Isaac Laquedem

The White House conquers a once-proud law firm

Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison, a prominent New York law firm, gave in to President Trump's sanctions today.  As part of its surrender, the firm agreed to eliminate diversity, equity, and inclusion from its hiring practices, and to provide $40 million of free legal work to civic causes favored by the Trump Administration.

The concession of Paul, Weiss to White House pressure comes just two months after the president revoked John Kennedy's executive order that prohibited federal contractors from discriminating in hiring.  It's especially poignant when set next to the Statement of Firm Principles that its managing partner Simon H. Rifkind laid out in 1963, in a masterful essay that the firm posts on its website to this day (it may still be there next week . . . maybe). 

Judge Rifkind wrote, “We believe in maintaining, by affirmative efforts, a membership of partners and associates reflecting a wide variety of religious, political, ethnic and social backgrounds, characteristic of that community.”  Judge Rifkind also wrote: “We refuse to be deterred by the unpopularity of a client or his cause from accepting a matter which justice and professional responsibility prompt us to take. *** Finally, we are committed to achieving our objectives without wearing any client's collar or any political party's livery.”  

I would like to believe that if Simon Rifkind were to walk into the office of his old firm today he would tear into the current management and then rip his name from the door.

 

This song from 50 years ago is strangely relevant today

Robert Lamm's 50-year-old call to Harry Truman to rescue the nation resonates again today.  Mr. Truman, three years deceased, didn't answer.  Now would be a good time for him to break his silence or propose a successor.

Born on third base and thinks he . . .

In 1988 at the Democratic National Convention, Jim Hightower said that the elder George Bush was "born on third base and thinks he hit a triple."  Donald Trump and Elon Musk have placed a modern twist on the phrase: they each believe that just because they inherited the stadium they know how to play baseball.

[Image created by Infolight and used under license.]

If Rudy Giuliani is convicted in Arizona . . .

. . . on any of the various counts that Arizona has indicted him for, the sentencing judge will have a dandy opportunity to order him to perform community service instead of serving a prison term, while furthering one of the stated policy objectives of the incoming Trump administration.  Arizona has 2.8 million acres (about 4,500 square miles) of national forest.  In his first term, Donald Trump famously told reporters that Finland rakes its forests and doesn't have any problem with forest fires.  (He had apparently misunderstood something that the president of Finland had told him.)

    It would be fitting for the court to order Mr. Giuliani to spend a month or two raking one of Arizona's national forests, perhaps in the Coconino National Forest at the campsite pictured here.  The folks at Four Seasons Total Landscaping might even be willing to give him a few raking lessons in appreciation for all that he's done for the business.

An Armistice Day reflection

In 1918 Uncle Leon Laquedem, born on this day 125 years ago, joined the United States Navy to fight in the Great War.  Two months later Uncle Joe Laquedem joined the Marines.  In that simpler time, the armed forces were run through the Department of War, though its functions were mainly ones of defense.  

On June 8, 1949 George Orwell's prescient book 1984 was published.  Orwell described a government in which the war department was named the Ministry of Peace, the commerce department was the Ministry of Plenty, and the department of official misinformation was named the Ministry of Truth.  The sardonic names of the government departments in Orwell's dystopia are probably not why, two months later, the United States renamed the War Department the Department of Defense.  Since then the Department of Defense has engaged in mostly war and very little defense.  The hijackings of September 11, 2001, led by Saudi and Egyptian nationals, were the only serious foreign attack on United States territory since 1949, to which the Bush (43) administration responded by mounting a military operation (what we used to call "invading") against a nation that wasn't involved.

Our incoming president will be dealing with three United States wars (by Wikipedia's count) that started before his first term.  Mr. Trump could atone for his past disrespect for the United States military by reducing our involvement in foreign wars, as for instance by stepping down our involvement in Syria and Yemen.  It's unreasonable to expect that killing off the non-military citizens of other nations will make their survivors like us more.  

"Comedian" Tony Hinchcliffe is Donald Trump's modern-day Samuel D. Burchard. Oopsie!

The 1884 presidential contest between James G. Blaine (the Republican nominee) and Grover Cleveland (the Democratic nominee) came down to the wire.  The polls (such as they were then) placed Blaine slightly ahead, and most observers expected that Blaine would defeat Cleveland and become the president in 1885.

Then, 140 years ago yesterday, six days before Election Day, a delegation of local clergymen met with Senator Blaine at the Fifth Avenue Hotel.  The chairman, the Reverend Samuel D. Burchard, included these three sentences in his welcome remarks:

"We have a higher expectation, which is that you will be the President of the United States, and that you will do honor to our name, to the United States and to the high office you will occupy.  We are Republicans and don't propose to leave our party and identify ourselves with the party whose antecedents have been Rum, Romanism and Rebellion.  We are loyal to our flag, we are loyal to you." 

"Rum" meant alcohol, on which attitudes crossed party lines.  "Rebellion" meant the late Civil War, when Republicans stood for the union and Democrats for secession and slavery.  "Romanism," however, meant the Roman Catholic church, which the Protestant ministers opposed on theological grounds and Blaine opposed on political grounds.  (In 1875 Blaine had proposed a constitutional amendment to prohibit all government aid to religious institutions, which for him meant mainly Catholic schools.)

Blaine heard Dr. Burchard call the Democratic Party the party of "Rum, Romanism, and Rebellion," and did not dissent.  The national Democratic campaign committee and some of the state Democratic committees printed signs with Dr. Burchard's remarks to swing Catholic votes from the Republican candidate to the Democratic candidate.  "Here's what Blaine thinks of you," the signs implied, "so vote for his opponent."

I should add that in 1884 Catholicism was New York City's largest religious denomination.

Cleveland defeated Blaine by 23,000 votes nationwide and by a scant 1,149 votes in New York State.  He received 219 electoral votes to Blaine's 182.  If 575 New Yorkers had voted for Blaine instead of for Cleveland, Blaine would have won the state and its 36 electoral votes, and would have defeated Cleveland in the Electoral College, 218 to 183. 

On October 27, 2024 at a rally for republican candidate Donald Trump, almost exactly 140 years to the day after Dr. Burchard torpedoed the Blaine campaign, a speaker named Tony Hinchcliffe called Puerto Rico "a floating island of garbage in the middle of the ocean,"  Several of his other attempts at humor were based on racist or religious tropes.  Mr. Trump heard Mr. Hinchcliffe's remarks and said nothing about them in his own speech shortly afterward.

Tony Hinchcliffe has given Donald Trump a modern "Rum, Romanism, and Rebellion" moment.  Residents of Puerto Rico are citizens of the United States, but they don't vote in the general presidential election  . . . until they move to one of the states, where as citizens they are immediately eligible to register to vote.  Over 200,000 Puerto Ricans moved to the United States after President Trump and FEMA botched the response to Hurricane Maria in 2017, including a large contingent to Pennsylvania, one of the swing states in 2024.  It would be a delicious irony if President Trump's mishandling of Hurricane Maria has combined with his modern-day Burchard moment to switch just enough Puerto Rican voters in Pennsylvania to give the state, and likely the national election, to Kamala Harris.

Isaac riffs on how the 25th Amendment will affect a second Trump administration

    Mr. Trump's increasingly disjointed public appearances have made it evident that he doesn't have the mental capacity to make it through a full term in office - maybe not even the first year. That of course raises the question of the 25th Amendment, which in turn leads to a political dilemma for Solons of both parties. Let's suppose that he and Senator Vance are elected, and that some time later Vice President Vance (as he would then be) and a majority of the Cabinet inform Congress that the President can't perform his duties.

 

    That's fine, if President Trump (as he would then be) agrees . . . but if he doesn't agree, and notifies Congress that he believes himself to be fit to serve, then Congress must vote, and he would return to power unless two-thirds of the House and two-thirds of the Senate vote that he is in fact incapacitated and unable to serve. Neither party will hold two-thirds of the seats in either chamber, meaning that Mr. Trump would return to the presidency unless Democrats join with republicans to oust him . . . in favor of J.D. Vance.

 

    Will the republicans, up to now mostly servile, vote to eject Donald Trump from the presidency and risk the anger of their base? And will the Democrats vote to eject him, knowing that J.D. Vance will then lead the nation? The senators and representatives of both parties will have no correct answer.

 

    The situation gets more complicated if Mr. Trump should resign or die in office. Vice President Vance will become the president, and the Speaker of the House will be next in line for the presidency until President Vance nominates a new vice president and a majority of both houses approve his choice. Imagine that the Democrats flip the House and choose (say) Hakeem Jeffries as the speaker. Would the Democrats, still remembering the non-hearing of Merrick Garland, be willing to vote down any nominee and keep the Veep position vacant? I think that turnabout would be fair play, and would enjoy watching the Senate republicans rage that the House is refusing to hold a hearing on a presidential nominee.

Judge Engoron was the Trump fraud trial judge, but he wrote for the court of appeals

Judge Arthur F. Engoron presided over New York's civil fraud trial against Donald Trump, two of his children, two of his associates, his trust, and nine companies that he controls.  On February 16 Judge Engoron handed down his final ruling on February 16.  In 92 pages he held Mr. Trump and various entities liable for $355 million plus interest, found his sons Eric Trump and Donald Trump, Jr. liable for $4 million each, and barred Mr. Trump, his accountant Allen Weisselberg, and Jeffrey McConney (formerly the Controller at the Trump Organization) from serving as an officer or director of any New York entity for three years. 

Political aficionados with a thirst for blood can be excused for skipping to the last two pages, where the judge laid out the penalties he was imposing, in the manner of the impatient reader of a mystery novel who reads only up to the crime itself and then jumps to the detective's solution, skipping over the 200 pages of investigation in the middle.  The casual reader who skips over Judge Engoron's 6 pages that recite the history of the case, the 67 pages discussing the facts, and the 17 pages of legal conclusions has missed a great deal.  Herewith Isaac's take on what Judge Engoron said.

First, Judge Engoron explained why New York cares about financial fraud.  "New York State, particularly New York City, is the financial capital of the country and one of the financial capitals of the world."  (Page 3.)  "The common excuse that 'everybody does it' is all the more reason to strive for honesty and transparency and to be vigilant in enforcing the rules.  Here, despite the false financial statements, it is undisputed that defendants have made all required payments on time; the next group of lenders to receive bogus statements might not be so lucky.  New York means business in combating financial fraud."  (Page 4.)

Before he dug into the testimony, Judge Engoron threw a dash of shade at Mr. Trump's lead lawyers, Christopher Kise and Alina Habba, stating (correctly) that as the state sought only equitable relief in the form of injunctions and disgorgement of fraudulent profits, the defendants were not entitled to a jury.  The shade came in the form of a footnote on page 6, "In any event, neither party applied nor moved for a jury trial."

Then the judge described the testimony of the 14 non-party witnesses (mostly bankers and outside accountants), the five individual defendants, the eight other witnesses from the Trump Organization, the state's expert, and the 13 expert witnesses that the defendant called.  What's important in his descriptions of the testimony of the witnesses is not what they testified to, but the judge's evaluation of their credibility.  (Isaac will explain why this is important later on.) 

Judge Engoron did not comment on the credibility of the 14 non-party witnesses.  He began his saltiness with four of the five individual defendants.  In the  judge's view, Jeffrey McConney's credibility was "severely impaired" (page 25), then "further compromised" (also page 25), and then further strained when he could not recall if his separation agreement prohibited him from voluntarily cooperating with governmental investigations of the Trump Organization, which lapse the court found "implausible" (page 26).  Allen Weisselberg came in for more direct treatment: his separation agreement bars him from cooperating with the government, which "renders his testimony highly unreliable.  The Trump Organization keeps Weisselberg on a short leash, and it shows." (page 26.)  The judge turned to Eric Trump, whose "credibility was severely damaged when he repeatedly denied knowing that his father ever even compiled a [statement of financial condition] that valued his assets and showed his net worth 'until this case came into fruition.'" (Page 32.)  And the court kept firing salvos in his direction: "When the documentary evidence against him became overwhelming, Eric Trump reversed his previous testimony."  (Page 32.)  "Eric Trump's testimony [about appraisals] was shown to be false when he was confronted with the ample contemporaneous documentary evidence demonstrating otherwise." (Page 33.)

And then there was Donald Trump himself, whom Judge Engoron deflated in a footnote.  On page 36, the judge wrote, "Nonetheless, Donald Trump insisted that he believed Mar-a-Lago is worth 'between a billion and a billion five' today, which would require not only valuing it as a private residence, which the deed prohibits, (footnote 19), but as more than the most expensive private residence listed in the country by approximately 400%."  Footnote 19 reads, "A fact of which he is well aware, having signed the deed himself."  He concluded with this politely damning description of the former president's time on the stand: "Overall, Donald Trump rarely responded to the questions asked, and he frequently interjected long, irrelevant speeches on issues far beyond the scope of the trial.  His refusal to answer the questions directly, or in some cases, at all, severely compromised his credibility."  (Page 37.)

Yet it was not the Trump family but its hired experts that drew the sharpest of the judge's stiletti.  One expert witness, Steven Witkoff, "conceded that he is neither an appraiser nor an accounting expert, nor is he familiar with what 'estimated current value' is under GAAP."  (Page 48.)  Of Steven Laposa, whom the defense offered as an expert witness on real estate research, the court observed that he had "formed no opinion as to whether any of the valuations at issue in this case were accurate, and, prior to this assignment, he had no experience preparing or reviewing personal financial statements."  (Page 50.)  The next expert witness earned a more severe burn from the judge.  He was Gary Giuletti, offered as an expert in surety underwriting and surety brokering.  He testified that he has known Donald Trump for about 25 years, plays golf and eats lunch with him, and is a member of "a bunch of his clubs."  He's also the Trump Organization's insurance broker.  (Page 51.)  The judge's evaluation:  "In its over 20 years on the bench, this Court has never encountered an expert witness who not only was a close personal friend of a party, but also had a personal financial interest in the outcome of the case for which he is being offered as an expert."  (Page 51.)  In 2022, Mr. Giuletti's firm earned $1.2 million in commissions from insurance that he handled for the Trump Organization. 

Mr. Giuletti got off easier than Robert Unell, whom the Trump Organization offered as an expert in commercial real estate finance and banking.  The court summarily disposed of his work: "On the whole, the Court was unable to ascribe any reliability to Unell's 'expert' opinions, finding them unresearched, unsupported, inconsistent, and contradicted by ample other documentary and testimonial evidence."  (Page 56.)

Why are the trial judge's conclusions on credibility important?  Judge Engoron undoubtedly knew that Mr. Trump and the other defendants, except possibly Allen Weisselberg, would appeal his final decision.  It's a principle of appellate law that the appellate court will usually defer to the trial judge's assessment of the credibility of the witnesses.  The trial judge sees and hears the witnesses and their demeanor; the appellate judges read their words from a transcript and only rarely will watch or listen to the testimony. Judge Engoron underscored this point on page 6: "Witnesses testified from the witness stand, approximately a yard from the Court, who was thus able to observe expressions, demeanor, and body language."  My sense is that he's emphasizing to the appellate court that most of the Trump Organization's principal witnesses, including Donald Trump, Eric Trump, and Ivanka Trump, were simply not credible.

As with a good detective story, the description of the crime is at the beginning and the resolution is at the end.  In the case of Judge Engoron's decision, the good stuff is the part in the middle.

One of Donald Trump's upcoming trials commemorates Benjamin Harrison's "spectacularly corrupt administration"

Donald Trump will go to trial on March 4, 2024 in federal court in the District of Columbia on the charges related to his attempts to overturn the 2020 election result.  Why March 4?  It's a Monday, and long trials often start on Mondays.  But Judge Tanya Chutkan, who chose the date, may have intended to make a sly historical reference.  Elected presidents are inaugurated on January 20 now, but before 1937 they were inaugurated on March 4.  March 4 is thus the anniversary of the inauguration of all the elected presidents from John Adams to Franklin Roosevelt in his first term (1933).  It was on March 4, 1889 that Benjamin Harrison (5'6", 160 pounds) was inaugurated.  Harrison's "spectacularly corrupt administration" (the words of historian Heather Cox Richardson) produced a collapse of the stock market and the Panic of 1893.

Celebrations of Benjamin Harrison are few and far between.  Judge Chutkan has figured out an appropriate commemoration, and Mr. Trump will get to play the leading part.

Fulton County's indictment of Donald Trump and friends, analyzed

            The 41-count indictment that a Fulton County grand jury handed down today is riveting in its narrative and notable in its detail.  Isaac has read it with great interest.  The grand jury’s accusations are not vague in time and place, nor are they more vague than necessary in describing the witnesses to the 161 numbered acts in furtherance of the election plot.  Those in Mr. Trump’s inner circle who are yet uncharged will read the indictment attentively to determine which of their friends are “Unindicted Conspirator One,” “Unindicted Conspirator Two,” and the other eighteen or so of the unnamed additional conspirators.

            All 19 defendants were charged with violating the Georgia Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (“RICO”) Act.  This charge is particularly ironic, or perhaps poetically just, when applied to Rudolph Giuliani, as he came to fame in the 1980s for using the federal RICO Act to dismantle the core of the New York mafia; as a federal prosecutor he obtained indictments against a long list of the mob’s leaders and lieutenants, convicting most of them.

            The indictment has some Easter eggs within its bulk.  I’ve alluded to one, which is the game of guessing the identities of the unindicted conspirators.  Another is to examine who got indicted with whom.

            The indictment has 41 counts and names 19 defendants.  Every defendant was charged with violating the Georgia RICO Act.  No defendant, however, was charged with violating even half of the 41 counts, and no count except the RICO charge names more than 7 defendants.  Messrs. Trump and Giuliani lead the pack with 13 charges each, sharing in 7 of them.  The runner-up in the indictment list is more obscure; he is Ray Stallings Smith III, a lawyer at a small firm in Atlanta whose practice includes election law.  He faces 12 charges, including all 7 of the charges that name both Mr. Trump and Mr. Giuliani. 

            At the other end of the spectrum lie Jenna Ellis, Jeffrey Clark, and Mark Meadows, who face only one charge each in addition to the all-hands-on-deck RICO charge (Count 1). Ms. Smith’s [thank you, Kari Chisholm, for catching the error] Ellis's charge (Count 2), which she shares with attorneys Giuliani, Eastman, and Smith, is that she participated in inveigling members of the Georgia Senate to appoint impostor electors.  Mr. Clark’s charge (Count 22), which he faces alone, is that he criminally attempted to knowingly make the false statement that the Justice Department had ”identified significant concerns that may have impacted the outcome of the election in multiple States, including the State of Georgia,” asking for permission from acting attorney general Jeffrey Rosen and acting deputy attorney general Richard Donoghue to send that message to Georgia’s governor, speaker of the house, and president of the senate.  Count 28 names only Mr. Trump and Mark Meadows and charges them with having unlawfully “solicited, requested, and importuned” Brad Raffensperger, the Georgia secretary of state, to unlawfully alter the certified vote.

            So who did get indicted with whom?  (It sounds rather like high school gossip.)  Three of Georgia’s fake electors are among the indicted.  They are the only ones charged with Counts 8, 10, 12, and 14.  Two of them are the only ones charged with Counts 16 and 18.  Those six counts all relate to preparing and signing the false certifications.  They form a distinct group of charges and defendants. 

            A second group of defendants share Counts 9, 11, 13, 15, 17, and 19.  They are Messrs. Trump, Giuliani, Eastman, Chesebro, Smith, and Cheeley, and those counts relate mainly to the attempts to file the false elector certifications. 

            A third group of defendants are Sidney Powell, Cathleen Latham, Scott Hall, and Misty Hampton, the only ones charged with Counts 33 to 38.  Those counts describe the efforts to obtain or break into the voting machines of Coffee County.  Ms. Powell was a visible advocate for Mr. Trump’s cause, but the indictment relegates her to a minor part in the Georgia portion of the broader conspiracy.  Based on the structure of the indictment, Donald Trump and Rudy Giuliani were at its center, and Mr. Smith wasn't far from the core.  The skills of high school gossip tell us not who's going out with whom, but who's going down with whom.