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New York is a place that Donald Trump may have to spend a whole lot less of time because the trial is about to wrap up. We still have one week to go. Joe, although he's not going to have to be in court every day for the rest of this week, closing arguments on Tuesday as his defense together with the prosecution, which of course was pleading the case on the behalf of a district attorney, Alvin Bragg, who was charged in with thirty four felon accounts of falsifying
business records related to the hush money payments. Both the prosecution and defense are done trying to make the arguments. They're not testifying any witnesses. They'll have their final word.
Yeah, it's pretty remarkable to see how quickly we ran through this. And but you know, I thought he was going to start warming up to New York again. I thought staying at the night at Trump Tower. It might be something reinvigorating Fifth Avenue, but I think maybe that's not going to happen. He's back Tomorro A Lago as soon as physically possible, and next week it's going to
be something you were there when jury selection began. Imagine the security that will come with the actual verdict being delivered. We're in for some pretty heavy stuff next week. So it's a good opportunity for us to see where we stand now and look at both arguments here both cases. Dave Ehrenberg joins US Palm Beach County State's attorney with his take on this. He's been walking us through the
arguments since opening statements. David's great to see you. I wonder your thoughts on the way the defense brought this to a close largely yesterday with the man named Robert Costello, a lawyer on the stand who misbehaved so much during his testimony the judge had to clear the courtroom twice and threatened to strike his entire testimony from the record. Is that the best way to leave a final impression with the jury.
No, Joe and Kayley, good to be with you. You know, I wonder why they called Robert Costello to the stand because it was going pretty well for Todd Blanche, Trump's lawyer. Todd Blanch scored some impressive punches against Michael Cohen, and then they decided to call their only substance of witness,
Robert Costello. Now, I think the reason why they called him is because Costello has been a darling on the far right, and if you watch far right media, they've been urging Trump's legal team to call Costello because Costello, who tried to be Michael Cohen's lawyer, apparently knew that con was lying and was going to expose him as a liar and a fraud, someone who said that Donald Trump was innocent all along, and.
The defense called him.
I think it was because Donald Trump, who watches those programs, probably urged his legal team call him, and they did, and it blew up in their face. What a debocle. They wanted Robert Costello. They got Abbot and Costello.
It was a joke.
They got a guy who was insulting the judge. Hayley's too younger, Remember Abbod and Costello.
Joe, we're the.
Old guys, so are we? What are you talking about?
Got a guy who was insulting the judge who had to clear the core room. And then today he was under cross examination, and there were text messages between Costello and his law partner that pretty much said that Cohen's an a hole and that this guy Coen, we gotta, you know, help the boss. You know, he's he needs to play ball, essentially, and that's so devastating.
Okay, so we obviously heard some testimony from Robert Costello, who we did not hear from, though Dave is Donald Trump himself, despite teasing on more than one occasion that he might indeed testify in his own defense, he very clearly did not take the stand before the defense rested today.
If ultimately, a lot of this is going to down to the word of Michael Cohen, who, of course the defense tried to paint as an incredible witness considering he's perjured himself before versus the word of Donald Trump, and we didn't hear from Donald Trump. What does his lack of testimony if not surprising due to the case overall, it was.
Smart that Trump did not take the stand because if he did, he'd be walking into a perjury trap. If he did, he'd be confronted with really embarrassing details about his affair with Stormy Daniels and others. I mean it would the Egen Carroll case would have been thrown in his face, really bad stuff. And so he listened to his lawyers and he did not take the stand. He was never going to take the stand in this case.
But they don't have to. The prosecution has the entire burden, and so the defense didn't even really put on a case. They're just trying to poke holes in the prosecution's case. And they made some headway in poking holes in Michael Cohen's testimony, but in the end, the prosecution built up Michael Cohen with a lot of corrobbery evidence, not just testimony from other witnesses, which were important, but also Trump's
own words in his tweets, in his court documents. Documents are much more powerful than any testimony because people can lie, but documents rarely do. And I think that's why this case is headed towards a guilty verdict. Because you may not want to like Michael Colin, you may not believe that he's always telling the truth. But when the prosecution shows you corroboration, it means that Yeah, he's telling the truth.
Now, that's really interesting. Dave Arenberg says it will be a guilty verdict. That said, in that world, is this a jury that we'll have to chew on this for a long time? What will deliberations look like?
Dave?
Wow, the only thing that's predictable about juries is that they are notoriously unpredictable. So what's going to happen behind that closed door? I'll bet you we'll be talking about how the defense's only witness was chewed out by the judge. And although yes, I know the jury wasn't there when Judge Mr Shawn laid into Costello, they felt the vibe in the room. They saw how Costello is muttering under
his breath and giving the judge a side eye. And you know that stuff is going to make it in the deliberation room, which will just credit the entire defense strategy, I think, and I think in the end, yeah, it's going to lead towards a guilty verdict. Now, could it be a hungary, sure, but I do not believe there's really any chance that this will be in a quittle
So there could be a compromised verdict. Perhaps they convict on some counts and not all, and perhaps they have a hungary on somewhere all but Donald Trump's not walking totally free out of this, not based on what I saw for the past few weeks.
Well, we won't know for at least a week longer, Dave, because as Joe and I have mentioned, closing arguments aren't until next Tuesday. Just how unusual is it to have a week long break like this between when they actually rest their cases and when the jury gets to take up the case.
It is a bit unusual, but you're running up against the holl calendar and days where the court takes off anyways, and so you know what the Memorial Day. So what they didn't want was to have oral argument, excuse me, closing arguments, and then to send the jury home for the long Memorial Day weekend and then you start deliberating on Monday. You don't want the jury to talk about it with their families, with their friends. You wanted all the conversations to be done in the deliberation room, and
you want it right after the closing argument. So it was the right move for the judge to postpone the closing until next weekend.
Look, it gives commentators.
Like me more of a chance to go on Bloomberg to discuss it.
Well, God knows you're not going to be done after this one, Dave, I've got news for you. Can I just clarify, by the way, and I'll apologize in advance to my partner Kayley on this is is there a rule against side eye? The judges Mersehawan is calling out Costello for giving him side eye? How does that work? Dave Ehrenberg, It wasn't.
Just side eye. It was that Costello was on the stand. And Costello comes from that right wing echo sphere were or ecosphere or whatever you want to call.
It, where they hate Judge Murshon.
I think he's corrupt and compromised, And so he took the stand and you can see his disgust on the stand. And when Judge Mrshon was sustaining the prosecution's objections, you had Costello from the witness stand saying things like geez and even saying struck, like like he's the judge the strike things from the record, and the judge was like excuse me, and you had Costell giving him side eye. So it was all of those things. And then after the jury was out of the room when the judge
was dressing down Costello. The judge said, are you are you staring me down?
Is that what you're doing?
And he just kept getting worse from there.
Oh, really bad shape.
And that's why these judges wear the robes and have the big gabble.
You have a stand up when the.
Enter of the room because they're in control war room.
Just more evidence of how difference this different, this all might feel if we actually saw these things playing.
Out on camera, something.
In real time. Dave Arenberg is always great to see you on camera and hear your voice for thank those who are listening on Bloomberg Radio. Dave Arenberg, of course, is the state attorney for Palm Beach County. Never a shortage of color in these cases, Joe, But it is worth keeping in mind for the vast majority of Americans, including us, we've only read about what has happened from that room. We did not get to see or hear it for ourselves.
That's why I think we need more dramatic readings of what's happening in the court. I think there's a whole industry there.
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We're tracking where the money is going in terms of the presidential race because Joe in the month of April more money went to Donald Trump and the RNC than Joe Biden in the DNC. This is a change in the pattern we have seen up until day point in this election cycle. Joe Biden pulls in fifty one million dollars, Donald Trump seventy six million, and that's them and the parties combined.
This is important because it's the first time it's happened in this campaign cycle. And I know that everyone's gonna say, but Joe cash on hand, Joe Biden still has an enormous advantage when it comes to money, and that's true. They've been outraising on a campaign level and on a party level almost two to one for the better part of this cycle. But to see this, whether it's an outlier or a turning point is the question, and that's
what we want to get into with our panel. Genie Shanzano was with us today Bloomberg Politics contributor of course, a Democratic strategists, joined by Lester Munson, Republican strategist principle at bg R Group. Great to see you both, Lester, how do you read this unless you're going to tell me that we're data dependent? And I understand that you do need a couple of months to realize a trend.
But the fact is donors have been warming up to Donald Trump, not the opposite during his criminal trial.
Well, I think it's two things. One, it appears Trump has a little bit of a lead in the polls one or two points if you average it out. That helps excite his donor base. Also the fact that he's appears to be being persecuted, if you will, certainly by his supporters, he's perceived as being persecuted, and so they
want to come to his aid. And I think the you know, he's really worked this trial in New York to his advantage, whether it's a press conference outside the court room or railing at the judge or you know, the perfidy of Michael Cohen or whatever the little mini drama is, he's turned it into a real opportunity for fundraising here, So I guess we give him some credit for creativity.
Okay, well, but there also is the consideration that that funding mechanism, at least the ability to stand outside the courthouse and plead your case each and every day, is about to potentially go away. The case is the defense and prosecution rested their cases. We just wait until closing arguments next week and then jury deliberation, and Genie, this may be the only trial that actually happens. All of the other ones are on hold right now, basically and definitely.
So by getting rid of a legal headache, potentially, does it open up a new fundraising headache when you lose the opportunity to potentially you have the visuals to pull in more dollars.
Yeah.
I mean, I can't believe we're at a point where we're talking about Gosh, isn't a presidential candidate going to miss being under indictment for thirty four felony cops and that trial ends. But you're right, that's where we are. You know, these numbers are important. I was going to be one of those people that said, oh, Joe, but Democrats have more cash on hand, which is true.
Yeah, but I'm there.
But what I will say is that there is also a regular expectation that this happens, putting aside the trial and everything else, because, of course Donald Trump has just recently got into the nomination, and of course when you get to the nomination it opens up the ability to collect money with the RNC, so he can collect these big checks. So there's other aspects of this. If it becomes a pattern, then that's going to be a problem for the Biden team. But right now they feel pretty
good about fundraising. Less so about what Lester mentioned, which is the poll, so that is a problem, But fundraising they feel okay about right now.
All right, Well, Genie, let's say it out loud here. Joe Biden's campaign ended April with eighty four and a half million dollars on hand eighty four. Donald Trump's campaign had forty eight million dollars net cash on hand. But we've also talked to your Genie a lot recently about whether money matters, or to the extent to which money will matter in this general election campaign, when the king of earned media is running against Joe Biden. How do you square these two?
Yeah, I mean, these are two people with one hundred percent name recognition. Donald Trump is the king of earned media, so he's been able to win campaigns having less money.
Just look back at twenty sixteen.
You know that said, there's a different component here because of course he not only has less money on hand, but he's burning through cash because of his legal challenges, and that is a problem. They also are lagging behind on their ground game. He can with earned media make that up, particularly because we're talking about you know, six to seven states.
But it is a problem. So I'm one of those people.
Money is not determinative in these things with this kind of name recognition, but it is an asset.
So you'd rather have more of it than less.
Okay, so you'd rather have more than less. It also just isn't about having it in your possession lesser, but using it effectively. Have we seen either of these campaigns use it effectively so far in the cycle or are they all just hoarding it for the final push later?
Yeah?
Acculle, great question. I you know, I think the real campaign pros look at the burn rate, right, what does it cost you to raise the money? And then are you using it effectively with respect to the polls. Let's Let's give both of these candidate's credit. They won the nominations of their parties. It was a little bit harder, arguably for Trump than Biden. Biden kind of stacked the deck as the incumbent. But they're here, they are, and they were both the nominees last time, so they must
be doing something right. I think the question is going to be does Trump need more money this go round than he did four years ago or eight years ago in order to deliver his message of putting the onus on Biden. He failed to do that last time. He was the You know, the election was about Trump in twenty twenty. If he can make the election about Biden this year, then he's probably going to prevail. What does
Biden need to make the election about Trump? Probably he's a little bit more than he's raising right now, so he's gonna have to step up his game. But I think that's this This question of the burn rate, are you using the money effectively? Is exactly the right question.
We saw the Biden of campaign make a big investment this month, Genie, a fifteen million dollar ad buy. Not just an ad buy, it's a fifteen million dollar spend that will also partially go to organizing on the ground, hiring up in different swing states. Could we be in a world where next month, the next time that we're looking at fundraising for a couple of months down the road, we start seeing the fruits of that spending.
Yeah, I mean they hope that they do. Because this is going to be.
So focused on these key states, they understand the importance of organizing and because it's going to be so tight in each of these states. I think the Biden team does have a more difficult path for that reason, and also as the incumbent.
So it is a good campaign.
It has been run well so far, but they come with their deficits, and we see the President with the recent announcement about the bait, trying to change the trajectory because it has been the pull so far that have left them in the position of feeling like they're a bit of the underdog at this point. But I agree with Lester. If Biden can make this about Trump, he's got a better shot. But if Trump can make this
about Biden, then Trump has a better shot. The one good thing for Biden is Trump likes to make everything about himself, So you know, what's the likelihood he wants the focus to be on Joe Biden.
Well, he may not like the focus that is on his true Social account today for at least one reason, and that is after a video was posted on his true social platform on his account that essentially showed a bunch of newspaper clippings talking about what would happen in a hypothetical Trump victory in twenty twenty four, and under the headline what's next for America, it referred to the creation of a unified Reich. This video was up for about twenty four hours ultimately before it was taken down.
Lester the campaign said that it was posted by a staff member while Donald Trump was in court. But does it matter who posted it if it lived out there in the world for a full day.
No, it doesn't, Kaylee. Then it's shameful that stuff shouldn't happen. And you know, I'm under the impression that Susie Wilds and Chris Lsovita, who are here to be very good campaign managers, should have better control over the message than to allow something like that to happen. It's that's atrocious.
Does the Biden campaign call these out one by one as they happen, Genie, or do you just continue to give the other campaign rope on.
This you call them out. I mean, this is a despicable pattern. I couldn't agree more with Lester on this. It shouldn't have happened. But it's not the first and only time. This goes back to Charlottesville, This goes back to the twenty sixteen campaign. This goes back to comments
that he made to General Kelly. I mean, the list of anti semitic tropes by the Trump are long, and I hope that Republicans who have been railing against young people for protesting the war, accusing them of being anti Semitic or equally as offended by this video that Trump's campaign put up, whether he was responsible for that or not.
All right, Jeanie Shanzeno and Lester Munson our wonderful political panel today. Thank you so much for joining us. Genie of course as a Bloomberg Politics contributor. She's also Senior Democracy Fellow at the Center for the Study of the Presidency in Congress. And Lester Munson is a Republican strategist, as I said, but BGR Group co head of the International Practice and certainly that video which stayed up for a considerable period of time. As I mentioned, Joe getting a lot of attention.
To Yeah, to think we were reading about this this morning and it was still there says a lot about the operation.
Yeah, absolutely, although we have had reported consistently by us here at Bloomberg and others that the campaign by and large is more organized this time, a lot is more disciplined with the messaging, which raises a question of how something like this would.
Have Well, there's a bit of a distraction in over Manhattan. I realized they were in court yesterday. It's not there any longer, but the conversation will continue.
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I'm Joe Matthew alongside Kaylee Lines, and it's pretty remarkable. Kaylee, here we are again talking about the potential for some votes in the capital. Yet no one seems to think these bills are going to become law.
Yeah, one of them a border bill that's going to get a vote for the Senate very likely will not get adequate votes to even send it to the House. Then some cryptorelated bills that are very likely to pass in the House that may not go anywhere in the Senate, where there is much more skepticism about the industry overall.
We got the chance to speak with Congressman Tom Emmer, who's on the House Mynancial Services Committee, also serves of course as the House Majority whip, who told us yesterday he does think the two crypto pieces of legislation will pass on the House floor. But we also got to talk with him about something else, because just minutes before our conversation, we got the news from the chair of the fdiic Martin Gruenberg, that he would indeed step down
once the successor was named. And this was Congressman Emmer's reaction.
He should have resigned weeks ago, perhaps years ago, based on the hundreds of pages of report that showed this toxic work environment with sexual harassment and all kinds of awful things with the employees. And yet here he goes again, Hey, I'm going to resign. I'm prepared to do that, but not until we have a successor. Well, guess what, Kaylee, We've got six months left, roughly six or seven months left, Marty Greenberg. Greenberg needs to go yesterday, so he should resign and get out of there.
Congressman Tom Memory the House Majority with how do you really feel last night? Not holding back? Joining us now for more on this conversation, and please to say is Barat Rama Murti. He is formerly Deputy Director of the National Economic Council, now Senior Advisor for Economic Strategy at the American Economic Liberties Project, and he is here with us in our Washington, d C. Studio. So Barat, great to have you. Welcome back to Bloomberg TV and Radio.
Mister Groomberg, much to the chagrin of Say, Congressman Number has said he will step down once a successor is not just named but confirmed. Would you take that job?
Well, I appreciate the offer, but no I had any discussion. I haven't and there's a lot of good candidates for that job, but I assume that the White House will pick one of them. But it's not something I'm interested in at the moment. I do think it's really important to take a step back at number one. It's pretty commonplace for an outgoing chair to say that they will leave if and when somebody is confirmed for that role,
so that there's a smooth transition there. And when Congress wants to act quickly, they can act very quickly and confirm one of a qualified nominee. So it should not take that long if Senate Republicans cooperate. Number two, I think it's important to remember that the FDIC is an extraordinarily important agency in all of this. I remember when I was in the White House last February during the
Silicon Valley bank situation. The FDIC was critical and making sure that that issue didn't spiral out into a much larger problem with the banking system and played a big role in containing that. So it's important that we get somebody into that role who's experienced and who has a strong hand on the till when it comes to financial regulation.
You wonder who would want this job if you read that report. The current state of the culture of the workplace cultural alone in this agency is deeply troubled. This is going to require a fixer. Do you have a sense of what it would take to repair the problems that the FDI see?
Yeah, Look, I.
Think it is going to take some time. When you have that type of issue at an agency which employs hundreds and hundreds of people and where there's clearly some systemic issues, it's going to take somebody who comes in and makes it a real focus of theirs to turn those issues around. It involves sitting down with the employees, really listening to what the concerns are, putting in measures
that would address those concerns. But it can be fixed, and I've seen it happen with other agencies that have had these types of systemic problems that have really improved over the years.
Well, certainly that effort, I'm sure even now is underway, even if Marty Greenberg says he's outgoing. There also is the consideration though, as to what might not happen if he does indeed step down, or if we can't get someone else confirmed in time, which includes Basil three capital reform for some of the biggest banks that are out there. Obviously, that is something this administration has been pushing very heavily
across all of these different regulatory bodies. When it comes to the prudential regulators at least, is that realistically going to happen now that all of this is happening or is it time to call time on the end game of bozzle three.
Look, I think that there's a number of complicating factors on Basle three. The end of the day, there's a very strong case for higher capital standards on big financial institutions, but it takes a lot of coordination across agencies and these types of issues, along with what's clearly been a big pushback from the industry and from some folks on
the Hill is going to complicate that timeline. Generally speaking, not a lot gets done in Washington a few months before the presidential election, so it wouldn't surprise me if the resolution of the Basil three issue happens after November. But this is another complicating factor in all of that.
We started by talking about the potential for a vote here on a crypto framework bill. Is this something that needs to happen because it's going nowhere it seems in the Senate.
I'd say on crypto there's a pretty strong case for legislation that does a couple of things. Number one, really protecting consumers from the kinds of frauds and scams that are quite frequent in this industry. Based on what we've seen, and number two, making sure that whatever the use of these assets, they're not going to spill out into a broader risk to the financial system, or broadly.
Are we giving enough money to the CFTC to do this right.
Well, my concern with this bill is that it falls short on both of those measures, and that a good bill, I think would be a step forward in terms of protecting consumers, in terms of addressing any systemic risk that crypto poses. My concern is that this bill isn't that bill, and that it'd be good for Congress to go back to the drawing board and take another crack at this again. I'm in favor of doing that for the right piece
of legislation. I'm just concerned that this isn't the right approach, and I think that those concerns are reflected in the Senate.
Well.
What the industry will say is the concerning approach should be the approach taken by the regulator, specifically the chair of the sec Gary Gensler, who is instead, because there is no existing regulation written by Congress, is trying to apply securities law and basically just sue the way to authority. Can that status quo stay.
The same no again.
I think that there's a strong case for having some kind of legislated outcome here. When you have these types of new technological developments, it makes sense for Congress to step in and fill in some gaps that may exist in the current regulatory framework. They need to be very thoughtful about that. Look, my head goes back to pre two thousand and eight, where the financial industry came in repeatedly from two thousand onwards and said these rules are too onerous. We need to make it easier to do
subprime lending because it's easy. We've got to get access to credit for folks. And Congress listened to those industry requests, and what happened was that we set the conditions for a financial crisis that put the entire economy into a recession. We just need to be very, very careful when it comes to these types of changes to our financial system, because the risks of getting it wrong are so large.
Spending time with rot Ramamerti, who is working as well with the groundwork collaborative and addressing the tax code, I want to ask you about the twenty seventeen tax cuts, which we're hearing a lot about now, an effort to be made permanent. Here you're on the other side of this argument. How do you tell Americans that they're better off with higher taxes?
Well, I think it's actually quite popular with Americans to make sure that they're rich and big corporations are paying
more in taxes. And what the Trump tax cuts did in twenty seventeen, if you recall number one, there was a massive and permanent cut to the corporate tax rate from thirty five percent to twenty one percent, and then there was a series of individual changes like, for example, increasing the estate tax threshold so fear people pay that increase are reducing the top tax rate for people making well over four hundred thousand dollars in income each year.
Those are set to expire in twenty twenty five. The CBO, the Congressional Budget Office disc did a report that the cost of extending all of those expiring tax cuts is four point six trillion dollars and the majority of those benefits go to higher income household people.
Have an association, though, with those tax cuts and a strong economy, a very difficult association, I.
Would I would respectfully disagree on that. Do you know that the single most unpopular moment of the Donald Trump presidency wasn't when he was trying to go after healthcare. It wasn't when he was saying crazy statements about COVID. It was the week before he.
Tried to pass the tax cut and job sect.
And that's because the public really revolted against the idea that we should be spending trillions of dollars on tax cuts that primarily go to big corporations.
And the wealthy.
And so when you're setting a poll or there's a survey research, go look at it, gallop and so on. He was in the low thirties when it came to his approval rating at that point in time. And so, and that's one of the reasons why every single Democrat in Congress, from the most liberal to the most conservative,
voted happily against that piece of legislation. And so now we have a chance in twenty twenty five, that's what this letter is about to take a fresh look at all of this because a lot of those provisions are expiring in the Trump tax bill, and so rather than thinking about which ones are we going to extend, which ones do we want to modify, we should be looking at the tax code holistically and say we need to reverse this decades long trend that we have towards bringing
in less and less revenue. Just one final data point in all of this. Before the Bush tax cuts in the two thousands, we were bringing in the federal government about twenty percent of GDP and tax revenue each year. After the Bush tax cut and the Trump tax cuts closer to sixteen percent. And that reduction in revenue by itself explains why our national debt is growing. And by the way, a lot of those benefits went to the very highest income household. So we need to reverse this trend.
And twenty twenty five soar opportunity to do that.
Well, this is going to be a big fight. We'd like to stay in touch with you, of course, barat Rama Murdy with us in his post White House life now senior advisor for Economic Strategy at the American Economic Liberties Project BROT. Thank you for your insights today, Kayleie.
We're talking as well about an important day in Lower Manhattan as the defense rests in the Trump trial, and we want to go to New York where June Grosso at Bloomberg Law is standing by with her take on what we learned here today, not a huge change as the defense wrapped its case here June. Not a huge change with what we had seen yesterday with Robert Costello, for instance, But tell us the significance of this moment, now that we've seen both sides have their say.
Well, I think the prosecution actually made some good points and did an aggressive cross of Costello. So I don't know what you know how the jury's viewing it, but I think one thing that you have to remember is he's the last witness. The defense put on two witnesses, and he was really the only witness of substance, and the jury's going to go home for how many days now until Tuesday with that on their minds. So I think the defense sort of went out with a whimper.
But remember, the defense only needs one juror in order to hang up the jury, and that's probably what they're thinking. And their whole approach has really been to attack the credibility of the state star witness, my uncle Cohen. The state on the prosecution, on the other hand, has been trying to pump up his testimony and use documents and texts and other witnesses testimony to.
Back him.
Up today's jury instructions to fight about jury instructions, and those are really the most important part of a trial, even though they're not the most interesting for the you know, for people are who are there, but they're critical, and especially in this case where there's such a conundrum about what are the federal or tax or state tax crimes associated here to make this a felony. So that's really important.
Yeah, I'm so glad you brought that up June, because things aren't all done and dusted at court today at two point fifteen is when this meeting on jury instruction between the judge and the attorneys is set to happen. Just what exactly is involved in jury instructions what we will be looking for.
So jury instructions, So the jury, through the witnesses, saw the evidence, but how do they apply the evidence? What's the law that they'll apply the evidence with? And that's something that the judge is going to give them in the instructions. It's not going to come from you know, what they saw at trial. It's going to come from the judge. So it's very important. And what's going to what's happening at the charge is each side is going to try to influence the judge in what the instructions are.
There are standard instructions. The judge might just use standard instructions in some of these cases, he might use something that the defense proposes, something that the prosecution proposes, or a combination of each. But it's really critical. And you know, in appellate procedure, when there's an appeal, a lot of times it's reversed based on the jury instructions that were given. It's always a way for uh, you know, the defense to attack a verdict is the judge gave the wrong
jury instructions. So in this case, the jury instruction on what the election crime is connected to the falsifying the business records to make this a felony is going to be critical. And everybody knows that. The judge knows that, and so I'm sure he's going to be very careful and it's going to be interesting to see what he says, what he decides.
It's interesting entourage in court today, we've seen you know who's who of Capitol Hill. We had more members of Congress there. Eric Schmidt showed up. Ronnie Jackson was there today.
Yep.
A Kaylee, the former White House doctor now a member of Congress, Dan Muser, Dale Strong, a few others, but Joe Piscopo also made his way to the courthouse today June, and I'm just wondering, well that have any impact on the jury to see Joe Piscopo at court.
You know, I don't think the jury is really influenced by who's coming into the court. Unless Milania Trump came to the courtroom. I think that would be an impact. Considering what the case is about and her connection to it, that would be an impact. But I don't think they're influenced by any of these people that come into the courtman sit there. I know that the reporters who are covering the trial are perturbed that these people are coming in and getting seats when you know they're a lot
of times are waiting online for hours. They get there at five in the morning or whatever to get seats because they are only a certain number allocated. Even the overflow room is overflowing. So I know that the reporters are not happy about it. I doubt the jurors pay any attention.
Wow, all right, June Grossel Blomberg lost six pm Eastern time on Bloomberg Radio. A fascinating day in court once again, Kaylie. We'll wait for the instructions next.
Your listening to the Bloomberg Balance of Power podcast kens just live weekdays at noon Eastern on Applecarplay and then roud Oro with the Bloomberg Business App. You can also listen live on Amazon Alexa from our flagship New York station, Just Say Alexa Play Bloomberg eleven thirty.
One of the other big stories that we're covering today here on Balance of Power is a new wrinkle on the US policy in Israel and the very real challenges domestically politically that Joe Biden is facing here as the President now calls outrageous the story that we discussed a bit yesterday, the International Criminal Court working up arrest warrants for the leaders of Hamas and Israel, including Prime Minister Benjamin Nett Yahoo at once. Outrageous, says Joe Biden, and
that has become the conventional wisdom. We heard from Secretary of State Anthony Blincoln earlier. He called the decision to seek these arrests quote extremely wrong headed, echoing the President. We heard earlier today on Bloomberg on Bloomberg TV and Radio from Ron Dermer as we continue this messaging clearly speaking in this case for the Israeli government. The Israeli Minister of Strategic Affairs, he's part of the war cabinet. His reaction to this news, let's hear what he said on Blooma.
I agree with the President Biden that it was outrageous. I'd also say that it was dangerous. Why is it outrageous because they're creating a false symmetry between Israel and Kamas, and they're basing it on false charges.
Challenging the conventional wisdom today in Washington is a voice that you've heard before on this program. Writing for Bloomberg Opinion, Andreas Klouth with a smart column and one that we should consider. Andreas is with me here, as you can see on YouTube, at the table, writing if the US now scorns the it helped to create the nineteen nineties, it will undermine the international regime of law and order that it claims to defend. It's great to see you, Andreas.
Thank you for joining me here. Walk me through your rationale here. Because this is an administration that is specifically focused on equivalency. That's what Joe Biden said that maybe if this had come in a different consideration, it would be a different story. But you're putting Israel and Hamas on the same stage here.
Yeah, and that's very interesting. So you heard in the sound about just now he used the word symmetry and you use the word equivalents. You heard that from Jim Rish in the Senate, you heard that from Biden from Lincoln, and it's interesting. It is absolutely true, in my opinion, that the two sets of applications for an arrest warrant three Hamas, two Israeli are not equivalent morally or illegally.
The interesting thing is that this has become such a talking point in this news cycle because it's a red herring. The prosecutor, Kareem Khan, in no way implied an equivalence. He did make a decision and that may may have been a mistake in communicating this news to bungle the five cases into one announcement, and that gives an opening to people who will politically defend and this is understandable that they want that the US wants to back Israel,
which will counter this. And you know, and of course Hamas was equally offended and rejected at it as well. So just for equivalents, but that gives him one opening, and the US is now rejecting this on the basis of a if you listen to the press conference yesterday, a number of confused So sometimes with this argument, sometimes one another one is does the court even have jurisdiction?
Now it's not equivalent, And everyone needs to remember that this is an application for an arrest warrant which was recommended unanimously by a panel of legal experts chosen from around the world, after enormous body of evidence, and it now goes to a panel of independent judges to even become a warrant, and then it will not go to trial for reasons we can revisit. But if it did ever come to trial, each of the five would have
a separate case presumed innocence and all of that. And I'm saying the US has a much larger strategic interest with a view to being called hypocritical and the global South with a view to what it stands for, what it has stood for since World War Two in being on the side of international law. So whether it's domestic courts, so you just had another context to domestic law and
order or international you cannot pick and choose. You cannot be for the rule of law and courts and independence of the judiciary only when it suits you.
We should have frontloaded this conversation, and you just alluded to it by the fact that likely no one's going to be arrested because of these warrants. With that said, though, it sounds like you're isolating a communications problem here more than a procedural or legal one.
I think it is a communications problem. And he was trying the Kareem Khan, the prosecutor, was trying to He said explicitly, you know, we have to choose. And this is the same for the International Court of just As, a different court in the Hague, and in general for the organs and bodies of international law. We have to decide are we going to apply the law equally or not.
By the way, a while back, I wrote a column the United States is usually not in favor of applying the law equally, which would apply even to itself.
Nobody complained when they went to arrest Vladimir Putin.
Though, well, for instance, let's go to that that is very similar. If you take the point of jurisdiction, neither Ukraine nor Russia is a signatory to the Rome Statute which established the court. Therefore, that didn't bother the United States, because here it's in its interest to support the same court in going after prudent story in building the evidence.
It's a good storyline. But when the US is afraid that the Court might investigate an American or in this case, Israel, the Trump administration slapped sanctions on a judge and a lawyer of the ICC. And there is even a law passed by Congress called facetiously that the Hague Invasion Act. If weever bring an American to the Court, and the
Hague will invade and get them out. So you cannot no, And you mentioned I think in the in the intro, even the US, in this case the Roman Statute, as in so many cases of other treaties, was actually the leader in getting it done. It wanted this and then decided and got cold feet and says, oh no, no, they might turn it against us. Well, we only want it when it suits us, or when it's against other people, and not against us. And I'm saying that is a bad look. And so there is more at stake. And
actually I firmly happened to believe. I said the outset that even though I or not even I believe they're not equivalent. I think Natanyahu and as Defense Minister, if it ever were to go to trial, which it won't, would be found innocent about that. But why not trust the court to find that?
Yeah, this is all about optics and a great piece that I'll point you to from Andreas Kluth on the Terminal OPI n Go or of course online Bloomberg Opinion. Andrea's great to see you, great writing and a great case to make here. Don't be a stranger. Thanks for
listening to the Balance of Power podcast. Make sure to subscribe if you haven't already, at Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts, and you can find us live every weekday from Washington, DC at noontime Eastern at Bloomberg dot com