Meta Must Pay, Bannon's Judge Pushes Back, and a Dolly Parton Shoutout from the Bench

Transcript

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

0:00:00 Clip: Thank you.

0:00:03 Matt: Plaintiffs further contend that celebrity singers like Lady Gaga, Jennifer Lopez, or Dolly Parton could be accused of being quote unquote nude for on Meta. Totally knew about these things and the harms to children. -wise, it is the single biggest consumer settlement with one company in U.S. history. It is a total of $17.1 billion.

0:00:30 Thomas: Hello and welcome to Opening Arguments. This is episode 1,291. I'm your host Thomas Smith. That over there is real life attorney Matt Cameron with bad, bad legal takes. I can't get it out of my head. How's it going?

0:00:40 Matt: How did you know? I was just going to say that. I was literally just going say that, Thomas.

0:00:42 Thomas: How did I know you mean the, the only thing that's consumed both of our brains for 24 hours?

0:00:49 Matt: So bad.

0:00:49 Thomas: That's so bad.

0:00:50 Matt: It's AI Weird Al.

0:00:52 Thomas: Actually a good jingle. But the wrong style and recorded dorkily, like it was from the 60s or 70s, this person would be a millionaire.

0:01:03 Matt: It'd be classic. Yeah, absolutely.

0:01:05 Thomas: Yeah, we'd be talking about him. Maybe George Gershwin. I don't know. It's just so inappropriate. Anyway, make sure you listen to the VR for that one. If you didn't get that magical. So funny.

0:01:18 Matt: That was one of my favorites in a while, other than the earworm stuck in my ear. All

0:01:21 Thomas: Anyway, while that music is raging loudly in my brain, what are you going to be talking about that I barely hear?

0:01:28 Matt: Well, let's try to get something else in our brains. Big news on the social media. Lawsuits today. We've been following these pretty closely. This is actually the single largest consumer settlement with one company in the history of the United States with Meta today. So that is huge. It's also only second litigation to in terms of how much money it is. And that was four companies. So this is huge This This is with 49 states. Florida has decided to do its own thing. I guess they're going after Meta on their own. They didn't think this was good enough. So we'll talk about it. We can see if we think it's good enough pretty interesting. There's a lot of interesting angles to this. I'm not sure what to think yet. I'll give you the facts. Update on Steve Bannon. Of we haven't heard about him for a while.

0:02:08 Thomas: Why? Why are we updating on Steve Bannon? What's going on there?

0:02:11 Matt: There's a funny thing that happened with Judge Nichols of the Sandwich Trial. Remember Judge Carl Nichols in D.C.? The government has attempted to dismiss charges against Steve Bannon, the previous contempt charges for not showing up to the January 6th committee. And he's not letting them do it for reasons that are, admirable. Yeah, Some the others, yeah.

0:02:28 Thomas: Because we've talked about, was it Bannon or was it other like Jan Sixers or whatever, but just the idea of just dismissing stuff being like even more harmful maybe than some these pardons sometimes, right?

0:02:41 Matt: Really bad for the system that they can just come back corruptly and do this. But he's holding to the law, and we'll see what happens.

0:02:46 Thomas: Good hear.

0:02:47 Matt: Yeah, and of course, as usual, ICE is not so much holding to the law. I've got a quick story, just I don't remember where I saw this, but I just dug into it and read through it. And kind of a Gregor Garcia levels of injustice against someone, just open violation. And involves a provision of law that I'd never actually seen applied. We've seen a lot of that these days. That probably shouldn't exist, as I think we'll talk about. Interested to see what you think about all of this. It's really a terrible story, but I'm feeling like it's going to work out okay in the end. Then we've Trump is coming for the American Bar Association's ability to accredit law schools, which relevant to our beat here. Very weird.

0:03:18 Thomas: Weird. Don't know who I'm rooting for. No, I'm just kidding.

0:03:23 Thomas: I guess I'm running for the ABA. Fine, whatever.

0:03:26 Matt: They've been at war with the ABA for a while. And it's funny to me because I've always thought of the A.B.A. as being like a very conservative, at least centrist organization. But they're apparently not run by radical woke leftists, according to the Trump administration. So,

0:03:38 Thomas: Why they're so good at punishing horrible lawyers every time one is exposed. You know, they're just, they, they're SO good at it. Iron Fist.

0:03:47 Matt: Every time. Then finally, we've got a fun footnote. It's a bittersweet fun foot note because it actually is a federal judge giving a shout out to Dolly Parton on the day that she died yesterday, on the date they were recording this. It was a coincidence. I don't think he meant to do that. But it's a fantastic outcome, the case itself, because it is finally providing an injunction to Texas's drag ban. So that's something we talked about a couple of years ago.

0:03:59 Thomas: Man. Wow.

0:04:12 Matt: I really appreciated that in the course of that, he mentions Dolly Parton favorably several times. So just a little Dolly part and shout out at the end in our footnote today.

0:04:19 Thomas: Yeah, what an interesting person. Was a real one.

0:04:22 Matt: Yeah. One of the last ones that everybody can agree was all right.

0:04:25 Thomas: Really. Like, pretty much.

0:04:26 Matt: Everybody.

0:04:27 Thomas: Uh, it's, yeah. Really, really interesting.

0:04:29 Matt: Love to hear about the ways, you know, just as it's coming out now, but all the different ways that she helped the queer community. And going to talk about actually one way that she invested in a black neighborhood and always stood up for racial justice. Made a point of standing up for undocumented people. Her last performance, I actually went back and watched again because I'd seen it at the time of the Country Music Awards, was actually arguably a climate justice song at the Country Music Awards at the age of 77. So pretty great. Big fan, always have been, and a very sad loss, but we'll honor her at the end here.

0:04:57 Thomas: Man, we could could have used more of her. You people who criticize her for not getting explicitly political. But I actually don't. I think that's wrong. I actually think she did more good by staying sort of neutral in a way. But like, that's how you can tell. Look, I don't think every single human on Earth has the obligation to get into. The freaking like political back and forth, you know. But but the thing that, of course, I and so many people resent is the fake like, oh, I'm not political, but that just means you're conservative. And, you Know, you like want conservative things to happen. This is a genuinely like, Oh, I am. I'm an entertainer. I am not going to dig into politics, but she's also just a good person who did good person stuff, which in today's crazy world. Really is political. Like so many of the things you did were pretty explicitly political, but still maintained that ability to be loved by both left and right. That is pretty, unmatched. I don't, I don' think there's anyone else even close that I could think of.

0:05:56 Matt: Really good use of her money as well, which is an important part. Even if you don't want to be overtly political, you can get a long way with the kind of money she had. So great stuff.

0:06:02 Thomas: And then Tim Curry had to die too. Come on.

0:06:06 Matt: Oh, I just saw that. Yeah. No, that means there's got to be one more coming. You know how it is.

0:06:10 Thomas: Yeah. And it's like the round. It's the age, you know, it's the it's that age. But that's a bummer. All right. Well, we'll take a break and then we will dig into all of that.

0:06:25 Thomas: Matt, we want to talk about the settlement first.

0:06:26 Matt: Let's get into it. So we've been talking about social media litigation now for a while. We we had Matthew Bergman, the founding attorney of the Social Media Victims Law Center on. Is not that lawsuit, but he is doing a whole lot of sort of parallel suits around with states. This much every state, as I said, New Mexico has already reached a separate settlement, and Florida has decided to go their own way in taking on Meta. And Godspeed.

0:06:52 Matt: But But every of the other attorneys general around the country have reached this agreement with Meta, and I want to kind of get into what's in it. It's pretty complicated. There's a lot to it. As I said up front, money -wise, it is the single biggest consumer settlement with one company in U .S. history. It is a total of $17 .1 billion. It's a little sneaky because only $12 .7 billion of that is guaranteed, and the rest of it is contingent on YouTube that's

0:06:53 Thomas: How they do in the playoffs. Oh, no, sorry. I'm so used to sports stuff. Performance bonuses. And yeah, yeah,

0:07:19 Matt: It's signing bonus, and billion is actually contingent on TikTok and YouTube, being eventually to the same thing they're being subjected to.

0:07:26 Thomas: That's a very interesting. I want to pause you there because I saw that was so interesting where they're like, the here's and then if these other companies are also like to it, then then pays more.

0:07:38 Matt: Yeah, they want to be sure that everybody's on the same page and is subject to the same stuff. We'll talk about what those things are, but that also means that they have every incentive to try to stop. Well, it's a little complicated, but it says by statute or by settlement, right? So the states have the right to try and regulate this. I'm sure they'll try to reach some kind of settlement. Actually just reached a $400 million settlement with DOJ, which is separate. This is the states, obviously, but very similar litigation over the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act, which the main vehicle for this lawsuit. This is all kind of happening pretty quickly. We discussed with Matthew Bergman, as we talked about when we were reviewing that California state case, which was the first case of its kind to win against a social media company on behalf of children harmed by social media, a lot to get your arms around here. Still don't know completely how I feel about all of it. Is kind of taking the model of the big tobacco litigation, but there's also a much more direct harm that's easy to show with tobacco.

0:08:30 Matt: We can agree there's plenty of harms and plenty of ways that we know, in fact, Part of the reason they reached the settlement, I think, is that they were already about a week into trial for this massive lawsuit. And as you know, maybe listeners know. Basically like 1 % of all federal civil cases go to trial at this point. It's incredibly rare to have a trial finish. Just had had an Instagram former engineer testify about how they totally knew about these things and the harms to children. Know, this suit, like the ones that Matthew Bergman is bringing, is not about the content. It is about the conduct and about the design of the product. It s a products liability case, essentially, and it's deceptive, and they're saying that they knew that there's harms to But the harm to children is not sort of the primary allegation. It's just about the deception about the things they knew and about the design of these things. A lot here. There's some stuff I didn't really realize was kind of on the table. I want to take you through a little bit some of what's in the settlement because main thing besides the money. There's this injunction that's going to have them subjected to a series of things for what they call U13, under 13 users, and then teen users. Don't think I disagree with any of this. I think it's all pretty reasonable. States basically are releasing all of the claims they might have had otherwise, which is very much like the tobacco litigation. They're just reaching this sort of giant omnibus lawsuit. Most of the claims were brought under the COPPA, which is about how they handle data for children and how they basically get children out of the platform. And they, as much as acknowledged, they conceded essentially that they had not responsibly handled the data. The money itself, the $17 billion, is going to go to the states kind of in pieces, and it's going to toward mental health services, toward after -school programs, potentially sports and music -type programs, which I think is great. Could be a real shot in the arm. There's a lot of money in here being spread around the states. It is kind of along the lines of certain things that are related to this litigation, to get kids off of social media, basically, and give them access to better mental health. Let's go just through the highlights of what is in here. Default, when you register an account now, they're going to be assessing the account and they're gonna use this sort of sophisticated algorithm to try to figure out looking at your social network, looking at patterns of usage or whatever, if this is potentially

0:10:30 Thomas: See what a loser you are. First off, the assessed mind.

0:10:33 Matt: If all your friends are 13, then you might also be 13.

0:10:35 Thomas: They're like that. Oh, God, we're deleting your account.

0:10:39 Matt: This guy looks like some kind of podcast host. That's still protected so far. Not just going to trust self -declared age. They're going to assess your account. Now, they're still working on different ways to do that. There are a lot of concerns, valid concerns, of which I share about how they might be assessing age and the kinds of... privacy inquiries that might be required there. Going to be working out a more sophisticated age assessment kind of thing. It looks like it is going to a holistic look. But after 14 days, if they're not able to assess it, or if you don't subject yourself to whatever they need to assess your age, they're to default it to a teen account. So it'll just assume you have the lowest level of privileges. There's a two -hour cap that the teen can't change. Can have a link to supervising parent. They can choose to raise it or lower it. Can choose to do that for you know maybe a week maybe a month they can you know there's like a default though built in about this two hour cap uh continuous infinite scrolling um was a big issue that Matthew Bergman identified along

0:11:29 Matt: With the autoplay for videos and those are both things that are now things that you can choose but I think you can already choose to change those in the settings I'm not really sure it doesn't even seem like it's going to be the default to turn those off I didn't really understand what the win was there um and of course a lot of this with a teen account is parents will have control over the different settings. And the non -algorithmic feed as your default. But again, I don't know why that wouldn't just be set as the default.

0:11:50 Thomas: Yeah. Can I do that?

0:11:51 Matt: I'd love to, I know.

0:11:52 Thomas: Remind me, is this all, this meta products or something, or is it specific to Instagram or what?

0:11:57 Matt: Facebook and Instagram, yeah, these two. And will also be able to turn off autoplay so that it doesn't automatically play videos as you go. You have to actually tap it to do that. Thing I thought was actually, this actually could be good for everybody too. Teens won't be seeing the number of likes and reactions on their posts, which when you think about it is kind of a mental health issue.

0:12:13 Matt: You're sitting there waiting for people to like your stuff. That's just by default. That's something else I think that parents can change. Going to disable extreme makeup filters. I don't know anything about this, but apparently there's like cosmetic surgery filters and makeup filters, so you mess with your face.

0:12:13 Thomas: Awesome. Yeah also just delete the app. And also. Just fold into the center of the earth. Because this all is ruining our lives.

0:12:29 Matt: Pretty much. I know They claim that they've already got very serious privacy settings to keep adults from randomly contacting kids and teens on these platforms. Looks like they're going to institute a bunch of other things that help parents oversee these accounts and make sure that's not happening. Just stronger parental controls. They're also going to have a night mode, along with the time limit, a night mod and a school mode. So basically you can't get notifications during school hours, which I think is a really good idea. And that's something I've already done on my phone. I've drill down so I don't use my phone for anything but work during work hours it may be blue sky at lunch um I still don't need to be getting notifications and then night mode for you know whatever period of time um night that you're not using it so in the aggregate, this seems like the right direction. The money, I can see the complaints already that the money isn't enough because obviously Meta made $217 billion last year, and this is a total of $17 billion if it all gets paid out, $18 billion. It's not so much even about the money. I mean, I think it's really just about getting them to change their standards and conduct. Of these terms are going to be in place for 10 years. The time and night mode features will with a five -year commitment, and prepared to have that extended if the rest of the industry agrees to it as well. So think that just generally putting guardrails on this stuff,

0:13:42 Matt: Again, a parent. I'm a teenager. I don't really know how kids are using this stuff. I think this is mostly going to relate to Instagram.

0:13:49 Thomas: Instagram probably.

0:13:49 Matt: I don't think they care about Facebook, but doesn't turn off messaging, which I think is good. I mean, I think they should be able to keep in touch with their friends. I don' have a problem with that.

0:13:58 Thomas: I think everybody. Do this but for everybody. Because the algorithmic feeds.

0:14:01 Matt: Yes, I know.

0:14:03 Thomas: Are ruining our lifes. The autoplay actually is. A sleeper for how. Annoying that is to like how much that not only hooks you on the scrolling, it also just, you subjects you to some amount of whatever content, whoever's dumb opinion or whatever misinformation for a while. Yeah. Would to just see what the internet was. And that's not even like the best time of the internet, but just in terms of the social media, like early social media.

0:14:10 Matt: It's obnoxious.

0:14:33 Thomas: Was, I so much different. I mean, it was just completely different. And it's, it's not that long ago. And I know that, you know, this is kind of pie in the sky, but it's like, I can't, we just go back to that. Like it's just in term, it'll still be new stuff, but in terms like the algorithmic, that the tools that they're using to hack our brains, like just dial those back, you

0:14:31 Matt: Sure. Yeah, yeah. Yep. Just turn all of that off. I would love that. I would like to have this apply to everybody.

0:14:58 Thomas: Hear that? We're All Teens Now. Everybody pretend to be a teen. Official legal advice from opening arguments, Matt Cameron, attorney at law, pretend to a teen on social media.

0:15:01 Matt: We're all getting the kids meal. Online yes uh final answer that's right just get the kids mail everybody um I think these are some good developments I do have real concerns about the mental health effects on this for all of us, as you said, but especially for young people. There's also one thing I thought this was, I still don't really know what to think about this part of it. So of course, this is not about content. They've been pretty clear. They're trying to make it seem like it's not about the states, because then you run into the Section 230 issues where you can't regulate the content on the platform. So it's just like what we talked about with Matthew Bergman, that the strategy is to keep this as product's liability, as deceptive marketing, as Deceptive Practices, and say that you know full well that this is addicting to kids, that it's bad for their brains, that's causing them to have mental health problems. By sticking with that, that is the safest way to get through all of this, and it brought them to the settlement, along with the COPPA privacy issues. But a section here about sensitive aggregate content, which depiction or discussion of personal experience living with mental or emotional distress. I'm a little bit concerned about this because I was looking kind of through this to see if they reference any of the concerns the states raised about harms to children. And it's really not in here because that's not really the point of this. It's really just trying to rein in how they do these things where they're not reaching the point. This isn't about payouts to individual families or victims. This is just about better practices for everybody. The states to develop resources to deal with these things and get kids doing other things and being healthier. Sensitive aggregate content thing, depiction or discussion of personal experience living with emotional going to be maintaining some kind of intervention to limit or interrupt repeat exposure to sensitive aggregate for teen users. And that starts to get a little touchy because know, if you've got someone maybe sharing their experience with an eating disorder and how they got through it and how it was distressing, but they've overcome it, right? Or if you're got someone talking about the very real life that they have, you know, living with depression or chronic depression, right, I feel like maybe sharing those stories is helpful. I can see how watching those stories for two hours wouldn't be helpful maybe in the aggregate. I understand that. But it just seems like that's getting a little too close to content regulation, which is the kind of thing they were trying to avoid with this. Know, from what I understand about the research, like that kind of peer support and just hearing from other people that are going through the thing that you're going through is one of the most helpful things that kids can have. So that was one of things that kind jumped out at me when was looking at this. It's a little beyond my lane here, but think otherwise I can't really argue with any of these restrictions. And I think it's probably the right direction.

0:15:33 Thomas: Who's making it seem like it's not about content? This ain't right. Oh, gotcha. Right. Huh.

0:17:29 Thomas: Yeah, we have... All the details like are all the details out versus I mean, obviously, this is very fresh. So I don't know how much, you know, you've gotten to go over all of it. But so there isn't like more to come that we don't have. Yeah.

0:17:41 Matt: No, the entire agreement, and actually it's so funny, when I opened this thing up, I immediately thought of Trump v. IRS and that nonsense where they came to the court with a voluntary dismissal and didn't show the court what they'd agreed to, right? Is the opposite of that. This is what it's supposed to look like. It's a consent thing where both parties are coming before the court. They're saying, this is what we've done. This Is how we got there. Here's the entire settlement agreement. Here is, you know, page after page of everything we've agreed to and the court's going to help hold us to it. That's how it's suppose to work. To see the system working in that way at least.

0:18:07 Matt: I'd almost forgotten. It's all out and it's out there. And I'm sure you'll get a lot more analysis here pretty soon. But it's kind of my initial take. And as you said, just a few hours ago, I'm looking at this thing. What I'm seeing, generally, people are saying that these restrictions seem like they're the right direction. There are people complaining about the amount of money. But this is a pretty unprecedented thing. I'm not sure it was ever really about collecting a giant amount of out of meta. I mean, there's just no amount of that's going to fix this. They have to change the product.

0:18:33 Thomas: Well, I mean there's probably amounts of money that would like them from doing stuff.

0:18:37 Matt: Yes. Yeah. No, that's true too. This is also because it is all being run through the court. The parties can always come back to the court they if don't think it's being upheld and exactly the way it's supposed to work.

0:18:47 Thomas: Seems like pretty good news.

0:18:48 Matt: Provisionally, yeah. I'm all right with it. Speaking of good news, we've got another quick thing here with Steve Bannon. As I mentioned, Carl Nichols, our judge from the sandwich trial, had before him the government's motion to dismiss the indictment of Steve Bannen under Rule 48. Now, you might remember, of course, everybody Steve Bannan did not show up to January 6th committee. He was held in contempt. He had to do two months in prison. He tried to take this up to the Supreme Court. Government had notified the Supreme Court they were going to be filing a motion to dismiss the indictment. And that is what they did. Judge Nichols took a look at this and he's like, what are you doing? Why? Why are we doing this? Which is exactly the right response from a federal judge to the DOJ right now when they bring one of Trump's friends up to dismiss an indictment and made the very reasonable point that, you know, I don't have to do this very often, but Under Rule 48, the courts have interpreted that if a prosecutor is going to bring something like this, even with the defendant's consent, and we've talked about before about how Rule 48 changed the general rule. And here in Massachusetts, it's a little different. The null process, if government decides to drop a case, for the most part, that is supposed to be honored by the court. But Rule 48 was specifically changed to require that the court has to sign off on dismissal of indictment to be sure nothing corrupt is going on, as it almost certainly is here.

0:19:57 Thomas: It's something that we never had to think about, like almost never had a thing about until the Trump era. Now it's all the time.

0:20:04 Matt: Been interpreted in one D .C. case that has particularly shocking facts that prosecution has to provide at least a basic statement of why they're doing it so the judge can understand why it's happening. And he's saying, look, he was already found guilty. Already went to the Supreme Court. Now it's back in front of me. You better tell me why you're doing this. And they won't. So he

0:20:20 Thomas: Unless you're like DNA evidence suggests it was a different Steve Bannon that didn't show up. Like, I don't know what it would be.

0:20:26 Matt: We've actually got him on camera. Nobody noticed, but he was sitting there the whole time. Who knew?

0:20:28 Thomas: Someone someone in a jailhouse confessed to the not showing up. I don' know what.

0:20:32 Matt: Yeah, that's right. We got the wrong guy that didn't show up. Yeah, that is exactly what we want courts to do, federal courts. And I've been really trying in this show to point out as much as possible when the federal courts are doing the thing that they are supposed to do. For our next story, which we can get up to after the break, I'm hoping the courts will do the right thing. I think they will from what I'm seeing here, but it remains to be seen.

0:20:55 Thomas: Right, let's take a break and then we'll get to it. Hey, skip those ads, patreon .com slash law.

0:21:02 Thomas: So, Matt, it sounded like I this was going to be more extreme bummer news, but maybe somebody going to do something right in this immigration case.

0:21:10 Matt: That's happened to date is bummer news. It's pretty bad.

0:21:12 Thomas: That's why we're bummer. Bummer news with Thomas and Matt.

0:21:16 Thomas: It's bummer News. Yeah. I don't know. We'll try to.

0:21:19 Matt: I just started thinking of the jingle. It's got to be a happy, happy jingle. That's the only way. We, I think more than pretty much any other podcast, follow the saga of Kilmore, O 'Brigor, Garcia very closely because to me it was always a test case. It was always the government trying to see what they could get away with. Know, they had an order not to deport this man to El Salvador. They deported him to El And we got him back and they tried to charge him with a crime, etc. We know the story, I this is a completely different person. As with Mahmoud Khalil and Ramesa Ozturk and the others who were charged under that very strange provision of law that nobody ever thought to really use before for regular people, which allows the Secretary of State to designate some people threats to foreign policy interests or whatever, there is a provision like that that has been invoked in this case. And I'll tell you about it because I had seen it in the regulations before and I'd never once thought about it, because when would this ever happen? As always, we're in the times when these things do happen. So this is, is the Convention Against Torture, which is kind of your last ditch. If you have nothing else to protect you, you can say, I'm going to be tortured in my home country. It's more likely than not that I will suffer torture, either from the government or from somebody the government can't control. And this is somebody who's afraid of cartels in Mexico. And the immigration judge in July of 2024 gave him deferral of removal to Mexico, which that tells me most likely is there probably does have a serious criminal record. That's usually kind of the last ditch thing available to you is like, okay, we won't deport you if you're going to be tortured. We'll leave it at that. Can't get asylum. You can't get other protections, but at least you'll be protected to that degree. Provided substantial assistance to DOJ. So this is probably somebody who was previously in a cartel, testified against Mexican cartel -affiliated defendants. So, this is somebody that just should never go back to Mexico.

0:21:59 Thomas: Just single handedly. Okay. Yeah. We want people to help us. And if they help, then we should probably at least not consign them to a horrific fate.

0:23:07 Matt: That Yeah, being killed by a cartel is about as bad as it gets, and somebody like this that testified against them. Deferral of removal was granted in July 2024. You can see where this is going. Was detained at a check -in pretty much right after Trump came in in January 2026. Now, the catch with this kind of deferral or removal is that we don't have to send you to Mexico, but we can send you somewhere else. They tried to send him to Guatemala while his habeas petition was still pending in Louisiana. And Guatemala rightfully pointed out he's not a citizen of Guatemala. We can't help you out here. But they handed him over to a Mexican officer. His attorney, I don't know who his attorney was in this case, but it sounds like a very good one. Attorney intervened. Mexico found out about this cat order and they wouldn't take him back. He's returned. Was in July 10th of this year, July 15th. Soon as he came back. Tried to send him back to Mexico again, and Mexico again refused, directly tried to sent him back. July

0:23:59 Thomas: It takes effort to be this shitty. It really takes so much effort.

0:24:02 Matt: Just leave the man alone. And again, I'm guessing he probably has a pretty bad record. I think that's probably the motivation. Usually why you end up with a deferral of removal like this instead of other protection. Again, he participated in a federal prosecution of the group that's ruining Mexico right now. And is the least you can do is just let him stay here. Here's the part where it gets weird because, I mean, obviously these violations of court orders are pretty bad, but we're used to that kind of thing, unfortunately, right now. But there's a provision in 8 CFR 208 .17f.

0:24:32 Matt: I never knew what to make of this provision. I'm pretty familiar with the Convention Against Torture and its implementing regulations. It says that if we get diplomatic assurances that ICE can unilaterally terminate somebody's cat protection, somebody's Convention Against Torch protection. Now, usually, if they're going to terminate, we've had this happen in our cases, and it does happen from time to time. They want to move to terminade a cat grant, ICE can come back and say there's new evidence that shows that maybe it's safe now. And they can take it back to an immigration judge, have a full hearing. With notice and, you know, the ability to present evidence. The judge can decide if maybe that should be terminated. But this is about how bad this is. Marco Rubio calls up Mexico and he's like, hey, you guys going to torture this guy? You're going to let him get tortured? Oh, No, no, won't happen. Fine. They get an assurance from Mexico. There's no way Mexico can protect this person. He's a target of cartels.

0:25:19 Matt: Mexico can't control the cartels on its own borders, right? Don't think a diplomatic assurance from they present him with this thing in English. He doesn't read English. And they know of the termination until the government files its response in this case when they're trying to undo all of this. Government failed to disclose that it actually terminated all of sometime between July 30th and August 1st, deported him to Mexico, where he is now. And that's the terrible part, is he's hiding somewhere. According to this filing, he's in a region with active cartel presence. And now they're trying to bring him back because they're saying, obviously, multiple violations of court orders here. The diplomatic assurance thing. The council didn't even know about that. That wasn't something they'd ever revealed before. And again, this all happened pretty quickly, but they just did this very cursory sign off. You know, Mexico promises he's not going to get tortured for whatever that's worth. And that's it. Have to think this is going to work for the same reason that the bigger Garcia eventually worked. Pretty easy to facilitate his return back. Clearly, this is in violation of court order, and the termination is extremely suspect. And what's amazing about this thing with the termitation by diplomatic assurance, there's only one published case on it. It

0:25:47 Thomas: Crap. Huh. Right.

0:26:29 Matt: Only been one published case on it because they hardly ever use this stuff. Know, that case kind of creates a framework because there's nothing in this provision that allows for proper review, that allows you to see the evidence against your, even like how they've consented to this. Litigating more. But I think the obvious solution right now with everything that's happened so far is to bring him back and continue to litigate it from that. And I hope that's what happens. I want to keep watching.

0:26:55 Thomas: But said he's like in hiding though, right?

0:26:56 Matt: Right, right. But his attorney knows where he is. And if they can, they could arrange to get him back. They're telling the court. Serious stuff. And these are the games they're playing with people's lives.

0:27:07 Thomas: All for what? God, it's so for nothing, like for one guy who helped us, you dedication to being shitty that I just cannot, I can't even do that amount of dedication to I can do that. How do these people manage it?

0:27:09 Matt: The intensive focus. Exactly. Secure serious prosecutions against people that will torture him. Yeah. It's an inspiration. Up in the morning and being like this. I know.

0:27:34 Thomas: Think the problem is that evil people aren't depressed and unsure of themselves enough, you we need more it's just not how it tends to be yeah no

0:27:42 Matt: Syndrome over on that side. Not at all. They could use a bit because

0:27:45 Thomas: They think everyone else is an imposter yeah well

0:27:47 Matt: Yeah, right. Published case, though, is pretty good for due process, even though there isn't much guaranteed by this regulation. So, I mean, at least there should be something when this is resolved. Like just can't get away with this. This is not something they should be able to do. And I remain confident that the courts, as they have been in pretty much in every immigration case, will do the right thing here.

0:28:05 Matt: It is. I'm looking at interesting cases that have come down recently, Monica McIver, the congresswoman from New Jersey, born and raised in Newark, represents Newark New Jersey. Was arrested, you might remember, in the Delaney Hall protest at which the mayor of Newark was also arrested, among other people. Of the other charges have been, I think, have been dealt with except for hers have been dismissed.

0:28:05 Thomas: That's good news uh yeah huh

0:28:26 Matt: Allegation is, once again, our old friend 18 U .S .C. 111, the charge from the sandwich trial and from so many other cases we've been looking at about interfering, impeding, you know, in some way getting in the way of ICE. Question at the center of this case is fascinating to me because raises so many interesting questions and it also is... pretty perilous potentially for what the executive branch can do to legislators. So is claiming, rightfully, that under Section 527 of the Federal Consolidated Appropriations Act, that a federal congresswoman, she has the right to just enter any ICE facility anytime because it says that.

0:28:26 Thomas: Right yeah the inspection stuff right

0:29:00 Matt: That is the law. The law says that no ICE funds can ever be used to stop a member of Congress from coming in to inspect. No notice necessary. They can't show them whatever they want to show them, and they can't make wait. That's exactly what we want in a democracy, is our elected representatives to be

0:29:15 Thomas: What's the like downside of that like what's you know would be the alleged problem with that like a big heist involving a congress person like I don't

0:29:27 Matt: Think the problem is that she would see what ICE is doing to people. I think that's literally their position. That's it.

0:29:29 Thomas: Of course, yeah. I mean, what problem a rational, not evil person, is the question I'm asking, yeah, with that?

0:29:37 Matt: You can say is it's inconvenient, but so what? Democracy is often inconvenient. That's how it works. You might get multiple members of Congress that want to show up on any given day, but, like, she is actually the person who represents Newark, where the facility is. She's born and raised in Newark. This is exactly her right. She is also, I should point out, she's on the DHS committee in Congress. So she actually, it says that one of her jobs is she must provide oversight of these facilities.

0:29:57 Thomas: I can't think of anyone with much more of a right to take a peek.

0:30:01 Matt: That's why this prosecution has always been very concerning, is because she was there for that extremely legitimate purpose, along with several other elected representatives, including the mayor of Newark. Got really rowdy and got things going. These people were just trying to get into this facility, as they'd ever right to do. Were not breaking the law. They're doing all the things you'd expect them to do, they were waiting patiently. Apparently the Deputy Attorney General of Todd Blanche at that time authorized the arrest of the mayor of Newark.

0:30:23 Thomas: What?

0:30:23 Matt: And Yeah. This set off a Yeah. Thought he was too close to security gate or something. I don't really know. They told him he's going to have to leave and that he'd be arrested if he didn't comply and he didn' t leave. And that's where it went. Yep, straight up. And yelled, circle the mayor, and a bunch of protesters and Congresswoman MacGyver circled the mayor. And agents were pushing their way through. And she placed herself between the mayor and one of the ICE agents.

0:30:33 Thomas: Fascists. Oh, now you're interfering with...

0:30:47 Matt: Right, you're standing in the way, putting your body there. Entitlement says that she slammed her forearm into the body of V1, Victim 1, the ICE agent, reached out and tried to restrain V1 by forcibly grabbing him. That is pretty much the crux of it. At some point pushed somebody or tried to use her forearms to push back, as there's this chaotic scene with a lot of people where they're coming for the mayor. Third count, so there's the first two counts. The third count basically just says that she interfered with the activities of Homeland Security investigations on that day. So the reason I'm mentioning all of this, the reason why I want to talk about it is that One of her primary defenses in a motion to dismiss, which I think is extremely legitimate, is, have you guys read Trump v. U .S.? Are you familiar with the idea that the president, in the course of his official duties, gets to do whatever he wants? You know, you think about the testimony of Cassidy Hutchinson, right, because the Secret Service agent in question testified otherwise, but she was told she believed it. She thought it was credible that he assaulted a Secret Service officer, or driver, I think it was a driver, right, of the Beast, the presidential car, on January 6th, trying to get himself back to the Capitol because he wanted to go so badly. Know, that would be a crime under other circumstances, but that's an interesting sort of thought experiment, right? If the president assaults a Secret Service agent because he doesn't think he's doing his job well enough, in the course of his duties, John Roberts, I would think, would say, well, that's part of his official duties, right.

0:32:05 Thomas: Hand-to-hand combat, you know. The president's official duties.

0:32:07 Matt: That's right. Once in a while. Yeah, I mean, you've seen... Was it Air Force One? Yeah. Once in a while, you just gotta...

0:32:14 Thomas: Seen every movie with Harrison Ford in the 90s, you know.

0:32:16 Matt: Sometimes the president has to assault people. This is the really interesting question. So there's the Trump v. U .S. question, and and the Third Circuit in this decision that just came down this week found that Trump v.-U .S.'s is different because it's John Roberts basically finding a structural immunity within the Constitution. But there is a legislative immunity already in the Constitution with the speech and debate clause and the questioning clause, right, that they can't be prosecuted for things that they're doing in the course of their official duties.

0:32:45 Matt: So that's the more interesting argument to me. I mean, it's great to raise Trump v. U .S. I think everybody should raise it whenever they can because it was a really bad idea. And I think, out you you should get the same protections. You're an equal branch of government. That this happened in the course of her duties. She's also saying that you're prosecuting me for doing my job, that I needed to be there. This was an investigation that I'm required to do as a member of the Homeland Security Committee, that have every right to do, as a congresswoman. Up, and things got rowdy. But this is all kind of within the penumbra of me doing my. An interesting question, because a number of interesting cases about this, including Robert Menendez, one of the more corrupt. People in Congress in our lifetimes. That case involving him and a doctor where he took a bunch of trips to Dominican Republic and other places. There was a published case on this in New Jersey, and that's one of the precedents for this, actually. I thought was interesting about this is that the court found under the Menendez test, The which first question is, are you doing legislative activities? And what they said was the thing that is indicted here, the conduct that is alleged in the indictment, shoving an ICE officer, potentially striking an ICE official, those aren't your duties. Those are not legislative duties. You might have been there for purposes of your job, but we can't say that counts one and two here, which involve these assaults.

0:33:49 Thomas: What if we get some some from New Jersey to say, yes, I want you to assault?

0:33:54 Matt: That's what I elected you for.

0:33:56 Thomas: I mean, you're your spot of the voters, right? You know, voters

0:33:58 Matt: I mean, you ran all those campaign ads saying you'd do it.

0:34:00 Thomas: Will is the voters will. It's one of my job is.

0:34:03 Matt: That's right, that's right. And she also was bringing selective vindictive prosecution claims, which is perfectly legitimate, I think, here since she's an elected officer. She's of the opposition party and she's doing something that's politically unpopular with the current administration. Status of those claims is a lot more complicated. I don't want to get into it right now, but I just want to note that those are in there. I thought this was all pretty interesting. I've never heard of anything quite like this before, because you've got the speech and debate issue, you've the separation of powers issue, the potential immunity issue under the Trump case, selective enforcement. The end of the day, what they decided here in the Third Circuit was that the first two counts, which just involved the different counts of assault, can go forward because those were not legislative. Are crimes that are on video, according to them. Interesting, too, is that they acknowledge that the government conceded that she was there for a legislative purpose.

0:34:46 Matt: And basically say, well, the indictment is framed in such a way that she's being charged with crimes that are extraneous here. And it does open the door for the government to take 15 seconds of an otherwise completely lawful visit and blow it up and say, this is a crime and you shouldn't have been here. That's a problem. I don't like it. Also the question about whether some of this occurred inside the gate where she had the right to be or outside the gate, where she was told to leave. That could actually potentially matter for the future. But unfortunately, what we have here is a published decision saying that this can go forward. But the third count, which is basically encompassing all of her efforts to hinder, impede, whatever, what she did with ICE. Because it included the efforts that started inside the gate before things got ready outside, that it's too broad and they had to dismiss that count. So she's going forward on two counts of interfering with ICE. Unfortunate. I hope that she has a good lawyer at trial. And it sounds like she's gonna have to go to trial and it's one to follow. But this is a whole set of issues that I've never seen raised, even in all the precedent cases involving speech and debate where people are being prosecuted and trying to say, well, I was just doing my job. Are usually people who are engaged in some kind of corruption. I haven't seen anything like this before that involves something that definitely on the job but was otherwise not, you your job. So, just thought it was interesting, and I do wish her the luck in this one.

0:35:57 Thomas: Just trying to think like if you can separate stuff out like that, wouldn't that work on the Trump stuff, too? Like you can kind of separate out like, well, this specific thing wasn't your duty. I just feel like when it came to Trump and I don't know, you know, legally what's going on here, you tell me. But when it If somewhere in the room with you is something like a duty, then nobody look at him. He can do whatever he wants. It just felt so much more permissive than subdividing down to the little individual actions.

0:36:23 Matt: No, it is. It is. And points this out. And the court basically says she's correct to say this, that Trump's immunity, the president's immunity under that case is much broader than what the legislature seems to get. But the court's answer is essentially that this is structural immunity that John Roberts has come up with versus the very specific textual immunity that we're going to read from the Constitution about what legislators get. No, I agree, though. I don't like this. I think the dissent has a real point in this one about they should take a closer look at what she was actually there to do and how this is very concerning, you know, in terms of how the administration is going to choose to do this. They still agree that some of this should go forward, but

0:36:59 Thomas: Wait a minute. If she's an official who has a right to be there, ICE prosecuted for preventing her to do her duty?

0:37:07 Matt: Question.

0:37:07 Thomas: What's the difference between that?

0:37:09 Matt: Yeah, denial of rights, you

0:37:10 Thomas: They're both federal people, right? Is it just the nature of the statute that it protects ICE but not sitting of Congress?

0:37:21 Matt: Think it's the nature of the event, unfortunately. Is they were told to leave. ICE was taking lawful steps to remove them, even though they had a right to be there. It's a mess. But no, I agree. I agree, right,

0:37:32 Thomas: It. Okay, our position is we had a right to be there, and then these assholes told us to leave for some reason, but they're not allowed to do that because we have a right what happens if two ice officers do this to each other? You know, like which one has the if they. Yeah. Yeah, it's like I of don't get it. But I mean, I guess, you know, logically, kind of rationally speaking, you are on their turf, I Guess so. Maybe, you Know, that that does make that make sense. But again, if she has the right to be there as a part of her duties, then I don't really understand why that matters.

0:37:48 Matt: Spider -Man meme with ICE officers. Think a better administration would have prosecuted the officers and left her alone, obviously. But that's not the world we're in, unfortunately have a quick not here on the American Bar Association and how now Trump, after having already come after lawyers unsuccessfully, is coming after how we make lawyers, which you know, the lawyer factory.

0:38:24 Thomas: One demon loves another demon very much. Sorry. No offense, man. Doesn't account for immigration and defense attorneys different.

0:38:34 Matt: I had never complained about lawyer jokes. Here's an admission. Let's check this out. This is from the Agenda 47 series of videos where Trump was announcing at the beginning of his term what he'd be doing. Video on protecting students from the radical left and Marxist maniacs. Is from 2023. And

0:38:52 Clip: Many years, tuition costs at colleges and universities have been exploding. And I mean absolutely exploding. While academics have been obsessed with indoctrinating America's youth, The time has come to reclaim our once great educational institutions from the radical left, and we will do that. Our secret weapon will be the college accreditation system. It's

0:39:17 Thomas: You just told me about it, so.

0:39:20 Matt: Our secret plan.

0:39:21 Clip: Called accreditation for a reason. The accreditors accreditors are supposed to ensure that schools are not ripping off students and taxpayers, but they have failed totally. When I return to the White House, I will fire the radical -left accreditors that have allowed our colleges to... become dominated by Marxists, maniacs, and lunatics. We will then accept applications for new accreditors who will impose real standards on colleges once again and once and for all. These standards will include defending the American tradition and Western civilization, protecting

0:39:33 Thomas: Like Trump University, for example.

0:39:57 Matt: You get the idea.

0:39:58 Thomas: God. Had the energy of a much younger man. Yeah, three years ago.

0:40:02 Matt: 2023, golden days. But our secret weapon will be the college accreditation system. I have to appreciate that.

0:40:07 Thomas: Yeah Hey, not for nothing. Sure you're aware there's woke listener because we've covered the it's really funny. They try to do like their own dumb versions of this stuff. I think Florida did. Like making their own AP courses that no one takes and are stupid. They really just want their own version of everything, but run by dumb people. And they may be successful. Who knows? You know, they'll just have the right wing version. The thing you sent me is on Rumble. Isn't that like a right wing?

0:40:24 Matt: That

0:40:37 Thomas: So it's, you know, they create their own ecosystem and then it has terrible standards and fraud and it all sucks. Good luck with that.

0:40:47 Matt: Is, yeah. Yeah. This is what they're doing with law schools. Now there are only 198 law schools, there's like 19 ,000 colleges and there's about a dozen or more accreditation. For undergraduates, but there's so many more of those. There's only one for law schools. It's the American Bar Association. And I don't have a problem with that. I think that's fine. Just have one thing that says this is a valid law school that, is a big thing. It makes a deal to be accredited for many reasons. Obviously you can take the bar in other states besides the state that you went to school in.

0:41:13 Thomas: Matt's saying is he's kind of a big deal. You know, people know him.

0:41:16 Matt: I went to an accredited law school. That's right. No offense to people who didn't go to accredited laws schools, but honestly, go to an accredit law school if you can, if you have the opportunity. You know what, you know, what matters is the kind of lawyer at the end of the day. And I'm sure there are plenty of people who've been out there for decades practicing and doing well that didn't get accredited to law schools. But it is a good kind of benchmark. And the ABA has generally been a pretty middle of the road respected institution generally. Now, of course, they're not. Trump administration is not happy with them now because after Trump went to war with lawyers, the ABA did take sides, if you'll ever believe this, with lawyers. I know. American Bar Association. They get involved in some of those suits when the lawyers are trying to stand up to Trump eventually, the ones who actually did. Of course, they're wielding the cudgel that they're wielding against everybody else, and they're saying that the ABI is doing too much DEI because was a rule, Standard 206,

0:41:20 Thomas: Way. Sounds like I'm trying to say something to Lydia without the kids knowing what it is. The ABA is doing too much DEI.

0:42:12 Matt: In there. Stupid. I mean, it's just the usual thing of, you what I've seen of this, like 78 % of attorneys still are white, I

0:42:17 Thomas: I was going to say, yeah, they haven't changed. But I was gonna say that they, you know, famously, just equality among genders and races among lawyers, you

0:42:27 Matt: The DBA did have basic standards about making sure that law schools had some kind of commitment to diversity and inclusion and how they admit people. And of course, when the Supreme Court dismantled that, they did eventually catch up with that as they promised and they would and they had to because that's the law now. Course, are still doing everything they can to punish the ABA. They're calling them woke and leftist and everything else. Blanch in, I think, April last year, there's some memo that barred federal employees from attending ABA events. Heritage Foundation has been complaining about how they're a monopoly and a cartel. It's just like, come on. Then, of for judicial nominees. They really don't like that either because a lot of those judicial nominees haven't come out well.

0:43:11 Thomas: Because it's been so helpful. I mean, it's made no difference.

0:43:14 Matt: Exactly. But they also haven't been kind to Trump's appointees because they're not very qualified, most of them. A 500 -page report. I started looking at it. My eyes glazed over. I was hoping we could do some reading of it, but it's so boring. Department of Education is trying to remove the ABA's ability to do this, to accredit law schools, because there is some, inevitably, some right -wing law accreditation thing that wants to take over. Going to be a long road, but they're coming this way because, you this is a pretty core thing about... fairly uncontroversial body that has just made sure that law schools are holding up to certain standards. And it does kind of go to the heart of the profession. Checked the stats, and 20 % to 30 % of people who go to non -accredited law schools pass the bar, and up to 70 % of accredited students pass the

0:44:02 Thomas: But who makes the bar? Accreditation.

0:44:04 Matt: That's right. Yeah, the big cartel that is just trying to create lawyers. So that's something to watch. It's sort of the latest front in the war on lawyers since nothing else has really worked out. I don't think this is going to work out either because

0:44:17 Thomas: Wait, what's the thing? Because the thing you played from three years ago. I'm blanking now on what was the current thing that's happening.

0:44:23 Matt: Was him saying what they're going to be doing, which was they would come after your creditors. That was the plan.

0:44:27 Thomas: Oh, they're finally getting around to it?

0:44:29 Matt: So for law schools. I think they've been trying it with other organizations too, but this one is an easy one because there's only one accreditor for law school, so it's an easy target. Just something to keep on the radar. Going to be a long fight, and they do get to continue to do this while all this is going on. It could be pretty bad if they actually didn't allow them to accredit law schools anymore. It would be reversible, but one more way that authoritarians are trying to interfere with the law.

0:44:35 Thomas: Gotcha. Right, well, let's take our last break. And then I need me a wild card. Been working 95. I Is it is it Dolly related?

0:45:03 Matt: Is Dolly related.

0:45:03 Thomas: Oh, that's great.

0:45:05 Matt: Yeah, so we were talking about up front, I've learned a lot about Dolly Parton as a person in the last 24 hours. I already knew a good deal about her, but

0:45:11 Thomas: I didn't know much. And, you know, I was I was tearing up. It's really sad. I like a tribute to how cool she was. I really knew nothing about her. But within seconds, I'm like, oh, I miss her.

0:45:24 Matt: Was always spoken with reference in my home, and going back and I remembered, because every so often I remember I'd just sort of discover another Dolly parton song. I remember a few years ago, she did the only cover that anybody's ever managed to pull off of a collective soul song, for example. Just totally unexpected, right?

0:45:35 Thomas: Well, no one's ever bothered before.

0:45:37 Matt: Nobody's bothered. It's not that important, but she made it so much better because the Collective Soul is fine. They're just like a regular 90s rock band, but like she did a beautiful cover of Shine. Actually, it's a perfect thing to watch in her memory right now because it's is a great song and she turns it into a bluegrass tune and it rocks. It just absolutely rocks.

0:45:37 Thomas: So, oh man, I want to. I actually I liked that song quite a bit. Was their one hit. Oh, wow.

0:45:55 Matt: Yeah, it is great.

0:45:55 Thomas: Okay. I love that.

0:45:56 Matt: We'll link to it.

0:45:56 Thomas: I got to check that out.

0:45:57 Matt: Yeah. Just before I get to the main thing I meant to talk about, I learned recently that in the course of this that, She wrote I Will Always Love You, You, the Whitney Houston famous song that she made famous, but it was actually on the same album as Jolene. Made a bunch of money off of Whitney Houston, obviously. Whitney Houston made way more money. She decided intentionally that she would use the money that she from the royalties from I Will always Love You from Whitney Houston's performance to invest in a black neighborhood in Nashville.

0:46:22 Matt: And I just think that's super cool in Whitney's honor, basically. And set up her office there and basically revitalize this area. Just thought that was great. A really good use of royalties. And so many stories like that about her kind of going out on a limb for people, you know, when nobody was talking about people with HIV, supporting them, certainly nobody in the country music community, supporting undocumented immigrants, making a point of recording the song Deportees in talk about this, besides just gratuitously talking about, you know, a wonderful person who's just passed, is that just total coincidence that in this major decision on the Texas Drag Show ban, which we talked about with Casey way back at the beginning of my time on Opening Arguments, within a couple of months of me getting started here, case has been up and down a few times. And this is a very, very broad, very stupid law. Of those extremely vague things about sexually oriented performances. And they're trying to target drag, but of course, as a First Amendment issue, it's targeting all kinds of other things, as the court points out. And is a great decision, which we'll link to, which finds that this, that a federal court is finding this is unconstitutional, SB 12 in Texas. So that's great news unto itself. But it mentions Dolly Parton several times. I'll read you the relevant portions here. Plaintiffs further contend that celebrity singers like Lady Gaga, Jennifer Lopez, or Dolly Parton could be accused of being quote unquote nude for wearing low-cut tops that show cleavage below the areola. That general, that the nudity could include parts of your breasts. But here's the part that is especially an here. And this is a complete coincidence that this decision came out the day that she died. SB 12 does not specify who determines whether a performance appeals to the current interest or require that the work be taken as a whole, a single moment of eroticism could condemn an entire performance to criminal or civil penalties. Just as many people criticized Elvis's signature hip gyrations and were offended by his display of male chastised Dolly Parton as a voluptuous sex symbol because of her big hair, flamboyant clothes, and breast exposure, and shamed Miley Cyrus for twerking on stage during a live performance at the MTV Music Video Awards. There are erotic elements in countless popular performances that could be subject to civil and criminal penalties under SB 12. I think, a testament to her place in the culture that she's as notable as Elvis, right? She's like in the same line as Elvis here of an example of the kind of performance that could end up getting banned under this extremely vague and very badly written law. Favorite part of the decision, but other than that, is at the very end. As part of its findings in the case, at paragraph 83, the court writes, Finally, for those who find such activities as described in this case offensive, the solution is relatively simple. Dot, dot, dot. Just don't go. Period.

0:48:52 Matt: And that really is, that's the message to Ken Paxton is, you know, you don't have to go to a drag show. Nobody's making you go. Should, but nobody's making it.

0:48:55 Thomas: We know you're probably doing it in your own privacy of your own home anyway, most likely.

0:49:02 Matt: Do that anyway.

0:49:03 Thomas: If I had to guess, I don't know.

0:49:04 Matt: Enjoy it yourself. Stop trying to criminalize it.

0:49:07 Thomas: Odds wise, just playing the odds.

0:49:08 Matt: Sure. And we know by now. Yeah, I thought that was heartwarming that, you know, even on the day we lost her, that a federal court is paying this tribute and that we get a great decision. And also that she supported, I should mention, and I didn't even mention this yet. She loved drag and she supported people dressing up as her. She thought it was great.

0:49:19 Thomas: Course. That's nice. What a nice coincidence referenced in a good decision. Good stuff. Say, so some other judge, can you do a nice ruling and reference Tim Curry? Somehow, I don't, I dunno what that would be. Something related to Muppet law or I

0:49:36 Matt: He also could have made the drag decision, but

0:49:38 Thomas: That's a good point. Yeah. He could have.

0:49:40 Matt: Somebody else in a drag decision. Let's do it.

0:49:41 Thomas: Well, there you go. All right, Matt, thanks so much for the breakdown. Hey, thanks everyone for listening. We really appreciate you. And we'll see you on Monday.

0:49:48 Matt: Right. See you next time.

0:49:52 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 Bluesky at OpenArgs. But most of all, please share the show. Thanks for listening.

0:50:25 Thomas: One demon loves another demon very much.

0:50:29 Matt: That's happened to date is bummer news. It's pretty bad.

0:50:31 Thomas: That's why we're bummer. Bummer news with Thomas and Matt. It's bummer News. Yeah.