And Donald Trump says that all proceedings, including but not limited to pretrial motions, defense disclosures relating to trial defenses and evidence, SEPA hearings, and jury selection should all be shut down until the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals makes its ruling on the issue of absolute presidential immunity on the appeal from Judge Tanya Chutkin's order from December 1st.

And get this, though, in support of that, what case, Britton Jordy, do you think he cites to support the stay of the D.C. proceedings? The blasting game versus Trump case where the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals just ruled that he does not have presidential immunity. So he's citing a case that says he does not have presidential immunity to stay a district court's order saying he does not have presidential immunity. It is really the level of audacity. He cites one other case as well, a case called Coinbase versus Bielski. And that case deals with arbitration provisions and a decision denying arbitrability and staying a district court case where there's arbitration provisions.

But obviously, the issue of presidential immunity is not arbitration provisions. But that's what Donald Trump is citing there. And here's what Donald Trump says. He goes, Trump will proceed based on that understanding and the authorities set forth herein absent further court order. In other words, Trump's saying he's not going to participate in the case. He's not going to fulfill the deadlines and obligations based on his citation to the Glassengame case, which says he doesn't have immunity and that that's how he wants to stay

the case. And so Judge Chutkin just issued a minute order before we went live. And in the minute order, she set a briefing schedule and required papers to be filed right there by Jack Smith's team on December 10th, 2023. And Trump shall file any reply on his own end by December 12th of 2023. So an expedited schedule there that will all be briefed in the next five days. And so we will take a look at that briefing, but pretty wild to see those arguments being made like that. It's insane. And Ben, like you said, Brett, Brett Jordy, guess what case it is.

Blassing game. V. Trump was right on the tip of both of me and Jordy's tongue. You didn't let us answer, but we give us a chance to answer. I was going to show us about the shorty. And I, Jordy and I were like, blasting game versus Trump. We were, we were both texting each other. Yeah.

I know. I mean, I think everybody knew he was citing Blattson game there. The actual case that undercuts his argument saying that he does not have presidential immunity. He claims that case gives him the authority to unilaterally stay a district court case, denying his claim for presidential immunity. And then he goes so Trumpian, though. I mean, he's the guy who he could declassify documents with his brain. He could stay his own court cases with his mind.

It follows this just Trumpian idea where like, going back to what his lawyer said in that Colorado court, we're just making it up. We're just making it up as we go. And that's what you saw there in that filing. And so this order though, by judge Chuck, and you know, this is now the order, right? He said, absent further orders by the judge. So this is the order he's going to have to respond to this order. He can't just be like, nope. I, with my mind said that I was staying this case and not responding. So this has to proceed. Now it's a pretty tight deadline. Judge Chutkin seems like she wants to get to that court date come hell or high water, and she is not playing any games with all of Donald Trump's ludicrous attempts to

delay this thing. So I think it's important that we have somebody like Judge Chutkin, who's a real law and order judge on this case, who really understands the stakes of this moment. One of the things he tried to do with Judge Chutkin is do the same thing he's doing now with Judge Cannon, demanding that his lawyers enter the SEPA section for hearing. And that's a hearing where the government says that it wants to withhold certain highly classified documents. And they're so top secret that for purposes of national security, you hold what's called an ex parte in-camera hearing with the court where the defendant or the defense counsel are both not present. And the judge looks at the classified documents and says whether or not they have to be turned over

pursuant to a SEPA protective order or whether they can be withheld and that you could substitute some sort of summary or description of the document in its place. And Donald Trump's lawyers previously argued to Judge Chutkan, they wanted to be involved in SEPA Section 4. And Judge Chutkan was like, what? That doesn't make any sense. The whole purpose is so the judge can make the determination if these documents are truly

so top secret that the defendant or the defense lawyers can't see these documents at all. So if you were at the hearing, you would be seeing the documents. So it would defeat the entire purpose of what SEPA section four is all about. So Donald Trump was rejected there. He's now has made the same request to Judge Eileen Cannon. Now, this is really the first time Judge Eileen Cannon's hand has been forced now by Donald Trump. She's been issuing all of these paperless orders that basically continue everything and move dates around and make a mess out of the docket without actually making an order. She hasn't issued an order that is appealable by special counsel Jack Smith. She's refused to even set the key SEPA deadline, which is the SEPA section five deadline where a defendant says, these are the types of classified documents we want to introduce at trial. In a case involving classified documents, in the Southern District of Florida case involves the Mar-a-Lago classified documents, of course you have to set a SEPA Section 5 deadline. It's like the most basic deadline other than the trial date, and Judge Canons refused to set that.

And she's doing it on purpose to kind of manipulate the dates and create all this confusion to cause delay for Donald Trump. But now she's going to have to rule about this SEPA Section 4 intervention that Donald Trump is seeking. I predict she'll make the wrong ruling, like she always does, the same way she previously tried to assert equitable jurisdiction back with the search warrant executed at Mar-a-Lago in 2022, and she was overturned twice by the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals. So this could actually be good news that Donald Trump is kind of overplaying his hand here, because I expect Judge Cannon to try to help him out. And then that will result in an appeal by

Special Counsel Jack Smith. So we will see about that. But a lot of law updates right there from New York to Washington, D.C. Crisscrossing the nation. Oh, my goodness. I have a question about the appeal with Judge Cannon. So, you know, say she does the wrong thing like you believe that she may in your prediction. When Jack Smith goes to appeal a decision like that, is he specifically appealing that specific decision? Or does he have an option to kind of appeal the fact that she's just in case at all? Just that decision, but he's going to bring

up her other conduct. And this way the 11th circuit will see that. And I think he won't say it like in a scathing way. I think he'll say there've been many problematic SIPA issues, this being the most glaring and the only one that is appealable. But for example, she hasn't set the SEPA Section 5 deadline, and she hasn't done other things that you would normally expect, hoping that the 11th Circuit responds. And even if they're not addressing those orders because they're not on appeal, basically saying in what's called dicta, which is non-binding

but persuasive, what they ultimately want to get done. And then Jack Smith can say, look, you're not following what the 11th Circuit is saying. And then Jack Smith may be able to tee up eventually trying to get her to be removed. It's tough to remove federal judges, but there is precedent in the 11th Circuit where there was a federal judge who was reversed three times. It's like strike three. The judge was removed from the case. So I don't know if Judge Cannon's two reversals back in 2022 count or if you're going to have to add additional appeals here. But ultimately, the 11th Circuit's going to overturn her conduct. It's just a matter of

time for that to happen. And I do want to mention this, the Nevada electors, they've been indicted. And that, you know, there hasn't been a lot of discussion there about that. I want to talk about that. That'll be the last court update. And then I want to talk about, I want to talk about kind of what's going on in the world of normalcy, what president Biden is up to. I want to talk about that and more. Let's take our last quick break of the show. And now let's take a quick break to talk about our next partner, Roan. If you're like me, you understand the pains of finding out what to wear. Let's face it. Most clothes are uncomfortable or too tight, or never actually the size that you really are.

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the best boxers i've ever worn get 20 off and free shipping with the code midas at manscape.com that's 20 off with free shipping at manscape.com and use code midas manscaped get your family jewels ready for the holidays we are back live jordy with those and reads hey man I absolutely love her own huge fan of Manscaped like I said earlier great discount codes for you guys it's in the description of the YouTube it's in the description of the audio just click use the codes helps you helps the show let's do it Brett gotta love it I'm in Nevada and what's going on with Kevin McCarthy from Killing County by the way Colin Kaepernick warned everyone. Again, I did that documentary with Colin Kaepernick on Kevin McCarthy's district

called Killing County. I don't know, maybe listen to Colin Kaepernick about those things. Well, you know, there's a theme, we'll get to it, but there's a theme with Kevin McCarthy where he stays silent in the face of bad acts. That is a theme of Kevin McCarthy, and he actively aids and abets those bad acts. But let's first start with Nevada. Nevada Republicans, man, they are in big, big, big trouble, six Nevada Republicans. And these are people who are deeply embedded in the Republican Party. It includes the state party chair. They've been indicted for participating in the fake elector scheme during the 2020 election to try to overturn the election results in Nevada. I mean, we're talking state party chair, Michael McDonald, national committee, man, Jim DeGraff and Reed

Clark County, Republican County, Republican party chair, Jesse law and others in the state party vice chair. These are not just like random Republicans. These are like leaders of the Republican party in Nevada hit with a crushing indictment. The six officials were indicted on two felony charges, one for offering a false instrument for filing. And the second for uttering a forged instrument. The first is a class C felony punishable by up to five years in prison. And the second is punishable by up to four years in Nevada prison. And the charges also carry a mandatory minimum sentence of one year in state prison. Now, I found that there was something interesting about the timing here. If you

remember in one of the hot takes that either Ben did or Popak did, we were discussing that Judge McAfee in Georgia let Ken Chesebro go. They made an exception for him to leave the state in order to travel to Nevada in order to meet with the grand jury over there. So when we heard that was happening, we kind of realized, oh, these fake elector prosecutions are really, really, really heating up throughout the country. And so it's no surprise that just a mere, what was it, Ben, a day later, like right after the weekend, Ken Chesebro shows up, he talks to the grand jury, and what happens right after that happens? Indictments drop. Boom. So now what I want you to focus on as we head into the end of the week is on Monday, Ken Chesbrough is scheduled to travel to Arizona and he's going to meet in Arizona with the

investigators from the Attorney General Chris Mays' office to then probably speak to the grand jury in Arizona as part of their fake elector investigation. So judging by what we just witnessed in Nevada, I want you to keep your eyes on Arizona because there's very likely that we're going to see indictments similar to Nevada out of Arizona next week. So keep your eyes on Arizona. If it's anything like what we just witnessed in Nevada, we are going to see that happen there. Mark my words. Now, we got to talk about Kevin McCarthy. Got to talk about McCarthy. McCarthy, it feels like ages ago that McCarthy decided to end of this year, the end of this year. Let me play you now just a bit of his announcement video. It's so Kevin McCarthy, and I don't mean

anything good by that, but here's Kevin McCarthy, the video that he ended up posting on social media, a part of it. 17 years ago, I was elected to a seat in Congress that I couldn't get an internship for. Today, I sit here having served as your whip leader and as a 55th speaker of the house. As the son of a firefighter from Bakersfield, my story is the story of America. For me, every moment came with a great deal of devotion and responsibility. Giving my best to all of you has been my greatest honor. I'm proud of what we have accomplished. What did you accomplish? What did you accomplish? What are you proud of? You were in the, you were the Speaker of the House for what? 12 months? It took you 15

rounds to get there. You were the weakest speaker in history. Does he even buy his own bullshit? He comes off as just the phoniest, weakest individual on the planet to me. And let's not forget what Kevin McCarthy said. This is like a month or two months ago when they were in the heat of the Kevin McCarthy drama. And Kevin McCarthy made it clear, no matter what happens, I never quit. Spoiler alert, he did quit. But it's fun to watch this clip from the past. Your question is, just give up and quit. I'm the wrong guy to ask that question to. I never quit. I'm not working for some member sitting in my office. I'm working for this country and I'm never going to give up on the American people. I'm going to work every day.

And you know what? If I come up short today, I'm going to work harder tomorrow. That's what I do. Okay. Well, he, well, he, he quit and he's not working harder and he'll sail off into the sunset and probably get some private gigs somewhere and make a lot of money and become a contributor on Fox or whatever Kevin McCarthy is going to do. But I could talk all the crap about Kevin McCarthy that I want, and I could do this for hours and hours and hours, but perhaps there's nobody who is closer to Kevin McCarthy who knows him as well as Liz Cheney, who had to deal with him on January 6th and throughout all this time. Liz Cheney was on the Bulwark podcast, and she was asked about her thoughts on Kevin McCarthy. And she was absolutely brutal. I'm

going to play you a snippet of that interview, Randy. Just give me your Kevin McCarthy take. Well, I think that he's a pathetic figure in many ways in our history, but I also think it's important not to minimize the damage that he did because even though he's somebody who didn't seem to have strong ideological beliefs, he was leading the Republicans in the House. And at each moment when his determination to do the right thing could have made a difference, he determined instead to do the wrong thing. And so I talk in the book, for example, about the whole process of objecting to electoral votes. And we'd obviously gone through a huge debate internally about it. But once the violence happened, you know, I obviously made clear that I believed it was unconstitutional to object.

And I certainly assumed that in the hours after the attack on the Capitol, there would not be a continuation of the objections. And in fact, that's what Kevin told me. He was not going to continue the objections, but then he did. And it's just an example where there are these moments where, because he was the leader, had he done the right thing, he could have taken a lot of people with him. And instead, he sort of led the conference again and again and again down this path where it ended up with Donald Trump maintaining a real grip on a conference that was dependent on him, particularly for campaign money.

I mean, just a brutal assessment of Kevin McCarthy's career, if you want to call it that. And Brett, Kevin McCarthy could have had so much actual power. That is the ultimate sad irony of this, which was after the insurrection, he could have asserted himself as a real leader. He could have confronted Donald Trump. He could have rallied a Republican caucus against that. And then he could have actually governed. I think the American people would have rewarded that conduct in those 2022 midterms when people are predicting a red wave is going to happen. That wouldn't normally have happened anyway, but because of their support for Donald Trump, that's what actually led to there not being a red wave because of their taking away women's reproductive rights and all of the really, really dangerous, fascistic, taking away people's

freedom stuff that they did. But the ultimate irony is then even again, he could have had power if he cut a deal with Democrats in the House as Donald Trump was mocking him behind his back. Kevin McCarthy could have rallied those 100 or 105 Republicans, formed some sort of coalition with Democrats, actually got done real border issues. And like things could have happened and he could have been back in history as like, yeah. And by the way, I would have been for like, I obviously would prefer Speaker Jeffries than Speaker McCarthy, but by far, but look, the border does need to be fixed. But the Democrats have offered productive solutions to that. The Democrats are the ones who have offered comprehensive immigration reform.

The MAGA Republicans want to go there and roll up their sleeves and do this performative BS while actually making the situation worse, just so that they could yell at the Democrats and have a talking point. But there was an opportunity for him to actually do things that were productive, where we could compromise and come up with solutions to problems. And he did. What was the one thing he did in the debt ceiling? Got student loan payments resumed. That was great work, Kevin McCarthy. You got student loan payments resumed in order to raise the debt ceiling. It wasn't even an opportunity missed by Kevin McCarthy. It was an opportunity squandered,

especially if the guy had no long-term political aspirations as far as maintaining his seat in Congress or whatnot, because he had the time then. He didn't have to worry about re-election if this was going to be the ultimate goal of what happens to him if he can't handle the crazies in his own party, which was inevitable. Just stand up and have a backbone. And if you don't care to be in that seat, as long as, I don't know, others may want to be in that seat for, then you could at least use your time and your power to be advantageous to the country. Do something. Here's what it comes down to. Here's how Kevin McCarthy determines success. Once you realize

what he thinks about as success, I think it becomes a little clearer. Liz Cheney, both in that interview and in other interviews I've heard her say that it came down to money. And it really shows you how horrifically that money pollutes our politics. After January 6th happened, nobody wanted to donate to Republicans anymore. Their funds had completely dried up. But whose funds didn't dry up? Donald Trump and his rabid supporters. They continued to give money to Donald

Trump. And Donald Trump had also amassed these lists with millions and millions and millions of email addresses and phone numbers that Kevin McCarthy could use in order to fundraise. And that's really the crux of why he did it all. He didn't do it because he doesn't view success as let's try to pass as many bills to help the American people. That's not what it was even on his mind. He always viewed himself as I'm the guy who brings money in for this party. And by the way, that's what other people viewed him as also. When the people were upset that Kevin McCarthy was given the boot from the speakership. I didn't hear any of the people defending him say things like, and he was doing so many great things for the American people. I heard things like, he was the best fundraiser for the party. How could they do this?

Because when it comes down to it, that is what so much of politics, and by the way, on both sides, that's what so much of politics is about. But when you have this egomaniac, mega maniacal dictator guy who is controlling you and controls all the purse strings, then it becomes incredibly dangerous. And Kevin McCarthy quite literally sold his soul. And when you look at the comments on the videos that Kevin McCarthy posted, they're not very pretty. It's not a good legacy. And from all sides, you have the Democrats hating on him and you have the Republicans hating on him to the point where I'm like, at the end of the day, who did you please except maybe some big dollar donors? Right. What did you think you accomplished? Ben,

I know you wanted to talk about some breaking news here on the show. Breaking news before going over MAGA Republicans raging against Taylor Swift. A nine count indictment was just handed down against Hunter Biden. I want to read it to be deliberative about what the charges are, but it is a nine-count indictment for failure to pay taxes, 2016, 2017, 2018, and 2019. Reading the complaint, the indictment that was handed down in Los Angeles federal court, it was assigned to a Trump appointee, really goes into Hunter Biden's lifestyle from when he was a drug addict. It says between 2016 and October 15th, 2020, the defendant Hunter Biden spent his money on drugs, escorts and girlfriends, luxury hotels and rental properties, exotic cars,

clothing and other items of a personal nature. In short, everything but his taxes. He paid back his taxes in 2021. Many people are commenting, for example, Roger Stone failed to pay $2 million in taxes, no indictment. Rudy Giuliani currently owes $500,000 in back taxes and is also an addict that lives an extravagant lifestyle. Whereas his indictment, Hunter ended up paying what he is owed. But look, at the end of the day, you got to pay your taxes and you're not going to hear me here on the Midas Touch Network defending misconduct. I want to read the overall allegations here. Hunter Biden didn't have a position in the government. He wasn't like Jared Kushner, who worked in the Oval Office and then got $2 billion from the Saudi sovereign wealth fund and

made $620 million while he held a position that he couldn't get a security clearance for. So I don't want to bite the bait that media wants you to do or legacy media and spend a huge amount of time on it. But I do want to make clear that our position here at the Midas Touch is that crimes need to be prosecuted. If you are law and order, you are not selectively law and order. It doesn't mean I'm going to spend the time of this platform railing against somebody who was a drug addict going through a difficult time who paid back his taxes. But nonetheless, if you're for law and order and there is evidence to prove a crime, that is something that goes before a jury. It should be noted, though, that there appear to have been a resolution that was reached with

Hunter Biden back in Delaware, where the judge ultimately rejected it after a pressure campaign from MAGA. And then you see all of these allegations. And if you're dealing with a case, though, that's just failure to pay taxes, to see kind of a speaking indictment really talk about the horrible things that somebody did, the morally kind of horrible and perturbing things that somebody did, the morally kind of horrible and perturbing things that someone did when they were a drug addict is certainly intended for an audience. But that doesn't mean that I'm going to look at that and be like, yeah, I'm okay with that. Like I'm cool with that. Witch hunt, maybe the FBI planted the document. No, not at all.

If you're for law and order, you're for law and order. However, save me the selective outrage when it comes to somebody like Hunter, when we see that what Jared Kushner is doing, Ivanka is doing, people who are actually in office as well. So I thought it was important to address that on this show. Again, it's literally just breaking as we're doing this show, but I want people to know where we stand on this. You mean you didn't read all the pages while you were actually talking on this podcast? I mean, come on, Ben, step up your game. Now, very odd of Joe Biden to weaponize the Justice Department against his own son. Anytime stuff like this happens, it's like, you know, it also like sticks a dagger into

the complete arguments of the Republican party about all their utter BS. Like just if they're crimes, prosecute the crimes. This feels like selective, this feels a little bit like selective prosecution to me for these crimes when you look at some other people, but you know, they are, it's a damning piece for the information. I just want to be clear though, the MAGA Republicans want to defund the IRS and there are charges here relating to- Maybe after this, they won't. Maybe they're like, more money, IRS. Fund the FBI actually. Fund the IRS. More money. And then the other charges against him are gun charges. So you have IRS charges and gun charges.

Gun charges in Delaware when he purchased a gun. If Hunter were a Republican, he would be a legend. A legend. A legend. I see some people saying, under this standard, a lot of Americans are going to be indicted if we're talking about the kind of morality police. And look, the bottom line is he paid it back in 2021. And this indictment could have been a simple indictment, failure to pay taxes in this year, but they really

went deep into his addiction. They're trying to embarrass him. They're trying to. They're absolutely trying to. They're absolutely trying to embarrass him. But look, I don't want to ignore that breaking news here. And again, when you're for law and order, you cover it all. Even if you believe it to be selective prosecution, you cover it all. You don't say like the MAGA Republicans that, oh, I think the FBI planted it. I think the FBI planted it. No, you're for law and order. Justice should be served. Everybody, of course, even Donald Trump is entitled to their day in court, which Donald Trump wants to desperately avoid. But I thought it was important we addressed it.

Brett, tell me about MAGA Republicans raging against Taylor Swift. And by the way, I want to make it clear here. I'm not voting for Hunter Biden for president. I'm saying it now. I'm saying it now. Okay. So MAGA is in a tizzy, as the kids say. No kids say that. About Taylor Swift. Taylor Swift was named Time Magazine's Person of the Year yesterday. I'm sure a lot of you have heard. Here's the cover photo right here for those watching. I think Taylor Swift probably deserves this. I mean, she was everywhere this year, had an incredibly successful year. I think she built up a business empire and made more money than many actually countries' economies. She caused earthquakes with her crowds. But never let MAGA take something that's kind of normal in a normal way. Everything is a conspiracy.

Everything is a psyop. Everything is something. There's got to be something behind this. So MAGA just started going nuts as this. And I, I was telling Jordy earlier, I said, these are some of my favorite stories because it just, it shows you the brain worms of these MAGA people and how they are just so disconnected from reality. And I'm just going to show you some comments from MAGA Republicans. Now you think like, how is this even like a political issue from MAGA Republicans. Now you think like, how is this even like a political issue? From MAGA Republicans about Taylor Swift being on the cover of Time Magazine's person of the year. We've compiled them. Jordy compiled them. Jordy made these graphics. Great job, Jordy. Great job.

And these are like MAGA influencers. And they're people who like Donald Trump might even have like in his next administration or in his administration before. So you got Stephen Miller, big brain Stephen Miller over here. He says what's happening with Taylor Swift is not organic. Okay. You got Laurel Loomer, a, uh, an, uh, you know, a white nationalist, a big Trumper, somebody who Trump praises at his rallies, uh, denying reality, denying reality entirely that Taylor Swift was named person of the year and says in all caps, Donald Trump is the person of the year. Brain worms, man. Brain worms. You got this verified MAGA influencer. I know here, here it comes guys. The sort, you knew it was going to Soros, right? Soros bought up all of Taylor Swift's music rights. And now she's out here all like, I love Joe Biden.

Cheap hussy. Okay. Fixed it, somebody said, and put Donald Trump on the Time magazine cover of the year. Johnny Maga, this is a big MAGA influencer. Johnny Maga says, this isn't a joke. Taylor Swift is dangerous, is what this person said, because Taylor Swift helped drive some voter registrations. You have Dave Official, this MAGA influencer. Taylor Swift was named Time Person of the Year after she started dating Pfizer's spokesperson in the most comically scripted relationship we've seen in years.

There's no doubt in my mind Swift is compromised by powerful forces. We need to wake up the next generation to the occult forces from colluding with their favorite celebrities. Keep red pilling, Anons. This is like some weird, weird, weird stuff. I'll go through a couple more. I don't know how many more of these I can read. But there will be conservatives who applaud Taylor Swift Time mag awards, sigh up of the year 2024. And then later they'll wonder how they lost the country. They're only making Taylor Swift time person of the year to help Joe Biden

get elected. I mean, like there's countless, this was all over Geordie. This is all the day or, you know, because she asked people to register to vote. Yeah.

She didn't even say like vote for this person or vote. She said, register to vote. She didn't even say like, vote for this person or vote. She said, register to vote. And that's a triggering thing to MAGA Republicans, number one. Number two, that a sliver of her audience is the biggest crowd size Donald Trump could ever possibly draw. Like just one small slice of one small section is basically the biggest of Trump crowds. I mean, she has a real crowd. So her crowds intimidate MAGA. The fact that she told people to register vote intimidates MAGA. They're really triggered by the Time magazine. That triggers MAGA because they think their cult leader deserves. And they're very jealous of Kelsey, her boyfriend, like, like all these fake MAGA alpha people who go, I'm an alpha. Like when they actually see somebody who is, and who is compassionate and who is like a decent

human being who also plays a sport like football that, and the fact that he was their worst nightmare enforcement for Pfizer oh my god we've got someone who looks like that who is who is actually like compassionate and loving we're used to all of these like right-wing evil people like who are misogynistic like you're doing the opposite you know and and so all of that combined is why they like despise. It's so weird. It's got to be so just exhausting every day to be like one of these right wing influencers or someone with real influence, like a Steve, like Stephen Miller to, to, theme of this episode, fascism and dictatorship relies on exhausting the rest of us. The rest of us don't live in that world. Like right now, you know what I'm thinking about? Like I just texted my fiance. I'm like, I really want an egg burrito. And I know it's late at night, but I want to spoil myself. That sounds good. You deserve it.

You deserve it. It's only 633 by you. You're good. But the broader point is like, look, I just want to watch a movie sometimes. Like we just want to spend time with our family. One of my favorite things, Ben, is like when though this weirdo world of these MAGA people, like when, when it gets, when it confronts with normal people, like I, I unfortunately know too many of these names and the things like the people, like I, like I regret, regretfully so,

but I enjoy watching like TikToks of like, just run of the mill, like just diehard Taylor Swift fans, right? Who are confronted, like there are some videos where they're confronted with people like Charlie Kirk and like, you know, all these weirdos who make comments and they're like, what the fuck is that? Who are you? Who are you? Like, they don't know who they are, but those people think that they're superstars. You's why Taylor Swift's celebrity truly shocks them to their core in every single way. And they go, Soros, Pfizer, vaccine. It's just like they don't know what to do. So they short circuit and they throw out every conspiracy theory possible other than- But you can be, and the thing though, is it is exhausting though. So

when they exhaust you, some people react by tapping out, they want to kind of suck away the joy of people. And then eventually people are like, you know what? Everything's this is the problem. People like everything seems crazy. They're all crazy. Everything's crazy. I just need to be, I just need to be, I just need to be left alone and just whatever, just, just leave me alone. And then that's kind of what they want, you know, and it's kind of like a zombie apocalypse in a way, just because it's a relentless stream of maga madness where finally something's like, I give up. It's fine. Okay. But the problem is, is that they don't stop there and they keep on going, taking away your freedoms one by one.

And we just have to recognize what's happening in this moment. And that's why we talk a lot about just like love. We talk about compassion. We talk about, it's okay that you make mistakes. People make mistakes, but we could be forgiving to some people. We could be forgiving to people. It's okay. Mistakes could be made. We want to be loving, compassionate, respectful of people. Just those messages are not talked about. It's always like anger and resentment and hatred spewed over and

over again. And we show you these contrasts and Brett, you're going to talk about like actual things that president Biden is doing right now. Cause I don't want you to forget that, that there is intelligence out there. Sure, is President Biden an elder statesman? Yeah, but to me, that's a good quality, someone who's thoughtful and delivered. I don't want maniacs waving their hands and doing all of that. I just want someone who's steady and is able and who's competent, but I don't want our community here to ever lose sight of the importance of just like community and love. And this is why I love the Midas Mighty community and being a part of it. Just like call someone in your family or tell a friend that you appreciate them and you respect them and that you care about them.

And we need to spread more of that right now. Ultimately, love prevails. It's just there's so much negativity out there over and over and over again, to your point, Jordi, where it can get overwhelming. But be there for each other. I think that's so important. Tell us about now President Biden, some announcements he's made, some speeches he's given over the past 24, 48 hours.

You know, President Biden's been doing normal president stuff, trying to help out the people in the nation, trying to help out our allies abroad. And, you know, there's this big fight right now on Capitol Hill over Ukraine funding. And the Republicans have really been, you know, they don't want to fund Ukraine. And so there was a bill that kind of died in the Senate on Wednesday night. You know, they're still trying to do negotiations. They're trying to pair it with border funding, which, you know, fine. President Biden said, you know, he's absolutely open to that, you know, but these Republicans really, they don't like to negotiate in good faith and they like to wait till the last second. The problem is in this sort of scenario, every single day matters when you have a country like Ukraine that is battling a country like Russia from an invasion.

I mean, this is a serious, serious thing that we cannot play political games with. And so President Biden gave a speech and he said to the Republicans, he said, we cannot let Putin win. Stop giving Putin a win here and pass this funding. Look, I know we have our divisions at home. Let's get past them. This is critical. Petty, partisan, angry politics can't get in the way of our responsibility as a leading nation in the world. The entire world is watching. The entire world is watching. What will the United States do?

And think if we don't support Ukraine. What's the rest of the world going to do? What's Japan going to do do which is supporting Ukraine now? What's going to happen in terms of the G7? What's going to happen in terms of our NATO allies? What are they going to do? If we walk away now, it'll only embolden other would-be aggressors. So I'm calling on Congress to do something and do the right thing, to stand with the people of Ukraine, stand against the tyranny of Putin, stand for freedom, literally stand for freedom. Let's get this done. And you see it in like Republican state TV and stuff. They are out there

praising the Republicans for not passing aid for Ukraine. President Biden went on to say, quote, frankly, I think it's stunning that we've gotten to this point in the first place. Republicans in Congress are willing to give Putin the greatest gift he could hope for and abandon our global leadership. And we see Republicans just at every single corner and every single day do things to the detriment of our national security. And finally, finally, finally, finally, after 10 months of his complete and utter reckless disregard for our military readiness, Tommy Tuberville finally said, okay, I'll give up. All right, I'll let the military holds go. And they were voted through by unanimous consent. He decided he had to keep like 10 or 11 four-star nominees held behind and have them held for roll call votes. And then he goes,

let's just chalk it up as a draw, you know, which draw we tied. Not like there were serious people's lives on the line here, people's livelihoods on the line here. You put our troops at risk and you had one person, even in the military, a general, even get a heart attack because they were working multiple jobs because of you. It should have never have gotten to that point. But now shifting back into normal world, student debt relief update on Wednesday, the Biden-Harris administration approved another $4.8 billion in student debt relief for 80,300 people.

One of the cool things was when we posted this story, we got some feedback from a few people kind of quickly that they were saying they were in this group of people whose student loans are forgiven. So remember, like we went to the factory the other day in Pueblo, Colorado, it's one thing to read the headline. It's another to actually meet people who are living the results of those headlines. And so I thought it'd be cool to just show some of these stories that people commented to us here quickly. This is from Jamie on X. I was one of those recipients today. It's a miracle in my mind. Great president. This is Mace Dark Jedi AF. My wife and I got a letter informing me that their student loan debt has been dissolved, all gone, thanks to President Joe Biden. Those payments are now being used so we could afford healthcare. We're both approaching 60 years old. I also wish we lived in a country where you didn't have to

worry about your healthcare payments also, but that is for another discussion. But you see how these are truly impacting people's lives in a positive way. And like Ben said before, what these Republicans want you to do is they want you to go, there's chaos on every side. These people can't get anything done. Look, President Biden, he promised student debt relief and look, he didn't deliver. But you got to look at the facts. I mean, in total, the administration has canceled $132 billion in student debt relief, affecting over 3.6 million Americans. They did this via fixes to the public service loan forgiveness and income-driven repayment plans. And if you remember, President Biden put forth a plan to forgive loans for everybody.

And what happened? The Republicans blocked it, and Republicans around the country sued to stop it. So don't give me that, oh, it's both sides and he's reneging on his promises and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. No, there's people who are trying to get the work done. And you have President Biden here trying to work every single mechanism possible to get this done legally because he wants to follow the law. Meanwhile, you have Republicans trying to block this in mass. Then you also have President Biden trying to deal with drug prices. He announced a massive plan to end the big pharma price gouging by allowing the government to license drugs to new manufacturers if they aren't being sold at a reasonable price. So what they're doing is they're saying that they, as the government, can seize patents of taxpayer-funded drugs if the companies that are selling them, if the manufacturers, are price-gouging consumers. They want to create more competition. They want to

lower drug prices. They don't want these big pharma companies to take advantage of the American taxpayer. Here was President Biden's statement on this. He says, folks, right now, 25 of the American taxpayer. Here was President Biden's statement on this. He says, folks, right now, 25 of the largest pharmaceutical companies in America control 70% of the market. The lack of competition drives up prices, making it harder for hardworking Americans to access the healthcare they need. Today, my administration is doing something about it. Let me explain. Hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars are spent on research, discovery, and development of new prescription drugs. And while I firmly believe that the strength of a nation can be measured by the boldness of its science, the quality of its research, and the progress it helps bring forth,

I also believe that the folks who paid for the research, you, ought to be able to access and afford the final product. That's why my administration is proposing that if a drug made using taxpayer funds is not reasonably available to Americans, the government reserves the right to, quote, march in and license that drug to another manufacturer who could sell it for less. This is an important step towards ending big pharma price gouging. It's good for competition, it's good for the economy, and it's good for the millions of Americans who can't afford their medications. We all know too well that fine line between dignity and dependence for the price of prescription drug can draw.

So don't you dare tell me what we talked about earlier in this episode and throughout this episode that both parties are the same. I think we are seeing here the differences between democracy and dictatorship, the differences between serious people who really want to get things done for people and people who are just trying to get their next fundraising dollar, people who are just trying to hold on to power at any cost, even if that means following a demagogue to destroy the United States Constitution. The stakes have never been

higher. We are going to continue to call them out here on the Midas Touch Network. And I hope we did a good job with that today, Ben. You know, and I want to say this, and I'm not going to show the clips because I think we end on a high note right there of that News Nation disastrous MAGA Republican debate, other than Chris Christie, all MAGA Republicans. And you think about NewsNation, which is hosting that debate for the Republican Party, and you just look on all of the digital numbers, the community that you have all created here with the Midas Touch Network, I mean, vastly exceeds NewsNation, which is hosting that debate. And I want to say

that because for those thinking about, is the pro-democracy community growing? More people are now watching the Midas Touch network on digital where everything's moving to than Fox, than CNN. That's a testament to you because this is more than a network. This is a community. And I think where we think about where the silent majority really is, as I mentioned, the silent majority is pro-democracy. The silent majority just wants to spend some time with friends or family and just have a cup of coffee, watch a good TV show, read a good book, do some hobbies, and go about things without the kind of MAGA Republican, anti-Taylor, swift, rah, talking about gas stoves and just all of that chaos.

2024, what we're talking about now, as I mentioned, is about democracy over dictatorship. It's also about normalcy over chaos. Sharing with you these clips of how leaders of the various parties act, how the people who are the main influencers of the various parties are acting, what their focus is on, I just think is very, very, very important. And I think it's important that we all continue to share this channel, share the videos, share positivity and compassion and love. Let's let people around us know that we are, how much we all care about you and how we wake up each day so motivated knowing the work that you all put in each and every day. And it's incredible to be able to do these shows with you, not at you. We're all in this together, and this fight for our democracy is so, so important. Thank you all for watching. I want to remind everybody that our Patreon Zoom meeting will take place December 12th at 8 a.m. Pacific, 11 Eastern in the morning.

I'm really excited to meet everybody. So if you want to meet us in that Zoom chat, please make sure you're a member of our Patreon. We don't have outside investors here at the Midas Touch Network. So the way we grow this is through our pro-democracy sponsors. And I really appreciate those pro-democracy sponsors. And I know sometimes seeing a lot of ads could add a little bit more time to these things, but it's helpful to have those pro-democracy sponsors and they have good discounts and it's helpful for us to grow. Also through the emojis, and I see everybody throwing

those emojis up and I love seeing those. And then separately through our Patreon. And that's how we grow this through the community organically. And I think you all see the way we've grown MidasTouch.com and some of the other aspects of this. It's Patreon.com slash MidasTouch. We're going to do an after show right now. Our after show content is exclusive podcasts that we do on Patreon. It's just a fun way to try to encourage

more people to join the Patreon so that we could help keep growing the resources of this network. So patreon.com slash MidasTouch. Also, asastouch.com. 100% union made, 100% made in the USA. That's store.midastouch.com. Check out all the great gear that we have there. Take a look at that. You got the dark Brandon shirts. You've got the Jack Smith shirts, a bunch of great stuff. The Midas Touch fade. It's some really great stuff. I'm woke and I vote. And again, 100% union made, 100% made in the USA. Rock that pro-democracy gear. Thank you everybody for watching. We'll see you next time on the Midas Touch podcast. Jordy, take it away. Shout out to the Midas Mighty! Hey!

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