BREAKING: Judge EXPLODES at Trump official IN COURT

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Legal Breakdown episode 491: @GlennKirschner2 discusses a judge losing her patience in court over Trump officials lying.  For more from Brian Tyler Cohen: Straight-news titled YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@briantylercohennews YouTube (español): https://www.youtube.com/@briantylercohenespanol Order my #1 NYT bestselling book: https://www.harpercollins.com/pages/shameless Newsletter: https://plus.briantylercohen.com Twitch: https://www.twitch.tv/briantylercohen Apple Podcasts: https://apple.co/36UvEHs Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0066rKCBIycIMI4os6Ec5V Twitter: https://twitter.com/briantylercohen Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/briantylercohen Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/briantylercohen TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@briantylercohen Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/briantylercohen.bsky.social Threads: https://www.threads.net/@briantylercohen

Transcript

00:00You're watching The Legal Breakdown. Glenn, I think it's fair to say that these federal judges

00:03are finally losing their patience with Trump. A federal judge just exploded at a Trump administration

00:08official in court. Can you explain what just happened? Yeah, Brian, this one involves Donald

00:13Trump's, you know, really horrific attempt to ban transgender people from serving in the military.

00:20They've been serving honorably since 2021. And the Trump administration, you know, just kind of

00:27cruelly and arbitrarily wants to put a stop to them being able to serve our country in the

00:33military. And a federal court judge in Washington, D.C., Judge Anna Reyes, just exploded at Trump's

00:40dirty DOJ lawyers who are going in and arguing garbage, basically, to the court. And she

00:47exploded in two ways or on two fronts, both on the form of this litigation and on the substance

00:54of the litigation. And what I want to do, we often don't like to, you know, read extended

00:59segments of court rulings, but I want to read just a couple of sentences of what Judge Anna Reyes

01:06said to these DOJ lawyers, because it really drives home just how horrific and cruel and lawless

01:14the Trump administration is being. So District Judge Anna Reyes found that Trump's transgender

01:22ban from military service is soaked in animus and it violates the Equal Protection Clause

01:28because it discriminates based on transgender status and sex. Quote, it's the ban's language

01:37is unabashedly demeaning. Its policy stigmatizes transgender persons as inherently unfit and

01:46its conclusions bear no relation to fact. But the judge didn't stop there. Quote,

01:52transgender persons have served openly since 2021. But defendants, meaning Trump and his DOJ

02:01and his Department of Defense, including Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, defendants

02:08have not analyzed the service of transgender service members. That is unfortunate. Plaintiffs,

02:15meaning the transgender military service members, plaintiff service records alone are Exhibit A

02:23for the proposition that transgender persons can have the warrior ethos, physical and mental health,

02:31selflessness, honor, integrity and discipline to ensure military excellence. I mean, what she's

02:38doing there is on the substance of this litigation. We have transgender military service

02:46members who have been serving honorably and they have excelled in their work as members of the

02:53military since 2021. And the Trump administration walks into court without any evidence to support

03:01their attempt to just completely ban all transgender folk from serving in the military.

03:08But there's a mountain of evidence undercutting this, you know, ugly transgender ban that Trump

03:15is trying to implement. And that's why she exploded on the substance of this litigation,

03:21because these DOJ lawyers don't have a damn leg to stand on.

03:25Glenn, I want to read you another quote from Judge Reyes. And I want your reaction to this

03:29quote. I am not going to abide by government officials saying one thing to the public,

03:33saying what they really mean to the public and coming in here to the court and telling me

03:37something different, like I'm an idiot. Your reaction to that?

03:41My reaction to that is those kind of observations by a judge and those kind of,

03:47let's call them shortcomings in litigation by DOJ lawyers is fatal. They can be fatal

03:54to litigation. And Brian, let me tell our viewers exactly what it was Judge Reyes was talking about

04:00there, because Pete Hegseth, secretary of defense, you know, people say he's a DUI hire.

04:08He said that, quote, transgender troops are disqualified from service without an exemption,

04:14period. Just a blanket statement. Transgender folk are disqualified. And yet, Brian,

04:21here is what these DOJ lawyers went in and argued to Judge Reyes. They said that, oh, Judge,

04:27we're only looking to disqualify people with a medical condition called gender dysphoria,

04:34which is not what the proposed transgender ban says. And that is what prompted her to

04:41explode. You've got the secretary of defense saying one thing publicly, which obviously

04:47is the true goal of the Trump administration, discriminate against all transgender folk.

04:54And then you have these DOJ lawyers coming in and contradicting that, arguing something

05:00completely different, frankly, something that's not even supported by the language

05:05of the proposed ban. Do you think I'm an idiot? Well, guess what? I'm not an idiot. And I think

05:11we can see the trajectory that this litigation is on, Brian. But Glenn, this has been a recurring

05:17theme where we've watched Donald Trump say one thing in public and say another thing in court.

05:21And really what matters at the end of the day is what's said in court. And so why doesn't

05:26this administration just have the freedom to lie in public if what they're saying in court

05:33is really the only thing that should matter? Well, because the plaintiffs in the case will

05:39introduce into evidence what the Trump administration officials are saying and doing

05:46publicly. And that becomes evidence that undercuts what, you know, this is not just

05:52judges reading newspaper articles or watching cable news and taking that as information and

05:58evidence in the case. It will be properly admitted. And the statements of people like the

06:03secretary of defense, Donald Trump, and other high government officials are absolutely fair,

06:09evidentiary game in this kind of litigation. And so what does it do to the credibility of

06:15the Trump administration when the judge really feels like they're being jerked around? Like,

06:22historically, what has this kind of thing done? What it does is once you lose your credibility

06:28as a lawyer, whether you are a DOJ prosecutor, whether you are a civil defense attorney,

06:34a criminal defense attorney, once you lose your credibility, once the judge can no longer

06:40count on your word as being truthful and accurate, which, by the way, we as what are called

06:47officers of the court, every attorney is considered an officer of the court and has an ethical

06:53obligation to be truthful, accurate, and candid with the court. Once you have proved to the judge's

07:00satisfaction that your word cannot be trusted, you're all but done. You will have very little

07:08chance of, one, rehabilitating your credibility before that judge and, two, winning the litigation

07:15that you're involved in. So, you know, these DOJ attorneys who are debasing themselves,

07:21demeaning themselves, insulting our democracy and insulting the judges in the process are doing

07:28themselves real harm. These are people who I predict will end up being referred to Bar Council,

07:33may be sanctioned, could be disbarred at the end of the day, as other Trump-aligned lawyers

07:39have been. And here's the good news. We're always looking for a point of light to give our viewers,

07:43right? I think the DOJ is going to run out of dirty lawyers who are willing to go in and debase

07:51themselves like this in service to dear leader. And what we're seeing, Brian, the people who are

07:57going into court, first of all, I can tell you they're not the best and the brightest at the

08:01Department of Justice because the best and the brightest are honest, honorable, ethical attorneys

08:07and hardworking public servants who remain loyal to the Constitution. And you see these kind of

08:12high DOJ officials who are Trump flunkies going in and arguing cases where I can promise you,

08:19you never see, for example, the deputy attorney general, the number two at the Department of

08:25Justice, going into court and arguing anything. They're bureaucrats, right? Usually it's three

08:30or four levels below them in the org chart where you see lawyers go in and arguing cases in court.

08:38They're going to run out of unethical lawyers to do Donald Trump's dirty bidding in court. And

08:43that's why I keep saying as bad as it looks, as bleak as it is right now, I don't think any of

08:49this is sustainable in the long run. And I think it will all end up imploding. Now, what form that

08:55implosion takes, how long before it happens and how much damage can Donald Trump do to our

09:01democracy and the American people before it implodes? That's anybody's guess, unfortunately.

09:08Well, I want to dig into the personal liability that some of these lawyers might shoulder by

09:13virtue of going into court and really jerking the judges around or lying in court or having

09:19or misrepresenting what the Trump administration's true position is in terms of whether they're able

09:23to keep their law licenses, for example. Do you think that the bar has taken an aggressive enough

09:29posture against folks in the recent past who have been part of the stolen election saga that Trump

09:36raised in 2020 when it comes to really trying to preserve the integrity of this entire profession?

09:43Yeah, it's a great question. And when we use a term like the bar, what people need to know,

09:48there are 50 bars. Each state has its own bar, has its own bar counsel, and has its own

09:56mechanism, its own procedures for investigating allegedly unethical practices by the lawyers

10:04who hold a law license from that state. Let me give you an example. When you are, for example,

10:10a federal prosecutor, you have to be a member of one state bar. I was a member of the state

10:15bar of New Jersey. And then you can practice federally in federal court in all 50 states,

10:20in all 13 federal jurisdictions. So the people who are going in, and when a judge says something

10:27that calls into question the credibility and the candor and the truthfulness of an attorney,

10:33I can promise you the first thing that happens, Brian, is that attorney will be referred to their

10:39state bar counsel for a possible investigation. And people may not know this. Every single

10:46court opinion that is authored goes into a database, and state bar counsel have these

10:54programs, these computer programs that will review, just as a matter of course, will review

11:01every court opinion to see if a judge criticized the ethics of an attorney who's a member of that

11:09state bar. So these things will inevitably be discovered, and hopefully the attorneys who are

11:15going in and arguing unethical positions or misrepresenting things to the court, ultimately,

11:22they will be held to account, and their state bar will give them a look to see if they should be

11:28sanctioned. And finally, Glenn, you had mentioned that you don't believe that there's going to be

11:34enough lawyers to sustain what the Trump administration is doing, enough prosecutors,

11:38enough folks in the legal profession to be able to sustain this corrupt behavior that's being

11:43presented by the Trump White House. When we see something like, you know, you and I had spoken

11:48in our previous episode about Paul Weiss, this law firm that opted to bend the knee to the Trump

11:54administration to offer legal services that would be more palatable for conservatives. And when

12:01we're seeing things kind of go in the wrong direction, especially among folks who should

12:06know better, like the lawyers at Paul Weiss, just to name one firm, does that give you worry?

12:11Because on one hand, yes, it lends itself to reason that there should eventually come a point

12:16where we're going to run out of bargain basement lawyers who are willing to do the corrupt bidding

12:20of Donald Trump. But at the same time, we actually are seeing things move in the wrong direction as

12:26it relates to these lawyers who are increasingly willing to allow themselves to be cowed by Trump.

12:32Yeah, it gives me grave concern when I see DOJ lawyers going in and, you know, misleading the

12:40court, saying one thing when they know full well that the secretary of defense is saying and

12:46intending something very different when it comes to Trump's transgender ban for military service.

12:54It gives me grave concern when I see law firms, otherwise respectable law firms like Paul Weiss,

12:59go into the Oval Office and bend a knee because Donald Trump attempted to retaliate against them.

13:06And instead of standing up in court against that lawless retaliation, indeed, the New York Times

13:13reported that these executive orders that Donald Trump is signing, trying to punish and retaliate

13:19against law firms that displease him, are, quote, likely unlawful. And I have a feeling that's the

13:26way you'll see judges rule. So you have law firms like Perkins Coie that is going in and fighting

13:32this lawlessness of Donald Trump. And then law firms like Paul Weiss, who are capitulating and

13:38saying, I'll tell you what, we'll give you $40 million in legal services if you'll just stop

13:44punishing us. You know, what Paul Weiss did, Brian, makes all of our jobs fighting for the health and

13:51viability of American democracy significantly harder. But here's what I'm heartened by.

13:57I have been watching very closely all of the pushback from lawyers, from law firms in the wake

14:06of the reporting about how Paul Weiss bent the knee, that law firm bent the knee to Donald Trump.

14:12And I am seeing the legal community coalescing around the rule of law and the Constitution and

14:20the honor of our practice in federal courts and elsewhere. And I do think all of this will end up

14:27being a Trump miscalculation. I think the more people and entities and organizations Donald Trump

14:34alienates with his lawless executive orders, for example, the more that will help hasten his

14:41ultimate political demise, which I still think is coming. Maybe not tomorrow, maybe not next year,

14:46but I do think it's coming. So I'm actually heartened by the response of the legal community

14:52overall to what we are seeing, you know, from those select law firms that are bending the knee

14:57to Trump. Well, look, all of this underscores the importance that the courts are having right now.

15:01They are really serving as the most effective bulwark against the worst excesses of this

15:04administration. We're seeing it by virtue of the fact that judges like the one that we spoke about

15:09in this very video, Judge Reyes, losing their patience with these folks, the Trump administration,

15:14who are lying in the same way that Trump has been lying for so long. So we'll continue to

15:19stay on top of this. For those who are watching, if you want to support our work and stay on top

15:22of the news as it continues to break, please make sure to subscribe. The links to both of our

15:26channels are right here on the screen. I'm Brian Tyler Cohen. And I'm Glenn Kirshner.

15:30You're watching The Legal Breakdown.

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