Trump Leaving Office Poll (Part 2)

[Crick]

I've seen a tweet or two that says he may in fact still be on that case, but they're tweets, so I'm going to wait to see how that all shakes out.

Seems to a growing case in any case:

https://www.axios.com/2022/09/27/doj-asks-judge-to-compel-navarro-to-return-trump-white-house-emails

[Cait]

Stuff I've been seeing is that Chris Kise is registered as a foreign agent on behalf of Venezuela, and thus might have difficulties being able to work on a case involving government secrets.

[Mongrel]

Is there even the slightest facet of this which isn't a total disaster area?

[Thad]

Stuff I've been seeing is that Chris Kise is registered as a foreign agent on behalf of Venezuela, and thus might have difficulties being able to work on a case involving government secrets.

That too, but I don't see that as something that would concern his client nearly as much as last week's various ass-whoopings.

[Thad]

Thread by Charles Star regarding today's developments/Nitter mirror



Actual text of that last screenshot, because fuck this tweet of an image of text shit:

Plaintiff’s Objections

Plaintiff makes three objections to the Amended Case Management Plan. Although the three objections are different, all are without merit.

First, contrary to Plaintiff’s objection, the verification required by Plaintiff of the Detailed Property Inventory is a condition precedent to the document categorization and privilege review. The Special Master needs to know that that he is reviewing all of the materials seized from Mar-a-Lago on August 8, 2022 – and no additional materials – before he categorizes the seized documents and adjudicates privilege claims.

Second, that the Amended Case Management Plan has six categories (ECF 112, at 3) and the Appointment Order four (ECF 91, at 1) is entirely a function of the fact that the four categories in the Appointment Order speak of “privilege” in general and do not (as the Amended Case Management Plan does) differentiate between attorney-client and Executive privilege. The Amended Case Management Plan is entirely consistent with the Appointment Order. Plaintiff’s objection has no logical basis.

Third, the Special Master’s request for briefing on a particular point of law is similarly consistent with the Appointment Order. The government will brief that point of law. It behooves Plaintiff to brief that point as well.

Plaintiff brought this civil, equitable proceeding. He bears the burden of proof. If he wants the Special Master to make recommendations as to whether he is entitled to the relief he seeks, Plaintiff will need to participate in the process by categorizing documents and providing sworn declarations as the Amended Case Management Plan contemplates.

(Source: DOJ court filing, PDF)

[Crick]

DAMN. This'll just get appealed and draw out the whole thing as things get slogged in the appeals process.

[Thad]

DAMN. This'll just get appealed and draw out the whole thing as things get slogged in the appeals process.

It's obnoxious, and another pretty clear sign that Cannon's in the tank for Trump and there's more obnoxiousness to come, but it's also not that important in the scheme of things. The DoJ has access to the classified docs and this doesn't change that, it just delays their access to the other, less-important documents they seized.

Trump continues to pursue his primary legal strategy of putting up roadblocks and delaying everything as long as possible, but I think that strategy is seeing diminished returns now that he's fighting the DoJ instead of running it. The DoJ has effectively unlimited resources; they've appealed this order but that won't slow down the review of the classified documents, which are the meat of the case. They've got the staff to do both.

[Crick]

OH, well, that's good. I've been wondering how well his strategy would work against something as massive as the DOJ versus something like, you know, a local HVAC company.

I have precious little knowledge about how a lot of this works, so forgive any dumb worries of mine.

[Thad]

It's reasonable to worry that the DOJ ultimately won't bring charges, or that Trump will delay and delay and eventually get back into office in 2025 and shut the whole thing down. Both of those are entirely possible outcomes and I don't mean to minimize them.

It's just that this specific piece of news is, ultimately, a pretty minor speed bump.

It's still concerning! Cannon's behaving in a manner that is extremely unprofessional and erratic, and it almost certainly won't be the last time! And she's got a lifetime appointment and it's extremely improbable she will ever face any real consequences! And she's just one of many unqualified judges Trump appointed!

All this stuff is pretty bad! It just doesn't have a major impact on the DOJ's investigation. Other things could still crop up later that do, up to and including the DOJ just deciding that it's not worth the political risks of indicting a former president. There are lots of ways this could still go very wrong.

But this latest order, while concerning, doesn't move the needle in a major way in itself.

[Crick]

Those are all great points.

We'll see how it goes.

[Thad]

DOJ Asks to Speed Up Appeal to End Trump’s Special Master Review, Resume Mar-a-Lago Probe ‘Without Restraints’

“I believe that the Department of Justice has had just about enough of the farce that Judge Canon has created, having read her order essentially overruling the special master’s theory on virtually every point,” opined former federal prosecutor Mitchell Epner, now a partner at Rottenberg Lipman Rich P.C. “And they have decided that rather than live through the annoyance of going through the special master proceedings, they’re going to seek to have the curtain brought down on it by the 11th Circuit long before Judge Cannon can issue her next destructive order.”

The government makes a point to note that, if the special master review is allowed to proceed, Trump’s legal team will be able to challenge any of Dearie’s determinations at every turn.

“Absent such resolution by this Court, the special master proceedings could result in prolonged litigation, including through seriatim appeals to the district court from reports and recommendations and other rulings issued by the special master,” the motion states.

No guarantees on how this is going to go, but the DoJ's arguments are good, Cannon's behavior is way out of line, and the 11th Circuit has already demonstrated once that they agree.

[Crick]

All that sounds reasonable to me, someone with which this all sounds like magic

[Thad]

Supreme Court rejects Trump request on Mar-a-Lago documents

Not much to the story as of right now; here it is in its entirety (though there's a note at the bottom it'll be updated later):

The Supreme Court on Thursday refused to reinstate Judge Aileen Cannon’s order that a special master review classified documents taken in an FBI search of Mar-a-Lago, Donald Trump’s Florida home and private club. There were no noted dissents.

The one-sentence order turned aside an emergency request from the former president to intervene in the document review, which is part of an ongoing criminal investigation into the potential mishandling of classified material after Trump left the White House.

So one more indication that his "delay, delay, delay" strategy isn't seeing quite the same success against the DoJ that it did against other parties.

[Crick]

Damn, and this just happened too:

https://www.npr.org/live-updates/house-jan-6-hearing-10-13-2022

Don't know if this'll even work, but it seems like a pretty huge deal regardless.

[Thad]

Way I see it, there are three possible outcomes:

1. He refuses to comply with the subpoena, and gets referred to the DoJ for contempt of Congress.

2. He shows up and pleads the Fifth. This is his best possible option, but it'll still look pretty bad in a video alternating between him saying "Fifth" and the many, many previous occasions he's stated that only guilty people plead the Fifth.

3. He testifies and incriminates himself.

I don't really see any other possible outcomes. He may try to go to court to delay until (he hopes) Republicans take the House and this is a moot point, but I don't think he'll be able to delay that long; again, his delay tactics aren't working as well against the state as they did when he was head of state.

And I think we can rule out the possibility that he testifies and doesn't incriminate himself.

[Yoji]

2. He shows up and pleads the Fifth. This is his best possible option, but it'll still look pretty bad in a video alternating between him saying "Fifth" and the many, many previous occasions he's stated that only guilty people plead the Fifth.

I just half-listened to an episode of Legal Eagle that touched on that. As I understand it, pleading the Fifth is something you can do when you fear your words will be confused or misused thanks to ambiguous circumstances or outright nefariousness. So it's something innocent people can do, even multiple times. Like, I imagine it's kind of like refusing to answer a loaded question like "when did you stop beating your wife" or whatnot, where any response at all could be twisted.

But doing a blanket Fifth literally hundreds of times? When you've already been credibly accused of lying and obstruction? When the only question you answer is what your name is? If this isn't where coincidence becomes pattern, I don't know what is. On a gut level, it just looks very very very bad.

3. He testifies and incriminates himself.
[...]
And I think we can rule out the possibility that he testifies and doesn't incriminate himself.

I remember hearing somewhere that one of the reasons he plead the Fifth so much was because his lawyers pressured him to do it. Something along the lines of "he absolutely will incriminate himself if we let him open his big stupid mouth."

[Thad]

2. He shows up and pleads the Fifth. This is his best possible option, but it'll still look pretty bad in a video alternating between him saying "Fifth" and the many, many previous occasions he's stated that only guilty people plead the Fifth.

I just half-listened to an episode of Legal Eagle that touched on that. As I understand it, pleading the Fifth is something you can do when you fear your words will be confused or misused thanks to ambiguous circumstances or outright nefariousness. So it's something innocent people can do, even multiple times. Like, I imagine it's kind of like refusing to answer a loaded question like "when did you stop beating your wife" or whatnot, where any response at all could be twisted.

Yeah, I'm not saying that in support of the idea that only guilty people plead the Fifth; that's authoritarian bullshit. But it is, nonetheless, something Trump has said often, and if a guy goes around saying "only guilty people plead the Fifth" and then pleads the Fifth, well, it does invite people to draw certain inferences.

But doing a blanket Fifth literally hundreds of times? When you've already been credibly accused of lying and obstruction? When the only question you answer is what your name is? If this isn't where coincidence becomes pattern, I don't know what is. On a gut level, it just looks very very very bad.

Right. It's Trump's best option, but it's still not a good outcome for him. It places him in the least amount of legal jeopardy but it doesn't look good in the court of public opinion.

3. He testifies and incriminates himself.
[...]
And I think we can rule out the possibility that he testifies and doesn't incriminate himself.

I remember hearing somewhere that one of the reasons he plead the Fifth so much was because his lawyers pressured him to do it. Something along the lines of "he absolutely will incriminate himself if we let him open his big stupid mouth."

Even an intelligent person with good self-control can be tricked into saying something incriminating. That's feds' and prosecutors' job.

Trump is not an intelligent person and does not have good self-control. He's the "I didn't store those classified documents on the floor, I had them in cartons!" guy. The "I fired Comey because he refused to stop the investigation into my connections to Russia" guy. He doesn't know when to shut up, and his "defenses" of his actions tend to involve confessing the crime he's been accused of.

[KingRoyal]

I don't think anyone whose in for Trump at this point is going to even clock his hypocrisy on pleading the fifth. They think all legal issues against him are some conspiracy anyway

The bigger challenge seems that he'd plead fifth enough in a defamation trial that he'd effectively have no defense

[Thad]

I don't think anyone whose in for Trump at this point is going to even clock his hypocrisy on pleading the fifth. They think all legal issues against him are some conspiracy anyway

Of course, but it's not about appealing to people who are in the tank for Trump, it's about reminding everybody how bad he was and is, as often as possible. The American public has a short attention span, and one of the major benefits of the hearings is that it's reminded everybody that January 6 is a thing that happened and it was fucking appalling.

Though really that's secondary to the goal of goading him into confessing something.

[nosimpleway]

They could go the Sideshow Bob route and just have someone casually remark, halfway through the hearing, "Pff, Trump couldn't have masterminded the Jan 6 attacks. He's not smart enough, doesn't have enough influence." And then just let Trump talk until his lawyers manage to land the tranquilizer dart in his neck.