Speaker 1: Welcome to the Bloomberg Law Podcast. I'm June Grosso. Every
Speaker 1: day we bring you insight and analysis into the most
Speaker 1: important legal news of the day. You can find more
Speaker 1: episodes of the Bloomberg Law Podcast on Apple Podcasts, SoundCloud,
Speaker 1: and on Bloomberg dot com slash podcasts. Roger Stone will
Speaker 1: tell a judge he's sorry this afternoon, but she may
Speaker 1: revoke his bond and send him to jail anyway. Stone,
Speaker 1: sometime adviser to President Trump, posted a photo of federal
Speaker 1: Judge any Berman Jackson on his Instagram account with an
Speaker 1: image of what appeared to be the crosshairs of a
Speaker 1: rifle site behind her head. This from a man who's
Speaker 1: been warned by that very judge about media antics joining
Speaker 1: me as Brad Moss, a partner, Mark said, Brat, this
Speaker 1: post strikes me not only as utter folly on Stone's part,
Speaker 1: but could be interpreted as threatening the judge. Correct yet,
Speaker 1: and I can almost guarantee you that the moment his
Speaker 1: lawyers learned of what had been posted, they were probably
Speaker 1: on the phone screaming at him for it. This is
Speaker 1: something you just don't do. I mean, look, Roger Stone
Speaker 1: has been playing dirty political tricks and using the full
Speaker 1: extent of the First Amendment since the sixties. This is
Speaker 1: who he is. It's who has always been. He's the
Speaker 1: ultimate dirty tricks there. He propagates conspiracy theories and he
Speaker 1: makes a vile commentary. The difference here is now he
Speaker 1: did it to a federal judge. The game is different.
Speaker 1: He didn't recognize that he possibly crossed the line into
Speaker 1: threatening the federal judge, which, as you noted, is a
Speaker 1: federal crime. And he's the least going to get taken
Speaker 1: out to the woodshed today. It's not quite clear how
Speaker 1: much of a sanction or punishment he'll get. I don't
Speaker 1: think he's going to jail today, but I think it's
Speaker 1: more than likely he's going to get a full and
Speaker 1: complete gag order as opposed to what was previously opposed. Well,
Speaker 1: Judge Jackson is the same judge who revoked Paul Manafort's
Speaker 1: bail and sent him to jail pending trial. Why wouldn't
Speaker 1: you do it here? The one difference there with mana
Speaker 1: Fort was that was kind of the last straw there,
Speaker 1: and in that case it involved actually trying to tamper
Speaker 1: with witnesses. It was a little in my opinion, was
Speaker 1: a little bit further along in the process and a
Speaker 1: little bit more severe than just a really stupid and
Speaker 1: childish post on Instagram. Could Judge Jackson try to make
Speaker 1: a point here and throw Rocher Stone in jail today, Yes,
Speaker 1: But I think she's also going to try to run
Speaker 1: this one completely by the books, to try to avoid
Speaker 1: any appearance of impropriety, any appearance of bias, anything that
Speaker 1: could get reversed on technical grounds on appeal. You also
Speaker 1: have to wonder, it seems you don't have to be
Speaker 1: a lawyer to know that you want the judge that
Speaker 1: is going to try you to like you, or at
Speaker 1: least not to dislikely like you. And he in the post,
Speaker 1: he also called her an Obama appointed judge and the
Speaker 1: hashtag was fixes in I just look at this. This
Speaker 1: is right the promise. Roger Stone is a man in
Speaker 1: his late sixties. He's been doing this for decades. This
Speaker 1: is what has come second nature to him. This is
Speaker 1: what you do. You smear and discredit the person investigating you.
Speaker 1: You call them names, you try to arise issues of
Speaker 1: political bias. The problem is he's never done it in
Speaker 1: the context of a criminal investigation, where he's been indicted
Speaker 1: he had. He didn't recognize that the circumstances have changed,
Speaker 1: the game was different, and he caught himself in a
Speaker 1: vice here, and he is going to get in some
Speaker 1: manner of trouble. How much depends on whether or not
Speaker 1: the judge truly finds him credible and authentic in whatever
Speaker 1: kind of apology I'm sure he's going to try to
Speaker 1: make today. Roger Stone is a great actor. I don't
Speaker 1: know if he can pull this one off. We shall see.
Speaker 1: Let's turn now to the Muller Report, because there are
Speaker 1: reports that Mueller is going to submit his report to A. G.
Speaker 1: William Barr as early as next week. We've often said
Speaker 1: that Mueller speaks through his indictments. So is it possible
Speaker 1: that there won't be any blockbuster information in the report
Speaker 1: that the public doesn't already know. It's certainly plausible, though
Speaker 1: I have a feeling I'm certainly expecting that there's going
Speaker 1: to be some politically damaging, though not necessarily criminally damaging
Speaker 1: information that shows up in this final report. I think
Speaker 1: a lot of what Robert Muller viewed his task as
Speaker 1: being was not so much to be the all encompassing
Speaker 1: special prosecutor who runs the entire thing forever and investigates
Speaker 1: and prosecutes everybody till the end of time. I think
Speaker 1: he went in there to find out the truth, outline
Speaker 1: it in the report, prosecute cases were needed in the interim,
Speaker 1: and then let the Attorney General and the rest of
Speaker 1: the Justice Department decide where to go from there. If
Speaker 1: he's got something on the president, I think it's going
Speaker 1: to be outlined there in the final report. I'm pretty
Speaker 1: sure it's not going to be a good day for
Speaker 1: the Trump boy House when this report, or at least
Speaker 1: some details of it, come out. I don't know if
Speaker 1: it's going to be the bombshell, impeachment worthy report some
Speaker 1: people were expecting all along. So ken Trump's family and
Speaker 1: former aids now breathe a sigh of relief that they
Speaker 1: won't be indicted. It depends on what's in this report
Speaker 1: and whether or not there were steps that could still
Speaker 1: be taken that Robert Mueller just decided it wasn't necessary
Speaker 1: for him to take because it wasn't going to further
Speaker 1: his investigative inquiry. So it could be that he outlines
Speaker 1: where there could be possible indictments of people like Donald
Speaker 1: Trump Jr. Or Jared Kushner for false statements to Congress,
Speaker 1: things along those lines, But that Robert Mueller decided it's
Speaker 1: not necessary for me to do that at this point
Speaker 1: in the further end of my investigative equity. I'll hand
Speaker 1: that off the to the rest of the Department of
Speaker 1: Justice if they want to do so. That's at their
Speaker 1: discretion at this point to be that. So I'm not
Speaker 1: breathing any size of relief. So it's up to the
Speaker 1: discretion you mentioned of the Department of Justice, more likely
Speaker 1: the discretion of the A. G. William Barr. How likely
Speaker 1: would he be to pursue that and how likely to
Speaker 1: even let the public know something about the other individuals
Speaker 1: who might be involved here or would he protect their privacy. Well,
Speaker 1: I think there's gonna be a lot of pressure for
Speaker 1: as much of this report, or at least the detailed
Speaker 1: summary of it, to be made public, and it's gonna
Speaker 1: be someone and this is just my view, a bipartisan
Speaker 1: push to get it because both sides have an interest
Speaker 1: in disclosure here just as much as you know, Democrats
Speaker 1: and liberals will want as much of it out because
Speaker 1: they think it will be damaging to the Trump White House.
Speaker 1: There's a lot of Republicans who want these details out
Speaker 1: because they think it will exonerate him, that'll lift some
Speaker 1: of the cloud off the president. And if it's kind
Speaker 1: of hushed up and covered up and just a small detail,
Speaker 1: you know, report given to Congress that doesn't explain a
Speaker 1: lot of things, they worry that the conspiracies will never
Speaker 1: truly dissipate. So I have a feeling we're gonna learn
Speaker 1: a lot. I don't think we'll ever learned everything, but
Speaker 1: I think we're gonna learn a lot of details about
Speaker 1: people in the Trump circle, including the President himself. Which
Speaker 1: do you think is the more likely route, Congressional subpoena
Speaker 1: or a subpoena actual subpoena of the report or a
Speaker 1: subpoena of Robert Muller. I think there's going to be
Speaker 1: a fight over the report first. I don't think they
Speaker 1: want to go the route of trying to drag Robert
Speaker 1: Muller before Congress, if only because that will start a
Speaker 1: legal war between the Justice Department and Congress over having
Speaker 1: him testify as a post too simply disclosing the report itself. UM,
Speaker 1: I don't know if the kind of kind of a
Speaker 1: last option for members of Congress to take. I think
Speaker 1: the report itself will speak to whatever Robert Mueller needs,
Speaker 1: unless there was some controversy, unless there's an aspect where
Speaker 1: Robert Mueller was stopped or you know, prevented from pursuing
Speaker 1: an investigative line of inquiry. I think the report will
Speaker 1: do just what the indictments day, which they'll speak and
Speaker 1: explain everything Robert Muller could say. Thanks so much, Brad.
Speaker 1: That's Brad Mask. Thanks for listening to the Bloomberg Law podcast.
Speaker 1: You can subscribe and listen to the show on Apple podcast, SoundCloud,
Speaker 1: and on Bloomberg dot com slash podcast. I'm June Brasso.
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