The former president* had a very bad mid-afternoon on Thursday. I mean, when you can’t even count on Judge Aileen Cannon, you’re pretty much lost as a defendant.

Within hours of each other, El Caudillo del Mar-a-Lago saw two of his bogus motions for dismissal flat-line in two different courts. In Georgia, Judge Scott McAfee declined to dismiss the case against him for his part in trying to ratf*ck the Georgia electoral count in 2020. A few degrees south, Judge Cannon declined to dismiss the charges against him with regard to the Pool Shed Papers scheme. How much sharper than a serpent’s tooth it is to have a thankless judge. From CNN:

The short order from U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon on Thursday leaves open the possibility that Trump could still use the argument to defend himself at trial. Cannon, in the new order, pushed back on special counsel Jack Smith’s request that she make a final ruling on whether the theory can be used at trial, so that prosecutors could appeal to the 11th Circuit. She said that “demand” was “unprecedented and unjust.”

So Judge Cannon did not leap all the way out of the bag. But it is not unreasonable to speculate that Smith’s scalding finding regarding her conduct of the trial may have occasioned some judicial independence. Meanwhile, up in Georgia, Judge McAfee was far less ambivalent concerning the former president*’s notion that attempting to blackjack the Georgia secretary of state into helping him cheat was not “political speech” protected by the First Amendment. From CBS News:

In a fourteen-page order, Judge Scott McAfee rejected the argument put forth by the defendants that the charges violate the First Amendment’s protections of political speech and the right to petition Congress. “[F]ree speech—including political speech—is not without restriction,” McAfee wrote. “These excluded categories include speech integral to criminal conduct, fraud, or speech presenting an imminent threat that the Government can prevent.”
In his order, McAfee said only a jury can resolve whether Trump and his allies’ speech or conduct “was carried out with criminal intent,” as prosecutors have claimed. Still, he added that “accepting the allegations as true for the purposes of this pretrial challenge, as the court must, the speech alleged in this indictment is integral to criminal conduct and categorically excluded from First Amendment protections.” McAfee said defense attorneys have not presented “any authority that the speech and conduct alleged” is constitutionally protected political speech.

The real action in Georgia is the continued assault on Fulton County D.A. Fani Willis. The former president* and his lawyers are busily trying to find a way to get her bounced off the case, or at least to hamstring her ability to prosecute it. From CNN:

Willis has continued to speak publicly about the case, at times invoking race despite being rebuked by the presiding judge as the Fulton County district attorney juggles a reelection bid with prosecuting Trump and his fourteen co-defendants. Some attorneys for high-profile defendants, though, are hesitant to try to silence her at this time. A gag order against one of Trump’s biggest foes could score political points and help him and his co-defendants in the short term. But it could also backfire by undercutting their efforts to have Willis disqualified from the case, or by inspiring efforts to seek a gag order against Trump and other defendants who have publicly criticized Willis.

I have to admit that it’s pretty hilarious to read that one of the former president*’s Georgia lawyers says of Willis, “Apparently Judge McAfee’s warning to Willis in his disqualification order about talking about the case in a public forum is simply being ignored. Does that surprise anyone?” while up north, his client continues to harass Judge Juan Merchan and his family, almost daring the judge to slap a gag order on him. No wonder Lady Justice is wearing a blindfold. Who’d want to watch this?

Headshot of Charles P. Pierce
Charles P. Pierce

Charles P Pierce is the author of four books, most recently Idiot America, and has been a working journalist since 1976. He lives near Boston and has three children.