Trump Arraignment Syndrome

So on today's show, we got Donald Trump turning his federal indictment into a campaign event. Slash fundraiser, slash birthday party, someone does. He turned 77 on Wednesday, Dan.

I think that raises serious questions about whether Trump is too old to do the job, don't you agree?

What else we got? we got Chris Christie cannonballing into the CNN town Hall waters. Strict scrutinies. Leah Littman and Dan talk about what comes next in the legal process. So there's an actual smart person in the B block in the show. We stick around for that.

Last week, when did any? When does anything happen? It was very recent, I watched it on YouTube.

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So Trump was arrested in Miami. He pleaded not guilty to 37 felony counts of violating the Espionage Act and obstruction of justice. He was fingerprinted, there were no photographs, a bail. There's no gag order or travel restrictions that we know of, though.

The judge did say Trump is not allowed to commit any more crimes before the trial. Uh, that seems unfair to me, Dan, it's kind of like in his nature. The crowd of Trump fans and protesters outside the courthouse was smaller than expected. But Trump did make an unannounced campaign stop at a famous Cuban restaurant before flying to Bedmister, where he held a campaign style rally. Here's a clip.

I did, I love it. Trump doesn't just give like a campaign style speech about the indictment and do the fundraiser, uh, complete with teleprompter and crowd and all the trappings. They also scheduled what people in politics call an OTR at a famous Cuban restaurant. That means you don't advise the president advance.

You just sort of show up, so Secret Service doesn't have to lock down the place. Were you surprised that the Trump team turned this into just another day on the campaign trail?

He did it after the indictment details came out. Over the weekend. He went to a waffle house in Georgia and bought waffles for everyone. Now he's at a Cuban restaurant. And I do think that in the Yes, Trump is a self-destructive buffoon, which is why he's in this mess.

But this version of his campaign, unlike 2016 and unlike 2020, actually has some strategy surrounding the cell phones from Trump. That is pretty impressive. There's an actual plan here and he is working aggressively to maximize his political position, despite possibly being sent to jail for decades. So I think it's impressive. And I tell any Democrat that I talk to about this is that his campaign this time around has a plan and this is part of that plan.

First and foremost, and I don't know, maybe he wants to raise money, he wants to keep his supporters on sides, he wants to keep the Republicans on sides. And he probably thinks. All I need to do is convince one juror that I'm innocent, future juror I should say, and that this is unfair.

So why not go big and influence public opinion and to your point about the plan? The restaurant he went to, Versailles, is a famous spot for politicians to visit. He's clearly appealing to a more conservative Cuban community. In Miami. Stone crab season is over.

It's worth mentioning that so we didn't go to Joe's. But question for you, Dan. He may have a little competition. In the Miami Cuban community, the mayor of Miami, Francis Suarez, jumped into the race today. He once suggested that the U.S. should consider airstrikes on Cuba.

He might be most famous for creating a cryptocurrency called Miamico.in, which is only down 96 from its peak so far. So some room to grow there. He may also be under indictment. He also said publicly he didn't vote for Trump or for DESantis.

So, competitor, what do you think?

There was a lot of whataboutism when it comes to Biden's classified documents, and Hillary's server. CNN and MSNBC did not take this speech live. What did you make of this thing?

Sort of catharsis and therapy for Trump, where he just spits out everything he's going to say. And then there's one or two 30-second soundbites that he has been told by his campaign staff that he has to say you can see him, just switch and start reading. He's the least subtle teleprompter reader in history, where he's like, this way and now this way, and then back this way. But in it, and I think he doesn't pay a price for any of these speeches.

No one sees them. Not that anyone would have seen them if CNN hadn't necessarily aired them, or certainly no one. Who's going to make up their mind based on the speeches? He just goes out, says his crazy things. And then, hopefully, in the eyes of his campaign staff. The one or two lines that matter to them are the ones that get picked up by TV.

Does it make you feel better? Do we think the series of headlines about January 6th insurrectionists going to jail kind of helps keep the proud boys away?

An indictment a day keeps the proud boys away.

We can take our institution and weaponize them for political purposes on both sides. You think the sun's here? The next Republican president is going to be under tremendous pressure to bring charges and indict Joe Biden, his family, his crackhead son, whoever.

That seems like a small number of bathrooms for Mar-a-lago for me.

So they don't, they're not paying attention to the differences between the Espionage Act and the Presidential Records Act. They don't know how the Special counsel is walled off from Merrick Garland and how the Justice Department is walled off from the White House. And so they just throw a bunch of shit out there. And then these people will throw up their arms and say, I don't know, I don't care. And they'll disengage on this issue or from the election altogether. And so I think that's what's.

But it's worth noting that about Trump's document retention, Rubio said There's no allegation that there was harm done to the national security. There's no allegation that it was sold to a foreign power, or that it was trafficked to someone else, or that anybody got access to it. About Hillary Clinton's email server back in the day, he said mishandling of classified information was disgraceful and unbecoming of someone who aspires to the presidency. Actions were grossly negligent, damaged national security and put lives at risk.

So there you go, wait, are you saying Marco Rubio is full of shit? I think I am Dan, I think I'm saying he's inconsistent. But the difference, so far, maybe, is that there are some Republicans, including some of Trump's 2024 opponents, who are finding a spine.

Let's hear from a few.

I happen to be on the Senate Intelligence Committee and I get classified briefings on a regular basis. And what they did was unacceptable. But I do think that even half is true. Then he's toast. I mean, it's a very detailed indictment and it's very, very damning. And this idea of presenting Trump as a victim here, a victim of a witch hunt, is ridiculous.

In the past, nobody goes first, right? They don't want to go first, and there's sort of a collective action problem.

The problem is, it's a mealy mouth version of the case. And too often, they are already echoing Trump's primary talking points by essentially saying yes. Joe Biden has weaponized the government to unfairly attack Donald Trump. But if Donald Trump did these things, that's bad, and that's not a strong enough case. You can't reinforce Trump's message, narrative and then make the criticism.

You just have to make the criticism you have.

They gauge the reaction before kind of walking it back or going all in. Maybe that's what's happening here. But I have to assume that everyone in this case is pretty clear eyed that the MAGA base is going to hate even the lightest criticism. Mike Pence is calling the allegations very serious. I think Tim Scott said. It's a serious case.

Everyone is leaning, I think, rightly, frankly, on innocent until proven guilty, because we do live in a nation of laws here. But I don't know. It does seem like they're dipping their toes in, but I can't imagine.

And that could be very politically painful in the.

It's his conduct, and let me ask you a question, what exactly was he doing with them? Did someone remind him he's not the president anymore? This is vanity.

Run amok, Anderson run amok, Ego run amok. And he is now going to put this country through this when we didn't have to go through it. He wants to continue to pretend he's president.

He wants the trappings of the presidency around him, and I think one of those trappings is these documents. I am convinced that if he goes back to the White House, that the next four years will all be about him just settling scores. I'm going to take him on directly and not because I don't like him, I'm going to take him on directly because he's the leader.

Like, how do you? I just want to understand the other candidates who won't even mention his name. I watched that Joni Ernst Roast and ride thing, it was like he was Voldemort from Harry Potter, say his name.

How do you beat someone if you won't talk about them? How do you beat them if you won't distinguish yourself from them? He hasn't won a damn thing since 2016. Don't allow the showmanship to obscure the facts. The facts are he lost.

What do you think of this?

But every piece of research will show that Republican voters, who should be the target of it, do not like it. And that is as much a messenger problem as it is a message problem. Chris Christie has a minus 54 approval rating in a recent poll among Republicans. He is a deeply, deeply unpopular individual minus 54..

Oh my God. He is only slightly more popular than Mike Pence, who was nearly murdered by his own voters. So that gives you a sense of where he is. There is a part of it that I think is useful and could....

I think it's a useful thing, like if someone wants to get up there and kick the living shit out of Trump in a compelling way. That even if Chris Christie never gets a single delegate in the Republican nomination, that has some value to either defeating Trump in the primary or serving as a disqualifier. For some more moderate, never-trump Republicans or Trump-skeptical Republicans, who may view Christie more, he may not be in that minus 54 cohort, so I think it's largely I'm glad he's doing it.

I just don't think it's necessarily gonna work. Yeah, I'm glad he's doing it, too.

He's a compelling speaker, he's brash. You're right, if you have a negative 54 approval rating, you're probably not the best messenger.

But I have a thought experiment for you, Dan. Okay, it's not a fun one. As we've discussed, there's a polling threshold and a donor threshold that candidates have to meet to get on the Republican debate stage. Let's say Chris Christie has met the polling threshold, but he hasn't hit the 40,000 donor number that he needs to get invited to the debate.

Would you give him $1 and encourage others to do so to get him on that stage? I'm calling this a Christie's choice.

I don't think I would do it, and I don't think I'd encourage other people to do it. What fuck I already did on PotSave the world. Can we cut that and redo it? I'm just kidding.

Keep going. I mean, if other people, this is one of the things....

The debate will be more interesting for us, at least if he is on stage. So great.

That'd be such a boring, stupid debate. Maybe they'll kick the shit out of Ron DeSantis, but probably not. Maybe they'll all just kick the shit out of Trump in absentia, which is gonna make them look even weaker. Maybe they'll pick someone funny to kick the.

We're gonna take a quick break. And when you come back, you'll hear Dan's conversation with legal expert and co-host of Crooked Media's amazing legal analysis podcast, Strict Scrutiny. You'll hear from Leah Littman. So stick around for that.

Joining us now to talk about the Trump indictment is.

It is great, but I have some follow-up questions for you, so I'm so glad you're here. Let's do it, okay.

Let's just start with the real basics here. Donald Trump has been arraigned, he's been given a set of release guidelines.

So, basically, any evidence that's favorable to Trump and suggests he might not be guilty, there might not be any of this, but who knows? And then, aside from that, the defense will probably start to file motions seeking either access to certain documents if the prosecution isn't turning them over, or seeking to challenge various aspects of the prosecution's case. Maybe saying it's legally insufficient, or other bases to basically prevent the trial from going forward, but that's basically.

And so that's likely to happen as well. I would say I was more than.

Of course, there might be surprises sometimes that happens, but yeah, I kind of agreed with Kate's prediction. Is there an argument or a?

This is bananas and like, here are all of the reasons why. And they can try to move the case along a similar timeline as other cases in that particular jurisdiction. Which, again, is among the faster, you know, areas for handling cases in the United States. So, yes, of course, they can, you know, respond to motions that Trump's counsel may file. They can make requests of the court and propose their own timelines.

But, you know, at the end of the day. The schedule is going to be determined by the district judge overseeing this case. Who has very limited experience with criminal cases, and certainly no experience with criminal cases. That involve, you know, really, novel facts and a host of legal issues that haven't been presented to courts before. And again, is pretty indulgent of Donald Trump thus far in related litigation.

Those are the two courts that they are relying on to, basically, police Judge Cannon's, you know, abuse of the law. And the government needs to be able to maintain credibility and not annoy those courts and those judges and justices. In the event that Judge Cannon does something insane. And they need to ask one of those courts to intervene. And it's that posture that makes it really difficult for lawyers in general, and federal government lawyers in particular to sound the alarms about what is happening with our courts. Because they need to maintain a posture under which they're not really pushing any of the federal courts buttons or annoying them too much.

It does not include what Trump's defenses could be. What do you? So there have to be some holes in this case. Theoretically. Where do you think Trump's? If and when he finds a defense attorney? What do you think that defense will be?

I think that a second angle is probably going to be, you know, some version of the argument we heard in Trump's post-arraignment speech slash campaign event? Which was also the line of argument he pursued before Judge Cannon in an earlier round of litigation. In this case, which is that these documents are somehow his, and you know, they're kind of invoking the Presidential Records Act, which makes no sense. Previous times they've suggested, you know, he declassified them. Or there's going to be some kind of variation of this argument where they're going to say. Basically, all of the documents created by any federal agency are prepared for the president, and the president owns them and can kind of do what he wants with them. Again, this argument makes no sense of the law and is absolutely insane, but we'll probably see some variation of that. And then the third is, you know, on those charges that actually require the government to show that. President Trump knowingly, you know, defied the government's orders, or knowingly, you know, concealed and refused to give over classified secret information. We'll probably hear challenges that, oh, he didn't actually know that, or he didn't actually understand that, he didn't have the legal authority to possess that. That's why, you know, the recorded audio conversation of him admitting I know I can't actually declassify.

This is so damning and important, but those would be my early predictions about what we're likely to see.

But Judge Cannon will basically decide that anew here. And so that will also probably be a challenge to the government's ability to use some evidence or some theories to support an obstruction charge. As well as some others.

Does this indictment, in this case, affect the timing of his New York case? Attorney General James, in New York at a Positive America show on Monday night, suggested. It could affect both her case against the Trump Organization and Alvin Bragg's indictment against Trump. On the hush money payments.

Given the importance of these proceedings, it's likely that if there is some conflict between the timeline of these cases, that they will basically allow him to delay some of the proceedings. While others play out oftentimes when we.

This would be the exception, I guess, right? But on this particular challenge, based on how the oral argument went, we did expect that the court was going to rule against those challenges. Now. Technically, it didn't rule on two other challenges. One of which is the equal protection challenge that maintained that the Indian Child Welfare Act, by protecting Native Americans, actually engaged in unconstitutional race discrimination. And what the court said is, we're not going to address that challenge. Because the plaintiffs in this case aren't actually injured by the relevant provisions in the Indian Child Welfare Act that contain these placement preferences.

And Justice Kavanaugh wrote a concurrence that was like, Well, if there were such a case that ever came before the court, it's possible that I might rule for this equal protection challenge and invalidate parts of ICWA. But the court again turned away major challenges to ICWA and upheld the statute to the extent it addressed the challenges. So that is happy, welcome news and not to claim too much credit. But I will just point out that strict scrutiny went to D.C last week for the live show.

And ever since then, the court has basically been behaving so. Is that causation, is that correlation, I'm not sure, but of note.

Leah Lipman, Thank you so much for.

All right, before we go, we did also want to talk about California Governor Gavin Newsom's hour-long interview with Fox News host Sean Hannity.

You said the economy 13.

1 million jobs he's created, these are post-COvid jobs. You know that? I mean, that's an artificial number. No, no, no.

Then let me stipulate this as an opportunity to engage civilly on this, okay, fair point, your president Donald Trump lost 2.6 million jobs during his four years. We've created 13.1 million.

Fine, you can maintain a Covid frame. How about the fact that Joe Biden's created more jobs, six times more jobs than the previous three Republican presidents combined? Are you? I think he's a man of decency and character.

I'm really proud of the president, proud of what he's accomplished in the last three years. Is he strong enough to be president? That's what I'm talking about, strong enough.

Look what he just did to McCarthy, he ran circles. Look at the vote card. I didn't like the vote card, I wouldn't have voted for it.

Exactly, Kevin got played by the President of the United States. You would do a two-hour debate with Ron DeSantis, I'd make it three, three-hour debate.

Do I hear four do it with one day notice with no notes? I look forward to that. Okay, I'm a border state.

Ron DESantis is not. I know he's desperate to get in on the action. No, because a lot of people, he's belly flopped. Donald Trump is going to clean his clock.

Is it fair that Joe Biden?

DESantis has belly flopped. He will clean his clock he needs. I don't have a crystal ball.

Attention. And he set this up months ago by doing an RFP. I have the contractors that he tried to hire saying he was going to send people to California. This is a stunt, it's embarrassing.

It's pathetic. I like how Hannity crumples up paper.

I think he dealt with the Biden age question in the most easily understood way possible, particularly with this audience. If Biden is not strong, why did he just run circles around? Kevin McCarthy in the debt ceiling deal, which worked really well because Sean Hannity opposed the debt ceiling deal? And so it was very, very well done, yeah.

He was so much better prepared.

He was very honest about that. The tone, though, was positive and impressive. I think it's worth noting that what Fox News did with that performance was turn around and use Gavin's performance to contrast with Biden to make Biden look old. Now, Gavin Newsom can't control that, but that's just what Fox does. I spent some time with Gavin Newsom fairly recently.

I'll be honest, I went into it feeling like I'm not really sure about this guy, I don't know what I think about him. I came out really impressed. He clearly works his ass off, he has in private conversations on TV, he has facts like this at his fingertips at all times.

He memorizes a lot of stuff because he's dyslexic, and this is how he works, he just commits things to memory. As you and I know, Dan, having lots of facts and statistics available to you as a communicator can cut both ways. We saw Obama do really well with this and not, but in this case, he really did well with Hannity. I also think like Gavin is super competitive.

He wants Democrats to be tough, he wants to win. You can tell that he hates Ron DeSantis guts. Anyone who wants to spend three hours with that guy at a debate or anywhere else has something going on. He is very worried about the information bubbles.

I think he said it to Hannity in his interview, and he clearly watches Fox all the time. I told Gavin that I would like to see him go on Joe Rogan's show because I think Rogan's got a big audience of people who are far more likely to be persuaded than the typical Fox voter. But that gets us to this question of why do you think he did, Hannity? And do you think that's the right venue?

But because he did it, and he did it well, it went viral and got attention elsewhere, and people will consume it by osmosis on social media through other coverage. And so I think it was the right thing to do. And what you want to do in this sort of disaggregated media environment is do things that get attention beyond the people who are watching the moment in which you do it. And so he had a plan to do it, and he did it well.

We struggled with this in 2009.

I agree with you. I think what made Gavin's interview so smart and compelling was it won't just reach those Hannity viewers. But it became like a media event that was covered unto itself. And that will get his brand out, it'll get the message out.

If I worked at the White House, would I advise Joe Biden to do Fox News? No, because I think ultimately there's more downside than upside. And when the chips are down, we know that Fox is going to go all in for the Republican Party. We read all the Dominion emails about what they really think about the call in 2020 for the election. We saw the other night they called Biden a wannabe dictator in a chyron.

I'm not sure that's the most level, even-handed place, but I agree with you. I think surrogates should go on, I think Democrats should go on. Who are ready to push back hard and do it with a smile. But I do think, to your point, Dan, Big picture, I agree.

Fox News is not really the audience I'm worried about. The average Hannity viewer is probably 70 years old and super conservative and not about to change. The people I think about a lot are disaffected voters who feel like politics is lame, a waste of time. All politicians are the same, so why even bother? Increasingly, you see polling where there's young men of all races falling into this category, kind of like Joe Rogan, kind of barstool sports fans demographic.

And I think if you want to persuade people who are skeptical and hard to reach, I think you need to make a push there. And just help those people understand that politics isn't annoying people who annoy you on Twitter or cable news from both sides. It's like, you vote for the person who sends your buddy to Iraq or not, you vote for the person who says. Your mom with breast cancer has a precondition and can't get health care, or the person who fixes that problem and allows your mom who had breast cancer to get health insurance. Or you vote for someone who thinks that trans kids should be treated like human beings, like everyone else in this country or not.

And I think finding those people and talking to them about kind of like, the underlying stakes of politics are what is so important. And making them understand that no, all politicians are not the same. Like we're all smart people, we can all figure out where they stand on things and figure out who is making choices that matter to you. And I think getting to those folks is the hardest part of politics. It's not even the message.

It's like, the delivery mechanism, yeah, I think that's.

Pretend thinking, you know, thinking that, like Brett Barrett, is going to give you a fair shot.

God knows, but I think, if you, you know Joe Biden, I'm not saying he should do Fox, I just want to stipulate that. But some of his best moments are when he's mixing it up with Republicans, like during the State of the Union. So in the course of this campaign, as it unfolds over the next year and a half here. Like some moments like that, you know? I think when he gets into a little bit of a argument or something with Peter Doocy during either, you know, Q and A's, or press conferences, whatever, he usually comes off pretty good.

I think, I mean, I even thought when he called him a son of a bitch, that was pretty good, too. Like he seems human and real and on his game, and so finding some like moments of conflict like that, it's not. Or, you know, you don't want to give Sean Hannity or the rest of these Yahoos the president of the United States. Which would be a huge boost for them ratings wise and advertising dollar wise. But there is.

Dan, Last question for you before we let you go. Listeners probably know that you're like a famous YouTube star and you do this show called like, Experts React, or some shit like that. And I've been doing this really fun new show on YouTube with my friend Brian Tyler Cohen. Where we, you know, we draft and rank fun things, like the greatest campaign gaps in history. It's called liberal tears. And for some reason, you keep attacking us on your show, which is, you know, far more people watch it.

And I'm just wondering why you feel the need to gatekeep YouTube and what Brian did to you to get us to this place.

It's great we look, we have a little fun competition around here, you know, I'm just trying.

In the previous episode, I spent the morning borrowing my.

To wipe a off my fucking back. So make sure you subscribe to The Positive America YouTube. And if Dan keeps coming after us, Elon, if you're listening, because Dan is trying to de-platform us. We are willing to take the Tucker Carlson deal and take the show to Twitter.

This is her last week. She has been a critical part of the team that works their asses off long hours to make this show happen. We are incredibly grateful to her, to everybody that works here, but incredibly grateful to Andy in this moment and we'll miss her and just want to say thank you.

How do you make a sock puppet that good? Anyway? Well, that's it for this week's episode. I'm about to get in the car and just drive over to John's house and just sort of ladle soup into his mouth or something. We're going to baby bird him back to health, so we'll let you go, Dan, and talk to everybody.

We have no episode Tuesday because it's Juneteenth, so I think the next episode is Thursday. Bye everyone.

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