Trump Runs Scared in Court and Goes After Comey Lawyer

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2:19Michael Popok:We got some breaking news with a retaliatory potential motion by the Trump administration against James Comey and his lawyers to try to get James Comey's lawyer defense team disqualified because, let's be frank, they already told the Trump administration and the judge that they're moving to disqualify the prosecutor, Lindsey Halligan, handpicked by Donald Trump. You've got competing motions. Only one is in good faith. I've got three pieces of paper to tie together with you right here on this hot take on the breaking news. I've got the, I've got the motion where it was buried on a Sunday night filing by the Trump administration that they're probably going to move to disqualify James Comey's lawyer, Pat Fitzgerald.

3:02Michael Popok:Again, retaliation for them signaling that they're going to be moving to disqualify the prosecutor. And then I've got the response that just came in from James Comey's lawyer. And then on top of that, I've got the Office of Inspector General report back in 2019 that this is all based on. I'm going to tie and knit all these three pieces of paper together right here on Legal AF and on the Midas Touch Network. Let's get to it. Late on Sunday, in a late night filing, the Trump administration told Judge Nakmanoff, who was presiding over all this, that they are going likely to disqualify. What's their basis for disqualification?

3:36Michael Popok:Not much. But what they're saying is they have documents that they've obtained from an attorney, likely Professor Richmond at Columbia, who was and a former employee of the FBI and friend of James Comey. James Comey had written seven different memos, sort of CYA memos at the time when he interacted with Donald Trump, when Trump told him, you better stop the prosecution investigation of Michael Flynn or else. Or else happened, Comey was fired. He had these seven memos. None of them contained classified information. Of course, after Comey left office and under the Trump administration, they've tried to up-classify this to make it look like he sent secret or confidential information.

4:20Michael Popok:He only sent it to his lawyer team, in other words, an attorney-client privilege relationship, to get advice. Part of that lawyer team back in 2017, 2018 included Pat Fitzgerald, the former U.S. attorney for Chicago. So what they said in the filing late last night by the Trump administration is, This is under footnote two. Relevant to this motion, the attorney has informed the government, that would probably be Professor Richmond at Columbia, that the quarantined evidence contains communications between the defendant and several attorneys. The current lead defense counsel, that's Fitzgerald, appears to be a party to some of these communications.

5:01Michael Popok:And then goes on to say, bottom of page two, based on publicly disclosed information, the defendant used current lead defense counsel to improperly disclose classified information citing to the Office of Inspector General Report. That's a big problem with that. That's not what the Office of Inspector General Report says. I'll post it up on Legal AF Substack so you can read it. Here's what it says on page two. It says, on May 14th, 2017, Comey used his personal scanner and a private email to provide electronic copies of his seven memos, number two, four, six, and seven, to one of his personal attorneys.

5:40Michael Popok:Three days later, the attorney provided via personal email copies of these four memos to two other attorneys who were also part of Comey's legal team. In other words, covered by attorney, client, attorney, work product, privilege, communication so that Comey could get advice. Of the memo shared with his attorneys, the FBI later determined, in other words, they classified after the fact, how convenient. In June 2017, classified, this is under the Trump administration, FBI, classified them as confidential level for a memo two, about six words in memo two, that memo four and six contained for official use only information and seven was properly redacted about classified information.

6:27Michael Popok:Later, they conclude, we found no evidence that Comey or his attorneys released any of the classified information contained in any of the memos to members of the media. So there was no leak. They say there was a leak that there was a, according to the Trump, to read Trump, they're saying it was publicly disclosed and disclosed classified information. Yeah, from client to attorney. And they were cleared. So we see that buried. Did you know the liver is the second largest organ in your body? It's responsible for over 500 functions. But for some reason, liver health doesn't always get the attention it deserves.

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8:35Michael Popok:Dose is gluten-free, dairy-free, sugar-free, and vegan. Save 30 % on your first month of subscription by going to Dosedaily.co slash Legal AF or entering Legal AF at checkout. That's D-O-S-E-D-A-I-L-Y dot C-O slash Legal AF for 30 % off your first month subscription. So then we have the response by James Comey that just came in, which I'll also post the Legal AF sub stack. That's how we roll here. And here it says, first of all, on the document review issue, because all documents should have been turned over, but the government is withholding some because they want to set up a certain filter process because there's allegedly classified information.

9:17Michael Popok:That's when they took the pot shot at Comey's lawyer. And this is how they say it. They say, we need a couple of weeks. And it also says that they're defaming lead counsel. It says, finally, the government's effort to defame lead defense counsel provides no basis to grant the motion. Particularly, they go through all of the ways the search warrant and other materials were obtained. Then on page four, they say the government's assertion that Mr. Comey's used current lead defense counsel to improperly disclose classified information and the implicit assertion lead defense counsel and Mr. Comey engage in criminal activity by doing so is provably false.

9:57Michael Popok:And then they cite to this inspector general report, the August 2019 inspector general report cited by the government demonstrates that notably there was, quote, no leaking of classified information either to the press by either Comey or his counsel. full stop. The report found no evidence of any such release. Moreover, the OIG specifically addressed Mr. Comey's sharing of certain memoranda with his defense counsel, including lead defense counsel, Pat Fitzgerald, in May of 2017. It says after Comey was fired on May 9th, he sought legal advice with respect to his termination and with regard to having witnessed behavior by the president that he considered unlawful.

10:39Michael Popok:Let's not bury the lead. The then now former director of the FBI believed that the president of the United States had done illegal and lawful things and was consulting with counsel about it. Mr. Comey had written seven contemporaneous memoranda about his troubling interactions with President Trump. He had judged three memoranda to contain classified information and four to be unclassified. He shared the four unclassified ones with his lead defense counsel, who then shared those memoranda with other attorneys. But they continue. The memoranda were unclassified at the time they were shared. Mr. Comey did not share the classified memoranda with counsel.

11:21Michael Popok:So there was one that he withheld. Thereafter, some weeks after the unclassified memoranda had been shared, the government, led by Trump, decided to upclassify one of the four unclassified memos to confidential, which is the lowest level of classification. This up-classification does not change the fact that when the memo was initially transmitted, they were in fact unclassified. In short, there is no good faith basis for attributing criminal conduct to either Mr. Comey or his lead defense counsel, they say on page six. Similarly, there are no good faith basis to claim a conflict between Mr. Comey and his counsel.

11:58Michael Popok:Let's talk about that for a minute. One of the most sacrosanct rules of our entire justice system is that you not only have the right to counsel, but you have the right to the counsel of your choice. And anything that interferes with that, any rule, any contract provision, anything that tries to put a wedge or a wall or deny you your chosen lawyer, is generally found to be illegal. and those kind of motions, especially ones that are seen as a way to gain a tactical advantage are not regularly granted or at all, especially by federal judges, and especially by this federal judge, Judge Nakmanoff, a Biden appointee, who in his career have been a federal public defender.

12:40Michael Popok:It is a loser strategy. It shows you, all it shows you is that they are scared of Comey and they're scared of his lawyer, and they should be. The lawyers that the carpet-bagging lawyers that Lindsey Halligan imported in from North Carolina to handle this Virginia case, they should know better. They are outmatched. They are outwitted. They are outfoxed. And they're already caught flat-footed. And to try to get rid of your opponent is the ultimate both compliment and insult, and shows weakness. They're so scared of Pat Fitzgerald combining with James Comey, two former U.S. attorneys against them.

13:19Michael Popok:They're trying to get rid of one of them. We're going to follow it all right here on the Midas Touch Network and Legal AF. This is fast moving. Later on, on the 20th, there's going to be more motions that are going to be filed, including the one against Lindsey Halligan. I'll follow it here for you. I'll do it on Legal AF. I'll do it on Legal AF Substack and do a live report. We'll keep you updated on all the developments fast moving in the Comey Prosecution Charade. I'm Michael Popak. You're on Midas Touch Network. Take a minute, hit the subscribe button here, slide over to Legal AF YouTube, do the exact same thing.

13:50Michael Popok:This is how you defend what we do here for you every day. I'm Michael Popak, till my next report. 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. 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.

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