The "Great Unraveling" continues.

Barring more jurors feeling fear from the threat of intimidation from the Trump mob asking to be excused tomorrow........the jury has been sworn in.

 

New York AG says $175 million Trump fraud bond isn’t properly backed, should be voided

The New York Attorney General’s office on Friday asked a judge to effectively void a $175 million bond posted by former President Donald Trump to secure a much larger monetary damage award in his civil business fraud case as he appeals the judgment.

The AG’s office in a filing said Trump and other defendants in the case had failed to show there is enough identifiable collateral to back the bond for the judgment in Manhattan Supreme Court.

The filing notes that the surety Trump used to obtain the bond, Knight Specialty Insurance Company, is “a small insurer that is not authorized to write business in New York and thus not regulated by the state’s insurance department, had never before written a surety bond in New York or in the prior two years in any other jurisdiction, and has a total policyholder surplus of just $138 million.”

The filing opposes a joint motion by Trump and KSIC to justify the insurer as the surety company holding the bond.
https://www.cnbc.com/2024/04/19/new...nd-isnt-properly-backed-should-be-voided.html

Seems like it was just a matter of time until this happened since the underwriter of the surety bond is not authorized to do this kind of biz in NY.

 

Trump Opening Statements: ‘Election Fraud,’ Fake News, And An Appeal To Exhaustion

NEW YORK — Opening statements in the first-ever criminal trial of a former President kicked off Monday morning with prosecutors accusing Trump of “election fraud” as the defense asked jurors to take a jaundiced view of the case.

The courthouse and area outside were flooded with law enforcement, journalists, protestors, and spectators as the case began.

I got in line alongside other reporters at 5 a.m. to watch opening arguments as part of TPM’s extensive coverage of the first-ever criminal trial of a former President — an attempt at real accountability after nearly a decade of national political scandals driven by Trump.

Prosecutors sought to paint Trump as masterminding a plot which extended far beyond the creation of fake business records to cover up reimbursements to his attorney, Michael Cohen, for hush money payments. In their telling, the scheme became a broader attempt to “corrupt the 2016 election” by taking illegal steps to withhold critical information from the public. Prosecutors need to not only prove that Trump created fake business records, but that he did so in furtherance of another crime in order for this to qualify as a felony.
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/...ion-fraud-fake-news-and-a-call-for-exhaustion

I know I'm exhausted by having no escape from the odious affect of Trumpery.

 

Prosecutors say Trump violated his gag order 10 times. The judge is finally set to weigh in.

On Monday, Manhattan prosecutors began trying to persuade a jury that Donald Trump is guilty of 34 felonies in his hush money case. On Tuesday, they’ll try to persuade the judge that he deserves a more immediate penalty: They want him held in contempt.

The prosecutors say Trump has repeatedly violated a gag order that prohibits him from attacking witnesses, jurors and others involved in the case. Justice Juan Merchan has scheduled a Tuesday morning hearing, outside the presence of the jury, to consider the prosecutors’ arguments.

If Merchan agrees that Trump has defied the gag order, he’ll then face the thorny question of what to do about it. His options range from a sternly worded warning to a modest fine to a short stint in jail.
https://www.politico.com/news/2024/04/22/trump-hush-money-trial-gag-order-contempt-00153154

There's no reason to think Merchan will act any differently than all the other judges who have let His Orangeness get away with murder.

 

Investigator says Trump, allies were part of Michigan election scheme despite not being charged

DETROIT (AP) — A state investigator testified Wednesday that he considers former President Donald Trump and his White House chief of staff to be uncharged co-conspirators in a scheme to claim that he had won Michigan in the 2020 election, despite Democrat Joe Biden’s clear victory.

Trump and Mark Meadows were among the names mentioned during the cross-examination of Howard Shock, whose work led to forgery charges against more than a dozen people in Michigan. A judge in the state capital is holding hearings to determine if there’s enough evidence to order a trial.

A defense attorney, Duane Silverthorn, offered a series of names and asked Shock if they were “unindicted co-conspirators,” which means they weren’t charged but could have been part of an alleged plot to put Michigan’s electoral votes in Trump’s column.

Prosecutors from the attorney general’s office didn’t object. Shock responded “yes” to Trump, Meadows, Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani and some high-ranking state Republicans.
https://apnews.com/article/michigan-fake-electors-2020-election-1b65f10b04a7baedebfd5138ed5997e9

Criminality oozes from their pores.

 

Trump advisors are considering plans to dramatically revamp the Fed, WSJ report says

Former President Donald Trump’s political operatives are putting together a plan that would give him unprecedented influence over the Federal Reserve, including a provision that could make him an “acting” central bank board member, according to a report from The Wall Street Journal.

That plan, which the Journal report described as highly secretive, is part of a 10-page document that suggests Trump — if elected — would be consulted on interest rate decisions. In addition, the Treasury Department would be used as an added check and balance to oversee the Fed’s bond-buying activities.

Along with those proposals, the draft contends that Trump could remove current Fed Chair Jerome Powell from office and require that Fed policy be aligned with the administration’s goals. While in office, Trump harshly criticized Powell and his fellow central bankers as they were raising interest rates and reportedly considered ousting him.
https://www.cnbc.com/2024/04/26/tru...matically-revamp-the-fed-wsj-report-says.html

OMG.

 

After 7 bankruptcies and with no bank wanting to loan money to the Orange Stain without 100% collateral, someone is floating the idea of letting the Orange Stain
have any control over the Fed ?

 

This was the same D!c&head that wanted the FED to have negative interests in the waning 3rd year when he was informed that a recession was on the horizon.

 

That someone being the MAGA god.

 

Seen through the lens of victimhood, making observations about Trump's abhorrent behavior is mean, really mean, and biased. In reality it's what abhorrent behavior calls for.


Judge Puts Trump On Full Blast

With all the other news last week, you may have missed the withering treatment Donald Trump received from the federal judge in the E. Jean Carroll defamation case.

U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan rejected Trump’s motion for a new trial and upheld the $83 million damages award in Carroll’s favor. In doing so, the judge raked Trump over the coals for his ongoing defamation of Carroll, his repeated instances of defamation, and his demeanor during the trial.

The full opinion is here.

The judge rejected Trump’s use of comparable cases to argue that the compensatory damages awarded Carroll were excessive: “None of these prior examples involved publication of defamations as widespread and destructive as Mr. Trump’s defamation of Ms. Carroll, and none involved a publisher of defamation who was a president of the United States or anyone nearly as high-profile.”
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/morni...irects-his-scorn-at-trumps-courtroom-behavior

https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.nysd.543790/gov.uscourts.nysd.543790.338.0.pdf

 

Donald Trump held in contempt for violating gag order in New York trial

Donald Trump was held in contempt by Justice Juan Merchan Tuesday morning for social media posts and other statements the former president made that violated a gag order imposed in his Manhattan criminal case.

The judge ordered Trump to pay a $9,000 fine — $1,000 for each violation. And he warned Trump that additional violations could land him in jail.

“Defendant violated the Order by making social media posts about known witnesses pertaining to their participation in this criminal proceeding and by making public statements about jurors in this criminal proceeding,” Merchan wrote in his Tuesday decision.

Though Trump’s lawyers had argued that several of the posts in question were “reposts” or remarks made by other people, and therefore shouldn’t be considered Trump’s own commentary, Merchan rejected that argument, finding that “a repost, with or without commentary by the Defendant, is in fact a statement of the Defendant.”

“Defendant curated the posts at issue and then took the necessary steps to publish the posts on his Truth Social account and on his campaign website,” Merchan wrote. “In doing so, he endorsed the posts with one purpose in mind — to maximize viewership and to communicate his stamp of approval.”
https://www.politico.com/live-updat...riminal-trial/trump-held-in-contempt-00155109

Don got off easy, as always.

 

Word is this side of the pond is that Trumps victimhood is working for his dedicated followers, but no longer across the board.
His claims that he is a warrior protecting the people the secret society are after have not drawn the support of outraged citizens he expected.

Your thoughts.
One question, how many of you would think Trumps supposed crimes acceptable if they had been carried out by any other American citizen?