Court of Public Opinion Is Running Very Hot on James, Comey Cases: Fmr Federal Prosecutor

New York Attorney General Leticia James pleads not guilty to federal mortgage fraud charges. Her defense attorneys are making familiar arguments. Joining me now to discuss is Jim Trusty, former federal prosecutor and former attorney for President Trump. Thank you so much for joining us tonight. So, Attorney General Latricia James has now pleaded not guilty to federal charges against her and her trial for mortgage fraud is set for late January. So, first Jim, did we learn anything about the case today? What's new? >> Well, the newest thing is Leticia James is basically copying the homework of James Comey. Uh Comey's lawyers filed motions to dismiss the case. Part of it based on what they call selective and vindictive prosecution. And that's all just kind of the political fireworks of President Trump versus Jim Comey and some of the comments that the president has made as well as putting Lindsay Halligan in office in the US attorney's office to initiate those charges. The second motion that Comey filed and that now apparently James is also going to file relates to her authority, Lindsay Halligan's authority as the interim US attorney. And that's a really interesting kind of complex question. But in the uh case of Alina Haba, when she was put in to be the US attorney in New Jersey, a judge waited through the appointments clause and all of this uh statutory authority about what does it mean to have an interim US attorney? And the question boils down to something very small, which is can the president have multiple interim US attorneys, in other words, not Senate confirmed, but exceeding a total of 120 days, or is it all limited to 120 days? And so it sounds very technical, but at the end of the day, if Comey wins his motion with the statute of limitations having run, he's done. He gets a dismissal. James, there might be some way to argue that the statute of limitations hasn't run, but she'd still have a big win. She'd have a dismissal, at least in the short run, based on that. So, a lot of litigation to come. I think Earl argument on Comey's November 13th, so right around the corner. and we'll learn a lot about whether Lindseay Halligan's appointment is going to withstand the scrutiny of these judges. >> So, like you pointed out here, there are some similar points in the defense being made by both uh Leticia James as well as Comey here. Tell us about how the public narrative around these two cases might have or have not an influence on how thea case might play out. >> Yeah. Well, look, both cases, you know, they're both different. They're certainly from the Eastern District of Virginia, but not even from the same courthouse. And there's different prosecutors assigned to their cases. But what they have in common is obviously that these are people that President Trump has a lot of animous for. I would say Jim Comey and Leticia James uh show their share of dislike of President Trump. Whether it's Jim Comey walking on the beach and saying he found shells that arranged a pattern that called for killing President Trump or Leticia James who ran for office saying I will target President Trump. So I think you know the court of public opinion is running very hot. Obviously, both of these people and their attorneys are saying a lot and DOJ and the president have said a lot, but ultimately the court's going to rule on some fairly traditional areas of law uh when it comes to the vindictive or selective prosecution. I don't think that's really a winner for either defendant. I don't think that is going to uh show a constitutional violation. But this very narrow technical issue about how long uh Lindseay Haligan is whether she had authority to be in there indicting these cases, that's a tough one and I'm not sure how that's going to go, but it could easily break in favor of Jim Comey and possibly Leticia James. Let me just add this, Iris. Leticia James going out to court and saying it's not about me. Well, yeah, it is. It's very clearly, whatever you think about this prosecution, it's all about Leticia James because of her targeting of President Trump, her pre-announced targeting when she went after him for half a billion dollars and a loan fraud case in New York before it was overturned. So, it's going to be exciting days over the next couple of months watching both these cases. >> Well, certainly a lot of public attention on these two cases like you mentioned and hopefully we'll find out more around mid November, a key date set for that. Meanwhile, pivoting to another topic here, Arctic Frost probe. Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley has now released documents that former Attorney General Merrick Garland and former FBI Director Christopher Ray were among the officials who signed off on the probe targeting top conservative figures and as well as organizations. Do you think we could see prosecution taking shape over this? >> Yeah, we might. I mean, it certainly falls into the category of overreach and DOJ being politically motivated and weaponized. And, you know, I think a lot of people over the last few years have focused on Jack Smith and his team in terms of their behavior. But under the special counsel statute, they always answered to the attorney general. So, somehow Merrick Garland has just kind of escaped a lot of scrutiny by saying, "I was just here while Jack Smith did what he did." Well, the reality is he supervised those cases whether it's January 6 or Mara Lago and I think he supervised the Department of Justice that was just too eager to be political and too excited to go after President Trump as a target regardless of whether they had the evidence. So when you start seeing subpoenas for phone records from congressmen, from people even outside of the political direct political office, it gets to be of concern. And so it's very early to know exactly what they did, but there's doesn't seem to be a good answer as to why they did it. >> Well, certainly more documents coming out to uh could lead to more comments from the administration on that as well. Meanwhile, you're representing a pretty high-profile case figure here, Terry Rosier, the NBA player, indicted in New York over gambling practices just this week. Break this down for us uh from your perspective. What is this case centered around and how it might play out? Wow, that's that's a good one because we could, you know, we could fill a two-hour show. But, um, look, there's actually two indictments that were un unsealed yesterday in New York. One of which has absolutely nothing to do with my client, Terry Rosier. It's about high stakes poker games that were fixed, that were designed to make people fall into debt and then do things they wouldn't otherwise do. And that's the case that involves Hall of Fame basketball player and coach Chanty Bilips and I think 36 other people. So that case is, you know, on its own track and it has a little bit of overlap in terms of a defendant or two, but it's basically a completely separate conspiracy. Uh the case that Terry Rosier is involved in, I think it's a very unfortunate one for him to even be exposed to. you know, when the investigation was going on, they uh somebody, and it certainly wasn't us, leaked his name. It greatly affected his professional prospects because he was heading into the last year of his contract with the Miami Heat. And then they have a press conference that unfortunately kind of combines the two different cases and that spreads guilt in a lot of different directions where it really shouldn't be spread. But at the end of the day, the indictment's very light on Terry Rosier. I think it was a very bad thing for the FBI and the prosecutors in Brooklyn to decide to arrest him when they knew he was represented. They knew we would turn ourselves into New York anytime they called. And so I think the bottom line is Terry Rosier is not a gambler. He's not somebody that did anything wrong here, but he's not afraid of a fight. And so representing him, I can't say anything about the other five defendants in his case, but I think we'll be fighting this thing. And I I think we have great chances. >> Jim Trusty, thank you so much for legal insights today. Appreciate it.