Note from Elie: The Danger of Weaponization – No Matter Who Does It 09:08

There's nothing worse than getting home from your trip only to find out you missed a can't-miss travel experience. That's why you need Viator. Book guided tours, excursions, and more in one place to make your trip truly unregrettable. There are over 300,000 travel experiences to choose from so you can find something for everyone. And Viator offers free cancellation and 24-7 customer service. So you always have support around the clock.

Download the Viator app now to use code Viator10 for 10% off your first booking in the app. Regret less. Do more with Viator. Hey, everyone. Ellie here wishing you a very happy Friday. This is our second last episode of the year. I guess it's flown by. I hope everyone has a little bit of an extended holiday weekend. If Christmas is your holiday, I hope you have a great Christmas on Monday. I guess it is.

In the meantime, we have this episode and then one very special year ender for next week that I've been working on that I think you're going to enjoy. Hope you find this one interesting. I think you'll find this one provocative at a minimum. As always, love to hear your thoughts, questions, or comments. Send them in to letters at cafe.com. ♪

What would you think if a person ran for high public office and promised in advance that if elected, he would use his extraordinary official powers to go after his political opponents? If you're anything like the vast majority of experts and observers from both sides of the partisan aisle or from neither side in particular, you'd probably use terms like openly authoritarian, appalling, dangerous, insane, and legitimately scary.

Now, these are quotes pulled directly from prominent commentators in response to Donald Trump's overt declaration that if reelected president, he will use the power of prosecution to punish his political rivals. Legitimately scary is me, by the way. I said that on CNN and we talked about it on this podcast. I stand by all of it.

Now, go back to the proposition that opened today's podcast. But let's change the he to she. And let's take it from the hypothetical to the actual. So here's what we start with. What would you think if a person ran for high public office and promised in advance that if elected, she would use her extraordinary official powers to go after her political opponents and then did so?

Now you've got Letitia James, the New York State Attorney General. The same criticism that rightly applies to Trump's promises of prosecutorial retribution applies to James, too. We cannot be appalled by Trump's vow to use his office to go after his political opponents unless we also reject A.G. James doing the same thing and then delivering as promised. Trump's rhetoric is without question more dangerous.

In an interview with Univision, he said of his ongoing prosecutions, quote, they've released the genie out of the box. If I happen to be president and I see somebody who's doing well and beating me very badly, I say, go down and indict them. They'd be out of business. They'd be out of the election, end quote. And that's the less reprehensible part. Days later, Trump deployed Nazi-like rhetoric, vowing to, quote, root out the, quote, vermin who oppose him. I'll stipulate Trump's language is more extreme than...

Thank you.

At bottom, Trump and James have made the same promise. Vote for me and I'll nail the other guy on the other side. That was the central premise of James's successful 2018 campaign for New York State AG. She tweeted that if elected as the state's most powerful law enforcement official, she would be, quote, leading the resistance against Donald Trump and NYC.

That quote, New Yorkers need a fighter who will take on Donald Trump and stand up for our rights. I'll be that fighter. Join my campaign. And that quote, real Donald Trump should keep asking about me because I'm getting ready to ask him some questions under oath. End quote. James raised funds from political donors with these entreaties and others like this. Quote, I need your help in this fight against Donald Trump.

End quote. Worse yet, James made clear that she didn't even know or much care what she'd pin on Trump once she became AG. Just something. Anything. At one point during her candidacy, before she had access to a morsel of actual evidence, James declared that Trump, quote, engaged in a pattern and practice of money laundering and can be indicted for criminal offenses. End quote. Sure. Put him in prison for, I don't know, money laundering, something, whatever. End quote.

And the day after she won office, one day after, James proclaimed that, quote, we're going to definitely sue him. We're going to be a real pain in the ass. He's going to know my name personally, end quote. Sue him for what? Who knows? We'll find something. It's no different than if a Republican candidate for Delaware AG promised during his campaign to nail the Bidens for something, anything, or if an aspiring New York state prosecutor promised to string up the Clintons somehow, some way.

James has continued to grandstand and play politics throughout Trump's civil fraud trial, which will finally wrap up in January. Boy, has this thing dragged on. She has made patently inappropriate out-of-court statements to the media throughout this trial, going so far as to publicly brand Trump and his family members as liars while they were testifying during the pendency of the trial. She tweeted that.

If any prosecutor did this during a criminal trial, she'd be disciplined, probably fired, and the case might well be thrown out for prosecutorial misconduct. This is a civil trial, so the stakes are lower, but the same principle applies. We're talking about the state's top law enforcement official here.

Now, I'm going to anticipate this response, but James is right. Trump has committed massive fraud. I agree with this as a factual proposition. Trump's business has largely been built on a rickety foundation of bullshit. But I reject this as a basis to excuse James's political targeting. First, it's simply a non sequitur, a non responsive rejoinder to the problem of political targeting.

The principle here is not it's unacceptable for a politician to run for office by specifically targeting political opponents unless the politician thinks it's OK in a given instance. If that were the case, anyone could and would claim they had ample cause to persecute their tormentors. Donald Trump surely believes he has such justification, too. The principle is it's unacceptable to run for office by promising to use your power to go after political enemies. And that's it.

Second, as Ruth Marcus, an unapologetically liberal editor at the Washington Post, recently demonstrated in a column, A.G. James' civil action against Trump is unprecedented overkill. Marcus acknowledges in her thoughtful piece that she despises Trump and would love to see him punished. But to her credit, she doesn't just leave it at that. She does the work. She quotes various New York practitioners and experts who confirm that the punishment sought by James here, cancellation of all Trump's business certificates,

is unprecedented in New York history and that other cases involving comparable or worse allegations of fraud had resulted in far less severe penalties. Marcus writes that the penalties sought by A.G. James against Trump are, quote, unnecessary and unduly punitive, disproportionate to the offenses charged, end quote. Attorney General James is an extraordinarily popular figure among Democrats in New York and beyond.

There is, frankly, a reluctance in some quarters to publicly criticize her, though some folks will privately excoriate her. But her conduct is unacceptable and, yes, dangerous. Not as dangerous as Trump, but still dangerous. As the chief law enforcement officer for the state of New York...

James wields enormous, almost unimaginable power. Her political future, bolstered largely by her pursuit of Trump, is bright, and she's likely to ascend to even higher office someday. She actually ran briefly for New York governor in 2021, but she withdrew and decided to return as AG.

Don't apologize or make excuses for the attorney general. She doesn't need it. She's highly competent and she knows what she's doing. Don't accept or ignore her conduct either. Reject the hypocrisy and repudiate the explicit political weaponization of high public office, no matter who's doing it. Thanks for listening, everyone. Stay safe and stay informed.

On September 28th, the Global Citizen Festival will gather thousands of people who took action to end extreme poverty. Watch Post Malone, Doja Cat, Lisa, Jelly Roll and Raul Alejandro as they take the stage with world leaders and activists to defeat poverty, defend the planet and demand equity. Download the Global Citizen app to watch live. Learn more at globalcitizen.org.com.