OA655: 11th Circuit Slaps Down Judge Cannon!

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 655. I'm Thomas. Boy, that can't be right because that's like four numbers higher than last week at this time. I'm not the lawyer, that's Andrew Torres. He is the lawyer. How's it going, Andrew?

0:01:31 Andrew: I am fantastic, Thomas. How are you?

0:01:33 Thomas: Doing well. That was a lot, Andrew. Our first week of doing the extra schedule, we decided to record a four-hour music episode.

0:01:36 Andrew: Yeah, yeah, did, you know, and I love the fact that we were sitting here thinking, like, should we make it a two parter? And you were like, no, man, like let's just let's just give everybody, you know, a hundred and ten minutes of Tuesday content. Content

0:01:51 Thomas: That 110 minutes Uh, it started out everybody as 150 minutes, so we recorded, we're like, let's do this recording and we also had recorded another episode, so that was, that was a long session, Andrew. But I, but we've we It was just unlucky timing because whenever we do a music show, there's gonna be, I have too much and Andrew always has too much. So, uh, 150 minute recording, what happened? But it was so much fun.

0:01:55 Andrew: Yeah. That was a big evening, I I love it, though. Yeah, and, and I think the listeners enjoy it.

0:02:21 Thomas: I really had fun with that one. And I there's a lot of good points made, a lot really bad points made that we don't have even discuss on the show, but a lot of discussion. And also, this is so we're on like the end of that first long week, and I think it feels pretty good. So, looking forward to next week. We did just want to note, some people, we said this, but it's a worth repeating, some people have asked about Patreon, the fact that we've always been a patron charge per show, show, and we just want to make extra clear, no additional Patreon charges are happening. This is the same, the same amount, it's always been the same number of charges that it's always been, it will continue to be, that was kind of why we were saying the ad model is what allowed us to do this, because we didn't want to ever charge our patrons more times. Um, so that's kind of what's happening.

0:03:08 Thomas: And it's, it's the same as like when we post the Q and a audio for patrons, I don't, we don't charge for that. Like it's same as when we do any other posts like that, where it's not a charge post, not a paid post. So that's how that works. I think, there's a lot of information to take in. So worth repeating. We had a few questions about it. So patrons, no additional charges than you already had.

0:03:27 Andrew: Your bill will not go up, and if you'd like to be a part of the, you know, ad free experience, if you'd to get on the lamb train, all that good stuff, you know, you know how to do that, patreon.com/law let's let's not make the mistake of thinking this is the run-off between incumbent senator democratic senator Raphael Warnock and incompetent Republican treason challenger Herschel Walker.

0:03:41 Thomas: Yep. And I just see a note here, Andrew, in the pre-segment announcement that says, VOTE IN GEORGIA! In all caps.

0:04:01 Andrew: It's super important to get that additional vote so that we don't have to have a power sharing arrangement. It is just an outright Democrats control 51, Republicans control 49. It helps us further marginalize Joe Manchin Kyristen and Sinema. It's all upside. And the only thing that I think could really stand in our way right now would be overconfidence or, you know, thinking it's not that important because, you Know, Trumpers get out there and they crawl over broken glass. I mean, it was way closer than it should have been on election night. And so, you KNOW, if you live live in Georgia, get out you and haven't voted by mail, haven't voted early. Make sure you get out there and probably vote in person now, you know, given how late it is. Right. Sure make sure you show up. Make Sure your vote counts.

0:04:01 Thomas: Oh, boy.

0:04:48 Thomas: Do not take any chances. Make sure you voted or already voted or mailed in your vote or go in person now. Good message. Let's do this.

0:04:56 Clip: Down the law, down the law.

0:05:00 Thomas: All right, Andrew. Let's talk about the great news. I know we've already covered this, uh, that it's not perfect news. It's not perfectly in the year 2022. Imagine, folks, folks. Not perfect news. But if you hold your nose and swallow this down, it's good news. It's very good news with the Respect for Marriage Act.

0:05:00 Andrew: Correct yeah this is also inspired by a comment I got from a patron legal eagles legal beagle and it goes on from there, but you now know who you are. And it is with respect to the way in which the Respect for Marriage Act interfaces with questions about survivorship benefits from the Social Security Administration. So I want to get to that. At the outset, I want to talk a little bit about the procedure of the vote, right? So this was voting on the Senate, it was voting on House Resolution 8404, which was to conform the Respect for Marriage Act to the subsequent amendments that were offered.

We talked about this on Episode 649 to bring Republicans on board. That final vote was 61 to 36. And if you add that up, you're like, OK, well, who are the three that didn't vote on that? The three that did vote? One was Raphael Warnock. You can kind of understand that he was on the campaign trail, that's pretty important, and again underscores the reason why we want to get 51 votes in the Senate, right? Like, senators have important stuff to do. Sometimes, sometimes, you they're sick, and I have no doubt that

0:05:34 Thomas: Yeah. Yeah.

0:06:26 Andrew: If this was, you know, if we had 59 votes, I have no doubt that if, you know, there was no possibility of getting a a Republican to cast the vote for you, which happens sometimes, that that, you know, Raphael Warnock would have left the campaign trail and come in and cast the boat. I'm glad he didn't have to do that. So, non-voting, good reason. Also non-evoting were two Republicans, Ben Sasse from Nebraska and Pat Toomey from Pennsylvania. Those two, you may recall, both voted to convict Donald Trump in the second impeachment. They're both retiring from the Senate. They may not have even been there in the lame ducks. I mean, you know, they're really short timers, right? Like, their their career in the Senate ends in a couple of weeks. And on top of that, they can be Republican lobby. I mean, like, you know, that's what you do when you retire from the Senate is, you know, you get yeah, you can you give it and maybe chose the opportunity to not have to have cast a tough vote. I don't know.

0:07:13 Thomas: They're already cashing the checks. Yeah. Oh, yeah. A tough vote. Something 70% of the country supports or whatever. It's a very tough vote for them.

0:07:23 Andrew: Yeah. Yeah. Well, no, and it's worth, again, it's worth emphasizing, every single episode, you know, that the number of listeners we have who still kind of fall back on the like, well, you know, yeah, the parties are all the same in terms of how they treat capital, well, you know, they're not all the same in terms how we treat basic fundamental equal rights among persons. So, you know, keep that one in mind. All 49 remaining Democrats voted yes, including Joe Mansion, including Kirsten Cinema, uh, again, remember that's a real difference. Um, and, and I think we should call out the 12 Republicans who voted yes. Um, the three were sort of, you know, that considered, uh, the most moderate of Republicans, Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski, Mitt Romney, uh, and then the rest of the list is interesting, right? It also includes some, uh, iconoclastic, uh, folks who, who have occasionally cast a vote in our, in direction, Rob Portman from Ohio, uh, Richard Burr

0:07:26 Thomas: Yeah, yeah, no, I'm just, Yeah.

0:08:15 Andrew: From North Carolina, um, and then it includes a lot of hard right folks, you people who you would otherwise put in the pro-Trump, uh, pro-Christian nationalist camp, uh, Dan Sullivan from Alaska, Roy Blunt from Missouri, Shelly More Capito from West Virginia, Joni Ernst, Cynthia Lummis from Wyoming, Tom Tillis from North Carolina. And then we've kind of put a question mark on Todd Young in the past. So that's a weird group of senators. And, you know, one of the things that that we sort of piled on Joe Biden about, and I think continues to be criticism from the left, is that, you know, Joe Biden is still sort of of the mindset, you know, of the 1996 mindset, you know, Bill Clinton, like, we can compromise and get legislation passed.

0:09:08 Andrew: And I think it's worth it is a kind of a broader Andrew was wrong. Like, it's worth noting this is the second major victory, right, after getting three trillion dollars in infrastructure spending in 2021 for team dealmaker, you know, for for that. Hey, I am going to talk to Republicans. If you'd ask me, is there ever a reason, in for Torres, you are the president, is there ever reason you are going to take a phone call from Joni Ernst? I would be like, are you kidding me? Like, nope. Nope, she can get the dial tone all day long because she's horrible, she's a mom, but, like, voted in favor of this. And that, um, think you need to know, I think you need acknowledge that, right?

0:09:27 Thomas: Well, yeah, I guess. But I don't think this is well, there was some negotiation in that we had to take out certain things that they thought they were afraid of, you know, like the polyamorous stuff. Stuff. But other than that, I mean, I guess it feels a little weird to be like, hey, how can I get you to vote for my basic human rights bill, huh? How can I negotiate you into supporting basic human rates?

0:10:01 Andrew: I

0:10:13 Thomas: What pork do you want out of this barrel to support basic human rights?

0:10:13 Andrew: It should you know except that three quarters of that party was like, no, there's nothing you can do to get me to support basic human rights.

0:10:22 Thomas: Yeah, no. And I think the ones who did, it just came down to who happened to have a gay family member. I heard so much discussion of that in the... Well, they have a guy who's a gay, a gay daughter-in-law, and you're just like, all right, yeah, I forgot, the only way they'll ever support anything is if they happen to finally, they are exposed to somebody of that in their own family, and then they're like, oh, okay, yeah, sure, I guess I'll support

0:10:27 Andrew: Uh-huh. Oh, yeah, that's how they're still they're still a person, how interesting, yeah, well look, like that's why visibility is so important, yeah, and and and you get to that, the, you know, where should our jeers go, you know, you you previously mentioned Mitch McConnell, who was in an interracial marriage that, uh, you could potentially, uh, be struck down by the Supreme Court, uh, and then, you, I think it's worth pointing out, Marco Rubio, Rand Paul, Lindsey Graham, these are Republicans, all who have all run for president, who have all been on the national stage and who have always been had pretensions of posing as, you libertarian or centrist or pragmatist or whatever, and just remember, uh, this is, they are part of the extreme wing of an extreme right-wing party, uh, they cast a vote against the

0:10:47 Thomas: Yeah yep true, wait a minute,

0:11:34 Andrew: Respect for Marriage Act. He showed

0:11:35 Thomas: Marco Rubio got like he doesn't, because he doesn't do anything, so he, he, he showed up

0:11:40 Andrew: Up in a lame duck session to vote against this

0:11:42 Thomas: Wow, Wow. You know, lame ducks. What would, do you have like the, the typical, like in the movies when somebody he's got the sunscreen, you know, that's still white on his face at the, like the fishing at get up or something. And he's like, ah, I hate gay people so much. I showed up for this one here. And then I got to get back to my boat or whatever he does. I

0:11:44 Andrew: Yeah, yeah. Yeah I could yep yep I don't know what he does either. I do not understand why the state of Florida keeps returning him to a job that he has such disdain for doing. But, but, you know, yeah, great job, Florida residents. Anyway, as we talked about the importance of codifying, as a, as a matter of federal law, the Respect for Marriage across state lines, Legal Eagles, Legal Beagle wrote in and me to 42 U.S.C. Section 416H, which is the section of determination of family status. And so this is pre the Respect for Marriage Act, how the law worked. And the important thing to consider in the background is there are relationships that are short of marriage in the law right now.

0:12:51 Thomas: Like say one between two podcast co-hosts.

0:12:54 Andrew: Right. Indeed, there are common law marriages, domestic partnerships. And so some of the things that happen is you have disputes after a surviving spouse, right, after their spouse dies, as to whether they're entitled to Social Security benefits. Okay. So that section 416H provides the definition, and it's weird. Okay. It says an applicant is the surviving spouse of a fully or currently insured individual for purposes of the subchapter if the courts of the state in which the insured person is domiciled at the time of death, or if such insured individual is or was not so domiciled in any state, the courts of the District of Columbia would find that such applicant and such insured individual were validly married at the time that they died. And if you're thinking, okay, so it depends on where you die, like if you die on vacation or on the plane, it does, um,

0:12:55 Thomas: Uh, yeah.

0:13:54 Thomas: Really? That's what, that didn't, I parse it that way, okay, so you could, lifelong, you live in a certain state that recognizes like gay marriage or something, and you, you happened for some reason you went to a really, you had to, maybe your family member passed away in a conservative state that you left, and then you die there in a car accident, you're just screwed in terms of survivorship, chip, oh, okay, but it could be a different, yeah,

0:14:14 Andrew: And again, remember right now, right, marriage applies to everyone. You know, the Supreme Court has not overturned Obergefell. So not an issue now, but would be an issue if this Supreme Court, which is itching to overturn Obergefell, overturns Obergefell, right? So Legal Beagle says, consider John and Jane are in a relationship that may or may not be considered considered a valid marriage, depending on jurisdiction. John, the insured individual, dies while he is domiciled in California. We use California law to determine if he's legally married to Jane, the applicant. If he dies while domicile abroad, we use D.C. law. There's also precedent that Native American nations have the same authority as states in this regard. Car, okay, so as you can imagine, right, that question, and, and, and we need to, we need to amend the, the, my immediately prior statement, right, that question of being domiciled, it's not the question of like where you happen to be, it's, it's where you're living, so you would, you know, let's

0:14:38 Thomas: Interesting, oh, okay,

0:15:09 Andrew: Say you

0:15:09 Thomas: Darn, because I had just come came up with the really good new Weekend of Bernie's idea where it's, we have to get a guy to a Native American reservation, but, like, dead, but they're like, oh no, this is just our big kid, you know, you have to pretend the whole time, and then pretend he died there in order to get the survivorship benefits, or whatever, man. Okay, but we don't have to do that, but maybe we Weekend at Bernie's him, buying a house in a better state, like the, you know, the whole picking out a house, dealing with the mortgage people, everything, and he's just dead the whole time, but then you know, you have to, yeah, okay, so

0:15:24 Andrew: Yep, yep, I, I love it that's love, I love it, rather than go through that process, the Respect for Marriage Act now requires the federal government to acknowledge a marriage based on the validity in the state where, where the marriage took place, not where you happened to be living at the time you die, right?

0:15:57 Thomas: That seems yeah makes a lot more sense

0:16:00 Andrew: Of course it does. And so, you know, whether you did something like a NOAA, you know, moving to a deep, Georgia's rapidly bluifying, but, you know, a deep red area to take care of, sick loved ones or whether, you know, you've weren't thinking about politics when you decided to retire to Florida or You know, yeah, not going to take that away from you on the basis of where you happened to live at the end of your life. We're going to decide on the bases of where, you know, where you made your marriage decision.

0:16:01 Thomas: To me, but we did do that until yesterday, or whatever, like, wow, okay, right,

0:16:34 Andrew: Yeah. Yeah. And again, all hypothetical because of the Supreme Court and that Supreme Court decision is obviously at risk. One last matter that I thought was super interesting was that the Social Security Administration actually has some guidelines for polyamorous marriages. And so we talked about the negative language in the RFMA regarding polyamorous marriages. And, we you accepted and told you, you know, hey, hearts are with you, but, you're being used as a little bit of a political football. We're sorry, but know you it's not going to make a material difference. Actually, the RFM is a step forward for individuals who are poly. Here's why. Take, for example, California Family Code Section 308, right? That says a marriage contracted outside California that would be valid by the laws of the jurisdiction in which the marriage was contracted is valid in California, okay?

0:17:30 Andrew: OK, so California says you get married in, let's say, Vietnam. You use if your marriage was legal in

0:17:37 Thomas: That meant anywhere any, like a state in a global sense, so we need poly country, we need poli vacations for that's

0:17:40 Andrew: California, that would be laws of the jurisdiction. Yes. A foreign country. So A general counsel guidance memorandum issued in 2003. Someone was married to two people concurrently. The second marriage was enacted in Vietnam in 1948, which recognized polygamous marriages until 1959. So Both marriages were lawfully performed in their respective locations, and and the Social Security Administration decided California law would recognize the second married spouse as having inheritance rights equivalent to the first married spouse's, were, you know, lawful under the state of California.

0:18:04 Thomas: Huh. Oh.

0:18:22 Thomas: Dinner. Uh, conversation.

0:18:23 Andrew: Yeah. No.

0:18:24 Thomas: That night, uh, so but that is no longer in effect in Vietnam or whatever. So We got to find a new Pot.

0:18:30 Andrew: That's no longer in effect in Vietnam. We gotta find, we gotta find a poly nation, um, but Yeah, the Polynesia. Would be Really, really good, the advertisements write themselves.

0:18:32 Thomas: Yeah. Polynesia. There you go. Yeah.

0:18:41 Andrew: You know, if

0:18:42 Thomas: But also in it might not just be for our polyamorous friends. It's also just like monogamy in this economy. You know, like we might get to the point where you need like five incomes to afford a house. So like, you know, friend friend marriage.

0:18:55 Andrew: Yeah. There you go.

0:18:57 Thomas: It's not as outlandish as it might sound in this economy, Andrew.

0:19:00 Andrew: So RFMA does not supersede that interpretation of state law. And the way I read it would say, you know, in that circumstance, if California recognizes that second marriage as valid, then that becomes something that is entitled to full faith and credit across the states. So it doesn't require states to recognize polyamorous marriages. But if they do, if they have an underlying law that's like California, that may be a potential vehicle for change down the line. Actually does kind of move the new. Again, I don't want to oversell it. Right. It's a it's a corner edge case from Vietnam pre-1959. But I do want to say that usual, when a bill has has uh kind of overarchingly good intentions that that may help uh build the framework for that kind of progress, you 20 years hence, 10 years hence, I don't know, down the line.

0:19:37 Thomas: Cool.

0:19:54 Thomas: Good news. Is this signed yet? Are we still dilly-dallying?

0:19:57 Andrew: It is on Joe Biden's desk, so just awaiting his signature and he has indicated that of course he will sign it, it will be a signature accomplishment. Now you know that the the administration requested it. So, yes. Yes, they will.

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0:22:09 Thomas: Oh, wow. We haven't talked about Alito enough in this whole mess, I don't think.

0:22:13 Andrew: We have not.

0:22:14 Thomas: Did we ever do the Andrew was essentially right about this on the show?

0:22:17 Andrew: We did not.

0:22:18 Thomas: Oh, well, shoot. Andrew was essentially right. About the fact way back when there was the leak of the Dobbs decision, we were, you know, a lot of speculation on who, who it was. And, uh, I was more of the mindset that it could be somebody on the left who is sounding the alarm. And Andrew was of the mindset that it was Ginny Thomas celebrating or something like that, or, or somebody, you you know, somebody equivalent and, uh, it's seeming like maybe you were right about that, Andrew.

0:22:45 Andrew: Yeah, I mean, here's, and again, wrong in the detail. But, but but right in the sense that having advanced knowledge that a grossly favorable to you Supreme Court decision is coming down helps you if you are coordinating with right wing activists to build the infrastructure to pounce and, you know, fundraise and deliver and kind of roll out a, like, you, this is the best Supreme Court ever. And, uh, how do I know that? I know that because the Reverend Robert L. Shank, uh, sent a letter to, uh, Chief Justice John Roberts, after John Roberts said finding out the leaker is far more

0:22:49 Thomas: Sure. Yeah. Yeah, well,

0:23:21 Andrew: Important than actually restoring the rights of women and individuals in this country.

0:23:25 Thomas: Because after all, the leaker put their lives at danger. Not the, not the decision, not The Thing they were doing, but us knowing about it was really, that's the key.

0:23:27 Andrew: Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Reverend Shank wrote as follows. He said, "Back in June 2014, when so many awaited the court's opinion in Burwell v. Hobby Lobby, I was informed by a donor to the Capitol Hill-based nonprofit organization that she and her husband would be dining at the home of Justice and Mrs. Alito. She suggested that in their table conversation she might be able to learn the status of the case, something she knew I had an interest in knowing.

I received a follow-up message from her notifying that she had indeed obtained the information during that visit. We spoke on the phone. She detailed the revelation." Right, and that revelation was the Supreme Court ruled in Burwell versus Hobby Lobby that, uh, religious corporations, whatever the hell that means, uh, have, uh, a right under RFRA to exempt themselves from having to apply for an exception to Obamacare on the grounds that they think some kinds of birth control, that they falsely think that some kinds OF birth control are equivalent to abortion and then falsely think that that is, prohibited by Christianity, which, you know, corporations can't practice anyway. Anyway, as you might imagine, that was a huge rallying point for the right wing. I will go back to the letter. As I recall, we talked about the Green family, owners of Hobby Lobby, and how they, too, would be interested in this information.

Over the ensuing three weeks, I kept the sensitive information to myself, undetectably using it to assist me in preparing for the inevitable announcement. Then, a day or two before the opinion was released, I called Mr. Steve Green, CEO of Hobby Lobby, and reported what I knew of the court's finding. He thanked me. We did not speak again about it until October of that year.

Considering that there may be a severe penalty to be paid by whoever is responsible for the initial leak of the draft, Dobbs' opinion, I thought this previous incident might bear some consideration by you and others involved in the process.

0:25:29 Andrew: Of course, I would be happy to fully cooperate should you find any value in the other details surrounding what I've transmitted here. That was the basis of a story in the New York Times. You and I read it.

0:25:38 Thomas: Yeah I think it was on The Daily too, Which is good, because then a lot more people are going to know about this huge, you breach in ethics. Oh.

0:25:41 Andrew: Yep. Yep, I'm not going to detail that story. Go read it That led our buddy, Senator Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island, to, to send a letter to the Supreme Court that was basically like, what the hell? And that prompted a response from the Supreme Courts legal office. If you're like me, your first response is, the Supreme court has a legal office?

0:25:52 Thomas: Yeah. Yeah.

0:26:05 Thomas: I thought the whole thing was a legal office. We got marketing, we got HR, we got, yeah, no, actually they don't have HR, famously, they need HR.

0:26:06 Andrew: Yeah, I know, Right. But, no, established in 1972. This is a non-statutory organization. So, in other words, this is established by rule of the court. And so, you know, Congress could abolish it if it wanted to. I mean, I don't see why you would want to. But not created by legislation, you know, not a formal branch of the Supreme Court. The description I'm going to read you directly is staff attorney.

So there are two staff attorneys, and they are to assist the court in legal matters, provide research and recommendations on pending petitions and motions. And I would say that that, that cannot be a major portion of their job, because that's what the justices themselves and their clerks do. Get, you don't go to the legal office to get a background on a cert petition. You, the justice will ask their clerks, might farm something out on an esoteric point, but and undertake special projects on request. But really what they are is the Office of Legal Counsel for the Supreme Court. It is a purely advisory position, but those lawyers then represent the Supreme court as an institution and the individual justices in legal questions such as this. So, the legal office wrote back to Senator Whitehouse, and again, this is a sternly worded crunchwrap, right? Like this is, should say, what they said, I'm to read a little bit of this letter, that that's nonsense, this right. Was written by Ethan V. Torrey, who was one of the two lawyers. Torrey says, Justice Alito has said that neither he nor Mrs.

0:27:00 Thomas: Wait,

0:27:47 Andrew: Alito told the Wrights, that's the woman who's mentioned in the letter, about the outcome of the decision in the Hobby Lobby case or about the authorship of the opinion of the court. Gail Wright has denied Mr. Schenck's allegation in multiple interviews, saying the account given by Mr. Schenck was patently not true and Don Wright is deceased. Justice and Mrs. Alito became acquainted with the right some years ago because of their support for the Supreme Court Historical Society. And they had a casual and purely social relationship. The justice never detected any effort on the part of the rights to obtain confidential information or to influence anything he did in either an official or private capacity.

0:27:54 Thomas: Case closed, I'm satisfied. Oh.

0:28:24 Thomas: Well, that's a

0:28:26 Andrew: Yeah.

0:28:26 Thomas: Relief, yeah.

0:28:27 Andrew: And then we get to the law. There is nothing to suggest that Justice Alito's actions, now mind you, this is not phrased in the alternative. So it's kind of hard to square because the first paragraph says, well, we asked Justice Alito and he said, I didn't do it. So that's fine for me, right? And sure, that's great for your lawyer, right, but that it says there's nothing to suggest that justice Alito his actions. And again, question mark, what are you conceding that?

Like I would say, you know, if I were this lawyer, I would have said even assuming that, arguendo, you know, right, you would say even if it were, we believe Justice Alito, even if you don't believe Justice Alita, there's nothing to suggest that they violate the ethics standards. Sadly, this is true. Right. It goes to the relevant rules, which is the Guide to Judiciary Policy, Volume 2C, Chapter 6, Section 620.35, which says a judicial officer or employee is not permitted to accept a gift from anyone who is seeking official action from or doing business with the court, or other entity served by judicial officer employee, or from any other person whose interest may be substantially affected by the performance or nonperformance of the judicial officers or employees official duty.

0:28:44 Thomas: Hmm. So

0:29:40 Andrew: So unpacking that, what the letter says is, the Wrights owned a real estate business in Dayton, Ohio, and to our knowledge, they have never had a financial interest in a matter before the Supreme Court. In addition, the term gift is defined to exclude social hospitality based on personal relationships, as well as modest items such as food and refreshments offered as a matter of such hospitality.

0:30:01 Thomas: You can whine and dine the justice is all you want. Well,

0:30:03 Andrew: Here's what this means. And Justice Sotomayor, if you're listening, and we know you are, you could come to a weekly Friends of Opening Arguments dinner, hang out, chat with us. We could give you the best scotch we could find, whatever you drink, And, right? You know, get you good and drunk would not be an ethics violation because, you know, opening arguments, media LLC does not presently have any interest. We're not doing any business before the court. We haven't appeared in any cases. Don't. Our business is not, quote, substantially affected by the. What an unbelievably ridiculous standard.

0:30:36 Thomas: Yeah, plus the putting it in financial terms too, oh, I don't have a financial interest in screwing over LGBT people and or women. I'm just doing that for fun, that's for me.

0:30:43 Andrew: Yeah, I have a I have crazy religious interest. Yeah, that's

0:30:47 Thomas: That's just my hobby, I don't, it's not a, you know, don't any money on it.

0:30:47 Andrew: Exactly right. Look like this accurately states the ethics rules. And I think the response is, OK, well, then we need to change the ethics rules.

0:30:58 Thomas: No kidding.

0:30:59 Andrew: But yeah, so that that's where you stand. I think that the inference that, it is almost certainly Samuel Alito that released the draft of his own opinion would would simplify the process of, hey, how'd you get this opinion and would would be consistent with past practice.

0:31:14 Thomas: Look, we're all trying to find out who did this, okay?

0:31:18 Thomas: So, yep. That's the Alito in the hot dog suit. We're all trying to finally get to this. And it makes it even funnier or more hypocritical to think about that language where he was like, this person who leaked this was trying to get us killed. We almost died because they leaked this opinion. It's like, oh, it was you, dude. It It seems like it was you. You did it. So let's talk about Nara Lago updates. The gift that keeps on giving.

0:31:42 Andrew: Yeah, We are still waiting on a ruling from the 11th Circuit with respect to the overall question, right, that we discussed one week ago today on opening arguments, right? The oral argument at which Donald Trump's lawyers got destroyed by the very conservative three Republican judge appointed panel, including the chief judge of the 11st Circuit.

0:32:06 Thomas: Yeah. Ronald Reagan's ghost.

0:32:08 Andrew: Circuit, yeah, yep.

0:32:10 Thomas: George H.W.'s ghost. It was like a Star Wars-esque force ghost thing. And the most conservative it could be. And even they were like, this Judge Cannon is just an idiot. This is so bad.

0:32:19 Andrew: Yep. And And I had predicted that the ruling would come out, uh, on Friday, uh, sort of despite Thanksgiving. When it stretched over into this week, I was like, all right, well, you know, a little bit of a food coma or something. The fact that, as we record this on Thursday in the afternoon, uh, that we have not yet gotten a ruling from the 11th Circuit, I'm, I, a little bit befuddled by that. I don't think there's any risk that Trump is going to win, uh, and and that leaves, uh, active two motions now that are pending before Judge Cannon. And we've referenced one of them already. That was on the 22nd. So a week ago, Wednesday, through his lawyers, went back to the same well, said, I want it is it is a motion to unseal affidavit.

0:33:10 Andrew: And again, as we told you, that that motion is basically, hey, I want this court to revisit the ruling that Magistrate Judge Reinhart already made requiring the DOJ to release part of the affidavit. And now I want the whole thing. It is completely improper. I was somewhat surprised that the DOJ didn't actually raise this as a reason for needing relief from the 11th Circuit. Although, again, hard to second guess the DOJ's oral argument when the 11th Circuit was, you know, essentially like dunking the basketball for you, the court wants to run wild with your position, you stand back and let them do it. No criticism of Sopan Joshi and his oral argument.

0:33:58 Andrew: But this was sort of pending. And then a couple of days ago, I think this is really, really interesting as to how this might play out before the same, you pro-Trump lunatic Judge Cannon, the various media parties who have intervened in this case, to right, get a copy of the redacted search warrant filed a joint motion for access. And they say this was filed on the 30th. Right. So yesterday, as when we're recording this and it says the the news media filed this motion in response to Trump's motion for last week, requesting that the court order the government to provide him with an unreacted version of the affidavit underlying the search warrant.

0:34:39 Thomas: What's the reason that he has that right, Andrew? Oh, is it nothing?

0:34:40 Andrew: Uh, don't it's Absolutely nothing. Um, and to the extent that they've tried to bootstrap this, and is what I was about to get to, uh, tried to bootstrap actual authority, uh, in, with, you know, sort of their, hey, Judge Cannon, uh, do what you want, um, they've cited cases like a case in the Southern District called Bennett versus United States, which says the common law, the First Amendment, and as recognized by some courts, the Fourth Amendment may all afford the public a right of access to court proceedings and judicial records. And then they go there.

0:34:46 Thomas: Okay. Cool. Okay. Yeah.

0:35:17 Andrew: Specifically, the fourth amendment may greater may grant a right to access to pre indictment warrant affidavits. Plaintiff cannot vindicate his constitutional rights unless he is permitted to review the search warrant affidavit. Right. Right. So intervenors looked at that and said, oh, hey, good point. The entirety of Donald Trump's argument.

0:35:33 Thomas: That sounds like our argument. Yeah.

0:35:35 Andrew: Yeah. So here's what it says. Beginning of page two. Trump's motion relies in large part on the First Amendment and common law rights of access to judicial records. Of course, those rights belong to the general public, not to any individual. Then here's an 11th Circuit citation, recognizing that the media acts as an advocate for the public in seeking access to judicial proceedings. If the court unseals any additional portion of the affidavit, the news media seek access to those portions of affidavit as well.

0:36:05 Thomas: Is That a bad sign, legally, Andrew, when you make a point in your brief or whatever in your argument and then the other side's like, oh yeah, great point, we love that, that's not a great sign, is it, what he said

0:36:16 Andrew: It's not it's not a great sign. And and what it really does is it puts Judge Cannon in a and again, she's been happy to be in a ridiculously untenable box and just give Donald Trump what she wants. But are optimistic about the future of the rule of law in this country, you might take some solace from the fact that her would-be colleagues on the 11th Circuit have so roundly slapped her down that, you know, at least she didn't jump in and immediately grant the relief here. Or I was going to do this as a separate story, but I think I could just do this as an aside. Judge Deary, the special magistrate, issued an order that we talked about that said, OK, I'm going to cancel oral argument in this case and there's no need for the parties to come to Buffalo. I just want you to answer a couple of questions about categorization on documents. So, you know, submit those electronically by

0:36:26 Thomas: Yeah. Yeah. She does not care. Oh.

0:37:15 Thomas: Okay.

0:37:15 Andrew: December the 2nd.

0:37:15 Thomas: So Like, this could have been an email kind of thing, this, this meeting could have been, anyway. Oh, god.

0:37:17 Andrew: Yeah, it's exactly, this meeting could have been an email. Look,

0:37:21 Thomas: If I were a judge, I might do this for everything. Hey, I know there's a Supreme Court case about the future of everything in America, but could you just type it out and just send, give it to me, I don't feel like sitting through this meeting.

0:37:31 Andrew: That is a thing that district court judges, especially special magistrate judges, did all the time, even pre-COVID, right? You you, as the judge, are thinking about a disputed position of law. And in particular, when you're thinking like, OK, well, I'm probably like 80-20 on this side or 90-10 or 95-5, right? Right. But I want the other side to be able to give me sort of their Just their day in court, but, but specifically to answer the questions that I have, because I think this case implies X and is controlling. So, counsel, why isn't this controlling? Right.

Like, that's a good, if, if you're a judge, you, you want that answer, because it gives you, on the off chance that you haven't thought about the implication of it or, you know, haven't realized it, maybe you change your mind, but, but really what it does is it tells you, okay, like, yeah, the way I'm planning to go in this case makes it, makes totals I've, I've done everything I can to button it up and my interpretation of the law is correct. And, you know, it's why I've said that, you, uh, know, I don't think that oral arguments are nearly as

0:38:02 Thomas: Have its day in court, yeah.

0:38:46 Thomas: Yeah.

0:38:46 Andrew: Important as, as the brief writing part. Don't need oral argument when the question is, hey, is this a document that you think is subject to attorney-client privilege or not. That's yes or no. Just fill out the spreadsheet, okay? So I interpret that, hey, we're going to cancel oral arguments, as maybe Judge Deary thinking that his time as special master may be about to come to an end. Even if you don't think that that's the case, uh, it is interesting that, you know, what precipitated the immediate appeal to the 11th Circuit in the first place was Judge Deary wrote an order and then Judge Cannon came in before anybody had a chance to say anything about it and was like, oh, I'm, I'm totally rewriting that order in favor of Donald Trump, right, that was the

0:38:55 Thomas: Is that yes or no yeah

0:39:36 Andrew: Initial discovery that we spent an hour and a, a half, I recorded from a villa in Tuscany breaking down, uh, exactly how glorious that discovery order was and how it was going to screw Donald Trump, and, uh, upon, upon completion of that 90 minute recording, uh, you were like, oh, hey, there's a, there's an additional, yeah, some news came out and, uh, and that got a lot of us on, on law, you know, who do public law explaining, at least, at At least we didn't make a video about it.

0:39:58 Thomas: Some news bit of news, well, yeah because that's and that's just a testament to how, how terrible this judge is. Right. I mean, you just truly went beneath any already very low expectations, just absolutely through the floorboards.

0:40:11 Andrew: Yes. Yep. And so, you know, she's been reined in that to extent. And is Right. Public shaming working? You know, I don't know. So the last part. Who knows? The last part of argument. I love this. The government has already recognized the public's clear and powerful interest in understanding what occurred in the search at Mar-a-Lago, which weighs heavily in favor of unsealing as much as possible. Trump's pending motion confirms that he does not assert a privacy or reputational interest in keeping the affidavit under seal. Right. And then they say, take a look at his pleading on page seven and nine, which we're going to go back to and kind of summarize quickly. So for these reasons and those stated in their prior motions to unseal the affidavit, the news media respectfully requests that the court grant public access to the affidavit to the same extent that it grants access to Trump.

0:41:06 Andrew: And I just love that. Again, you know, stop a Judge Cannon, if she hadn't been smacked down repeatedly at the 11th? No, it wouldn't. But might it stop her here? I don't know. It might. Referred to pages seven through nine of their brief. That is section two, which is titled, No Compelling Interest Justifies Withholding the Affidavit from the Plaintiff. And, and so in going through, uh, and making that argument, it says, uh, the government has to show a compelling interest in keeping portions of the affidavit redacted. Plaintiff recognizes a general interest in limiting the public disclosure of facts that might interfere with an investigation. However, general concerns regarding secrecy are insufficient for the government to meet its burden here, where the attorney general has held a press conference about the investigation and where the government has engaged in a continuous pattern of leaks.

0:41:58 Andrew: This case requires a case-by-case balancing of the interest in disclosure against the government's need for continued secrecy. So, in other words, by framing the argument in the context of, oh, the DOJ is leaking this in a selective way, right, the media was like, okay, right. So what you're saying is let's balance that out, right? Right. If they've if they've been publicly leaked in way in in this slanted way, then the way to correct that is to publicly expose everything. And so, you lines like the entire matter has played out in the media overwhelmingly because of the government's leaks. Not not, by the way, not true at all.

0:42:37 Thomas: Yeah.

0:42:37 Andrew: But but what

0:42:38 Thomas: I, and you originally said when we first covered this, I'm pretty sure you said that if Trump or Trump people or Trump lawyers or whoever had hadn't said anything, we wouldn't know about this. Right? Because Merrick Garland said the DOJ speaks through its court filings. They would have done this quietly because, you know, in the interest of justice, maybe they did do this quote unquote raid and they find nothing. You they don't advertise that because they're not James Comey.

0:42:50 Andrew: That's exactly right.

0:43:06 Thomas: And it's only because of Trump team or Trump himself or whoever broadcasting this that we even know about it.

0:43:05 Andrew: Yeah, that Absolutely right. That is 100 percent correct. And I love, and I believe you made the same point last time, which is that, know, you and I have zero sympathy for Donald Trump and, you nor does any right-thinking person, but those principles are designed to protect individual would-be defendants, right As of right now, Donald Trump has not been charged with any crime. And if, and if he were, you know, Thomas Smith, you would say, like, yeah, um, lots of people wind up being the subject of search warrants who are never charged with a crime. And so one of the Major, major reasons why we don't broadcast that is because we don't, we want to tag you as, you you're a criminal if, if in fact turns it out that you're not.

Now, you know, I feel very confident calling Donald Trump a criminal, but, but yeah, those, those that principles do apply. So, so much more to talk about, including, and you really want to do a victory dance for, for Team Merrick Garland, the convictions of Stuart Rhodes, Kelly Meggs, the Oath Keepers for Seditious Conspiracy. But I guess that's going to have to wait for our Monday episode.

0:43:35 Thomas: Yeah. Yeah. If only we had more episodes on which to do victory dances. Oh, wait, we do. There's more. Wait, all right, well, I am really looking forward to that victory lap. I'll start, uh, warming up, getting loose for the dance that we're gonna do on that, and And Andrew, even though our new format makes us quite responsive, we're even more responsive because post recording there's a major headline, major breaking news, and I'm getting it in today's episode, that's right, I'm doing it, what happened, breaking news, okay,

0:44:27 Andrew: Yes. Limber up, my friend.

0:44:53 Andrew: We were waiting for from the 11th Circuit has now come in. It is a per curiam, that is unsigned 3-0 opinion from the 11th Circuit effectively ends the case just as we predicted. So procedurally, what happens is that this order vacates the lower court's order, Judge Cannon, Federalist Society weirdos order establishing appointing a special master. That order has been vacated, so hopefully Judge Deary got paid, but he's done. He goes home and remands the case back down to Judge Cannon with instructions to dismiss the case for lack of jurisdiction, and it's great news. It is exactly what we thought.

0:45:38 Thomas: So that's good news, I was, yeah, Well, I was just a little confused because I thought she was going back on the special master thing, so I thought that was like, what she wanted, but I guess if you're saying, yeah, okay, get rid of the special master, and it's because this whole thing is effing nonsense, then that's a different answer, right? Oh,

0:45:55 Andrew: That is correct. And if you're wondering, you know, usually you have to delve into the meat. This is a 21 page order. Usually you've got to delve in to the law to kind of figure out, OK, how big of a smackdown is this? Sometimes they do you the favor of the opening paragraph. This appeal requires us, that is the 11th Circuit, to consider whether the district court had jurisdiction to block the United States from using lawfully seized records in a criminal investigation. The answer is no.

0:46:30 Andrew: Then they go through and they talk about the anomalous jurisdiction. And again, this is the introduction to the opinion. This is as big a how the hell could you have done this, Judge Cannon, you idiot, as I have ever seen. The conclusion of the introductory section, in considering these arguments for anomalous jurisdiction, we are faced with a choice. Apply our usual test, dramatically expand the availability of equitable jurisdiction for every subject of a search warrant, or carve out an unprecedented exception in our law for former presidents. We choose the first option. So the case must be dismissed.

0:47:07 Thomas: Wow.

0:47:08 Andrew: Then there's, you know, lengthy fact section.

0:47:11 Thomas: And once again, worth repeating, this is a conservative panel?

0:47:14 Andrew: Is as conservative a panel as you get. This is two Trump appointees and a George W. Bush appointee. These are the three most conservative members on this court. And it is just not close. The court notes, this is page 12, for example, when we examine plaintiffs' argument about the Ritchie factors, right, that's the four-part test for anomalous jurisdiction, we note a recurring theme. He makes arguments that, if consistently applied, would allow any subject of a search warrant to invoke a federal court's equitable jurisdiction. That understanding of Ritche would make equitable jurisdiction not extraordinary, quote, but instead quite ordinary. And then they're quoting from a case that, you know, made fun of somebody who tried to do the same thing.

0:48:00 Andrew: Our precedents consistently reject this approach. We have emphasized again and again that equitable jurisdiction exists only in response to the most callous disregard of constitutional rights. And even then, only if other factors make it clear that judicial oversight is absolutely necessary. And then they go through, none of the Ritchie factors favor exercising equitable jurisdiction over this case. Plaintiff, however, asks us to refashion our analysis in such a way that, if consistently applied, would make equitable jurisdiction available for every subject of every search warrant. He asks us to ignore our precedents, finding that a callous disregard for constitutional rights is indispensable. He asks us to conclude that a property interest in a seized item is a sufficient, quote, need for its immediate return.

0:48:49 Andrew: He asks us to treat any stigma arising from the government's access to sensitive personal information or the threat of potential prosecution as irreparable injuries. And he asks us defined that he has no other remedy apart from equitable jurisdiction, even though he faces no remediable harm. Anyone could make these arguments, and accepting them would upend Ritchie, requiring federal courts to oversee routine criminal investigations beyond their constitutionally ascribed role of approving a search warrant based on a showing of probable cause. Our precedents do not allow this, and neither does our constitutional structure. Only one possible justification for equitable jurisdiction remains, that plaintiff is a former president of the United States.

It is indeed extraordinary for a warrant to be executed at the home of a former president, but not in a way that affects our legal analysis or otherwise gives the judiciary license to interfere in an ongoing investigation. To create a special exception here would defy our nation's foundational principle that our law applies, quote, to all without regard to numbers, wealth, or rank. The law is clear. We cannot write a rule that allows any subject of a search warrant to block government investigations after the execution of the warrant, nor can we write a rule that only allows former presidents to do so.

0:49:42 Thomas: Yeah. Oh. Wow. Wow. Geez.

0:50:10 Andrew: Yeah. So the district court improperly exercised equitable jurisdiction. We vacate. We remand with instructions for the district Court to dismiss the underlying civil action. They do not add whatever the hell that was.

0:50:24 Thomas: So I just want to ask, from a hardball, this judge, Cannon, is truly unhinged and trying to cause as much havoc as possible. Does she have any opportunity to still cause trouble here, or is this just done?

0:50:34 Andrew: No. If she were to cause trouble here, it would be, and, and I know I've tossed this around and I know it's a Republican House of Representatives, it would, it would be an impeachable offense. I mean, it would be the, the, kind of disregard, it would be like, um, the Supreme Court, uh, overturning a particular decision yeah overturning Roe v. Wade, and a lower, lower court judge saying, well, I'm going to pretend like Roe v. Wade is still in effect. Anyway, the, yeah,

0:50:51 Thomas: Roe v. Wade or something that sounds pretty good, let's do that.

0:51:01 Andrew: I agree. But, you know, the mandate is we remand with instructions for the district court to dismiss the underlying civil action. So if she doesn't, you could go to a different court and mandamus her to do so, right, like that is you shall, you must, this is a thing that the 11th Circuit has told you to do. And in the history of the republic, never seen a judge fail to comply with that kind of order.

0:51:04 Thomas: Uh-huh. Yeah.

0:51:27 Thomas: Well, what a great ending to that particular chapter of this nonsense fantastic

0:51:31 Andrew: Yep. There you go.

0:51:33 Clip: Andrew Torres is wrong, wrong, wrong.

0:51:37 Thomas: A quick, a little bit of Andrew was wrongs in.

0:51:40 Andrew: My My favorite segment.

0:51:42 Thomas: So, yeah, you mixed up band the name and the song name of a band and song nobody has ever heard of, except for the coverage of this. But important to emphasize, the band is Spirit. The song is Taurus. There you go. Fact corrected. Good stuff.

0:51:57 Andrew: Thank you. I we covered that correctly every prior iteration, including on OA369, where we really broke that down. Randy California's band is Spirit. I think just in the back of my head, Taurus kind of sounds like a cooler band name to me. I mean, you know, again, all due deference to the estate of Randy California. I transpose those. I'm really, really sorry. When I used to play a rock band, yeah, my band was always "I Don't Believe in Elephants." So there you go.

0:52:03 Thomas: Yeah. Yeah.

0:52:26 Andrew: I called my band "I Don't Believe in Elephants" so because there was a little graphic that was like an elephant with a line through it, in in the pre-made graphics. So when you were doing like your merch, yeah, it was weird. It did. Nope.

0:52:26 Thomas: Wait, what? What?

0:52:36 Thomas: That required some explanation. Cause I had no, I had no idea. I was like, I was trying to work out elephants, Taurus spirit.

0:52:43 Andrew: Nope.

0:52:43 Thomas: What is he, what is he talking about? Okay. You played rock band though. That game was so fun.

0:52:45 Andrew: I'm just saying I suck at naming bands Oh, I loved, yeah, that was

0:52:49 Thomas: There was a Beatles rock band. Did you ever play that?

0:52:49 Andrew: Great fun. I'm I I did

0:52:52 Thomas: Oh, so good.

0:52:52 Andrew: Play the Beatles Rock Band. Yeah, no,

0:52:54 Thomas: It is a tragedy of a lifetime because of the way the rights changed. You can't like get that anymore. Like I still have the game, but but I stupid me. Yeah. I never unlocked all the content. And so they, they aren't allowed to sell even, which seems nuts to me. It's like, if you had the rights to do it at the time, you I know I'm sure it's however the contractor's written, but it seems crazy. That's like well, since that has changed, you no longer can sell the thing that you've sold for a while. I don't know. That's frustrating to me we can talk about that, but yeah, no, I can never get those Beatles songs again. I'm going to have to, if anybody knows a enterprising method of being

0:52:54 Andrew: I know. Oh, do you? Yeah.

0:53:32 Thomas: Able to get old, deep, downloadable content on a PlayStation like two or whatever it is. Let me know. What a game though.

0:53:40 Andrew: And I'm I'm sad that rhythm games have kind of gone away because those that was super fun. Party games, we would always pull that out late at night And yeah, my my brother-in-law would cry whenever someone would do John Lennon's Imagine. It was great, you know.

0:53:43 Thomas: Yeah, that's a good point. Totally.

0:53:55 Andrew: All right. Next up, I have this in the notes as RNC versus RNC.

0:53:55 Thomas: It's great song. Yeah.

0:54:01 Andrew: This was, I thought a really good correction a Patreon sent in. So in explaining how Mike Lindell was running for the chair of the Republican National Committee, right, against Rana Romney McDaniel, I tried to riff on an analogy to the super delegates at the Democratic National Convention, right, and user Cord the Elder on Twitter points out that like there's also the Republican National Convention which has its own delegates which are separate, so, you know, when you're saying our ends and that's, that's true. Uh, Mike Lindell is not running for chair of the Republican Natural Convention, that's actually a much smaller and more discreet job and a different set of voters. So, uh, potential confusion on what RNC meant there, and you know, maybe I shouldn't have tried to extemporize with, you know, sort of saying there are no super delegates, because it, Cord, uh, was well taken that that was potentially confusing, and I apologize for the confusion.

0:54:01 Thomas: What?

0:54:15 Thomas: Oh, ah, well, I accept your apology, Andrew. Oh, it says not for me. Okay. Nevermind. One more item here on Alex Jones, what did, there actually are demons turning the frogs gay? Is that our correction, the frogs are gay We measured, they're

0:55:08 Andrew: They really are, there's It's just, yeah, For one, welcome our new gay frog. So patron Andrew Nielsen writes in, and this is, I thought, just an excellent point, is less something I got wrong and more something I didn't elucidate. Listening to episode 652, you noted that it was strange that Alex Jones would have a protective order on transfer of his own information between the two sets of lawyers, years. Strange isn't quite the right word, but more, you know, delicious schadenfreude. But however, Andrew notes, the drive that was sent to Lee, and that is the bankruptcy attorney, did not only contain records of Alex's phone, although that's the most famous piece from the Perry Mason moment in the Texas trial. Absolutely. It also included their case files, which included the medical records in the Connecticut plaintiffs that were under seal. Mark Bankston, the Texas lawyer in that hearing in the case before Judge Maya Garagamble noted that he immediately deleted the medical records. We talked about that on the show.

0:55:59 Thomas: Yeah, Yeah, We talked about That, oh, That might have been on Lamb, though. Huh, Oh, Yeah, that was on Lot Awful Media, I

0:56:12 Andrew: It could have been. Yeah. Yeah. So Andrew's point is even the protective order on attorney-client privilege, the fact that Norm Pattis cavalierly transferred medical information from one jurisdiction to another is also and obviously sanctionable. Really, really good point. So I wanted to make sure that that got airtime.

0:56:38 Thomas: Feel like maybe Norm Pattis isn't a great lawyer, I'm Starting, starting to weird.

0:56:41 Andrew: It kind of seems that way. It can right

0:56:44 Thomas: All All Right. Well, uh, Andrew, never be wrong again. Thank you. I hope you learned your lesson. That's our show for today that's the deep dive so much uh we're able to cover. I love this and we'll see you very soon. Uh, well, I guess on a Sunday late at night for our Monday episode, essentially. See you then.

0:56:48 Andrew: Yeah

0:57:01 Clip: I move for a bad court thingy. You mean a mistrial? Yeah, that's why you're the judge and I'm the law talking guy.

0:57:34 Clip: www.openargs.com. Be sure to join the Facebook group at facebook.com slash groups slash Yodel Mountain and follow us on Twitter at OpenArgs. This podcast is a production of Opening Arguments Media LLC, all rights reserved. It is produced with the assistance of transcriptionist Heather Leverage, production assistant Ashley Smith, and additional contributions from Morgan Stringer and Debra Smith. Special thanks to Teresa Gomez, who runs our live shows and heads up the OA Wiki, follow at OA Wiki on Twitter. Additional thanks to the moderators of the Opening Arguments Facebook community, Emily Waters, Alicia Cook, Eric Brewer, Natalie Newell, Brian Ziegenhagen, and Teresa. And finally, thanks to Thomas Smith, who edits the show and created the fabulous theme music, which was used with permission.