Speaker 1: This is Bloomberg Law with June Grassoe from Bloomberg Radio.
Speaker 1: It was chaos at the heart of American democracy when
Speaker 1: a mob of pro Trump writers stormed the capital, reached
Speaker 1: the security barriers, terrorized lawmakers, and vandalized the offices and
Speaker 1: congressional chambers, delaying the certification of the Electoral College vote.
Speaker 1: President elect Joe Biden was blunt. They were protesters. Don't
Speaker 1: dare call them protesters. They were a riotous mob, insurrectionists,
Speaker 1: domestic terrorists, and Biden was not alone in blaming President
Speaker 1: Trump for inciting his followers. Lawmakers like Republican Senator Mitt
Speaker 1: Romney also placed to blame on Trump. What happened here
Speaker 1: today was an insurrection incited by the President of the
Speaker 1: United States. Joining me is an expert in national security law,
Speaker 1: former federal prosecutor Jimmy Garula, a professor at Notre Dame
Speaker 1: Law School. Clearly, the Capitol police were unprepared, with all
Speaker 1: the notice, some from Trump himself, with much of the
Speaker 1: nation bracing for what might happen, and with threats of
Speaker 1: violence on social media. Should they have been prepared for this,
Speaker 1: they had forewarning, literally weeks in advance. I mean Trump
Speaker 1: on Twitter had notified the world that he was again
Speaker 1: recruiting as followers to come to Washington, d C. On
Speaker 1: January six, and he said, you know, be looking out.
Speaker 1: This is gonna be like something you've never seen before.
Speaker 1: It's going to be powerful. I mean, so it was
Speaker 1: clear that again he was recruiting his followers to come
Speaker 1: to d C for this event, and then of course
Speaker 1: at the rally before the actual assault on the Capitol Building,
Speaker 1: he's firing up his supporters and telling them to take
Speaker 1: back America. And in order to do so, you have
Speaker 1: to be strong. We have to use act with strength,
Speaker 1: which is code words for violence. So there was plenty
Speaker 1: of time to prepare. And it's inexcusable. I mean, this
Speaker 1: should never have happened in America. And thank god it
Speaker 1: wasn't worse than it actually was. I mean, had these
Speaker 1: protesters have been more heavily armed when they took siege
Speaker 1: of the Capitol Building, we could be talking about today
Speaker 1: the killing of members of Congress, the killing of senators,
Speaker 1: violence a much larger scale than what was witnessing. This
Speaker 1: can never be permitted to happen again, and I'm hopeful
Speaker 1: that the new administration immediately initiates an investigation or commission
Speaker 1: to get to the bottom of this and to termine
Speaker 1: what went wrong and to ensure that it never happens again.
Speaker 1: Would you call this an insurrection, an attempted coupe? What
Speaker 1: would you term this? Well, it's certainly an insurrection. You know,
Speaker 1: it certainly falls with in the seditious Conspiracy Statute. It's
Speaker 1: an act of sedition. It was an attack either to
Speaker 1: overthrow the government by violence or to prevent the enactment
Speaker 1: of laws by violence, which is also prohibited by the
Speaker 1: sedition conspiracy Statute. These people wanted to disrupt Congress's fulfillment
Speaker 1: of their constitutional duties under the Twelfth Amendment. That's what
Speaker 1: was driving them. The timing of this wasn't accidental. You know,
Speaker 1: their presence on January six, they're storming the Capitol Building
Speaker 1: while Congress was in session undertaking its constitutional duties. That
Speaker 1: was not a coincidence. This was an attempt to disrupt,
Speaker 1: to prevent them from fulfilling those constitutional obligations, from certifying
Speaker 1: the electors and then certifying Joe Biden is an ex
Speaker 1: president of the United States, and I would say further there,
Speaker 1: it was certainly anti Democrat because one of the principal
Speaker 1: cornerstones of our democracy that we have cherished over the
Speaker 1: last two hundred plus years is a peaceful transfer of power.
Speaker 1: There's a range of crimes the rioters could be charged with,
Speaker 1: from misdemeanors to felonies, from vandalism to sedition. Does it
Speaker 1: seem like they're going to be charged with the lower
Speaker 1: level crimes vandalism, breaking and entering, etcetera, rather than sedition. Well,
Speaker 1: I would say certainly everyone that can be identified who
Speaker 1: is inside the Capitol Building should be charged under the
Speaker 1: Anti Riot Act because this clearly satisfies the requirements of
Speaker 1: the statute. I mean, these are people that traveled in
Speaker 1: interstate or used an interstate facility for the purpose of
Speaker 1: engaging in a riot, for either inciting a riot or
Speaker 1: participating in a riot or facilitating acts of violence, which
Speaker 1: is what is required under the statute. And fortunately, many
Speaker 1: of these individuals were caught on video inside the Capitol
Speaker 1: Building and the FBI and other law enforcement agencies are
Speaker 1: going to be able to identify many of these perpetrators quickly,
Speaker 1: and once they're identified, they should be charged by the
Speaker 1: FBI and prosecuted by the Apartment of Justice, the U. S.
Speaker 1: Attorney's office. I mean, it could be the U. S.
Speaker 1: Attorney's offices in the districts where these individuals reside, or
Speaker 1: in the district of Columbia where the offenses were actually committed.
Speaker 1: On the question of sedition, I think here we're talking
Speaker 1: about again a conspiracy, and I think a conspiracy can
Speaker 1: be proven through their concerted action. And their concerted action,
Speaker 1: their intent again was to buy the use of violence
Speaker 1: to prevent, hinder or delay the execution of any law
Speaker 1: of the United States. That's language from the Seditious Conspiracy Statute,
Speaker 1: to prevent, hinder or delay the execution of any law
Speaker 1: of the United States. And the law of the United
Speaker 1: States that they were attempting to prevent was the Twelfth Amendment,
Speaker 1: was the certifying of the electors, the recognizing of the
Speaker 1: electoral votes, and certifying of the president. I want to
Speaker 1: get your take on why the Capitol police allowed the
Speaker 1: rioters to leave the Capitol building. We saw a video
Speaker 1: of rioters walking out of the building yelling, threatening to
Speaker 1: come back, with a police officer actually holding the door
Speaker 1: open for them. No, it was it was certainly at
Speaker 1: the very least a dereliction of duty. I can understand,
Speaker 1: you know, the argument that the Capitol Police felt that
Speaker 1: they were overwhelmed, that they didn't have sufficient numbers to
Speaker 1: prevent this assault on the Capitol building. That's one thing,
Speaker 1: But to actually be opening the door, assisting them as
Speaker 1: they're leaving, not attempting to prevent any of this illegal
Speaker 1: conduct that was taking place. These are officers, again, that
Speaker 1: took an oath to defend the constitution to enforce the law.
Speaker 1: They violated that oath. So this isn't simply a question
Speaker 1: or any shoe of the government wasn't adequately prepared to
Speaker 1: deal with the crisis. I think that there are some
Speaker 1: officers that have to be held accountable for dereliction of
Speaker 1: their duties and responsibilities as law enforcement officers. It's shameful.
Speaker 1: It's nothing less than shameful. Beyond that, there was video
Speaker 1: of the Capitol Police letting writers get past the barricades,
Speaker 1: moving the barricades. Even now, people will look at that
Speaker 1: and say, was there an order from above that led
Speaker 1: them to that course. It does raise an interesting question
Speaker 1: whether there was an order. Here's the other aspect of
Speaker 1: that too. If you look at the videos and you
Speaker 1: see some of these protesters. They didn't seem intimidated or
Speaker 1: all are worried by the presence of the law enforcement
Speaker 1: officers of the Capitol Police. They were very confident, they
Speaker 1: were very smug, and the action that they were taking,
Speaker 1: they weren't threatened at all feel threatened at all by
Speaker 1: law enforces. So that makes you wonder. That raises a
Speaker 1: question was there um order, either explicit or implicit, for
Speaker 1: the Capitol Police to stand down, to not enforce the law,
Speaker 1: to not arrest these individuals. I mean I watched literally
Speaker 1: two or three hours of footage on television and did
Speaker 1: not see a single arrest. Now we're told after the
Speaker 1: fact that there were, you know, individual arrest I I
Speaker 1: witnessed hours and hours of illegal activity going on and
Speaker 1: did not see a police officer, a law enforcement officer,
Speaker 1: arrest a single individual. That investigation should result in the
Speaker 1: senior members supervisors of the Capitol Police being fired an individual,
Speaker 1: lower level officers being fired at a minimum, At a minimum,
Speaker 1: our Capitol building, this symbol of democracy, was desecrated in
Speaker 1: a way that should never have ever been permitted to
Speaker 1: happen in this country, and someone has to be held
Speaker 1: accountable for that. There's been a lot of commentary about
Speaker 1: the marked difference in the way the Trump administration handled
Speaker 1: the Black Life Matters protests this summer with federal agents
Speaker 1: and riot gear, tear gas, rubber bullets. That's a fair
Speaker 1: point to raise because we saw over the summer the
Speaker 1: use of force that was employed against peaceful protesters in
Speaker 1: Lafayette Square, and again, as you stayed at tear gas,
Speaker 1: rubber bullets, etcetera. We didn't see that here. And this
Speaker 1: was an assault on the Capitol building. It raises questions,
Speaker 1: you know, had these been block protesters, would they have
Speaker 1: ever been permitted to get that close to the building,
Speaker 1: let alone go into the chambers of the Senate, go
Speaker 1: into the chambers of the House of Representatives. I am
Speaker 1: confident the Capitol police would have found some way to
Speaker 1: restrain them. They wouldn't have made it halfway up the
Speaker 1: steps of the Capitol Building before they were confronted with
Speaker 1: rubber bullets, tear gas, and even more lethal use of force.
Speaker 1: And so that it's another issue that needs to be
Speaker 1: addressed in this inquiry. Is this a dual standard of
Speaker 1: justice here? So if you're a block protester, you're treated
Speaker 1: one way, but that if you're a white protester, and
Speaker 1: we all saw for ourselves that the these protesters are
Speaker 1: white protesters, they're treated differently under the law. Our democracy
Speaker 1: cannot witness and embrace a dual system of justice that
Speaker 1: depends on the color of the person skin. The articles
Speaker 1: of impeachment have already been drafted. How Speaker Nancy Pelosi
Speaker 1: has been calling on Vice President Mike pens to invoke
Speaker 1: the twenty fifth Amendment to remove President Trump from office
Speaker 1: after the attack on the nation's capital by pro Trump rioters,
Speaker 1: and Pelosi says the House will move forward on articles
Speaker 1: of impeachment if nothing is done. A very dangerous person
Speaker 1: who should not continue in office. This is urgent. This
Speaker 1: is the emergency of the highest magnet too. I've been
Speaker 1: talking to national security law expert Jimmy Garula, a professor
Speaker 1: at Notre Dame Law School. Top Democrats are calling on
Speaker 1: Vice President Pence to invoke the amendments. It's never been
Speaker 1: used to remove a president. Do these circumstances fit Amendment?
Speaker 1: I think they do. It's actually Section four of the
Speaker 1: Amendment that's applicable here, and that authorizes the president and
Speaker 1: the majority that's referred to as the principal officers basically
Speaker 1: would be the cabinet members, and in this particular case,
Speaker 1: it would require thirteen cabinet members along with the vice president,
Speaker 1: to conclude that the president is unable to discharge the
Speaker 1: powers and duties of his office. And so here I
Speaker 1: think you can make a compelling case that over the
Speaker 1: last two months, the President Trump has been obsessed with
Speaker 1: the presidential election and his defeat, and his behavior during
Speaker 1: that period of time has become erratic. He's unstable. He
Speaker 1: has advocated his responsibilities with respect to the coronavirus pandemic,
Speaker 1: He's advocated his responsibilities regarding a recent hacking attack by
Speaker 1: a Russia. So I think the prerequisite regarding his inability
Speaker 1: to discharge his powers and duties that's required under the
Speaker 1: amendment can be met. Once that is communicated in writing
Speaker 1: to the leaders of the House and the Senate, then
Speaker 1: the vice president immediately assumes the duty as the acting president.
Speaker 1: But that doesn't end it. I think President Trump would
Speaker 1: immediately contest that, and then it would fall back on
Speaker 1: the vice president to make a further determination of the
Speaker 1: president's lack of capacity to hold office. And I think
Speaker 1: that's probably about as far as we're going to get
Speaker 1: within that short period of time. But interestingly, that would
Speaker 1: deprive the president of his ability to stay in office
Speaker 1: for the balance of his his trump. Now it seems
Speaker 1: highly unliyly that Penn's is going to involve the amendments.
Speaker 1: So then we come to the Democrats threats of a
Speaker 1: second impeachment. How much of the process could they get
Speaker 1: through in the time left till its term ends. It's
Speaker 1: finally unlikely that in that period of time. First of all,
Speaker 1: the publican members of the House are going to be
Speaker 1: fighting this, and they're going to be resisting this at
Speaker 1: every step, and so I think it's highly unlikely in
Speaker 1: days that there would be articles of impeachment that are
Speaker 1: submitted to the House, that are debated. You know that
Speaker 1: there witnesses that are called, and then a vote concluded
Speaker 1: on those articles of impeachment, and then of course that
Speaker 1: again would just be the charging document. Then it would
Speaker 1: be up to the Senate to the side. Again, it
Speaker 1: requires the two thirds vote of the Senate to actually convict.
Speaker 1: It's just not practical, it's not feasible for all of
Speaker 1: that to happen. I think what's more realistic, again, if
Speaker 1: Vice President hence took the initiative and again was able
Speaker 1: to get the support of thirteen cabinet members that he
Speaker 1: could become acting president and probably delay the final process
Speaker 1: here through the balance in the president's term. Thanks Jimmy.
Speaker 1: That's Professor Jimmy Garoule of Notre Dame Law School. The
Speaker 1: votes in Georgia have been counted not once, not twice,
Speaker 1: but three times, and they confirmed that President elect Joe
Speaker 1: Biden beat President Trump by eleven thousand, seven hundred seventy votes.
Speaker 1: But in a sixty two minute call last Saturday, Trump
Speaker 1: pressured Georgia officials, including the Secretary of State, to find
Speaker 1: thousands of votes and recalculate the election results to flip
Speaker 1: the state to him, just enough to pass Biden by
Speaker 1: one vote. So, look, all I wanna do is this.
Speaker 1: I just want to find uh eleven thousand, seven d
Speaker 1: eighty loaves, which is one more that we have. The
Speaker 1: people of Georgia are angry. The people of the country
Speaker 1: are angry, and there's nothing wrong with saying that you know,
Speaker 1: um that you've recalculated. Georgia officials stood firm by the
Speaker 1: election results, joining me as former federal prosecutor Elie Hoenig
Speaker 1: of Lowenstein Sandler. The first broad question, did Trump break
Speaker 1: the law during this call? So I think the short
Speaker 1: answers is quite possibly, maybe meaning towards probably. You know,
Speaker 1: we don't have all the facts, but the call itself
Speaker 1: is a pretty darned good starting point. So both federal
Speaker 1: law and Georgia law are similar in that bottom line,
Speaker 1: They say it is a crime to try to influence
Speaker 1: an election official to count ballots that we're not actually cast. Now,
Speaker 1: clearly Donald Trump is trying to influence and then some
Speaker 1: these Georgia Secretary of State Rapidsburger's overtly pressuring him, even
Speaker 1: threatening him with the potential of criminal prosecution of his own.
Speaker 1: And he's also clearly trying to pressure the Secretary of
Speaker 1: State to count votes in his favor and votes that
Speaker 1: if you are tethered to reality, you know we're never cast, right.
Speaker 1: I mean, every source that has a pined on this,
Speaker 1: from d o J to DHS, two dozens of courts
Speaker 1: have said there was no such fraud. Perversely, I guess
Speaker 1: the best defense of Donald Trump here would be he
Speaker 1: actually believes, truly believes that he got those votes, Because
Speaker 1: if he truly believes he had those votes. It's not
Speaker 1: a crime to ask an official to count votes that
Speaker 1: you truly believe. We're You're You're not asking for some
Speaker 1: fraud to be committed. If in your mind you truly
Speaker 1: believe those votes were for you. Now, that would require
Speaker 1: one to believe Donald Trump is delusional. Perhaps he is.
Speaker 1: And I also think it's a little bit of intention
Speaker 1: with the words Trump uses on the call. If I'm
Speaker 1: a prosecutor, going back to my prosecutorial role, I would say,
Speaker 1: why does he use the word find? We need to
Speaker 1: find these votes? That to me is a little different
Speaker 1: than we need to have a full counting of all
Speaker 1: the votes that were actually cast. And that number, remember
Speaker 1: Donald Trump says we need exactly eleven thousand, seventy or whatever,
Speaker 1: one more vote than he needed. That also is very
Speaker 1: conspicuous and different from we need to count all the votes.
Speaker 1: So I think at a minimum, prosecutors have to take
Speaker 1: a look here, investigate, and sit down and make a
Speaker 1: very hard decision. I want to talk about some problems
Speaker 1: that may occur because the call is very meandering. He
Speaker 1: goes from topic to topic, He skirts the issue a lot,
Speaker 1: and he keeps saying over and over that he won
Speaker 1: the election. So is that a problem? Well, so meandering. Absolutely,
Speaker 1: it's not a problem that he never says I would
Speaker 1: like you to perform this illegal act. I mean, that's
Speaker 1: certainly not required. And yes, it does complicate it though
Speaker 1: that Donald Trump repeatedly he seems like he's almost reading
Speaker 1: off of a list or something of all these wild
Speaker 1: claims that have really come from Twitter or you know,
Speaker 1: far far right wing media and I don't mean Fox News,
Speaker 1: I mean far the right wing than that. And that
Speaker 1: would be the defense, if I'm done Trump's defense lawyer,
Speaker 1: I would argue, he truly believes that he won this
Speaker 1: election and that he's entitled to have the Secretary of
Speaker 1: State recount these votes. And I think the argument is
Speaker 1: that may be a bad look, that may say something
Speaker 1: bad about his own mental stability, But legally it's a
Speaker 1: defense because again, if you truly believe that votes were
Speaker 1: cash for you, and you ask officials to count those votes,
Speaker 1: that's not a fraud. That's not a crime. That would
Speaker 1: be the difficulty in prosecuting this case, and that would
Speaker 1: be something to prosecutors would need to sit down and
Speaker 1: sort of puzzle through in meticulous detail. Is his ignorance
Speaker 1: of the law and excuse he says, I didn't know
Speaker 1: that was a problem. No ignorance of law. It's a motto,
Speaker 1: it's a saying, but it's true. Ignorance of law is
Speaker 1: not a defense. You don't have to know specifically that
Speaker 1: this exact conduct is prohibited by statute. You have to
Speaker 1: know general link that it's wrong. I do want to
Speaker 1: throw in one other potential wrinkle here. Clearly, Donald Trump
Speaker 1: threatens Rappensburger with criminal sanctions of his own right. There's
Speaker 1: that weird passage where Trump says, what you're doing is
Speaker 1: actually a crime, Mr. Happensburger, and paraphrasing here, it is
Speaker 1: a crime, a federal crime, an estate crime. To threaten
Speaker 1: somebody as part of an extortion, as part of trying
Speaker 1: to get something, you want to threaten somebody with unjustified
Speaker 1: criminal charges. Now, there's no argument that Rappensburger committed a
Speaker 1: crime of any sort, but Trump uses that as a
Speaker 1: bully tactic. There is an interpretation of the extortion laws
Speaker 1: that could include that, and I think prosecutors ought to
Speaker 1: look at that as well. Do you really think that
Speaker 1: the threat is that explicit? He talks about a big
Speaker 1: risk of potential criminal charges. Do you really think that
Speaker 1: the threat is explicit enough. Well, that's the question. It's
Speaker 1: not as explicit as a prosecutor would like it to be, right,
Speaker 1: it's not. If you don't do this, I will go
Speaker 1: to FBI and we will indict and prosecute. That would
Speaker 1: be an example of the easiest case. This fall somewhere
Speaker 1: in the middle, And that's why I think that the
Speaker 1: exact verbiage is important. You know, he does say, you know,
Speaker 1: he gets fairly explicit about you you're committing a crime,
Speaker 1: and even has the weird exchange where Trump says something
Speaker 1: like I'm putting you on note, I'm notifying you right now,
Speaker 1: which is I think close to the line. But I
Speaker 1: agree it's not as explicit as other extortions that I've seen,
Speaker 1: for example, in the mob world. But that also doesn't
Speaker 1: necessarily mean he's in the clear either. Explain the willfully
Speaker 1: requirement in the federal law. So will so he essentially
Speaker 1: means with intent to commit a crime, or to commit
Speaker 1: the elements of the crime. So that gets back to
Speaker 1: sort of the state of mind. Is the president in
Speaker 1: the deepest recesses of his mind and by the way.
Speaker 1: This is the difficulty of any intent based crime. Right,
Speaker 1: So for example, a robbery of a seven eleven is
Speaker 1: not an intent based crime. You see someone coming with
Speaker 1: a gun in the mask and demand money, that's a robbery.
Speaker 1: But when you get into things like frauds, then you
Speaker 1: have to get into the mind of the person and
Speaker 1: did they really know what they were proposing. Was they
Speaker 1: fraud or was they llegal or did they actually honestly
Speaker 1: believe that they were entitled to this or that it
Speaker 1: was legitimate. So that's a difficulty here. And you know,
Speaker 1: if I was investigating this, I would start with the
Speaker 1: tape itself, Like I said, I would scrutinize the words
Speaker 1: on the tape, but I'd also i'd subpoena or want
Speaker 1: to speak with those around Donald Trump, the other people
Speaker 1: on that call. Is there evidence that before that call
Speaker 1: or after the call he said to somebody, look, we're
Speaker 1: gonna bend this guy to our will, or is there
Speaker 1: evidency said things that evidence that he doesn't truly believe
Speaker 1: that he was. But there's been reporting out there that
Speaker 1: Donald Trump understands that he lost this election, but he's
Speaker 1: doing this for show, or he's doing this to rally
Speaker 1: donations or support, or to keep themselves relevant. If you
Speaker 1: could find a couple of witnesses to say, I spoke
Speaker 1: with Donald Trump, he told me I know I lost this,
Speaker 1: but just I'm playing this game here, right, It's something
Speaker 1: to that effect I think would be a significant piece
Speaker 1: of evidence. And again that goes to my point of
Speaker 1: why prosecutors and to at least dig in here and
Speaker 1: not just sort of glide past it. Two members of
Speaker 1: Congress referred the case to the FBI. Does that mean
Speaker 1: the FBI will actually do an investigation? No, it does not.
Speaker 1: There's this common misconception out there that there's some magic
Speaker 1: to a referral like criminal referral. There's not. All it
Speaker 1: means is and I've gotten referrals as a prosecutor from
Speaker 1: any source you can name, from members of the public,
Speaker 1: from politicians, you know, you name it. All it means
Speaker 1: is somebody has asked the FBI or whatever your law
Speaker 1: enforcement agency to take a look. Now, referrals are taken seriously,
Speaker 1: and depending on both the source of the referral and
Speaker 1: the apparent seriousness of the conduct and the support for
Speaker 1: the conduct, referrals absolutely can lead law enforcement agencies and
Speaker 1: prosecutors to open cases to take a look. So it's significant,
Speaker 1: but it doesn't find anybody to do anything. The next
Speaker 1: question is, let's just suppose that enough evidence is found,
Speaker 1: who would prosecute with the Justice Department under President elect Biden,
Speaker 1: who said that he is not going to try to
Speaker 1: influence that the Justice Department is there to do its job.
Speaker 1: But are they going to want to start their administration
Speaker 1: by prosecuting a former president? That's a great question, at
Speaker 1: a very important question. Let's start with focusing on the
Speaker 1: federal authorities here, d O. J Joe Biden has done
Speaker 1: one thing that I think is really important and good,
Speaker 1: and one thing that I have an issue with what
Speaker 1: he's done that I think anybody should approve of, is
Speaker 1: he has said publicly and clearly, I will not get
Speaker 1: involved in the prosecutorial decisions of my Attorney General. That
Speaker 1: will be entirely up to the new a G. I
Speaker 1: don't get involved. That That is right, That is correct,
Speaker 1: That is as it should be, that something Donald Trump
Speaker 1: himself frequently violated. What I don't approve of is the
Speaker 1: fact that Joe Biden reportedly told several people around him,
Speaker 1: and this was reported by NBC News. They say they
Speaker 1: had five sources saying this is a few weeks ago,
Speaker 1: that Joe Biden has no interest in having his d
Speaker 1: J go down this rabbit hole of Donald Trump investigations,
Speaker 1: that he does not want to see his d o
Speaker 1: J go that round. Now, Joe Biden has been around
Speaker 1: long enough, you know, forty eight years, that he understands
Speaker 1: that if he's going to make a comment like that
Speaker 1: to five different people, it's going to get out there.
Speaker 1: And so I don't like the fact that Joe Biden
Speaker 1: is doing that, and in so doing is putting a
Speaker 1: thumb on the scale of what the attorney general will do. Now,
Speaker 1: as a practical matter, if you're the new attorney general,
Speaker 1: if you're going to charge and prosecute a case against
Speaker 1: the former president, you have to understand that will consume
Speaker 1: all the oxygen, all the attention, all the focus on
Speaker 1: everything else you do um and probably everything else the
Speaker 1: presidential administration does until that actual trial happens and it's
Speaker 1: over with. We're talking a year, eighteen months. That is
Speaker 1: an enormous distraction, That is an enormous price to pay.
Speaker 1: I fully understand that, and I expect the new A G.
Speaker 1: To to to factor that in. On the other hand,
Speaker 1: I think it's really difficult that the new Attorney General
Speaker 1: and new d o J to just say we were
Speaker 1: not even going to take a look. It's just too
Speaker 1: much of a hassle. It's just too difficult. We're not
Speaker 1: even going to bother with this that I don't approve
Speaker 1: of either as a prosecutor. Look, part of your job
Speaker 1: as a prosecutor, a big part of your job is
Speaker 1: to make difficult decisions and to do things that ruffle feathers.
Speaker 1: And if the job of a prosecutor was to just
Speaker 1: look for the path of least resistance, then well, beyond
Speaker 1: Donald Trump, there's plenty of powerful people who would never
Speaker 1: be investigated. There's plenty of wealthy people, well connected people
Speaker 1: who you would just say, too much trouble, people might resist,
Speaker 1: it might be too much of a circuit. That to me,
Speaker 1: is not the job of a prosecutor. So I will
Speaker 1: say this, at a minimum, I believe d o J
Speaker 1: has a duty to investigate this see what they find.
Speaker 1: But I do appreciate that it's a very difficult charge
Speaker 1: to bring. And I also do appreciate that it's unlikely
Speaker 1: that d o J ultimately will charge the president. There
Speaker 1: may be a slightly different calculus for state level prosecutors,
Speaker 1: but that's how I look at d O J. What
Speaker 1: do you think of the fact that the U S.
Speaker 1: Attorney Atlanta resigned one day after this phone call? Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's in some respect, it's suspicious in some respect. That's
Speaker 1: not the timing everything that's happening in Georgia. You can
Speaker 1: it's consistent with I guess I'll say, we don't know
Speaker 1: what's going on, but it's consistent with he was asked
Speaker 1: to do something that he wasn't comfortable with doing and
Speaker 1: that caused him to resign. It also is unusual that
Speaker 1: the U. S. Attorney would resign with essentially no notice.
Speaker 1: Now what's not unusual is this is resigning season, um
Speaker 1: and it always is. Whenever you're about to have a
Speaker 1: change in administration, especially from one party to the other,
Speaker 1: all the U. S. Attorneys start resigning around now um
Speaker 1: or you know, up to January twenty and then they're
Speaker 1: replaced fairly quickly by the new administration. That's the way
Speaker 1: things go. But usually the way that happens is the U. S. Attorney,
Speaker 1: for example, in New Jersey where I live put out
Speaker 1: a public statement weeks ago, and he said in January
Speaker 1: five will be my last day. Um, you know, two
Speaker 1: weeks notice, three weeks notice. That's normally the way it goes.
Speaker 1: So it is unusual to me that this has happened
Speaker 1: with essentially no notice. And also one of the lawyers
Speaker 1: who was representing Trump on that call, Clio Mitchell, resigned
Speaker 1: from her law firm. Look, obviously there was a lot
Speaker 1: of public pressure. I think the public was by and
Speaker 1: large revolted by what was heard on that call. And
Speaker 1: the lawyer Cleedo Mitchell, is part of it, and she's
Speaker 1: on board with what Donald Trump's doing. And I think
Speaker 1: most worrisome from my perspective looking at her as an attorney,
Speaker 1: is she is completely espousing and supporting these conspiracy theories,
Speaker 1: these theories that have no basis in fact. And you know,
Speaker 1: it's a difficult thing. I don't necessarily believe in going
Speaker 1: after someone's employment or profession or vocation if you disagree
Speaker 1: with what they've done. But there's also a line here
Speaker 1: that lawyers are not the cross of just spinning utter fantasy.
Speaker 1: Your duty bounds to defend a client, including clients who
Speaker 1: may be guilty of things, but it is another matter
Speaker 1: altogether to affirmatively promote outright false statements and fictitious conspiracy theory.
Speaker 1: So that was ultimately the consequence for this attorney. Thanks Ellie.
Speaker 1: That's former federal prosecutor Ellie Hohenick. And that's it for
Speaker 1: the sedition of the Bloomberg Lawn Podcast. I'm June Grosso.
Speaker 1: Thanks so much for listening, and remember you can always
Speaker 1: get the latest legal news on our Bloomberg Lawn podcast.
Speaker 1: You can find them on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and wherever
Speaker 1: you get your favorite podcasts. And please listen to The
Speaker 1: Bloomberg Lawn Show every weeknight at ten pm Eastern on
Speaker 1: Bloomberg Radio