Trump peed his pants.

I posted this 4 years ago on facebook and it popped up as a memory.

STILL revelant today!

The first witness yesterday destroyed the entire defense argument made in opening statements. I have a feeling the defense will end up just being throw as much shit at the wall as possible, hope it muddies the waters or confuses the jury, and lean heavily on reasonable doubt.

Also, Trump called for MAGA to show up and protest and like 5 people showed up so he claims thousands of protesters are being turned away.

There was one person yesterday when a reporter went to check after Trump's call for protests

The defenses opening statement seemed desperate. They attacked the witnesses and the process. Seems to me that’s what you do when you can’t defend the allegations.

Actually that's what you do when you're a dumbass. It's just a coincidence that it also works for desperation

By all accounts his attorney is not stupid. That being said he is also probably handcuffed by Trumps ego.

I actually think it's a decent strategy. The facts aren't in his favor. Their best hope is to play this up as a political prosecution and hope there's one MAGA on the jury who will refuse to convict.

He's had some shitty lawyers in the past but Blanche knows what he's doing.

Looks like fake electors are being charged in Arizona.

https://mcusercontent.com/cc1fad182b...ictment.03.pdf

There are seven people not revealed because they haven't been charged yet. But some reporters figured out they are:

Rudy Giuliani
Mark Meadows
Mike Roman
Ken Chesebro

Trump is also listed as an unindicted co-conspirator.

Man wish they would just indict trump right along with them. that's 3 states now where Republicans tried to overthrow the election and trump was the #1 Republican

There has been a lot of talk about 'diet coke guy' which I had no idea what that even meant. I guess there was a guy essentially paid to provide idiot with endless IV of diet coke and he was the guy that hid the documents and moved them around so the big bad fbi couldn't take them away. And diet cokehead still works for trump and is also indicted.

Lives of the rich and famous, LOL. How does that look on a resume?

12 years as the diet coke regulator for a crazed narcissist

Job responsibilities included
1-Ensuring the pull tab was opened to at least a 72 degree angle, to allow maximum carbonation enrichment.

2-Providing 3 symmetrical ice cubes, all carved to resemble said narcissist, allowing not only complete enjoyment of his sweet liquid treasure, but the added comfort of staring at 3 tiny images of himself as he took each sip.

3-Quality control over label covers which corrected calories from 180 per can (fake news) to 7 calories per can, which made my employer the healthiest, slimmest mass consumer of carbonated flotsam the world has ever seen, never seen anyone this healthy, much more healthy than a 20 year old vegan tree hugger.

4-Hiding classified Government documents, for the sole purpose of ensuring no diet Coke was ever spilled on them, no really, my employer protected classified documents even better than the CIA and FBI.

Trump found in contempt 9 times and is being threatened with jail time if he keeps it up.

I think that jailing him gives him some of what he wants.

Putting a monitor on his social media would be pretty funny

I was going to post the same. As a contempt penalty could they put him in a room where he could watch the trial with cctv, be seen on camera, but not be heard? An audio connection to his lawyers via ear piece would let him still be involved, but no way to vocally disrupt the trial? And if he can be seen having fits while not heard? That's not going to be a good look. :)

Yeah, my idea was that he should be in one of those boxes they have in Russia. Or the equivalent of the Cone of Silence from Get Smart. But, I'm not sure those would look too good either.

Another kind of crazy point that someone made--for most of us, having to be somewhere we'd rather not be and doing something we'd rather not be doing on a weekday isn't weird. It's our jobs.

But in his almost 80 years on Earth, this is the first time that he's had to be somewhere and do something he'd rather not be doing.

And watching the effect on him is kind of amazing.

Still, a pretty good run by him of not having to do anything he didn't want to do.

Goes to show that being born rich is still the best job out there.

wait what? I thought once you are in contempt you are taken away

No. That's one possible remedy, but would be more for someone acting up in court.

Trump was held in contempt for violating the gag order based on social media posts. So removal from the courtroom would not really be an appropriate remedy.

I mean you can't take away the internet...

Trump hinted today that the gag order will keep him from testifying.

That is, of course, not true. But it shows him exploring ways to save face.

He will not testify. He has no obligation to. And there is no way he will subject himself to cross examination.

But he has to not look like he's backing down. A pretty obvious evasion (and one I still expect) is for him to say that he wanted to testify but his lawyers would not let him. (That would be a lie. The decision to testify or not belongs to the client not the lawyer). I can see why he's also workshopping the gag order fake excuse. It fits into the persecution myth he's selling to his acolytes.

Yeah he's all tough talk about testifying right until they get to the part in the trial where he has to, and he chickens out every time. So he has to make up excuses for why he's not testifying. Any good DA would tear him apart if he ever did testify. I hope this judge makes it crystal clear to him and the jury that the choice to testify has always been Trump's not his.

I think that is good practice for any criminal defendant. I know some judges who, out of the presence of the jury, explain to the defendant, personally, their right to testify or not testify and make sure the defendant tells them directly (i.e. not through their lawyer) whether they will or won't.

It's a good system.

dola:

The judge will not, however, make a big show of it to the jury. Indeed, the jury will be specifically instructed to draw no inference from Trump's decision not to testify.

yeah if I was ever a judge, that would be how I would do it. Lawyers are used to talking lawyer-language in the courtroom, defendants often are not and judges need to make sure they know their rights.

It's also for practical reasons for an appeal, if any - to put on the record that the defendant, as free from pressure of his/her lawyer as possible, agrees of their own free will that they have decided not to testify. This helps to short-circuit an "ineffective assistance of counsel" argument, at least as it relates to the decision to testify.

ha! Judge has already told him he has a constitutional right to testify or not.

This issue caused me much consternation years ago (especially because I was figuring it all out as I went).

In my state (and I think this was relatively unique in states at the time when it came up, no idea if that's still true), a defendant can't be found to have waived the right to testify unless the record affirmatively shows he was aware he had that right, and also was aware of his authority to decide whether to testify, no matter what his attorney wanted him to do.

So in that situation, if the court doesn't put that advisement on the record, the state could still potentially win an ineffective assistance of counsel claim (where it's the defendant's burden to prove a constitutional violation), but it's impossible for the state to win the merits of a "violation of right to testify" issue unless the defendant's awareness of his right is evident somewhere else in the record; and then the conviction is vacated unless the state can prove that error is harmless. So the state has to make sure to remind the court to give that warning in the record, if they drop the ball on that.

Then you have to untie all that when the case gets to a federal habeas proceeding, where federal constitutional law as recognized by the United States Supreme Court applies, and sometimes review under that standard is less stringent than what the state courts are doing.

So that was probably 2-3 years in state appeals, another year or two in the federal habeas litigating just that claim, which all could have been avoided if the judge just said, "hey, you have this right". So they're better about doing that now.

There's a lot of boxes to check to make sure this all goes right (which is a feature, not a bug). And I know that can be hard in your normal case where where the trial attorneys and judge are doing everything on the fly and the appellate and habeas attorneys get to sit back with more time on their hands and carefully figure out all the ways everybody fucked up at trial.

thank the gods we have lawyers here who can explain all this. :) It will be a good thing when we get sued for defamation. ;)

I'm just going to briefly live in a little fantasy where someone said this part.

:confused::banghead::devil:

As much as you guys get crapped on, thank God there are lawyers.

everyone hates lawyers until they need one

Trump continuing to show up to court with printouts of articles that he thinks helps him reminds me of a lot of "not legally incompetent, but not all there either" criminal defendants that I have seen.

Trump fined another $1,000 for one of his gag order violations, but not the others. Judge told him that this is the 10th violation-I do not want to put you in jail, but clearly fines are not stopping you, so that may be the option if you continue to disobey my orders.

Thank you sir, may I have another (fundraising email)!

Can gag orders be challenged in court? I imagine there could be some first amendment grounds for an appeal.

Yes, they can. Not sure if he is appealing the fines or not

He did appeal the gag order and it was rejected by the appellate court. The Supreme Court has historically ruled that as long as gag order are as narrow as possible they're constitutional based on the 6th ammendment right to a fair trial.

also, this judge is being very careful. He's not finding every violation alleged by the prosecution. He's making a point of imposing fines but indicating that they may not be enough.

If (and it is still a big if IMO) it escalates to jail time, he will have papered it over very well.

I think he’s going to get locked up at some point. He’s not going to stop, his lawyers can’t control him, and at some point the judge will start looking weak if he doesn’t have a response with some teeth.

I don't think he's going to stop and I think the judge will just keep giving him leeway because that's how our justice system works. Feels like any other defendant would be locked up by now.

Next the judge is going to put Trump on double secret probation!

We could have a 'fun' question if he wins the election and is in jail at the time. Do they hold the inauguration at the prison, or ??

And do we know if he gets Secret Service protection while he's behind bars?

He does.

Last I heard that hadn't been decided, it's a wait and see if it necessary thing. Sadly even after all this, there will be still be secret service lining up to protect him in prison.

How is that sad? Should federal agencies stop doing their job because they don't like who the president is, or do I misunderstand your point?

It’s sad that any member of law enforcement would support him.

But ... serving in government and supporting Trump are in many cases two different things. Do you think it's better for nobody to be willing to serve who doesn't approve of the person who was elected?

my point was that Secret Service agents are still loyal to him even to the point of still doing their job when he tried to destroy the whole government, including their jobs.

Speaking clearly only for myself, I much prefer that to the alternative. I don't view it as a case of being loyal to him, though I'm sure there's some who are. It's about being loyal to the public, to the job itself. If we reach the point where people start refusing to be involved in public service when they don't like the person they are serving under, we won't have a functional government no matter who the people elect.

Same way prosecutors can prosecute defendants for violating laws they don't agree with; they aren't serving that particular law, they are serving the law in a more general sense, and serving the public. IRS agents, plumbers and food preparers in any governmental capacity including the White House, there is of course almost no end to examples of this kind of thing.

Do you not know what the term lining up means?

You're incredibly naive if you don't think serving in a Trump admin and supporting him aren't one in the same. He has flat out said he is going to give loyalty tests and remove anyone not loyal to him. He wants to be a king, not a servant of the people.

It has nothing to do with what he's said or what he plans to do. It's about serving the system, the institution, the office. There is no president imaginable - I mean that literally - for whom serving would mean supporting that person, personally or in terms of policy, inherently. If it did, government could not function.

When a military action is ordered, the question isn't 'does the order come from someone whose politics I agree with or who I think is worthy of his job'. The question is 'do I have valid orders from my chain of command, which begins with the commander-in-chief as selected by the constitutional process'.

This is why democracy is in jeopardy.

Youre fooling yourself if you don't think there are service members willing to put Trump over country.

I think we're talking at cross-points there. There are people willing to do that ... there have always been people willing to do that but I made a comment to that effect in one of my posts not far up.

The quote you are objecting to though is just about how the system has to work. Not just our system, but any system, under any quality of leadership no matter how good or bad. It doesn't put democracy in jeopardy, and it's not about putting Trump over country. It's about putting country over Trump (or whoever else), serving regardless of who the president or other leader might happen to be. That's a requirement for functional government of any kind to exist, so Secret Service or whoever else being willing to participate in a Trump administration is not a negative thing. It's a necessity.

The Star of the show...er trial Stormy Daniels is appearing today. trump isn't happy about it because they only found out the day before because the judge had ruled earlier to not give his lawyers the normal courtesy of letting them know in advance who the witnesses will be because of their client's continued intimidation of them in social media.

This sounds like the judge just gave Trump grounds for appeal. I thought the surprise witness thing was a big no-no nowadays.

Then again IANAL.

They are on a witness list, so it isn't a surprise that someone is testifying

I'm no lawyer but I would assume one post about horseface would be enough to get the appeal tossed out

Oh, so the order is a surprise but the witness itself isn't?

If that's the case then I misunderstood Thomkal's post.

Just because someone is on the witness list, there is no obligation that they are called to testify.

Each side can call a witness from the list as they see fit. The order could change based on how the testimony goes from previous witnesses.

There should be zero surprise about Stormy Daniels testifying. They had to be prepared if she was the first witness, last witness, or not called at all. To say they didn't have time to prepare is simply not the case and is being used probably for fundraising purposes from people that don't know any better.

Both sides have the witness list and plenty of time to prepare for them. Because Trump couldn't stop intimidating potential witnesses leading to some of his gag orders, the judge ruled that they don't have to follow the common courtesy in a trial and didn't have to reveal who was next on their witness appearance until the day before.



i'm damned sure that Trump's lawyers were very ready for Stormy whenever she gave her testimony.

Posts about Stormy Daniels and then a too-quick read of another post referring to ANAL and I was like, OK maybe it's time to start paying attention to that trial.

It just occurred to me that there must be a Trump/Stormy parody porn out there.

Speaking of "what's the worst that could happen?" ...

Probably several

My wife received a text from Trump/Trump adjacent group asking for an "endorsement" before his trial resumes.

The Republican presidential candidate is texting people for money to help with his trial because he lied about paying to fuck a porn actress...

The party of family values

Judge Cannon has indefinitely postponed the documents case.

She needs to be removed from this case and the bench.

Clearly the government was just too mean to poor ol' trump. It's just so unfair that he be put through this. All he's ever done is love the USA and this is how they repay him. He's more persecuted than Ghandi, Lincoln and Jesus...combined. All we can do is fix this and make it right or we risk angering God. God Bless the USA. Pray for us all.

Jesus molson, I was having a good day. QS was having a good day. We were all having a good day....

:p

Haha I got that trash too.

I'd be interested in hearing the other lawyers here chime in, but from my perspective she is very carefully making sure that all of the things she is doing to help Trump are not the sorts of things that would get her removed from the case.

First, she is not doing anything that is immediately appealable, so the government would have to file a writ of mandamus (or something similar) to get to the appellate court. (And the fact that you've probably never heard of a writ of mandamus gives you a sense of just what an extraordinary remedy that is).

Second, she is confining her rulings to areas where the appellate courts traditionally give trial judges very wide discretion, like scheduling.

Also, as a bonus, the Eleventh Circuit is the 3rd most MAGA/Conservative federal appellate court in the country (behind the 5th Circuit and the Supreme Court), so any attempt to go over her head would be very risky.

TL;DR--What she's doing is obvious. But she's doing it in a way that, from my point of view, won't get her kicked off the case.

This is a dead avenue; Trump won.

Democrats need to run on the swamp winning and how the corruption from Trump's taint is spreading.

It was a lost cause when the case went to her court.

Steve Bannon don't past Go, don't collect $200


Just a moment...

Break out the popcorn-It's Michael Cohen Testify day in court today. Not a fan of Cohen during his time as Trump's attorney, but since then we haven't really seen/heard him act that way. And he's already gone to jail for his part in what he did in this case, so I'm sure it will be a pleasant reunion

Mike Johnson is the latest republican to come to court to support Trump. What an absolute disgrace rump has turned us in to.

Is this some rich people thing? Can't you just put out an arrest warrant for the guy?

Arizona officials say they can’t find Rudy Giuliani to serve him with indictmentÂ*notice | CNN Politics

And today Johnson gave a speech saying that crimes need to be crimes again.

Spoiler for barf inducing content:

I will say these Republicans are getting valuable experience for when their own trial starts

At this point does having Gaetz and Boebert at your trial count as 'support'?

The party of family values - showing up en masse to support a guy in his trial for *checks notes* illegally paying off an adult film star with whom he cheated on *checks notes again* his third wife.

Someone mentioned that Boebert didn't even show up to her son's court case last week. Nor did she get him an attorney.

That surprises me. She seems like the sort of woman who would willingly offer a hand.

Happy Birthday Giuliani!

Rudy Giuliani is served indictment papers at his own birthday party after mocking Arizona attorney general

The fall of Rugy Giuliani is one of the most fascinating things in politics for me over the past 25 years.

Agreed.

I lived in NYC in the late 90s. He was hugely popular, a pragmatist, enacted policy you could see improving the city. There was an underlying oddness with his personal life, but, that seemed like just fun subway tabloid reading. I also remembering him dressing in drag more than once for events. It wasn't a big deal, it fit the city and the time and it was who he was.

I choose not to remember this Giuliani. I choose to remember the Giuliani that went after falsified fat free yogurt.

I've said this on here before, but if Giuliani had retired a few years after 9/11, wrote a bestseller autobiography called "America's Mayor," gone to live upstate and just came out to make the occasional appearance at 4th of July Parades, he'd be at 98% approval.

Giuliani took cops along and started a race riot in front of the Mayor's house in the 90's. He was pretty bad but got insanely friendly media coverage after 9/11 despite some of those deaths being his fault.

Reminds me if how Cuomo was this hero during COVID while he was killing off the senior population in record numbers.

Cuomo was killing them off, or COVID was?

Well he was sending COVID positive patients into nursing homes and then lied about the numbers. Was a pretty big scandal and killed a lot of people.

Did he tell people to inject bleach, though?

If not, he was negligent.

I can't believe the gag order prevented Trump from testifying. Fucking woke mob activist trans judges.

It's really outrageous that Judge Cannon is doing everything she can to keep this trial from happening.

It would also be nice if Dems decided to scream bloody murder about at least one thing in the seemingly bottomless pit of corruption of and criminality.