Jury selection for Donald Trump's federal election interference case
will begin in March of next year and
that is according to a new decision by US District Judge, Tanya Chutkan.
Now, just a quick reminder of the indictment and
the counts that he's facing in that particular case.
Again, it has to do with election interference, conspiracy to obstruct
an official proceeding, obstruction of and attempt to obstruct an official
proceeding, conspiracy against rights, but they all again relate to the months
long attempt to stay in office despite losing the 2020 presidential election.
Now, the trial date actually falls in the middle of the Republican presidential
primaries, and it's going to take place, the jury selection specifically,
on the day of the North Dakota Caucus and the day before Super Tuesday.
And during this hearing on Monday, Chutkan heard arguments from Trump's lawyers and
federal prosecutors about when the case should be set for trial.
Special counsel Jack Smith proposed that the trial start in January with jury
selection beginning in December of this year,
while Trump's team said that the trial should be pushed back until April of
2026 after the presidential election.
Now, Chutkan disagreed with both parties on this saying that the special
counsel's team is proposing a trial that would begin too soon, and
Trump's proposal of a 2026 trial was not reasonable.
She says, and I quote, these proposals are obviously very far apart,
neither of them is acceptable.
Discovery in 2023 is not sitting in a warehouse with boxes of paper looking
at every single page, kind of referencing how the discovery process, for
the most part, especially on the prosecution side, is pretty much complete.
So, March 4 is the exact day when they're going to do jury selection, and
Trump's team obviously didn't like the judge's ruling.
So, I wanna go to a video featuring NBC News Justice and
Intelligence correspondent Ken DeLeon, here's what he had to say.
>> Speaker 2: And immediately after she made her ruling,
trump attorney John Larrow put on the record.
He said, we will not be able to provide adequate representation.
So, there's no doubt in our judgment that this trial date is inconsistent with
President Trump's right to due process and effective assistance of counsel.
So, laying the groundwork for an appeal there but
legal experts say this is really the judge's call.
This is a tough issue to get overturned in the appeals court, obviously,
the Trump team is gonna try to do that.
But Judge Tanya Chutkan heard from both sides in this hearing, and
she heard the Trump team make an impassioned plea that there's just so
much material and discovery here, so many witness interviews, so
many transcripts of phone calls and emails and
communications that they needed years and years to go through all this material.
But the prosecution, the special counsel countered that that just wasn't the case.
>> Speaker 1: What's hilarious about the argument is a former Trump lawyer was on
Cable News over the weekend, and made the declarative statement that Donald Trump is
intelligent and doesn't really need to do much preparation, [LAUGH] which again,
counters the argument that you just heard from the defense according to NBC News and
their reporting on this.
>> Speaker 3: Yeah, and if Donald Trump wanted to study those documents,
he had plenty of time, he just needs to go to the bathroom at or
do the where was he holding it, in some sort of ballroom?
>> Speaker 1: Right? >> Speaker 3: He just goes
through the ballroom and look through all those documents,
why'd you take him in the first place?
>> Speaker 1: Right, so again, those statements made by his former lawyer were
in regard to the classified documents case.
But in regard to the case we're talking about right now,
it's the federal case with election interference.
>> Speaker 3: And maybe you should have consulted with those lawyers a little
longer before you decided to try to steal the election.
Apparently, you thought you had plenty of time between November and
January to cook up a fake elector plot.
So, now how much time do you take, I mean,
I thought you got clearance on it already from your lawyers.
That's why you did it, right?
You thought the fake electors and
having them sign fake documents was perfectly legal.
So, that case should be ready to go, what are you waiting on?
That's the easiest thing in the world, come on, man.
Look, I know that the legal process takes much longer than regular
human beings anticipate.
It's maddening, I mean, look, here we are in August and
they're like, we could never have a trial by March, really?
We used to have trials that were way faster than this and by the way,
some of the defendants are asking for speedy trials.
And so, they're like, no, this is waiting too long.
He's like, it's not waiting long enough, et cetera.
Can they actually get ready by that date, of course they can, right?
But I hate the timing, I mean, it's on the day of the North Dakota primary,
this gives Doug Bergam a huge advantage [LAUGH].
>> Speaker 1: Okay, that's obviously a joke, but I do think that the timing helps
to consolidate the notion in the minds of Republican voters that this is purely
political, it's nothing more than a witch hunt.
Now, they believe that already, but I think that this provides in their minds,
more merit to that argument.
>> Speaker 3: Yeah, no kidding aside, I really hate the timing.
And so, my preference would be to start earlier.
My preference would be to start right now, get it resolved one way or another.
And Maggie, you should want it resolved one way or another.
It's starting the day before Super Tuesday, well,
how the hell do you know what's gonna happen?
And by the way, now this is Fanny Willis had also asked for
March 4, and the New York case is also gonna start in March.
Why did these prosecutors wait so goddamn long?
And by the way, here, I'll give a credit to the Trump side on this one, okay?
Because the prosecutors say, no, we can go right now.
And Trump says, I need more time, and prosecutor's like, no,
you don't need more time.
Well, brother, you took two and a half years to bring this case, right?
So, that is a massive problem for the prosecution.
And of course, the reality is Jack Smith didn't take that long.
Stupid Merrick Garland, who just sat there like a lump on a log for
two goddamn years before he pointed Jack Smith, because that's what Democrats do.
Total inaction, total incompetence, so, >> Speaker 1: I mean obviously,
this is a question that calls for speculation, but do you think that it's
incompetence, or do you think this was like, the timing is politically motivated?
>> Speaker 3: Well, I'm gonna need six months to answer that question [LAUGH].
>> Speaker 1: Okay, fair enough.
>> Speaker 3: No, but seriously, I don't know the answer, and
maybe the different prosecutors have different answers.
So, it's not on Jack Smith, he went as quickly as he could,
as soon as he was appointed.
So, that one to me, is totally, definitely not Jack Smith.
Now, when you go to New York, that guy didn't wanna bring this case at all.
>> Speaker 1: He did not want to move forward with criminal charges.
In fact, two of the prosecutors that were working on the fraudulent documents
slash hush money payments case ended up quitting because they felt
that Alvin Bragg wasn't taking the prosecution seriously.
And even though they had adequate evidence,
he didn't wanna file those criminal charges.
But ultimately, he did and I'm curious what changed his mind?
>> Speaker 3: Yeah, I have a sense of it, it's the donors and why do I say that?
So, Alvin Bragg comes in, SiVance is the legendary prosecutor,
not necessarily in a good way, if you ask me, but before that, and
he dragged his heel, dragged his heels.
They could have charged this guy as Michael Kotas co-conspirator was being
charged five years ago.
>> Speaker 1: Right?
>> Speaker 3: And so, those New York prosecutors didn't, like that's what MAGA
doesn't understand, they didn't want to charge Trump, because charging Trump makes
it a giant political issue, and they don't wanna deal with that.
They're loser Democrats, they don't want any hassles in their lives ever.
And back then, it was like, whoa, whoa, that's charging the elites and
what if they charge other Democrats and that would affect us, so don't do that.
But after a while, it got pressure mounted that isn't anybody gonna
charge Trump with anything when he broke 285 laws, right?
And finally, the pressure built up enough in New York that Bragg was, okay,
I didn't mean to have all those prosecutors working on the case quit cuz I
wasn't doing anything, I meant to charge him.
I think Alvin Bragg's the worst of them, like people say,
he shouldn't have brought those charges because they're weak.
I don't agree with that at all, that is a slammed-on cases.
Coca Spirit already went to jail,
those charges should have been brought years ago.
So, that decision was definitely political, but
half of the politics was to avoid charging Trump in the first place.
So, now when you get to Fannie Willis in Atlanta, who knows, who knows?
But it doesn't matter, at the end of the day, the Democrats invite the charge of
corruption, either because they were corrupt and waited for
it to affect the elections, or because of their usual pathetic incompetence,
they wind up getting stuck with a corruption charge allegation against them.
And I'm not gonna fight it, that's their goddamn problem,
why didn't they just act when they should have?
That's because they never take action for their voters, never,
unless absolutely forced to.
My guess is overall for the whole thing, they thought Trump would go away, and
when he didn't go away, they're like, golly gee, we have to do our jobs.
>> Speaker 1: Yeah, that could be it, again, we're speculating as to why these
decisions were made for these charges to be filed when they were.
Now, I wanna end on one other note.
Remember, when it comes to the federal prosecution case having to do with
Trump's involvement in election interference,
the judge made it very clear that the condition of his bond was that he was not
to engage in any kind of witness tampering, intimidation, don't
try to have your case adjudicated through public opinion, that kind of thing.
It appears that he's not really interested in abiding by these types of rules.
In fact, Donald Trump just today on Truth Social,
reacted to the US district judge's decision and said this of Jack Smith,
deranged Jack Smith and his team of thugs who were caught going to the White House
just prior to indicting the 45th President of the United States.
An absolute no no, he says, have been working on this witch hunt for
almost three years, but decided to bring to bring it smack in the middle of crooked
Joe Biden's political opponents' campaign against him.
By the way, let me remind you all that he pressured Vladimir Zelensky to announce
a scam investigation into Joe Biden, which ended up getting him impeached for
the second time by the House of Representatives.
So, what he is accusing our justice system of doing to him was something that
he absolutely wanted done to Joe Biden in order to give him a leg up in the 2020
presidential election.
But nonetheless, let me give you the rest of the statement.
He says, election interference today, a biased Trump hating judge gave
me only a two-month extension, just what our corrupt government wanted.
Super Tuesday, I will appeal, so clearly, he's planning on appealing this decision,
we'll see where it goes.
>> Speaker 3: Okay, one thing in favor of Trump, one thing against,
first against him.
He always and it's an interesting tactic that he uses,
it's probably a good political tactic, but it's, of course, nothing but a lie.
He says election interference, he's being charged with election interference.
Remember, his team is the one that spread all the fake news in the first place in
2016 on Facebook.
And then anytime there was an allegation against him, he said fake news.
He turns around everything, everything is projection, right?
He calls Jack Smith the most normal, boring prosecutor, a deranged thug.
If there's one person who's deranged here, gee, I wonder who it is,
it's obviously Trump.
A thug, a lifelong criminal, that's Donald Trump.
So, everything is projection, but I and
the jury came in in the middle of this story.
>> Speaker 3: Okay.
>> I decided in answer to your question, I thought about it one other way and
decided no, these prosecutions are in some ways definitely political.
>> Speaker 1: Yeah.
>> Speaker 3: Here's why, cuz I thought if Trump had not run again,
would they have brought these prosecutions forward?
And my guess is no, because Democrats would have thought,
we don't wanna rile up the Republicans.
We don't wanna prosecute a former president cuz then we might get
prosecuted, it's the elite protection racket.
>> Speaker 1: It did appear as though the pursuit of criminal charges became a lot
more serious after it became clear that Trump was planning on running for
president again.
That's my read of it, I just think both things can be true.
I think that it could be both political, the timing at least, and
the accusations against him, the charges brought against him have merit.
>> A 100% and I don't want anybody to misinterpret what I'm saying.
I'm saying they should have charged him no matter what,
but they made it political because they didn't wanna charge him and
only when he decided to run, they're like, okay, panic, panic, panic.
Everybody get your cases together and
let's charge him, because it turns out he's not going away.
>> Speaker 1: I mean, I think Alvin Bragg, again, is the best example of that.
Someone who literally lost two of his prosecutors because he didn't want to
bring forward criminal charges against Trump.
And then later, as election season starts to ramp up, all of a sudden,
surprise indictment coming from New York.
>> Speaker 3: Yeah, last thing guys, look,
my theory is that money controls everything in politics.
And so, what politicians do can be traced back 99% to the money,
to the donors, right?
And the donors want the elites protected.
And so, when they thought Trump might not run, the way to protect the elites was not
to charge anyone who was a former president, right?
But when Trump decided to run, the elites and the establishment do hate Trump.
That doesn't mean he's innocent, he did do those things,
but the establishment does hate him, right?
And so, then they're like, okay, the way to protect the establishment and
the elites has now flipped to charging Donald Trump instead of not charging him
and that's why they're doing what they're doing.