DOJ Just Convicted Several People of Imaginary Antifa Terrorism

Transcript

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

0:00:00 Clip: Thank you.

0:00:01 Matt: Is the first case in Trump 2 .0 of the government demonstrably treating opposition as an organized terror network. He writes, it has come to my attention reliably that Georgetown Law school continues to teach and and promote DEI. This is unacceptable.

0:00:32 Thomas: And welcome to Opening Arguments. This is episode 1245. I'm Thomas Smith. That over there is real life immigration attorney Matt Cameron. How you doing?

0:00:38 Matt: I'm absolutely freezing. Our building decided that it is spring because it's March 18th and it's spring in Boston, apparently.

0:00:46 Thomas: So the AC is getting you.

0:00:47 Matt: No, they just turned everything off. Yeah, we're just sitting here in the cold.

0:00:50 Thomas: Oh, I see. Okay. We do a fun thing. I don't know if all places do this, but in California, because it can be, you know, 100, 110, whatever, do a thing where to compensate, we make the insides of our building 33 degrees degrees. Breeze because you know it's so hot outside that you want to make it freezing cold inside so that makes it so you can't possibly be comfortable in any circumstance it's great yeah

0:01:08 Matt: And it great when you're wearing a suit and you've been sweating heavily and you walk in and just get frozen.

0:01:17 Thomas: Yeah that's true it would feel good for a few minutes but people just like work in their building forever and freeze to death but I do still I'll take a cold building any day over a hot one I just can't I mean I mean obviously to a point but like the sweating while you're sitting there working you can't do anything that's the thing there's always the battle over the office thermostat it's like, hey, if you can always put something on, a sweatshirt, a blanket, anything. If you're hot, there's laws, okay? You can't do anything else. So it's like, sorry, you got to bias toward cold. It's just the way it is.

0:01:19 Matt: Everyone enjoys that. It's true. My brain still works when it's cold and not when it's hot. So my brain should be on overdrive right now in this temperature, so

0:01:55 Thomas: Yeah, we're going to get a super mat. Well, what are we going to be talking about today?

0:01:56 Matt: Well -cooled. Yeah, all right. Well, we have got to talk about the Prairieland ICE protest case that just went to a verdict last week, unfortunately. And we talked about this back back in October when DOJ brought superseding material support for terror charges alleging that these people were members of an Antifa terror cell. And I flagged it at the time because this is the first use of this idea of charging people as members of Antifa, which is a group as we all know does not exist. Flagged how dangerous this could get and this case really I'm going to make the argument proves because this the murky case they have right now. This is the one that shows the evils of Antifa and there's nothing here. This really bad case.

0:02:41 Thomas: But I saw it was a guilty verdict, wasn't it?

0:02:44 Matt: That's right. That's what I'm saying. Of what they were actually convicted of, what most of these people, most of these defendants actually were convicted of. Pretty scary because this really could be any of us. So I'll get into a little more. I think that it's not getting enough of attention. And this is a real classic kind of OA story because there's a lot more going on than the government's going to tell you.

0:03:03 Thomas: Oof. Well, that sucks.

0:03:06 Matt: On the other side of things, we've got Ed Martin, one of our favorite MAGA characters, former US attorney from DC, January 6th attendee, and current pardon attorney for Trump is now facing actual potential bar consequences because he's been such an idiot in his job.

0:03:13 Thomas: A tent. Yeah.

0:03:21 Matt: Want to talk about that, but also about this ridiculous ridiculous proposal that Pambandhi has put out, very coincidentally, right around the time when this complaint came out, try to keep DOJ attorneys from getting any state bar consequences. It's very important we talk about this because they're going to try and tell us that they have the right to do this. Obviously, they don't. And I think the states have a lot of power here. So I wanted to talk about that. Then in today's footnote, I am going to tell you how to steal $100 million worth of jewelry and get away with it.

0:03:49 Thomas: Make us wait all the way to the footnote. We should keep that behind the paywall. If you want to be rich, patreon.com/law. Matt is going to tell us how to steal 100 ,000. Boy, I thought they frowned upon that. I guess, you know, there's no rules anymore. So I think Matt's kind of accepting the, you yeah.

0:03:50 Matt: So you that's right that's true oh yeah it's anarchy man that's it 100 million dollars it's the largest jewel heist in american history and can tell you how to get away with it because someone just did legally all

0:04:14 Thomas: Legally. Holy crap. So then you're not even advocating breaking any laws. There's nothing they can do. This is sound law. Well, I'm excited. Sounds like a fun episode. Okay. It sounds like a bad start and then a fun episode. But we do need to talk about Prairieland. So we'll take our usual break. Go to patreon .com slash law. Support the show. We have the lot awful movies is in the edit bay right now. That was a lot of fun. Very fun 90s movie uh that was everything I could have hoped out of a 90s legal thriller and it was peak alec baldwin I mean just just epitome of alec baldwin 90s uh so much fun uh that'll be up pretty soon uh within a few few days as I get back from peter and uh that'll be exciting so patreon .com slash law to hear that you gotta be at that second tier and above and thanks so much to those who support the show and those who listen and those Who Share and all that that stuff. We'll take a break and then we'll get to it.

0:04:40 Matt: That was fun yeah

0:05:14 Thomas: Right. So let's talk about the terror cell that was finally brought to justice.

0:05:19 Matt: We could talk about the oscars for a second because this is actually relevant uh

0:05:22 Thomas: Oh, the Oscars. You didn't tell me about this.

0:05:24 Matt: Haven't actually talked about one battle after another yet, but obviously it just won Best Picture and a whole bunch of other awards. I I liked it for the most part. It's very hard to adopt a pension book, although he actually went to the trouble of not adopting a pension, but he just sort of did a bit of it. It's relevant because you might remember the opening scene in the movie is a cell of basically domestic terrorists taking over a CBP facility. And cool.

0:05:45 Thomas: A bunch of stuff in Sacramento too. It'S really funny. Our kids' old daycare is like in the very beginning.

0:05:49 Matt: Like that bank robbery?

0:05:50 Thomas: Think so. Yeah. I forget now what what what happens but there's a bunch of sacramento stuff yeah

0:05:55 Matt: I just thought it was interesting, just one of those cosmic coincidences, I guess. But the Academy and the critics and a lot of the movie -going public has been celebrating this movie, which begins with a full -on assault on an immigration facility. I the movie, and it was an interesting to watch. And it was obviously sort of an alternate timeline, and it wasn't DHS in the movie. It was some other agency, right? It was supposed to be sort of maybe near future, maybe current times. You couldn't really tell, but I don't remember the name of of the agency, but it was something else. Impressed that it got made at all.

0:06:24 Matt: But three days before One Battle After Another won the Oscar, we have the conviction of the Prairie Land defendants. And so I want to kind of take you through what this was actually about, what they charged them with, and kind of where this goes and what this means. Because to be this clear, is nothing like what I'm talking about, what was portrayed in one battle after another. This was not at all a a violence assault on immigration facility. DOJ is trying to try to portray that way in this conviction. Just reading their kind of crowing press releases about this, when you look at the screenshots they're using and the things that they're saying, you know, prove the worst of the worst here, it's really people coordinating to show up on July 4th and shoot off some some fireworks outside a Texas detention center. Had legal fireworks. It They a noise protest. They wanted to encourage the people in there to show that there's people outside that supported them. Of course, it's July 4th when everybody else is shooting up fireworks. All, just as a starting point, we're going to link to the website. There's a very good website that humanizes these people, that shows you their faces, tells you their stories, introduces you to their pets and partners, and sort of shows you that These are regular people. This is not an Antifa terror cell. This is not some sort of organized terrorist operation. These were friends looking out for each other. These were people that were deeply involved in mutual aid in their communities in Texas. Number of these defendants are trans and queer and looking out for their communities. Are people who were very concerned about what was going on inside this ICE facility. On July 4th, they show up, there's this noise protest, and the techs exchange before this, and they're using Signal, which I do too, and the government in the indictment is almost trying to make it seem like that in itself is evidence of some kind of crime, that they're Using Signal, that they have the chats set to delete, as you can do every so often, just kind of periodically and automatically delete, which is just good security hygiene for your techs, you should do that anyway. There is nothing in the the text. It indicates that they're planning violence, that they intend to exercise any violence. One of them talks about bringing a rifle, which is legal, legally registered to him. Texas. A lot of people have guns.

0:08:11 Thomas: So we're doing more of the like right wingers pretend that having a gun is outrageous stuff

0:08:15 Matt: Or a gun to a protest is a crime, right? Yeah, more of that. A little unclear what happened. Charges originally dropped in July. I remember reading the government's account and thinking, well, that sounds pretty bad. Was waiting to see how things played out. I took a look at the indictment. And then when the superseding indictment came out, thought, well is that all? They're just basically charging these people with having, I'm not really exaggerating here, having socialist and anarchist literature and flyers and completely normal stuff. Just we'll get to the box in a second, the box of stuff.

0:08:17 Thomas: Oh come on really what's in the box no sorry it's I can't resist huh

0:08:48 Matt: Members of the John Brown Gun Club and the Socialist Rifle Association, which are left -wing equivalents of any number of NRA -type groups that already exist for right -wing people. They get a lot more nervous when we exercise our Second Amendment rights, those of us who do. You can look through this indictment and the superseding indictment for yourself. Most damning exchange basically is someone suggesting that rifles might make the situation more hot, talking about this protest. Song, who is the person who was convicted of potentially trying to kill law enforcement, replied that rifles would be used to intimidate, stating cops are not not trained trained or equipped for more than rifle, so it tends to make them back off. That was pretty much the extent of it was that we're there for self -defense. Defense version of this, and I'm going to focus mostly on the people around this incident, but I want to make sure that I acknowledge sort of what the allegation was. Version basically is that someone took a shot out of to the woods and hit a local police officer who showed up and hit him in the neck. And one very striking thing about this trial is they did not put the medical records of this officer into the trial. Yeah. And because he was in the hospital for maybe a few hours, this was not a fatal shot. This was nothing close to a fatal shock. It looks like it hit him on the collarbone he was released. So, know, again, I understand the attempted murder and that's you're taking a shot. That's what's going to happen. But there is a credible theory of self-defense here that an officer had pulled his gun on somebody who's running away.

0:10:03 Matt: And either the possibility that the bullet was a ricochet from a warning shot or that someone did actually try to take a shot in self -defense. Judge Mark Pittman, who's a Trump appointee who was overseeing this trial, specifically excluded the defense from making any arguments about self -difense whatsoever in this case. I know. That's Pittman rulings. And I want to say up front before we really get into this, I do want to have a guest. We're talking to a couple people right now to come on to talk to us more about this, people who've been on the ground and know the story better. I'm just going to give you the basic overview right now. I just described, the officer who was hit in the neck and went to the hospital, that is the extent of the violence. That's what happened. Everything else, all of these other people, they basically harassed and really intimidated about 18 or more people. This trial was nine people.

0:10:45 Thomas: People how many

0:10:46 Matt: Everybody

0:10:47 Thomas: Many handles does a gun have because I didn't know how many triggers does it have do they make nine trigger guns now yeah

0:10:49 Matt: Just lines up and takes a poll for

0:10:56 Thomas: I think that's the part that anyone's not familiar with this I I think I think maybe you're too immersed in this um to be clear uh know we covered a little bit but I I already forget there's somebody who shot maybe shot somebody okay why isn't that person just on trial for something this is nine people for doing doing what?

0:11:15 Matt: Material support basically. And I should say there are also state charges that may be starting up again. They were paused for this federal prosecution. Thing we were talking about back in October that I was so concerned about and that I remain concerned about, and I'm going to blow the alarm on as hard as possible, is that the idea of material support for terrorism when you essentially believe in pretty standard left -wing concepts of socialism, anarchism, nonviolent protest, and you show up prepared to defend yourself if you need to, but not showing up looking for a fight, not looking for violence, you show up with fireworks to make a noise protest basically and to support the people who are in there. Feds used this as an excuse to try to break up this network of mutual aid and left wing organizing in Texas.

0:12:00 Matt: The stories of the way they broke people's doors down and pointed guns at kids and intimidated. There were a number of people who have already been forced to take pleas before this trial even began. Read about the people who were forced to testify against their friends, and they did not help the government's case at all from what you you can tell when reading about their testimony. I mean, they basically, they said, I love these people. They're not Antifa. We weren't organized. We waren't looking for trouble. This is not a violent group, right? I mean there was nothing, as far as I can tell, except for the government's witness, witness, who we'll get to in a minute, expert witness. Was nothing from any of this that would suggest these people were, and what the government kept calling the North Texas Antifa cell, as if that's a thing, right. That's really what they called it. Nothing. I have to really stress that, that this is pretty standard left -wing, mutually decentralized organizing, and it's for the good of the community. And these are people that were showing up for community defense. And that's my take on it. After reading all of this, I've tried to keep it objective as I do when I look at these things. I am very concerned about the idea of calling this terrorism because Megan Morris, for example, was in her car about a mile away playing on her Nintendo Switch. That was what she was doing during this activity.

0:12:16 Thomas: Well, that's good. Yeah. Oh my God. Really?

0:13:08 Matt: Worst, most egregious things besides that, are Daniel Sanchez Estrada and his wife, Maricela Ruda, who were at the protest and then moved a box. This is the box I mentioned before. There's a picture of the box in the indictment, And it's a box full of left -wing literature and flyers, basically. That's it. Nothing in there that I can tell from the indictment at least. There's nothing that's violent. There is nothing that is talking about rising up violently against the government. There was an anti -Trump sticker that says something like, make America not exist again or something. Standard left -wings stuff. Was charged as concealment of evidence because it was concealing their Antifa ties and their Antifas beliefs.

0:13:44 Thomas: Way.

0:13:45 Matt: Else removed someone from a group chat that was considered to be tampering in the same way of concealment. These are people who were there, who were at a protest, who had self -identified anti -fascist, socialist, anarchist beliefs. None of these things are criminal. And literally, one of these flyers depicted a swastika going into a garbage can, which is a we can all get behind.

0:14:07 Thomas: That's some, yeah. Controversial messaging these days.

0:14:10 Matt: Exactly. Exactly. Can take you through the charges a little bit here. But the I'm looking at it, and I've been in touch with some people who've helped me understand the case better, and I have looked through the multiple websites here that the defendants have set up as well as all of the government's filings, read the trial accounts. Got a Trump -appointed judge who really set the rules in such a way that I've never heard of some of these restrictions. He was was the only one who was allowed to ask questions in the voir dire, for example. He Yeah, the judges, he said it that way. Limited opening arguments from the defense to eight minutes, which somebody should have done in the Trump trial, but not enough time, obviously. That's pretty severe restriction, severely limited cross -examination and the defense's rights in a lot of ways.

0:14:34 Thomas: Judge? Yeah, geez. Is crazy.

0:14:52 Matt: Yeah. Declared a mistrial at one point. Because And one of the attorneys who was supporting on the case was wearing a t-shirt he didn't like, with a black civil rights icon on it.

0:15:01 Thomas: They had a mistrial and had to do it again because of that? Hell.

0:15:03 Matt: Because it was during jury selection, so the judge decided to start over. There was an argument about whether one of the attorneys was actually local enough, even though he was a Texas attorney and that's all that's supposed to matter for the purposes of this trial. There's just any number of things, and again, I want talk to it with the people who are sort of on the ground and attended.

0:15:20 Thomas: You would hope that if this crap is true that you're saying, you would help that there's a lot of grounds for appeal, right? I don't

0:15:26 Matt: I would hope. It's a Fifth Circuit appeal. It's federal, of course, in Texas, but even so. I thought it was interesting. By the end of it, they're having discussions about jury instructions. And of course the government is pushing very hard to get a jury instruction on Antifa and on connections to Antifa. And Judge Pittman actually asked, this made every news story about it. He said, whether it's Antifa or the Methodist Women's Auxiliary of Weatherford? Why does it matter?"

0:15:52 Matt: I had the same question because they're being tried for material support for terrorism. So you would think that the government needs to establish that there's a terror group that they're supporting, but they don't.

0:15:51 Thomas: Even understand that is Yeah. Right, because if it was like a sewing club or a, you club, does it matter, doesn't it?

0:16:06 Matt: Should, you would think, because the name of the statute is material support for terror. But the reason I'm extra, extra concerned about this case is that you don't actually have to prove that there's a terror organization involved. They're just throwing all this Antifa stuff in to show that there is like terroristic tactics going on and this is how they're organizing is using Antifa, which again, under these national security memos and the FBI's new approach, they're allowed to treat it very differently. They're allowed to treat people who they think are involved in this Antifa as presumptive criminals, basically. But the statute itself, 18 U.S.C.

0:16:37 Matt: 2339A, thanks, unfortunately, to Joe Biden in 1994, who got this through the Senate. Yep, another unfortunate Joe Biden joint. Is material support. It's supposed to allow the federal government to go after terrorist networks, but it doesn't require that you prove that these people had any particular beliefs or working with a terrorist group. And so that's why the Santifa thing is extra bad, the way it's clouding everything. And it's also why it was so easy to convict these people, because whoever provides material support or resources or conceals or disguises the nature, location, source, or ownership of material support, knowing or intending that there will be used in preparation for or carrying out a violation of. And then we have all of these options. And what they're going for here are two very different things. They're saying it's a violationof the provision of law as to attempt to kill a law enforcement officer, which obviously is a pretty serious federal offense under Section 1114. But they're also saying depredation of government property under 1361, which is the spray painting. There was some spray painting that went on that night.

0:17:33 Thomas: Depredation?

0:17:34 Matt: Depriving the government of valuable property by spray painting it.

0:17:38 Thomas: Deprivation? Or, oh.

0:17:39 Matt: Depredation. Yeah, it's kind of a weird word, But yeah, basically attacking government property.

0:17:40 Thomas: Depredacion? Oh, okay. I don't know that word. Yeah, oh, okay, sure.

0:17:47 Matt: Just really weird. I think we can understand that by definition, in many cases, attempting to kill a federal officer is an act of terror. It can be. But spray painting as an act of terror, as a predicate offense, is pretty unusual.

0:17:54 Thomas: Sure how was the spray paint was

0:18:01 Matt: I mean, mean, it said something about them being pigs or something.

0:18:02 Thomas: It spooky was something spooky like

0:18:04 Matt: Yeah, spooky spray painting. Yeah. Break down the indictment, that's why it's extra terrifying to me, is that this statute that has not been used very much, and there's a lot of talk about how the president can't designate it. We talked about it before. The president can create something called a domestic terror group. That's kind of what he's trying to do with this executive order. The second half of the statute is about support for foreign terrorist organizations, and those are strictly defined, and they're actually outlined and named. But this thing is extremely broad, and it doesn't actually require that you have these beliefs or that you support a terror group, where it gets a lot worse here.

0:18:04 Thomas: A skull goblin yeah well that seems insane matt I don't understand how that could possibly be well

0:18:41 Matt: And it needs to be changed. Not a good statute. It was kept expanding since 9 -11 and also one of those things that it's been lurking there the whole time for a Trump -style administration to use and it hasn't really been used this way against people who engage in anything that looks like domestic acts of terror, but it's always been there. It's like a lot of federal law where it's only as useful as when you use it yeah brought in as an expert witness, David Kyle Shetler, who is best known for his association as a leader in the Center for Security Policy, which is one of these very boringly named groups that is actually super hard right Islamophobic and racist. And one of the main sources of the nonsense about Sharia law that we've discussed many times by Frank Gaffney, who's a pretty famous Islamophobe. I wanted to show you my Frank Gaffney fact, actually.

0:19:26 Thomas: Defense agency gaffney has asserted the logo of the U.S. missile defense agency is a coded signal showing the official U.S. submission to islam what okay

0:19:39 Matt: Yeah. So And it's the Obama logo. He's claiming this is partly incorporating the Obama loco. Person founded the Center for Security Policy, and is one of their leaders. And the Center for Security of Policy, course, has been branded a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center, like a lot of places the Trump administration gets its people from. Center of Security Policy has provided a lot of really helpful information to the Trump administration. Believe Kellyanne Conway was also briefly associated with him. So just a whole world of fun with the Center for Security Policy. So this guy's previous gig, Shidler, is his expertise in Sharia law and the way that Islam is going to take over America. But I guess he's developed a cottage industry here of Antifa expertise. He's an expert on all this. Brought in this government expert witness to talk about what literature means and how you can actually see that they're an organized cell, whatever else, but a very credible witness. Was a big loss for justice because most of the charges were convictions. On almost everything. Song was pretty much solely responsible for the attempted murder. He was convicted on one of three counts of that, and two counts of discharging a weapon during or in relation to a crime of violence, and everyone else was acquitted to those. Taking that out of the equation and looking at the fact that everybody else was charged with some kind of support for terror, which were purchased legally and were just regular July 4th fireworks were charged as explosives. So they were all charged with use and carry of explosives, and those were all guilty. And they did shoot them off outside the ICE facility, not into the ICE Facility, but just outside in the regular way. And there's even pictures in the indictment of them going off outside the fence. It's pretty obviously not aimed at the facility. They're not even saying it was, they just didn't like that they had them, I guess. Have multiple counts relating to these explosives, allegedly, and then providing material support for terrorists and then riot. Riot, of course, began when law enforcement came out. They were just having a peaceful protest. Is, again, understanding, having read all of this as much as I possibly can. I do want to talk to people who are closer to the situation. And we're going to talk about this in a little bit. And I'm going to talk to somebody who was actually in the courtroom for most of the trial, as well as an attorney who's very familiar with the case and can talk about the legal aspect. But I wanted to bring this to everybody's attention, if you're not already following it, to make sure that you're on it. And if you can go do anything to support and talk about this case at prairielanddefendants .com, is the first case in Trump 2 .0 of the government demonstrably treating opposition as an organized terror network.

0:22:00 Matt: The Neil Muller poem, first they came for the communists, right? But before they came for the communist, they came from all of their political opponents, and they came for people who were organizing against them. And frankly, they they came for the lawyers. I mean, some of the very first people sent to what they called protective custody at the time.

0:22:13 Thomas: We're fine with that though no I'm just kidding

0:22:18 Matt: The chain of events, though. It starts with organized opposition of any kind. That's what you have to go through first to really set up about these people a lot, and especially after getting to know them and their stories. Are people that I could know that live in Somerville or in Cambridge here in Massachusetts. They're very familiar to me and the circles I'm in. Think that if these kinds of people are terrorists, then we're all terrorists. That's what it comes down to. And that's what I've been saying. The national security memo that came out just a few weeks before this indictment, we talked about it before, but it essentially designates anyone who has what they call anti -Christian, anti -capitalist views, think that marriage is between one man and one woman only, anyone who chooses who thinks there's more than two genders or whatever they say, all that stuff. They consider all of that to be antifa, to be indications of terrorism and a basis to harass and investigate you. And that all played out in this case when you read about the way that they tracked down everybody who might have been associated with these people and tried to lean on them as much as they could. Things they did, now everybody involved here. Sobering to to read about. And sure what else to say, but it's something people need to know about, and I really want to talk more about it.

0:23:23 Thomas: Seems like it's the thing that we have all been kind of afraid of for a long time Um, it seemed like maybe maybe it wasn't working in different ways that they're trying to charge people, you know, whoever, depending, you know, call me all these different people, but this one feels like they they really did it. It sounds like if someone shot someone, okay, maybe someone's guilty of something. I don't know the details, you know, and then you could argue about the self -defense or whatever, but beyond that, like this is a joke.

0:23:50 Matt: It let them distract you with any act of violence associated with this, because again, you can't have criminalization of protest, which is really exactly what this is. Want to just send you very quickly, just so you can see just how ridiculous this gets. This people are really the zines, like a lot of leftists are, self -published magazines. And is one of the things that was actually cited by the prosecution. Out this headline. Is from the Commune Zine, Commune Mag.

0:24:16 Thomas: Satanic death cult is real in hereditary and now midsummer horror is family oh that

0:24:23 Matt: The movie Midsommar. It's a movie review. Literary, sophisticated review.

0:24:28 Thomas: If it weren't what would that even be let's say it's just totally real what crime is it to I mean we've got a lot of conspiracy theorists if we're going to start locking up people for saying a satanic dead cult or is it supposed to be like they're part of the satan death cult oh

0:24:31 Matt: I know. Right? I think an admission that we are the Satanic Death Cult, but it's a movie review. They didn't even read it.

0:24:49 Thomas: You know what people tend to do is they tend to like satanic death cults are like you know we're tired of flying under the radar we're this is we're coming out it's our coming out story tell your friends how so a jury did this how

0:24:58 Matt: It's Satanic death cult day. That's right, that' right. It was charged. Told by an expert witness that these are all indicators of Antifa. They were told by the government that you can find that if these people were supporting what they were calling Antifa, that they are providing material support for terror, and that they brought these explosives, which were again, legally purchased fireworks on the 4th of July that they were setting off, that this all somehow some sort of big plot. And there's nothing in these communications that suggests any kind of plot. I brought up one battle after another just to kind of contrast, right? Because I think that's what they want want to say this is, right?

0:25:23 Thomas: Come on yeah

0:25:37 Matt: And you can see the signal chats for yourself. There's absolutely nothing like that. And that's clearly not what people are in it for. There's some heartbreaking witness, of personal testimony from people who know these people on the website I'll link to talking about it. These are not the kind of people who would ever plan anything like this. They have no interest in being involved in anything like this. You know, these are good people involved in mutual aid trying to help their communities.

0:25:33 Thomas: Yeah yeah wow this is wow that is really something yeah well I know we we are working on uh talking to more people about this, and I really think we need to, because what in the world? Talk about gavel, gavel. I mean, maybe this is, we got to talk about this.

0:26:08 Matt: I think maybe some of the pretrial stuff, especially kind we've talked about even with the sandwich trial, a lot of the pre -trial stuff matters so much. It can really set up everything else that happens and how the arena is constructed for a trial.

0:26:20 Thomas: Oof, well, that sucks. All well pin in that, we'll get more on that, but why don't we move on to stuff that's less depressing than that.

0:26:27 Matt: Yeah, we've talk about consequences for the innocent, and now we can talk about consequences for other people.

0:26:32 Thomas: One of the biggest assholes in, the whole thing, in the hole asshole ballgame. Administration, I know it's the Super Bowl of assholes. It's a, it's a tight competition. This is not your local asshole competition. This is a pros.

0:26:46 Matt: This is the Nationals. We're at the Nationales.

0:26:47 Thomas: No, you don't, you know, F around like this. Be serious. Uh, this guy is one of the best. Right, well, we will take a break and then we will get to it. Uh can't wait for this one.

0:27:01 Thomas: Okay. Matt, remind us about Ed Martin. I, I remember, but just in case anyone else doesn't remember this guy yep

0:27:07 Matt: There is a fantastic profile in Ed Martin's hometown newspaper in St. Louis talking about what a piece of shit he is. It's a lengthy profile. And working from memory, I believe one of the people who knows him pretty well said that he has a heart of coal, which I thought was a pretty good description. Live your life in such a way that people don't say that about you. Martin has a long and not very impressive political career, but he was most recently famous, of course, for going to January 6th and then representing January 6 defendants, and then just for extra treat, representing the government against the same people that he was previously representing. He entered his appearance on both sides of criminal matters and multiple appeals when they were withdrawing because of the pardons.

0:27:42 Thomas: God he's a two -way player in the asshole competition those are rare these days they don't have many of those well

0:27:50 Matt: It goes both ways. Yeah, no, no. It's true. And was originally supposed to have been a u .s attorney for dc that was what trump wanted to reward him with but he was actually too nuts for this congress to actually allow yeah that's right and

0:28:07 Thomas: He was something for was that the thing he was temporarily sort of trying to be okay yeah because he he was just a shit poster really right as the main thing he did he

0:28:18 Matt: Poster uh 6th guy conspiracy theorist uh yeah I think let Let me see.

0:28:20 Thomas: Has a podcast imagine giving podcasters a bad name that's that's the kind of guy we're talking about pro

0:28:27 Matt: I believe it's called the Pro -America Report. Come on, man. Just give me a better name. I have a very good name.

0:28:31 Thomas: America report geez that is awful that is can't you propaganda better than that that makes me want to propaganda just to show you how it's done I could do way better than that oh

0:28:36 Matt: It's terrible. Unfortunately, he became the pardon attorney for Trump. And of course, as we know, the pardons have become super corrupt, even beyond what pardrons usually are. Also was involved in the Weaponization of Government Committee, which, very accurately named because they're going after all of Trump's enemies. But it was, of course, supposed to be going after the people that Biden allegedly weaponized the government with, or Obama, in getting charged Trump with crimes. This Barr complaint that I'm going to tell you about in a second here. So this is from Washington, D .C., where he is barred. Is ridiculous because I didn't even know about this one. He is the kind of guy that you can't possibly keep up with everything he's doing.

0:28:49 Thomas: That's right yeah oh

0:29:19 Matt: It's just too much going on. This is so stupid. I wrote a letter on with a terrible font formatting. You know I have to bring it up. Not even justified.

0:29:19 Thomas: No yeah yeah it's the least important thing but oh

0:29:31 Matt: But it matters. 12 -point Arial. Come on.

0:29:34 Thomas: My god I just remembered remind me I have a minor minor minor footnote to tell you don't let me forget okay pin in that it's a good one uh

0:29:40 Matt: All right. Like Thomas Putnam. Let's do it. Okay. A month into serving as the temporary U .S. attorney, he writes to Georgetown Law School. From his position as the U. s. Attorney. And he writes, it has come to my attention reliably that Georgetown Law school continues to teach and and promote DEI. This is unacceptable. DEI, just, you know, I guess there's a class in it or something. I mean, there's no legal, right?

0:30:06 Thomas: Dei class yeah are you in dei 200 or dei 300

0:30:11 Matt: Yeah. Is no legal definition of DEI he doesn't even spell out what it means. So if you're just reading, maybe you don't even know what it means. This Is unacceptable. I have begun an inquiry into this and would welcome your response to the following questions. First, have you eliminated all DEI from your school and its his curriculum from your school and his curriculum. Second, if DEI is found in your courses or teaching in any way, that's one word, will you move swiftly to remove it?

0:30:40 Matt: What is going on? And this guy is a lawyer.

0:30:39 Thomas: It's so stupid oh the dumbest people yeah

0:30:44 Matt: I mean, this is not a lawyer letter. He threatens Georgetown with a good time by saying that they're not going to allow anyone DOJ to work as an intern or a fellow at had Georgetown law. So yeah, loss to Georgetown there under Trump's DOJ. DOJ. Dean Treanor responded and this

0:30:58 Thomas: It was an attack so terrible that even these cowardly schools uh this in this era of people folding they're like well okay we can't fold to this that's yeah it's

0:31:09 Matt: Is an easy one. I mean, this doesn't mean anything, right? Like flatly, obviously First Amendment unconstitional because he's just saying, yes, it is, right.

0:31:16 Thomas: Just like a crank letter you don't even like would throw it away it's not even even worth responding to yeah

0:31:23 Matt: Eliminated all DEI from your school and its curriculum. Nobody even asked you to do that, but also, how do you define it? What does it mean? What programs are you talking about? What courses are you talking about?" How do you find the teaching of DEI? So basically, Traynor writes back and makes the very reasonable point that you can't tell us what to teach at a university.

0:31:41 Matt: Please Yeah, exactly. Yeah. New law school is this. So just has to take it basically Georgetown comes back and says, we're not going to do anything and that's pretty much to the end of it. But it. But there was a former judge who found out about this and decided this was worth reporting to the DC Bar. And I have to agree, because you're using your position as U .S. attorney to threaten a university about their curriculum.

0:31:40 Thomas: Sorry wrong number yeah oh nice yeah aren't many rules still but I would hope this would be one of them yeah

0:32:06 Matt: Yeah, the Bar should take a look at this guy, maybe. Maybe you shouldn't be practicing law. I don't know. Because he's done probably way more disbarrable things, such as, as I said, appearing in both sides of a criminal case. We talked to, of course, the director of the 65 Project about specifically that they had just filed a complete bar complaint against him for that, among other things.

0:32:09 Thomas: How

0:32:25 Matt: Was removed, I meant to mention before, Todd Blanche removed Ed Martin from the weaponization working group about a month ago because he had illegally shared grand jury materials to try to build a case against Adam Schiff. Stupid enough to try and build a against Adam Shiff, but then illegally sharing grand jury material is one basic thing you know a prosecutor can't do.

0:32:24 Thomas: About that so this guy's an idiot what a

0:32:46 Matt: The FBI agent who responded to the scene at Sandy Hook if he got any money from the plaintiffs for his testimony in the Alex Jones suit.

0:32:53 Thomas: Piece of shit wait sorry I missed the alex jones thing he was alex he jones's lawyer oh

0:32:58 Matt: No, yeah, I was just sort of mentioning and passing things that he's done. But on September 15th, 2025, again, from his letterhead as the U.S. pardon attorney for some reason, wrote to ask the special agent who showed up to Sandy Hook if he had received any financial benefit. This is on behalf of Alex Jones, basically, right? Again, disparable. You're the pardon attorney. Like, you don't, what are you doing? It's nothing to do with your job.

0:33:12 Thomas: Shit wow unbelievable this is this guy like therapy these people walk among us it's like inexplicable I

0:33:25 Matt: Especially in DC, if you have the misfortune of living in DC right now, that's very true. And that's kind of what the disciplinary body kind believes from the DC district court. So I will explain to non-lawyers that for the most part, this is going to be relevant to the next part I'm going to tell you, lawyer discipline is handled by state bar, obviously, but the state bar is overseen by our state courts. So we have the Supreme Judicial Court in Massachusetts, Supreme Courts of any any given state, conduct disbarment proceedings and make sure that you get a fair hearing and you get all the due process you're entitled to as a lawyer before there's a disciplinary decision. So that's relevant to what I'm going to tell you the next part. But DC federal court receives this complaint from a former judge saying, I'm aware that he sent this letter to Georgetown. Here's copies of what he's trying to do with Georgetown and saying this is inappropriate for a federal prosecutor. It's pretty unusual to be able to sustain a bar complaint against a federal prosecutor. They

0:33:28 Thomas: Just how dumb and evil this is, is like it's hard to believe these people are just around. Hmm. Yeah.

0:34:17 Matt: Have leeway to do a lot, but there are limits, as you said. There's got to be limits. Lawyers, we all understand that if you get a letter Bar Counsel, you answer that letter. That's very important. A long enough, you're going to get somebody filing a bar complaint. And they've all been fairly minor. I would take responsibility if I'd actually made a and disparable mistake, but they were either misunderstandings or people that were just not happy with outcomes. And that happens when you're in any profession.

0:34:44 Matt: I took them seriously and responded properly and made sure that I participated in the process and it didn't go anywhere. That's how it works. Thing you don't do is go running to the chief judge of the district court instead of responding to the letter, which is what he did. And I think that's actually why this issue is because they're not happy. Instead of responding to the letter, he sends a letter to the chief judge and the senior judges, all of them, of the District of Columbia Court of Appeals, which is above the district court. Explained about how he wasn't going to be responding, that he found this to be uneven behavior. I don't even know what that means. Requests a face-to-face meeting with the entire appellate court, basically. Then he cc'd White House counsel just to really throw his weight around, right?

0:35:21 Thomas: This guy thinks since he's somehow a little bit tied to this administration, he can just do whatever. These people.

0:35:28 Matt: Really does. And he's got good reason to think that, but point, the way things are going. This all in mind for the next part when we talk about how Pam Bondi doesn't want any of these consequences ever to happen.

0:35:32 Thomas: Not to this degree. Yeah

0:35:41 Matt: The Chief Judge responds and says, this is ex parte, right? You're for a meeting with me when you should be responding to disciplinary counsel, going through the process. To hide, then just do the process, right? They said there's a lot of back and forth, and he's just trying to basically say, do you know who I am? Just doesn't go very well for him. So this complaint actually issued, and I think it's possible having read this that it may not have issued if he had just complied with it, but of course, he had to be at Martin instead.

0:36:04 Matt: So, this is as far as I know, the first Barr complaint that has been sustained. I mean, it hasn't been upheld yet, but it's actually gone forward against a Trump 2 .0 person. Believe Jeffrey Clark and some of the other people associated with the election fraud denial stuff, the fake electors. I know Jeffrey Clark actually did face consequences, but of course he also had criminal charges and that's what happens. As we were talking about with the 65 Project, this is a very important way to regulate some of the worst people who are doing some ofthe worst things because they are still at at the end of the day, is subject to state disciplinary authorities. And if they can't practice law, they can appear in court, although they'll try. We've learned that from Lindsay Halligan and others, that even when they're told that they're not the attorney, they might still try, but the judge still has to recognize them as the lawyer, which they're not. Continue to stand by Barr complaints as one of the primary weapons. And of course, he complains a lot about that, about the weaponization. Should say more, it's a tool of defense because we shouldn't be using it as a weapon. We should be using it when people are actually committing egregious violations of their ethical obligations, which is what this was and what a lot of his job has been. Is why it is so important that we stop the next thing that I'm going to transition to here, which is Pambandi's memo from earlier this month, in which she basically has said that of Justice is no longer going to be recognizing state bar discipline proceedings. So I want to talk about the law of this. Yes. So this is a proposed rule. This isn't the rule yet. And of course, you have to put regulations. You have notice and comment. People have the chance to comment, which you should. Is in direct violation of the law. So I have to think that if they ever start doing this, they're going to get an injunction. But she wants to amend the regulations, which tell DOJ very clearly that attorneys for the government are subject to state laws and rules in their jurisdiction. Like wherever they're licensed, they have to submit to those rules, those ethical standards, and those investigations in exactly the same extent and the same manner as other their attorneys in the state.

0:37:51 Thomas: Of those like it's I can't believe we have to say this kind of thing like yeah how how else could it work what

0:37:56 Matt: Right. And what's called the McDade Amendment that went down into 28 U.S.C. 530B, if you want to look it up. Was 1999. I guess at some point there was something that happened in 1999 that Congress decided they needed to write this down.

0:38:06 Thomas: Happened before that did they just like informally do it or something

0:38:09 Matt: Well, there's a memo from DOJ, from Office of Legal Counsel from 1984 that I found in which they found basically the same thing, that they have to comply with state proceedings. But a couple of interesting wrinkles I wanted to mention, some interesting things I wouldn't have thought about. First, I was wondering if Jenessa is aware of this one. Patent Office has allowed since 1869 that any persons of intelligence and good moral character may appear as an attorney in fact for any patent application.

0:38:33 Matt: So you could be a patent attorney right now. Have the qualifications. Occasions.

0:38:35 Thomas: Well thank you that's so nice of you to say yeah

0:38:39 Matt: Assume you're probably better off doing what Jenessa did and going for the patent bar, but apparently you could just do it. And in 1963, the Supreme Court upheld this because the state of Florida was like, you've got people in Florida who are practicing law who aren't lawyers because they're appearing in front of this patent agency as lawyers. And the Supreme Court found, I think appropriately, the Supremacy Clause allows the federal government to say that can determine who appears as lawyers before it, right?

0:39:02 Matt: There's no federal bar, to be very clear. To There's get a registration number. So I'm registered in the First Circuit Court of Appeals, the Massachusetts District Court, the federal immigration courts. I have different license numbers for all of those, but that's just tied to your state registration. And there's no special qualifications other than a fee that you have pay. Really does come down to your State Bar. Bondi rule here that she's proposing is that DOJ is going to reserve the right, essentially, by amending the regulations to put state bar proceedings on hold and conduct its own investigation first. And you know how that's going to go. Can take all the time they want.

0:39:33 Thomas: It's working great for these ice murders it's awesome you

0:39:36 Matt: Right. Exactly. Same thing. DOJ can investigate itself, the that's message. And there are a couple of agencies within DOJ that are supposed to investigate their misconduct, but that's supposed to be in coordination or even to refer to state bars, right? Once you actually have reason to believe that somebody has committed misconduct. An interesting case from 1982 that confirms all of this kind of in the other direction. I didn't know much about it. I'd heard this case before. It's called Middlesex County Ethics Committee versus Garden State Bar Association. This is a New Jersey case. Is a very interesting situation. And it's clearly a racist bar complaint. I can't really argue with the person saying this because Lennox Heinz was an attorney in New Jersey. And in 1977, he spoke at a press conference in support of a defendant. And he was not the counsel of record. He was not actually one of the attorneys on the case at all. He just was an attorney that was there that had something to say. And He said that the trial that he was there to watch was a travesty, a legalized lynching, and a kangaroo court. Watching this decided that that was worthy of a bar complaint because he was trashing the prosecution of a black man. Tried to go after him under the section of ethical rules in New Jersey that say that a lawyer shall not engage in conduct that is prejudicial to the administration of justice. So what's interesting about this is that he actually did the same thing as Ed Martin. He he didn't respond to the disciplinary counsel. He just went straight to federal court. He said, this is unconstitutional. They're trying to disbar me because of something I said

0:40:57 Matt: In public.

0:40:57 Thomas: It's interesting.

0:40:58 Matt: The rule itself is unconstitutional because nobody really knows what it means to engage in conduct prejudicial to the administration of justice. And I wasn't even the lawyer in the case. So they're just coming after me. All raises the issue of what's called federal abstention. And that's a whole other conversation. But maybe this has come up in a way before, but the Younger Doctrine, which is when federal courts get involved and when they don't, have long ago forgotten most of my federal courts class that I took in law school, but I do remember the Younger Doctrine, which talks about when they get involved. And the three -part rule they came up with in this one, basically, is that if there's an ongoing state judicial proceeding, which is what bar discipline is, that implicates important state interests, that there has to be an adequate opportunity for the plaintiff to raise federal constitutional challenges within that proceeding. And they found that there were in that case. Basically, the federal government could step in if you're being railroaded in this kind of way, in a way that they find is not fair or that you don't have due process, they could actually review a state bar complaint under those circumstances. But there is absolutely no precedent and certainly it is directly against the McDade Amendment for the federal government to just say, no, thank you, you can't do that.

0:42:01 Thomas: Yeah. You're making me kind of nervous because it does feel like there's some amount of ability for the federal government to just be like, nah.

0:42:08 Matt: Not really. Said, they can raise the ceiling and they can say that some people get to be lawyers who don't get to be lawyers in their home states. And that's unusual, but there's some agencies that allow that. Courts can step in if they think that something unfair is happening. So certainly, Ed Martin has every right to try to go to federal court and say, I'm being railroaded because I met Ed Martin and people just don't like me because of Trump. He can raise those claims. Has every rights to. I don't think they would get anywhere. He did it was pretty stupid.

0:42:34 Thomas: I guess the fact that they can make people lawyers who aren't otherwise lawyers kind the part that feels a little bit like, oh, okay. OK, so then they can determine like guess I think of the basic function going on here. The state bars is like determining who's a lawyer in that state, you know, like determining what you have to do to be a lawyer. And if you're saying there's a way that they can just be like, well, for this thing, you just got to be. A handsome feller, you feels kind of like they could kind of do what they want, but you don't think so. So,

0:42:57 Matt: Basically. Not to appear in court. Agencies that have that ability. So even like immigration court, there is kind of a middle ground for immigration court where you can have somebody who's a licensed representative or is somebody in good standing in the community who can stand in.

0:43:07 Thomas: That makes sense, because you've said, you don't even like immigration judges are kind of fake. Right. I mean, in my words that I don't want to get you in trouble, but

0:43:20 Matt: Administrative court. Exactly, exactly. Of course. No, they're not judicial judges. They'll tell you that that themselves, they're administrative judges. And with the Patent Office and lots of other administrative agencies, where honestly, it might be better if you can't afford a lawyer, that you have a reputable member of your community, maybe even a notary, who can help you put in a basic claim, right? If you're talking about social security benefits or something like that. I don't know if that's possible, but I think it is. Makes sense to an extent. But the federal government, fortunately, can't just say this person gets to appear in federal actual court. We're good on that. This came out right around the same time as the Ed Martin thing, so I have to think maybe it is related.

0:43:49 Thomas: Gotcha. Yeah.

0:43:56 Matt: Ethics board of any given state could get an injunction immediately against this rule if they tried to have it go into effect. It hasn't gone into effect yet. It's still on the notice and comment period. Think this wouldn't go go anywhere. I think that any federal judge looking at this, the law is really unusually black and white for this because it's actually something that Congress said. And it's also just common sense that that's where you're licensed. That's who controls your license.

0:44:20 Thomas: Could also have to do with the the woman who kept not being the thing she was. And the judge is like, you're not that thing. What was that? I think you mentioned it. Yeah.

0:44:27 Matt: Lindsay Halligan. Yeah, yeah. And yeah, there's even another couple now of DOJ attorneys who are showing up when they're not supposed to. A lot more to talk about with that. I mean, just DOJ antics up and down. No, certainly the Lindsay Halligan thing where she was not the U .S. attorney, demonstrably not. And multiple judges had found this and she kept showing up until she finally had to go.

0:44:47 Thomas: You're just a raccoon has been let in the building. You don't get to just be that's just you can't let anyone in a building, you know, like you can just pretend. So you're not worried about this though.

0:44:57 Matt: I'm not. I mean, I just don't think that they can stop state bar investigations. Be careful about saying things that the government can or can't do, but I just know that state bar organizations take themselves pretty seriously. These ethics boards. They don't want to be interfered with, and there's only so much they can do in state court. A lot of these federal attorneys are licensed in blue states, DC, New York, Massachusetts, California. So I think that is an important restriction potentially on their behavior. I it is the kind of thing that I'm going to say it one more time. I must have said it a thousand times by now that the fascism does require lawyers to show up and stand up in court, in the stage that we're in, at least, while we still have courts that are working. A judge refuses to recognize your appearance, that's the end of the case. That's just not going to happen. So really does mean something. This isn't just some sort of symbolic liberal fantasy about how we can use this one weird trick to win. This is actually a way to win, is to make sure that people that are acting this badly are disciplined by the bars they're supposed to be responsible to.

0:45:54 Thomas: That's a relief.

0:45:54 Matt: I thought so.

0:45:55 Thomas: I was kind of worried about that. Right. Well we will take a break and and then we will get to a footnote. Oh, a pair of footnotes. I got a little tiny footnote for you.

0:46:06 Thomas: So, Matt, so son Arlo has been writing lately. He's a writer. He's six years old. He's almost seven. Oh, he's turning seven soon, but he's in first grade. Precocious child, doing a lot of writing. Talk about it on Dear Old Dads all the time. A video gamer with me, but then he just quit cold turkey and decided to just be a writer of books. To my dismay, but no, it's good. I have to encourage him. Yeah, no, it's great. You don't want to play with me anymore. Yeah. Sure. Let's write some books anyway. I let him, you work on like one of the computers. Know he's trying to do all this kinds of stuff and he, uh, I bought him these little books on Amazon to write in all this stuff.

0:46:44 Thomas: Well, on the computer he's, he's wants me to help him. He's been doing this quite a bit. He's got like several little things in Microsoft word he's doing, you know? And then he tells me like, Oh, I, So it's the font I'm trying to do. He typed in the font that he was doing. I was like, wow, you typed in the font? And he's like, yeah, it's not working. So I go over and look. And sure enough, he has typed in Garamond into Microsoft Word. I was Like, you wanted that font? He's like Yeah, it is my favorite font. Sorry, did you did did was like, did mom tell you? Did somebody tell you anything? Like I seriously was like is it did anybody what? Why? How? How? He's like, I just like it. It's my favorite.

0:47:10 Matt: You're raising him right

0:47:24 Thomas: It was like, no, this is from apropos of nothing. You know how many freaking fonts there are in Microsoft word. This is a hundred percent. And think of a kid's brain. Like he's just browsing the fonts, the millions of fonts. He's, he's done a bunch of other ones first, but then all of a sudden he decided Garamond was his favorite one. And then I think since I made a big deal about it, now he's kind of doing the kid thing where he's like a no, you know, but like he did, he was like that's my favourite one. I was like I have have to tell Matt.

0:47:23 Matt: He's not a listener I take it yeah he's got great taste obviously that's great I'm very good work I

0:47:54 Thomas: I promise you, apropos of absolutely nothing, like he just decided it was his favorite font. So there's my font footnote for you.

0:48:01 Matt: The kid was Kid was raised right obviously uh whether you told him or not he knew what to look for

0:48:06 Thomas: Got a good set of eyes.

0:48:07 Matt: Boy of taste I like it well good job Arlo so I'm going to tell you how to steal 100 million worth of jewelry, as promised.

0:48:14 Thomas: Good. Yeah, people are like, get over it. Enough of this bullshit kid story. I want my 100 million 300

0:48:19 Matt: Well, I wouldn't encourage Arlo to do this. I think he's a little young, maybe. Is a story back from 2022, and it started with a jewel heist. Is like a very cinematic sort of thing where you have a Brinks armored truck that was for followed 300 miles by a group of jewel thieves, basically. It was going from from San Francisco. I don't know where I was going, but bunch of jewelry back to basically mom and pop jewelry shops. At first, I wasn't very sympathetic to the people who lost the property because it's extremely expensive jewelry. But then I read about some of these people and they're saying some of this business is closed or might close soon because they weren't properly insured or they just lost everything. There's an artist who was saying basically an artisan who'd lost his entire life's work, basically, the that's That's really important. That's people's art. And million worth in 24 bags, $100 billion, considered to be the single biggest heist, perhaps in US history, certainly the biggest jewelry heist in US history.

0:48:35 Thomas: Wow la and oh no holy crap yeah

0:49:14 Matt: Way to get away with it, since I know you're now wondering, is to not be a US citizen. Nelson Precio Flores was taken into custody by ICE in LA. I gathered, I couldn't quite find exactly where, but I think the timing might've worked out that it was during the worst sort of ICE enforcement in LA. And I wanted to highlight this story as a footnote because this really shows the point that I've been trying to make for a while now. Have this kind of rampant, unchecked, completely uncoordinated immigration enforcement, you're going to pick up people that you might actually want to prosecute for other things. They're going get away with it. And that's what happened here. He was off a permanent resident. He Was charged and indicted in federal court for this. But apparently, ICE never informed prosecutors that they had him in custody for this extremely serious federal theft offense. Just took him into custody. And within a month or two, he gladly accepted deportation to Ecuador. Ecuador isn't great on extradition. And that's it. Now pushing to have the indictment fully dismissed without prejudice. It was dismissed with prejudice if he ever comes back.

0:50:15 Thomas: From out of the country he's like get rid of that

0:50:18 Matt: His attorney was actually, I think there's a hearing coming up on this. Yeah, that happened a couple of months ago. I just wanted to make the point because when Trump is talking about going after the worst of the worst, always careful when we're talking about these things. I don't like to play the good immigrant, bad immigrant game, but there are people that do things like steal somebody's entire life's work of jewelry and make off with it. That's $100 million. And facing federal charges. And if you want that man prosecuted, don't have rampant immigration enforcement that is so completely out of control that it doesn't care about any other part of government or anything else that might be going on and is just obsessed with their numbers.

0:50:48 Thomas: And you always make that point and I also tack on the point that think I got from you but just to reiterate it's not always just like the bad guy right or in quotes it's also they could be a witness to nicht just this if people want to say like oh well we got a criminal out of the country I don't care like okay there might be a bad guy who is a citizen and an immigrant uh who's a witness to a crime and then they're gone now bad guy gets away and and is in this country, right?

0:51:16 Matt: Imagine. That s a great point. Imagine the situation in which the only witness to that crime was the driver and they deport him, right? That could have happened.

0:51:24 Thomas: It's not good. What happened to the jewels? Is this going to be, like, if it was the movie, he somehow buried them in Ecuador and then gets deported to where they are or something.

0:51:37 Matt: Of the last story I saw, these are still missing.

0:51:39 Thomas: Still missing. There you go.

0:51:42 Matt: Got away with it. The worst consequence of mass deportation is mass deportation. That's thing, I don't think anybody listening to this needs to be convinced that mass deportition is bad. Breaking up families is bad, snatching people off the streets and violating their rights and holding them in terrible conditions, all of that. I'm not saying this is the worst thing that could ever happen out of mass deportations.

0:51:57 Matt: I just want to point out sort of these ancillary things that I think a lot of people who voted for Trump may not think of. And if you have somebody in your life who voted for Trump, maybe this is a story they want to know. I

0:52:07 Thomas: it'S not just that. It's plus, that I think it does show show that a lot of the people making these decisions are blinded by the racism that they don't know. Like one thing to be like, yeah, you or I, obviously we, we already have all these other reasons for, wanting the policy to be the way it is. it'S not a contradiction to us to say, yeah. Okay. But the thing you think you're doing, which is making America safer, justice, blah, blah. It's actually not even doing that. And the reason they don't care, it could be incompetence. And I'm sure some amount of it is ignorance, but some amount might just be they don't care. They just want brown people out of the country. They're not particularly interested in the details.

0:52:46 Matt: And who cares if it throws off a that took a lot of work, like three years of building, if you get the satisfaction of deporting one guy to Ecuador, I guess.

0:52:54 Thomas: Shoot. I guess I was all I had my I had my black turtleneck and my my my other gear ropes and such ready. And darn it. I didn't know you're going to tell me a thing that I couldn't do. If Trump takes away our citizenship, I guess, you know, if it gets to that point, I suppose there's a bright side we can start doing a whole lot of heists uh my

0:53:13 Matt: To find that silver lining. It's true. Sure. And you get a free trip to somewhere else. Yeah.

0:53:20 Thomas: Heist is I'm gonna steal a bunch of supreme court justices from the court put them all in a bag and I'm going to carry them and then you're going to see like the little like you know like the bag like little things punching out of the bag you know in a cartoon and I'm gonna steal them in a heist that's my heist from when when well I'm very clear not doing that now no worry it's when and if my citizenship gets revoked there you go

0:53:46 Matt: I just want to say hi to everybody listening to this at Thomas's trial when it's being played as evidence of his threat to kidnap Supreme Court justices.

0:53:55 Thomas: I'm gonna have to prove I'm a comedian ah god um uh knock knock oh good times

0:54:07 Matt: I think you're funny. So expert witness.

0:54:09 Thomas: Attorney thinks I'm funny everybody as I said I'm in my trial

0:54:12 Matt: I'm a witness. I can't be your lawyer on this.

0:54:14 Thomas: You're right. You can't. That's true. Oh,

0:54:15 Matt: And nobody listening to us can represent you either. So

0:54:15 Thomas: Man, that's a good point. Wow. I've really screwed myself over. We better stop talking.

0:54:20 Matt: I am quite a really good listener. Lawyer is listening to this.

0:54:23 Thomas: I'm getting worried now. Okay. All right. Well, that was a lot of fun. Thanks, Matt, for another great week of breakdowns. I'll see everybody on Monday for the Genesisode and reminder that lot awful movie should be coming to you pretty quick. It's a a lot of fun. I'll definitely let you know when it's for sure out, but I'm just excited about it.

0:54:40 Matt: Sweet. That was a good one.

0:54:42 Thomas: We'll see everyone then.

0:54:43 Matt: Later.

0:54:47 Clip: This has been Opening Arguments, produced by Thomas and Lydia Smith, with editing help from Peter Baird. The intro is by Thomas Smith. This outro is by Matt Cameron. Support the show at patreon.com/law. Contact us through Patreon or openarguments@gmail.com. Make sure to follow our blue sky at OpenArgs. But most of all, please share the show. Thanks for listening.