Has Trump's lawfare blown up in his face?

0:02Pete Hegseth:This is a Global Player original podcast.

0:05James Comey:When I was a kid, my parents would wake us up for school every morning by snapping open the shades and saying, time to rise and shine and show the world what you're made of. Well, it's that time, America. It's time to stand up and show the fools who would frighten us, who would divide us, that we're made of stronger stuff, that we believe in the rule of law, that we believe in the importance of doing things by the law. So stand tall, shine and keep the faith.

0:39Mark Kelly:That was James Comey with his rallying cry to, you heard it, America, after a judge dismissed the case against him and said that it couldn't stand. It was, in fact, illegal.

0:53Pete Hegseth:And the same applied to the New York attorney, Letitia James. That case also thrown out. So where does this leave Donald Trump's policy of vengeance, of going after his enemies and using the law against them? Welcome to the News Agents USA. The News Agents USA with Emily Maitlis and John Sopel. It's John. It's Emily. And what happened yesterday, I mean, in some ways could have been anticipated. But the case that had been brought with such fanfare and support of Donald Trump to prosecute the former FBI director, James Comey, who Trump fell out with spectacularly in the first term. and Letitia James, who was the district attorney in New York who brought the case against the Trump organization, leading to fines of 40 million dollars.

1:49Pete Hegseth:Both cases thrown out by a judge who said the acting attorney. And there's a lot of attorneys here. The person who had been given the task of bringing the prosecution case against these two had been appointed unlawfully and didn't have the authority to do what she did. In simple terms, it was a massive rebuff to Donald Trump.

2:15Mark Kelly:Yeah, it was the Judge Cameron McGowan-Curry who ruled yesterday, last night, that the Comey case had to be dismissed. And he said in writing, I agree with Mr Comey that the Attorney General's attempt to install Miss Halligan as the attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia was invalid because she had no lawful authority to present the indictment. Now, just to run you through what this means, essentially, Trump and his gang were trying to find an attorney who would be willing to indict Comey on a very spurious case, spurious for many reasons, not the least of which was that it looked like a vindictive prosecution.

2:55Mark Kelly:It looked like something that Donald Trump was doing because he frankly did not like James Comey. He'd said as much many times. He said he was going after him. He said he was corrupt. He said he was a badun. And so there were very few lawyers that were willing to take on this case at all. When they finally found Lindsay Halligan, she agreed to do so. She wasn't up to the job and she was appointed to a role that was actually an invalid role because she had never been made that level of attorney. And so the judge in a way had a very easy job because he just looked at her, looked at what she was trying to pretend to be, looked at this case of, as they call it, vengeful prosecution and said, sorry, folks, this just won't wash.

3:40Mark Kelly:They chucked out the case against Comey. They chucked out the case against Letitia James. And what they did was they said, I think they called it without prejudice. In other words, if you get your act together, you can still try and bring the case again, but you need to do it better next time. It had all been done in a rush because the statute of limitations was going to run out. They tried to bring Comey into the courts in a very sort of sped up version of events. And Comey, I think, had always said, had always been outspoken about the fact, he's a former director of the FBI. He knew that the case against him was pretty spurious, but he kind of had to go through with it.

4:24Mark Kelly:And it's kind of what he's trying to tell people now. This is the speech he gave. It was kind of like a speech to camera that he gave after that verdict was through.

4:34James Comey:I'm grateful that the court ended the case against me, which was a prosecution based on malevolence and incompetence and a reflection of what the Department of Justice has become under Donald Trump, which is heartbreaking. But I was also inspired by the example of the career people who refuse to be part of this travesty. It costs some of them their jobs, which is painful, but it preserved their integrity, which is beyond price. And I know they will serve again. I was very lucky that some of the best lawyers in America stepped forward to represent me. I hope they serve as an example to more and more lawyers, especially at some of the big firms, to participate in protecting our liberty, protecting the rule of law.

5:18James Comey:and my family and friends were always with me and luckily for me includes some of those great lawyers. This case mattered to me personally, obviously, but it matters most because a message has to be sent that the President of the United States cannot use the Department of Justice to target his political enemies. I don't care what your politics are, you have to see that as fundamentally un-American and a threat to the rule of law that keeps all of us free. I know that Donald Trump will probably come after me again. And my attitude is going to be the same. I'm innocent. I am not afraid. And I believe in an independent federal judiciary.

6:02Pete Hegseth:So James Comey, they're setting out the case that if you're going to bring a prosecution against somebody, The convention, the rules in America are that career professionals in the Department of Justice build the case. They then take it to a grand jury and the grand jury votes on whether there is sufficient evidence to bring a prosecution. What happened in this case was that the career professional responsible for this part of the jurisdiction in America, Virginia, said there isn't the evidence. I'm sorry, Pam Bondi, Attorney General. I'm sorry, President Donald Trump. There just isn't the evidence to bring a prosecution against James Comey and Letitia James.

6:45Pete Hegseth:So what happens? The person is then kind of shamed by Donald Trump on social media and resigns his position. And then Donald Trump or Pam Bondi appoint this woman, Lindsay Halligan, who has got no experience in criminal prosecution. She dealt with insurance fraud before and there should have been a confirmation hearing to say that she could act. And there was no confirmation hearing. She was put in as this acting attorney in the Department of Justice. And the judge has said, no, you can't just pull anyone off the street and have them as your preferred judge to do your bidding. There is a process.

7:25Pete Hegseth:The law has to be blind in the way it is administered. The law has to be evidentially based. And what had happened in this case was the evidence was scant. The career professional said no. So they appointed someone who would do the bidding. And it's now being thrown out of the court. Is that the end of it? Probably not. Donald Trump's spokesperson, Caroline Levitt, was saying, don't think you're in the clear, Mr Comey.

7:51James Comey:Well, what I will say is that everybody knows that James Comey lied to Congress. It's as clear as day. And this judge took an unprecedented action to throw these cases out to shield James Comey and Letitia James from accountability based on a technical ruling. And the administration disagrees with that technical ruling. We believe the attorney in this case, Lindsay Halligan, is not only extremely qualified for this position, but she was, in fact, legally appointed. And I know the Department of Justice will be appealing this in very short order. So maybe James Comey should pump the brakes on his victory lap.

8:25Mark Kelly:I mean, the irony is that in her saying everybody knows she has once again prejudiced any fair trial against him. But I think when she says it was a legal appointment in Caroline Levitt's head, that is probably true because she assumes that anything that happens within the Trump administration, any decree makes something legal. If Trump has done it, if Pan Bondi has done it, if she's been appointed, it is therefore legal. In their eyes, this is the legality to which they are playing. It is the rule of Trump, not the rule of law. But as you said, Soaps, it's not the end of the case. Pan Bondi, the Attorney General, has already said that they will take all available legal action, including an immediate appeal.

9:10Mark Kelly:One of the things they're thinking of doing is changing Lindsay Halligan's title to make her a special attorney, which has that sort of the office ring to it of assistant to the regional manager. They've somehow found a way of just giving her a slightly different title and hoping that that will clear everything up with the judges. I don't think it will.

9:32Pete Hegseth:And you talk about, I think so rightly, about you play by Donald Trump's rules, not the law of the land. And you go back to that quote that Trump used a few months ago where he sort of was quoting Napoleon, apparently, clearly having imperial ambitions. You know, when he said that he who saves his country does not violate any law. So, you know, on that basis, Donald Trump could do whatever he likes, whenever he likes and has no regard for any of the process of the Department of Justice. Look, the Department of Justice is meant to be at arm's length from the presidency. Under Biden, you had an attorney general to Biden's fury who would go his own way on things and wouldn't do what Biden asked.

10:19Pete Hegseth:And what Donald Trump has posted on X about the need to prosecute these people, I demand Pam Bondi. You know, it was a message to Pam. He's taken it down. But he said, Pam, you've got to do this. You've got to take measures against Comey and Letitia James. they're rotten they're corrupt just do it and get this prosecution done and of course you can't do that it's not the president to decide who his political in his defense it was meant to be

10:48Mark Kelly:a direct message that he accidentally typed publicly to the entire world so what he was basically saying was go around the back and sort these blokes out sort the fellas out and yet just so happen he told the world yeah so we now know that the president because he had these enemies

11:06Pete Hegseth:letitia james as i say at the top who came after the trump organization for its falsely inflating the value of properties to get kind of better insurance deals and james comey who when he was director of the fbi said he wouldn't pledge his loyalty to donald trump he owed his loyalty to the u.s constitution and was then very critical of donald trump they're his enemies and so enemies need to be punished and they need to have the book thrown at them and this is how it works in Trump's America where people are you know scared and I thought it was interesting when Comey talked about you know I would ask the law firms to stand up because so many so many of the law firms are running a mile because Donald Trump has threatened to issue executive orders against them and say you're not going to be allowed on federal land because we've got suspicions about you.

11:57Pete Hegseth:Now, if you're not allowed on federal land, you're not allowed to represent your clients in court. So in other words, you've got the president in effect saying, you can work for me and my friends, but don't represent anyone who's been an enemy of mine, because I'll come after you. And law firms have been intimidated by that enormously.

12:19Mark Kelly:I do think this 24 hours has been the day of the rallying cry. I mean, you just talked about Rutger Bremer and his message to the BBC on the newsagents today. We've heard from James Comey very clearly talking directly to the citizens of America, the law firms of America, the universities of America, the institutions of America saying, you have to fight or this will all disappear. But just as one of these absurd cases leaves the stage, on time, another enters. And this is, in a way, just as jaw-dropping, even more jaw-dropping perhaps, because at the center of it is the court marshalling by the Pentagon of a decorated military man.

13:05Mark Kelly:He is a former astronaut. He is the Democratic senator for Arizona. He is the husband of Gabby Gifford, who was shot in the head. And he is a man who is so highly respected amongst many certain half of America, certainly if not more, that he was at one time considered for the vice presidential pick for Kamala Harris. Now, what has happened here is Pete Hegseth, the Department of War, the Secretary of War, has decided to turn his ire on this man for a video that he and others put out.

13:43Pete Hegseth:Yeah, so this was a video saying, and again, it goes back to the point I was making about Comey a moment ago, where you say, you know, you do not owe your loyalty to the President of the United States, you owe your loyalty, your fealty to the US Constitution. And so what we've seen over the past few weeks is these, you know, boats being blown up off the coast of Venezuela because, you know, the US military say they're drug runners and they're narco-terrorists. And so there is no due process. The US military is acting as, you know, judge, jury and high seas executioner and killing all these people without any evidence based that they are indeed guilty as charged or whether they're just fishermen who are you know we just don't know because there's no process at all in attempting to bring these people to justice so six members of congress including mark kelly issued a video saying guys if you're carrying out orders which are unconstitutional you know just blowing people out of the water without any process or attempt to arrest them then this could come and get you later on.

14:52Pete Hegseth:So Donald Trump's reaction to that video was, as you might imagine, very measured, calm, you know, settled. It was these people must be hanged. These Democrat lawmakers need to be hanged. This is sedition. They are encouraging servicemen and women to defy orders. Well, no, they're not kind of trying to defy orders. what they're saying is you can't act in an unconstitutional way and expect legal protection from that if the orders you've been given are unlawful.

15:23Mark Kelly:Yeah. And in the wake of those accusations, where in essence they're saying we're not talking about any one thing. We're just trying to make it clear that if you feel that these orders will make you break the law, you do not have to follow them. And in the wake of those accusations, all the lawmakers basically said they'd been subjected to death threats. And Mr. Kelly, Mark Kelly, the former astronaut, the man who is kind of revered in many circles of sort of, you know, wider America, not just democratic America, basically gave his response, his reposte also on a piece to camera video. And he basically says, if this is meant to intimidate me or other members of Congress from doing our jobs, it will not work.

16:09Mark Kelly:I've given too much to this country to be silenced by bullies who care more about their own power than protecting the Constitution. Just have a listen. Hey, folks, Donald Trump called for my execution.

16:22James Comey:Now, I served 25 years in the United States Navy. I flew 39 combat missions. I flew into space four times. Never once did I expect that at some point the President of the United States was going to threaten me with being hanged because of something I said. Folks, we have a Constitution. We have First Amendment constitutional rights of free speech. I know a little bit about political violence. My wife, Gabby, was nearly assassinated. She was shot in the head because of political violence. She nearly died. These are the kind of threats that this president makes. Not just to me, some of my colleagues as well.

17:05James Comey:Just this week he did this. Threatened our lives, said we should be hanged because of something we said. This is dangerous. And this kind of rhetoric, especially from a president of the United States, makes us all less safe. Folks, if you can, speak out about this. It's dangerous talk from a president who doesn't really seem to get it, doesn't understand his responsibilities under the Constitution. And I got to say, this was a rather disturbing thing for him to do.

17:42Mark Kelly:So that is one response, Mark Kelly. It is dignified. It is thoughtful. And it is very thought provoking in the message it's trying to send out. another response from another democrat also an arizona senator was slightly more to the point this is ruben gallego who just writes to hegseth fuck you and your investigation i mean there are people who who are getting to the point where they think that the only language that trump and his cronies understand is the kind of stuff that they would use at their own enemies

18:19Pete Hegseth:But this is also as well. And this is what's so interesting about the new space we're in. Look, a few months ago, Donald Trump was absolutely clear about wanting vengeance against his political enemies. He'd made that absolutely clear and he wasn't in any way embarrassed about doing so. And, you know, in fairness to Donald Trump, he is kind of putting into action what he promised in the campaign, what he promised all along that he would do. But it's now ruffling Republican feathers as well. And you've got Republicans saying, well, hang on a minute. You know, Pete Hegseth saying he's going to court martial a serving U.S.

18:56Pete Hegseth:senator, a decorated war hero who's flown combat missions. Come on, you must be bloody joking. We're not doing that. And of course, you know, we spoke about it a bit last week about Marjorie Taylor Greene and what's happened with her. One of the reasons that this firebrand of the MAGA movement cites for announcing that she's stepping down from Congress and giving up her seat in Georgia is because of the threat of political violence from Donald Trump as well. And so, you know, what used to be kind of big, tough, macho, Trumpian posturing before is now not landing as well. And I think that you've got Comey and Letitia James on what Caroline Levitt says is a premature victory lap.

19:40Pete Hegseth:You've now got the Pentagon going after Kelly and you've got growing unease about where this ends. And I do think that Donald Trump is running into problems with all of this.

19:51Mark Kelly:Yeah, I mean, the response to Kelly's video from Pete Hegseth was, So, Captain, in commas, Kelly, not only did your seditious video intentionally undercut good order and discipline, but you can't even display your uniform correctly. Your medals are out of order and rows reversed. I'll start with a uniform inspection. I don't know whether you'd call that petty or threatening or undermining, but I think the point of all these investigations are not that they're, you know, they're not going to find Comey guilty. They're not going to find Letitia James guilty. They're not going to find Mark Kelly guilty and they're not going to hang them.

20:29Mark Kelly:But what they are going to do is punish them with this process, this never ending process where you undermine, You waste people's time. You sort of add to their Wikipedia entry. So it becomes another line that they have to keep including every time their story is written up. It is about time wasting and it is about just making them feel like they can't get on with their lives. I think that is all quite a powerful part of this.

20:56Pete Hegseth:and of course the chill effect that it will have on others who might think i want to criticize donald trump but geez what a lot of hassle what a lot of pain what a lot of cost that's going to involve in legal fees and having my life turned upside down and the need for greater security around my house i'm not going to bother anyway we will be back in just a moment with mark landler from the new york times on what is happening right now in the maga movement

21:36Pete Hegseth:the newsagents usa well i'm joined in the studio now by mark landler from the new york times who writes on british politics and has been doing for the last few years but we were together in washington and mark covered the white house for many many years and still observes very closely and I wonder from 3 ,000 miles away looking back to America and what is happening now it has seemed to me that Trump has had an iron grip on everything to do with public opinion and policy and what will happen and you know if I say it, it happens I am MAGA and MAGA sadly seems to be turning around and saying you know what, no, we're ourselves and we'll do what we want to do and it's like Donald Trump maybe that grip is loosening

22:20James Comey:Yeah, I think that's right. And I feel like the last two weeks, if there was sort of a meta theme you could put on that period, it's that we're beginning to glimpse a kind of a post-Trump era. I think there's a sort of a recognition, which was always there, but has now become very obvious, that his time will be over. We're not sure exactly when. We assume it'll be at the end of this term. And you're beginning to see people positioning themselves for whatever that world will look like. And so it's surfacing a number of philosophical and political divides that Trump had always successfully papered over.

22:57James Comey:And now the paper is beginning to rip here and there. And so it's a really interesting moment for a movement that he still claims he has an iron grip over, but now it's clear he doesn't.