By Mike Huckabee
November 13, 2023
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The Shining City on a Hill has never looked so tarnished.
The latest example was discovered by Laura Loomer --- portrayed in the media as a “far-right pro-Trump operative,” as if that negated what she found --- and deals with Judge Arthur Engoron, who’s presiding over the civil real estate fraud trial of Donald Trump brought by Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg. This case has the potential to affect thousands of people in that city by shutting down the entire Trump Organization in New York, over something that many real estate professionals have said is common practice.
Even without Loomer’s story, Engoron has already done plenty to signal his obvious anti-Trump bias, from mugging for cameras on the first day of trial to saying, “No, I’m not here to hear what [President Trump] has to say,” to ruling BEFORE THE TRIAL HAD EVEN BEGUN concerning what Trump had allegedly done, severely limiting what Trump’s attorneys can use in his defense.
But as REVOLVER NEWS reported Thursday, Loomer appears to have discovered a social media account belonging to Dawn Marie Engoron, Judge Engoron’s wife, on which she allegedly posted “F--- TRUMP” along with photoshopped pictures of him in an orange prison jumpsuit, one shot looking particularly frightful with his head shaved. (It might not be bloody like Kathy Griffin’s murderous “severed head” picture of Trump, but it’s still just as hateful.) Never mind that this is a civil case, not criminal. Loomer also posted on “X” that this woman was “openly attacking” Trump attorney Alina Habba. She says she took screenshots of Mrs. Engoron’s posts, and they are here...
https://twitter.com/LauraLoomer/status/1722244994965414277?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctw
The posts were taken down, and REVOLVER hasn’t been able to confirm that Loomer’s screenshots are from Mrs. Engoron’s account or if they’re from some other “Dawn Marie.” At the time of this writing, we can’t be 100 percent sure, either --- more like 95 percent --- but it’s important that someone determine right away whether or not they’re real. To quote REVOLVER, “If the social media posts in question really do belong to Mrs. Engoron, then this entire case should be dismissed outright. It seems our judicial system has devolved into a farce, fueled by the left’s insatiable desire to dismantle anything associated with ‘Trump.’ We must stand against this extreme animosity becoming the force that grinds this country and the values we believe in into the dust.”
Or, to put it more bluntly: “A judge with a crazy, biased, crackpot wife like this has no business overseeing a case like this.”
Some on social media --- gearing up, I suppose, for the account to be found genuine --- are already trying to imply, “So what?” by saying, “Okay, now let’s look at Mrs. Clarence Thomas.” Sorry, folks, this goes far beyond a spouse having her own political opinions and activities. If these posts are genuine, they show a spouse making it clear she wants to see a man convicted who is on trial in her husband’s courtroom.
Bestselling author and persuasion expert Scott Adams weighed in on this Thursday during his podcast, “Coffee With Scott Adams.”
“In what world do you continue the trial?” Adams asked, “assuming this is true, and I think Laura Loomer has the right information. Seriously, in what world do you do that?”
He continued: “They need to shut down the trial, immediately, or else I will never think this country is credible again...I mean, my opinion of the justice system will go to ‘completely broken’ if there’s even one more day of this trial.”
“You cannot have a judge who can only have one outcome or else he can’t (BLEEPING) go home.”
“...There’s no way he’s going to go home to that. No human husband is free of that bias...In our world it doesn’t exist that he can do his job independently if he has to go home to that. Nobody could --- I couldn’t, you couldn’t. There’s no amount of ‘training,’ of legal, ethical behavior that has any bearing on this.”
“...So, congratulations, Laura Loomer,” he said. “I think you ended this trial. And if you didn’t, there’s just no way this is gonna be credible.”
Here’s his full video segment. Language alert: f-bombs are sprinkled here and there. Obviously, he feels very strongly about this.
If the case does go on and Engoron delivers the verdict he so obviously craves, Adams wonders if there could be an appeal based on this. He was advised by a viewer that Jonathan Turley had said there could be; we’ll look into that. Turley has already criticized Engoron, along with Special Counsel Jack Smith and Judge Tanya Chutkan, for violating Trump’s free speech rights; you might remember this column...
Going to Loomer’s own site, she adamantly stands by her story under the headline “NEWSWEEK miserably fails to discredit bombshell Loomer report on Judge Engoron’s wife.” They wrote a deceptive headline, she says, but ultimately could not show that this wasn’t Dawn Marie Engoron’s account. (Dawn did deny to NEWSWEEK that it was her account. All they used to “debunk” the allegation was her denial.)
Loomer also posted the sensible rules judges are supposed to follow to avoid a conflict of interest or appearance of impropriety. Judge Engoron is way out of step with them. We are deep in kangaroo-court territory.
Speaking of Judge Chutkan, who has demonstrated obvious anti-Trump (and anti-Trump supporter) bias while presiding over other January 6 trials, she partially granted a motion by Special Counsel Jack Smith to make Trump say in advance whether he’s going to use the defense that he was acting on his attorneys’ advice, which Trump has claimed in public. By forcing him to state this, Smith is maneuvering to get Trump to waive attorney-client privilege in this criminal trial.
"When a defendant invokes such a defense in court, he waives attorney-client privilege for all communications concerning that defense," Smith's team wrote, adding that "the government is entitled to additional discovery and may conduct further investigation, both of which may require further litigation and briefing."
Or, with the above statement, Smith could be trying to get Trump to NOT USE that defense, even if Trump can provide sufficient evidence of that, as it could make Smith’s job harder. (Note: We’re donning our lawyers’ hat here to speculate what Smith has in mind, but we are not attorneys.) For example, as the WASHINGTON EXAMINER mentions, to get a conviction, Smith would have to convince the jurors that Trump knew he was breaking the law even if his lawyers had told him his actions were legal. Otherwise, Trump’s reliance on his attorneys could raise doubts about his alleged criminal intent.
Criminal intent?? The trial sounds like even more of a joke now. If Trump’s attorneys told him his actions were legal, how WOULD he know if they weren’t? He had no criminal intent.
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/policy/courts/trump-ordered-advice-counsel-defense-2020-j6
Related: New York Republican Rep. Elise Stefanik has filed an official judicial complaint against Judge Engoran for his “inappropriate bias and judicial intemperance” in what she described as “this disgraceful lawsuit” that’s part of the state’s “dangerous, weaponized lawfare against President Trump.”
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