UNBIASED - New Texas Law Criminalizes Illegal Border Crossings, Senate Sex Tape Scandal, Pope Approves Blessings for Same-Sex Couples, Apple Halts Sale of Watches, and More.

Episode Date: December 19, 2023

1. DEEP DIVE: Texas Governor Signs SB4 Creating New Criminal Offenses for Crossing Border Illegally and Allowing for Deportation (1:23)2. DEEP DIVE: Senate Sex Scandal: Staffer Fired After Leaked Sex Tape (11:06)3. QUICK HITTERS: US Warship Responds to Distress Call, Driver Crashes Into Biden's Motorcade, Southwest Airlines Hit with Record $140M Penalty, Vatican Approves Blessings for Same-Sex Couples, Apple Watch to Stop Selling Some Watches (16:50)If you enjoyed this episode, please leave me a review and share it with those you know that also appreciate unbiased news!Subscribe to Jordan's weekly free newsletter featuring hot topics in the news, trending lawsuits, and more.Follow Jordan on Instagram and TikTok.All sources for this episode can be found here.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Please gamble responsibly. Gambling problem? For free assistance, call the Connex Ontario Helpline at 1-866-531-2600. BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with iGaming Ontario. You are listening to the Jordan is my lawyer podcast, your favorite source of unbiased

news and legal analysis. Enjoy the show. Welcome back to the Jordan is my lawyer podcast. Happy Tuesday. Let's get right into it. I have two relatively deep dives I want to do. The first one is going to be about SB4, which is the new law that Texas's governor just signed into law on Monday. It deals with immigration. The second deep dive I want to talk about is this Senate sex tape scandal, and then we'll get into the quick hitters. So this episode will be a little shorter than those two, but still I have a wealth of information for you. Before we get into the stories, let me just give you the reminder I give every episode. The best way you can help me out

is by leaving a review on whatever platform you listen. If you love what you hear, just let other people know why they should tune into the show and helps me grow my audience. And of course, as my legal disclaimer, yes, I am a lawyer. No, I am not your lawyer. Without further ado, let's get into today's stories. The governor of Texas signed a bill on Monday that gives law enforcement in the state the power to arrest migrants and gives judges the ability to issue orders to remove them to Mexico. So this law, it's known as SB4. It will take effect in March. It's supposed to take effect in March, at least. We'll likely, very likely, see legal challenges to this law, which may delay that, may even

never take effect. But let's talk about it. Obviously, we know that border crossings have been at record highs. On top of that, Texas and the Biden administration have really been clashing over border protection methods. Specifically, Texas has tried to introduce many different deterrents like barbed wire fencing on the bank of the Rio Grande on the Texas side, obviously, as well as placing some big buoys in the middle of the Rio Grande. And the Biden administration challenged both of those and has gotten both

removed. So this law is Texas's most recent attempt to curb border crossings. It was actually passed by the legislature months ago, but just got the governor's signature on Monday, which means it is officially a law. Basically, it creates new criminal offenses called illegal entry and illegal re-entry into the state. Under this law, a person who's an alien, as defined by federal law, commits a Class B misdemeanor if he or she enters the state of Texas from a foreign nation at any location other than a lawful port of entry. So as we know at the border, we have these lawful ports of entry, right? But a lot of times people will enter between those ports of entry.

So this law says that if someone tries to do that outside of a lawful port of entry, that is a misdemeanor. This is punishable by up to 180 days in jail and a fine of up to $2,000. Now, if that person had previously been convicted of illegal entry from a foreign nation and attempts to enter again at any location other than a lawful port of entry, the crime becomes a felony. So you try to enter once and you get charged with that misdemeanor and you leave and then you try again, this is illegal re-entry and in that case, it's no longer a misdemeanor, it's a felony. Now, if a person had previously been removed due to a conviction of a crime and re-enters, the new offense becomes a

second or third degree felony depending on the crime that they were convicted with before. Now, the punishment for this offense ranges from two to 20 years in jail, depending on the crime, right? Or depending on whether or not they were convicted with a crime in the past. Obviously, if they were convicted with a crime in the past, the worse the crime, the longer the jail time for illegal reentry. So that is how that works. Now the bill also sets forth when a judge can order a migrant back to their foreign country, and what the law says is this. After making a determination that probable cause existed for an arrest for an illegal entry or re-entry offense, a judge could order the arrested person released from custody and issue a written

order discharging the individual and requiring the person to return to the foreign nation from which they entered or attempted to enter. The law also says it is unlawful to arrest a person under this law if that person is on the grounds of a public or private primary or secondary school, a church, a synagogue, or other place of worship, a healthcare facility if the person is there to receive treatment, or a safe ready facility which provides forensic medical exams to sexual assault survivors. So if they are there getting an exam, they cannot be arrested there. This law is about 10 pages if you want to read it. You can find it in the sources section in the podcast description

as always, but I ran through the main points of this. Now I want to get to what the supporters and opponents have to say about it. So let's start with the supporters. And this excerpt of support I'm going to read you does come from a member of the Texas legislature. So what it says is this, allowing a judge or magistrate to order migrants return would be less costly than continuing to detain and house those arrested under current trespassing laws, since most migrants would likely rather return across the border than face prosecution. Additionally, while the bill would ensure that law enforcement kept appropriate records by requiring fingerprinting and background checks for an individual arrested for illegal entry or illegal re-entry, these provisions would not

require extensive or excessively costly biometric testing for every person. Now I will read you an excerpt from an opponent in the legislature. SB4 would subject migrants across Texas to the threat of detention or forced removal and could lead to an increase in racial profiling. Although the bill would require that law enforcement officers have probable cause to make an arrest, a person could still be detained anywhere in Texas for a variety of reasons, as the bill would not explicitly state that probable cause constituted an officer witnessing the individual physically crossing the border. The bill would also not require officers or magistrates to undergo any training

to implement the bill's provisions. Immigration law is complex, and magistrates or law enforcement officers may not have the expertise needed to determine an individual's immigration status and whether or not satisfactory evidence exists that the migrant crossed the border illegally. Now, I will say the bill that I have linked for you in the sources section at the end, you can actually see pages and pages of what the supporters say and what the opponents say. So if you do want to get a better idea of the views on each side, I highly suggest reading that. But before we move on, let's talk about how this law changes things, given that crossing into the United States outside of a lawful port of entry is already considered a federal crime. Currently, under federal law, if you cross the border illegally outside of a lawful port

of entry, technically you can be fined and imprisoned or fined or imprisoned. So I believe the first fine is anywhere from $50 to $100, and the imprisonment term for a first-time offense is up to six months. And then if you re-enter after that, that fine and imprisonment time doubles. However, given the fact that the United States has so many different areas of the border to patrol and so many people crossing as well, there's a lot for border patrol to look after. So one difference is that this new law out of Texas now gives authority to state law enforcement, not just federal law enforcement. And the amount, you know, the area that is covered is

not as vast as what what Border Patrol has has to cover right on a national basis. But another difference is in the fact that this is now a state offense rather than a federal offense. Now, there is no other state that makes it a crime to cross the border. This is the first of its kind, so this will have to play out in court, which I'll talk about in a minute. One other difference is that currently in Texas, law enforcement can arrest those who have crossed the border illegally and are on private property. But with that, that is a trespassing offense. So that actually requires the consent of the private property owner because they're the ones whose land is being trespassed. Whereas now under this new

law, they can arrest people who have unlawfully crossed the border, whether they're on private property or not, and don't need the consent of the private property owners. So those are a few differences with this new law and what we currently see federally. Now, will this law stand up in court? I obviously don't have a yes or no answer for that because courts rule in various ways all the time. But what we do know is that the Supreme Court ruled in 2012 that the federal government is the one that sets immigration policy and laws, not the states. And that case stemmed from an Arizona law called SB 1070, which penalized unauthorized immigrants in various ways, but included, you know, allowing state police to stop anyone that was believed to be in the country illegally.

This law was mostly rejected by the Supreme Court. And as I said, the Supreme Court held that the federal government is in charge of setting immigration laws, not the states. So what I would say is definitely expect a challenge in the coming days. The ACLU has already said they will be challenging it and also expect it to make its way up to the Supreme Court. Whether or not the Supreme Court agrees to hear it is another story. But, you know, that's how the Supreme Court has ruled on a similar issue in the past. There's obviously no guarantee they'll rule exactly the same because this is an entirely different law. But at least, you know, the Supreme Court precedent here. As a final note,

Mexico's government has said in a statement, quote, the Mexican government categorically rejects any measure that would allow local or state authorities to detain or deport Mexicans or other nationalities to Mexican soil, end quote. So the Mexican government not on board with this. That's what I have for you on that. Now let's talk about this Senate sex tape scandal. A leaked video of two men having sex in a Senate hearing room led to the firing of a Senate staffer. I want to discuss the allegations, what we know to be true, what has not yet been confirmed,

and also explain this sort of drama that has unfolded between NBC News and some conservative outlets. So first of all, where did this video come from? Well, the Daily Caller is the outlet that leaked it. But the Daily Caller says they got it from a source that is involved in a private group chat for gay men in politics. The Daily Caller said they have confirmed the chat. They saw that that's where it was sent. However, they did not confirm the identity of the men in the video. What does the video show? If you want to see it, you can head to the sources section of this episode. As always, all of my sources are there. You can find it in the podcast description. But obviously, as I said, it's two men having sex.

The room that they're in has been identified as room 216 in the Hart Senate office building, and you cannot see the face of the man who's filming, but you can see the face of the other man. However, the Daily Caller, which is who published this video, blurred out the man's face because, as they said, they were not able to confirm his identity, did not want his identity out there. With that said, though, other outlets like the New York Post and the Washington Examiner identified the man as a Senate staffer named Aiden. I'm not even going to try to pronounce his last name. Actually, I'll try, but this is the only time I'm going to try. Mace Serapowski? That's probably wrong, but we're going to go by Aiden. So Aiden worked for Senator

Ben Cardin, and Senator Ben Cardin has not officially confirmed that Aiden was one of the men in the video. However, Aiden has been let go, and following the leak, Aiden wrote a statement on LinkedIn that said, quote, this has been a difficult time for me as I have been attacked for who I love to pursue a political agenda. While some of my actions in the past have shown poor judgment, I love my job and would never disrespect my workplace. I will be exploring what legal options are available to me in these matters. End quote. Senator Ben Cardin's office also told Politico on Saturday, the day after the leak, that Aiden is, quote, no longer employed by the U.S. Senate. We will have no further comment on this personal matter, end quote. Then on Monday, Cardin told Fox News,

quote, I was angry. I was disappointed. It's a breach of trust. And Cardin still didn't name the staffer in question. He just said it was a personal issue. He said he didn't want to get into all of that. He also added he was not aware of any further disciplinary issues against the staffer. He said he hadn't spoken to him since he was fired and that the Capitol Police are investigating the incident. Then who else chimed in? George Santos, the recently expelled congressman. He shared Aiden's LinkedIn statement to X and he wrote, quote, having sex in a United States government building and filming it is the reason you got heat. You being gay and having gay sex, nobody gives a rat's ass. No one is perusing a political agenda. We are just disgusted about your vile behavior as a

staffer to a United States senator. Now, you do put a new definition to fuck around and find out. Aiden, you will forever be remembered as the Democrats' favorite sloppy bottom. Now, there's also some drama between the outlets, specifically between NBC News and you will forever be remembered as the Democrats' favorite sloppy bottom. Now, there's also some drama between the outlets, specifically between NBC News and conservative outlets like Fox. NBC posted the article about the sex tape and wrote a headline to go along with it that said, quote, Cardin's office has parted ways with a staffer who conservative news outlets alleged was shown in a leaked video having sex in a Senate hearing room. Now, let me tell you both sides of this,

okay, like I like to do. So what the headline is saying is that the senator's office parted ways with a staffer who the conservative outlets are saying was involved in this video. Now, the reason that the headline is portrayed in that light, which I'm not saying is right or wrong, is because the outlets that identified him, like the New York Post and the Washington Examiner, are both conservative-leaning outlets. They were the ones that first identified him. So that's what the headline is referring to. However, the headline is definitely biased.

And NBC News has received backlash from the conservative community for making this story about conservatives and conservative outlets when that's not what it's about. Fox News posted a headline that said NBC News frames Senate sex tape video as, quote, conservative news outlets pushing the story. So that's what's going on with that. Just just in case you heard anything about it and you wanted some clarity on it. A few things I do want to clear up before we move on to

the next story. Number one, the other man in the video is not Senator Cardin. The identity of the second man, as I said, has not yet been confirmed. But if you use context clues, you can clearly see it's not the senator. Senator Cardin is 80 years old. He's fully white hair. The man filming has black hair on his stomach. And lastly, the last thing I wanted to just mention is that Senator Cardin announced back in May that he would not be seeking reelection in 2024. He is 80 after all. So if you hear that he's not seeking reelection, just know that this is not anything that stemmed from this issue. He announced it back in May. Let's move on to some quick hitters. The first quick hitter being that a U.S. warship in the Red Sea responded on Monday to a

distress call from a commercial vessel after it was attacked by multiple projectiles in the Southern Red Sea. Information as to what type of projectiles were launched and from where, those were not immediately available, but as we know, this is something that's been going on in the Red Sea for weeks. Yemen's Houthi rebels have been targeting commercial ships in the Red Sea, justifying these attacks as revenge against Israel, so this is just another one that has happened. Also on Monday, BP, the oil company, announced it was pausing all shipments through the Red Sea due to the, quote, deteriorating security situation, end quote. The second quick hitter is that a driver who has now

been charged with a DUI crashed into a parked SUV that was part of President Biden's motorcade on Sunday night. Basically, there was a car blocking off the intersection, which you would cross over to get to the street that President Biden's campaign headquarters is located on. That car, the one that was blocking off the intersection, was the one that was hit. The president had just so happened to finish what he was doing at the headquarters, and he was leaving the building. He answered a question from a reporter outside of the headquarters when the crash happened. This was at 8.07 p.m. on Sunday night. Biden's Secret Service agents immediately escorted him into his car,

while the other security agents approached the car that had caused the crash. They had their guns drawn and the driver of the car just put his hands up and complied while President Biden and his wife Jill were taken home. So everything was fine. It just happened to be a guy who was drinking and driving and hit the president's motorcade. The third quick hitter I have is about Southwest Airlines. You may remember the whole travel chaos debacle that airline passengers went through last holiday season, specifically with Southwest. More than 16,000 flights were canceled in the last 10 days of December when everyone is traveling. The cancellations started with a winter storm, but then continued with a system overload issue. It was a mess. The Department of Transportation

has spent the last year investigating what went wrong. They ended up finding that Southwest had violated consumer protection laws by failing to provide adequate customer service assistance. This included, but is not limited to, not picking up the phones, putting customers on hold for hours at a time, failing to provide flight status notifications, and failing to provide quick refunds. And when customers would seek out a refund, they would be hit with some sort of error. So Southwest settled this with the Department of Transportation yesterday for a record $140 million. This is 30 times larger than any penalty ever assessed by the Department of Transportation for consumer

protection violations, and the department said that the majority of the penalty will go towards compensating future Southwest passengers affected by cancellations or delays. And that is because Southwest has already issued more than $600 million in refunds and reimbursements to those that were affected last holiday season, so the rest of the money will go towards future issues that Southwest has. This will bring Southwest total for last holiday season to $750 million because they've already paid out, as I said, about $600 million. You add on this $140 and you're at roughly $750 million. So they have paid a big sum for what took place last

December. The fourth quick hitter is that Pope Francis officially approved a document that changes Vatican policy surrounding same-sex couples. While the church stands strong in its stance that marriage is a sacrament between a man and a woman, it is allowing same-sex couples to be blessed by priests. Here's the fine print. One, a blessing is not the same as the sacrament of marriage. The document makes this very clear. This is a blessing from a priest, not a marriage. Any blessing must be non-liturgical in nature, should not be given at the same time as a civil union, using set rituals, or even with the clothing and gestures that belong in a wedding. Places for such blessings might be, quote, in other contexts, such as a visit to a shrine,

a meeting with a priest, a prayer recited in a group, or during a pilgrimage, end quote. The new document offers an extensive definition of the term blessing in scripture to insist that people seeking a transcendent relationship with God and looking for his love and mercy should not be subject to a, quote, exhaustive moral analysis as a precondition for receiving it. The document also says that such blessings would not legitimize irregular situations, as the Vatican calls them, but be a sign that God welcomes all. And the fifth and final quick hitter I have for you is about the Apple Watch debacle and what's going on with that. With the holidays coming up, I'm sure someone out there wants an

Apple Watch and you're wondering, what is going on with the Apple Watches. Why is Apple, you know, pausing the sales on these Apple Watches? So let's talk about it. Apple said on Monday it's going to stop selling the Apple Watch Series 9 and the Apple Watch Ultra 2 starting Thursday on Apple.com and then starting Christmas Eve it won't be sold in any retail stores. This news comes amid a legal battle with a medical device maker challenging the watch's blood oxygen feature. So here's what happened. This medical device maker challenged the blood oxygen feature because they say it violates their patent, which uses light-based technology to read blood oxygen levels. In October, the United States International Trade Commission found that Apple was in fact in violation of this

medical device maker's patent and issued an import ban to take effect on December 26th. At this point, what happens from here, the president has 60 days to review the ruling from the United States International Trade Commission because the president is the one who oversees the International Trade Commission. So the president gets 60 days, which means he has until Christmas Day to review this ruling and make a determination. Now, if he approves the ruling, this import ban takes effect on December 26th. If he rejects the ruling, the import ban does not go into effect. But Apple says it is taking these preemptive steps to comply should the ruling stand. So Apple added in its statement that it, quote, strongly disagrees with the order and is pursuing

a range of legal and technical options to ensure that Apple Watch is available to customers. The company said if the ruling stands, it will take all measures to get the Series 9 and Ultra 2 back to customers as soon as possible. So what can you expect as a consumer? Other models will still be available for purchase. But if the import ban goes into effect, it would affect Apple Watch Series 6 and later and all models of the Apple Watch Ultra. So the Apple Watch SE won't be affected and any other model won't be affected. It's just these devices that have this blood oxygen feature in it that violates this medical device company's patent.

So that is what's going on with Apple Watch, and that concludes this episode. Thank you so much for being here today. I hope you have a great week. I hope you're not too stressed with the holidays coming up. Remember, life is good, and I will be back on Friday.