June 1, 2024

Saturday, June 1, 2024. Annette’s News Roundup.

I think the Roundup makes people feel not so alone.

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Joe is always busy.

Biden Denounces ‘Reckless’ G.O.P. Efforts to Discredit Trump Conviction.

The president broke his long silence over his predecessor’s legal troubles, calling the New York jury’s guilty verdict vindication for the idea that “no one is above the law.”

1:43 seconds 👇

President Biden took on his newly convicted opponent on Friday, declaring that a New York jury’s guilty verdict against former President Donald J. Trump should be respected and denouncing efforts to undermine the justice system as “reckless,” “dangerous” and “irresponsible.”

Breaking his long silence over Mr. Trump’s legal troubles, Mr. Biden directly and unambiguously characterized the putative Republican nominee as a lawbreaker whose conviction amounted to a victory for the rule of law. And he rejected assertions that the prosecution was a political witch hunt, noting that it was not a case brought by his own administration.

“The American principle that no one is above the law was reaffirmed,” Mr. Biden said in a hurriedly arranged televised statement at the White House before outlining his latest efforts to end the war in Gaza. “Donald Trump was given every opportunity to defend himself. It was a state case, not a federal case. And it was heard by a jury of 12 citizens, 12 Americans, 12 people like you, like millions of Americans who’ve served on juries.”

“This jury,” he went on, “was chosen the same way every jury in America is chosen. There’s a process that Donald Trump’s attorney was part of. The jury heard five weeks of evidence — five weeks. And after careful deliberation, the jury reached a unanimous verdict. They found Donald Trump guilty on all 34 felony counts.”

While he may have relished noting that his opponent in this fall’s election was found guilty on all counts, Mr. Biden made no mention of the substance of the case, in which Mr. Trump was convicted of falsifying business records to cover up hush-money payments to a pornography actress who claimed to have had an affair with him.

Instead, Mr. Biden focused on the orchestrated efforts by the former president and his allies to discredit the prosecution and the judgment of the jury by painting the process as a political persecution that supposedly treated Mr. Trump unfairly.

“It’s reckless, it’s dangerous, it’s irresponsible for anyone to say this was rigged just because they don’t like the verdict,” Mr. Biden said. “Our justice system has endured for nearly 250 years, and it literally is the cornerstone of America. Our justice system, the justice system, should be respected, and we should never allow anyone to tear it down. As simple as that. That’s America. That’s who we are.”

Mr. Biden and his team have shown more willingness to poke at Mr. Trump’s criminal troubles in recent weeks even without taking them on frontally. The president has mocked his predecessor for falling asleep during the trial (“Sleepy Don”) and sent the actor Robert De Niro to hold a feisty news conference at the courthouseassailing Mr. Trump (“guilty and we all know it”).

And they quickly sought to capitalize on the verdict on Thursday with a string of fund-raising appeals, just as Mr. Trump did. “Despite a jury finding Donald Trump guilty today, there is still only one way to keep Donald Trump out of the Oval Office: at the ballot box,” Mr. Biden said in one solicitation email just hours after the jury announced its judgment, adding that “Donald Trump’s supporters are fired up and likely setting fund-raising records for his campaign.”

Still, the Biden campaign did not predict that the verdict will change the contest, which polls show is exceedingly tight, especially in the critical battleground states needed to prevail in the Electoral College. Instead, advisers said Mr. Biden will continue to frame his argument to voters around issues like the economy, abortion rights and democracy.

One adviser said he did not expect the campaign to run advertisements focusing on Mr. Trump’s status as a convicted felon, nor did he imagine that Mr. Biden would try to back out of the June 27 debate on the grounds that he should not appear onstage with a criminal, as some Democrats have urged. It says something about today’s politics that running against a felon is not seen as a winning strategy.

Asked by a reporter at a later event on Friday whether the contrary were true, that the conviction might actually help Mr. Trump win the election, Mr. Biden demurred. “I have no idea,” he said.

But he said he was not worried that the case could set a precedent for a local prosecutor pursuing him someday. “Not at all,” he said. “I didn’t do anything wrong. The system still works.” And he scoffed at the notion that he was somehow pulling the strings behind the scenes. “I didn’t know I was that powerful,” he said.

The president’s formal statement came at the start of an announcement about the latest cease-fire proposal in the Middle East and shortly before meeting with the visiting prime minister of Belgium and hosting a celebration of the Kansas City Chiefs. Mr. Biden then left for Rehoboth Beach, Del., for the weekend before heading to France next week for ceremonies marking the 80th anniversary of the D-Day invasion.

That is a contrast the Biden campaign is all too happy to foster: On the one hand, a commander in chief welcoming foreign leaders and football champions to the White House, grappling with momentous questions of war and peace and traveling to the iconic beaches of Normandy to pay tribute to American heroes. On the other hand, a challenger railing against the system and preparing for a sentencing hearing where he may get prison time, just as convicted felons typically do.

“Trump will descend even more deeply into rage and self-pity. He cannot help himself,” Mr. Axelrod said. “Biden and the campaign would be well served to lean more deeply into the contrast between a president fighting to address the pressing concerns of people, and Trump, who fights only for himself.” (New York Times, video - PBS).

Biden Calls for End to Gaza War, Endorsing Israeli Cease-Fire Proposal

The president outlined a plan to try to get Hamas and Israel to break out of a monthslong deadlock that has resulted in the killing of thousands of Palestinians.

“This is truly a decisive moment,” Mr. Biden said. “Israel has made their proposal. Hamas says it wants a cease-fire. This deal is an opportunity to prove whether they really mean it.”

With that statement, Mr. Biden appeared to be revealing his true agenda: making public elements of the proposal in an effort to pressure both Hamas and Israel to break out of a month’s long deadlock that has resulted in the killing of thousands of Palestinians. (NY Times)

Biden Dons Kansas City Helmet to Celebrate Its Super Bowl Victory.

Taylor Swift was not at the White House to celebrate with her boyfriend, Travis Kelce, but kicker Harrison Butker, who recently drew controversy for a commencement speech, attended.

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Can lies be measured comparatively? Is this the BLOAT?

Biggest Lie of all time.

Trump told many whoppers yesterday, as he has over the decades. Yesterday, MSNBC, CNN, and Fox covered his lies for the cable audience. Only NBC of the network channels covered him.

Whoever was watching the convicted felon speak on Friday were subject to his usual ramblings, lies and attacks on our institutions - these focused on our judicial system.

As the AP reported, “Trump on Friday addressed his conviction on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records in what prosecutors have called a scheme to illegally influence the 2016 election by paying hush money to silence the accounts of women who claimed to have extramarital sex with him.

While making his comments he repeated numerous false or unsupported claims that he has made not only during the trial but while campaigning for a second term as president. His comments, made from Trump Tower, ranged from blaming the Biden administration for orchestrating the hush money case to other false claims about the trial and other issues facing the country.“

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Sample CLAIM: “This is all done by Biden and his people.”

But this 👇 was the BLOAT.

Watch Trump try to explain away why he didn’t testify. 👇

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What “Guilty” on 34 Felony Counts may cost Trump.

They may be right, they may be wrong - but pundits have weighed in on this question.

Nate Cohn - In New York Times/Siena College battleground polls in October, about 7 percent of Mr. Trump’s supporters said they would vote for Mr. Biden if Mr. Trump were found guilty in an unspecified criminal trial. This may not seem like a huge number, but anything like it would be decisive in our era of close elections. Much more recently, a Marquette Law School poll taken during the hush-money trial found that a modest lead for Mr. Trump among registered voters nationwide became a four-point Biden lead if Mr. Trump were found guilty.

But Mr. Trump doesn’t just count on the support of Republicans and MAGA loyalists in the conservative information ecosystem. His strength in the polls increasingly depends on surprising strength among voters from traditionally Democratic constituencies, like young, nonwhite and irregular voters. Many of these voters are registered as Democrats, back Democrats in races for U.S. Senate and may have even backed Mr. Biden in the last election. This is not Mr. Trump’s core of proven support. This is a group of voters whose loyalty hasn’t yet been established — let alone tested.

The Times/Siena and Marquette Law polls both suggest that these young and nonwhite voters might be especially prone to revert to their traditional partisan leanings in the event of a conviction, with Mr. Biden getting back to a far more typical lead among young and nonwhite voters. In fact, almost all of the unusual demographic patterns among young, nonwhite and irregular voters disappear when voters are asked how they would vote if Mr. Trump were convicted.

In the Times/Siena poll, 21 percent of Mr. Trump’s young supporters said they’d back Mr. Biden if there were a conviction. In comparison, only 2 percent of 65-and-older Trump supporters said the same. Similarly, 27 percent of Black voters who backed Mr. Trump flipped to Mr. Biden, compared with just 5 percent of white respondents.

(New York Times).

Nate Silver - My expectation is that Biden will see some improvement in his numbers [after the guilty verdict] — perhaps something roughly equivalent to a mini convention bounce — and the question is mostly about how steep it is and how long it persists. In particular, I’ll want to see whether any decline for Trump survives past the first debate on June 27 or instead the debate reverts the race to where it was previously.

If there isn’t some sort of bounce for Biden, however — even a temporary one — then obviously that will count as a highly bearish signal for him. Improved consumer perceptions about the economy haven’t really improved Biden’s numbers much, and nor has a period of comparatively favorable news coverage. (The “vibes” within the pundit class don’t translate in any reliable way to those among swing voters.) The poker term for being in a dicey spot but where your odds have a chance to improve is “having outs”, meaning that you might catch some good cards to redeem your position. The possibility of a criminal conviction was one of the best outs Biden had left — and if it doesn’t move the numbers, I’m not sure what will. (538)

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Transcripts you may find interesting.

The transcript of the closing arguments of the criminal case.

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/05/29/podcasts/the-daily/closing-arguments-trump-trial.html?showTranscript=1

The letter Justice Samuel Alito wrote to Senators Whitehouse and Dubin. 👇

https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/24698833/samuel-alito-letter-to-senate-judiciary-committee-on-flags.pdf?ref=wakeuptopolitics.

The letter Chief Justice Roberts wrote to Senators Whitehouse and Durbin.

Roberts (left), Whitehouse (center), Durbin (right)

The article Congressman Jamie Raskin wrote to the world.

Jamie Raskin: How to Force Justices Alito and Thomas to Recuse Themselves in the Jan. 6 Cases.

Many people have gloomily accepted the conventional wisdom that because there is no binding Supreme Court ethics code, there is no way to force Associate Justices Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas to recuse themselves from the Jan. 6 cases that are before the court.

Justices Alito and Thomas are probably making the same assumption.

But all of them are wrong.

It seems unfathomable that the two justices could get away with deciding for themselves whether they can be impartial in ruling on cases affecting Donald Trump’s liability for crimes he is accused of committing on Jan. 6. Justice Thomas’s wife, Ginni Thomas, was deeply involved in the Jan. 6 “stop the steal” movement. Above the Virginia home of Justice Alito and his wife, Martha-Ann Alito, flew an upside-down American flag — a strong political statement among the people who stormed the Capitol. Above the Alitos’ beach home in New Jersey flew another flag that has been adopted by groups opposed to President Biden.

Justices Alito and Thomas face a groundswell of appeals beseeching them not to participate in Trump v. United States, the case that will decide whether Mr. Trump enjoys absolute immunity from criminal prosecution, and Fischer v. United States, which will decide whether Jan. 6 insurrectionists — and Mr. Trump — can be charged under a statute that criminalizes “corruptly” obstructing an official proceeding. (Justice Alito said on Wednesday that he would not recuse himself from Jan. 6-related cases.)

Everyone assumes that nothing can be done about the recusal situation because the highest court in the land has the lowest ethical standards — no binding ethics code or process outside of personal reflection. Each justice decides for him- or herself whether he or she can be impartial.

Of course, Justices Alito and Thomas could choose to recuse themselves — wouldn’t that be nice? But begging them to do the right thing misses a far more effective course of action.

The U.S. Department of Justice — including the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, an appointed U.S. special counsel and the solicitor general, all of whom were involved in different ways in the criminal prosecutions underlying these cases and are opposing Mr. Trump’s constitutional and statutory claims — can petition the other seven justices to require Justices Alito and Thomas to recuse themselves not as a matter of grace but as a matter of law.

The Justice Department and Attorney General Merrick Garland can invoke two powerful textual authorities for this motion: the Constitution of the United States, specifically the due process clause, and the federal statute mandating judicial disqualification for questionable impartiality, 28 U.S.C. Section 455. The Constitution has come into play in several recent Supreme Court decisions striking down rulings by stubborn judges in lower courts whose political impartiality has been reasonably questioned but who threw caution to the wind to hear a case anyway. This statute requires potentially biased judges throughout the federal system to recuse themselves at the start of the process to avoid judicial unfairness and embarrassing controversies and reversals.

The constitutional and statutory standards apply to Supreme Court justices. The Constitution, and the federal laws under it, is the “supreme law of the land,” and the recusal statute explicitly treats Supreme Court justices like other judges: “Any justice, judge or magistrate judge of the United States shall disqualify himself in any proceeding in which his impartiality might reasonably be questioned.” The only justices in the federal judiciary are the ones on the Supreme Court.

This recusal statute, if triggered, is not a friendly suggestion. It is Congress’s command, binding on the justices, just as the due process clause is. The Supreme Court cannot disregard this law just because it directly affects one or two of its justices. Ignoring it would trespass on the constitutional separation of powers because the justices would essentially be saying that they have the power to override a congressional command.

When the arguments are properly before the court, Chief Justice John Roberts and Associate Justices Amy Coney Barrett, Neil Gorsuch, Ketanji Brown Jackson, Elena Kagan, Brett Kavanaugh and Sonia Sotomayor will have both a constitutional obligation and a statutory obligation to enforce recusal standards.

Indeed, there is even a compelling argument based on case law that Chief Justice Roberts and the other, unaffected justices should raise the matter of recusal on their own (or sua sponte). Numerous circuit courts have agreed with the Eighth Circuit that this is the right course of action when members of an appellate court are aware of “overt acts” of a judge reflecting personal bias. Cases like this stand for the idea that appellate jurists who see something should say something instead of placing all the burden on parties in a case who would have to risk angering a judge by bringing up the awkward matter of potential bias and favoritism on the bench.

But even if no member of the court raises the issue of recusal, the urgent need to deal with it persists. Once it is raised, the court would almost surely have to find that the due process clause and Section 455 compel Justices Alito and Thomas to recuse themselves. To arrive at that substantive conclusion, the justices need only read their court’s own recusal decisions.

In one key 5-to-3 Supreme Court case from 2016, Williams v. Pennsylvania, Justice Anthony Kennedy explained why judicial bias is a defect of constitutional magnitude and offered specific objective standards for identifying it. Significantly, Justices Alito and Thomas dissented from the majority’s ruling.

The case concerned the bias of the chief justice of Pennsylvania, who had been involved as a prosecutor on the state’s side in an appellate death penalty case that was before him. Justice Kennedy found that the judge’s refusal to recuse himself when asked to do so violated due process. Justice Kennedy’s authoritative opinion on recusal illuminates three critical aspects of the current controversy.

First, Justice Kennedy found that the standard for recusal must be objective because it is impossible to rely on the affected judge’s introspection and subjective interpretations. The court’s objective standard requires recusal when the likelihood of bias on the part of the judge “is too high to be constitutionally tolerable,” citing an earlier case. “This objective risk of bias,” according to Justice Kennedy, “is reflected in the due process maxim that ‘no man can be a judge in his own case.’” A judge or justice can be convinced of his or her own impartiality but also completely missing what other people are seeing.

Second, the Williams majority endorsed the American Bar Association’s Model Code of Judicial Conduct as an appropriate articulation of the Madisonian standard that “no man can be a judge in his own cause.” Model Code Rule 2.11 on judicial disqualification says that a judge “shall disqualify himself or herself in any proceeding in which the judge’s impartiality might reasonably be questioned.” This includes, illustratively, cases in which the judge “has a personal bias or prejudice concerning a party,” a married judge knows that “the judge’s spouse” is “a person who has more than a de minimis interest that could be substantially affected by the proceeding” or the judge “has made a public statement, other than in a court proceeding, judicial decision or opinion, that commits or appears to commit the judge to reach a particular result.” These model code illustrations ring a lot of bells at this moment.

Third and most important, Justice Kennedy found for the court that the failure of an objectively biased judge to recuse him- or herself is not “harmless error” just because the biased judge’s vote is not apparently determinative in the vote of a panel of judges. A biased judge contaminates the proceeding not just by the casting and tabulation of his or her own vote but by participating in the body’s collective deliberations and affecting, even subtly, other judges’ perceptions of the case.

Justice Kennedy was emphatic on this point: “It does not matter whether the disqualified judge’s vote was necessary to the disposition of the case. The fact that the interested judge’s vote was not dispositive may mean only that the judge was successful in persuading most members of the court to accept his or her position — an outcome that does not lessen the unfairness to the affected party.”

Courts generally have found that any reasonable doubts about a judge’s partiality must be resolved in favor of recusal. A judge “shall disqualify himself in any proceeding in which his impartiality might reasonably be questioned.” While recognizing that the “challenged judge enjoys a margin of discretion,” the courts have repeatedly held that “doubts ordinarily ought to be resolved in favor of recusal.” After all, the reputation of the whole tribunal and public confidence in the judiciary are both on the line.

Judge David Tatel of the D.C. Circuit emphasized this fundamental principle in 2019 when his court issued a writ of mandamus to force recusal of a military judge who blithely ignored at least the appearance of a glaring conflict of interest. He stated: “Impartial adjudicators are the cornerstone of any system of justice worthy of the label. And because ‘deference to the judgments and rulings of courts depends upon public confidence in the integrity and independence of judges,’ jurists must avoid even the appearance of partiality.” He reminded us that to perform its high function in the best way, as Justice Felix Frankfurter stated, “justice must satisfy the appearance of justice.”

The Supreme Court has been especially disposed to favor recusal when partisan politics appear to be a prejudicial factor even when the judge’s impartiality has not been questioned. In Caperton v. A.T. Massey Coal Co., from 2009, the court held that a state supreme court justice was constitutionally disqualified from a case in which the president of a corporation appearing before him had helped to get him elected by spending $3 million promoting his campaign. The court, through Justice Kennedy, asked whether, quoting a 1975 decision, “under a realistic appraisal of psychological tendencies and human weakness,” the judge’s obvious political alignment with a party in a case “poses such a risk of actual bias or prejudgment that the practice must be forbidden if the guarantee of due process is to be adequately implemented.”

The federal statute on disqualification, Section 455(b), also makes recusal analysis directly applicable to bias imputed to a spouse’s interest in the case. Ms. Thomas and Mrs. Alito (who, according to Justice Alito, is the one who put up the inverted flag outside their home) meet this standard. A judge must recuse him- or herself when a spouse “is known by the judge to have an interest in a case that could be substantially affected by the outcome of the proceeding.”

At his Senate confirmation hearing, Chief Justice Roberts assured America that “Judges are like umpires.”

But professional baseball would never allow an umpire to continue to officiate the World Series after learning that the pennant of one of the two teams competing was flying in the front yard of the umpire’s home. Nor would an umpire be allowed to call balls and strikes in a World Series game after the umpire’s wife tried to get the official score of a prior game in the series overthrown and canceled out to benefit the losing team. If judges are like umpires, then they should be treated like umpires, not team owners, team fans or players.

Justice Barrett has said she wants to convince people “that this court is not comprised of a bunch of partisan hacks.” Justice Alito himself declared the importance of judicial objectivity in his opinion for the majority in the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization decision overruling Roe v. Wade — a bit of self-praise that now rings especially hollow.

But the Constitution and Congress’s recusal statute provide the objective framework of analysis and remedy for cases of judicial bias that are apparent to the world, even if they may be invisible to the judges involved. This is not really optional for the justices.

I look forward to seeing seven members of the court act to defend the reputation and integrity of the institution. (Op-Ed in the New York Times.)

With regard to Jamie Raskin’s suggestion, I have but one reply: He expects Merrick Garland to do this?

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Some of my favorite things of the week.

Tops, of course, was that a jury, presented with facts, found Trump committed 34 felony crimes intended to hoodwink voters in the 2016 election.

Needless to say, that was also the saddest development of the week too - a former “president” deceiving the public to affect our elections.

But daily life sends small moments that please too. Here are some of mine. 👇

Touch to watch the crowds outside Trump Tower, following the May 30th verdict- guilty as charged. 👇

The signed Verdict Sheet.

Manhattan Appeals Court.

I see judges. MAGA sees “Never Trumpers” because the judges are black women.

Touch to watch.

Photo of the Day: West Side Chalker Shares the News – West Side Rag.

Chalking by Karin Schall.

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Have a great weekend. See you on Tuesday.

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