Triaging All the Horrible

Transcript

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

0:00:00 Clip: You must never, ever give up or give in. You must keep the faith and keep your eyes on the prize. That is your calling. That is you mission. That is moral obligation. That is mandate. Get out there and do it. Get in the way. Change happens because people care. The people have the power to make this life free and beautiful. To make this live a wonderful adventure.

0:00:38 Clip: I still believe with all my heart, America can be a place where no child is left hungry, no community is left behind, and no one gets told they don't belong. Country is always worth it.

0:00:57 Thomas: Hello and welcome to Opening Arguments. This is episode 1116. I'm Thomas Smith. That over there is real life attorney, Matt Cameron. How are you doing?

0:01:05 Matt: Just a little bit of rage on a Thursday afternoon.

0:01:07 Thomas: Only a little bit.

0:01:08 Matt: A little. I mean, honestly, I can't get mad at Trump at this point. I mean, whatever. Trump's going to Trump. But I'm just having a little anger toward my friends these days. People are supposed to be on our side. If you talk about that, we've got some Democrats I got to get mad at, and I've got a bunch of people online I got to get mad at. So this is me getting very mad. This is what I sound like.

0:01:24 Thomas: Is interesting how we do this. Like I do the the same thing. Like, I don't think about Trump all that much because it's sort of like we treat him like, okay, that's just like a you that not going to argue with the tumor. I'm like, I'm like critique it. I's bad medical staff around it, I you just thinking as you said that though, it is also I think unfortunate because I think we do that a lot with the right and it has led to this thing where the left is the adults in the room who we expect things from and the right nobody expects anything from it feels like a thing we most of us naturally do that

0:01:52 Matt: That's that's very true. Is some value in getting upset with people who might actually listen to you. Also calling in rather than calling out, which I have some things to say about today. You know, that's not the most of our episode. Most of our episode today is going to be just trying to figure out what's going on this week, as we always do on Fridays.

0:02:08 Thomas: A lot there's I said on uh you know what is it it tuesday it a long week and then there's more of the week happened somehow

0:02:14 Matt: Yeah, it's been a long couple of weeks. Here we are. It's not even the first full week of the Trump presidency. And, you know, we expected this. We knew it was coming. I mean, Stephen Miller promised shock and awe. I'm not all that shocked or awed, I got to be honest. Maybe I was just ready for worse.

0:02:28 Thomas: I like this this I has so far been your reaction very it's it's interesting I like I mean part of me worries that they're gonna be like oh yeah matt well now it'll be even worse but no I get it all right well we have so much to talk about we've um got a grab bag of things as you might expect yeah

0:02:43 Matt: But Well, I gotta catch up on a little bit about what's actually going on with ICE because I can't stand the the way it's being reported right now. We also have a bunch of non -immigration stuff to talk about. We got a quick TikTok update because we haven't talked about it since before the oral arguments before the Supreme Court. And we'll talk about that Trump meme coin. Got a footnote for you where I want to try to start featuring heroes and people that are doing the right thing in the face of all this. And, uh, I think that's a good use of our footnote this week.

0:03:03 Thomas: How much of the meme coin did you buy I loaded up on it I think it's a it's a sound investment it's right part of that is stuff I want to hear so we'd better get to our break and uh get going hey hey did did want to make one announcement uh quick Matt I'm excited about this uh we're having the january hangout there uh was a lot of fun last month these are always fun we're in january patron hangout and that is going to be next tuesday which is the 28th next tursday at 3 p .m pacific 6 p .м eastern and look out on patreon for details about that we'll uh send send you all the info you need to know where to go, who's invited, all that stuff. Uh, but Matt, this was a lot of fun and, uh, we're going to just

0:03:07 Matt: Think I missed out before Yeah.

0:03:42 Thomas: Keep, those will just keep getting better. I'm excited.

0:03:43 Matt: I really enjoyed it you know casting pods is a lonely business sometimes don't knows out there it's really nice to see some response and get to know y 'all good

0:03:49 Thomas: That's true. I never see another living human soul ever. Was going well out there, buddy. All right. Back to my editing dungeon. Hey if you want to support the show please go to patreon .com slash law thanks so much to our supporters uh you're the best objectively speaking you're just the best you're There's lots of good bonus content, both already out and more coming. So we appreciate it. And you can avoid this ad right now.

0:04:16 Matt: Let's talk about some quick immigration updates. You know, I'm going to be providing these. Immigration is pretty much dominating the headlines right now, as it should be. There's a lot going on. But one of my favorite things about opening arguments has always been the ability to tell what's actually going on in the news, look beyond the headlines, and try to understand what we should actually be thinking about. And I have been upset on multiple levels about the way this is getting covered, about the way that our current times are being talked about. So let's start with the actual reality of what ICE is doing right now. Because I am seeing things online that are just so far from the truth or so far from anything that ICE can do. For some reason, people on our side of things, especially allies who really have nothing to lose, and we're talking for the most part about people like you and me that are white U.S. citizens that spend a lot of time online, sharing and things saying are directly against my warning from a couple of weeks ago.

0:04:59 Matt: And I know not everybody was listening a couple weeks ago, and maybe not everybody's listening now, but please do not share rumors. Please do not show pictures. Please don't say things like, ICE is swarming Massachusetts, or look out and stay hidden or whatever. Those things don't help. Because what ICE is actually doing is what ICE does every day. Yesterday, Elise Stefanik came out and said very proudly that ICE had arrested 300 people in the streets and had gotten about 300 people into custody, which is usually how they arrest most people, where they transfer people from state or local custody into immigration custody. And I'm looking at this, and I'm waiting for the rest of it, right?

0:05:32 Thomas: Yeah.

0:05:32 Matt: Because 600 people, that's just a Wednesday, which is what it was. That's a Wednesday for ICE. It's nothing.

0:05:36 Thomas: So it's not more more than they normally do.

0:05:39 Matt: I actually went back and looked at the averages from September, when you might remember Joseph R. Biden was the president. Was saying they went out and arrested 308 people. And the September 2024 average was 282. So that's not that much of a difference. That's not a dramatic rise. That's, again, these are averages. So I'm sure there were plenty of days in September where there were more than 300 people. You know, again, we're talking about a police force of 6,100 arresting officers, approximately, looking out for a population of maybe 15 million people. I'm not great at math, but that's about 25,000 years that it would take to arrest everybody if you use that force.

0:06:11 Thomas: That's that would take a while to arrest that many people.

0:06:15 Matt: That's just the arrest. It takes forever to deport people as well. And I just want to make the point that 6 ,100 people for a national force, what they're trying to do right now is pretend, because they're going to fake it until they make it. They're trying to pretend that they have the kind of force that Stephen Miller has been promising, that the mass deportations they've been talking about. Not like Trump Trump came into office and suddenly there was three times as many ICE officers or five times or whatever, right?

0:06:33 Thomas: That would. Take a while.

0:06:35 Matt: I mean, same force we always had. And it's not Like when Biden was president, they were sitting around reading the paper and doing and crossword puzzles.

0:06:41 Thomas: This is such a perfect scheme Matt. It really is. Like I gotta say it's such a perfect bullshitting scheme because Because nobody knows any of these things, of course. We've talked about it. Nobody knows how immigration works. Nobody knows any these facts. And so what they do is they just wait until they're in power. And then they just brag about the very pedestrian normal day that ICE had. And it's like, whoa. Well, when Biden was president, nobody talked about it, so it must have been zero, must not have existed.

0:07:05 Thomas: You know, they had all of ICE. They actually had them in a holding cell. Like we didn't, Biden didn't let ICE do anything. They're all tied up. And then like Trump comes in, they got a big scissors and they cut the ribbon of ICE and then they streamed out and started arresting people that's how it works

0:07:19 Matt: That's right. Back to work, boys. That is right. No, I mean, come on. Featuring these things. They went out and arrested some gang members in New England and other people with serious records. It is not like Joe Biden was not arresting gang members. That was ridiculous. This is what they do every day. I was saying, I went back and looked just for fun just to see what the numbers were like. That actually approximately 300 people per day that are arrested by the NYPD in New York. The NYPD doesn't get up and announce every day that, hey, we arrested 300 people, right? I mean, like, we kind of assume that. It's a huge city, the huge police force, and that's just what happens. And for Elise Stefanik to brag about 308 people, and again, I'm not encouraging them to do better, to do better numbers. Just saying that idea that they're around every street corner, that they'RE busting into people's houses, that THEY'RE, you know, taking people from wherever. And again, workplace raids will start again. That's going to be a thing. But they'RE still not going to BE doing random house -to -house enforcement. They'RE still going out with a list of people. There will be collateral in the sense that there will be people in homes, and it's very good if you are undocumented or if you're loosely documented to know who you live with and to know if somebody might have a removal order, maybe has a serious record. Because that's the number one way that people without those factors get picked up.

0:08:21 Thomas: Being in a house with somebody who

0:08:22 Matt: If you were nearby, and usually if they're coming to your house or if they are arresting you. You know, in a car is the other way, right? If you're pulled over by ICE. Again, Again, they are looking for specific people with specific factors. And the reason that I trust them when they say they're going out with a list of people is, first of all, because that's how they've always done it, but also because that is politically what they want to be able to do right now. They want to say, we've arrested people with child sex abuse convictions, drug convictions, wanted for homicide in their home countries, things like that. That's what they're going to continue to do. And they're gonna pound that into our heads, and they're at least probably the first, I don't know, eight or 10 months until they actually ramp up to the force that they want. They're going keep telling us that these people are criminals, criminals, criminals. And then when the time comes that they've increased the size of the force to something that might actually be able to do the kinds of things they're promising to do, then they're hoping that the rest of us will be numbed out and that liberals and conservatives will just be like, well, whatever, they're criminals. Sure, they broke into somebody's house and pulled him out, but there must have been a good reason.

0:08:28 Thomas: Gotcha yeah what won't help that is crying wolf a bunch of times before then when there is no wolf that's like actually identical to what the parable is now that I think

0:09:22 Matt: That's true. Exactly. That is how it works. It is a very good parable.

0:09:24 Thomas: And then there'll be a wolf and we'll be like wolf and everyone will be like you said that already so many times someone

0:09:30 Matt: And you know, the other bad thing about Crying Wolf is that it actually terrifies the villagers. And I just want to make the point, because again, I am on the front lines of this. I do run an immigration law office, for those who are just joining us. And, I sit down every day with people, and I have had so many upset people. I had just someone else today who just insisted on coming in for a meeting because she had heard that they are arresting everybody without a work permit. Which is impossible. How is that possibly ever going to happen? Where would they put them? We only have two detention facilities in New England. They're mostly full, and they're mostly full of people with records right now. To give one example, but I will tell you in a much darker story, and I'm sorry to do this with a minor content warning, have at least heard of one suicide now from all of this, from someone who took their life and decided that they did not want to have to live with this kind of fear of immigration. And these are the consequences as an ally of sharing this kind information when you don't know if it's true, or even honestly, if you do know it's true, and it's something that's just happening in your backyard that afternoon, it doesn't

0:09:50 Thomas: That's impossible yeah

0:10:18 Matt: Help. There's nothing that can help about that. And the mental health collective consequences, I can tell you, because we're bearing it here in the office. Long -time listeners will remember Azul, of course, who does amazing work on our phones. And she's a part -time counselor at this point, dealing with people who are crying and breaking down. And that is the same in my office.

0:10:34 Thomas: I want her to be my counselor no she was so delightful to talk to that's that's amazing that you have her but yeah that'd be hard work I'm

0:10:35 Matt: She is it is and know so do it for us all um don't do it I guess but anyway so

0:10:42 Thomas: Everybody do nothing was matt's advice about this, but it's right.

0:10:45 Matt: And it continues to be yeah

0:10:46 Thomas: Go back and listen. If you didn't hear it, go back and listen to episode eleven thirteen. Is that one? If you need a refresher on how to do nothing, thing because that's, I the job I was born to do. But in this one case, we're

0:10:57 Matt: This one case, there are plenty of things you can do to help, and we're going to be talking about those. But really, just look out for the mental health of these communities. It's something you can deal. I's not as mad at you if you've been sharing this, because I know that you're trying. I understand that you want to be here for your community. Who I am mad at, I am going to read their names very quickly. Catherine Cortez Masto of Nevada, John Fetterman of Pennsylvania, Ruben Gallego of Arizona, Maggie Hassan of New Hampshire, Mark Kelly of Arizona, John Ossoff of Georgia, Gary Peters of Michigan, Jackie Rosen of Nevada Jean Sheehan of New Hampshire, what are you doing? Alyssa Slotkin of Michigan Mark Warner of Virginia and Raphael Warnock of Georgia. You voted to enact the Lake and Riley Act despite my direct advice not to but I mean, okay, let me just explain.

0:11:28 Thomas: Raphael Warnock. Oh, yeah. Was another thing where we were saying do nothing.

0:11:38 Matt: Yes, please.

0:11:40 Thomas: Here we're here to tell people when they don't have to do things. Take us up on it.

0:11:40 Matt: You didn't. That's right. Want to just talk about this for a second, because this is another one where the coverage was killing me, because the coverage around the ICE actions was murdering my brain, because all these headlines about mass deportation, and then in the story, it's like, oh, yeah, 300 people, right? That's not mass deportition. The media knows that. They just want headlines that you're going to click on. They know there's not mass deportation happening, and they're still enhancing this fear. And in this case, the media knows, I hope, that the Lake and Riley Act is not just about what they're calling immigrant crime. Of all, as we know, it's about people who are accused of crimes, not just convicted, which is a completely new way to approach mandatory detention for ICE. Means that people can be taken into custody as soon as they're accused of shoplifting. They can be transferred from a local jail to ICE custody. And that certainly hands a tool to local racist sheriffs and cops if they want to start cleaning up their communities their view. Democrats had to say Democrats had the chance to say or do anything, or at the very least, as we said, to do nothing. And they didn't do that. Chuck Schumer said it presented some interesting issues and that they thought it was worth trying to amend. And I am completely beyond understanding how that is possible, because not only does it expand mandatory detention in a way that gives Donald Trump a gigantic nude gift gift on his way in, in terms of actually carrying out mass deportation once they do have the $89 billion that they're looking for to do that, once they have the detention facility once they have quadrupled or quintupled the size of ICE. Not only does that, but it gives state attorneys general, excuse me, I'll say it properly. It gives state attorneys general the tools that they need to stop anything they don't like the immigration system is doing and to basically harass the system into no longer granting immigration bond by allowing them causes of action to get damages if somebody is released on an immigration bond from ICE custody and goes out and does something they don'T like. And so it is a very, very bad bad bill. The Democrats should have made a lot of noise about this, but they just decided that they saw where the wind was blowing and they weren't going to do anything and they were going to try to amend it. And they made some half -ass attempts to amend it. But of course, the amendments that did go through were from Republicans, as you would expect. Of them was from John Cornyn to expand it to include undocumented undocumented people that commit crimes that involve any kind of assault on law enforcement, which, as you might know, is an add -on that's actually tacked on a lot to protesters. So this is something that will directly chill immigrant protest. So it is going to be on Trump's desk next week. And this is not the clear moral statement against mass deportation that I was hoping for from the Democrats. And there are a lot of us that still want to hear that. For some reason, they seem to think that we don't want it. And just because 49 % of the country or whatever Whatever. Voted for Trump doesn't mean that you just get to roll over on this stuff, guys.

0:14:03 Thomas: I saw that thing about the amendment. I didn't understand it, because Schumer didn't vote for it, right? But

0:14:08 Matt: So yeah, to be clear, Democrats had a chance to filibuster this because of course you need the 60 vote threshold and enough Democrats joined to advance the bill. And then enough Democrats joined in the end to vote for it. And this could have been stopped at the gates and it should be, don't just say it. This is Stephen Miller's immigration policy.

0:14:22 Thomas: Because they still need... They haven't killed the filibuster yet. I forgot. I think a lot of us might have been operating under the impression that they're going to do that because they will probably, but I guess they haven't yet, right? Right. That's so they needed 60 votes and we gave them 61.

0:14:33 Matt: Can still still stop the worst stuff. Yeah, that's right. That's

0:14:39 Thomas: Unbelievable. That sucks.

0:14:39 Matt: Right, because we think that people want this. And again, when I say this, it's not even expanding mandatory detention. I have serious issues with the way that we treat criminal offenses and immigration, as you know, but it's the other part of it with the attorneys general that's gotten no attention. The media is not covering it. They're not talking about it properly, and it's going to cause headaches and just massive changes to the immigration system that I still can't really imagine for years going forward. So just read these things, at least, and tell us what's in them. Don't, I guess I'll just keep doing it. It's my job now.

0:15:05 Thomas: Terrible. Yeah, don't get it. This is baffling. I really don't get it just what are we doing? We're not getting credit for this.

0:15:17 Matt: Yeah, I will know. Nope, as always.

0:15:20 Thomas: Not Maga wasn't like oh well now we like these us or seven Democratic Democratic senators. They're great now. We're going to vote unanimously for that.

0:15:25 Matt: I think it's just what they wanted to do. And I think that Democrats Democrats have always pretty bad on wanting immigration enforcement in a way that I disagree with. Anyway, we should move on to a couple of other things very quickly. Speaking of enforcement, I'm with you.

0:15:35 Thomas: I'm still mad though. Sorry. Give me a second to be mad, Matt.

0:15:40 Matt: I've been mad all week. Ever since that it was going to pass, I've had a low state of rage.

0:15:41 Thomas: What are we doing? Okay. That is awful.

0:15:47 Matt: Is. A bad start to all of this because we need clear clarion statements against mass deportation. We need people to say that it's actually bad. And this is expanding it and giving Trump a completely new tool that he wouldn't have have had otherwise. Completely unnecessarily. Total own goal. Okay. Quickly, speaking of things that we know that Trump was actually going to do on his own, to talk very quickly about the sensitive locations policy, which is something that I don't think has been getting quite enough attention. And the attention it has been giving has been wrong, I think. So very quickly. In 2011, Barack Obama deported a record number of people. Trump still isn't caught up with this and may not. Ended up deporting about one and a half million in his first term alone. And immigrant advocates were starting to get pretty annoyed. They started to see what was going on. This is when DACA started to be talked about as kind of an olive branch to give to advocates before his next election. At that time in 2011, in October 2011, put out a memo in which they made it very clear that they would not be conducting arrest or investigations in what they called sensitive locations. And sensitive locations at that point were schools, hospitals, churches, and other institutions of worship, weddings, or religious ceremonies. And the one that nobody ever talks about, that I really think we should be talking about, which is the site of a public demonstration, such as a march rally or parade. ICE was staying away from protests, which they should be. Want to encourage people to be able to come out and exercise their First Amendment rights, whether they're documented

0:17:03 Thomas: That feels very chilling, as they say. Chills the First Amendment rights to do that.

0:17:06 Matt: Or not. It is. It's not. And I hate to even have to tell people now that that is a problem, but it is a problem, because I fully expect the way the CBP was involved in protests during the George Floyd era that they will be involved again. Again is just a policy, it's not a law, and it something that's a deviation from regular law enforcement, because as you know from the movies, you can certainly be arrested in a hospital. There's that trope about, I can't go to the hospital when you get shot. Cops go to hospitals all the time to find people. They can go if you're going to visit your dying mother if they really want to, if you have a warrant out for murder or something like that. It is not unusual at all to see law enforcement in these kinds of locations. But this is the kind of thing where they're rescinding this policy, as was fully expected, because why would they keep it? It's not something that's been around that long. It shouldn't be rescinded. Obviously, this should be a standing policy that they don't do immigration enforcement in schools, churches, and hospitals. And I a problem with it. Obviously I wish wish they hadn't rescinded it. Is not necessarily a sign that we're going to be seeing massive immigration raids or sweeps in hospitals and schools. What it means is they're going to give themselves permission to go find the people that they're looking for, at least in the beginning of all of this. They're going to be phases of this operation, whatever it is. In the first year or two, as I'm saying, when they don't have the resources, they don'T have the $89 billion they want, they're going to continue to exercise, for the most part, these operations in targeted ways. But But I've been seeing a lot of people online talking about how this means they're going to go raid hospitals and raid schools and how I can't send my kids to school or whatever. Does not mean that they're Going to Arrest Children. That's not what they're trying to say. It's They're very common that ICE officers, like other law enforcement officers, will sort of follow people around, get a sense of the routine. So if they know that you are going to pick up your kids at school and they know that's the place you're going to be at 3 .15 p .m. or whatever, they might arrest you there. That's what it says. Is. So again, for all of these things, I'm just trying to turn the temperature down a little bit. Think it's just an important thing for us to continue to do. And I'm doing that as somebody who's actually watching this stuff play out every day.

0:18:47 Thomas: Panic is a real killer just in in all disasters of any kind, and we need to be tuned to the right things. It's fine to that this is very bad, and it is very Bad, but panicking is, said, I mean, you already referenced, I means, this causes really negative mental health effects that need to happen,

0:19:04 Matt: Is. Is. That's right. That is right. And to me, the takeaway is that advocates and activists should be prepared for the idea that ICE and CBP will show up at protests now. That is something that they weren't necessarily doing before. We should be preparing for the fact that if you have one of these factors, such as a deportation order or you have a warrant or you have a serious criminal record, that you can't necessarily expect to be able to take shelter in a church, for example, which people have been able to do for a very long time. So those are the kinds of takeaways for me for this.

0:19:30 Thomas: Now means churches are good for exactly nothing in my book. That's, man, they had one thing.

0:19:33 Matt: Who knew? Yeah, well, I get free food once in a while, but not even great. And again, I want to be clear, and I want to say this as many times as I can. When we're sharing bad news, I want try to give you the takeaway about what you can actually do with that news, because actually should be a priority for you and what shouldn't. Because right now I think the most dangerous thing toward collective burnout is just the the complete deprioritization of everything, right? Are worried about the birthright citizenship order. And as I've said, and pretty much it looks like every legal commentator at this point is saying it's really nothing. And it has actually, good news, been stayed. As of today, I should mention that.

0:20:02 Thomas: Oh, breaking news, Matt. Matt, no one could have predicted this. Matt, egg on your face. The John.

0:20:08 Matt: Well, I will say, I do have to tell you, I was wrong. I'm going to take full responsibility here because I did say that I thought that it it would be stopped within 24 hours. And in fact, it was 72 hours. So sorry, guys. I'll try to do better next time.

0:20:22 Thomas: Matt was wrong, everyone.

0:20:24 Matt: But it was in fact stopped by Seattle Judge Judd Koffner.

0:20:26 Thomas: But I think part of that is because there was a delay built into the thing anyway, right? Because it was like not going to come.

0:20:31 Matt: It wasn't starting until February 20th,

0:20:33 Thomas: Yeah. So I think I think if it started right away, it probably would have gone faster, I imagine.

0:20:33 Matt: So it wasn'T as urgent. That's true. That'S true. They would have followed my prediction. But yeah, I went to Med Radio and I was going to get to this anyway. But let me just read in very quickly from Reagan appointee Judge John Koffiner in Seattle, shuttle, his full quote on this, because this is exactly what every federal judge should say, including every one of the Supreme Court justices. I have difficulty understanding how a member of the bar would state unequivocally that this is a constitutional order. It just boggles my mind. I've been on the bench for over four decades. I can't remember another case where the question presented was as clear as this one is. This is a blatantly unconstitutional order. Where were were the lawyers when this decision was being made? So good.

0:21:11 Thomas: But that's just a woke liberal Reagan appointee. So,

0:21:15 Matt: More than 40 years of service. Yeah. So that's some good immigration news. That is very good to share. Is some not so great immigration news as well from the Department of Justice, from Acting Deputy Attorney General. Do you know who the Acting Deputy Attorney General is right now it's in the bovine

0:21:27 Thomas: It blanche bove okay that's right so it's the god it's so weird that

0:21:34 Matt: Blanche is going to be deputy ultimately he's still waiting on that but uh issued a memo on january 21 uh some interim changes I'm not gonna we'll probably be talking about this later because I want to do a full episode on sanctuary cities and what they actually are and what it actually means, because that's another one where there's just so much misunderstanding. This is scary. I will not say that it's not. Not scary to me. It should be scary to law enforcement officers. Basically aiming at all of those woke district attorneys and police chiefs who want to enforce local law without interference from the federal government. That's who they're aiming at. And they're suggesting, as Stephen Miller did in a bunch of letters that he sent out just before before Christmas to a lot of the same people. I think I saw there were like 200 or 300 letters that he sent out threatening that they could get up to 20 years in prison if they interfered with the federal government on this. They're suggesting that they're violating the harboring statute by not sharing information with ICE and by not holding onto people when ICE asks them to. And a lot OF Sanctuary policies are just saying, we're not going to do the federal government

0:22:25 Matt: A favor, which is a fundamentally conservative, exactly, fundamentally conservative position. Can't think of anywhere else where conservatives expect the states to do the federal government's work this way?

0:22:25 Thomas: We're going to do your work for you.

0:22:33 Thomas: Yeah, it's almost the opposite normally, Matt. Almost the opposite.

0:22:36 Matt: You would think.

0:22:36 Thomas: Normally, get those feds out of our state business. It's their normal thing.

0:22:37 Matt: Federalism. How about it? I guess maybe they think federalism is more federal government. I don't know. But yeah,

0:22:45 Thomas: They're like, oh, hi, Mr. Fed. We did a bunch of your work. We did your work and we're doing your work for you, that's, yeah, that'S totally consistent.

0:22:50 Matt: We'll get to it another time. But I was especially appalled because it cites the supremacy clause, which is a very strange use of the supremacy clause to say that somehow it's a basis for criminal prosecutions for getting in the federal governments way. This is all designed to scare local prosecutors and cops and to let them know they're going to be harassed and investigated if they enforce any kind of sanctuary policies, to the point that our governor, Maura Healey, I'm not happy about this, came out today and specifically said, we are not a sanctuary state. Don't worry about it. Massachusetts.

0:23:16 Thomas: That just like a, like messaging thing or to change anything, I guess is what I'm asking is

0:23:18 Matt: And It's a messaging thing, but because we have a Supreme Judicial Court opinion that says that we can't hold people for ICE, but maybe she doesn't know about that.

0:23:28 Thomas: It for the immigration updates for now. Obviously, there's a million others, but thanks for giving us some perspective on that, Matt. Appreciate it. And worried about stuff, but the right stuff, the stuff that we need to actually worry about where there is a wolf.

0:23:35 Matt: That's what I'm here for yeah there's a fight let's keep the priorities where they should be.

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0:25:43 Matt: Let's talk about TikTok. We have an update to give because we talked About this was All the way Back on January 3rd, which feels like several years ago to me now. That was just before the oral arguments for the Supreme Court case. And of course, they heard the case on an expedited basis, and January 17th the Supreme court gave us the decision that I'd pretty much expected. And it was almost exactly it has expected it to be, which was unanimous on per curiam. So we don't know exactly who wrote it. Sotomayor and Gorsuch both wrote concurrences. Gorsuche's was mostly just reminding you that they had to make this decision very, very quickly, which I thought was kind of a strange thing to put no concurrence.

0:26:13 Thomas: I like doing decisions for the ages but uh this one was a

0:26:15 Matt: That's right. But this was a decision in which we've had a fortnight to resolve, finally and on the merits, a major First Amendment dispute. I know. That's Justice Justice Goresich. Very short and said that she really thought that it probably was a First Amendment issue, but

0:26:20 Thomas: Fortnight I'll go to my grave not knowing what a fortnite is you could tell me right now it doesn't matter it'll get it doesn's it'll be out of my brain it's quicker than a fortnite I don't know that's stupid do you mean two weeks this whole time you've been saying two weeks everybody when you say fortnite why don't we call it my fortnites notice hey I'm putting in my fortnite's notice us then

0:26:36 Matt: 14 nights, that's all. Yeah, it's a dumb unit of measurement that we don't need. Things used to take two weeks. Yep. That's a good point. That actually would be very convenient, but we don'T do that.

0:26:54 Thomas: I would remember maybe what it is well now I probably will because that was memorable

0:26:58 Matt: Sotomaya's concurrence not join Part 2A of the opinion in which there was some question about whether or not it implicates the First Amendment, the TikTok ban, which again, let me just remind everybody, not a ban on TikTok itself, but a ban upon China and Chinese -controlled interests controlling TikTok or having anything to do with it. It was a forced divestiture. It was requiring TikTok to be sold and transferred to some other company January 19th, which of course is the day before before inauguration. We'll talk about how that went. The court, pretty much as I predicted, could not find itself to reverse something that had been passed and recommended by two other branches of government on national security concerns. Yes, there are First Amendment issues. And I will say that I've revised my position somewhat on this. I was a little too quick to judge TikTok because I don't like it personally, because I'm an old man. I don'T want to be that old man who's yelling at kids for using something I don' t understand. I do want to say that I've heard from a lot of people who have meaningful community on TikTok, where it's something that's important to them. And I certainly understand that as got my own dopamine addiction over at Blue Sky now. So I get it. And I do want to read actually from a decision that the Procurium decision cited from 1944. It's called Northwest Airlines v. Minnesota. In that case, the court was looking at how to tax commercial jet airliners because there was such a thing as commercial passenger jets. This had just been invented, basically. This is like a new form of transport. And to what extent it should be carried over to the totally new problems presented by the very different modes of transportation and communications that the airplane and the radio have introduced, let alone the still more subtle and complicated technological facilities that are on the horizon, they raise questions that we ought not to anticipate. And certainly we ought not to embarrass the future by judicial answers. So we have plenty of opportunities to embarrass the future on this show when we're making quick takes after looking at something for a day or two. I stand by my assessment that this is complicated, that there's more than one side, that There's no clear immediate thing, but I do still think it is a serious First Amendment problem. And I said that at the time, that you're targeting one company and one form of speech, essentially. We got from this decision is pretty much what I expected, which was the court saying that there is a First Amendment issue. There may be, but the fact is that it's content neutral, because at the end of the day, this is about divestiture. It's not about who controls it or who's saying anything. Is a very serious First Amendment issue here still, because you're still talking about content, and you're talking about the fact that the people that voted for this, that initiated this legislation, had a problem with certain content on this site, had problem with people controlling certain content. And that is very problematic, and that potentially could be a real problem for other things. But because it has this patina of national security, how it comes down, and that is how it came down. So unanimous with the law, which means that it went into effect. And as I'm sure everybody saw over the weekend, TikTok had these very traumatic statements that they put out about how they couldn't operate anymore and

0:29:37 Matt: How President Trump was working on fixing it for them.

0:29:37 Thomas: Our lord and savior is working on it we

0:29:41 Matt: Then they gave a a welcome welcome back back message saying, as a result of President Trump's efforts, TikTok is back in the US. Now, this was before, order. But of course, on Monday, on the 20th, Trump did sign an executive order. Now we talked about a whole pile of those on Wednesday. I didn't mention the TikTok one, because I wanted to save it for this one. This is a weird order, because by the terms of of the law, for whatever it's worth, the president is allowed to sign one 90 -day extension if he thinks that there is actually a very good chance that there's a deal in the works, that it's going to actually be divested, and that there was something actually happening. And nothing like that is happening at all. We know that's not happening. What he signed was an executive order basically just saying that he thinks that he should get to tell the attorney general not to enforce the law.

0:30:18 Thomas: Well, but didn't Biden already not enforce it?

0:30:21 Matt: Say that he wasn't going to, but he didn't sign anything like that. And he basically just said it's Trump's problem because there was one day between him and Trump taking office. But, know, you officially, at this point if you're one of these companies, it's a pretty sticky situation because the president is telling you that he's not going to enforce the law. But at the same time, you're talking about $5 ,000 per violation potentially. Potentially, and if you have a future president, or if this very volatile and unpredictable president changes his mind and decides he doesn't like you, then all of that time could be used against you, that you were operating even if you were told that it wasn't going to. And that could still happen. He orders the Attorney General not to take any action for 75 days in this executive order, and not to impose any penalties, and that essentially just because it's unfortunate timing, as he says, they want to be able to assess national security and foreign policy implications. Communications, and the timing interferes with my ability to negotiate a resolution, which is very strange because it is not the president's job to negotiate a resolution to this problem.

0:31:10 Thomas: It is if he's going to sell a sale benefit the oligarchy that he's, hey, I've got to hook somebody up. You got to give me time to figure out who to dole out this perk to.

0:31:20 Matt: One of those guys at the front row of my inauguration, perhaps. Might end up with it. Like a lot of the other executive orders that we were talking about. It doesn't have a particular legal basis. It is just kind of saying, I get to do this and I am going to do it. And, of course, the president can direct the attorney general not to take action. You might remember Obama had Eric Holder no longer prosecute marijuana offenses, and that's something we could all support. This is a little different. I don't does go to show, though, that the law is just made up and government can do whatever it wants at the end of the day.

0:31:44 Thomas: This is a unique situation to say the least because they just passed a bipartisan bill and the president signed signed it. Then because of like minute kind of outcry, they're like, well, but did we though? Nevermind. We didn't.

0:31:47 Matt: Is, in many ways. Yeah, I didn't mean it. Really. Well, what they saw was that there were a lot of people, especially young people, that were very, very upset about it.

0:32:03 Thomas: No one could have seen that coming. It was impossible to see coming.

0:32:05 Matt: They could have. It to show, though, that getting very, upset about things does work. So it's got that going for it. We will see in 90 days what happens because, again, the only way that he's allowed under the law to actually kick this thing down the road is this divestiture. But again, who's going to stop him? Who's going to sue him at this point? There's nobody that really cares enough to say the attorney general should enforce the law. That he has also said multiple times that he is considered having the US government buy 50 % of TikTok, which is a very strange thought to make it half a public utility.

0:32:32 Thomas: Would be bizarre.

0:32:33 Matt: Gets the rest, maybe. Hope not. But

0:32:35 Thomas: Don't, what would that do? Whatever. It's bizarre.

0:32:36 Matt: Yeah. I don't want to think about it yeah

0:32:38 Thomas: Let's talk about the official pyramid scheme of the Trump administration. This is what I skied it at out in the blue sky which is really we've gotten to the point and this was like just prior to inauguration right this meme coin the first one anyway we got to the point where he can just say hey the official pyramid scheme of maga is here buy into it and people are like yeah sick and it goes up to a gajillion dollars um and well why don't actually give us the actual opening arguments details but uh yeah it seems seems outrageous to a to a layperson here oh

0:33:09 Matt: It is it's completely outrageous I actually did not realize that trump had already actually previously through his sons had gotten involved in some crypto stuff back in uh september the world liberty financial have you heard about this this was a previous crypto venture because baron apparently is really into crypto so he wants to give him a chance to to get in it. Eric Trump is running some of this, but yeah, yeah, totally.

0:33:22 Thomas: He would be that a that would be an insult I would like think up about him knowing nothing else but just looking at him you're the crypto aren't you wow

0:33:38 Matt: Only the best people are. $352 million in Ether that they're holding onto and other coins. They had a gimmicky thing where they bought $47 million on Inauguration Day of different things. Anyway, I'm just saying that they've already fully invested in crypto. And this matters a lot because the president is, of course, going to have the authority to regulate crypto. That's going to be very much on the table in the next four years. And I noticed that crypto -based super PACs gave Trump a total of $131 million for this campaign. So he's all in on crypto. So this is essentially a meme coin. This is the kind of thing where, you know, I think that's funny or cool, and I'm just going to buy it because I want some like a collector's edition kind of coin, I guess. I don't know that much about crypto. It's called Dollar Trump, all in caps. Peaked on January 17th at $74.77, and it stabilized. It got cut in half after that and stabilized to $37. Generally is being seen as a way of showing support for the president. But of course, you're putting money in the president's pocket. And as no one short of Anthony Scaramucci has pointed out, I just want to read Anthony Scaramucci's point about this in full because I think it's very good. The most dangerous thing for country about about Trump coin is what comes next. Anyone in the world can essentially deposit money into a bank account of the president of the USA with a couple of clicks. Every Every favor, geopolitical, corporate, or personal is now on sale right out in the open.

0:34:51 Matt: A good point. Is a direct deposit to the president. This is much less subtle than staying in his hotel in DC, which is what was previously being done. I don't see if there is such a thing as an emolument, how that would not be an emolument. You are buying it because he is the president and for no other reason.

0:35:04 Thomas: He doesn't own a hundred percent of it right it also is like this you kind of investment thing allegedly that other people will have a stake in right yeah

0:35:11 Matt: Right. But he's making money off it. I mean, at the end of the day, if you're making dollars off of it, it has to be an emolument. Not going to claim I understand how the whole thing works, but it's actively benefiting him and it's actually trading on his actual name, which is his whole thing. That's obviously we all know that's how Trump makes money anyway. We can hear him talk about it in that clip I just sent you at round 11.

0:35:28 Clip: Know? Mr. President, you launched your crypto coin the other day. Do you know any of the Chinese dollar products that benefit yourself personally while you're president? Well, I don't know if it benefited. I don' t know where it is. I don't much about it other than I launched it. I heard it was very successful. I haven't checked it. Where is it today? You made a lot money, sir. How much? I mean, several billion dollars, it seems like, in the last several days. So we're building those peanuts for these guys.

0:35:59 Matt: Team that put this out has made, just in the first 24 hours or so, they made $58 million just in trading fees, just putting this out. Is extremely lucrative stuff.

0:36:07 Thomas: Understanding is it's the same you know the hawk to a girl they the scheme is that they They launch it and then somehow the people who, you know, are behind whole obvious scheme, they kind of get their stuff up front, you probably those fees and some other stuff and inevitably tanks because people are like, oh, this is nothing. It doesn't matter because somebody else is left holding the back.

0:36:26 Matt: That's right. And that's a lot of cryptos, I understand it. That is kind of the business model.

0:36:29 Thomas: Pretty much its whole thing.

0:36:31 Matt: Yeah. We've come pretty far from Jimmy Carter and his poor peanut farm, poor guy having to sell his peanut farm before he became president?

0:36:36 Thomas: That is, man, when you think about what that means terms of the oligarchy, in terms if like just Just he's got all these billionaires with him. He's a billionaire, which I think still allegedly possible.

0:36:47 Matt: Knows?

0:36:47 Thomas: I don't know who knows. Well, with all the all these benefits that he has now, he's surely a billionaire. And they're like, hey, isn't this this is bad. Isn't this weird? You're making money. You're going to keep making money off the office. I go, what is it? I don' t know. It's like how much we make a couple billion. Oh, that's nothing compared to all the oligarchs. I got like, it's just what a wow. What a what a time, Matt. What a time.

0:37:08 Matt: Yeah. That emoluments case didn't make it to the Supreme Court. It was obviously mooted because Trump did not become president again. There was a lawsuit that was going to the supreme court about his benefits from hotels and restaurants and the fact that you had foreign leaders purposely staying at Trump Hotel in DC to make him money. I would really like an answer to that. I'm hoping that someone else is able to bring this suit and actually have the Supreme Court tell us maybe that this is an emolument or not, but it should be decided.

0:37:27 Thomas: That would have been good.

0:37:35 Matt: We should, yeah,

0:37:34 Thomas: Is it another just direct clause in our Constitution that actually doesn't mean anything because it's inconvenient, so we just get to pretend it's not there?

0:37:41 Matt: We just forgot what the word meant.

0:37:42 Thomas: Whoops.

0:37:42 Matt: I mean, who even knows what emoluments are anymore?

0:37:44 Thomas: I mean, in fairness, that's the one time I'd be like, okay, we did kind of, nobody knows what that means, but I feel like it's somebody's job to know what that meant.

0:37:52 Matt: Yeah. At some point, it's

0:37:56 Thomas: Matt, that all sucks. Before we get to your footnote, I want I want to add one thing. I received a message from a listener and is something that's already out there, but I just wanted to add like a little bit to it because I know we see a lot of things and we're like, oh, is that real? Is that happening? In government agencies got an email saying no more DEI stuff, essentially report any DEI related people. Basically we're firing everyone who's involved in DEI of any kind in the whole government. And And if you think anybody's doing a thing where they're like renaming their job or whatever, which makes sense, like I worked in state government, you could kind of try to reclassify stuff to keep it maybe in a way I could see that happening. They say, if there's anyone doing that, send us this email to this like, you know, watchdog email. And I just wanted to emphasize that like, that's real. Like I saw that and I was like, oh, is this one of those bullshit things, you know, that some, some Krasenstein tweeted or whatever. You know but like just in case anybody else was kind of of that impression I heard from a listener who showed me the actual email they had and this is a real thing that is happening um that's disturbing I mean it's just I they not see what they are like I don't you're doing like sweeping firings of everybody involved like isn't that directly analogous to I donno know every single fascist thing and both in nonfiction and fiction that has ever happened

0:39:13 Matt: It's a little purgy. Seems a little purgy to me. Kind of purge -like, it's also just resegregating the federal government. I mean, I'm sure you saw the other thing with the 65 order he overruled that pretty much eliminates special contracts for minority -owned businesses, things like that. This we're heading into. It's the world that people voted for.

0:39:15 Thomas: It's just wow yeah and going to be really hard to like I think I could be wrong actually but I think it's gonna be really harder to tangibly calculate the damage of this kind of thing you know but like

0:39:34 Matt: I know. And I was going to say, I actually was talking to somebody last night and said on the National Institutes of Health that there are all kinds of pending studies and grants that are now being canceled that have anything to do with looking looking at racial disparity, for example, in any kind of health outcomes, or even accounting for race, that's enough to shut down. So that's actually real scientific problems and potentially hurting people.

0:39:54 Thomas: Well also just the the a bunch of people people disproportionately non -white are now going to be losing their jobs and fear for their jobs and like how do we Wecalc how someone could do a study I'm sure but like that's just massively a disproportionate that's I think going to Be pretty hard to quantify and I hope we I hope we keep track of this but like it's just mind -blowing yep

0:40:02 Matt: Get new jobs. Yeah, also And the DEI thing is pretty genius because those are just letters, right? But diversity, equity, and inclusion actually really do matter. And those should be goals of any government. And these are the goals that we can preserve. And that's what I wanted to talk about in our footnote, are the ways that we can can preserve our values and the things that matter.

0:40:28 Thomas: All right it's in footnotes isn't it, Matt? You're going to tell us it's in Garamond Footnotes.

0:40:34 Matt: For the moment, it kind of is. I want to continue on that we've been talking about in the last few weeks since the January 6th anniversary year, is the idea that they are trying to rewrite history. And they have all the tools they need to rewrite history because it's very easy to do right now with social media and with the unreliability of the media that we do have. One institution that we can really count on to help to write history, and that is the judiciary, beneficiary to people who are actually tasked with telling us what the law is and often what the facts are. And so I want want honor today, Amy Berman Jackson, D.C. federal judge, who got a lot of the January 6th cases.

0:41:03 Thomas: Do I know that name? That's

0:41:05 Matt: So heard her name a lot in the news. And she was called upon to implement the proclamation that Trump put out. I want to talk about what was in that proclamation because, you know, we touched on the pardons a little bit on Wednesday and I wanted to just mention again that Trump commuted the sentences of the most serious offenders, including Stuart Rhodes, who got a very long sentence and was one of the ringleaders of the whole thing from the Oath Keepers. And he pardoned everyone who'd been convicted, even after saying that he wasn't going to pardon people who had committed violent offenses. And the other part that really didn't get a lot of attention is that he ordered DOJ to dismiss with prejudice all pending cases relating to January 6th. So not just the convictions, but all of the pending cases so they can't go through. And of course, dismissal with prejudice means that they can't bring it again. Now, as Berman Jackson points out, it's kind of moot because you're talking about the statute of limitations of five years, which means that government couldn't bring these after January 6, there's no way that the Trump administration would ever change their mind on this and accidentally go back and prosecute these these people again. But as a symbolic thing, they're asking her to dismiss with prejudice all pending cases. And she refused to do that today

0:42:05 Matt: In a series of orders. And I wanted to read out because she's creating the record for history. Now, again, she had to dismiss because it's the government making that request and that's what she has to do. But she could have just put out a two or three sentence order that said, I'm just dismissing, but I'm denying your motion to dismiss with Prejudice. But she went back on the government and told them, and I'm going to read a little bit here. Again, this is history being written today, not just this week, but within the hours that we're talking. Everything toward this effort matters because going forward, the way that we tell these stories, how we talk about January 6th, I think it could be up for some radical revision. And I want to keep telling these stories. The government has filed a motion pursuant to Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure 48A, asking the court to dismiss the indictment against the defendant with prejudice. Among other things, the grand jury charged the defendant with committing or attempting to commit an act to obstruct, impede, or interfere with law enforcement, lawfully engaged in the lawful performance of their official duties during a civil disorder, forcibly assaulting, resisting, opposing, impeding, intimidating, or interfering with officers or employees of the United States while they were engaged in performance of their officials' duties. Now, for context, this is the case of Gregory Mijares. I picked him out of the many people whose cases that she had a similar order on today because he was the first rioter to enter the Capitol through the lower West Terrace doors on January 6th. That's where the worst violence was. And there's a strong argument from what I understand that he set off that violence. He was actually pretty famous because he was wearing a gas mask while he did it. This is someone who showed up at the Capitol wearing a glass mask. This is not a tourist, as they like to tell us. Was where some of the worst injuries were sustained and where writer Roseanne Boyland died. So again, this man might have been directly responsible in some way, at least somehow morally responsible for the outcome of these things that happened in the West Terrace. So she's writing in this order. Explains why there's a strong presumption in favor of no prejudice dismissal, that you want to make sure you keep the option open. And she states what I just said about how the statute of limitations means that there's really, it's a non -existent possibility that he's going to be harassed through re -prosecution. She said that the government didn't explain why it would serve the public interest. Indeed, in the court's view, in absence of any showing that the indictment was was legally or factually flawed, it would be directly contrary to the manifest public interest in upholding the rule of law. Here's the good part. A dismissal with prejudice would dishonor the hundreds of law enforcement officers who put their lives on the line against impossible odds to protect not only the U.S. Capitol building and the people who worked there, who were huddled inside in terror as windows and doors were shattered, but to protect the very essence of democracy, the peaceful transfer of power. Would dishonor those valiant officers who fulfilled their oaths to support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies foreign and domestic. Are the patriots. Loyalty to country and loyalty to the Constitution, not loyalty to a single head of state. Stroke of a pen and no proclamation can alter the facts of what took place on January 6, 2021. When others in the public eye are not willing to risk their own power or popularity by calling out lies when they hear them, the record of the proceedings in this courthouse will be available to those who who seek the truth. It's powerful stuff. Reminding you that the record that you need to understand the history is going to be in this courthouse. That's what our courts are for, the ultimate arbiters of truth. They don't always do it perfectly, but I think that this is a really solid reminder that even in defeat, even even when we're in retreat here, there are ways that we can still resist and that we can say what the truth is and preserve it for history.

0:42:07 Thomas: That's excellent. Yeah, absolutely. Wow yeah, that note, Judge Berman Jackson. Sorry to call you out. I love a lot of your work, but you could have done better with the sentencing. I feel like it was an opportunity lost there.

0:45:26 Matt: Chance. And we'll hear it soon enough on Gavel Gavel about what actually happened.

0:45:29 Thomas: Yeah, Yeah, that's great. That's It's good to call out someone actually doing that. I really, really appreciate that. And wow, powerful stuff.

0:45:34 Matt: These footnotes are a good opportunity to feature stories you might not have heard, but in this one I think I want to feature more and more heroes and people who are doing the right thing in the face of some difficult odds. We'll keep up the weird and funny stuff too, but I think this is a good use of the time.

0:45:47 Thomas: Right. Well, that is our show. Wow. Lots to pack in there, Matt. Well done. Informative. Thank you so much. Reminder, please stop scaring people about ice. Just stop doing it. Just do nothing. Just one more reminder on that. That takeaway. It is not good. Thank you so so much for listening everyone and supporting and uh we'll see you next time uh

0:46:04 Clip: This podcast is a production of Opening Arguments Media, LLC, All Rights Reserved. It is produced and edited by Thomas Smith, who also provided the fabulous intro and outro music used with permission.

0:46:22 Matt: Um and I'll I the heater okay so of course the heater has to get on the action it knows it's beat the clock get

0:46:22 Thomas: That what's is that the heater no yeah I think you have the soul of an old employee in there and it's like it's five o 'clock ah clocking out yeah well

0:46:35 Matt: Me out of here