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Supreme Court to Hear Trump Immunity Claim on April 22

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The order is here.

The application for a stay presented to The Chief Justice is referred by him to the Court. The Special Counsel’s request to treat the stay application as a petition for a writ of certiorari is granted, and that petition is granted limited to the following question: Whether and if so to what extent does a former President enjoy presidential immunity from criminal prosecution for conduct alleged to involve official acts during his tenure in office. Without expressing a view on the merits, this Court directs the Court of Appeals to continue withholding issuance of the mandate until the sending down of the judgment of this Court. The application for a stay is dismissed as moot.

The case will be set for oral argument during the week of April 22, 2024. Petitioner’s brief on the merits, and any amicus curiae briefs in support or in support of neither party, are to be filed on or before Tuesday, March 19, 2024. Respondent’s brief on the merits, and any amicus curiae briefs in support, are to be filed on or before Monday, April 8, 2024. The reply brief, if any, is to be filed on or before 5 p.m., Monday, April 15, 2024.

This is sub-optimal, insofar as I had hoped they would rule quickly. Perhaps Trump’s immunity claim in Florida changed that?

Nevertheless, we should get an order in June, and so possibly a trial starting in late August?

Stolen Documents Motions to Dismiss

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Trump and at least Carlos De Oliveira are filing motions to dismiss (some are being unsealed via a review process). I’ll post them here until I read in more detail.

De Oliveira MTD or Bill of Particulars

Trump’s claim of presidential immunity to steal documents

Trump’s claim that he’s too stupid ot understand 18 USC 793(e)

Trump’s Special Counsel claim (repeating Hunter Biden’s appropriation claim)

Trump’s claim the Presidential Records Act says the opposite of what it says with assist from John Solomon

Still to come: A motion to suppress the search of Mar-a-Lago

Notice of pretrial motions

Mr. Smith Goes to SCOTUS

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I’m close to bed, so I won’t read it here, but here is Jack Smith’s SCOTUS response on Trump’s immunity claim. This was Trump’s appeal.

Remember that this was technically an application for a stay, not the entire appeal (though one option for SCOTUS is that it treats Trump’s request as a cert position). What Jack Smith is arguing is that the stay should be lifted.

DC Circuit: Go Big and [in a Footnote] Go Blassingame!

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Note: Our discussion of the decision starts after 10 minutes.

During the entire month we’ve been waiting for a DC Circuit ruling on Trump’s immunity claim, I have argued we’d be better off with an opinion for which SCOTUS was likely to deny cert than a decision in which a — say — Judge Karen Henderson concurrence offered surface area for Justices to claw out review.

Before I explain why there’s a good shot that this opinion was worth the wait, let me review how SCOTUS came to uphold a Judge Chutkan opinion chipping away at Trump’s Executive Privilege claims for January 6. In that case, Trump was trying to prevent the Archives from sharing presidential documents with the January 6 Committee; because he was seeking to prevent something, it was actually easier to make appeals go faster. The appeals were resolved in 74 days:

  • On November 9, 2021, Judge Chutkan rejected Trump’s attempt to enjoin the Archives from sharing his papers
  • On November 30, a DC Circuit panel of three Democratic appointees heard his case; on December 9, the Circuit issued an opinion from Patricia Millet upholding Judge Chutkan
  • On January 22, 2022, with only a dissent from Clarence Thomas, SCOTUS upheld the DC Circuit opinion; Justice Kavanaugh noted that, even if a more stringent standard were applied, Trump’s claim would still fail

This appeal has taken 67 days thus far:

  • On December 1, Judge Chutkan, waiting less than 12 hours after the long-delayed issuance of an opinion in Blassingame holding that former Presidents are not immune from lawsuit when in the role of office-seeker, issued her ruling rejecting Trump’s immunity claim
  • A bipartisan panel — Karen Henderson, Florence Pan, and Michelle Childs — heard Trump’s appeal on January 9
  • The panel issued a strong per curiam opinion on February 6

In recent weeks, I had shown where there seemed to be disagreement on that panel, disagreements that are all resolved in the opinion.

Posture

Let’s start with the last one, what I called posture. Judge Henderson had originally not favored an expedited review. This order forces Trump into an expedited appeals process.

The Clerk is directed to withhold issuance of the mandate through February 12, 2024. If, within that period, Appellant notifies the Clerk in writing that he has filed an application with the Supreme Court for a stay of the mandate pending the filing of a petition for a writ of certiorari, the Clerk is directed to withhold issuance of the mandate pending the Supreme Court’s final disposition of the application. The filing of a petition for rehearing or rehearing en banc will not result in any withholding of the mandate, although the grant of rehearing or rehearing en banc would result in a recall of the mandate if the mandate has already issued.

The only way he can stop Judge Chutkan from issuing opinions on the remaining motions to dismiss filed last fall is if he immediately appeals to SCOTUS for a stay pending appeal, which he has already said he’d done. The only way he can get that stay is if five Justices say they think Trump will succeed on the merits and vote to grant the stay.

Steve Vladeck says that SCOTUS has a lot of options, but the two most likely are to deny the stay or to grant an appeal in this term, committing to an opinion by June.

Jurisdiction

At least by my read in the table, the one reason Pan and Childs couldn’t write their own opinion without Henderson was because Childs was much more cautious about whether the Circuit even had jurisdiction.

Nine pages of the opinion treat that question. It adopts two suggestions from Jack Smith’s prosecutor James Pearce. Most notably, it notes that SCOTUS has repeatedly given [former] Presidents get immediate appeals.

Nor was the question presented in Midland Asphalt anything like the one before us. Procedural rules are worlds different from a former President’s asserted immunity from federal criminal liability. The Supreme Court has repeatedly emphasized that the President is sui generis. In the civil context, the Court has held that the denial of the President’s assertion of absolute immunity is immediately appealable “[i]n light of the special solicitude due to claims alleging a threatened breach of essential Presidential prerogatives under the separation of powers.” Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. at 743. And in United States v. Nixon, the Court waived the typical requirement that the President risk contempt before appealing because it would be “unseemly” to require the President to do so “merely to trigger the procedural mechanism for review of the ruling.” 418 U.S. 683, 691–92 (1974). It would be equally “unseemly” for us to require that former President Trump first be tried in order to secure review of his immunity claim after final judgment.

Trump did not contest jurisdiction here, so it’s unlikely to be something that SCOTUS pursues (and if they did, then it would get bumped back to Chutkan for trial).

Go Big and [in a Footnote] Go Blassingame

Finally, I noted that Judge Henderson seemed to have concerns about the scope of their decision — what she described “floodgates” of follow-on charges. She at least considered the wisdom of limiting this opinion to a former President’s unofficial acts — in this case, defined as those of an office-seeker under Blassingame.

Rather than going Blassingame, though, the panel’s top line holding went Big.

The operative language in this opinion rejects the notion of Presidential immunity categorically as a violation of separation of powers.

At bottom, former President Trump’s stance would collapse our system of separated powers by placing the President beyond the reach of all three Branches. Presidential immunity against federal indictment would mean that, as to the President, the Congress could not legislate, the Executive could not prosecute and the Judiciary could not review. We cannot accept that the office of the Presidency places its former occupants above the law for all time thereafter. Careful evaluation of these concerns leads us to conclude that there is no functional justification for immunizing former Presidents from federal prosecution in general or for immunizing former President Trump from the specific charges in the Indictment. In so holding, we act, “not in derogation of the separation of powers, but to maintain their proper balance.” See Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. at 754. [my emphasis]

Even in that sweeping language, though, the opinion addresses the question of presidential immunity generally and specifically, as to the charges in the indictment.

The import of this move in resolving any disagreement on the panel is more clear elsewhere.

Perhaps most importantly, footnote 14, does something that Judge Chutkan also did. It said that because they reject the notion of categorical immunity, they don’t have to review whether the alleged crimes are official acts.

14 Because we conclude that former President Trump is not entitled to categorical immunity from criminal liability for assertedly “official” acts, it is unnecessary to explore whether executive immunity, if it applied here, would encompass his expansive definition of “official acts.” Nevertheless, we observe that his position appears to conflict with our recent decision in Blassingame, 87 F.4th at 1. According to the former President, any actions he took in his role as President should be considered “official,” including all the conduct alleged in the Indictment. Appellant’s Br. 41–42. But in Blassingame, taking the plaintiff’s allegations as true, we held that a President’s “actions constituting re-election campaign activity” are not “official” and can form the basis for civil liability. 87 F.4th at 17. In other words, if a President who is running for re-election acts “as office-seeker, not office-holder,” he is not immune even from civil suits. Id. at 4 (emphasis in original). Because the President has no official role in the certification of the Electoral College vote, much of the misconduct alleged in the Indictment reasonably can be viewed as that of an office-seeker — including allegedly organizing alternative slates of electors and attempting to pressure the Vice President and Members of the Congress to accept those electors in the certification proceeding. It is thus doubtful that “all five types of conduct alleged in the indictment constitute official acts.” Appellant’s Br. 42. [my empahsis]

But they say if they did have to review whether the indictment charged Trump for official acts, the fact that so many of the alleged acts in the indictment pertain to Trump’s role as an office-seeker, and because Presidents have no role in election certifications, the indictment would survive that more particular review anyway.

This is the kind of out that Justice Kavanaugh took on a related issue, whether the interests of Congress in reviewing an attack on the election certification preempted any Executive Privilege claims.

That is, both the District and Circuit have already said that, if they were asked to consider whether this indictment withstands an immunity claim, it substantially would.

I have no idea what SCOTUS will do. But by producing a unanimous opinion with little surface area for Justices to grab hold, Judges Henderson, Pan, and Childs may have ended up producing the most expeditious result.

Trump Spent $50 Million Paying Lawyers But Taxpayers Are Providing Loaner Laptops

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As multiple outlets reported this week, Trump spent over $50 million of the money raised from his supporters to pay for legal representation last year, both for himself and for those whose loyalty and silence he needs to ensure.

That includes upwards of $250,000 to a solicitor in London who filed a lawsuit against Christopher Steele that got dismissed this week.

Meanwhile, the response to Trump’s motion to compel in his stolen documents case reveals that, in October, Jack Smith provided two of the most important lawyers being paid by Trump funds, Carlos De Oliveira attorney, John Irving, and Walt Nauta attorney, Stan Woodward, loaner laptops.

Here’s how the response filing describes the loaners and the attorneys’ delay (and subsequent difficulties) accessing the surveillance footage in the proprietary media player Trump Organization uses.

In an email on October 24, 2023, months after the materials were made available to the defense, counsel for De Oliveira for the first time mentioned problems that he had encountered when attempting to access specific CCTV files that the Government had obtained from the Trump Organization and produced in discovery. The Government immediately arranged a call with counsel and technical personnel from the FBI to help resolve the reported issues. Exhibit E at 2- 3. During the call, counsel for De Oliveira explained that he did not own or have access to a laptop or desktop computer and was instead attempting to review the entirety of the Government’s discovery on a handheld tablet. Id. The Government then offered to lend him a laptop computer to facilitate his review. Id. Counsel for De Oliveira accepted the offer, and on November 1, 2023, the Government hand-delivered a computer to him. Since then, whenever De Oliveira’s counsel has raised technical issues with viewing specific Trump Organization CCTV files, the Government has promptly assisted with resolving these inquiries, providing tips and examples, and offering to set up calls as needed. See ECF No. 252 at 2 n.1.

Counsel for Nauta was copied on the October 24, 2023 email and reported “having the same issues” as counsel for De Oliveira. Exhibit E at 3. The Government extended the same laptop offer to Nauta’s counsel, who accepted the offer but noted that he planned to “return it promptly assuming I have the same issues.” Id. at 2. The Government also emailed defense counsel with additional suggestions to facilitate expedited review of CCTV footage, and counsel for Nauta responded within minutes, explaining that he planned to “run a test to extract data” to a separate drive, “and report back” about how it went. Id. at 1. The computer was delivered to Nauta’s counsel on November 1, and has not been returned. The Government heard nothing from Nauta’s counsel about CCTV for more than two months and thus reasonably believed that defense counsel had watched and was continuing to review the footage.

Then, on January 11, 2024, Nauta’s counsel confirmed that he was able to extract all of the files but had encountered difficulty attempting “to launch the [M]ilestone video application.” Exhibit F. Counsel’s reference to “Milestone” was to a proprietary media player and camera system vendor platform used by the Trump Organization to record, archive, and play video footage. In response, the Government worked with counsel to identify his misstep in attempting to launch the player and provided detailed instructions and screenshots about how to do so. Exhibit G. This most recent problem—the apparent basis for the statement in defendants’ brief that “[d]efense counsel for Mr. Nauta was not able to launch the proprietary video player at all” (ECF No. 262 at 61)—omits that for over two months he did not even attempt to launch the player the Government provided (on the laptop that the Government also provided), and did not do so until days before the motion to compel was due. In any event, once notified of the problem, the Government provided prompt assistance in diagnosing the simple and easily correctable user error that has now been resolved. [my emphasis]

The filing is worth reading for more than the revelation that John Irving doesn’t own a laptop.

It starts with a 15-page section describing the course of the investigation.

As Politico first reported, it describes how upwards of 45,000 people entered Mar-a-Lago during the period when Trump was hoarding the nation’s nuclear secrets without getting their names checked by Secret Service.

of the approximately 48,000 guests who visited Mar-a-Lago between January 2021 and May 2022, while classified documents were at the property, only 2,200 had their names checked and only 2,900 passed through magnetometers;

And it provides details of Trump’s lack of security clearance and his loss of Q Clearance after he got fired by voters.

The defendants next request evidence related to the “attempt to retroactively terminate President Trump’s security clearance and related disclosures.” ECF No. 262 at 38-42. This request includes any information concerning “President Trump’s security clearances, read-ins, and related training,” as well as, “where applicable, the failure to maintain formal documentation and training that is typically required.” ECF No. 262 at 40-41. The defendants specifically assert (ECF No. 262 at 41) that the Government must search the Scattered Castles database (a database of security clearances maintained by the Intelligence Community) and a similar database maintained by the Department of Defense (the Defense Information System for Security, which replaced the Joint Personnel Adjudication System). The Government has produced the results of a search in Scattered Castles, which yielded no past or present security clearances for Trump.

[snip]

First, the Government has already produced all non-privileged, responsive materials. The Government produced to the defendants through discovery a memorandum authored by an assistant general counsel in DOE, dated June 28, 2023. Exhibit 59. The memorandum stated that DOE had granted a Q clearance to Trump on February 9, 2017, “in connection with his current duties” as President, see id., pursuant to a statutory provision that permits DOE to grant clearances without a background check if doing so is in the national interest, see 42 U.S.C. § 2165(b).25 The memorandum further stated that when DOE officials learned that Trump remained listed in DOE databases (its Central Personnel Clearance Index and Clearance Action Tracking System) as possessing a Q clearance after his term ended, they determined that Trump’s clearance had terminated upon the end of his presidency and that the DOE databases should be updated to reflect that termination. Exhibit 59. In response to the defendants’ motion, the Government made a second request for documents to DOE on January 24, 2024, and included the categories of information in Trump’s request described above. The Government is now producing approximately 30 pages of responsive materials, while withholding eight emails under the deliberative-process privilege.

24 The document charged in Count 19 may be viewed by someone holding an active and valid Q clearance. Trump’s Q clearance ended when his term in office ended, even though the database was only belatedly updated to reflect that reality. But even if Trump’s Q clearance had remained active, that fact would not give him the right to take any documents containing information subject to the clearance to his home and store it in his basement or anywhere else at Mar-a-Lago. No Q clearance holder has authorization to remove documents from a proper place of storage and keep them for himself. And a Q clearance would not even permit access to, much less offsite possession of, the documents charged in Counts 1-18 and 20-32.

25 The authority to classify and control access to national defense information rests with the President, see Dep’t of Navy v. Egan, 484 U.S. 518, 527 (1988), and accordingly, during their terms in office, Presidents are not required to obtain security clearances before accessing classified information, see 50 U.S.C. § 3163 (“Except as otherwise specifically provided, the provisions of this subchapter [dealing with access to classified information] shall not apply to the President and Vice President, Members of the Congress, Justices of the Supreme Court, and Federal judges appointed by the President.”). Those exceptions for the President and other high-ranking officials apply only during their terms of office. See, e.g., Executive Order 13526, § 4.4(a) (authorizing access to classified information by former officials, including former Presidents, only under limited and enumerated circumstances). [my emphasis]

These details should, but won’t, resolve all sorts of confusion about under what authority Presidents and Vice Presidents access classified information.

Dan Scavino, Alone with Trump, Had Access to the Attempted Murder Weapon

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Since DC District unsealed Jack Smith’s warrant to obtain Trump’s Twitter account, I have described that one of the most important things prosecutors were seeking was attribution: to learn, before conducting an Executive Privilege-waived interview with Dan Scavino, whether Trump or Scavino wielded the murder weapon, Trump’s Twitter account, that almost got Mike Pence killed three years ago.

Donald Trump nearly killed his Vice President by tweet — the tweet he sent at 2:24PM on January 6, 2021.

111. At 2:24 p.m., after advisors had left the Defendant alone in his dining room, the Defendant issued a Tweet intended to further delay and obstruct the certification: “Mike Pence didn’t have the courage to do what should have been done to protect our Country and our Constitution, giving States a chance to certify a corrected set of facts, not the fraudulent or inaccurate ones which they were asked to previously certify. USA demands the truth!”

112. One minute later, at 2:25 p.m., the United States Secret Service was forced to evacuate the Vice President to a secure location.

113. At the Capitol, throughout the afternoon, members of the crowd chanted, “Hang Mike Pence!”; “Where is Pence? Bring him out!”; and “Traitor Pence!”

114. The Defendant repeatedly refused to approve a message directing rioters to leave the Capitol, as urged by his most senior advisors-including the White House Counsel, a Deputy White House Counsel, the Chief of Staff, a Deputy Chief of Staff, and a Senior Advisor.

As the indictment tells it, at the time Trump sent his potentially lethal tweet, inciting the mob bearing down on Mike Pence, Pence’s spouse, and daughter, Donald Trump was alone in his dining room with the murder weapon: an unknown phone, and his Twitter account.

But when DOJ served a warrant on Twitter for Trump’s Twitter account on January 17, they couldn’t be sure who was holding the murder weapon. They also wouldn’t know whether triggering the murder weapon was coordinated with other events.

That explains why, as Thomas Windom described in a February 9 hearing, metadata from Trump’s Twitter account showing any other account associated with his own may have been just as important for the investigation as any DMs obtained with the warrant.

MR. HOLTZBLATT: Well, Your Honor, we don’t — the issue, Your Honor — there isn’t a category of “associated account information”; that’s not information that Twitter stores.

What we are doing right now is manually attempting to ascertain links between accounts. But the ascertainment of links between accounts on the basis of machine, cookie, IP address, email address, or other account or device identifier is not information that Twitter possesses, it would be information that Twitter needs to create. So that’s the reason why we had not previously produced it because it’s not a category of information that we actually possess.

[snip]

MR. WINDOM: It is, as explained more fully in the warrant — but for these purposes, it is a useful tool in identifying what other accounts are being used by the same user or by the same device that has access to the account is oftentimes in any number of cases, user attribution is important. And if there are other accounts that a user is using, that is very important to the government’s investigation.

[snip]

MR. HOLTZBLATT: That’s right. If the records — if the linkage between accounts, which is what we understand this category to be referring to, is not itself a piece of information that we keep, then it’s not a business record that we would ordinarily produce.

What I understand the government to be asking is for us to analyze our data, as opposed to produce existing data. And we are trying to work with the government in that respect, but that is the reason that it is not something that — that is a different category of information. [my emphasis]

By that point, DOJ would have had Cassidy Hutchinson’s testimony describing what she saw sitting outside Trump’s dining room door (and once, going in to pass off Mark Meadows’ phone). They would have had two grand jury appearances from the two Pats, Cipollone and Philbin, the White House Counsel and Deputy Counsel described in the passage. They would have had at least one interview with Eric Herschmann — the Senior Advisor trying to calm him down.

They did not yet have privilege waived testimony from the Chief of Staff — Mark Meadows — or the Deputy Chief of Staff — Dan Scavino.

And Dan Scavino was the most likely other person to know about that near murder by tweet, because Dan Scavino was in his position, the Deputy Chief of Staff, first and foremost because he had masterminded Trump’s own mastery of Twitter going back to 2016.

So one thing DOJ needed to know before they conducted an interview that took place after Beryl Howell rejected yet another frivolous Executive Privilege claim in March was how Dan Scavino accessed Trump’s Twitter account when he did, from what device.

Who else had access to Trump’s Twitter account, one part of the murder weapon?

ABC News reported details from several of the interviews that took place after Jack Smith got that Twitter warrant, including extensive details about what Scavino told prosecutors. Sure enough, he claimed that he had nothing to do with the Tweet that almost got Pence killed — that instead, he had left Trump alone with the murder weapon. He claimed — as the indictment made it clear he must have — that he wasn’t in the room.

According to what sources said Scavino told Smith’s team, Trump was “very angry” that day — not angry at what his supporters were doing to a pillar of American democracy, but steaming that the election was allegedly stolen from him and his supporters, who were “angry on his behalf.” Scavino described it all as “very unsettling,” sources said.

At times, Trump just sat silently at the head of the table, with his arms folded and his eyes locked on the TV, Scavino recounted, sources said.

After unsuccessfully trying for up to 20 minutes to persuade Trump to release some sort of calming statement, Scavino and others walked out of the dining room, leaving Trump alone, sources said. That’s when, according to sources, Trump posted a message on his Twitter account saying that Pence “didn’t have the courage to do what should have been done.”

Trump’s aides told investigators they were shocked by the post. Aside from Trump, Scavino was the only other person with access to Trump’s Twitter account, and he was often the one actually posting messages to it, so when the message about Pence popped up, Cipollone and another White House attorney raced to find Scavino, demanding to know why he would post that in the midst of such a precarious situation, sources said.

Scavino said he was as blindsided by the post as they were, insisting to them, “I didn’t do it,” according to the sources. [my emphasis]

Why would Pat Cipollone confront Scavino about the Tweet if “Scavino and others walked out of the dining room” — implicitly, walked out together — “leaving Trump alone”? Cipollone would only confront Scavino if he had believed that Scavino were still there with Trump, as his testimony describes he had been until just before Trump sent the Tweet.

The warrant on Twitter, which would have shown whether it is really true that Scavino was the only other person with access to Trump’s Twitter account, is not the only way Jack Smith tested this claim, knew the answer to this claim before interviewing Scavino.

As an expert witness notice revealed last month, Smith will call a witness at Trump’s trial to describe what they found on Trump’s White House phone and that of one other person — which might be Scavino, Nick Luna (whose testimony is also described in detail in the ABC piece), or one of several other people. That witness will explain when Trump’s phone was unlocked and using Twitter on January 6.

Expert 3 has knowledge, skill, experience, training, and education beyond the ordinary lay person regarding the analysis of cellular phone data, including the use of Twitter and other applications on cell phones. The Government expects that Expert 3 will testify that he/she: (1) extracted and processed data from the White House cell phones used by the defendant and one other individual (Individual 1); (2) reviewed and analyzed data on the defendant’s phone and on Individual 1’s phone, including analyzing images found on the phones and websites visited; (3) determined the usage of these phones throughout the post-election period, including on and around January 6, 2021; and (4) specifically identified the periods of time during which the defendant’s phone was unlocked and the Twitter application was open on January 6.

So whether it is true that Scavino was blindsided by the Tweet, as he told Jack Smith he told Cipollone, Jack Smith has Scavino’s testimony that he wasn’t present (again, as I said he must), Cipollone’s testimony that Scavino said he wasn’t present, and metadata consistent with Trump sending the Tweet himself.

As you read the rest of the ABC piece, keep two things in mind. This leaked testimony concentrates on other aspects of the claims made to Jack Smith about how Twitter was used that day, such as this description of Luna’s testimony, describing that he warned Trump before the then-President sent a Tweet making him look “culpable” the day of the attack.

According to the sources, shortly before 6 p.m. on Jan. 6, Trump showed Luna a draft of a Twitter message he was thinking about posting: “These are the things and events that happen when a sacred landslide election victory is so unceremoniously and viciously stripped away from great patriots. … Remember this day for forever!” it read.

The message echoed what Trump had allegedly been saying privately all day.

Sources said Luna told Trump that it made him sound “culpable” for the violence, perhaps even as if he may have somehow been involved in “directing” it, sources said.

Still, at 6:01 p.m., Trump posted the message anyway.

That testimony — that Luna warned Trump the Tweet would make him look like he was responsible for the violence — will only strengthen the extent to which this Tweet was already going to be used to prove that Trump ratified the violence, effectively showing that Trump remained in a conspiracy with those who violently attacked the Capitol even after watching them do so.

Which brings me to the second point. Multiple people who gave this testimony — and probably the person or persons who shared it with ABC — claim to believe that they witnessed that Trump almost murdered his Vice President, someone who had been just as (or in Scavino’s case, almost as) loyal as they had been.

Again, there has to be a bunch of metadata that is consistent with the stories told to Jack Smith, so it’s not so much I doubt Scavino’s claim that he was not in the room when that Tweet was sent out. It’s that this testimony came from people who chose to stick around — some of whom, including Scavino, continue to stick around — knowing that if Trump ever turns on them he wouldn’t stop short of using his mob to get them killed.

This Poll Is as Important as a Trump Trial

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Tomorrow marks the 3rd anniversary of Trump’s attack on the Capitol. People have used the opportunity to revisit their conspiracy theories about things that Merrick Garland didn’t do, all of which ignore the overt steps taken against Trump’s co-conspirators in 2021s.

Hopefully, I’ll complete a post on options Jack Smith would have if DC Circuit Judge Karen Henderson finds a way and the will to continue to delay Trump’s trial after Tuesday’s hearing on his Absolute Immunity claim.

For now, though, I want to argue that this poll, showing that an outright majority of Americans (still) believe a series of things that equate to January 6 being an attack on democracy. For example, 56% of all US adults think Trump is guilty of conspiring to steal the election.

After three years of concerted propaganda effort, thin majorities still believe:

  • January 6ers were “mostly violent” (50%)
  • Punishments for Jan6ers have been fair or not harsh enough (73%)
  • Trump bears responsibility for January 6 (53%)
  • DOJ is treating Trump like anyone else (57%)
  • Trump telling his mob to march to the Capitol threatened democracy (51%)
  • The mob entering the Capitol threatened democracy (58%)
  • Congress voting against certifying the election threatened democracy (53%)
  • The attack on the Capitol should never be forgotten (55%)
  • There is no solid evidence of widespread voter fraud (63%)

Only on whether Trump’s role disqualifies him for the presidency (or Republican members of Congress who voted to disqualify votes) did less than a majority vote for democracy (46%).

These aren’t great numbers — and they have slipped over time.

But there are about 7% of Republicans who recognize that Trump was in the wrong. Most independents agree with Democratic views on January 6, not Republicans.

The propaganda is working … but thus far it hasn’t won.

If 7% of Republicans reject Trump’s party of fascism, it could swing the election.

Trying and convicting Donald Trump for his January 6 crimes is necessary, but not sufficient, to reverse the tide of fascism in the United States. Just as important is defeating the Republicans who empowered Trump’s fascism, to punish them for doing his bidding for the last three years. Just as important is affirming the importance of democracy, is ensuring that Americans choose to protect democracy. A Trump trial should help convince swing voters; indeed, prosecutors plan to tie Trump directly to the violence that Republicans reject here.

But that effort must go hand-in-hand with defending democracy, defending the process of trying and prosecuting January 6ers, crime scene and not.

And that’s a political fight that everyone can engage. That’s a political discussion about what it takes to preserve democracy.

What Jack Smith Didn’t Say in His Double Jeopardy Response

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Jack Smith just submitted his response to Trump’s immunity claims before the DC Circuit.

While most attention will be on the absolute immunity claims, given the disqualification of Trump in Colorado and Maine, I’m more interested in Smith’s response to Trump’s claim that his impeachment acquittal precludes these charges.

That’s because, depending on how this appeal goes, Jack Smith could make the question of Trump’s (dis)qualification much easier by superseding this indictment with an insurrection charge.

Most of the response argues that impeachment and criminal charges are different things. That argument is likely to prevail by itself.

In addition, though, the response repeated a passage, almost verbatim, that appeared in Smith’s response before Chutkan. In it, Smith said that the elements of offense currently charged do not overlap with the elements of offense for an insurrection charge.

Any double-jeopardy claim here would founder in light of these principles. Without support, the defendant asserts that his Senate acquittal and the indictment in this case involve “the same or closely related conduct.” Br.52. Not so. The single article of impeachment alleged a violation of “Incitement of Insurrection,” H.R. Res. 24, 117th Cong. at 2 (Jan. 11, 2021) (capitalization altered), and charged that the defendant had “incit[ed] violence against the Government of the United States,” id. at 3. The most analogous federal statute is 18 U.S.C. § 2383, which prohibits “incit[ing] . . . any rebellion or insurrection against the authority of the United States or the laws thereof.” A violation of Section 2383 would therefore require proof that the violence at the Capitol on January 6, 2021, constituted an “insurrection against the authority of the United States or the laws thereof” and that the defendant incited that insurrection. Incitement, in turn, requires proof that the speaker’s words were both directed to “producing imminent lawless action” and “likely to incite or produce such action.” Brandenburg v. Ohio, 395 U.S. 444, 447 (1969) (per curiam); NAACP v. Claiborne Hardware Co., 458 U.S. 886, 927-28 (1982). None of the offenses charged here—18 U.S.C. § 371, 18 U.S.C. § 1512(c)(2) and (k), and 18 U.S.C. § 241—has as an element any of the required elements for an incitement offense. And the elements of the charged offenses—e.g., conspiring to defeat a federal governmental function through deceit under Section 371, obstruct an “official proceeding” under Section 1512, and deprive persons of rights under Section 241—are nowhere to be found in the elements of a violation of Section 2383 or any other potential incitement offense. The mere fact that some of the conduct on which the impeachment resolution relied is related to conduct alleged in the indictment does not implicate the Double Jeopardy Clause or its principles. See Dixon, 509 U.S. at 696.

This doesn’t mean that Smith will supersede Trump, if this appeal succeeds. There are a lot of reasons not to do so (including that Trump would get to file a motion to dismiss that charge).

That said, Smith might have another reason to do so if SCOTUS significantly narrowed the obstruction charge in the Fischer appeal, because the obstruction charge is how Smith is presenting the evidence that Trump caused the attack on the Capitol.

In my view, this language keeps options open.

Jonathan Chait’s Rube-Con Lets SCOTUS Off Easy

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Congratulations to Jonathan Chait, whose stupid column arguing against excluding Trump from the ballot won him recognition from the alleged insurrectionist himself.

To be sure, there are sound arguments against the Colorado ruling, even sounder ones against immediate SCOTUS action upholding or overturning it.

Chait — who boasts that Trump once labeled him a “no-talent illiterate hack” — does not make such an argument.

Chait abdicates any responsibility for reading the opinions at issue because, he says, he’s not competent, lacking the talent and literacy to read legal documents.

I am not a lawyer, and I won’t comment on the legal merits of the case.

Then, having declared himself incompetent to comment on the legal merits of the case, Chait proceeds to comment on the legal merits (or maybe he considers these mere political merits?) of labeling Trump an insurrectionist.

The argument for disqualification is quite simple. The Constitution bars officeholders who engaged in insurrection; on January 6, 2021, Trump engaged in insurrection; therefore, Trump is ineligible to hold office.

The weak point in this argument is the finding that Trump’s behavior constitutes “insurrection.” This is a defensible shorthand for January 6, one I’ve used frequently myself. But it’s not the most precise term. When I have the chance to use a longer description, I generally say that Trump attempted to secure an unelected second term in office.

Trump’s plan was to mobilize a mob to intimidate Congress into following his scheme to ignore the election results. His use of violent threats to secure power is obviously unforgivable, authoritarian, and very likely criminal. But there is at least some grounds to question whether it was an “insurrection” in the meaning intended by the 14th Amendment. Trump was not trying to seize and hold the Capitol nor declare a breakaway republic. [my emphasis]

Whether or not Trump is an insurrectionist under the meaning of the 14th Amendment, and Trump’s own failure to define insurrection in a way that excludes January 6, is something addressed in the opinions Chait has excused himself from reading.

For example, here’s some of how the Colorado Supreme Court — after a trial, after Trump mounted a defense — came to rule that January 6 qualified as an insurrection.

¶183 Finally, we note that at oral argument, President Trump’s counsel, while not providing a specific definition, argued that an insurrection is more than a riot but less than a rebellion.

[snip]

¶185 The question thus becomes whether the evidence before the district court sufficiently established that the events of January 6 constituted a concerted and public use of force or threat of force by a group of people to hinder or prevent the U.S. government from taking the actions necessary to accomplish the peaceful transfer of power in this country. We have little difficulty concluding that substantial evidence in the record supported each of these elements and that, as the district court found, the events of January 6 constituted an insurrection.

¶186 It is undisputed that a large group of people forcibly entered the Capitol and that this action was so formidable that the law enforcement officers onsite could not control it. Moreover, contrary to President Trump’s assertion that no evidence in the record showed that the mob was armed with deadly weapons or that it attacked law enforcement officers in a manner consistent with a violent insurrection, the district court found—and millions of people saw on live television, recordings of which were introduced into evidence in this case—that the mob was armed with a wide array of weapons. See Anderson, ¶ 155. The court also found that many in the mob stole objects from the Capitol’s premises or from law enforcement officers to use as weapons, including metal bars from the police barricades and officers’ batons and riot shields and that throughout the day, the mob repeatedly and violently assaulted police officers who were trying to defend the Capitol. Id. at ¶¶ 156–57. The fact that actual and threatened force was used that day cannot reasonably be denied.

¶187 Substantial evidence in the record further established that this use of force was concerted and public. As the district court found, with ample record support, “The mob was coordinated and demonstrated a unity of purpose . . . . They marched through the [Capitol] building chanting in a manner that made clear they were seeking to inflict violence against members of Congress and Vice President Pence.” Id. at ¶ 243. And upon breaching the Capitol, the mob immediately pursued its intended target—the certification of the presidential election—and reached the House and Senate chambers within minutes of entering the building. Id. at ¶ 153

¶188 Finally, substantial evidence in the record showed that the mob’s unified purpose was to hinder or prevent Congress from counting the electoral votes as required by the Twelfth Amendment and from certifying the 2020 presidential election; that is, to preclude Congress from taking the actions necessary to accomplish a peaceful transfer of power. As noted above, soon after breaching the Capitol, the mob reached the House and Senate chambers, where the certification process was ongoing. Id. This breach caused both the House and the Senate to adjourn, halting the electoral certification process. In addition, much of the mob’s ire—which included threats of physical violence—was directed at Vice President Pence, who, in his role as President of the Senate, was constitutionally tasked with carrying out the electoral count. Id. at ¶¶ 163, 179–80; see U.S. Const. art. I, § 3, cl. 4; id. at art. II, § 1, cl. 3. As discussed more fully below, these actions were the product of President Trump’s conduct in singling out Vice President Pence for refusing President Trump’s demand that the Vice President decline to carry out his constitutional duties. Anderson, ¶¶ 148, 170, 172–73

¶189 In short, the record amply established that the events of January 6 constituted a concerted and public use of force or threat of force by a group of people to hinder or prevent the U.S. government from taking the actions necessary to accomplish the peaceful transfer of power in this country. Under any viable definition, this constituted an insurrection, and thus we will proceed to consider whether President Trump “engaged in” this insurrection.

In a column claiming to defend the interests of democracy, Chait substitutes his own self-confessed incompetent opinion — the “longer description” he sometimes uses instead of “shorthand,” when he uses “insurrection” — for that of duly appointed judges applying the laws of a specific state.

He does so while expressing another legal opinion: that Trump’s actions on January 6 were “very likely criminal.”

This is where Chait’s column turns into word salad — perhaps demonstrating that Trump was right about his literacy. First, there’s this bit about timing.

[T]he timing of the court’s ruling makes it more imperative that its reasoning be unassailable. And the conclusion that Trump’s attempt to secure an unelected second term was “insurrection” isn’t solid enough to bear the weight of the outcome it supports.

To deny the voters the chance to elect the candidate of their choice is a Rubicon-crossing event for the judiciary. It would be seen forever by tens of millions of Americans as a negation of democracy. It is not enough that their belief is plausibly wrong or likely wrong. It must be incontrovertibly wrong to support such a momentous step.

Chait argues that the Colorado ruling — the one he has excused himself from addressing, one he seems to believe he is incompetent to address — “isn’t solid enough” for kicking Trump off the ballot. But this bit seems to confuse who is wrong.

It is not enough that their belief is plausibly wrong or likely wrong. It must be incontrovertibly wrong to support such a momentous step.

Is he talking about the Colorado Supreme Court? Wouldn’t he then mean their decision must be “incontrovertibly right,” not wrong, to support booting Trump off the ballot?

It’s an important distinction, because how we adjudicate things to be incontrovertibly right in the US is a legal issue.

Even before he gets there, though, Chait spews some other word salad.

The timing of this decision is important context to its democratic legitimacy. If this ruling had come a year earlier, the Republican Party would have had time to organize a campaign built on the assumption Trump would be ineligible. But a month away from the first primary is late to change the rules of the game.

I am not arguing the timing rules out legal intervention. Trump is obviously facing several potentially adverse legal rulings. But most of those crimes are unambiguous, and the timing was determined by Trump himself, who deliberately set out to drag out the legal process as long as possible, specifically in order to force the rulings into the presidential campaign so that he could call it illegitimate.

First the substance, best as I understand it. Chait says that the timing of kicking Trump off the ballot is the problem here, but then admits that Trump himself has “drag[ged] out” “potentially adverse legal rulings,” so “he could call [the legal process] illegitimate.”

So far, I think this means that Chait says decisions have to appear fair for people who want to vote for Trump. He admits Trump is stalling … something … so as to be able to make false claims about that something to be unfair. Chait doesn’t weigh the equity of Trump’s stall against the interests of those who want to vote for Trump.

Chait only considers the interests of those who want to vote for Trump, not the interests of those who want to uphold rule of law, including the Constitution and the premise that the legal opinions of duly appointed judges who are competent to weigh in should probably carry more weight than the equivocations of a guy who confesses he’s not competent to do so.

And I can’t really be sure because Chait gets awfully vague when he talks about those things that Trump is dragging out: the potentially adverse legal decisions. But I think those things are trials. Including his federal trial on charges tied to January 6. I think that Chait is admitting here that Trump is dragging out the trial that would subject Trump’s actions on January 6 to a jury of American citizens, even while arguing that it’s not fair to people who want to vote for Trump to boot him from the ballot just before the primary.

He may not realize it, but if I’m translating this word salad correctly, Chait has just admitted the problem here: that Trump himself has stalled the best way to decide whether he should be disqualified from running, a far better way than having Colorado judges decide: A trial.

In an ideal world, SCOTUS, with the assistance of the DC Circuit, could resolve this issue in the most just way: Forestall any decision on the Colorado decision (Trump will be on the primary ballot as soon as he appeals the decision, so any delay will do nothing to change the status quo), but ensure that a January 6 trial happens before general election ballots are printed.

The just legal thing would be to prevent Trump from holding up criminal legal accountability while he also claims he can’t be legally accountable via other means. And heck, if SCOTUS believes they’re going to rewrite the 18 USC 1512(c)(2) statute with which Trump and hundreds of other January 6ers have been charged, they should do that quickly, too, so Jack Smith can supersede Trump, formally, with insurrection, so a jury of American citizens can weigh in on the question of whether January 6 was an insurrection or not.

The smart political stance — since Chait disclaims any competence to weigh in on legal issues — would be to deprive Trump and his supporters of claiming there’s a problem with the timing of Colorado’s action while Trump at the same time is depriving not just Trump opponents, but even Republican primary voters who should get to know whether their favorite candidate is even eligible to be President before they vote in the primary, of the most legitimate means to decide this issue, a trial.

Having Trump’s eligibility be determined state-by-state, by duly appointed judges, is less than ideal. I agree that Trump supporters would hate that.

But that makes the better way of determining his eligibility, a trial, all the more important.

I don’t care who you are, whether you’re competent to weigh in on the legal opinion or not, whether you’re illiterate or not. If you believe Trump’s eligibility should not be decided by unelected judges, then the only defensible position — Republican or Democrat, literate or no — is to ensure that Trump stands trial before general election ballots get printed, so a jury can weigh in on Trump’s actions on January 6.

Ensuring that happens is absolutely among the choices the Supreme Court faces. Making that choice clear is a far smarter political choice than whatever it is that Chait engaged in.

Google Kills the Geofence Capability that Will Show ~30,000 Trump Supporters Swarmed the Capitol on Trump’s Orders

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At Trump’s trial, prosecutors will use Google Location data to show how Trump’s mobs responded to his order to march to the Capitol by doing just that: swarming the Capitol. That data will show that roughly a quarter of the people at the Ellipse, around 30,000 people, entered the restricted grounds outside the Capitol, committing at least trespassing on Trump’s instruction, of which 11,500 would be identified by their Google Location data.

Jack Smith’s prosecutors revealed that they will do this on Monday in an expert notice filing.

On Wednesday, Google announced that it will soon change the way Google Location works to make such analysis impossible in the future.

If you’re among the subset of users who have chosen to turn Location History on (it’s off by default), soon your Timeline will be saved right on your device — giving you even more control over your data. Just like before, you can delete all or part of your information at any time or disable the setting entirely.

If you’re getting a new phone or are worried about losing your existing one, you can always choose to back up your data to the cloud so it doesn’t get lost. We’ll automatically encrypt your backed-up data so no one can read it, including Google.

Additionally, when you first turn on Location History, the auto-delete control will be set to three months by default, which means that any data older than that will be automatically deleted. Previously this option was set to 18 months. If you want to save memories to your Timeline for a longer period, don’t worry — you can always choose to extend the period or turn off auto-delete controls altogether.

These changes will gradually roll out through the next year on Android and iOS, and you’ll receive a notification when this update comes to your account.

Orin Kerr first identified the significance of the change to surveillance capabilities: that it will make Google geofence warrants all but impossible. Forbes confirmed that Google is making the change with the intent of making it impossible to respond to geofence warrants.

But they missed one aspect of the timing. The announcement — of a change Google is implementing prospectively, a change that will take a year to implement — came days after prosecutors revealed they had obtained a Google warrant showing the movement of people from the Ellipse to the Capitol.

Expert 1

Expert 1 has knowledge, skill, experience, training, and education beyond the ordinary lay person regarding the interpretation and visual representation of geographic location data. The Government expects that Expert 1 will testify about his/her use of ArcGIS (Geographic Information Systems) software to create a map of the Google location history data produced in response to a search warrant. Specifically, Expert 1 plotted the location history data for Google accounts and devices associated with individuals who moved, on January 6, 2021, from an area at or near the Ellipse to an area encompassing the United States Capitol building. His/her testimony will describe and explain the resulting graphical representations of that data, and it will aid the jury in understanding the movements of individuals toward the Capitol area during and after the defendant’s speech at the Ellipse. [my emphasis]

We had known that the FBI used Google geofence warrants — which identify all the people using Google Location services in a given geographic area — to identify individual January 6 suspects.

Challenges to the geofence — first by trespasser David Rhine and then by cop-sprayer Isreal Easterday — revealed that the FBI had gotten two geofence warrants (and had done three sets of de-anonymization of the data obtained): the first, on January 13, 2021, for just the Capitol building itself, and then the second, for the entire restricted area outside the Capitol, on May 21, 2021.

The warrant described in Tuesday’s expert notice must be a third warrant, one building off the May 2021 one. Perhaps the FBI asked Google for all the selectors found in the May 2021 warrant (who, with the important exception of journalists, were either victims, first responders, or trespassers), that also showed up in a geofence at the Ellipse while Trump was speaking.

There would be no need to de-anonymize these selectors. Those of investigative interest for their own actions at the Capitol would have been de-anonymized with one of the earlier warrants. This warrant is about capturing the effect of Trump’s speech, measuring how many people who attended the speech itself — Trump claims 120,000 did so — then moved to the Capitol.

Of those who moved, only a third or less would trigger the geofence (and fewer among Apple users). But it would include most of the 11,500 people who had already been identified and de-anoymized. altogether, that’s consistent with 30,000 people being at the Capitol.

Trump is claiming that just 1% of those who heard his incitement went on to join the insurrection. This expert witness will show it’s closer to a quarter of the total.

There were, undoubtedly, a range of reasons why Google made the decision to end its ability to respond to geofence requests. As Forbes noted, the Fourth Circuit also heard the government’s appeal of Okello Chatrie’s successful challenge of a geofence this week. Early next year the DC Circuit will review Rhine’s appeal of its use with him. The Easterday challenge made it clear that Google geofences work best on Android devices — meaning Google was making it easier for law enforcement to investigate its customers over Apple’s.

But Google announced this decision — of prospective changes — months ahead of the time when a geofence will be used to prove the crimes of Donald Trump.

It’s likely at least partly an attempt to pre-empt the blowback that is bound to result.

Update: To clarify some responses I’m getting to this. Killing the geofence capability won’t affect the evidence against Trump at all. Prosecutors already got the warrant and did the analysis on the results. This will only prospectively make Google geofence warrants impossible, and not even immediately.

Easterday challenge

une 30, 2023: Motion to Compel, Declaration

August 22, 2023: Opposition Motion to Compel

September 26, 2023: Motion to Suppress Geofence

October 10, 2023: Opposition Motion to Suppress

October 17, 2023: Reply Motion to Suppress

October 26, 2023: Guilty Verdict

November 25, 2023: Supplement Opposition Motion to Suppress