voter irregularities and they join david shafer and kathy latham. shafer is the former gop head in georgia and was in the fake elector scheme and he said he acted at the direction of donald trump as well as other federal officials and kathy latham, the former chair of the gop who was a fake elector herself and also instrumental in the alleged scheme to access illegally access voting data in coffee county. we ve been talking to defense attorneys in fulton county and they say that their clients who have bond much like these defendants in this case are treated much differently. earlier i spoke to jimenez who is a defense attorney in a rico case in atlanta right now and i asked him about the treatment of the defendants in the trump sub version case. believe they re getting preferential treatment because like any celebrity and any person they cannot be put in general population.
face the consequences of this, but i do want to ask you about the merits of the case that mark meadows has tried to bring forward. does he have a case that could potentially go to the federal courts? my sense is he has a colorable argument. i don t think he s ultimately likely to succeed on it. what the federal judge is going to be deciding is whether mark meadows or any of the co-defendants who are trying to get these cases into federal court is whether or not meadows was acting in his capacity as a federal officer when he did what was alleged in the indictment and whether he has a colorable federal defense to make. my sense is these arguments on meadows part are not frivolous, but i do think there s an uphill battle and there s a good chance that while you are charged here, you exceeded your official duties in trying to tamper with this election. so my sense is it s probably unlikely to succeed, but i understand why he s making the
argument because as i said, it s not a frivolous one. i want to turn to tom eastman. he was booked and mug shot taken as will happen to every single person, including the former president, but i do want to ask you about what he said. he defended his actions after the 2020 election. here is his response after he came out of jail. they target attorneys for their zealous advocacy on behalf of their clients and something their attorneys are ethically bound to provide and which was attempted here by formally challenging the results of the election through lawful and appropriate means. do you still think the election was stolen? absolutely. absolutely still. no question. so he s making the case they re just going after attorneys who are doing their jobs. does that hold any water? well, it s a bit of a stretch based on what was alleged in the
appear in a pre-taped interview with former fox host tucker carlson. david chalian, no surprise, the timing of donald trump doing an interview with tucker carlson, that s going to take some of the air out of the room, i m sure. what are you watching for tonight with eight, maybe seven of the candidates? yeah, well, as you mentioned, with donald trump not on the stage, sara, i am looking to see how much of a presence he still has in this debate. it is, no doubt, the fox hosts have sort of previewed in some pre-debate interviews questions about donald trump will come up. that seems pretty certain. how much time is spent on it and how much percentage the other candidates see in talking about donald trump versus taking the attacks to joe biden, trying to introduce themselves to the republican electorate and largely tuning in for the first time in this race to make the case why they are the best
you want to get them in and out as fast as possible especially if they have a bond. there are inherent dangers by putting someone famous, a celebrity with general population because they may create a risk for others and they may create a riot, somebody might try to attack them. pat labott said he will treat everyone equally when it comes to this case. it remains to be seen if that will be applied to the former president when he is expected to surrender tomorrow. kate? nick valencia, thank you. thank you both very much. the lineup for the first republican debate is in question this morning and that s because the governor doug burr numb had to be taken to the emergency room after playing basketball. he is okay and out of the hospital, but we don t know if he ll join the other serve candidates on the debate stage tonight. one candidate we know will not be there, donald trump will