Trump lawyers nailed for using pundit opinions to 'prove their points' – Raw Story
Tom Boggioni is a writer, born, raised and living in San Diego — where he attended San Diego State University. Prior to writing for Raw Story, he wrote for FireDogLake, blogged as TBogg, and worked in banking, marketing and construction.
Addressing a legal brief submitted by Donald Trump's lawyers to the Supreme Court requesting that the court not rush hearings on whether the former president is afforded presidential immunity, ex-U.S. Attorney Joyce Vance noted the inclusion of social media posts in lieu of citing case law.
On her Civil Discourse Substack platform, the former prosecutor found it amusing that Trump's legal team saw fit to include tweets from pundits that carry exactly zero weight when deciding constitutional issues.
Along the way, she took a jab at the attorneys for apparently agreeing to share them with court at the former president's urging.
"Letting the client dictate the arguments that make it into a brief can damage the arguments overall credibility, and there’s some sense that happens here," she wrote, "It’s not often you see lawyers relying on political pundits instead of legal authority to prove their points, but it occurs here."
Case in point a posting on X, formerly known as Twitter, where the lawyers cited Byron York, who identifies as, "Chief political correspondent, Washington Examiner. Fox News contributor. Host of ‘The Byron York Show' podcast.”
ALSO READ: How Republicans paved the road to Texas with misogyny
York wrote, "Did I miss something? In SCOTUS request, Jack Smith repeatedly says it's super important Trump immunity issue be decided quickly. But he doesn't say *why* it must be decided quickly. Obviously, that is so Trump can be tried, convicted, and sentenced before 2024 election. Why not explicitly say so?"
Trump's lawyers used that to imply, "As soon as the Special Counsel’s petition was filed, commentators from across the political spectrum observed that its evident motivation is to schedule the trial before the 2024 presidential election—a nakedly political motive.”
That led Vance to retort, tongue-in-cheek: "If it’s in a Tweet, it must be a good argument for the Supreme Court to buy into, or so thinks Trump."
You can read more here.
Donald Trump will not be given special sentencing treatment if convicted of conspiring to overturn the 2020 presidential election, says Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis.
CNN caught up with Willis at an event on Thursday.
"I know that in the media, and even in the world, we like instant gratification," Willis explained. "The judicial process is a long process, and so we'll be here with that case for a while."
ALSO READ: A neuroscientist’s guide to surviving Christmas with Trump-loving relatives
The reporter asked the district attorney if Trump would go to prison.
"I think that everyone in society is the same, and I don't know why that's such a difficult concept for people," she replied. "You can look at the charges, and based on those charges, we'll be recommending appropriate sentences. No one gets a special break because of their status."
Watch the video below from CNN or click here.
Former President Donald Trump has an "absurd" new plan to expand the rights of American police, even as he rages against those investigating him, legal experts told The New York Times Thursday.
Trump's new proposal would "indemnify" on-duty police officers, essentially shielding them from misconduct lawsuits, despite already high immunity standards that make legal cases against officers hard to win, Michael Gold reported.
Legal experts told Gold the proposal doesn't make much sense.
“The idea that officers need indemnification is frankly absurd, because they already have it,” said Benjamin Cardozo Law School professor Alexander Reinert.
“Officers virtually never pay anything in settlements or judgments entered against them,” said UCLA Law professor Joanna Schwartz, noting police departments and insurance companies usually make payouts, not the officers.
That didn't stop Trump from saying in a recent speech, “We are going to indemnify them, so they don’t lose their wife, their family, their pension and their job."
Nor did his professed support of law enforcement stop Trump from "raging" against federal and state law enforcement officials leading the four criminal cases against him, Gold notes.
"Even as he proclaims his steadfast support for rank-and-file officers, he has been raging against federal and state law enforcement officials who have led the four criminal cases against him, resulting in 91 felony charges," wrote Gold.
While Trump does have a strong support base among police, a pair of Capitol Police officers injured during the Jan. 6 attack have filed suit against him for, they say, inciting the violence, Gold reports.
"Colorado’s Supreme Court ruled this week that there was enough evidence that he engaged in insurrection to disqualify him from holding office again," Gold notes.
Meanwhile, Trump has escalated his attack on special counsel Jack Smith and Justice Department prosecutors over the criminal cases, warning there will be "repercussions" if the DOJ doesn't withdraw the charges.
Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel has filed charges against Ann and Robert Minard, who served as staff fof former Republican Speaker Lee Chatfield.
The charges include conspiracy, criminal enterprise, embezzlement, filing false tax returns and more, Nessel said in a speech Thursday.
"Michigan residents deserve more," she said. "They deserve better than what this flawed system has allowed. As my team works on these investigations we are also meeting with the legislative work groups that have been formed to analyze and improve Michigan's campaign finance laws. And at the conclusion of these investigations, I will also be hearing very specific legislative recommendations that place additional sunshine on political fundraising and spending, and to make it more difficult for bad actors to engage in these kinds of activities."
She went on to say that the charges are not the conclusion of this specific investigation or any other public integrity investigations still moving forward in the A.G.'s office.
In January, 2022, "Chatfield's 26-year-old sister-in-law, Rebekah Chatfield, accused the former speaker of sexually abusing her beginning when she was 15 years old," The Detroit News reported in Feb. 2022. "The woman's attorney, Jamie White, said there were also unspecified financial allegations involving Lee Chatfield."
Rob Minard was serving as the speaker's chief of staff in 2019 and 2020 while his wife served as the director of external affairs. While authorities began an investigation into the speaker, there was also an investigation into Minard that spun off of the initial probe.
ALSO READ: Let fear be your greatest motivator in 2024
Detroit News explained at the time of the search of the Minards' home that "authorities are entangling two well-connected operatives who've been involved in making and raising campaign money in their investigation."
It wasn't certain what they were looking for at the time, however, Anne Minard was the former treasurer to four political action committees that Chatfield used to raise campaign cash money, disclosures revealed.
One "social welfare" non-profit shares the address with a pro-Chatfield PAC called the Peninsula Fund.
"Victor Strategies received $151,568 in 2020 for fundraising work through Chatfield's Peninsula Fund," the report from 2022 explained. "The Peninsula Fund reported spending $142,266 on travel and entertainment for public officials and $454,337 on food, dining, travel and entertainment overall in 2020."
See the video of the briefing below or at the link here.
Attorney General Nessel to Announce Charges in Public Integrity Investigationwww.youtube.com
Copyright © 2023 Raw Story Media, Inc. PO Box 21050, Washington, D.C. 20009 | Masthead | Privacy Policy | Manage Preferences | Debug Logs
For corrections contact corrections@rawstory.com, for support contact support@rawstory.com.