Trump’s Potential Trials Are a One-Man “Stress Test of the Legal System”

Summary

Podcast Summary: The Political Scene | The New Yorker Episode: Trump’s Potential Trials Are a One-Man “Stress Test of the Legal System”
Original Air Date: March 24, 2023
Panelists: Susan Glasser (host), Jane Mayer, Evan Osnos

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Overview

In this episode, The New Yorker’s Susan Glasser, Jane Mayer, and Evan Osnos discuss the unprecedented legal challenges facing Donald Trump. With potential indictments in New York, Georgia, and from the Department of Justice, the panel examines what it means for democracy, the legal system, and American political culture when a former president faces criminal charges. The conversation delves deeply into the mechanics and implications of each major case, the way Trump weaponizes the legal process, and the broader questions of accountability and precedent.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. Trump as a “Stress Test” of the Legal System

[03:57] Jane Mayer: "[Donald Trump] has been a stress test of the legal system. He pushes the limit... he just doesn't care what's the difference between legal and illegal."

• Trump has long been investigated, relentlessly "pushing the system’s boundaries."
• The real issue is less about Trump’s personality and more about whether American legal institutions can withstand such a challenge.
• The unprecedented nature of possibly indicting a former president – "the particulars are small, the moment is huge." [03:57]

2. The Political Optics of Indictment

• Trump’s supporters preemptively attack any pending indictment as politically motivated.
• Discussion of the claim that this scenario is "good for Trump" by energizing his base. Evan Osnos is skeptical, saying:
  [07:05] Evan Osnos: “I’m quite skeptical of that theory... There are not a lot of Americans thinking, ‘I was a little exhausted by Trump, but now that he’s been indicted, I am finally energized to get back into the game.’”
• Rival Republicans, notably Ron DeSantis, walk a line between defending Trump and distancing themselves.

3. The Manhattan DA Case: Stormy Daniels Hush Money

Timeline:

• 2006: Trump’s alleged affair with Stormy Daniels.
• 2016: $130,000 hush payment via Michael Cohen.
• Legal Questions: Does misclassification of this payment as a campaign contribution constitute a state crime? Can a state court criminally charge for federal campaign violations? [08:45]
• Michael Cohen is now a pivotal, if complicated, witness, having gone to jail for his role. Mayer compares his pivot to John Dean turning on Nixon:
  [10:09] Jane Mayer: “He’s an insider turning eyewitness on the boss…he was thrown under the bus by the boss.”

4. Michael Cohen’s Arc and Testimony

• Cohen transformed from intimidating “fixer” to apologetic whistleblower.
• Cohen’s insight: Trump avoids direct orders, maintains plausible deniability:
  [15:24] Susan Glasser: “He avoids getting in trouble because he speaks with this sort of indirection... he never writes it down on email. He sort of says, ‘this is what I’d like you to do’...”
• Cohen predicted Trump would not leave office if he lost the 2020 election. [15:33]

5. The Broader Legal Landscape

• Beyond New York: Georgia election interference, January 6th insurrection, and classified documents at Mar-a-Lago.
• The sequence of cases matters—New York might "break the barrier" and make other prosecutors more willing to proceed. [16:24]
• Complexity: What happens if Trump faces charges or trials in multiple venues? Can he run for president from jail? (Eugene V. Debs did.) [18:24]

6. The Justice Department and January 6th

• The DOJ’s investigations into both January 6th and the classified documents at Mar-a-Lago are seen as the gravest.
• The panel grapples with whether prosecuting Trump would be a step toward justice or dangerous retribution, mindful of his ability to rally supporters by casting himself as a victim.

7. Trump’s Rhetoric: "I am your retribution"

[20:09] Evan Osnos (quoting Trump): "I am your warrior, I am your justice. And for those who have been wronged and betrayed, I am your retribution."

• Trump frames legal challenges as a collective battle for his supporters.
• The panel expresses concern about the risk of violence, linking his rhetoric to January 6th and to ongoing threats.

8. Institutional Precedents and International Comparisons

• Discussion of how other democracies (France, Israel, Italy, Germany, Spain, Austria, etc.) have prosecuted high-level leaders and survived.
• Jane Mayer notes the US system is less equipped – impeachment failed, DOJ’s policy shielded Trump while in office, and now the legal system is struggling to respond.

9. Fact-Checking the "Soros DA" Narrative

[36:46] Jane Mayer: “Bragg has never met Soros... He put a million dollars into a group called Color of Change…they only spent a half million. It’s certainly not a direct kind of funding of Alvin Bragg by George Soros.”

• The "Soros-funded" label is debunked and contextualized as a dog-whistle with antisemitic undertones.

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Notable Quotes and Memorable Moments

• [03:57] Jane Mayer: “Donald Trump is a one man crime spree... he has been a stress test of the legal system.”
• [07:05] Evan Osnos: “There are not a lot of Americans thinking, ‘I was a little exhausted by Trump, but now that he’s been indicted, I am finally energized to get back into the game.’”
• [10:09] Jane Mayer: "It’s a revenge story... [Cohen] was stung when he experienced what so many people around Trump do, which was he was thrown under the bus by the boss."
• [15:33] Jane Mayer: "He was among the people I interviewed, one of the only ones who said if Trump loses in 2020, he won’t go."
• [20:09] Trump (quoted): “I am your warrior, I am your justice. And for those who have been wronged and betrayed, I am your retribution.”
• [25:46] Jane Mayer (on Trump’s true fears): "Michael Cohen... said, it keeps him up at night. This is his terror."

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• 01:42 – Podcast proper begins; the week's news context
• 03:57 – Jane Mayer on Trump as “stress test of the legal system”
• 08:45 – Evan Osnos on the legal challenge of indicting Trump in the New York case
• 10:09 – The role and motivations of Michael Cohen
• 16:24 – Comparison of New York, Georgia, January 6th, and documents cases
• 20:09 – Trump’s rhetoric: “I am your retribution”
• 24:05 – Risks of political violence fueled by Trump’s language
• 27:09 – The classified documents case and the crime-fraud exception
• 29:37 – Frustration with slow accountability compared to Watergate
• 32:46 – U.S. legal system vs. international prosecutions of leaders
• 36:46 – Jane Mayer debunks the "Soros-funded" district attorney narrative

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Tone and Closing Thoughts

The panel’s tone is urgent, analytical, and conversational. There are moments of dark humor—especially at Trump’s expense—contrasted with frank concern about the future of American democracy and the rule of law.

[38:43] Jane Mayer: “We begin and end...with Donald Trump trolling us, as it were, once again raising money off of the fear and anxiety he himself has generated, putting out the idea that he’s excited for his perp walk and undercutting the rule of law.”

Conclusion:
The episode closes on the note that Trump’s legal saga will remain central, both as legal drama and as a test for the American democratic system. The hosts underscore the historical importance and the unresolved question: Can American institutions rise to the challenge that Trump presents—or will this one-man “stress test” expose their breaking point?

Transcript

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[Michael Colory]

Can we talk about the most important pressing matter of American life, which is Kyrsten Sinema's comments to Republican audiences about her Democratic colleagues? Did you see this? Yeah.

[Susan Glasser]

You know that. Just a bunch of old men drinking Jello.

[Michael Colory]

Drinking Jello.

[Susan Glasser]

Drinking Jello. I don't know if it's drinking J.

[Michael Colory]

So that would be even more withering.

[Susan Glasser]

Not Jello shots. No, I don't think she's Jello shots.

[Jane Mayer]

Definitely not the vodka in this.

[Susan Glasser]

Welcome to the Political Scene, a weekly discussion about the big questions in American politics. I'm Susan Glasser and I'm joined by my colleagues Jane Mayer and Evan Osnos.

[Jane Mayer]

Hey, Susan.

[Michael Colory]

Hi, Susan.

[Susan Glasser]

So, big sigh. It's been another week and another dramatic scramble to figure out once again if the law will ever catch up with Donald Trump. Will the Manhattan DA indict him? What about the Georgia grand jury, the Department of Justice Special counsel? As of Friday morning, we just don't know. Remember, the week started with Donald Trump saying he was going to be arrested. Not only arrested, he even knew the time and date it was going to be on Tuesday in New York. Well, here we are, days later, no arrest yet. Donald Trump busy putting out the word, he's ready for his perp walk, even speculating that it might be fun. Yes, I'm afraid to say the Trump show with all of its chaos, all of its misdirection goes on the racist.

[Michael Colory]

Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bray. The Manhattan District Attorney is a Soros funded prosecutor. Let's be very clear here. The case died this very week. It is very obvious, it is very clear.

[Jane Mayer]

And all they do is they cause anger and problems for our country cuz.

[Michael Colory]

Our people aren't gonna take this stuff.

[Susan Glasser]

So Jane, in a lot of ways this would be truly a historic moment. It's never happened before that a former President of the United States has been indicted. It appears, and again, asterisk underscore that. It appears that Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg might be on the brink of breaking that historic barrier. But in some ways it also feels like we've actually been here before, at least with Donald Trump. I mean, think about the way we've been breathlessly waiting all week. Shades of the Mueller report, if nothing else, right? But Donald Trump, he has been investigated since he basically entered adult life in the 1970s, right? Again and again and again. What do you think this moment means for him? I mean, is this truly something he's gonna bluster his way through or is this something that he really fears that he's really in jeopardy from?

[Jane Mayer]

You know, it's been said that Donald Trump is a one man crime spree and he has been for years. And he's always been a stress test of the legal system. He pushes the limit. And I think you can really suspect that he just doesn't care what's the difference between legal and illegal. And so I think it's an incredibly important moment because the question is whether our legal system, our rule of law, which is the crux of our democracy, can catch up with someone who votes violates all the rules that everybody else has to abide by. It's in part about him and his personality and his ability to turn everything into a reality show. But I really think the more interesting question in a way is whether the system can handle him and what he's doing to the system and what his backers are doing to the system. So I mean, it looks small, the particulars are small, the moment is huge.

[Susan Glasser]

So Evan, I mean, I have to say we've seen Trump rally his defenders once again. This is a playbook that he's turned to time and time again. But it works. And Republicans are already out there criticizing the indictment that has not yet happened as being politically motivated. And that they would argue that rather than attacking the rule of law, they're the ones in effect defending it. They're the ones saying that you shouldn't have what amounts to Victor's justice, that you shouldn't have a local prosecutor imposing a political agenda and watching out the whirlwind. There was a column in the Wall Street Journal this morning, in fact, saying just that, hey, Democrats, you better beware, because we can find crazy local prosecutors, too, to indict Joe Biden or indict other Democratic politicians. Do you think there is the risk of sort of unleashing the hounds of retributive justice?

[Michael Colory]

Well, I think we'll talk about whether or not this, in fact, is something that is utterly unprecedented. I'll make the case that I think actually there is history here. But I want to talk about something in the meantime, which is that, look, right now we're in this period that because everybody's waiting and expecting something, that everybody is already getting a little bit too clever by half. You've got a lot of Republicans, in effect, kind of preparing the electorate by saying, this is a great thing for Donald Trump. This is really gonna help him. And there's column after column that say more or less that, that this is gonna consolidate the base. I'm quite skeptical of that theory because I think there are not a lot of Americans out there that are thinking, you know, I was a little exhausted by Trump, but now that he's been indicted, I am finally energized to get back into the game. And I think the other thing that is quite clear is that his frenemies like Ron DeSantis are just delighted by this development. Take, for example, the fact that, you know, DeSantis is doing the thing that Republicans are doing now where he is sort of mouthing all of the ritual statements about how this is a quote, unquote, sorrow backed prosecutor going after Donald Trump. But then, I mean, there was one quote in particular that caught my attention. Then I noticed that DeSantis did linger on the following quote when he said, I don't know what goes into paying hush money to a porn star to secure silence over some type of alleged affair. I just can't speak to that, which with friends like these, I think. So the damage to Donald Trump will be real in the sense that he will be contending with this issue for a while.

[Susan Glasser]

So, okay, you're out on a limb here saying that actually an Indictment, shock, horror is not actually good for a politician. This is certainly a defensible argument, a.

[Michael Colory]

Bold moral claim, but I'll stand by it.

[Jane Mayer]

I mean, it's kind of like what Senator Smith from Minnesota said. She says, I'm an old fashioned girl. I think being arrested in the middle of your campaign is not a helpful thing. But so much of the punditocracy is in the other place on this. And I think what's fascinating if you step back is Trump has again turned the press and the punditocracy into sort of film critics of his reality show. And they're busy. Is he up, is he down? Whatever. But meanwhile, they're playing his game, which is that he's criticizing the justice system and they're all in on it, saying this is the wrong indictment, the wrong time. We shouldn't start with this one. They're buying into the idea that they know better than the criminal justice system.

[Susan Glasser]

Good point. Because, by the way, there's no indictment. So we've all pre analyzed an event that has yet to occur. That being said, we do have some understanding about what this investigation in New York is about. Evan, what exactly do we expect in terms of charges from the Manhattan D. Alvin Braggin? What is the case about?

[Michael Colory]

Well, it's actually a bit of a tricky case because in theory, this is gonna be a case about how they accounted for campaign contributions and whether in fact, the hush money that was paid to Stormy Daniels constituted an illegal contribution. But it rests on this quite tricky legal detail which is can, in fact, in fact, a contribution to a federal campaign be subject to criminal charges in state court. All of this matters greatly in terms of whether or not Donald Trump could be charged, whether it's a misdemeanor, whether it's a felony. So I think there is more than a small amount of play here in terms of what the actual result could be.

[Susan Glasser]

So, Jane, the origins of this are this affair that Donald Trump had with Stormy Daniels, adult film star, actor Stephanie Clifford, her real name. This happened all the way back in 2006.

[Michael Colory]

Right.

[Susan Glasser]

And then there's this 2016, $130,000 hush money payment made by Michael Cohen. He seems to me to be really the key character here. This is Donald Trump's former lawyer, former fixer. He's actually already gone to jail for this crime, already served his time, and is now out and seems to be the key witness. You've talked with Michael Cohen. You've met him. What do you think? I mean, this is sort of a revenge story, isn't it? This whole case?

[Jane Mayer]

I don't know. I mean, it's a little bit kind of more earthy version of the John Dean story. He's an insider who's turning eyewitness on the boss. And he was right there in the midst of this. And you can imagine why. I mean, I think when the prosecutors first went to talk to him, he was in jail, and the DA's office sent prosecutors up to talk to him, and he was furious, because he was the henchman, the secondary guy in this plot, and he was the one serving the time, but he didn't do the crime. Basically, it was his boss who came up with this scheme, according to him. And so he was angry, but eventually he gave them all the details that formed the beginning of this prosecution. But he's a fascinating guy to listen to. He's a lawyer. He was a loyalist above loyalists to Trump. And he was so stung when he experienced what so many people around Trump do, which was he was thrown under the bus by the boss.

[Susan Glasser]

Well, right, Evan, didn't he say that he would actually take a bullet for Donald Trump? And then just a few months later, of course, he broke with him.

[Evan Osnos]

It is painful to admit that I was motivated by ambition at times. It is even more painful to admit that many times I ignored my conscience and acted loyal to a man when I should not have. Sitting here today, it seems unbelievable that I was so mesmerized by Donald Trump that I was willing to do things for him that I knew were absolutely wrong.

[Susan Glasser]

What does that tell us?

[Michael Colory]

It is amazing when you look at the full arc of Michael Cohen's passage through American public life, that when we were first introduced to him, he was this guy who was threatening mayhem on reporters who were reporting on things about Donald Trump. I mean, he was a really crudest possible way.

[Jane Mayer]

I mean, he was an intimidating thug.

[Michael Colory]

And they know exactly who you are, and they know exactly what you do, and they know exactly the story you plan on writing. So I'm warning you, tread very lightly, because what I'm gonna do to you.

[Susan Glasser]

Is gonna be disgusting.

[Michael Colory]

Do you understand me?

[Jane Mayer]

And he also threatened mayhem to Stormy Daniels if she wentif she broke the deal, came out, and violated the hush money agreement. He threatened that. Remember, they worked out a thing where every time she mentioned that she was gonna have to pay a million do. I mean, these are tough negotiators, guys.

[Michael Colory]

And what comes through the fact is that there's a great description of him from one of the prosecutors who dealt with him, who was looking into his. Actually worked on his case, described him very well, I think, as a feral creature, meaning smart, manipulative, and utterly survivalist. I mean, somebody who will do what it takes to get through. Now, that person also said he was truthful. And I think this is one of the things that it will come down to is a guy who has been pled guilty for lying and so on. Is he, in fact, gonna be somebody that a court listens to faithfully? And that's the big part.

[Jane Mayer]

Okay. So having interviewed him, I have to say he has the feeling of someone who's come clean. I don't know whether the jury will buy it, but he is a true believer in what he's doing.

[Evan Osnos]

Now, at the end of day, it's really all about accountability. That's what I think America wants to see, because Donald has managed to escape accountability his entire life, and the rest of us that have been around him all seem to be the ones who get thrown under the bus.

[Jane Mayer]

This isn't a for show thing. It's not just to get vengeance or something. He sounds like someone who thinks he's seen the light.

[Michael Colory]

Well, his podcast is called Mea Culpa.

[Jane Mayer]

Oh, yeah.

[Susan Glasser]

Well, he's got good advice in terms of his branding. But one thing that I was always struck by with Michael Cohen is, among other things, he's one of the very best Trump whisperers and Trump explainers. In fact, I asked at the very beginning of the Trump presidency, when he was still on the inside, I asked a group of the kind of smartest Trump observers, well, who do you turn to for Trump insight? And a number of the very best ones, they said absolutely without par. Michael Cohen, he really speaks the language and can interpret Donald Trump. And I'm reminded of that thinking of, remember his famous hours long hearing before the House after he had been arrested, but before he had gone to jail, he did this incredible public testimony against Donald Trump. When Trump was in the White House, it was actually the very same day that Donald Trump was having the Hanoi summit with Kim Jong Un. And Michael Cohen is up there spilling all of his secrets, talking about how he did, quote, unquote, dirty deeds for Trump. But there was this, I think, really interesting Trump insight in that Michael Cohen hearing back in 2018. He said Donald Trump has avoided. He avoids getting in trouble because he speaks with this sort of indirection. You know, who will rid me of this meddlesome priest? Donald Trump speaks the language of. He never writes it down on email. He sort of says, this is what I'd like you to do or, you know, what about that guy? We'll see about him. And I thought that, of course, is one of the reasons why Donald Trump has never yet until now been indicted criminally.

[Jane Mayer]

I agree that he was a great Trump interpreter and he was among the people I interviewed, one of the only ones who said if Trump loses in 2020, he won't go.

[Susan Glasser]

Well, Mike said that in the testimony he testified to Congress to he absolutely.

[Jane Mayer]

That was a prophecy promoed what was gonna happen. And he really knows him well. And you're absolutely right about how he understands how Trump leaves no fingerprints, which is why there are all of these prosecutions on all the different this country moving forward. But they're so hard because Trump is so good at not leaving fingerprints and being just slightly ambiguous in how he says things. Should we run through them all these prosecutions?

[Susan Glasser]

Well, that's right. Okay, so, Evan, walk us through this New York case. What the other potential cases are, and what do you think is the hierarchy of them?

[Michael Colory]

Well, I mean, we've got the chronological hierarchy, and then there's also the, the chances of one of them actually landing. So New York is the first case that seems to be coming up. But then there's the Georgia case, which is in some ways, this is about the question of whether, in fact, he interfered in the election by, as we all remember, telling the Secretary of State that he needed to find a certain number of votes. That's a classic example of the sort of coded language that, you know, that case may hinge on whether or not in fact that constituted him directing or seeking improper influence. And there are two cases associated with January 6th and with the documents that were found in Mar a Lago. So that is the lineup of conceivable options. I think the sequence matters. I mean, one of the things that you hear people talking about now is that even if the New York case is not the most serious of the allegations, that that in a sense gives permission to some of the other prosecutors out there to say, all right, well, now it's no longer a question of whether Donald Trump is impervious. It's now just a question of whether this case on its has the merits to go forward. So that makes it easier, in effect, to charge him, rather than being the first one that has to cross that threshold.

[Jane Mayer]

What happens if he's on, if he's facing charges and on trial in more than one place at once?

[Michael Colory]

Well, what happens if he has a campaign event at a competing venue? These are complex logistics.

[Susan Glasser]

The political scene will be back in just a moment.

[Michael Colory]

America is changing and.

[Susan Glasser]

So is the world. But what's happening in America isn't just.

[Michael Colory]

The cause of global upheaval.

[Susan Glasser]

It's also a symptom of disruption that's happening everywhere.

[Michael Colory]

I'm Asma Khalid in Washington, D.C. i'm.

[Susan Glasser]

Tristan Redman in London. And this is the Global Story.

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Every weekday, we'll bring you a story.

[Susan Glasser]

From this intersection where the world and America meet. Listen on BBC.com or wherever you get your podcasts. We should say, just to be clear, you can run for president from jail. Eugene V. Debs did this. Now, of course, he wasn't actually expected to win. He didn't win. He was the socialist candidate. Donald Trump right now is the leader of the Republican field and could well be a serious contender to return to office, even from jail. But we're getting ahead of ourselves. It does strike me that obviously the justice department is the 800 pound gorilla here and that it would be by far the most serious crime were the Justice Department. The special counsel right now is looking at this. Ultimately, though, it will have to be Attorney General Merrick Garland who will have to make the call, we're told, but who knows, right, that this is something they would decide upon by later this spring, early summer, perhaps. I want to ask both of you, how likely do you think it is that Trump would actually face charges related to January 6th, and is that ultimately, in your view, a good thing or a bad thing for the country? This idea of justice as retribution is something that Trump and his allies are going to lean very hard on, that this is something that should be adjudicated essentially in the court of public opinion and ultimately in our elections.

[Michael Colory]

Well, I can tell you that right now, Donald Trump is not simply framing this as an act of retribution against him, but in some ways it's even more powerful and more ominous that he's framing it as he did to a crowd the other day.

[Jane Mayer]

He said, I am your warrior, I am your justice. And for those who have been wronged and betrayed, I am your retribution.

[Michael Colory]

I am your retribution, not the right. I am am your retribution. Meaning that his capacity to resist prosecution is somehow an act of valor and endurance on the part of his base. That's a really volatile bit of language because if that's the way he frames it, that's setting a predicate for a kind of, I don't want to say necessarily an armed resistance. But we've got him now very clearly calling on his supporters to stand up and demonstrate their commitment to him.

[Jane Mayer]

I have to say in that phrase from him, I hear so many biblical echoes of vengeance is mine. And it's a tyrannical thing to say, basically, for an elected politician or even an unelected one at this point. I think something else caught my eye, which is there's a prediction from an interview in the New York Times from someone who is Charles Teifer, who's a lawyer, who's been very involved as a counsel in Congress, who looks at what's going on in all of this and predicts that what the Republicans are doing and what Trump's doing is laying the groundwork for an indictment of Attorney General Merrick garland during the 2024 campaign. Putting the Justice Department on trial, Bas. Putting the legal system on trial, but specifically putting Garland on trial or trying to. That they'll turn it back. I mean, and what Trump's trying to do is delegitimize, again, the legal system in this country. And I think it's potentially quite dangerous, what he's doing.

[Susan Glasser]

Well, and he's helped, of course, by his enablers on Capitol Hill. I think that's why you have this new committee run by his close ally, Jim Jordan. The weaponization. Right. They're talking about the deep state. Who are they talking about? They're talking about the Justice Department. There's been a sort of a sustained attack on institutions. But I think what's new to Evan's point is also is adding this almost overtly call to arms. Call to arms. And there's this quote I want to read that Trump just posted overnight. He's clearly in sort of deep freakout mode here. He's already rallied his supporters to, you know, said that they should, you know, come out and protest his arrest, which didn't happen. The arrest didn't happen. But overnight, he said that, that not only had no crime been committed, but he warned about the potential death and destruction in such a false charge could be catastrophic for our country. Who would do such a thing? He said, only a degenerate psychopath that truly hates the usa truly spelled wrong, of course. But this death and destruction, it echoes, Jane, the thing that you were talking about, which was this extraordinary speech at CPAC a few weeks ago. I wrote about it in my column because this idea of a president calling for retribution, in that same speech, he urged his supporters on by saying that this is the final battle. It is our last chance to save the country. That was the kind of almost biblical language that he was using, warning people that there was no other chance, that essentially they had to stand and Fight now. And we all saw in January 6th, Evan, some people don't take Donald Trump as a joke. They take him at face value. They listen to inflammatory rhetoric like that, and they act upon it. Do you think that these court cases could actually come along with the prospect of a serious kind of politicized violence in the country?

[Michael Colory]

Yeah, I remember I was covering the events on January 6, and the apocalyptic language of the kind that you were just describing is the coin of the realm. It is about because it gives a lot of people who otherwise feel kind of listless and unattached in American life. It gives them the noblest of purposes because it feels as if they are the ones who are defending the realm from some vague attack. And that's what he's doing. And I am deeply, deeply worried because, as we know from January 6th, it takes a few hundred people. And I was talking to a strategist the other day, a Democrat, who was saying that they've sort of segmented this out. They've run their numbers, and they believe there is some core, and it's a not insignificant number of people who are. Are well armed, they're devoted to Trump no matter what happens, and that that's the fear that we need to be contending with.

[Jane Mayer]

I know. I mean, I've actually done interviews with, I guess it was a former Democratic governor from Ohio who said, the problem is they've got more guns than we've got. I mean, which was rather startling thing to say. But, yeah, it certainly seems like Trump will do stop at nothing if he can, if he can, to keep from being convicted and to get reelected.

[Susan Glasser]

So, Jane, it strikes me that maybe you're a little bit skeptical that his bluster leaking out of Mar? A Lago that, oh, well, I'd love to get, you know, handcuffed and perp walked. What do you think? Do you think that's how he views it, that it's just a spectacle and a political benefit for him, or is he actually terrified of being arrested?

[Jane Mayer]

Well, turning back to Michael Cohen, I had a conversation with him about this, and he said, it keeps him up at night. This is his terror. And I said, do you think he talks to Melania about it? And he laughed and he said, only if he walks up another floor to find her.

[Susan Glasser]

I will say for the record that when we visited Mar? A Lago twice to interview Trump, there were no discernible signs of Melania's presence there or in his immediate orbit. So, actually, one case we haven't talked about at all, and I Just I want to bring it up because there have been some developments this week, but also because I'm not sure what to think about it. And that's the classified documents case. Talk about January 6th and the Justice Department, but Jack Smith has also been charged with investigating and figuring what to do about this classified documents case. Now, there was a whole kind of spinoff legal fight this week went all the way up to an appeals court which ordered that one of Trump's attorneys needed to testify in this case because of the crime fraud exception. What that means is that they have found essentially probable evidence that a crime was committed, and that's enough to break the attorney client privilege. There appears to be taped audio evidence as part of this. Does it mean that we have a situation here where Donald Trump was either lying to his own lawyers or was on tape or something saying, hey, I don't have any more classified documents?

[Jane Mayer]

Well, I think the question is whether the lawyers were conspiring with him or whether he was lying to them. And that's what they're trying to figure out. And why they need to call the liarsexcuse me, why they. They need to call the lawyers in to question them.

[Susan Glasser]

Are we allowed to talk about Freudian slips anymore?

[Jane Mayer]

And so, I mean, the breaking the crime into attorney client privileges is an incredibly serious thing. It happens very rarely. The Justice Department would have had to make a decision on this at the various top levels. And Judge Beryl Howell, who was hearing this, obviously has seen the evidence and is under the impression that it's serious enough, that it is worth saying that there's a crime fraud exception here. So this is an important moment. I mean, the case, what you have to think of this case is not so much about classified documents anymore. It's an obstruction case. That's what we're looking at here. And that the federal government asked for these documents back and that somebody in the Trump camp misled the federal government, possibly very deliberately, in which case it becomes an obstruction of justice.

[Susan Glasser]

So, Evan, it seems like everybody has an opinion when it comes to the question of the documents case and January 6th and what, if anything, the Justice Department should do. What's your view?

[Michael Colory]

I come down to the fact that, that as serious as the documents case may be, I think it got kind of muddied by the fact that clearly a lot of other people had documents.

[Susan Glasser]

Including Joe Biden.

[Michael Colory]

Including Joe Biden and Mike Pence and on and on.

[Jane Mayer]

So true.

[Michael Colory]

That doesn't undermine the obstruction piece of it, which is a huge distinguishing factor. But I think just to direct our attention to the elephant in the room. Donald Trump led an insurrection against the democratic system and sought to undo an election with a violent insurgency. Seems to me like there could be some violation of law in there. And I think that is, from my perspective, the much larger risk here is that if that does not get addressed, if it doesn't get cauterized in the sort of full cultural and legal sense, then we are creating a new era in which that becomes a permissible tool because you can get away with it.

[Susan Glasser]

Well, listen, I do think that there is a kind of inchoate rage in the country in many ways, not just among Trump's rage filled reporters, supporters. We often talk about that, but amongst those people who've been waiting and waiting and waiting for some kind of accountability. Hundreds of the foot soldiers in Donald Trump's army have gone to jail as a result of January 6th. But so far, not a single person has been charged. And I think it's worth noting in that context, it has already been longer. From January 6th until today, with no charges forthcoming from those who organized and made January 6th happen. Then the entirety of the Watergate scandal, from the break in at the Democratic Party headquarters in June of 1972 to the exit and forced resignation of Richard Nixon in 1974, it is 807 days and counting as of today since January 6th. I just think that's a remarkable day.

[Michael Colory]

And we haven't asked you directly, Susan. I mean, do you think that this is likely to lead to a case? I mean, are you making the argument that you think that that means that they've decided they can't do it, or do you think it's diffic difficult to do it? What's your assessment?

[Susan Glasser]

Well, look, there is an argument, I think, that a special counsel would not have been appointed had the attorney general not reached at least some threshold of deciding that it was worth potentially pursuing charges? Right. So I do think that it's an indication of extreme seriousness, perhaps even intent on the part of the Justice Department to pursue charges in this particular case. But your point is the right point. How can it be in this country that Donald Trump. Trump is the first president in our entire history to refuse to concede his election defeat and to leave office peacefully. That's a remarkable thing. January 6th, a horde of people not only just storming their own capitol, but doing so with the very explicit purpose of obstructing Congress's constitutional role to certify the election. This. This was a breathtaking moment. As much as we often talk and talk and talk about January 6th, so that we seem kind of inured to it. I think it's still hard for us to absorb what a significant moment it was. Arguably, it was a moment when our democracy crossed some kind of a really dangerous threshold. We're still in this crisis. The lights are blinking red on the system. And I don't know. I mean, look around the world. There are a lot of democracies that have been challenged by this, that have had presidents who've done all sorts of crimes. In some cases they've prosecuted them, in some cases they haven't. I wonder, I mean, are we in a world, you know, like when France and Israel prosecuted former leaders and they went to jail, or are we in a world where, in fact, they used court cases against them, like Benjamin Netanyahu in Israel today and Berlusconi in Italy? He's, you know, faced lawsuit after lawsuit after criminal investigation, and that's actually fueled their political movements. What do you think?

[Jane Mayer]

I mean, I think one thing is that what we're seeing is that the tools we have to deal with what's essentially a massive crime against democracy here by Donald Trump, because he wouldn't concede the tools are not great in the United States, what we have are impeachment. So that is the Constitution method that's been set up for a president, and it hasn't worked here. That's one problem. The other is our Justice Department has come to the conclusion that you can't charge a sitting president with a crime. And so he could get off the hook during the period when he was in the White House. Now that he's out, these issues, particularly something like Stormy Daniels, seems like ancient history and may be unfair. So someone else goes to prison for something that he was involved in and he was an unindicted co conspirator. Again, our system seems to not be quite capable of dealing with it the way that we've seen. Other modern democracies have managed to do better in some ways across around the world, you know, France and Portugal and there've been a number of countries that have. This is not just a banana republic thing, despite what some of the Republicans have said. Actually, modern democracies have handled corruption at the highest level very well elsewhere in the world. We're struggling with it here.

[Michael Colory]

I think that's a crucial point, actually, that we don't talk enough about the fact that there is this real record around the world, in other advanced democracies of them attending to the commission of a Crime by a high level politician. And you've named some of the key cases, but there's others, too. I mean, there's Germany, Spain, Austria. You can go down the list and see that this is in fact a feature, not a bug, of democracy and that you have to be able to hold people to account. I mean, this gets back to one of the early things we talked about today that I think is really vital to mention, which is that as we talk about the are we ready to cross the Rubicon of prosecuting a former president, we have to remember that this is not the first time that we've had a president or a vice president who's done something really bad. I mean, we talked about Nixon, but Spiro Agnew, after all, resigned because he pleaded no contest to a felony tax evasion charge. Look, periodically, in two and a half centuries of American politics, you're gonna get somebody in a high office who is gonna break the law. And you have to respond to that. If we suddenly announce that it's just too divisive or it's gonna fuel more, that's throwing in the towel.

[Susan Glasser]

Well, I hear you, I hear you. But I have to say, I keep thinking as we're talking about this around the world, look at the comeback bid of Benjamin Netanyahu in Israel, who right now has been on trial for several years and has used the grievances in that to kind of reignite his political movement. He's come back to power as prime minister. The first thing he's doing is a very controversial effort to force through changes in the judicial system that would make it hard, harder to prosecute him. It's an extraordinary moment and it is not without precedent. Donald Trump is trying to play the Bibi playbook. In fact, we can end on this note. I just received this email just in from Donald Trump friend. The Soros funded prosecutor in Manhattan knows he has no case. All caps in red against me. But instead of dropping the case and admitting I'm innocent, the Soros TA will drag this witch on forever. All caps to try and find any way he can to take me down. You're getting a preview of just how far the left will go to destroy our campaign and eliminate the one candidate, me, who can crush.

[Michael Colory]

Here comes the fundraising appeal who can.

[Susan Glasser]

Crush Biden in 2024, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. So please make a contribution to Save America.

[Jane Mayer]

Unbelievable.

[Susan Glasser]

For 1,500% impact, it's so believable.

[Michael Colory]

But it's like buying a rotisserie oven online. I Mean, it's like he's turned this into a profit opportunity never to be.

[Jane Mayer]

He's selling his victimhood, which is just in high dudgeon. Can we just do one quick moment on fact checking on the Soros situation? I think it's fair to say, having done a profile of George Soros, that he has put a tremendous amount of money into American and international political issues. But in the case of Bragg, he has never met Bragg, never had a conversation with Bragg. He put a million dollars into a called Color of Change. Color of Change decided to back Bragg and use some of those funds to wage an independent campaign in favor of Bragg's election to become DA In New York. But Color of Change, partway through, changed its mind about Bragg. They were going to spend a million dollars and they only spent a half million. They got some kind of cold feet on this. So there's more here than people seem to realize. And it's certainly not a direct kind of funding of Alvin Bragg by George Soros.

[Susan Glasser]

I noticed that in the past it was the Soros controlled the Soros funded. Now he's just shortened it. You know, he's edited down to the Soros da And there are, I mean.

[Jane Mayer]

As Susan pointed out earlier, there are definitely certain echoes in this that everybody knows about, which is Soros was born into a Jewish family. And this sort of idea that he's the kind of of a puppet master Jewish globalist who's controlling everything is very much the dog whistle in all of this.

[Susan Glasser]

Absolutely. Well, so we begin and end, I guess, in the same place, which is Donald Trump trolling us, as it were, once again raising money off of the fear and anxiety he himself have generated, putting out the idea that he's excited.

[Jane Mayer]

For his purpose walk and undercutting the rule of law.

[Susan Glasser]

So next week, is it gonna happen?

[Michael Colory]

I've given up trying to predict that. I can't do.

[Susan Glasser]

Stay tuned, everybody. Stay tuned. All right, Jane, Evan. I suspect this is not the first or last time that we will be having an entire show devoted to the legal troubles of Donald Trump. Thank you both for this week. This has been fantastic. Another edition of the play Political Scene. I'm Susan Glaser. We have productions and assistants today from Alex d' Elia and Dan Richards. Stephen Valentino is our executive producer. Our theme music is by Alison Leighton Brown. Thank you so much for listening and we'll see you next week. I'm Katie Drummond. I'm Wired's global editorial director.

[Michael Colory]

I'm Michael Colory, Wired's director of Consumer tech and culture.

[Susan Glasser]

And I'm Lauren Good. I'm a senior correspondent at Wired. And our show, Uncanny Valley is about the people, power, and influence of Silicon Valley. And right now, Silicon Valley and Washington have never been more intertwined. So each week, we get together to talk about a big story, often at the intersection of tech and politics.

[Michael Colory]

Right. So whether we're talking about Trump, Coin Doge, or Elon Musk, we will always explain how these Silicon Valley forces are.

[Susan Glasser]

Affecting Washington and how they affect you. Make sure you're following Uncanny Valley in your podcast app of choice so you don't miss an episode.

[Jane Mayer]

From prx.