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- [00:00]
A
This is like a high wire act without a net. Will I be able to cram everything.
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B
I want to tell you at the.
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A
Intersection of law and politics here on the Midas Dutch network in one show? I'm going to try. I'm a master weaver. And here we go. As we came onto the show, we got the new reporting that Chris Mays, the Attorney General extraordinaire in Arizona, has finally filed that lawsuit. I wanted them to file to get Adelita Grijalva sworn in to represent the 7th congressional district in Arizona and represent 8, represent 803,000 people and be the 218th signature on the discharge petition so that the House will vote on the release of the Epstein files. And now the lawsuit has been filed. Then I'm going to talk about Trump stealing from taxpayers, not just once, but several times. I'm going to tie together a few things. One, his new demand, actually a slightly old demand for $230 million of our taxpayer dollars for reparations for Don Trump to pay for attorneys fees he never paid for himself. He, that he grifted off of donors related to his indictments and, I guess, conviction. And he wants the taxpayers to pay the $230 million. Forget black Americans and the historical racism about slavery and all of the degradation and their reparations. Donald Trump, the most privileged snowflake of a president in history, he, he needs his $230 million and he wants the taxpayers to pay it. No, I'm not making it up. While he's stealing $230 million from taxpayers, which is something that has to be approved by. Wait for it. His criminal defense lawyer, now number two in the Department of Justice, Todd Blanche. He's stealing $400 million from a local university in Miami called Miami Dade College, which is being forced by Governor DeSantis to turn over a three acre valuable parcel worth $400 million, for which they paid about $20 million 10, 15 years ago, turn it over to the state so the state can turn it over for free to Donald Trump for a presidential library.
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B
Did you see the sleight of hand.
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A
Money laundering, $400 million taken from a school that can't afford it. So now we're 230 million. We're 400 million.
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C
We're on a roll.
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A
Let's keep going. Another 230, $250 million scandal, the demolition of the White House. Why don't we just bulldozer over the entirety of the White House? Donald Trump. This is on public land. This is a sacred building. This is the People's building. And now he's scarring it. He's already started the demolition. Didn't get any approval from Congress, didn't get any approval from the landlord, the people to tear down half or all of the east wings. And, and where that $250 million come from. That sounds like an emoluments clause violation, a campaign violation. How many foreign donors paid to get access to Donald Trump so he could have a holiday in Style ballroom attached to the White House? I got a better, better use of that. Once the Democrats retake the White House. Stick around here on the intersection and I'll tell you what it is. Then after we're done with that. And the arch. Oh, remember the arch. We're going to have an arc. An arc de Trump. Where is he getting that money from? And who gave him the right to commission an arc to himself? One of the reporters said, oh, Mr. President, the person who designed it with a design competition said he wants it to symbolize the unity of the American people. Well, who is it for? And he looked at the reporter and said, me. Great. So now we're gonna spend untold tens or hundreds of millions of dollars to put up a giant ark across from the veterans memorial and to honor Donald Trump. You know, even the ballroom. Think about the ballroom. He's all private donor money. I'll show you a clip when I get to it. Sounds like money. Yeah. Who's money? Who's gonna do the maintenance of that building? Tens of millions of dollars for a ballroom. Just like the free cutter Air Force One that Donald Trump wants to fly off, apparently to Miami to visit the presidential library. Oh, it's a free gift of $400 million. No, it's not. It's hundreds of millions, if not billions of dollars to retrofit that plane for a presidential use. And then the tens of millions of dollars of monthly or yearly expenses. I got an update on James Comey. Yes, he came out swinging going for the knockout punch against Lindsey Halligan, the Insta prosecutor. Just add water. Lindsey Halligan, Donald Trump's hand chosen meat puppet. Because no career prosecutor worth any of worth their bar licenses would touch Letitia James's prosecution or Comey's prosecution or anybody's prosecution with a ten foot pole. But you know, Ambassador Bolton's sort of a different story. We'll talk about him later. So there's a lot of things going on. Two, two separate motions have been filed and some dirty pool paperwork filed by Donald Trump to try to defame the lawyers representing Comey, suggesting that they received the leak of confidential, classified information. It's all bogus. It's all a frame job. It all weakens their case, not strengthens it. Anytime you're trying to get rid of the lawyer and break the sacrosanct bond between lawyer and client in America chose, you're afraid of that lawyer, they're afraid of Pat Fitzgerald, no doubt. And then I got an update about Alina Hava. She. Let's just say things did not go well for her at the Third Circuit Court of Appeals in a motion to disqualify her and to have her declared to be illegally appointed as the U.S. attorney of New Jersey. And I've got some receipts for you. I think you'll enjoy looking down my list here. Speaking of Lindsey Halligan, Lindsey Halligan doesn't know how the press works, doesn't know how the media works, doesn't know how off the record works. And I had an interview with Anna Bauer for Lawfare, who got an interesting. Hi, Anna, this is Lindsay. Signal chat that went on for 10 or 15 rounds about the Letitia James prosecution while Lindsey Halligan was and is the prosecutor for Letitia James. You're going to find it fascinating. I think Lindsey's gonna be getting a phone call somewhere along the lines of, hello, Lindsay, this is Pam. Can you come to my office? And then I'm gonna end with a 9th Circuit update. We got a new ruling coming out of the 9th Circuit, but with a twist about the National Guard. And I just had an amazing interview with Rob Bonta, the Attorney General of California, about his cases before the ninth Circuit, which I did during no Kings Day. Thank you to everybody who took to the streets, the Midas mighty, the legal effers, the intersectionists who took to the streets to protest this king, this tyrant, this dictator, this rogue, lawless president of ours. We should have a giant clock counting down the minutes until he's out of office, like the national debt clock. We should actually form that. I'm going to talk to the brothers about that. All that and so much more. Thank you for making the Intersection with one of the fastest growing podcasts around. We bounced back into the top 100 podcasts of all YouTube podcasts in the weekly rating. That's all because of you. And we're trying to do the exact same thing on Apple and Spotify related to all of that. So let's. Let's dive in. We're here. Okay, let's start with Adelita Grahalva and what's happening in Arizona. She's Already been. She's already, she won over 70% of the vote to represent the 7th district, 803,000 people. And I said a couple of weeks ago they should file this motion for declaration or motion or a complaint for Mandamus to force Mike Johnson to swear her in. He keeps saying, well, we've got a shutdown. Day 21 of the shutdown. I can't do a swearing in. Sure you can. You can do it during the pro forma session that's used so that Donald Trump doesn't declare a, a recess and start doing recess appointments. Has anybody noticed that it doesn't get a lot of press. Even MAGA doesn't trust Donald Trump. They're like, we better do the pro forma sessions. Go in there, have three people and then turn on the lights, turn off the lights every day. Or he's going to say that we're out of session. He's going to start appointing people, including judges even they don't want him to do that. But you can swear in at Alita Gralva. The reason they're not because she's already said she's going to be the 218th vote on the petition to discharge from the committee a bill to have the Epstein files in their entirety released to the American people. So we can see exactly what Donald Trump is covering up and who he is covering up in the child sex trafficking ring. He's protecting somebody besides himself. Who is it? Now there's a lot of routes here, but the first is you got to get Grahalva sword in. The people of Arizona deserve it. Mike Johnson's playing games. He's setting a dangerous and bad precedent and the lawsuit's going to sort it out in federal court. Now in addition to that, we've got, you know, if you want to talk about process, process, even if it gets out of the House and it sounds like it's got the votes for that, still got to have a majority of the Senate and then Donald Trump's got to sign it and you know, but it'll put pressure where pressure is due, where it's important on this administration to be branded a enabler and cover up agent for people in high places who participated in the Epstein child sex trafficking, including one named Donald Trump. He has to be, has to be permanently branded that way. Let's talk about Trumper rations because we have to. I'm going to talk a lot about 230, $250 million numbers here on the intersection. Donald Trump filed a claim under the federal tort claim act in 2023 and 2024, we covered it here on the, on the Midas Dutch network. He said that in 2023, his first claim, which is a prerequisite to filing a lawsuit before you sue the federal government, you got to, you got to file a claim, give him 180 days, try to fix it. He filed that back in 2023 demanding lots of money, hundreds of millions of dollars because of the Russia collusion investigation. He never filed the suit yet, but you see, now that he's done with his enemies list, must be time to collect money. 2024, he filed another notice of claim against Merrick Garland and Christopher Wray, then the head of the FBI and the doj, claiming that they ruined his life and made him spend a lot of money because of the criminal investigations. Again, suits haven't been filed, but they're going to be. Now, those suits against the individuals really are defended by the United States of America, who step in under a doctrine called Westfall immunity. And they say, we're the party and they pay the money. Now, in order to pay the money, if you're suing the Department of Justice, you got to get approval. Who do you get approval from? The number two in the Department of Justice. And who may that be? It's Todd Blanche. Yes, Todd Blanche, Donald Trump's current and former criminal defense lawyer, who's the number two in the office. So we got that going for us. Okay? The, the approval is going to come. Donald Trump was caught during a press conference last week when he was bleeding out about, oh, Jack Smith should be investigated and prosecuted. Remember that one? He also said, it's going to be kind of weird. We have a good case. It may come across my desk. I'll have to be settling with myself. That doesn't sound like that doesn't sound like a demand of the Department of Justice. That sounds like an instruction to the Department of Justice and a violation of his sacred oath to the American people. Now lining his pockets and what is his loss? He grifted off his donors. He took between 10 and 20% of everything they donated to his packs, his political action committees. And in the fine print, he said he diverted it to his legal expenses. So people did it right. People were like, I want to help Donald Trump. He's selling shoes out of the sneakers out of the back of a van. I'll, I'll buy him. He's selling Bibles out of a back of a van. I'll buy him. He's selling bobblehead dolls and Meme coins. I'll buy him. I want to help the president. Half my money, third of my money, 20% of my money is going for his legal expenses. I want to. So he did the math. One day he was made whole for all the money. So what's, what's the damages? If he was made whole by his sucker donors in maga, where's the damage? The Republican Party paid a lot of it. Their pac, their fundraising, Donald Trump's pac, Donald Trump's fundraising. But you know, as Maya Angelou once so famously said, and I may be, I'm going to paraphrase it, when somebody tells you who they are, believe them. And I've never gone wrong believing Donald Trump when he says he's going to do something. Part of what my job is as a legal commentator is to talk about the legality of it and what we can do next and what kind of lawsuit we can file. The judges, we might, that we might get involved. But I think we need to believe him when he says it. Speaking of stealing, let me switch gears to the library. He's going to build it somewhere. This is a guy that can barely read. He Ghost. He never wrote a book. Either Ghost wrote all of his books or had them ghostwritten for him. But he's got his, he's got his eyes set. He's a real estate guy on a three acre parcel of land in Miami right down the street from me. Crossroad the Miami Heat play on Biscayne Boulevard. It's the last undeveloped lot. Now lots similar to that. And I have friends in real estate and development who told me lots almost exactly like this one, especially on that row of luxury condos would go for $400 million. This the Miami Dade College, which doesn't have a big endowment, does not have a big endowment. I bought that property for about 20 million about 10, 12 years ago. That's pretty good $380 million improvement. That can pay for a lot of scholarships, that can pay for a lot of operating expenses, a lot of new, a lot of new seats and chairs and faculty and students and building and infrastructure. Couldn't it? It could except Donald Trump stealing it. And I'm going to have on my legal AF for an interview tomorrow. The lawyers Andres Rivero and George Mestre who sued successfully for now to stop Trump's grabbing the that $400 million parcel of land which is now a parking lot next to Miami Dade column, next to the Freedom Tower of all places, the Ellis island of Miami where the Cuban diaspora came through to get naturalized. And just the irony of it all is Donald Trump chases migrants and immigrants and Americans through the streets and tries to abuse their civil liberties in due process. He's going to buy next to the Miami Freedom Tower. But they stopped it with a lawsuit in front of Judge Mabel ruiz in the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals in Miami. Because, of course, the Miami Day trustees, who voted in secret, really, without proper notice, at 8 o' clock in the morning, without a YouTube link for anybody to see, voted to turn it over to the state for free. And on the other hand, DeSantis already passed a bill that said local government can't be involved with presidential libraries, only the state. And then Right on cue, DeSantis and his cabinet voted to give it for free. So, free. Free. Free to Donald Trump. Except Miami Dade county and Miami Dade College is out $400 million. And 59% of Miami Dade County. Let me, let me explain this. 75% of Miami Dade county or so is Latin, is Latino or Latina. That's 75%. Most of that, 50% of that, maybe a little bit less, is Cuban. Most of that is of Miami Dade county is a huge Republican group in Miami. Okay? 59% of the county, including a fair number of MAGA and a large number of Democrats, believe that that should not be given to Donald Trump for free. Or, or should not be given to Donald Trump for his library at all. And then there's a scandal within a scandal because we can't find the $15 million that Donald Trump took from ABC to settle the George Stephanopoulos calling him a rapist instead of a sex abuse defamation case. Remember that one that went into one foundation, but that foundation, according to Open Secrets investigation, got dissolved and a new one popped up. And I'm sure if there was something siphoning of money from one to the other by Donald Trump and his family, it was probably done for tax purposes or to evade something. And so there's a $15 million scandal nestled within a $400 million scandal. It's like Russian nesting dolls when you talk about Donald Trump and scandals. So we've done so far, the library theft, the theft from the taxpayers. Now, let me just touch on the arch. Donald Trump got it in his mind. And I guess there was a designer who designed an arch to put in one of the few remaining spots of, in the monuments area of D.C. and Donald Trump, the, the designer and Donald Trump, let's just say they're not getting along on the vision. The designer said he, he designed this arch, this triumphal arch to be a testament to the unity of America, to pull America together. But when they asked Donald Trump. I'm going to play it for you. Let me play you the video of Donald Trump being asked by a reporter, is this for unity of the America or for something else? Play the clip. What is this?
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What is this?
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For who? Thanks, guys.
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Yeah, no, I know where it is.
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But who's it for?
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A
The arc to Trump, right? It's for himself. It's for himself. So that takes us Lord knows where he's getting the money for that. It's all a violation of the emoluments clause. It's Donald Trump lining his own pockets with foreign dollars and taxpayer dollars in order to self aggrandize. That's all it is. Which takes us to the ballroom. Okay. I don't think a picture could better encapsulate all that is corrupt and wrong by the Trump administration, of the Trump administration, than this one here and this video clip of the demolition, effectively of the People's house. Donald Trump's blown up our constitutional republic and he's demolished the White House. Perfect. That is the image now that transmits around the world with a viral. A viral video. A viral video and photo that Donald Trump, publicist in chief, realizes was terrible for him and has now issued an edict that to the employees of the Treasury Department who had the site of the teardown, they are not allowed to take any more photos. And they are not, because it'll harm security. That's the problem. Harming security. Now, where does Donald Trump get the right to tear down the east wing of a historic building on public land he does not own nor control without congressional approval or funding, and put up his idea of a Holiday Inn meets Mar A Lago replica for $250 million, 900,000 square feet. It's not his house, it's the People's House. He's a temporary custodian and occupant at the very least. To me, it's a violation of the emoluments clause about how the funding came in. Because he's lining his pockets with money that's really intended for the public. It's also a violation of. It's. Yes, here's one problem. That building the White House and the Supreme Court is, is exempt from the National Historic Preservation act, doesn't mean he can do whatever he wants with the building that the people sent him to. So I think there should be a lawsuit to stop the further demolition and certainly the erection of this ballroom, this scar on the people's house. Now this finally goes up despite lawsuits. I got a great idea which I'll share with you now because I don't think the next president, especially a Democratic one, is just going to blow away or throw away $250 million and tear it down, put it back the way it was. But why don't we turn it into something that's useful, a unhoused or a homeless shelter, a museum dedicated to the presidency, including the criminality of Donald Trump in term one and term two. How about a hall of shame attached to the White House, which is lined with Madame Tussaud Wax museum like figurines of all the members of the cabinet who enabled Donald Trump, who all should be impeached and prosecuted when this administration finally sundowns. That's my idea. Can't stop it to make it something useful and something that speaks to history. We got a lot more to talk about on the Intersection. Having just covered all of that, we're going to talk about what's going on with James Comey. New motions that have been filed there, new attempts by Donald Trump to get rid of James Comey's lawyer. Alina Haba had a rough day at the 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals and we've got the audio clips to prove it. Lindsey Halligan is obviously lonely and looking for a friend and reached out in the middle of the afternoon and tried to reach a reporter named Anna Bauer and things went awry from there. For Lindsey, not for Anna. And I did an interview of Anna and I'll show you. I'll show you what happened there. And then I've got an Update on the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, including a great interview that I did just over the last couple of days with the Attorney General of California. Rob Bonto will pull it all together. Thank you for being here. So many ways to support what we do on the Intersection. Find us on audio if you're. If you're watching us on YouTube, plug in the intersection. Leave a five star review. I think we just crossed 250 reviews. Like to try to get that to a thousand. It helps keeps us on the air. It's a way to defend our independent commentary and show your love and support. It's like the Hummingbird theory. I'm not quite sure what exactly keeps these things up in the rankings, but this will help. We're trying to break into the top 100 of audio podcasts for news. We're already in the top 100 of all YouTube podcast. This is all a compliment to you. I'm not taking credit for it. I do my part from the content standpoint, but I'm not, I don't take my credit, I don't take credit for that. Then we've got, if you want to become a full card carrying member of the Legal AF community, we've got Legal AF YouTube. Legal AF YouTube, let me just brag for a minute is on fire right now. We've had more views in the last two weeks, in the last two days than we ever had ever in our life. We're about to cross 900,000 subscribers. We just crossed 330 million views of our work. And that's again a testament to you. Show your Love for Legal AF YouTube, hit the free subscribe button, that's all you gotta do. And then set the reminders and we'll continue to bring you the contributors, the new content and the interviews that you've come to love and expect. Then slide over to Legal AF substack where for $6.77 a month. Hear that number. Sounds almost made up. $6.77 a month, you can become a full fledged paid member of Legal af. Some amazing benefits you can only get that way. And it helps keep the lights on, helps keep the editors paid, helps keep the content coming to you. That's how this works and this is how you can help us in that way. So Legal AF substack and for live reporting as well, which I think you'll, you'll very much enjoy. And then, you know, we've got my law firm, the POPOC firm, we'll put up some information about it right now that sits at the intersection of justice and our community. I'm representing hundreds and hundreds of people and we get contacted by 5,000 people a week from our community looking for help in personal injury. So if you've been injured, contact the POPOC firm. Go on my website, you'll see all the different ways. 1-877-popocaf I made it easy for all of us or thepopocfirm.com live callers 24, 7 and see Habla Espanol. So let's take a break for our sponsors of the intersection.
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B
I'm officially obsessed. This is my Lola blanket. And I'm telling you it's not just.
- [25:21]
A
A blanket, it's a full on experience.
- [25:23]
B
The first time I wrapped myself in this thing, I audibly said, oh my God, it's insanely soft. Like next level soft. And the design, it actually looks good. Thrown over my couch, total upgrade. I'm a blanket person. No shame in that. After a long day. I wind down with the show and now with this blanket.
- [25:39]
A
Mine's the large and it's perfect. But the extra large massive.
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B
Like bring a friend massive.
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A
Lola Blankets are machine washable, vegan and.
- [25:46]
B
Somehow they don't pill or shed.
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A
No joke.
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B
I've already thought about replacing all my.
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A
Other blankets with lola.
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B
They've seriously ruined other blankets for me. For a limited time, our listeners get 35% off at Lola Blankets.com with code LEGAL AF at checkout. That's Lola Blankets.com code LEGAL AF for 35% off your entire order. And don't forget after you buy, tell them we sent you. Wrap yourself in luxury with Lola Blankets. This episode of Legal AF is brought to you by Moink Box. Did you know four companies control over 80% of the US meat industry and that the largest share of US pork is now controlled by China? These meat giants use mobster like tactics to crush American family farms, flooding our food supply with sketchy additives and low quality meat. So what can you do about it? Here's where Moink comes in. Featured on Shark Tank Moink is standing up for family farms and your food security. Their meat comes from animals raised outdoors like nature intended. Their farmers get an honest day's pay and Moink delivers straight to your doorstep at a price you can actually afford. This is real American meat, born, raised and harvested right here in the usa. Moink is helping save rural America. I love it and you will too. Join the Moink movement today. Support American family farms and join the Wait for it. Moink movement today@moinkbox.com legal af right now and get free bacon for a year. That's one year of the best bacon you'll ever taste, but only for a limited time. Spelled M O I n k box.com legal af that's mikebox.com legal aaf f.
- [27:29]
A
Welcome back to the intersection. Let's dive into the James Comey story. Former FBI Director has now filed two motions. One to disqualify Lindsay Halligan. That's going to go to a different judge than the Judge Namcoff who's presiding over the case in the Eastern District of Virginia. It will go to another judge because if they're right about the disqualification because Lindsay Halligan was illegally appointed, then the judges of the Eastern District of Virginia pick her successor. So it'll go to a different judge somewhere else in Virginia or maybe North Carolina. That one's relatively easy. The statute under which she was appointed only allows for one appointment per Attorney General, so she only Gets one pick. She picked Eric Siebert. Donald Trump didn't like him, even though he was a conservative Republican because. Because he wouldn't indict Letitia James and he wouldn't indict James Comey, so he fired him. Well, that was your one. Unless you get a permanent nominee. You know the goal here, let's not forget the goal here. The goal here is to have A permanently confirmed U.S. attorney in 93 federal districts, not to have all these games being played with acting, interim and interim, acting and special attorney, appointed and temporary attorney. It's because Donald Trump puts up hack maga, unqualified people who even his own party won't support. So then he's left with all of these gymnastics to try to get the Alina Habas and the Lindsay Halligan's put into a chair for some short duration. And for you, and for a defined purpose, let's be frank, the defined purpose for Lindsey Halligan is to do that which career prosecutors wouldn't do, prosecute Donald Trump's political critics. I don't think she cares about getting confirmed. I'm not even sure she thinks she'll ever be put up to be confirmed. And so she. So she won't be. But in the meantime, she'll get her indictments unless Pat Fitzgerald and James Comey get their way and she is disqualified because she's the number. She's the second person to be put in by Pam Bondi, and Pam Bondi only has one to choose from. And then it goes to the district court judges of the Eastern District of Virginia. That's got to be cited quickly. I mean, the whole case is quickly. The judge said a January 5th or January 6th start to the trial in 2026. So that's going to go quickly and then on top of it. So probably the next 20 days we're going to get a ruling on that. And then they filed a motion against the entire, the entirety of the indictment for vindictive and selective prosecution, which is sort of what it sounds like, using the animus of Donald Trump against James Comey, which is legion says started in 2018, right after he fired him, all the way through today, to say that there's the animus and here's the prosecution. You put them together, you got vindictive prosecution. And it doesn't matter what Lindsay Halligan thinks. It's not Lindsay Halligan's animus. She's just the stalking horse, as the case law says. And the true bidding is being done and she's taking direction from the Chief legal officer of America, Donald J. Trump. So they lay out all the case law, they lay out all the attacks on James Comey and all the reasons Donald Trump hates him. To make out the case, you can make it out by actual vindictive prosecution showing animus that a reasonable person would notice, or you can do it by presumptive vindictive prosecution or presumptive animus. And then the burden shifts to the government to prove that what they did was on the up and up. Selective prosecution says nobody's ever been prosecuted for what James Comey's been prosecuted for in the history of the Eastern District of Virginia. They can't even get the indictment right. The indictment says it has to do with an exchange in 2020 on September 5 between Ted Cruz and James Comey, where Cruz fumbled and effed up the question. So already you got a perjury problem. Gotta have a clean question and a clean answer. That's not true. Not a fumbled question. You know, Cruz said, do you stand by your testimony about the Clinton administration? He meant the Clinton. He meant that. He meant the Clinton investigation. Hillary was never elected. And he says, I do. Because in 2017, in response to a question by Chuck Grassley, he said, I never leaked any information about Trump or Clinton to the Wall Street Journal, nor did I authorize it. Do you still stand by that about the Clinton, Clinton administration? Yes, but that can't be perjury. So they point that out in the indictment and that no, no self respecting prosecutor would bring this kind of case. So you got all that going on then just the day before to pay them back for trying to disqualify Lindsey Halligan. The government buries in the bottom of a Sunday night filing and says, well, we're going to release documents, but we have a problem, your honor. That guy over there, Pat Fitzgerald, the lawyer for James Comey, who used to be the U.S. attorney in Illinois, he was James Comey's lawyer back in 2017 and 2018. And James Comey made seven memos, and he sent the seven memos to lawyers to get legal advice, Right? The sacrosanct bond between lawyer and client. And so, yes, he was sent that information. Now, at the time, this is the part they leave out because they say in the paper to the judge to try to defame Pat Fitzgerald, he got confidential classified information. He might not be able to stay in this case. Pat Fitzgerald fired back and said, let's make this clear. There were seven memos written by my client. I was his attorney at the time. And he wanted Legal advice. The FBI director did not classify anything in there and he's the first classification person as being classified. About nine or ten days after the memos were sent to me, the Trump FBI upgraded up classified the memos after the fact. So when I got it, they weren't classified and I didn't leak it to anybody. I kept them to give my client advice. So that's going to go exactly nowhere by the Trump administration. But, but they want to do a bunch of what about ism, hoping the judge will make some sort of Solomonic decision. Well, we've got two equally good faith filings about disqualifications of the prosecutor and the defense lawyer. Well, I'll just deny them both. That's not going to happen. Judge Nachmanoff is really smart. He's a Biden appointee and he was a former federal public defender. He knows his way around the Eastern District of Virginia the way Lindsey Halligan doesn't. Or as somebody, somebody once pointed out, the, the, the office services team in the courthouse knows more about that courthouse and how it works than Lindsay Halligan. So that was a good set of filings by, by Comey. And then that brings us to Alina Haba. It must. Alina Haba was also illegally appointed to be the U.S. attorney of New Jersey. And a criminal defense team representing a drug dealer filed a motion several months ago to get Alina Haba disqualified and anything she touched to be declared void, including their indictment. It actually got to a judge that was assigned outside of New Jersey, same problem as before. And the Middle District of Pennsylvania federal judge ruled against Alina harbor goes up to the Third Circuit Court of Appeals, sits in Philadelphia over things involving New Jersey and other states. And in that one we had a three judge panel, two Bush and one Obama. And the Bush senior status judges took over and they grilled the crap out of Mr. Whitaker representing the Department of Justice. Now, Alina Haba lied to the American people afterwards and she said she was defending at an oral argument. She didn't say a word. Just like Lindsey Halligan never says a word in court. Alina Haba, last time I ever saw her operate was at the Second Circuit Court of Appeals about Eugene Carroll. And that went terribly. She got her head handed to her. She, she got told that she, that she didn't properly raise the immunity issue in the sex abuse case. And sit down. Let me play you a clip of, of the judge at oral argument, which we had up on Legal AF as a live, a live recording that you can get right now. Let's Play, let's play the clip so people can see we're bringing the receipts here on the intersection.
- [36:09]
D
The first assistant is absolutely a political appointee and I think that is an extremely odd result. But there's some language, there's language in 3345 that would reference experience for the person 90 days within the prior 365 days. So it's hard for me to see when you look, when I look at the total section itself because it, you know, it's not the best and most clearest statute that I've ever read, I'll grant you that. There's some confusion in it, but it does say to me that Congress had a very specific intent. They wanted an experienced person to be that acting officer.
- [36:58]
A
Now, my prediction is the 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals, at least 2 to 1, if not 3, 0, is going to find that Lena harbor and her and her masters, her, her bosses, her, her leaders there, her client illegally appointed her too, because as Judge Smith outlined. Let me get, let me, let me go over all the different ways you violated the appointments clause and the confirmation clause for the Senate. Okay, you pulled her nomination and then you made her the number two. You fired the person that the court put in and then we didn't extend her, her 120 day term after it expired. So you try to do end run around, bring her up through the Deputy Attorney General, the deputy US Attorney position, then made her a special attorney all because we wouldn't let you do it under the statute. Now a major issue that has come up in the disqualification and at the Third Circuit is how that statute works. And wouldn't you know it, Sam Alito now on the US Supreme Court, when he was a young lawyer in the White House, the Office of Legal Counsel for Reagan, he said in support of what Comey has written in support of the motion against Alina harbor that you only get one, one pick. One pick and you don't get two if you're the Attorney General. And then it goes to the, to the federal judges of that district to vote for the person that they want. Which brings us to Lindsey Halligan. Nothing says I am, I am lonely, I don't have friends, I don't know what I'm doing. And I'm going to reach out to a lawyer, reach out to a reporter without telling them that it was off the record and start texting with them or on a signal app, which I think is disappearing, start texting them about confidential information about the Letitia James prosecution. It was so weird that Anna Bauer, who's going to be a regular on Legal af. I'm sure. Hopefully she'll come back. In brief was the reporter for Lawfare who Lindsey Halligan knew and starts to write her right after she's triggered by a couple of social media posts by Anna in which she's reporting on the New York Times, disclosing information that undermines the indictment against Letitia James. That a grand niece for Letitia James testified to a grand jury that she was living in this $118,000 modest clapboard house in Virginia that sometimes Letitia James visited it and that she never paid rent. So how did she violate some covenant with her bank that's basically out of business, by the way. They already sold the loan to another entity. How did they commit fraud when they said they were going to use it as a second home? Which she's using it as a second home and she's not going to rent it out. She's not renting it out. She's letting people live there, which she's allowed to do and expressly allowed to do over a year. Well, Lindsey Halligan didn't like that. So she uses the Signal app. Remember that relatively unsecure platform with disappearing messages that Mike Waltz, the national Security advisor at the time, now I think he's the ambassador to Iceland. I'm not making it up. He accidentally added Jeffrey Goldberg, from the reporter, editor in chief of the Atlantic magazine to a chain including JD Vance and Marco Rubio, Stephen Miller and Tulsi Gabbard to start talking about bombing the Houthis in the and in Yemen to open up the. The trade port, the trade shipping lanes. Remember that was all the scandal. And they were using Signal with the disappearing messages. Well, she uses it again, didn't learn her lesson. So she reaches out and that's the article that Anna Bauer writes, which start, which is the title of her piece, which is hi Anna, this is Lindsay. And then a series of text messages. Well, let me let Anna put it in her own words with a great interview I just did of her. That's up on Midas Touch today. Let's play the clip.
- [41:08]
C
The top prosecutor there. And. And then one day out of the blue, I get a message from her or someone purporting to be her, which I didn't believe at first. You know, I thought it was a troll. And it turns out it really was her because she was able to tell me where we first met, who she was with. And then we confirmed that it was her by obtaining her phone number, which connected to the discussion and the Justice Department eventually confirmed it.
- [41:37]
A
So to be clear, you're, when you woke up that day to her text message, you're not planning to write an article about Lindsey Halligan particularly, and some.
- [41:48]
B
Some of her prosecutorial work on Letitia James. So when, when she later says, I didn't know there was a story, there wasn't a story, the story is her communicating with you.
- [41:59]
A
Right, Right.
- [42:00]
C
And I, and I want to be very clear here, Michael, because, like, there's a lot of context here about how relationships between reporters and prosecutors work. So a few things that people who maybe aren't familiar with that context and just like how unusual this is and why this is even a story, I think it's important to keep these things in mind. So one is that it is normal for prosecutors and journalists speak to each other, you know, prosecute. It's the kind of thing that, that's how reporting happens, you know, so that's not strange. But there are a few things that are really abnormal here. One is that it's the sitting United States attorney who's one of the most high profile prosecutors in the country, who's already under immense scrutiny because of the circumstances in which she was put into this job and the cases that she is pursuing against Letitia James and J. Comey. The other is that she is reaching out to me, who, you know, it seemed that she was reaching out to me about these tweets I wrote that was summarizing. But finally, nothing, at no point did she say that we were off the record. And for people who don't know what that means, everyone who is a public figure knows very well that when you engage with the media, you can set at the beginning the basis on which you wish to speak. One way that you can do it is say, hey, I'd like to go off the record. And there has to be an agreement with the reporter that that is the basis on which you speak. And then they can't publish anything, you know, that you speak about in that off the record conversation. But if there's no agreement at the outset, the assumption is that you are speaking on the record and that everything that you say is fair game and no backseat and no backseats and there's no takesy backsies. It doesn't work where you can retrospectively, as a source, say to a reporter, oh, hey, by.
- [44:05]
A
So I don't know where to start. You've got an incompetent. Well, what did you, what did Donald Trump expect? This is. He had to expect this, she's inexperienced. She's never been a prosecutor. She's never really been in federal court. She was a fender bender lawyer in Florida seven or eight years out. Never been a federal law clerk. I'm telling you, the person that empties the waste paper basket in the courthouse, in the courtroom, and in her own office in the Eastern District of Virginia, once proud prosecutor's office, knows more than she does. So of course she violated policy. She didn't call the public affairs office for the Department of Justice. She didn't clear communicating. And then she panicked when ha. When Bowers wrote to the Department of Justice saying, I got a long text message, Jane, about Letitia James, prosecution from Lindsey Halligan, who I confirm was Lindsey Allegan, because I asked her for the secret password. Where did we meet and who were you with? And she wrote back, the person Lindsey Allegan wrote back, I met you at the Breakers Hotel with Jim Trustee, the lawyer. Bingo, we're in. And the Department of Justice said, you're just, you're just doing e tattletail reporting. Tattletale reporting. And then Lindsay Allegan says everything I just told you nine days ago that backseats back seas. That's all off the record. That's not how that works, Lindsay. You know that. You should know that now. And I didn't know you were writing a story. She wasn't writing. For God's sake. For. She wasn't writing a story. Anna Bauer. She was on the recipient end of your. Of your signal chat. That is the story and the disappearing messages. I guess you've never heard of screen grabs. It's just you'd have to. You gotta laugh at some point, don't you? Now let's turn to the ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. So much going on there at the ninth Circuit. We just got a new ruling, two to one, as we expected, based on the Oregon filing by Judge Immergut to stop the mobilization of the National Guard in Portland because it was based on stale information, things that barely happened in June, certainly were not happening in September when Donald Trump decided to embarrass Oregon and send in the troops and, and federalize them. Now, I knew from the oral argument and we put it up on Legal AF on the YouTube under the Live playlist, that it was not going to go well. I mean, there's an old joke I've created. How many Trumpers Trump judges does it take to screw up a constitutional republic? 2. And there were two Trumpers that were on there against the Oregon and against ultimately Judge Immergut. And the two Trump judges had. There was one Clinton appointee. The Clinton appointee in her dissent said the, there were not the grounds for Donald Trump to under statute called 12406 to commandeer the National Guard of Oregon and to common and to commandeer it and to mobilize it. And she worried about the slippery slope. She worried and she invited an en banc review, which means more judges in the 9th Circuit taking a look at it and that. And she invited that in the way she wrote her dissent. She went through a timeline of all the events that were in the record. You know, this date 20 people showed up low energy. This date nine people showed up low energy, wearing costumes, some not wearing any clothes at all. And this is how Portland was demonstrating. Sure. There were some people that set fire to a car. Yes. There were some people that may or may not have been armed. There were some people that put a pole and a bike rack across certain intersections. Did it stop fundamentally the federal government and Donald Trump from executing the federal laws with regular forces? No. Did it stop his capture of migrants without due process? No. Did it stop their detention and detention centers? No. This is the fundamental basis. But to the two MAGA Trumpers who were appointed by Donald Trump back in the first term, anything he says goes. In fact, one of them in their concurrence said he gets to call rebellion and we can't do anything about it. What was the rebellion in Portland, Oregon? Have you seen the people of Portland, Oregon? Have you watched Portlandia with Fred Armisen? I was watching it. I've been there. I thought it was a documentary. These are very peace loving people dressed in chicken suits and giant penis suits and frog suits. Now they're getting pepper sprayed and the rest on the streets of Portland. Is it stopping Donald? This is, this is the question. Is it stopping Donald Trump from executing the laws with his normal federal forces? The answer is no. Law enforcement is doing their job. So that's going to go up on an en banc appeal. In fact, two judges of the ninth Circuit have already said they'd vote for an ban. Now, once they vote, which means that I think a majority of the 20 plus judges in the 9th Circuit have to say, yeah, we should have en banc. I mean if they get over that and that's going to be briefed tomorrow, then they create a special en banc panel of 10 judges of the 9th Circuit with the chief judge on top, 11 total, who then vote, majority vote wins. Same thing's going to happen in California. In fact, things happened in Oregon. That helped California in their appeal and their future en banc. In fact, I had Rob Bonta, the attorney General of the great state of California with me. Great honor on, no Kings Day in California, in San Diego, as missiles and ordinance was being fired over five, over the. Over the five, as they say, at Camp Pendleton. And I had Rob Bonta, and here's what he had to say about the impact on his case in California.
- [50:14]
E
That the federal government would suffer irreparable harm, that it was absolutely necessary that they had these troops on the ground in California to protect federal interests, to protect federal buildings and property. And they were so important that when there was an opportunity to send them to another state and away from California and Los Angeles, they sent the vast majority of them. They sent 200 to Oregon and they sent some to Illinois as well. And we called out that hypocritical action to the court with an additional filing and presentation to the court saying, if these National Guard are so necessary, if the federal government will suffer irreparable harm, then why are they being sent out of state and no longer here in California? And I think it speaks for itself. It's a very compelling argument and it was a gift in the courts. And we have shined a light on it to the judges to make sure that they consider this action when they make their decision.
- [51:13]
A
So the ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, I think we're headed for the odd bunk. We'll see what happens. We'll see how it impacts California because that case is still going on as we watch what happens at the seventh Circuit Court of Appeals related to the Illinois mobilization. All these things are separate. We don't have a final ruling, except we're still waiting for the United States Supreme Court to make a decision based on an emergency application by Donald TRUMP to the 7th Circuit, I mean to the Supreme Court, as to whether the 7th Circuit stopping him from mobilizing the National Guard was right or wrong. We're going to get a ruling out of the 7th Circuit. Well, we're going to get a ruling out of the Supreme Court any minute now. They're either going to block the 7th Circuit and let Donald Trump deploy while they're working out the niceties of his appeal, or they're not. And that will have a domino effect, cascading effect on all the other cases in all the other states. And we'll cover it right here. I'm so pleased you're here with me at the Intersection. Support our sponsors, become a full fledged member of the intersection community. I don't have a name for that. I should. I'm going to set it up here in comments. If you want me to give a name to the audience like we the Legal a effervers and the Midas mighty. Should we be the intersectionists? I don't know. More creative types than me can put something down in comments. We'll have a contest. I guess the first vote in the contest is do we need a name at all? The second vote and second one is if we do need a name, what is that name? Years ago Ben branded people that followed me or liked me as Popo. Not sure I like that too much but you know it is an option if you want to support what we do here. Let's continue to show some love to the Intersection. Go over to the audio podcast on Spotify and on Apple, leave a five star review and comment and let's try to get the reviews up. I think we got 200, 220 reviews. We're trying to get to a thousand. I think that's the magic number. Or a magic number. Let your friends know about it. Here we broke in for the second time to the top 100 of all podcasts, regardless of what type of podcast in the YouTube weekly rankings rankings. Let's do that here. Intersection Audio there people know me hopefully from the 40 or so videos I do and as the editor in Chief of Legal AF YouTube channel I do my work 1415 videos on Midas. I do another 2030 videos over on Legal AF we try to bring you the newsmakers, the lawyers, the law firms at that intersection of law and politics over on legal AF YouTube. I got 12amazing contributors. I think you're really going to like the work then. And then finally the icing on the cake, the cherry on the Sundae is legal AF substack and wait for this number for $6.77 a month. That's less than a Starbucks special. Coffee will overwhelm you with material and interesting commentary, analysis, writing, video, commercial free versions of things over on the Legal AF substack and the Legal AF Substack Live. So consider becoming a member today. Thank you for being here. Appreciate all that you do to help us to continue to grow our pro democracy channels. Shout out to the Midas Mighty and the Legal A effers. I'm Michael Popak and I got some.
- [54:39]
B
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A
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B
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- [56:21]
A
Every step of the way.
- [56:23]
F
Morning Zoe. Got donuts.
- [56:25]
G
Jeff Bridges, why are you still living above our garage?
- [56:28]
F
Well, I dig the mattress and I want to be in a T mobile commercial like you teach me. So Dana.
- [56:35]
G
Oh no, I'm not really prepared. I couldn't possibly at T Mobile get the new iPhone 17 Pro on them. It's designed to be the most powerful iPhone yet and has the ultimate pro camera system.
- [56:46]
F
Wow, impressive. Let me try. T Mobile is the best place to get iPhone 17 Pro because they've got the best network.
- [56:54]
C
Nice.
- [56:54]
G
Jeffrey, you heard them.
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F
T Mobile is the best place to.
- [56:57]
B
Get the new iPhone 17 Pro on.
- [57:00]
A
Us with eligible traded in any condition.
- [57:03]
F
So what are we having for launch?
- [57:04]
G
Dude, my work here is done.
- [57:06]
H
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