Raw Story

Former chief impeachment lawyer Barry Berke brought up the former staff of Donald Trump on Friday, taking to the media to sound the alarm that a second term would be dangerous.

The conversation began about the Trump trials and the notion that Americans deserve to see the evidence against him before the November election. MSNBC's Nicolle Wallace asked Berke whether those conversations should happen in the context of court or the presidential campaign. Berke said both, and everywhere.

"Ideally, it will happen in the courtroom, but these issues should be amplified publicly as well," said Berke. "The evidence is overwhelming, as someone who spends my time defending charges and the like, it is hard to imagine a case stronger than the January 6th case. Stronger than the confidential document obstruction case. It is overwhelming, and it's challenging because not everybody — most voters don't follow it like you follow it and like I follow it."

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He told Wallace he hopes that she, as a television host, can take the evidence and help Americans understand it if there is no trial.

"Make sure that the American people understand what's at stake here, what conduct happened," Berke continued. "And I'll tell you, from me, in particular, here's what I feel most strongly: This is a movie series in which the sequel has already been written. Every time Donald Trump gets away with something, his conduct gets much worse."

He went on to blast Republicans who failed to stop Trump when they had the opportunity.

"You see somebody like Liz Cheney — I don't think I agree with her on a single issue except about the importance of democracy," Berke explained. "When I was there for the second impeachment she encouraged us to use her words and that's leadership and that is courage. My hope is, because Donald Trump's not going to get any better. His positions in this election are only going to get more extreme."

Berke called on more conservative Republicans to show the courage Cheney and others have shown.

See the discussion in the video below or at the link.

The more Trump gets away with something 'he gets much worse': Impeachment lawyer www.youtube.com

Real estate mogul and former president Donald Trump admitted Wednesday he'd have to sell off properties to pay the $450 million he owes in damages after a ruling in his civil fraud trial.

Trump filed a more than 1,790-page emergency motion to a New York appeals court requesting a stay on Judge Arthur Engoron's verdict which he said would cause "irreparable harm," and offering to hand over a $100 million bond instead.

"In the absence of a stay on the terms herein outlined, properties would likely need to be sold to raise capital under exigent circumstances," Trump's attorneys wrote. "And there would be no way to recover any property sold following a successful appeal and no means to recover the resulting financial losses."

As attorney Bradley Moss summarized it, "He doesn’t have the cash."

Moss also noted this contradicts a previous boast of Trump's that he has "$400 million liquid." He made the claim during deposition for the trial involving E. Jean Carroll. He was ultimately found liable for defamation in that case.

The New York Attorney General's office, which brought the massive civil fraud case, believes the appeals court judge will issue a decision by the end of Wednesday, the Daily News reports.

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Trump was found liable for fraud after exaggerating the value of his properties to secure favorable rates for loans and insurance, Engoron found. He hit him with the damages and also ruled that the former president could not conduct business in New York for three years.

Trump filed an intent to appeal, but cannot begin that appeal until the damages are paid or an agreed upon bond is secured. Trump has the difficulty that he is not allowed to loan money from any banks doing business in New York, as another term of Engoron's ruling.

A filing from prosecutors stating that they plan to quote extensively from books written by — or ghost-written for — Donald Trump in his upcoming hush money trial has his lawyers on the defensive.

According to a report from ABC News, Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg's office has found a wealth of material in the multitude of quotes from the ex-president in the books, including, "For many years I've said that if someone screws you, screw them back."

They intend to present them before the jury tasked with considering the 34 felonies contained in the indictment related to the 2016 cover-up of his alleged affair with adult film star Stormy Daniels.

The report notes that investigators have compiled quotes not only from Trump's bestseller "Art of the Deal," but also "Think Like a Billionaire," "How to Get Rich," "Think Big and Kick A--" and "Great Again."

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According to ABC, the new filing includes, "Four dozen quotes from books published between 1987 and 2015," and that Trump's lawyers protesting the former president's words could "prejudice" the jury.

In response, Trump lawyer Todd Blanche stated, "Whatever President Trump's style of business operations was in 1987, 2004 and 2007 ... is by no means probative for how he would have operated those businesses when he was President of the United States of America."

The ABC report adds, "According to the defense, some of Trump's quotes that prosecutors intend to highlight involve his approach to business — including his frugality and 'hands-on' approach — while others focus on Trump's interactions with women, which is expected to be a central issue in the trial."

It continues, "Defense attorneys argue some of those statements could potentially offend jurors, such as when Trump wrote, 'I always think of myself as the best-looking guy and it is no secret that I love beautiful women.'"

Trump's lawyers are arguing the quotes are, "Largely irrelevant, stale, and cumulative," further explaining, "Many of the statements that the People seek to admit have no apparent relevance to the issues in this case and will only lead to juror confusion."

You can read more here.

Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-AL) attacked the city of New York for supposedly being crime-ridden on Tuesday, only to receive a brutal fact check from a reporter in his home state.

In a post on his Twitter account, Tuberville mocked President Joe Biden for traveling to New York this week to appear on Seth Meyers' show on NBC.

"Hope Joe Biden enjoyed going out for ice cream in NYC while the rest of the city is afraid of crime and migrants," wrote the Alabama senior senator.

However, AL.com's Kyle Whitmire was quick to inform Tuberville that their home state was far more dangerous in terms of the likelihood of being murdered than New York City.

"NYC’s homicide rate is 4.8 per 100k," he wrote. "Alabama’s homicide rate is 15.9 per 100k — more than three times that of NYC."

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In fact, according to federal government statistics, the states with the three highest homicide death rates are Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana, which are all dominated by Republicans.

Many New Yorkers were quick to pile on Tuberville's attempt to trash their city and mocked him for apparently not knowing the massive crime problem in his home state.

"I personally got murdered three times in NYC over the last six months," joked user Maura Dougherty.

"Things I spend my days afraid of in New York: random right-wing football coaches from Alabama getting massive political power and using it to take reproductive freedoms away," wrote New Yorker Laura Bassett. "Things I do not spend my days afraid of: crime and migrants."

Another user, meanwhile, said Tuberville should be focused on the 91 felonies allegedly committed by the man who will once again likely be his party's standard bearer.

"A major criminal, Trump, is about to go to jail and New Yorkers are excited!" they wrote.

NBC host Kristen Welker and Rep. Byron Donalds (R-FL) disagreed over a speech Donald Trump gave to a group of Black conservatives.

In a speech Friday to the Black Conservative Federation's annual gala, Trump argued that African-Americans like him because of his legal problems.

Welker confronted Donalds about the speech on Sunday after Biden campaign co-chair Cedric Richmond, a former congressman, called it "plain racist."

"How do you respond to that charge that it's just plain racist?" Welker asked.

"What I would say is that Cedric is trying to play politics and use racial politics even now as we get into the general election," Donalds replied. "Number two, like I said at the top, the number one reason why minority voters in our country want to support Donald Trump is because he did the job of president. He did a great job as president."

"What Americans don't want to see, especially Black Americans and anybody else, they don't want to see a politicized Justice Department," he continued. "They don't want to see a two-tier system of justice. They want justice to be followed. They want lady justice to be blind."

Welker corrected the lawmaker.

"Again, there's no evidence that the indictments against him are politicized," she pointed out. "But sticking to this question, were you offended at all by his comments, Congressman?"

"No, I wasn't, because I understood what the president was talking about," Donalds insisted. "And Kristen, let me push back a little bit."

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"You have to acknowledge the fact that now that the Robert Hur report has come out about Joe Biden's misuse of classified information, which is a violation of the Espionage Act, he had no rights to any of those documents when he was a senator or vice president, yet there are no charges against President Biden, but President Trump is under prosecution?" he said. "Come on now. We know that doesn't make any sense at all."

"I have to hit the pause button for one minute, Congressman, because the Hur report was very clear that there was not enough evidence to bring charges against President Biden, and that ultimately there was not enough," Welker observed.

Donalds battled the NBC host.

"Kristen, I've got to push back on you," he remarked.

"Congressman, that is exactly what the Herr report said," Welker said.

"The Espionage Act is clear," Donalds interrupted.

"There wasn't enough evidence to bring charges," Welker noted.

"You cannot possess those documents as a senator or a vice president," Donalds asserted.

"Bottom line, though, Herr himself said there wasn't enough evidence to bring charges," Welker concluded.

Watch the video below from NBC or at the link.

Legal and political experts are responding to Special Counsel David Weiss' allegations that a former top FBI informant, now under federal indictment, had, as one reporter explained, "high-level contact with Russian intelligence operatives," and fed Republicans falsehoods from the Kremlin which they used to attack the Biden family and to try to build a case to impeach President Joe Biden.

"How many intel and legal findings and counter-espionage cases before people are willing to accept that the entire MAGA movement is a Russian intel op?" asks David Rothkopf, the noted foreign policy, national security, and political affairs analyst and author.

The bombshell allegations from the Special Counsel, a U.S. Attorney nominated by then-President Donald Trump, were published in his legal memo asking a judge to detain Alexander Smirnov, the defendant and former FBI confidential human source.

"Russia has fully infiltrated the Republican party. Nice going traitors," alleged Richard Signorelli, a former Asst. U.S. Attorney at the Southern District of New York office. He added: "Trump & @SpeakerJohnson et al are Putin's 'useful idiots.'"

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U.S. Rep. Dan Goldman (D-NY), an attorney who served as the lead counsel for the first Trump impeachment, wrote: "The Comer/Jordan impeachment sham appears to have been a Russian intelligence operation from the start. The only remaining question is whether Rs were witting or unwitting agents of Putin in their desperate quest to get Trump reelected. Will the GOP continue to work for Putin?"

The Comer/Jordan impeachment sham appears to have been a Russian intelligence operation from the start.
The only remaining question is whether Rs were witting or unwitting agents of Putin in their desperate quest to get Trump reelected. Will the GOP continue to work for Putin? pic.twitter.com/erzG7b54sU — Daniel Goldman (@danielsgoldman) February 21, 2024

Former U.S. Attorney and Deputy Assistant Attorney General Harry Litman, a frequent MSNBC commentator, points to a passage from the DOJ's memo: "More from DOJ motion re Smirnov: 'the misinformation he is spreading is not confined to 2020 ...He is actively peddling new lies that could impact U.S. elections after meeting with Russian intelligence officials in Nov.'"

"This guy made be the sole reason for R's Burisma obsessions," Litman says.

Litman continues: "DOJ to court: 'Smirnov transformed his routine & unextraordinary business contacts with Burisma in 2017 and later into bribery allegations against [Joe Biden] and [Hunter Biden], after expressing bias against Joe Biden.' Was the entire R Burisma obsession based on phony intel?"

He adds: "And the big plot point to the Smirnov revelations from [Special Counsel David Weiss] is that the misinformation that Republicans have gone running -- in fact galloping with --originates with, you guessed it, Russian intelligence. i.e part of overall Putin misinformation campaign that so distorted 2016."

Attorney Blake Rutherford, in a social media post "retweeted" by attorney George Conway, wrote: "At what point will the broader American press, and I mean producers, editors, and publishers, wake up to very real fact that Russian propaganda is being normalized in today's @GOP. They are all useful idiots. Putin knows it."

Republican turned independent Tim Miller, a political strategist and author at The Bulwark, takes a look at recent events:

"To sum up: RUS/Putin have invaded their neighbor, assassinated the biggest domestic political threat, coopted one of the right's biggest media stars, and seeded a fabricated story about the US President that was echoed by GOP congressional leadership & rightwing media en masse."

But even before the Special Counsel's allegations against the indicted former FBI informant, some were growning increasingly aware of Russia's alleged penetration into the GOP.

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Former Trump White House Director of Strategic Communications Alyssa Farah Griffin, now a co-host on "The View," last week wrote: "It’s becoming increasingly clear that Russia is winning the information war within the US. GOP politicians - who know better - are amplifying Kremlin garbage. We are in deep, deep trouble."

Watch the video above or at this link.