Alex Jones in trouble again.
So, Alex Jones lost the defamation lawsuit with the Sandy Hook victims families and
now he's facing a jury trial to figure out how much
exactly he's going to have to pay them.
And ahead of this trial, Alex Jones's lawyers made a really unusual request.
Here's what they filed in a motion on Tuesday.
Evidence on the topics of white supremacy and
right wing extremism is not relevant to the issue that will be before the jury and
would also be unfairly prejudicial and inflammatory to Jones.
Evidence related to those topics is irrelevant, would be an attack on Jones's
character and play to the emotions of the jury and distract from the main issues.
Of course, members of the jury, maybe they've been on the internet or
Google Jones once or twice.
But anyway, Jones's attorney said it is a transparent effort to smear
the defendants by associating them with unpopular ideas and
people which themselves are not a part of this case.
The documents specifically mentions two potential witnesses,
the lawyers for Sandy Hook parents.
Those who brought the cases before the court may call upon Dr. Heidi Beirich,
who formerly led the Southern Poverty Law Center's Intelligence Project.
And Oren Segal, the Vice president of the Anti-Intefamation League's Center on
extremism.
And so, this is all a part of a larger effort by Jones's attorneys to ensure,
that his character isn't slandered, right?
They wanna make him look like a good guy and rehabilitate his image.
And sadly this strategy might actually work, there's precedent for
people doing exactly what Jones's attorneys are doing.
If the judge does rule, that this evidence cannot be included in the trial,
it wouldn't be the first time that ties to far right extremists
have been banned from a courtroom.
For example, the judge presiding over Kyle Rittenhouse's trial band prosecutors
from bringing forward evidence that he posed with the Proud Boys.
And yesterday some new court documents were released from Jones lawsuit and
those documents covered his deposition and he denies any responsibility.
For the suffering, for
the families that were affected by him calling Sandy Hook a host.
And we have some excerpts from that transcript of his deposition.
Jones said no, I don't accept responsibility.
Of course, because I wasn't trying to cause pain and suffering.
And this is they are being used and their children who can't be brought back,
being used to destroy the First Amendment.
Of course, it's all about the First Amendment.
If questioning public events and
free speech is banned because it might hurt somebody's feelings.
We are not in America anymore.
They can change the channel.
They can come out and say I'm wrong, they have free speech.
Well, Alex jones has been using his free speech to spread right wing
nationalism and extremism.
He's an advocate for white supremacy and
I think he should face the consequences of his actions strength.
What do you think?
>> So, first of all, shows congrats,
they're gonna share your First Amendment thoughts with the jury.
>> [LAUGH] >> Problem solved, right?
You have a right to say him.
We also have a right to record them and
we have the right to use them in legal proceedings.
They always use this like First Amendment, like, I've got a right to have an opinion,
so you have to agree with it.
No, I don't.
That's not how opinions work, right?
And in this case there's a novel one.
I have a right to have an opinion.
That's why you're not allowed to share it with anyone else.
Wait, how is that part of the right?
It's just a thing you made up, all right?
Now, in this case though, it's a legal proceeding.
So there's nuance to it.
As Jessica explained, I'm going to give details on that in a second to but
get a load of what they are quite literally saying.
If you show the jury how prejudiced our client is,
it will prejudice the jury against our clients on.
Now, Alex Jones is worried about prejudice, okay?
I mean, what an unbelievably ironic argument.
Now, look, if the jury finds out that he's an incredible racist,
They might not like him.
Well, is he an incredible racist?
Yeah, I know that's why we don't wanna show him, okay?
[LAUGH] And remember the his lawyer makes it sound like,
they're just gonna randomly talk about these right wing groups and
these extremist groups and these racist groups.
I mean, in the middle of our trial for no recent.
No, that's not how it works,
they're gonna talk about those groups in connection to Alex Jones.
If they're not connected to Alex jones, of course the jury, the judge would say, no,
you can't randomly talk about those groups in the middle of this trial,
they got nothing to do with this trial.
No, they have to prove that those groups are in some way connected to Alex Jones.
And they go, because why there's many different potential reasons why it
might be a motive, maybe, like, hey, you know what, he doesn't like those
group of people, that's why he lied about him, I don't know if that's the case, but
that's their job to sort that out in court.
Now, the reason why it might work is our system and
I've said this in many instances, and this is ironically an old school
conservative opinion, I have a judicially conservative opinion.
The court constantly keeps out evidence to protect the defendant.
And so, in some cases where the evidence is irrelevant to the crime,
it makes sense.
But oftentimes it'll be very relevant to the crime and of course, like,
no, no, we're gonna keep it out, protect the defendant completely.
Why?
We're supposed to get to justice.
Present evidence, let the jury decide.
So Kyle Rittenhouse case a pretty good one.
He goes to what he perceives to be a black lives matter protest.
And they, he perceives that a plastic bag being thrown at him is life threatening.
So he kills that guy,
he perceives that a skateboard hitting him is life threatening, so he kills that guy.
But he went with a weapon too, what he perceived to be an African American
protest, him making a white supremacist sign with a white supremacist
group would be directly relevant to motive.
And of course, like no way, no way.
And funny how white right wing defendants or
all of a sudden showing a lot more leeway.
Like all of a sudden, my God, we gotta protect the hell out of these guys,
so we're not gonna let any evidence and
that would show you what kind of a monster they are.
So, they haven't ruled on this as far as I know yet.
It's what Alex Jones's lawyer is asking for.
What I'm afraid is that it's gonna work, but it should not work if it's not
relevant to the case, that's fair, but if it's relevant to his motives or
other reasons then you should definitely allow it in.
>> Yeah, they'll argue relevance to this specific part of the case,
I suppose Jake and you have the legal background.
In fact, one of the things that you just said that was provocative, I thought was
the notion, and I never really considered it this way that right wingers in
court are somehow given a broader birth oftentimes than those on the left,
it's I never really thought of it that way.
I do think of the justice system in America as wildly imperfect and awful and
just this mechanism that we set up that constantly frustrates us because it
doesn't really do anything in the way of justice.
That's why it's such a great day when once in a while you know some decisions
are handed down that seem to be on the correct side of things.
But, I thought your comment about the sort of general way that rulings
are made in court was intriguing.
Do you really think that the right is given a broader birth and
the justice system than is the left?
>> 100%.
So let me explain why, and it's not just the right wing,
it depends on who the judge is and how much they empathize with the defendant.
They're human, they make those kind of judgment calls all the time.
That's why when you had a Stanford student who raped someone behind a dumpster,
the judge said, he already lost a swimming scholarship.
Cuz the judge thinks there but for the grace of God goes my son.
And I wouldn't want him being you know suffering for
just a little rape behind a dumpster.
And so, they gave a very very very light sentence the case in I believe Ohio
where the kid claimed affluenza that he was so
rich, he didn't know the consequences of his actions.
The judge said yes that, that was a real defense and he got off now why?
Cuz the judge is rich.
And the judge empathizes and goes, yeah,
my kids don't know the consequences of their actions either.
You're totally innocent go, right?
Kyle Rittenhouse's judge, in that case, it was more political.
That judge was obviously massively right wing,
whatever the prosecutors offered all of a sudden this conservative judge was like,
no, no, no, no, no to everything the prosecutors say, defense.
I love the defense.
All of a sudden conservative judge loves the defense.
No, that was one of the most biased judges I have ever seen.
So, now are there a lot of poorer judges?
No.
So, even if you leave race out,
do poor defendants have a tougher time with a massive bias?
The judges have?
Yes, yes, they do.
>> I think it's a huge problem that when, when people imagine the courts and
I'm guilty of this as well.
It's this like institution that we imagine in our heads.
But it's really up to people, People who are judges.
It's up to people to enforce the law.
And you think about what it takes to become a judge.
Law school's expensive.
You have to get good grades all the way up to the point of getting into good schools,
you have to go to good schools to get into good law schools and
then go on to become a judge and get good clerkships before that.
And so, people who are wealthy have the upper hand, they're wealthy.
People who grew up with money become judges.
They're probably going to sympathize with people exactly like,
the rapist in the Stanford case.
And that's really unfortunate.
But something that Jake said, and
I'm glad we have you here because you have a legal mind.
And I was curious what your thoughts would be on this.
But I really like the argument, that it's a part of the larger motive for
Kyle Rittenhouse to show up with a gun.
It's a part of his larger motive.
He's a right wing extremist and that's exactly why he was there that night.
That's exactly why he shot those people.
His life was absolutely not an in danger.
We all know that,
the judge absolutely did an awful job giving jury instructions in that case.
And I'm sure if we had a better judge, it would probably be a different result.
But also, Alex Jones had a larger agenda here.
He's a right wing extremist.
He wants people to have guns like crazy in the United States of America.
And he was following a political agenda by saying that Sandy Hook was a host.
So, it does plan to motive and I hope the prosecuting attorneys are watching
the show tonight and heard you make that argument.
>> Yeah, you're right.
I think that's one of the more compelling cases I've heard for
that being admissible.
So yeah, bravo.
>> So, my favorite part of the story is when you guys complimented me on my legal
background, okay?
>> [LAUGH] One last thing I get to Jane, can I say?
One last thing I keep thinking,
well, where is Alex Jones getting all this money?
I mean these are these are expensive judgments that are being brought against
him and this is an expensive process, the legal process.
He has anonymous donors who are sending him money.
So, there's a there's a well funded right wing blast furnace of
hate that is considered is throwing considerable amounts of money,
Alex Jones way for these legal fights and beyond.
>> You know what Mark, I'm gonna use my legal mind one more time.
Okay.
So, but seriously, that's such a great point because if I was the lawyer, I would
also argue, look Alex Jones declared fake bankruptcy and the judge wouldn't let him
because he's trying to hide his money, but that's not his only source of money.
We talked about how he scams his own viewers saying,
you're gonna lose vital your male vitality.
Look at your lucky for you, I have male vitality pills here, right?
>> [LAUGH] >> So, that's how he gets
a lot of his money.
But now to Mark's point,
there's anonymous people sending him millions of dollars through Bitcoin.
But his fan base like, and Kyle Rittenhouse got millions of dollars for
his legal defense fund from his fan base, right?
But the fan base, if they can prove it to be linked to those extremist groups
are linked to right wing groups that are in that category or linked to just racist.
Well, that's funding Alex Jones that would be totally relevant to the case.
So, that's why it's important to have a real decision here and I get it.
If it doesn't have any new with the case it shouldn't be allowed in.
But if there's a logical argument for why it affects the case,
yes, the jury should definitely hear it.