M S W media. Hello and welcome to the Daily Beans for Monday, December 22nd, 2025. Today, Donald Trump's Justice Department violated the law with a partial release and subsequent reduction of the Epstein files as representatives Garcia and Massey way options for consequences. Epstein's survivor, Annie Farmer speaks out about potential missing FBI reports from 30 years ago.
O'Brigo Garcia's lawyers have documentary evidence tying Todd Blanche to the decision to prosecute him. Milwaukee Judge Hannah Dugan is found guilty on one count of obstructing a proceeding and is acquitted on another count of helping someone evade arrest. At least Stefanik drops out of everything. R.
F K. Junior and Dr. Oz announced moves to ban gender affirming care for young people. The Trump administration said it would be dismantling the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Colorado.
And Donald Trump claims his ball room is a matter of national security. I'm your host, Alison Gill. Hey, everybody. Happy Monday.
I hope you had a restful weekend. I'm going to be joined later in the show by I'm class fell from all rise news to discuss abrigo Garcia's lawyers having evidence finally it was withheld by the Department of Justice, but they now have evidence that Todd Blanche was directly involved in charging Mr. Abrigo and they're asking the judge for sanctions. And they are also asking the judge to dismiss the charges against Mr.
Abrigo. So we're going to go over that without him class of all later in the show. Also, I did an in depth interview with Epstein's survivor, Annie Farmer over the weekend on the Midas Touch Network. There's a link in the show notes if you want to see that it's also at molarshero.com.
We do break some news there. And I just want to, you know, hats off to Annie and her sisters and Maria for being just so brave and courageous for speaking out for so long in the face of just pushback and denial and gaslighting. It's just just incredible women. Also, I'll be going over a pretty devastating new poll from Atlas research today on the beans talk podcast.
That's a video podcast. You can watch that on the MSW media YouTube channel for free. Dana's gonna be back Christmas Day. That's our Christmas present.
Please send in all your baby photos. Thanks for hanging in with me solo while she unplugs. And if you do have those baby photos or any good news or any good trouble, you can send it to us by going to dailybeanspod.com and clicking on contact. Alright, we have a ton of news.
So let's hit the hot notes. Alright, first up from the Associated Press, at least 16 files disappeared from the Justice Department's public web page for documents related to Jeffrey Epstein, including a photograph showing President Trump. And this happened less than a day after they were posted with no explanation from the government and no notice to the public. The missing files, which were available Friday and no longer accessible by Saturday, included images of paintings depicting nude women, one showing a series of photographs along a credenza and in drawers in that image inside a drawer among other photos was a photograph of Donald Trump, alongside Epstein, Melania Trump and Epstein's longtime associate, Gailine Maxwell.
The DOJ did not answer questions Saturday about why the files disappeared, but said in a post on Twitter, photos and other materials will continue being reviewed and redacted consistent with the law in an abundance of caution as we receive additional information. Now, online, the unexplained missing files field speculation about what was taken down and why the public was not notified compounding longstanding intrigue about the Epstein files into powerful figures surrounding Jeffrey Epstein, Democrats on the House Oversight Committee pointed to the missing images, especially the one featuring Trump in a post on Twitter saying what else is being covered up when he transparency for the American public. The episode deep in concerns that had already emerged from the Justice Department's much anticipated document release, the tens of thousands of pages made public offered little new insight into Epstein's crimes or the prosecutorial decisions that allowed him to avoid serious federal charges for years. While emitting some of the most closely watched materials, including FBI interviews with victims and internal justice department memos on charging decisions, some of the most consequential records expected about Epstein are nowhere to be found in the DOJ's initial disclosures, which span tens of thousands of pages, again, missing FBI interviews with survivors, internal judicial department memos examining charging decisions records that could have helped explain how investigators viewed the case and why Epstein was allowed in 2008 to plead guilty to relatively minor state level prostitution charges.
Then now the gaps go further, according to the AP, the records required to be released under the recent law passed by Congress, hardly referenced several powerful figures long associated with Epstein, including Prince Andrew, renewing questions about who was scrutinized, who was not, and how much the disclosures truly advance public accountability. Among the fresh bits that were released here, insight into the Justice Department's decision to abandon an investigation into Epstein in the 2000s, which enabled him to plead guilty to the state level charge, and a previously unseen 1996 complaint accusing Epstein of stealing photographs of children. That is the complaint, by the way, filed by Maria Farmer, and I speak to her sister, Annie Farmer, who's referenced in that 1996 report in that might as touch interview that I did again, you can find that at military road.com. And from the times they report Todd Blanche, Deputy Attorney General on Sunday, defended DOJ's public release of the files related to Epstein, saying the administration would not remove any mentions of Trump in the files as they continue to be released in the coming weeks, even though they've been pulling files down to remove Trump's name.
Quote, we're not redacting information about Mr. Trump said Blanche on NBC's Meet the Press. The second in command of the Justice Department, Mr. Blanche said hundreds of agency lawyers have been scouring a million or so pages of documents and redacting information about victims.
The Deputy Attorney General said the department was complying with the statute in completing a gargantuan task that has to be done carefully to protect victims. That bothers me that he says that quote, you're talking about a million pages or so, virtually all of them contain victim information. He acknowledged that a small number of documents, photographs inside Mr. Epstein's home had been removed from the online collection.
And one of the removed photos we talked about a second ago was included Donald Trump. Blanche said that photo of the credenza and others had been removed because of concerns raised by victims. After the photo was released, he said concerns were raised about some of the women depicted in other photos on the credenza. So we pulled the photo down.
Absolute dick move again and again, blaming the victims, using the victims and survivors of Jeffrey Epstein, Colleen Maxwell and all of their clients to justify your bullshit redacted release to justify pulling down photos of Donald Trump. It's disgusting. But you know, he's lying much to the surprise of no one. Next up from the Times, Hannah Dugan, that's the Milwaukee judge, was found guilty Thursday of obstructing federal agents, a high-profile victory for the Justice Department in a prosecution of a judge who it said was illegally aiding an undocumented immigrant.
Dugan faces up to five years in prison, but she'll serve nowhere near that. I assume she'll get probation. As a person who's been convicted of a felony, she's likely ineligible to continue to hold office as a judge in Wisconsin. That's according to the state constitution.
She was a quitter of a less serious charge, I'm a consumer of concealing a person from arrest. I think this verdict is bullshit. An appeal, they may appeal on inconsistent verdict, which you know, because it was guilty on one and not guilty on the other. And it seems like a lot of the components account one have to be there in order to be guilty account to.
But there's something called the Supreme Court's inconsistent verdict doctrine, which allows for this, they allow juries to split verdicts this way, even if it's inconsistent. Because it might have been part of a jury negotiation. But there are other aspects of appeal that may be successful and we'll cover it here and over on sub-stack once it's filed. And from public notice, last week, the National Trust for Historic Reservations sued the Trump administration over the ballroom, the big ballroom project, saying the law requires that plans be reviewed and approved by two federal commissions and the construction must be authorized by Congress.
But according to the administration, construction cannot be halted for even the briefest moment or our national security will be imperiled. How does putting a pause on the big-ilded ballroom compromise national security? Well, the administration can't say because it would compromise national security. Indeed, in the ballroom case, the administration doesn't bother to make a legal argument about national security at all.
Instead, there's just the ball desertion that there are security concerns that weren't permitting the current below-grade construction to continue. Below-grade construction refers to the bunker that was under the East Wing. He's building a bunker. He's building a bigger bunker.
You can read more about it on sub-stack at public notice. I'm interested to see how this lawsuit goes. Next up from NPR, health officials from the Trump administration announced several moves Thursday that will have the effect of essentially banning gender-affirming care for transgender young people, even in states where it's legal. R.F.K.
Junior and Dr. Oz, who leads Medicare and Medicaid, announced the measures in a press conference at the headquarters of the Department of Health and Human Services in D.C. Quote, "'So-called gender-affirming care has inflicted lasting physical and psychological damage on vulnerable young people. That's what Kennedy said.
This is not medicine. It's malpractice. These are medical decisions. It should be between doctors and patients.
Forever, the Republican Party was like, keep your government out of my whatever. Keep your government hands off my Medicare. Keep your, like, and now they're like government in everything. It's so odd to see Republicans go along with this.
The American Academy of Pediatrics push back strongly. The ban takes the form of two new proposed rules for Medicaid and Medicare. The first prohibits doctors and hospitals from receiving federal Medicaid reimbursement for gender-affirming care provided to transgender patients younger than 18. Medicaid is a health care program that covers low-income Americans.
Second rule blocks all Medicaid and Medicare funding for any services at hospitals that provide pediatric gender-affirming care. Virtually every hospital in the country takes Medicare, which covers older Americans in the disabled. Because the hospitals rely on Medicare, the rule would have a wide-ranging effect. If you get Medicaid money or Medicare money, we're not going to send it to you.
You're no longer approved for Medicare and Medicaid, even if you don't use it for the gender-affirming care. You can't have gender-affirming care at your hospital at all, or all Medicaid and Medicare funding is cut. Yeah, supporters and opponents of transgender rights agree taking together the forthcoming hospital rules could make access to pediatric gender-affirming care difficult, if not impossible. The care has already banned in 27 states.
The proposed rules will be entered into the federal register on Friday, this past Friday, which starts a 60-day comment period. The rules don't take effect immediately. I don't think they give a shit about our comments, but we should make them. The ACLU is announced plans to sue to stop these rules.
Quote, these rules are baseless intrusions into patient-physician relationships. That's what AAP's Cressley said. Patients, their families, and their physicians, not politicians or government officials, should be the ones to make decisions together about what care is best for them. Kennedy and others at the press conference insisted that AAP and others, including transgender people themselves, are wrong.
There's no such thing as being transgender. That's active as Chloe Cole, who uses her experience of transitioning as a young person and regretting it to advocate for government restrictions on care. Cole continued to the young people out there who are struggling with this mental illness. I want you to know it's not too late to accept the beautiful way that God has created you.
Oh, can't. Why don't you let us decide that for ourselves, with our doctors, but leave us the cleave of people to fuck alone. Oh, it's so frustrating. The pivot to the topic of transgender minors comes one day after Republicans in the House passed a package of health care bills that do not extend subsidies for people who buy health insurance and affordable care act plans.
Cressley of the Pediatrics Academy said, yet new measures do nothing to bring down health care costs. Instead, they unfairly stigmatize a population of young people. The legislative package Congress considered this week included a bill introduced by Marjorie Taylor Greene that makes it a crime to provide gender affirming care to transgender minors. In case you were wondering if she's welcome in our tent, fuck no.
It's punishable by a fine or prison time of up to 10 years. And that passed the house. Another bill passed Thursday was introduced by Dan Crenshaw. It would prohibit Medicaid reimbursement for gender affirming care for youth.
Both bills will also have to pass the Senate to become law. So frustrating. Oh, it's so frustrating. Next up from the Times, the Trump administration said it will be dismantling the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Colorado, one of the world's leading Earth science research institutions.
The center was founded in 1960 and is responsible for many of the biggest scientific advances in humanities understanding of weather and climate. Its research, aircraft and sophisticated computer models of Earth's atmosphere and oceans are widely used in forecasting weather events and disasters around the country. And its scientists study a broad range of topics, including air pollution, ocean currents and global warming. But in a social media post announcing the move late Tuesday, Russ Wot, the director of the office of management and budget, called the center one of the largest sources of climate alarmism in the country, and said that the federal government would be breaking up the institution.
Scientists, meteorologists and lawmakers said the move is an attack on critical scientific research and would harm the United States. National Center for Atmospheric Research was originally founded to provide scientists studying Earth's atmosphere with cutting edge resources, such as supercomputers that individual universities could not afford on their own. It is now widely considered a global leader in both weather and climate change research, with programs aimed at tracking severe weather events, modeling floods, understanding how solar activity affects the Earth's atmosphere. Important shit.
Now, for decades, the center is operated with the freedom to develop outside the box ideas that have advanced weather forecasting. Its researchers identified atmospheric patterns that meteorologists rely on today to predict the weather. Scientists said dismantling the center's climate research would do irreparable damage to the cutting edge meteorology and advances in weather forecasting. Putting the facility on the chopping block would also be an economic blow to Colorado.
President Trump's real mad at Colorado right now, he's futed with Governor Jared Polis. In recent days, calling him a weak and pathetic man and accusing the governor with no evidence of being run by a Venezuelan gang. The dispute stems from the case of a former election official in Colorado, Tina Peters. She was convicted of multiple felonies after she gave Trump supporters unauthorized access to voting machines after the 2020 election.
Trump tried to pardon her, but Colorado officials have countered that presidential pardon with saying that, sorry, your pardons don't apply to state crimes. They're going to try to litigate it. So because of that, because of Tina Peters, just, I mean, these are all impeachable offenses. All right, a little bit of better news from the New York Times, representative Elise Stefanik of New York, a top Republican with close ties to Trump, abruptly suspended her campaign for governor in New York on Friday, and announced she would give up her seat in Congress next year.
The decision was a stunning turnabout for one of the Republican Party's most ambitious stars, climbers, I would say, instead of star, ended up ended what was said to be a high wattage governor's race. I kind of wanted her to run for governor. She'd be way easy to beat. In a statement posted on social media, she framed her motivation as a mix of political pragmatism and family priorities.
I need to spend more time with family that old chess nut, but allies privately acknowledged that years of intraparty intraparty fighting and a series of embarrassing disappointments that the hands of Mr. Trump had taken a toll. You think? Stefanik, who's 41, was a Harvard educated phenom when she took office a decade ago, becoming the youngest woman to serve in the history of the house, up to that point.
But over the years, she went to extraordinary and sometimes brazen lengths to transform herself from a moderate Republican in the mold of GW Bush to full-on MAGA, embracing Trump helped propel her into being a national figure beloved by many conservatives and loathsome Democrats. She shot up through congressional leadership ranks, briefly becoming the highest ranking woman in the house, and nearly became ambassador to the UN. But she also suffered a series of painful setbacks and humiliations that demonstrated the limits of her approach. The president pulled back her UN nomination this spring, fearful of losing her house seat in a special election.
And after she entered the race for governor, expecting to have his support, he withheld it. Now Stefanik will join a growing list of Republican lawmakers headed for the doors as they openly bristle under the leadership of Johnson. She is the second high-profile Republican who had been close to Trump to call it quits in about a month following representative Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia who's leaving office early in January. All right, everybody in other news, lawyers for Kilmar Abrego have filed for sanctions against the government and to oppose the Justice Department's efforts to quash a subpoena for Todd Blanche to actually have to appear in a hearing to determine whether this entire criminal case should be dismissed for vindictive and selective prosecution.
And now they have evidence, Todd Blanche himself, to the decision to prosecute. Now I'm going to talk about this in depth with Adam Classfeld from All Rise News after this quick break, stick around. We'll be right back. Delete Me makes it easy, quick, and safe to remove your personal data online at a time when surveillance and data breaches are common enough to make everyone vulnerable.
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You'll be glad you did. Please welcome from All Rise News probably at an airport lounge somewhere out traveling. Thanks to your support for All Rise News so that you can do that. Please welcome Adam Classwell.
Hey Adam, how's it going? Doing well, doing well, Elson. And indeed you got me out an airport lounge. So I got a message that I should check out the a Brago docket late last night because there's been some stuff going on under seal, ex-parte hearings, things that have been redacted, stuff that's under seal.
We haven't we've been like, ooh, this is interesting. What's going on in the Abrego case? And it seems to be pursuant to a finding by Judge Crenshaw a while back that there seems to be a likelihood of vindictive prosecution for the two crimes the Department of Justice charged Abrego with in order to effectuate his return to the United States. And in order to shut down the discovery process in Judge Ceniz's courtroom about why they wouldn't bring him back to the United States.
Remember the Supreme Court said you need to tell the judge, you need to take steps to return him and let everybody know what those steps are. And a long time ago, Todd Blanche said on Fox News with Laura Ingraham, he made a statement that, yeah, well, once that Maryland judge did that thing, we started investigating Mr. Abrego. And it was pretty much on that statement that the judge was like, there seems to be a likelihood of vindictiveness here.
But what they were missing was the proof, the documentary evidence that tied Todd Blanche to the decision to prosecute for months now. You and I have been talking about how the Department of Justice has argued that the decision to prosecute Mr. Abrego had nothing to do with the White House or Todd Blanchor trying to get him back or shut down the discovery. That decision was because he was a criminal and it was made solely by the U.S.
attorney in Tennessee. No one else, Mr. McGuire alone did this. So apparently what these sealed proceedings have to do with is the fact that they, through discovery, finally pride loose some evidence showing Todd Blanche's involvement in charging Mr.
Abrego. And I would love it if you had it in front of you. First of all, let me know if I got any of that wrong. But the opening paragraph in this motion, because, you know, Abrego wants to call Todd Blanche in to question him for the vindictive and selective prosecution of an entry hearing.
And they're trying to squash that subpoena, saying Mr. Blanche has nothing to do with this. Why do you want to talk to such important people? He's busy, you know, I don't know, kidnapping other brown people off the street and reporting them to Uganda.
And we can't be bothered with this. So this is their opposition to that. And it's been unsealed. So Adam, talk a little bit about what this could mean for the case.
And if I got anything wrong, and if you would, he would want to read that first paragraph, that opening salvo in this opposition, it is a banger. It is a banger, Alison, you have that right. And here is what the opening paragraph says, I actually do have it in front of me and I highlighted it quite a bit because said banger, I'm going to start about midway through that paragraph, because that's where it gets pretty spicy. Sean Hecker, who's the lead criminal defense attorney for Abrego Garcia, says this quote, the government has repeatedly claimed sometimes under penalty of perjury that the book stopped with Mr.
McGuire. And side note, that's the US Attorney for the Middle District of Tennessee. That claim, it turns out, was false. It remains unknown where the book actually stopped.
The deputy attorney general, the attorney general, the White House, we may never know. But what we do know from documents in the defense and the court had to pry out of the government's hands inside the government deceived to the court, the defense and the public about Mr. McGuire's purported status as the sole decision maker. Put bluntly, numerous government lawyers chose to mislead this court in order to try and save this unjust prosecution.
And that's how they start this very extensive 28 page legal brief. Yeah, it's indicative of a lot of different cases that we've seen that this is it seems to be the government holding on to evidence that implicates them and some bad stuff that might result in the dismissal of these charges or the dismissal of other charges. But for them to say, we don't know where the buck stops, but what we do know is taught Blanche how to hand in it and that they lied to the court. And so they are asking, I believe, in a previous motion for sanctions.
Now, some of some of what's in in this document about the communications between Todd Blanche and the O-DAG and another guy named Singh and McGuire are partially redacted because they said we filed a motion for leave of court to file this on redacted, but just to be safe, we're going to keep it redacted because there's a protective order over discovery, I think. But even with the redactions, I think we can kind of get at what Todd Blanche and Mr. Singh told Mr. McGuire to do with this case.
And this all boils down to proving that he was vindictively and selectively prosecuted, selectively prosecuted so that he's asking the court, hey, can you dismiss these charges against me because they were brought vindictively and selectively? And for, you know, because what we had imagined was that the only reason they brought charges and started investigating in the first place is because they wanted the discovery process to go away on why he was deported in the first place and that they are out to get him and all that other stuff. And so to actually now have evidence and the fact that they had to pry it out of their hands and the fact that they've been misrepresenting the truth to the court for months now, that Todd Blanche was involved in these decisions along with Mr. Singh is, I think, definitive proof that this administration has vindictively and selectively prosecuting him to punish him, to get to get discovery to stop, not because what they say, what they are trying to get us to believe, what the government would have us believe is he's a criminal and we're just punishing him purely because he committed a crime in 2022 at a traffic stop.
That's it. It's got nothing to do with malfeasance or us trying to cover stuff up or anything like that or us trying to deport him to other countries. So this is actually pretty significant discovery on behalf of Mr. Yes.
And I can't wait for those redactions to be lifted if that comes to pass. I'm going to kind of give a little more to what you were saying just to underline it about the fact that this entire discovery process, vindictive and selective and selective prosecution began because Todd Blanche went on Fox with Laura Ingram and said that this investigation began because a Maryland judge questioned our decision to whisk a brago from Maryland to the debt of night to a country where a court order had blocked his deportation. That the act of questioning by a judge and by the way, five orders demanding his return that that was the reason. He said that on national television.
So that is why Judge Crenshaw, who's residing over the criminal case, ordered further discovery and vindictive prosecution hearing. And throughout that, Todd Blanche has been trying to avoid testifying, trying to quash that subpoena saying that there is no nexus. There's no link between him and the decisioning and the true decision made per he claimed was Robert McGuire. So I highlighted a little more.
I want to read that. The only thing the court found missing from the record was evidence tying Mr Blanche's statements to act the actual decision makers, not anymore. Previously, the court was rightly, rightly wondered who placed this case on Mr McGuire's desk and what their motivations were. Now we know it.
It was Mr Blanche and his office, the office of the deputy of the deputy attorney general or ODAG. So they say it flat out. And I want to give folks, because here's what the redactions look like. They look a little bit like the Justice Department's release of the Epstein files because DOJ is claiming these communications are privileged.
They are talking, you know, essentially getting a peek under the hood, their communications of what happened before the trial, the just excuse me, the indictment. And they are now claiming, oh, well, Blanche was just performing oversight. Apparently, the messages are so damning that, you know, that it's that, you know, one, they say that's no longer credible. And two, they're changing their story.
They said there was no link. Now they're saying this is unremarkable oversight. So it's an incredible 28 page. And let's remember the import of this if he wins on vindictive prosecution by by criminal case.
Now he's already won on the in the civil matter, in the sense that he, Judge Zenis ordered his release from immigration detention. So, you know, this, those proceedings are ongoing because Trump's DHS is still at it, trying to deport him again. And we will see that come to head even this week as, you know, holiday week. But we are also trying to figure out what is coming, will there be a trial, will there be a criminal trial or on January or will they prevail, kill my regular guard seat as attorneys prevail on this motion?
Because what they're saying is there is that link that the court was looking for between the actual decision maker has been provided after they had to pry the discovery out of the government's hands. So they're saying they should win without an evidentiary hearing. Yeah, I, I'm looking at page seven of that docket entry 138 that's referenced here. To remove any doubt, Deputy Attorney Blanch said the criminal case was brought to return a breakout, not because of a judge, but instead because of an arrest warrant.
This could be evidence of vindictiveness. And he did say the court need not resolve a Braco's arguments on actual vindictiveness at this juncture, given that his showing of a realistic likelihood of vindictiveness entitles him to discovery. And the reason is, is because the judge says, well, the remarks that Todd Blanch made on Fox News may come close to establishing vindictiveness. I'm ordering discovery and I'm ordering an evidentiary hearing because it says those remarks that he made on Fox News fall short on the record before the court because they require an inference tying them to actual decision makers.
And that's what the quote that is brought up in this new filing that says, oh, hey, we got that. We have that inference tying them to actual decision makers now, which you judge said speculated back then that we, you know, we wouldn't need a vindictive and selective prosecution evidentiary hearing on this motion to dismiss. And we wouldn't need discovery if we had that. Now we have it because of the discovery.
And the fact that it was withheld and had to be pryed out of their hands as as Sean Hoeckers says in this recent filing is really astounding. I'm actually kind of surprised that that stuff was handed over. Do you know what I mean? Like, right?
Well, I mean, there were all of these sealed filings in the case that were coming in short, a rapid secession. We remember there were a couple of times there were scheduled dates for vindictive prosecution hearings. I was planning to go down to a natural twice and I had canceled and it was canceled. I had to change my flight.
You know, as a matter of fact, one of those hearing dates was supposed to take place shortly before Judge Dukin's trial. So I just transferred my flight to Milwaukee. Now the reason why those hearings were canceled was that the government wasn't providing the goods. So there were seal filings.
One can only assume that the judge read the government the riot act in the sealed filings and they ultimately provided the goods. And those goods are under those black marks on that page that they are redacted goods that according to a break-o's team, established firmly that Todd Blanche was a person behind this prosecution that he directed it and that the communications between him and the US attorney in the Middle District of Tennessee are the communications that are protected in this filing. Yeah, and it was around that same time when that hearing was canceled. Shortly before that, Sean Hecker, Mr.
O'Brigga's lawyer, had filed a motion to dismiss saying we don't need an evidentiary hearing anymore, but because of what was happening under seal, but in a separate issue, that Costa Rica came out and said, we've always been willing to accept Mr. O'Brigga. We never stopped the declaration that you filed in court that Partly State Department lawyer partly wrote that guy didn't even know, the guy who wrote it didn't even know what some of the words meant. Now that Costa Rica has dropped the bombshell and said, he's always been welcome here, we don't need a vindictive and selective prosecution evidentiary hearing.
We don't need that. You can go ahead and resolve it now. And so I thought, I remember I messaged the legal team, I was like, did it get canceled? Because you're going to win your motion to dismiss because of what Costa Rica said?
And they're like, no comment. Everything's under seal. And I was like, what is it? What's under seal?
Turns out it's evidence that specifically was referenced by this judge, Judge Grandshaw saying this is what's missing in order for me to rule on this right now. And they have it and they got it. And that was it. Like you said, that was canceled because they weren't handing over the goods, which is what you and I had suspected because a lot of evidentiary hearings have been canceled because this Department of Justice refuses to hand over discovery.
Right. And I'm on an underline one of the points that you just made, Alison, about Costa Rica. Because the point that's made, whenever you talk about Camarbrigot Garcia's case on certain corners of social media, one common response is, oh, these radical activist judges are keeping us from deporting this dangerous man. And let's just say you're from the state of mind that even though he's never been convicted of a crime and has a right to defend himself against the government's allegations, let's say he's dangerous.
And even then, so why is the government not sending him to Costa Rica? The government, and I was over in the federal court in Maryland multiple times where his lawyers asked direct questions by the judge. Would you your client agree to self-deport Costa Rica? They said, yes, twice.
So if you're of the mind that Camarbrigot Garcia is dangerous and these radical judges are stopping us from deporting him, no, they're not. They are he would gladly per his attorneys facilitate his own self deportation, probably not gladly, but he knows what he's up against. But he has agreed to self-deport Costa Rica. The government refuses to.
It wants to do it in the unlawful and more cruel way that it would prefer for reasons unstated. And that itself is evidence that his criminal defense attorneys have cited for vindictive prosecution. So let that particular fact sink in because beyond all this, there's this games claim behind this case because there has impediment, the only impediment to the deportation right now of the Camarbrigot Garcia comes from the federal government, comes from Trump's DOJ and DHS. Yes, that is so important.
This government is preventing him from being deported right now. That's it. So thank you so much. Thank you for being on the ground for the whole Hana Dugan trial.
Let's talk about that another time because there's a lot of interesting legal stuff on appeal that could go on there. But your workers invaluable, everybody, if you have a couple of bucks to throw to all rise news to support the on the ground in the courtroom, play by play journalism from Adam Classfeld, it's invaluable, especially during this administration, that we get the truth about what's happening in the courtrooms and he does that. He brings that to us and his reporting makes me smarter. So if you want to be smarter too, you'll do what you can to support all rise news.
We're going to keep an eye on when those redaction bars come off because I think it was a cautionary measure. And I think that Judge Crenshaw will rule to unseal and release and take those black boxes off the redaction bars and we can find out exactly what Todd Blanche did to direct this prosecution, to lead to vindictive and selected prosecution. And we'll also keep an eye on if this is dismissed. What are the next steps for Mr.
O'Brigo? He's free from ICE custody. I think the next step is a January 12th appeal to the Board of Immigration Administration. I think that's where his case is right now.
The government's acknowledged that even though they're mad about it. And we'll see what ends up coming out of that because that is actually not in the federal court system. Immigration Court is under the executive branch. So we'll keep an eye on it.
And I know that Adam, you're going to have your finger on the pulse of all of these cases. So thank you for the work that you do, my friend. And thank you for the work that you do, Alison. I look forward to catching up with you on the Dugan trial.
There's a lot to talk about there, especially as it moves forward to post trial motions and an appeal. Yeah, and I'm looking forward to that appeal. I'm interested to see what the arguments are and which arguments they might leave out. So thank you again so much.
Thank you everybody. Wow, 1.7 thousand of you on your day off coming in to talk to talk to us. We appreciate it. Fly safe, travel safe, my friend.
Everybody, we'll see you next time on the Breakdown. After these messages will be right back. All right, everybody. Welcome back.
It's time for the good news. Watch, go you in and in your near good news. And if you have any good news or good trouble suggestions or a joke you'd like to tell us, anything that'll put a smile on our face, a story that you like to tell when you're hanging out with your friends, we would love to hear it. And your good news can be any number of things.
It could be from yesterday or 20 years ago. It could be that you at some point got a degree and you want to share your thesis or your dissertation title and we'll do our best to pronounce the words in it because we're not that good at it. You can send shout outs for your good news, whether it's to a loved one, a spouse, a kid, a parent, a family member, yourself, a small business in your area, a non-profit, you want to give a shout out to some great community organizing, somebody running for office that you want to draw attention to, a government program that's helped you or loved one, send it all to us. At DailyBeansPod.com and click on contact and all you got to do to get your submission right on the air is pay your pod pet tariff, which means attach a photo of your pet.
We're happy to try to guess the breeds of your pet as well. We're not good at it, but again, we like to try. If you don't have a pet, send in the Dr. Bill Petting area.
If you don't have that, you can send the random photo of an animal from the internet. You can send family photos, baby pictures, what you dress up for is Halloween, what your holiday decorations look like. Photos from rallies where you show us your favorite signs. Sometimes people send in dogs at rallies with dogs that have cool signs.
You can send those in bird watching photos, which can be a bird or you flipping the bird to a Trump building. We love those. You can also send any photo of your happy place, what you're growing, what you're making, what you're creating, send it all to us, DailyBeansPod.com and click on contact. All right, we have a bonus, good trouble today.
This is from DC, her, pretty time sensitive, but some good trouble. The Endangered Species Act is under threat. The current administration wants to repeal the blanket rule, which automatically gives the same protection to threatened species that endangered species receive, such as prohibiting the harming killing or training of those species. Without the blanket rule, each species wanted or needed to be added to the ESA needs to be added individually, which takes time.
Time that threatened species might not have. So leave a comment on a federal register. We'll have a link below. And we have to do this by today, the end of the day, December 22.
Tell them not to change the rule. Brookfield Zoo gives a better description in their link below. Attached is a fish picture from Wisconsin caught over the summer. Can you guess the species?
Hint, it's invasive. Oh, geez. It doesn't look like a rainbow trout. Maybe a carp?
Wow, man, I don't know, let's see. It's a carp. Oh my God, I got a fish, right? Holy cannoli.
Oh, wow, look at me go. You know, big ups to my dad who took me fishing when I was a kid. We always throw him back. But I think that's the only reason I knew that.
All right, so we've got a bunch of links in the show notes about the federal register and where you can learn more about the Endangered Species Act and the blanket rule. Next up from Lori Prennow, she and her, my husband and I have been running a faith-based clinic in our large town for about 15 years. I am a physician and my husband is a French horn player who was a fabulous stay-at-home dad and performs in local theater productions. I, Lori, I imagine him being in the doctor's office, playing in the French horn with you.
He is executive director of the clinic. We accept no government funds and are entirely supported by private donations. We are aggrieved by the Christian nationalism movement that has thoroughly misrepresented the Jesus way. Amen, literally.
Our faith wades us to care for the poor and the sick and the immigrants in our community. Both of our children are trans and we are unwavering in our support for the LGBTQI plus friends. I'm writing this as a shout out to my husband because when the Republicans decided to continue to be awful and not fix the mess they have made out of healthcare, he contacted the big four news agencies in our town and said, come see our clinic. We need to make sure people know about us right now.
He has been on the local Fox NBC and ABC so far. I guess CBS is too tied up in their own political rhetoric. I'm super proud of him that even in dark times he's able to give a spark of hope to people who need it. Our care is entirely free.
We have our x-rays, ultrasounds and labs, entirely free. I work full time for another organization and I'm the medical director at this clinic in my spare time. That's how I can afford to do this. So if you need to spark a spark of hope today, just know that you're not alone.
There are clinics like this scattered around the country. We meet every year near Cincinnati at a conference. Look for local free clinics or low-cost clinics. And please, if I can give a piece of advice, never put medical bills on a credit card.
If you're making payments of even $5 a month, they will usually not send you to collections. If you put the bill on a credit card, the interest can be crippling. So do the payment plan. I think what Laurie is saying with the institution and not with a credit card.
It's very good advice for my pod bet tax. I've included my beautiful baby snips. She's an orange cat that was delivered by the cat distribution system. We live on five acres in the country and unusual in that she is an orange female since most orange cats are male.
She loves to take naps cuddled up under the covers with me and she's adorable. I had a female ginger named copper when I was growing up. Laurie, they are very rare. She's beautiful.
Thank you for all you do and thanks to your husband. Next from Ida horses. Shout out to the pro voice project at theprovoiceproject.com. Abortion stigma leads to silent isolation, misinformation, and harmful policies.
But in Idaho, stigma around reproductive health, silence is public discourse and deepens isolation for those navigating reproductive health care. We serve the most impacted by Idaho's abortion stigma. Rural, low income, and religious communities who remain unheard, unseen, and unserved. Oh, wonderful.
So everybody check out the pro voice project.com. Thank you, Idaho. Next up, Marianne Pronucci and her, hi there, Bean's Queens. I'm a relatively new listener.
Welcome, Marianne. Thanks to the person. I'd like to give a shout out to you today. My awesome friend of 40 years, Jenny.
We were able to keep each other saying during a shit show over year by traveling around Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, attending No Kings rallies. In addition to protesting, we participated in the independent bookstore tour in Vermont. 20 incredible stores across the state in just six months. Oh, that's so cool.
Books for everyone this holiday. Fuck Amazon. Hell yeah. Along the way, we got some live shows from our favorite bands in the 90s and both celebrated our 50th birthdays.
Insert Salio Malle imitation here. I have 50. I kick and stretch and kick and I'm 50. Now that winter is upon us in New England, the three plus hour distance between us isn't as easy to navigate.
But we both start our day with a daily double dose of the beans and often check in with each other to make sure we caught a story or laugh shared by UK ass ladies. Oh, Marianne, this is so cool. For my pod, Terry, please enjoy this picture of us at the October No Kings. Notice we're multitasking by protesting just before checking a bookstore off our list.
Jenny is the one on the right. This is her fabulous Bernie Muppet t-shirt. Her sign brought mixed reviews at most rallies. I, for one, love it.
Thanks for bringing us the often upsetting news, mixed with moments of joy. Happy holidays. Okay, so it's Bernie as Bert, the Muppet shirt and her sign says, got measles. I'm sorry.
That's amazing. That's a fantastic sign. Hello, you two. This is so cool.
I have a decades long friend. We celebrated our 50th the same year. Well, within a couple of months, but over across the different years, but yes, within a couple of months. And we did Sally O'Malley quite a bit, by the way, when we got our 50th.
Anyway, hello to both of you. And that's wonderful. And I love love love your signs. Proud Americans are ashamed of Trump.
So good. Next up, you can call me Gretchen. Queen beans. Where have you been all my life?
I just recently found your podcast and feel seen. Oh, I'm so glad that's the whole reason we're here, Gretchen. Welcome, welcome. A little about me.
I'm a federal employee recently impacted by the numerous executive orders from this administration. Most impactful is my now 100 mile a day, a round trip work commute involving a mountain pass. I put 13,000 miles on my car since the end of July. I'm so sorry.
Those returned to office orders are such bullshit. All it is is, is because super rich landlords that have office space, emptying out, because people can work from home. That's all that's all this will return to office. Shit is.
And for the federal employees, believe me, you know, I was one of them Gretchen. They also just want you to hate it so that you resign and they don't have to backfill your job and they can get rid of that job. Anyway, I'm sorry. My little soapbox.
I pulled out in the middle of your submission, Gretchen. I'm taking it all in stride. I'm seven years from retirement and I love what I do. Hence, now thrilled to listen to you as I head to the office.
Since this last year has been the absolute hardest of my 23 year federal career, I started crocheting to manage my mental health, started with little stuffed animals. Now I'm working on crocheting hats for my family as gifts. Crafting brings me joy. Gretchen, I love this.
I like to crochet into two, but I can really only make scars and blankets. If you can make turns, I get lost. For pod pad tacks, I submit all my furry babies, two pups, Tucker, the big beautiful black guy, Sage, the small fawn color guy, both rescues and both five years old and our newly adopted kitties, Maxine, the little gray girl and Barry Manolo, the cream colored boy. Oh my goodness.
Always like a little flame point. I have one of those dudes and she's a little blue point. They're adorable. So are your puppers.
Gretchen, thank you for your federal service. I'm sorry for what's happening to you. I mean, I only worked at VA for 11, 12 years, something like that. But I was devastated when they pushed me out.
So I understand I'm trying to hang on there. Seven years from retirement. 23 years, serving. Thank you.
And welcome. All right. Next up from Michelle, pronoun she and her high beans. My husband and I do a little good trouble when we go to bookstores.
Whenever we see books with the orange man on them, we flip them over for my pod bet tariff is Lilly. And what she thinks about this administration, she's doing a blap. Love it. I also love your little hex tiles there in your kitchen.
And Michelle, something else, when I go to craft stores like Michaels and they have things with letters on them, I always try to spell out fucktrombo. Anyway, thank you all so much for your good news. Thanks for hanging with me, solo. I promise Dana will be back this week.
I miss her. I miss her too. Welcome to all our new listeners. We got tons of new listeners all of a sudden.
I'm not sure what happened. I don't know if somebody shared one of our episodes with a bunch of people or what, but welcome. Maybe word of mouth is just getting out there. Tell your friends, tell your fam.
When you're at the holiday dinner, grab your MAGA relatives phones and subscribe to the daily beans in their podcast app. Please just. Everybody, please check out my in-depth interview with Annie Farmer. It was on the Midas Touch Network, but you can find it at melishiro.com.
And then also, please check out the beans talk. I'm going to go over some stuff I didn't cover here on the beans today. And you can find that at MSW Media's YouTube channel. You can just Google MSW Media Beans Talk.
Boom. It pops up. You can see the whole list of them. We would love to have you subscribe because that improves the algorithm and our stuff gets in front of more people.
So thank you so much. And if you want to become a patron, all, you know, our shows are free, but if you want to financially support us, if you can swing it, that would be the best Christmas gift to us. You can do that by going to patreon.com slash melishiro. Thank you all so much.
I'll see you tomorrow. Until then, please take care of yourself. Take care of each other. Take care of the planet.
Take care of your mental health and take care of your family. I've been a G and that's the beans. The Daily Beans is written and executive produced by Allison Gill with additional research and reporting by Dana Goldberg. Sound design and editing is by Desiree McFarland with art and web design by Joelle Reed with Moxie Design Studios.
Music for the Daily Beans is written and performed by They Might Be Giants. And the show is a proud member of the MSW Media Network, a collection of creator owned podcasts dedicated to news politics and justice. For more information, please visit mswmedia.com M-S-W-Media.