Speaker 1: Welcome back to it could happen here, the podcast that
Speaker 1: is occasionally introduced competently as it sort of was today
Speaker 1: because our guest today is someone who is very near
Speaker 1: and dear uh to me and to like almost every
Speaker 1: other person that I know and work with. Um, Moira
Speaker 1: Meltzer Cohen. Moira, you are a lawyer, uh, focusing on
Speaker 1: civil rights and movement kind of cases. Uh. And you
Speaker 1: are the lawyer of yeah, like every everybody I respect
Speaker 1: in the world. Yeah. Um, you're the person that I
Speaker 1: text whenever I need to know, hey, was this a crime? Um?
Speaker 1: Or it? And it never is. I'm with law abiding,
Speaker 1: very law abiding um. And uh. Yeah, we wanted to
Speaker 1: have you on both as you're always a breath of
Speaker 1: sunshine and because um, there's some like lost stuff happening
Speaker 1: these days. We just had our mutual friend Molly Conjure
Speaker 1: on to talk about the Charlottesville case, which is quite
Speaker 1: a thing. Today was the day. Yeah, Today Today had
Speaker 1: some had some moments. Chris can't Well and Richard Spencer
Speaker 1: representing themselves separately, each cross examining each other. I'd have
Speaker 1: so many thoughts, but mostly my thoughts involved laughing. It's very,
Speaker 1: very funny. It's it's it's the funniest of of an
Speaker 1: incredibly tragic and infuriating situation. Something finely funny finally happened. Um,
Speaker 1: So at least there's that often very funny in spite
Speaker 1: of himself. Yeah, UM, I would love one day to
Speaker 1: just get you on and duo, we can do a
Speaker 1: reading of some of Chris can't Well's better legal filings. Um.
Speaker 1: These guys quite the legal mind, Robert. I think I
Speaker 1: maybe didn't ever tell you about the fact that we
Speaker 1: um did a Poorams Feel, which is a performance of
Speaker 1: the story of Esther Um, Oh my God, traditionally done
Speaker 1: at Poor Ram, which is a Jewish holiday. Um, and
Speaker 1: it was based on the complaint that he filed God.
Speaker 1: Those Twitter the third was prominently featured in the role
Speaker 1: of Hayman. For those of you who don't know, Chris Cantwell,
Speaker 1: the crying Nazi from the Unite the Right rally, has
Speaker 1: been incarcerated for a year or so now UM and
Speaker 1: continues to put out his own legal motions, generally handwritten UM,
Speaker 1: alleging all kinds of conspiracies from the people who did
Speaker 1: not call the FBI and admit to committing several crimes.
Speaker 1: We should we should absolutely absolutely do a crossover with
Speaker 1: Dannel Harper um and to discuss Wells legal genius. But
Speaker 1: but today more we wanted to have you on because
Speaker 1: there is another case that, uh, a lot of folks
Speaker 1: are rightly concerned about, because it has some pretty dire
Speaker 1: implications depending on how it goes in a number of ways,
Speaker 1: the trial of Kyle Rittenhouse. Um. For the I mean,
Speaker 1: everyone knows Kyle written House took a gun illegally across
Speaker 1: state lines to a protest so he might have the
Speaker 1: chance to shoot people. Um, and then shot people. This
Speaker 1: is my opinion about what happened. Obviously, the legal case
Speaker 1: is unfolding. Um, there's been a lot of talk online
Speaker 1: on on Twitter and whatnot about how obviously unfair the
Speaker 1: judges being. This is what the talk on Twitter is about.
Speaker 1: And it's because of a couple of things. One is
Speaker 1: that the judge and and again I'm before I cut,
Speaker 1: I go to you, Moira. I'm just explaining kind of
Speaker 1: the way the discourse has been. The discourse has stated like, well,
Speaker 1: the judge said, you can't call Kyle, you can't call
Speaker 1: the people that he killed victims, but you can call
Speaker 1: the people that he killed looters and arsonists. UM. And
Speaker 1: so people are saying, look at this very clear example
Speaker 1: of how how bad the justice system is. UM. And
Speaker 1: I wanted to bring you on for a number of reasons,
Speaker 1: including the fact that, like there's a lot of stuff
Speaker 1: that seems fucked up and in fact is fucked up,
Speaker 1: you could argue, but it's also like like pretty normal
Speaker 1: justice system stuff and some stuff that seems fucked up
Speaker 1: but actually isn't. This is not I'm not necessarily talking
Speaker 1: about the Rittenhouse case here, just in general, and we
Speaker 1: talk about the law. So I guess I wanted to
Speaker 1: have you on to explain to us what's happening in
Speaker 1: your opinion and how normal, abnormal, good, bad are kind
Speaker 1: of the things that we're seeing the decisions we're seeing
Speaker 1: this judge make UM in this case so far. Yeah, sure,
Speaker 1: absolutely so the trial, UM. I think when you asked
Speaker 1: me to comment on this, UM, the trial had not started.
Speaker 1: The trial has now started. It has been characterized by
Speaker 1: the defense saying the N word be here this morning.
Speaker 1: I think was just missed for making a cruel and
Speaker 1: nakedly racist joke. Uh. And apparently the judge had a
Speaker 1: fit of peak about the media's response to his evidentiary rulings,
Speaker 1: which are what you've asked me to come discuss, UM,
Speaker 1: which is itself actually one of the more unusual things
Speaker 1: about this how this trial is going. UM. It's always
Speaker 1: a little bit hard for me to appine on a
Speaker 1: case that is not my case. UM. I feel tentative
Speaker 1: about it. UM. This would never be my case because
Speaker 1: I would not represent a white supremacist, and I am
Speaker 1: not a prosecutor and would never be a prosecutor. And
Speaker 1: I was not able to look at the briefing because
Speaker 1: although all of the briefing was ostensibly publicly filed, it
Speaker 1: is not actually publicly available. UM. I had a very
Speaker 1: interesting conversation with the Clerk of court and Nosha, who
Speaker 1: told me that if I mailed her a request, she
Speaker 1: would fax me the briefing at a dollar twenty five
Speaker 1: a page. And I said, thank you very much, goodbye. UM.
Speaker 1: So I'll do my best to speak to these rulings, UM,
Speaker 1: and the sort of larger issues as I see them. UM.
Speaker 1: As you noted, there's been a lot of kind of
Speaker 1: salacious headlines about the evidence here in this case. UM,
Speaker 1: and I think those headlines are really they're less about
Speaker 1: what's actually happening in the case, and they're more reflective
Speaker 1: of the sort of pearl clutching um liberal impulse to
Speaker 1: to notice the totally self evident hypocrisy of the legal system, uh,
Speaker 1: and then to conclude that because certain groups are shown
Speaker 1: more leniency, the way to resolve this hypocrisy is to
Speaker 1: make sure everyone is pleased and prosecuted and punished as
Speaker 1: viciously as the left is, which is not actually the
Speaker 1: goal that I have. UM. And just to clarify when
Speaker 1: I when I talk about liberals as I as I
Speaker 1: will probably do a little bit, UM, I don't mean
Speaker 1: like I mean liberal as opposed to radical um. People
Speaker 1: who are more or less okay with the underlying big
Speaker 1: systems uh, like capitalism and white dipremacy and hetero patriarchy
Speaker 1: and like maybe are more concerned with the iterations of
Speaker 1: those things that are particularly ghost but they don't actually
Speaker 1: mind the systems themselves or the way that those systems
Speaker 1: are reiterated and enforced by, for example, the American criminal
Speaker 1: legal system. UM. So you know, I think the kind
Speaker 1: of liberal read on these rulings is not only not
Speaker 1: legally sound, UM, I think it's actually incredibly dangerous. And
Speaker 1: it's watching this unfold and watching the liberal commentary on it,
Speaker 1: I think is one of the things. It's one of
Speaker 1: the ways that I can really see liberal liberals and
Speaker 1: liberalism losing credibility. Um, because because they're sort of calling
Speaker 1: out this hypocrisy and at the same time, there's a
Speaker 1: little bit of a double standard that they want to um,
Speaker 1: that they want to propose an enforce UM. So okay,
Speaker 1: So I'll talk about the rulings that you discussed. UM.
Speaker 1: The first one is that the judge UM said that
Speaker 1: the prosecution is not allowed to refer to the people
Speaker 1: at Rittenhouse killed as victims. UM. I will remind you,
Speaker 1: as I remind all of my clients continuously, UM, that
Speaker 1: the law is at best adjacent to common sense understandings
Speaker 1: of justice and even frankly common sense understandings of reality. UM. Obviously,
Speaker 1: the people that Kyle Rittenkow's killed were victims. UM. But
Speaker 1: as my beloved colleague Sandy reminded me, UH, the concept
Speaker 1: of victimhood, the status of victimhood is among the things
Speaker 1: that needs to be proven beyond a reasonable doubt at
Speaker 1: this trial. Yeah, right, UM, And so in in fact,
Speaker 1: this is a totally straightforward ruling. It is a ruling
Speaker 1: that I would argue for as a defense attorney and
Speaker 1: that I expect to win where I trying in murder case.
Speaker 1: So you know, it's one of those things like you
Speaker 1: have to overcome this, this you have to overcome when
Speaker 1: you're thinking about a trial, like the fact that you
Speaker 1: know he's guilty, because the point of a trial is
Speaker 1: that everyone like there's a process, right, we don't just
Speaker 1: do street justice because that's what written House did um
Speaker 1: like we're we're you have to like one of the
Speaker 1: It is troubling to me the extent that people are like,
Speaker 1: well he he should be presumed like we should be
Speaker 1: referring to the people he shot as victims before where
Speaker 1: he has been adjudicated as guilty, because like that's that's important,
Speaker 1: Like the presumption of innocence matters, and it's it's it's
Speaker 1: also something that's very unfair, Like there's a person in Portland,
Speaker 1: Alexander Dial, who got in trouble for taking a hammer
Speaker 1: out of a Nazi's hand during a rally um and
Speaker 1: has been charged with several felonies, and because his trial
Speaker 1: kept getting delight spent two and a half years under
Speaker 1: pre trial conditions, So the presumption of innocence is hardly equal,
Speaker 1: but it is important. Yeah, exactly, And I think that
Speaker 1: you know, we'll talk about this, I think in a
Speaker 1: little bit, but that's exactly the issue, right, is that, Um,
Speaker 1: we need to be enforcing the equal application of the
Speaker 1: presumption of innocence, not being you know, rapidly going after
Speaker 1: the right in the same way that we are used
Speaker 1: to uh, law enforcement and the judiciary going after the left. Um.
Speaker 1: The other rule thing that the judge made, um, which
Speaker 1: you mentioned, was that he said that the defense is
Speaker 1: authorized to characterize the people that written house killed as
Speaker 1: looters or rioters if there's evidence presented that they were
Speaker 1: in fact looting and were rioting. I would, if I were,
Speaker 1: you know, in this case, which of course I'm not,
Speaker 1: I would object to this on the grounds that it
Speaker 1: is prejudicial in bullshit, and it's sucked up in bullshit. Yeah, yes,
Speaker 1: that said, I am not super surprised by that ruling. UM.
Speaker 1: I would say, it's likely within the sound discretion of
Speaker 1: the judge and if you know, and if the prosecution disagrees,
Speaker 1: it's a matter for appeal. UM. You know, I think, UM,
Speaker 1: one of the things the judge said about this actually
Speaker 1: that I think is really important and correct, UM, is
Speaker 1: that he has uh a tremendous amount of discretion making
Speaker 1: evidentiary rulings rulings. UM. One of the rulings he made
Speaker 1: was that he's admitting the testimony of an expert witness, UM,
Speaker 1: which you know, I think a lot of people are
Speaker 1: also quite upset about. UM. But that said, again, this
Speaker 1: is not that unusual, and it's very difficult for him
Speaker 1: to deny that motion to have his evidence or his
Speaker 1: testimony admitted, because the prosecution routinely uses use of force
Speaker 1: experts in similar trials. UM. So now we're they're just
Speaker 1: on the other side of the table. Yeah. So you know,
Speaker 1: first of all, I get that these rulings don't make
Speaker 1: us feel good, UM, but they aren't that strange. And
Speaker 1: as I said, the judge has tremendous discretion in these matters. UM.
Speaker 1: I was thinking about how to illustrate this, and it
Speaker 1: occurred to me that I think the last time I
Speaker 1: was on one of your podcasts, you asked me whether
Speaker 1: cocaine was illegal. Yeah, what are we landing on that?
Speaker 1: By the way. So I think the first time you
Speaker 1: asked me, I was a total kill joy and was like,
Speaker 1: of course, it's a legal probert um. But if I
Speaker 1: had actually taken your question more seriously, I think a
Speaker 1: better answer probably would have been nobody knows, um for
Speaker 1: precisely this reason, because the real question is not what
Speaker 1: the law says. The real question is how, or whether,
Speaker 1: or against whom, or to what degree and under what
Speaker 1: circumstances will that law be enforced. And these are always
Speaker 1: open questions and arguments, and judges have a ton of power.
Speaker 1: This case is no exception. So you know, again, not
Speaker 1: only are these rulings pretty standard, but there I think
Speaker 1: within the judge's discretion. Some of them I really dislike.
Speaker 1: Some of them make total sense to me, um, And
Speaker 1: I think that what is happening is is not necessarily
Speaker 1: sound legal analysis. But liberals sort of trying to argue
Speaker 1: that Writtenhouse should be more harshly prosecuted by saying that
Speaker 1: these specific rulings are unfair or unusual. It's a little
Speaker 1: bit like the liberals crying out now because people are
Speaker 1: putting like, let's go Brandon on printing it on rifle
Speaker 1: receivers and saying like, well, the Secret Service should investigate it. Well,
Speaker 1: if they do that, then some then like thirty. If
Speaker 1: they do that and like one company gets a fine,
Speaker 1: forty people are going to go to prison for having
Speaker 1: red flags on their body armor. Like that's the way
Speaker 1: it works in this country. But the right Yeah, any
Speaker 1: any anarchists for the three D printer is gonna immediately
Speaker 1: go to jail. Yeah that's not like that is correct? Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So I guess the thing that I want to point
Speaker 1: out here is that what is actually unusual about this
Speaker 1: case is not these rulings. It is that Written House
Speaker 1: is going to trial at all. And the reason Rittenhouse
Speaker 1: is going to trial is able to go to trial
Speaker 1: is largely because this prosecution is fundamentally calculated not to
Speaker 1: be repressive. Um So, I want to kind of zoom
Speaker 1: out and get away from the weeds of the evidentiary rulings.
Speaker 1: Um So, in its simplest expression, when we talk about
Speaker 1: the difference between state and federal jurisdiction, we're saying, kind of, um,
Speaker 1: jurisdiction for dummies, Uh, overly simplified is stuff that happens
Speaker 1: inside or only impact a given state. Is typically prosecuted
Speaker 1: by the state and if it impacts if your offense
Speaker 1: conduct or alleged offense conduct impacts more than one state, UM,
Speaker 1: then it is or can be prosecuted by the Federal
Speaker 1: Department of Justice. So Kyle Rittenhouse cross state lines with
Speaker 1: a pretty serious firearm and he shot three people. This
Speaker 1: puts us immediately into federal jurisdiction land. UM. He did
Speaker 1: this in the context of an uprising for racial justice
Speaker 1: that has been characterized by the fact that those rising
Speaker 1: up on the side of racial justice have been subject
Speaker 1: to intense repression by the federal government. D o J
Speaker 1: has shown themselves to be fire breathingly enthusiastic of opicizing
Speaker 1: their jurisdiction over heady offenses based on totally tenuous grounds
Speaker 1: um for people on the left or who are perceived
Speaker 1: to be on the left. UM. D o J has
Speaker 1: asserted jurisdiction in order to prosecute people for um absolutely
Speaker 1: trivial but politically motivated offenses that would be left to
Speaker 1: the state to prosecute absent the politics of the accused. UM.
Speaker 1: They have assertained federal jurisdiction on really flim the bases,
Speaker 1: like that a local police building or vehicle UM. Belongs
Speaker 1: to an apartment that has received federal funding, so property
Speaker 1: damage against it becomes a federal offense. One thing they're
Speaker 1: doing that is unusual is the federal government is as
Speaker 1: certain concurrent jurisdiction to prosecute offenses. So I know, there's
Speaker 1: someone in Courtland who is simultaneously being prosecuted by multnoma
Speaker 1: and also the federal government um for allegedly throwing some
Speaker 1: accelerant on a police building. UM. Right, So it is
Speaker 1: very curious that written House, who quite clearly did something
Speaker 1: that would you know, fall under federal jurisdiction, is not
Speaker 1: being federally charged. And it matters a lot for how
Speaker 1: the case proceeds, UM, because the way that federal prosecutions
Speaker 1: operate is that the Feds will typically stack these indictments
Speaker 1: UM in a way that really puts tremendous pressure on
Speaker 1: them to plead guilty um, which is not typically the
Speaker 1: case or it doesn't happen in the same way in
Speaker 1: a state prosecution. So UM, you have these stacked indictments
Speaker 1: with multiple, multiple counts ranging you know, all all kinds
Speaker 1: of conduct um, often involving you know, a conspiracy, which
Speaker 1: can be very very easy to prove um, and a
Speaker 1: guilty finding on any of those counts could be like
Speaker 1: a mandatory minimum of five to ten years. And then
Speaker 1: if you're looking at, um, you know, a guilty on
Speaker 1: more than one or all of those counts, you're looking
Speaker 1: at a sentence, potentially concurrent sentences that our tantamount to
Speaker 1: dying in prison. Right, And so this creates tremendous pressure
Speaker 1: on federal defendants to negotiate a pre trial disposition to
Speaker 1: take a guilty plea um. So again, Kyle Rittenhouse crosses
Speaker 1: state lines with this firearm which gets used in the
Speaker 1: in the commission of an act of violence. And I
Speaker 1: feel extremely confident that any federal prosecutor could come up
Speaker 1: with a stack of counts against him within about ten
Speaker 1: minutes without breaking a sweat um. But you know, so
Speaker 1: you know, if you think about him being in that position,
Speaker 1: you think through, Okay, if I go to trial, what
Speaker 1: is what are likely outcomes? If Kyle Rittenhouse went to
Speaker 1: trial federally, and even if he prevailed on a self
Speaker 1: defense right, which which could happen if you were found
Speaker 1: guilty on one or more of the lesser charges, he
Speaker 1: would still be looking at really really serious time, right, Um,
Speaker 1: but that's not where we are, right. Um. We are
Speaker 1: in a really weird place where like in a federal context,
Speaker 1: we wouldn't even be like talking about evidentiary rulings because uh,
Speaker 1: he would almost certainly not be going to trial, right yeah,
Speaker 1: or you know, if he had a reasonable lawyer, he
Speaker 1: would probably be negotiating a plea. I'm curious what do
Speaker 1: you think about because one argument I've heard, and I'm
Speaker 1: certainly in no position to evaluate this personally, is that
Speaker 1: if federal charges had been placed on him, you know
Speaker 1: when the crime in Trump would have pardoned him. Um,
Speaker 1: I don't know, yeah, Like I've heard people argue that
Speaker 1: that like, well, at least with the state charges, he
Speaker 1: can't be pardoned by President Trump. Like, I'm in no
Speaker 1: position to really evaluate that, but I'm curious what you
Speaker 1: think about that. Hey, honestly can't even yeah, speculate about
Speaker 1: what might have happened. That is very interesting. I do
Speaker 1: think that if if d O J wanted to charge
Speaker 1: him at this point, I mean not he only, but
Speaker 1: like there I think wasn't opening for that to happen
Speaker 1: after Trump left. I see, fact, there is a very
Speaker 1: interesting foy a request to be made to d o
Speaker 1: j uh to see what kind of memo was circulated
Speaker 1: about whether or not they were going to pick this
Speaker 1: one up. They clearly declined to prosecute Um. I the
Speaker 1: only thing that I could come up with, to be honest,
Speaker 1: And I looked and did not really see any meaningful
Speaker 1: discussion of this, of their decision not to prosecute Um.
Speaker 1: The only thing that occurred to me is that they
Speaker 1: might have been reluctant to a search jurisdiction over a minor.
Speaker 1: But they can prosecute anyone over the age of fifteen
Speaker 1: as an adult if they engage in violent crimes or
Speaker 1: if they are alleged to have engaged in violent crimes.
Speaker 1: So that's not it wouldn't entirely undermine their ability to
Speaker 1: do so. UM. So, you know, for whatever, you know,
Speaker 1: for whatever reason they didn't, I think it is worth noting.
Speaker 1: I think it is, as I said, very curious UM.
Speaker 1: And it's particularly curious in light of the intense federal
Speaker 1: repression that has been faced by people perceived to be
Speaker 1: on the left, you know. So, like again, I want
Speaker 1: to be very clear, I don't I'm not suggesting that
Speaker 1: I want him to be federally prosecuted. UM, I don't
Speaker 1: particularly I'm not interested in arguing for more prosecutions or
Speaker 1: for making the state the arbiter of political righteousness, or
Speaker 1: um giving the state more enforcement power or more resources. UM.
Speaker 1: You know, but you know, and look at no shade
Speaker 1: to Kenosha, Wisconsin. All right, But UM. One of the
Speaker 1: things that the UH federal prosecutors are really have a
Speaker 1: lot of experience doing is digital forensic investigations, and UH
Speaker 1: in this case, one of the sort of critical questions
Speaker 1: is did he have specific intent to go across state
Speaker 1: lines and engage in violence? And I suspect that if
Speaker 1: you were to access all of his texts and metadata
Speaker 1: and social media posts, that you could probably find evidence
Speaker 1: of that specific intent. And I think that the federal
Speaker 1: government is probably better positioned to do that than the
Speaker 1: prosecutors UH in Kenosha. And they decided not to, right, so,
Speaker 1: you know, and that is exactly the kind of investigation
Speaker 1: that they mounted against Daniel Baker, who justs a the
Speaker 1: yoga teacher in Tallahassee, who just got three and a
Speaker 1: half years for posting vague sort of incoherent, mutually contradictory
Speaker 1: I'm not at all frightening. Yeah, it's not that I
Speaker 1: wouldn't threats, but I hesitate to to that. You know,
Speaker 1: he posted some stuff on social media and and now
Speaker 1: he's going to do. Yeah, my attitude on the nature
Speaker 1: of what he posts that, Like if prior to his prosecution,
Speaker 1: you had brought that post. But to me, I said, well,
Speaker 1: probably not a great idea to post. But also literally
Speaker 1: every week a right winger in the Portland area posts
Speaker 1: something significantly more actual. Right now, Chandler pappas currently being
Speaker 1: charged with assaulting six police officers in the state capital
Speaker 1: and Salem, just announced that he's doing armed training as
Speaker 1: a convicted felon outside of Portland's uh later this November. Um,
Speaker 1: which if he's if he touches a firearm, he should
Speaker 1: go away to like based on the letter of the law,
Speaker 1: he should go to prison for years. Like that's the
Speaker 1: way the law is written. Nothing's going to happen to him.
Speaker 1: He's going to get to train people with guns and
Speaker 1: continue to carry guns and it's it's fine for him.
Speaker 1: Um anyway, whatever, I'm sorry, it's okay. I guess your
Speaker 1: your listeners can't see that. I have my head. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean, look what Daniel Baker did was certainly ill advised.
Speaker 1: If advised, it would characterize I have clients who have
Speaker 1: been visited by the Secret Service or have been visited
Speaker 1: by the FBI for saying stuff that when they call
Speaker 1: me and they're like, well, I just said this, and
Speaker 1: I'm like, yeah, I know that you're not gonna actually
Speaker 1: do that, but maybe don't you know, it's it's not
Speaker 1: it's ill advised, but it's protected by the very First
Speaker 1: Amendment more or less. And you know, I've said this before.
Speaker 1: I don't think the solution to two um being surveilled
Speaker 1: on social media is self censorship. I think it is courage.
Speaker 1: But I also think that discretion is the better part
Speaker 1: of ballotor. So yes, pick your battles and maybe, yeah,
Speaker 1: understand that it's not fair, you know. Yeah, And also
Speaker 1: like what do you gain by you know, being bump
Speaker 1: stous on the internet. It's one of those things where, yeah,
Speaker 1: if that guy had had a high dollar lawyer, Um,
Speaker 1: if he if he'd been a rich person, yeah, maybe
Speaker 1: he would have gotten away with it. Um, who knows,
Speaker 1: but like he it's it's he certainly would have gotten No,
Speaker 1: I can certainly say he would have gotten away with
Speaker 1: it if he'd been a right winger, because a bunch
Speaker 1: of them do every single day. UM. I can't make
Speaker 1: any speculation about that particular ship case, but I can
Speaker 1: say that the people who are being surveilled intensely and
Speaker 1: targeted for that kind of repression are not the people
Speaker 1: on the right. Um. The people on the right are
Speaker 1: able to make those kinds of statements and not be
Speaker 1: particularly taken seriously even when they should be, and people
Speaker 1: on the left are presumed to be you know, Antifa
Speaker 1: super soldiers. UM. So you know, I think the decision
Speaker 1: not to assert federal jurisdiction in the written House case
Speaker 1: is interesting. It is noteworthy, really curious about what was
Speaker 1: going on there. Um, and it has had a sort
Speaker 1: of cascade of effects, including UM, I doubt that the
Speaker 1: forensic digital investigation was as good as it would have
Speaker 1: been had it been federal Uh. And I doubt that
Speaker 1: the I mean, he's facing multiple charges, but I don't
Speaker 1: think that he would have been as likely to go
Speaker 1: to trial had he been federally charged. UM. So again,
Speaker 1: I don't you know, this is not an argument for
Speaker 1: more federal prosecution, but like I think the breathless outrage
Speaker 1: that we're seeing in you know, these headlines, UM, where
Speaker 1: people are correctly identifying the hypocrisy of the criminal legal system. UM.
Speaker 1: I think it's sort of an exercise in point missing. Um.
Speaker 1: You know, this prosecution, UM, like many of the prosecutions
Speaker 1: that we see, or the prosecutions that don't happen at all, UM,
Speaker 1: that involve members of the dominant class or people who
Speaker 1: uphold the values of the dominant classes. UM, is sort
Speaker 1: of proof of concept that it's possible to effectively allocate
Speaker 1: the burden of proof to the prosecution. It's possible not
Speaker 1: to go super hard on people and punish them for
Speaker 1: exercising their trial, right, Um. Right, I mean, it's it's
Speaker 1: possible two treat all people accused of offenses in this way. UM.
Speaker 1: And I wouldn't much for there. I mean, obviously my
Speaker 1: ultimate goal is to uh dismantle the entire system, you know.
Speaker 1: But but in the meantime, I don't think what we
Speaker 1: need is more vicious prosecution of the right. I think
Speaker 1: we need consistent and commensurate prosecution or lack of prosecution.
Speaker 1: We need, you know, uh, I think that seeing the
Speaker 1: way that the right is treated should be evidence for
Speaker 1: an argument for the possibility of um treating all people
Speaker 1: with more leniency rather than you know, intense the intense
Speaker 1: federal repression that we are facing and have been facing,
Speaker 1: you know since the Palmer Rates. Um. So yeah yeah,
Speaker 1: ah um, Well that uh is the stuff I wanted
Speaker 1: to ask about. Is there anything else? Um that I mean,
Speaker 1: I definitely go off on liberals smart please, um please.
Speaker 1: I mean, Garrison is a huge fan of liberals. He's
Speaker 1: got actually a full back tack two of Barack Obama
Speaker 1: and Bill Clinton, but they're they're in the volleyball scene
Speaker 1: from Top Gun. Um. It's an incredible tattoo. He did
Speaker 1: it all freehand on his own back. Amazing. Um, this
Speaker 1: is like the Garrison. I hope I don't receive any stones.
Speaker 1: I hope I don't receive any awful fan art. Now, someone,
Speaker 1: someone do it. Come on, come on, photoshop Garrison's head
Speaker 1: onto onto Roger Stone's back and the photoshop Nixon's head
Speaker 1: out and the volleyball scene from Top Gun with Bill
Speaker 1: Clinton and Barack Obama. Do it. Do it. Someone's gonna
Speaker 1: do it, is definitely going to do it. This is
Speaker 1: you consume me for this, and you'd be right to
Speaker 1: do so UM, but let's get back to and I
Speaker 1: might represent you trial of the trial of the century. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that sounds great. I think this is a trend that
Speaker 1: we see with people who are not necessarily focused on
Speaker 1: looking at the ways that the law is always going
Speaker 1: to be used first and worst against the already most vulnerable. Right.
Speaker 1: So we've seen things like, UM, I think there's just
Speaker 1: this very well documented liberal impulse and I think it's
Speaker 1: very well intentioned, but it's very dangerous UM to do
Speaker 1: things to like assume that the system somehow works UM
Speaker 1: or should work, and that it just needs to be
Speaker 1: like followed more closely, and that if we push for
Speaker 1: things like um, if we like use the law to
Speaker 1: constrain things that would agree are the most harmful UM,
Speaker 1: excesses of bigotry. Right, UM, that the law would be
Speaker 1: a good tool for UM for addressing violence and bigotry.
Speaker 1: The law does not, But that is not what kind
Speaker 1: of tool the law is. UM. When we push for
Speaker 1: things like laws regulating political speech, including so called hate speech,
Speaker 1: laws regulating what are referred to as hate crimes, laws UM,
Speaker 1: regulating who can carry a fighter arm and what they
Speaker 1: might look like. UM, you know, pushes for limiting the
Speaker 1: places or circumstances under which you could protest UM or
Speaker 1: demonstrate right, um, which you know, which was done. Um.
Speaker 1: There there was a real big UM pushed to forbid
Speaker 1: UH anti choice activists from protesting outside of UM clinics, right,
Speaker 1: which I understand, right, But what actually is the upshot
Speaker 1: of doing that? When we see this kind of push
Speaker 1: to use the law as a tool to enforce a
Speaker 1: particular political agenda, it is not you know, it's it's
Speaker 1: just a very ill conceived way to approach this because
Speaker 1: the law is never going to protect the most vulnerable.
Speaker 1: Um well, these structures of power that up all remain
Speaker 1: in place, and so you know, it's just always going
Speaker 1: to be leveraged against the people who have the least
Speaker 1: amount of power, and and so you know, this this
Speaker 1: sort of response to the written house stuff, to me
Speaker 1: is just essentially a recuperation of that impulse. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: mean it's it's a little like that old I think
Speaker 1: the joke has attributed to Gandhi. I don't know if
Speaker 1: Gandhi actually said it, but like he was asked, what
Speaker 1: do you think of Christian civilization? And he said, I
Speaker 1: think it would be a wonderful idea. What do you
Speaker 1: think of the fair and equal rule of law? Sounds nice? Um,
Speaker 1: but yeah, one of the two, Um yeah, maybe both,
Speaker 1: maybe both. I don't know that we ever saw them together.
Speaker 1: Um right, So I don't know, I I it's it's
Speaker 1: obviously it's too early to It's one of those things
Speaker 1: where all of the complaining about the unfairness of the
Speaker 1: trial of Written House winds up getting um rammed into
Speaker 1: a legal wall. Metaphorically, Uh may seem silly in content
Speaker 1: or in in retrospect, or he may this may be
Speaker 1: the thing that ignites a new wave of vigilante showing
Speaker 1: up at protests with guns, but it seems to be untouchable.
Speaker 1: Like really, the big fears that they don't set a
Speaker 1: precedent that will allow other people to use quote unquote
Speaker 1: self defense claims an effort just to kill black activists,
Speaker 1: to kill activists on the left, to kill people wearing
Speaker 1: you know, black hoodies and bandanas, because that's the it's
Speaker 1: the big fear out of this situation. Because my my
Speaker 1: expectation is that if Written House gets off or even
Speaker 1: just gets very minor, like if it's if he's if
Speaker 1: he's out of jail quickly within about six months, he's
Speaker 1: going to be a millionaire. Um. Absolutely, Yeah, that's the
Speaker 1: way the wing works. I would gently ask you to
Speaker 1: think about what happens if he doesn't, because if he's convicted,
Speaker 1: we are going to see a deepening of the repression
Speaker 1: that is faced by everyone on the left as well.
Speaker 1: We lose either way. Yeah, which place is on the table?
Speaker 1: There's no winning, I guess, I think, I mean part
Speaker 1: of it, I guess depends on what he's convicted for. Um,
Speaker 1: because some of the stuff has I would it seems
Speaker 1: to me, some of the things he's charged with, if convicted,
Speaker 1: there's more potential negative implications across the political aisle than
Speaker 1: with others. Um, like if if it's ruled murder. I
Speaker 1: don't know, that feels less worries. I mean, I have
Speaker 1: some concerns about the crossing state line stuff. I don't know.
Speaker 1: I mean, none of it's none of it's good. I
Speaker 1: guess where I am is. I remember vividly how much
Speaker 1: the situation on the ground changed after Kenosha, just in
Speaker 1: in Portland, even I mean, Garrison can can back we
Speaker 1: up with that. They were there for that too, Like
Speaker 1: it was a it was a significant shift in the
Speaker 1: feeling of deadliness, you know, whenever there was a right
Speaker 1: wing left wing confrontation. Um and someone someone died a
Speaker 1: few days later, someone died a few days later, and
Speaker 1: in a fucking gunfight. Um And I I don't know.
Speaker 1: I don't know, Moira, Uh, I don't know. I I don't.
Speaker 1: I don't want Rittenhouse to get off scott free for
Speaker 1: shooting three people. You're absolutely right, there's no there's no
Speaker 1: winning with the legal system. The only way to win
Speaker 1: is not to play. The only way to win is
Speaker 1: not to play. So form your own breakaway civilization and
Speaker 1: as Gandhi and Gandhi yeah, uh and Hubbard take to
Speaker 1: the sea. Yes, yeah, always Look, I don't I don't think. Um,
Speaker 1: I'm not looking for him to prevail on the self defense.
Speaker 1: Not like none of this is going to make me
Speaker 1: feel good. But I think that whether or not he
Speaker 1: is punished, whether or not he is convicted, there will
Speaker 1: be negative recussions, and all of those negative consequences will
Speaker 1: redound to the detriment of the people who are already
Speaker 1: facing the most intense federal repression. Yeah, that is I mean,
Speaker 1: in fairness, like this is the case of a child
Speaker 1: who killed two people and is now we are determining
Speaker 1: whether or not this child will spend the rest of
Speaker 1: their life in a cell. None of this should make
Speaker 1: anyone feel good, no matter what happens. It's a thoroughly
Speaker 1: bleak story. Yeah. Yeah, it's because this kid is never
Speaker 1: going to have a chance to grow up and be like, oh,
Speaker 1: I was being like a horrible No, they'll never be
Speaker 1: able to adjust to anything else rather than being this
Speaker 1: person that like culturally has been created right there. They
Speaker 1: are like a cultural thing. They're an item. They're not
Speaker 1: a person anymore, and they'll never be able to escape that. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I was a piece of ship when I was seventeen,
Speaker 1: and if I had had access to an a R
Speaker 1: fifteen and a chance to feel like a hero, I
Speaker 1: might have done something horrific too, And instead you were
Speaker 1: just doing sloppy steaks And it's fine and now it's fine.
Speaker 1: Um have you watched? I think you should leave Moira?
Speaker 1: I'm sorry, have you watched? I think you should leave Moira? No?
Speaker 1: Oh it's good, it's good. Okay, alright, I'll check it out. Um, um,
Speaker 1: I'll take a look. Yeah I don't know. Um, well,
Speaker 1: thank you, Moira. Uh, this is always appreciated. UM, I
Speaker 1: don't know, like, were you We've talked a bit about anarchism.
Speaker 1: How many of how much? How much of like your
Speaker 1: belief about the way the world ought to be and
Speaker 1: is came as a result of getting into the guts
Speaker 1: of the legal system. Do you mean did I become
Speaker 1: more devoted to anarchism and I went to law school? Um,
Speaker 1: I didn't become less devoted to it. I remember when
Speaker 1: I was going to law school, people kept saying, Oh,
Speaker 1: You're going to become really conservative, and I was like,
Speaker 1: I don't think that's true. That seems seems fake. Uh.
Speaker 1: And in fact, I remember, um being in my criminal
Speaker 1: procedure class and just thinking, how in the world can
Speaker 1: anyone at any law school read Miranda, which is a
Speaker 1: case where someone is, you know, just horrifically abused by
Speaker 1: police in order to extract a statement. How could anybody
Speaker 1: read this case and not come out of law school
Speaker 1: with a deep contempt for law enforcement? You know, I
Speaker 1: know that it happens. I don't know how always uplifting, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean it it is. It's important to know, you know.
Speaker 1: I when I was, when I was younger, and poor
Speaker 1: uh and dealing with things like taxes. I would often
Speaker 1: go like years without paying them, and I would like
Speaker 1: ignore debts and bills until like like my student loans,
Speaker 1: until it became like a serious problem because I didn't
Speaker 1: want to look at it. I didn't even want to
Speaker 1: like look at the scale of the issue and grab
Speaker 1: with it. I just wanted to run away from it.
Speaker 1: And when I actually like sat down and figured out
Speaker 1: my situation and like really came to understand like what
Speaker 1: what I needed to do in order to deal with
Speaker 1: those problems, like, it was stressful and it sucked, and
Speaker 1: it was fucking days of work, but getting understanding the
Speaker 1: scope of the problem I'd gotten myself into was a
Speaker 1: necessary step to like fixing the situation. And I think
Speaker 1: the same is true with like this kind of ship.
Speaker 1: It's not fun, nobody who is. I think a reasonable
Speaker 1: person like wants to dig into the US justice system
Speaker 1: and get into the guts of it because it's bleak
Speaker 1: as hell. But you need to because it's it's you
Speaker 1: can't escape it unless you flee the country and live
Speaker 1: in a place with no extradition treaties, um or international waters.
Speaker 1: I feel like you're talking about a lot of the
Speaker 1: people you've profiled. Yeah, I mean, Couador does sound nice.
Speaker 1: I'm sure it's loveliest time of here. Um. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: think you're right. You need to be able to have
Speaker 1: a sort of clear eyed assessment so that we can
Speaker 1: accurately identify and effectively address the problems. Unfortunately, I think
Speaker 1: the problems are so um all encompassing that I don't
Speaker 1: know that there's I would venture to say that there
Speaker 1: is not a real totalizing solution that doesn't involve total abolition. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I agree with you. But in the meantime, I mean,
Speaker 1: I think there are there are things that we can
Speaker 1: do to to advocate for our clients, or as an individual,
Speaker 1: you can do to protect yourself. And that's why it
Speaker 1: is important to have some sort of working understanding, because
Speaker 1: you can keep yourself and the people around you at
Speaker 1: least somewhat safer if you do understand the beast um
Speaker 1: even though your goal is to is to destroy it. Uh,
Speaker 1: And that's I think the only reasonable goal when you
Speaker 1: really understand it, it's still behooves you to to understand it.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's the same with like, it's the same
Speaker 1: with what what Garrison and I do with the fucking
Speaker 1: Nazi spending all this time in weird telegram channels like
Speaker 1: reading what they're trying to understand them, because you do
Speaker 1: need to understand them to effectively combat them. Well it's
Speaker 1: not for the faint of her, no, no, yeah, neither
Speaker 1: is what you do. Um. The messages is that we're
Speaker 1: all well adjusted and we're all great. That boats secondary trauma,
Speaker 1: there's no secondary trauma and international waters Moira, I have
Speaker 1: that that that my my old friend l R. H
Speaker 1: told me that just you and the open sea and
Speaker 1: a bunch of twenty year old sir arching for gold
Speaker 1: that I buried in a past life, live in the dream. Yeah,
Speaker 1: he is both fascinating and terrified. Yeah. Um, just just
Speaker 1: like just like our legal system system. And that wraps
Speaker 1: up this episode that brings us around. Um, anything you
Speaker 1: want to plug any any place, Maybe our listeners could
Speaker 1: could send donations that would help somebody who's themselves against
Speaker 1: a wall at the moment. Would certainly suggest that people
Speaker 1: look into whatever bail funds are local to them. There's
Speaker 1: one I know in New York called COVID Bailout NYC
Speaker 1: that's um doing incredible work right now. To get people
Speaker 1: off Rikers Island, which is having a humanitarian crisis of
Speaker 1: just unbelievable scope. UM. It sounds to me like the
Speaker 1: conditions on Rikers right now are at least as bad
Speaker 1: as the conditions that led to the Attica uprising. UM.
Speaker 1: So I would always, always, UM direct people to give
Speaker 1: money to local bail funds. I also want to plug
Speaker 1: the National Lawyers Guild UH Anti Federal Repression or Federal
Speaker 1: Defense hotline, which is to one two six seven nine
Speaker 1: to eight one one two one to six seven nine
Speaker 1: to eight one one if you call that number, or
Speaker 1: you can call that number if you are having unwanted
Speaker 1: contact with federal agents, and you can be advised by
Speaker 1: an attorney who is me about your rights and responsibilities
Speaker 1: with respect to federal agents, and I will try to
Speaker 1: connect you with appropriate resources in your area. UM. This
Speaker 1: is not the hotline to call if you've been injured
Speaker 1: by a police officer. UM. This is the hotline to
Speaker 1: call if you have been visited by the FBI. UM,
Speaker 1: don't talk to cops. If few are contacted by law enforcement,
Speaker 1: say I am represented by counsel. Please leave your name
Speaker 1: and number and my lawyer will call you uh, and
Speaker 1: remember that you cannot talk your way out of and arrest,
Speaker 1: but you can talk your way into a conviction. All
Speaker 1: great points, all great things to be aware of. Um,
Speaker 1: speaking of great things to be aware of. Be aware
Speaker 1: that we'll be back tomorrow, unless this is a Friday,
Speaker 1: in which case we'll be back next week. From now
Speaker 1: until the heat death of the universe. Thank you so much, Laura,
Speaker 1: You're so welcome. It Could Happen Here is a production
Speaker 1: of cool Zone Media. For more podcasts from cool Zone Media,
Speaker 1: visit our website cool zone media dot com, or check
Speaker 1: us out on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,
Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can find sources
Speaker 1: for It Could Happen Here, updated monthly at cool zone
Speaker 1: media dot com slash sources. Thanks for listening.