More Fun With Lawyers!

JUST IN: Trump has formally appealed the ruling requiring his accounting firm to turn over his personal financial records to the House. pic.twitter.com/ymSKvv5C5l

— Kyle Cheney (@kyledcheney) May 21, 2019

Well, yeah: 

Plaintiffs (Donald J. Trump; The Trump Organization, Inc.; Trump Organization LLC; TheTrump Corporation; DJT Holdings LLC; The Donald J. Trump Revocable Trust; and Trump Old Post Office LLC) hereby appeal to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit all aspects of this Court’s order and opinion from May 20, 2019, which overruled Plaintiffs’ objections to Rule 65(a)(2)consolidation, treated the parties’ preliminary-injunction filings as cross-motions for summary judgment, entered final judgment against Plaintiffs, and denied Plaintiffs’ request for a stay pending appeal. See Dkt. 36; 35.

This isn't an argument on the legal merits, just a statement of the record as grounds for appeal.  Considering the action was basically a declaratory judgment action on the quashing of subpoenas issued by a House committee, a ruling on the motion for a temporary injunction was inevitably a motion for summary judgment, as the standard for issuing a TI is that the moving party is likely to prevail at trial.  The only issue before the court was whether or not the subpoena was valid, which means it made sense to dispose of the case with one hearing.  Besides, as we shall see, Trump, et al., had every opportunity to present facts and arguments in favor of their position; they simply failed to do so.

The trial court treated the hearing as one on "cross motions for summary judgment" because "the material facts are not in dispute."  To understand that, you have to understand how the facts were presented to the court.  That information is all documentary, and was presented to the court by the parties.  It's detailed in the Memorandum Opinion on pp. 4-11.  The important analysis, for the question of the summary judgment, is in this paragraph:

At the May 14th hearing, the court heard further argument from Plaintiffs on consolidation, and overruled their objection. The court found that no additional briefing would aid in its decision-making, as the parties had comprehensively presented the issues and cited all applicable precedent. Indeed, Plaintiffs could identify no new argument that they would make if given the chance to do so. Id. at 34–36. To allow for Plaintiffs’ asserted need to gather additional evidence, the court left the record open until May 18, 2019.  Plaintiffs already had submitted some additional evidence after the consolidation order, which consisted of news reports of public statements of various Members of Congress.  Plaintiffs added two more letters from the Ranking Member before the record closed. 

There is a footnote to that paragraph which is relevant here:

Plaintiffs did not offer any evidence from Mazars; nor did they submit the memorandum of understanding that they claimed in their Opposition was critical evidence. The Oversight Committee, however, did submit that memorandum of understanding to the court in camera. The court has considered the contents of the agreement in rendering its judgment.

(and as an aside to all those armchair lawyers and computer-bound police officers who think TeeVee reflects judicial reality:  read through the factual recitation in the court's memorandum opinion, and note all the procedural steps needed to get to this judgment.  Note, too, the Court even critiques the Committee for not seeking a resolution to “spell out the intended legislative purpose and scope” of the investigation.  Internet 'experts' find this kind of thing annoying, because they imagine all governmental power is executed through the police, who bang on doors and take people away to jail, like on the TeeVee.  Well, that works for simply criminal offenses, but the fact is, refusing to comply with a subpoena may put you in a world of hurt, but it is not a violation of criminal statutory law.  The steps from issuance of a subpoena to enforcement are not a straight line, with police officers enforcing it like a drug bust.  The system presumes compliance, but also allows for due process of law.  The detailed history of this one subpoena, in the court's memorandum opinion, is a history of that due process.  Without it, we are all Trump supporters mindlessly shouting "Lock her/him/them up!," and throwing out the rule of law in favor of the rule of those in office.)

The Court's legal opinion rests on two basic legal principles:  Congress' broad authority to investigate; and the presumption by the courts that Congress is acting as a legislative body unless there is evidence to overcome that presumption (think of it in terms of the presumption of innocence which a prosecutor must overcome to prove you guilty of a crime.  It's a presumption that keeps the courts from sticking its nose into Congress' business.)  And here's where that "tedious" stuff the internet always complains about comes into play:

Had the Oversight Committee adopted a resolution that spells out the intended legislative
purpose and scope of its investigation, the court would have begun its inquiry there. Indeed, the Supreme Court has considered congressional resolutions as a primary source from which to glean whether information “was sought . . . in aid of the legislative function.”

There are reasons the system works the way it does.  Cops busting down doors leading directly to courtrooms where lawyers prove the guilty guilty, or the accused innocent, inside of 60 minutes, is fantasy, not reality.

The opinion deals directly and particularly with every legal argument made by Trump, et al., and dismisses them, largely based on Supreme Court precedent (that is, by citing Supreme Court cases to apply to plaintiff's arguments).  The next interesting bit is how the court deals with the Plaintiff's request for a stay pending appeal.

Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 62(c) authorizes a district court to issue an injunction
pending appeal. Fed. R. Civ. P. 62(c). To obtain a stay pending appeal, the moving party “must establish [1] that he is likely to succeed on the merits, [2] that he is likely to suffer irreparable harm in the absence of preliminary relief, [3]that the balance of equities tips in his favor, and [4] that an injunction is in the public interest.” 

The court having handily disposed of all Trump's arguments, clearly there is no likelihood of success on the merits of their claim.  The court is flat-out dismissive of this ground:

Indeed, Plaintiffs have cited no case since Kilbourn from 1880 in which  the Supreme Court or the D.C. Circuit has interfered with a congressional subpoena—because it either intrudes on the law enforcement prerogatives of the Executive or Judicial branches, seeks personal information unrelated to a legislative purpose, or demands records that lack “pertinency.” This case does not merit becoming the first in nearly 140 years.

The court also notes a DC appeals case where it was found public interest favored Congress in discovering private financial records.

In sum:  good luck with that appeal!  Trump's lawyers appear to have been pounding the table, as they had nothing else to pound on.  It doesn't look like that's going to do them much good.

Trump is widely expected to take the case to the Supreme Court.

Whether they will take it, is another matter.