Mass Resignations

Summary

UnJustified – "Mass Resignations"

Podcast: UnJustified (MSW Media)
Episode: Mass Resignations (Ep. 52)
Date: January 18, 2026
Hosts: Alison Gill and Andrew McCabe

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Overview

This episode of UnJustified examines a dramatic week at the Department of Justice (DOJ) under President Trump's second term, focusing on unprecedented resignations across key legal divisions. Hosts Alison Gill and Andrew McCabe analyze the DOJ’s handling of the police killing of Renee Nicole Good, the subsequent exodus of federal prosecutors, and the greater implications for civil liberties, institutional integrity, and the politicization of justice. The episode also delves into President Trump's increasing dissatisfaction with his Attorney General, Pam Bondi, and efforts to dismantle traditional DOJ independence, plus new developments in the Epstein files and public debate about constitutional free speech.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Mass Resignations at DOJ Over Shooting of Renee Nicole Good

[02:30–10:42]

• Federal Prosecutors Walk Out:

  • Six Minnesota U.S. Attorneys and four DOJ Civil Rights Division leaders resigned after the DOJ refused to investigate the fatal shooting of unarmed citizen Renee Nicole Good by a federal immigration (ICE) agent in Minneapolis.
  • Among those who resigned was Joseph H. Thompson (second in command in Minnesota), who had led major fraud probes. (03:23)
  • Source: New York Times, The Guardian.

• DOJ Leadership Reaction & Spin:

  • Deputy AG Todd Blanche, a Trump loyalist, insisted, "there is currently no basis for a criminal civil rights investigation" ([05:30]).
  • DOJ spokespeople denied resignations were tied to the Good shooting, saying departures were pre-planned ([05:30–06:17]).
  • "Allow us to lie right now." – Alison Gill ([06:25])

• FBI’s Unprecedented Conduct:

  • The FBI blocked state and local investigators, took exclusive control, and prioritized probing Good’s ties to activist groups instead of the shooting’s circumstances ([07:35–08:12]).

• Administration Messaging:

  • Top Trump officials—including President Trump—labeled Good a “domestic terrorist” without evidence, despite video suggesting she was not threatening officers ([09:30–10:42]).

• Collapse of Civil Rights Oversight:

  • Over 250 attorneys have left or been reassigned since Trump’s second term began—a 70% reduction in the Civil Rights Division ([08:36–09:30]).
  • New priorities: voter fraud and anti-transgender initiatives, pushing classic rights enforcement aside.

• Quote Highlight:

  • "I don't think it's an overstatement to see this as the end of the division as we've known it." – Civil Rights Division attorney to The Guardian ([09:25])

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2. Political Retaliation and DOJ Purges

[11:53–15:10]

• Firing of Eastern District of Virginia Official:

  • Robert McBride (number two at EDVA) was fired after refusing to lead a prosecution against Jim Comey—considered meritless—and for suspected political jockeying ([11:53–14:27]).

• Risks for Dissent Within DOJ:

  • McCabe: “Stand up, tell the truth. If you get fired for it, you’re only the latest US Attorney getting fired...” ([15:10])

• Suppression of Investigations and Evidence:

  • FBI withholding evidence from local prosecutors; concern that discovery in a civil suit (like the George Floyd family’s) may be the only recourse ([15:10–18:56]).

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3. White House Attempts to Command DOJ Functions

[21:44–28:52]

• Trump’s Frustration with AG Pam Bondi:

  • Trump has called Bondi “weak and ineffective”—due to her not pushing prosecutions of his perceived enemies, including Comey and Letitia James ([21:44–23:11]).
  • Trump explored more direct control via “special counsels” and, fundamentally, a new fraud unit within DOJ reporting directly to the White House ([21:44–25:43]).

• Loss of DOJ Independence:

  • AG Bondi acquiesced to the creation of this White House-run DOJ post, bypassing normal DOJ authority ([25:12–25:43]).
  • McCabe: “I cannot think of another Attorney General… who would ever have agreed to such a travesty...” ([25:44])

• Stark Contrast to Past Outrage:

  • Gill: “They dragged Loretta Lynch in and questioned her for eight hours on [the tarmac meeting]...This is unscrupulous, destroys independence. It’s stunning.” ([26:12])

• Quote Highlights:

  • “We have confirmation from inside the Trump administration that they’re weaponizing the DOJ.” – Alison Gill ([28:34])
  • "It hasn't been weaponized enough, apparently. So they're just going to take it in their own hands." – Andy McCabe ([28:44])

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4. The Epstein Files, Congress, and Special Masters

[30:13–39:40]

• Attempt to Appoint Special Master Over Epstein Files:

  • Judges and DOJ dispute whether Judge Engelmeier (SDNY) has jurisdiction to appoint a special master to oversee DOJ compliance with the Epstein Files Transparency Act ([30:14–37:11]).
  • DOJ (Pam Bondi) argues representatives Massie and Khanna have no standing; their request should be denied ([35:33]).

• Legal Process and Standing:

  • Only direct parties (e.g., survivors) are likely to have legal standing to force DOJ compliance—putting the burden on victims, again ([38:38–39:40]).

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5. Debating Free Speech and Trump Prosecutions

[41:01–42:55]

• Washington Post Editorial Board Criticized:

  • Randall Eliason (lawyer, former guest) rebuts a WaPo editorial claiming Jack Smith’s prosecution of Trump infringed the First Amendment ([41:01]).
  • Smith’s case is clear: Trump is prosecuted for criminal conspiracies, not lying per se ([41:51]).

• Quote Highlight:

  • “Speech in furtherance of criminal activity is not constitutionally protected. The board failed to acknowledge that.” – Randall Eliason ([41:51])

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6. Listener Q&A: Civil Rights, Legal Mechanisms, and Use of Force

[46:28–57:35]

• Miranda Rights & ICE Enforcement:

  • Miranda applies only with custodial interrogation, not simple detention or street questioning ([46:28–49:58]).
  • Gray area as ICE agents increasingly target not just immigrants but also activists and bystanders.

• Obligation to Obey ICE Orders:

  • Unclear in many protest situations; depends if agents act within authority ([50:28]).

• Presidential War Powers and Greenland Hypothetical:

  • If Trump orders military action without Congressional consent, would it be illegal?
  • Historically, presidents evade Congressional checks via “police actions” or covert ops, with little recourse unless Congress acts legislatively ([51:23–56:00]).

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7. Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• "In any other universe, the amount of resignations that happened this week at the DOJ would be above the fold, front page news." – Andy McCabe [02:30]
• “They were investigating the victims instead of the shooter.” – Alison Gill [03:23]
• “250 attorneys have left—about a 70% reduction [from the Civil Rights Division].” – Alison Gill [08:36]
• “This is classic terrorism, Vance said. Now hold on a second. I spent decades... This has nothing to do with terrorism.” – Andy McCabe [10:42]
• "We've decided we would like you to be the sole owner... of this stinking bag of dog poo." – Andy McCabe (on McBride’s firing) [14:13]
• "Allow us to lie right now." – Alison Gill [06:25]
• “I cannot think of another Attorney General... who would ever have agreed to such a travesty.” – Andy McCabe (re: White House-run DOJ unit) [25:44]
• “We have confirmation... that they’re weaponizing the DOJ.” – Alison Gill [28:34]

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Timestamps for Key Segments

| Segment | Time | |-----------------------------------------------------|-----------| | Main theme and news intro | 01:02–02:30 | | DOJ mass resignations & Good shooting crisis | 02:30–10:42 | | Political firings, Comey case fallout | 11:53–15:10 | | Evidence suppression and comparison to SDNY cases | 15:10–18:56 | | Trump, Bondi, and White House DOJ power grab | 21:44–28:52 | | Epstein files and special master legal debate | 30:13–39:40 | | First Amendment and Jack Smith prosecution | 41:01–42:55 | | Listener Q&A (Miranda rights, ICE, war powers) | 46:28–57:35 | | Show wrap-up and protest safety warnings | 58:34–60:58 |

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Takeaway

UnJustified exposes an unprecedented erosion of civil rights enforcement, the rule of law, and DOJ independence under the Trump administration. The episode foregrounds the threat posed by political manipulation of legal institutions—not just to victims of state violence, but to democratic governance itself. The hosts urge vigilance, legal literacy, and peaceful, persistent advocacy as crucial tools for accountability.

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Tone & Language

The hosts employ a mix of dark humor, incredulity, and deep expertise, with frequent sarcasm ("Allow us to lie right now"), outrage ("They’re weaponizing the DOJ"), and a sense of foreboding about the fragility of the rule of law. Their commentary is candid, sharp, and intended to galvanize listeners to understand the gravity of these institutional shocks.

Transcript

[Martin Sheen]

It's Sunday morning and that wonderfully relaxed feeling of a long, lazy day lingers in the air. If you want to make the moment last, may I suggest the perfect solution, The Martin Sheen Podcast. Join me, your host, Martin Sheen, for beautifully crafted 20 minute programs filled with never before heard stories of my life, along with personal reflections and poetry that inspires. The Martin Sheen Podcast is the perfect Sunday refresh. A chance to take a deep breath, relax and know that the stress of Monday may be just around the corner, but not here, not now. So make this your weekly moment of calm as we explore faith, hope, love and what it means to be human. And know this, this journey is ever unfolding as I invite you to see what's next with me, Martin Sheen.

[Alison Gill]

And thank you, MSW Media.

[Andy McCabe]

The Department of Justice faces mass resignations from the Civil Rights Division and the Minneapolis U.S. attorney's office over the handling of the killing of Renee Nicole Good.

[Alison Gill]

Judge Engelmeier in the Southern District of New York asks the parties for briefing on whether he has jurisdiction to appoint a special master and whether the congressmen have standing to ask for one.

[Andy McCabe]

Smith has agreed to testify publicly this week as experts debunk claims that he infringed on Donald Trump's free speech.

[Alison Gill]

And President Trump is becoming disillusioned with Attorney General Pam Bondi and wants to create an office within the Justice Department that reports directly to the White House. This is unjustified. Hey everybody, welcome to episode 52 of Unjustified, which happens to be airing the week of my 50 52nd birthday. So it's week of 52's here on unjustified. It's Sunday, January 18th, 2026. I'm Alison Gill.

[Andy McCabe]

And I'm Andy McCabe. And an early happy birthday to you, Allison. Man, I didn't know we were having this 5252 thing happening. That must be a sign of good luck in the universe. All this stuff is going to turn around now, I think because of that.

[Alison Gill]

But it's been a long game. I mean, I had planned this since we started the Jack Podcast to coincide directly with my 52nd birthday. Knowing that Donald would win the election. I did this whole thing on purpose.

[Andy McCabe]

You are like an evil genius. That is impressive. Well, in any other timeline, in any other planet, in any other universe, the amount of resignations that happened this week at the Department of Justice would be an above the fold, front page news, basically running all day, every day on cable news. But as it stands, it's just a blip on the radar. So we're going to make sure that we cover it here in detail on Unjustified. So let's start with some reporting from the Guardian. A wave of federal prosecutors in Minnesota and Washington, D.C. have resigned in protest over the Justice Department's decision not to hold a civil rights investigation into the fatal shooting of an unarmed U.S. citizen by a federal immigration agent in Minneapolis.

[Alison Gill]

Yes, six lawyers from the U.S. attorney's office in Minnesota quit on Tuesday over the department's reluctance to investigate the shooter of Renee Nicole Good could that's according to the New York Times. Among them is Joseph H. Thompson, who was second in command at the office that led the large scale fraud inquiry last year that led in part to the Trump administration sending a surge of immigration agents to the state. And Andy, I'm not quite sure why you would send armed militia members to investigate white collar fraud, but okay. Thompson and his colleagues, according to the Times, were upset at senior Justice Department officials demanding a criminal inquiry into any ties between Good and her widow Becca and activist groups. So they weren't just refusing to investigate the shooting, they were actually proactively investigating the victims and also the refusal of the FBI to allow state investigators to join its investigation of the shooting.

[Andy McCabe]

Separately, four leaders of a crucial division in the US Justice Department have also resigned. The lawyers left the Civil Rights Division, which has a criminal investigations unit that is responsible for investigating the use of force by police officers, according to Ms. Now citing three people it said were briefed about the departures. The resignations follow a decision by Harmeet Dhillon, the Trump administration aligned Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights, not to investigate the 7 January killing of Good by Jonathan Ross, an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent. Dylan told the unit the week before that it would not be involved in any investigation, Reuters reported one source as saying, because of course, Allison, you are the source of the unit that is put together for the express purpose of investigating law enforcement use of force. And so of course you would not investigate this use of force. Does that make any sense?

[Alison Gill]

No, it doesn't. Well, I mean, it does considering the timeline we're in and the planet we live on.

[Andy McCabe]

That's right.

[Alison Gill]

On Tuesday, Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanch, former personal attorney to Donald Trump, said in a statement, quote, there is currently no basis for a criminal civil rights investigation. The statement, first reported by cnn, did not elaborate on how the department had reached that conclusion, that no investigation was warranted. A Justice Department spokesperson confirmed the resignations in a statement to the Guardian, but denied they were related to the Minneapolis sh. Okay, quote, although we typically don't comment on personnel matters. We can confirm that the Criminal Section leadership gave notice to depart the Civil Rights Division and requested to participate in the Department of Justice's early retirement program. Well before the events in Minnesota. That's what he said. Any suggestion to the contrary is false. Okay.

[Andy McCabe]

Yeah. Although we typically don't comment on personnel matters, we will comment now in a way that defends us and makes the other people look bad.

[Alison Gill]

Allow us to lie right now.

[Andy McCabe]

God.

[Alison Gill]

Yeah.

[Andy McCabe]

The FBI, which seized total control of the investigation after freezing out local officials, is looking into Good's, quote, possible connections to activist groups. According to the New York Times, a succession of Trump administration officials, including the president himself, have portrayed Good without presenting any evidence as a domestic terrorist or a paid agitator, who, while video of her confrontation with Ross appears to show her trying to steer her vehicle away from him when she was shot three times in the face. Multiple career prosecutors in Dylan's office offered to lead an inquiry into the shooting, but were told not to do so. CBS News reported on Friday.

[Alison Gill]

Yeah, there's some additional video that is. It has been out, but now they're kind of pointing to this in the original angle before the closer angle came up and before Jonathan Ross's cell phone came out when Renee Goode was waving the cars around her. You can actually hear her tell the officers, I'm pulling out.

[Andy McCabe]

Yeah.

[Alison Gill]

So that's gonna be interesting.

[Andy McCabe]

I gotta give a shout out here. The New York Times with their video investigations crew, which is amazing. They're really next level on. On the work that they do with this sort of evidence. They had a piece that came out on Friday morning, and it syncs all. Many of these different videos together and just walks you through on a like, fraction of a second. Fascinating piece. Highly recommended. But, yeah, when you really get down in the nitty gritty, the actual. What these videos show is very different than what we've heard from federal officials in the last week or so.

[Alison Gill]

Yeah. And some. Some more good news coming out from the Times. Becca and Nicole's family. Renee. Nicole's family. Excuse me. Have hired the same law firm that represented the family of George Floyd when they filed their civil suit against him. So I'm very glad that they have that kind of representation.

[Andy McCabe]

Yeah. For real.

[Alison Gill]

The resignations are the latest in a flow of departures from the Civil Rights division since Trump began his second term in May. The Guardian reported that more than 250 attorneys had left, had been reassigned or accepted a deferred resignation offer since January. That's about a 70% reduction. That's a Civil Rights Division, Dylan, a former Republican official in California and an election denier who promoted the big lie that Trump's 2020 election defeat was fraudulent, was confirmed by the Senate in April. She worked quickly to realign the division's priorities away from its long standing work tackling discrimination and protecting the rights of marginalized groups and towards Trump's political goals, including exposing voter fraud, which is rare, and focusing on anti transgender issues. Quote, I don't think it's an overstatement to see this as the end of the division as we've known it. That's what a Civil Rights Division attorney told the Guardian back then at the time.

[Andy McCabe]

Subsequently, in September, the Online news outlet notice reported that only two lawyers remained out of 36 at the Justice Department's Public Integrity Unit, assigned to investigations of corrupt politicians and law enforcement. Quote, investigating officials to determine if they broke the law, defied policy, failed to de escalate and resorted to deadly force without basis is one of the Civil Rights Division's most solemn duties, Kristen Clark, who led the division in the Biden administration, told Ms. Now.

[Alison Gill]

Yeah. The FBI investigation into Good's alleged links to activist groups protesting ICE activities in Minneapolis and elsewhere, meanwhile aligns with the White House messaging seeking to blame the victim for her death and absolve ICE of responsibility. In the days since Good's killing, numerous Trump administration officials, including J.D. vance and Kristi Noem, have repeatedly alleged without evidence that she was engaging in domestic terrorism and that Ross, Jonathan Ross, was forced to shoot to save his own life and the lives of others. Noem said Good had been stalking officers.

[Andy McCabe]

Family members say Good, a mother of three children, had just dropped her six year old son off at school and videos shows her waving ICE officials past her car despite the insistence of Vance and others that she was deliberately blocking traffic and impeding their work. This is classic terrorism, vance said. Now hold on a second. I spent decades of my life involved in classic terrorism to some degree involved in every single terrorism prosecution in the United States over, let's say a 10 year period. This is not, this has nothing to do with terrorism. And J.D. vance, he knows that. But let's, if he actually believes what he said here, this guy has absolutely no idea. But, but again, I think he does. He, he knows full well that this is an absolute false statement. Okay, sorry for that rant. Officials in Minneapolis have contradicted the administration's assertions and condemned its rush to judgment before an investigation had taken place.

[Alison Gill]

So this is from Ms. Now we're going to shift gears from the US Attorney's office in, in Minnesota and Main Justice. But the Justice Department also fired the number two official at the Eastern District of Virginia this week after he declined to lead the controversial prosecution of Jim Comey. And that's according to multiple people briefed on the matter who spoke anonymously. His name is Robert McBride. He's 64. He's a Justice prosecutor and former Navy lawyer. He was brought into the prominent satellite office of the Justice Department to serve as the first assistant to U.S. attorney, which I put in air quotes, Lindsey Halligan and took a more prominent role as her status was, quote, in question. And after a judge ruled in late November that she was not legally appointed to run the office. So he was the number two guy.

[Andy McCabe]

McBride, a prosecutor and former supervisor in a U.S. attorney's office in Kentucky, had been asked in recent days to run the Comey case and told top justice officials he felt it would be difficult to do. Sorry. Difficult to do that and also run the office. According to people, Halligan had also recently learned that McBride held private meetings with federal judges in the Eastern District of Virginia, according to a source familiar with McBride's removal. And Alison, I've seen reporting that suggests pretty strongly that the purpose of those meetings was basically lobbying for the job of U.S. attorney. So the man brought in to back up Halligan was kind of, at least the allegation is kind of politically maneuvering himself for the top gig.

[Alison Gill]

Right. Because as we know, it's the court that appoints after the 120 day interim U.S. attorney has served.

[Andy McCabe]

Yeah.

[Alison Gill]

Boy. Yeah. It would be real difficult to run the Comey case since it's dead. I don't even know what, like, I guess to handle the appeal because I think they've given up trying to go back to a grand jury. At least they have for Letitia James. But to be asked to run the Comey case, like to run the appeal that the Trump administration has, has filed with the circuit court to, to challenge the disqualification of Lindsay Halligan. I. I mean, yeah, it's going to be difficult to run the Comey case because it sucks. I don't even. I don't. I.

[Andy McCabe]

Congratulations, Mr. McBride. We've decided we would like you to be the sole owner and completely responsible for this stinking bag of dog poo.

[Alison Gill]

Yeah, yeah.

[Andy McCabe]

Go to it.

[Alison Gill]

I think I'm good. All right. You're fired.

[Andy McCabe]

Yeah, I got a lot of problems with this, so I gotta tell you, I think there's a. I don't know McBride, but there's a lot of bad stu signs here. Like to come up with this nonsensical answer of, well, it would be hard to do that and run the office. Like, that's not the right answer. The right answer under these circumstances would be, no, I'm not doing that because there's no case there and it's not consistent with the law and my own personal values like stand up, tell the truth. If you get fired for it. I mean, you're only the latest US Attorney getting fired in the Eastern District and then the political kind of machinations in the background also. I don't know, put all this together and doesn't seem like anybody's cloaking themselves in glory with this story.

[Alison Gill]

No, certainly not. But that kind of, you know, going back to Minneapolis U.S. attorney's office and the Civil Rights Division, that kind of mass resignation, like we said, at the top of the block, would be nonstop above the fold breaking news. That's a huge amount of people, that's almost a dozen people leaving. Because not only was the FBI refusing to help investigate, help local prosecutors, not only were they not doing a civil rights investigation into a shooting of an unarmed citizen, which is just something you automatically do in the civil rights division, no matter what the outcome is, but also because they were. They decided that they were going to go after Becca and Renee, Nicole good just to, you know, investigate their ties to the woke Marxist antifa mob that is doing nothing but exercising their First Amendment rights by alerting their neighbors to the, to the presence of ICE in their neighborhoods. So, I mean, this is all, you know, we're going to keep an eye on this story. We're going to keep an eye on whatever civil lawsuit and wrong, maybe wrongful death suit comes out of this from the law firm that handled George Floyd's case. I think he was awarded $27 million, his family in that case. And I'm also wondering, I'm curious and maybe you know, the answer to this. I mean, we've never seen the FBI withhold evidence from local prosecutors like this, but perhaps, maybe discovery or subpoenas in the civil case could help get some of that evidence for local prosecutors. But if DOJ isn't willing to give it up, they'll just say, no, you can't have it.

[Andy McCabe]

Yeah, there's, you know, and I mean, look, in, in the past, when things go wrong and relationships fall apart and the state authorities and federal authorities pursue a similar prosecution or prosecution of the same subject for different stuff at the same time, you sometimes See this like, well, we're not going to share our evidence with you. You know, we want to go first. No, we want to go first. That sort of thing happens. But this feels like a deliberate blocking attempt. Like they had to do this essentially to ensure that. That the state authorities wouldn't uncover facts and build a case that was inconvenient with the federal government's theory about how they're pursuing immigration enforcement. So as for the civil case being able to. To kind of call for access to that evidence, the trump card here, pardon the pun, is that we're having open.

[Alison Gill]

An ongoing investigation and we can't.

[Andy McCabe]

Exactly, exactly. And, you know, evidence in a criminal investigation is sacrosanct. Right. If. If the government says that's what they're doing, you kind of. You can't break through that. That wall.

[Alison Gill]

Sounds like Jack Smith saying to, you know, I didn't have any contact with Fani Willis or Chris Mays or anything. I didn't. We weren't giving our evidence over to them. We were in the middle of an active investigation. That was a legitimate reason and a legitimate active investigation. It's like this is more like when the Southern District of New York under Trump refused to give information over to the Manhattan district attorney in the hush money case, in the election interference case and sat on that investigation until Trump was out of office, hoping that they could. Told that they, you know, they could get the statute of limitations to expire. But for the governor of New York expanding the statute of limitations because of COVID we wouldn't have had that case at all. Because Southern District of New York was just going to sit on it.

[Andy McCabe]

Yeah.

[Alison Gill]

So, yeah, catch and kill. But for. But for investigations. And we're seeing it.

[Andy McCabe]

Yeah, yeah, basically.

[Alison Gill]

All right, we have more news to get to, but we have to take a quick break. So everyone stick around. We'll be right back. January is the best time for a new start. We all have ideas and skills, a product concept or even a service we could offer. And taking action is what turns your dream into your new future. January is short, but there's a lot you can do before February gets here. And the most powerful move to make it all happen in 2026 is to start your business with Shopify. When my business hit a rough patch, I was losing time, missing details. I even began considering scaling back a little bit, switching to Shopify, though. That was the turning point. It made my business feel more manageable and under control. What I love about Shopify is that no matter how big you want to grow. It gives you everything you need to take control and level up. Shopify is designed to be your all in one home base for selling. Whether customers shop with you in person or online, millions of business owners use it, from major brands to people building something new from scratch. Ever wonder how successful businesses like Thrive Cosmetics handle their whole operation? Shopify makes it easier to create a store that you're proud of with a huge library of templates you can customize to fit your look and feel. You can get up and running quickly using Shopify's built in marketing tools so you can launch email and social campaigns that reach customers wherever they're scrolling. So as you grow, Shopify grows with you, helping you process more orders, expand to new markets, and manage everything from the same dashboard. If it works for Thrive Cosmetics, it can work for you in 2026. Stop waiting and start selling with Shopify. Sign up for your $1 per month trial and start selling today at shopify.com unjust again go to shopify.com unjust. That's shopify.com unjust here's to your first this new year with Shopify by your side.

[Martin Sheen]

It's Sunday morning and that wonderfully relaxed feeling of a long, lazy day lingers in the air. If you want to make the moment last, may I suggest the perfect solution? The Martin Sheen Podcast. Join me, your host, Martin Sheen, for beautifully crafted 20 minute programs filled with never before heard stories of my life, along with personal reflections and poetry that inspires. The Martin Sheen Podcast is the perfect Sunday refresh, a chance to take a deep breath, relax and know that the stress of Monday may be just around the corner, but not here, not now. So make this your weekly moment of calm as we explore faith, hope, love and what it means to be human. And know this, this journey is ever unfolding as I invite you to see what's next with me, Martin Sheen. And thank you.

[Alison Gill]

Hey everybody, welcome back. All right, this next story, Andy, it blew my mind. It's another above the fold front page. Should be 24 hour news cycle stuff, but it's not. It didn't get much news coverage at all, in fact, especially a revelation buried in paragraph 18 of the Wall Street Journal article. But here's how it begins. President Trump has complained to aides repeatedly in recent weeks about Attorney General Pam Bondi, describing her as we and ineffective when it comes to enforcing his agenda. That's according to administration officials and other people familiar with the complaints. This month, Trump has talked with allies about how he could appoint special counsels at the Justice Department because he's so frustrated with what he sees as the slow progress of its work. That's according to people familiar.

[Andy McCabe]

So he needs some of them unconstitutional special counsels.

[Alison Gill]

Yeah, the things that he thinks are illegal, I guess.

[Andy McCabe]

Okay. Chief among his grievances is what he sees as Bondi's failure to quickly and effectively prosecute the investigators who had pursued him for years, including former FBI Director James Comey and New York Democratic Attorney General Letitia James. The officials and others familiar with his complaints said both criminal cases were dismissed in November by a judge who said the Trump aide who secured the indictment had been improperly appointed to her post. Trump has wanted to see the cases continue quickly.

[Alison Gill]

I don't think he understands that she's not a legitimate U.S. attorney.

[Andy McCabe]

Does he know that he has terrible lawyers? I mean, he's got to get the idea by now, right?

[Alison Gill]

Probably not, since he hasn't ended up in jail for anything, when you think about it. But a Justice Department investigation into another of Trump's antagonists, Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell, became public on Sunday night. Powell, who Trump has publicly berated and pressured to lower interest rates, disclosed that the Justice Department was pursuing a criminal investigation over his testimony last summer about the central bank's building renovation project. Trump also complained frequently that Pam Bondi's handling of the Federal Bureau of Investigations files on Epstein has created months and months of political and personal headaches for him. That's his fault.

[Andy McCabe]

He has also heard from conservative activists and influencers criticizing Bondi and collected similar social media posts that he has asked other aides about, the officials said. And Trump has expressed frustration that the Justice Department hasn't done more to pursue those he claims helped steal the 2020 election, which he lost. Some of the people familiar with the complaint said at times, Trump has complained to Bondi directly about his frustrations with the department, officials said.

[Alison Gill]

Of course, remember when there was, like, video of him, like, screaming at Bill Barr in the Oval Office because he wouldn't investigate election fraud or whatever? And Bill Barr's like, I'm out of this. You're crazy now. Bondi has grown concerned in the past month about Trump's complaints, according to people who are in touch with her. A spokesman for Bondi said she's been focusing on executing Trump's directive to make America safe again. Late Friday, the Fed received grand jury subpoenas, the Federal Reserve grand jury subpoenas from the Justice Department that threatened a criminal indictment. The Bondi spokesperson said she had, quote, instructed her U.S. attorneys to prioritize Investigating any abuses of taxpayer dollars, unquote.

[Andy McCabe]

Well, here's paragraph 18, the one you mentioned earlier. Vance on Thursday also unveiled an unusual arrangement. The creation of a high ranking Justice Department post to investigate fraud that would be run by the White House and answer to Trump instead of Bondi. Bondi thanked Vance in a post on social media. She worked with the White House on the position, the department official said, and she and Vance chose it over the appointment of a special counsel. Wow.

[Alison Gill]

Yeah.

[Andy McCabe]

I mean, talk about rolling over and giving up any semblance of independence that you have as Attorney General. I cannot think of another Attorney General of either political party who would ever have agreed to such a travesty of the White House actually literally running a piece of the Justice Department directly. Like, fold the tent, Pam. Like, go home. You're not needed here. It's horrible.

[Alison Gill]

Yeah. Particularly in light of Republicans, especially in Congress, having a fit about Bill Clinton running into Loretta lynch on a tarmac in Phoenix in 2016 for five minutes.

[Andy McCabe]

Yeah.

[Alison Gill]

They dragged Loretta lynch in and questioned her for eight hours on that. This is unscrupulous, destroys the independents. It's stunning. It's, you know, they flipped out over that close of a connection between the White House and the Department of Justice.

[Andy McCabe]

I mean, more recently, they screamed for four years about, oh, Merrick Garland is taking direction from Joe Biden about investigating Donald Trump and prosecuting Donald Trump and inventing cases against Trump like the fact that he had hundreds of classified documents at his private residence in Florida when he wasn't president. I mean, that was some sort of, you know, the allegations of White House control over Justice Department actions. Well, how silly does that seem? Now they're going to have their own department, their own employee, their own DOJ employees working out of the West Wing.

[Alison Gill]

Yeah. And if I'm Jack Smith. Jack Smith, if you're listening, who's going to publicly testify this week? And we'll talk about that in a second. And Jim Jordan or any of his staff or any of the other Republicans on the House Judiciary panel, ask me about whether or not Joe Biden told me to investigate Trump or whether or not Merrick Garland met with the White House or. Do you remember there was some sort of communication between the DOJ and the White House about these investigations, but it didn't have anything to do with the actual investigation itself. If I'm Jack Smith, I'm saying, didn't you just set up a department inside the, Inside the Department of Justice, A unit inside the Department of Justice that's answerable only to the President. You. You certainly can't have any problem. No, we didn't. But how can I do this?

[Andy McCabe]

But it seems like if we did, you'd be perfectly fine with it, right?

[Alison Gill]

Yeah. I mean, didn't you. And, oh, and by the way, is the reason you didn't appoint a special counsel is because you think they're unconstitutional. Just curious, like. Yeah, unbelievable. That sort of like, that's in paragraph 18, Andy, the fact that they buried the lead like that.

[Andy McCabe]

Yeah.

[Alison Gill]

This whole article, if. If I were to write a headline for it, I would be like, we have confirmation from inside the Trump administration that they're weaponizing the doj.

[Andy McCabe]

Yeah, yeah, for sure. They're not. It's. It hasn't been weaponized enough, apparently. So they're just going to take the weapon in their own hands.

[Alison Gill]

Yes. So, Mr. Smith, when you go to Washington, just talk about that. Just. Just keep asking them questions about. For real. About their special unit run by the White House inside the department. All right, we've got more to get to, but we have to take another quick break. So everybody stick around. We'll be right back.

[Martin Sheen]

It's Sunday morning, and that wonderfully relaxed feeling of a long, lazy day lingers in the air. If you want to make the moment last, may I suggest the perfect solution? The Martin Sheen Podcast. Join me, your host, Martin Sheen, for beautifully crafted 20 minute programs filled with never before heard stories of my life, along with personal reflections and poetry that inspires. The Martin Sheen Podcast is the perfect Sunday refresh. A chance to take a deep breath, relax, and know that the stress of Monday may be just around the corner, but not here, not now. So make this your weekly moment of calm as we explore faith, hope, love, and what it means to be human. And know this, this journey is ever unfolding as I invite you to see what's next with me, Martin Sheen. And thank you.

[Andy McCabe]

Welcome back.

[Alison Gill]

Okay.

[Andy McCabe]

Last week, we discussed the letter sent to Judge Engelmeier in the Southern District of New York, who presided over the Ghislaine Maxwell case and the DOJ's request for release of the Maxwell grand jury testimony. The letter was sent by Representatives Massie and Kana and requested the judge appoint a special master and or monitor over the release of the Epstein files pursuant to the Epstein Files Transparency Act.

[Alison Gill]

Yes, yes. And if you recall, I had questions. We had questions about what would give Judge Engelmeier jurisdiction to appoint a special master over the DOJ files writ large. Since that's not before him in this particular case. This is The Maxwell case. Right. This is about the protective order over the Maxwell grand jury stuff and the discovery in the Maxwell case and whether that needs to be released under the Transparency Act. But here's a clip from last week's episode of Unjustified. It'll be interesting to see if Judge Engelmeier believes that he has jurisdiction to have the Special master look after that law, as well as what was supposed to be released in his courtroom specifically. It'll be interesting to see if he. If he agrees that. I didn't. I went through the letter. I didn't see any citations of other similar cases where a special master was appointed by a judge to oversee a law and something that was going on in. In his courtroom. So I'm very interested to see if Engelmeier has jurisdiction to appoint a special master to oversee the release of the Epstein files pursuant to the Act. It's kind. I think. I think it's an interesting legal question. So, Andy, like I said, we were wondering whether Engelmeier, presiding over the Maxwell grand jury transcript, could extend his authority over the entirety of the Transparency Act. And it seems as though Judge Engelmeier is wondering the same thing.

[Andy McCabe]

Yeah. Yeah, for real. It's like, how does he go from being the trial judge on the Ghislaine Maxwell case to being an independent judge in the Southern District of New York, basically running an inquiry as to the administration's adherence to a new law. So, in response to the letter, the letter motion filed by Representatives Khanna and Massie, Judge Engelmeier has issued the following order. The order says the court directs the government to respond by letter publicly filed on the docket. The government's response should address the issues implicated by the representative's motion. These include, but need not be limited to. One, whether the representatives have standing to participate in this criminal case, including to raise issues concerning DOJ's compliance with the act that have not been raised in this matter by any party or victim. And two, whether the court, by virtue of its supervision of the protective order in this case or otherwise, has the authority to rule upon or take action to bring about DOJ's compliance with the act.

[Alison Gill]

Yeah. Now, the government's response, Pamela Joe's response is due Friday as we record this. January 16th, should defendant Ghislaine Maxwell wish to be heard on this matter. Any letter from or on behalf of her is also due today, January 16, as we record this, should the representatives wish to file a reply. That reply is due Tuesday, January 20th. So Engelmeier and the Department of justice had been discussing, through letter briefings and orders, what parts of the Maxwell case must be published pursuant to the Act. And I guess that makes sense to me, for them to discuss what he has purview over. On January 15, though, the DOJ sent Engelmeier a letter updating him on the broader release of everything, like an update, a status of their compliance with the DoJ or with the Transparency act in its entirety. So I was kind of trying to. To look for where that stemmed from.

[Andy McCabe]

Yes. And the DOJ wrote to the court on January 5, quote, While not all of the materials under review are covered by this court's prior orders, the government writes to advise the court as to how it intends to address its obligations under the court's prior orders in the context of how it is handling the review and publication processes more generally. So now, basically, Engelmeier is asking, as we did last week, what gives him the authority to oversee the larger production of files under the law. So it. It makes perfect sense that he has the authority to make decisions about, let's say, the release of the grand jury materials in the Maxwell case, because those are materials that were all collected and were evidence in her trial or relevant to that underlying criminal prosecution that was officially before him. But how he goes to being, like, the authority over everything that's released under the Epstein Transparency Act, I don't see it personally, but that's just my opinion.

[Alison Gill]

Yeah. And, Andy, I have just looked at the docket. I've checked the docket, and the government has responded. Pam Bondi has responded in a letter brief to Judge Engelmeier and. And basically is arguing the same kind of questions that. That we had and that Judge Engelmeier had. They're. They're sort of locking onto that, and they're saying that. Let me see if I can read a little bit of this to you. Representatives Khanna and Massey's motion for leave runs afoul of these rules seeking entry into a long closed criminal case. The representatives explicitly try to create a new issue by moving the court to appoint a special master, an independent monitor, for the purpose of compelling the DOJ to make mandatory production under the Act. The supposed need for this oversight is an issue that neither party has raised, nor could they, as the narrow issues before this court has been how the protective order can be modified to allow the government to proceed under the act as opposed to enforcement of the act itself. So that's generally their. They should. You know, Pam Bondi is saying that Massie And Khan's believe to be amici curi in this case should be denied. And they're sort of relying on the arguments that we raised in, in our questions and that the, the judge raised in his as well. So it'll be interesting to see how on January 20, Khanna and Massey respond to this, because in their initial letter asking for a special master, they didn't cite any case law or anything like that to, of course, to show why they would have standing or why this judge would have authorization.

[Andy McCabe]

And you know, we talked about this last week. I, I, I'm all for their. They're showing a lot of spunk here and they're trying to get creative. The, the, but the source of the problem is that they are not in a position to force the department to comply with the law.

[Alison Gill]

Right.

[Andy McCabe]

That's Congress's job. That's what Congress should be doing. But Congress is run by Republicans. Right now. The Republicans are not interested in this issue at all. And they certainly aren't interested in poking DOJ to release more material. So just not. So they're just ignoring it. They' allowing their own law to be ignored by the Department of Justice. Unfortunately, there's no clear remedy for a couple of congressmen who are actually trying to do their jobs here. It's not like this, not like the request for the Special Master in the Mar A Lago case.

[Alison Gill]

Right.

[Andy McCabe]

If you remember, I know you remember. Trump filed a federal lawsuit in the same district to raise the issue of the federal, of the, of the appointment of a special master, which notoriously ended up in front Eileen Cannon, who agreed to it, which she shouldn't have. But at least he was the subject of, of the underlying investigation. Right. It wasn't even a prosecution yet. It was still just an investigation. But it was his stuff. They had taken his stuff. So he had some standing right to, to get in front of the judge. He shouldn't have prevailed. But of course, it's wacky world down there. And he did in at least initially.

[Alison Gill]

Well, he ultimately didn't. Right. 11th Circuit was like, get out of here. Exactly. Exactly. I think what needs to happen here is perhaps the survivors, the Epstein survivors need to file a lawsuit and say we are have imminent harm because not only are they not releasing the files as they're supposed to under the act, but they're also not redacting our names properly and protecting our privacy. So we have irreparable harm. And then you've got a case before a judge that you can possibly ask to appoint a special Master for. So I tend to think that Judge Engelmeier will deny Massie and Khan. As much as I would love to see a special master in this case, I think they will deny.

[Andy McCabe]

Sure. Yeah.

[Alison Gill]

I think he'll deny the special master appointment because he just doesn't have authority, and I don't think that the congressmen have standing. But we'll see.

[Andy McCabe]

I agree with you.

[Alison Gill]

Yeah.

[Andy McCabe]

And I think that the path that you just laid out there makes perfect legal sense to me. But unfortunately, once again, we're putting, like, all of the responsibility to do the right thing here back on the shoulders of the victims, which, like, is the worst possible result. But anyway, here we are.

[Alison Gill]

Yeah, I'm not even sure Congress could sue for compliance of the act. I'm not even sure they would have standing to sue. But we'll see, we'll see what ends up happening. I, I, I thought initially that if they didn't comply, it could trigger a lawsuit from Congress. But we'll see, we'll see what happens, and we'll keep you posted. All right, we've got one more story. We've got a letter to the editor of the Washington Post, who, who wrongly had their editorial board claim that Jack Smith was trouncing all over Trump's First Amendment rights when he brought a case against him for the January 6th and, you know, trying to stop the peaceful transfer of power. Randall Eliason has written a letter to the editor. We're going to touch on that and go over Jack Smith's public testimony this week. Stick around. We'll be right back. Hey, everybody, welcome back. Our last block today. Today is a letter from Randall Eliason, a lawyer. I believe we've had him on the Daily beans before. And he's written a letter to the editorial board at the Washington Post about special counsel Jack Smith. It says the January 10th editorial, quote, Jack Smith would have blown a hole in the First Amendment, unquote, was wrong to claim that Smith's prosecution of Donald Trump for allegedly conspiring to overturn the 2020 election would have violated Trump's free speech rights.

[Andy McCabe]

Now, the editorial board wrote, quote, the indictment accused Trump of lying so pervasively about the election that he committed criminal fraud. But the indictment explicitly acknowledged Trump was free to lie about the election and could not be prosecuted for lies alone. Those lies were tools that Trump used in furtherance of alleged criminal conspiracies to defraud the government, obstruct a congressional proceeding, and deprive citizens of their right to vote. Those crimes involve speaking but speech in furtherance of criminal activity is not constitutionally protected. The board failed to acknowledge that. The trial judge ruled the indictment, quote, properly alleges Trump's statements were made in furtherance of a criminal scheme and thus did not violate the First Amendment.

[Alison Gill]

Yeah, when I read that editorial from the Washington Post, I was like, do they know? Did they read the indictment? Do they know what they're talking about?

[Andy McCabe]

I thought the same thing.

[Alison Gill]

Who is on the editorial board today? Yeah, Uncle Frank. My Uncle Frank. I don't understand. The board also criticized Smith's fraud theory, claiming that fraud, quote, almost always involves dissembling for money, not political advantage. But the Supreme Court has long recognized that a conspiracy to defraud the government does not require monetary laws. The board further faulted Smith for seeking a gag order after Trump repeatedly attacked witnesses, prosecutors and criminal in the criminal process. But although it tweaked their order slightly, the appeals court agreed that limiting Trump's speech was justified. The judge in Trump's New York prosecution also found that a gag order was necessary. Trump is trying to rewrite the history of January 6, 2021. It's disappointing to see the Post bolster that effort by casting him as the victim of a prosecutor who did not respect the Constitution. So signed Randall Eliason. Great letter.

[Andy McCabe]

Well, Jack Smith will testify publicly before the House Judiciary committee this Thursday, January 22nd. And Jack Smith's new law firm is now up and running.

[Alison Gill]

Tim. Hey, we talked about this.

[Andy McCabe]

Yeah, right. Tim Heaphy, Jack Smith, David Harbaugh and Tom Windom have spent much of their careers in public service committed to protecting and defending the rule of law. Their new full service firm, Heathy Smith, Harbaugh and Windham hshw, remains faithful to that core value. The firm's advice to clients will be guided by the same principles that have characterized the partner's government service. Clear eyed assessment of the facts and honest application of the relevant law. That foundation will underpin their comprehensive client service, which will include thorough investigations, zealous advocacy and litigation, and candid strategic advice and counsel, resulting in improved policy and process for clients. Quote, I am both privileged and excited to open the doors of our firm with my fellow partners. Smith said, our goal is to practice law at the highest level and to do so consistent with our values and long standing commitment to public service.

[Alison Gill]

Interesting. Very interesting. So, will he hang up that shingle when asked to be the attorney general in 2029?

[Andy McCabe]

That's your. That's your dreams creeping into.

[Alison Gill]

That's my dream. I am going. Whoever our candidate Ends up being. I will, I will write a letter every day. I don't care how long it takes. Please appoint Jack Smith Attorney General, please. So anyway, that's cool. So they're doing a full service law firm.

[Andy McCabe]

Yeah.

[Alison Gill]

In case you need a lawyer. But I think they're doing white.

[Andy McCabe]

I frequently do. So I'll keep that in mind.

[Alison Gill]

You do, you do.

[Andy McCabe]

I got more lawyers. And then Bayer makes little white pills. That's what my grandparents used to say anyway. Yeah. Have a few lawyers.

[Alison Gill]

Yeah. Cool. Well, now maybe you could hire them. Private, private attorneys for hire. And I'm. That's a cool, that's a cool law firm. All of those people, by the way, just incredible people that worked on the investigations into Donald Trump. So. And have.

[Andy McCabe]

I think it's really interesting. Yeah, I think it's really interesting that guys like this who have like big names, well known attorneys, long, distinguished careers at the Justice Department, you know, before the DOJ went off the cliff, typically these people like this would go directly into the biggest, most influential firms in Washington and New York. And making this decision is a very different path, you know, and I wonder if part of it is motivated a little bit by what they saw as the, from some of those big distinguished firms really buckling under the pressure of the Trump administration early on in 2025, in a small firm with your friends, you can, you have the ability to make, let's just say, more agile decisions and you don't have the same, you're not under the same pressure from shareholders, other partners, stuff like that. So, yeah, they're not going to make the kind of money they would have made had they gone into some one of those big firms. But they likely do great work and feel good about it at the same time.

[Alison Gill]

Very cool, very legal and very cool. Yep. Thank you so much for that little story. All right, it's time for listener questions. We've got a few minutes here to answer a couple. If you have a question, there's a link in the show notes that will take you to a form you can fill out to submit your questions to me and Andy. So what do we have this week?

[Andy McCabe]

Yeah, two interesting ones this week. First one comes to us from Gary. Gary says, starts by saying, my name is Gary, which is a good start. He said, I really enjoy your podcast. I've been listening since you started with Jack. My question is, don't the ICE agents have the requirement to read the Miranda rights to the people they arrest? That's a really good question, Gary. And I think you're hitting on a theme that a lot of people would assume is true, that they. That they are required to. But it's not quite that simple. So the requirement to read Miranda rights attaches or becomes necessary when you have someone in what we refer to as custodial interrogation. So as an FBI agent, if I, if I stop someone on the street and I start asking them questions and they can turn around and walk away whenever they want, I don't have to read Miranda rights because they're not in my custody. On the other hand, if I bring someone into custody and I. And I am not subjecting them to interrogation, I don't have to read the rights. Right. You have to have both of those things, custody and interrogation. In this case, if ICE agents, let's say they actually do what they're saying they're doing, which we all know that this is not the extent of what's happening right now. But just for hypothetical sake, let's say they have the name of a person who they know is here illegally and they go out to detain that person to put them in deportation proceedings. Well, that's detention for sure. But there might not be any interrogation. They might just take that person, bring them back to the lockup up, send the notice to the court, get them in front of the. You know what I mean? Like, and process them for deportation. And you might not ever be at a point where it's legally necessary to provide Miranda warnings. Yet. Flip side of it is if you violate, if you, if you have to provide them and you don't, the penalty for law enforcement for doing that is whatever evidence you've recovered in the state in the course of that interrogation is then forbidden to be used in a criminal prosecution. Again here, these ICE detentions are really for deportation. They're not for criminal prosecution. So that sort of, you know, penalty doesn't apply either. So it's not so clear. If you're gonna. If you're gonna bring them back and, and question them and subject them to interrogation, then yes. But if, if you're not gonna be questioning them, probably not.

[Alison Gill]

Yeah. And I think the question arises from folks who are filming or protesting or, you know, and the ICE agents now have in their back pocket, they Keep quoting Title 18, U.S. code 111 at People, you know, whoever forcibly impedes law enforcement.

[Andy McCabe]

Right.

[Alison Gill]

Forcibly being the key word there. Sandwich guy was. They tried to indict sandwich guy with 111. The federal grand jury said no. And so I think the question here is if you're detained for Filming. Are you being, you know, for violating code, you know, Title 18, Code 111, US Code 111. That seems like if they're trying to arrest you for committing a crime, that they would need to Mirandize you.

[Andy McCabe]

Well, again, like detaining you on the. Just holding you on the street for some temporary period is not going to be enough to implicate Miranda. You really have to be taken back to, you know, the precinct or the headquarters, whatever it is, and then questioned. And that's when you have to. You have to get the Miranda.

[Alison Gill]

Right. It's the questioning that triggers Mirandizing.

[Andy McCabe]

Yeah, it's custodial interrogation. You have to have both of those factors before Miranda is implicated. But there's. There is a great. There's a lot of questions floating around right now about people whether or not random citizens who are out there observing, videotaping, protesting lawfully and non violently, are they obligated to follow the orders of ICE agents? When the ICE officer comes up to you and says, you know, get off the sidewalk or open your car door or something like that, are you obligated to do that?

[Alison Gill]

And.

[Andy McCabe]

And there's. There's not. I wish I could tell you that no, you're not, or, yes, you are. It's not that clear, though. It all comes down to whether what the ICE agents are doing and are they doing something that is within the purview of their federal authority. So, like in a, In a Renee Good situation, if they were, all they were trying to do is move her out of the way. That's like a traffic enforcement issue. And federal agents don't have that sort of local authority. So the order they give you in the course of them trying to, like, fall, you know, pursue some sort of traffic offense is not really lawful. So you may not have to follow, but it's. These are all, like, esoteric legal questions that are impossible to answer and understand in the heat of the moment.

[Alison Gill]

Yeah. Yeah. All right, well, thanks for that. I didn't know that. Appreciate that. I think we got time for one more.

[Andy McCabe]

All right, we got one more here. And this is. This is a little bit out of left field, but I thought. Also an interesting. Raises some interesting legal questions. So this comes to us from Brent from British Columbia. Brent says hello from Canada. I, like many Canadians, enjoy your podcast and the insights you provide on affairs related to your nation's struggle with democracy and the rule of law. Boy, sad hearing someone else say that. He's not wrong, of course, but it's sad realizing that our Our current struggles are being perceived by our closest neighbor, he says. I don't think I would ever have imagined the crumbling of both. As we've seen. My question relates to Trump's recent threats against Greenland. If Trump were to order a military attack or invasion against these peace loving people, would such an order be considered unconstitutional and lawful if it lacked congressional approval and defied long serving stabilizing international treaties? Please continue to offer a voice of reason and clarity. And that's Brett from bc. That's a really interesting question. And I guess what jumps out to me, Allison, here is would such an order be considered unconstitutional and unlawful? It's hard to understand in that that hypothetical how and who is making that determination of unlawful. So if a president decides to order the troops into battle, that's not something that's before a court or even the Supreme Court. Right. It's just the President's authority to do that and he issues the order. And typically the military follows that order. Now, there might be individuals in the military who determine in a personal way that that's unlawful and therefore they're not going to do it.

[Alison Gill]

It.

[Andy McCabe]

But you know, that's not going to stop that sort of invasion from happening. What that conjures up is a situation much like we had in Vietnam. There were many, many Americans who thought what we were doing in Vietnam was unlawful and possibly unconstitutional. And many of them refused to comply with the draft or, you know, military service and things like that. And so you could see a situation like that developing here. If Trump took military action in Greenland, it's certainly possible that we could have that same level of unrest and protest here in the United States. But I don't believe that it would stop a determined Donald Trump and his boot lick of a defense secretary from executing that order.

[Alison Gill]

Right. And the question of do you need congressional authority to declare war? Yes, you do. But as we've seen, and history is replete with examples of getting around that.

[Andy McCabe]

Absolutely.

[Alison Gill]

That separation of powers by saying it's a police action instead of an invasion, for example, or having the CIA do the COVID ops. CIA actions don't need congressional approval. I don't think it's constitutional, at least in the spirit of the Constitution, to go in and send in troops to seize sovereign nation, especially a NATO ally. But we are not really held to international laws like that. Donald Trump has long ignored treaties and will continue to do so. So I think it comes down to what is the vehicle to contest it. We just had the Senate, we had Hawley and another senator. I can't remember which one, young maybe, who had voted to advance a War Powers Resolution to prevent continued invasion of Venezuela. They flipped on the actual vote and JD Vance came in and broke the tie, blocking the War Powers Resolution to prevent Trump from having any additional activity, military activity in Venezuela. So a lot of it has to do with Congress. But, you know, like you said earlier in the show, Congress is run right now by Republicans. And so they seem to continue to kowtow to Trump's agenda. So it'll be interesting and horrifying to see what Donald Trump does with Green to. With two about Greenland explained.

[Andy McCabe]

Yeah, for sure. And you're right. Presidents for decades and decades and decades have been pushing the envelope on this and accruing more and more power for the presidency in the process. I mean, the Constitution certainly gives the president the authority to order the military into a conflict. Now, it doesn't have the ability to declare war, but he can send. We can. There's a lot of military action, aggressive, destructive, warlike military action that a president can embark upon without ever getting authorization from Congress. Now there's the War Powers act and all kinds of laws that were meant to push back on that. So those things are debated. But it has happened time and time and time again. We just saw it, whatever, two weeks ago in Venezuela. There's no war declared there. And Trump sent in everything that he did there and literally pluck the president out of the country to oppose the government. So could that happen in Greenland? Yeah, it could. Think it would be horrible. Horrible decision. Terrible for NATO, terrible for the world. A destruction of the alliance that's basically kept peace in the world since World War II. I mean, it just, you know. But this is the guy that's running the country right now. This is kind of what we're stuck with. So keep an eye on that. Brent, we share your concerns about what's happening here, and that's one of the reasons why we gather every week to talk about them right here on Unjustified.

[Alison Gill]

Yeah, indeed. And it'll be interesting to see with the upcoming continuing resolution battle with the shutdown of the government, another potential government shutdown. What the Democrats end up demanding in order to fund this government, whether it's to defund ICE operations or defund Department of Defense operations with regard to Venezuela or Greenland or nothing. Maybe they'll just fund the government along with it. I don't know. But that is something to also consider is because we haven't had a budget in decades, we have to keep doing this continuing resolution dance and Every time Republicans are in charge, they like to threaten government shutdown. So we'll see what ends up happening there, there. Thank you all so much for your questions. Again, if you have questions, you can send them to us by clicking on the link in the show notes and sending them to us and we'll see if we can read them on the air. And then every once in a while, as you know, we'll have bonus Q and A episodes that are nothing but us answering your questions. So we'll do our best to get to all of them. Do you have any final thoughts before we get out of here today, my friend?

[Andy McCabe]

No, just, you know, the end of another head spinning week. I know people are really, really reeling right now over what's happened in, in Minnesota. This two shootings we've had up there in the last couple of weeks. And it's really hitting people hard. And you know, in one way it's, I mean, I think it's good that so many people are, are engaged in this and are getting out and letting their voices be heard. But please, please be careful. Protest, engage in First Amendment protected activity. Let people know what you think. But when you physically start to interact with these agents, that's when you start to put yourself at risk. And that's a decision everybody has to make for themselves. But that's when you physically literally start to become very vulnerable. And we have seen now time and time again that many of these agents are not going to hold back at all. What Todd Blanche did this week by saying that there's nothing here to investigate, essentially gave that Agent Ross a preemptive pardon for having to deal with any accountability whatsoever. And I can tell you right now, every ICE agent, everybody working on the immigration issues out there on the streets every day doing this, every one of them saw and heard that perfectly clear. And what they heard was, green light, we got your back. Do whatever you have to do, do whatever you want to do. There will be no consequences. So I'm really, really worried about what we'll see going forward.

[Alison Gill]

Yes, definitely. Peaceful protests, please, because Donald Trump and Stephen Miller are itching to invoke the Insurrection act since the Supreme Court shut down their authority to, to deploy the National Guard under authority title 10, US code 12406. They are itching to do it. They would have done it had they thought that what happened with Renee Nicol, a Reichtag fire enough to do it. They don't, they don't think that because I think they would have invoked the Insurrection act by now. They're just waiting for something to give them, to give them the justification to do that. So please be safe, be careful, definitely exercise and be peaceful rights. Yeah, be peaceful. Thank you so much, everybody. We will see you next week on Unjustified. I'm Alison Gill.

[Andy McCabe]

And I'm Andy McCabe.

[Alison Gill]

Unjustified is written and executive produced by Allison Gill with additional research and analysis by Andrew McC. Sound design and editing is by Molly Hockey with art and web design by Joelle Reader at Moxie Design Studios. The theme music for Unjustified is written and performed by Ben Folds and the show is a proud member of the MSW Media Network, a collection of creator owned independent podcasts dedicated to news, politics and justice. For more information, please visit mswmedia.com.