GOP Now Scared to Death to Release Jack Smith Video Depo

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3:02Michael Popok:Special counsel Jack Smith's not back. He never left. And now we know from a new letter from his lawyers that there is a nine-hour videotape of him telling the House Oversight and Judiciary Committees in nine hours of sworn testimony that Donald Trump is a criminal and that he had evidence to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Donald Trump committed crimes to interfere with our election in 2020, that he had credible evidence that he committed Espionage Act violations and obstruction of justice at Mar-a-Lago. That's the nine-hour videotape that the House MAGA don't want you to see. And now Jack Smith is pounding on a table to have it released for the American people.

3:46Michael Popok:I'm Michael Popak. You're on Midas Touch and on Legal AF. Marry whatever your holiday is. We're certainly happy and merry to have you here and helping us continue to grow our channels. Legal AF YouTube hit one million over the weekend because of you. And we appreciate each and every one of you. Let's get to the Jack Smith story. We've heard from Jack Smith in the past. Jack Smith, although he's been gagged by MAGA and the MAGA House, who went into that nine hours of testimony behind closed doors over the objection, strenuous objection of Jack Smith, who demanded to be heard like every other special counsel.

4:23Michael Popok:He's the only special counsel that didn't deliver a report in public under oath to a public hearing at the House. Robert Herr and Biden and documents. There was a public hearing, right? Robert Mueller about whatever he was investigating in Russia and other things in Donald Trump. There was a hearing. We all watched it. John Durham for Donald Trump about his investigations. There was a hearing. There was public hearings. Nope, not this time. Let's put them behind closed doors so that we can selectively leak. And then they did exactly what Jack Smith feared and his lawyers feared. Jack Smith went, gave a public statement, which we got a copy of, saying that he had evidence beyond a reasonable doubt, which is even the higher, it's a higher standard than is required under the Department of Justice manual to even bring the indictment.

5:16Michael Popok:He's basically saying, I would prove it. And he's already absorbed the Supreme Court immunity decision. Even despite that, he said he could win his case. And exactly what they feared happened. They didn't release the video yet. They didn't release the transcript. until the public picks up pitchforks and starts going after members of Congress who are holding it back. And then Jim Jordan goes on Fox News and says, I didn't hear anything that changed my mind. Right, because your mind was already made up that this was a political witch hunt. You only focused on an aspect of Mar-a-Lago and the FBI search warrant.

5:55You did not comment at all

5:58Michael Popok:about Jack Smith's other eight and a half hours of testimony, proving his case against Donald Trump for the American people. That's what Jack Smith didn't want to have happen. He didn't want people to comment on his report, on his video testimony before they saw it for themselves. But that's what happened. But Jack Smith has spoken out in the past. In fact, I keep saying this, and I pinch myself, and still up on the Department of Justice website is the video of Jack Smith presenting the indictment related to the D.C. election interference case. And here's a clip. Good evening. Today, an indictment was unsealed, charging Donald J.

6:43Trump with conspiring to defraud the United States, conspiring to disenfranchise voters and conspiring and attempting to obstruct an official proceeding. The indictment was issued by a grand jury of citizens here in the District of Columbia, and it sets forth the crimes charged in detail. I encourage everyone to read it in full. The attack on our nation's capital on January 6, 2021 was an unprecedented assault on the seat of American democracy. As described in the indictment, it was fueled by lies. Lies by the defendant, targeted at obstructing a bedrock function of the U.S. government, the nation's process of collecting, counting, and certifying the results of the presidential election.

7:39The men and women of law enforcement who defended the U.S. Capitol on January 6th are heroes. They are patriots and they are the very best of us. They did not just defend a building or the people sheltering in it. They put their lives on the line to defend who we are as a country and as a people. They defended the very institutions and principles that define the United States. Since the attack on our Capitol, the Department of Justice has remained committed to ensuring accountability for those criminally responsible for what happened that day. This case is brought consistent with that commitment, and our investigation of other individuals continues.

8:24In this case, my office will seek a speedy trial so that our evidence can be tested in court and judged by a jury of citizens.

8:33Michael Popok:Can't believe that's still up on the website. Now that we have the new reporting today coming out of Axios that the White House has taken over the Department of Justice's social media accounts and X accounts in order to clear and exonerate Donald Trump for anything found in the Epstein files. We've done our full investigation in what, a microwave investigation overnight? You cleared Trump? How could you possibly clear Trump? What about the 1 ,200 victims that are inside these files? What are you doing about them? Did you clear Bill Clinton about his, is that a phony hot tub photo? No, just everything about Donald Trump is either scandalous, spurious, groundless, fake, right?

9:15Michael Popok:Only Donald Trump's information in the repository is fake. Everybody else's is real. So now you got the Department of Justice, right, who still has up on the website, Jack Smith. That's not the only time he's spoken out loud. He gave a recent statement. He was overseas when he gave it. But knowing that he may be gagged and we'd never see the video, he started giving some interviews. And here's a clip of one. This latest prosecution of the former director of the FBI. There's a process to secure an indictment. There's a process of predication, having some evidence before you do that. Here, and again, I only know what I see myself in the media, but the career prosecutors, the apolitical prosecutors who analyzed this said there wasn't a case.

10:02And so they brought somebody in who had never been a criminal prosecutor on day's notice to secure an indictment a day before the statute of limitations ended. That just reeks of lack of process. And I think a lot of Americans do not see this as a political issue. Process shouldn't be a political issue, right? Like if there's rules in the department about how to bring a case, follow those rules. You can't say, I want this outcome, let me throw the rules out. That's why, frankly, you see all these conflicts between the career apolitical prosecutors I worked with, because they're being asked to do things that they think are wrong.

10:39And because they're not political people, they're not going to do them. And I think that explains why you've seen the resignations, you've seen people leave the department. It's not because they're enemies of one administration or the next. They've worked through decades for different administrations. It's just they've been doing things apolitically forever. And when they're told, no, you got to get this outcome no matter what, that is so contrary to how we were all raised as prosecutors. I think that's been the center of all the conflict.

11:06Michael Popok:We demand the videotape. Let me read to you from the letter. Now, the letter is dated about five or six days ago. But let me read it to you because we just got our hands on it. It just got disclosed. Here's what the letter says, sent by email to Jim Jordan. Let me show you first a clip of Jim Jordan in which he said, I basically have my mind made up and I didn't hear anything in Jack Smith's testimony that changed my mind on Fox News. Let's play that clip. Well, Jack Smith testified for seven hours and none of that time did it change my belief, as you said, Sean, that this was all political. Now, Jordan, we don't want to see you talking about it.

11:51Michael Popok:We want to see the videotape. Here's what Lanny Brewer and Peter Kosky, representing Jack Smith, wrote to Jamie Raskin, the Democratic ranking member, and Jim Jordan. Our client testified before the committee for approximately nine hours regarding his investigation into President Trump's alleged unlawful retention of classified documents, obstruction of justice, and role in attempting to overthrow the results of the 2020 election. Mr. Smith welcomed this opportunity and to correct the many mischaracterizations about the work of the special counsel's office. And by the way, he's the special counsel.

12:30Michael Popok:He's not the alleged purported, supposed, in quotes, special counsel that the Department of Justice likes to troll Jack Smith about in their filings. Mr. Smith respectfully requests the prompt public release of the full videotape, there it is, of the deposition. Doing so will ensure that the American people can hear the facts directly from Mr. Smith, not through secondhand accounts like Jim Jordan that we just heard. and he stands by his decision to prosecute. We need that transparency. It's not just about Epstein files transparency. It's about all of it. Now, what's going to happen is we're going to get the ranking Democrat on the committee like Jamie Raskin writing a letter to the House, to the Judiciary Committee's, sorry, to the Department of Justice's Inspector General demanding a full investigation about the release of the videotape and why the reports shouldn't all be released.

13:28Michael Popok:We've got Judge Cannon still sitting on volume two of the Mar-a-Lago report, right? Which deals with Mar-a-Lago. Oh, I may get around to releasing it in February. I'm not quite sure yet. You know, doing the bidding of Donald Trump. But we need to hear from Jack Smith. Now, there are some ways around this. The minority Democrats can try to do some shadow hearings and bring in Jack Smith to testify. I can think of a handful of people. Erez Reveni, the whistleblower against the Department of Justice, should testify. You got 5 ,000 former Department of Justice personnel, 2 ,000 lawyers just since this administration started, all chomping at the bit, champing at the bit to testify.

14:14but bring him in.

14:16Michael Popok:Let's have a whole shadow oversight committee hearing. It matters. You know, as I said, every special counsel, but Jack Smith got the opportunity to speak directly to the American people, except for Jack Smith. He got volume one about the DC election interference case. He got that out the door. That's available for reading, for your reading pleasure. That's out there, along with the Jan 6 report by the Jan 6 committee. But just at the moment he was going to get volume two out, it was blocked by Judge Cannon. Then the change in the administration happened. Merrick Garland left a love note for Pam Bondi.

14:54Michael Popok:It's up to you now to release this file. And of course, she didn't release it. She buried it. It's not just release the Epstein files. It's release Jack Smith's volume two, a copy of it sitting with Judge Cannon. And she's still jerking around with the American public about not releasing it. But it's important. It's an important chapter. We will finally, with pressure from this audience on Legal AF, we will get this released. You know, I have on the show Senator Blumenthal, Senate Judiciary Committee, Jamie Raskin, the ranking member on the House Judiciary Committee. You know, we've had Senator Coons, there's so many different Congress people and senators we've had on to put pressure, but we need public pressure, public scorn of the Trump administration.

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