For starters let me remind everyone of two things. First, most case law is defined by Appeals Courts since they issue thousands of decisions each year and SCOTUS only grants “Cert” (chooses to hear and issue their own ruling) a handful. Second, the 11th Circuit includes two of the jurisdictions where Trump is under criminal indictment along with co-defendants in each case. Florida, and Georgia where Fulton County DA Fani Willis has a sprawling RICO case in the works against Trump and eighteen others for election interference in the 2020 election.
I’m sure you’re aware Mark Meadows who served as Trump’s last Chief of Staff and was part of all the (allegedly) criminal goings on in the various components of Trump’s Big Lie made a desperate move to get his case removed from the state proceedings in Fulton County and into federal court – in the hopes that given the physical location of the federal court he might have a more sympathetic jury pool. He’s not the only Trump co-defendant to attempt this. Much has been written about what appears to have been Meadows disastrous decision to take the stand (he really didn’t have much choice if he wanted to have a prayer of winding up with a favorable ruling) but let’s set that aside. None of those indicted in Fulton County want to face Georgia state justice (prison) and the more likely that becomes for them the more likely they are to flip and help convict Trump himself.
That brings us to this ruling from the 11th Circuit in an unrelated case. As reported in Raw Story the Pate case involves a defendant, who defines himself as a “Sovereign Citizen” (a-holes who grab up every benefit of U.S. citizenship and avail themselves of every right EXCEPT when they don’t like the obligations/responsibilities or consequences of ignoring the law) the actual statute in question is different so that case and the Fulton County case against Trump et al don’t precisely overlap. Still, Trump co-defendants and Team Trump have reason to be concerned.
In the Pate case it’s about a bogus 93 million dollar lawsuit he’d filed. He wanted it moved to federal court as the defendants had worked for the federal govt. at the time some of the events took place. He lost at the District level so he (naturally given what I said about Sovereign Citizens) took advantage of the system and appealed. Well, the 11th Circuit has just slapped him down. The linked article cites law professor Anthony Michael Kreis who says the language of Pate’s case alleging retaliatory liens sounds a good deal like what Trump co-defendants are claiming when it comes to govt. employee’s performance of official duties.
The Pate case is as I said quite different from the Trump Rico case. Pate, who claims to be the direct “heir” to the Kingdom of Morocco filed a bogus claim and wound up being charged under 18 U.S.C. § 1521, which criminalizes retaliatory liens.
“However, retaliatory liens are unlawful when made against persons included under 18 U.S.C. § 1114,” he added. “So, who are those people? ‘[A]ny officer or employee of the United States… while such officer or employee is engaged in or on account of the performance of official duties.'”
This gets a bit confusing because as Kreis notes there are differences between that statute and state law. He points out the govt. argued that the retaliatory liens were unlawful because federal officials are protected against said bad liens based on their former status as federal officials. (former is the key word in all this, and I suspect what’s to come) Kreis goes on to say:
“The 11th Cir said, ‘no.’ When Pate filed the retaliatory liens against the property, the owners were not in federal service. The court rejected that the statute’s language means the inquiry should be about why the lien was filed. Rather, the key question is when it was filed.”
Confused? I’ll confess I was and it took a re-read and some thinking for me to get it. Hopefully others are smarter than I am but just in case some are confused as I was and simply move on (there is after all a lot going on besides Trump’s legal problems) I think the key point is that the 11th Circuit seems to take the view that what matters most is when a case gets filed rather than when individuals involved worked for the federal government. Kreis says the removal statue provides for allowing individuals to move their case to federal court the language of this new ruling suggests Trump’s co-defendants won’t meet the legal standard to move their prosecutions to federal court. Kreis is clearly skeptical about the Pate case and the arguments made but equally clear the 11th Circuit seems poised to disagree with him – I assume due to the part of the decision noting the key issue was when the case at issue was filed:
I want to be very, very, very clear. These are not identical statutes and so mapping one issue onto the other is not perfectly predictive nor controlling, but it is fair to say this not the kind of news you want if you’re Mark Meadows, Jeff Clark, or the among the GOP electors.”
To sum it all up, it doesn’t look like the 11th Circuit will “rescue” Trump’s co-defendants (or Trump) from Georgia state courts. As I said earlier given that Willis took her time to build a solid case that’s bad news for a lot of people being tried alongside Trump. The more it looks like they could wind up doing time in a Georgia state prison the more they will be willing to allow their lawyers to cut a cooperation deal.
And that is very bad news for Trump. He is losing the ability to control things both in GA and elsewhere, especially with co-defendants starting to find non Trump paid for representation. In Georgia in particular he’s the big rat in a sack full of rats tossed into the river and all of the smaller rats know exactly who’s responsible for their situation. If the trial of Powell and Chesebro that will start later this month starts out badly for them expect more GA co-defendants to flip on Trump. It could well be that by the end of the year or early next year enough will have flipped that only Trump and 4-6 are left to put on trial. That means one more trial and Trump will have to be in court every day for it. Between that and the DC trial on January 6 charges he’s not going to be able to campaign except on weekends and holidays.
And remember one last thing. Both the imminent trial and when Trump himself is at the defense table the Georgia stuff will be televised. Live.
“And remember one last thing. Both the imminent trial and when Trump himself is at the defense table the Georgia stuff will be televised. Live.”
Whereupon Trump will have to decide whether his actions will be performative or factual.
Of course the facts don’t support him, and he IS Trump, so watch for a TV ‘performance’ that shows him as the bloviating moron he really is, and sinks him.
AWESOME, can’t wait!