Dear listeners,
It appears that E. Jean Carroll’s defamation lawsuit against Donald Trump might actually go to trial pretty soon. It’s scheduled for trial next month, and while these things often get delayed, the court is behaving like it does when a trial is about to begin.
This week, we talked about evidence of Trump’s prior behavior — two other accusations from women who say he committed sexual crimes against them, decades apart — that Judge Lewis Kaplan has decided may be admitted in court. Usually, testimony about prior bad acts isn’t allowed in evidence — it’s prejudicial — but there’s a special, legislated exception for evidence about sexual assaults. Even the Access Hollywood tape will be admitted under this exception.
We also talked about moves by Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg, who may be preparing to indict Donald Trump for falsifying business records related to his hush-money payment to porn actress Stormy Daniels. The former president says Bragg is reaching, and he has a point — this is not near the top of the list of Trump’s bad acts, and the theory he’d need to pursue to make it a felony charge is especially dubious. But Bragg is under a lot of political pressure to find some way to indict Trump, and meatier accusations about his larger financial dealings didn’t pan out, so here we may soon be.
And we talked about Peter Strzok and Lisa Page, the former FBI staffers who were involved in both an extramarital affair and the FBI’s investigation into the Trump campaign’s links to Russia. He’s suing for wrongful termination and she’s suing over the release of her embarrassing text messages; long-suffering federal judge Amy Berman Jackson is presiding over their case, and she’s decided they may depose both Trump and FBI Director Christopher Wray, but only about specific topics and only for two hours each. We discussed what you have to show in order to get the right to depose a president (or former president) himself when you sue the US government.
We hope you enjoy the episode,
Josh
The Week Of Unintended Consequences