Bad Legal Takes

“Trump sounded at turns confused & meandering. At one point, he referred to Kemp as ‘George.’ He tossed out several different figures for Biden’s margin of victory in GA & referred to the Senate runoff, which is Tues., as happening ‘tomorrow’ & ‘Monday.’” https://t.co/xT0fMfKtla

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) January 3, 2021

Can't believe this call lasted an hour.

— Maggie Haberman (@maggieNYT) January 3, 2021

But, sure, the Chairman of the Georgia GOP has a point:

The audio published by @TheWashingtonPost is heavily edited and omits the stipulation that all discussions were for the purpose of settling litigation and confidential under federal and state law.

— David Shafer (@DavidShafer) January 3, 2021

Except Trump can't have filed the lawsuits yet. It's Sunday, the courts are closed in Georgia and everywhere else. 

And it can't possibly be regarded as a "discussion for the purpose of settling litigation" and therefore "confidentical under federal and state law." A) The GA SOS is not a lawyer representing the State of Georgia or the SOS. B) Trump is not a lawyer representing anybody, either. C) Trump was clearly trying to strongarm Georgia's SOS into doing Trump's bidding. This was not a "negotiation" for "settling litigation," as there is no litigation, pending or threatened, against the state of Georgia or the Georgia SOS. And if there was, settlement talks without lawyers conducting them or present, can't possibly be confidential. Raffensperger reportedly had a lawyer from the Georgia AG on his end, and Trump had a private lawyer on his end, who was identified as not being "of record" in the discussion.  But again, no litigation, pending or threatened, and the parties to the call were not negotiating anything, nor was one of them, at least, empowered to.

Shafer, of course, doesn't have a fucking clue what he's talking about.  A lot like Trump, in that respect.  Besides, I want to see the discovery in that case.  If Trump wants to make this go away, filing a civil suit is not the way to do it.  Besides:

There so much in here that's priceless. But my favorite is Sec. Raffensperger's response to @realDonaldTrump's claim that "close to 5000"
dead people voted in GA:

"The actual number were two. Two people that were dead voted. So that's wrong." https://t.co/7GG0UuOtos pic.twitter.com/MVDB6EFcsM

— George Conway (@gtconway3d) January 4, 2021

Trump's gonna have to produce the "full" version in court.  Except that's already been done:

The Post has published Trump’s full phone call with Georgia election officials. Listen to the audio and read the transcript. Via @AmyEGardner @paulina_milla @WordsOfSarah https://t.co/LP1JcecUzh

— Amy Gardner (@AmyEGardner) January 3, 2021

Turns out I could have shortened this whole post to this:

pic.twitter.com/iF007ggvyI

— Bad Legal Takes (@BadLegalTakes) January 3, 2021

It's a Hall-of-Famer of Bad Legal Takes.