Clarence Thomas Is an Even Worse Doctor Than He Is a Judge

Transcript

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

0:00:58 Thomas: Hello and welcome to Opening Arguments. This is episode 1168. I'm Thomas Smith. That over there is real life immigration attorney, Matt Cameron. How you doing?

0:01:05 Matt: I'm having a beautiful summer day in Boston. How about you?

0:01:08 Thomas: Why are you always doing so well? Can you change it up? Can I go over to you and be like, ah, sucks.

0:01:14 Matt: I'm sleeping four hours a night as usual, and I am under more pressure than I've ever been in my life, but I'm feeling good. This is where I thrive.

0:01:20 Thomas: Okay. Well, all right. I guess you're still going through stuff. You just pretend to feel good. How does it work? Take us through it. How do you does one do it oh

0:01:29 Matt: You know, I might have mentioned this before, but in Massachusetts, marijuana is legal. Not presently showing up high at work, but you know.

0:01:33 Thomas: Okay gotcha yeah coming to a high court near you oh boy well you're gonna need it today lots of lots of news

0:01:43 Matt: Yeah. Yeah. Nothing too great, but we got lots of good patron questions to get to and a wide range of different news items to hit. So got everything from Karen Reid here in Massachusetts all the way up to the big Scrimetti decision, which we're going to have to talk about.

0:01:57 Thomas: Yeah yeah cool that is infuriating I love that clarence thomas has got a site some nonsense misinformation it's just it's a dark time when it comes to trans rights.

0:02:06 Matt: I think you mean Dr. Clarence Thomas, as we'll find.

0:02:10 Thomas: You're right. Sorry.

0:02:11 Matt: Extensive pages of medical evidence in Clarence Thomas's concurrence. We'll talk about it. But yeah, no, it's a sad day for trans rights and for trans lives.

0:02:19 Thomas: Lest it go unsaid, the way that the standards were figured out for medicine for kids who might be trans was safe and it was good and it was effective and it wasn't. It was thought out and it was researched and they just pretend none of that exists. And I'm not saying it was widely available or always administered well, because, you know, there's a lot of human error going to to that. But the standards themselves were very considered and are helping kids survive. And we just get to ignore all that. Just pretend it doesn't exist. Yep. Yep, yeah. He's as much a doctor as anybody else in the federal, like involved in the government now.

0:02:47 Matt: Overwhelmingly recommended by medicine, but not Dr. Thomas. We'll see. Sure.

0:02:55 Thomas: He is the level of medical expertise we get.

0:02:58 Matt: Yeah. Just making America healthy, one decision at a time. So yeah, we got that. And then I also have a couple of places where I think the media could have done a lot better, including one place where Trump is just openly, flagrantly violating the law and nobody seems to care or notice. And then I got a quick explainer at the request of listener Liz Skeen to talk about, yeah, a big fan of Liz Skein. I know, we were just talking about it. We've got to get her back on soon. But she was asking about the Bradlander arrest in New York.

0:03:13 Thomas: Oh, I love listener Liz King. I miss Liz. Yeah, yeah, Yeah.

0:03:21 Matt: Meryl Candidate was picked up by ICE. Got to talk about that for a minute. And then I've got a fun footnote with one of our favorite MAGA characters.

0:03:29 Thomas: Oh, good times. All right. Well, that's the agenda. Oh. Oh big announcement. Live YouTube Q&A coming to you Sunday. The link is in the show notes. You can already go and wait in a virtual YouTube queue for that, for that live Q&A. I'm going to make sure it all the tech works, you know, so I'll probably get working on it on Saturday. It always goes wrong. There's always something that goes wrong and I haven't done it in three years or whatever it is. So I'm gonna, I'm going to get going real early on that, but the link is already there and we're going to answer questions. The questions are on the Patreon thread. That's the patron privilege to ask the questions for the Q &A. But if you show up, if you're in the chat, we'll interact with you. I'm sure you could sneak a question by the bouncer or whatever. And we really are looking forward to it.

0:04:15 Thomas: It's been way too long. Matt and I have never really done one of these, right? Like at all. We did some patron hangouts, but not an actual Q &As to the masses. And I'm excited. Yeah, I'll be wearing my tux. It's a black tie affair. Yeah.

0:04:14 Matt: Yeah, nothing too formal. Let's see if I can survive the format. Yeah. All right. It's the best, though. Love this stuff. Love talking to patrons. And it's still just can't believe we get to do this. Good stuff.

0:04:34 Thomas: So that's Sunday at three Pacific six Eastern. Look for that link in the show notes. You can, uh, you can go sit there right now. You Can also look for that patron thread and you'll get all the notifications everywhere. We'll make it happen. So very excited about that. Hope to see you there.

0:04:47 Matt: See you there.

0:04:48 Thomas: All right. Well, we'll take our usual break, which you can avoid a patreon.com/seriouspod. And then we'll get to the creeping fascism. Oh, plus Karen Reid.

0:05:02 Ad: [Ad break 1 — ad music]

0:05:02 Thomas: Where'd you want to start in our Pope -a -Reef Creeping Fascism plus Karen Reid day?

0:05:07 Matt: Let us start in my backyard with Karen Reid. And of course, we extensively covered Karen Reid in the episode 1147. I thought that That was a great one. Good one to go back and listen to if you didn't follow the trial too closely or still wondering what people are talking about. I know this case here in Massachusetts has gotten international attention, and we've heard from listeners around the world about this, wanting to know, and it was one of the top patron requests this week for me to talk about the verdict. And there was a verdict just earlier this week. And I will tell you what this verdict comes down to is the single most expensive drunk driving prosecution in U .S. history. That's what this has been.

0:05:37 Matt: Yeah. We don't know yet how much the government spent, but I told you last time about special Special Prosecutor Hank Brennan, who's a very well -known defense attorney, and he was contracted for $250 an hour. They raised his cap from $75 ,000 to $225 ,000. So we know he at least probably got that. And they had quite a few experts and all kinds of other expenses. And this is the second trial. Just to remind everybody, this is a retrial of a woman who was alleged to have hit her boyfriend with her car while she was drinking. And she did admit to drinking.

0:06:04 Thomas: Ooi.

0:06:04 Matt: She pretty explicitly admitted to drinking a lot and driving. And that's why she was convicted of OUI, as we call it here in Massachusetts Operating Under the Influence.

0:06:09 Thomas: That's interesting. Ooi! It's DUI for us, but yeah.

0:06:14 Matt: We, yes. Actually, you know, nobody has come up with the say no to we campaign in Massachusetts. That just hit me right now, lightning bolt. Not even high. These are the ideas you get for free, guys. All right. Okay. So like I said, so much money on Karen Reid's side. We know going into the second trial, she owed 5 million in deferred legal fees.

0:06:23 Thomas: There we go. Yeah. Oof. Yeah.

0:06:33 Matt: That's deferred legal fees when the trial started in the second trail. Now she's had enormous support from the public. It's an amazing movement, like nothing I've ever seen around the defendant, like pretty much ever, you know, just like popular support.

0:06:42 Thomas: Besides maybe Adnan.

0:06:45 Matt: Yeah. But in terms of just people showing up, like it's directly, this community has been, we talked about on the episode, but just the local Norfolk County community, especially, but around the state, really, it's been so divisive. Yep. The whole deal. And just so many people with strong opinions about this and like the actual social movement that came out of this case. But she ended up selling her house in November for about 800 ,000. She's done about a million in fundraising since then. I know she has Netflix and HBO deals, so I'm hoping that helps helps her out.

0:06:52 Thomas: Hmm. Hmm, turtle boy, you know? Yeah, she'll be fine. But it does make me think like, take all the not her, just the people bullied by the criminal justice system every day. What are they supposed to do? You know, like, or maybe the people in the middle, like it's one thing, obviously, if you get a public defender, you Know, there's all kinds of issues with that. But like, if You're somebody, I don't know, kind of in the Middle of the socioeconomic ladder, and you want to hire your own attorney to not get, you Now, maybe like wrongfully convicted of something, let's say, and you're out, I don't know, millions of dollars. And then let's say you were totally innocent and you get off and then the government's like, oh, all right. I feel like they should owe you or something, you know? I don'T know. Seems crazy to me.

0:07:43 Matt: If you're wrongfully convicted, then you get the money. But rightfully acquitted, it's a different deal. As we discussed at the time too, this is just maybe my provincial criticism, but she didn't have to hire a fancy California lawyer. She could have found a local. She did have a very good local attorney, Mr. Natti. But at the end of the day, Alan Jackson did give a fantastic closing argument. And I wasn't able to watch. And again, there is so much media out there about Karen Reid. We're just touching on it here. But from what I can tell, this trial was tighter and more controlled on both sides. And it seems like both sides did a better job all around.

0:07:46 Thomas: Yeah. Weird. Yeah, sure. Sure. Yeah but it's sort of like garbage in garbage out. I mean with for the state, you Know, because I like the idea that they're putting all these resources into it except, you KNOW, my two-year-old was the one who gathered the evidence. So they have to like, all right, you look over here, Miss Reed and it's a finger painting of like nothing. You're like, yeah, what is that? That's the DNA. I don't know. I'm not sure. They did such a bad job. It's like it was bring your two year old to work day for the police officers, you know, and so we got to do we got To go with the evidence as they collect it.

0:08:35 Matt: Was that the plastic solo cup with the blood? Or was that the tissue with the hair on it? Or? Yeah, exactly. Yeah, yeah.

0:08:46 Thomas: And if you put whoever billion dollar lawyer, whoever it is, like big prosecutor, somebody, at the end of the day, they have only that, right? They can only work with what was gathered at the time.

0:08:57 Matt: Like you said, garbage in, garbage out. And that was a garbage case. And OUI is really the only proper thing that you could ever have, I think, beyond a reasonable doubt, prove it. Because with her own statements and the video, they know what she was drinking. So yeah, this is the right outcome. No question. It just never should have been retried.

0:09:11 Thomas: Yeah, that part is really bad.

0:09:13 Matt: And I want to thank Dan in Massachusetts for making sure that we got that in here.

0:09:16 Thomas: So anything to be said? I mean, she got off of everything except drunk driving, essentially. Any other observations? I mean, was that what we had predicted? I kind of feel like we had semi mixed feelings about this back when you told me about it the first time. Like, it seemed like it was is possible that she could have been responsible for something right or am I misremembering sure

0:09:36 Matt: It's possible, but I think that my take has always been that it was never possible beyond a reasonable doubt. I just never saw the state's case that far, and they didn't do themselves too many more favors in this retrial, from what I can tell. And we weren't really talking about the OUI because it's so incidental when a man has died, obviously, but I do think that this is the appropriate outcome. And I saw people saying that this means that the jury must have bought the conspiracy theory, because that still is what what the defense was going with was like a full -on police conspiracy. But I don't see it that way at all. I think that the jury was doing what juries do, and they were looking at the evidence and looking at legal standard and saying, we just can't see a reasonable doubt. That's what I would have gone with. You don't have to buy the defense's complete alternative theory.

0:10:15 Thomas: -hmm yeah that makes sense what are all the folks gonna do this is almost like for the fanboys for the fandom it's almost like the worst thing I know it's what they're probably rooting for but now what do they do they're just like oh well I guess we're all done with that they almost need to thrive on like the constant sense of like justice hasn't been and done kind of thing. Where do they go?

0:10:33 Matt: Yeah.

0:10:33 Thomas: They find another trial to hang on to?

0:10:35 Matt: They're going to have to find another moderately attractive white

0:10:38 Thomas: Banned to follow on tour? Yeah.

0:10:38 Matt: Lady who's been framed by the police. Yeah, pretty much. But if they want bad prosecutions, I'm sure we can find some more for him. Maybe we can dig some up. No. Just saying they're out there. Pretty easy to find.

0:10:44 Thomas: Oh, okay. Is that a lead into something else? Oh, I gotcha. Yeah.

0:10:53 Matt: So I want to get to Liz's question about Brad Lander, who's a mayoral candidate in New York. I didn't know much about because we've been following Zoran Mandani. That's about as much as I know of who you should vote for in Newark. But Brad Lander's on the same political side, and Mandani has basically also endorsed him. And I thought it was great that Mandani showed up for him this week and supported him after he was arrested. So I've sent you a quick clip here, and we can watch and describe this arrest. But this is Brad Lander in immigration court. This is the third time that he went in, to his great credit, to support an immigrant who's going to court. He's going through a legal services organization, and he had locked arms with this man who was leaving the court. Now, this has been happening. We've touched on it, but immigration authorities have been arresting people in immigration Court, totally unprecedented, never happened before. And this is by design, where ICE prosecutors are dismissing cases with the knowledge that they're going to have people outside to pick people

0:11:00 Thomas: Well, that's good at least. Oh nice. Wow.

0:11:40 Matt: Up and subject them to expedited removal, which will bypass the court. So it's a terrible good news, bad news kind of thing. You're being told your case is being dismissed. You are not in deportation proceedings anymore. Bad news, you are in expedited removal proceedings, which skips immigration proceedings. So that's what's been happening. And so activists, obviously, and Mr. Lander himself are very aware that this is what's happening. A lot of U .S. citizens have been showing up to try to get in the way. And that's happens here.

0:12:02 Thomas: Okay. I did not understand what was going on. I was like, he's in the court with... I didn't get that distinction that they're actually, they're in immigration court but then they're like dismissing you're saying they're dismissing whatever's going on there on purpose in order to do this thing oh yeah

0:12:17 Matt: Right. Because expedited removal doesn't require a judge. And as we've talked about before, all you have to do, and a a lot of the people who are in immigration court are arguably subject to expedited removal because they haven't been here for two years. And if they know for sure that you entered in 2023, and it's pretty easy for them to know your entry date, and so they can come and get you. Now, they've been trying to expand this in ways that we have talked about. We'll be talking about more that are actually illegal. But these arrests are technically legal. It's just really shitty.

0:12:40 Matt: They shouldn't be doing it because this is discouraging people from going to immigration court. I'm already seeing the rippling effects on my clients. The people who Are asking me are not subject to expediated removal or shouldn't and they're still afraid to go to court. And And if they don't go to court, it's an automatic deportation. So bad.

0:12:52 Thomas: It's a catch -22 what are you supposed to do

0:12:54 Matt: What you're supposed to do is appear on video. If you get a lawyer and appear on a video, that's the answer. That is my legal advice. I don't mind giving that advice on this podcast.

0:13:00 Thomas: So what's this brad lander guy trying to do when he goes there and and he's the comptroller or something yeah but running for mayor

0:13:06 Matt: Comptroller of New York. We'll just pretend that we know what that job is. I've never understood it. Yeah, that is right. I assume, given that it's managing the money in New York, it's a pretty big deal to be the comptroller of NYC.

0:13:09 Thomas: Yeah he comptrolls yeah but it's not as though it would involve this like that's this isn't like this is this part of either something he's doing for campaigning or for just because he wants to do it it's not really like he's not like in his official capacity doing something in this way or

0:13:29 Matt: No. He's definitely running for mayor by doing this. But I think he also believes that. I have no question of his convictions. And it's good thing for prominent people to do.

0:13:35 Thomas: Yeah yeah I just wanted to check like the manner in which he's there like if it was yeah some work related thing or not mm

0:13:39 Matt: And I don' mean to be too cynical about this. I support what he did, obviously. But I think that he knew he was going to be arrested. I don't think there's any question that he new that. And unfortunately, let's play the clip here. And I'll tell you, nothing that he says during this arrest is legally correct, unfortunately. That hasn't really been pointed out yet.

0:13:54 Thomas: Oh no all right great no

0:13:57 Clip: This is the moment federal officers arrested New York City Comptroller and Democratic mayoral candidate Brad Lander inside a Manhattan immigration court. While he was trying to escort a migrant, officers apparently were attempting to arrest. No, see the warrant. I would like to see the warrants.

0:14:29 Clip: You don't have the authority to arrest U.S. citizens. Authority to rest U. S. citizens I'm not obstructing. I'm standing right here in the hallway. I asked to see the judicial warrant by asking that you for a judicial warrant. You don''t have the authority to a rest U S citizens asking for a traditional one. It's too late to

0:14:53 Matt: I know the audio is a little muddled there, but there's a couple of statements he made. I just want to break down very quickly. And, I hate to do this, Brad Lander. I do appreciate what you're doing. But, we should know the truth. Ruth. And, you know, honestly, I think he should have just stopped at doing what he was doing and

0:14:58 Thomas: I want to know the truth of what's going going on? Sure.

0:15:05 Matt: Not necessarily said these things because it is a little more confusing. And I think you might encourage people to do this kind of stuff. But, and again, if you want to do THIS, as we have discussed more than once, and I will say very clearly again, IF YOU'RE PREPARED TO BE ARRESTED AS HE WAS, THEN THIS IS SOMETHING YOU CAN DO. But you will be arrested under 18 U .S .C. 111, which we'll talk about in a minute. But he says multiple times, I want to see a judicial warrant. I want TO SEE A WARRANT SIGNED BY A JUDGE. Now, they are in a federal building, in a public hallway outside a public courtroom, there is no need for a judicial warrant under those circumstances. That is actually not something that he needs. If the man had been meeting with him in his office and officers just walked in and did that, yes, absolutely, judicial warrant. If they'd been at his house, sure. He's showboating a little bit there. And then he says several times that you don't have the authority to arrest U .S. citizens, which is just not true.

0:15:36 Thomas: Gotcha.

0:15:48 Matt: ICE does have, under AUSC 1357, the authority, like any other federal law enforcement, to arrest people for crimes they see them committing. Basically, if they see you engaging in a drug deal or whatever, they can arrest you and turn you over to the FBI.

0:15:48 Thomas: What was the crime he's did? Obstructing the officers and

0:16:02 Matt: Yeah. So I just want to talk about 18 U .S .C. 111, because this is their new favorite statute. It's what they arrested Roz Baraka, the mayor of Newark, under. It'S what they arrest a U. S. Representative LaMonica McIver for in Newark around that same time when she was demanding to know what's going on in that facility. And that one hasn't gotten a lot of attention, though. Those charges are still pending. She's a black congresswoman in New Jersey. And it's what They've arrested countless numbers of other people for in the last few months. Such is kind of an interesting history, and I was just looking into it a little bit, because this is one of those things that clearly has expanded in a way that's very favorable for the government. But in general, whoever forcibly assaults, resists, opposes, impedes, intimidates, or interferes with any person designated in Section 1114 of this title, which includes ICE officers, while engaged in or on account of the performance of official duties. So this statute, as of like 1934, was very much about assaulting or killing officers while they're doing their duties. And then they started adding words like opposes, impedes, intimidates, or interferes. And that is so broad.

0:16:52 Thomas: Poses. Wow. Yeah. Jeez.

0:17:00 Matt: I mean, I could fully expect to be charged under this statute just for saying things about ICE by the end of this administration. If I'm interfering or intimidating, right, if I'm saying, I think you suck and you should quit, is that intimidating an ICE officer? I don't know. I don'T think anybody should invite you to the barbecue or swipe right on you on Tinder. Is that opposing ICE, I guess?

0:17:16 Thomas: Yeah, also, you should never mind. I won't. I'm not going to do it. Cool.

0:17:21 Matt: Yeah, let's not get you arrested too. Yeah. But the statute, it's been noted, is there's a lot of mission creep on this one. And in 1975, I went looking again for the case law. There's a Supreme Court case on it where they actually held over the dissent of the liberal justices that you don't actually even have to know that the person is a federal officer to be arrested under the statute. So you can see the problem in our current situation. Yep.

0:17:38 Thomas: So you wouldn't even need intent to be that stupid.

0:17:44 Matt: And that's exactly the scienter requirement is not there. There's a lot of debate about whether this is originally supposed to be like an actual statute about assaulting or, you know, everyone's putting them in fear or if it's just a general obstruction statute, which is how they're using it now. And it really doesn't seem like it's supposed to been an obstruction statute. But the I just want to mention the thing about how the Supreme Court in 1975 in USB FIOLA specifically held that the defendant doesn't have to know that you're a federal officer. And the reason I'm mentioning that is because obviously we've now got right is about the masks and the unmarked vans. So it can't be that I wasn't sure. They certainly can use that against you, too. I think people should know that. Hate to have to fact check somebody I agree with so much and who I think was doing an honorable thing. But I just thought those facts should come out.

0:18:08 Thomas: Yeah every question we get is about the masks and the, yeah. Yep.

0:18:24 Thomas: No, that's important. I would like our little corner of the internet to know what's going on. And it's not like it makes it better for the, it's like, it's wrong no matter what, but I really don't like the idea of this very viral clip where a guy is shouting, guy on our side is shouting a bunch of legally incorrect stuff. That kind of sucks.

0:18:45 Thomas: It just makes it too easy for the Ben Shapiros and the Charlie Kirks and the whatever.

0:18:48 Matt: But also for honing our activism and for how we approach this. Right? I think that we really should have the best information we can. And the unfortunate fact is, too, that we as U .S. citizen third parties don't have the right to demand the warrant anyway. It's the person being arrested, really.

0:19:00 Thomas: Yeah. Makes sense. I mean, unless I guess if it was you said if it was his office, if they're entering his space, then maybe. Right. Yeah. Yeah.

0:19:05 Matt: So, yeah, right. Yeah. Yeah, sure. Of course. But when you're just watching an arrest go down, as I've said before, the best thing you can do is make sure you get your phone out and start recording that arrest. That's that's what you can do for us. And everybody there.

0:19:18 Thomas: Yeah, so okay. In the end, what what happened to this guy? Did they not? I feel like they didn't charge him with anything or something.

0:19:24 Matt: Not yet. This attorney has indicated they're looking into possibly, but I don't think they have. They haven't by now. I don'T think they will. I think they're probably gonna let it go. But, you know, there is always that thread.

0:19:29 Thomas: Yeah so they've really just taken this law to mean way too many things, but also if we want to change this, we need political power and that requires winning elections is something we should maybe try to do next time and not not to say that we shouldn't be be protesting all that. I'm not saying that at all. But bottom line is we need the political power to change laws like this and to, hey, let's get abolish ICE. We got beaten up so much for saying that. And then it couldn't have been more correct.

0:19:58 Matt: 22.

0:19:58 Thomas: Like it's actually the most correct statement. Abolish ICE, defund the police. I don't care that everybody thinks that those phrases were tell that's what lost us the election because I don'T really buy that. I think that the people who want to oppose that, we're going to find ways to criticize it anyway. Way. And what I really think is that morally speaking, and just as a matter of how things should be as governance, like we should do those two things. ICE does not need to exist how it does. It's so new. Things that have been here for, what is it, 20 years or whatever, like even after like five years, we took it for granted that it existed forever. You know, it's frustrating. It doesn't need to be this way.

0:20:32 Matt: Totally agree, as you know. I'd also like to see this 18 U .S .C. 111 pared back to something like what it used to be, because obviously you shouldn't assault or kill a law enforcement officer in the commission of his duties. But when you open it up to interfere or intimidate, especially with this particular organization that is already so unaccountable and is looking for any excuse to arrest opponents, that's bad news.

0:20:49 Thomas: Now you can't even have an ICE officer answer my riddles like you can't even do that like that's that's opposing him now they can't even come on just have to answer these riddles three to get through the doorway that's all

0:20:56 Matt: I think they're

0:21:03 Thomas: I'm saying oh here it is

0:21:03 Matt: Coming for us. I'm hearing sirens. Yeah, Yeah.

0:21:05 Thomas: Well it's been nice thanks for listening everybody yeah all right Matt well we're gonna take ourselves a little break and then we're going to talk about a thing that President Trump keeps doing illegally that just no one cares no one seems

0:21:08 Matt: See if I can finish this recording before they get upstairs. At all.

0:21:19 Thomas: To just weird I mean I know there's a lot of things but this is a weird one Matt so after the break we'll We'll we'll get to that. Yeah.

0:21:28 Ad: [Ad break 2 — ad music]

0:21:28 Thomas: So this TikTok thing, I feel like we all just forgot. It's weird that the legal system should forget, though. I feel like that's the part that shouldn't forget. Like, it's one thing if all the citizens are like, oh, yeah, that was that thing that kind of weird that Trump just did that he shouldn't have been able to do. And in fairness, I feels like Biden kind of did something weird with it, too, right? As he was as he was going out, it was a bizarre thing. Well, you can take us through the history. Refresh us on TikTok.

0:21:49 Matt: Yeah, we'll talk about it. But actually, my concern on this one is with the media, because I cannot find, at least in a written story, I couldn't find a written study except in one source. And the source that it's going to be will surprise you. There's only one source that has pointed out this is actually illegal. And I'm going to go through those at the end here. But no, it's really bad, because this is illegal. I'm just going to say up front that I know this is a law that a lot of people don't like. I know that a lot of people, maybe even listening to this, are addicted to TikTok. I understand. It's important to a lot people. But Congress did pass a law. And if the president is just going to decide that he can ignore, completely ignore, which he's doing, laws like this one, then we're only a few years away from ignoring, I don't know, like your constitutional right to challenge your detention. Don't mean to be too extreme about it, but if we don't notice these kinds of things, yeah, tattoo, I guess. Anyway, so the TikTok ban obviously was a couple of different laws. We've talked about it a few months ago, back when it was being challenged to the Supreme Court, but the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act, the PAFACA, one of my favorites. Yeah, I think of the Boston accent, you do. Yeah, so this was a unanimous Supreme Court decision on January 17th, completely upholding this ban, which, and then again, to remind everybody, the ban was on Google and Apple and other stores, and those are pretty much the only stores, offering tech talk and allowing it it to be hosted and allowing it to be used, downloaded. So, and this is, you can listen to the whole episode on that one. I don't want to get too much into it right now, but for our purposes today, the important thing that matters is the extension provision because it was supposed to have expired just before Trump took office. I believe it was right around, it was the day or two before. And on the 17th, the Supreme Court, knowing that this expiration was coming up, they upheld the ban. There's no question. They were very clear about what they wanted here. So the law is in effect, and that law includes this one extension provision. Vision. So the president may grant, I'm just going to read very quickly so we know what we're working with, a one -time extension of not more than 90 days with respect to that date, if the president certifies to Congress that A, a path to executing a qualified divestiture, that's a divesture from China, Chinese control, has been identified, evidence of significant progress toward executing the qualified divester has been produced. There are in place, C, the relevant binding legal agreements to enable an execution of such qualified divesticure. Now, Trump granted a 75 -day extension on January 20th. It was one of his first executive orders to protect TikTok.

0:22:33 Thomas: That's A couple of months away. Yeah. Do I have to bleep that? I don't know. Jeez.

0:24:10 Matt: He cited no authority in doing that. He did not say that he was invoking the one -time option that he has under the statute for a 90 -day extension because he couldn't say that because there was no deal in place. So then he comes back after 75 days on April 4th and he extends it to June 19th, again citing no authority, just saying we're extending it again.

0:24:26 Thomas: Just saying it.

0:24:28 Matt: Yep, we're just not going to enforce it. And this is now June 19th. As of the day we're recording, he got 90 more days. And the 90 more days is justified by the authority vested in me as president by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America. Yeah. To which I have to put up a goose meme and ask, which laws? Which laws? Because I don't know. Citation needed.

0:24:48 Thomas: By the authority vested in just nobody's stopping me, I guess.

0:24:52 Matt: Exactly. That's it. There's one shareholder suit because it would require a suit. Obviously, Google and Apple are happy to let it go. And one shareholder of Google has sued and saying you're breaking the law. Now, this is where I have to take issue with the entire media, because I went looking. I saw this originally in a CNN story. CNN did not mention the extension, the existence of the deadline, any of the legal issues with this extension, so -called. Newsweek completely did not mentioned this. The New York Times says Trump has, quote, again, paused the enforcement, quote of the law. Law.

0:25:21 Matt: Okay. There's a separate New York Times article from this week in which they talk about the extension and don't mention the controlling law at all. Just kind of obliquely, just referencing the timing, just with like one quote from Alan Rosenstein at Minnesota Law School saying that this is a wild situation, that the president has essentially nullified a law because he doesn't like it. But I don't know what he's talking about in this story because the New York Times hasn't told me what the law is. PBS says there's no clear legal basis for this extension. Mention. The Verge, a tech publication, says that this is questionable legal cover for Google and Apple.

0:25:33 Thomas: Unreal. Yeah. Hmm. Hmm.

0:25:52 Matt: I'm painfully taking you through all this so you can understand. These are, yeah, that there's, it's questionable. Yeah. But the big winner for this week, I am very sorry to say, and it gives me no pleasure to say this, is the Washington Examiner, owned by a far -right Christian nationalist billionaire. And I will read you, they got it correct. They got an A -plus on this one. Republicans want to see TikTok sold or shuttered in compliance with the 2024 law that was supposed to force the app out of Chinese hands by January 19th. But Trump is now issuing his third extension of the year, a move that goes well beyond the initial 90 -day grace period allowed by Congress, period. That's it. That is all you have to say.

0:25:53 Thomas: Those are like better than the other ones, I guess. At least they're mentioning that there's no legal. Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

0:26:28 Matt: It is illegal. It goes well beyond the grace period. You should not be doing it. How hard is this? What is the problem here, media?

0:26:33 Thomas: It's something I've really been, as I keep mentioning, I can't stop being mad about this. And I keep trying to think like how to best distill it. And I think the media is not they're not covering things from any sort of principled factual basis. They are covering things based on us, based on, you know, like you would want it to be that no matter how much a bunch of people said something was wrong. I would hope that our best media would be able to be like, well, look at the facts, though. Like if a whole if 80 percent of us say climate change isn't real, I want the newspaper, the New York Times to still be like. Hey, but we've talked to the scientists and they're like, it's real. That's what it should be and not everything is that cut and dry but a lot of things are and it feels more like as long as there's a valid question maybe not with science well I say that but with transmedicine they've done that but this just goes to show that if nobody cares if they're not seeing the numbers or something and they're not seeingthe response then they're like yeah it doesn't really matter this is all made up and illegal it doesn't matter it just doesn't give me faith that they're doing anything objective whatsoever like in any way shape or form

0:27:38 Matt: Governing by executive order. That should be a story. I mean, he is doing that in a lot of places, but he is really doing that here.

0:27:44 Thomas: But most of the time it doesn't do anything like here. It somehow is. I don't even know how this is supposed to work. This is very weird.

0:27:49 Matt: As you said, the only reason it works is because there's nobody that's going to sue to stop it. And that's the way they're proceeding on a lot of these things. But this one is just so black and white, so obvious illegal, just like not even questionable. And I just, I was appalled, honestly. Maybe I didn't look far enough. Maybe one of the other outlets I missed somewhere, but okay, good. I mean, I did a pretty extensive survey.

0:28:06 Thomas: No, it's really bad. I saw it too. Yeah sure.

0:28:11 Matt: Maybe, I don't watch TV news, so maybe somebody got it right there, but that's right. Well -known purveyors of truth. Yeah. Well, butthat's what we're here for, I guess.

0:28:15 Thomas: We'll say the TV probably got it right. Matt. Yeah very very bad. Just not a good state of affairs all in all.

0:28:27 Matt: No, it's just not. And I do also understand that everybody loves TikTok and maybe they just don't care. Yeah.

0:28:33 Thomas: Yeah it's like everyone just decided to not. You know it's like we're all just like yeah. Which I get you know I guess I get. I wish it was something better or like it was someone who was like wrongfully convicted of something and everyone was just like, well, it's just not or something, you know, I wish it was something more just weird. Yeah. It's just, Hey, we all agree. We didn't see the footage of him leaving. Like it's just, they put it on the news. Invisible man leaves it. Nope. We don't see it. It is not there. We can't see. Yeah. Yeah, that would be great. I wish it was Something like that.

0:28:47 Matt: Right, right. Yeah he just lets Luigi Mangione out. And we're just like... Yeah.

0:29:00 Matt: We're just pausing enforcement. That's New York Times language.

0:29:08 Matt: Well, here we are. Let's get on to our main story, unfortunately. Originally.

0:29:11 Thomas: Oh, well finally. Wow. Just now the main story. That's how bad out of a week it was, everyone. Yeah, let's talk about Scrimetti.

0:29:17 Matt: As summarized on 08 -1096, back on December 6th, somehow, that does seem like so far back, but that is when these oral arguments happened. And as we noted at the time, they were bad. It was hours, hours of oral arguments to try to pretend that they didn't understand how the basic concept of equal protection on the basis of sex works. Quick 101, though, if you don't want to go back and listen right now. The Supreme Court was reviewing Tennessee law. They actually also consulted a Kentucky law, but the Tennessee law was the main one here. Kind of popularly known known as HB1. It's called the Prohibition on Medical Procedures Performed on Minors Related to Sexual Identity, Tennessee Code, Section 6833 -101. And this law prevents puberty blockers, surgery, and other treatments for trans youth. And the explicit purpose of it, as we talked about at the time, which just in case there's any doubt, is that they don't want youth to be disdainful of their sex. That's just a very openly transphobic law. That is the purpose of this.

0:29:21 Thomas: Boy, we had bell -bottoms and handlebar mustaches back then. That was forever ago. Wow. Huh. And they were bad then. Well, and openly, like, religious, right?

0:30:15 Matt: Yes, there are two genders. Yeah. It is not subtle.

0:30:17 Thomas: I mean, yeah.

0:30:17 Matt: There's nothing subtle about it at all. And I will also note, this hasn't really been talked about enough, I don't think. I think we mentioned it at the time. But I went and watched the press conference that Jonathan Scrimetti, who is the plaintiff here, he's the very bad attorney general of Tennessee, and I hope nothing but bad things for him. He gave a press conference along with some of his buddies yesterday after the decision. And there was a lot of talk in that press conference about genital mutilation, the horrible ways they talk about surgery. And I just wanted to note that surgery was not before this Court because that was not included in this. The district court below already found that the plaintiffs in this case did not have standing to challenge the surgical provisions of this. The surgical ban remains in place and was not challenged by any of this.

0:30:58 Matt: What we're talking about is puberty blockers and other treatments for gender affirming treatments for minors so this right-wing stuff about the horrible disgusting ways they talk about this yeah

0:31:04 Thomas: It's just lies. It is just all lies.

0:31:10 Matt: It's it's and plenty of lies at the press conference celebrating their big win on behalf of Tennessee so that just really got me too. But the district court back last June found that they could grant this injunction in part. And this was based at the time on parental rights and the idea that obviously parents should have some say in their treatment for children who badly need it. So the Sixth Circuit reversed the district court in this case and found that there was some reason that the state had done this and didn't actually apply intermediate scrutiny, which is what would apply if you're talking about discrimination on the basis of sex. Now, very important, I think, that kind of overlooked, worked, and maybe we didn't talk about it enough last time, but the question before the court was not about the validity of the law in the end. It was about what the standards should be.

0:31:49 Thomas: It was about that standard, yeah? I think we talked about that yeah oh

0:31:52 Matt: I think we did. Again, this was seven months ago. I can't be expected to remember. But of course, the Supreme Court did what they do, what the conservative majority does, and they just went ahead and blazed on to go beyond the question and uphold the law in full.

0:32:05 Thomas: Really they so they didn't wow okay

0:32:09 Matt: Kagan's dissent in this was very reasonable. It's only one page. Sotomayor, of course Chris wrote the classic Sotomayor dissent. It's really good. We'll talk about it. But the Kagan dissent I just wanted to point out right now is very straightforward and just says we shouldn't have gone this far. All the parties were asking was what the standard should be, both parties. And I think it should be an intermediate scrutiny. Sotomaior thinks it should be an immediate scrutiny. That's what it should have sent back for us because there's an enormous record here. There's like so much different stuff that the parties have presented and it should have been looked at through that lens. And we didn't have a chance to do that. So, you know, I think that's a pretty reasonable point just before we get going here.

0:32:40 Matt: So as we talked about at the time, and as Sonia Sotomayor points out in her usual moral clarity, this is an easy case on paper. This is a very easy case because it's an equal protection challenge saying that you can get gender -affirming care for certain children, but not for others. And just to remind people, of course, when you do something as a cisgender man, if you're getting Viagra covered by your insurance, that's gender-affirming care, arguably.

0:32:56 Thomas: Yep well yeah it's not just that because we're talking about kids and I remember this was the one where it was like so puberty blockers is a thing that if a cis kid needs it for early onset puberty or whatever you call it then totally fine but if a trans kid who might be trans needs it not fine seems like the most basic equal protection question there could be right yeah

0:33:06 Matt: Right, right, right. And Sotomaya Moira points out that there's something called hirsutism, right? If you have a child that's getting hair in their face much too young, and so if you have a girl who's got hair in her face, it's a different treatment than if a boy does. You have to actually look into that. I mean, it'S just, again, this is, Roberts, in his majority opinion, just to kind of tell you where this is going, none of this is very much of a surprise. We fully expected them to be disingenuous about this. We fully expect them to do everything they could. And this is a 118 -page total decision, including all the concurrences and dissents. Roberts is quite a lot of that page count. Out. He's doing everything he can not to talk about the plaintiffs, certainly, of course, because why would you want to talk About the actual kids involved, and not to talk about The harm that's gonna be caused, but to pretend that he understands the science and to say that this isn't about sex at all. This has nothing to do with sex. It's, it's actually it's what it's about is about age. And it's About medical care. And both of those things, the state has every right to discriminate to discriminate the basis of age, which it does. I mean, obviously, you know, I even the most libertarian parents, I don't think want their kids, 12 year old kids buying cigarettes or whatever. Maybe they do. I don't know. And we have the right to discriminate to some degree on how we provide medical care, or at least to have rational basis on how we control it and regulate it. And so he's trying to recast all of this. But the way that he does it is pretty clumsy. If you actually understand the issue and understand the science to some degree, I'm not saying I fully do. And I want to be careful about how I'm talking about this because I don' t say that I fully understand it. But if you have any sympathy for the idea that, as the medical community has said overwhelmingly, that this is vital for the mental health of kids who know what their gender identity is, that we have to listen to them. Clarence Thomas, as I said in his dissent, almost all of it is medical. He goes on and on and on about all this medical stuff that he thinks he understands. But, you know, he's a judge, not a doctor. And there is quite a lot in this record from amicus from medical professionals telling them the opposite of what Clarence Thomas says.

0:33:45 Thomas: Oh okay what a relief sure yeah what do they know

0:35:10 Matt: But what do they know? They're just doctors. So he's saying at the end of the day, this is a rational basis and that the state has provided a rational basis for classifications based on age and medical use. But in the process of doing this, he is fully engaging on the argument about whether or not this is discrimination on the basis of sex. And he's essentially, once he's decided that rational basis review is the way to go, he's acknowledging that it's basically okay to acknowledge on the basis of six because he thinks that it is okay to prohibit medical care that might encourage minors to become disdainful of their sex. He thinks that's perfectly fine. So he's using smoke screens here, as you might expect. And of course, they're citing the usual nonsense about detransitioners as if that's any kind of significant statistical issue, which it really isn't. They're doing the usual thing about the risks of the drugs rather than the risks of not administering the drugs.

0:35:59 Thomas: Yeah I remember cavanaugh doing a lot of that are you still on thomas's thing oh yeah I just I just remember distinctly that cavanaagh always does the really playing dumb thing well we've got on one hand someone detranges her over here and on the other hand you know trans any do they do that thing where they faux pretend to like care but then we got But other kids over here say it's good for them. So why do we get involved? Why is the court involved? Sure. Yeah. Yeah. Gay people can still get straight married.

0:36:02 Matt: I'm looking at Robertson between everybody. Right, right. And he's using the Goodell -Doug argument about how special provisions about pregnant women aren't discrimination against women, they're just discrimination against certain kinds of women in certain situations. And it's honestly, it's kind of not that different from what the people that supported miscegenation law said, that black and white people are free to get married to black and white people, right? Marriage still exists. They can, or, you know, opponents of gay marriage saying that that's right, anytime they want to.

0:36:52 Thomas: Yeah. Equal protection. Yep. Yeah, it does, though. So let me draw an analogy and see if this is right. Let's pretend, and there probably is real cases of this, honestly, real medication that does this. Let's pretend that a man's boner pills turns out there's a big discovery that like if women take them it helps with some sort of disorder or something like let's say it's life -saving if you take these boner bills for that disorder let's Say it's I don't know a heart thing who knows just for fun and then let's SAY for some reason religious people have a problem with that or something and they're like well women shouldn't be able to take boner Pills and on boners so that they shouldn't Be allowed to do it so the people on the the correct side would be like well yeah but it's the pills men or women or anybody should be able To get the pills for whatever they they want. You shouldn't have to have boner, like a literal boner. They're boner pills, but like, yeah. And then these dinguses are like, well, it's not unequal because women could still get it for their boner if they had one, but they don't have one. So nobody's allowed to get it for the heart condition and everybody's allowed to get in for their boning problems, right? That's not equal. I think that's pretty much just, I pride myself on trying to come up with analogies that actually work. And I think that is it I think that's what's happening right yeah I was just handed some just now just for saying I don't I don 'y know how'd you get in here somebody just provided them wow wow I

0:36:53 Matt: It is a sort of like separate but equal dancing around that kind of thing. I'll read the relevant Roberts provision here. The law does not prohibit certain medical treatments for minors of one sex while allowing those same treatments for minors of the opposite sex. SB1 prohibits healthcare providers from administering puberty blockers or hormones to any minor to treat gender dysphoria, gender identity disorder, or gender incongruence, regardless of sex. It permits providers to administer puberty blockers and hormones to minors of any sex for other purposes.

0:37:34 Matt: Mm-hmm. Sure. Right. Right. Exactly. Exactly. Right. That's right. Yeah. Yeah. That's, I don't think that's too far off. I think that'S pretty close. Yeah. It'S pretty solid. Yeah. Yeah. And of course, I just want to note that, uh, burner pills are covered by insurance, uh... as, as gender -affirming care, basically. And Jonathan Scarametti makes $281 ,000 a year, I checked, as the AG of Tennessee, and I'm sure that his health care covers it just fine. Yeah. And I hope that he's denied that coverage somehow, but I don't think that'll happen. So pretty much what we expected. It's not good. And I do, you know, I want to say just our condolences, obviously, to, I know that we're proud to have many trans listeners and people who have been watching for the outcome of this case. I know that we have talked about it already as kind of a foregone conclusion of where this was going, because we know this court, and we know after those arguments what they were going to do. And that's where they've landed. So I do want to just make sure that we get Sonia Sotomayor's voice in here, as always. I'm going to read just a few excerpts from her extremely reasonable dissent, which I do Want to point out also does the classic Sotomaya thing that we appreciate so much, like in Grants Pass and other cases where she actually talks about the plaintiffs and who they are, and why they need this treatment and what it means to them to have have it denied. And the mother, actually, of L .W., one of the plaintiffs, wrote a very good New York Times op -ed today. That's well worth reading. I should link to.

0:39:38 Thomas: Know I was just so mad about oh new york times you're gonna publish that oh because it's like a heart -wrenching thing that I'm sure will get you a lot of reviews and reads yeah you're going to publish that but they're on both sides of it they're all they're also going to public the transphobic garbage garbage science. Yeah. Yeah, but they can get the medical treatment at that age if it's for something else.

0:39:41 Matt: Right. Yep. Oh, they got it both sides up. Right, for sure. But let's get a nice breath of moral clarity here from Sonia Sotomayor. This case presents an easy question. See, that's what we were saying. Whether SB1's ban on certain medications applicable only if used in a manner inconsistent with sex contains a sex classification. Because sex determines access to the covered medications, comma, it clearly does. Yet the majority refuses to call a spade a spate. Instead, it obfuscates a sex classification that is plain in the face of the statute, all to avoid the mere possibility that a different court could strike down SB1 or categorical health care bans like it. The court's willingness to do so here does irrevocable damage to the Equal Protection Clause and invites legislatures to engage in discrimination by hiding blatant sex classifications in plain sight. And Roberts is fully rewarding this, just to remind you that he's saying, I just see age, I don't see any kind of sex issue here.

0:40:39 Matt: Right. Right. And, you know, if you had a law that was like, any child under 18 can get this cancer treatment except for Muslim kids, like, obviously, that would, yeah, I think we could see that. But, you see what you want to say. And she has a lot to say about the rational basis review. And by retreating from meaningful judicial review exactly where it matters most, the court abandons transgender children and their families to political whims. In sadness, I dissent. That's a very good way to put that.

0:40:48 Thomas: That'd be pretty obvious. Yeah good. No respectfully bullshit. I like it.

0:41:07 Matt: Nope. In sadness. That is the only way to approach this decision, because it is a sad day. And we're all very concerned about where this could go. Certainly, all of this discussion, I mean, it's also, it is very strange, the first few pages of this, it isn't just Thomas, you know, Roberts does a long sort of medical analysis in the first few pages that, as I'm reading it in the beginning, I had to check to be sure I was actually reading the majority, because he's talking about the 1 .6 million Americans who are suffering from gender dysphoria and the difficulties they're having. And I was like, how do you get from there to where you're going, where I know you're going. Right, exactly. Out of that 1 .6 million. Exactly. So yeah, I will say that the one, and again, I hate to say silver lining, but the one thing that could have gone worse with this is that there was this concern that they were going to find that being transgender is not a suspect classification, that it's not something that deserves special scrutiny. And Thomas and Coney Barrett, Coney Berrett wrote separately just to say that she thought it shouldn't be. Thomas said it shouldn'd be. Alito, of course, I won't even mention Alito's dissent. You can guess what that's what's in there, said that it shouldn't be. But if the full court had actually found that it should be a suspect classification, that would have set trans rights back much further.

0:41:32 Thomas: Huh, but there was one person who said they detransitioned though. So yeah, yeah,

0:42:11 Matt: So there is at least, you know, hope here. You know, we talked to Rutgers law professor Katie Iyer back in February, around the time when we were thinking about this, you know, sort of under the shadow of Scrimetes, we were talking about the time and she was talking about sort of the long march of civil rights in these contexts and how, you know, you had Bowers v. Hardwick in 1986 saying that sodomy laws were fine, that it was okay to criminalize queer people. And it wasn't until 2003 with Lawrence v. Texas that we finally had that rectified. And she was saying she's fully expecting a setback here, but in the end, we know where justice is going to go. We know that John Scarametti's name is going to go down as a villain, as one of the great villains of legal history in civil rights. I can know that now, and it's easy for me to say, but at the end of the day, that's where this is going. But it's a hard day today.

0:42:55 Thomas: It's really bad. This is really bad trans people are in danger and they have been for a while. There's nothing to say other than we got to keep fighting. We got to Keep protecting people. This isn't good. There There's no not really a good spin on this.

0:43:07 Matt: No. But of course, we love you, we support you. And I know this is tough. I'm sorry we have to talk about it, but that's where things are at today.

0:43:13 Thomas: I just hope that folks can remember what's at stake next time we need to all get out and vote like this is what's at stake. It doesn't you don't have to love every Democrat. You don't. It's this is it. This is why it's always better to mitigate harm because there's a lot of harm that I think people are just incredibly bad at keeping in their heads at all times. I think they are. It's way easier to just focus on some abstract principle or something, some whatever, and not realize like the amount of harm every day that you are mitigating by not allowing a complete collapse of the system, you know, and a complete collapse of expertise and any sort of over government oversight, like all of that harm that we were mitigating. It's so easy to just lose focus on and not take into account. But that is important.

0:43:18 Matt: Yeah. Yeah, it is.

0:44:00 Thomas: All right. We'll take a final break here and then maybe Matt can cheer us up with a frivolous footnote.

0:44:06 Matt: You got it.

0:44:10 Ad: [Ad break 3 — ad music]

0:44:10 Thomas: All right, lay it on me. What do we got? Food law? What do you got? Ah yes yeah how do you do how do uh how are you doing that you okay no oh I every single time he talks I lament that Chris Farley is not alive to be able to play him on snl because it's it is a chris Farley character yeah yeah picture a pillow that can talk with a mustache yeah best

0:44:11 Matt: All right. Today, every so often I've got footnotes of just people who deserve to be historical footnotes. And today we have one Michael Lindell, the MyPillow man himself. So you might've heard that this defamation trial just wrapped up, Coomer v. Lindell. And I want to just talk a little bit about him. Not great. No. Yeah Yeah, I mean, he definitely said some really defamatory things. And I'm sure that probably most people listening to this have heard Mike Lindell talk. You're about to again, I'm sorry. But he really is, just in every way. And yeah, people are going to miss out on the video, but I think we can all picture Mike Lindell as you're hearing it.

0:44:59 Matt: So that's a pillow that's done a lot of crack cocaine, just a lot.

0:45:06 Thomas: Thing about him yeah yeah

0:45:07 Matt: Good for him for allegedly cleaning up. You know, it sounds like he's done well, but he's got problems, Mike Lindell. And just for people that don't know, of course, he was an active insurrectionist and tried to help overthrow the government and was telling Trump right up to the end that he needs to impose martial law. At one point, he's carrying out, I think, like a super secret plan with giant letters on it that was, you know, martial law in the U .S. or something, one of those deals. But the defamation in here is typically stupid of Mike Lindell. It's pretty much what you expect. In fact, it also gives you a good insight into where these people get their own media because, you know, they're living in another planet, just a completely different media planet. So there's this lunatic podcaster named Joe Altman who has a podcast called Conservative Daily. And Conservative Daily, not a news source, obviously. I couldn't find this clip. It probably has been taken down by now. But Joe AltMAN said that he would absolutely that he'd listened in on an Antifa conference call. So and I would

0:46:02 Thomas: Yeah fantastic let's go around the room

0:46:09 Matt: Know because I was there that's right

0:46:10 Thomas: Introduce ourselves boop yeah uh antifa california division thomas smith here representing yeah turn your camera on a camera's on everybody you're on mute you're

0:46:20 Matt: Treasure never heard of this guy but yeah he he went on this weird thing about how he had heard on this antifa conference call that he was definitely listening into that someone named eric from dominion he identified himself as eric from Dominion which is very funny too that you'd be in the antifa conference call representing dominion checking in with your Antifa contract that we have with Dominion Voting Systems. But apparently he heard Eric from Dominion bragging about rigging the election using Dominion voting systems. And then he found some posts on... And this Eric allegedly was Eric Coomer, Dr. Eric Coomer who was working with Dominion at the time as their director of product strategy and security. So he found Some private Facebook posts where Eric Coomer, it turns out, didn't like Trump very much, like a lot of us. But of course, this Antifa thing didn't happen. I don't have to tell you that. He actually tried to provide evidence that he had Googled Eric from Dominion in Denver in September when he actually made the search on November 11th. He actually trying to doctor the photo to change the date that he'd done this search. And again, no other evidence of this conference call. So Lindell hears about this. He hears about this guy talking about this thing, about this Antifa conference call, and decides that he's going to talk about it. So I'm just going to let you hear one of the defamatory statements. This is just one of them that I could find. We can decide if this is defamator.

0:46:21 Thomas: Unmute antifa conference call hi yeah eric from dominion oh boy yeah it's stupid it was on the minutes of the meeting so yeah he's gonna do it yeah no prove it

0:47:43 Clip: To close the gate the cows are out of the barn dominion you did your best and Smartmatic to take our country through china you did you did our best you corrupt people you tried to suppress our voice you didn't fit you failed and I'm telling you you coomers of the world what's his name is eric coomer eric coomer yeah eric coomer if I'm you right now I am instead of going over and making deals at Newsmax. I'm if I'm you, I'm turning myself in and turning the whole operation. So maybe just maybe that you get immunity and you only get to do I don't know, 1020 years. I mean, you're disgusting. And you are you are treasonous. You're a traitor to the United States of America. And

0:48:21 Thomas: Why would it be that if you have immunity then

0:48:34 Matt: Now you can say that. You can say it.

0:48:37 Thomas: There will never be any consequences for this

0:48:37 Clip: Evidence is there and I, you know, it's sitting there well mike why don't you turn it all in to the supreme court and bring it to the fbi oh it's getting to the Supreme Court everybody but we're going to let you the people that's what plan's all about we are going to dump it we're

0:48:45 Thomas: Turn it into this

0:48:50 Matt: Yeah, you got it. That's enough.

0:48:51 Thomas: Yeah no it's not enough I want to hear all of this

0:48:52 Clip: Not taking any chance that those nine justices say nope we don't want to look at this because um they told us early in this in november there was not enough to overturn the election

0:48:58 Thomas: He's doing himself he's doing his own

0:49:02 Matt: It's a Supreme Court voice.

0:49:02 Clip: And we don't want to get involved because, you know, somebody might be upset. Well, you know what? This wasn't around in November, December. This came on January 9th.

0:49:08 Thomas: They don't care about that okay that's the end of it dang yeah

0:49:12 Matt: I think the Supreme Court doesn't want to get involved because there's no drop box at the Supreme Court where you can drop off evidence. That's a pretty,

0:49:16 Thomas: I'm gonna turn in my evidence to the Supreme Court yeah who would that what would that be I don't even

0:49:24 Matt: Pretty good one. Del, I got to say, that's pretty solid impression. So this trial went pretty much the way you'd expect this is gavel gavel material up and down this would be a really fun one to cover I am working to see what we can do about that I can't guarantee anything yet

0:49:32 Thomas: Know yes I teased something on last episode and I had told I had said that reddit would know who we were talking about but that's okay we can reveal deal we're trying to get this audio oh I'll read the hell out of these yeah give me give it to me

0:49:44 Matt: And if not audio then at least transcripts something we can work with because these trials this testimony I mean it's really he did for days yes and I mean this is perfect gavel gable material because it's an important story I mean the guy actually did have a lot of influence but it's also ridiculous and nobody really got hurt so it's one of my favorite kinds of trials.

0:49:53 Thomas: Did he testify oh yes oh my god I will read that entire thing yeah sure

0:50:06 Matt: Although I don't want to say that Eric Coomer didn't get hurt. He did say at trial that his career and reputation were destroyed because he's been associated with this. But I think any reasonable person hearing this would know that this is a former crack addict yelling about something he heard on a completely disreputable podcast.

0:50:19 Thomas: That would mean my defense if I were mike lindell look nobody could ever take what I'm saying seriously look at my face I sell pillows there's no way that you could find me liable, who would listen to this? It's like the easiest impression to do. I don't know. I love it. Put on a little fake mustache. I'm ready. I almost hope we don't find the audio. Get the transcript. I'll do it. I'm ready for my closeup.

0:50:30 Matt: How did you find that clip of Mike Lindell saying that? That's pretty good. I can't do impressions.

0:50:46 Matt: I mean, it sounds like his lawyers were all in on this too, that they actually said that it was reasonable to call Coomer a traitor because his lawsuits were an attempt to silence the truth about the Antifa phone call conspiracy theory.

0:50:59 Thomas: Which is, and what's crazy is like, it is pretty hard to be liable for defamation. Like it's not, you know, like it's Not super easy to be Liable for Defamation. Now I guess this wouldn't have been a public person, right? So So it wouldn't have been the, the actual malice standard. So that helps a little bit, but like, especially with stuff like that, like I could see arguing like, well, trader's an opinion, you know, I'm just saying like, ah, you're a trader, you know? That's just kind of an opinion. There's a lot of ways in this country to get out of defamation is all I'm saying. And he couldn't, he couldn'T. Oh yeah, sure. Oh yeah. That's not good. That's getting into, that's getting Into actual malic territory. If he were, even if like this were a public person, boy, what an idiot.

0:51:05 Matt: Sure. Yeah, sure. Well, this is only one of the statements, but it's also, and he said he had the evidence, which that's always, yeah, that's super defamatory. Right. Absolutely. Yeah. No, it's a masterclass in defamation. They were seeking, I think, 60 million. He ended up getting 2.3 million out of this, which isn't too bad. It's not enough to destroy. But I mean, Lindell's already been found liable in any number of other things. He's facing criminal charges elsewhere. So he's got to sell a lot more pillows.

0:51:49 Thomas: It no it's not enough yeah my pillow hoards my hordes of money from the pillows is getting thin I don't have that much more to pay

0:52:04 Matt: I was about to suggest maybe you could just do an episode in character, but I think I might lose it. I don't know if I can handle co-hosting with Mike Lindell. It's too much.

0:52:10 Thomas: Out would everyone who bought the first pillow like to buy a second pillow that would really help me right

0:52:19 Matt: He has been doing that. You know, he has his own Lindell media thing, and he's been going on every day. And yeah, actually, just as a quick bonus before we go, I wanted to mention Joe Altman himself, the original Antifa phone call guy. Same day, the appeals court actually upheld the $1,000 a day fine that he received as of June 6th, 2024, because he walked out of his deposition to go home and record a podcast about how much the judge in the case sucked. Called her a DEI judge. So typical stuff. Yeah, you know who these people are. Yeah, they're all the same. So, but yeah, just a little bonus that Joe OATMAN himself, not even a party to the case,

0:52:20 Thomas: Now yeah yeah oh boy boy. Oh my fuck you asshole. Yeah.

0:52:52 Matt: Is also suffering consequences. So that's nice to see.

0:52:55 Thomas: The pillowcase makes a really good hood if you need it to go do anything with in your off time.

0:52:59 Matt: Uh, you know, hoods.

0:53:03 Thomas: So good. Oh, wow. Well, that cheered me up because as this was not a great day for news, but, uh, thanks so much. That's, that's always, that'S always nice. What a great footnote. All right, everyone. Thanks so much for listening. Uh, really excited to see you on Sunday on YouTube for that Q &A. Going to be a fun time. And Matt, thanks as always.

0:53:22 Matt: Yeah, we'll see you soon.

0:53:23 Thomas: All right. Take care, everyone. We'll see you then.

0:53:43 Thomas: Now you can't even have a nice officer answer my riddles three.

0:53:46 Matt: Ha fucka.

0:53:48 Thomas: By the authority vested in just nobody stopping me, I guess.

0:53:52 Matt: The court's willingness to do so here does irrevocable damage. Excuse me.