Yes, The Trump Cease & Desist Letter Over The Bannon Book Is Stupid

Just like every other legal document prepared by this administration.

There’s an established path for these things.

It’s a snow day in the Northeast. If you’re reading this, it’s because you went into work to try to be a hero, found that nobody else is there, and are just killing time until you feel it’s okay to go home.

Since we’re just among friends, let me bring you behind the curtain and show you a little of how the sausage gets made around here.

We have to cover the legal machinations of the Trump administration a lot, but to make that process quick and efficient, a while ago I created a little template for myself that I keep in Google. You want to see it? Okay, here goes:

Title: Trump Files [name of legal document], It Is [synonym for “dumb”]
Lead: The Trump administration today made another frivolous claim. [Name of idiot Trump lawyer this time] filed a [name of document] against [target]. It is unlikely to succeed.
Blockquote: [From document or WaPo or NYT story about document]
Analysis: Administration officials think [whatever Breitbart is saying]. In reality, [the opposite of what Breitbart is saying].
Commentary: [Explain how document is normally used.] [Criticize Trump lawyers for being bad.] [Criticize Trump for being racist/sexist/Hitler, as needed.] [Make tortured analogy.]
Kicker: We’re all going to die.

This format works for pretty much any story involving a Trump legal action. They’re always dumb, they’re always unlikely to succeed, the attorney work-product is always pathetic, and there’s always an overtly sexist or racist or authoritarian aspect to the desired legal effect.

Reporting on the Trump administration is like a game of Clue. Today, it’s Charles J. Harder with the cease and desist over the Michael Wolff book that includes tell-alls from Steve Bannon. Tomorrow, it could be Don McGahn filing a lawsuit against snow for “false imprisonment” of the President in D.C. The details of each successive eruption of legal fallacy hardly even matter. The man employs hundreds of lawyers and none of them seem to be able to make a cogent legal argument.

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Trump filings are just like this blizzard. It’s a flurry of white stuff that stings and freezes, but if you try to really wrestle with any individual piece, it just kinds of melts away, like there was nothing there to begin with.

We’re all gonna die.


Elie Mystal is the Executive Editor of Above the Law and the Legal Editor for More Perfect. He can be reached @ElieNYC on Twitter, or at elie@abovethelaw.com. He will resist.

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