Each one of those bullet points is potentially a way for Comey to get his whole case thrown out. In addition to that, Comey has 4 other motions to dismiss pending right now, and they’re pretty good arguments. At this point, Comey has so many different ways to win, that it is really hard to imagine that he won’t win on one of them. (In which case he still has an entire trial to defend himself on).

The issue where there’s no case law is a pretty narrow one, I think: The grand jury voted to approve the words of the charges (except that the charge numbers were different), but not the specific piece of paper that the words ended up typed out on. Is that important for the formal charging process or not? Either way this gets decided, it won’t effect very many people, because any competent prosecutor will just re-run the new piece of paper past the jury to make sure. And it may not get decided at all if Comey’s case is dismissed on any of the other reasons.

EDIT: If it’s not true. If it turns out that the grand jury no-billed all three counts, then we’d be looking at a forged indictment. And that would be a serious crime.

I encourage everyone to read the opinion, at least the fact findings. Because it is absolutely unhinged and insane. There are 11 separate findings of fact as to why Comey needs to see the grand jury materials. Here are some summaries:

• Nearly all of the presented evidence relies on search warrants from the Arctic Haze investigation (2019-2020). In the USA, search warrants specify the specific types of evidence to be seized, and the crimes they are searching for. These warrants were for some personal hard drives and email accounts of James Comey’s personal friend and attorney, Dan Richman.
• The warrants themselves said that the government was to go through the full forensic extractions and pick out data that was relevant to the investigation into classified data mishandling. The rest of the search data was to be thrown out. This was not done.
• The warrants said that attorney-client privilege data was to be separated out and thrown out. The first part was done, but not for the Comey-Richman privileged material, and in any case, the full extractions were retained, illegally.
• The warrants were to look for evidence of classified data mishandling, not evidence of lying to Congress. You can’t just take the data from one warrant and use it on another case. You need to get a new warrant for the new case, which wasn’t done. What happened here turns the warrants into “general warrants,” which King George III was infamous for using.
• The FBI agent (Agent 2) for this case was directed to review raw Cellebrite cell phone extractions, which were not supposed to be retained. While reading this stuff, he noticed that some emails between Comey and Richman appeared to be attorney client privilege material.
• Agent 2 passed some information from the Cellebrite to Agent 3 in a memo. Despite being tainted, Agent 3 went ahead and testified to the grand jury anyway.
• Halligan told the grand jury that Comey would be required to testify at trial to clarify things. This is absolutely wrong. Comey has the right to “take the fifth” and not testify at trial, and no adverse inference can be drawn if he chooses not to testify.
• Halligan suggested to the jury that her burden of proof at trial would something less than “beyond a reasonable doubt.” This is also a wrong instruction on the law.
• Halligan told the jury that she would have better evidence to present by trial time, and they could consider that promise when deciding whether to indict. This is wrong. The grand jury must make its decision based only on the evidence presented to it.
• And finally, the big kicker. There is a reasonable basis to think that the 2-count indictment that this prosecution is based on…the actual charging document…was never actually presented to the grand jury for an up-or-down vote. Instead, we think that the grand jury voted on the 3-count bill, rejecting count 1, and finding probable cause on counts 2 and 3. Then Halligan wrote a new indictment, renumbering 2 and 3 as counts 1 and 2, and got the foreperson to sign that, without holding another vote. This is, in the words of Judge Fitzpatrick, “unknown legal territory.” There’s no case law on this exact kind of screw-up.

The auto pen stuff too.

I remember I went to a Mardi Gras parade that year, and every single float was a joke about Bill Clinton’s penis. Very family friendly that was.

The discharge petition is just discharging a resolution that amends the Epstein stuff as a rider onto a regular bill.

So even if everything passes the House, the Epstein provision still has to complete the rest of the Schoolhouse Rock process:

• Pass in the Senate
• Survive conference committee
• Re-pass both chambers
• Trump veto
• Veto override on 2/3 votes in both chambers

This form of exercise is called aerobics. It is not yoga.

I want to point out a detail here:

The line “is referred to the Court” means that this case was yanked out of Justice Jackson’s hands by at least 5 other votes.

If Jackson had turned the case over voluntarily, it would say “and by her referred to the Court” instead.

Yeah. That’s only like 3 tractor trailers (assuming they’re not just running overweight too)

As many times as you want, at least until the auto-pen breaks.

Do these experts also have license plates that say “TRAVELER?”. Is admiralty court involved? Does it involve crossing out the “penalty of perjury” line on the 1040 form?

I’m pretty sure some of their flights out of DCA were moderately delayed. It was horrific!

We might never know. Subway has been accused of bread shenanigans in the past (in addition to short-selling their footlongs).

The FBI crime lab didn’t even do any forensic analysis on whether the sub measured up to the full 12 inches or not.

It was such a shoddy investigation.

There’s a federal rule that says that if you can prove that the prosecution is vindictive or selective, then the case is dismissed.

A prosecution is vindictive if it is only happening because of personal animus against the defendant. You have to prove that the animus caused the prosecution, in a legal “but for” sense.

A prosecution is selective if you’re getting singled out. That is, if other people in similar circumstances are not getting charged for the same behavior, but you are. For example, Attorney General James alleges that Ken Paxton is also a state Attorney General, and he also has multiple “second homes” with mortgages that he rents out and never visits, but somehow he has not been charged.

James is alleging both vindictive and selective prosecution, but she only has to prove either one or the other to get the case dismissed.

What the fuck is Justice Jackson doing ?

Here’s one analysis:

Jackson gets this application because it’s from the 1st circuit, and she is assigned to initially handle all shadow docket matters from the 1st circuit. By writing this admin stay, she potentially keeps the full court from stepping in and doing it for her. And this way she gets to set the 48 hour limit. This could cause the whole case to be decided one way or another a lot faster.

The supreme court let the trans passport case sit on the shadow “emergency” docket for 48 days. This stay gives the 1st circuit approx the weekend to make their decision, then the 48 hour deadline puts some oomph on the rest of scotus to make their decision.

If Justice Jackson did nothing, and 5 votes on the court intervened to issue a stay at 1 am, then there would be no 48 hour limit.

Federal employees will get back pay if that provision is in a bill that Congress will eventually pass. It’s not a guarantee, as you stated.

New York Times claims that one engine fell off the plane.

Update: court adjourned for today with no verdict. Jury deliberations will resume tomorrow.

The video clearly showed an intact, wrapped sandwich on the ground after the incident. Nothing “exploded.” The cop lied on the stand (surprise, surprise), and he got called out on it by the defense.

Monty Python is technically a proper name, but they went with the snake, because they wanted a last name that “sounded slippery.”

“Monty” may or may not be a reference to Field Marshal Montgomery, from world wars 1 and 2.