Government

Guy Who Campaigned On A Platform Of LOCK HER UP Sues NY AG For Political Bias

Vexatious litigant says what now?

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(Photo by PAUL J. RICHARDS/AFP/Getty Images)

Stop the presses! Donald Trump has filed a totally bullshit lawsuit!

Just kidding, that guy is constantly plastering the federal docket with garbage complaints. But this one demanding that a jury step in and enjoin subpoenas from the New York Attorney General which have already been enforced by state courts is destined to become a classic of the genre.

The theory of the case, filed by Trump and his eponymous company, is that AG James hates Trump, and thus it is unconstitutional for her office to investigate him.

James has deprived, and will continue to deprive, Plaintiffs of their rights under federal law, state law and common law by virtue of her callous acts. Even worse, rather than diligently prosecuting actual crimes in the State of New York—which are steadily on the rise— James has instead allocated precious taxpayer resources towards a frivolous witch hunt.

WITCH HUNT. Drink.

Unsurprisingly, this stinker was not filed by Trump’s entirely competent counsel from Consovoy McCarthy PLLC. This drek comes to the Northern District of New York courtesy of attorney Alina Habba, last seen on these pages threatening to sue the Pulitzer Committee if it refused to claw back prizes from the New York Times and Washington Post.

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The complaint opens with twelve pages laying out all the times AG Letitia James promised to bring Donald Trump to justice, both during her campaign and while in office. Which is a bit much coming from a guy who stood on a debate stage next to Hillary Clinton and promised that she would go directly to email jail if he was elected. It then moves directly to alleging that the ongoing investigation violates Trump’s First, Fourth, and Fourteenth Amendment rights, as well as alleging abuse of process.

As of this writing, Trump has not requested an emergency injunction, simply asking that a jury tell Tish James to knock it off eventually. And that’s not the only glaring omission here. Along the way, Habba and Trump seem to have yadda-yadda-yadda-ed a whole bunch of details.

For instance, Trump howls that “Defendant chose to file a motion to compel Eric Trump’s deposition on August 24, 2020, which was conveniently filed on the first day of the Republican National Convention,” citing this as evidence that “the Office of the Attorney General has been reduced to nothing more than the right arm of the Democratic party.” They fail to note that Trump himself cited the ongoing campaign as a reason to delay this testimony, and that New York Supreme Court Justice Arthur Engoron ordered Trump’s son to show up and start talking. Indeed, Justice Engoron has repeatedly sided with the state in its quest to get documents and testimony from the Trump Organization.

Similarly, the plaintiffs’ claim that James inappropriately relied on testimony from Trump’s former fixer Michael Cohen leaves out one or two salient details.

“Cohen was convicted of making false statements to Congress in violation of 18 USC § 1001(a)(2) as well as seven additional federal felonies which ‘each involved deception,’” they argue, attacking the disbarred attorney as an unreliable witness. Which is true, but one of those “additional federal felonies” involved making an illegal campaign contribution to the plaintiff’s presidential campaign, and Cohen had the signed checks proving that the Trump Organization reimbursed him for the Stormy Daniels hush money payout, plus his associated tax liability, and called it a “retainer.”

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There’s also this bizarre allegation that James is somehow peer pressuring Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. to criminally investigate the former president.

On May 18, 2021, Defendant compounded her efforts to prosecute Trump by relentlessly pushing New York County District Attorney, Cyrus Vance, into a criminal investigation of the Trump Organization. By doing so, Defendant is inappropriately heading parallel civil and criminal probes into Plaintiffs’ alleged unlawful business practices as a further attempt to erode their constitutional rights.

Here on Planet Earth, Cyrus Vance first tried to get Trump’s financial records in May 2019. If Ms. Habba is confused about it, she can Google “Trump v. Vance + SCOTUS.” And then she can ‘splain to the court why the federal judiciary needs to step in and stop the AG from seconding a couple of attorneys from her office to help the Manhattan DA with his work.

If this lawsuit is a last ditch effort to stop James from deposing Trump on January 7, as the Post reported she intends, it probably won’t work.

“The Trump Organization has continually sought to delay our investigation into its business dealings, and this lawsuit is yet another attack,” tweeted James this morning. “Mr. Trump doesn’t get to dictate this investigation. We will continue undeterred because no one is above the law.”

The case has been assigned to US District Judge Brenda K. Sannes, an Obama appointee.

Womp womp.

Trump v. James [Docket via Court Listener]

Liz Dye lives in Baltimore where she writes about law and politics.

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