Fulton County Foreperson; Jan 6 Propagandist; Creepers in The Comments - Transcripts

Hi, I'm Frances Callier. And I'm Angela V. Shelton. And we're Frangela. You know what you need in your life? The Final Word Podcast. Yes, you do. That's right. It is the final word on all things political and pop cultural. Where we make real news real funny. We inspire you so you can hashtag resist. Subscribe and get a new episode of the Final Word Podcast each week.

We round up the stupid because you know what somebody has to okay, all we do is give.

So Renato, did this Fulton County grandeur completely screw everything up? It's complicated. I'm Renato Mariotti.

I'm a former federal prosecutor, a practicing lawyer and a legal analyst. I'm Asha Ringapa. I teach national security law at Yale University.

I'm a former FBI special agent and I'm a legal and national security analyst. And we're here to help you understand topics that can't be boiled down to a sound bite or a tweet. So Asha talk about this is this thing with the Fulton County grandeur is like the definition of complicated. Okay, it's hard to understand and I will just tell you it's funny because my original take on this when I first saw this on my cookie, this is actually not complicated. This is a humongous problem. And it's actually a little more complicated because of Georgia grand jury law, but it's not. I'm getting a lot. I got a lot of commentators on Twitter like, oh no, it's just no big deal.

And unfortunately, it is kind of a big deal. Okay. Okay. So can you explain first the Georgia law because I it's different than the secrecy laws for

or the rules around federal grand juries? Correct. And really also federal grand jury law in most states. As far as far as I know. So Typically grand jurors cannot share anything about what happens in the grand jury. That's just, um there are absolute secrecy laws. And so if you share what happened before the grand jury, witnesses can share. But but you know, if a prosecutor or granger shares what happens in the grand jury, it can actually be charged with a crime, a serious business. And so, um, are they ever? Yeah, you know the Barry Bonds case is a very interesting one. That was one where there were chart there there was an a whole investigation because there were leaks from the Balco grand jury about his you know, the steroids scandal with Barry Bonds and I think they put they actually put a reporter in Prison for a period of time to try to get her or to reveal her sources as my recollection But it was I mean there they went really hard on that case because it was very problematic To them that somebody was revealing what was happening in the grand jury and it did but I mean obviously have an impact on his life

Are they ever and so before we get into the Fulton County, can you can you maybe break down? the policy reasons behind this so Ostensibly, it's to protect the rights of the potentially accused, right? Right Um, but in in that case why then allow witnesses to talk but not grand jurors? In other words, why not a blanket secrecy? In other words, what what is the secrecy trying to?

Protect against because I think that will help illuminate the contrast with Georgia law and why this is problematic, right? Well, it's interesting. I mean, I think the It's more complicated to go to something again when you're when you're when you're talking about Trying to restrain somebody's a witness to a crime from talking about it. I mean, there's a First Amendment issue there so, you know, you've been assaulted and you want to tell the world about it and you know, suddenly because you were asked about in a grand jury your your You are gagged forever from discussing, you know your injuries and your the the horrific crime you suffered so that I think that's that that would be my my assumption of why

You know witnesses aren't but that that has been the rule for a long long time. Whereas it by contrast I assume the grand juror is Sort of a temporary civil servant if you will In other words, they're they're kind of acting at the request appointment of

The court and so they can be held to kind of a different standard. Yeah, I mean they're effectively I mean, they're all sworn in as a sort of they're they are they are acting as an officer of the court all right, and the grand jury is part of the court system and so yeah, I think you know, it's you know, it is they're acting sort of as part of the system in which we prosecute criminal cases and so I think You know grand jurors Their ability to talk are heavily restricted, which is why You don't see it You don't see this happen and I think the instant reaction from pretty much Every lawyer who saw this who had anything to do with criminal law was like, oh my god, this is a disaster This is a worse thing. She should keep her mouth shut. She's violating her oath So on and so forth that all sorts of private chats with other people who had been prosecutors who are just Absolutely livid about this But under Georgia law it's a little different if you add you know And I kudos to the Georgia lawyers who are pointing this out her only oath Was to not reveal deliberation. So anything other than deliberations Technically speaking she could reveal And so then I guess that brings the question and a lot of our listeners I'm sure thinking this then so why is this a big deal? Why are we even talking about it this week and I will tell you that most of the commenters on Twitter were that way They're like, you know Marietta you're making enough something out of nothing. She could totally do this. It was super okay and you know, the reality of the situation is is more complicated than that because the law is not as black and white as a lot of Folks think it is in other words. Yes, it's true that She had the right to say these things However, I mean I would say a couple there's gonna be a couple obvious consequences One is there's gonna be a whole slew of motions by the defense raising this issue They're going to fail light very likely going to fail. And so then you're so you're gonna say, okay So what's the difference? I mean first of all that already is like a cost and it's

What are these motions gonna be based on so you said that she's allowed to talk about anything Except for the deliberations now, I didn't watch her full interviews I heard snippets of it. She seems starstruck. She's like, oh, you know Lindsey Graham. What's so funny and nice and Whatever, I like so, you know, I don't know how close she got to disclosing deliberations In in terms of violating the letter of the law But I I'm assuming that these motions are not just going to be she disclosed deliberations. They're going to be about a potential that they were prejudicial to

Their client. Yeah, that's right I mean, first of all, one thing I'll just say and and you I think you alluded to this Asha I think it's a good point to make is that she comes off as somebody who is not very serious and is Approaching this I think with the wrong considerations in mind like oh, I might get to swear in Trump I was totally hoping he would testify so I get to meet him and like oh my god Rudy Giuliani was there This is so cool. So there's there's that element to it because I think when you may say well So what and it's like well, it creates a narrative I mean, I'm just saying this is somebody litigates cases all the time It just it gives a picture to the judge. Okay, there may be an issue with this process In other words, we usually think of this process is like very routine and this is just how it goes and yet Every defendant's want to complain about it, but this is just how it works And then it's like, you know, I could see some of this racing a judge's eyebrows now The the the stuff this probably most problematic that she said is actually stuff that made her seem like really chummy with the prosecutors

You know she had this one stick. This is the paint the ice cream social. Yeah

Yeah, she talked about how the grandeur has attended an ice cream social at the prosecutor's office And when she was swearing in a witness you had like a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle Ice cream ice pop. Yeah ice cream pop or something You know, those ones you got from the ice cream truck when you were a kid. So I mean, you know, you may you may be like, so what? So she got an ice cream, you know, $2 ice cream bar or, well, just inflation. Maybe it's a $5 ice cream bar nowadays. But you know, why does this matter? And the answer is just grand jurors are supposed to be wall wall there. It's this weird almost fiction that we have that they're distinct from the prosecutors. They are distinct from the prosecutors. I don't want to say that they aren't but because the defense doesn't have a role in the grand jury process. They aren't presenting their arguments, they aren't presenting their evidence, they're

not there.

It's not adversarial. Yeah. And of course the prosecutors get to know them over time and of course they identify more with that side. And that's why there's a joke about how they can indict a ham sandwich or whatever that people talk about. So, but nonetheless I think what is going to happen is you're going to get these motions and the defense are they'd portray the whole process is flawed. grand jurors or, you know, star struck, they're approaching, they're trying, they're approaching their duties and they're going to claim that you can learn about her deliberations from her comments because you could see that her perspective on the witnesses was all based on her prior prejudices regarding each of these people. And she's in bed with the prosecutor, so to speak. And she's basically excited about these secrets and maybe making decisions because she wants to, you know, please the prosecutors. Yeah. And potentially have some exciting news that she could share to get her 15 minutes of fame. That's how they'll portray it. I think that will fail because there's not a lot of meat in the bones there.

this stuff in front of the jury.

Right. Please the prosecutor. I think that's such an interesting point of kind of putting the judge in a psychological posture of wanting to counter any perception that the, that the prosecution has had an unfair advantage by in some ways, kind of putting the feather on the scale in favor of the defendant, like through the process. That's really interesting. I had not thought of that before, but I could totally see how, as you said, the judge would say, no, I mean, this isn't enough to dismiss these charges, but then going forward, a judge wants to be seen as being impartial and kind of even the playing field, I guess, even if it's just a matter of perception.

Yeah. I mean, what I would say is, you know, most criminal cases are like, ultimately there's so much evidence, like you got the guy on tape or they've caught with the drugs or they were caught running out of the bank with the money and the people want to challenge them and raise all these legal issues and they have the right to do so, but it's a waste of everyone's time. And the judge is really often just focused on making sure that the record on appeal is clean so she doesn't have to deal with this when, you know, some issue over a second time. And but there are, but judges do not want somebody railroaded who is either innocent or it's been overcharged or there's some serious issue with the prosecution. And so you have to kind of, if you're a criminal defense attorney, you have to flag for the judge like, yeah, this is kind of a weird case and there's problems here and you really need to pay attention to this to treat it seriously. And judges know that the prosecution has a lot of advantages. And so like you said, that you need to make sure the judge understands like you got to give me some breaks here because the, you know, they're doing, they're doing something with a little, little off a little crazy here. You need to watch this one really closely judge and they usually do. And so I think, you know, that is what Fannie Willis bought, you know, unfortunately got bought herself here with this grand jury, it's unfortunate. I mean, she didn't select this versus. She had no idea, I'm sure, what this person was going to do, but I do think this grandeur complicated things. And by the way, like I said, also created a narrative at trial in the same way that like, I think the analogy I draw is like the Strzok and Page texts where, you know, that had nothing to do with anything.

Like that's not real trial work, in my opinion, and so whatever. And I think even outside of the courtroom, because as you know, Renato, it's not, it's not just that the process is fair. It must be perceived as fair. I mean, the legitimacy of the rule of law is, you know, I think of it as, you know, it's like the dollar bill, right? Like people have to believe that it works. And I think that you're absolutely right, that one of the very successful things that Trump has done is to be able to de-legitimize and sow seeds of doubt in the justice system among the public. And that erodes the faith of any outcome that comes out of that process. In fact, there's a law professor, Tom Tyler, who talks about legitimacy in the criminal justice process, and he talks about this, that so much of it rests on people have to believe that the process is fair, because that's how they will accept the outcome, even if it's something that they don't like. And when they don't believe that the process is fair, I mean, just look at the election,

then they don't accept the outcome. Yeah, that's really interesting. Yeah, I will just say that I think Trump did a very masterful job of spreading disinformation during the whole Mueller investigation to suggest that that was all unfair. And there are many Republicans, probably a vast majority of Republicans who believe that just because it was repeated a lot of times by that side. And I just see the same thing happening here. And I think the issue here is that, frankly, while certainly Fannie Willis is, frankly, I think operating in a very careful and deliberate manner with regards to this investigation, she is an elected official and has a stake in how she's perceived by her electorate. And so she was already more vulnerable than a career prosecutor to this sort of attack. So I just think it's going to be very, very substantial in this case. In terms of the bottom line, what I would say is that people are asking me, does this mean that the prosecution's tanked and all of that work is gone? No, it doesn't mean that. But it's just, it's an obstacle that the prosecution has to overcome.

And I would- It's another thing she's going to have to deal with in what is already a very difficult and politically fraught and divisive prosecution

should she choose to bring it. Yeah, I always thought it was an uphill battle, like the Fulton County DA's office trying to take on the former president of the United States in an unprecedented prosecution, potentially making very broad allegations. And now she's got to take this on as well. It's just, it's hard.

It's trying to get a prosecution in hard mode. So just quickly, the last point, what do you think was going through her mind when she saw this? Do you think she threw things?

Is she just living like- I have the feeling, I mean, I'm sure she was just profoundly disappointed because I will just say, as somebody watching this, I had a profound disappointment in it because I do care about respecting the law. And I do think that we want to try to preserve a system in which the public does have confidence in it. And so I actually was kind of horrified to see it myself.

I can only imagine her reaction. Yeah, and just as a CODA, I saw an article that said that at least some legislation had been introduced in Georgia to essentially make the law more analogous to other states and federal law in terms of grandeur or secrecy. So it sounds like a lot of people

found this very problematic. Yeah, very good idea because the next person, I mean, it could be a mass murderer, right? Who ends up just, you get the wrong grandeur. And she's also, I think, setting a precedent that other grand jurors are like, oh, well, she got on TV all the time. Ooh, I'm gonna do the same thing. It's just a bad idea. So Washa, what do you make of this decision by McCarthy to release all of the surveillance footage from January 6th

to Tucker Carlson and his team and no one else? Wow, I don't even know where to start. I mean, first of all, this is like all of the surveillance footage, we're talking about, I think it was something along the lines of 44,000 hours of security footage. Now, beyond what Tucker Carlson could, how he would possibly actually analyze all this, let's first start with just the security problems, right? Having all of that security footage really offers a lot of information and intelligence to nefarious actors, right? It shows where all the cameras are located, what the angles are. It reveals what was happening inside. How did security respond? Where were members of Congress taken? I mean, all of these things are revealed for someone who wants to improve what they did the second time around. What did the 9-11 hijackers do before they flew planes into buildings? They went into security.

Or button cam things too from the cops

or things like that, the cops or things like that. Yeah, but I think that what they want to do is muddy the waters and potentially in advance of charges that might be brought

for the violence on January 6th. Yeah, I really agree with the thrust of what you're saying. I mean, obviously Tucker Carlson is a propagandist. I mean, I wouldn't, I don't think anyone, even before the Dominion suit, I don't think anyone considered him a neutral purveyor of anything. And as you point out, I mean, there's just massive security issues here. And McCarthy's explanation for why he did this is, I had made a promise. I mean, this was, as far as I could tell, this was part of the secret handshake deal

that he made to get the speakership was that- With co-conspirators of January 6th.

Right. Who want to have the footage out there for the reasons you say. They want to find, is there a cop who just stood there as people were coming in? I mean, I suspect if you go through the footage, you will find Capitol police officers who are like, you know what, I don't want to get the crap beaten out of me by 200 people trying to get in through this door. I'm just going to stand there and let it happen to preserve their own life or safety, or some other reason. And that could be taken out of context to suggest that, oh yeah, these people were totally invited. We actually wanted these people to like defecate

in the house chamber or whatever, right? Yeah, and I mean, I guess I initially thought is, and I'm struggling to think about how this would be framed. So maybe it's not a legal issue, but if there does seem to be sort of a, I don't know if it would be a First Amendment issue, but an equal access issue, I'm struggling to see how the government could provide, or government official can provide all of that

to one news organization? Yeah.

It's prohibitive, it's prohibitive from another? Like that seems really strange and it's not quite viewpoint discrimination,

but in some ways it's sort of it? I don't know. It's interesting, yeah. It's an interesting, it's a sort of claim I don't expect to get broad. I mean, I'm sure a lot of news organizations

upset about it. I mean. Well, they are suing for access. So I don't know. I'm not sure

on what grounds, but. Well, the mere act of suing. I mean, there's another thing where there's the shades of gray thing that I hope our listeners understand. Have come to appreciate. Have come to appreciate is that, you know, merely filing a lawsuit imposes costs on the other side and it forces the other side to reckon with the arguments and the issues. And so, you know, for a news organization, just merely saying, okay, we're going to file suit and we're going to grind you out and do this. It's like, okay, well, whoever CBS News, they've got, they've certainly got the money to hire lawyers. And if they're going to do that, you know, then I think the house has to pay attention. What I will say is there has been some movement. I mean, Marjorie Taylor Greene told reporters the other day that there supposedly is going to be a deal that McCarthy is going to make to provide this to other outlets and to sort of have some agreement regarding security. The cat may already be out of the bag regarding Tucker Carlson, but I think that it must be the case that they thought there was some risk regarding, like you said, regarding a suit. I don't know off the top of my head what the claims would be.

Yeah, I come to appreciate. I'm comfortable. Yeah, it doesn't exactly fit. So basically, you know, First Amendment jurisprudence is complicated, but among some of the basic doctrines is this idea that the government, you know, to the extent that it engages in any kind of restrictions on First Amendment activity, it can't discriminate on the basis of viewpoint. In other words, it can't allow some people to speak and other people to not speak based on the fact that some have a particular opinion and others have a different opinion. It has to be viewpoint neutral. And so that was the first thing that came to mind, but I think you're right. I'm not sure that this fits neatly into that, but it just seems in my gut problematic. It is. You know, I mean, you can imagine, I guess, like, like I get I mean, can Biden just say I only allow MSNBC reporters to come into the press room and come with me on, you know, Air Force One, like they are the only ones who will have any kind of access. I suppose theoretically he could maybe. I don't know.

find that weird and problematic. Yeah. And kind of yeah. And kind of remember when Jim Acosta had his credential revoked. Right. By the Trump White House. That was a big part of the argument that they ended up dropping that or losing that because he had a valid First Amendment argument there. He was basically being they were retaliating against him for taking a view contrary to the administration. So it's possible. I think, you know, it's interesting. I mean, one thing I will say is the legislature I think here is exempt from FOIA. I don't think Congress members of Congress are subject to FOIA.

Yeah. And I think it's a real security risk. I mean, we have no idea who Tucker Carlson might share this footage with PS. And we we did, in fact, have people who have been convicted of seditious conspiracy, which is essentially, you know, trying to levy war against the United States. So it's not just, I think, a hypothetical concern. These are people who have already tried to attack the seat of government. And we have someone who is sympathetic to and potentially connected to that movement now in possession of information that could be helpful to those designs. Yeah. Obviously concerning. I guess when I was kind of querying other lawyers about this and I was like, how can McCarthy do this? And the answer was, well, he can do anything he wants as a House Speaker. But it sounds like Schumer also has the same ability.

Yeah. Schumer wrote like a pretty aggressive letter about it and condemned it and that sort of thing. So I agree. It also creates a false equivalence, like whoever and whatever. Let's just say that Schumer gives it to all the other media, then it's going to buy into the conservative idea that all the media are biased in favor of the Democrats and all Schumer would really be doing is kind of evening the playing field amongst all of the news organizations. So yeah, what an unfortunate situation. But I have to say it's sort of emblematic of how unserious House Republicans are. I mean, I have, you know, there was a tweet recently where this House Republicans like, oh, we've changed everything and done all this stuff and is an amazing job we've done since we've taken over. They haven't passed a single bill. They haven't done anything as far as I can tell. But yet, you know, it's all this sort of clown show stuff like give all of our security tapes to a propagandist or whatever. So Hasha, you know, last week we talked a little bit about the controversy with the Nikki Haley dust up.

that what that's like for you. Were they stalker creeps or were they harassing creeps? And I'm asking because I don't always see all of those, at least on Twitter, because I have my settings adjusted. So I only see comments from people who follow me. So often swarm trolls like don't show up for me when

I see the notifications and things like that. That's already a consequence, though, because I don't do that. I don't need to. I mean, there are people who say mean things about me that par for the course. I people try to say what they think are threatening things and not very scared of them. But I'm willing to listen or willing to see the comments from other people because they're not bothering me as much as I suspect these people bother you. I don't it was like all these people like, oh, you're so beautiful. And you know, all the sort of BS. I just I'm

sure that's got to get old. Yeah, it gets old. You know, I mean, I just, I just ignore it really. Like, I don't know. I mean, it's only, there's only been a couple of instances where it's kind of crossed a threshold to become alarming. Like, you know, I had one person who got to be kind of so excessive both on Twitter and then on Instagram and DMing me on Instagram that I blocked him. Then he got really angry that I blocked him. So he started emailing me. And at that point, I had to contact, you know, Yale security because I was like, I don't know what this guy's gonna do. It's gonna show up at my house or something like that. So and that's on kind of the stalker side. Then there's, you know, there's the other side, right, which is like, you know, I remember there was a clip a couple of weeks ago.

Yeah, I agree with that. I mean, I think I do. I mean, I occasionally get people comment on my parents, who some of them have strong opinions about certain things. I've gotten people saying that I you know, certain things I wear are stupid looking. I've had a lot of people say I should shave my beard or this or that all sorts of stuff like that. But it's it's so much less than you I have had the creepy stalker types as well. But it's just I think there's a couple things. One is there's I'm sure I was just from judging from the comments of one of your tweets that I looked at randomly. I think it's a lot less than what you get. But also, I'm not scared of those people. You know, in other words,

you know, I'm saying like, I mean, I was you know, another I was gonna show at your door

and you don't write an attack. Right. Right. Exactly. Like there was a woman who was tremendously unbelievably stockier and stalking and harassing me on all sorts of mediums all over the place. But I was just like some some crazy person from Washington state, like, whatever, like, you know, come at me, you know, I mean, do what you're going to do. I've like I was concerned when criminals who like it was a guy escaped from prison who wanted to kill me. I'm not concerned about like, you know, some random bozo off the Internet, you know, people in

their Internet words. Yeah, I mean, and they can feel physically threatening. Like I said, I did have to call security once and just get their advice on what to do. And they have me put an app on my phone and keep tabs and save all the emails and things like that. But it reminds me of this saying that I've seen a few times, which is something along the lines of men's greatest fear is that a woman will humiliate them. And a woman's greater fear greatest fear is that a man will kill. Yeah. And it's sort of like this kind of trying to highlight the asymmetry between, you know, what what is the extreme consequence of, you know, these different, you know, approaches, I guess, or responses by unhinged people.

Yeah. And I just think I think that's something that, you know, men should think more about, I, you know, I think that particularly, I don't know what people think they're accomplishing with these comments that they're making, but I just, it's not only really weird and inappropriate, but it's just you're, you're, you're actually making yourself look like a fool and potentially hurting someone else. I just don't, I don't understand it, but I want to get your comment on it because I was like, it was so taken by that. I was like, wow, there's a lot more

of this than I thought. Like this happens must happen every day to her. Yeah. And it's really, it is, I think I pay a less attention to the stocky side. I, maybe I don't see them. I feel like my followers kind of know to be respectful. I kind of, I have really, I have really good loyal followers on Twitter and I, I haven't seen anything go too far, though. Maybe they're just, they're being screened out. I do think that there is, you know, definitely a trolling aspect to women based on physical experience, physical

appearance. You voted. I did. You protested. Again. You postcarded. So many Sundays. You

posted on social media. Got some likes. And you're still reeling from all the terrible news. Yeah, but what else can I do? I'm Kelly. I'm Lila. And we're going to help you figure that out. Each week we'll interview people on the frontlines of political action about

the things they actually did to take action. What got them started, who helps them along

the way and what they do differently if they had it to do all over again. And in the process we'll give you concrete advice about how to take the leap from freaking out on Twitter

to making a difference. Follow what can I do wherever you listen to podcasts or tune in on what can I do? Podcast.com.