Sarah Longwell and George Conway take on Trump's New York criminal trial: Hope Hicks' testimony and a story about Trump glaring at George across the courtroom. Don't worry -- George explains it all.
Watch George and Sarah record this episode without the interruption of ads, here. Add this podcast to your player of choice, here.
Listen to Keith. He’s much better than any Bulwark pod. https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/countdown-with-keith-olbermann/id1633301179?i=1000654761624
Enjoying the podcast. Wonder why the judge isn’t sentencing Citizen Trump to community service for his failure to abide by the gag order? 100 hours of serving at an urban community food shelf facility or a homeless center night shift seems more effective than a $10k fine or jail.
Stop interrupting Sarah, George. She can barely get out a complete sentence before you cut her off.
Has anyone mentioned on the air the irony of the former "Chief Law Enforcement Officer of the United States" denigrating and insulting the legal system? Donald is running for President again. Some pundit should observe that his words and behavior are unbecoming of someone who aspires to the the Chief Executive again. A bad example for young people who look up to their elder leaders for consistent guidance. "Why should I abide by the laws when the top cop in the country flaunts them?"
Thanks George & Sarah, this has become my favorite podcast and I fervently hope that Trump's passage through the justice system continues to provide fodder for your discussions. The trailer song gets my spirits up every time and I wonder when George is going to finally tell us all about the "emoluments and the Russian ties".
George, I ordered the Psycho hat. Clever! Thanks. Here’s a simple hat slogan alternative. Feel free to use if you like it -
Pro America
Anti MAGA
It’s a “Pro Anti” hat!
I have a question for George; apologies if it's already been asked and I missed the answer. Getting to guilty seems to be based on deciding that Trump made the payment to help with the election. Do I need to believe that's the only reason he did it? Like, say I'm a juror and I walk into the deliberation room thinking "y'know, I think he did that both to keep it away from his wife *and* to help with his campaign." Would I vote to convict, nullification notwithstanding?
There is a contrast between Mr. Conway's optimism and the more cautious reports from observers in the courtroom. On next week's podcast, could you two comment on that please?
Trump "will" be convicted? Some of us are old enough to remember when OJ got acquitted. Trump is guilty as sin, of course. But he also has unbelievable luck (no cameras to document his sleeping through the trial, for example), and while he may be a moron, he possesses a low animal cunning that makes him very hard to pin down. Like OJ, he also has money and can afford good attorneys.
OJ had much better attorneys and, apparently, he listened to them and let them win his case.
i hope you're right but i expect a hung jury.
Sarah, when you say,"We are going to do it live!" you have to do it with anger and conviction like Bill O'Reilly famously did on Inside Edition so many years ago. (after He screwed up)
That Merchan hesitates to incarcerate DJT for blatant gag order violations clearly shows (whether he even knows it) he is playing into Trump's narrative. No cojones. Too afraid to be unpopular in his own courtroom equals cowardice.
Trump has never been convicted of anything and his cult worships him. The USA is fucked and the Bulwark is a noise additive, not a reducer.
Sounds like you are ready to flip to the dark side. Not sure why you continue with Bulwark.
I’m not sure either. The bulwark was a refreshing change from boring pro trump reporting on all the cable news channels including cnn and msnbc back in 2018. But honestly after stoddard started claiming Biden is too old, I lost interest. I quit the discord channel and tend to only do other podcasts like Olbermann or Tiedrich. I guess dropping my monthly payment is the final step. Occasionally I do enjoy Tim Miller. He’s the smartest guy at the Bulwark.
Alvin Bragg has certainly been the recipient of a lot of criticism about his "lightweight, unimportant" case. It sounds to me like he is hitting the ball out of the park, with probably the only criminal proceeding Trump will face before November, so all his critics should chew on that. However, no matter how confident George the Lawyer is, and I absolutely respect his expertise, all it takes is one single solitary person to believe the trope that Trump signs lots of checks without thinking about them, and bingo, Trump goes scot-free and gets to plead witch hunt with an enormous boost amongst his cult followers. BTW George is brave to wear a red cap.
Question: Why did Hope Hicks recount the 2018 conversation with Trump about the effect on the election? No tape, documentation, or witness. Why would she tell prosecutor something damaging to Trump? I haven’t heard that discussed anywhere.
I read something yesterday that indicated that she first gave testimony relating to this in the NY grand jury, so I'm assuming the DA's office had other information about this and pushed her in the grand jury. From what I read yesterday, the prosecution seemed to be having trouble getting her to admit this again at trial on Friday, and eventually brought up her grand jury testimony to either refresh her recollection, possible impeach her on any sudden "vagueness" she was having on this issue, or both.
Thanks….I figure there must be some corroborating info.
corrupt trump lets see if we can get this to trend
I believe there is at least one stealth juror whose mind was made up, regardless of all that is said and done. I pray not. We do not need that lunatiic to be president.
George! I never get tired of your....Where? Sixth and Eye? Whose on First schtick. Too cute. Another winner with Sarah and George! Thank you, for keeping up with the maelstrom, even in your undisclosed locations.
This podcast interview with George Conway was informative and gave average listeners like myself some insights of the strengths and weaknesses of the case against Donald Trump.
However, I do not think that George gave enough true credence as the possibility of that one or more Juror(s) voting against the Prosecution.
Very many Americans continually place their faith on some divine intervention in any critical situation, much as they have for generations sought and gotten the good guys in movies to swoop in to save humanity at the last moment, as reality rather than entertainment.
I agree. I think George is too optimistic because he’s a lawyer and can see this as a clear cut case of the evidence proving the crime. But we live in a country where 40% or so are completely devoted to Trump, and it seems very unlikely that not one of them is on this jury.
I really appreciate this and I love, love, love the music at the end. I don't have a legal background so this helps me understand what's going one. Thanks.
Thanks. Well done.
Amazing commentary like always. I wonder if there is an alternative to fines and jail for contempt of court. Could a judge prohibit Trumps lawyers from cross examining a witness that he has tried to intimidate? Or could there be a directed verdict?
No, and no.
I don't want to seem salacious and (almost) feel sorry for Melania and (definitely for) Barron Trump, but, if I had been the prosecutor, under oath, I would have (as respectfully as possible) asked Hope Hicks if she ever had had an affair with Donald. As exquisite as she is, whatever her answer, it would have been relevant to her credibility as a witness.
I'm not a lawyer, but I suspect that question might be ruled as irrelevant.
Also, it's not a good idea to ask a question when one does not know the answer.
And, finally, that may not have played well with the jury.
True. True. And true. Also, curiosity killed the cat...
If she answered "no" (which I'm assuming is the truthful answer) the prosecution would look foolish or worse in front of the jury. No competent prosecutor would take such a chance when it was clear that she had testimony that would help the prosecution.
I contemplated that. But, it still leaves me, as a one of the millions of collective citizen-victims of Trump's many alleged crimes, wondering about the reality of her testimony.
I have no illusions about Hicks. Her attempt during x-examination to wax on about how concerned Trump was about Melania finding out about the McDougal affair and Daniels tryst made me taste a little vomit. In addition, it's likely Hicks committed perjury in 2019 when she testified under oath to the House Judiciary Committee that she had no knowledge of, and was not involved in any conversations about, hush money payments to Daniels during the 2016 campaign. She clearly wanted to imagine herself walking a line during her testimony where she could appear "neutral" and not damage Trump too much. Whether she told the whole truth during her testimony will probably never be fully known.
That was really interesting. And thanks for the answer to the last question. Sounds like Trump would’ve been legally okay if he’d reported the check to Stormy if he’d done it before the end of November deadline. As I understand it, it’s legal, although morally reprehensible, to lie to the American people.
I have never heard of anyone being allowed to testify in their trial without possibility of cross-examination. I suppose that would help avoid committing perjury?
I went to law school, finished and then realized it was not on brand for me to be a lawyer, and so im now a middle aged dj who argues with houseplants and some people on twitter sometimes - but that aside, I sort of recall the reason for each check trump cut as qualifying a separate charge, like or in answering the question as to why he couldn’t have just written a personal check (which George got perfect I think, this is just my added thought bubble to the implication that the issue is about proper file management and recording) - I sort of remember being told that an additional charge for each infraction, like the charge per check could be best understood as representing a moment of time in which the defendant has a choice and doesn’t need to continue to crime, like so each time he cuts a check, like if he cut MC Cheques for $1, like 150k different checks, that would necessarily mean that he had 150k moments to pause and not write the check but did so despite it being a crime. Like I know it’s more in the context of mens rea and “heat of the moment” type issues, like in the “did the defendant have a period to cool down after catching his wife with another man before he shot that man” - but the same sort of cool down period or period in which to reflect on the matter and where he has the window of time to have made a choice to either crime or not, that’s why each check and each misfiled financial document represents a separate count; he didn’t just do a crime one time, he had time to reconsider the way he was handling it and chose not to again and again. I’m sure the prosecutor will highlight that, but yeah, it helps to think of the defendant as walking down a crime path and considering the options they had to not crime along the way, it can be a useful way to evaluate the reasonability of what their defense is.
I've done several events with current presidents so I'm familiar with Secret Service protocol for everyone to be in place before and stay in place after the president comes and goes. I didn't realize that it applies to former presidents as well. Or maybe it's what the former guy asks for? Since we haven't seen any other former presidents on trial it's hard to know.
If it's a security thing, it wouldn't matter if it's a former President; the process would be the same.
Just following protocol I guess.
Is it a court rule? Most people have to be in place before the judge enters the courtroom and cannot leave until the judge does. The judge in this case stopped the former president from leaving one day. Asked him to sit down and then the judge left.
But it sounds like people need to be seated before Trump enters, which is normal protocol for presidents, and then Trump has be in place before the judge enters since it is his courtroom, with the reverse being true of exits, judge, former guy, the people. It kind of explains to me why lunch break takes a while anyway!