Trump DOJ Admits Defeat in Devastating Filing

Summary

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Legal AF (MeidasTouch): "Trump DOJ Admits Defeat in Devastating Filing"

Released: December 9, 2025
Host: Michael Popok (MeidasTouch Network)

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Episode Overview

This episode takes a deep dive into a major legal filing from the Trump-era Department of Justice (DOJ) regarding the ongoing investigations into former FBI Director James Comey. Host Michael Popok analyzes the DOJ’s attempt to dissolve a restraining order on evidence, exposes legal contradictions, and critiques the DOJ’s admissions and arguments. The discussion focuses on issues of prosecutorial conduct, constitutional rights violations, and what these legal maneuvers reveal about potential future indictments.

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Major Discussion Points & Insights

1. The DOJ’s Motion Against the Restraining Order

• [02:31] Michael Popok introduces the DOJ's "odd new filing" in the case involving ex-FBI Director James Comey and his attorney, Daniel Richmond.
• The DOJ is seeking to dissolve an order by Judge Kollar-Kotelly stopping them from using certain documents to potentially re-indict Comey.
• The DOJ argues that civil plaintiffs, like Richmond, cannot “interfere” with criminal prosecutions by reclaiming their property under the Fourth Amendment.

Hypocrisy in Legal Strategy

• Popok points out the contradiction: Lawyers who now represent the DOJ previously took the opposite position when defending Trump (e.g., Todd Blanche intervening in Trump’s Mar-a-Lago case as a civil matter).
  • Quote:
    • “To hear Todd Blanche, now wearing the hat of the head of the Department of Justice, say out loud, ‘Oh, you can't let a civil litigant interfere with criminal prosecution. How dare you.’” — Michael Popok ([04:19])

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2. Controversy Over DOJ Appointments

• [04:20] The DOJ filing is signed by both Deputy AG Todd Blanche and Lindsey Halligan, who is listed as U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia.
• Popok explains that Judge Curry previously ruled Halligan is illegally appointed and cannot act as U.S. Attorney, yet her name remains on filings.
  • Quote:
    • “Nobody believes that she's the U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia. I'm not even sure Lindsey Halligan does.” — Michael Popok ([05:54])
• Suggestion that Judge Curry could issue a contempt order for violating court directions on legal appointments.

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3. Statute of Limitations and the Indictment’s Validity

• [05:54] Discussion shifts to whether the indictment against Comey can be redone (“re-indicted”) after being declared void.
• Judge Curry’s ruling: Indictment was void “ab initio” (from the outset) due to Halligan’s illegal appointment.
  • This wards off attempts to use 18 USC §3288 (which extends the statute of limitations for “defective indictments”) because the defect was in who prosecuted, not the indictment’s wording.
• DOJ admits they “have no other crimes to charge James Comey with” except the perjury charge, centered on testimony from September 2020.

Fourth Amendment Violations

• Richmond’s property (including his attorney-client materials) was seized and used in investigating Comey, potentially infringing constitutional rights.
  • Quote:
    • “That's called a warrantless search, folks. That's in violation of the Fourth Amendment of the Constitution.” — Michael Popok ([08:22])

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4. DOJ’s Legal Arguments & Flawed Logic

• DOJ asserts that dismissal of the Comey indictment (due to Halligan’s appointment) should allow re-indictment under §3288.
  • Quote:
    • “See, we had a defect. It was an appointment defect. We're going to fix it. They haven't fixed it.” — Michael Popok ([09:18])
• Popok explains why this statute applies only to errors within an indictment, not the legal standing of those issuing it.
• DOJ implicitly concedes that the window for charging Comey with other crimes has closed.

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5. Violation of Attorney-Client Privilege

• [11:20] Magistrate Judge Fitzpatrick ruled that the FBI mishandled Richmond’s privileged materials.
• No proper “taint team” segregated attorney-client information prior to the evidence being used.
• The discovery was supposedly for the Clinton email investigation, then later used against Comey, violating legal norms.
  • Quote:
    • “…the FBI agent who testified to the grand jury against Comey already saw [privileged evidence]. Fruit of the poisonous tree — they’ve already seen it.” — Michael Popok

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Hypocrisy Highlight:
  “How dare you. Now, let’s move on to their other admission...”
  — Michael Popok, satirizing the DOJ’s argument against civil plaintiffs interfering with prosecutions, after previously doing exactly that for Trump. ([04:19])

• On Lindsey Halligan’s Appointment:
  “Lindsey Halligan apparently keeps showing up to work. But that... if I’m Judge Curry, I do an order to show cause…”
  — Michael Popok ([04:20])

• Fourth Amendment Frustration:
  “That’s called a warrantless search, folks. That’s in violation of the Fourth Amendment of the Constitution.”
  — Michael Popok ([08:22])

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Key Timestamps

• [02:31] — Summary of DOJ’s odd filing and hypocrisy in legal strategy
• [04:20] — Details about the Halligan appointment controversy
• [05:54] — Discussion of Hunt for new charges, validity of re-indictment, and voided indictment
• [08:22] — Explanation of unconstitutional search
• [09:18] — Analysis of DOJ’s mistake in invoking §3288
• [11:20] — Attorney-client privilege breach and fallout

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What Happens Next?

• Richmond’s legal team will respond to the DOJ’s latest positions.
• Judge Kollar-Kotelly will rule whether the government must return Richmond’s files and be prohibited from using them in any future prosecution.
• Possible contempt proceedings over repeated appointments violations.
• Ongoing coverage promised: “We’ll cover it right here on Midas Touch and on Legal AF until my next report.” (Michael Popok, [12:39])

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For those who missed this episode:
Michael Popok’s solo briefing delivers sharp legal analysis in a brisk, engaging style. He exposes DOJ flip-flops, explains the procedural chessboard, and makes the significance and stakes clear for both legal professionals and the general public.

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Summary by Legal AF Podcast Summarizer — Episode: "Trump DOJ Admits Defeat in Devastating Filing" (December 9, 2025).

Transcript

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[Legal AF Host (Michael Popak)]

We got a very odd new filing in federal court by the Trump Department of Justice in a case involving former FBI Director James Comey. They've moved to dissolve the temporary restraining order issued by Judge Kolar Catelli on Sunday to stop them from using certain documents to try to re indict James Comey. Documents belonging to law professor Daniel Richmond, who's also an attorney for James Comey. But in the filing, they take certain positions that are going to make your hair stand on end, are hypocritical, and are also contrary to the law. I'm going to cover it all here for you right now on the Midas Touch Network. Take a moment, hit the free subscribe Button on Legal AF YouTube to support all the work that we do there. Just got filed. The first odd position is they actually have the brass ones to tell Judge Kolar Catelli that a civil litigant like Daniel Richmond, who brings a motion to reclaim his property under the Fourth Amendment, should not be allowed to interfere with an ongoing criminal prosecution. They say, particularly on page one. The court's grant of Richmond's request for preliminary relief has effectively enjoined the government from investigating and potentially prosecuting Comey. But federal courts cannot enjoin federal criminal prosec. A civil plaintiff cannot circumvent bedrock federal criminal procedure via an equitable proceeding like this one. That is exactly what some of these very same lawyers when they used to privately work for Donald Trump, like Todd Blanche. It's exactly what they did when they filed a motion to interfere with the criminal prosecution of Donald Trump related to Mar?

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They filed a motion that ended up before Judge Cannon. She actually agreed with them, allowed the defendant as a civil litigant to file a motion to interfere with that prosecution. Now, it got reversed by the 11th Circuit. But to hear Todd Blanche, now wearing the hat of the head of the Department of Justice, say out loud, oh, you can't let a civil litigant interfere with criminal prosecution. How dare you. Now, let's move on to their other admission. They also admit that they're not complying with Judge Curry's order about who is the U.S. attorney in the Eastern District of Virginia. If you go to their signature page, sure, it's signed by Todd Blanch, Deputy Attorney General, but it's also signed by somebody that's masquerading and impersonating a U.S. attorney. Lindsey Halligan is still on the, still on the motions as United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia. Nobody believes that she's the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia. I'm not even sure Lindsey Halligan does. Judge Curry three weeks ago said she was illegally appointed. That a vacancy resulted in based on Judge Curry's order and it needed to be filled by the Eastern District of Virginia judges. Now they haven't filled it and Lindsey Halligan apparently keeps showing up to work. But that is a if I'm Judge Curry, I do an order to show cause why these filings are in contempt, are not in contempt of her order. And then you go to page 15.

Interesting things are sometimes buried on page 15 of a 20 page motion. Here they talk about the indictment and we've been wondering if they're going to try to re indict James Comey just like they tried to re indict and failed to indict Letitia James for mortgage fraud recently, where they're going to try to do a Lindsey Halligan free indictment, a clean indictment, to try to clean up the mess. And we said it's going to be difficult because Judge Curry declared that the indictment was null and void. Void ab obnitio because it came from an illegally appointed U.S. attorney in Lindsey Allegan. Not that it was a defective indictment, that the indictment was illegal in and of itself, was void of itself. And that meant that the statute of limitations clock didn't run and that the government would not be able to use a statute we call 18 USC 3288, which allows the government to fix a defect in an indictment. A defect in an indictment, not in the indicting entity, not in the indictment signer, not in the U.S. attorney in the indictment. A mistake, an error, a typo, an element that was left out. A statute that was miscited. Then you have six months to fix it and the statute of limitations is extended. That's not what happened here. Plus, they basically admitted they don't have any other crimes to charge James Comey with. They're going to be sticking with this perjury where that he allegedly lied in a question and answer in with Ted Cruz back in September of 2020. But here's what they say on page 15, Mr. Rich, they say Richmond, who's again the lawyer for James Comey, who brought the motion to get his stuff back. This is documents and information that Richmond had turned over pursuant to prior warrants, not even for this case back in 2017 and 2020 that were just laying around the FBI offices apparently up on a shelf till Lindsey Halligan decided to let an FBI agent go rummaging through them and trampling over the fourth Amendment rights of Richmond and ultimately the constitutional rights of James Comey. To try to gin up an indictment against James Comey in 2025. That's called a warrantless search, folks. That's in violation of the fourth Amendment of the Constitution. You know that nostalgic feeling of sitting at the breakfast table as a kid.

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Here's what they say about the position. Richmond is flatly mistaken that any charges related to the underlying conduct are time barred simply because the district court held that the prior indictment was void as a result of an appointment defect. It's not an okay, see where they're going to use the word defect. See, we had a defect. It was an appointment defect. We're going to fix it. They haven't fixed it. How do they fix it? Because they brought in a number two Deputy Attorney General, Deputy U.S. attorney to sit next to her. No.

They go on to say that the statute of limitations has indeed expired on the charges with which the grand jury indicted Comey. That's perjury. But 18 USC 3288, a new law expressly allows the United States to re indict quote whenever an indictment/dot charges of felony, charging a felony is dismissed for any reason after the period prescribed by the statute of limitations has expired, citing a case from 1976. Except when you go back and you read 3288 and I know it pretty well, that's for a defect in the indictment, not the indictment process, not the prosecuting attorney defect that she has a defect that's the only way you get it. Otherwise you're done. Statute of limitations has run, but we're going to be having a fight over 3,288. You can see it coming. It's going to start with Judge Nakmanoff, who I think presides over this particular case. And then we're gonna wait on Judge Curry to decide whether she's gonna bring an order to show cause or contempt proceedings against Lindsey Halligan. I recommend that she does. But this also is an admission that they have no other case against James Comey, but this thing that Lindsey Halligan indicted with like an hour to spare in the statute of limitations. They didn't even drop a footnote to talk about other charges that they could bring. They say that.

And finally they disagree with Judge Magistrate Judge Fitzpatrick, the judge in the lower court who's the magistrate for Judge Nakhmedoff, who took a look at what happened with the Richmond files and filed an order, issued an order that said Daniel Richmond's fourth amendment rights were trampled upon, that he had provided his iPhone, his iPad, his emails and correspondence, and a server back for another investigation that that should have all been segregated by a taint team to make sure that there were no attorney client privilege information in there and non responsive information in there that weren't, that wasn't responsive to the warrant. It then sat on a shelf. It never got used in that investigation. Nobody got prosecuted. Related to Hillary Clinton's emails. And so Lindsey Allegan was told there was a box from Daniel Richmond. They were, oh, let's go through the box. They didn't even bother getting another warran to get that same material. And Richmond wants his box back because it has attorney client privilege information in it that the FBI agent who testified to the grand jury against Comey already saw. Fruit of the poisonous trees already seen it. So we've got that going on.

And the violation of the Fourth Amendment. So what's going to happen next? Later, there's going to be a file, a final filing by Daniel Richmond's lawyers opposing these positions that have now been taken for the first time by the government. There'll then be a ruling before Friday by Judge Kolar Catelli about whether Daniel Richmond's files, documents and copies are not only going to be returned to him, but that the government is going to be blocked from using them or any fruit of that poisonous tree for a future indictment. That's what this is all about. And we'll cover it right here on Midas Touch and on Legal AF until my next report. I'm Michael Popak.

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