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 podcast, SoundCloud,
Speaker 1: Bloomberg dot com, Slash podcast. Met against Deputy Attorney General
Speaker 1: Rod Rosenstein. Speaking on Fox News, House Freedom Caucus member
Speaker 1: Mark Meadows explained the actions for us, it's all about transparency,
Speaker 1: so of the American people can judge for themselves, and
Speaker 1: so you know, they may be able to ignore Congress,
Speaker 1: but they can't ignore the American people joining us. As
Speaker 1: Jeff Kramer, a former federal prosecutor and managing director at
Speaker 1: the Berkeley Research Group, Jeff a lot of drama, but
Speaker 1: not much evidence of any traction. Paul Ryan says he's
Speaker 1: not supporting it, and Republican Senator Lindsey Graham said it's
Speaker 1: more likely Rosenstein will end up in the NBA playing
Speaker 1: basketball than being impeach So why file articles and impeachment? Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's a good line in the basketball. It's basically for
Speaker 1: it is for drama, and it got a news cycle
Speaker 1: for a day and that was it. You know, it
Speaker 1: allows some people to pop off and express their dissatisfaction
Speaker 1: um with the deputy Attorney general. Um. But it's it
Speaker 1: was absurd to think it was gonna go anywhere. I'm
Speaker 1: sure they thought so as well. So what do you
Speaker 1: think is rosen Stein's future here? Does he does he stay?
Speaker 1: Does he eventually leave? What do you think? You know?
Speaker 1: The rosen fins is a career prosecutor, so he certainly
Speaker 1: has you know, d o j uh running through his blood.
Speaker 1: I don't think he's gonna leave anytime soon, certainly not
Speaker 1: before the Mueller investigation is done. I mean, he he
Speaker 1: knows that if he were to leave, someone could be
Speaker 1: appointed who would then stopped in his track. So I
Speaker 1: think he has a sense of duty that he needs
Speaker 1: to stick it out, and he's gonna be a punching
Speaker 1: bag and he knows that. But he's got to wait,
Speaker 1: I think until the Mueller investigation, not necessarily all the trials,
Speaker 1: but certainly the crux of the investigation has done. You
Speaker 1: just spoke about the Mueller investigation. Let's talk about that
Speaker 1: a little bit. There was a New York Times article
Speaker 1: this morning that talked about how Mueller's investigators are really
Speaker 1: seriously looking at some of the president's tweets tell us
Speaker 1: about how those tweets might play a part in the investigation. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean that's been banted around, not by Mueller, but
Speaker 1: just by you know, various individuals that that could prove
Speaker 1: to be fodder. And not surprisingly, Mueller is looking at it.
Speaker 1: It's it gives you a glimpse into what the person
Speaker 1: and you know, if this was an average individual, you
Speaker 1: do the same thing. What is he or she said?
Speaker 1: That could add some color to what they were thinking,
Speaker 1: because that's what obstruction comes down to, is their intent.
Speaker 1: And you look at someone's intent, you look at what
Speaker 1: their actions are. And part of this president's actions are
Speaker 1: his tweets trying to influence, if not the investigation, then
Speaker 1: public perception. But he was certainly trying to influence as
Speaker 1: best he could uh the investigation. You could argue that
Speaker 1: that has obstruction not two problems. One, it's not great evidence,
Speaker 1: but it's it's a part of the mosaic if you
Speaker 1: will too. Which is a bigger problem is even if
Speaker 1: he did commit obstruction, even if you could prove it,
Speaker 1: Mueller has been clear that he's going to abide by
Speaker 1: d o J policy. It's not the law, it's policy
Speaker 1: that a sitting president cannot be indicted. So I think
Speaker 1: it best you're going to get an argument laid out
Speaker 1: in a report to Congress. What about the collusion piece
Speaker 1: of it? Though, yeah, I mean I don't know. The
Speaker 1: president says no collusion over and so far, you know,
Speaker 1: there's no leaks that suggests that that's where Mueller, that
Speaker 1: Mueller's got anything on that true. But this investigation, and
Speaker 1: we've seen it, uh, surprised us in the sense that
Speaker 1: we just wake up and there's an indictment. I mean,
Speaker 1: I dare say that nine percent of the population has
Speaker 1: never heard Bob Muller talk. They don't even know his voice.
Speaker 1: It's like, and that's appropriate because he's just putting his
Speaker 1: head down and doing his work. Is up press release,
Speaker 1: there's no news conferences, et cetera. So he's certainly looking
Speaker 1: at the collusion. That's a hard argument to make. Um.
Speaker 1: We certainly see some individuals in the Trump orbit, and
Speaker 1: some of them have been indicted, who were interacting with
Speaker 1: Russian government officials and perhaps agents of the Russian government,
Speaker 1: and we saw a recent indictment just now. Um. But
Speaker 1: proving that Trump or someone very close to included. And
Speaker 1: you know it's called a conspiracy because collusion itself is
Speaker 1: it's not a crime. Um, it's conspiras a conspiracy to
Speaker 1: take uh anything of aid from a foreign government, that's
Speaker 1: the crime. It's gonna be hard to tag that to
Speaker 1: the White House itself. So now I don't know if
Speaker 1: we'll see Muther even observing at the Maniford trial, but
Speaker 1: that's supposed to start next week. How important is a
Speaker 1: conviction of Manifort to the Special Council's investigation as a whole.
Speaker 1: I think it's are important. It's the first first volley,
Speaker 1: and you want to win that trial because as you
Speaker 1: move forward in the investigation. Part of this that's true
Speaker 1: with any prosecutorial office. When you're bringing people in, is
Speaker 1: you're trying to flip them, you're trying to turn them. Well,
Speaker 1: how you flip them, how you turn them is the fear,
Speaker 1: the specter that if they get indicted and tried, they're
Speaker 1: going to jail. And that specter becomes more prominent if
Speaker 1: you've already cut a scalp, if you were um and
Speaker 1: this one is I don't want to say it's a
Speaker 1: you know, it's it's an easy case because all cases
Speaker 1: are difficult once you get to trial. But it's a
Speaker 1: pretty solid case with documents, money trail, no taxes paid,
Speaker 1: and you've got several witnesses who are going to give
Speaker 1: some color to the trial itself. Certainly, Mr Gates, it's
Speaker 1: not a long trial. You know, this thing may take
Speaker 1: three weeks. I doubt will see Mr manafor trial or
Speaker 1: to actually testify. And I think at the end of
Speaker 1: this trial there'll be a conviction. Uh, and that's an
Speaker 1: important one for the special prosecutor to get. Well, it's
Speaker 1: going to be a little bit of a picture of
Speaker 1: life styles of the rich and famous, five exhibits, including
Speaker 1: including pictures of his palatial houses and expensive clothes. Now
Speaker 1: the judge is trying to lay down all kinds of
Speaker 1: ground rules so that the jury won't be exposed to
Speaker 1: the politics of the case. Is it possible to shield
Speaker 1: jurors from that? You know, it's it's hard. I mean,
Speaker 1: they're not going to be sequestered, so they're gonna go home,
Speaker 1: they're gonna be told not to read anything about uh,
Speaker 1: you know, politics or this trial. Certainly, that basically leaves
Speaker 1: the sports section availbum the potential jurors. You can't turn
Speaker 1: on the TV. That's too risky. But like I say,
Speaker 1: this is not a four months trial, so they just
Speaker 1: need to keep their heads down for for a few weeks.
Speaker 1: You know, the Virginia District is known to pick a
Speaker 1: quick jury. This is gonna be a little trickier because
Speaker 1: given where it's located, either they or someone close to
Speaker 1: them probably works or worked in the past tense for
Speaker 1: the government, and chances are, like everyone else in this country,
Speaker 1: they have pre solid views politically speaking. Uh, maybe a
Speaker 1: little tricky to pick a jury, but once they do,
Speaker 1: in my experience, jurors are pretty good about listening to
Speaker 1: those kind of instructions. The trick here is to make
Speaker 1: sure you get a fair jury and not someone who
Speaker 1: wants to get on this panel just to get their
Speaker 1: fifteen minutes of faith and maybe prove a point. Just
Speaker 1: about thirty seconds here, what do you think man of
Speaker 1: forts defense is going to be just trying to knock
Speaker 1: holes in the prosecution's case. It's a hard defense, it
Speaker 1: really is. And that's what it comes down to. You're
Speaker 1: looking for one juror just to hang this thing up,
Speaker 1: and you know Gates has some baggage on him, as
Speaker 1: any flipper does. But you can't cross examine a document.
Speaker 1: It is what it is. Either paid the taxes or
Speaker 1: he didn't. Either set up the shell companies or he didn't.
Speaker 1: It's a very hard defense, uh, to to muster, and
Speaker 1: you're just gonna throw everything against the wall and maybe
Speaker 1: get lucky. Always great to have you on, Jeff. That's
Speaker 1: Jeff Kramer. He's managed and directed the Berkeley Research. Of course, America, lawyers,
Speaker 1: intern porners, and other professionals are volunteering some of their
Speaker 1: free time to help an organization called Lawyers for Good Government,
Speaker 1: which its founder, executive director and only employee, Tracy fight
Speaker 1: Love says, is a progressive non partis an organization. I
Speaker 1: think the reason we're seeing the wave of activity that
Speaker 1: we're seeing now, and the reasons so many people joined
Speaker 1: Lawyers for Government, and the reasons so many people are
Speaker 1: participating in these other movements is because they believe as
Speaker 1: I do, in the idea of America, in the dream
Speaker 1: of America, and what we can accomplish when we stand
Speaker 1: up for those ideals together joining us as Nick Lieber,
Speaker 1: a reporter for Bloomberg News who has written about this group. Nick,
Speaker 1: It's not unusual for lawyers to do pro bono work,
Speaker 1: but this kind of a setup and network is different
Speaker 1: from the usual pro bono work. Explain how it works. Sure, So,
Speaker 1: they are one point three four million lawyers in the
Speaker 1: US and many of them work for themselves and work
Speaker 1: for small firms that don't have pro bono councils that
Speaker 1: you know, and this group is a way for those
Speaker 1: lawyers who don't have access to pro bono councils to
Speaker 1: volunteer and to find opportunities where they feel like they
Speaker 1: can do some good. So it's a it's a group
Speaker 1: that helps train these lawyers and helps place them in
Speaker 1: volunteer opportunities, and that can be anything from um environmental
Speaker 1: protection to preventing voter suppression to helping immigrants cheek asylums.
Speaker 1: Are there any volunteer lawyers for Trump? Um? There there
Speaker 1: are probably volunteer lawyers for Trump the causes that this
Speaker 1: group Lawyers for Government does UM, I would doubt there
Speaker 1: are too many lawyers within it who support UM many
Speaker 1: of Trump's policies that have to do with immigration or
Speaker 1: environmental protection or voter suppression. Nick I was noticing in
Speaker 1: your article that a lot of the lawyers who are
Speaker 1: volunteering don't have experience in these practice areas, so what
Speaker 1: do they do to train them? So the the organization itself,
Speaker 1: Lawyers for Good Government, will do some training, and the
Speaker 1: organizations in which they volunteer, so say a legal services
Speaker 1: group UM on the border, will will train them as well.
Speaker 1: So there are there are different opportunities to get trained
Speaker 1: depending on what you elect to volunteer and do. And
Speaker 1: you know, and of course it's competitive, there are a
Speaker 1: lot of people who want to volunteer and UM. The
Speaker 1: in the detention centers there is limited space, limited limited
Speaker 1: visiting space where you can meet with clients. UM. So
Speaker 1: you you sort of um have to have to find
Speaker 1: time space training and then be able to do it.
Speaker 1: Make any sense of how much time some of these
Speaker 1: lawyers are spending away from their day jobs, I think
Speaker 1: it's generally about a week if you're if you're on
Speaker 1: the ground in a in a detention center. UM. That's
Speaker 1: generally how it works. But then people are also UM.
Speaker 1: During the first iteration of the of the Muslim band
Speaker 1: the travel ban, people were spending weeks away from their
Speaker 1: offices UM. And I think it depends. I think there
Speaker 1: are also people volunteering UM remotely and helping prepare briefs,
Speaker 1: and that could mean you spend you know, six hours
Speaker 1: at night after after you finished your work at your practice,
Speaker 1: or four hour US at night after you finish your practice. UM.
Speaker 1: I think it. I think it varies, but generally it's
Speaker 1: about a week if you go to to volunteer at
Speaker 1: a legal services group UM and you're and you're in
Speaker 1: a detention center. So I thought you mentioned that they
Speaker 1: volunteered remotely, which I thought was really interesting. But the
Speaker 1: coordination it must take to get all these disparate elements
Speaker 1: together and even to get translators involved. So tell us
Speaker 1: about how she's managing all this. Well, I think I
Speaker 1: think you know right right when she she started the
Speaker 1: group UM, there was an incredible outpouring of people who
Speaker 1: wanted to be involved. And I think what she's been
Speaker 1: spending a lot of time doing is exactly that is
Speaker 1: figuring out. Okay, let's make sure we have an interpreter
Speaker 1: who can be on the ground at Boston Air at Logan.
Speaker 1: Let's make sure we have someone who has spent a
Speaker 1: decade doing immigration law who can go to Texas it's
Speaker 1: figuring out who has certain skills and who can get
Speaker 1: from point A to point B at a certain time.
Speaker 1: And a lot of that is people volunteering their time
Speaker 1: to create spreadsheets that they then used to say, Okay,
Speaker 1: I'm available this, this person is available at this time.
Speaker 1: They have these skills and they can do this, and
Speaker 1: they're willing to come on these dates and then and
Speaker 1: then the sort of magic of them making coordinating all
Speaker 1: that and making it happen. But it's, you know, it's
Speaker 1: it's hard work. Only less in a minute here, Nick,
Speaker 1: But what other professionals besides lawyers and translators do does
Speaker 1: she have? I think that they're also looking for psychiatrists
Speaker 1: who can help do evaluations of parents and children that
Speaker 1: they can use in in their asylum requests. Who can
Speaker 1: talk about the stress and and more hardcore UM realities
Speaker 1: that asylum seekrets have faced and can document that in reports.
Speaker 1: UM interpreters, yes, UM, and people who are willing, I think,
Speaker 1: to give rides to asylum seekers when they're going, say,
Speaker 1: leaving a detention center and then trying to reconnect that
Speaker 1: ended there, Nick, It sounds really comprehensive and as was
Speaker 1: your story. Thanks so much. That's Nick's Lieber, a reporter
Speaker 1: for Bloomberg News. Thanks for listening to the Bloomberg Law Podcast.
Speaker 1: You can subscribe and listen to the show on Apple Podcasts, SoundCloud,
Speaker 1: and on bloomberg dot com slash podcast. I'm June Brosso.
Speaker 1: This is Bloomberg. Yeah,