Trump Busted Selling Pardons For Millions In Insane Influencer Scheme

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1:21Josh Welch:Luigi Mangione is back in the news and his defense is saying that they're going to use a psychiatric defense in his murder case in New York. Pop this up. The Associated Press is reporting Luigi Mangione will assert a psychiatric defense at his state murder trial and killing of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson, judge, says here to discuss what a psychiatric defense is, is criminal defense attorney Josh Welch. Josh, what is a psychiatric defense? In the state of New York, an affirmative defense is called extreme emotional disturbance. If you can prove that at the time of the criminal act, then it allows you to get potentially a manslaughter conviction as opposed to a murder conviction.

2:07But in essence, you are admitting that you did commit the crime. So if he asserts this defense, he is in fact making the admission that I committed the crime, but I did so under these circumstances. Therefore, the defense kicks in. What's the takeaway here from my perspective is that a conviction on manslaughter would give him a significantly less period of incarceration than a conviction of murder.

2:31Josh Welch:So when it goes to trial, the defense actually has to prove something like the prosecution has to prove that he did it beyond a reasonable doubt. But in this type of defense, you have to, you have to put on your own case. That's right. Similar to what the prosecution is trying to prove their, their set of facts. It's an affirmative defense. And before the jury can be instructed on the defense, the judge has to make a finding that there was sufficient proof. And I assume it's going to come in the form of psychiatric testimony from different evaluations they've had on him to help support this theory.

3:08Again, it's still an admission by Mr. Mangione that he did in fact commit the crime, but it has to do with his mens rea and the fact that he was under this extreme emotional disturbance at the time of the occurrence to where he thought that the commission of this crime was somewhat different than what it was. It was mitigated to a certain extent as a normal thought process in his mind.

3:30Josh Welch:Again, does the jury have to, can they reject that defense and then he's admitted that he's They can. And just think of it in terms of like in any bar fight you get into, a defendant might assert the defense of self-defense. In other words, I was being struck first. Therefore, I'm going to assert the defense that I was protecting myself. A jury can, in fact, say, no, the evidence doesn't show that you were struck first. It shows that you were the aggressor. We're here in the same context. The jury could hear the psychiatric testimony and say, hey, I think this is bullshit. I don't think this guy really felt that way or thought that way.

4:07And they can reject that defense if they want to. And then he could be potentially convicted of murder. So there's a risk associated with running this defense up the flagpole. And the risk is that you're admitting the commission of the crime up front.

4:20Josh Welch:So as a criminal defense lawyer, if you know that the psychological soil with the American electorate, with a potential jury pool, is that these healthcare companies are denying people cancer treatments, are saying, I'm sorry, that's not covered by your insurance, and that there is a real appetite in the electorate slash jury pool that these healthcare executives are killing people. As a criminal defense attorney, is this a gamble that you are going to play into this trial? Are you going to try to slip that in. Can you do that? Because that's why this is so famous. I mean, everybody on gay Twitter will say it's famous because he's hot and everybody hates healthcare companies.

5:09Josh Welch:But is that something that you're going to try to slip in as a criminal defense attorney all the time, the egregious denials for profit by these healthcare companies? I think what you're asking me is, is it okay to tell the jury, listen, This son of a bitch deserved to be killed. And here's why. And obviously, judges are the gatekeepers of things like that. And they're not going to allow criminal defense lawyers to get that egregious with those suggestions. And so they're going to try to keep stuff like that out. But yes, as a criminal defense lawyer, you want to paint a picture that what Mr. Mangione was going through, how he was grieving.

5:47You want to show the greed of these corporate CEOs. But again, a trial judge is going to limit the amount of that evidence that's admissible simply because being a greedy piece of shit doesn't also justify you being murdered. Right. In the eyes of the law, even though you want to suggest it. And a lot of people in the public believe that or they've echoed those things. In a court of law, those things don't fly.

6:12Josh Welch:I think this trial is going to be super big. So I want you to stay locked in on it to support to report to our viewers exactly what's going on here. Let's shift gears, keeping in the legal genre. People are paying Trump for pardons, as has been reported. But there's a little hook to it here that I didn't see coming. Pop this up. Trump gave pardons in exchange for up to two million dollars through influencer program, bypassing the Justice Department. Next slide. A Reuters investigation found Trump's clemency now flows through a paid network of influencers appealing directly to him. With the Justice Department sidelined, 96 % of Trump's pardons broke Justice Department rules.

7:03Josh Welch:Some intermediaries charge up to$2 million for access, that access is enhanced when an applicant can craft a narrative that resonates with the president's own sense of victimization. I am no criminal investigator. I am no criminal defense lawyer, but this in and of itself, what I just read to you, sounds like it's a bunch of crimes. Well, to me, what jumps out off the screen is the fact that 96 % of these pardons don't meet the Department of Justice guidelines. Now, that, of course, is under a normal regime and leadership of the Department of Justice, but 96%, that's an ungodly number. So, what he's done is he's sidelined the Department of Justice.

7:50He set up his own porthole for pardon requests. He's got these influencers like Roger Stone running out front where they can literally money grab two, three million dollars per hit if the people have that much money simply for Roger Stone's access to Donald Trump to sit down and try to sell him on some bullshit theory as to why this person was convicted. It was a weaponization of Biden's Department of Justice, blah, blah, blah. It's unheard of. It's all, again, everything we talk about in the Trump administration always comes down to one thing, and that is it's one big grift. Everything is a grift.

8:29Josh Welch:Let's talk about a lot of the people that he is pardoning have robbed people out of money, have absolutely stolen from people. And they have bravely hired attorneys, had class action lawsuits and received a verdict wherein the person who stole from them is supposed to face accountability, but also more importantly to them, receive restitution. And so when the president does this and you have people that like invested in things, their retirement accounts, kind of Bernie Madoff, miniature Bernie Madoffs that he's pardoning. What happens to their restitution when the president pardons their crimes?

9:12Well, he has the authority and he has done this, in fact, and we've talked about this, in fact, he's wiped away just completely with a wave of a magic wand, wiped away all of these orders of restitution that these defendants are ordered to repay. So, for example, let's say that you're the CEO of a company and you defraud your investors, you defraud the stockholders, of tens or 20, 30, 40, 50 million dollars, and you're convicted at trial. And the court also makes a finding that restitution is owed to these victims in the amount of$70 million. Well, when Trump grants one of his pardons to one of these pay-for-play individuals that reach out through a social media influencer like Roger Stone, he also wipes away the one chance that these victims of crimes have to be paid back, to be made whole, to receive restitution.

10:05And that's the part of it that is jaw-dropping. These innocent victims, These pardons reach far more than just the defendants and their families and their freedom. It reaches all of these victims of crimes that are looking forward to that payday of restitution to be made whole for the fraud that was perpetrated upon them.

10:25Josh Welch:So they were first ripped off by these felons that had been found guilty. And then secondly, ripped off by their own country. Probably a lot of these people maybe even voted for this man. That's right. That's right. And it's happening daily. Moving along. The DOJ, same subject, is arguing that Elon Musk's data center powering Grok has the right to pollute. Pop this up. The New York Times is reporting the Justice Department is seeking to throw out a lawsuit against Elon Musk's company XAI over the data center's air pollution, saying it has the right to run polluting gas-burning turbines in Mississippi, despite not having permits for them.

11:12Josh Welch:The department cited national security concerns, saying Elon Musk's company had played a crucial role in the Iran war. It also argued it has the authority to stop environmental lawsuits brought by citizens. Mississippi's in the Bible Belt state. Josh, you and I grew up in a Bible Belt state. What amazes me about the Republican Party is their ability to tell people on the one hand, we are pro-life. We value life so incredibly much that we think if you're raped by your uncle, that's God's will. And you're going to have to have that baby. That's how much they value life in a real twisted, sadistic kind of way.

11:51Josh Welch:Right. But on the other hand, when it comes two corporations completely plundering the environment, which is going to cause cancer clusters, generational health issues, warming of the climate, et cetera, they're absolutely pro-death. And this by the DOJ, we pay the government to set up safety net for its citizens. And the Republican Party has brilliantly said, oh, we think government needs to be run like a business. What's the point of a business to make a profit? That is not the point of government. Government is to protect its citizenry. From your vantage, from your career, when you see the DOJ siding with these corporations that are plundering the earth, what stage of fascism here do you think we are?

12:47Well, I think what we haven't talked about, and I'll answer your question in just a second, What we haven't talked about is the communities that are impacted by this pollution are African-American communities in the state of Mississippi. So that shows you right there. They don't care about an African-American community. I think there are 27 natural gas turbines that are owned by this company that are putting these toxins into the airway in violation of the Clean Air Act. And the Department of Justice wasn't even a party to this lawsuit. So understand this, the Department of Justice in the state of Mississippi intervened.

13:23They stepped in the middle of this lawsuit and said, hey, we're asking the court to dismiss this. We think it should be dismissed. And for the reasons that you stated up front, they're basically saying, we don't have a permit. We don't have the right to do this stuff. But this is an important company. It's involved in, you know, all this bullshit. You can hear the Iraq war, all this stuff as an excuse. And it just shows you, once again, a prime example of capitalism in this country and people that have more money are treated differently than those that aren't. And that couldn't become more and more apparent daily as we watch this administration.

14:00We just talked about the pardons. If you have means or money and access to President Trump, then you can get something done. And I don't know why the people in states like Oklahoma or Mississippi that live in a small town somehow think that Donald Trump and these people are somehow champions of their causes, that they give two fucks about what you're doing in the middle of Oklahoma. These guys are all about money. And if you have a lot of money, if you have a shitload of money, millions of dollars, then you can pretty much do whatever you want to in this country. But if you don't, if you own a small business in Paul's Valley or in Norman, Oklahoma, and you play by the rules and you pay your taxes, well, guess what?

14:40You're fucked. Pay attention. Watch the news. Read these stories.

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15:30Josh Welch:I'll tell you what, Pumps has used Roe, and as you can see, she looks absolutely dynamite. So, listener, be like Pumps and go to roe.co.ihip to see if you qualify. That's ro.co.ihip to get started on Roe. Go to roe.co.safety for boxed warning and full safety information about GLP-1 medications. It's really stunning. I mean, their ability to get working class people to vote against their own communities, their children's future, their own economic interest is really the most successful plot of the Republican Party. It's impressive. It really is. Okay. And last story I want to review with you. Pop this up, Kylie.

16:16Josh Welch:New York Times, the Trump administration took its most aggressive steps to dismantle the education department by breaking away key programs for disabled students and the enforcement of civil rights laws in schools. And so not only is this completely racist, I want to also point out to a lot of our listeners that might not know this, in a lot of rural towns in Oklahoma, their funding for schools in the richest country in the history of the world. The funding for schools in rural Oklahoma has dried up so much that they have changed to a four-day school week where the kids go to school only Monday through Thursday in a state that ranks 50th in education.

17:01Josh Welch:They are drawing back spending even more, which creates all sorts of obstacles for the pro-family, traditional family, family values, God, guns, and Jesus group. Because then these working class people, what do they do on Friday? Where a lot of these kids are very poor. That's where they got their lunch and their breakfast. And then their parents have to go to work and there's nobody to take care of them. Then pile on if you're disabled or black. And then it just becomes almost insurmountable to live in America, which it feels like is the design of all of this. Josh. I think Trump has always made it a priority for him to dismantle the Department of Education.

17:43And I think he's delivering on that promise. They don't want a system where government can help and or educate people. That's when they lose when people become educated, when they learn more, when they progress more. That's when administrations like the Trump administration start to face consequences. So, this is all by design and it's all designed to hit the lower income minorities of this country. They just don't care about them. And so, like you said, if you're living in a small town in rural Oklahoma, you depend on your government to a certain extent. You depend on your school system. You depend on these things.

18:25And if you don't have them, it's going to hit your pocketbook. And so, we can only hope that people are paying attention and they see these cuts or they see the lack of enforcement of these things in real time and they pay attention. You have to pay attention.

18:42Josh Welch:And the changes move programs for disabled students into the Health and Human Services Department and the enforcement of civil rights laws in schools to the Justice Department. So RFK Jr., the guy who castrated a raccoon, kept the penis to study it at a later date, will now be responsible for helping disabled students. And Todd Blanche, the person who sat down with convicted child sex trafficker, Ghislaine Maxwell, and probably has a pardon just folded up in his pocket, just waiting for the politically opportune time to roll that out. He will be responsible for protecting marginalized students, America.

19:24Josh Welch:So the man who protects child sex traffickers will now be responsible for protecting our most marginalized citizens in America. And all of this is voted in with a mandate by evangelical Christians that sanctimoniously lecture the electorate about traditional family values and how Jesus Christ is their Lord and personal Savior. And then they bully and ratfuck the most marginalized Americans in this country. It's so disgusting. And the people that experience this in real time need to pay attention. I mean, this is a layup for Democrats. Like these things are happening across the country. The economy is in dire straits.

20:09People are suffering economically. So again, you can just remove the politics and just stick to the messaging of this. The facts are the facts, like everybody's hurting out there. And this is an opportunity for Democrats once again to jump in and try to message this because you and I both know in Oklahoma and other states like Oklahoma, people are inclined to vote against their own financial interest. They do it day in and day out all the time. But when it hits them personally, you would hope that they can see this for what it is. I mean, I know here in Oklahoma, the Republicans have controlled both houses in the state.

20:51They've had the governor, they've had the lieutenant governor, they've had the attorney general, they've had both U.S. senators, they've had all four U.S. congressmen. So, if you don't like something about where you live and you live in fucking Oklahoma, there's only one party to blame. Only one. You can't say Joe Biden this, you can't say Democrat this. I'm sorry, that doesn't work. It's all Republicans.

21:13Josh Welch:And all of those Bible Belt states, darling, they are all bottom 10 states. It's almost as if their higher power knows they're full of shit. All right, that's all we have. Please like, subscribe and comment and we will be back later with more news.

21:38Thank you.