OA56: Jury Secrecy and Pena-Rodriguez v. Colorado

Transcript

This transcript was generated automatically and may contain errors — the audio is the record.

0:01:17 Thomas: Hello, and welcome to Opening Arguments. This is episode number 56. I'm your host, Thomas Smith, and that over there is your host Andrew Torrez. How are you doing today, Andrew?

0:01:26 Andrew: Fantastic, Thomas, how are you?

0:01:27 Thomas: Doing great. We are going to answer a very interesting question, Andrew. So let's go to, let's break down some law, shall we?

0:01:38 Clip: The law breaking down

0:01:45 Thomas: Weird thing happened. Again, we, you know, we record this a little ahead of time, but this, I I think it's Nunes, anyway, this guy, you may have seen last week, he just gave a press conference. He's part of the House Intelligence Committee. Oh, he's the chairman. That's right.

0:02:00 Andrew: He's the chairman, actually. Yeah.

0:02:02 Thomas: And he just gave a briefing to the press without any other member of the committee knowing about it. He just did it and divulged stuff that ranking Democrat Adam Schiff said, who's a ranking Democrat on on the committee, said he didn't even know about the stuff Devin Nunes was talking about. So there's some interesting stuff happening there. People have asked, did he just, with all the Republicans have been making a big deal with how much they've been talking about leaks, and that's been the focus of their, any time Comey's testifying, any Time anyone else is testifying before Congress, the Republicans are just interested in these leaks. They don't care about any of the illegal stuff actually going on. They just want to know who's tattling.

0:02:48 Thomas: So with all that said, didn't Chairman Devin Nunes just leak stuff himself? Didn't you just leak classified material to the White House because he did this little briefing? So did he violate 18 U.S.C. 793(f), Andrew?

0:03:03 Andrew: Yeah. So a couple of things here. The answer to that question is yes. If you like, you just want the answer and want to turn off the show. Yes. So a few things. Nunes believed that as part of his intelligence briefing, or appears to have believed as part part of his intelligence briefing, that he had some kind of evidence of, you know, that that supported the Trump conspiracy theory that he was being wiretapped by President Obama, that has been conclusively disproven, that the information relates to conversations between Trump and individuals who were targets of FISA court warrants, legitimate FISA court warrants. And Nunes himself has said that those were validly procured surveillance warrants.

0:03:49 Andrew: Right. So there is, there is nothing that supports the wild Trump allegations. If you're seeing that, that's not true. There's nothing that sports any illegal activity. And in fact, like the most troubling aspect of it is that Donald Trump is talking to people who are themselves the subject of FISA court warrants. What I found profoundly interesting about this question is our listeners who have been with us for several months might recognize statute 18 USC 793 F because it is the same statute that we discussed at great length in Opening Arguments episode 16 about Hillary Clinton's emails. And in fact, the statute provides as follows.

0:04:35 Andrew: It says, whoever being entrusted with or having lawful possession or control of any document dot dot dot related to the national defense, one, through gross negligence permits the same to be removed from its proper place of custody or delivered to anyone in violation of his trust or to be lost, stolen, abstracted or destroyed, asteroid, dot dot dot, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than 10 years or both.

And so we evaluated that statute as to whether Hillary Clinton's use of a private email server violated 18 U.S.C. 793(f)(1) that I just read, and we concluded in light of the long history of, read through over 240 cases that were 18 U.S.C. 793 cases, that that subsection, even though it uses the words gross negligence, that no case has ever been brought, let alone a conviction has been secured, to anybody who failed to have the willful intent to disclose or destroy, uh, confidential information. Um, so we talked about cases like the guy who discovered that he had confidential information in his gym bag and then shoved it into a desk drawer and forgot about it. Right. Or the guy who was supposed to destroy documents, but instead threw him in a dumpster for neighborhood kids to find, you know, things like that.

And what we found lacking for Hillary Clinton as a result of the FBI's own internal investigation was that critical element of intent. And the intent was not only read into the statute by practice, but there was also a strong suggestion that in the absence of intent, that the statute would be unconstitutionally vague, right, that you would wind up criminalizing accidental behavior and that that would not survive constitutional scrutiny. So that was our Hillary Clinton analysis. Same analysis to House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes, who received information clearly labeled confidential as part of his briefing.

0:05:57 Thomas: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

0:06:50 Andrew: Think, uh, this is not like, oh, what does the C mean at the bottom? Like, are you really? No, this was stamped header said The guy saying, this is now, Congressman, this is confidential information, and he ran out and held a press conference about it. It is, uh, that is at the core of what these, what the statute prohibits, right? It prohibits the disclosure, uh, causes to be communicated, delivered, or transmitted. Um, right yeah, um

0:06:55 Thomas: This wasn't mislabeled email. Or whatever. Yeah, yeah.

0:07:21 Thomas: It seems pretty intentful, intentional I guess

0:07:26 Andrew: Yeah And so, uh, we're sort of keeping a running tally of the people who violated the law who, uh, appear to never, uh, whom it appears that they're never going to be held accountable for it. Uh, this is is a very, very clear case. And I would love for anybody, I would particularly love for anybody to make the case that Hillary Clinton should be busting rocks in Leavenworth, but Devin Nunes should not, right? Like that, that is, impossible.

0:07:26 Thomas: Yeah they're never held accountable right

0:07:54 Andrew: I feel very confident to say that case is impossible to make no matter how tortured a definition of the law you have. And it really is, you legal answer is sufficient. This clearly violates the law. It clearly violates the Espionage Act. The only argument that you could make is that the information is not sufficiently vital to the national defense. Would require an analysis of the entire briefing versus the amount that was disclosed. But that, that's typically not a good argument right like, no of course, of course you didn't make that argument with Hillary because, uh, I didn't even try in our

0:07:47 Thomas: Yeah yeah did anyone ever make that argument with Hillary, because I don't remember yeah yeah right okay

0:08:35 Andrew: OA 16, because this is not typically a successful argument, um, you know, if a document is clearly labeled confidential, uh, it is, you know, there is a presumption that attaches to it that it is, it has been so classified because it is vital to the national defense, and courts, and you can understand this, right? Like, let's leave aside, you know, Democrat, Republican, I don't want courts second guessing, you know, material the Pentagon labels as vital to national security within kind of that short time frame. Right. Like, there's, you know, there's the famous Pentagon Papers case in which, you know, 20 years later, the Pentagon still hasn't declassified information. Yeah. OK, let's start second guessing when we are five, 10 years out. But when you're talking contemporaneous classified intelligence documents, I did not make that defense for Hillary Clinton. I did not say, you know, these are these emails are of no consequence, right? That wasn't part of the argument. And it shouldn't be. And it shouldn't be part of the argument here for Nunez either. So I don't I don't, don't see that there's any way to square those positions I

0:08:39 Thomas: Yeah you know, I'm just puzzled why I'm not seeing anybody talking about this. I don't know if you have, but all I'm seeing is people saying, oh, he really shouldn't have gone straight to the president. Like, that's pretty much all I've seen. What, why, how do you account for that? Um, it's, are people just not, I mean, yeah.

0:09:55 Andrew: I think it's, I mean, I think it's fatigue, right? Like, Luke Russert, uh, tweeted about it, um, David Corn tweeted about it, but, uh, I would, um, say it's probably the same reason that you're not seeing people banging the drum every day with respect to Ivanka Trump, with respect to, um, you know, Jared Kushner it's as clear as Kushler. So keep that still

0:10:12 Thomas: Is this as clear as Kushner? Cash, we need a new, yeah, we needed new, uh, uh somehow work that into the, to the intro or or something, because this verdict on this is clear as Kushner.

0:10:25 Andrew: Yeah. Hashtag clear as Kushner.

0:10:27 Thomas: Yeah. And it's so frustrating too, because the whole reason he did this, this is the person, by the way, who, am I right? This is the leader of the committee that should be looking into some of these charges, these allegations against the Trump administration. And the fact that he's just running up to give Trump some secret information that he heard that doesn't even vindicate what Trump has said. Like, he was trying to do that to say, oh, Trump, you were right, Obama was wiretapping you. When really, all this says is people in your campaign were heard because they were talking to people who were being investigated, right?

0:11:09 Andrew: Yes. And I just want to go back to this. This is Nunez's own statement. Right. Quote, This is a normal incidental collection based on what I could collect. This appears to be all legally collected foreign intelligence under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. Right? Right. So, yeah, this is not a brave whistleblower. This is Trump loyalist information and running out, holding a press conference, and then briefing the president and his political flax on like Kellyanne Conway, is not authorized to receive foreign intelligence committee reports. Thank God. And, and taking confidential information and giving it to Kellyanne Conway and giving it to Luke Russert is precisely what the Espionage Act is meant to prevent. Right.

0:11:26 Thomas: Right, right.

0:11:59 Andrew: It's not 100 percent right. Like, the core of what it's intended to prevent is, you know, taking it and giving it to the Russians. But but giving it to a press who then has the right to circulate it is awfully close to giving it to the Russians, right. So, um yep clear as Kushner

0:12:06 Thomas: Yeah, yeah, yeah. All right, well, clear as Kushner, everybody. Buddy. All right, let's get to our main segment for today.

0:12:28 Thomas: Okay. I'm just going to give a vague intro cause I don't know anything about this, but, but that's fine. I think that'll be fine.

0:12:35 Thomas: Okay. Andrew, for our main segment, we're going to talk about jury secrecy. Now, it looks like you've labeled the case here. It's Peña Rodriguez versus Colorado. I don't know. Did this establish jury secrecy? Or I don'T know. But I'm excited to learn about it, especially with all of the facts I learned from Law'd Awful Movies number three, which was Runaway Jury. So, I mean, I feel like I already have a very good base I'm working from here of just, you know, factual legal knowledge from that movie. But I'M looking forward to building on that.

0:12:55 Andrew: Yeah Um, this is, I, I think this is going to be a very, very significant case going forward, uh, I, I hesitate to call it a landmark case, um, but uh, but it's, I think, really significant, uh, and um it's

0:13:17 Thomas: Hmm oh it's so it's a new case, okay

0:13:23 Andrew: A, it's brand new case, just just out of the Supreme

0:13:25 Thomas: I'm sorry I thought we were I thought we're gonna be talking about, like, the the history of it. My fault, oh

0:13:26 Andrew: Nope. First time the Supreme Court has tackled this particular question that I'm about to put forward. It also helps illustrate it is another that breaks down along non-originalist versus originalist lines, which we're not, you know, like, I'm going to continue beating that drum until Gorsuch is filibustered off the Supreme court.

0:13:43 Thomas: No, well I have to ask, right now will this be decided, or was it decided before, like, will it be decided before he's in, if he gets in, it was decided. Oh oh okay, just came out. Okay.

0:13:53 Andrew: Yeah, no, this was decided March 6th, 2017. Yeah, yeah. It's

0:14:04 Thomas: I see, so that, that's good then so

0:14:04 Andrew: A it's a five. It'S a five three decision. And so it lines up the the non-originalist judges, Ginsburg, Breyer, Sotomayor, Kagan and Justice Anthony Kennedy, who wrote the majority opinion.

0:14:16 Thomas: The so the real justices

0:14:17 Andrew: Yeah. And then.

0:14:17 Thomas: Okay on one hand you have actual justices, got it

0:14:19 Andrew: Right. And And then The Descent is Thomas, Alito, and Roberts. And so, you know, Thomas and Alito are sort of hardcore originalists. You find them in every – and Roberts is, you Know, 90-odd percent of the time. You know, he's thrown a couple of bones that make him a little bit unpredictable. But is sort of the lineup, up, um, and you know, I was, I was ready to predict, and I think I had sort of predicted, uh, when I thought, uh, the ninth seat was going to go to a Hillary Clinton appointee, uh, that we were going to see, um, Anthony Kennedy kind of shift, uh, leftward and align and align himself with sort of of the new uh you know liberal majority on the Court, um, it seems as though uh he's aligned himself uh with the non-originalists on the Court uh in In a number of cases, including this one.

So, you know, look, it remains to be seen how that's going to play out uh in some other cases, but uh this but case comes out very squarely on how do you interpret the Sixth Amendment's guarantee of a right to a fair trial uh versus uh do you use the kind of originalist uh mentality to to sort of read, read that guarantee a sort of as minimal as possible. So, so here's

0:14:35 Thomas: Yeah you did say that well That's good. Okay.

0:15:40 Thomas: It's

0:15:41 Andrew: What here's, what we're dealing with as a factual background. By and large, we have a rule that is called the non impeachment rule in with respect to jury jury deliberations. And what that means is what happens in the jury room stays in the jury room, right? You cannot come out of that and complain to, if you're a juror, you can't come out that and tell the judge, oh, hey, look, like, you know, this was crazy. And you should disregard this jury's verdict because we didn't look at the facts at all, right. Right. You know, you could imagine lots of scenarios.

0:16:19 Thomas: Just assumed that whatever they did in there, they somehow came to a good decision or something like that, okay.

0:16:19 Andrew: Right. Yeah. Right, right. And the federal rules of evidence have a set of exceptions for when you can come out. This is actually a Colorado state case. So this is an example of when the Supreme Court can review the decisions of a state court because they impinge upon a constitutionally protected right. Right? So, so in other words, they're not interpreting the Colorado statute. They're asking, assuming that your interpretation of the Colorado statue is correct, does that violate the Sixth Amendment to the Constitution? And here the Supreme Court said yes. So what does the Colorado statutes say? It says inquiry into validity of verdict or indictment, upon an inquiry into the validity or verdict of an indictment.

0:17:14 Andrew: A juror may not testify as to any matter or statement occurring during the course of the jury's deliberation, or to the effect of anything upon his or any other juror's mind or emotions as influencing him to assent to or dissent from the verdict or indictment, or concerning his mental processes and connection therewith. But a juror may testify about, one, whether extraneous prejudicial information was improperly brought to the juror's attention. Two, whether any outside influence was improperly brought to bear upon any juror, say somebody trying to buy off the jury from operating on a shady consulting firm, right? Or three, whether there was a mistake in entering the verdict onto the verdict form, a la Lionel Hutz, this verdict is written on a cocktail napkin and it still says guilty, and guilty is spelled wrong. A juror's affidavit or evidence of any statement by the juror may not be received on a matter about which the jurors would be precluded from testifying, okay? So that's the no impeachment rule, says what happens in the jury stays in the jurory.

0:17:48 Thomas: Yeah. Oh.

0:18:18 Thomas: That's the original, I thought you were reading the Colorado

0:18:21 Andrew: Yeah, that's what, that's, that's the, that's the Colorado statute, which reflects the mainstream view in most states and in the federal rules of evidence. Right. So what happened in this case? This was an individual, Miguel Angel Pena Rodriguez, was accused of sexually assaulting two teenage girls in the bathroom of a horse racing facility at a racetrack.

0:18:21 Thomas: Okay.

0:18:51 Thomas: Larry.

0:18:51 Andrew: Okay, so girls told their father, identified the man as an employee of the racetrack, uh, and then, um, the uh jurors were asked about their bias, etc., etc., after the verdict came down, two jurors submitted affidavits to the judge that said we're really concerned about this jury's verdict because, uh, there was a juror identified only by by his initials, H.C., who said, yeah, right.

0:19:15 Thomas: Clinton. No. I'm just kidding.

0:19:17 Andrew: Who said, I'm an ex law enforcement officer and I can tell you that Mexican men have a bravado that caused them to believe that they can do whatever they want with women. Right. The jurors said that H.C. physically stated his belief that Mexicanmen are physically controlling of women because of their sense of entitlement. And he said, this is, I think, the key quote, H.C. saying, I think he did it because he's Mexican, and Mexican men take whatever they want. OK, according to the jurors, H.C. further explained that in his experience, quote, nine times out of 10 Mexican men were guilty of being aggressive towards women and young girls. And again, as a Torres, I have a very strong interest in how this case comes out. I can tell you that's a, that's a horrible slander against my people.

0:20:04 Andrew: So so the facts are in the jury deliberation room, you have you you cannot get a more clear illustration of racial bias than that. Right. Like, I think Mexicans just take what they want. And 90 percent of the time, Mexicans are guilty. So come on, vote this guy guilty. Right? Right. So the question is, can those jurors go to the judge and say, hey, look, we got a real problem here. Like you got a jury who is coming up with a decision because they're being swayed by this racist. Right.

0:20:13 Thomas: Yeah. Yeah. Right. Yeah.

0:20:36 Andrew: I read the Colorado statute first because you might be able to make an argument of, you know, is that prejudicial? No, okay, it, it does not, you, I want, I want you to just take as a given uh that it does not fall into the exceptions of the no impeachment rule, because there was no specific evidence that was adduced in, right, like to fall within those exceptions you have to bring In, you, and what happens in those cases, right?

Like, so, for example, um, we, we often talk about this on Law Awful Movies, this is a good, um, a good segue, um, you'll make an objection in court, in a real trial, one attorney will ask a question, there will be an objection, the judge will say "sustained," and then will turn to the jury and say, the jury will disregard that remark. Or there's a piece of evidence, right? The jury will disregard this piece of evidence. You are not to take it into account in your deliberation. And then if you go back into the room and the jurors say, hey, look, I know we were told to disregard, but like, Like, did you ask him, you know, didn't you agree? You know, Didn't you sign

0:20:59 Thomas: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

0:21:40 Andrew: A confession?

0:21:39 Thomas: So that, yeah so that would fall under the exceptions.

0:21:40 Andrew: Right. Yeah. That would fall under one of the exceptions. Right. So if you if the jury has been instructed to disregard a piece of evidence and the jurors deliberate about it anyway, you need to pierce through that impeachment, that no impeachment rule in order to say.

0:21:45 Thomas: Yeah.

0:21:55 Thomas: So essentially there's a very high sounds like a high threshold or a high burden for things that it's okay to go outside of the jury deliberation room later and say, hey, here's what happened and I don't think it was right. It seems like there's very few exceptions where you can actually do that.

0:22:13 Andrew: Exactly. Exactly right. And so this doesn't by the terms of the statute, this doesn'T apply. And in fact, that'S what the lower court said. Like, look, like we agree it's really, really bad. Sounds horrible, but we're not going to invade the jury because near and violent.

0:22:14 Thomas: Okay, right.

0:22:29 Thomas: Would they have so that that hopefully this would have been weeded out in jury selection or something is that where

0:22:34 Andrew: Right. And that's why they go into, I didn't, I didn't go in. But there were questions asked during voir dire of, you know, are you racially biased? Do you have anything? But but again, like, you know, as the lawyer, as somebody who's done this sort of thing, like, you know, how do you, when I ask somebody, are are you, you know, are you racially biased, is there, are there tests you would ask, you know, is there anything that would cause you to weigh the testimony of a member of one race lower than the member of any other race? Well, one of the things racists are really good at is lying, right? Like, so they say, oh no, absolutely

0:22:35 Thomas: Yeah, yeah. Yeah, that's why you have

0:23:06 Andrew: Not.

0:23:06 Thomas: To ask them. Does your mom know you're racist, that's how, just little lawyer, lawyer trick, just take voir dire, uh, tips from a podcast. Anyway. Anyway.

0:23:06 Andrew: Yeah, yeah, Right. So if not, not this path of the podcast. So now let's go to kind of the central argument that was made and is now law, thanks to the five justice majority. This is part three of the opinion in which they've said the Sixth Amendment's protection of a fair trial as incorporated to the states through the 14th Amendment. We've talked about that process means that laws, those non incorporation laws are void insofar as they shield from disclosure, obvious racial animus that takes place in a jury. Okay.

0:23:53 Thomas: Interesting.

0:23:53 Andrew: And here's why. So I'm going to read a little bit. There's a little bit lengthy from the opinion, but I think it's really significant. "It must become the heritage of our nation to rise above racial classifications that are so inconsistent with our commitment to the equal dignity of all persons. This imperative to purge racial prejudice from the administration of justice was given new force and direction by the ratification of the Civil War Amendments, the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments." Right. Quote, "the central purpose of the 14th Amendment was to eliminate racial discrimination emanating from official sources in the states," end of quote. In the years, and then there's a citation to the case, "in the years before and after the ratification of the 14th Amendment, it became clear that racial discrimination in the jury system posed a particular threat both to the promise of the amendment and to the integrity of the civil trial."

0:24:40 Andrew: "Almost immediately after the Civil War, the South began a practice that would continue for many decades. All white juries punished Black defendants particularly harshly, while simultaneously refusing to punish violence by whites, including Ku Klux Klan members, against blacks and Republicans. To take one example, in 1865 and 1866, all white juries in Texas decided a total of 500 prosecutions of white defendants charged with killing African-Americans. All 500 were acquitted. The stark and unapologetic nature of race motivated outcomes challenged the American belief that the jury was a bulwark of liberty and prompted Congress to pass legislation to integrate the jury system and to bar persons from eligibility for jury service if they had conspired to deny the civil rights of African Americans.

0:25:29 Andrew: "Members of Congress testified that legislation was necessary to preserve the right to a fair trial and to guarantee the equal protection of the laws." I could go on, but I think that piece of evidence, it shows if you were listening to the language, right? The language adopted by the majority was the intent behind the Sixth and Fourteenth Amendments is a general anti-discrimination principle in the administration of justice. Historically, it's been a problem, uh, that juries have, uh, reached blatantly racially biased outcomes. And one of the purposes in passing the 14th Amendment, uh, was to combat that kind of racial injustice. Okay, and from that, um, they then concluded that the Sixth Amendment right, as incorporated to the states through the 14th Amendment, outweighs history of the no impeachment rule.

Right, this is this is a big enough problem that we have to intervene and solve it. And so what that means is when you have a case like this where the jurors come forward and say there's just outright racial prejudice in the deliberations that renders the jury verdict, uh, null and void, you cannot reach, right? Like, this is precisely the kind of outcome that is illustrative of, you know, what is sometimes called the living model of the Constitution, right. That, that says you have a, a, uh, a vague term in the Constitution. Right. Which is, in this case, the Sixth Amendment's guarantee of a fair trial. Like, what's a fair trail? Right. It's

0:27:03 Thomas: Yeah.

0:27:04 Andrew: It's informed from philosophy and history as embodying a particular principle. It includes, you know, we talked about this on Tuesday's episode. It includes some evaluation of the the history that was relevant at the time of the passage of the 14th Amendment, you know, which is namely the bias against African-Americans and that, you know, horrifying statistic of juries in Texas just basically letting white people charged with murder go free. Um, and then incorporates that as a sort of a general principle going forward. Um, it may not surprise you that the dissent, uh, authored authored by Alito. Yes, um, let, let's check out section one of Alito's dissent. "Rules barring the admission of juror testimony to impeach a verdict, so-called no impeachment rules, have a long history. Indeed, they predate the ratification of the Constitution. Their previous, they are typically traced back to this 1785 English court in which Lord Mansfield declined to consider an affidavit from two jurors who claimed that the jury had reached its verdict by lot," right, that is by flipping a coin.

"All right, Lord Mansfeld approach soon took root in the United States, and by the beginning of the 20th century, if not earlier, the near universal and firmly established common law rule in the United States flatly prohibited the admission of juror testimony to impeach a jury verdict." Um, know, I could, I could continue to, you know, kind of read through, but but essentially you have, you know, an originalist driven argument that says, hey, look, uh, this principle of, uh, how we disregard jury testimony

0:27:33 Thomas: Yeah, yeah.

0:27:44 Thomas: Let's hear it.

0:28:40 Andrew: About what takes place in jury deliberation, uh, goes back 240 years. Uh, it was well known at the time that the 14th Amendment, it was well known at the time that the Sixth Amendment was passed. It was well known that the Fourteenth Amendment was passed. If you wanted to override it, they would have said they were going to override it. They didn't. So therefore, it's, you know, now, quote, judicial activism to try and extend the Sixths and Fourteenth Amendments to apply in these particular cases. And that's, right, that's how it breaks down. Dissent comes out the other way. They say, as you suggested, that the court has identified four mechanisms that protect your Sixth Amendment rights. First, jurors can be examined during voir dire. Second, during the trial, the jury is observable by the court, by counsel, and by court personnel.

0:29:28 Andrew: Third, juror's are observable each other and may report inappropriate juror behavior to the court italicized before they render a verdict. And fourth, after the trial, a party may seek to impeach the verdict by non-juror evidence of misconduct. These other sources of protection of petitioner's right to a competent jury convince the court that the juror testimony should be properly excluded, right? So, you know, there's kind of where the rubber meets the road, right, which is to say look at – and

0:29:32 Thomas: Wait, did they need a unanimous decision for this for the jury?

0:30:01 Andrew: So the answer is in – yeah, in many states you have rules that require either a 9-3 majority or – I mean it varies state by state. But I believe that Colorado follows a 9-3 majority.

0:30:04 Thomas: They must not have otherwise because it okay.

0:30:18 Thomas: Because it would be interesting if it required, you know, if if you would have needed uh every juror to go, so, you know, 12 jurors to go one way. But yeah, it strikes me as interesting if one of the ways that a fair trial is going to be preserved is jurors will hold each other accountable. Well, if up to three jurors can all say, like, "Gosh, look at this racist," but there's, you know, one racist and eight impressionable jurors, there's nothing they can do to that effect.

0:30:48 Andrew: Yeah, I mean, that's right. So, you know, ultimately, you Know, this is another illustration of, you that justices like Scalia wore as a badge of honor is the, I don't care if the result is absurd, right? And you actually heard, yeah, yeah.

0:31:08 Thomas: Yeah, I was just going to bring that up. I mean, how do you feel about that? I know we've been hammering on originalism a lot lately, but I think this is a really interesting case and it's worthwhile. So what do you think about the arguments of that you shouldn't be legislating from the bench? And if even it might be that the law leads us to a bad outcome, it's not our responsibility ability as justices to to to try to fix like change laws, we're just here to interpret. I mean, how do you see that question as regards this particular case?

0:31:46 Andrew: So Let me tackle the second one first, right, which is the we're not here to judge the outcome, right. Right. So the keep in mind, this argument is, I believe, disingenuous. Right. It is always advanced by people who, by judges who have their opinions, reach a conservative and non-humane outcome as a defense for why they reached that outcome, come, right, like it's not, it's not like they're unaware. So, for example, you talked about on Serious Inquiries Only, the Gorsuch's dissent in the trucker trapped in the ice case, right? Like, and he used the same language. He said, well, I, I understand it reaches this, you know, absurd result, but like, my job is not to reach results, my job is to apply the law.

Well, he's applying that, that, that argument only comes up when you have a particular kind of result, right? And that particular kind of result is an inhumane and horrible one, right? So the idea that that is some kind of abstract principle is, in my view, A, you know, not true, because you see when it's invoked, right, not invoked other circumstances, always invoked when you have, you knows, sort of this monstrous conservative outcome that shocks the conscience.

0:31:47 Thomas: Yeah. Yeah.

0:33:06 Andrew: And B, I've talked a little bit about my history. In terms of practice, that doesn't reflect what happens in real life in courts all the time, right? And I have mentioned previously, I litigated a case, call it a case because it's a single set of operative facts, but it was actually three separate lawsuits that proceeded through every level of the Maryland judicial state judicial system, including having cert granted twice for eight years regarding the placement of exterior billboards on a downtown arena, right? And I represented, I was co-counsel along with the state, excuse me, along with the city of Baltimore. I represented the private parties who put up the billboards and the owner of Baltimore's indoor soccer league team, the Baltimore Blast.

0:33:58 Andrew: And opposite us was Peter Angelos, the owner of the Baltimore Orioles, and what I would describe as an astroturf group of, quote, concerned citizens that were organized to, protest the exterior billboards. And in that case, the primary argument that was advanced at every level in eight years of litigation, including before the Court of Appeals on two separate occasions, was a fairness argument, right? Was, I understand the law says X and they can do this, but it's not fair that the law say X. And in particular, what they were challenging was the act of the legislature in creating an exception to the law, because there was a citywide prohibition on exterior signage, uh, of billboards in the city.

0:34:52 Andrew: Uh, there was one exception to it for, for bus shelters. Uh. But what the city did was they created a new exception and then they approved that exception with respect to the Baltimore Blast for the, uh, exterior billboards on the outside of what was then called the First Marin Arena, was now called the Royal Farms Arena. Uh, and they did that in one piece of legislation, right? So they created an exception and gave it to the team owner all in one fell swoop. And the argument on the other side was, that looks kind of fishy and it seems unfair and they should be required to go through a more rigorous process than just the legislative process. And at every level, I had to take that argument seriously, right? Like I couldn't just go into court and say, it please the court, the law says we can do it.

0:35:40 Andrew: They don't challenge that the law was validly enacted. They don'T challenge that this complies with the law. So I don'T know why we're here, right? If I had done that, I firmly believe that I would have lost, right, like it, I had to address, questions of various aspects of zoning that were, were fundamentally rooted in fairness concerns. Yeah,

0:36:00 Thomas: So What you're saying is like, even if we, you know, even if we steel man and say that somebody like Gorsuch did not really want to rule against this trucker because what was, what the company did to him was morally wrong. Let's say he, you know, he said he, he's made that claim a little bit. He soft pedals it, but, but let's say, let's take him at his word. He thinks that's a bad outcome, but he, you know、 he has no choice. The law says X must be X. You're saying that even if we take, take that him at His word and that all these originalists, you Know, they, they have to do what they, this hurts them as much as it hurts us, but they have To, you Now, they Have to rule this way. You're saying even just that part is not true. You have this case history where the judge was going to potentially evaluate fairness. Is this law fair? And it's not simply a question of, well, it's written this way, it is this way.

0:36:07 Andrew: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

0:36:59 Andrew: And I would invite, we have a lot of lawyers that listen to the show and I would invite any of them, wherever you fall on the political spectrum to write in. If your experience is different than mine, I don't believe we will get a dissent on that. I think anybody Anybody who's practiced law, who's been in court, knows that judges left, right and center will ask themselves the question, is this fair before before making?

0:37:25 Andrew: And you've got to get over that hurdle. Yeah, right.

0:37:24 Thomas: When they do that, are they appealing to just another law? Okay, so hypothetically, with Supreme Court justices, they don't always just say the law says X, they need to say does the law violate the Constitution, essentially, like is this consistent or something like that, so is fairness somewhere enshrined in the Constitution, so really you could just say that's what they're doing, they're not necessarily choosing for themselves whether the law is fair.

0:37:55 Andrew: Yeah, it's not typically made that way in particularly in state or in federal trial courts. It's typically made in the context of, um, plaintiff encourages us to reach an absurd result in the law, right? Plaintiff's view of the law says, you Know, that, uh, you know, X, Y, Z can happen. Uh, and that can't possibly be what the legislature meant, you know, in enacting the law.

0:37:59 Thomas: Okay. Sure.

0:38:19 Thomas: You know, that's exactly what Al Franken, my new hero. Al Franken's argument was to Gorsuch, if anyone watched that, it was great. He was like, hey, you know, there's an exception for the literal interpretation of a law, it's when it's an absurd result, this result was absurd, he just said it like three times, it's like, yeah, yeah, right.

0:38:22 Andrew: Yep. Yep. Mine too.

0:38:33 Andrew: Yeah. Yep. And, and, and that's true, right like that. And again, you know, it's not you're not appealing to a specific provision of the Constitution. This is sort of the the hot dog defense, right? This is the yeah, if you if you take you sign up and you get a permit to sell hot dogs on the street and, you You know, the state compliance officer comes by and you have, you know, literal flaming poodles in your cart like that. There's no way that, you Know, the court is going to uphold your right to set dogs on fire in the middle of the street. Right. They're gonna be like that, You know.

0:38:46 Thomas: Yeah. Yeah, yeah. It also could be the Air Bud rule, that's my favorite thing, there's no rule, it says a dog can't play basketball. Interesting.

0:39:12 Andrew: Yeah. Yeah. So. So, yeah, that that that statement is contrary, I think, to the experience of anybody who has litigated in any case, in any level, anywhere in the country.

0:39:25 Thomas: I wouldn't have, have necessarily known that as much as I've always, you know, as much as I listen to you and I agree with your take on originalism, I guess I wasn't sure if that was a valid argument or not, but that really, I'm glad to have learned that now because it makes sense when you say it, you know, judges are concerned with fairness and potentially absurd results, and we know that Scalia wasn't. We know that he was very happy with absurd results.

0:39:29 Andrew: Yeah. Yeah. Well, and again, because you have a group of people who want the court to refer for those individuals. Right. The results aren't absurd. Right? They are. They are callous. But that's the result. Right, by definition, nobody thinks it's the same. It's it's it'S the you know, to go back to comic book movies, right? Like, nobody Nobody thinks they're the villains in their own story.

0:40:07 Thomas: Yeah. Right.

0:40:18 Andrew: Right. Like nobody believes that they're the bad guy. They just believe that, you know, their outcome is, you know, appropriate under the set of rules that are put into place. And so, in my view, that defense is the, is the way of kind of taking that out of ordinary scrutiny. Um, I, I also want to go back kind of very quickly to your question about legislating from the bench. Um, because I, uh, I think the answer to that is yes, I strongly believe in the separation of, of powers. Uh, and you I've made the case. It's not worth going over again here. You can hear you can listen to OA 49 that originalism actually erodes those powers and aggregates greater power to the judiciary than it ought to have by removing constraints upon the results that you can reach.

0:41:10 Andrew: I think Gorsuch is a particularly egregious example of this, as we've talked about, because he said in print while serving on the 10th Circuit, I would like to overturn the Supreme Court's rules that allow for Chevron deference in administrative cases. Right. Like, you know, when you have a 10th Circuit justice who wishes he could be on the Supreme Court to overturn, you know, relative, that's 1982 case. So, you know, I don't want to say recent, but but relatively recent Supreme Court president, right? Like that tells you, right, like he's, he's telling you in print, I'm licking my chops, hoping someday I get to be on the Supreme Court because I can get rid of these cases.

0:41:46 Andrew: In my view, you the charge of activism falls far more on the Gorsuch side. Look, there is a real core of the argument there, which is to say, can come up with decisions from the Warren court in the late 60s and early early 70s, that look like legislation from the bench. So, for example, crafting new rules that specify to school districts exactly how they must bus children into, you know, across district lines to put African-American kids in predominantly white schools and vice versa, and imposing a set of taxes to pay for that. Yeah, that looks an awful lot like legislation, right?

0:41:33 Thomas: Yeah. Yeah yeah

0:42:32 Andrew: And so, so you can, throughout history, pick a couple of those cases and we could have a discussion about it and you could make a strong argument that the school busing cases, for example, constituted legislating from the bench. I would say that that phrase outside of that context, I cannot come up with a case in the past 30 years that is comparable to those busing cases. And I would say that the phrase has, you know, not only lost its meaning, but but has been deliberately employed to sort of obfuscate the, the shell game that that is going on where you have, you know, uh, we've talked at length about DC versus Heller, but, um, you know, you essentially had, uh, Scalia, uh?

0:43:18 Andrew: Marshaling a conservative majority and saying, I'm going to take my pet view of the second amendment that has never been endorsed by any court in history. Uh, and I'm going to pretend as though that is the patently obvious view. Um, I mean that, that, you you know, to me, that's just, you know—well, again, I've hammered

0:43:36 Thomas: I feel like we've hammered on originalists a lot this week and but it but this is a really interesting case though and and I like it. So yeah, that's uh, Pena Rodriguez v. Colorado. Interesting. Thanks for taking us through that. Let's get on to the rest of the show.

0:43:39 Andrew: On that, so. Yep.

0:43:52 Clip: He who questions training, only trains himself at asking questions. What?

0:44:00 Thomas: Now it's time for our listener question. This is longtime friend of the show, Eric Brewer. We love Eric. He's always commenting and messaging and all that. Love that participation in the show. So Eric asks, I'm curious to know why some or most places don't allow convicted felons to vote. If they've served their time and are released back into the population, then they shouldn't have a right to vote. Then, sorry, then shouldn't they have a right to vote? I don't know if it makes any legal sense, but the whole taxation without representation argument seems to be reasonable here, right? These are citizens who have paid their debt and who are being taxed but can't vote. Why is that legal? I would like to add that I won't remember the episode, but months and months ago, if not maybe a year ago, I did a thing on this on Comedy Shoeshine because my joke about it was like, what are we worried about?

0:44:53 Thomas: There's still like Trump versus Hillary. The worst thing that can happen is they vote for Trump. There's not, it's not like there's a felon candidate that all the felons are going to vote for. If there's like an evil candidate that they'll elect, like evil felon candid, if we let them vote, I don't get this either. I've never gotten it. There's no like, it only gets, it doesn't get worse than Republicans. Like, so whatever.

0:45:09 Andrew: I I think that that's a, I think Dan, Dan the Conservative Man, just dropped his patronage at that one. Um, no, uh, there was also an episode of GI Joe, uh, way back in the day, that was based on the sneakily getting in. Like Cobra was trying to get Cobra operatives elected to local government. Uh we

0:45:20 Thomas: Yeah. Yeah. We treat it like it's, yeah, exactly. Like some comic book thing where there's, they're gonna vote in, you know, uh, I don't know, what are the, the guy with the spider legs and Spider-Man, that's the last one I saw. I haven't seen any of these comic book movies. Yeah.

0:45:45 Andrew: Know how you feel about comic book movies, um, so here's the answer to the question. Okay, first, the taxation without representation has exactly as much legal force as the Declaration of Independence, right, which is to say it's a slogan from our history, uh, but not binding legal precedent. And, and as proof, I offer the citizens of the District of Columbia, right? Like, they, they have a shadow representative in the House, Eleanor Holmes Norton. They have no representation in the Senate. They pay taxes, uh, and in many cases, uh, they pay, you know, a very high rate

0:45:47 Thomas: Exactly yeah right oh yeah they ought to have themselves a tea party

0:46:18 Andrew: Of taxes

0:46:18 Thomas: A boss of a DC tea party just

0:46:18 Andrew: Yeah um no there, look, the, um, it is part of the DC statehood party has, uh, tried to use the maxim of taxation without representation for as long as I can remember, you know, to sort of no effect.

0:46:21 Thomas: Yeah, yeah well it makes some sense, but yeah I guess they just have, yeah yeah

0:46:35 Andrew: Of course, it makes plenty of sense, but it doesn't, it's not a prohibition. I will say this, the law seems to be moving in a direction, we had a time period, particularly in the 1980s, in which was marked by a great many trends in the law, but one of of the trends was, uh, increasing, uh, federalization of formerly state crimes, right? Like making those, uh, federal offenses as well as state offenses, and, um, imposing, uh, lengthy mandatory minimums for the commission of crime. So it was a sort of a, uh, Nixon-Reagan, uh, tough on crime, like that was the definition of the Republican Party back then. And, you know, you see some of that rhetoric from Donald Trump. Now, you didn't see that same kind of rhetoric from George H.W.

0:47:24 Andrew: Bush or even George W. Bush in interregnum. And part of that is a cultural shift. But we're seeing a little bit of a backlash to the practical consequences of federalizing tons of state crime and imposing mandatory minimum sentences is all of a sudden you have tremendous, tremendous expenses and overcrowded prisons. See, look, we did the terminology and even I slipped into it. So, have sort of all of those problems. Now we have, probably not likely to go anywhere, just like it hasn't gone anywhere the past couple of years, but there have been bipartisan commissions that are looking to recommend reducing or eliminating, eliminating sentences for nonviolent drug offenders and revisiting currently incarcerated inmates who are incarcerated for non-violent offenses. You have a political movement called Ban the Box, which has been effective in many states in prohibiting employers from asking. There's a standard checkbox that employers use that ask, have you been convicted of a crime?

0:47:47 Thomas: Yeah clarified the difference yeah oh

0:48:37 Andrew: And so the Ban the Box movement, which I think, by the way, is far more crucial in terms of reintegration into society than voting, not to downplay. I mean, we talk about the significance of voting on the show all the time. And I would encourage every member of our audience, particularly if you disagree with us, to register and go out and vote. So that's not to suggest it's not important, but but but getting a job, getting sort of basic sustenance, you know, if you think about, you've, you've paid your debt to society and have been released, for employers to kind of maintain that level of discrimination, I think is counterproductive. So I'm pro the Ban the Box campaign. And states are making progress in terms of restoring felon voting rights. So 38 states right now and the District of Columbia provide for felons to regain their right to vote.

0:49:28 Andrew: In many of those cases, it's automatic. In some cases, they have to wait for a certain period of time. And in some cases you have to actually fill out an application. But but in lots of those states, it is actually automatically restored to you. So not not quite true that that most places don't allow convicted felons to vote. Now, the the majority allow them to vote, not allowed to vote in federal elections, not aloud. You know, in a very sort of state by state, in 12 states, they're still prohibited from voting in state elections. Uh, but the trends are moving in a direction that is that is more sort of pro integration back into society. And I, and I think, you know, you and I and Eric are all sort of on the same page with respect to, um, it makes sense.

0:49:52 Thomas: Okay it's

0:50:15 Andrew: Yeah well

0:50:15 Thomas: Makes good, it's gonna make so little difference in the grand scheme of things too, like I mean

0:50:18 Andrew: Yeah but but now let me say, I, I think the statistics I am giving you are obviously through 2016, right? Right. Like a core part of Trump's rhetoric is, I really won the popular vote because Hillary Clinton used illegals and fake votes to get three million more popular votes than me. And that makes it really, really difficult if you are a member of a humanitarian public interest organization to go out there and organize to to return the right of convicted felons to vote, right? Like that that plays directly into that accusation. And I, I am sure, uh, that those organizations are having a difficult time of it right now, because, you know, the, the other side is saying, see look, like, you know, you want to take criminal votes and pad them to your total, like, you know, real Americans vote, voted for Trump. And and, you know, that's a, uh, it's a tough environment in which to operate, so.

0:50:55 Thomas: Well I but I bet you, I'm in reality, do you, I don't know if you know any of this data, but the political breakdown of felons, like I bet it's not that far from 50-50. Do you, I mean it might even, it could even lean Republican for all all I know. I don't care. I just, it just seems like the principle of letting them vote is a good to me. It makes sense if you've, you know, served your time. I do not know about, this is all after they get out, right? I do know about.

0:51:16 Andrew: Yes

0:51:43 Thomas: Yeah. So, I mean, yeah, it is like after they get out, whatever. They are back in society. Why would not they be able to vote? It seems obvious to me,

0:51:42 Andrew: Yeah, not not during Yeah. No, I I agree, I don't know of any study, uh, that breaks down sort of the political preferences of prisoners, I mean I will say that the, um, the organizing that occurs in prison, right, prison ministry programs and the like, like we know that evangelical Christians are overrepresented among the prison population, uh, both going in and coming out, um, and so, you know, it is entirely possible that restoring felon rights would, would actually, uh, you know, benefit, uh, the Republican Party more so than the Democratic Party, uh, and I, I don't care, right, like, I if for the same reason that I oppose voter ID laws, like, I want to be a part of the political movement that says, that looks back and and says with a clear conscience, I encourage more people to vote, uh, and be involved in the political process, not less, uh, and um you know, you, I mean you heard my, uh, uh, know, spiel at the beginning of the this segment, I, I mean that, right, like, it be involved in the process, uh, even if you disagree with me

0:52:14 Thomas: Yeah. Yeah. Yep. I agree.

0:52:52 Thomas: Be involved in the process, but just stop disagreeing with Andrew. That's what I would say. So I'm going to go a slightly different route than you.

0:52:55 Andrew: Well I'm with you on that too

0:52:59 Thomas: No. Yeah. All right. Well, good question, Eric. And yeah, we kind of agree with the sentiment there, although it's not exactly based on taxation without representation per se, but it's, but yeah, I agree with that, that the sentiment of your question. Absolutely. Is time to thank our top patrons, it is Top Patron Friday, and by the way, we are inching ever closer to our next goal of a bonus Q&A for patrons only every month, which I love, those we've done a couple little things like that and people have a ton of questions, we're never getting to everybody's questions. So that's a great goal. Help us reach that goal. And then after that, we're going to have a live show. I want this live show to happen so badly. I can't even explain. It's going to be so fun. So thanks for another strong week of patronage, getting us closer to those goals. And with that said, let's thank our all-time greats, our Hall of Famers who

0:53:22 Andrew: Okay.

0:53:56 Andrew: So thank you to Roger Metcalf, Dan Irazari, our pal Eli Bosnick, to Dave Nichols of Positively Doubtful Podcast, thank you to Steve Sigman, Jim Grove, Desecrator, Patrick Fussell, Amanda Lipnack, Libibliotecatrice, Heather Loveridge, Geeker 41, Sean Pity Ian, and Ally Matthew Vernon, Violet Page Hall, thanks to our buddy Heath Enwright, to Jeffrey Mainer, the Wayward Willis, to detective Matthieu Maxson, always on the case, uh, to Zena Dana, Dave Lovely, Danny Baker at Combat Nonsense, to Charone Frankel, Squick Thinger, Ian Ryan, and Matthew Hillier, thank you all so much.

0:54:37 Thomas: Yeah, and thank you, Aaron Grady. You are here. Aiden McCool, Brandon Smith, TVIsMyGirlfriend, Nukeslion, I don't know, C6Sara, Hunter Ash, John Bodley Esquire, Kaylee Reiser, Jeff S, Sakashite Fukasumi, Philip Strongberg, Michael Schaefer, Michaela, TheElectronicFrontierFoundation at EFF.org, The Inciting Incident Podcast, Marissa Alexa McCool and her fabulous snarky publishy stuff,

0:55:15 Clip: Oh, no associate of this firm has ever failed the bar exam. No kidding.

0:55:21 Thomas: And now it's time to find out if I can keep this improbable streak alive of one in a row. Can I make it two in a roll? We'll see.

0:55:28 Andrew: Alright, Thomas, you ready?

0:55:33 Thomas: No, go ahead.

0:55:33 Andrew: Okay, good. So, here we go. A man went shopping to buy a used car. He found one on a used-car lot that was offered, quote, as-is. He looked at it thoroughly. The tag on the window indicated a special 30-point inspection was done on the car. The man put a $1,000 down payment down on the car. He took the car to an independent mechanic who told him that the car had been in an accident, sustained severe damage, including a cracked engine block. The mechanic believed that the dealer had to know about such extensive damage. The man tried to return the car and get his down payment back, but the dealer refused. Used stuck with a lemon. The man sued the company under a common law fraud theory. The company counterclaimed for the balance of the purchase price. Will the man likely prevail in the litigation? All right. Pretty clear. Buys a lemon?

0:56:20 Thomas: I remember Something. I remember Lemon Laws in business law, but I don't remember any details that would help me with this question. But uh, but I do remember that existing right

0:56:29 Andrew: Yes. Okay. Remember that the question is asking under a Common Law theory of fraud, right? Right. So lemon laws are statutory laws that states pass. So that might actually distract you from the question. So it's a good thing you don't.

0:56:38 Thomas: Right. Right. Don't Worry I Knew All

0:56:43 Andrew: Yeah, you don'T remember it.

0:56:43 Thomas: That I knew All I Heard The Common law Thing. I caught it. Oh,

0:56:45 Andrew: Right. Yep. I knew you did. So, OK, your answers are a yes, the man will likely prevail in the litigation because the dealer withheld material information intentionally and knowingly misrepresenting the condition of the car. B, yes, because the dealer has a duty to give every reason why an as-is car may go bad and list those reasons on the window. C, no, because the dealer cannot be held responsible for possible damage that the used car may have developed after years of use. Or D, no because the dealer is absolutely protected when he sells a used car in as- is condition.

0:56:48 Thomas: Man.

0:57:22 Thomas: I hope it's not D. I hope for the sake of society and and For the stake of my, this is weird because I swear it's either A or D and I thought that was what I've had the last like two questions I thought were A or B, so maybe I'm just, you know, I'm caught in a weird groove. I think that, gosh, there's some possibility that under common law, maybe it's D and we're all screwed. Like you can just say as is and then you're fine. But I don't know. That seems a little too shady.

0:57:26 Andrew: All

0:57:52 Thomas: I hope that's not the case. So I think I'm going to go with A and just hope that you can sell something as is. But if you know that there's something wrong, that you would have had to disclose it. In some way. So I'm hoping it's A.

0:58:06 Andrew: Right. Well, we will find out next Tuesday if you want to play along with Thomas, as always you can play along on Twitter, uh, when we release our announcement tweet. At Open Args, you should be following us on Twitter. Just re, uh, just quote and retweet that announcement tweet along with your explanation and answer and we will pick a winner and give a shout out to your Twitter handle and all sorts of fabulous prizes, fame and fortune will head your your way. Fame and fortune not guaranteed. Okay.

0:58:42 Thomas: And same goes for Facebook. Follow the page, like the page and share dot dot dot. Give your answer on the post for a chance to get a little shout out. I love it. It's really fun to do. Thanks to everyone who participates. And with that said, boy, I hope I'm right. We'll see. So let's see. I'm 9 of 16. That would be 10 of 17 closing in on, you know, something like a respectable score, maybe kind of. If I go on an incredible run, I could get to 13 of 20 and be at 65%, which would be, that would be nice. So that's what I'm rooting for. It'll probably be, you know, like nine of 20, but anyway. All right. That's it for this week. Thank you so much for listening. Thank you. So much for pledging. And thank you so much for being Andrew, all of you out there who are Andrew and we will see you next week.

0:59:35 Clip: This has been Opening Arguments with Andrew and Thomas. If you love the show and want to support future episodes, please visit our Patreon page at patreon.com/law. If you can't support us financially, it'd be a big help if you could leave us a five star review on iTunes, Stitcher, or whatever podcast delivery vehicle you use. And be sure to tell all your friends about us. For questions, suggestions, and complaints, email us at openarguments@gmail.com. The show notes and links are on our website at www.openargs.com. Be sure to like our page on Facebook and follow us on Twitter at OpenArgs. Until next time. This podcast is a production of Opening Arguments Media, LLC. All rights reserved.