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: and on Bloomberg dot com slash podcasts. Former National Security
Speaker 1: Advisor Michael Flynn may have one goal in replacing his
Speaker 1: longtime criminal defense attorneys with the politically provocative Sydney Powell,
Speaker 1: to win a pardon from his old boss, President Trump. Flynn,
Speaker 1: a retired U. S. Army general who admitted he lined
Speaker 1: to government investigators and is awaiting sentencing, fired the legal
Speaker 1: team that represented him since the case began in joining
Speaker 1: me as former federal prosecutor Jeffrey Kramer, managing director at
Speaker 1: Berkeley Research. So, Jeff tell us a little bit about
Speaker 1: Sydney Powell's a federal prosecutor, has been in a couple
Speaker 1: of jurisdictions, has done a fair amount of a federal
Speaker 1: criminal appellet work, so certainly knows the system, and it
Speaker 1: is quite familiar with courtroom tactics and is an experience
Speaker 1: litigated by all definitions. There's been no statement on the
Speaker 1: record of why Flynn is changing attorneys. So there's been
Speaker 1: a lot of speculation about why he's changing attorneys, right,
Speaker 1: and you know, his prior attorneys certainly knew that the
Speaker 1: lay of the land and these types of cases and
Speaker 1: certainly high profile cases as a d C law firm
Speaker 1: that has certainly been around the block. Flynn's already pled guilty,
Speaker 1: and the judge just to make sure you're going to
Speaker 1: reaffirmed that colloquy with that information that Flynn gay that
Speaker 1: indeed he was guilty. So it's gonna be hard or
Speaker 1: impossible for Flynn to withdraw his guilty plea. So at
Speaker 1: this point you have to ask yourself, why change horses
Speaker 1: in midstream? Why bring on a new attorney? And that
Speaker 1: just leads to either a sentencing argument and or you know,
Speaker 1: a message being sent to the White House for a
Speaker 1: possible part, And those are really the only two options.
Speaker 1: At the news of Flynn's hiring Powell, President Trump tweeted this,
Speaker 1: General Michael Flynn, the thirty three year war hero who
Speaker 1: has served with distinction, has not retained a good lawyer.
Speaker 1: He has retained a great lawyer. Sydney Powell, best wishes
Speaker 1: and good luck to them both. You know, that's got
Speaker 1: to be one of the take to say it's one
Speaker 1: of the stranger tweets. I think that course has already
Speaker 1: left the gate. But it's certainly an odd one for
Speaker 1: the president or any executive branch employee which has charged
Speaker 1: again with prosecuting crimes, to complement a defense lawyer and
Speaker 1: wish them well in their case against you know, I'll
Speaker 1: be at a special council, but an arm of his
Speaker 1: own Department of Justice. I mean, you have to shake
Speaker 1: your head at this. It's strange. I don't know of
Speaker 1: any time in the past where a president has wished
Speaker 1: the best of luck to a criminal defense attorney. Well, also,
Speaker 1: has Trump forgotten that Flynn was the first of his
Speaker 1: former advisor to cooperate in Mueller's investigation, right, He doesn't
Speaker 1: really doesn't seem to hold that against him as he
Speaker 1: does hold it against others. I think Flynn, you know,
Speaker 1: the testimony coming up is against some of Flynn's business partners,
Speaker 1: which really, at least as far as we know, doesn't
Speaker 1: touch the White House, nor Trump uh, nor any of
Speaker 1: Trump's close associates or relatives. So while he was the
Speaker 1: first to plead guilty, and if you remember dialing back Trump.
Speaker 1: President Trump then said some you know, fairly negative things
Speaker 1: about Flynn. And now he's kind of come full circle
Speaker 1: because I think of this lawyer that Flynn has hired,
Speaker 1: which again she is an experienced prosecutor, she also has
Speaker 1: some pretty odd conspiratorial theories. In point of fact, she
Speaker 1: said on Monday that she'd most likely need a security
Speaker 1: clearance to review classified materials that were separate from the
Speaker 1: documents that prosecutors had already handed over, leading to more speculation.
Speaker 1: Can a new lawyer changed the legal strategy at this point?
Speaker 1: At this point is the operative phrase? Probably not unless, uh,
Speaker 1: the argument is going to be that this new information
Speaker 1: you need to have a colorable argument why you should
Speaker 1: get the information is going to be relevant to the
Speaker 1: plea of guilty. But but again, as we discussed, this
Speaker 1: judge has already you know, belt and suspended uh General
Speaker 1: Flynn's guilty polee. He went back and did it again.
Speaker 1: So the government is required to turn over and any
Speaker 1: exculpatory evidence. They're required to turn over any evidence that
Speaker 1: is relevant to the charge. Right now, we might have
Speaker 1: a fishing expedition where this lawyer is using General Flynn's
Speaker 1: case as a as a vehicle, really as a as
Speaker 1: a shield and a sword to try to get at
Speaker 1: other information and perhaps embarrass the Mueller prosecutors. Not anything
Speaker 1: to do with General Flynn's case, but just muddy the
Speaker 1: waters a little bit, which obviously President Trump would would
Speaker 1: would enjoy the watching that. It's former federal prosecutor Jeffrey Kramer,
Speaker 1: Managing director of Berkeley Research. Thanks for listening to the
Speaker 1: Bloomberg Law Podcast. You can subscribe and listen to the
Speaker 1: show on Apple Podcasts, SoundCloud, and on Bloomberg dot com
Speaker 1: slash podcast. I'm June Brosso. This is Bloomberg