Ari Hoffman, Associate Editor of The New York Sun Interview

Ari joins us to breakdown what is happening with AG Letitia James's getting investigated by the justice department , for her civil case against Trump and his businesses. 

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Now let's get to Ariy Hoffman, associate editor of The
New York Sun, with us every Monday at this time. Well, well, well,
Ariy Letitia James, they're considering criminal charges against her at
the Justice Department. Uh, tell them, tell me how how
you see this going?

Speaker 2 (00:17):
Yeah, Well, it's great to be with you as always, Larry.
This is a significant development in this story that you
and I have both both been fascinated by. Just to
catch folks up, remember there's already a criminal DJ investigation
into her mortgage or for alleged mortgage fraud, listing you know,

(00:39):
a residence in Virginia as her primary one, listening her
father as her husband on a mortgage document to get
more favorable terms. And so that you know that investigation
is continuing. In the irony there, of course is you know,
some of what she's being accused of is the mirror
image of the she brought against Trump for what's now

(01:02):
over five hundred million dollars. But this now we're learning
is there's a separate DJ investigation, and that's into two things.
One is her effort basically to shut down, in her words,
the NRA in New York, and two that fraud case

(01:23):
that she brought against President Trump. So subpoenas are out,
grand juries have been convened, So this is really ramping
up pretty quickly. We don't know yet whether this is
going to be a criminal kind of investigation or a
civil one, but it certainly seems seems pretty serious.

Speaker 1 (01:43):
Is there criminality involved? Could they make a criminal case
out of this, because that's what I keep hearing in
report after report after report. I just don't know what
the crime would be.

Speaker 2 (01:53):
Yeah, So what seems to be the focus of investigation
right now, Larry, is a crime called the deprivation of rights. Now,
deprivation of rights is a crime. It can exist either
as a civil issue or as a criminal one where
a government official deprives you of your civil rights right.

(02:17):
It's most often used against police officers or correction facility
personnel who defendants allege somehow infringe on or violated or
infringed upon their civil rights. Now, one of the ironies here, Larry,
and I wonder how much of this actually is going

(02:38):
on at the DOJA behind the scenes, is that this
crime is one of the ones that Jack Smith charged
Donald Trump with in connection to January sixth. Smith argued
in what was a fairly novel and sort of bold
accusation that Trump's efforts after the election deprived America of

(03:00):
their right to vote. That was the argument that that
deprivation of the right to vote. And now the allegation
seems to be as it's taking shape, is that Letitia
James violated Donald Trump's civil rights by maliciously selectively bringing
this fraud case against him.

Speaker 1 (03:22):
It was a bogus case from the beginning, as we've
talked about a million times. The bank said they do
business with them. Again. There was no victim in this crime.
It was just something Letitia James promised she was going
to do. And now the whole case is an appellate
court and it's been there forever. What's happening with that?

Speaker 2 (03:46):
Eric, Yeah, this is one of the sort of great
mysteries right now in the American criminal justice system, is
what's going on with this case. It was heard, as
you know when September our arguments any objective, I mean,
we both watched it. Anyone watching it would have said, Okay,

(04:08):
a reversal is coming down the pike, either a complete
reversal of the fraud verdict or at the very least
cutting down that enormous penalty, unprecedented penalty against Trump, his business,
and his two adult sons. And yet it's been radio
silent since. You know, I've done some reporting and some

(04:28):
speculating that, you know, maybe there's a maybe one of
the judges on that panel is holding it up right,
maybe they don't want to hand Trump a victory. But
it's hard to say. It's hard to impress upon you, Larry,
how unprecedented it is for an appellate court to take
more than three hundred days, and it's getting the appellate court.

Speaker 1 (04:50):
It's getting very little coverage. I know you've been covering
it in the Sun and you can go to nysun
dot com to read Ari's reporting on this, which has
been phenomenal. But it sounds like no one else is
covering this. So do you understand why that could be.
You're right, it is unprecedented, and it is I would
I would imagine after a while, it would almost be

(05:12):
unlawful to hold it up this long.

Speaker 2 (05:14):
Yeah, yeah, you know there is that. You know, justice
delayed is justice denied. You know there you can also,
you know, make an argument that you know, the Constitution
promises to the defendant, not to the government, but to
the defendant the right to a speedy trial right at
some point, as you said, Larry, is withholding a verdict
in injuring that right to a speedy trial. If not technically,

(05:39):
then maybe the kind of spirit of the law. Right.
So this is really becoming a very very strange situation,
especially when you remember that you know, no one really
takes the Alvin Brad verdict seriously, let's be honest, right, So,
if you're looking at all of the kind of cases
against Donald Trump, this is the big one, I think,

(06:01):
even though it's a civil one. And so you know,
any kind of reversal would be an enormous victory, victory
for the president. And you know, maybe someone just isn't
you know, it, just doesn't want to give him, just
doesn't want to give him that win. But eventually, you know, something's.

Speaker 1 (06:18):
Got to give here, you would think, so I would
think you just write a minority opinion and then it
moves forward. But I guess that's not the case. Erry Hoffman,
as always, thank you so much. He's the associate editor
of The New York Sun. He's with us every Monday
at nine oh five, and he covers things that the
other people in the media do not cover in this city,
so it's worth going to NYSN dot com. Thanks so much, Eric,

(06:42):
Thank you so much. Lair