The Molly Mash(-Up) VI

welcome to another what we call at talking feds land Molly mash up with Molly Jong fast special correspondent for Van Fair host of the podcast fast politics and man what a propitious time to be talking to her there's been a thing or two happened since we last convened Molly you can give me your little legal questions but then I get to throw my politics but you they're gonna be everyone's gonna tune me out and tune you in and that's just fine what do you got well that's not necessarily true okay so explain to us what legal Jeopardy does Trump face right now you know a lot depending right now depending on whether he wins the election if he loses the election kind of everything that there's been this clock about the clock's gone we lost that battle but other but the the cases still remain with the exception of that fton County case that I'm not sure will ever be revived and see the light of day but the January 6 case it's going to be trimmed down because of immunity the um maralago case it's gonna go and maybe and probably not without Canon and um just yesterday Molly you had Jenna Ellis plead guilty in an Arizona case so they're these State elector cases Trump is in charge there but he's co-conspirator number one in the indictment so that and also the civil case in New York uh those things for the most part are not going away so everything with the exception of the trim down January 6 and Fulton County's any anybody's bet that's again if he loses so F fton County why does fton County gone well it's just such a mess it's not clear that you that Humpty Dumpty can put the pieces back together again in theory there's going to be an appeal and the appeal it it's already been uh this is kicking this is kicking her off the case whether to kick her off not just her but it would be her whole office it's this big sprawling case and I don't know people that I talked to in um Georgia have tended to use the word moraband there's no reason you could try to revive it but it has this feel of being pretty mothballed but it could it could come back and the Arizona case that Jenna Ellis just agreed to plead very very very bad news for Mark Meadows Rudy Giuliani Boris Epstein that's some of the same kind of conduct and could still ins snare Donald Trump because guys like Meadows and Giuliani if they're looking to get a good deal like Jen Ellis just just got they got one person to give up that would be the former president of the United States the ticket is set Tim Walls is K Harris VP pick uh you know you talked on Rick Wilson's podcast about well a lot of things about Kamala like a lot of people I haven't really seen walls but you know until he's he came to the four calling JD Vance and the Republican Party weird uh which is a separate thing to ask you about but um what I've heard is relative to the other finalists maybe a little Minnesota Bland uh no so let's hear about Tim Walls okay so first of all Tim Walls the two things that people have been saying which neither of which are true one is that he's some wild leftist which he's not and two is that he is not interesting so what I would say about him is this Tim Walls why he became why he came on my radar was two things one he was the head of the governors the Democratic Governors Association which is something that you get when you're popular with other Governors and you're good at raising money two things you want in a vice presidential candidate and and if you look at JD Vance like popular with other people or Ronda santz like not the first line yeah right you're already ahead of the game then the other thing about him is that he's famous for being able to enact really and I don't even want to say progressive legislation because I think it under sells what it is but free breakfast and lunches 6 weeks paid leave you know and he was a teacher and he was also an enlisted man so he wasn't an officer he was really in it the way Ruben gyo was and and I think that if you look at these at him he's a very kind of M Midwestern guy right he was born in Kansas he grew up there he had a father who had Misfortune he enlisted to save his family and make money so it's a really relatable story I also just find him to be a pretty charismatic guy you do okay we we'll be gling that soon yeah he's very Midwestern and his affect is full Midwest but you know he hunts he fishes he has guns he's all about gun safety but he doesn't take money from the NRA like he's a really I I think he's a really impressive guy okay cool I got much more on him but you go next and I I'll come back on a walls to question Jenna Alice it tell us yeah we want the full everything on Jenna Alice Jenna Alice May man first her qualifications for getting where she got and it was pretty high up and pretty visible were only that she would say whatever crap Trump wanted her to say she puffed about her resume she never had really any credentials but at that time in the in Trump plan that got you in the room your ticketed I once debated her on Fox and she they gave her the last word and she just like lied flagrantly you know so she would s it yeah now she got you know Works her way there and she's one of the team with especially Rudy who she's really close to and and she's thick as you know in it totally thick the whole especially uh false elector part of the scheme so she goes so now Arizona and I I mentioned this only in passing Molly but that's that's a part of the overall liability picture for for Trump and team Trump All the President's Men Trump they go to Cal to Arizona they do the whole the whole three three-way deal first they try to Badger the legislature into saying the you know withdrawing certification because falsely they make up all these lies about why it was why it's not accurate legislature says goodbye anyway second they go on the phony elector plan and they literally have the code defendants in that case you know I am the actual elector for Donald Trump just a flagrant lie and then third they on January 6 try to uh pressure Mike Pence into breaking the law so you got the the classic full case in Arizona it was brought only recently but it's now one of four or five State cases and Jenna Ellis uh was subject to nine charges like all the rest of the gang here Boris epin Rudy Giuliani they're giving her a full walk no charges at all if but only if she testifies truthfully can yank it at any time and she it really is interesting because they have put her out in the cold did team Trump they didn't pay her legal fee she tried to do a GoFundMe and kind of got nowhere and she's just a kid without any you know she was in the CT so she's always I I I had pointed to her repeated she was just a dangerous figure she is right now State witness number one and she is absolutely in the middle of it all she can kill Giuliani in particular but also Epstein maybe Meadows and of course there is cpor number one in that indictment being Trump and those guys that could put pressure on on them one last thing I assume if Trump becomes president he can make enough Mischief that even the state law cases go away or get put on hold but Mark Meadows can't Boris Epstein can't Rudy Giuliani can't this is now set this case will happen she'll go forward as the star witness and you know Meadows in particular who's kind of known the most but is kept out of trouble with very good lawyering he really is looking at serious time in state prison in Arizona this is a a real deal and it it dovetails precisely with Trump saying you know I'm not going to pay your bills I'm not so she was this loaded weapon and and Arizona prosecutors picked her up it's a real thing all right back to Tim so you mentioned I do think that the contrast with juvenile not very funny and totally stupid snarky JD Vance will be distinct but you know they'll have one debate what so they're looking in general they talked about should could chapiro give Pennsylvania could Kelly give him Arizona The Hope here supposedly is he's such a St solid midwesterner that he actually helps with Michigan other than what you said and raising what does he sort of do for them do they hope in this razor razor sharp election historically vice presidents have not delivered their states and if you look at like John Edwards in North Carolina or and it really the last vice president to deliver estate was LBJ so it's not a com you know it's just not it's sort of not how it moves I would say you know he if you're just looking at him superficially he reads like a Midwestern guy he didn't go to an Ivy League College he went to school on the GI Bill he is a Midwestern guy whereas Trump's vice president went to very fancy schools worked in Silicon Valley it's just a different look a lot of people wanted Shapiro to be picked I think that Shapiro is a very good Governor but I'm not sure the difference between like I think people got very involved in the Shapiro walls matchup but including shooting him down Shapiro Shapiro drew a lot of flack right yeah right and I'm not convinced they're so different I mean Shapiro you know was an Attorneys General more like KLA Harris's record whereas walls was a member of Congress and then a governor and but I mean the reason why I thought walls was a better pick was just because he had military experience which again he's the highest ranking governor who was an enlisted man so that is like you know he really was he was in the National Guard for 20 years so he knows the guard and and then I would say also I think he worked well with the legislature that was very split to get a lot of things pass now the same has really been true for Shapiro but but I I I mean I think that that was ultimately what it was I don't think I mean people on the right are going to say it was because Shapiro is Jewish I don't think that's true as a Jew myself but I do think Shapiro looks more like someone who would come from an urban area and walls you know with the ice fishing and the hunting and the guns looks like someone who would come from a more rural area look and more generally Shapiro kind of plays FMS up a little to the right especially on Israel and and walls a little to the left so it does suggest she was worried about her left wing no yeah uh not really walls is the S there's almost no daylight between walls and Shapiro and Israel except that Shapiro is Jewish I mean that really is you know they're almost the same and in fact this idea that that one is more right than the other I mean they're really so close the free breakfast they're doing so many of the same things legislatively it's really like a style question I think so just explain to me what but the documents case what happens now with the documents case you had this aen Canon the trumpy judge and she basically kicked it out right she not only kicked it out she like she like there's just no way around it she uh she was in the tank for Trump and you know you had meric Garland the doj is not in the business normally of personally insulting judges and if they were Merrick Garland wouldn't be but you know the case the what I the way I wrote about him all is he Mi sense to analyze oh the weakness of this argument or that it it's just a total H favor to throw Trump but it's our last favor I think and it's a big one because it means he's got the talking point now until the election of that's been thrown out but it's going to be reversed I think they're GNA probably move to bouncer I think and that would that would get her done here's the interesting point about it you know she said said you there's no constitutional legal authority to use the special counsel and the next day if you were really worried about time the doj could have filed it again with a regular us attorney everyone recognized that a lot of people were urging it but this is a really pontious doj under Merck Garland they like the special counsel Rag and they want to be able if they prosecute a Donald Trump to for the public to have confidence so they don't want to do it with the US attorney they want to vindicate their right to bring it with a special counsel which you know if you're actually Prosecuting the former president the thetive opponent then of your boss the president that's when you need it for so they could have just said fine screw you and and and refiled it but not not challenged her legal ruling it would have hung out there but you know it wouldn't have gone anywhere but instead doj acting in its institutional interests and taking time now it's going to go the 11 circuit has set a schedule it's going to be the normal plotting schedule but I'd say around February March her her rulings been reversed 5050 or better she's off the case and now she's done all the damage for Trump she can do in that case which by the way is the strongest and the most cut and dried where they really have them dead to wrs will resume and it will go to new it will go to a new probably it'll stay in that District it'll stay in that district and there'll be a strategic call of trying to whether to bounce Canon but I think everybody even the judges wants to and this is s it's a good opportunity it's a hard thing to do in the 11 circuit but I think it'll happen so that's what we'll see so if Trump win if Trump loses Trump goes to jail you know I think I've said this I said appreciable chance he spends the rest of his life in jail and people you're so it's just the M that's a federal right isn't that a federal uh yeah but the the the penalties are severe not to mention all the other cases not to mention January 6 you know we could have had a whole different history here where years ago we cut some big deal with philosopher Kings of like all right you don't have to go to jail but get out of here and don't come back right don't we've been we've been so determined to treat them like others that that's what it means if he doesn't win yeah I think Molly I think he's going to jail and maybe dying in jail because those federal charges don't they have a sentencing uh structure that is is very punitive right yeah for I mean depends what you're saying it's a serious [ __ ] crime he took National SE way so yeah they're I mean he's looking at Big at at real time and he's pretty old and yeah it's it's uh it's again if he loses but we've been thinking by November by November but that's beyond now but we're back to a serious as a heart attack series of charges against him all right um I want to fold walls into this but I just want to talk about Harris who when when when we could see the writing on the wall it just seemed like well Biden's got to go but it can't be Harris it has to be Harris but it can't be Harris because of her you know lackluster campaign in 2020 and her not being very focused and like the woman's on she hasn't made a false move yet she's like like like like made a deal with the devil or something she's the K she's energized everybody electrified she's got joy and vigor and makes Trump look old and grumpy what happened and what is she doing so right and how long can it last so I would say a few things one is the conventional wisdom that told us Harris shouldn't be the candidate it's the same conventional wisdom that's telling us that Shapiro must be the vice president right which is the this is the election where nobody knows anything just nobody knows right there were some anxiety about Harris she came out of the gate incredible she I mean I would say a few things that I think helped her she I had written about her a ton and interviewed her and I had always thought that two years into the Biden president she presidency she became a completely different she became a much better orator like a real Obama lever speaker now that said she had spoke very very well when she announced her candidacy you'll remember in California she actually gave an incredible speech and so she she had it in her but she didn't start like hitting she didn't start hitting home runs every time she got at bat until she was about two years into it she also got a new Chief of Staff around then who is very very good and since then and there were WS on the old one that it was just chaotic and not happy place yeah right and two years and then in the last two years you've seen much few M much less turnover much less you know and the office is like a machine in that way and then so that was one thing I think the three weeks it took Biden to come to that decision were a huge help to her because it didn't feel like she was taking him out which and she her office also was super careful never to make it sound like she you know so that was another thing and in fact someone an Insider told me that she believed he should stay in so the the way it came out was just exactly right and then the third thing was that he had to see he was losing in the polls which he started to see and the Bas needed to see he was losing in the polls because until the base saw it you know people would come over to me and they'd say are they going to take away my candidate like until they could see it it was you couldn't explain to people and the truth was none of us knew I mean back to this whole nobody knows what's going to happen election until we started to see him really and then the other thing was that he really couldn't do the campaign schedule that said since he's dropped out I mean he's done incredible stuff for example uh the day he dropped out was the day he secured this enormous very complicated multicountry prisoner relief re uh release package that was incredible the kind of thing that would make a presidency for anyone else and also I would like to add real proof that he's not Jimmy Carter because you'll remember that Donald Trump had said that Putin was going to hold Evan gersowitz until he became president and then release him then just like Reagan you know maybe got those got those yeah kidnapped victims released when he so I I did think that it was you know Biden is really a good president I mean he's an old guy and he can't crisscross the country and he has some speech issues but he's done really well and and so I think that really helped her too but but she's really become a Next Level oror and then the one other thing that I think is really important in this story is that he the message from his campaign and the message from people in his campaign and the message from him and his people was if you want to honor me you will help her and that is such a St staunch contrast to you'll remember the other time a president stepped down to uh elevate his VP he was much more on the fence about the whole thing yeah so I do think that was very helpful too he now gets to play a great role because he doesn't have to you know when he comes through Thursday night the rafters will rock in Chicago I think we'll both be there I hope to see you but man if next month's if NE if as much happens between this month and and next month we're gonna have a lot of mashing to do always a pleasure Molly thanks so much for being here thanks for having me thanks for tuning in if you enjoyed this video and other talking feds content please take a second to like And subscribe talk to you later