And We Know Where It’s Going

Given the Gag Order’s extraordinary nature, one would expect an extraordinary justification for it. Yet none exists," wrote Trump's attorneys in the filing. "President Trump has made months of public statements about this case, but the Department of Justice ('the prosecution') submitted no evidence of any actual or imminent threat to the administration of justice. Instead, when asked about the supposed threat to the case, the prosecution admitted, 'of course this prejudice is speculative.'" 

"Based [on] this speculation, the district court entered a sweeping, viewpoint-based prior restraint on the core political speech of a major Presidential candidate, based solely on an unconstitutional 'heckler’s veto,'" the filing continued. "The Gag Order violates the First Amendment rights of President Trump and over 100 million Americans who listen to him. President Trump’s uniquely powerful voice has been a fixture of American political discourse for eight years, and central to the American fabric for decades."

There’s a legal term for this, and that term is “claptrap.” This isn’t even an argument that sounds like a legal argument. It’s just a narcissistic assertion that Trump is too important to have any rules imposed on him. And being a Presidential candidate makes him too important even for the courts. (The things you can get lawyers to do when you’re spending other people’s money.)

You’ll notice this “argument” is only tangentially related to the First Amendment, and it has nothing to do with constitutional jurisprudence at all.

So what will the appeals court do? I can’t do better than the court did today, ruling on Ivanka’s appeal to quash her testimony because her appearance would be during a school week, and that imposes an undue hardship on her. The court ruling on her request is in two pages. You can see it here. The ruling is one sentence: 

Application for interim stay pending decision on the motion is denied.

The appeal will still be heard, but it’s moot because the testimony will be given. A stay only issues when the party seeking the stay shows they are likely to prevail on the merits of their claim. So the court is saying they didn’t meet that requirement; and the appeal is already lost.

Trump’s appeal of the gag order won’t fail for the same reason, but it will be as surely rejected. It’s as good a legal argument as: “But your Honor, my kids are in school that week!”

These people have no idea what they’re doing:

Junior recaps his testimony in NY: “Did two days of testimony. Had some fun in the process. I think even the judge found me a little bit amusing.”

And how did brother Eric do?

Eric testified today and basically just lost the entire case," she said on Thursday. She noted that, "[a]fter testifying he 'never heard' about the Trump org statement of financial condition until recently, he later admitted that he knew about it in 2013."

The awakening is going to be so rude. I just hope their lawyers got paid in advance. By March Trump’s gonna need those donations for legal fees to keep the lights on.

Besides:

If the federal prosecutors can put Sam Bankman-Fried in jail for stealing billions of dollars, imagine what they can do to you.

Too soon? Not soon enough?