Opening Arguments - OA744: Georgia Fake Electors Scheme Gets Real (feat. Lawfare’s Anna Bower)

Liz and Andrew welcome Lawfare's Anna Bower to the podcast to break down everything going on with the potential indictment of Donald Trump in Fulton County, Georgia, with a focus on Trump's recent motion to quash the Special Purpose Grand Jury report, DA Fani Willis's response, and more!

Notes Fulton County docket http://www.fultonclerk.org/DocumentCenter/Index/94?Grid-orderBy=LastModifiedDate-desc Anna Bower, Lawfare, "Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Georgia Special Purpose Grand Juries But Were Afraid to Ask" https://www.lawfareblog.com/everything-you-ever-wanted-know-about-georgia-special-purpose-grand-juries-were-afraid-ask

Anna Bower's columns: https://www.lawfareblog.com/contributors/abower

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Amarica's Constitution - Judging for Yourself – Special Guest Kathleen Clark

Justice Thomas remains in the news, as items old and new - from his ward’s private school tuition to his wife’s employment - appear on almost a daily basis.  Friends of the Justice are quoted implying an effort to hide some of these transactions from public view.  An infamous Supreme Court case, Shelby County, creeps back in.  To help untie this web of questions, we are privileged to have Professor Kathleen Clark, a widely-recognized expert with an overwhelming resumé and Professor Amar’s seal of approval.  The discussion is predictably energized.

SCOTUScast - Delaware v. Pennsylvania and Wisconsin – Post-Decision SCOTUScast

On February 28, 2023, the Supreme Court issued its ruling in Delaware v. Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. The issue at hand was a dispute over whether uncashed MoneyGrams qualify as “a money order, traveler’s check, or other similar written instrument (other than a third party bank check) on which a banking or financial organization or a business association is directly liable,” pursuant to 12 U.S.C. § 2503, and therefore whether they should be escheated to the debtor's or creditor's state.

Join us to hear Prof. Adam MacLeod unpack the decision's reasoning and discuss its jurisprudential impacts going forward.

Featuring:
Adam Macleod, Professor of Law, Faulkner University Thomas Goode Jones School of Law

Opening Arguments - OA743: Trump Hallucinates Gag Order as DOJ Blocks Testimony in Strzok Suit

Liz and Andrew update you on the latest developments in Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg's criminal case against Donald Trump as well as Peter Strzok's ongoing civil suit against the DOJ.

Notes OA 700 https://openargs.com/oa700-rumors-of-trumps-testimony-in-strzok-suit-may-be-greatly-exaggerated/

OA 716 https://openargs.com/oa-716-jim-jordan-is-not-alvin-braggs-daddy/

Trump Protective Order https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/23807787/protective-order-5-8-23.pdf

Trump notice of removal https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.nysd.598311/gov.uscourts.nysd.598311.1.0_1.pdf

5 U.S.C. § 552a https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/5/552a

28 U.S.C. § 1442 https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/28/1442

28 U.S.C. § 1455 https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/28/1455

 In re Commonwealth,  790 F.3d 457 (3d Cir. 2015) https://scholar.google.com/scholar_case?case=5539437264593415986

Jordan 3/20 Letter to Bragg https://judiciary.house.gov/sites/evo-subsites/republicans-judiciary.house.gov/files/evo-media-document/2023-03-20-jdj-bs-jc-to-bragg-re-trump-investigation.pdf

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Strict Scrutiny - You Can Crime If You Want To

Melissa, Kate, and Leah cover the gift that keeps on giving-- a.k.a. billionaire Harlan Crow, who can't seem to stop giving undisclosed gifts to Justice Clarence Thomas. They continue the discussion on the deluge of stories about questionable ethics at the Supreme Court following a report that said Leonard Leo arranged for Ginni Thomas to be paid tens of thousands of dollars for "consulting work". The cherry on top? Two recent Supreme Court opinions about political corruption and fraud. Finally, they are joined by John Mills, an attorney for Richard Glossip, who was sentenced to death for a crime for which there is powerful evidence he did not commit.

  • Listen to an interview with Justin Elliott, one of the ProPublica reporters who broke the news about Harlan Crow and Justice Thomas.
  • The hosts covered the arguments of the opinions for Percoco v. US and Ciminelli v. US in this episode.
  • In this episode, the hosts discussed the arguments for Santos-Zacaria v. Garland, another one of the opinions discussed.
  • This past episode discusses the arguments for National Pork Producers Council v. Ross, an opinion the hosts talk about this week.
  • Follow @CrookedMedia on Instagram and Twitter for more original content, host takeovers and other community events.

Get tickets for STRICT SCRUTINY LIVE – The Bad Decisions Tour 2025! 

  • 6/12 – NYC
  • 10/4 – Chicago

Learn more: http://crooked.com/events

Order your copy of Leah's book, Lawless: How the Supreme Court Runs on Conservative Grievance, Fringe Theories, and Bad Vibes

Follow us on Instagram, Threads, and Bluesky

Opening Arguments - OA742: Twitter Can’t Violate the First Amendment, But Fox Can Definitely Defame a Gov’t Official

In light of Linda Yaccarino being named CEO of Twitter, Liz and Andrew break down Trumpworld's never-ending lawsuits against social media, and yet another defamation suit against Fox News, this one by Nina Jankowicz.

Happy Mother's Day!

For the Patreon bonus, we discuss beer, the Superbowl, and Rule 62.1 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, because of course we do.

Notes OA 551 https://openargs.com/oa551-trump-may-out-of-office-but-his-federal-judges-are-not/

Donato dismissal Trump v. Twitter https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cand.387133/gov.uscourts.cand.387133.165.0_6.pdf

Trump v. Twitter, Motion for Indicative Ruling https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cand.387133/gov.uscourts.cand.387133.191.0.pdf

FRCP 62.1 https://www.law.cornell.edu/rules/frcp/rule_62.1

Jankowicz federal docket https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/67365497/jankowicz-v-fox-news-network-llc/

Jankowicz complaint https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/23809394-jankowicz-v-fox-complaint

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Amicus With Dahlia Lithwick | Law, justice, and the courts - The Supreme Court’s Dangerous Return to Its Roots

Get your tickets for Amicus Live on May 24th. 

On this week’s Amicus, we head to Seattle for a live taping of the show at the Cross Cut Festival with guest Michael Waldman, President of NYU Law School’s Brennan Center. Dahlia Lithwick asks him about his new book, THE SUPERMAJORITY: How the Supreme Court Divided America, and what the ongoing ethics scandals and plummeting public approval for the court mean for our democracy. They also look ahead to next month when the court’s legitimacy may be stretched even further by major decisions that fly in the face of the majority of public opinion.


In this week’s Amicus Plus segment, Dahlia is joined by Slate’s Mark Joseph Stern to talk about the decisions that came out this week concerning pork producers and public corruption, which delivered some surprising and depressingly unsurprising opinions. They also try to figure out how many more times E Jean Carroll might have to sue Donald Trump to halt his defamation demolition derby.


Sign up for Slate Plus now to listen and support our show. 

Dahlia’s book Lady Justice: Women, the Law and the Battle to Save America, is also available as an audiobook, and Amicus listeners can get a 25 percent discount by entering the code “AMICUS” at checkout. https://books.supportingcast.fm/lady-justice

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Opening Arguments - OA 741: It’s a Derp-Off! Trump vs. Santos vs. Dersh

Liz and Andrew break down the latest developments in Fulton County, GA; some truly terrible takes on the E. Jean Carroll verdict by Alan Dershowitz; and the indictment of Congressman Astronaut Rabbi George Santos. Be there, will be wild!

NotesOA 738 https://openargs.com/oa-738-trump-flops-proud-boys-drop/

Surveillance footage of Cathy Latham https://www.washingtonpost.com/investigations/2022/09/20/coffee-county-georgia-cathy-latham/

SPGJ report sections made public http://www.fultonclerk.org/DocumentCenter/View/1706/EX-PARTE-ORDER-OF-THE-JUDGE-2-16-2023-Report

Willis Modification of Motion to Disqualify Debrow http://www.fultonclerk.org/DocumentCenter/View/1918/SPGJ--STATES-MODIFICATION-OF-MOTION-TO-DISQUALIFY-5-10-23

Shafer letter Fulton County https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/23800972/shafer-final-march-26-letter-to-da-willis-w-exhibits.pdf

FEC Complaint - Santos https://campaignlegal.org/sites/default/files/2023-01/Campaign%20Legal%20Center%20-%20Santos%20Complaint%20%28Final%29.pdf

Santos indictment https://www.justice.gov/d9/2023-05/santos.indictment.pdf

18 U.S.C. § 1343 https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1343

Federal Sentencing Guidelines https://www.ussc.gov/sites/default/files/pdf/guidelines-manual/2021/GLMFull.pdf

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Opening Arguments - OA740: BREAKING – E. Jean Carroll, $5 Million; Trump, ZERO (feat. Mitchell Epner)

Liz and Andrew bring on former sex crimes prosecutor and New York attorney Mitchell Epner for a discussion of the breaking civil verdict awarding E. Jean Carroll $5 million for Trump's assault and subsequent defamation. We go WAY beyond the regular media coverage; you won't want to miss this episode!

This episode is a paid post on Patreon and was released early to supporters.

Notes Carroll verdict form (blank) https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/23808239/carrollvtrumpverdictform.pdf Screenshots of actual verdict form (Pagliery tweet) https://twitter.com/Jose_Pagliery/status/1656020932031389697?s=20

Trump depo testimony - full video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DkU49iYkw2A

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