Trump Messed With the Mouse. Now He Gets the Ears.

Transcript

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

0:00:03 Matt: As far as I know, and I went looking, I don't think there's ever been anything like this, and it needed to happen. It's about time.

0:00:17 Thomas: Not effective on individuals who are extremely hairy.

0:00:22 Matt: So there you go. That's how you foil the glove.

0:00:33 Thomas: Hello and welcome to Opening Arguments. This is episode 1289. I'm Thomas. That over there is real life attorney Matt Cameron. How you doing, Matt?

0:00:40 Matt: Well, I'm in immigration law hell, but otherwise, doing fine.

0:00:43 Thomas: But for real, like, how are you actually doing? We don't get to, we the audience don't gets to hear enough. It's been a while since we've talked about that. I know you've talked about, you know, how hard it is to maintain proper, like mental health and life balance with a job like yours. But how's it going? How are you? Are you okay?

0:01:00 Matt: Thanks for asking. Well, of course, I always feel bad talking about this because I can't compare to what my clients are going through and their families, but we are squeezed right now. And we talked about this a little on Wednesday's show. I just want to be very clear, because it's one of the things I want to talk about today, that temporary protected status, thanks to Samuel Alito and the concurring justices in the Supreme Court, ended formally, finally, on August 4th.

0:01:23 Matt: TPS for El Salvador is scheduled to end on September 9th. That is a tough place to be squeezed between for this community that we serve. We represent a lot of people from Haiti and a whole lot of People from El Salvador. We have one of the biggest Salvadoran communities in the country here. I've always worked closely with Salvadorans at the Salvadoran Consulate, just wonderful people. And it's been really hard because in the case of El Salvador in particular, And they've had it for 25 years.

0:01:46 Matt: So you've got people that have adult children, own multiple houses and businesses, and have counted on this work permit, which is going to be expiring on the 9th. I had to tell somebody else today who's losing a very good union job after 18 years that I can't help him get a work permit. His daughter can file for him in May.

0:02:00 Thomas: What does that mean his daughter can file for him in may what does that mean

0:02:04 Matt: His daughter will be turning 21 in May, so she's able to file. Because he has a lawful entry from having had TPS before, he's come and gone. He's able to file that way to seek residency. But there's nothing else I can do to just magically produce a work permit before that time. Tough choices.

0:02:17 Thomas: He said 21 what is that not

0:02:19 Matt: You have to be an adult to file for your parent. You have to at 21 years old to file your parents' residency. No, you can vote at 18, but you can't sponsor your parents. Yeah. You're a child until you're 21 under immigration law.

0:02:24 Thomas: 18 like huh what so it's just another way for them to like dial it back a little bit dial it back like is that what it is I can't think of any other reason why that would be

0:02:40 Matt: It's so funny. That's one of those things that sits so baked into what I do. It should be changed. You are right.

0:02:44 Thomas: I don't think you've ever mentioned I've never heard that before that I know

0:02:48 Matt: That is a good point. There was actually, so the only way it is beneficial is for the special immigrant juvenile visa, which means you can get that up to 21. And that can be really helpful for people just at a high school or essentially on their own.

0:02:57 Thomas: Of oh that like goes the other way like there's like one instance where it keeps you eligible for something longer you're saying but pretty much every other way it counts against you huh

0:03:05 Matt: Yeah, it is not great. And of course, a lot of people approach me and say, well, my child just turned 18. I'm ready to have her file for me. She wants to help. And of course I have to say, wait three years.

0:03:12 Thomas: Huh. I cannot think of why that would make any sense. Just like apropos of nothing.

0:03:17 Matt: You can be drafted. You can vote.

0:03:19 Thomas: Yeah. Weird.

0:03:19 Matt: You can't sponsor your parents. That's a good point. It's been really tough because, you know, I've told you about the anxiety in our communities and the people that we deal with and sort of the collective trauma that people are feeling. You know, we all expected the TPS for El Salvador, all the TPS programs. I mean, John Kelly promised it in the very first Trump administration as his first DHS secretary that these would end. It was especially egregious when Kelly promised It because he was the military commander for Central America. Like he knows the the situation on the ground in Central America.

0:03:44 Matt: And he was promising to send all these people home. And it finally has come to fruition. It's a tough thing. It says it's the end of an era. It is really hard to not have answers for so many people that deserve them, but we're doing what we can with the people we can. We're still winning plenty. We'RE still helping a lot of people. On top of that is more and more detained cases. We have more and more people going into custody one reason or another, and we're just doing everything we can to help them. So it's, it's been a lot, but I still get to look forward to jumping jumping on and talking to all of you and hanging out with you. And it is one of the high points of my week every week. So appreciate it.

0:04:08 Thomas: Yeah, no kidding. Yeah. Well, what are we going to be talking about this week?

0:04:20 Matt: I am going to actually touch on the TPS termination for El Salvador because I do believe it's completely illegal. For whatever that's worth, we'll find out after the Alito decision that we looked at. I want to start with the big lawsuit from ABC Disney against the Trump administration. This is potentially the most important First Amendment lawsuit, certainly in this administration so far, or maybe one of the most in our lifetimes.

0:04:39 Thomas: I don't know, man. So I'm sorry to disagree, but on where there's work, I've covered a whole bunch of college professors who wanted to say the N -word without punishment. And I I think those they're the real.

0:04:50 Matt: The heroes.

0:04:51 Thomas: Yeah。 First Amendment here. So but second place. I'll give you second place,

0:04:54 Matt: It does seem to be what they mostly want when they talk free speech on campus, isn't it? Yeah. Right. Or to actually defend genocide.

0:04:55 Thomas: Mm hmm. Hmm. Usually or something equally offensive that, you know, something like that. Yeah.

0:05:04 Matt: It's a big one. This is actually, I'm going to break it down, but this is a really unprecedented lawsuit in several different directions. And I think ABC has a fantastic point. They're absolutely right. And they're right to fight it. This is actually more fighting than I expected from the media. So this is very encouraging. I think it feels like a turning point.

0:05:19 Thomas: I actually kind of missed this. I haven't seen this in the news. What is it over exactly?

0:05:23 Matt: Yeah, this is kind of the long -term fallout from the ridiculous Jimmy Kimmel post -Charlie Kirk assassination thing. The FCC, see the short version is they're calling their license in early, their licenses. Well, I'll explain how this works. This has never happened in our lifetimes. This is huge. And ABC is bringing a straight up, right up and down First Amendment equity claim. This isn't even a statutory thing. This is just a constitutional claim saying you can't do this to us. And they're also detailing in just exquisite detail all of the different ways that Trump has threatened to retaliate against them just for the things they've been broadcasting, not just Jimmy Kimmel, but so many other things. We'll get into some of that. I feel like this has to be a win. Again, this is not my field of law, but I've done some research on it now.

0:06:01 Matt: And it really does seem like this is something they can prevail on. And even if they can't, they're making a really good stand. So I'm happy to talk about it.

0:06:07 Thomas: Yeah, I'm excited to get into that. What else we got?

0:06:09 Matt: Well, we got the, as I said, the TPS termination, and then we've got to talk about one of the most dystopian things I've seen in a while. Yeah.

0:06:15 Thomas: Yeah, now I know what you're talking about. Weirdly, sometimes you don't like in this day and age, but at this time, I actually do know what you're talking about you're talking about our new overlord shock gloves aren't you oh wow

0:06:26 Matt: I sure am. The Nintendo Power Glove from hell. Yeah so bad. I found the manual for this glove. So we're going to take a look at that and check out how to use it. I know we always appreciate going deep on ICE documents. Or if that's what you're into. I don't know. Right. This had better be your thing if this is what you were going to do. Yeah, this is horrifying, even by the standards of the agency we all know and hate. This is bad.

0:06:33 Thomas: Step one do not masturbate just like yeah yeah just no just no ahead of time be a be a it'd be knowledgeable about it yeah yeah

0:06:57 Matt: I wanted to break it down. I think maybe people have seen the headlines, but this is something that is so out there that most law enforcement hasn't even even heard of it, which tells you something.

0:07:05 Thomas: It's entirely possible listeners have seen the headlines and thought it was a joke or not real so this is yeah Yeah.

0:07:09 Matt: Yeah, no, it's very onion -y, I will say. It's very darkly onion -style, the idea that we're investing millions and millions of dollars into shot gloves that are specifically designed to keep people from suing.

0:07:20 Thomas: Keep people from suing. Oh, wow. Okay.

0:07:22 Matt: This isn't what I thought the future was going to be like, Thomas, I got to tell you. This is not the future I was intending. It can all still be stopped, but we got to talk about it anyway. People should know. And as usual, I like to try to make sure we balance things out so that we end with dystopia, but we're going to talk About an interesting antitrust suit involving a man who calls himself the Kentucky Hammer as our footnote today. And you know, it's got to be good when somebody calls himself the Kentucky hammer, very much like the ABC suit. This is completely unprecedented. I've never heard of anything like this. It appears to be completely new in the legal field. And it actually could be a very important precedent as to how lawyers are treated when they leave their firms. So it's especially interesting to me as a practitioner.

0:07:57 Thomas: Yeah, I was just thinking like what first came to mind when you said that was like, wait, is this a John Oliver bit where it's like a lawyer with the commercials that are weird or something? Oh, huh?

0:08:05 Matt: He does have some of those and they're higher quality than some of the other commercials we've looked at. I got to say, we'll watch one so we can understand the Kentuckyhammer. He is hammering people into to remaining in the firm and then punishing them very badly when they try to leave in a way that actually rises to the level of an antitrust, anti -competitive suit, which is very different. It's never been brought this way.

0:08:22 Thomas: But your honor, my name's the hammer. Like that would be my main. Yeah?

0:08:25 Matt: I would expect. Yeah. He's not the velvet glove or the shock glove even. He has a hammer. That's what you get. There you go. There's a show. Always.

0:08:35 Thomas: Boy, so much to talk about. We better get right to it we don't have time I want to mention again a lot awful movies ton of fun in case you didn't hear that is out patreon .com slash law two dollar level and above that was so much fun yeah like like I said kevin bacon gary oldman bad law movie some of the dumbest courtroom scenes we've ever seen love a good dumb courtroom scene I mean it's just a just a whole genre unto itself you know fantastic so check that out all right we'll take a break and get to it

0:08:53 Matt: It's saying something.

0:09:07 Ad: [Ad break 1 — ad music]

0:09:07 Thomas: All right now let's talk Talk about this ABC lawsuit, this, you know, the second most important First Amendment lawsuit.

0:09:12 Matt: Yeah, this is a big one. And there are so many different points that they make here. Obviously, they've got the best lawyers. I want to explain a little bit about the background and how this happens, because this involves the FCC and Brendan Carr, who you might have heard about, of course, as being very aggressive. And I don't want to rehash all of this, but I don' t even remember what the dumb joke was that Jimmy Kimmel made after the Charlie Kirk shooting.

0:09:31 Thomas: Yeah, well, it wasn't anything. It wasn't even a joke, actually. Yeah, it was it was him specifically. It was him saying they're trying to find every which way to blame this on anyone but the but MAGA or something like that. Yeah.

0:09:33 Matt: Yeah, it wasn't even a joke. Yeah, it wasn't funny.

0:09:41 Matt: That's right. That's fine. Yeah, which is true.

0:09:44 Thomas: Even though it did end up being true that the guy wasn't MAGA, it's still actually his statement was still true that they were trying to find any way to claim anyone else because no one knew at the time, really.

0:09:49 Matt: Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, sure. So Jimmy Kimmell makes a statement. Brendan Carr comes out and says, you know, we're going to be looking into their licenses or looking into some way to punish them, or if there's some kind of news distortion going on. He said the hard way. Exactly. Right. And that was last year.

0:10:00 Thomas: Really right can do this the easy way or the hard way

0:10:05 Matt: What they did after thinking about it for a while, I guess, is they decided to do an early review of their licenses. And I want to explain about how the licenses work in this case, because I didn't really know this because this isn't my thing, but ABC itself does not have a broadcast license as a company. It actually has a bunch of subsidiaries.

0:10:21 Matt: It has, I think it's eight stations that it actually owns that are big stations. Right?

0:10:25 Thomas: Yeah that was something I learned about this too which is like oh they I guess they make the content but not actually doing the broadcast they don't have like the towers or

0:10:35 Matt: What they have to review is the licenses for the stations that are going to air this. And that, of course, cuts right to the heart of what ABC, you know, the money they make from these stations and how everything works. So it works out to the same thing. The reason this matters so much is that essentially ABC is skipping the process, which I think is completely fair in this case, because as with so many other things the Trump administration has been doing, and as they point out in this complaint, the process is the punishment, right?

0:10:44 Thomas: Whatever

0:11:00 Matt: Forcing them through all of this, trying to pull their licenses early, the revocation of a license under the FCC rules, the burden's on the government. But for renewal of the license, the burden is on the applicant. And they can basically, they can call it in any time and they basically in the public interest, and they can say, we want you to justify your license. We want you To put in an application to renew early. And if you do not put in the application, we'll just pretend you did. And we'll proceed with a renewal review.

0:11:00 Thomas: Yeah

0:11:25 Matt: This is pretty interesting. And all of these licenses that we're talking about, I think the earliest one was up in December, 2028. So, you know, obviously we've got some time on these quite a bit early. This Is Under the Eye, if anyone wants to look it up, 47 CFR 73 .3539. Section C of that says, whenever the FCC regards an application for a renewable license as essential to the proper conduct of a hearing or investigation and specifically directs it to be filed by a date certain, such applications shall be filed, et cetera, et cetera. Essentially allowing the FCC to set a deadline earlier. And the other kind of ominous thing in this regulation is that they can't grant a renewal more than 30 days prior to the expiration, but they can deny one.

0:11:23 Thomas: Huh oh weird

0:12:06 Matt: So they could basically hold it and grant it later, But this is very much for the purpose of denying. This would be catastrophic, obviously, for ABC if they revoke these or refuse to renew these licenses. It's basically the end of ABC's ability to do journalism, which they point out here. Their subsidiaries, the stations they own

0:12:19 Thomas: Wait but sorry how does it work with the fact that they're not the ones who do the broadcasty stuff oh they do own the stations oh okay

0:12:26 Matt: In whole, the eight of these. Right. Yeah. Yeah, so this is their, and these are all the biggest markets. Markets. The Telecommunications Act of 96 puts the burden on the applicant, but it also makes it very hard for the commission to deny this. It says, essentially, they shall grant renewal if the station has served the public interest, convenience, and necessity. There have been no serious violations and no other violations that would constitute a pattern of abuse.

0:12:47 Matt: So it's mandatory, basically, in that case. And of course, what Brandon Carr is trying to say is that they have not served the public interest because, among other things, they sure did. And they refused to broadcast his most recent speech about election nonsense.

0:12:47 Thomas: Gotcha they made don trump really sad oh yeah the stupid election bullshit dumb thing the media for once did a good

0:13:05 Matt: Yes. They didn't broadcast it on ABC actual. They broadcast it in ABC streaming as a concession, basically. And they pointed out that they did not broadcast Barack Obama's live 2014 speech, which I watched very closely.

0:13:14 Thomas: Thing sure oh when he said it was the election was still yeah I love the idea of trying to even come up with an equivalent like sure I mean make the point I guess but like there is no other

0:13:23 Matt: Right. Yeah. We all forgot about that because they didn't podcast it. Right? Yeah.

0:13:33 Thomas: Time that a president got on to do conspiracy conspiracy theory stuff about an election that just does not exist.

0:13:40 Matt: They don't say this, but it's obviously misinformation that he was trotting out this tired old intelligence stuff that's already been reviewed. Very stupid. But they did compromise by streaming the whole thing. And then they did air some analysis of it live.

0:13:50 Thomas: Well, compromise, what does that even mean? Yeah, I was going to say, like, what is that? It's like if they don't pick up my TV pilot, can I be like, all right, well, compromise by letting it air, you know, like what?

0:13:52 Matt: Yeah, they don't have to. I know. They don't have to compromise. Yeah.

0:14:02 Thomas: What is even, that's already conceding that the state gets to dictate what you're doing, right?

0:14:06 Matt: It's a good point. And they make the point that they felt like they had to do the streaming broadcast because they had a gun to their head, essentially, right? That they already had multiple threats from the FCC. The details in here, I was at dozens and dozens and thousands of things I'd never even heard about that the Trump administration has been doing to harass and threaten and intimidate ABC up and down all these different ways. And when It's bad enough with the Jimmy Kimmel thing, right?

0:14:28 Thomas: Yeah.

0:14:28 Matt: I mean, no matter what you feel about Jimmy Kimmell, it was really bad that they didn't talk about threatening their license. Just to give you a couple of examples just from here that I hadn't even heard about. The September 10th, 2024 presidential debate. ABC News did real -time fact -checking. And in response to that, in retaliation for that, they filed a reinstatement of a complaint that had previously been dismissed of a news distortion complaint. That's a thing they can bring.

0:14:51 Matt: This is not in response anything particular, but they, of course, have opened the Equal employment opportunity investigation of the DEI practiced by Disney and ABC, like they're doing with every other company and university they can possibly do.

0:15:02 Thomas: Diversity is just too good these days. There's just too, It's too diverse, too many opportunities for non -whites as male people.

0:15:09 Matt: Yep, they sent a threatening letter to one of their subsidiaries because The View had James Tallarico, how do you say that? Tallarco? Tallarrico? Yeah, on Colbert, right? Yeah. Recently. Yeah, that was different.

0:15:14 Thomas: Oh, Tallarico. Yeah, I remember that one. Oh, wait, no, that was The View. There was the James Tallarco with, yeah, Colbert. So that might be a different network. Yeah, okay.

0:15:23 Matt: They just don't want him on TV, apparently. They've interfered with The View in a number of different ways. They really seem to watch The View a lot, more than anybody.

0:15:29 Thomas: Yeah, he like cares about The View a weird amount. I forget it exists at all times that it isn't actively being talked about.

0:15:31 Matt: I know, it's really strange. Strange. I know. That's my first thought. Is this still on?

0:15:38 Thomas: Couldn't imagine watching it.

0:15:39 Matt: Yeah, I know, I mean at one point they felt multiple letters and letters of intent basically demanding, here's the summary of one, the view's staff's internal communications about any candidate over two years, two named co -host messages to the executive producer about one booking, an itemized four -year list of every employee's political donation, and internal booking guidance for the view, right? Very bad.

0:16:01 Thomas: Are you allowed to demand employment from your employees, their political donation information?

0:16:08 Matt: I don't think so. And I don't think the government should get that either.

0:16:10 Thomas: Can't imagine that. Yeah. Both as an employer and a government, sure.

0:16:13 Matt: Yeah, right. And this is just because they want to see how they're making decisions around which candidates they have on and what they're saying about the candidates. There's actually a Supreme Court precedent on this. You can't subject the editorial process to this kind of examination. Like, there's nothing that allows the FCC to do this, nor should there be.

0:16:27 Thomas: We're so far away from anything real, but it would be one step closer to non -insanity, one small step if this was a news show, but you're talking about the effing view, right? Right. Who thinks you watch The View and it needs to be like just the straight facts? Like what? It's called The View. Like they have views.

0:16:47 Matt: Right. It is editorial. No.

0:16:48 Thomas: I know they have balance on there and stuff, but like they don't have to, do they?

0:16:51 Matt: The Fairness Doctrine is long gone. They love yelling about that. All of these statements from Brendan Carr, like, he's been out in public like all the the Trump idiots, giving these ultimatum and just being an idiot, talking about the fake news, talking about how they're violating the public trust by not running this election speech, giving them the chance to change course. Here we go. Fake news have a chance now to correct course before their license renewals come up. They will lose their licenses if they do not. Talking about political ideology. If you didn't take it seriously, now you should. That was in May about the early renewal order. Exactly the thing that's being challenged here. He correctly said that it's been about 50 years since the last time the FCC has used this. It tells you something, thing, that the FCC has had this ability to call in these licenses early and hasn't used it in our lifetimes.

0:17:28 Thomas: That strikes me as one of those like even if technically legal, I think you have an argument for, OK, but you're never doing this ever for anyone else.

0:17:39 Matt: This is what you're doing to us. And it's very clearly because you've said it in public, retaliation for what we're doing.

0:17:45 Thomas: Yeah. The law doesn't work the stupid way most people think it does. At least most of the time where you're like, no, it's by the bylaws. They can technically do that. It's like, yeah, but if they've never done that to anyone else, I feel like usually we protect that, right?

0:17:55 Matt: And as always, if you're not sure, you can go to Truth Social. They've got a long list of Truth Social posts where he's threatening licenses, talking about fake news, talking about how they should be illegal and 100 % negative.

0:18:09 Thomas: I'm just imagining in the lawsuit, the judge being like, all right, so you can begin discovery. Oh, we don't need to really. We've already got it. It's fine. I don't even. Yeah. Yeah, oh, the person we're suing just diarrhea is their every thought publicly. So we don'T even need. We actually would like to return some of the stuff that he said. Yeah.

0:18:15 Matt: Yeah right. Right. You're going to have to download Truth Social, but otherwise, right.

0:18:32 Matt: Yeah. Well, stipulate to Discovery. It's already out there. Literally saying we're going to test ABC because they gave fake news Jimmy Kimmel's job back, talking about how Jimmy Kimmels should be immediately fired over and over again. The one that's really bad, the one I just said, where he said that Kimmel should be immediately fired because it was the next day that they issued this early renewal order. So you can't really say that's a coincidence. They can come out and say, well, that's just the president shooting his mouth off. But of course, now that Humphrey's executor has been overruled, don't listen to that guy. That's right. Yeah. I just heard myself say that. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

0:18:54 Thomas: Just the president of the United States shooting his mouth off. Yeah. What other era would you have ever said anything like that? Yeah. It's so funny. God, we need to, I know we all know this, but I really do think it's somewhat important to try to remember what normal life is like a little bit when it comes to this yeah mm

0:19:15 Matt: Yes. None of this is normal. Noneof this is normal. And this is like the president doesn't talk about the media this way. They don't retaliate against the media. This way, the FCC does not get used this way there. A lot of these things were these horrible precedents. I'm not going to say it's a silver lining, but like we can use these things to our advantage on the side of justice.

0:19:31 Matt: And they can easily point out, well, Humphrey's executive has been overruled. The president has made it very clear that the unitary executive is the way he's proceeding. So he can't just say that these are things the president's saying. Brennan Carr can't say that.

0:19:40 Thomas: Oh right yeah yeah yeah that excuse is gone

0:19:42 Matt: Brenman Carr clearly is at the president's will at this point, right? Like entirely. Yeah, exactly.

0:19:46 Thomas: According to the the idiots that every executive branch employee is mind controlled by the president at once they are the borg there's no otherwise trump couldn't do his job it'd be

0:19:55 Matt: Yep, exactly, and resistance is absolutely futile. Yeah, I was surprised. They actually, they only mentioned Gorsuch's concurrence in Slaughter. I actually would have thought they would have just mentioned in passing, at least, here's all these these statements to the president and you can't write these off. You can't say that they're just statements because he's clearly giving marching orders to Brennan Carr. I'm just going through like the kind of defenses and the way they might view this. I was also thinking, well, they can say, okay, well yeah, we said all those things, but we really think you're doing illegal DEI, right? Which is stupid, but that's at least a non-speech justification.

0:20:09 Thomas: Impossible yeah mm hmm

0:20:26 Matt: It's yeah, that's what they got. But the complaint goes through this too, and it does a really good job of it. Four days before the change in leadership, there was a complaint about ABC News. The FCC SEC, on January 16th, 2025, four days before the new regime, said that they would decline to act as a self -appointed free -roving arbiter of truth in journalism. Merger concessions were offered to other stations, I will point out, to other outlets. And again, they shouldn't have to do all these things, but basically they've been using this thing as a carrot. Well, a stick, I should say, not a carrot, it's a pretty big stick.

0:20:25 Thomas: Is it yeah the big carrot they're beating people with one of the beating carrots uh but I I actually was making a serious point though it's not like it's less free speechy to say oh no well okay I guess you have a better excuse but like it does seem to my mind still free speech to be like we don't like your diversity isn't that a viewpoint

0:20:59 Matt: That's right, yeah. Just a combo, such a good image. Right. But yeah. Yeah.

0:21:21 Thomas: In some ways I mean I guess they could argue if they think it's racism against white people then whatever. But yeah, I still would make the argument like if I were Disney, like, well, that's also a viewpoint, isn't it?

0:21:26 Matt: Right. If it's a discrimination claim, of course. Yeah, right. That we want a diverse newsroom, that we want diverse staff. Of course, it is a different analysis with the EEOC. So they at least have that to fall back on. And then of course, they're able to show already all kinds of injury. Like they actually have not booked a political candidate since February 2026 on The View because they just didn't want to deal with it. That's pretty bad.

0:21:37 Thomas: Right. Gotcha. Wow. Yeah.

0:21:52 Matt: Going on here, as we say. Certainly, if they actually lose advertising and they get bogged down in years of FCC litigation, which is what they're saying, basically, because there is a pretty serious jurisdictional question here. This is not supposed to be something they can just run straight to the district court for. But at the same time, I think the brilliance of this lawsuit is that they're proceeding only on a constitutional claim. So it is an equity suit. It is saying only First Amendment claim. They're just trying to get basically declaratory judgment to say that this early renewal in itself is a violation of the First Amendment because it's obviously brought in and retaliation for protected journalism. And that's the crux of it. That's why I thought this was so important to talk about.

0:22:27 Matt: As far as I know, and I went looking, I don't think there's ever been anything like this, and it needed to happen. It's about time.

0:22:27 Thomas: It's pretty cool to see Disney's legal army working for good for once. I mean, I just imagine like when you're talking about them, they all receive like a signal, you know, to theirs. And then it shows like we get get a montage of them you know like one lawyer's beating the shit out of a small creator for having like a like a mouse on his you know and that's like gun they all get it's a bunch of them doing a series of things just totally abusing the little guy and then they're like hold on we've got to go assemble and sue the president

0:22:50 Matt: That is wall. Right. Yeah, because they have the big guns, they got the lawyers that can do this, and this is what they need to do. There are some issues. Because this is so unprecedented, there are some serious issues that are going to be sorted out by the court here. Technically Technically speaking, they have to get a final order to actually appeal it. They have to, it's supposed to go through the process, but there is a very strong argument here that there should be jurisdiction because this is so out of line, because it's so obviously something that's going to hurt them. Disney brought this in the district court of DC and the venue is really supposed to be the appeals court, but it makes sense to go to the district board in this case, given the factual stuff they have, to get through. There's case law support for the idea that if an agency is engaging in retaliatory stuff like they clearly are here, that you can go to a district court to get equitable relief and try to stop them from doing it. Unfortunately, the New York v. Trump case out of DC District Court last month, which I believe you talked about with Jenessa on the mail -in voting, read that whole thing pretty narrowly about how and when there's actually jurisdiction in the district court to stop a retaliatory agency action. The fact is it's not necessarily an existential threat to ABC right now because the license will be in effect all the way through the hearings and the the appeals. What they're saying is it's going to be burdening the station.

0:24:11 Matt: It's going to make advertisers shy. It going to overall put a cloud over their journalism and just freezes on everything for years.

0:24:17 Thomas: I would have to imagine like if they're trying to sign like sign talent and stuff they wouldn't want to you know have people People are like, you're not going to be able to broadcast.

0:24:23 Matt: Right. They're a big, big outlet. This is a huge thing for American journalism. I'm not saying they're perfect, but they are doing the news. This process is punishment, is what it is. They are just straight up going to the district court, and I think they're being very honest about the fact that this is what they're asking them to do. They ask them to stop it. I think that their asks at the end are a little too broad.

0:24:45 Matt: Really, all that they're going to be able to do here is get the district court to stop this particular order from the FCC, which is ordering them to basically justify their licenses. They're also asking in this very sweeping way for basically asking the Trump administration to be enjoined from abusing them any further, which, you know, that's kind of a case by case. Can't really get a broad review on that. I think that they have a very strong case from what I can tell for just getting an injunction against this, because this is so obviously a territory. They've detailed it beautifully. And I think that there's really something here. One thing I thought was interesting just before we close this out is that they mentioned that this is the first time in many decades that the FCC has even tried to do this. They don't mention the name of it.

0:25:24 Matt: I had to go looking, but it appears they're talking about a case called Lafleur Broadcasting Company from 1972. That's 54 years ago. It's basically named in a footnote just to give you the idea of the kind of thing that is supposed to be compelling reason to not renew somebody's license and call it in early. This is somebody who bought an R&B station in 1969 specifically for a majority black market, switched to country and western, fired the black announcers, replaced everything with white staff, right? So at that point, you're not doing the same license, right, you are not doing same thing that you were given, right.

0:25:48 Thomas: Oh, my God. Oh, my God, geez. Yeah.

0:25:56 Matt: They had made specific commitments in their renewal in 1970 and then immediately switched over to white stuff. That was actually denial of renewal and the DC circuit affirmed it because that's misrepresentation. You knew that you're going to switch from the black market to the white market and you know you're going to serve the market that you said you were in your license. That's pretty straightforward. That's nothing like this. There are a number of other cases where courts have noted that we really need serious, compelling reasons to call in a license. Otherwise, since then, as far as I can tell, there's never been cause to do it. So it has to be something to that order, to that kind of thing. So I just thought I wanted to mention that. That is important.

0:26:31 Thomas: I like how you casually were like, oh, I just happened to look it up. It was in a footnote. I know what you were doing that. You can't hide it.

0:26:36 Matt: Well, I thought this was, honestly, this complaint is a good read, but I thought that was really strange that you can just kind of throw that out there. It's grandiose, but good language about this is the threat to the First Amendment and everything. And they mentioned that it's been these many decades, and then they don't tell you what the case is, except in a footnote. So of course, I'm going to look it up. That's how we do.

0:26:49 Thomas: Huh. Yeah. Sure. You were just looking at the footnotes for the articles. Yeah.

0:26:54 Matt: That's just the articles, just enjoying it in my spare time. It was an interesting read. This is so far beyond the stuff I usually think about, but it's still administrative law, which is my day -to -day. And I'd like to learn more about FCC law. It seems pretty interesting, actually. We will keep watching this one and see how it goes. But I like ABC's chances here, and I appreciate that Mickey Mouse is resisting.

0:27:13 Thomas: Right. Well, I think we should take a break before we get to the rest of our stuff today.

0:27:17 Matt: I agree.

0:27:18 Thomas: And we'll come right back and talk about the world's worst power glove.

0:27:25 Ad: [Ad break 2 — ad music]

0:27:25 Thomas: All right. You want to cover TPS first?

0:27:28 Matt: Yeah, just very quickly, I wanted to just have a quick note here as somebody who thinks about TPS quite a lot, that for what it's worth, and I haven't really seen this covered, and I just wanted to note it for our listeners because I know it's the kind of thing that we enjoy just taking note of, this termination is illegal because it hasn't happened yet, the termination of TPS for El Salvador.

0:27:45 Matt: The one for Haiti, you might remember, of course, Moulin Bidot we read on Vapid Response. That was a particularly good episode where we read through the Alito and the Thomas concurrence in that case. And one of the main contentions in that case is a statutory provision that you can't have an appeal and you can have a review of termination of TPS.

0:28:04 Matt: But as the dissent pointed out, and I think very reasonably, that doesn't mean you couldn't have a view of the process that got you there, or in this case, the failure to actually terminate. So let me explain something very quickly. The concept of temporary protected status, it is in itself a designation where there's a formal finding from DHS in conjunction with the Secretary of State that this is a country that we need to protect people who are here right now from that country. Ukraine is a very obvious example. Everybody understands what's happening in Ukraine.

0:28:31 Matt: As soon as Russia invades, we can't let people go back. Haiti, obvious example in 2010.

0:28:34 Thomas: And it would be stupid to, before the war is over, be like, eh, it's been long enough. Whiners, like, just go back. Oh, I use that as an example. They are going to do that? Oh, wow. Jeez.

0:28:40 Matt: But they're going to, unfortunately, because they're intent on ending all of these programs. A kind of last -ditch litigation in Massachusetts District Court did fail earlier this month. I still think there's something to be brought here, and I haven't had time to look to see who's doing what right now, but I think there should still be some kind of challenge to this. And this came up in the Venezuela TPS designation, which was a whole morass unto itself. I'm not going to get into the details of how that That worked because it was actually super complicated because there were multiple TPS orders involved. But the short story here is that it's an 18 -month extension that they just keep renewing every 18 months. You reapply, you pay your fees, you get your background check, and you get an extension. But the extension is separate from the temporary protected status itself, which is what allows you to be here, is separate from the employment authorization that's associated with it, which is very stupid. They should just staple employment authorization to your notice, obviously. Great question. I mean, it's just like the way that we regulate employment authorization is a whole other I'd love to do a whole show on employment authorization. It's something people need to know about the way that we are hamstringing our own economy by doing this, basically forcing people into underground labor. And that's the idea. That's what we want to do in a lot of these cases is have entire markets that are not regulated. But as it is, the law, for whatever it's worth, and I hate to be the guy that just goes ahead and points out the law again.

0:29:23 Thomas: Yeah. Why would that be different? Such a bummer

0:29:52 Matt: The extension ends September 9th, 2026 for the entire thing. The deadline for the government to say what they're going to do with TPS was actually July 11th, 1026, which was 60 days before the September 9th. So there has been no federal register publication saying what they're going to do. They have, meanwhile, gone ahead and notified, and we just got a giant stack of these in our office from everybody that we'd helped apply for TPS. All of our clients got these as well. They sent out these formal notices on fancy paper, letting everybody know that September 9 means September 9. They've let employers know in the E-Verify system that they have to enter September 9, and they have to terminate people on that day. But that does not match up with the statute, because the statute, for what it's worth, again, and I feel like an idiot for just reading you what's in the statute. Section C of the relevant statute here grants an automatic extension if they don't do anything. If there's no timely determination of whether or not they're going to extend it or terminate it, this should be automatically extended on March 9th. And I really hope that happens.

0:30:43 Thomas: Well there you go case closed

0:30:45 Matt: This has already been done before. It's something that DHS knows. I think it was back in Honduras in 2017. I remember they just kind of automatically did it because they didn't make a decision in time. And I think they might be just relying on the fact that they don't think there should be judicial review and they think that Samuel Leto just upheld that idea that there should be no judicial review at all. And I think they're just being that bold. Yeah.

0:31:12 Thomas: But what why don't they just do you're saying they didn't bother like announcing in the time that they're supposed to why wouldn't they just see that

0:31:14 Matt: I had just a great question. I guess they have other things to do and they're just letting 300 ,000 people lose their work permits and not even bothering to tell them and have the dignity to just even tell them they're doing it. They're just letting them run out. There is potentially the one argument I can see for the government here is a statute says that if they don't determine, if they're not, so that doesn't mean published, they could have some secret internal memo that they could put out, I guess.

0:31:23 Thomas: Though oh boy hmm

0:31:36 Matt: I couldn't find a case law on that. There's not necessarily, I mean, it seems like that should have to be public notice. I I don't understand why it wouldn't be, but I don'T see that they necessarily have to. All of this should be something that should be brought as an injunction to enforce the automatic extension, because I think that's what it should be. So maybe I'm just trying to grasp for hope here because, as I said, we're squeezed between these two TPS terminations, and I'm JUST really getting sick watching people lose jobs that they should still have. And having employers call me and basically ask me, can I allow this person to continue working? And I can't say they can.

0:31:32 Thomas: Oh yeah right geez wow

0:32:03 Matt: Even if it's a client I've known for many years, I can'T tell you you can continue to employ him. I can, ethically, right? That's the expiration. Operation. So I guess I'm just looking for answers here. But once again, I mean, this is the only hope that we've had through a lot of this stuff is they're just bad at this, that they just don't check the boxes. And I really think that Alito's decision at Moline Bideau is sort of the enabling factor here.

0:32:24 Matt: And can you blame him? I mean he did give them a pretty big check here.

0:32:28 Thomas: I think I think you're right Right. Because it was the same thing with the Rubio signature, where it was like, why didn't they just do it? Is there some greater plan to them just not doing this? It's just an F up, I guess.

0:32:35 Matt: Right, right. Yeah.

0:32:40 Thomas: They are incompetent at the heart of it.

0:32:42 Matt: And arguably even that automatic extension may not extend the work permits. I can see it either way. But anyway, I just wanted to mention that because this is my field and I always like to get into the details on this stuff.

0:32:53 Matt: Let's go from bad to worse. Let'S talk about the gloves. I've sent you the manual. You want to open that up and take a look.

0:32:52 Thomas: But compliant technologies, like just go F yourself, man.

0:33:04 Matt: It's the most dystopian shit you've ever seen.

0:33:05 Thomas: I wouldn't think of that for a, you know, yeah, dystopian book or movie or video game, like compliant technologies. All right.

0:33:14 Matt: It'S so bad.

0:33:14 Thomas: Come on.

0:33:15 Matt: See the slogan under the logo?

0:33:17 Thomas: The force multiplier.

0:33:19 Matt: You too can be the hero that wears these gloves that shock people. Good job.

0:33:22 Thomas: I don't often say this, but these people should use AI.

0:33:25 Matt: Yeah, this is ugly, isn't it?

0:33:26 Thomas: Their design is so bad that you're like, OK, why aren't they using AI? These are the exact assholes that would be a fan of that yeah this is a mess

0:33:35 Matt: You know you don't want to get me started on these fonts. Everything is in bold. These fonts, graphic design is somebody's passion that created this manual.

0:33:41 Thomas: Yeah this is like boomer powerpoint presentation

0:33:45 Matt: I know. That's why I had to look at at it and we'll link to it, of course. But yeah, this is a conducted electrical weapon. And just to set this up, you know, obviously we know that ICE was just handed an enormous amount of money that basically we can't take back, that Congress gave them last summer in the budget. And it is allowing them to just go nuts, including this technology. I think it's something like 20 million maybe in this, they're buying thousands of these things. There's a whole piece in Wired that we can link to in which they openly admit that they know that this kind of technology can help them dodge lawsuits because you can really hurt people with these things and you don't necessarily leave a mark.

0:34:16 Matt: Yeah, they're just kind of mild electric sort of conduction, I guess. It's a conducted electrical weapon. And of course, just to be as dystopian as possible, the name of this thing is the GLOV, which is the Generated Low Output Voltage Emitter, the glove. It does kind of look like a power glove when you hold it on the other side. It has like a whole plug in the side, but it's just a big glove. They try to include rules of engagement, but of course this is just the manual.

0:34:41 Matt: Like, you know, your microphone's manual can talk about stuff you should say into your microphone, but exactly right.

0:34:41 Thomas: The manual oh yeah that's binding on the federal government they better not tear off the label on their mattress or whatever

0:34:51 Matt: Exactly, exactly. It charges, and it charges for a long time, for hours of use, potentially. I noticed that the fourth generation, up to the fourth generation of the glove, has an SD card that records the data. I'm sure that's pretty easy to lose if you want to lose it, about how often you've used the glove. The fifth generation just has a USB plug -in where it stores the glove on the thing, so it's harder to destroy. A couple of other things I noted here. If you look at page 15 of the manual, it

0:35:16 Thomas: I'm glad you're going through this because the fonts and everything is so bad my brain is refusing to take in any information it's just like no can't do it you know what what it is you know why it is it's all in the same font as when you get okay when you know when you get a manual and then you have four pages of like warnings and bullshit before the directions of the thing it's in that font their

0:35:22 Matt: Really hurts. Yeah. Yeah, it is. It's a warning.

0:35:39 Thomas: Whole manual is in the font of the warnings that you ignore that's what I was like seriously my brain was having a hard time like okay I'm not reading this not reading this It's all in that

0:35:48 Matt: And every single page pretty much has a giant warning with an exclamation point in red. Check out page 14. I thought there's kind of a funny, some funny advice here. Not legal advice, but practical advice for how to avoid the glove.

0:35:52 Thomas: Font oh my god this design on this is worth people looking at just for fun big giant warning thing out of alignment with everything else it's not centered it's like the warning I'm sorry I know this is an important I never thought when we were talking about the shock glove dystopia my biggest thing I would be like look at these fonts and graphics like it's just like that's the world we're in the big giant warming like uh clip art is that's like left left aligned. And then the text is almost like one bullet point alignment shifted right under it. Like, like warning is the heading, I guess, for a list or something.

0:36:02 Matt: It's so bad. Yeah. Right. Yeah, it's so bad. It's so bad

0:36:40 Thomas: God, it's so stupid. Do you think that people who make electric shot gloves to torture immigrants didn't do well in high school? So I think it's possible they didn't doing well in school. I'm just saying.

0:36:49 Matt: I'll tell you they didn't they didn' t have the best graphic designers or writers involved in their manual for some reason I can only imagine.

0:36:54 Thomas: All right. Sorry. I'll let you get to the thing you're trying to tell me about.

0:36:57 Matt: So actually yeah so check out under the warning what it says there we can only use I'll let you read the next part but I'll I'll just tell you. It says, you can't use more than two pairs of gloves applied at one time to one individual for no more than 15 seconds in duration on a level two ROE event, which is a rules of engagement event. It's a device that comes with rules of engagement that you totally don't have to follow. Obviously, it will work through soaked thin clothing layers, such as t -shirts and very thin blouses and dress shirts, et cetera. Now check out under note. Let's, let's have a quick reading here.

0:37:13 Thomas: Note, and it has to be the GLOV with caps and periods every time. The glove must come in contact with the subject's skin. The glove's CEW component is not effective. It's not effective through clothing. I'm telling you, they should use AI.

0:37:41 Matt: So bad.

0:37:41 Thomas: Maybe some of you AI people that hate it, maybe you'd change your mind if you had to read this right now. I'll just say it. Not effective, so it doesn't have an affect effect uh through clothing or hair and can be degraded on individuals who are extremely hairy yeah all right yeah oh my gosh I'm telling you the bear community is gonna we need them more than ever you're just gonna oh man this this we just want bears versus ice just a bunch of bears Bears beating the, that's my new, I'm sorry. That would be porn, actually. That would Be, I would watch that porn. Bears just beating the shit out of ice. They don't even have to do any sex stuff. It's just, it would be porno for me, is all I'm saying.

0:38:00 Matt: So there you go. That's how you foil the glove. Just be very hairy. So Bigfoot is not getting taken down with the gloves. That's right. That's great. Yeah. Poor otters. Yeah. They're in trouble with the bears.

0:38:31 Matt: This is such a good, I'm going to post this in Provincetown next time I'm there. Like next time for bear week. This is amazing. So also the next one is kind of funny too.

0:38:39 Thomas: CEW, what was that again? CEW. Okay. Component of the GLOV is not effective on animals because of their fur. Oh my God. God.

0:38:41 Matt: That's the electric part, basically the actual shocking part. Right.

0:38:51 Thomas: Believe me, we tried abusing some animals, but it didn't work.

0:38:55 Matt: Many animals were harmed in the testing of these gloves. Yeah. Because you can imagine that might actually be one use for it. And like, obviously we don't support animal cruelty, but like if you have a really out out -of -control dog or something that you could maybe calm him down.

0:39:06 Thomas: Sorry. Does it help to shock the shit out of somebody? What does this actually help? I mean, I guess, is it in the... Okay. When someone actually gets electrocuted, they can't move and they're all tensed up. Is it that? Or is it just like... Because my understanding was it was just kind of like a painful shock, which I can't imagine that helping anything or anyone at all.

0:39:09 Matt: Yeah, that's true. That's a very true point. Yeah.

0:39:28 Matt: No, no. The purpose is just to shock him to submission, so he'll just stop. They're pretty clear about that,

0:39:33 Thomas: The glove can get wet but can't get immersed in water. There we go. Okay. We're just learning how to fight back here.

0:39:39 Matt: How to overcome the glove. But it doesn't change or diminish when the subject or user are wet. So just FYI. Next page, we've got medical and physiological effects. And this is the kind of thing where you read it and you're like, maybe you shouldn't use this at all. Maybe this is bad.

0:39:52 Thomas: CEWs stimulate the sensory and motor systems of the central and peripheral nervous systems, which inhibits slash distracts the subject from performing coordinated muscle movement. Many medical and research studies, study, study apostrophe S. God, this is, This is incredible. This is incredible, we are being ruled over by the dumbest idiots in the world.

0:40:14 Matt: Yeah, that's for the worst. Yep. As always.

0:40:21 Thomas: Many medical and research study, apostrophe S, involving CEW, apostrophe S, have been conducted over past decades. The vast majority of those findings conclude that when used properly within legal limits, agency policy, and along with sound TTPs, apostrophe S, these tools pose no immediate threat or significant health risk to the general population. However, Compliant Technology. I'm just in a video game, man. I'm just I got one of the consumer or not consumables one of little like flavor things in a in a like portal 2 or something you know it's It's just like, yeah, compliant technologies recommends not using the glove or other CEWs on the following higher risk portions of the population. Oh, my God. The elderly, small children, pregnant women, the severely handicapped, those with obvious health conditions. Yeah. If it's not obvious, you're fine. Yeah. Everyone should wear like a pacemaker flag now or something to make sure they signal to the.

0:41:05 Matt: Yep. All those tape decks in Bioshock just lying around, just listening to them.

0:41:19 Matt: Obvious health conditions, so we'll find out about the rest. Because, you know, just make sure they're wearing their pacemaker on the outside. Side yeah and it notes that it can increase increase blood pressure blood chemistry a change your blood chemistry increase respiration or heart rate changes in heart rhythm increase adrenaline the greater the exposure the greater risk no doubt and of course it may cause or contribute to death or serious injury and it goes on from there they have a whole page about excited delirium syndrome which is a bullshit thing that's been pretty you know about all that right that the thing is basically like people have like to basically get scared to death there yeah right Right. Just, yep, yep. That they just suddenly died. Yep.

0:41:57 Thomas: That's it. It's an excuse to be able to kill people as a cop like they're so they're so drugged up or whatever that they yeah they're they get superpowers yeah oh yeah, is it that's part two yeah

0:42:10 Matt: That's part of it too. Yeah. But it's justification for all kinds of things. Tactical considerations on the next page. There's an interesting kind of thing here. They recommend that you have an additional officer to cuff while the glove is being employed. So you get one guy cuffing the other guy, like torturing, I guess. Always advise other officers of glove employment by saying, and this is highlighted, highlighted glove on okay guys yeah yeah yeah uh basically just be aware uh there's other stuff here okay yes here we go here's here's the last piece 18 this is the part you gotta read

0:42:30 Thomas: Like game on glove on chapter six tactical considerations for use of force that one no one shall in caps ever employ the glove for the following verbal defiance or belligerence well what are they what What say do they have? This is just like, we'd recommend, it's like, do knife companies be like, hey, don't stab people with our knives?

0:42:45 Matt: That's the one yeah nope none

0:43:04 Thomas: Like, yeah, okay, that's not going to stop anything.

0:43:04 Matt: Right selling a microphone and telling people not to do hate speech like come on like right yeah they can't stop us torture

0:43:10 Thomas: Yeah, not to podcast. They've tried. No one shall ever employ the GLOV for the following. Verbal defiance or belligerence, punishment, torture, horseplay. Wow, horse play.

0:43:18 Matt: They have to go ahead and say don't torture people with it even though it's inherently torturous. Horseplay. Yeah, don't f*** around with your... I'm sorry. Don't mess around. Yeah. No horseplay.

0:43:26 Thomas: Also, I don't, it starts out, don't employ the glove for the, for the following. It starts out with verbal defiance or belligerence as in okay so yeah so if they're talking back but then it switches to punishment so it's like so if their punishing me no okay don't use it for punishment torture and then horseplay I don't know if it's saying don't you use it when some kids are doing horseplay to stop them or don't us it in the same way it's torture or punishment don't use it for the purpose of horseplay because they're so bad at English.

0:43:34 Matt: Right. Talking back. I'm picturing officers just picturing them in the locker room, just putting on some gloves and touching each other with them. Like, they should encourage that. That's fine. They want to do it to each other.

0:44:03 Thomas: Yeah, yeah, I genuinely can't tell if they didn't mean don't use it to stop horseplay or don't use it to do horseplay. I don't know.

0:44:11 Matt: So, you know, you get the idea. They've got all the descriptions of the suggested rules of engagement levels. But again, these are just suggestions. Oh, yeah. Actually, one more thing. Page 22. I can't get it off this manual. You guys got to take a look at it. You Yeah, this is absolutely real.

0:44:21 Thomas: This is, I can't. Are you sure this is real? You're right. It's too good. It could, no one could make this as a joke. It's two, it's two perfect.

0:44:32 Matt: Check out the graphic and the watermark on page 22 when they're talking about suggested post-incident. This is literally how you record when you've used it. And then there's this graphic in the background.

0:44:35 Thomas: Oh my God. Holy crap. Crap. After an incident in which an officer or user employs the glove, they will be able to record the event on Compliant Technologies Glove CEW After Action Review Form.

0:44:54 Matt: I'm sure they'll be happy to do that every time.

0:44:56 Thomas: This form can be filled out online. Go to the conference and fill out, you know, the survey and tell us, how did you like your dystopian torture of citizens?

0:44:58 Matt: But it's the water mark, the graphic.

0:45:07 Thomas: Yeah, the watermark. What is this? It's a, yeah, slightly the opacity at about 50 % or whatever. Whatever evil in the capitals is powerless I can't describe words don't how do I even describe this we've got the blue that blue line flag thing the police which is the police thing right then blue line and then above and below there's extra like it's in a box that's in the dark like square and the text above it is evil and big is powerless and then under it is if the good are are unafraid in all caps and that says I guess

0:45:10 Matt: It's evil. Yep. Thin blue line. Yep. On the American flag.

0:45:43 Thomas: Ronald reagan did he did he say that evil is powerless if the good are unaafraid I

0:45:44 Matt: Yeah. Did not check that one. See what context that was. But I don't think he was talking about cops.

0:45:51 Thomas: Would like it if the thing underneath it said this is the kind of thing you can expect the people fighting you to say because you we are evil oh man

0:45:59 Matt: They're protesters. Yeah, that was from his first inaugural address, apparently. He did say that. But I do not think he said that. I do know that he was referring to cops. I'm pretty sure he wasn't referring to them as the good. Who knows? He loved cops, too. Anyway, this is what your tax dollars are doing.

0:46:14 Thomas: Oh yeah I'm sure that's insane

0:46:19 Matt: Yep. Yep. So be sure to study the manual, folks, and be prepared. And grow some extra hair, if you can.

0:46:25 Thomas: I know we need to move on but like I can't imagine even if I were like a pro law enforcement, ICE, whatever I can't imagine a situation that this would make sense for the whole thing that they do is and and I don't even know that this will happen all that much unless unless you're right and it's just they're able to like do it in low -stakes situations to just hurt people that's probably what it would be but all the other times what they talk about is how well it's Just too dangerous too dangerous of a job and so So therefore, we have to stand back and shoot people like that's what they like to do. I can't imagine a situation where it's like, well, it's so dangerous that we have our hands on someone. So they don't that means the person doesn't have a gun. But but that's not enough. Like, like, like that hasn't been enough in times past. So we also need a shock glove. I don't I still don't even get it. I don' t get what this would be.

0:47:17 Matt: Imagination, as does mine, does not extend to torturing people. I'm happy to hear that, or why you would need to torture anybody. Page 27, one more thing I wanted to mention before we go. There is one point of leverage here. They recommend the use of glove sticks, which are a product that, as noted, and I have to think, yeah, these are a real product. I looked them up. As seen on Shark Tank, there's a special thing that cleans smelly gloves. And I have to think, if anybody knows the inventor of glove sticks, as seen on shark tank, I looked her up. She's a soccer mom.

0:47:33 Thomas: Looks like nunchucks. Glove sticks? Oh, God. Yeah, I was going to say as a hockey player, I get this kind of thing. But not for my torture gloves.

0:47:52 Matt: I think she might be very surprised to learn that her product is being advertised in a torture glove manual. So if anybody who knows the soccer mom who invented these, please let her know.

0:47:59 Thomas: You guys need to see this manual. This is like, I can't even, I mean, I know we say this a lot, but the amount, the stupid dystopia that we're in is just incredible. Just incredible.

0:48:11 Matt: Also on this page, just to add a note that they explained that if you want to decontaminate the glove due to blood and or other bodily fluids, why would you be getting blood on your gloves guys what's going on here yeah yeah there's a description of how to do that because they expect you're going to get blood on it I think that's more than enough of the glove for

0:48:21 Thomas: This is so dark. All right, well, we got to take our last break, and then hopefully the footnote is not this bad. Jesus.

0:48:33 Matt: Today

0:48:40 Ad: [Ad break 3 — ad music]

0:48:40 Thomas: All right. All right man, footnote.

0:48:42 Matt: Not torture I can promise that okay we'll keep this quick but let's check out the Kentucky Hammer I have sent you an ad so that we can level set this and get an idea of who we're talking about here of course anybody who's ever watched tv has seen a personal injury ad at some point but these are pretty slick I gotta say this uh puts top dog to shame these aren't we're not going to be talking about the ads. I just wanted to show you this one.

0:48:59 Clip: In the galaxy of Kentucky, the fight for justice continues. Oh, big insurance. Help me, Daryl Isaacs.

0:49:08 Thomas: Big insurance spaceship and I can't he had it wow holy shit this is high budget

0:49:18 Clip: So you've come for your small check.

0:49:20 Matt: Yeah, it's pretty slick.

0:49:22 Clip: Never. Daryll Isaacs is on his way. The hammer can't help you, Tim.

0:49:25 Matt: Confronting.

0:49:37 Thomas: I can't. This is sorry I'm all descriptioned out why did they do a wally ripoff robot

0:49:40 Matt: Yeah. Yeah they're beating up the poor robot. I know. Like the stormtroopers I get it but yeah. Yeah that was uh the droid didn't have it coming. It's a lot. This is the Kentucky Hammer. This Is Who We're Dealing With. He's got the money to put these kinds of ads out. Pretty good looking I gotta say. The ad's not the guy.

0:49:45 Thomas: And it's definitely WALL-E eyes I don't get what the point of that is this is a lot, man. This is a lot.

0:49:58 Thomas: Yeah, no, the guy's hideous. But he's fighting some people. It's high budget. It does. Yeah. I mean, it looks stupid, but also high budget,

0:50:07 Matt: You can see how this is a Super Bowl commercial in Kentucky. He also I want to point out in that ad and some of the other ones I was seeing he's He's got basically like a mall looking hammer, but in the billboards, he's got like a classic like construction hammer, like a claw hammer, which is a lot more violent than a mall, but I don't know why that matters. Anyway, so the Kentucky Hammer is a very well-known personal injury lawyer who specializes in car accidents throughout what the complaint refers to as Kentuckiana. Did you know that's a place? Kentuckianna.

0:50:32 Matt: That is Western Kentucky, Indiana, and Ohio. Apparently is a Kentuckiano region. Yeah, the names.

0:50:39 Thomas: Ohio gets kind of shafted in terms of the what's the representation it gets in the name.

0:50:41 Matt: Yeah, there's no Ohioana. On. The Kentucky Hammer has a practice of extremely punitive agreements that you sign. Basically, if you want to work at his firm, you're going to agree to these massive fines that are going to apply to you if you try to leave. Generally speaking, in Massachusetts, I don't think any of this would fly because under our, I think it's rule five of our rules of professional conduct, just to name a state where this works, you can't punish people for leaving. You have to let them notify the people that are their clients in your firm that they're leaving.

0:51:10 Matt: You have to give the clients a chance to go with you because that's your lawyer. We can't restrict them. We can't basically take their fees. We can't, you know, whatever. If you want to leave, you're going to leave with your book. That's the idea. You've earned these clients, you've earned this money.

0:51:12 Thomas: Mm hmm, wow. So interesting, like, because it really doesn't work like that in any other line of work. But it does make sense. I guess that it's the one line of where you do have like a constitutional right to your lawyer.

0:51:30 Matt: And that's a good person that you have developed a relationship with, presumably. And, you Know, personal injury requires a certain amount of trust. I can see it.

0:51:36 Thomas: Well, I know, but there's so many jobs where that's, you don't get to do that, that have just as much trust and whatever. If your doctor leaves another thing, I don't even know that they're allowed to. Yeah.

0:51:44 Matt: That'S true. They can be non -competed. But the non -compete, at least in a lot of states, on lawyers are pretty limited. But it sounds like Kentucky has allowed more. We'll talk about at the end here what they might be allowing. But in this case, the reason this matters so much is that the suit is brought by Nicholas Alexo, who is one of the lawyers that tried to leave, and his new firm, White PLLC, the Kentucky SAW. They are bringing an antitrust, anti -competition suit, which is very unusual. It's a federal suit. Usually you'd be talking about some other tort when you're trying interference with contract or whatever else.

0:52:05 Thomas: The screwdriver for now. It's like a competing like name.

0:52:23 Matt: But this is straight up saying that you're using these extremely punitive contracts to dominate the personal injury market in Kentucky on it. And I think this is interesting because I've never heard of anything like this before. Apparently there have been even more stringent things, but just to give you the idea, $8 ,000 per client for any client who follows him, a $6 ,000 case acquisition cost, which they claim in the complaint is designed to survive judicial review somehow. And then a gag on communications by which clients are told they have a choice of counsel, which is a, that's sacred. Like you can't just stop them. And he has apparently apparently not only refused to tell clients that their attorney is leaving and they have the right to follow him, but he's put out statements saying they've been fired when they've in fact left voluntarily

0:52:22 Thomas: Hmm wow oh wow

0:53:04 Matt: In some of these cases. And then he goes ahead and sues them preemptively to try to get ahead of things. And also omits the breach of contract claim that would force an arbitration. And so he can just basically smear them out in public and try to get ahead of the fact they're leaving. It's really evil. Like this is unconscionable.

0:53:20 Thomas: Yeah what is your law firm like such that you would think to even do this like it's not even doesn't you know you could be like the Kentucky Hammer and still be an asshole and all that and do do your lot but like why would this be part of it must be that you suck so bad people are constantly leaving

0:53:36 Matt: Let me read you paragraph 73. The Kentucky Hammer promoted a toxic workplace culture. You don't say. Secrecy was one weapon of choice. The Kentucky Hammer, and this is all the way through, he refers to him. Sometimes he calls him Isaacs, which is his last name, but he often just refers to them as the Kentucky Hammer for the worst stuff. The Kentucky Hammer threatened attorneys against discussing the terms of their compensation with one another, which is also illegal, of course. This is really bad. And apparently there was some other firm nearby that was taking two thirds of their settlements. In this case too, he's also claiming some percentage of their supplements even after they've left the firm and finished out the cases. These are just unconscionable.

0:53:41 Thomas: Hmm there you go

0:54:08 Matt: This has just no way to treat people who have worked with you. I can't imagine treating my lawyers this way or anybody. I would actively not speak with an attorney that I knew was doing this to people. I mean, this is really bad and he should be ashamed. The Kentucky Hammer, bad guy. I think this really has a chance, except, so this was filed in the beginning of June and on June 25th, the Kentucky Supreme Court came down with a case that I found. It was a close case. It Was actually one vote from the Kentucky, Kentucky Supreme court. They found that an Emory law office v. Joel Franklin, this was issued on June, 25th. So just a few weeks after this was and the fee allocation provision here was extreme. I think it was 75%. That's when I was thinking of that the former firm, after you leave your firm, gets 75 % of your contingency fees from those clients.

0:54:08 Thomas: Yeah

0:54:55 Matt: It's incredibly extreme because you're essentially, the argument is you're restricting that person's ability to practice law forever, right? With those clients. And it's very hard to get started if you can't bring some clients with you. Obviously, anybody who's actually worked in a law firm doesn't want to see this happen to people. So the trial court ruled in the law firm's favor with the judgment to enforce the fee allocations. Kentucky Court of Appeals reversed that, finding that it was violated public policy, but the Kentucky Supreme Court reversed that again.

0:55:19 Matt: They found that the separation agreement does not explicitly restrict his ability to practice. It just takes all of his money. Yeah, what's wrong with that?

0:55:25 Thomas: Sure yeah yeah it doesn't restrict your ability to have a job, just the paying part. So you get to be like an indentured servant. Cool.

0:55:30 Matt: Yeah, you go ahead and try to start a firm with that kind of burden on you. I don't deal in contingencies. These seem like enormous amounts of money to me when they're describing these things, but this is a way to make a living. Obviously, people who are victims of bad car accidents deserve this money, and their lawyers deserve to get paid too. 4 -3, Kentucky Court of Appeals. It does seem like it's going to be a real problem for at least part of this argument. I still think that this should be a very strong ethical complaint. And I do still think that if you're viewing it, and maybe this is why they brought it this way, because they might've been aware that this other case is working its way up. If you're reviewing it from a strictly antitrust, anti -competitive lens, I think it still does pretty well. I think this is a pretty strong claim because you are clearly trying to control the market in Kentuckiana. Like you're trying to make sure that these attorneys, it's a big firm and there's a lot of attorneys. We'll see how it plays out, but good to see at least people standing up to the Kentucky hammer and his fancy fancy ads.

0:56:18 Thomas: Yeah. Jeez. I was trying to think of something funny to say. When everything's a Kentucky hammer, be a nail. No. When Everything looks like a Kentucky hammer. No, I can't. I don't have it.

0:56:29 Matt: Nothing there.

0:56:32 Thomas: When you have a Kentucky hammer, everything looks like Kentucky nail, but that's not anything. So never mind. All right. I tried.

0:56:41 Matt: Close enough.

0:56:41 Thomas: Hey, you know, some weeks you just aren't good. It's fine. Other people get to be bad at their jobs, you know, temporarily, and then nothing happens to them.

0:56:50 Matt: Can't nail it every time. You're fine.

0:56:50 Thomas: They don't suffer public embarrassment, you know? All right. Thanks so much, everybody, for listening. Check out that lot of awful movies. And, of course, on Monday, we'll see you for another show. Have a good weekend. And thanks, Matt.

0:57:04 Matt: All right. See you later.

0:57:40 Thomas: Step one, do not masturbate. Yeah. Yeah, bears just beating the shit out of ice. They don't even have to do any sex stuff. It's just, it would be porn for me.

0:57:43 Matt: Or if that's what you're into, this had better be your thing if this is what you do.

0:57:57 Thomas: The big carrot they're beating people with. One of the beating carrots.