Trump indicted on four counts - attempt to overturn election

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Defence:

But is it a crime to believe things that aren’t true? To ask lawyers for advice until one of them tells you some batshit crazy thing you want to hear? And then to repeat and embellish upon it to the nth degree on various forms of media, making cult followers Also believe it ?? Is that a crime?! The defence rests.

The point is that recent testimony shows (or seems to show) that he did NOT believe that stuff, and knew it was all lie.  And that's the whole reason they finally dropped the other shoe and finally indicted him.

Not only that, but he uttered and published those lies to subvert the American electoral process, which is called "Sedition".

Less than a day after the judge told him not to f**k around he posted thinly veiled threats on troth sensial, something like “If you go after me I’ll go after you,” and now commentators are expecting the judge to give him a smack and remind him that if he f***s around they can put him in jail pending trial.

I’m very sure he’s gonna f**k around. It’d be pretty funny if he ends up behind bars awaiting trial. It’d also be what he deserves and a point for the justice system applying the law equally to everyone regardless of his orange hue.

Donald Trump's lawyers asked a judge Monday to narrow the protective order federal prosecutors proposed last week to prohibit the former president from publicly disclosing certain evidence gathered in the special counsel's 2020 election probe.

In a 29-page filing, Trump’s attorneys called for a “less restrictive alternative” to the government’s order, framing their revisions as an effort aimed at “preserving the First Amendment rights of President Trump and the public.”

Trump's lawyers argued that the government's proposal was "overbroad" and instead asked U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan of Washington, D.C., to adopt a revised order "to shield only genuinely sensitive materials from public view."

“The government requests the Court assume the role of censor and impose content-based regulations on President Trump’s political speech that would forbid him from publicly discussing or disclosing all non-public documents produced by the government, including both purportedly sensitive material and non sensitive potentially exculpatory documents," they wrote.

The filing includes proposed changes that would narrow the scope of the limitations sought by the government. One of the revisions would allow Trump to publicly disclose recordings and transcripts of witness testimony that prosecutors obtained in their investigation and are expected to turn over to the defense.

The government had proposed in Friday’s filing to bar Trump from disclosing sensitive materials, defined in part as “recordings, transcripts, interview reports, and related exhibits of witness interviews." Under the Trump team's proposal, sensitive materials would be defined as "information regarding the government’s confidential sources or which may jeopardize witness security.”

That phrasing could require the judge to determine what would and would not pose a threat to witnesses, a process that could eat up hours of court time.

Prosecutors filed a response Monday night, defending their proposed order.

"To facilitate the efficient production of discovery to the defense, the Government proposed a reasonable protective order consistent with current practice in this District," they wrote. "The defendant instead proposed an order designed to allow him to try this case in the media rather than in the courtroom."

In their proposal Friday, prosecutors cited Trump's social media posts in asking Chutkan to prohibit him and his defense team from publicly disclosing certain evidence. One of the posts was from Trump's Truth Social page Friday afternoon; it read: “IF YOU GO AFTER ME, I’M COMING AFTER YOU!”

Trump’s disclosure of details or grand jury transcripts “could have a harmful chilling effect on witnesses or adversely affect the fair administration of justice in this case,” prosecutors argued.

In their filing Monday, Trump's lawyers argued that the social media post was "generalized political speech, not directed to this case."

Former New York City Police Commissioner Bernard Kerik met Monday with investigators from special counsel Jack Smith's team as part of the probe that resulted in the indictment of former President Donald Trump last week.

Kerik’s attorney, Tim Parlatore, confirmed the meeting, which was first reported by CNN. NBC News reported last month that Kerik, an ally of Trump's, had been expected to meet with federal prosecutors in Smith's office.

Monday's meeting lasted for about five hours, and Smith was not present, Parlatore said. The meeting focused on former Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election.

A spokesperson for the special counsel’s office declined to comment on the meeting. A spokesperson for Trump’s presidential campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment Monday.

Kerik had worked with Giuliani in an effort to uncover voter fraud following President Joe Biden’s victory. Giuliani appeared to be one of the six co-conspirators named in the indictment against Trump. No alleged co-conspirators were charged in the filing.

The federal grand jury that returned an indictment against former President Donald Trump last week was meeting again Tuesday — an indication that special counsel Jack Smith’s investigation into alleged 2020 election interference is far from over.

Members of the grand jury were seen in the E. Barrett Prettyman Courthouse in the late morning while apparently taking a break before returning to where the grand jury meets. It was not clear whether they were hearing testimony from witnesses. They departed the courthouse around 1:30 p.m. ET.

Meanwhile, a dispute over a protective order in the Trump case that would enable the government to start handing over evidence to the former president's attorneys seemed stalled Tuesday after Trump's lawyers indicated they weren't available on any dates offered by the judge for a hearing on the issue.

U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan had ordered Smith's office and Trump's lawyers to pick a date on or before this Friday. The hearing is to debate Trump's objections to an order that would bar him from publicly disclosing prosecutors' evidence in the case. Trump's attorneys argue the order is too broad.

In a joint filing Tuesday, the special counsel's office said it was available for a hearing on Wednesday, Thursday or Friday.

Trump's team said Thursday was no good for them. One of Trump's two lawyers on the case, Todd Blanche, is due in federal court in Florida that day for his client's arraignment on a superseding indictment in a separate prosecution brought by Smith's office alleging Trump mishandled national security documents and tried to cover it up.

They asked that the hearing be held on Monday or Tuesday of next week, but did not explain why Wednesday or Friday were not options.

Special counsel Jack Smith's office executed a search warrant on former President Donald Trump's Twitter account earlier this year, searching for "evidence of criminal offenses," according to a court ruling made public Wednesday.

The existence of the January search warrant was disclosed in a decision by a federal appeals court in Washington affirming a lower court's decision holding Twitter in contempt of court and sanctioning the company $350,000 for not immediately complying with the warrant.

Elon Musk, who has been a critic of the government's relationship with Twitter, took over the company in 2022 and restored Trump's Twitter account, which had been banned after the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol that had been stoked by his bogus stolen election claims.

The company had objected to a nondisclosure order that accompanied the search warrant barring them from informing Trump about the search, contending it "violated the company’s First Amendment right to communicate with its subscriber, former President Trump." It also argued the order "would preclude the former President from asserting executive privilege to shield communications made using his Twitter account."

The lower court and the appeals court noted the Stored Communications Act allows for nondisclosure orders in specific circumstances, and said the special counsel's office had met that bar here.

"Based on ex parte affidavits, the district court found probable cause to search the Twitter account for evidence of criminal offenses. Moreover, the district court found that there were 'reasonable grounds to believe' that disclosing the warrant to former President Trump 'would seriously jeopardize the ongoing investigation' by giving him 'an opportunity to destroy evidence, change patterns of behavior, [or] notify confederates,'” the ruling said.

U.S. District Court Judge Beryl Howell also found that adopting Twitter's approach to the nondisclosure order would invite tech companies "to delay execution of any [warrant]" while they "litigated challenges based on 'slivers of knowledge' of an investigation's scope."

She held Twitter in contempt and sanctioned the company after she extended the initial deadline for the company to comply with the order by two weeks. It then failed to meet the revised Feb. 7 deadline, and did not turn over the documents until three days later, the ruling said.

Special counsel Jack Smith is seeking to put Donald Trump on trial on Jan. 2, 2024 — less than five months away — on charges related to his bid to subvert the 2020 election.

That aggressive timeline would put the weighty criminal trial first on Trump’s crowded calendar of criminal proceedings and guarantee an extensive airing of the grave allegations against him just before Republican primary voters head to the polls.

Prosecutors say the abbreviated timeline is rooted in the extraordinary public interest in seeing this case resolved.

“It is difficult to imagine a public interest stronger than the one in this case,” assistant special counsel Molly Gaston wrote in a court document filed Thursday, “in which the defendant — the former President of the United States — is charged with three criminal conspiracies intended to undermine the federal government, obstruct the certification of the 2020 presidential election, and disenfranchise voters.”

Prosecutors say they’re prepared to deliver a “large amount” of evidence to Trump’s team within days and have gone to great lengths to organize it in a way that will simplify the defense’s ability to review it and prepare for trial. Among the evidence they say they are ready to deliver — as soon as U.S. District Court Judge Tanya Chutkan enters a “protective order” to govern the handling of the evidence — are grand jury transcripts, witness interviews and evidence obtained through “numerous sealed search warrants.”

Trump’s legal team is expected to file its own proposed trial timeline next week but has already forecast a starkly different view of the case. Trump’s attorney John Lauro has predicted it could take years to review and organize evidence, well past the 2024 election in which Trump is favored to be the Republican nominee.

If Chutkan agrees to something close to prosecutors’ preferred timeline, it would put Trump on track to face three criminal trials prior to the close of primary season. He’s scheduled to go to trial in New York in March on state criminal charges that he falsified business records to cover up an affair with a porn actress. He’s also on track for a criminal trial in Florida in May on federal charges — also brought by Smith — that he hoarded classified information at his Mar-a-Lago estate after leaving office.

Smith’s team says they anticipate putting on four to six weeks of evidence in the case, a timeline that — when combined with his other legal obligations — would put Trump in a courtroom for most of the first three months of 2024.

Smith’s team sharply rejected Lauro’s characterization of the evidence in their eight-page filing, saying it misconstrues how much preparation Trump will need to be ready for trial. Significant swaths of prosecutors’ evidence have been aired by the House Jan. 6 select committee, they note.

Notably, prosecutors intend to propose a separate schedule for a hearing on the prospect that a “minimal amount of classified information” may be part of the evidence they provide to Trump in the case.

Under prosecutors’ timeline, Trump and the special counsel would trade relevant motions throughout the fall before jury selection begins on Dec. 11, just four months from Friday. Once selected, jurors would be excused until a “date certain” in January to avoid any hardships over the holidays, prosecutors proposed.