Crooked Media - Oops! All Bench Trials

- Donald Trump’s elegant thoughts on green military technology

THINGS ARE BAD for disgraced former president Donald Trump, whose legal team showed up in court Monday sporting a gaming laptop. Trump had a long day of declaring the trial illegitimate and calling Justice Arthur Engoron “a rogue judge.”
 

• Trump appeared in a Manhattan courtroom for the opening day of his $250 million civil fraud trial. The case, which was filed in September 2022 by Attorney General Letitia James (D-NY), also includes members of the Trump Organization and Trump’s two adult sons Eric and Don Jr. 
   

• Trump will not receive a jury trial in this case, a point which he has raged against in the public and on social media. Flanked by his lawyers and his Large Adult Sons, Trump spoke to reporters in the hall of the courthouse, saying, “I was going to come out and say that, as you know, we're not entitled to a jury, which is unusual in the United States of America.” Trump actually was entitled to a jury trial, but his legal team (accidentally or not, it’s unclear!) requested a trial without a jury on their official paperwork back in July. Just a well-oiled machine over there at Trump legal enterprises. 
   

• The bench trial is being presided over by New York State Supreme Court Justice Engoron, who has already found that Trump committed years of fraud; Engoron issued a “corporate death penalty” to the Trump organization last week. So Trump’s fate is in the hands of a judge who has already repeatedly ruled against him and his legal team, and who Trump has attacked a “Democratic Party operative.” Should be good!

It was an eventful first day of the trial.
 

• A lead lawyer for the Attorney General’s office, Kevin Wallace, said in his opening statements: “Year after year, loan after loan, defendants misrepresented Mr. Trump’s net worth,” and got in a quick jab that while it might be standard practice to exaggerate these numbers for a television audience or Forbes magazine, “you cannot do it while conducting business in the state of New York.”
   
• Wallace methodically laid out the dubious value claims Trump has made about his signature properties over the years, including Manhattan’s Trump Tower. If the AG’s office proves its case, the judge could impose a quarter-of-a-billion-dollar penalty on the former president, and prohibit him from operating a business in New York ever again. Wouldn’t that be fun??

The trial is expected to last several weeks, and Trump himself will testify. After this civil case wraps up, the former president still has four criminal trials to deal with, while also chugging along with his unhinged reelection campaign. He continues to be the frontrunner—far and away—in the 2024 Republican presidential primary, because the GOP is Normal and Healthy.

Could civil rights be in danger because of a case about hotel websites? This is the Supreme Court we’re talking about, so, you bet. The Court’s officially back in session, and when the justices get messier than anything Andy Cohen has to contend with, Strict Scrutiny is just the pod you need to make this term a little less scary. Each week Strict hosts Melissa Murray, Leah Litman, and Kate Shaw- unpack what’s on the docket for this term, and help you keep up with the slew of legal news headed our way. Listen to new episodes of Strict Scrutiny every Monday wherever you get your podcasts.

Fresh off of almost shutting down the government for no reason, Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) has moved on to his next priority: ousting GOP House Speaker Kevin McCarthy. Gaetz officially introduced a resolution to remove McCarthy from his post on Monday after days of warnings, setting the stage for the kind of political punishment only endured by two other speakers in the history of the House of Representatives.

McCarthy’s chief sin, according to Gaetz and his band of far-right loonies, was relying on Democratic votes to push through the stopgap spending bill that averted a catastrophic government shutdown. He accused McCarthy of lying to the GOP caucus and making a “secret deal” with Democrats regarding future funding for Ukraine, which Gaetz and many other House GOP members have opposed.

McCarthy and GOP leadership will need to address the motion within two legislative days, but could do so sooner. Shortly after the motion was introduced, McCarthy tweeted, embarrassingly, “Bring it on.” and then Gaetz quote-tweeted, even more embarrassingly, "Just did." No one to root for with this many losers involved, but it sure is fun to watch!

The House finally voted not to do a government shutdown on Saturday. Thanks for nothing, Republicans! The legislation keeps the government funded through November 17 and authorizes additional disaster relief funding. 

Gov. Gavin Newsom (D-CA) vetoed a bill on Saturday that had passed the California State Legislature; the bill would have made workers on strike for over two weeks eligible for unemployment benefits. 

Over the weekend, Newsom also appointed Laphonza Butler, the president of EMILY’s List, to fill the seat Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) who passed away last week. Butler will be the first openly queer Black woman to serve in the Senate. 

Rep. Dean Phillips (D-MN) has stepped down from his House leadership role, adding to speculation that he may mount a primary challenge to president Joe Biden. 

Former Red Sox pitcher and two-time World Series champion Tim Wakefield passed away from brain cancer on Sunday at 57 years old. 

Justice Clarence Thomas recused himself (for once) on Monday when the Supreme Court declined an appeal from John Eastman, one of Trump’s main legal advisers who helped the former president try to overturn the 2020 election results.

On Tuesday, crypto fraudster and FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried is set to stand trial in Manhattan, where he faces federal charges of fraud and money laundering. FTX collapsed after Bankman-Fried’s alleged mismanagement came to light in one of the most significant and fast-moving corporate catastrophes in decades. The rest of the crypto industry is implicitly on trial alongside Bankman-Fried, as well; his hubris and greed have come to represent the excesses of the notoriously opaque decentralized finance world. In their arguments, lawyers for both Bankman-Fried’s defense and his prosecution are expected to expose the high-risk  culture that pervaded FTX and its peers. But primarily at issue is Bankman-Fried’s use of billions of his customers’ dollars to shore up another of his businesses—trading firm Alameda Research, which specialized in buying soon-to-be-worthless cryptocurrencies and selling them off before they collapsed.

Legal experts say that the inherent (scammy) nature of crypto allowed for the explosive fraud to persist and proliferate. Bankman-Fried faces seven criminal counts. The fraud for which he stands accused siphoned billions of dollars from customers to finance his political contributions, venture capital investments, and personal purchases of luxury real estate. He has entered a plea of not guilty, and if convicted, could receive a prison sentence which would amount to the rest of his life. Maybe that will begin to heal the national wound caused when zero Wall Street executives went to jail for the 2008 financial crisis. 

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President Biden hosted actress Selma Blair, who lives with multiple sclerosis, to commemorate the 30th anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act at the White House. 

Former president Jimmy Carter celebrated his 99th birthday on Sunday. 

Covid-19 vaccine pioneers Katalin Karikó and Drew Weissman were awarded the Nobel Prize for physiology or medicine on Monday.