Little Sister Resister: Court Matters

It has been a legalrrific week! There have been developments in multiple areas in the cases against djt and his co-conspirators.

Monday August 28 was a busy day for parallel court hearings.

Judge Tanya Chutkan set the federal trial for the attempted coup for March 4, 2024.

There was quite a bit of yelling and faux outrage from T****'s lawyer John Lauro, prompting the judge at one point to admonish him to "take the temperature down."

Lauro wanted the trial date to be moved to 2026, which she found was "absurd." Despite her asking Lauro numerous times to provide a suggestion for an alternate date, he refused to do so, insisting that the 2026 date was the only acceptable time. In the absence of any other suggestion from him, Chutkan gave him two additional months, moving the start date from January to March 4, 2023. This is the day before Super Tuesday.

Lauro's outrage stemmed from the "massive amounts" of discovery in the case. The prosecution countered with the fact that much of the evidence has been in the public record for more than a year (such as that from the January 6 Congressional hearings), and that the defendant lived through the events, so there is little discovery per-se. Besides that, the prosecution has provided the defense with the evidence in an organized, searchable database. It's not like on the Cold Case Files where there are boxes and boxes of evidence to sort through. Perhaps T****'s only point of reference is the boxes in his bathroom.

The prosecution has also shown how they'll use the defendant's and his team's words against them. It came out that Lauro has said in TV interviews that the evidence is "a regurgitation of the J6 committee report" and, "we are not starting fresh from indictment in this case." Lauro has also said publicly that he has read former Vice President Mike Pence's book twice. No time to prepare, huh?

Lauro tried to convince the judge that his client would be much too busy campaigning to take part in such a little thing as a criminal trial. But she pushed back: all defendants are busy, and their schedules are irrelevant. Be here on March 4.

One super-duper offensive, gross, inappropriate, and effed-up citation that Lauro made in his bid to delay the trial, was comparing T****'s case to that of the "Scottsboro Boys." This 1930s case surrounded the false rape allegations and railroading trial against black teenagers in Scottsboro, Alabama. Within two weeks of arrest they were put on trial and sentenced to death. The Supreme Court later reversed their convictions.

The audacity to cite this case to Judge Chutkan! She was not pleased, and shoved back, pointing out (from MSNBC):

The young Black defendants in that case “were met at Scottsboro by a large crowd and that the attitude of the community was one of great hostility.”
Their trials “began six days after indictments.”
The Supreme Court found “a clear denial of due process because the trial court failed to give the defendants reasonable time and opportunity to secure counsel and the defendants were incapable of adequately making their own defense.”
That Trump’s case, “for any number of reasons, is profoundly different from Powell.”

Chutkan also talked to Judge Juan Merchan, who is overseeing the New York case that surrounds his false business reporting of payments to Stormy Daniels, about the schedule. That trial has been set for March 25, 2024. March will be busy for us!

By the way, Judge Merchan is another immigrant judge. Go, Melting Pot!

Meadows made a bid to move his case to federal court.

Also Monday, U.S. District Court Judge Steve Jones in the Northern District of Georgia heard arguments about Meadows's desire to move his case from the state of Georgia to the federal court.

Meadows waived his Fifth Amendment rights and testified in this hearing. He was on the stand for four hours! It was an unusual move for him to testify, and his assertion was that his actions in "questioning" the results in Georgia were "official capacity as chief of staff."

To rebut this, the judge asked the question of what actions would test the limits of this capacity. Meadows lawyer George Terwilliger admitted, "But if he shot a demonstrator in Lafayette Park, that would obviously be outside the scope of his duties."

Yeah no.You can't break the law under color of your job.

Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger testified as well. He characterized the telephone call as "a campaign call," and stated that he didn't return an earlier call from Meadows because he felt it was inappropriate to talk about the Georgia election with the Whitewash House.

Why does Meadows want to move his case? According to CNN, moving the case to federal court is "where he hopes to get the charges dismissed under a federal immunity claim extended, in certain contexts, to individuals who are prosecuted or sued for alleged conduct that was done on behalf of the U.S. government or was tied to their federal position." He also is possibly angling for a better jury – he needs just one MAGAt – from the jury pool in the more conservative federal district court.

Jennifer Rubin of the Washington Post opines that Meadows has made a risky move and that it may backfire. He outright said under oath that it was his duty as chief of staff to "make sure those campaign goals and objectives are implemented at the federal level." Which is, actually, opposite of what the Hatch Act says. He is not allowed to take part in the campaign. Furthermore, he admitted to sending "a text message to a Georgia election official asking if the state could speed up the ballot signature-matching process if the Trump campaign paid for it." No, no. Not allowed! There is also evidence that he was involved in the phony elector scheme. Not part of any chief of staff's duties.

Why do we care about the Hatch Act? Read AP's Q&A.

Rubin points out that his testimony not only will not help him get his case moved, but gave D.A. Fani Willis more ammo to convict him, home court or not.

The judge did not making a ruling on the motion, and Meadows – along with the rest of the co-conspirators – is due to be arraigned on Tuesday, September 6. We'll see if the ruling comes before then.

Other Court Stuff.

Defendant Kenneth Chesebro, whose trial got moved to October 23 per his request for a speedy trial, made a motion for records to be unsealed.

Rudolph Giuliani was found liable for defaming Georgia elections workers Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss. A judge decided the case, because Giuliani did not comply with orders to submit evidence. A jury will now decide how much he is to pay them.

Georgia defendants Sidney Powell, Trevian Kutti, and Ray Smith have waived arraignment and pled not guilty to all charges.

What to watch next? Arraignment in the Georgia case for the ringleader and the rest of the co-conspirators will be in just a few days, on Tuesday, September 5.

The Fun Stuff.

Live reaction to Trump's mugshot photo #TrumpMugshot pic.twitter.com/fRemuuQEWZ
— The Lincoln Project (@ProjectLincoln) August 25, 2023