Tomorrow - Episode 83: The Chris Geidner Clause

Episode Date: February 22, 2017

Amidst the ongoing apocalypse, beside the flaming wreckage of democracy and the ashes of the constitution, there has been a lot of people with no idea what they're talking about throwing around legal terms like "emoluments" and "tort." So to help get this nonsense back on track, this week Josh sits down with Chris Geidner, an award-winning legal editor at BuzzFeed and a former principal assistant attorney general in Ohio. Perhaps after an hour with Chris, we'll all know a bit more about what exactly may save this nation and planet – legally speaking. Or perhaps the world will explode before you finish... but then, what a way to go out. We present episode 83. Learn something today! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey and welcome to tomorrow on your host Josh with Polsky. Today on the podcast we really just talk about one thing which is how the fuck can we get Donald Trump impeached. But first, a word from our sponsor. USA is passionate about what they do ensuring the financial security of the military community and their families as an employer, USAAA creates conditions for employees to succeed. USAAA is hiring for customer service reps, designers, developers, insurance, banking, and more.

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He's a fascinating man. Well, I'm about to find out if he's fascinating. Actually, I'm of course talking about Chris Geidner. Chris, thank you for being here. So you must be very, very busy. Yeah, no, I mean, every morning, I get up and my now first task is to once I check to see if I have any text messages or direct messages or Slack messages is to check the president's Twitter account. Yeah. Yeah. And that's real. And it's not something I do for fun.

It's not something I do because I don't have anything else to do. It's because something legally significant might have happened an hour before I woke up on the president's Twitter account. And what is it? That's account. And what is it? That's absurd. No, it's, and what is like, for legally speaking, I mean, one of the things that I, I mean, early on,

I mean, after he won, I was like, okay, well, the Twitter stuff is gonna stop. And then he didn't during, you know, the transition period. And I thought, okay, well, this will be peeled back. And I started to kind of care less about what he said on Twitter, because like, you could see that like, what he was saying on Twitter wasn't necessarily, wasn't always related to what was actually happening

in the world. It was just sort of like him blowing off steam. But like, what is the, how do you think about that in your job? Like, how do you think about that in terms of like actual policy? Because clearly sometimes he's saying things that do have an impact and reflect and reflect a... Well, I mean, here's the difference between him tweeting something on January 18th and him

tweeting something on February 21st. He's the president. Like, like... Right. It's sort of a reverse of the whole, it's legal because I am the president. This is, it matters because he's the president. Like, him blowing off steam when he was like, the host of the apprentice was like, all of us on Twitter. Right. Right. Right. And him blowing off steam when he was the president-elect was like, ugh, well, that sort of awkward.

Yeah, but it's like, okay, he'll get out of this habit or like. But him tweeting and blowing off steam when his president is, oh, a lawyer is going to have to defend that in court. Right. Or, oh, the Secretary of State is going to have to make a call to the ambassador. Right. I mean, those are the best case scenarios. Right.

I mean, it is hard to understand, but I think the administration is starting to understand. With some of the pushback they got in court over the past few weeks, that these things that he has said, that everybody was like, well, he's just doing it because that's a convenient way to get votes or he's just doing that to blow off steam or take me literally, but not seriously or seriously, but not literally whatever that was. They're finding out that right. They're finding out that that courts don't like any of those answers because words are words and they're gonna they're gonna look at what those words are and so I mean if you assume the long game of four or eight years here like they're gonna have to get it under control in one way or another.

I mean, it just seems like, I mean, especially with the ruling in the case of this executive order, I mean, they're looking at statements he's making outside of the office of president, right? They're looking at his, how he is indicating he will be prior to the presidency and then saying well this can this is I mean actually I'd love to hear you're you're taking this like is the courts bit clearly said

I mean at least in my reading and my understanding yes this stuff is applicable the stuff that happened before your president the stuff that you said outside of like your job as president You know it seems to me like there are so many ways Where he is crossing a line. Like, but is this, does it really matter? Will it really matter? I mean, that is sort of unresolved and that there are some people who have questioned that part of, I mean, so we've, this refugee and travel ban with the travel ban for the seven majority Muslim countries, and it goes to court and they, the people who have challenged it have put in this stuff that he said from the original 2015 statement about a total shutdown, a totaling complete shutdown of all Muslim immigration

into the country. And then the... Well, he actually said Muslims didn't he? I mean, he didn't even say... He said Muslim. Did he... No, but he said Muslims didn't he? I mean, he didn't even say it. He said Muslim. But he said, but he said that not even relating to my reading of it when he first said it was that wasn't even about immigration.

I think he was literally saying, if you're Muslim and you're not in America, you can't come in. Period. Well, I mean, yeah, and that is technically, I mean, yeah, the Muslim ban, I mean, there were questions in the initial days after that news release came out, whether it applied to US citizens. Right. Well, that's what I'm saying because when you say Muslim, you're not talking about somebody from a specific region, you're not talking about somebody from a specific region, you're talking about a religion.

Well, that, I mean, so, but that's also the pushback is that the federal government's argument, the Justice Department's defense is like, well, this clearly is a Muslim ban. This is only the one judge on the ninth circuit raised the point. He's like, these seven countries represent only 15% of the Muslim population in the world. How can you call this a Muslim ban? It clearly isn't.

Right. But the point, and this was debated before the trial judge in Seattle, it was discussed in lots of the other cases. It was discussed in Massachusetts where the judge sided with the federal government. It was discussed in Virginia where the judge sided with the challengers to the ban. In that case, the Virginia Attorney General. And in the ninth circuit, and at the trial court,

the question was like, it's possible that there, it's possible that we shouldn't treat It's possible that we shouldn't treat a statement made during the campaign in the same way we would treat a statement made when you were a president. Like we shouldn't give that the same effect because we understand that a campaign is different than a presidency. But the question that both the trial court and the Ninth Circuit considered is, well, it's one thing to say, like, it's not the same thing as like a statement he made when he was enacting it, but it's another thing to say what the federal government was arguing, which is we should

ignore that. We shouldn't count that at all. And both the the trial court judge and the Ninth Circuit said that that's not true. We're going to consider it. But because of the way that the Ninth Circuit resolved the case, they basically said, we've decided that there is a likelihood that Washington and Minnesota who had challenged the ban will succeed in their argument that this violates the due process rights of people. And so because of that, we don't need to decide whether this is a religious discrimination

issue. Right. You're saying there are other problems that proceed with it. There were so many things wrong that they didn't need to reach the question of whether this was a unconstitutional religious discrimination. Right. Take your pick. It's a cornucopia of issues.

They basically said, we've decided it's likely unconstitutional as a due process violation. So because of that, we don't need to reach the religious discrimination or equal protection questions now. Sure. But if this did go back and you had a full decision on the merits, they made it clear that they were going to consider the Muslim ban statement. They made it clear that they were going to consider Rudolf Giuliani's statement that he was basically told like, find a way that we can do this legally. I think that

that's why. Now, the administration is trying to sort of smooth this over, but I think that's why they've decided the lawyers at the Justice Department have convinced the White House like, you need a new man. You're going to not only potentially lose, but you could create some really, really horrible law for you as president. I mean, remember there is this big part of the ruling about the idea that like the government's claim that this was unreviewable. And like Stephen Miller said that, right? I mean, that was his- Well, Stephen Miller said that, and that wasn't argument that the Justice Department made,

that because this is, is a area of national security and area of immigration, that these are two different areas where the executive has traditionally been given wide deference. And that is his constitutional authority as commander-in-chief. It's also his statutory authority. They say under the laws relating to immigration,

that they say that the statute that that that Sean Spicer and and President Trump often read that they say gives the President the right to decide when to exclude aliens or classes of aliens from the country. Right. And so they saying, we've got all of this constitutional and statutory authority. So this is unreviewable. And the Ninth Circuit really slammed them on that and said, there's a difference between deference to the executive branch and unreviewability. And the court has never said that these things are unreviewable. And I think that the Justice Department, when they got that decision,

I think that the Justice Department was like, this is really bad. You do not want this decision staying on the books, President Trump. So what happens if it stays in the books then? Does it mean does it just open up all of his orders? I mean, it is, it applies to, it has some really strong language about like, there are limits on immigration. There are limits on national security. And those are two things that presidents do not want courts to let alone a pellet courts.

Let alone the ninth circuit, which is basically the entire Western seaboard. That's a federal appeals court ruling. That is the law in Washington, in California, in a lot of key military and immigration places. And so, if what they actually asked for was, can you put the case on hold, there's going to be a new executive order, and then what we want you to do is look at the new executive order and assuming it passes constitutional muster, we want you to vacate the earlier decision. They want it which would basically eliminate it from existence. So that's why I think that the Justice Department basically went to the White House and said,

hey, you might love your executive order. You might love the idea of defending this to the death, but they're you're gonna be president after this and You don't want this ruling coming back to bite you on your next executive order, right? So so let me ask you this so after the ninth circuit, if Trump wanted to challenge us, where does it go? Well, I mean, so this was, that's a very good question, man. Nobody is exactly sure, because so the trial judge in Seattle, when he issued his ruling, that basically shut down both the travel part and the refugee part of the ban.

He did so in what was a temporary restraining order. And that's how it was styled, that's what it technically said on the document. Now temporary restraining orders aren't generally available because they're supposed to be for a short period of time. They're supposed to be in place basically until you can get a fully-reasoned injunction. And the the trial court judge was planning on scheduling that within the next two, three weeks. But the federal government said, no, we want to go up to the appeals court right away and ask for a stay.

We want that TRO to be put on hold. And in order to do that, they basically had to convince the appeals court that this wasn't a TRO. It was like a preliminary injunction because that would be appealable. And so once they convinced the appeals court of that sort of the question and the the trial court judge flat out asked the parties after the Ninth Circuit's decision. They were, he was like, so was that a preliminary injunction that I issued? Is that how we're counting this now? And if it is, should, should I just move on to the permanent injunction question?

And it was at that point that the federal government, sort of rather than moving forward at the trial court, rather than moving forward at the appeals court, or their final option, which would have been going up to the Supreme Court and asking for a stay pending appeal, which basically like asking for the Supreme Court for the same thing they had asked the Ninth Circuit for and lost. And the problem is because of the fact that we only have a justices right now, they

were in a really tough position going to the Supreme Court on that. Well, that was my question is what happens. I mean, yeah, what is the situation where it gets in front of this gets in front of the Supreme Court? Does it? Well, if they don't ask for it at this point, basically the order is on hold. And I think that they probably correctly decided the odds of them being able to convince five justices to side with them on the staying the TRO or preliminary

injunction, whatever you want to call it, was going to be difficult because the standards there shift because the TRO has been issued. And so since it was already issued, basically the government bears the burden of proof to get a stay.

And so they have to convince the Supreme Court that like basically on the basis of what's already been presented in the lower courts, you should reverse those decisions. So they have to establish, so you're saying if they have to establish this like immediate need on like a national security basis because they weren't able to produce anything with the in the ninth circuit in that it to because they didn't produce anything at that at the earlier point, you're saying they couldn't bring something new. They couldn't go, oh, we have to do this because here's the evidence that we have an immediate

national security. It would be, I mean, technically you're at the Supreme Court, you can try whatever you want, but it would be difficult, like you're not supposed to. And even when they asked them, I mean, when at the ninth circuit, they said, do you have anything else? The guy's answer was, well, this has been moving really quickly and we don't have anything yet. I mean, that's the crazy part is they didn't even try to construct a, like, a kind

of actual reason for this to exist. It's like, they, like, literally when push came to shove in a court, you know, with, in front of judges, they weren't even like, oh, no, there's actually some reasons. I mean, they, if it, if it correct me if I wrong with the judges, we're like, we can take this into a close, right? They could have done, like like a kind of closed hearing about the evidence, right? I mean, at the trial court level,

I'm not sure at the ninth circuit. How about that? Okay, I thought it was okay. So here's a quick, so I have two questions for you following this. The first is, is it, does it seem, I think you've kind of already answered this,

but it seems likely that the Supreme Court, it would have been harder to convince the Supreme Court, but there's also, and this is more of a statement that I kind of want to get your take on it. There's a fun, another kind of foundational thing that seems to be going on here and please crack me if I'm wrong, but because Trump has been attacking the judiciary, like, on Twitter and attacking the concept of judges in America being able to like do their job. It almost feels like there's another sub-level to this where it's about defending the judiciary in a way and in its ability to do its job, right? Like, yeah, I mean, I Yeah, I mean, I don't think it's as simplistic as, oh, he said mean things about us, so forget

him. But I do think, I mean, I think the actual way that it probably hurts the administration is they're asking for deference. They're literally going to the court and saying, you need to trust us on these important matters and not question what we're doing or why we're doing it. Right. And it's hard to imagine like objectively as a judge, you being like,

well, you seem to have a poor understanding of the way that our three branches work. And yet, you want us to trust without review your decisions about national security. I'm not sure about that, sir. Like, I mean, just think if you were reviewing it, if you have, I mean, to this gets legal, I mean, if you have a friend who you know is cheating on his partner repeatedly, and that person comes to you and is like, so would you trust me to borrow your car and your house for the weekend when you're out of town and trust me, nothing sketchy's gonna happen. Right.

Well, I'm not deciding against you because of the fact that you cheated, but you've undermined your credibility with me. Right. They're basically saying, give us the benefit of the doubt. You know we'll do the right thing. And it's like, well, you've already kind of not done the right thing. So there's not a lot of ground to stand on.

So this actually, now there's a question. The whole time we've been talking about this, I've been had this question back in my head that I really wanna ask, and I feel like you'll have an interesting perspective on. Because everything you're describing at this point sounds like these guys kind of are fuck ups. Like they kind of have done something very poorly. Like it's a poorly constructed order.

They didn't have, like when push came to shove and they needed to produce evidence to prove their point, they couldn't do it. They sort of are asking for things that are above and beyond what you would normally ask from a judge or from the courts. So, but prior to, I mean, maybe right now people have started changing their opinion, but I'm not sure. There was a couple of weeks ago or a week ago, or maybe, let's say it's been two.

And so, again, I can't tell how long it's been this time is off, because all of the, but like people started writing these conspiracy theories that were like, this is the Trump administration, is this is the trial balloon for a coup, and they're testing DHS, they're testing, you know, what they'll do, what they won't do, they're testing the court system.

Does it seem to you, what is more likely, I guess, from in your professional opinion as a scholar and a journalist in your professional opinion? Is it likely that they are testing the system to see if they can essentially take over the government or are? It's really, really difficult to make these decisions from outside about what the, why are things going wrong. And I mean, the example that I've been using is over the past two and a half, three years. I've been spending a lot of time following death penalty litigation. And there have been a bunch of botched executions and a bunch of states over the past three years. And the

the question often once you get into like actual reviews, like in Oklahoma, they had a review of the death penalty process in the state. And when their report came out, penalty process in the state. And when their report came out, it was this combination of something bordering on, if not going beyond incompetence, and some sort of intentional wrongdoing, if you will. Right. And yet it's so hard to tell the difference if you're not in the room because it really is the sort of thing that like depending on how you look at it, it can look both ways. Right.

And now, I mean, the truth is, like this is the beginning of a new administration. I mean, now, that goes both ways because if you don't have your people in place, does it make it more incompetent or more ill-intentioned to act quickly? Like, are you trying to sneak something through before you get people in place who will stop you? Or are you just like doing things on the timeline you'd put in place and you just don't have enough people there correcting you when you put something in place that's going in the wrong direction. That's something and that's why when and I think that this can be part of what's gone on since the Ninth Circuit's ruling is that

when they went back down to the trial court, the trial court judge said the federal government was like, let's hold off on the trial court permanent injunction stuff while we work out the appeal of the preliminary injunction at the ninth circuit because the ninth circuit planned a whole sort of merits briefing on the actual question of the preliminary injunction. And that's when you would have gotten into all of the questions about how much weight do we give to his like Muslim ban conference and all of that sort of stuff. And the trial court judge said, no, we're going to keep going with the preliminary injunction.

And that would have led to discovery, which would have been the federal government having to turn over evidence. And I think that along with the concerns about the Ninth Circuit ruling, I think that this perspective of having to turn over evidence about the Ninth Circuit ruling, I think that this perspective, this perspective of having to turn over evidence about the actual process that the government went through in implementing the ban, in writing and implementing the ban, was sort of worrisome to the federal government because we would see in and get an idea of under oath. Right. What actually was happening.

Under oath, I don't know how much under oath applies to the Trump administration from what I can tell. They would find out. I mean, there's a difference between what, I mean, between what people will say politically and what their lawyers will let them say in a deposition. Oh right, because there's like stakes. And it, because right, if you're under oath, there's like actual stakes that are, that are physical.

Yeah, I mean, the lawyers also, I mean, remember, the lawyers have their, their law license. Right. All of a sudden, there's like real estate. I like how that, at the level of the president talking, no real stakes, but at the level of like you're in a deposition, there are now suddenly some, like somebody could lose their job over something, which is really interesting. Well, I mean, you get this ever widening circle. I mean, if you have an individual whose policy is,

I don't give a fuck, like that person can go pretty far on his or her own. And we've seen at several companies, at several in several governor's offices, in several congressional offices, we've seen how far that can go to screw things up. But once you start widening that circle, it gets more and more difficult.

Once you get in accountants in business, once you get in lawyers in government, and eventually you get somebody who's like, no, no, you've gone too far. And we're not gonna do that. And I think, I mean, we obviously saw that with the acting attorney general. I mean, she decided that this was a step too far.

And I mean, she clearly knew that that if she directed the Justice Department not to defend the new president's key order that he was probably going to be done with her. And she did it anyway. She did it to make a it. To make a statement. And in its spectacular fashion, I think. Chris, I want to take a quick break. And then I have, and then I have, and there's a, I have another topic, another legal case

that I'm very interested to get your take on. So we will be right back with Mark Chris Gardner. Needless to say, you love technology, but unfortunately the blue violet light that computers, phones and tablets give off can strain your eyes and put you at risk for long-term eye damage, which sounds very bad. Thankfully, Crisol, no glare lenses help protect your eyes from the glare of digital screens and the harmful effects of blue violet light helping to safeguard your eyes from potential risks. Crisol lenses give you the clearest vision possible by offering resistance to scratches and smudges.

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Chris, I want to know about, we actually, I read this Buzzfeed story a few weeks ago, again, right at the start of Trump's presidency, that a group of ethicists and lawyers had, I guess, sued Trump over this emoluments clause. Yes. And, and I assume that this is something you've been tracking. I don't know how much you've been writing about it or thinking about it, but this is something I'm very interested in because at the beginning of when I first heard about this clause, it sounded like, I mean, this could be the real kind of, this could be something that really has impact on Trump and his presidency.

It seems to me like he's an incredibly compromised president, even if you don't believe the Russia stuff, even if you don't think that he's got some skeletons in his closet or he thinks he's got some dirty tax returns or whatever, it seems like his business interests and the fact that he really hasn't divested himself completely of those interests. And his job as president are at odds. And this emoleumance clause seems to get at some of that in a really meaningful way. Can you tell me what, how seriously we should all be taking this or thinking about it? Yeah, I mean, the emoluments clause litigation and questions are both really troubling and really difficult to deal with because it...

what's the remedy? So remember, I mean, think about this in terms of any lawsuit, you have to ask for something. Like, what are you wanting the court to do? Right. Well, what are they asking for? What do you have the court do in this case? A violation of like the Amul, a Mollumons class. You're fired.

That's right. We can't do that. And so, I mean, they can't say that you're ineligible to be the president if you continue to. But it's not an eligibility. It is just a violation of the Constitution. It doesn't, you're not ineligible if you have. It's not like we're

finding out that he's 33. Right. Where, I mean, it is not a requirement to be president that you don't have foreign investments. It is that you cannot receive these things as an officer of the United States. So if he's violating that as president, what would the remedy be? I mean, so the things that they're asking for, they're asking for declaration that he's violating the Emolium Ones class. So a legal declaration, you are violating the Constitution. Right. And then they're also asking for him to have to divest for an order that he divest. But I mean, it doesn't do what they want.

Right. I mean, some of the lawyers who are involved, I mean, to Norm Eisen, one of the people from crew who citizens for responsibility and ethics in Washington who brought the lawsuit, who was one of the ethics lawyers for the Obama administration, and Richard Painter, who was one of the ethics lawyers in the George W. Bush administration both are on this lawsuit. But I mean what Norm Eisen said was like, I mean he said like one of the things that we hope we'd get from this lawsuit if it goes forward is that we could basically get his tax returns released because we can't even know how he's violating the Amolium

Ones clause because we don't know what all of his foreign investments are. Right. And we don't know what foreign countries have invested in him and his businesses. But like the, and I have to give him credit. Mike Sachs has been pressing this point a few times on Twitter. I don't know if he's written anything on it, but outside of Twitter, but he's definitely talked

about it a lot, is the idea that like this is sort of like some of those Obama care lawsuits at times in that, this is really something that is better handled by Congress, that they're trying to push into a legal posture. But the true way of dealing with a violation of the Amoleum-O-ium Enclos would be impeachment. Is that right? Are they trying to put pressure on Congress to push for impeachment?

But they'd have to be some discovery. You'd have to see his tax returns. I mean, I think that what they're hoping for, the first criticism of the lawsuit is that there's no standing. That the, this organization doesn't actually have losses. And some of the, some other legal organizations agree that like, organizational standing wasn't the way to go about this lawsuit that you should find. I mean you've probably heard it talked about like Find a hotel that would be competing for

Conference dollars with Trump's hotel in DC and have them sue because they're actually the ones losing money Right, I mean, it's Logan X stuff not in Miami and stuff But how fun would it be if it was Nordstrom? You're saying that the Sheraton would have to bring a lawsuit or something. Right. Somebody who, I mean, this is why there was some news coverage when like some country announced that they were moving their conference to Trump's hotel, and that got a lot of news coverage because I think the thought was,

oh, well here's a very specific hotel that used to hold a conference and this year, once Trump became president, isn't. And so therefore, how could you make a more clear case that this is a loss of business to this company? And so, I mean, the idea is that, whether it's this lawsuit or another one that some lawsuit that goes forward to the discovery point where your exchanging evidence would be able to get information about his foreign investments and what foreign countries might have holdings in his companies.

Right. And so therefore, would be paying money to him while he's president. And the other question is, is that a violation of the clause? I mean, this is an argument that's been made by some people that the ammonium-onced clause was not written The Ammonia Mott's clause was not written about a big business man who became president. It was written about, for the same reasons why we don't have titles of nobility in America. It was written about preventing foreign governments from

curing favor with presidents. But it was literally like the idea that like somebody would, you know, would want to do a trade deal with us and they would come along and say, we'll give you, we'll personally give you money whoever you are, Mr. President, to do something for us. And, and, and this is a situation where there's a pre-existing business, and now he's become president, it's not as if you have to find a case where you could prove somehow he's positioned right, the point that you just made, rather. So, okay, some business was if impacted by this and that foreignoreign government sees it as an opportunity

to win some favor with Trump and that becomes, you know, somehow he's compromised because of that. But it's pretty far away from, I mean, it's pretty far away from a very provable point. I mean, I guess the reason I'm asking about this is because what I really want to get to and I guess maybe, you know, because we got a wrap, but- I mean, something can be, something can be like really horrible and and also not something that a court is well suited to address. It is sort of the concern with these Omolyamon's clause, right. In the mitigation possibility. It's like, well, yeah, we don't like this, but like as a court,

other than saying, this violates the Constitution. You can't do, there's no action to take. What can we do, right? Can we force, I mean, even if, I mean, like, let's think about it in a sort of ideal sense. Like, I mean, even if, I mean, really in an ultimate ideal sense, the only way to draw this back to where ethicists would ideally want it to be, is for the entire Trump brand to end.

Because it's still his name. I mean, it's not just a matter, I mean, a blind trust, you can't have a blind trust when your name is on the building. Like, you would literally need to sell, I mean, traditionally, when you, I mean, you can actually go back and like, like, you would actually have to sell the business. And then the trustee who is not one of your children is a, a, a, a, a, arms length person

who you do not have a personal relationship with would make investments that you would not have access to and would not know about and that is how your money would proceed. And so like the only real way to do sort of the what what we in our imagination, see as full divestment when you hear people talking about full divestment and a blind trust, that's what they mean. And did anybody actually think that was going to happen that like we weren't going to have Trump brand? Right. Right.

Right. I mean, I think I don't think that I think the problem is that no one knows what's supposed to happen because this is such an unusual situation. Right. I mean, and people just didn't think you would, I mean, like everybody makes fun of the fact that like the Trump team wasn't prepared to take office. Let's be honest. Very few people were in the world, right? Right, right.

It wasn't just the Trump team, folks. Yeah, this is not supposed to happen. This is not supposed to happen. It was all of the Democratic Party. It was all of the Republican Party. It was the Trump team. It was most of the world. We didn't think this was going to happen.

And so we hadn't really figured out like, oh, with like adjust classes. Here's what will happen on November 9th. Once everybody gets things together after Trump wins, this is what we'll do. Yeah, literally nobody had a plan for Trump winning, including Trump. So here's my, let me hear. I care about this. I mean, I love this emolument stuff and I love the ethics stuff. And I mean, I remember spending like the two weeks after the election being like, wow,

I'm not sure how you even, I mean like he, he, he, he literally peace his name on buildings. And that is part of his brand. Like he licenses his name overseas. How do you untangle a contract with a company overseas that has licensed his name that a foreign government owns, like let's say like 5% in some foreign country that you have like 500 investors in that is literally based on his name, like there's no way to do it. This is not the question that I was going to ask. I'm going to ask, I have one other question, but could he, if he wanted to, could he just put the Trump logo on the White House?

Like could he do that? Is there anything legal he's stopping him from putting a Trump logo? I mean, he could, right? Am I going to say no in 2017 to a hypothetical question about what Trump could do? That would almost guarantee that he would do it. Exactly. No, we can't do that. Yeah, the tomorrow.

There's a crane. He can't quit and give me all his money. He definitely can't do that. Is that good? You say it, it'll happen. Here's my final question for you. Because I know you got to go. Is there anything that is going to stop Trump from being president that you can see out

there in the landscape that looks like he could turn into something real? And I am, I'm asking for a friend. I'm also asking for America. I mean, it seems like everything he touches is a landmine. It seems like everywhere he was like the Russia stuff, the Emoleumont stuff, the, you know, him putting Trump on the White House, the, you know, his, his, his tax returns. Is there anything that you see? I mean, you're looking at all this.

They can put it like the reverse, not the reverse. I mean, it is sort of the same just in a different way of Obama's line. Like, it's not the end until it's the end. We won't know what ends Trump until something ends Trump. Like, I mean, we've all seen the downfall of enough politicians that we know that we can always be surprised. And we also know that we can be surprised by like what it is that takes somebody down as opposed to all of the things that don't.

And so I mean, like anything could. I mean, it really, I mean, for the next two years, the only thing that will take Trump down is when Paul Ryan and Mitch McConnell decide that they're going to lose their majorities. Like, I mean, that's the bottom line. The only way that Donald Trump gets impeached and convicted would be if Paul Ryan and Mitch McConnell decide that he needs to go, because otherwise we are going to lose the house in the senate. Until that point, it's hard to imagine unless something just like so mind-bendingly repulsive happens that we just can't go forth.

But let's be honest, I think we've already seen those. I don't think I mean, I don't have a good answer there. I think the only thing it can be is if we find an old tape of him talking about how he's in the pedophilia, that would be the only thing that could stop him at this point. I mean, it's been a, quite a journey that we've been on with Trump. And I think, I mean, I think we've learned that it will really only come down to numbers. And when the House and the Senate. Now, if, if, if the House and the Senate change hands come, come, uh, the new Congress in after the midterms, then things could change. And then there's also been talk of the 25th Amendment.

And this, the provision that a majority of the cabinet can effectively tell Congress that the president is unable to serve. Now, the president is able to basically write back and be like, actually, I am, and then the cabinet can vote again. And if they do that, then it goes to Congress and Congress needs to decide. But I mean, that is veering into untested territory. And so, I mean, we'll see what happens that I mean, we remember, I mean, there was a point last summer, if you remember, when the judge curial stuff where Trump was suggesting that a federal judge's Mexican heritage was calling into question his ability to be an immigrant. a federal judge's Mexican heritage. I forgot all about that. Calling into question his ability to be an impartial judge

over a Trump University fraud lawsuit. Like this wasn't even an immigration related lawsuit. And that did lead Paul Ryan to sort of back off for a bit in the way that he treated it. And I do think that the so-called judge comment sort of concerned Republicans, but at the same time, he's president. And they were sort of like, let's just stay quiet and hope that it blows over and that the White House staff can get him under control. Yeah. And instead, Steven Miller got on the Sunday shows and said basically the same thing.

So who knows? I mean, it's, it is truly a who knows situation. Chris, I know you need to run, but thank you so much for doing this. I mean, I feel, I actually feel like I got smarter during this podcast, which for me is tough because I don't learn much. I mean, I'm actually pretty, my brain is pretty like a trap,

but this is super informative and I really appreciate it. And to anyone listening, if you don't follow Chris, follow him on Twitter, read what he writes on BuzzFeeded stuff is super interesting. And he's like, you're like, I mean, one of the most interesting, I think, one of the smartest writers on this topic. And I think covering it, what's really good for me,

and I think a lot of people reading is, you get a lot of very kind of stuffy writing about the legal view of what is happening in politics and what is happening in Washington. I think your stuff is like really approachable and really smart and really like captures this without being so convoluted and complex that you don't, you know, can't get the story out of it. So anyhow, so I just think that's fantastic and I really appreciate what I consider to be a great service to the craft of

the world of journalism. So thank you for joining us and and you got to come back maybe after the president is impeached you can come back and and tell us all about like what to how to make sense of the new reality. I hope I and I hope that's in very for this week. We'll be back next week with more tomorrow. And as always, I wish you and your family the very best. But unfortunately, your family is involved in a very long and complicated lawsuit with the President of the United States, Donald J. Trump. And there's no telling how long it will go on for or how much money they'll spend litigating.