  Friday, April 14, 2023

TODD ZWILLICH

Deputy DC Bureau Chief, VICE News

Washington, D.C. Bureau
@toddzwillich

State Rep. Justin Jones of Nashville speaks outside the Capitol on April 10, 2023 in Nashville, Tennessee. (Seth Herald/Getty Images)

Tennessee Three and me

Two Black Tennessee lawmakers are back in the state House, barely a week after Republicans expelled them. To say the expulsions backfired is a drastic understatement. Almost no one outside their districts knew who Justin Jones, Justin Pearson, and their colleague Gloria Johnson were before Republicans used their super-majority to punish them. Now they're symbols not only of their gun-control cause, but of the increasingly aggressive anti-democratic impulses of a GOP teetering into authoritarianism.

VICE News Tonight's Alexis Johnson sat down with Pearson just before the Shelby County officials reinstated him this week. Check out this great piece produced by Simone Perez and Nour El Hoda Seleem.

What were those Tennessee Republicans thinking? Well… listen for yourself. You'll hear elected officials who are fully signed onto the idea that they're at war with their political opponents, and that the very survival of the republic is at stake. Once that's your mindset, many things beyond expelling protesting colleagues can be justified. If you open this newsletter regularly (congrats, and thanks, btw) you already know that. But now the evidence is everywhere, all at once.

Republicans are using their majorities to go way beyond partisan policy fights like abortion and guns. They're turfing the self-rule of cities populated with Black and brown people, cracking down on prosecutors who might pursue accountability they don't like, and, of course, banning books. Back in Washington, the GOP House majority uses its power to interfere in a local criminal investigation threatening the leader of the GOP, who also tried to steal the last presidential election. They're also working hard to undermine anyone who investigates him for it.

So in the states, the contemporary GOP is using its power to assault democratic rights and silence dissent. In Congress, it's using it to undermine the rule of law and accountability. And the leader, Donald Trump, casts it all as an apocalyptic "final battle" for America. Republicans in the Tennessee House of Representatives have gotten the memo.

We'll see if the Tennessee Three's new fame translates into real galvanizing politics for Democrats and democratic-minded independents and Republicans. There are signs average voters are not interested in being part of the GOP's authoritarian lurch. And there are signs Dems are finding their feet in fighting against anti-democratic demagoguery. But the stakes involved are way more interesting, and vital, than any horse-race polling will be.

Because Tennessee Three is just the beginning.

WHAT'S HAPPENING

Home for wayward Tinas

Before we get to Trump, Dominion, Fox News and some very pissed off judges, time to check in on Mesa County, Colo. offender Tina Peters. The former county clerk and legendary conspiracy sorceress was sentenced to 120 hours of community service, four months home of confinement (with an ankle monitor), and a $750 fine after her conviction for obstructing investigators from collecting an iPad from her on a judge's order in February 2022.

Peters avoided jail time in this brush with the criminal justice system. While community service sentences remind most people of picking up trash along the highway, "nothing could be further from the truth," Adam Lewis, Mesa County's director of judicial services, told me.

Offenders generally get to choose from a wide range of businesses, churches, cemeteries, and nonprofits to complete their community service in a "meaningful" way, he said.

Peters is appealing this sentence. But she may not be so lucky in October, when she faces multiple felony charges for fraud and impersonation in a scheme to steal data from voting machines.

We withhold, you decide

Dominion Voting System's $1.6 billion suit against Fox News is supposed to get underway Monday in Delaware. Jury selection started yesterday. But Fox's lawyers didn't even make it out of pretrial motions without pissing the judge right off.

Judge Eric Davis sanctioned Fox's lawyers, suggesting that he suspects them of lying about Rupert Murdoch. And then he appointed an outside lawyer to look into whether Fox's attorneys withheld evidence on the eve of the trial.

This all goes back to how much control Murdoch wields over Fox News. While attorneys correctly ID'd Murdoch as Executive Chairman of parent company Fox Corp. in court documents, they apparently avoided disclosing that he's also an executive officer on the board at Fox News. Dominion's lawyers say they've missed out on a bunch of documents they would have access to had they known about Murdoch's role. And how much direct involvement Murdoch has in Fox's News decisions could definitely matter in this case.

Davis and the Fox's lawyers had a very tense exchange where the judge said he was "very concerned that there's been a misrepresentation to the court." Not the best start for Fox! But Fox PR says Murdoch's position has been public record for years, and it was "referenced by Dominion's own attorney during his deposition."

Couldn't you see Murdoch's reaction to all this drama winding up as a storyline on "Succession"? Thanks to his divorce lawyers… not a chance!

Abby: there are tapes

Meanwhile a former Fox producer says her one-time employer is holding back tapes of Trump operatives and propagandists admitting they had no evidence of a stolen election after the 2020 vote. That could also be pretty material in the Dominion case.

Abby Grossberg amended her lawsuits against Fox alleging that she made tapes in Fox's control room of Rudy Giuliani, Sidney Powell, and a high-ranking Trump campaign spokesperson separately discussing the lack of evidence supporting various stolen-elections claims. Grossberg gave the tapes to Fox lawyers, who she says haven't disclosed them in the Dominion case or other lawsuits.

About that Trump campaign official: Take a listen! You'll hear a member of the Trump campaign telling a producer that there were no problems with voting machines in Georgia.

Fox's PR operation says "FOX produced the supplemental information from Ms. Grossberg when we first learned it."

Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani at a Get Out the Vote Bus Tour campaign event for Republican gubernatorial nominee for New York Rep. Lee Zeldin (R-NY), November 01, 2022 in Staten Island (Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images)

T.W.I.S.™ Notes

When Trump got charged last week, he entered a new era of legal jeopardy. Lawsuits and potential indictments are on the horizon or already raining down. Will it be a hot accountability summer? I don't know, but it's most definitely a smorgasbord This Week in Subpoenas.

- Return of the Fifth Lord

Trump came back to New York City yesterday for a second deposition in the New York Attorney General's $250 million civil suit against him, his kids, and the Trump Org. AG Leticia James alleges that the Trumps routinely manipulated real estate values to defraud banks and insurers. The case could make it nearly impossible for the Trumps to do business in New York.

Trump was already deposed in this case once in January, when he took the Fifth more than 400 times. This time he answered questions for about seven hours (after attacking James, as usual.) That could help him avoid a jury drawing a negative inference from his initial refusal to answer questions.

- Trump calls time

On to the next case. Trump is seeking a delay to his upcoming civil trial for rape, saying the deluge of publicity around his indictment in the Stormy Daniels case will bias prospective jurors. Former advice columnist E. Jean Carroll accuses Trump of raping her in a department store dressing room in the 1990's, which he denies. A related suit accuses Trump of defaming Carroll for saying she was lying about the alleged incident.

Joe Tacopina, who's repping Trump in both cases, wrote the judge complaining that jurors will have allegations of Trump's sexual affairs "ringing in their ears" if the trial starts as scheduled on April 25.

- Enjoin the silence

Trump is still trying to keep his former veep from making a peep. Mike Pence said last week he won't appeal a federal court's order that he testify in front of the grand jury investigating Jan. 6 and the coup plot. But Trump appealed that decision this week and is still trying to keep Pence quiet on executive privilege grounds.

Trump's privilege claims have been getting knocked down all over the place. Aides have been ordered to testify in both the Jan. 6 case and the Mar-a-Lago documents probe (TWO of Trump's National Intelligence directors were questioned this week!). Trump's attorney in the documents case, Evan Corcoran, who was ordered to testify, was spotted in the federal courthouse in DC.

Trump's rogues' gallery of criminal miscreants is watching closely. Even Lev "Fraud Guarantee" Parnas has a take!

Suits for all seasons

The lawsuits are absolutely flying, so here's a roundup of the rest.

- Bragg v Jordan — Manhattan AG Alvin Bragg sued GOP Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan, who he accuses of abuse of power and attempted interference in Bragg's criminal investigation of Trump. Bragg is hoping to quash Jordan's subpoena of former Manhattan Special Assistant AG Mark Pomerantz, saying Jordan has no jurisdiction to get involved in local and state judicial matters.

A federal judge rejected Bragg's request for an injunction, so a hearing is scheduled for April 17. On Monday Jordan is bringing his Trump-is-above-the-law show to Manhattan, where he's scheduled a field hearing on NYC crime. (The idea is that Bragg should be focusing on NYC's violent crime while giving alleged white-collar criminals the impunity they're entitled to? I think?) Meanwhile, Bragg's suit also revealed that his office has been deluged with racist threats since he charged Trump.

BTW, Trump claimed earlier this week that courthouse cops and staff at his arraignment were crying with "tears pouring down" their faces as they apologized for booking him. The staff says that's bullshit.

- Trump v Cohen — Former fixer Michael Cohen answered questions dozens of times in the grand jury investigation that led to Trump's 34-count indictment. Trump would like Cohen to think twice before he talks any more. Trump filed a $500 million lawsuit against Cohen, alleging Cohen violated attorney-client privilege and spread falsehoods about him in the media. Don't forget that Trump and his lawyer were fined nearly $1 million for abusing the courts with bogus lawsuits!

- Schwartz v. Fox Corp. — Fox Corp. investor Robert Schwartz sued the company, saying allowing its hosts to air election conspiracies caused "long-term damage" to shareholder value. Fox is facing $4 billion in potential liability from the Dominion and Smartmatic defamation suits.

I SAID WHAT I SAID

"Don't buy it."

— Former Capitol Police Sgt. Aguilino Gonell, to a federal judge hearing Jan. 6 rioter Robert Sanford's expressions of remorse at sentencing.

ON OUR RADAR

Buckingham malice — We've seen this before: a rural community's entire elections staff quits, unable to cope with harassment and baseless conspiracy theories. This time it's Buckingham County, Va., where the local staff of four election workers, including the registrar, are now gone. Of course, the question now is who can replace them who will be acceptable to the local GOP officials who helped drive them out in the first place.

Giving tanks — The man who famously threw a fire extinguisher at Capitol Police officers during the Jan. 6 melee was sentenced this week. Robert Sanford, an ex-firefighter from Pennsylvania, got four years and four months in prison. Sandford's lawyers argued for leniency for his attacks on police, noting that he did not enter the Capitol building.

Exit stage far right — Tennessee Republicans weren't the only ones on an expulsion tear this week. Wednesday, Republicans in the Arizona House expelled GOP Rep. Liz Harris for promoting a bunch of wild conspiracy theories that tried to connect Dems and Republicans to bribes, drug cartels and real estate scams in the service of election fraud.

Harris, a QAnon supporter, says she's thrilled to be expelled because now she can get down to the real work of exposing election conspiracies. But in the world of the Arizona GOP, she's not fringe. Narrowly-failed governor candidate Kari Lake thinks Harris is about to become "an icon."