The Intersection with Michael Popok Full Episode - 10/7/2025

28:19Michael Popok:And then SCOTUS is open for business. And we got some new cases to talk about there as well. You're on The Intersection. It's my podcast on Tuesday nights at 8 p.m. Then again, you knew that you're here. And what we're trying to do is continue to grow The Intersection. It's doing great because of you. I'm doing my part. I mean, I'm doing whatever I can do. New glasses, a big pot of coffee, you know, I'm ready. But without your support, your fervent devotion and support, enthusiasm for what we're doing here, it would all be for naught, right? My editor would be out of a job. I'm only kidding, Ben, you would not be out of a job.

28:56Michael Popok:But on the way the hummingbird theory here applies, help us on the audio, Just put in the intersection on audio podcast platforms like Spotify and Apple. And then watch us on YouTube and listen to us on the audio. There we go. Thank you, Ben. And that helps. Right now, we're about to crack in, I think, again, to the YouTube top 100 of all podcasts on YouTube. That's quite a testament to our audience. And we're trying to get back into the top 100 on Apple for news. And that's all with you. And then the other ways to support what we do here, because this is like an ecosystem around law and politics, the intersection.

29:39Michael Popok:Legal AF, the YouTube channel that I curate, you might have heard about it. We're at about 850 ,000 subscribers. We're going to hit that million if it kills me before the new year, by the end of December. 10 new videos every day. A fair amount of them are mine, but a lot of other amazing contributors at that intersection of law and politics. So come to the Legal AF YouTube channel. And then we've got a Substack, Legal AF Substack. I love Substack because of its immediacy, because I can do things with our group on Substack and with our audience I can't do on YouTube. You know, I do two lives a day, pulling two or 3 ,000 people together at a moment's notice to update them on matters.

30:20Michael Popok:We got amazing writing going on there and journalism and commentary. You can't find anywhere else. And that's the way to support what we do. When I joked about, you know, texting to say, we got Rob Bonta, the attorney general of California. He's coming out of the hearing now in Oregon. We got to get him. Somebody picked up the phone. First of all, my phone worked and somebody picked up the phone and said, we're there, Popak. Here's the link. Let's jump on. And somebody edited that. We literally got it up within an hour. It's up there now on Midas Touch. And that's where the paid subscribers come in.

30:57Michael Popok:It's seven bucks a month. We kept it low. I promise you an amazing return on your investment. If you want to become a full-fledged legal AF card-carrying member, become a legal AF sub-stack paid member. And we've got, of course, our pro-democracy sponsors. And here's a word from them now. You know that nostalgic feeling of sitting at the breakfast table as a kid and pouring a giant bowl of cereal that just tasted amazing? Well, Magic Spoon has reinvented that feeling with cereal and treats that bring back the flavors you love, but in a way that actually fuels your day. Every serving of Magic Spoon's high-protein cereal packs 13 grams of protein, zero sugar, and four grams of net carbs.

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32:55Michael Popok:This is real American meat born, raised, and harvested right here in the USA. Moink is helping save rural America. I love it, and you will too. Join the Moink movement today. Support American family farms and join the, wait for it, Moink movement today at moinkbox.com slash legal AF. right now and get free bacon for a year. That's one year of the best bacon you'll ever taste, but only for a limited time. Spelled M-O-I-N-K, box.com slash legal AF. That's moinkbox.com slash legal AF. And welcome back to The Intersection. And let's get in and sit down, relax. That was the last commercial break. Appreciate you.

33:40Michael Popok:Support everything we do on Legal AF and on the intersection, and this is the way to do it. Let's get into Epstein and Maxwell and the 25th Amendment moment. It's easy. Maxwell files an appeal asking the Supreme Court through a writ of certiorari to take her appeal, arguing not that she's not guilty, but that she gets the benefit, the beneficiary of an immunity deal that she didn't even sign, that Epstein signed, quickly rejected by the Supreme Court in one line. Every Monday, they do what's called the long conference. They do a list and they say whether cert is granted, meaning appeal, we take you, or cert denied.

34:19Michael Popok:And right up there at the top, Maxwell, cert denied. Now, our lawyer said out loud, this is not the end. It is the end, David Oscar Marcus, because that's the last stop on the train and get off. Now, why does this undermine Donald Trump? Because he wanted the Supreme Court to take the appeal. So he could get up at some point in social media and all caps in the middle of the night and say something like, well, you know, there's a lot of victims in here and she may well be a victim. There's good people on both sides. You know, like in the Holocaust, there were good people on both sides. There's good people on both sides here.

34:56Michael Popok:And so I'm going to give her a pardon. Now he can't do that. Now he is literally going to have to pardon an unrepentant, because we've seen her testimony to Todd Blanche, an unrepentant convicted child sex trafficker of five counts. And that came up in a Q &A when he was asked just yesterday after the ruling came out, and don't buy this for a minute, he acts like he didn't know what the ruling was. He's made every major decision here about Ghislaine Maxwell. well. She needs immunity before she'll testify. Give her immunity. That was his order to Todd Blanche. Make sure she says something nice about me.

35:39Michael Popok:Yes. Give her a better prison as a reward. Donald Trump. Who do you think is making these decisions? Pamela Jo squinty bondy? No, that's not happening. So he's asked point blank. And it was as if he wasn't ready for the question. And here is the dementia-like moment. Let's play the clip. Say it. The Supreme Court is back and they rejected today an appeal by Ghislaine Maxwell to overturn her conviction. That means her only chance of getting out of prison is a pardon for you. Is that something you're asking? Who are we talking about? Ghislaine Maxwell. You know, I haven't heard the name in so long.

36:15I can say this, that I'd have to take a look at it. I would have to take a look. Did they reject that? She wanted to appeal her conviction. And what happened? They said that they were not going to hear her appeal. I see. Well, I'll take a look at it. I'll speak to, I will speak to the DOJ. I wouldn't consider it or not consider it. I don't know anything about it. So, but I'll speak, I will speak to the DOJ. I don't know. I mean, I'd have to speak to the DOJ. I'll look at it. I'll, I have a lot of people have asked me for pardons. I call him Puff Daddy has asked me for a pardon. Yeah.

36:49Michael Popok:Puff Daddy's asked them for a pardon. You remember Puff Daddy's name? I haven't thought about that name in a long time. I don't know, just a couple of years ago, a guy who was more with it, who looked a lot like Donald Trump, had this to say about his friend Ghislaine Maxwell, who had been arrested for child sex trafficking. Mr. President, the other day a reporter asked you about Ghislaine Maxwell. You said, quote, I just wish her well, frankly. I've met her numerous times over the years, especially since I lived in Palm Beach, but I wish her well, whatever it is. Mr. President, Ghislaine Maxwell has been arrested on allegations of child sex trafficking.

37:26Why would you wish such a person well? Well, first of all, I don't know that, but I do know that. She has. She's been arrested for that. Her friend or boyfriend... Epstein. ...was either killed or committed suicide in jail. She's now in jail. Uh-huh. Yeah, I wish you well. I'd wish you well. I'd wish a lot of people well. Good luck.

37:43Michael Popok:I wish we could be wishing Donald Trump well in jail. That didn't happen, as we now know. Is anybody buying... He's either demented and I haven't really thought about that. Who is it? Ghislaine. How do you spell it? Puff Daddy remembers. By the way, I don't think he goes by Puff Daddy any longer. But this is not helping matters. And now she's asking a great question, the press, which is, are you about to pardon a convicted child sex trafficker? uh and the fact that he doesn't reject it like i would i mean look his christian right political base in the eye and tell them that he's not going to be pardoning a convicted child sex trafficker go ahead we got time i don't know i haven't really thought about it i have doj i'll talk to the doj well are you gonna are you gonna actually consider pardoning a convicted child sex trafficker i may i may not it's up to the d i'll talk to doj i i'm thinking about a lot of people Puff Daddy, is this working?

38:45No. And so as soon as Representative Grijalva gets sworn in,

38:52Michael Popok:which if it's not going to be any day now, here's a note to her lawyers. File the writ of mandamus complaint to force the speaker to swear in your client. Okay. She doesn't, oh, well, I've been here three days and I haven't been sworn in yet. Screw that. File the lawsuit. Force his hand. Get her sworn in. She will be the 218th signature on the discharge petition, and we may finally get the Epstein files. But, you know, I'm a little, you know, I think the Democrats are starting to get their groove back, you know, like Hakeem Jeffries with that live stream that my partner Ben Masalas was on. They're starting to figure out.

39:35Michael Popok:I think Gavin Newsom was leading the way on how to troll Donald Trump, but like, you gotta bring a gun. No, that's the wrong, forget that. You gotta use sharp elbows against the Trump administration. File the motion, file the complaint, get sworn in. Let's get the Epstein files going. Let me turn now to the Oregon cases and the Illinois cases.

40:00Michael Popok:The foundation for these cases, I really think are what Judge Breyer, Charles Breyer did up in San Francisco several months ago in favor of California, where he found that the commandeering by Donald Trump of the state National Guard violated many things. The Posse Comitatus Act, where you can't use the military on domestic soil unless you invoke the Insurrection Act, that it also was an improper exercise of the statute that allows for the commandeering of the state militia, where there has to be a rebellion, an inability to exercise federal law and the rest. Part of his order was affirmed on appeal.

41:00Michael Popok:Pardon me, folks. Ovox alive. Part of it is the Posse Comitatus Act is still alive, but he laid the foundation for how you determine whether a president has properly commandeered the military. Now fast forward to Judge Immergut in Oregon. She was a Trump appointee in the first administration. However, her background is quite extraordinary. She was a U.S. attorney in California in Los Angeles, assistant U.S. attorney. She was the U.S. attorney for Portland, Oregon. She was a state district attorney. She worked for a couple of years in Vermont, but she's got an interesting body of work. She gets the case and she rules on a temporary restraining order issued last Saturday about 430.

42:02Michael Popok:That Donald Trump does not have the right to nationalize the Oregon National Guard in Portland just because he claims that Portland, Oregon and Oregon is a war ravaged city. That's news to the latte-sipping friends of mine in Portland who were like, we're war-ravaged? What, the 50 protesters who are peacefully protesting in front of ICE? There was one instance of one federal officer who was attacked. He used a stun gun and it was over. That's it. That's the entirety. Now we're going to spend$10 million to take over Portland, Oregon, and try to embarrass the governor and the mayor. And the judge said no.

42:45Michael Popok:Donald Trump fires back after attacking her along with Stephen Miller. She's an insurrectionist. She's a terrorist. She's an insurrectionist against the Constitution. She's a Portland, Oregon federal judge. She's commandeering and she's cutting off the president's war powers. Okay. Judge Immergut said in her order that Donald Trump's facts were not tethered to reality. And so as a result, Trump says, I got an idea. I've commandeered the California National Guard. I'll just send them north to Oregon. So a couple of hundred of them are on their way, which led California and Oregon joining together to file an amended complaint.

43:34Michael Popok:and a new motion for temporary restraining order emergency. They file it on Sunday. By Sunday at 10 p.m. Eastern time, the judge has another hearing. And she says, how is using the California National Guard or the Texas National Guard, how is that not a violation of my order? Well, you said, don't nationalize the Oregon National Guard, the DOJ said to her. And she just shook her head and was like, okay, here's the new order. on the same principles that I issued before, in which she said, citing our founding fathers, that Donald Trump is dangerously close to converting the rule of law and constitutional law into martial law.

44:18Michael Popok:She said, no, you are not to send any National Guard into Portland, Oregon, under any circumstances, and you again are blocked. Oh, and MAGA went crazy. MAGA went crazy uh and now Donald Trump is thrown around the insurrection the insurrection uh act in fact we have a clip of him musing about using the insurrection act let's play the clip do we have a clip then okay all right pitch and catch swing and a miss no clip take my word for it. Donald Trump threw around the Insurrection Act and said he was thinking about it. And that gives him tremendous powers. It's from 1807 or so, and it gives the president, if he spots a rebellion or domestic violence or anything that gets in the way of his ability to execute the laws, boom, he can send in military, federal military, and nationalize the National Guard.

45:24Michael Popok:And, yeah, I see Ben said no. Look up in the chain, Ben. I think it's up in my chain. In any event, the problem with the Insurrection Act for law-abiding citizens like our audience is that it's very hard to get federal judge oversight over it because the Supreme Court has said it's up to Donald Trump, the president, in the first instinct, in first instance, to declare the rebellion or declare the violence. and it's very hard to challenge him with federal courts, except if it's done in bad faith. So there is an ability, but we're going to be fighting and tussling over Donald Trump exercising the Insurrection Act or invoking it.

46:05Michael Popok:He tried to do it and was counseled to do it by Jeffrey Clark in 2020 to seize voting machines. And he, for some reason, there were enough adults in the room that he decided not to do it. So we have that case. and a lot of the framework for her analysis in Oregon came from Judge Breyer in San Francisco. So we then have Illinois. And the problem with Illinois is at first blush, the judge in Illinois didn't issue the temporary restraining order. So now they're flooding in. And so he's going to have to continue to revisit the issue with an evidentiary hearing and further briefing on it, but he let them in.

46:47She didn't let them in.

46:50Michael Popok:And I think that's the better place. Now, even when a president sends in the troops, their conduct and behavior in violation of civil liberties is still evaluated by federal judges. So we got that going for us. And the writs of habeas corpus have not been suspended. So if you were detained or sent to a deep, dark, dank prison, you can still have a lawyer file a writ of habeas corpus and get before a federal judge because because we haven't yet reached martial law that's the next step the question is where are we on the clock with donald trump how close to midnight in insurrection act are we how close to mid to beyond midnight after midnight and um the martial law are we and the suspension of the constitution You know, these are not good conversations to have to have, but we got to have them because we got to talk truth to each other here on the inner in the intersection.

47:47Michael Popok:And I was called at the insurrection. It's the intersection insurrection. We're all here together, vibrating on the same frequency, right, to defend democracy. Let's turn to the Eastern District of Virginia. Leaky and on fire. The unfired part is, as a part of the 5 ,300 people that Pam Bondi has fired, all of the best and the brightest and the talent, the nonpartisan prosecutors that once proudly represented the Department of Justice are gone. Michael Ben-Ari posted on the door like he was Martin Luther, a note typewritten decrying the destruction of the Department of Justice after he was fired because a right wing social media self-proclaimed influencer I never heard of called Julie Kelly, Jan 6th denier, election denier, Laura Loomer wannabe, not a journalist, not a professor, not a lawyer said well isn't it interesting that he used to work for uh lisa monaco the number two under a real attorney general in the forum of merrick garland he's probably part of the resistance against lindsey halligan he wasn't he was doing his job uh okay he was doing his job uh prosecuting terrorist cases like the 13 americans who died in kabul in afghanistan and he said justice should not turn on what Pam Bondi or the department or President Trump sees in their social media feed.

49:20Michael Popok:He literally typed it and posted it to the door. And so you have the resistance, including what I told you earlier, the Justice Connection. I'll be having an interview tomorrow up with the head of the Justice Connection, who has an urgent message to the recent department of, to America, and a call to action to America about the destruction of the Department of Justice. But before that, I have the insurrection clip that we found for President Trump musing about using the insurrection. Let's play it. Mr. President, the Insurrection Act, under what conditions are Trump's going to do? Well, I do it if it was necessary.

50:05So far, it hasn't been necessary. But we have an Insurrection Act for a reason. If I had to enact it, I'd do that. If people were being killed and courts were holding us up or governors or mayors were holding us up. Sure, I do that. I mean, I want to make sure that people aren't killed. We have to make sure that our cities are safe.

50:27Michael Popok:Thank you. Thank you for that. And I'm getting my voice back. You know, it's live because I had to take a cough break in the middle. Let me read to you from the urgent message from 282 former career employees who worked at the Department of Justice, all who got pushed out or resigned when the Trump administration started. They say that the DOJ's mission is to uphold the rule of law, to keep our country safe, and to protect civil rights. It's failing on all three fronts, says former members of the Department of Justice. The Justice Department cannot uphold the rule of law when it carries out the president's retribution campaign and protects his allies, violates court orders and evades due process requirements, directs attorneys to violate their ethical responsibilities.

51:16Michael Popok:That one just put a chill down my spine. It also can't keep our country safe when it ousts FBI employees, prosecutors, national security experts like Michael Ben-Honry and ATF officials. It cannot protect civil rights when it drives out 75 % of the attorneys for the Civil Rights Division and refuses to enforce the nation's civil rights laws, using them instead as a cudgel against marginalized groups, and then calls on the Justice Department, which is the foundation of our system of justice, to heal itself, to heal thyself. We call on the leaders of the Department of Justice to reverse course, to remember the oath we all took to uphold the Constitution and adhere to the legal guardrails.

52:09Michael Popok:We call on our fellow alumni of the Department of Justice to join us in sounding the alarm. We call on Congress to exercise its oversight responsibilities. We call on all Americans, that's where we come in, whose safety, prosperity, and rights depend on a strong DOJ to speak out against its destruction. Our democracy is only as strong, the alumni wrote, as the rule of law. And the rule of law can't survive without the principal institution that enforces it. Signed, 282 former members of the Department of Justice. Good news, Justice Connection and all that alumni network for the Department of Justice is going to be doing, I believe, based on my conversation today, regular work on Legal AF YouTube channel with a playlist.

52:56Michael Popok:Starts tomorrow. And they have a new sub stack. And of course, we have a Legal AF Substack, and we're going to be doing some collaborative work together. That's, you know, we have the ACLU regularly on Legal AF YouTube. We do two or three interviews a week with ACLU, who's got hundreds of cases against the Trump administration. And when we're not interviewing them, we're interviewing the Democracy Forward and Skye Perryman. She's got over 90 cases right now, including three filed this week against the Trump administration. and she regularly briefs and updates our audience on Legal AF Substack.

53:30Michael Popok:So there's more resistance within the Eastern District of Virginia. Keep an eye on Liz Yussi, because I'm not sure Liz Yussi is, I think she's going to be in the alumni network very, very soon, because somehow it leaked out that she is not going to be prosecuting Letitia James, the New York Attorney General, on behalf of Donald Trump. she was the she's the head of the major crimes unit she sits in and i'm not mispronouncing this she sits in norfolk virginia uh as part of the eastern district of virginia prosecutor's office and and the leak is that she's going to be advising lindsey halligan oh what i wouldn't take to be a fly on the wall in the next couple of weeks about why she's not more prosecuting Letitia James for mortgage fraud.

54:20Michael Popok:I can tell you many of the reasons, because there's no mortgage fraud, because she didn't mislead a mortgage lender that she was going to be living full time as her primary residence in Virginia as the New York attorney general. Every idiot knows where the New York attorney general lives in New York. And that her niece apparently with a power of attorney signed all the papers anyway. What bank was defrauded? What benefit did she get? What criminal mind that she exhibit? None. That's why the first U.S. attorney, a conservative Republican, as you heard Senator Klobuchar call him, Eric Seibert, that's why he left, because he wasn't going to indict her, nor Comey.

55:07Michael Popok:And now she's let it be known that in a couple of weeks, she's going to get around, talk about inviting your firing, to briefing Lindsay Halligan about why there's no case. I checked before the live. She's still around. She's still on the payroll. But that's the phone call coming from within the House. That's part of the resistance. This is the leakiest, thank God, Department of Justice I've ever seen. And we got another one, another one, about James Comey's prosecution. It leaked out in the last 24 hours. Now we found out why James Comey should not be prosecuted. And these are now going to be witnesses for the defense.

55:49Michael Popok:All right. John Durham, of all people, four years, the special prosecutor spending tens of millions of dollars of wasted taxpayer dollars about the Russia hoax and trying to figure out and get to the bottom of why the FBI went after Trump and others for Russia influence in the election. You know, if you don't think the Russians influenced the outcome of the election in 2016, then I got a bridge of Brooklyn to sell you. Whether it was done through trolling on social media or or I'm not saying they went in and like through satellites changed votes for Trump. I'm not insane. I'm not Sidney Powell.

56:30Right.

56:31Michael Popok:I'm not Mike Lindell, the pillow guy. But if you don't think that social media and brainwashing didn't happen to the American people to undermine Hillary Clinton, come on. So John Durham said about a month ago to the prosecutors in the Eastern District of Virginia, after an hour long video link, there's no case against James Comey. He said, I spent four years looking at everything. In other words, if I had a case against Comey, you don't think I would have brought it? He brought three minor indictments. He didn't get a conviction. I think he got one conviction. And that was it. So he told them there's no case for perjury against Comey.

57:14Michael Popok:Drop it. That went into the report that got delivered to Lindsey Halligan, which he completely ignored. But that's not all, folks. It also leaked that the Eastern District of Virginia career prosecutors spoke to their counterparts in D.C. at the U.S. Attorney's Office in District of Columbia, and they said, Comey, we looked at him for two years. We even impaneled a grand jury. There's no case. all of this will be used by pat fitzgerald representing comey to kill that indictment where it stands it's already deficient on its face and likely subject to as soon as that arraignment happens and get ready for the perp walk everybody because now i believe that pat fitzgerald is not going to do a darn thing to stop the perp walk he's just going to get his own film crew to get great images and angles like Midas would do of the perp walk of his strapping FBI director, former Comey, and then use that as exhibit A to support the motion to dismiss for vindictive prosecution.

58:21Michael Popok:Why are we getting a perp walk? And then you got Cash Patel going, oh, oh, the crybabies over at MSNBC. Oh, they didn't say anything when, I don't know, People like Bannon went to jail and Flynn and other people. When they were perp walked, I don't remember actually. I mean, they took Bannon off a boat because they were afraid he was going to flee. That's different than the former FBI director who's willing to self-surrender. But they just want the perp walk, like Hannah Dugan, the Milwaukee County trial judge. You don't think she surrendered or wanted to surrender? Nope. put her in handcuffs.

59:01And what leaked out is they're going to get some big, beefy,

59:05Michael Popok:this is their words, not mine, big, beefy FBI agents wearing full kit FBI in the front and back like it's some TV show to put them in handcuffs. Good, says Pat Fitzgerald, former U.S. attorney for Illinois, for Chicago. Do it to my client. More. Give us more gifts. So we'll see how that's going to run down. Of course, we'll have the video clips and everything up and running. We'll try to do it live if we can on Legal AF as well. So we got the leaky on fire Eastern District of Virginia, and we wish Liz Uc. Well, and if she ends up at the Justice Connection, maybe we'll get her on Legal AF so she can talk about her time in the Trump administration.

59:49Michael Popok:And now I want to turn as we round this out. And first of all, I want to thank the audience. We've got a tremendous audience here. It's almost 9 ,000 people. It's just remarkable. When we decided to do this show six months ago, five months ago, eight months, whatever it was, I started out as Bopak Live. We started to do it as a real podcast. I wasn't sure. I was like, well, I'm on Wednesdays and Saturdays. I've got the YouTube thing over on Legal AF YouTube. I want to do the show. I've always wanted to do the show. So there's going to be an audience for this. And we built it and you guys arrived.

1:00:24Michael Popok:And yes, we can. And I really do appreciate it. Now, keep us on the air. Now more than ever, law firms are getting hacked by the Chinese. My website got hacked by the Russians or Chinese posing as Russians. They're trying to bring us down. Midas Touch runs every other day on Substack. Another threat on Midas Touch. Another attempt on the life of legal AF. I'm not kidding. You know, we're not under the FCC. yet. We're not, you can't shut us down. We don't have corporate parents, but the way we stay independent to be able to bring you the commentary without blowing smoke or sunshine, telling you the truth as best as I can tell you based on research and investigation and things that we find is through listener and audience support.

1:01:09Michael Popok:We're like the old PBS. Remember when they used to ask for money every 10 minutes? We don't really ask for money, right? We're not behind a paywall. People are like, what's the business model here? We're not behind a paywall. We don't have outside investors. So we leave it to our amazing advertisers to support us who don't tell us what to say, never would, or we would fire them. And then we've got the paid memberships on things like Legal AF Substack. That's sort of it, folks. That's what keeps us, you know, that's what keeps the team behind the scenes. That's what keeps our rapid response channel and channels moving and just your eyeballs and your fervent support in the comments and leave the review.

1:01:54Michael Popok:I could, all right, let's do this. Let's get the 500 reviews for the intersection five-star on Apple. I think I'm at 250 now. More reviews help the hummingbird theory. Nobody quite knows what goes into the algorithm, but you do it all. You got to do everything. and being here tonight, just extraordinary. I thank you very much for it. I sent out some free memberships to show you my appreciation earlier in the night. Again, tip of the hat and chef's kiss to everybody here on our show tonight. Let's talk about the Supreme Court. Tomorrow on, again, the ecosystem in play on the Legal AF YouTube channel, just go into the live tab.

1:02:38Michael Popok:We've got Bost versus Illinois. I think it starts at 10 a.m. I'll be doing commentary. Sometimes I'm in the chat. Sometimes I do it in a video right after. This is about whether mail-in ballots that come in after election day are going to be counted. Donald Trump doesn't want mail-in. He wants one day, vote on election day, no early voting, no mail-in voting, because these are all the places that Democrats excel. We're really good at organizing. We're really good at early voting. We're really good at mail-in voting. We're really good at absentee voting and getting souls to the polls. Donald Trump doesn't want that.

1:03:15Michael Popok:He wants election day is election day. Well, states are allowed to, under the constitution, to set the means and methods on election day, even for federal elections. And people recognize mail-in ballots, you know, take a minute, especially with a post office that's been ravaged by Donald Trump and undermined by Elon Musk. I literally mailed a letter from Miami, let's see, Miami back to, I'm sure I think where I sent it, to New York, a letter in an envelope, you know, like snail mail with a stamp on it. It arrived seven days later. Seven days. I was getting like Dunning emails. Like where's the, it had a check in it.

1:04:00Michael Popok:Like where's the check? I'm like, it's in the mail, literally. So states like Illinois are like, we'll give you plus 14. As long as it comes in 14 days after the election, we'll count it. Who cares? As long as nobody opens the envelope, as long as it's postmarked on the day of the election. And that's mail about people overseas, you know, like our armed forces. And no, two Trump stooges filed a suit that made its all way up to the Supreme Court. Now, the only issue that's really supposed to be a judge tomorrow during oral argument is whether either of these two clowns have standing to actually bring the case.

1:04:40Michael Popok:They're not supposed to touch the substance of the decision, but anytime I see voting, an election, and somebody trying to take away and rip my mail-in ballot out of my hand, it sends up a spider antenna, spider sense. So we need to follow that case. There's lots of other ones coming up. We just had one today about conversion therapy. Doesn't that sound Orwellian? It's just a therapist and somebody and trying to convince them not to be gay or not to be a transgender person because their parents, I guess, sent them there, or because they want, in the words of the plaintiff, they want to align who they are in gender with their Christian values?

1:05:26Michael Popok:Okay, it's banned in 22 states because it has been shown by study after study and psychological study after psychological study that it does tremendous amount of harm to the person. It's pseudoscience. It's like, you know, getting under the hood of somebody's brain and tinkering when you don't know what you're doing. But this Christian therapist, Why is it always the Christians? It's the, sorry, I'm not trying to undermine the Christians. It's always the Christian baker who doesn't want to bake the cake for the cake couple. The Christian wedding invitation designer who doesn't want to create a website.

1:06:04Oh, God.

1:06:06Michael Popok:And it literally, in any event, it's a Christian therapist who wants to do conversion therapy and brought this on a First Amendment free speech ground. Free speech runs both ways, right? It's the, you're right to hear in the marketplace of ideas, somebody's comments, and as long as they're not terroristic or violent, and you're right to say it. And that's where the hearing went today. like you can tell there's a majority already to strike down conversion ban uh laws like in colorado under it is a viewpoint based discriminatory uh gagging of first amendment rights they didn't really get into the religion part but that was sort of in the background so say goodbye to 22 states conversion therapy bans say hello to pseudo psychology that that people are going to be subjecting their kids to, I guess, under the false flag of First Amendment freedom of speech.

1:07:08I hope that this Supreme Court is as vigilant about the First Amendment when

1:07:16Michael Popok:inevitably all of these protesters, the radical left-wing protesters on the streets, are crushed by Donald Trump and thrown into jail. I hope they remember how strongly, how strongly felt they were about the First Amendment when that happens. Not so sure about that. We've got lots of other cases. The court is open first Monday in October. It runs until, just to give you a little bit of a primer, it runs until June-ish. They hold, like, middle of June, they hold their last oral argument. Again, the emergency docket runs parallel. They're still running in with emergency docket applications from Donald Trump.

1:07:58Michael Popok:And if you're Donald Trump, you do the same thing. He's winning 84 % of his emergency dockets, right? Joe Biden, 50%. That delta is political hacks on the Supreme Court. There's no other way to call it. I used to like not call them the MAGA six, but they're the MAGA six. Roberts, Amy Coney Barrett, Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, Alito, and Thomas. Got a great new book that's out by one of our major contributors on Legal AF YouTube, Lisa Graves, called Without Precedent, about John Roberts. She's been tracking John Roberts' career since before he became a lower-level federal judge and trying to call out that he was a Trojan horse, that he was going to destroy America.

1:08:46Michael Popok:And she's been calling and sounding that whistle, that siren, for the last 20 years. And now she wrote a book about it. and it's required reading on your shelf. I don't get a kickback for this. I just really admire Lisa Graves. She served in all three branches of government, and she's written a fabulous book. Pick it up. It's called Without Precedent, and I've got a couple of videos up on Legal AF YouTube in which I interview her. You can learn more about the book, but we'll be tracking the Supreme Court. I got a show with Dina Dahl over on Legal AF YouTube. channel every week, Saturday mornings called Unprecedented about the United States Supreme Court.

1:09:30Michael Popok:And we're going to be doing the lives of, you know, not every live, there's 70 oral arguments, but the ones we think we'll curate for you. And then we'll be doing pregame show and postgame show. We have one tomorrow at 10 a.m. about, it's Boss versus Illinois, about mail-in ballots that matter. I really want to thank everybody in the audience tonight. We've got, Still got 8 ,000 people with us. Appreciate each and every one of you. Every Tuesday night, intersection, 8 p.m., right here on the Midas Touch Network. Wednesdays and Saturdays, the original, the extra crispy, Legal AF. Wednesdays, I do it with Karen Friedman, Ignifolo.

1:10:10Michael Popok:Saturdays with Ben Micellis, my good friend and co-founder, who I hope to see. I'm going to be doing a live stream. Get this, live stream a week from Saturday. We'll advertise the crap out of it in San Diego with my special guest, Attorney General Rob Bonta of California about all things that matter, about the 23 attorneys general fighting for our democracy led by people like Rob Bonta. I think Rob Bonta one day will be the governor of California. I think Rob Bonta could be the president of the United States one day. I mean, not the next next one. He's not going to jump over his boss, Gavin Newsom.

1:10:52Michael Popok:But one day, that's how much I admire Rob Bonta. And we're even trying to get one of the leading candidates for governor of California to join us there. I'm going to do it as a live stream, a live feed. And that's going to be next Saturday. We'll give you more details about that. But thanks for being here. Shout out to the Midas Mighty and the Legal AFers. See you next Tuesday. Can't get your fill of Legal AF? Me neither. That's why we formed the Legal AF Substack. Every time we mention something in a hot take, whether it's a court filing or a oral argument, come over to the Substack. You'll find the court filing and the oral argument there, including a daily roundup that I do call, wait for it, Morning AF.

1:11:35Michael Popok:What else? All the other contributors from Legal AF are there as well. We got some new reporting. We got interviews. We got ad-free versions of the podcast and hot takes wear legal AF on Substack. Come over now to free subscribe.

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