Still another crazy week in Trumpland

Donald Trump posted a $175 million bond to prevent New York authorities from seizing his assets, including properties such as Trump Tower, pending appeal of a civil fraud judgment against him of nearly a half-billion dollars. Trump posting of the bond was necessary to keep New York Attorney General Letitia James from initiating legal steps to take over his properties. The bond arrangement was made with Knight Specialty Insurance Company, according to a court document. About 30 surety companies he consulted with would not accept his real estate as collateral, only liquid assets.

[The CEO of Knight Specialty Insurance Company is also a large investor in Internet bank named Axos. Axos’ CEO and top investors have strong financial ties to the GOP. Axos loan Trump $100 million previously. Not surprising with the 30 companies. Between going bankrupt 4 times and inflating the worth of those properties he owned, it’s no surprise he wasn’t popular with them.]

If he does not win his appeal, Trump will still owe more than $450 million from a civil court judgment after James won the fraud case against him, alleging he deceived lenders and insurance companies by inflating his net worth by up to $2.2 billion annually from 2011 to 2021. Trump’s tab is growing by about $100,000 per day because interest will continue to accrue until the appeal ends.

Trump attacked Judge Juan Merchan for issuing the gag order – and he went after the judge’s daughter for her liberal political work, exploiting the ambiguous language in the order that didn’t explicitly forbid discussion of Merchan’s family. It didn’t take long for Merchan pushed back, expanding the gag order to cover his family – though the judge remains fair game for Trump – and attempting to limit Trump’s vitriol two weeks before the trial is set to begin.

[It should be standard practice that when you have Trump as a defendant, a gag order should be issued to cover the judge, court personnel and their families. The Republicans and their propaganda backers are saying that since the judge’s daughter works as a Democrat “activists”, she will influence her father’s decision. She did post something a while back saying Trump should be in prison. But that could be the same thoughts of most left leaning voters. Does Trump want a right leaning judge with a right leaning family who want no prison time for Trump?]

Then Merchan denied his motion to delay its start until after the US Supreme Court rules on Trump’s presidential immunity claim, calling it untimely and noting Trump’s lawyers had months to file a motion over the issue.

The prosecutor, Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, in Trump’s upcoming hush money trial has asked Judge Merchan to clarify whether a gag order issued for Trump recently bars him from publicly attacking the judge’s adult daughter — and to expand the order if it doesn’t.

Trump’s lawyers said Merchan’s gag order does not apply to comments about the judge’s family members and Trump’s recent posts had not violated the order and repeatedly argued that any limitation on his speech is a clear violation of his First Amendment rights and his rights as a presidential candidate.

[It would basically be open season any judge and his/her family if someone like Trump can constantly lie, harass and abuse the judge and his family. What judge would want to be a judge knowing him/her as well as the family could be threatened?]

A criminal case that was once viewed as the most open-and-shut prosecution against Trump has been mired in delay, unresolved logistical questions and fringe legal arguments that appear to have hijacked US District Judge Aileen Cannon’s attention. Special counsel Jack Smith said Cannon had asked for briefs that were premised on a “fundamentally flawed” understanding of the case that had “no basis in law or fact.”

In a 2022 lawsuit Trump brought attacking the FBI’s documents investigation, Cannon granted an extraordinary Trump request for a third-party review of the FBI’s 2022 search of his Mar-a-Lago resort for the classified documents. A conservative appeals court repeatedly reversed her rulings in the lawsuit, scolding her for giving Trump special treatment no other private citizen would receive, and shut down the review. Cannon’s rulings in the 2022 lawsuit were so outside the bounds that people rightly became suspicious of her motives.

[Cannon was appointed by Trump in 2020 and it shows that she is inexperienced. The probability of having the trial begin before the election is fading. On top of that, if Trump does win the election, he will shut down this and any other open cases against him.]

Observers were shocked when Cannon summoned the parties to Florida to present their theories on the validity of the charges.

[A judge generally doesn’t do that. She is judging 32 of the 91 charges against Trump.]

Judge Cannon will not dismiss the classified documents charges against Trump, who argued that he had the authority to take classified or sensitive documents with him after he left the White House. The short order from Judge Cannon leaves open the possibility that Trump could still use the argument to defend himself at trial.

[Well, at least she did something that is mostly right.]

Fulton County Superior Court Judge Scott McAfee upheld the criminal indictment against Trump in Georgia, rejecting the argument that Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election were protected under the First Amendment. “The defense has not presented, nor is the Court able to find, any authority that the speech and conduct alleged is protected political speech,” Judge McAfee wrote in his order.

[Unsure how Trump could ask for a dismissal when he clearly asked for an exact number of votes to be found that would declare him barely the winner.]

Lawyers for several defendants in the Georgia criminal case against Trump and others have been weighing whether to press for a gag order against Atlanta-area prosecutor Fani Willis, especially if efforts to disqualify her fail. Willis has continued to speak publicly about the case. A gag order against one of Trump’s biggest foes could score political points and help him and his co-defendants in the short term. But it could also backfire by undercutting their efforts to have Willis disqualified from the case, or by inspiring efforts to seek a gag order against Trump and other defendants who have publicly criticized Willis.

In one of Trump’s ever growing number of lies, after a 25 year old woman was killed by a migrant, Trump said “She lit up that room, and I’ve heard that from so many people…. I spoke to some of her family.” Except the family said he never spoke to them.

[Shocked? I’m not.]

“What the hell was Biden thinking when he declared Easter Sunday to be Trans Visibility Day?” Trump said, suggesting that the declaration showed “total disrespect to Christians.”

[Trans Visibility Day has always been May 31st. It just so happens that Easter was early this year. He said nothing about National Crayon Day.]

In the federal election interference case, Judge Tanya Chutkan previously also heard – and rejected – the argument that Trump’s actions should be considered protected political speech.

“Sending eight emails and texts a day that promise an artificial match, threaten to take away your GOP membership, or call you a traitor if you don’t donate doesn’t build a long-term relationship with donors,” said a Republican fundraiser.

[Spam, abuse, and threats all rolled into one.]

Trump said recently if he does not win November’s presidential election it will mean the likely end of American democracy.

[More like if he wins….]

Just a couple weeks after saying there will be a “bloodbath” if he doesn’t win the election in November, Trump repeated his call as well as repeatedly calling illegal immigrants “animals” and claiming they bring in disease and violence. After the first time he mentioned bloodbath, his campaign after claimed the word was intended for the auto industry.

[If you believe that I have a nice piece of land to sell you on Pluto.]

Some Trump cronies are thinking of pushing Nebraska to change their electoral vote. Nebraska and Maine are the only two states where their House representatives are not an all or nothing but by district. MAGA people think that they have a better change of getting the Nebraska state House of Representatives [note that they don’t have a senate] to switch to all or nothing before the elections and before the state House session ends.

The reason for the push to change? If the states won by Biden stays the same except Nevada and New Mexico, Biden would be ahead by 2 House representatives. If Nebraska went all to Trump [instead of one district that would go to Biden], it would be an even 269 representatives for each. In a tie, each state would then have one vote to cast and there are more Trump states than Biden states.

[Another dumb way to break a “tie breaker”. Just as bad as the NHL tiebreaker by having a shoot-out.]

At least six Republicans want to change the name of Washington Dulles International Airport to Donald J. Trump International Airport.

“Donald Trump is facing 91 felony charges,” Democratic Rep. Gerry Connolly, whose district includes part of Dulles, said in a statement. “If Republicans want to name something after him, I’d suggest they find a federal prison.”

[Or maybe Rikers Island? Dulles is considered as one of the worst airports in the world. It is old and antiquated.]

Trump’s DJT stock on NASDAQ lost over $4 billion in worth at one point in its first week of trading. In about ten days the stock was half the price of the highest price [almost $80 on March 26].

Trump has filed a lawsuit against two of the company’s co-founders, both former contestants on “The Apprentice.” Trump Media’s lawsuit accuses them of “mismanagement,” saying they “failed spectacularly at every turn” and “made a series of reckless and wasteful decisions.”

[And why wait so long to release this lawsuit? Unlike the morons who he hires in his cabinet who later on say things he doesn’t like, he can’t sue them. But he can sue the two co-founders.]

A Florida venture capitalist and his brother moved toward potential guilty pleas in an insider trading case connected to the merger that took Donald Trump’s social media company public. A third man was also involved in the insider trading. They pleaded innocent from the 2021 case but could change their pleas. Prosecutors are seeking the forfeiture of a bank account, the yacht and three Yamaha Jet Skis that were tendered to the vessel by one of the three men.

Trump has previously called immigrants “animals” and blamed migrants for “coming into our country with contagious diseases.” He warned of “illegal alien criminals crawling through your windows and ransacking your drawers,” where they “loot the jewellery.” When migrants aren’t busy doing that, they’re fixing to “obliterate Medicare and Social Security” and fill schools with “new migrant students who don’t speak a word of English.”

Regarding Trump [and the various conspiracy nuts] regarding that immigrants are causing higher crime, homicide and violent crime, after rising during the pandemic, have dropped for two straight years and are lower than during Trump’s final year in office. There is scant evidence that immigrants — legal or undocumented — commit more than their share of crime, and a lot of evidence that migrants are more law-abiding.

Former Trump adviser Peter Navarro asked the Supreme Court to take another look at his request to avoid prison, filing a long-shot request on Tuesday that the high court rarely grants. This after serving so far 15 days of his four month vacation. He’s in prison for his contempt of Congress conviction.

[He wants out early maybe because he was a bad boy and his TV privileges were reduced. ]

Trump still takes claim for killing Roe vs Wade but all he did was load the supreme court with right wing justices unless he ordered them to kill Roe vs Wade.

Trump also takes at least partial credit from the various states who have reduced or banned abortions.

Former Republican leaning contributor, George Conway, donated over $900,000 to Biden’s campaign and will headline a fundraiser for Biden.