UNBIASED - Trump v. Anderson Arguments, Special Counsel Releases Report Re: Biden's Classified Documents, Tucker Carlson Interviews Putin, Netanyahu Rejects Hamas' Counteroffer, and More.

Episode Date: February 9, 2024

1. DEEP DIVE: Supreme Court Hears Oral Arguments in Trump v. Anderson (1:51)2. DEEP DIVE: Congressional Updates (17:16)3. DEEP DIVE: Special Counsel Hur Releases Findings of Investigation Into Biden's Classified Documents; Biden Responds (24:46)4. QUICK HITTERS: Nevada Primary/Caucus (37:30); Netanyahu Rejects Hamas' Counteroffer (39:14); Tucker Carlson Interviews Vladimir Putin (43:07)5. ONE LINERS (48:32)6. NOT EVERYTHING IS BAD: Good News of the Week (48:17)If you enjoyed this episode, please leave me a review and share it with those you know that also appreciate unbiased news!Watch this episode on YouTube.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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call the Conax Ontario helpline at 1-866-531-2600. BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with iGaming Ontario. Welcome back to Unbiased, your favorite source of unbiased news and legal analysis. February 9th, 2024. This episode was recorded last night around 9 p.m. Eastern time. And let me just tell you, you are in for a treat today because today is quite the episode. Three deep dives. Then we'll get into quick hitters and then one-liners. And of course, it's Friday. Not everything is bad. These deep dives will include a recap of the Supreme Court oral arguments in Trump versus Anderson, as well as a recap of this past week in Congress.

There's been a few things happening there. And then a summary of this new report into Biden's classified documents, as well as what he had to say about it. I will include Tucker Carlson's interview with Vladimir Putin in the quick hitters, along with the Nevada elections and why Nevada has both a primary and a caucus, what's going on with that, as well as a look into the recent offer and counter offer between Israel and Hamas and why those were rejected. Before we dive in, I do have a special request today. Each episode, you know, I ask you to leave a review if you enjoy what you hear, but today I would absolutely love if you took the time to share

this episode with two or three people that you know, even one person. Honestly, that's great too. Some episodes I'm just particularly proud of. I have put in a particularly large amount of work into, and this is one of those episodes. So it would really mean a lot to me if you could do that. And without further ado, we will get into today's stories. The first deep dive is the Supreme Court oral arguments into Trump versus Anderson. They happened on Thursday, and here is what you need to know. Procedurally speaking, this case, as we know, was filed in Colorado and it was originally called Anderson v. Griswold. You may remember it as that. Anderson being Norma

Anderson, a Colorado voter, and Griswold being Colorado's Secretary of State, who is the one who determines who is on the state ballot. Anderson and Griswold are on the same page as far as not wanting Trump to be on the ballot, but Anderson had to sue Griswold in her capacity as Secretary of State in order to bring this lawsuit in the first place. So once the Colorado Supreme Court issued their decision, Trump then took this case to the Supreme Court. And from that point forward, this case has been known as Trump versus Anderson. Trump's side was argued by attorney Jonathan Mitchell. You will hear me refer to that side as either Trump or Trump's attorney. And then Anderson's side was argued by attorney Jason Murray. And you'll hear me refer to that side as Anderson or Anderson's

attorney. So let's talk a little bit about the arguments that were put forth, but I want to start at the highest level. So at the highest level, Trump's position is that section three of the 14th amendment, otherwise known as the disqualification clause, does not bar him from holding office, right? Whereas Anderson's position at the highest level is that it does. But if we break these arguments down, here is what we're looking at. So Trump has really four main arguments, three or four, two of them kind of are one in the same. But the first argument is that section three does not give the states the power to determine which presidential candidates can be on an election ballot. The second argument is that

Section 3 does not prohibit a candidate from running for president or even being elected, but instead, Section 3 only prohibits an individual from holding office, and that's only if Congress so determines. So along similar lines, the third argument is that Section 3 is not self-executing. In other words, it requires an act from Congress to be enforced and actually bar a candidate once that candidate is elected. And the fourth argument from Trump's side is that Section 3 does not apply to the President of the United States, because the President is not an officer of the United States. The President holds an office, but is not an officer. Anderson's position, on the other hand, is this. One, states, as per Article 2, are in charge of making their own election rules, which means that they can determine

which candidates appear on their own ballots. Two, that Section 3 is self-executing, meaning it doesn't require an act of Congress to be enforced. And three, that the president is an officer of the United States. He holds an office, he is an officer, and therefore Section 3 does apply to him. Now, I do want to note that whether Trump engaged in an insurrection was not really at issue here. The court didn't focus too much on it, meaning the justices didn't ask too much about it. Trump's lawyer didn't talk about it much. Neither did the lawyer for Anderson. Justice Jackson brought it up once at the end of Trump's arguments, but no more than 30 seconds was spent on that issue. And same goes for due

process, actually. Justice Barrett mentioned the issue of due process very briefly, as did Justice Kavanaugh, and I'll touch on that in a minute. But the arguments really focused on, one, whether the states have the power to exclude a federal candidate from their ballot, two, whether Section 3 applies to the president, and three, whether Section 3 is self-executing. With that said, Trump's lawyer was the first to present arguments, and he did face a fair amount of pushback from the justices, not as much pushback as the attorney for Anderson did, but he definitely, you know, faced some. And I will say this too, with Supreme Court oral arguments, these parties have already

submitted their arguments, they've already submitted their briefs, so oral arguments are really for the justices to ask questions. Justice Thomas was the first to kind of start the questions. He started by asking whether Section 3 is self-executing. Trump's attorney acknowledged that the 14th Amendment largely is self-executing all the other sections within the amendment, but that Section 3 is different because it specifically provides for Congress to issue a waiver with two-thirds vote. And therefore, according to Trump, you know, this implies the intent of the framers to require Congress's action. Justice Jackson inquired into the office officer argument.

Justice Sotomayor said that Trump's interpretation of who the disqualification clause applies to is a bit of a quote unquote gerrymandered rule, saying that it would really only benefit Trump and no one else. And the reason being is that one of Trump's main arguments is that the text of Section 3 applies to those who have previously taken an oath to support the Constitution as either a member of Congress or as an officer of the United States. So yes, President Trump took an oath to support the Constitution when he was sworn in as president. But according to Trump and his lawyer, the president is neither a member of Congress nor an officer of the United States. So the presidential oath actually doesn't satisfy the text of section three. Justice Sotomayor says that this is a very unique interpretation

given that it really only benefits Trump because every other president in history, aside from President Washington, has taken an oath to support the Constitution given their president in history, aside from President Washington, has taken an oath to support the Constitution given their background in politics, right? Maybe they took an oath as a congressman or a congresswoman. So Justice Sotomayor sort of really pushed back on this. She also pushed back on Trump's lawyer's reliance on a case called Griffin. Griffin is a case that involved a defendant's challenge to a criminal conviction based on the fact that the judge in that case had fought for the Confederacy in the

past. This is a case back in the 1800s. And in that case, Chief Justice Chase ruled that the insurrection ban could not be enforced against the judge unless Congress first passed a law. So there are two problems with Griffin, according to Justice Sotomayor. One, Griffin is a circuit court case out of Virginia. Circuit court cases don't really have much effect on the Supreme Court. And two, Chief Justice Chase later, once he became Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, you know, down the road, he actually took back what he said in Griffin and ruled the opposite, that Section 3 is self-executing and it doesn't require an act of Congress. So what Justice Sotomayor said to Trump's attorney is she said, quote, let's be very clear. Griffin was not a presidential Supreme Court decision.

It was a circuit court decision by a justice who, when he became a justice, assumed that an individual would be ineligible to hold any office, particularly the presidency, and treated Section 3 as executing itself. So she said, so you're relying on a non-presidential circuit court case by a justice who later takes back what he said, end quote. Then they got a little bit into the term limits case. So the term limits case is also known as Thornton. This was a case out of the Supreme Court that said states cannot impose their own qualifications for prospective members of Congress, which are stricter than those qualifications set forth in the Constitution. And what that holding read specifically, I want

to read you the exact quote. It said, allowing individual states to craft their own congressional qualifications would erode the structure designed by the framers to form a more perfect union, end quote. So Trump's side relies on this case in arguing that a state cannot impose their own qualifications as to who can appear on the ballot. Justice Sotomayor again pushed back on this a little bit, saying that there are states that have denied candidates a place on the ballot because maybe they're underage or because they're, you know, not a United States citizen. So what's the difference here? And what Trump's attorney argued is that those qualifications are categorically set forth in the Constitution, whereas insurrection is not. So insurrection is different than the actual

qualifications in the Constitution, such as age and citizenship and those things. Justice Jackson, at the end of Trump's arguments, did bring up insurrection, and she just asked whether Trump's actions constituted an insurrection, to which Trump's attorney responded that January 6th was a riot, not an insurrection. The only other time that insurrection was brought up was when Justice Kavanaugh asked Anderson's attorney why Trump should be removed when he hasn't been convicted of inciting an insurrection. So Kavanaugh said, look, we have this federal statute for insurrection, but Trump hasn't yet been charged with it despite facing all of these other charges from special counsel Jack Smith related to the election. So, you know, what's your argument here? And the attorney for Anderson responded that the federal insurrection statute was enacted prior to

the 14th amendment being adopted. Therefore, the clause would have specifically stated the requirement for conviction if it was intended to be a requirement. So that's how Anderson's side answered that. And speaking of Anderson's side, let's just jump into Anderson's arguments. When it came time for Anderson's position, the justices pushed back a little harder than they did with Trump's arguments, and not just the conservative justices either. Justice Kagan and Justice Jackson each expressed some concerns of their own. Justice Sotomayor too, but not nearly as much. Some of those concerns that were raised included the idea that if you allow a state to determine who can be on their ballot, then that state actually isn't only depriving its own voters

of the right to vote, but also the voters of the entire country. Justice Kavanaugh said that this position has the effect of, quote, disenfranchising voters to a significant degree, end quote. Chief Justice Roberts added to that concern, saying he predicts that if the court were to rule as Anderson wants them to and give that power to the states, some states would remove certain candidates solely because of their political affiliation. Roberts said, quote, it'll come down to just a handful of states that are going to decide the presidential election, and that's a pretty daunting consequence, end quote. Justice Jackson expressed concern that section three didn't include the word president, even though it specifically lists some other officials that would be covered, like, you know, senators, representatives, electors of the president, and even the vice president. Chief Justice Roberts, he kind of gave this broad view of the 14th Amendment. He said, if we look at the 14th Amendment from 30,000 feet up,

the broad purpose of it was to restrict the power of the states and augment the power of Congress. So why would the argument be that under Section 3 of the 14th Amendment, the states have the power to remove someone, especially a federal official, from their state ballot. He didn't really think that that aligned with the intent behind the 14th Amendment. Anderson's attorney responded to this by saying that nothing in the 14th Amendment specifically removed the state's power to choose their state electors as set forth in Article 2. So while the 14th Amendment may have limited some powers of the states, it didn't limit their power when it comes to elections. But again, the justices were really

focused on state candidates versus federal candidates, right? There wasn't really a debate as to whether a state could disqualify their own state candidates, but federal candidates, they said, are a different story because federal candidates affect the nation as a whole, whereas state candidates only affect that one state that's making the decision. Justice Kagan also chimed in on this concern. She said the 14th Amendment sounds very federal in nature and that it seems odd that states would have the power to determine eligibility of federal candidates. Justice Barrett also joined in on this idea, saying it does not seem like a state call.

Justice Gorsuch, at one point, he really honed in on the textual argument of Section 3, which is that Section 3 bars an individual from holding office, right? That's the specific language used, not necessarily running for office or being elected to office. Gorsuch also asked about the difference between office and officer. He brought up the incompatibility clause, which says that no senator or representative shall be appointed to any civil office under the United States while serving their term in Congress. And at the same time, the Constitution also refers to the President Pro Tem and the Speaker of the House as officers. So he says this is a good example of a situation where

you may have an officer of the United States under the Constitution that doesn't hold an office, also as per the Constitution. So Anderson's lawyer responded to this, that the meaning of an officer holds the same meaning that it did in the 1870s, which is that a person who holds an office is an officer, and that certain provisions of the Constitution might refer to a narrower class of officers, but that doesn't necessarily imply that those not included aren't officers as well. Justice Kavanaugh also brought up the dissent in the Colorado Supreme Court case, which expressed some concern about due process. So this is that little tidbit of due process that was talked about. Kavanaugh said that it's concerning that the dissent took issue, not necessarily with the baseline conclusion of the case, but just that

due process wasn't afforded here. And the lawyer for Anderson said that the dissent position just wasn't correct. He said Trump had the opportunity to testify, to call witnesses, to cross-examine the opposing witnesses, that Trump didn't use all of his time at trial. So his position was that Trump did have due process. So all in all, the justices definitely seemed to have more concerns with Anderson's arguments. And if I had to guess, because you guys always ask this, based on my knowledge of the laws and the current bench, I do think this will go in Trump's favor. And truthfully, I don't think it'll be as narrow of a decision as some might think. Typically, when we have these controversial decisions, we see a five to four ruling. It's usually pretty close, but I really don't think this decision will end up being that

close just based on how the justices were questioning and how they were voicing their concerns. Now, keep in mind, this ruling could take shape in a variety of ways. The court likely won't address the issue of insurrection, or at least whether Trump's actions rose to that level. The court likely won't address the conviction requirement, in their opinion. And the court will likely spend little time on the due process element of the case. I could actually see the due process element being included in a concurrence or a dissent, but not necessarily in the majority opinion. The decision will most likely focus on the main

issues that were discussed during oral arguments. Is section three self-executing? Does it apply to the presidency? And do the states have the power to determine who can appear on the ballot? So, you know, we don't know when that decision will come out, but given the expedited process here, it may even be in the next few weeks. Let's now move on to Congress, because Congress has had quite an exciting week this week. On Tuesday, the House failed to pass an impeachment vote against DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas. He was facing two articles of impeachment for his handling of the southern border. We touched on this in the January 30th episode.

One of the articles was for willful and systemic refusal to comply with the law, meaning that he was not enforcing various provisions of the Immigration and Nationality Act. He was releasing migrants who should have been detained. And then the second article was breach of public trust. That article stemmed from allegations of false statements to Congress, such as the border being secure, the border being closed, things of that nature. The resolution ended up passing the House committee last Tuesday, which was the first sort of procedural hurdle. And then it went to the full House for a vote, where it needed a simple majority to pass. Going into the vote, Republicans knew that there were two no votes from their side. And obviously we know there's pretty narrow margins in the House,

so they would have needed all the votes they could get. But then a third Republican lawmaker voted against the impeachment as well. This brought the vote to 215 to 215. The reason that the final vote ended up being 216 to 214 is because a fourth Republican actually switched his vote to no at the last minute. And this caused some confusion, but I'll explain why he did it. So the reason that he did it is because if you had a tie, 215 to 215, the resolution would have failed. By rule, in a tie, the measure fails. And when it fails, it's done. But what will sometimes happen is a member of the majority

leadership team, usually the majority leader, which is Steve Scalise, but he's undergoing cancer treatment, will offer what's called a motion to reconsider. That way, rather than the measure failing and never being heard again, the side that wants another stab at it will have the bill reconsidered at a later date whenever they decide to do so. But in order to offer this motion to reconsider, you have to vote with the prevailing side. So that's why Representative Blake Moore ended up switching his vote from yes to no. When it became known and clear that the bill was going to fail, he voted with the prevailing side in order to put forth this motion to reconsider. Now, in this case, Steve Scalise wasn't present. The Republicans needed his vote. And because

Steve Scalise wasn't there to offer this motion to reconsider, Representative Blake Moore did it instead. So Moore is the vice chair of the House Republican Conference, and he is the one who switched his vote. So now, despite the resolution failing, Republicans will have the opportunity to reintroduce that resolution at a time when perhaps Steve Scalise is back, they have all of the Republican votes necessary. So that was on Tuesday. Then on Wednesday, the Senate failed to get the foreign aid border bill past the procedural vote. And we've discussed this before, but basically basically the Senate has this funny rule. It's called the cloture rule where 60 senators need to agree to send the bill

to a vote. So it's a vote before a vote. If the Senate can't get those 60 senators, the bill doesn't even make it to the Senate floor for a vote. So that's the procedural vote, that cloture rule. That's the vote that took place on Wednesday. The vote ended up being 49 to 50, which obviously doesn't rise to that 60 threshold, and so that bill is now dead. The same day, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said he would be forcing a procedural vote on a separate emergency aid package, which basically included the foreign aid aspect of it, but not the border provisions. It was essentially a stripped down version of the bill that had just

failed. Democratic Senator Patty Murray, the chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, she said, quote, if our Republican colleagues won't even debate bipartisan border policy, then we must proceed with the rest of the supplemental package and get aid to our allies end quote. So the senators debated until late in the night on Wednesday to see if they could ultimately agree to open up the debate on the bill. One of the issues during that debate on Wednesday night was that some GOP senators wanted an agreement that would allow amendments to be added, so border amendments as well as other amendments, to this package, whereas other GOP senators didn't necessarily want amendments added. Senator Mike Rounds, who is a Republican senator from South Dakota, said Republicans discussed trying to add border amendments to the new deal, quote,

but clearly on our side of the aisle, there's a lot of people that feel that the former president's comments mean that he really didn't want to see something like that at this time. And that's held a huge amount of weight on our side, end quote. And that's, of course, referring to these comments made by Trump in recent days that, you know, a bipartisan border bill, border or foreign aid bill, would be considered a win for the Biden administration. And that's, of course, one of the issues that Trump is running on. So ultimately on Thursday, the Senate ended up having enough votes to get this foreign aid package past that 60 vote threshold, which means it's now open to consideration on the floor. The vote was 67 to 32. There's still a lot to be done on the Senate

side of things. Just because it passed this vote doesn't mean it'll pass the Senate. One of the main issues that they have to figure out is whether to allow these amendments from those senators that want them. Then if there are amendments, those amendments would have to be voted on. And if, you know, let's hypothetically a significant number of them get get passed, then that could alter the chances of final passage, right? Because then it kind of becomes sort of a different package than it was originally. The senators are planning to take a two-week recess starting this weekend, but that's sort of up in the air now because some senators are saying that they just want to get this done and they just may stick it out, you know, and

finish this. That is your update out of Congress. Now let's discuss the new classified documents report from Special Counsel Herr. Special Counsel Herr, the attorney assigned to the investigation into the classified documents found in President Biden's possession, released his findings in a 345-page report on Thursday. The most notable conclusion being that President Biden will not face charges for his possession. So to refresh your memory a little bit, these were the classified documents that were found in Biden's home in Delaware and his garage office and basement. This was back in December of 2022 and January of 2023. This was months after Donald Trump was indicted for the classified

documents found at Mar-a-Lago. A couple of things to note at the outset. Number one, the documents found at Biden's house included documents about military and foreign aid policy in Afghanistan, as well as notebooks that Biden had written in about, quote unquote, issues of national security, as well as foreign policy implicating sensitive intelligence sources and methods. The report starts by saying, quote, We conclude that no criminal charges are warranted in this matter. We would reach the same conclusion even if DOJ policy did not foreclose criminal charges against a sitting president. Our investigation uncovered evidence that President Biden willfully retained

and disclosed classified materials after his vice presidency when he was a private citizen. However, for the reasons summarized below, we conclude that the evidence does not establish Mr. Biden's guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. Prosecution is also unwarranted based on our consideration of aggravating and mitigating factors set forth in the DOJ's principles of federal prosecution. End quote. remember that with a criminal prosecution, the prosecution in this case, the federal government, would have to prove that Biden willfully retained these documents beyond a reasonable doubt. In other words, the DOJ would have to prove to a jury that President Biden, beyond a reasonable doubt, that's the burden of proof, had the intent to break the law in retaining these documents. And so what the DOJ is saying is

that they don't believe that they would be able to do that. Why? Well, for one, Biden originally found these documents back in 2017. He was writing his memoir at the time. He had a ghostwriter and he told the ghostwriter that he found the classified documents. At the time, he was a private citizen, right? Because his vice presidency had ended and he had not yet been reelected because he didn't get reelected until 2021. So that is, well, 2020, but didn't take office until 2021. So that's the time frame that the DOJ would have to prove willfulness between 2017 and 2021 when he was reelected.

But the DOJ says that there's a good chance that the jury would have reasonable doubt in that Biden could have forgotten about the documents soon after he found them because the documents didn't necessarily come up in conversation again with the ghostwriter after that one time he said he found them. Also, the documents were found, as the report says on page 208, quote, in a badly damaged box in the garage near a collapsed dog crate, a dog bed, Zappos box, an empty bucket, a broken lamp wrapped with duct tape, potting soil, and synthetic firewood, end quote. So the report says that this could convince jurors that he made an

innocent mistake, you know, he misplaced them rather than acting willfully, which is of course what they would have to prove. On top of that, the DOJ says that the jury might hesitate to put too much evidentiary weight on a, quote, single eight-word utterance to his ghostwriter, end quote. And that's given his limited precision and recall during both his interviews with the DOJ as well as with the ghostwriter. So page 208 goes into more detail about his limited precision. And what the report says is this. In his interview with our office, Mr. Biden's memory was worse. And when they say it was worse, they're referring to previous interviews he had done with the ghostwriter where they said his memory was bad.

But then when he later interviewed with them, obviously more recently, when for this investigation, his memory had gotten worse. It says, quote, he did not remember when he was vice president, forgetting on the first day of the interview when his term ended. He said, quote, if it was 2013, when did I stop being vice president? Question mark, end quote. The report says he also forgot on the second day of the interview when his term began. He said, quote, in 2009, am I still vice president? Question mark, end quote. The report says he did not remember even within several years when his son Beau died, and his memory appeared hazy when describing the Afghanistan debate that was once

so important to him. Among other things, he mistakenly said he had a real difference of opinion with General Carl Eikenberry, when in fact Eikenberry was an ally whom Mr. Biden cited approvingly in his Thanksgiving memo to President Obama. The report goes on to say, in a case where the government must prove that Mr. Biden knew he had possession of the classified Afghanistan documents after the vice presidency and chose to keep those documents, knowing he was violating the law, we expect that at trial, his attorneys would emphasize these limitations in his recall. The report also says, quote, we have considered that at trial, Mr. Biden would likely present himself to a jury as he did

during our interview of him as a sympathetic, well-meaning elderly man with a poor memory. Based on our direct interactions with and observations of him, he is someone for whom many jurors will want to identify reasonable doubt. It would be difficult to convince a jury that they should convict him. By then, a former president well into his 80s, I guess this report is assuming he won't be re-elected, of a serious felony that requires a mental state of willfulness. The report also addresses the differences between Biden's handling of classified documents and Trump's handling of classified documents, and it says this. Historically,

after leaving office, many former presidents and vice presidents have knowingly taken home sensitive materials related to national security from their administrations without being charged with crimes. This historical record is important context for judging whether and why to charge a former vice president and former president as Mr. Biden would be when susceptible to prosecution for similar actions taken by several of his predecessors. With one exception, there is no record of the Department of Justice prosecuting a former president or vice president for mishandling classified documents from his own administration. The exception is former President Trump.

It is not our role to assess the criminal charges pending against Mr. Trump, but several material distinctions between Mr. Trump's case and Mr. Biden's are clear. Most notably, after being given multiple chances to return classified documents and avoid prosecution, Mr. Trump allegedly did the opposite. According to the indictment, he not only refused to return the documents for many months, but he also obstructed justice by enlisting others to destroy evidence and then lie about it. In contrast, Mr. Biden turned in classified documents to the National Archives and the Justice Department, consented to the search of multiple locations, including his homes,

sat for a voluntary interview, and in other ways cooperated with the investigation. So that is what it says about that. And as a final note, the report also mentions potential charges against Biden's ghostwriter for his work with President Biden. Ultimately, again again they decided not to press charges but this is what it says the report says after learning of the special counsel's appointment in this matter mr biden's ghostwriter deleted audio recordings he had created of his discussions with mr biden during the writing of mr biden's 2017 memoir the recordings had significant evidentiary value. After telling the special counsel's office what he had done, the ghostwriter turned over his computer and external hard drive and consented to their search. Based on the FBI's analysis, it appears the FBI recovered all deleted

audio files relating to the memoir, though portions of a few of the files appear to be missing, which is possible when forensic tools are used to recover deleted files. The ghostwriter kept and did not delete or attempt to delete his near-verbatim transcripts of the recordings and produce those transcripts to us, including for each of the incomplete recovered files. We considered whether to charge the ghostwriter with obstruction of justice, but we believe the evidence would be insufficient to obtain a conviction and therefore declined to prosecute him. While the ghostwriter admitted that he deleted the recordings after he learned of the special counsel's investigation, the evidence falls short of proving beyond a reasonable doubt that he intended to impede

an investigation, which is the intent required by law. In his interviews, the ghostwriter offered plausible, innocent reasons for why he deleted the recordings. He also preserved his transcripts that contained some of the most incriminating information against Mr. Biden, including his statement about finding all of the classified stuff downstairs in 2017, which is inconsistent with an intent to impede an investigation by destroying evidence. And then it finishes by just saying, for these reasons, we believe that the admissible evidence would not suffice to obtain a conviction of the ghostwriter for obstruction of justice. So basically, and look, obviously this report is 345 pages. There

is a ton in there, but to sum it up, one, DOJ policy prohibits prosecuting a sitting president, and two, even if he were able to be prosecuted, the DOJ doesn't think they'll get a conviction based on the various elements at play here, including not enough evidence of willfulness to surpass the burden of proof and the fact that Biden would be a defendant that the jury would sympathize with because of his age and mental fitness. Now, I do have this report linked for you, of course, in the sources section, so if you are interested, it is there for you. There's also this executive summary, which is about 10 pages.

That might be a quicker read, but it's all there for you. Following the release, President Biden addressed the nation, saying that he was pleased with the conclusion that charges wouldn't be brought and that he was pleased with the distinctions made in the report between his handling of classified documents and Trump's handling of classified documents. However, President Biden also had some things to say that rebutted some of the allegations in the report. Specifically, he said any headlines about willful retention are wrong and that the report specifically says he did not willfully retain the documents. I do just want to clear up any confusion there.

What the report says is, quote, Our investigation uncovered evidence that President Biden willfully retained and disclosed classified materials after his vice presidency when he was a private citizen. However, for the reasons summarized below, we conclude that the evidence does not establish Mr. Biden's guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. End quote. In other words, there is evidence of willful retention, but not enough evidence to satisfy the burden of proof from a legal standpoint. President Biden also addressed the remarks about him not remembering when his son Beau died. He said, quote, how in the hell dare he raise that? Frankly,

when I was asked the question, I thought to myself, it wasn't any of their damn business, end quote. He got choked up talking about the rosary he wears on his wrist symbolizing his son, and he says he doesn't need anyone reminding him of that. He said at the time he was interviewed, he not only sat for a five-hour period answering questions, but was also dealing with the Israel-Gaza crisis at the same time. When it was time for questions, a reporter asked him, quote, how bad is your memory, end quote. He responded, my memory is so bad, I let you speak. Another reporter asked if he feels his memory has gotten worse.

He said my memory is fine. It hasn't gotten worse. Look at the things I've done. A third reporter asked, Mr. President, you told me back in December that there are plenty of Democrats that could beat Donald Trump. Why does it have to be you now when voters have expressed concerns about your age? His response was that he's the most qualified person in the country to be president of the United States and finish the job that he started. That takes us into quick hitters. Number one, Nevada held its Republican and Democratic primary on Tuesday and its Republican caucuses on Thursday. Why? Well, first, let's differentiate between the two, mainly that caucuses are put on by the respective parties, whereas primaries are hosted by state governments.

Most states have either or, right? Nevada has both, though, when it comes to the Republican Party, at least. The Republicans have the caucus and then they have the primary, whereas the Democrats just do the primary. And this is because in 2021, the state passed a law that mandated primaries in the state. Democrats made the switch, the full switch to primaries, whereas Republicans wanted to keep both. So now how it works, it's a little bit odd. Candidates can only compete in one. So the GOP candidates can only compete in one or the other, and only the caucuses count when it comes to awarding delegates. So the primary is really just symbolic of anything, it doesn't count for anything. Knowing that, Donald Trump competed in the caucus, whereas

Nikki Haley competed in the primary. So obviously that begs the question, why would Nikki Haley opt for the primary and not the caucus if the primary doesn't count for delegates? And the answer lies in the fact that Nikki Haley considers the caucus bought and paid for. She has said that herself. She said that as early as this week. But one of her campaign spokespersons told CNN, quote, even Donald Trump knows when you play penny slots, the House wins. We didn't bother to play a game rigged for Trump. We're full steam ahead in South Carolina and beyond. End quote. So let's talk for a second about the primary results, because at this moment, the caucus

results are not in yet. Time change and everything like that. Nikki Haley was the only candidate on the primary ballot. The other option that was listed on the ballot was none of these candidates. So 31% of the voters voted for Haley, 63% of the voters voted for none of these candidates. Despite Haley's loss on Tuesday, she does say that she will continue on in the race. She said Wednesday, quote, just know I'm not going anywhere. I'm in this for the long haul and this is going to be messy and this is going to hurt and it's going to leave some bruises. So for now, it's, you know, it's still Trump and

Haley. We may see that change following the South Carolina primary. She has always said she's going to stick it out at least till then, despite being down. But the South Carolina primary is on the 24th of this month. The Democrats obviously already did their South Carolina primary, but we'll see what happens out of, you know, after that. Now for a little update out of Israel and Gaza. Prime Minister Netanyahu of Israel not so explicitly rejected Hamas's counteroffer to a ceasefire proposal on Wednesday. Netanyahu called Hamas delusional, and he vowed to press ahead in the war until absolute victory. So let's run through what was included in Israel's original offer, Hamas's counteroffer, and then why that counteroffer was seemingly rejected. The original offer, which was negotiated by Israel, Egypt, Qatar, and the United States, it presented Hamas with this three-phase proposal, and this was about a week and a half ago.

The first phase consisted of the release of women, children, and elderly hostages, as well as the resumption of food and medicine deliveries to Gaza. From there, the second phase would involve the release of female Israeli soldiers, male military recruits, an increase in the humanitarian aid to Gaza, and the restoration of utility services to Gaza. Finally, the third stage would include the release of the bodies of the dead Israeli troops in exchange for the release of some Palestinian prisoners. So that's one of the main differences we'll see. The Palestinian prisoners don't get released until phase three in the original proposal. The counteroffer looks a bit different. So Hamas officials got this proposal, they reviewed it,

and then they countered with a proposal of their own. The plan that they set forth again included three phases. It was set to unfold over the course of four and a half months, so each phase would last about 45 days. Phase one included the release of all Israeli women, children under the age of 19, and the elderly and sick captives. In exchange, Israel would release all female, children, sick, and elderly Palestinian prisoners. So again, that was one of the main differences there. Phase one also included, this is in the counteroffer, included the withdrawal of Israeli forces from populated areas of Gaza, the cessation of all forms of air activity over Gaza, an increased flow of food and aid into Gaza,

permission for the UN to set up tent encampments, resumption of all humanitarian services offered by the UN and its agencies, which includes the UNRWA, an end to Israel's violence against al-Aqsa Mosque, and a return to the mosque's pre-2002 security status. So that's all phase one. Phase two included the release of the remaining Israeli male hostages and the continuation of the humanitarian measures from phase one. And phase three included the exchange of the remains of the captives who have died and the continuation of the humanitarian measures from phase one and two. Now, as I said before, the plan was rejected sort of in an indirect but direct way. What I mean by that is Netanyahu didn't come out and say no, but he did speak at a news conference after he received this counteroffer and said that the negotiations with Hamas just weren't going anywhere.

And he described the proposal terms as bizarre, again called Hamas delusional, and said, quote, There is no other solution but a complete and final victory. If Hamas will survive in Gaza, it's only a question of time until the next massacre. End quote. United States Secretary of State Antony Blinken, he has played a big role in the negotiations. He said that Hamas's counteroffer, quote, creates space for an agreement to be reached, end quote, though he did also say that the counteroffer contained some clear non-starters. So from here, the negotiations

will continue, and who knows what will happen. The third and final quick hitter is about Tucker Carlson's interview with Vladimir Putin. Tucker Carlson released this interview on Thursday night at 6 p.m. Eastern time. And prior to the interview's release, he posted a video to X. This was on Tuesday that he posted the video, and he explained why he was, why he chose to conduct this interview after debating whether he should do it for months. And what he said is, one, this is our job as a journalist. It's my job to inform people. And then he also said that despite the war going on for two years and this war reshaping the global military and trade alliance

and having significant effects on on a lot of aspects of the world most english-speaking people aren't informed nearly to the extent that they should be and and he said it's because of the media the media only feeds us certain things they tell lies he explained that america has been fed government propaganda through countless interviews of Ukrainian President Zelensky, but he said not once has a journalist bothered to interview the president on the other side. He said, quote, Americans have a right to know about a war that they are implicated in, and we have the right to tell them about it because we are Americans too.

We are not here because we love Vladimir Putin. We are here because we love the United States. We want it to remain prosperous and free, end quote. A couple of things just to note, one, Carlson also requested to interview Zelensky, but according to him, that request had not been granted, at least as of the time, you know, I'm recording this episode. And two, as far as Carlson's claim that a single West, uh, not one single Western journalist has tried to interview Putin in, in years, the Kremlin press secretary told the BBC that that claim is not correct. He said that they receive lots of requests for interviews. They just don't always do that. Now, because I only have so many hours in the day, I did not have the chance

to watch the entire two-hour interview when it released at 6 p.m., but I did watch a little bit of it, and I can tell you a few things that I know. For the first 30 minutes or so of the interview, Putin explained why Russia invaded Ukraine and a history lesson, so to speak. He said that Russia has a historic claim to western parts of Ukraine. And in his eyes, the war is to regain territory that was once theirs. Tucker asked Putin, and by the way, I'm just going to call him Tucker. I had someone one time tell me that they don't like when I refer to people by their first name because it, I don't know, takes away from the reporting. But that just feels right.

So Tucker asked Putin if he'd be willing to release Evan Gershkovitz, the 32-year-old reporter that's been being held captive in a Russian prison for almost a year. And Putin said that he feels as if he's done too many favors. And those favors haven't been reciprocated. So he's basically done doing gestures of goodwill out of decency. He did say that he's willing to resolve the issue, quote unquote, but that there are certain terms that must be agreed to. Tucker said, I hope you let him out, to which Putin responded,

I also want him back in his homeland. I am sincere. Tucker brought up Chuck Schumer's recent statement about the need to continue funding Ukraine, where Schumer said that we need to continue funding Ukraine, otherwise American troops are going to end up fighting in Ukraine. And Putin said that that is a provocation. He said, why would America do that? He said, don't you have anything better to do? You have issues with the border, issues with immigration, issues with the national debt, more than $33 trillion. You have nothing better to do, so you should fight in Ukraine. Wouldn't it be better to negotiate with Russia and come to an agreement? End quote. Tucker then

asked who blew up the Nord Stream pipeline. Putin said, you for sure. Tucker laughed, said he was busy that day. And Putin said, you personally have an alibi, but the CIA has no such alibi. He said, you have to look at who's interested and who has the capability. Those two things will tell you who did it. And in his eyes, it was the CIA. If you want to watch the interview, you know the drill. It's linked in the sources section, jordanismylawyer.com, or just click on the sources section in this podcast episode description. That is there for you. Let's move on to one-liners. Democratic presidential nominee

Marianne Williamson suspended her presidential campaign following her loss in the Nevada primary on Tuesday. Five U.S. Marines were confirmed dead by the Marine Corps on Thursday morning after their plane crashed in the mountains near San Diego two days earlier. A preliminary investigative report released by the National Transportation Safety Board found that four key bolts were missing from the door plug that blew off the Alaska Airlines flight last month. A judge denied former Trump advisor Peter Navarro's request to remain out of jail while he appeals his case. And on Thursday, the FCC unanimously outlawed robocalls that contain voices generated by AI. Finally, here we are. Not everything is

bad. It's Friday. I would like to remind you that not everything is bad. We do have some good news happening in the world. And I even have two for you today. They're short, but two is better than one. The first one, a 12 year old child who went missing in Massachusetts was found with the help of a police canine named Biza. The canine tracked the child sent for more than two miles and led the police to an area where they found evidence that the girl had passed through that spot not long before. More officers then honed in on the area and found the child a short time later, and she was reunited with her mom. So all thanks to Beza, the canine. And the second one is actually another dog-related story.

The United States Coast Guard rescued a dog who had been trapped inside of a shipping container for at least a week in the port of Houston. The inspection team was randomly selecting shipping containers to search when they heard barking and scratching from one of the containers that was stacked on top of another. They lowered the container, and when they opened the door, they found, quote, a very happy dog, end quote. The Coast Guard said Connie, the container dog, which is what they nicknamed her, was trapped for at least a week, was tired, hungry, and very happy to see her rescuers. The shipping container was full of totaled cars, so they think Connie got stuck in a car in a junkyard and was accidentally hauled off to the port. But they saved her. And the last I checked, Connie was awaiting adoption. But who knows?

Maybe the story keeps getting better and she was adopted. So that's what I have for you today. Thank you so much for being here. I hope you enjoyed this extra long, extra informative episode. Have a fantastic weekend. Enjoy the Super Bowl. Enjoy whatever the weekend has in store for you. And I will talk to you on Tuesday.