"Extending deadlines indefinitely is the same thing as giving Trump an indefinite trial delay"

 

Judge Aileen Cannon has granted Donald Trump a delay in the classified documents trial by pushing back a court deadline in the case.

On Monday, Judge Cannon temporarily stayed a May 9 deadline for Trump and his two co-defendants in the federal case to submit court filings. 

It relates to Section 5(a) of the Classified Information Procedures Act (CIPA), which would disclose what sensitive materials Trump intends to use at the trial.

The Context

Trump has pleaded not guilty to 40 federal charges concerning allegations he illegally retained classified materials after he left the White House in January 2021, and then obstructed the federal attempt to retrieve them.

The trial is currently scheduled to start on May 20. However, Judge Cannon did not immediately set a new date for Trump to file his CIPA-related documents, potentially increasing the likelihood the trial won't happen before the 2024 election in November.

If the presumptive GOP nominee wins the general election against his Democratic counterpart Joe Biden, the Republican could order the Department of Justice to drop the federal classified documents into him if the case has not yet been brought to trial.

Cannon submitted court filings on Monday "temporarily staying" the CIPA request regarding what classified materials the defendants intend to use in the trial and what expert witnesses Trump's legal team intends to call at the trial in Florida. 

Cannon did not offer any explanation as to why the May 9 CIPA deadline has been indefinitely postponed, only stating that an "order setting second set of pretrial deadlines/hearings to follow."

The judge, who was nominated to the bench by Trump, has frequently faced criticism for her rulings in the federal case which appear to have benefited the former president.

Cannon has yet to rule on a number of motions filed by Trump and his two co-defendants, aide Walt Nauta and Mar-a-Lago maintenance worker Carlos De Oliveira, to have the classified documents charges dismissed, which could also result in further delay to the start of the trial.

The postponement arrived after Special Counsel Jack Smith's office admitted to Cannon in court filings that some of the classified materials recovered from Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort may not be in the original sequence as when FBI agents retrieved them in August 2022.

Smith's office said this was "inconsistent" with what the government previously told the court when it said that the only changes were some classified documents had been removed and had placeholders put in them.

Smith's office suggested that the "size and shape of certain items in the boxes" possibly lead to them moving around, but it should not affect the case or the CIPA process.

"For example, the boxes contain items smaller than standard paper such as index cards, books, and stationary, which shift easily when the boxes are carried, especially because many of the boxes are not full," Smith's team wrote.

Former federal prosecutor Joyce Vance wrote: "This case was set for trial on May 20, which obviously won't happen. It should have been ready to try by the end of last year.

"Extending the 5(a) deadlines indefinitely is the same thing as giving Trump an indefinite trial delay."

A former CIA agent who posts on X, formerly Twitter, under the Secrets and Laws pseudonym wrote: "DOJ moved for its CIPA Section 4 protective order on December 6, 2023.

"It's five months later, and there has been no progress on the classified aspects of this case other than Cannon ruling on that motion, which took 3 months. Inexcusable."

Once Trump has filed his CIPA documents, the former president's lawyers and Smith's office could embark on a lengthy back-and-forth about what sensitive materials can be used in the trial.

Cannon is still to finalize when the classified documents trial can begin, as well as a new deadline for the CIPA filings.

Ewan Palmer, Newsweek

10 Times as Much of This Toxic Pesticide Could End Up on Your Tomatoes and Celery Under a New EPA Proposal

 

   

When you bite into a piece of celery, there’s a fair chance that it will be coated with a thin film of a toxic pesticide called acephate. The bug killer — also used on tomatoes, cranberries, Brussels sprouts and other fruits and vegetables — belongs to a class of compounds linked to autism, hyperactivity and reduced scores on intelligence tests in children. But rather than banning the pesticide, as the European Union did more than 20 years ago, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency recently proposed easing restrictions on acephate.

The federal agency’s assessment lays out a plan that would allow 10 times more acephate on food than is acceptable under the current limits. The proposal was based in large part on the results of a new battery of tests that are performed on disembodied cells rather than whole lab animals. After exposing groups of cells to the pesticide, the agency found “little to no evidence” that acephate and a chemical created when it breaks down in the body harm the developing brain, according to an August 2023 EPA document.

The EPA is moving ahead with the proposal despite multiple studies linking acephate to developmental problems in children and lab rats, and despite warnings from several scientific groups against using the new tests on cells to relax regulations, interviews and records reviewed by ProPublica show.

To create the new tests designed to measure the impact of chemicals on the growing brain, the EPA worked with the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, which comprises some of the world’s wealthiest democratic countries and conducts research on economic, social and scientific issues. The OECD has warned against using the tests to conclude a chemical does not interfere with the brain’s development.

A scientific advisory panel the EPA consulted found that, because of major limitations, the tests “may not be representative of many processes and mechanisms that could” harm the developing nervous system. California pesticide regulators have argued that the new tests are not yet reliable enough to discount results of the older animal tests. And the Children’s Health Protection Advisory Committee, a second group of advisers handpicked by the EPA, also warned against using results of the nonanimal tests to dismiss concerns.

“It’s exactly what we recommended against,” Veena Singla, a member of the children’s committee who also teaches at Columbia University, said of the EPA’s acephate proposal. “Children’s development is exquisitely sensitive to toxicants. … It’s disappointing they’re not following the science.”

The EPA’s proposal, which could be finalized later this year, marks one of the first times the agency has recommended changing its legal safety threshold largely based on nonanimal tests designed to measure a chemical’s impact on the developing brain. And in March, the EPA released a draft assessment of another pesticide in the same class, malathion, that also proposes loosening restrictions based on similar tests.

The proposed relaxing of restrictions on both chemicals comes even as the Biden administration has been strengthening limits on several other environmental contaminants, including some closely related pesticides.

In response to questions from ProPublica, the EPA acknowledged that it “will need to continually build scientific confidence” in these new methods but said that the introduction of the nonanimal tests to predict the danger chemicals pose to the developing brain “has not been done in haste. Rather, a methodical, step-wise approach has been implemented over the course of more than a decade.” [...]

Sharon Lerner, ProPublica

EPA Proposes Relaxed Limits on Acephate, a Toxic Pesticide — ProPublica

The Washington Post’s Fact Checker estimated Trump made 30,573 “false or misleading claims"

 

For whatever reason, it has always been difficult for people to call out Trump’s lies. In the early days of his presidency, it was, perhaps, understandable because we were so unprepared for an American leader who lied repeatedly, shamelessly, and obviously. Americans were used to respecting the office, if not the person holding it at the moment; it was uncomfortable to utter the words “president” and “lies” in the same sentence. Of course, that did not last for many of us, but even today, you will see people sugarcoat the lies Trump tells. Whether it’s fear of the punch back, a sense of polite reticence, or something else, Trump continues to cast his lies across the waters, often with little pushback. 

The Washington Post’s Fact Checker estimated Trump made 30,573 “false or misleading claims,” as they termed it, while he was in office. And the rate accelerated over time.

Almost half of Trump’s lies came in the final year of his term in office. He started with claims of excessive crowd size on inauguration day, leading his advisor Kellyanne Conway to coin the term “alternative facts,” which was an attempt by the people handling him to reframe Trump’s lies. Instead, it became a mantra on the left, watching first in surprise and then in horror as Trump was permitted to spew lies without any check from people in his own political party.

Among the many lies the Post’s Fact Checker documented are the following:

·       The coronavirus would disappear on its own, along with pitching bogus cures

·       Trump created the best economy in U.S. history

·       Caravans of criminals were approaching the southern border every time an election loomed

·       Trump passed the biggest tax cuts of any president

·       A modified map altering the scientific assessment of a hurricane’s path in Sharpie marker, and of course, the biggest lie

·       The 2020 election was rigged, and Trump lost due to fraud.

 

Trump, unchecked, has been free to repeat those lies over and over again, even when the falsehood has been thoroughly exposed, and his claims debunked. So, it was refreshing to read that Judge Merchan was having none of that in court in Manhattan Friday morning.

On Thursday, Trump lied, telling a gathering of reporters outside of the courtroom where he is on trial that he would not be able to take the stand and testify in his own defense, because of the gag order imposed by Judge Merchan. Of course, that’s a lie.

Trump has been promising he would testify—perhaps he was looking for a way to walk that back as the reality of being on trial settled in. But Trump was peddling trash in classic fashion, blaming the Judge and lying about the gag order.

Judge Merchan got right to the point Friday morning in court, before the jury was brought in. He told Trump the gag order “does not prohibit you from taking the stand.” He continued, “As the name of the order indicates, it only applies to extrajudicial statements.” That means Trump is only limited in statements he makes outside of the courtroom. In other words, Trump is free to testify in court; the choice is his.

Judge Merchan undoubtedly knew Trump didn’t need to have him explain the gag order to him. Trump has excellent lawyers who are well aware of this. Trump had even walked back his Thursday comments with reporters as he walked into the courthouse Friday morning. But the Judge took the issue on directly, not giving Trump a pass for the rollback, because after all, with the clip still out there, what do you think Trump’s base is going to see and hear where they get their news?

And how many times have we heard Trump continue to repeat a debunked lie? So Judge Merchan told Trump he had learned that there might be a “misunderstanding,” and he wanted to clear it up. He did that, advising Trump clearly that he has an absolute constitutional right to testify. That’s it, just like that. The authority Trump was lying about refused to bend the knee and called Trump on the lie.

Republican political leaders who have never mastered this art should take note. This is how it’s done. It's crucial that we share this information with Trump supporters and others in our circles. The Judge, whom Trump has often criticized and called “conflicted,” has made it unequivocally clear that Trump has constitutional rights, including the right to testify, and the Judge is committed to protecting them. By sharing this, you can help spread awareness about the truth.

We’re in this together,

Joyce Vance

Ten Famous American Horses by Heather Cox Richardson

 

It has been quite a week of news, and I’m willing to bet I’m not the only one who’s tired. So, I figure it wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world to look elsewhere for a bit of a break. Today is the 150th running of the Kentucky Derby, and in its honor, I'm posting a piece my friend Michael S. Green and I wrote together a number of years ago on Ten Famous American Horses. It has no deep meaning...it’s just fun. And it was totally fun to research, too: I watched hours and hours of Mr. Ed and reading television history to try to figure out what made it such a popular show. This remains one of my favorite things I ever had a hand in writing.

1) Traveller

General Robert E. Lee rode Traveller (spelled with two Ls, in the British style) from February 1862 until the general’s death in 1870. Traveller was a grey American Saddlebred of 16 hands. He had great endurance for long marches, and was generally unflappable in battle, although he once broke both of General Lee’s hands when he shied at enemy movements. Lee brought Traveller with him when he assumed the presidency of Washington and Lee University. Traveller died of tetanus in 1871. He is buried on campus, where the safe ride program still uses his name.

2) Comanche

Comanche was attached to General Custer’s detachment of the 7th Cavalry when it engaged the Lakota in 1876 at the Battle of Little Bighorn. The troops in the detachment were all killed in the engagement, but soldiers found Comanche, badly wounded, two days later. They nursed him back to health, and he became the 7th Cavalry’s mascot. The commanding officer decreed that the horse would never again be ridden and that he would always be paraded, draped in black, in all military ceremonies involving the 7th Cavalry. When Comanche died of colic in 1891, he was given a full military funeral (the only other horse so honored was Black Jack, who served in more than a thousand military funerals in the 1950s and 1960s). Comanche’s taxidermized body is preserved in the Natural History Museum at the University of Kansas.

3) Beautiful Jim Key

Beautiful Jim Key was a performing horse trained by formerly enslaved veterinarian Dr. William Key. Key demonstrated how Beautiful Jim could read, write, do math, tell time, spell, sort mail, and recite the Bible. Beautiful Jim performed from 1897 to 1906 and became a legend. An estimated ten million Americans saw him perform, and others collected his memorabilia—buttons, photos, and postcards—or danced the Beautiful Jim Key two-step. Dr. Key insisted that he had taught Beautiful Jim using only kindness, and Beautiful Jim Key’s popularity was important in preventing cruelty to animals in America, with more than 2 million children signing the Jim Key Band of Mercy, in which they pledged: “I promise always to be kind to animals.”

4) Man o’ War

Named for his owner, August Belmont, Jr., who was overseas in World War I, Man o’ War is widely regarded as the top Thoroughbred racehorse of all time. He won 20 of his 21 races and almost a quarter of a million dollars in the early twentieth century. His one loss—to “Upset”—came after a bad start. Man o’ War sired many of America’s famous racehorses, including Hard Tack, which in turn sired Seabiscuit, the small horse that came to symbolize hope during the Great Depression.

5) Trigger

Entertainer Roy Rogers chose the palomino Trigger from five rented horses to be his mount in a Western film in the 1930s, changing his name from Golden Cloud to Trigger because of his quick mind and feet. Rogers rode Trigger in his 1950s television series, making the horse a household name. When Trigger died, Rogers had his skin draped over a Styrofoam mold and displayed it in the Roy Rogers and Dale Evans Museum in California. He also had a 24-foot statue of Trigger made from steel and fiberglass. One other copy of that mold was also made: it is “Bucky the Bronco,” which rears above the Denver Broncos stadium south scoreboard.

6) Sergeant Reckless

American Marines in Korea bought a mare in October 1952 from a Korean stable boy who needed the money to buy an artificial leg for his sister, who had stepped on a land mine. The marines named her Reckless after their unit’s nickname, the Reckless Rifles. They made a pet of her and trained her to carry supplies and to evacuate wounded. She learned to travel supply routes without a guide: on one notable day she made 51 solo trips. Wounded twice, she was given a battlefield rank of corporal in 1953 and promoted to sergeant after the war, when she was also awarded two Purple Hearts and a Marine Corps Good Conduct Medal.

7) Mr. Ed

Mr. Ed was a talking palomino in a 1960s television show by the same name. At a time when Westerns dominated American television, Mr. Ed was the anti-Western, with the main human character a klutzy architect and the hero a horse that was fond of his meals and his comfortable life, and spoke with the voice of Allan “Rocky” Lane, who made dozens of “B” westerns. But the show was a five-year hit as it married the past to the future. Mr. Ed offered a gentle, homely wisdom that enabled him to straighten out the troubles of the humans around him. The startling special effects that made it appear that the horse was talking melded modern technology with the comforting traditional community depicted in the show.

8) Black Jack

Black Jack, named for John J. “Black Jack” Pershing, was the riderless black horse in the funerals of John F. Kennedy, Herbert Hoover, Lyndon Johnson, and Douglas MacArthur, as well as more than a thousand other funerals with full military honors. A riderless horse, with boots reversed in the stirrups, symbolized a fallen leader, while Black Jack’s brands—a U.S. brand and an army serial number—recalled the army’s history. Black Jack himself was buried with full military honors; the only other horse honored with a military funeral was Comanche.

9) Khartoum

Khartoum was the prize stud horse of Jack Woltz, the fictional Hollywood mogul in Mario Puzo’s The Godfather. In one of the film version’s most famous scenes, after Woltz refuses requests from Don Vito Corleone to cast singer Johnny Fontane in a movie, Woltz wakes up to find Khartoum’s head in bed with him… and agrees to use Fontane in the film. In the novel, Fontane wins the Academy Award for his performance. According to old Hollywood rumor, the story referred to real events. The rumor was that mobsters persuaded Columbia Pictures executive Harry Cohn to cast Frank Sinatra in From Here to Eternity. As Maggio, Sinatra revived his sagging film career and won the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor.

10) Secretariat

Secretariat was an American Thoroughbred that in 1973 became the first U.S. Triple Crown winner in 25 years. His records in the Kentucky Derby, the Preakness Stakes, and the Belmont Stakes still stand. After Secretariat was stricken with a painful infection and euthanized in 1989, an autopsy revealed that he had an unusually big heart. Sportswriter Red Smith once asked his trainer how Secretariat had run one morning; Charlie Hatton replied, “The trees swayed.”

-Heather Cox Richardson

 

"Tough to believe this man ever was or could again be the President of the United States" -Joyce Vance

 

[Yesterday] started off with yet another contempt hearing. If you were hoping Judge Merchan would punish Donald Trump for repeat gag order violations with some jail time, you were disappointed. He didn’t.

The gag order requires Trump to "refrain from making or directing to be made” public statements about witnesses and “about any prospective juror or any juror in this criminal proceeding." Trump has to willfully violate the gag order—he has to know he’s doing it—before he can be found in contempt.

There were four possible violations under consideration today. Two involved attacks on Michael Cohen, whom Trump called a liar. Trump also complimented David Pecker, saying he was “a nice guy.”

Prosecutors argued that both the carrot and the stick approaches toward witnesses violated the gag order, but Judge Merchan seemed disinclined to engage on those allegations and primarily focused on the second allegation, that on April 22, Trump talked about the jury on “Real America’s Voice,” a right-wing streaming, cable and satellite television channel founded in 2020. Real America’s Voice is home to people like Steve Bannon and Charlie Kirk.

Trump commented that the “jury was picked so fast — 95% democrats. The area's mostly all Democrat. You think of it as a — just a purely Democrat area. It's a very unfair situation that I can tell you.” Trump’s lawyers tried to argue that this wasn’t talk about an individual juror, claiming that is the focus of the gag order. The Judge was not impressed, reportedly shaking his head and “looking incredulous” at this line of argument, according to Adam Klasfeld.

All of these lawyers know that with virtually any judge, public comments about the jury while the case is in progress are off-limits. But the Judge’s goal here isn’t to put Trump in jail, it’s to ensure a fair and impartial trial that leads to a jury verdict that, if it’s a conviction, will be affirmed on appeal. So, from the Judge’s perspective, today’s proceeding was a win. He’s got Trump under his thumb.

Trump, or at least his lawyers, seem to know that. They came back to the court with a request for clarification about whether reposting articles by legal experts that criticize the prosecution’s case and mention prosecutors or jurors would be acceptable. “I’m not going to be in the position of looking at posts and determining in advance whether you should or should not post,” Judge Merchan told Trump’s lawyer. He said he thought the order itself was clear. “I think if in doubt, steer clear. That’s all I’m going to say,” Merchan advised them.

One tactical hurdle the lawyers have to deal with at trial is that they aren’t permitted to explain the significance of the testimony they’re eliciting while they’re questioning witnesses. The lawyers don’t get to testify, only the witnesses do. So, there’s no sort of introduction where the lawyer gets to tell the jury why they’re calling each witness and how their testimony fits into the larger picture. The have to hope they’re following along.

But, the lawyers get to put all the pieces of the puzzle together for jurors in closing argument. So, while they’re taking testimony, they’re collecting key pieces of testimony they’re getting from each witness that they’ll hone in on when they finally get to argue their case. During witness examination [yesterday], the lawyers on both sides scored some points that they hope will be telling for the jury.

For the People:

·       Stormy Daniels’ former lawyer Keith Davidson was being asked about the written denial of a relationship with Trump she signed in January of 2017. Davidson testified that he was careful to make sure that the statement was carefully written so she could sign it truthfully. Asked about the technicalities, Davidson pointed out it referred to a romantic sexual encounter with Trump, and that no one has ever said the relationship was “romantic.” The prosecutor asked, “isn’t this cleverly misleading?” And of course, the jury understood that it was, and that was the whole point. Trump’s lawyer may argue that Stormy denied it before she said it was true, but Davidson’s testimony was decimating on that point.

·       The obvious issue in this case is whether Cohen was acting on his own or acting along with, even being directed by, Trump. It’s not dispositive, but the People got in some election night 2016 texts between Davidson and Dylan Howard, then the Editor-in-Chief of the National Enquirer. As it became clear Trump was going to win, Davidson texted Howard, “what have we done?” Howard responded, “Oh my God.”

·       This and other testimony made clear that the prosecution was intent on eliciting testimony that the deal with Stormy Daniels was all about the election. Trump’s lawyer stumbled into that at one point during cross-examination, emphasizing a comment Davidson made to Michael Cohen, “If he loses this election, we all lose all f***ing leverage. This case is worth zero.” Trump’s lawyer asked Davidson if he remembered saying that. Davidson said he did. The jury will too.

·       The prosecution plays a recording of Trump talking to Cohen. Cohen drops this line: “I need to open up a company for the transfer about our friend David.” David Dennison was the pseudonym used for Donald Trump in the Stormy Daniels deal and the comment was made in the context of creating the shell company, Essential Consultants, LLC, that was used to pay her.

 

These are just a few extractions from what will be days of testimony before the jury gets the case. Prosecutors build proof beyond reasonable doubt not from just one witness or one document, but by layering testimony upon testimony so that circumstantial evidence becomes airtight. The classic example is, if you wake up in the morning and there’s snow on the ground, you can assume in the absence of any other explanation, that it snowed over the night.

Here, the government will try to show the jury, through circumstance upon circumstance, that Trump was in the know. They will ask why Cohen would pay $130,000 on Trump’s behalf, a payment that required him to take out an equity line of credit on his own home, if he was just a rogue actor.

The payment benefitted Trump, not Cohen, and Cohen, by virtue of the care with which he decided how it would happen, showed that he understood he was exposing himself to some legal risk. Why would the notoriously cheap Trump reimburse Cohen otherwise, and in any case, why do it using a series of falsified records? Reasonable doubt is just that, a reasonable one.

The prosecution’s job is to show that purely speculative doubt is not enough and that there are no reasonable questions about Trump’s dedication to this endeavor. Juries understand this when prosecutors put the right evidence in front of them.

For the Defense:

·       It’s all about keeping Trump out of it, and today the jury saw a settlement agreement between Trump and Stormy Daniels that was signed by Stormy and her then-attorney, Keith Davidson. But only Michael Cohen signed on the other side. Trump did not. Expect the defense to argue this vehemently in closing. The signed letter may say the settlement is between Daniels and Trump, but without his signature, how do the People prove Trump knew what was there and agreed to it?

·       First question in the cross-examination of Davidson was whether he had ever met Trump. “Never,” was the response. The defense will try to pick up as many of these nuggets as they can to argue Cohen was a rogue actor and Trump was unaware of what he was doing and how he did it.

·       Perhaps most importantly, the defense is trying to pick up evidence to argue that Michael Cohen has a vendetta against Trump because of the personal slight when Trump didn’t take him to Washington for a White House or other government job after he won the election. Expect the attack on Cohen’s credibility in this regard to be fierce. The defense will scrape for every last bit of testimony they can get in this regard. Davidson testified about it today, giving the defense a kickoff point. He said Cohen was deeply distressed about being left behind. Davidson testified, “I thought that he was going to kill himself.”

 

It is still early in the trial. Lots of evidence and testimony left to come. But for the lawyers, closing arguments are already in their minds as they formulate arguments they hope the jury will find compelling.

Even a couple of weeks in, it can be hard to believe this is really happening. Tough to believe this man ever was or could again be the President of the United States. After days of observation by the press that Trump appeared to be sleeping in court as his criminal trial is underway.

We’re in this together,

Joyce Vance