Dear listeners,
We start this week’s show by looking at Judge Kathleen Williams’ evisceration of President Trump’s attorneys for their sham lawsuit that was ultimately used as a pretext to create the “weaponization fund” settlement. Her order is bracing. But what are its practical effects? She makes bar referrals and she might award some attorneys’ fees. But the headline is that she says the settlement is void — meaning Trump can’t rely on it to protect him from future IRS audits. She says he can’t rely on it in other courts or proceedings. But… can she do that? We discuss how far her judicial authority can reach when she sees misconduct in her courtroom.
We also look at how E. Jean Carroll finally got the smaller of her two Trump judgments paid out. And we consider the very aggressive legal theory under which Mahmoud Khalil is suing the people who advocated for him to be deported. And the Trump administration’s effort to find out how The New York Times learned about security threats to the president’s new Qatari jet.
That’s this week’s free episode. For paying subscribers, we look at the Trump administration’s effort to get information about how Boris Epshteyn, its own representative, communicated with law firms that settled in the face of adverse executive orders. Those latter subpoenas may be part of a cockamamie plan to pressure the American Bar Association not to ask nosy questions (the ABA has issued its own subpoenas that the administration wants quashed) but whatever their purpose, they sure are awkward for the firms that settled.
Also for paying subscribers, we look at a defamation case that should worry New York City Councilwoman Vickie Paladino, at least as regards one of its claims, and we consider a bizarre episode that has Jack Burkman and Jacob Wohl back in the news, pursuing their very own big-boy federal felonies. It involves a rapper named “Boosie Badazz,” whom they charged a large fee in exchange for assistance getting a pardon, and whom they did not in fact get pardoned.
We hope you enjoy the episode,
Josh
