Trump Leaving Office Poll (Part 2)

[Thad]

$150M judgment against Rudy in the defamation case. He's vowing to appeal.

He certainly doesn't have that much money, and he has plenty of other creditors. It's unclear whether Freeman and Moss will ever see that money, but I'd sure like to see them take him for everything he's worth -- which is still at least millions in assets.

[Mongrel]

$150M judgment against Rudy in the defamation case. He's vowing to appeal.

He certainly doesn't have that much money, and he has plenty of other creditors. It's unclear whether Freeman and Moss will ever see that money, but I'd sure like to see them take him for everything he's worth -- which is still at least millions in assets.

They just filed a new suit against him because nearly the first thing he did was continue to defame them.

THAT'S A BOLD MOVE COTTON

[Thad]

That was before the judgement. He was out there defaming them outside the courthouse while the damages phase was still in progress, and the judge told his lawyer straight-up that he'd just given the plaintiffs grounds for another defamation claim.

His lawyer responded that he can't control what his client does outside the courtroom.

Also notable: the lawyer told the jury that a $50 million verdict would ruin him. The jury tripled it.

[Mongrel]

Also notable: the lawyer told the jury that a $50 million verdict would ruin him. The jury tripled it.

Ahahahahaha

Bury Rudy alive.

[Crick]

Colorado disqualifies Trump from their 2024 ballot.

I assume it'll be appealed all to hell. Seems they may be eying a Supreme Court ruling-- they cite precedent set by Gorsuch.

I'd like to think the idea of being seen as hypocrites would keep the US Supreme Court from doing the very obvious thing of overturning this, but I don't have a ton of faith. Could be wrong, though!

[Thad]

I haven't had time to read the 200-page opinion or even any analysis of it yet, so it's possible there's something in there that will change my mind.

But my immediate reaction goes something like this:

Of course Trump committed insurrection.

But he hasn't been convicted of insurrection. He hasn't even been charged with it.

It's a very bad idea to leave the question of whether a candidate is or isn't ballot-eligible based on the insurrection clause up to the states.

At least in this instance a court was involved, and made an affirmative decision that Trump committed insurrection. That's good! That's way better than if, say, a state legislature had made the decision to keep him off the ballot, absent any decisions from the judicial branch.

I think that addresses my brobdingnagiest concern, really. I still think we probably shouldn't leave presidential ballot access up to the states, but while I find it very easy to see a scenario where Republican state legislatures just declare a Democratic candidate to be an insurrectionist for no reason, I find it considerably less likely that courts would do so. Lord knows there are some terrible courts and terrible judges, but for the most part I doubt even the most conservative judges would, say, declare Biden an ineligible insurrectionist. This may really be something that's just about Trump and whatever precedent it sets never ends up applying to anybody else.

I think SCOTUS will probably reverse this, and I think legally that's probably correct. I think declaring a candidate guilty of insurrection should probably require a criminal conviction for insurrection. But a civil verdict is at least some form of due process, and so even if this decision were hypothetically upheld I don't think it sets the kind of bad precedent I was most worried about.

[Crick]

Yeah, that's all very fair.

[nosimpleway]

I while I find it very easy to see a scenario where Republican state legislatures just declare a Democratic candidate to be an insurrectionist for no reason

Surprising absolufuckinglutely no one...

[Thad]

Kari Lake is up next on defamation watch.

Well...I don't know about next. A lot of brobdingnagian Liars are getting sued for defamation; there may be some in line ahead of her.

[Mongrel]

I haven't had time to read the 200-page opinion or even any analysis of it yet, so it's possible there's something in there that will change my mind.

But my immediate reaction goes something like this: [stuff]

This seems correct to me, but also there's the issue that Trump is genuinely popular in many places, and removing him from the ballot smells too much like fear. It sends the message that people do not believe Trump can be stopped in a general election. Which may or may not be true, but fundamentally affects the perceived fairness of the elections and reinforces the "we wuz robbed" bullshit which is still being dealt with today. It's an invitation to violence and a re-match, the sort of campaign fought not with votes, but bullets. I don't know who has or hasn't seen this yet, but in the past week or two many of Trump's GOP acolytes have begun openly calling for full-on dictatorship, under the label "Red Caesarism".

Now if Trump is actually criminally convicted of insurrection, that's a different story. I don't think that changes the minds of most MAGAchuds, but it'll sway a few, perhaps just enough to let the matter lie with only a minimum of violence. I do believe that any Trump loss will bring a new wave of violence, it's a matter of minimizing it as much as possible.

So a SCOTUS ruling that knocks down the Colorado ruling but one which also which implicitly confirms that an actual conviction (which could still come for Trump) would have made the lower court ruling valid is probably the best outcome here, yes.

[Thad]

Rudy files for chapter 11.

I'd say it didn't work for Alex Jones, but that's reductive considering he's subsequently settled with his victims for pennies on the dollar and they still haven't been paid.

[Thad]

Jan. 6 rioter nabbed in Bumble dating app sting pleads guilty to assaulting officers

The woman referred to as "Witness 1” in Taake's FBI affidavit has previously recalled how "comically minimal ego-stroking" from her led Trump supporters to give her information about their activities on Jan. 6.

“I felt a bit of ‘civic duty,’ I guess, but truthfully, I was mostly just mad and thinking, f--- these guys,” she said, speaking anonymously for fear of online reprisal.

Her strategy, she said, was to say, "Wow, crazy, tell me more,” on repeat until guys gave her enough to send their information to the FBI.

[Thad]

Okay, so.

Trump's claiming absolute immunity in the January 6 case -- basically the argument is that he can't be criminally prosecuted for anything he did while he was president. It's an absurd claim, there's no way the courts uphold it (even his own SCOTUS appointees have rejected similar arguments he's made in the past), but his goal as always is to stall.

Smith countered the attempt to stall by more-or-less queue-jumping and trying to skip the appellate court and go straight to SCOTUS.

Today SCOTUS denied that request and told him he has to go through the court of appeals first.

Now, that could be bad. It could mean Trump gets what he wanted, which is to delay as much as possible.

But.

There's another possibility: the appellate court rules, Trump tries to appeal to the SCOTUS, and SCOTUS says no and lets the appellate court's ruling stand.

Mueller, She Wrote thinks that's what's happening. I'm not entirely convinced; there's definitely some tea-leaf reading going on. But I think they make some good points.

Three things are true:

1. SCOTUS has rejected Trump's immunity claims in the past;
2. SCOTUS has rejected Trump's appeals in the past;
3. There's not going to be a circuit split on this one, so SCOTUS isn't obligated to take Trump's appeal.

Those don't necessarily imply that they're going to reject his appeal and let the appellate court's order stand (whenever it comes -- possibly within the next month), but they imply it's a realistic possibility.

I think SCOTUS taking the appeal and allowing Trump to waste more time is possible too. And I think that's the best-case scenario for him, realistically; again, I don't think even this SCOTUS is going to buy the argument that a president can just do crimes in office and never be prosecuted for them.

[Crick]

I wonder too if his strategy this coming year is going to be "you can't convict me, I'm the front runner for the primary" then "you can't convict me, I'm the Republican candidate" in effort to make people talk about THAT rather than what's going on.

I suppose it doesn't matter in a court system, but I don't know.

[Mongrel]

Trump's lawyers' argument to SCOTUS for overturning the ballot bans is... holy shit

[Thad]

Trump's lawyers' argument to SCOTUS for overturning the ballot bans is... holy shit

That kind of hairsplitting over verbiage isn't that unusual in litigation, but the silliest thing is that that exact argument's already been tried before and dismissed. In a ruling by Gorsuch. That the Colorado Supreme Court cited in its decision.

I still think SCOTUS will ultimately decide in Trump's favor in the ballot access suits. But it won't be on this argument.

[Brantly B.]

Trump has the opportunity to prove himself history's greatest political troll if he manages to convince the courts that he's allowed to be elected President but not actually serve as President, but only if he picks a running mate who's equally ineligible.

[Cait]

I suspect the most likely SCOTUS ruling is "Come back with a conviction for insurrection"

[Upthorn]

Trump's lawyers' argument to SCOTUS for overturning the ballot bans is... holy shit

This is the same argument that they were planning to use if anybody ever tried to make waves about the emoluments clause

[Mongrel]

I know there's a million videos of Trump saying rambling nonsense but, this one's a bit too much fun not to share.