Clash ERUPTS between Trump and his CLOSEST allies

You’re watching the legal breakdown. Glenn, we have a feud erupting within Trump world. So, just days ago, Donald Trump’s tariffs were deemed unconstitutional, were deemed illegal by the Court of International Trade that included uh one judge who Donald Trump himself appointed as well as another Republican judge and one Democratic appointed judge. Donald Trump decided to rail against the system here uh posting on truth on the truth social, I was new to Washington and it was suggested that I use the Federalist Society as a recommending source on judges. I did so openly and freely, but then realized that they were under the thumb of a real sleas bag named Leonard Leo, a bad person who in his own way probably hates America. And so this is an organization who have been at the forefront of remaking the federal judiciary in this conservative mold. And so what does it say that Donald Trump is now opting to attack these this organization and this person? And do you think it’s going to have consequences for him down the line? Yeah, this is not going to end well for Donald Trump, I predict, Brian. So, first of all, Leonard Leo and the Federalist Society could always be counted on to funnel to the White House the most conservative judges and potential Supreme Court justices that exist in the United States of America. But what’s happening, Donald Trump’s DOJ is going in and today’s reporting is that they are losing 96% of the time. Let me just pause there because what federal prosecutors are forever touting, bragging about in an unseammly way in this former federal prosecutor’s opinion is that we win 99% of our cases. I never bragged that and I never won 99% of my cases, but that’s what they’re always boasting and crowing about. And now Donald Trump and Pam Bondi’s DOJ is losing 96% of the cases, the Trump cases that are being being argued in court. So, what does Donald Trump conclude? He concludes all of the judges are bad. Here’s the problem. Many of them are his own appointees. Many of them are Reagan appointees, George HW Bush appointees, George W. Bush appointees. So, he has to find someone to blame, right? It can’t be that he’s acting lawlessly. It has to be that all of the judges left, right, and center are wrong. And who has provided him with most of those judges? Leonard Leo and the Federalist Society. So he has to blame Leonard Leo for the decisions these judges are making. Donald Trump is almost literally biting the hand that feeds him judges. Here’s the thing. These judges are getting it right. When you look at the evidence in these cases, um, they’re calling it the way they see it by the facts, the law, and the Constitution, these are not close cases. Whether it’s the way he’s treating Harvard University, the way he’s trying to punish law firms, the way he’s trying to stiff USAD contractors, these are not difficult or challenging cases. And what I will say from the staunchly conservative judges that are produced by the Federalist Society for Donald Trump’s consideration, they’re remaining loyal to the Constitution by and large. And that is why Donald Trump is losing. So he’s cutting off one of the only spiggots that he had for these ultra-conservative judges by lashing out in really what sounds to be defamatory terms potentially about Leonard Leo. But when you bite the hand that feeds you, fewer and fewer people are going to be willing to feed you. And I see this as a real losing proposition for Donald Trump to overtly and viciously attack the Leonard Leos and the Federalist societies of our sort of sad uh uh moment in our nation’s history. This is not going to work to Donald Trump’s advantage. Do you have any concern that by virtue of the administration levying these attacks on people who, by the way, let’s let’s be perfectly clear, these judges are as far-right as it gets, that he’s going to basically disregard the whole system that’s in place, the whole feeder system that’s in place, and just say, “Screw it. We don’t even need anybody who’s even deemed unqualified by the by the ABA, by the American Bar Association. Let’s just pick judges from the stock that we have at Newsmax and O and and you know, Cat Turd 2 on Twitter. Like, why do we even need to abide by the bare minimum threshold that that was in place before when we can just have people who I know are just going to be rubber rubber stamps for even the most egregious parts of my agenda. Yeah, it feels insulting to cat turd, too, that you lump them in that way. But that’s okay. We’ll move past that. Um, so yeah, here’s the thing. They still have to be confirmed. He can get a bunch of hacks like Ed Martin who he wanted to be the US attorney for the District of Columbia and throw them up in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee. Well, he had to withdraw Ed Martin’s nomination. Now, I know he found a place to tuck him away at the Department of Justice, but that’s beside the point. And I know Brian how the viewers will look at me in particular when I say there is any lingering hope that you know Republicans in the Senate whether on the judiciary committee or in the Senate generally will kind of stand up and not allow abjectly unqualified human beings to become federal judges. But I will always not only hold out hope but try to keep the pressure on the Republicans to you know cross the aisle to consider saving democracy. And I think some of them will be willing to do that. So, I guess at the bottom of it all, Brian, I am concerned with who Donald Trump may be left to try to nominate. Um, I have some hope that the Senate Judiciary Committee will not put abjectly unqualified hacks on the federal bench because let’s face it, when the Senate has confirmed many of these Trump appointees, what have we seen? They’ve been ruling against Donald Trump. And that’s a good thing. including the Supreme Court when the last three cases that had to do with the constitutional due process rights of immigrants were 7 to2 in favor of the Constitution and everybody’s due process rights 7 to2 and 90 and those included Trump appointed justices. So hold fast because you know it it’s definitely not a foregone conclusion that things are going to get much worse because he is now telling Leonard Leo and the Federalist Society, y’all ain’t worth Just just for posterity here, can you give all of us some indication of what it means for a judge to be or for a lawyer or a judge to be rated as unqualified by the ABA? Yeah. So, there’s some new reporting that uh again I will say because Donald Trump did this in his first term, right? Donald Trump is unwilling to listen to anything that the American Bar Association, the ABA, says about whether potential judges, people that Trump is considering nominating to the federal bench are qualified to serve as federal court judges or not. By way of context, if we go back to the Obama administration, here was the process followed by the Obama administration when it came to nominating federal judges. Um, President Obama would come up with names of potential folks that he was thinking about nominating. He would provide those names to the ABA. The ABA would vet them, would rate them, and there are three ratings in the ABA’s system. Fully qualified, qualified, or not qualified. I don’t know why the ABA didn’t go with unqualified, but they went with not qualified. I believe the count was 16. 16 times the ABA ranked potential Obama appointees as not qualified. Guess how many of those judges President Obama went on to nominate? I’m I’m going to go I’m going to I’m going to shoot for the moon here and say zero. Zero. Because he took the ABA’s rankings, vetting, and recommendations dead seriously. as well he should. So, in the first Trump administration, Trump didn’t want the input of the ABA, but the ABA went ahead and vetted and and raided the people that that Trump was considering nominating anyway. And they came up with several not qualified nominees. And of course, Donald Trump didn’t give a rat’s ass. He crammed them right down the throats of the American people through Mitch McConnell in the Senate on party line votes. That’s what he did. And lo and behold, even some of those not qualified judges have been ruling against Donald Trump. So now, the fact that Donald Trump is again saying, “I don’t want to hear anything the ABA has to say,” that’s fine. You just go ahead and continue to do your worst, try to put hacks on the federal bench because I’ll tell you, it doesn’t seem like it’s been working out that well for Donald Trump. Glenn, do you have any concern though that the Senate Judiciary Committee um even though it’s supposed to hold itself to a higher standard is so wholly owned by Donald Trump that even as he’s saying the the Federalist Society judges that are being put forward are are they’re they’re too fair and we have to get people that are even less qualified as far as the ABA is concerned, less qualified as far as the Federalist Society is concerned. that these folks are so owned by Donald Trump that they’ll continue to serve as rubber stamps for him even as he puts people who are less qualified than than you know Ailen Cannon on the bench. Yeah, I’m I’m concerned and I will be concerned until the day Donald Trump leaves office. Right. However, I do think that all indicators are Donald Trump is becoming more and more desperate, not more confident. When you have to bite the hand that feeds you judges and you have to, you know, berate um the the the Leonard Leos of the world, you’re not winning as a conservative Republican president, you are losing. So, I will always remain concerned. But I think what Donald Trump is doing becomes less sustainable by the day. He’s losing support. He’s losing allies, even hardcore allies from the right who were typically in his corner. And I really I don’t think this will end well for Donald Trump. I’m not saying we’re going to be out of the woods in the coming weeks or even the next couple of years, but I think Donald Trump continues to um to lose strength and that is a good thing for his ultimate ultimate political demise. All right. Well, we will of course stay on top of this issue as he continues to wage these attacks against his own former allies, the people who had again remade the federal judiciary, very much in the mold of Donald Trump. But apparently that’s not far right enough because even these people are daring uh daring rule against him. And as far as Donald Trump is concerned, he is the ultimate authority and whatever he says goes. And uh the entire um the entire country has to just bend to his will. So uh we will stay on top of this issue for those who are watching right now. If you’d like to follow along and to support our work more broadly, please subscribe. The links to both of our channels are right here on the screen. I’m Brian Tyler Cohen and I’m Glenn Kersner. You’re watching the Legal Breakdown.

Legal Breakdown episode 532: @GlennKirschner2 discusses a feud erupting between Trump and the Federalist Society.

For more from Brian Tyler Cohen:
Straight-news titled YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@briantylercohennews
YouTube (español): https://www.youtube.com/@briantylercohenespanol
Order my #1 NYT bestselling book: https://www.harpercollins.com/pages/shameless
Newsletter: https://plus.briantylercohen.com
Twitch: https://www.twitch.tv/briantylercohen
Apple Podcasts: https://apple.co/36UvEHs
Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0066rKCBIycIMI4os6Ec5V
Twitter: https://twitter.com/briantylercohen
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/briantylercohen
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/briantylercohen
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@briantylercohen
Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/briantylercohen.bsky.social
Threads: https://www.threads.net/@briantylercohen

32 comments

  3. I used to enjoy your talks but the dramatic capital letter single word click bait is really turning me off especially when they do not add meat to the bones. Its not necessary for a journaliat to attempt to pull in more viewers with the dramatic block single words. I hope you drop them. They add nothing to what is usually an interesting and informative story.

  4. How on earth Americans can elect a President who is a convicted criminal.? Moreover, he is limited in his volcabury and can’t even articulate properly.He will repeat every few sentences the same going round and round.

  11. Trump’s insanity is frightening but he’s wrecking his own administration faster than I thought possible.
    Can we hope for Congress to finally take action on his blatant efforts to destroy our democracy?

  20. God almighty, we have all know Leonard Leo and the Federalist Society were in charge….just ask Clarence Thomas…..dump is mentally deficient and always has been…and he is evil incarnate besides….

  23. Gee, one would think that the main organization involved in licensing and regulating lawyers would be the nautical place to get recommendations….

  27. And all of these court cases are being fought by attorneys paid for by the American taxpayers. It's a giant judicial pump; and it's all cavitation.

  28. The Trump administration is destroying this country. Economically, geopolitically, the American people, small businesses, immigrants looking for a better life that aren’t coming in with millions of dollars, Congress, and most of all – the heart of 🇺🇸 by normalizing hatred, racism & bigotry.

  29. See, the problem for F45 isn't that they are not conservative judges, most of them are. The problem for him is that they are not absolute loyalist fascists as he wants them to be.

  30. If Biden or Obama had suggested to do even a tiny fraction of what The Creamsicle Charlatan has actually done the right would of been re-enacting the exploding heads scene from Kingsman: the Secret Service. Midterms can't come soon enough.

    (If they come at all…..Trumps police state has actual technologies only previously imagined in Hitler's wet dreams.)

    He is the modern version of John Gotti, The Teflon Don (minus Gotti's other nickname, "The Dapper Don, nothing "dapper" about Infection 4547). He has walked away from hundreds of incidents that would of, rightfully, ended any one else's political career. And yet this man walks free among. Federal three strikes laws need to be given teeth and cover more than just violent or drug crimes. No one with 34 federal convictions should be anywhere but an 8×6 cell.
    I wouldn't be, you wouldn't be, he shouldn't be.

Comments are closed.