Trump supporters and conspiracy theory - Part 2

[Rick Plant]

'Lock him up': Nuclear, government and legal experts call for Trump to be indicted



Should Donald Trump be indicted for his retention and refusal to return highly classified documents and documents that "detail top-secret U.S. operations so closely guarded that many senior national security officials are kept in the dark about them"?

That's how The Washington Post described its bombshell revelation Tuesday night, reporting that FBI agents found a "document describing a foreign government’s military defenses, including its nuclear capabilities," at Mar-a-Lago when it seized over 100 classified documents last month.

"Only the president, some members of his Cabinet or a near-Cabinet-level official could authorize other government officials to know details of these special-access programs," the Post explained.

Nuclear, government, and legal experts agree: Donald Trump should be indicted., especially given the top secret nature of the documents and what's at stake with nuclear weapons.

"The man stole nuclear secrets and should be in prison," wrote attorney Walter Shaub, the former Director of the U. S. Office of Government Ethics on Wednesday.

Jon Wolfsthal served as Special Assistant to President Barack Obama for National Security Affairs including serving as his nuclear advisor and as senior director for arms control and nonproliferation at the National Security Council, where he set nuclear policy. Wolfsthal even worked for the United States Department of Energy as an on-site monitor in North Korea.

"I worked in the US Government on nuclear weapon issues for 11 years," says Wolfsthal, now a senior policy advisor at Global Zero, which works for a nuclear-free world. "If anyone I worked with or I took any one of these documents home, we would be in prison. Trump must be indicted or the entire classification system will be at risk."

Global Zero's Managing Partner Derek Johnson in a statement sent to NCRM, painted a picture of what's at stake.

"That an ousted president could run off with highly sensitive documents, in clear violation of federal law, is stunning — but the fact that these secrets are about weapons that can kill hundreds of millions of people is orders of magnitude more consequential. Americans should be demanding an investigation: How could this happen, and why were there no safeguards in place to prevent it?"

Johnson warns, “the man who carted off state secrets on a foreign nation’s nuclear capabilities is the same one who had absolute authority to launch a nuclear attack at any time — and is doing everything he can to regain that power."

“This isn’t solely about Donald Trump: it’s an indictment of the inherent flaws and fragility of the nuclear system. Nuclear risks require an unattainable level of perfection and control. If the system to manage those risks is inadequate in the United States — and it’s impossible to conclude otherwise — the same is true in every nuclear-armed nation. The world we live in is simply too dangerous and unpredictable for nuclear weapons; the case for abolishing them makes itself.”

On Twitter Tuesday night Johnson served up a less serious response, writing: "I have a security clearance as high as Donald Trump's, which is to say, none at all. I'd already be in prison if the government discovered I had top secret documents about nuclear weapons."

Attorney Tristan Snell, who successfully prosecuted the Trump University case for the Manhattan DA's Office, says, "Yes, Trump stole nuclear secrets. And US defense intel so sensitive that the president was one of the only people to know about it. Indict him. Try him. Convict him. Lock him up."

An expert in government and media, David Rothkopf has an opinion piece in The Daily Beast Wednesday that says, "contrary to the measured pace of the [DOJ's] investigation to date, when documents like these are stolen the issue must shift from caution and deference to a former president to swift containment of what could be a grievous national security breach. It is time for action and the severest penalties the law allows."

Read More Here: https://www.thedailybeast.com/we-need-to-know-trumps-motive-for-taking-classified-documents

[Rick Plant]

Law professor sounds the alarm about the new plot to overthrow elections



Donald Trump's legal adviser John Eastman, the author of the so-called "coup memo," which made a legal case for why Vice President Mike Pence can stop the 2020 election certification, also penned a case that state legislatures could overturn the will of voters. This new idea is being funded by conservatives to the tune of over $1.3 billion.

Sounding the alarm on Wednesday was UCLA School of Law professor Rick Hasen, who said that even the so-called "Independence Day Legislature Theory" wouldn't support some of what Eastman is arguing in his new plot.

As MSNBCs Chris Hayes explained it, Eastman basically said, that "state legislatures, according to the Constitution, are the ultimate final arbiters are of how elections are decided. They have, as they like to say, plenary power, government power. The state supreme court that interprets the election on the state doesn't matter. Only the state legislature regulates federal elections which, in its most extreme form would mean the Wisconsin legislature which we discussed last night, widely gerrymandered, could just decide it wanted to give its electors to Donald Trump, even though state law in the state Constitution are required to give that -- popular vote in the state. They can say, no, we don't want to do that."

It's a "crank" theory, he explained, but it's one that is being not only promoted but planned by a group of Republicans who fear that they're about to lose power to the majority of Americans. Hayes went on to call it "a loaded gun aimed directly at the heart of American self-governance."

Hasen, who runs the Safeguarding Democracy Project, explained that there's no legal basis for what Eastman is proposing, but the question remains, who is going to stop them?

What Eastman is proposing is "even after the legislature had chosen, we are going to have a popular vote for president, you could take that back and start over," said Hasen. "So, that is more extreme, and I didn't see any of the amicus briefs going quite that far."

"First they would be pretty dire even putting aside the potential for election subversion," Hasen explained. "It means that state supreme courts couldn't apply the state Constitution to limit the state legislature from violating peoples voting rights. It would empower two bodies. One, it would empower state legislatures that could run roughshod over election administrators and overall state actors. So, they would be empowered. And the other would empower is the United States Supreme Court because it would turn every dispute about what an election law means in the state, as applied to the federal election, into a federal constitutional question. And the ultimate arbiter of that is, of course, the U.S. supreme court. It is a kind of feedback loop where the court is kind of not only giving more power to state legislatures. It would be giving more power to itself."

The overall question about giving power to choose the election to the Supreme Court, however, is whether they'd choose the same candidate the people would.

Watch:

[Rick Plant]

DOJ appeals Trump judge’s special master ruling: 'Irreparably harm the government and the public'

The U.S. Dept. of Justice on Thursday filed a notice of appeal against U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon’s ruling allowing Donald Trump the “special master” his legal team requested. The order also halted DOJ from taking any investigative steps in conjunction with the 13,000 items, including more than 100 classified documents federal agents seized during the August 8 search warrant execution of Mar-a-Lago.

“The Justice Department also argued that a former president cannot assert executive privilege after he leaves office, and that it is not possible for one part of the executive branch to assert privilege to shield documents from another part,” The Washington Post reports, but notes that the “appeals process could take longer than any document review by the special master.”

CBS News Congressional correspondent Scott MacFarlane adds that DOJ has also asked the court, the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals, to stay Judge Cannons decision.

Judge Cannon’s “order would irreparably harm the government and the public by unnecessarily requiring the government to share highly classified materials with a special master,” DOJ states.

Read More Here:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2022/09/08/justice-appeals-trump-documents-special-master/



Trump social media company loses vote to go public and raise money to keep running: report

Digital World Acquisition Corp., a so-called "blank check" company, failed on Thursday to garner enough shareholder votes to take Donald Trump's Truth Social public.

"Former President Trump's social media company has another potentially big problem on its hands: It's struggling to complete a stock market listing that would allow it to raise more than $1 billion it needs to keep running," NPR reported. "Trump Media and Technology Group, which includes the Truth Social app it launched earlier this year, had been planning to list on the Nasdaq stock exchange through a complicated process known as a SPAC merger."

The Securities and Exchange Commission has yet to approve the merger.

"Instead of pursuing a traditional IPO, the Trump Media and Technology Group decided to merge with a blank check company that is already listed on the Nasdaq," NPR reported. "These kinds of deals have became popular in recent years, when interest rates were near zero. In effect, they give private companies a shortcut to going public — requiring less transparency than traditional IPOs."

Axios reported, "Truth Social says it currently has enough cash to maintain options through April 2023, and that it soon plans to begin generating revenue via advertising."

Trump had 89 million followers on Twitter when his account was permanently suspended. Trump has 4 million followers on Truth Social.

AFP

[Rick Plant]

Watch: Steve Bannon gets 'perp walked' in handcuffs over money laundering case



Former Trump aide Steve Bannon was treated to a proper "perp walk" in handcuffs after he was indicted on conspiracy and money laundering charges.

Minutes before being arraigned on Thursday, police officers escorted Bannon down a hallway lined with journalists.

"This is what happens the last days of a dying regime!" he shouted. "They will never shut me up. They will have to kill me first! I have not yet begun to fight!"

Bannon surrendered to authorities earlier in the day.

Watch the video below from ABC's Olivia Rubin.

https://twitter.com/i/status/1567939525602844672

[Rick Plant]

Steve Bannon charged with money laundering, conspiracy

The former White House adviser faces state charges in a charity fraud case after a Trump pardon let him evade federal counts.



NEW YORK — Longtime Trump ally and right-wing firebrand Stephen Bannon, who dodged federal charges in a charity fraud case thanks to a last-minute presidential pardon, must now face the music in New York state court.

Bannon, 68, arrived in handcuffs to a crowded arraignment in Manhattan’s New York County Supreme Court Thursday afternoon, hours after surrendering to Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg. Moments before the controversial former White House adviser entered, Bannon remarked, “They will never shut me up, they’ll have to kill me first.” But inside, he said little, other than acknowledging a judge’s instructions — a heavy contrast to the bombastic and inflammatory persona that has become his trademark.

A six-count indictment charges Bannon with money laundering, conspiracy and scheming to defraud for his alleged role in We Build the Wall, a group that raised at least $15 million to construct a barrier along the border with Mexico but skimmed the donations.

The group publicly told donors its president and CEO, Air Force veteran Brian Kolfage, would not be compensated for his efforts. But Bannon allegedly arranged to pay him by moving money from We Build The Wall through a company he controlled. Kolfage previously pleaded guilty in the federal case. Only Bannon and the company were charged by the state.

Bannon pleaded not guilty Thursday. If convicted on the top charge, he faces a maximum 5 to 15 years in prison, according to Bragg.

“The simple truth is that it is a crime to profit off the backs of donors by making false pretenses,” Bragg said at the press conference. “We are here to say today in one voice that in Manhattan and in New York you will be held accountable for the defrauding of donors.”

Addressing reporters and bystanders outside the courthouse, Bannon suggested that the case was politically motivated. Reporters peppered him with questions about the pardon, his alleged co-conspirators’ guilty pleas and his relationship to the former president — in turn, Bannon called the crowd “paupers … in bondage” and urged them to check out his podcast.

His lawyer did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Acting Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchan ordered Bannon to surrender his passports. Prosecutors argued he has the means and the disposition to flee, citing his recent, unrelated contempt of Congress conviction for defying a subpoena related to the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol.

The judge also warned Bannon that if he is willfully absent during court proceedings, they could move forward without him.

In 2020, federal prosecutors accused Bannon of pocketing some $1 million in donations, using them to pay off hundreds of thousands of dollars of his own personal expenses. That year, federal agents arrested Bannon on the charges while he was aboard a luxury yacht off the coast of Connecticut. He pleaded not guilty, but was dropped from the case after Trump issued the pardon in the twilight hours of his presidency.

Presidential pardons apply only to federal charges and cannot shield Bannon from a state prosecution. Former Manhattan DA Cyrus Vance opened a state investigation that his successor, Bragg, continued when he took office last year.

At a press conference announcing the charges, New York Attorney General Tish James said Bannon’s presidential pardon unfairly leveraged his political connections.

Kolfage and another federal co-defendant pleaded guilty to wire fraud conspiracy. Their sentencing scheduled for this week was pushed back to December. A mistrial was declared in a third alleged co-conspirator’s trial when a jury could not reach a unanimous verdict.

Bragg wouldn’t say whether Bannon’s alleged co-conspirators in the federal case were cooperating in the state’s prosecution.

Federal prosecutors previously said the group raised over $25 million, but the state’s indictment Thursday only referred to about $15 million. Likewise, the state did not allege Bannon used donations to cover personal expenses, as federal prosecutors had.

Bragg chalked the discrepancies up to the differences between state and federal jurisdiction, as well as the laws Bannon was being charged under. State investigators only looked at money raised through GoFundMe, where they could be certain donors saw a disclaimer that no proceeds would go to Kolfage.

When pressed whether Bannon allegedly pocketed any of the money, James told reporters, “I think your inference is correct,” suggesting he had.

As Bannon arrived at the DA’s office Thursday morning, some onlookers lobbed insults at the far-right iconoclast, who has stoked controversy at frequent turns. In the past, Bannon has suggested Anthony Fauci, the nation’s leading infectious disease expert, should be executed. He has also echoed Trump’s false claims that the 2020 election was stolen.

“Stop hurting America, you greasy grifter,” one woman yelled as Bannon entered the building, his brief remarks drowned out by the heckling.

https://www.politico.com/news/2022/09/08/steve-bannon-surrenders-to-manhattan-da-00055427



Why Trump won't like Steve Bannon's New York indictment

Bannon’s legal fate is a portent for his old boss, former President Donald Trump.



Former White House staffer Steve Bannon turned himself in to New York authorities Thursday morning to face a set of charges that should be intensely familiar to him: money laundering, scheming to defraud and conspiracy.

It’s the second time in as many years that Bannon's been accused of bilking donors with promises to construct a wall on the southern border. He was indicted by a federal grand jury that accused him of the same in August 2020. While these new New York state charges threaten to interrupt his current role as a Christian nationalist election army assembler, they also serve as a reminder to his onetime boss, former President Donald Trump, about the limits of protection from the law that even the presidency can afford.

Importantly, Bannon’s legal fate is a portent for his former boss. It indicates that even if Trump had issued himself a “self-pardon” in the closing days of his term, as he reportedly considered, it wouldn’t protect him from the state and local investigations into him and his businesses. As he prepares to take another run at the presidency, Trump is likely to become more convinced than ever that only the Oval Office can provide the legal safety he craves.

Bannon was first indicted along with three others in August 2020 in relation to the “We Build the Wall” organization. Federal prosecutors claimed in their affidavit that the men raised $25 million under the guise of being a “volunteer organization.” Rather than building a wall on the border with Mexico, according to prosecutors, they built up massive personal bank accounts “using fake invoices and sham 'vendor' arrangements.” Bannon pleaded not guilty to those charges.

I’m obligated to say that Bannon “allegedly” did these things as he has never stood trial for these accusations. In one of his last acts as president, Trump issued Bannon a pardon that absolved him of the two federal charges he faced: conspiring to commit wire fraud and conspiring to commit money laundering.

It was an affront to justice, but an act the White House said at the time was justified because Bannon “has been an important leader in the conservative movement and is known for his political acumen."

Since then, Bannon has kept himself busy continuing to promote Trump’s conspiracy theories about the 2020 election, agitating the base with talk of dismantling the deep state, and organizing reactionaries to intimidate voters at the polls. He’s also stood opposed to the House Jan. 6 committee’s investigation efforts and is now awaiting sentencing after being found guilty of contempt of Congress in July.

That conviction and the new state charges he now faces illustrate the limits of even Trump’s abuse of his powers. While the president has near-absolute leeway to waive convictions, commute sentences or, as in Bannon’s case, pre-empt trials, that authority is only over federal charges. Against state-level charges, a presidential pardon is worthless.

Soon after Bannon’s reprieve was issued, the Manhattan district attorney’s office opened an investigation into the alleged “We Build the Wall” scam. That investigation came to bear Thursday as Bannon turned himself in. In a statement to NBC News on Tuesday, Bannon said, "This is nothing more than a partisan political weaponization of the criminal justice system."

Moreover, Bannon’s pardon was particularly narrow. Even if Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg wasn’t the one to charge Bannon under state law for the alleged con job, there was still plenty of room for the Justice Department to do so, former prosecutor Andrew Weissmann wrote for Just Security last year. And as the contempt of Congress conviction highlighted, Bannon’s was not a blanket pardon for all crimes he may have committed in general.

Trump won’t like this reminder of the reach that states can bring to bear against him and his cronies. His company is also under civil investigation in New York state, a case that steadily marches forward even as Bragg pursues a criminal investigation into the Trump Organization. And his attempt to force Georgia officials to declare him the winner of the 2020 election is the subject of an ongoing Fulton County investigation, one that will only close in tighter on Trump as more of his allies are forced to testify.

https://www.msnbc.com/opinion/msnbc-opinion/opinion-bannon-s-indictment-unwelcome-reminder-trump-n1298726

[Rick Plant]

Ginni Thomas 'intertwined' with 'vast' campaign pressuring Supreme Court to overturn Roe: report



Ginni Thomas is once again at the center of controversy and accusations of conflict of interest after an analysis of the 74 amicus briefs filed with the U.S. Supreme Court aimed at overturning Roe v Wade found she was linked to just over half of the legal entreaties to end a woman’s right to choose.

“A new analysis of the written legal arguments, or ‘amicus briefs,’ used to lobby the justices as they deliberated over abortion underlines the extent to which Clarence Thomas’s wife was intertwined with this vast pressure campaign,” The Guardian reports. “The survey found that 51% of the parties who filed amicus briefs calling for an end to a federal abortion right have political connections to Ginni Thomas, raising concerns about a possible conflict of interest at the highest levels of the US judiciary.”

Were Thomas merely a far-right-wing lobbyist her efforts could be called quite a success, especially given the Supreme Court’s 6-3 decision overturning the five-decade-old precedent by ramming a stake through stare decisis – something that rarely happens – but as the spouse of one of the justices leading the cry to overturn that ruling and others based on the same principles, like the right of same-sex couples to marry, it is drawing concerns.

The Atlantic’s Molly Jong-Fast, responding to The Guardian’s report, asks, “Isn’t this a conflict of interest?”

The Guardian reports the “analysis of the amicus briefs was carried out by Advance Democracy Inc, a non-partisan organization specializing in public-interest research and investigations.”

It “shows that 38 of the 74 anti-abortion amicus briefs – 51% – were produced by entities and individuals with links to Ginni Thomas. They included rightwing groups, religious interests, prominent conservative individuals and lawyers.”

That analysis also shows “an intricate web of connections between many of the most influential groups and figures on the conservative hard right, with Ginni Thomas at the centre of it. Several of the links run through her consultancy, Liberty Consulting, which she set up in 2010 and which brags that it can ‘give access to any door in Washington.'”

The Guardian does not state if Thomas received any compensation, financial or otherwise, for her efforts, but if she did, that could lead to even greater calls of conflict of interest.

Thomas’ actions related to the January 6 insurrection and her calls to overturn the free and fair 2020 presidential election are also being examined. She engaged in a months-long text message exchange with then-White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, urging him to somehow keep Donald Trump in the White House. She also corresponded with “coup memo” author John Eastman, who serves as the chair of the anti-LGBTQ National Organization For Marriage, and engaged in campaigns in at least two battleground states, emailing lawmakers urging them to help overturn the election results.

As The Guardian notes, Thomas also sits on the board of a highly-secretive and powerful religious right organization, the Council for National Policy (CNP).

Read More Here:

https://www.cnbc.com/2022/04/05/inside-the-consulting-firm-run-by-ginni-thomas-wife-of-supreme-court-justice-clarence-thomas.html



If Trump-appointed judge is 'smart' she'll grab the 'lifeline' the DOJ just threw her: legal expert



According to attorney Norm Eisen, Aileen Cannon, the Donald Trump-appointed U.S. district judge of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida, would be wise to agree with a legal filing submitted late Thursday by the DOJ asking her to stay a ruling she made on sensitive documents the former president was hoarding at his Mar-a-Lago resort.

Cannon set off legal fireworks earlier in the week with her widely criticized ruling that tied the Department of Justice's hands in their investigation into obstruction and possible violations of the Espionage Act by the former president

According to Eisen, who spoke with CNN's Brianna Keilar and John Berman, the DOJ filing was expertly crafted to allow Cannon to gracefully avoid having an appeals court overrule her.

"Norm, DOJ is saying that that intelligence damage assessment actually has to pause, that these things are too intertwined for that to go on if she has this injunction," Keilar prompted. "First off, does that make sense to you? And, do you think that the judge is going to find that compelling enough that she's going to say, okay, that makes sense?"

"Well, Brianna, we had a little clue that the judge is taking -- Judge Cannon is taking it very seriously because after DOJ filed, she ordered the parties in the special master recommendations, who the special master should be and the so-called order of operations," he replied.

"How the special master will work, even though she hasn't ruled on the stay motion, she said I want both parties to address how DOJ's motion will affect the choice and operation of the special master," he added.

"So I think that's a tell that she's taking this seriously," he elaborated. "Brianna, DOJ has given her a lifeline. This is the worst and most dangerous part of her order and if she's smart she will take it and she will stay this part of the order. I really do think it jeopardizes our national security if she doesn't," he concluded.

Watch:

[Rick Plant]

I remember when Criminal Donald disgracefully left office in 2021. After his failed coup attempt, he appointed an unqualified pro Trump lawyer to become a federal judge. Legal experts wrote on Twitter at the time, that Donnie most likely appointed this unqualified woman as judge so he could use her in the future hoping to escape his crimes when the authorities were investigating him or when they brought charges against him.

Sure enough, this same unqualified pro Trump lawyer is the "judge" who is trying to help Donnie thwart a DOJ investigation into his treason of stealing top secret classified information and nuclear documents. Donnie needed a judge to help him, and the only one who seemed to be willing was the same unqualified pro Trump lawyer he appointed as a judge as he disgracefully left office in 2021.

If you learned anything about the 4 disastrous years with Criminal Donald, you learned that he does not appoint people who have intelligence and are qualified to hold a position. He only appoints and promotes "yes men" or people he can manipulate into doing his dirty work for him. As you can see, this woman has no business being a federal judge.   

This is a good detailed thread to read from Peter Vroom which explains it all.


Peter Vroom @PeterVroom1

Aileen Cannon, a 38 year-old lawyer with no judicial experience and limited resume, was handed a LIFETIME appointment as a federal judge just as Trump left office. Cannon's primary credentials for the job were apparently her young age and membership in the Federalist Society.


 

Her professional experience was so limited that she was forced to admit on her Sen Judiciary Comm questionnaire that she had never made any speeches, produced any reports, participated in any panel discussions, spoke at any conferences or written for any bar association.




In her twelve years as a lawyer, she published no writings of her own and just 3 writings done with colleagues at Gibson Dunn -- limited to promotional articles on cases handled by the firm for their own website.




In an attempt to show writing experience, Cannon listed 17 short articles from a 2-mo undergrad stint at El Nuevo Herald. ranging from "Prenatal Yoga" to "Flamenco: An Explosion of Energy and Passion." Cannon is unclear on whether she authored or simply edited the articles.




Finally, the questionnaire for a LIFETIME judicial appt asks Cannon to list all interviews she has given to the media. Cannon lists only her wedding article in a local magazine as her only media experience.



https://twitter.com/PeterVroom1/status/1567676844203249664   

[Rick Plant]

In the Mar-a-Lago case, the DOJ appeal (and Trump’s reaction) matters

As the Justice Department responds to the Trump-appointed judge in the Mar-a-Lago scandal, the former president threw a striking online tantrum.



On Labor Day, a Trump-appointed judge in South Florida gave Donald Trump and his lawyers everything they wanted in the Mar-a-Lago scandal: U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon approved a request for a special master and blocked parts of the Justice Department’s ongoing investigation.

Among legal experts from the left, right and center, a consensus formed quickly: Cannon’s decision was ridiculous. Prominent legal voices used words like “nutty,” “preposterous” and “oblivious” when describing Monday’s ruling.

Nevertheless, federal prosecutors were left to decide what to do about the bizarre decision. Yesterday afternoon, as NBC News reported, the Justice Department’s plan came into focus.

The hundreds of pages of classified government records seized from Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate last month aren’t the former president’s “personal records,” and he has no right to possess them, the Justice Department said in a court filing Thursday as it said the government would appeal a judge’s ruling on the matter.

As part of its appeal to the 11th Circuit — where, it’s worth noting, Republican-appointed jurists tend to dominate — federal prosecutors also asked for a partial stay of Cannon’s ruling while the appeal is pending, saying that “the government and the public are irreparably injured when a criminal investigation of matters involving risks to national security is enjoined.”

Indeed, yesterday’s filing was not simply a routine, procedural step. Part of what made the appeal so notable was its specific arguments. As NBC News’ report added, the Justice Department noted that Cannon’s willingness to block investigators from doing anything with seized classified records would “cause the most immediate and serious harms to the government and the public.”

In other words, as far as prosecutors are concerned, the Trump-appointed judge may actually have undermined U.S. national security.

Just as notable was a line in the filing that Cannon’s injunction could “impede efforts to identify the existence of any additional classified records that are not being properly stored.”

There have been some hints over the past week or so that the Justice Department is concerned that there are still, even now, some sensitive materials in Trump’s possession that he’s not supposed to have. Yesterday’s filing suggests those concerns are quite real.

DOJ lawyers, making the district court judge’s conclusions look a little worse, added, “The classified records are government property over which the Executive Branch has control and in which Plaintiff has no cognizable property interest.”

Taking aim at Cannon’s strange ideas related to executive privilege, prosecutors went on to note that there’s nothing in the law that would suggest “that a former President can successfully assert executive privilege to prevent the Executive Branch itself from reviewing and using its own records.”

The judge gave Team Trump a deadline of Monday morning to respond to the motion for a partial stay, though on his Twitter-like platform, the former president didn’t feel the need to wait nearly that long.

In a pair of unhinged missives, the Republican condemned the appeal, celebrated the judge he nominated to the bench, peddled familiar lies about the FBI “spying” on his campaign, pointed to “record setting corruption” that does not exist in reality, and generally threw an online tantrum that seemed to reflect deep anxiety.

But just as notably, Trump once again added that federal law enforcement officials “plant fake evidence” — a bizarre claim that the former president embraced, then abandoned, and then re-embraced.

It’s all quite unhinged, but the biggest tell is the lingering gap between Trump and his own lawyers. On his social media platform, the Republican pushes creative nonsense about planted evidence and declassifying materials, but in court, his attorneys realize that they can’t get away with peddling garbage.

And therein lies the rub: We know the former president’s defenses aren’t real because even his lawyers won't endorse them.

https://www.msnbc.com



Trump lawyers fold on one special master defense — probably to avoid making false statements: experts



Donald Trump and the U.S. Department of Justice on Friday introduced new court filings in the battle over a special master in the courtroom of controversial Judge Aileen Cannon.

Prosecutors recommended retired Judge Barbara Jones and retired appeals court Judge Thomas Griffith while Trump's lawyers suggested former Judge Raymond Dearie and Paul Huck, Jr., who is listed as a former general counsel for Florida's governor.

"The two sides also clashed substantially over the duties of the special master. Mr. Trump’s lawyers argued that the arbiter should look at all the documents seized in the search and filter out anything potentially subject to attorney-client or executive privilege," The New York Times reported. "By contrast, the government argued that the master should look only at unclassified documents and should not adjudicate whether anything was subject to executive privilege."

Former Deputy Assistant Attorney General Harry Litman tweeted, importantly, Trump doesn’t argue that he declassified material."

Litman was not the only legal expert to focus on the importance of the omission.

National security attorney Bradley Moss wrote, "With yet another court filing, it is increasingly clear there is no evidence of Trump's alleged 'standing declassification order,' and no evidence that these particular classified records were ever declassified."

Former Pentagon special counsel Ryan Goodman wrote, "Gosh, I wonder why President Trump's side did not claim he declassified MAL documents, and instead just said this milquetoast line. Easy bet: Because they do not want to be caught in a false statement to a court - subject to sanctions and 18 USC 1001."

Read More Here: https://twitter.com/rgoodlaw/status/1568419811067330560



Trump’s request for DOJ to split the bill for his special master ridiculed by legal experts



Donald Trump's attorney's suggested that the Department of Justice pay for half of the cost of a special master which prosecutors have made clear they oppose.

In a Friday evening court filings before controversial Judge Aileen Cannon, Trump's defense team submitted a proposed order for a special master to oversee the documents the FBI seized at Mar-a-Lago.

"Each party will bear 50% of the professional fees and expenses of the Special Master and any professionals, support staff, and expert consultants engaged at the [special] master’s request," Trump's team suggested.

DOJ disagreed, writing that Trump, "as the party who requested the Special Master, will bear 100% of the professional fees and expenses of the Special Master and any professionals, support staff, and expert consultants engaged at the Master’s request."

Former Assistant Attorney General Elliot Williams explained, "This is one of those facts people might not realize about the process -- someone has to pay for the special master! DOJ being (justifiably) snippy here by saying -- why are you asking us to pay for something that (a) we don't need and (b) only you want?"

Jan Wolfe, a legal affairs reporter at The Wall Street Journal noted, "One of the candidates charged $700 an hour in 2018."

Former U.S. Attorney Barbara McQuade said, "This sounds a lot like Mexico will pay for the wall."

Read More Here: https://twitter.com/JanNWolfe/status/1568424177513934858