The show highlights the ACLJ’s ongoing efforts to support First Amendment rights in a new pro-life case in Ohio, where a peaceful protester faces legal challenges. Legal analyst Harry Hutchison provides an in-depth analysis of the Supreme Court’s possible actions on Trump’s emergency petition and its wider implications. Meanwhile, the ACLJ encourages listeners to become active supporters in the fight for life and justice through monthly contributions.
SPEAKER 05 :
We got breaking news. President Trump files an emergency petition to the Supreme Court.
SPEAKER 07 :
Keeping you informed and engaged now more than ever. This is Sekulow. We want to hear from you. Share and post your comments or call 1-800-684-3110. And now your host, Logan Sekulow.
SPEAKER 05 :
Welcome to Sekulow. This is Logan Sekulow. Will Haynes is joining us in studio as well. We’ll have some guests on a little bit later, including a brand new pro-life case that we have just taken. You’re going to want to hear about that if you are someone who cares about those issues, as I know most of you are. So stay tuned for that. Obviously, the breaking news coming out. of new york is that president trump’s filed an emergency petition to the supreme court to prevent the sentencing that was supposed to happen this friday we’re going to break that down with harry hutchinson and more and will in just a little bit give us a call if you want to hear if you have a question about this 1-800-684-3110 1-800-684-3110 also wanted to take a Prayers are certainly with our friends in California, including Rick Grinnell and members of our team that are in California dealing with the devastating fires in Pacific Palisades and the areas around there. So though today we’re going to be mostly focusing on some of our news items, because I know that if you want that coverage, it’s everywhere right now. You can find it a much better coverage, if I’m being honest, on other broadcasts, because today we are focused on this breaking news that came out of, well, President Trump’s legal team. to try to stop the sentencing which was supposed to happen on Friday in the New York case which again we kind of know won’t be anything it’s not going to be prison time that’s not what we’re looking at here but President Trump is pushing this taking all efforts to do that get this pushed beyond
SPEAKER 06 :
beyond being inaugurated that’s right so as you’ll remember earlier this week the president uh asked the judge to stay the sentencing uh due to the fact that his appeal on the presidential immunity issue is ongoing so said to the judge you shouldn’t continue with proceedings on this until after that is resolved because the appeals court may throw this whole thing out anyways the Judge Marchand denied that. He appealed that to the appeals court. They denied that as well. So now the president and his legal team are going to the Supreme Court of the United States with an application for a stay of criminal proceedings in the Supreme Court of New York County, New York, pending the resolution of President Trump’s interlocutory appeal on presidential immunity. So a lot of legal words there. What this means is that President Trump is asking the Supreme Court of the United States, to stay the sentencing to basically say anything moving forward in that disposition of that case that criminal case must be put on hold because an interlocutory appeal which that’s an appeal made by a party in the middle of the proceeding so an appeal after judgment is what you normally see but this is something made in the middle and he has appealed to the appeals court in new york the ruling to not throw out the case. Judge Mershon said that the presidential immunity ruling had no bearing here and so therefore he was going to continue with sentencing. That is pending at the appeals court whether or not they will throw out the case. So all the president is doing here is asking the Supreme Court to say, hey, all proceedings must slow down, must pause while the appeals court in New York decides whether or not this case remains based off the presidential immunity ruling from the Supreme Court earlier this year. We’re going to get into more details with Professor Hutchison in the next segment about what this means. What are the odds that the Supreme Court decides? Grants this stay. This isn’t something you’ll see oral argument on. It’s not a case of that nature. We could get an order on this or a denial on this as soon as any time now. So we’ll be watching for that as well. But stay tuned and give us a call at 1-800-684-3110 with your questions.
SPEAKER 05 :
They have to have a file of response by Thursday at 10 a.m. according to the news reports. So Thursday at 10 a.m. is when the latest, that’s tomorrow morning, that we should know something. Again, as Will said, phone lines are open at 1-800-684-3110. Harry Hutchinson joining us. If you have questions for our legal experts, this is a great time to call. 1-800-684-3110. Also, we encourage you to become an ACLJ champion today. You’re going to hear about a brand new case and why it’s important. Of course, if you’re one of us who fights for the protection of life, you’re not going to want to miss this. That’s coming up next. uh just in you got harry hudgeson next segment and then after that you’re going to hear about this brand new case and of course we’ve seen what’s been going on in massachusetts we’re about to start that huge campaign and we need your help aclj.org save babies Welcome back to Secular. Professor Harry Hutchinson is joining us, senior attorney here at the ACLJ, to really break down this breaking news, Will, that came out. If you just are tuning in, which a lot of people are, specifically on our YouTube and Rumble channels. If you’re brand new to our channels, make sure you hit subscribe. If you aren’t new and you’ve already subscribed, make sure you hit subscribe. Share this with your friends. Put in a comment. Let me know where you’re watching from. We like to watch that. We’ve got some big numbers right now, Will, because clearly this is on people’s minds. That’s right. And so this has been docketed by the Supreme Court.
SPEAKER 06 :
I’m looking at the docket page right now. Supreme Court of the United States.
SPEAKER 05 :
24A666.
SPEAKER 06 :
uh unfortunate number there yeah but uh what we’ve got is an application submitted to justice sotomayor uh and then they have said a response to this application requested by justice sotomayor by 10 a.m eastern tomorrow on january 9th so they have received this docketed it and are asking alvin bragg’s team for a response to this motion uh by 10 a.m tomorrow What the president is asking the Supreme Court to do is issue a stay on the New York Supreme Court, which is their lowest level, which is kind of like the U.S. District Court level. Those proceedings, this is on the campaign finance violation, the 34 felonies that President Trump is supposed to be sentenced to on Friday of this week. So they are asking for this response by tomorrow. President Trump is asking the Supreme Court to say, halt those proceedings while my interlocutory appeal, my appeal on the ruling of immunity, goes forward at the state level. Now, this is, once again, Supreme Court getting involved with state issues. President Hutchison. President Hutchison. Professor Hutchison. I like that. There’s a lot of words going on today. So Professor Hutchison. That was very Trump. A lot of words. You look at this. And one, it is the Supreme Court typically likes to stay out of state issues unless absolutely necessary. However, the flip side of that is this is the first time that they’re ruling back earlier this year on presidential immunity. is being tested he’s asking based off your ruling that’s what i’m appealing in the state court system should the state court pause the proceedings until that appeal is exhausted almost putting a little bit of pressure on the supreme court to look at this because to some degree it’s of their doing by creating this ruling earlier in the year what are your your thoughts on the overall picture what he’s asking and where we could go from here
SPEAKER 04 :
Well, ultimately, my view is that this particular appeal is basically down to a flip of a coin. Typically, the Supreme Court is unlikely to take an appeal in a low-ranking felony matter where there is no sentencing or at least custodial sentencing contemplated by the judge. However, the big issue for the Supreme Court in terms of its own legacy is whether or not it will uphold its earlier decision granting presidents immunity for official acts. There’s extensive evidence in the record showing that Judge Mershon allowed into evidence contested information which dealt with President Trump’s official acts while in office. So I think that was a mistake by the trial court. That’s number one. Number two, it’s important to keep in mind that this is an interlocutory appeal. In other words, the state courts haven’t finished their decision making, and they’re unlikely to finish their decision making in this particular case, in my judgment, for months. And so the Supreme Court will indeed have an incentive to stay out. Lastly, let me make this particular point. Alan Dershowitz argues, however, that many of the liberal members of the Supreme Court may wish to step in and end this lawfare once and for all so Americans can proceed with their business, which is basically the inauguration of Donald Trump, on January the 20th, and he can move forward with a clean slate.
SPEAKER 05 :
Harry, can you lead us through a little bit, people who are commenting, I’m seeing it come through right now, of what the process even is when you’re trying to get something like this state, when you’re trying to get a decision pushed back. They filed a Supreme Court, and is it the justices making this decision? Are they coming together like they would for a regular case and having a discussion? Is this assigned to somebody? How does that work in terms of who’s making the final decision? Because obviously, even in our comments, I’m seeing people go, well, this justice clearly is not going to vote that way, but hey, this one could. So how does that, How does that all come together?
SPEAKER 04 :
Very good question. So in this particular case, Judge Sotomayor, one of the liberal justices, has been assigned to this particular case. And so some of our listeners have noted that she is unlikely to vote in favor of Donald Trump. However, since this is a fairly momentous decision and it will have presidential value going forward, she may wish to invite, if you will, all of the members of the Supreme Court into this particular decision so they can take collective blame or praise. Yeah, I get that. That’s good leadership. And so I think she will probably defer to the entire court before rendering a final judgment. That’s just a guess. Please do not bet thousands of dollars on that guess.
SPEAKER 06 :
point as well, Professor Hutchison. There’s really three things that we could see come out of this. One, Justice Sotomayor could rule on a stay by herself, and so therefore because of the way each justice is assigned one of the appellate jurisdictions and so this is where Justice Sotomayor receives these uh these appeals these ask for stay and things of that nature so that’s just by the nature of where the court case was it wasn’t luck of the draw it’s just the normal path through the appellate process she could decide to issue a stay on her own she can refer as you mentioned to the entire supreme court to see if they can shoulder some of the blame or praise as you mentioned there or also they’re not required to do anything as well. They could, especially with a Friday deadline, she can get the reply tomorrow and still not do anything. And then the, the time period, uh, dissolves on its own and the supreme court just sat on their hands which in many cases when you ask for a stay of this nature they don’t respond especially when it is as you referred to you know normally in the normal course of jurisprudence a relatively minor issue for the supreme court something wouldn’t typically even make it that far up But because of all the context, it being a president-elect, a former president, all of those issues, a presidential immunity ruling, that I feel like there’s at least a little bit more likelihood of some sort of response. But that also, that interlocutory appeal issue, Supreme Court tends to not get involved until final judgment, final appeals judgment has gone through. You even remember the 14th Amendment case. They didn’t step in. Until the Colorado Supreme Court, it had gone through the lower level, the appellate level, and then the Supreme Court of Colorado had to weigh in before they even jumped in. So as we said, we don’t have a lot of answers, but it does feel like there are a lot of options for the Supreme Court to take here.
SPEAKER 04 :
I think there are tons of options, and certainly the coward’s way out, you might say, is for the Supreme Court to do nothing. Just sit on their hands and allow the sentencing to move forward. They may, however, wish to intervene. Why? Because it involves the President of the United States, number one, and then number two, it involves their own decision-making. I think it is crystal clear as well that President Trump can adduce evidence showing that Judge Mershon allowed official acts to be brought before the jurors in this particular case. That then taints his sentencing decision, even if it’s a non-custodial decision.
SPEAKER 05 :
so there um there’s an argument to be made in favor of the supreme court intervening uh but i would not best bet my last dollar on it all right well thank you so much for the analysis a lot of great comments you’re not getting this kind of commentary anywhere else we can’t do that without your support we can’t have this show the show’s not uh you know paid for by corporate sponsors it is funded exclusively through the ACLJ supporters and ACLJ champions. That’s what we encourage you today is become an ACLJ champion. That’s someone that gives on a monthly basis who says, hey, you set that price. I think it’s $5 minimum just because of processing fees, but we encourage you to go in, make it $25, $75, maybe do $100 a month to give monthly, to be a champion for the ACLJ. I’ve had people come up to me and say, I’m ACLJ champions, and that always makes me happy. It’s always nice when I’m waiting in line for coffee and someone will tell me that. It’s a really cool thing that’s happened over the last year. So become an ACLJ champion today. Make this possible. And you’re going to know why even more. You get this great analysis. But in the next segment, we are going to court. You’re going to hear about our newest pro-life case that’s about to really take shape. It’s really kind of classic ACLJ. freedom of speech kind of content you’re going to hear from one of our attorneys on that coming up in the next segment if you do have a question or comment we got full bank open right now tons of you watching but give us a call 1-800-684-3110 if you’re brand new on youtube but you know about half of you are hit that subscribe button hit the thumbs up we’ll be right back Welcome back to Secular. The ACLJ has been on the front lines of our fight for life for decades and decades. And you’d think that some of these cases that come about and these issues that come about should be settled. Well, often they are. But it doesn’t mean you still don’t have to fight them. And I’m excited today to talk about a new one. We have ACLJ attorney, Eldra McArdle, who is joining us. live right now via Zoom. Thanks for joining us. Why don’t you give our audience just a brief background on what this current issue is and of course it’s going to sound familiar because this is something the ACLJ has been fighting for since the 80s and here we are.
SPEAKER 01 :
Well thank you for having me first of all and I’m happy to share our current case, which involves a couple and specifically a man who has been arrested and cited for disorderly conduct based upon his actions on a particular day wherein he and his wife were advocating for unborn children in front of an abortion clinic. He was very composed. He used a megaphone and they basically cited him for using the megaphone because it was too loud, quote unquote. In the meantime, he was also, in my opinion, attacked and wrongly so, verbally, extremely vulgar, language used by the escorts that were at the clinic they basically used foul language and told his wife who herself is an abortion survivor so his wife’s mother was planning to have an abortion and changed her mind and so he is now married to that individual well the escort at the abortion clinic basically told her that if she wanted to die they could they could make that happen And it was very rude. And so he has been charged with this worldly conduct. There is supposed to be a hearing tomorrow on on those charges, but he has not been served officially from the court. Municipal court when he pled not guilty in mayor’s court, they shifted in Ohio to the municipal court and there they set a hearing. We are waiting to see whether they’re going to go forward with that hearing tomorrow or whether they’re going to go ahead and continue it. In the meantime, we are challenging his arrest and the constitutionality of the statute on both First Amendment and 14th Amendment grounds. First Amendment, obviously, on free speech, religious freedom. The content of the statute is unconstitutional, in our opinion. And also the… in equal or unequal application of that particular statute to this particular incident wherein he was the only one arrested and the escorts were not.
SPEAKER 06 :
when we we talk about this as well and you talk about the issues of the unequally applied law here they were the officers told him he caused annoyance or disturbance and that criminal citation under the noise ordinance uh says that it bans annoyance to another which is such a vague subjective statute in and of itself but when you have something here that is clearly uh is unequally applied. The pro-life individual is the one who is cited, placed in the back of a police car, and those that were, as you say, even making threats, being vulgar, had nothing happen to them, that raises the constitutional issues. But it also, I think, shows that even with the new administration coming in, that it is favorable to conservatives, to pro-life individuals, and those of us that stand for the sanctity of life, It also shows that our fight sometimes has to turn local and also ensure that we fight for the constitutional rights of everyday Americans, even in places that you may have not heard of, that may not be on the front page of the news. But that’s what we’re fighting here.
SPEAKER 01 :
absolutely and this is a local county cuyahoga county in ohio and it is a local ordinance and as i indicated it’s going to be in municipal court which is a city court which is a very very low court in in the grand scheme of things you know you were just talking about the united states supreme court but still this is where it happens to everyday individuals and everyday life where uh abortion clinics are still permitted to be um taking place or advocating or advocating abortions in Ohio. And so they have statutes that try to, I’m going to say, suppress the First Amendment speech and the religious speech that goes with it or religious beliefs.
SPEAKER 05 :
At the end of the day, that’s what we’re talking about here. Not only a religious police, but we also are talking about the First Amendment is something that we have been talking about again for decades, making this very clear that your pro-life speech, just because it’s pro-life doesn’t mean it stops because you’re on a public sidewalk in front of an abortion clinic. In fact, that’s where speech should be maybe the most popular. protected but it’s sort of a two-prong effort here at the aclj maybe go through that a little bit because we are both you know representing the client also taking on the statute you can kind of break that down a little bit uh before we really tell people how they can get engaged in this fight for life that we’re continuing on
SPEAKER 01 :
Yes. So yeah, the criminal case obviously is the one that started it. And we have to dispose of that first. And the motion to dismiss that we’re filing are based upon the First Amendment and 14th Amendment. And then ultimately, we would like to get it dismissed. And if it’s not dismissed, we want to go forward and challenge it on the civil end as well. But you know, you can’t challenge it civilly until you get through the criminal process. And so we are It’s sort of a hybrid and bifurcated case that we will be handling, but hopefully we will be very successful. I think we will. The conduct in this case was witnessed by the actual police officer. So the security guard was a private security guard who was employed by the Cuyahoga County Police. He was the one that I believe called the Cuyahoga County Police to come and cite our clients. So it is two-pronged, but we certainly are still fighting for pro-life. We’re fighting for free speech, and we are encouraging everybody to jump on board and help us out.
SPEAKER 06 :
And Elgin, we are we’re happy to fight this. And it is interesting. This is the second 14th Amendment case that we have worked on with you. One being the 14th Amendment ballot ban that was trying to go forward by the left. And now this the equal protection clauses within the 14th Amendment, same amendment, very different purposes here.
SPEAKER 01 :
Very, very different. But hopefully we’ll be as successful in this one as we were in the last.
SPEAKER 05 :
Thank you so much for joining us. If you want to join us in this fight today, as you heard, we are getting involved in filing critical motion in the courts in Ohio. And of course, you’ve heard about our campaign in Massachusetts. Hopefully you have. Where the state has been trying to shut down pro-life pregnancy centers and pressure women into having abortions, not going through those. And we are going to be fighting that. Not just… But we are also launching a $500,000 campaign, ad campaign, throughout the state of Massachusetts. And we want to bring that around the country to promote life in a really effective, beautiful way, in a way that is not shameful, not condemning. It is a great campaign that our team promotes. put together. So I’m going to encourage you to go to aclj.org to support that aclj.org slash save babies. You can scan the QR code as well to learn more. These battles require resources all year long. And of course we were trying to raise the funds for the total ad campaign as well. And the support of ACLJ individual donors is great, but you can also become and aclj champion as we head to the end of this first half hour some of you lose us on your local radio stations you can find us broadcasting live on youtube on rumble on aclj.org and now live on the salem news channel each and every day from noon to 1 p.m eastern work your way back but the support of the aclj members and aclj champions that’s people that give on a recurring monthly basis automatically Or really, what keeps this going? It’s a small group of people that are ACLJ champions. We want to see that double this year. So will you join us in that fight? Help protect the unborn at ACLJ.org slash champions. Again, a second half hour coming up. We got a lot of phone lines open for as many of you watching right now. So if you ever wanted to hear your voice on the radio… See it on YouTube. On the Salem News Channel. Give us a call. 1-800-684-3110. Be kind to our phone screeners. We’ll be right back.
SPEAKER 07 :
Keeping you informed and engaged. Now more than ever. This is Sekulow. And now your host, Logan Sekulow.
SPEAKER 05 :
Welcome back to Sekulow. Second half hour coming up right now. Give us a call at 1-800-684-3110. For a lot of you just joining us, I wanted to restate that breaking news item. Will, and maybe you can go through it here as President Trump has filed that emergency petition to the Supreme Court. And we need an answer soon. That is for the case in New York. And he would like to delay sentencing. And he does that by taking it up a notch, taking it to the Supreme Court of the United States.
SPEAKER 06 :
That’s right. Because President Trump has an interlocutory appeal, so an appeal that is in the middle of the proceedings, the final judgment after sentencing has not been handed down. So he’s asked for an appeal on the ruling of Judge Mershon about immunity. Judge Mershon decided to not dismiss the case based off the Supreme Court’s immunity ruling. President Trump appealed that decision by Judge Mershon. And so now he’s asked the Supreme Court to stay the proceedings, so stop the proceedings in the court and effectively stopping the sentencing that is supposed to happen, that is scheduled to happen on Friday while that appeal continues on, on the immunity ruling. He asked the Judge Mershon on Monday to do that. He denied that. He went to the Appeals Court of New York. They also declined to stay the proceedings. And so now he’s taken it an application for stay to the US Supreme Court. The way this works is it gets assigned to a justice that has a circuit assignment. So because this is coming out of New York, She has the Second Circuit, is where all the appeals go through, from the Second Circuit, go to Justice Sotomayor. If it were Delaware, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and the U.S. Virgin Islands, that’d be the Third Circuit, it’d go to Samuel Alito. So it’s all based off of the circuit assignment that these justices have. Sotomayor now has this application. She has requested a response from Alvin Bragg’s team by tomorrow at 10 a.m., And then she has some options. She can do nothing. Let it sit. There’s no required time. Right. There’s no required time. The Supreme Court doesn’t have to even respond. She could rule or issue an order on this application for a stay by herself. or she can refer the application to the entire court then the court would have to vote on whether or not to issue the stay on an application for stay to grant a stay it takes five members to grant cert we normally talk about it counts that you need four that to grant a case but this is just an application for stay it’s an emergency application it would take four justices to grant this, five justices rather, to grant this stay and to stop that sentencing on Friday. Now, we will talk about a little bit later. Maybe we’ll get back into some of the issues on whether or not this is normal, what they have done. Is there any precedent for this? Spoiler alert, the answer is no in this case because they just ruled on presidential immunity earlier this year. So this is really their first test case reaching them.
SPEAKER 05 :
after their immunity ruling earlier this year so a lot to unpack there and we’ll get into more of it later we got some other news coming up too viewers have been going up because i think people are interested in this i’d love to hear from you if you have a question or comment related to this you know what i’ve seen obviously in the last day as well is president trump making the claim and at first i thought okay this is a president trump kind of joke that would happen taken out of context becomes the news which is that whole gulf of america comment which is will we be making the gulf of of america he made some interesting points but i want to know your thoughts you know precedent over what’s happening right now hundreds of years but question for you do you like that president trump is taking on these kind of topics or do you want him to be focused solely on things like the economy and safety of our people which is why I think a lot of you voted for it. It’s kind of fun to discuss it. I think a lot of it is moving around, you know, pieces. It’s negotiation tactics. Same with what’s happening in Greenland, what’s going on all around the world in terms of the Panama Canal, all those discussions. What do you think about that? I want to get your thoughts because I would love to hear from the viewers. 1-800-684-3110. President Trump’s bigger announcements, if you will. 1-800-684-3110 to give us a call. Of course, support the work of the ACLJ if you can today and become an ACLJ champion, a monthly recurring member. We’ll be right back with your calls and comments and more on Zekula. Welcome back to Seculo. Hey, we are taking your phone calls. And look, I can see how many of you are watching right now. Thousands of you are just watching on YouTube and on Rumble. Maybe some of you are watching on the Salem News Channel. Give us a call. I don’t want to be someone begging here for calls. But come on, you’ve got to have a question or comment. I’d love to hear from you. This is a great time to call in. 1-800-684-3110. Will, we did want to give an update, you know, again. I always think we’re never going to hear the name Jack Smith again. And somehow every day, every day, Will, you’re like, I got a new Jack Smith update. Why don’t you give it to us?
SPEAKER 06 :
Well, we talked about this a little bit yesterday, that President Trump was asking Merrick Garland, the Attorney General, to not release the Jack Smith report, saying it wasn’t in the public interest. As well, we talked about that the… Co-defendants in the Mar-a-Lago case, the classified documents case, had filed with the court a request to block the release of it, mainly because it’s still on appeal. The Justice Department is appealing the ruling by Judge Cannon that threw the case out, saying that special counsel Jack Smith was not properly or constitutionally appointed. So what we’ve got today is new news out of the Department of Justice that Merrick Garland, who is the one who makes the decision statutorily based off the law, if the release of a special counsel’s report will happen. So he’s got about what? At this point, I mean, we’re talking about 12 days to decide to get it out. And he had earlier said months ago that at the conclusion of the work, he thinks it would be in the public interest to release the special counsel’s report. He’d been quiet since the election. And now what we’re hearing is that Merrick Garland will release the part of the special counsel’s report it will be two volumes one volume on the election interference january 6 investigation that was with uh the the judge in dc the dc uh district court and then the second volume is on the classified documents case out of florida with judge cannon because of judge cannon’s move yesterday she blocked the release while these appeals are going on for the other uh the both the justice department trying to uh say that the special counsel was properly appointed uh the judge has said you can’t release that one right now it’s still in the system uh the appeals court has this before them and you need to wait so That part will not be released. The Mar-a-Lago raid, the documents case, volume two of Jack Smith is not going to be released. But Merrick Garland has said that he intends to release volume one. Yes. Volume two coming later next year.
SPEAKER 05 :
It’s like Wicked. Yeah.
SPEAKER 06 :
One year this, but I also assume that if it goes past January 20th, Pam Bondi is not going to release a second volume. So that’s where we’re at. Of this, of Wicked. Wicked will become part two.
SPEAKER 05 :
I don’t think she has any say in that, really. You never know. President Trump can make a lot of moves. He’s saying we’re going to rename the Gulf of Mexico, the Gulf of America. It’s just good. Calling it good. It’s no longer wicked. Wicked, too, is wicked for good. Well, there you go. You didn’t even know that. It’s just in your head. Well, because it should be one film. Jack Smith’s double album coming soon.
SPEAKER 06 :
So that’s where we’re at. Merrick Garland, the attorney general, is trying to get one. the last shot at President Trump. We also know from reporting that President Biden was frustrated with the Attorney General. In some of this reporting it was one of his regrets that he picked Merrick Garland, gave him that consolation prize after not being confirmed by a Republican Senate to the Supreme Court. He was made the Attorney General. A lot of other Democrats wanted Doug Jones from Alabama. They thought that he would be a lot more aggressive as an Attorney General. They’re probably not wrong. Merrick Garland, President Biden was concerned that he slow walked the January 6th investigation and therefore he allowed Trump to become president again. So I think this may be Merrick Garland saying, I’ll get one more shot at President Trump on my way out the door. All right, let’s take some calls. Look, a lot of you have called in now.
SPEAKER 05 :
Stay on hold. Screen some of those calls. We’ll get it done. Not you, Will. The other Will. Bob in Michigan, line one. You’re on the air.
SPEAKER 11 :
Hey, thanks, guys. The appellate judge threw out the case to delay the sentencing based on the idea that President Trump is not, right now, the President of the United States. And my argument would be that although… J.D. Vance would have a shot at being the 48th president of the United States. My idea is that Trump right now is the 47th president of the United States. He’ll go down in history. It’s irrevocable. He’s going to be the 47th president of the United States, but he also is right now.
SPEAKER 05 :
Bob, not to cut you off, but they actually made a bit of that argument.
SPEAKER 06 :
Well, and Bob, he is not currently the 47th because he will not be the president until inauguration. He is president-elect, the 47th president-elect. It’s been certified, but he does not become the 47th president until January 20th at noon Eastern time when he is sworn in on the steps of the Capitol in Washington, D.C. But you do raise a good point. And that is part of the argument that President Trump’s lawyers filed in this emergency application to the U.S. Supreme Court. Specifically, they have three questions presented. One about is there an automatic stay when there’s an interlocutory appeal about presidential immunity, something that’s never been raised before because there was no Supreme Court precedent until now. But the third question presented is, It goes specifically to what you’re saying, Bob. It says whether a sitting president’s complete immunity from criminal prosecution during his term in office extends to the president-elect of the United States during the brief but crucial period between his election, his certification as president-elect, which has now occurred on monday and his inauguration as he conducts presidential transition activities that are integral and preparatory to his imminent assumption of the executive power of the united states so bob you’re asking the right question that’s the same question that trump’s lawyers are presenting to the supreme court is that even now can you be sentencing a president-elect based off of presidential immunity rulings because he’s having to we talk about the transition period between election and the new presidency there’s a lot of movement going on and there is a lot of that’s even why there’s briefings to the president-elect on intelligence there’s all these things that are very critical official government activities to ensure that the president is ready on day one to assume the executive office of presidency.
SPEAKER 05 :
We’re going to be taking more calls. Keep calling 1-800-684-3110. And we’re not ignoring the fires that are happening in California. Obviously, that has been absolutely devastating in the Pacific Palisades and Malibu and other areas that are being just really ravaged by these wildfires. We have different content to produce here. If you want to find out more information about that, there are other outlets for that, but we’ll continue to cover that. Obviously, our prayers are with our friends and colleagues. in that area including rick grinnell who’s on this show every week so give us a call 1-800-684-3110 we had a bunch but i don’t think he was waiting on holds keep keep holding uh james is calling in florida on line three james welcome
SPEAKER 08 :
Hello, guys. Thank you for everything you guys do. I was going to make a comment. Basically, I was born in Panama. And then I remember I was like seven years old when the treaty was signed by Torrijos and late President Carter. And I will tell you that I’m glad that President-elect Trump is looking up, looking out, looking up into any violations that the Panamanian government may have done to the treaty, you know, because to me, the Panama was very prosperous when the canal was under the U.S. hands and it was safer. Thank you.
SPEAKER 05 :
No, James, thank you for calling. I think that’s a great perspective that maybe people need to hear. You hear these moments of President Trump saying, hey, we need to take back the Panama Canal. And of course, there are moments where people go, and then you start really looking into the details. You go, OK, well, he’s not necessarily wrong here. Not wrong, at least in the thinking. Not wrong in the thinking of what’s going on in Greenland, even, which I know sounds aggressive. It sounds bizarre. But when you’re talking about the location of where that country is situated and the trade that goes through there and the trade that goes through the Panama Canal, the U.S. getting more involved certainly would not be a bad thing.
SPEAKER 06 :
That’s right. And when you even think about the concept of the Panama Canal, even more so than Greenland, while strategically the importance of Greenland is very apparent. But when you think about one, the the push for global dominance by China, you think about the fact that we built the Panama Canal. We built it, had control over it. I mean, John McCain was born in Panama because his father was working in the Panama Canal Zone. And so you think about the history and the ingenuity and how much prosperity to the world because of what the United States did by building that canal. And then Jimmy Carter handed over control of the Panama Canal to the Panamanians. When you think about it, I know most people watching the show have probably been frustrated about this for a very long time. Many people have. The fact that we ceded control of one of the most important shipping lanes in this hemisphere, it seems absurd. And so even to that point, President Trump makes very valid, very strong points. If you’re looking to build up American independence, security, as well as our ability to affect our trading partners, I think us taking back control of the Panama Canal should be a no-brainer for many people.
SPEAKER 05 :
Yep, absolutely. Phone lines are still open at 1-800-684-3110. A few people said they’ve been… You know, they call and it keeps ringing and ringing. Give it time. We got to let people get screened through and our screeners got to do this job. So stay on hold and just wait through the ringing. Someone will pick up the phone. 1-800-684-3110. Become an ACLJ champion today. Again, that’s someone who supports the ACLJ on a monthly recurring basis. Again, our prayers to our friends and everyone in California going through the wildfires right now. We’ll be right back with your calls and comments coming up. All right, last segment of the day, and I’d like to hear from as many of you as possible. We’ve got some great comments from YouTube and some callers coming in. Will, we had a comment from YouTube you wanted to take real quick.
SPEAKER 06 :
Right, this is Shelly on YouTube, and she’s asking, what happens if Trump doesn’t show up for the sentencing? Is there an arrest warrant put out? When Judge Mershon rescheduled the sentencing for this Friday, he actually made it clear that President Trump didn’t have to be there in person. They could do a virtual appearance. They could do it other ways. And that’s also mainly because he’s already signaled that the sentence is most likely, he said, I see the best path forward, what’s called an unconditional discharge. What that means is that it goes in the books as convicted felon, he’s been sentenced, but there’s no penalties, there’s no probation, there’s nothing. It’s just an unconditional discharge. You’re free to go, but you’re a convicted felon. Thank you very much. And he also tried to say that’s, you know, this will help president Trump move forward with his appeal because it’ll resolve the case here. We’re done here. Then he can appeal it at the appeals court as if that’s a nice, thank you very much from the judge that the entire time, uh, has been showing his hand of potentially not being in favor of the 47th president elect.
SPEAKER 05 :
Let’s go ahead and take some calls. Eric is calling in Texas, watching on the Salem News Channel, so that’s very cool. Welcome, a new live member to our set. We’re now on live every day from noon to 1 p.m. Eastern on the Salem News Channel. You can find that live on their website or on Pluto and a few other options, I believe. Just go check out what they’re doing there. Great lineup of hosts. Eric, you’re on the air.
SPEAKER 02 :
Yes, sir. Thank you. I enjoy your show and appreciate your work. What I want to talk about… It’s what you spoke about is like Merrick Garland and all these lawfare trials going against, of course, Trump and his associates and other conservatives around the. The nation, there has to be some kind of counterpunch to like when they bring forth these bogus lawsuits and. and lawfare that they, uh, that these people are punished when they actually break the law. Like for example, when they, uh, throw some of these pro-life families and stuff in jail and endless, uh, trials just meant to like break people and make them go bankrupt, you know? And, uh, there has to be something that we, that, and if we don’t have a counter punch to this, then why there’s no turn to, for them to like keep bringing forth more, uh,
SPEAKER 05 :
uh stalin stalin style uh kind of suits yeah i would say we do have a counter punch some of it is what we do here at the aclj obviously for the pro-lifers as you mentioned uh we talked about that today we have a new client that we are representing who was uh protesting in front of an abortion clinic was uh you know making his voice heard his wife and was arrested for it we are taking that to court Because we believe, and we do that absolutely for free. We do that because the ACLJ, great members and ACLJ champions and individual donors that support the work of the ACLJ continue. But for President Trump specifically, I mean, maybe one of the biggest counter punches has been he won the election. Right. He won the general election as both the popular vote and the electoral college, every swing state. And we saw that certified. So though it may feel that way, there are some times where a win can still happen.
SPEAKER 06 :
That’s right. And I think another legal counterpunch is the cabinet. If you go to ACLJ.org slash petitions, the second one on there right now is confirm Trump’s national security team now. Who does that involve? The attorney general of the United States, Pam Bondi, Kash Patel, who will be the director of the FBI, as well as Tulsi Gabbard, our colleague here, until now she moves on to be the next director of national intelligence. But you need those people in quickly. You need their deputies in quickly. The Senate has to get on this. I know they’re starting hearings next week to be ahead of the curve so that when President Trump is sworn in, they can actually confirm these people. But that’s the way you start cleaning it up. And that’s when they can also look and see if there was any impropriety, because unless documents are missing, they should be in the Department of Justice and they will be able to look into it.
SPEAKER 05 :
All right, let’s go ahead and continue on with our calls. Let’s go to Lori, who’s calling in California, watching on YouTube. Hey, I want to say something to YouTube viewers because there’s a lot today. We are only about, let me see where we’re at exactly. We’re at 250 subscribers away from hitting 450,000 YouTube subscribers. So I know, just because I know how the analytics work, there are more than 200 of you watching that are brand new or haven’t hit that subscribe button. Because usually only about 50% of the people watching are active subscribers. You may have been served this, but you’re still not maybe subscribing to the ACLJ channel. Hit that subscribe button. Let’s get this over 450,000 while we’re on live in the next four minutes. See if you can do it. Hopefully you can take the challenge. Lori, you’re on the air.
SPEAKER 09 :
Hi, I’ve really enjoyed all of your work trying to help President Trump. And, you know, I have watched cases sometimes where people go in at the last minute as interveners. And I’m wondering… is that possible or can the ACLU, boy, that was a mistake.
SPEAKER 05 :
The ACLJ, I understand how it happens.
SPEAKER 09 :
I understand the ACLU. Okay, can we come up with a template And every time I get after President Trump, do something, because I’ve had a guts full of all of it. It’s like, what are they going to try next? They’re going to say, oh, he’s a felon, so he can’t be president. It just never ends.
SPEAKER 05 :
Yeah, it does feel like a never-ending struggle, Laurie. And look, we’ve been there for President Trump when he’s needed. Our legal team and we’ve obviously been, Jordan and other members of our team are obviously involved and engaged in a lot of that. What I’ll say is it can’t really be templated because so much of it is different in each individual case, individual state, whether it’s federal, whether it’s, you know, there’s so much that goes on. I know you feel that way and it does feel that way. It’s exhausting. But then you have President Trump also taking all of his legal options and throwing them against the wall as well when you have something like the sentencing coming up on Friday. We don’t know how that will end up, but we know at least they are going to try everything they can.
SPEAKER 06 :
That’s right. And at this point, the application for stay is at the United States Supreme Court. We hope that we will maybe hear something tomorrow, whether or not they put a stay in place and that sentencing goes forward on Friday or not. But we’ll know very soon.
SPEAKER 05 :
Yep. And hey, two minutes left in this show and we have 200 subscribers away from hitting 450,000. Do it right now. Let’s go quickly. Let’s take one more. Who’s going to hold long as you’ll get it? Let’s go to Sid in Texas. Steve, I’m sorry. I don’t know if we’ll be able to get to you, but stay on hold. We’ll try. Sid, go ahead.
SPEAKER 03 :
Hey, I think this is totally cool that we are having conversations about Greenland, the Gulf of America, etc. Trump is so multitask. Yeah. I mean, there is multitask. It’s fun.
SPEAKER 05 :
Yeah. I mean, Sid definitely is bringing up new topics. I don’t think anyone’s been discussing beforehand and give you something new to think about. And what I like about these topics, because at first you had sort of a gut reaction. That’s not necessarily positive. And then you start looking into the facts and you’re like, Oh, it doesn’t seem like it’s wrong on this. Maybe we should be doing this quickly. Steve in Tennessee, watch it on the Salem news channel. Steve quickly. Go ahead.
SPEAKER 10 :
Uh, thank y’all for what you do each and every day, keeping us informed. Um, I just wanted to make a comment about, uh, Pam lock. Now, uh, we should have never turned it over in the first place, but, uh, I’m glad, uh, president Trump has a thought to, uh, see that we try and get that back. Uh, also, uh, uh, when it comes to Canada and the other territories that, uh, protect the United States. and that we have a presence in, if we have a presence and we’re spending young boys’ blood, our heritage of the United States, when we put forth those guys there, and if we have to spend blood, Those territories should become part of the United States.
SPEAKER 05 :
All right, Steve, thank you for your comment so much. I don’t mean to cut you off. We are just running out of time. We only have about 30 seconds left. Thank you all for watching. A lot of brand new viewers, a lot of brand new subscribers. Let’s see where we’re at. Oh, we’re getting close. Go ahead, hit that subscribe button. I’ll take it as a win if we get it in the next couple hours. So, hey, hit that subscribe button even if you’re watching later on. I would love to hit 450,000 YouTube subscribers today. Thanks again for watching. Support the work of the ACLJ, whether it is our pro-life cases or whatever it is that we’re involved in. You can find out more information at ACLJ.org and I encourage you to become a monthly recurring member and ACLJ champion. Talk to you tomorrow.
