each pemrson has a different defense. donald trump has a claim that he has an advice of counsel defense. he says he has an advice of counsel defense. he can argue, district attorney, you ve taken away that defense because every one of the lawyers who gave me advice is a co-defendant. i m not now i can t call them to testify because they will be sitting at counsel table with me and have a fifth amendment pri lidge. where all of the cases will have to be speparated and each tried on its own merits. i was hoping for a second on this. i always thought that by virtue of that advice of counsel defense, it sets up quite the acrimonious and contentious relationship. the privilege would exist. if you re engaged in a crime together, you don t get that same privilege. if you set that aside for a
you could hear it. you could even hear him a little bit even before the proceeding as he was whispering. he was quite animated as we were waiting for the proceeding to start. there were several minutes of wait time before the judge took the bench. trump was in the room. jack smith, the special prosecutor, he was also in the room. they had a clear view of one another. and so trump spent a lot of time looking directly at jack smith, then speaking to his attorneys. jack smith was also quite animated in conversation, appeared to be extremely relaxed, even had his arm up on the bench. he was smiling afterwards as he sat in the counsel table in the well. but donald trump was in court. he didn t seem to be in as foul of a mood as he was whenever we witnessed him in court in florida for his previous arraignment. but this really was a somber proceeding where he was asked to be directly engaged with what was going on there, with the charges he faces. actually, one more thing that i noticed is as
a couple of things. i m looking at conditions of release, as i mentioned earlier. i m also going to be looking at the former president s demeanor and who actually sits at the counsel table with him. although we understand that there will be a south florida defense lawyer with him, i m not sure we know the identity of that person yet. i do know todd blanch, he s someone i encountered in practice. his reputation is stellar. and i ll also be looking to see whether todd blanch appears to be a person the former president listens to. we have seen a number of lawyers with prosecutorial experience enter the president s orbit thinking they will be the person who transformed him. they will be the person who disciplines him, makes him into the client that he should be for his own benefit, and each and every one of them usually exit his orbit worse for the wear, if not for criminal exposure. my hope is that todd blanch, with whom i ve had nothing but good encounters, doesn t become one of those. i
the difference between mike pence s situation and mark meadows situation, they both have sharply incriminating evidence about donald trump. mike pence though, probably doesn t have a fifth amendment right against self incrimination to invoke mark meadows absolutely does. mark meadows lawyer will say if push comes to shove, and the executive privilege claims fails, you need to walk into the grand jury and plead the fifth over and over and over again. then jack smith has a decision to make, does he immunize mark meadows and compel s testimony against trump? or does he make mark meadows a co defendant and puts them at counsel table with donald trump, trying to force him to flip and become a cooperating witness? that s the way i see this playing out. all, right we re out of time, but as carroll said a moment ago, if donald trump had good lawyers giving him good advice, anyone who we just mentioned in the last 16 minutes i sure hope they were tuning in for the
january 6th and how we re going to, you know, stop this steal. here s how this old prosecutor sees things. the difference between mike pence s situation and mark meadows situation, they both have sharply incriminating evidence about donald trump. mike pence though, probably doesn t have a fifth amendment right against self incrimination to invoke mark meadows absolutely does. mark meadows lawyer will say if push comes to shove, and the executive privilege claims fails, you need to walk into the grand jury and plead the fifth over and over and over again. then jack smith has a decision to make, does he immunize mark meadows and compel s testimony against trump? or does he make mark meadows a co defendant and puts them at counsel table with donald trump, trying to force him to flip and become a cooperating witness? that s the way i see this playing out. all, right we re out of time, but as carol said a moment ago,