A (0:00)

Hey, everybody, I'm Alison Gill. Welcome to the breakdown here on Midas Touch. So I am the bearer of good tidings today. We are what, nine, ten months into this administration and all of Trump's plans and all of his cases in court, they're all falling apart and all at the same time. So much happened this week. The Comey indictment is hanging by a thread. The Kilmara Brago case has gone off the rails for the Justice Department. The prosecutors have dropped the charges against folks like Marimar Martinez and Ian Santos Ruiz, which was actually the case underpinning Trump's Supreme Court justification. His argument to the Supreme Court for deploying the National Guard in Chicago. That fell apart this week. The House and the Senate broke from MAGA and Trump and voted nearly unanimously to release the Epstein files. The MAGA plan to mum donify the Democrats in the midterms, that just fell apart because Trump can't resist a celebrity. The Alien Enemies act case. That's coming back to Judge Boasberg. We talked about that last week. That criminal contempt is going to be allowed to resume this week because the government defied his court order to turn the planes around this past March. Trump is blocked from deploying the National Guard in Portland and Chicago. They're packing up and leaving. And now the District of Columbia as well. That happened this week. He just lost another vote in the House because Marjorie Taylor Greene is announced surprisingly, she's going to resign a year early. It is all falling apart. The incompetence and malfeasance of this administration is just on full display. Any benefit of the doubt the government once enjoyed from the courts has been obliterated. Their obscene disregard for the rule of law has left the government's cases like teetering on the edge of a cli. Like the clicking up, click, click at the top of the roller coaster. They are precariously teetering on a cliff. Bad policy has wrecked affordability messaging for Republicans, which, by the way, now has Trump chickening out, rolling back his own tariffs, which is an admission that they sucked in the first place. It is all about to come crashing down, just like All Right now. And why? Because the regime is manufactured political hyperbole built on a foundation of lies and omissions and fabricated evidence. And because we the people keep pushing back, we're going to cover all of that, all of these updates on today's episode of the Breakdown. All right, first up, the National Guard is leaving Chicago. They're leaving Portland. They're packing it in after successful lawsuits blocked their federalization and deployment. And this week a judge ruled that the deployment in D.C. is illegal. U.S. district Judge for District the District of Columbia, Gia Cobb wrote that the deployment is unlawful because it caused irreparable harm to the District's sovereign powers under something called the Home Rule act, which was passed in 1973, and because the deployment infringes upon the District's right to govern itself. Now she has paused her own order for 21 days to allow for appeal. So they're not going to be leaving immediately. Next, let's tick through some of the most high profile cases that are just on the verge of collapse or have collapsed. They have already collapsed. There's a news this week in the case against Jim Comey. And I want to reiterate, I'm not a fan of Jim Comey because he played a role in why we're even here talking about these revenge charges that have been brought against him. But I do want to focus today on the corruption and incompetence of Trump's Department of Justice and Lindsey Halligan, specifically because it bears coverage. There is evidence that the government failed to get a warrant for the materials at the core of these charges. Also, their only witness before the grand jury was tainted by being exposed to attorney client privileged information. Lindsey Halligan made a series of misstatements on constitutional law to the grand jury. She likely wasn't even lawfully appointed. But on top of all that, what happened this week is the DOJ admitted in court this past Wednesday that Todd Blanche actually instructed the Assistant U.S. attorney to neither confirm nor deny the existence of a declination memo from the previous prosecutor, the one that was fired. I can't confirm or deny it exists, but if it does, it's probably privileged. So thank you for just confirming that it exists. But not only that, this week we learned the grand jury never even voted on the indictment. That's a case killer. And I think the introductory paragraph in a motion this week to support releasing the grand jury materials to Jim Comey and his defense team. I think it sums up the abject disaster that is Lindsey Halligan, and it does it pretty succinctly. It says the government's misconduct in its quest to indict Mr. Comey shocks the conscience. The government conducted a warrantless search of privileged materials that no reasonable agent or prosecutor would conduct, and it used those materials to present this case to the grand jury. And in doing so, it magnified its violation of Mr. Comey's rights. It misstated basic principles of constitutional law to influence the grand jury and it appears not to have presented any of the significant exculpatory evidence in the case. What is more, the government has now conceded that it did not even present the operative indictment to the grand jury, meaning no indictment was returned before the statute of limitations expired. And adding to the irremediable flaws permeating this process, the Attorney General twice ratified the defective purported indictment through a post hoc review that is legally incapable of rescuing this case. The record contains multiple particularized factual bases to conclude that grounds may exist to dismiss the indictment based on the government's misconduct and before the grand jury and overcome the presumption of grand jury secrecy. Now, the best part about all of this, all of this embarrassing shit that's coming out about the government in this case, about what she did in the grand jury room, we have it because the government demanded it. The government demanded a list of reasons why they should have to hand over all the grand jury materials to Comey. Had the DOJ not asked or demanded. We may never know just how messy Lindsey Halligan is. So we'll see how the government responds this week. And don't forget, like I said, I mentioned earlier, those contempt proceedings, the ones we discussed here last week on the breakdown in Judge Boasberg's court, they start back up this week. He wants to call whistleblower Erez Reveni and DOJ lawyer Drew Ensign to the standard. This will likely result in embarrassing discovery for the government about its unlawful actions attempting to kidnap and disappear innocent people and remove them to El Salvador Seacoat Prison, using the Alien Enemies act as justification evidence that will no doubt impact any future use of the law by this administration. And one of the people on those planes was Kilmar Abrego Garcia. There was a hearing this week, and once again the government was caught red handed. So, as you know, rather than return Mr. Abrego to the United States pursuant to a court order, the Department of Justice charged him with two bogus felonies from a traffic stop in 2022, where they didn't charge him, didn't even give him a ticket. And the DOJ told him if he pled guilty to those two charges, that he could be deported to Costa Rica. A nice place. But if he didn't, they would send him to Uganda, which turned into Uruguay, then Eswatini, now Liberia. And a guy who was recently given a big promotion signed a sworn declaration to the court that Costa Rica is no longer on the table. And that is why we were removing him to Liberia. Costa Rica won't take him anymore. The government says they're no longer going to take Mr. Abrego. The judge Polissinis brought that guy in who signed that declaration and he admitted in court that he did not write all of that sworn declaration, the one that he signed. He said a State Department lawyer wrote part of it for him and he confessed that he didn't know what a lot of those words meant, but he signed it anyway. And by the way, yesterday morning, this is kind of breaking news. Costa Rica responded saying they never closed the door. Kilmar Abrego is welcome. Trump's Department of Justice was caught red handed again lying in court. We also learned during that hearing there isn't even a removal order on file for Mr. Abrego, despite the government saying that there is and we're going to send him to Liberia. Judge Sinis seems to have had enough. This is from Adam Klassfeldt at All Rise News, who was at the hearing this past week. During an evidentiary hearing, a federal judge could not confirm that the government obtained a final order of removal. Quote, if your honor finds there's no removal order, then there's no basis for immigration detention whatsoever, abrego's attorney, Andrew Rossman said during a Hearing on Thursday, U.S. district Judge Polissini's grilled senior Justice Department lawyer Drew Ensign. There he is again on this matter. Ensign cited a document in the record, but Sinis told him that that file has no indication that it ordered Abrego's removal. Well, not in so many words, your honor, said Ensign. Not at all. The judge shot back. If there's no removal order, there's no justification for holding him in custody. Judge Sinis closed the evidentiary record and will issue a ruling soon. And if Mr. Abrego avoids deportation, his trial on these trumped up charges, which will be totally embarrassing for the government, is scheduled to begin January 27th. Now, I spoke with Adam Klassfeld about all this. Like I said, he was in the courtroom and you can watch that interview with him and me about the abrego hearing@muellershersherote.com it's up there. Also this week, the case of Marmar Martinez and Ian Santos Ruiz in Chicago completely fell apart. This is the case where the Department of Homeland Security lied to the public in a press Release saying that Ms. Martinez rammed ICE with her vehicle, rammed an ICE SUV with her car, and then brandished a semiautomatic firearm, which is what justified a federal agent firing five shots into her car. But as the reality of the situation began to unfold, we learned that ICE actually rammed her vehicle, that she never actually brandished a gun at all. The agent pulled up and yelled, do something, bitch. And then bragged in text messages about, I shot five shots and she has seven holes with his. With his buddies bragged about it. And with the mounting evidence of the lies told by the agents and the government, the Department of Justice just filed a motion to drop all the charges against Marimar Martinez and Mr. Ruiz. Now, that's great, but there's a bigger problem for the government here, too. They use that incident as a basis for an emergency request to the Supreme Court asking them to let Trump deploy the National Guard to Chicago. The government wrote the following to the Supreme Court. Two cars then rammed directly into the government vehicle. When the federal officers exited their vehicle, one of the cars that had rammed into them drove directly at a Border Patrol agent who drew her service weapon and fired at the driver who was hit, but fled the scene, only to be arrested later in possession of a gun. Approximately 200 rioters then gathered in the area after the shooting, throwing glass, bottles and other objects at the besieged fe federal agents. None of that happened. But this government presented to the Supreme Court as though it had, and the government dropped this case before the truth could come out in open court. So now they have lied in a Supreme Court filing, and I hope the lawyers in the Martinez Ruiz case send a notice to the Supreme Court with the video evidence disproving their claims to justify the deployment of the Guard. And in another case in Chicago against someone named Dana Briggs, the government filed a motion to drop those charges, too. And normally the judge is like, okay, charges dropped. But the judge in this case wrote this. Ordinarily, a court need not explain the basis for granting a dismissal, a dismissal motion filed by the government in a criminal case, per Rule 48A. And ordinarily, a court might do little more than inquire into the basis for the motion so that the reasons supporting the dismissal are more than conclusory. But these are not ordinary times at the Everett McKinley Dirksen United States Courthouse, So a brief additional explanation is necessary. The judge continues, setting aside the extraordinary judicial determinations that DHS sworn declarations are unreliable, that the candor of its agents is open to question, and that sworn testimony of its CBP chief contained knowing falsehoods, the court closes with a focus on the prosecution of Briggs and the other five Broadview arrestees from September 27th. These five prosecutions were highly unusual in this district for several reasons. A no bill vote by a grand jury was virtually unheard of in this district until Operation Midway Blitz. The last one, and only one the Court can remember was from the early part of this century. Then in the past two months at least three have occurred. Importantly, nothing in this order should be construed as scolding the government for dismissing in these cases. Dismissing appears to be the responsible thing for the government to have done in light of the government's judgment and discretion. But the court cannot help but note just how unusual and possibly unprecedented it is for the U.S. attorney's office in this district to charge so hastily that it either could not obtain the indictment in the Grand Jury or was forced to dismiss upon a conclusion that the case is not provable in repeated cases of a similar nature. Signed Gabriel Fuentes, United States Magistrate Judge now on yet another docket this past week, this one belonging to Judge Ellis, she is the judge who entered the preliminary injunction barring Customs and Border Protection from using force against journalists, protesters and clergy, forcing them to wear body worn cameras, forcing them to put their their badge numbers in two conspicuous places on their uniforms. Judge Ellis laid all the lies out bare from from the Department of Homeland Security and Gregory Bevino as well all the lies she uncovered. And thank you to Aaron Reichland Melnick on Blue sky for listing these on October 28th, DHS's social media account claimed that on October 23rd rioters shot at agents with commercial artillery shell fireworks, thus forcing agents to deploy tear gas and riot mu. Judge Ellis reviewed the video. This was completely false. The explosions were DHS's flashbangs. On September 19, DHS claimed agents were forced to use riot munitions to disperse an unruly mob, but in fact the scene was quiet and then almost immediately and without warning, agents lobbed flashbang grenades, tear gas and pepper balls, stating yeah as they did so. On September 26, the DHS officer claimed that they were forced to deploy riot munitions because protesters were becoming increasingly hostile. But in fact the body worn camera footage shows that the protesters were simply standing there when agents first deployed any force. DHS claimed on October 3 that agents were in danger of being rammed, but in fact body cams suggest the agent drove erratically and brake checked the other motorist in an attempt to force accidents that agents could then use as justification for deploying force. At one point, a top officer testified that protesters had shields with nails in them, but there were no nails and it was cardboard. In another incident, DHS wrote in an incident report that a person had thrown a bike at them when in fact the body cam footage showed it was the Agent that threw the bike, quote, actually took a protester's bike and threw it to the side. The head of ice's ERO in Chicago's field office testified that a protester ripped a beard off an agent's face and broken part of ice's building. But when questioned under oath, he admitted he had no evidence of that at all. Judge Ellis also found that a top Customs and Border Protection leader's testimony was not credible, in part because he admitted that that he was relying on unreliable use of force reports that were generated by officers. And in a footnote says that there is video showing an officer asking ChatGPT to generate those reports. Then of course, we have Timu Himmler Greg Bovino, who lied his face off under oath. Turning to Bovino, the court specifically finds his testimony not credible. Bovino appeared evasive over the three days of his deposition, either providing cute responses to plaintiffs counsel questions or outright lying when shown a video of agents hitting Reverend Black with pepper balls. Bovino denied seeing a projectile hit Reverend Black in the head. In another video shown to Bovino, he obviously tackles Scott Blackburn. But instead of admitting to using force against Blackburn, Bovino denied it and instead stated the force was used against him. Just lie after lie after lie. But speaking of ice, their brutality has finally led to charges against one of their own for a change. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer Gerardo Rodriguez was arrested this week for illegally detaining a minor at gunpoint while off duty. The boy's mother was notified and contacted and she went to the scene with his passport and called 911. When she arrived, the deputies that responded to that call referred the ICE officer to the Riverside County Sheriff's Department. This is in Southern California. Who arrested him the same day. Hey, ice, for your situational awareness, they don't let you wear your mask in your mugshot. And another ICE agent this week has been arrested on sex trafficking in a sting. CBS News reports. According to Bloomington Police Chief Booker Hodges, Officers started the three day sting on November 5th. They used several methods to find people who were attempting to solicit a 17 year old girl for sex. In all, police arrested 16 men during the investigation, which Hodges called Operation Creep. Hodges said most of the men came from within the Twin Cities area. So this is in Minneapolis. One of the men, he said, is an employee of Immigration and Customs Enforcement who could face federal charges. Only the best people. But speaking of sex trafficking rings, the entire Republican Party save Clay Higgins, broke with Trump and Mike Johnson and voted to release the Epstein files. Mike Johnson even broke with Mike Johnson, he voted yes on the Epstein Files Transparency Act. And I don't know the real reason Clay Higgins voted no. He put out a statement, but it seems sus to me. But I can tell you I will be looking for Clay Higgins sized redaction boxes when the files are released. Trump signed the bill despite being pissed about the betrayal from his party. And now Pamela Joe has 25 days or so to release the files. And it's important to note there are provisions built into this law that if she inappropriately redacts or over redacts things or withholds information, she'll be sued. And yes, that will eventually be decided by the Supreme Court. But remember, we'll get information from the lower courts first. The same thing happened with Bill Barr's redactions of the Mueller report. A lower court judge publicly declared the redactions were inappropriate and were used to sort of COVID up the breadth and depth of Russian interference in the 2016 election and ordered the full report to come out, which we got in 2020. So even if the Supreme Court rules in favor of Pam Bondi, a lower court judge will tell us if she's been inappropriately withholding information pursuant to the Transparency act, the law that just passed and got signed. And on top of all that, Senator Wyden told us this week that JPMorgan Chase withheld years of filing suspicious activity reports for over a billion dollars in Epstein transactions because the money was too good. And he's called for an investigation into why they helped cover up the sprawling, huge sex trafficking ring. Add that to the fact that Mamdani owned Donald Trump. In their Friday Oval Office meeting, all the Fox News is like showdown on socialism. He's going to take him apart. Everybody on the on the MAGA side was really excited that Donald Trump was going to take him down, take down Mamdani. But it's easy to mesmerize a narcissist that loves attention and celebrities and the media. But this has caused massive cracks in the MAGA base who had already spent tons of money and time strategizing on how to Mom. Donna. Fy Democrats running in the primaries, their whole plan went out the window with just one look. And now Marjorie Taylor Greene has announced she's giving up her seat in Congress a year early, cutting into that razor thin margin in the House. We've got a December 2 special election in Tennessee. We could win that. Top that off with a panel of federal judges ruling this week that the Texas five seat gerrymanders is racially biased and therefore must be thrown out. Now, the Supreme Court has put an administrative pause on the case while they consider it. But they are known for blocking new maps this close to a primary election. And if that ruling, the lower court ruling holds, throwing out the maps, the Republican plan to pick up some extra seats by cheating will have backfired spectacularly, leaving Dems with an advantage of a handful of seats. Because we passed Proposition 50, which has a better chance of surviving the courts. Because we're Democrats, we asked for consent. We got the. We got the voters consent. So we actually come out on top by a couple of seats. But that might not even matter. The latest Marist Poll shows Democrats up 14 points on the general ballot. We have not enjoyed a number that big since the year before we took 40 seats in the house alone in the 2018 blue tsunami. And just like the own goal on the doj, when the government itself demanded the court explain all the things wrong with Lindsey Halligan, it was Republicans themselves that caused the court to throw out the Texas map. The Texas Tribune reports if Greg Abbott had stuck with the story that this was purely political gamesmanship, the court would likely have allowed the redraw to stand based on Supreme Court precedent, effectively sanctioning partisan gerrymanders. But by repeatedly tying the process to a court ruling that changed the racial makeup of who can bring legal challenges under the Voting Rights Act, Abbott explicitly directed the legislature to redistrict based on race. That's what Judge Jeffrey Brown wrote in the ruling that blocked Texas's new map. Brown's 160 page opinion also sharply criticized the Republican legislators for unduly tethering the process to race and specifically condemning State Senator Phil King, chair of the Senate Redistricting Committee, as untruthful and inconsistent on the stand. Sic semper tyrannis, everybody. Tyrants rarely last. And now that MAGA is crumbling under the weight of its own incompetence and bigotry and lies, do we. Do we let up? No, we keep pushing. We keep fighting back. We all have a role to play. Whether you're out warning people about ice in their neighborhood like Maramar Martinez and Ian Santos Ruiz, or whether you're Kilmara Brago fighting back in court or a lawyer helping defend the people against tyranny. Yeah, I'm not. I'm not a lawyer. My role. My role is that I have a big mouth and that I'm not constrained by corporate media conglomerates. So big thanks to Midas for giving me this platform. For more unfiltered news, you can catch me on the Daily Beans audio podcast. That's weekday mornings. So keep pushing back. Keep doing this work. Keep fighting. Elect candidates that will hold these criminals responsible, that elect people who will drag them unmasked before Congress to answer for their crimes. Elect candidates that will impeach Donald Trump. I know Al Green is announcing articles of impeachment right now this weekend. I mean, you know, Canada says elbows up, America. I say cameras out and microphones on. Walt Whitman reminds us the powerful play goes on and you may contribute a verse. As Judge Polissinis said this week in the Abreco hearing, we eat the elephant one bite at a time, everybody. Thank you so much for watching. Thank you for sharing this video. I will see you here next week on the Breakdown. Sam.