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May 22, 2024 - Sean Hannity Show
32:22
Judge Jeanine Pirro - May 21st, Hour 2
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This is an iHeart podcast.
And an hour two Sean Hannity show, 800-941-Sean, our number, if you want to be a part of the program.
Well, we've gone over what was just complete, utter, unmitigated shock in the trial, the sham trial of Donald Trump yesterday.
The biggest problem that the defense faces at this point is not that they've proven a thing.
They've proven nothing, absolutely nothing.
They've not even identified the law.
But to watch Judge Mershawn go at what is a legal expert, Bradley Smith, who understands the heart of the law that is supposedly the novel legal theory that the prosecution is putting on in this case and limit the ability of Judge Mershawn to inform the jury that this is not a crime is pretty unbelievable.
Bradley Smith was on my TV show specifically talking about this very issue.
He's a former FEC chair.
There's no violation at all in the NDA agreement that although Trump is involved in, that Michael Cohn told everybody and their mother based on his own testimony yesterday and the testimony of Bob Costello before Congress.
I mean, not that they let him talk either.
Here's Bradley Smith, former FEC chair on my TV show.
The claim made by the DA is the federal law says something is a campaign contribution if it's made for the purpose of influencing a campaign.
And that's the argument.
Well, they were trying to do this because they thought if they could pay hush money to Stormy Daniels, that would help Trump's campaign.
So that's the theory.
Most of us would not think that it is a campaign expenditure to try to settle potential legal claims against you or other claims against you for events that occurred 10 years before you talked about running for office, you know, to pay, allegedly to pay hush money to Stormy Daniels or anybody else.
And the odd theory of the DA brag is that not only could those expenses be paid with campaign funds, they would have to be paid with campaign funds.
I think, again, as a common sense man, that's clearly wrong, but also when you look at the statute and you realize that's an objective standard, it's clearly not correct to say that these were funds that count as a campaign expenditure.
It's pretty just unbelievable.
Of course, the judge does not want the jury to hear any of this, and they fought the prosecution's fighting, and the judge is granting every motion.
That's what resulted in Bob Costello, whose credentials are impeccable, to roll his eyes and be like, you're kidding me?
Because he understands the law, and he understands an abusively biased judge, as we all know, the Biden donor judge with apparent family conflicts who should have recused himself from the get-go.
You know, even the mob, the media, by the way.
And then we have the issue of Michael Cohen.
What do we have?
August 2018 pleads guilty, campaign finance violations, bank fraud, five counts of tax evasion.
In 2018, also pleading guilty to lying to the U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee, the House Intelligence Committee, about the Trump-Moscow Tower Moscow deal that never existed, and of course then admitting that he's a thief on top of everything else, stealing $60,000 from the Trump organization.
Even the mob and the media didn't exactly think that him stealing from President Trump went over particularly well for the prosecution.
I'm still kind of reeling from the revelation that Michael Cohen stole money from the Trump organization and that wasn't, at least to my knowledge, that the prosecution didn't get that out earlier.
The prosecution has painted Michael Cohen as sort of this bumbling, pathetic character whose only sins were his misguided, undying loyalty to Donald Trump.
But now you see something a little different.
Now, there's an argument to be made that actually you're just an opportunistic thief.
The fact that he was ever charged with larceny is important because stealing $60,000 through fraud, which would be larceny in New York State, is more serious of a crime than falsifying business.
They knew about this.
They minimized it.
The prosecutor misled this jury.
That's what I would argue.
Are you allowed to say that?
Yes, sir.
Oh, yeah.
Well, the prosecutor, we learned also from Bob Costello, was specifically told about exculpatory evidence before he brought this case before the grand jury and purposely withheld that exculpatory evidence, which, by the way, he is required to present to them as a matter of law.
You don't believe me, then you've got to believe my next guest, which is Judge Janine Pirro.
By the way, her new book, I mean, it is literally ripped out of today's headlines, Crimes Against America.
It's on Hannity.com, Amazon.com, bookstores around the country.
And, you know, best-selling author that she is, but it goes to the heart of all of this.
It's a must-read if you want to preserve, you know, law and order and our great constitutional republic, which I would argue is now currently in jeopardy.
Judge, I was going to call you and because we're good friends, make a little bit of fun of you yesterday.
I was watching the hit show The Five that you're a part of.
Okay, okay, hold on.
It was, what was it, Barbie Day?
It was like all pink day.
Yeah.
You even had pink shoes on.
You know, yes, when you said yesterday, and then I thought, yeah, that's what I want.
Pink shoes, pink clothes.
Can I tell you, after this year, I'm never wearing pink again.
Why?
Sure, sure, Sean, and I tell you, everything is pink for women.
I'm so over this Barbie thing.
And it's not an oath to Barbie.
I could care less what it is.
Although, you know, the thing behind the Barbie doll is that Barbie was supposed to be a professional woman at a time when all dolls are supposed to be mothers.
And, you know, it doesn't matter to me one way or another.
I was both.
I mean, come on.
I had kids and I had a career and I ran for office and all that other stuff.
But I'm so over pink right now.
Well, I don't, I just, all I could think about, unfortunately, Barbie ruined pink for everybody else and the movie, which I cannot, as a guy, you know, hang on to my man cart if I go to a Barbie movie or call it up and rent it and watch it.
I couldn't imagine that day.
But, you know, I love you, and you're the best, and you are impeccably dressed all the time and just a class act all the way around.
You know, I said that your book, Crimes Against America, ripped right out of the headlines.
I'm not wrong.
It is.
I know you've been on both sides of this, both as a judge and a prosecutor.
I've been listening to your commentary.
You've been dead on accurate.
Well, the truth is that I've been Juan Murchand, the judge, and I've been Alvin Bragg, the DA.
And I got to tell you, the book, Crimes Against America, speaks to the attack on our institutions, everything from education to government to the Department of Justice to, you know, the Constitution, free speech, the Second Amendment, the Fourth Amendment, all that.
But this case in particular is a study in how the left progressives can make a decision that they are going to take a president, former president, and future president, as far as I'm concerned, and try to destroy him in a kangaroo court.
And it is offensive to me.
You know, people can report on this stuff, but I lived this for 32 years, Sean.
And when a witness comes in, Robert Costello, who is about as credible as I've ever seen, and tries to at least put truth to the lie of Michael Cohen about an essential element of the case, and that is whether or not Donald Trump did anything wrong at a time when Michael Cohen had everything to lose, the truth is that there was nothing, and the judge would not allow it.
Every time Costello spoke before he was even finished, the prosecution would object to the defense witness, and it would be sustained by the judge.
So today, when Robert Costello is cross-examined by the prosecution, this defense witness for President Trump, what happens is any objection is overruled.
I mean, the contrast is stunning.
On the one hand, you've got, it started from the get-go.
You've got that.
How do you interpret that?
What do you think happened?
He's tipping the scales of justice.
He doesn't want this jury to reconcile with the fact that possibly Donald Trump did nothing wrong.
And how dare a witness be brought in to say that the lynchman of the case, Michael Cohen, actually has told people at his most vulnerable period in his life that Michael Cohen did nothing wrong.
But it's the same thing that the judge did with Michael Cohen and Donald Trump.
Donald Trump, you're gagged.
Michael Cohen, you're not.
Stormy Daniels, you can talk about whatever you want, but Robert Costello cannot.
You talk about salacious material and talk to dead people.
That's relevant, even though it's not relevant.
It's immaterial and absolutely should have been stopped in its tracks and it wasn't.
And then you're going to allow Michael Cohen and David Pecker to talk about campaign finance violations and you're not going to allow Brad Smith, who can testify about what a real campaign violation is.
I mean, everything that this judge has done, he's had the scales weighted against the defendant.
And it's offensive to me because this is our system of justice.
And we rail all the time about how we're the best and we're the greatest.
This is terrible, Sean.
It's terrible.
He's trying to salvage the case that has been a disaster for Bragg.
That's what he's trying to do.
The Biden donor judge, who has family conflicts as well, should have recused himself as a matter of law.
And he's now throwing a lifeline or attempting to throw a lifeline to the DA and the prosecution in this case to hopefully get the conviction that everybody wanted and thought they were going to get coming into this, but it fell apart.
Everything deteriorated right before their eyes.
And at this last minute, Hail Mary, and you saw this with the anger from the judge yesterday.
Why is he angry at Bob Costello is the consummate pro, I mean, with incredible experience.
And he's sitting there in a state of shock.
And he rolls his eyes and he's like, really?
Are you staring me down?
I mean, you know, threatening to hold this guy in contempt, screaming, clear the courtroom, clear the courtroom.
The judge should have been held in contempt, Sean.
This judge doesn't know what he's doing.
This judge is tipping the scales.
And this judge has another chance, Sean.
It's not over yet.
He's going to charge that jury to essentially convict.
First of all, there's got to be an adverse witness charge.
The fact that the prosecution did not call Weiselberg, who was in their control in Rikers Island on a material issue, should be held against the prosecution.
The judge is entitled or should be telling that jury, the fact that they didn't call him means that he would have testified against them.
They should also get an adverse witness charge for not calling Keith Schiller.
If Keith Schiller was part of the essential case where Cohen called him and said, hey, I took care of it, but Keith Schiller says, no, this is all about a 14-year-old on an October 24th, 2016 phone call, then Keith Schiller should have been called by the prosecution.
There's all kinds of disasters that this judge can continue to impose to make this jury find it offended.
All right, quick break more with Judge Janine Piro, also of the hit show The Five, her new book out, Crimes Against America, really ripped out of today's headlines.
Anyway, it's on Hannity.com, Amazon.com, bookstores around the country as we continue.
Hey there, I'm Mary Catherine Hamm.
And I'm Carol Markowitz.
We've been in political media for a long time.
Long enough to know that it's gotten, well, a little insane.
That's why we started Normally, a podcast for people who are over the hysteria and just want clarity.
We talk about the issues that actually matter to the country without panic, without yelling, and with a healthy dose of humor.
We don't take ourselves too seriously, but we do take the truth seriously.
So if you're into common sense, sanity, and some occasional sass.
You're our kind of people.
Catch new episodes of Normally every Tuesday and Thursday.
On the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you listen.
Hey there, I'm Mary Catherine Hamm.
And I'm Carol Markowitz.
We've been in political media for a long time.
Long enough to know that it's gotten, well, a little insane.
That's why we started Normally, a podcast for people who are over the hysteria and just want clarity.
We talk about the issues that actually matter to the country without panic, without yelling, and with a healthy dose of humor.
We don't take ourselves too seriously, but we do take the truth seriously.
So if you're into common sense, sanity, and some occasional sass.
You're our kind of people.
Catch new episodes of Normally every Tuesday and Thursday.
On the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you listen.
All right, more with my friend and colleague, Judge Janine Pirow.
Her new book is How Crimes Against America, and very relevant to what's going on in that courtroom in New York and around the country and around the world.
Her new book is on Amazon.com, Hannity.com, and bookstores around the country.
There's no way the judge is going to dismiss this case.
There's no way we're going to get a directive verdict.
There's no way that jury instructions are going to be fair.
And he's going to try to tip the scales in the favor of the DA and the prosecution.
And at the end of the day, that makes me very nervous.
And it only reinforces what I had said from day one.
Donald Trump can't get a fair trial in New York or D.C. or Fulton County, Georgia.
Case closed.
It happened with Ngoran in the civil case.
The guy still maintains Mar-a-Lago's $18 million.
I'll buy it tomorrow.
I'll pay double and we'll be very, very wealthy.
I'll become a billionaire judge.
But they were allowed to get away with it there.
Listen, this is a judge who's not.
I'll even let you have 2% if you're willing to put in some money.
I could.
But look, this judge is not on the level.
This judge is, what he does is he stains that robe for every judge in this country who tries so hard to balance the rights of the defendant along with the interests of the people.
He is unable to let the defense conduct a defense.
And the truth is that in the end, he's on the line as much as Alvin Bragg is here.
He knows he's got to get a conviction to save himself, and he will do it in the charge to the jury.
I'm telling you, he will.
Okay, but will he be successful?
Last question.
That's the question.
And I'm hoping and praying that there is someone who's going to say, you know what?
Nobody said that Donald Trump told anyone how to write the check or that he got involved in it.
Just the opposite.
Michael Cohen admitted that he did it on his own and told all these people.
He admitted he told everybody he did it on his own.
That's called reasonable doubt, Judge, where I grew up.
Yeah, it's reasonable doubt, but you know what?
The judge wants no one to hear from Michael Cohen and Michael, excuse me, Robert Costello, because that may give them reasonable doubt as well.
It would impeach the argument of the prosecution.
It would be slam dunk, case closed, directive verdict.
Everybody, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, thank you for your service.
Goodbye.
Yep.
See you later.
I got to roll.
But listen, congrats, Crimes Against America.
Judge Janine Pirro, Hannity.com, Amazon.com, bookstores around the country.
Judge, we appreciate it.
And listen, you have a great holiday if I don't talk to you.
We'll talk.
Bye, Sean.
Yeah, that's true.
All right.
These are pretty unbelievable times that we're living in.
They really are.
You know, the idea that the Biden administration and that the UN, the UN holds a moment of silence for the butcher of Tehran, the former president of Tehran that died in his helicopter crash, U.S. deputy ambassador to the UN was seen standing during this, which is pretty repulsive.
Biden, of course, the administration through the State Department, they're sending condolences.
Does anybody not understand?
This is the president of the number one state sponsor of terrorism.
This is the guy that helped plan October 7th with the Quds forces and the Iranian Revolutionary Guards forces.
This is the guy that provides the weaponry to groups like Hamas and Hezbollah in the north out of Lebanon and the Houthi rebels out of Yemen.
Yeah, they're the ones that foment all the terror around the world.
And we're sending condolences to Iran.
And we have international organizations and bodies, you know, giving a moment of silence and all the ass kissing of all of these people is disgusting.
New York Post today, rot in hell.
You know, good thing Iran's president's dead.
You know, his blood splattered.
Kholmani is known as the butcher of Tehran for his role as the chief executioner during a massive 1988 purge, a key protege and current capo of Ali Khamani and most likely successor.
He was committed to the art of evil ideology and to violent repression so necessary to maintain its grip on Iran as in the 2022 nationwide crackdown against Iranian protesting at the religious police murder of this woman for daring to remove her hijab.
I mean, this is the guy.
We're sending condolences to this.
Really?
You know, then, of course, you have the ICC, you know, putting out an indictment against the prime minister of Israel.
What part of Israel being a victim of radical Islamic terror is the world not quite understanding here.
The 1,200 dead Israelis on October the 7th, they were victims that day.
The hundreds that were taking hostage and out of their country, including Americans, and we're not supporting Israel's right to win their war against radical Islamic terrorism?
You know, I was on Fox and Friends talking about this today, and I just kept saying it's unbelievable.
We have a president of the United States that has been doing nothing beyond the quid pro quo, the very thing they impeached Donald Trump over, and telling Israel you're not getting weapons if you fight offensively and try to defeat the terrorists that attacked you on October the 7th, when the message should be clear and unambiguous, and the moral clarity should be certain, which is you have a right to win your war against radical Islamic terrorists.
Period.
How would we feel after 9-11 if the world started lecturing us on how to fight back against those people that killed 2,977 Americans and many more from 9-11-related illnesses?
It was supposed to be lectured.
Oh, George W. Bush was supposed to be indicted by the ICC.
And while Joe Biden, quote, condemns it on paper, well, he sat through a speech at Morehouse College of a student, you know, and that was condemning Israel and, quote, occupation and demanding a ceasefire now.
And he started clapping.
I never thought we'd have a day where the president of our country is literally surrendering in the war on terror and thus emboldening radical Islamic terrorists and terrorist states around the world and simultaneously sending a message to the free world that America is abdicating its role as the leading country for the cause of liberty and freedom and democracy.
It really is.
These are sad times that we are living in.
It's really unbelievable.
Oh, but Joe Biden, by the way, announced that one of the hostages still held by Hamas was actually a White House guest.
This is how cognitively deficient your president is.
Listen.
My administration working around the clock to free the remaining hostages, just as we have freed hostages already.
And here it is today is Hirsch Gobert-Poland is still, he is not here with us, but he's still being held by Hamas.
And Rachel and John are here with us.
Stand up, guys.
By the way, Prime Minister Netanyahu was on Good Morning America and on Fox and Friends this morning.
And here's what he had to say about this ICC prosecutor pouring gasoline on the fires of anti-Semitism.
And he's 100% right.
Listen.
And he's making a totally false accusation here and everywhere else.
We are supplying now nearly half of the water of Gaza.
We supplied only 7% before the war.
So this is completely opposite of what he's saying.
He's saying that we're starving people.
You know, we have supplied half a million tons of food and medicine with 20,000 trucks.
This guy is out to demonize Israel.
He's doing a hijab.
He's creating a false symmetry between the democratically elected leaders of Israel and the terrorist chieftains.
That's like saying after 9-11, well, I'm issuing arrest warrants for George Bush, but also for bin Laden.
Or after in World War II, well, I'm issuing arrest warrants for FDR, but also for Hitler.
It's a hijab.
It's not serious.
He's out to defame Israel.
And he's also pouring gasoline on the fires of anti-Semitism that are spreading around the world.
I totally, completely agree.
And what have we been watching at our, quote, most prestigious universities around the country?
Calls for antifada, death to Israel, death to America, outright support for Hamas taking over school buildings, encampments all over these college campuses, which is unfathomable to me.
And we've heard very little from faculty.
We've seen a lot of support for the anti-Israel protests that have been going on, but not in the case of one person that is at the University of Michigan.
And anyway, this happened a few days ago.
The encampment at the University of Michigan finally was removed by police.
Now, if you remember, they had their graduation a couple of weeks ago and had it in the big house, which, you know, was well known for massive crowds.
And anyway, then, of course, that got disrupted by anti-Israel protesters.
But anyway, I will tell you the story.
These pro-Palestinian protesters, you know, place, you know, fake bloody corpses at the home of a University of Michigan official.
And anyway, a large group of protesters then make their way onto this university official's home property wearing masks and coverings.
Then they tape a list of demands to her door.
Immediately, they pitch tents and place bloody corpses in red stained sheets on her lawn and chanting, you know, Regent Hubbard, you can't hide.
You're fueling genocide broke out.
Now, this home is 60 miles away from the Ann Arbor campus.
The protests led by members of what's called the Tahir Coalition, a student-led alliance of more than 80 organizations.
I got to give a lot of credit.
Finally, a high-ranking official at a university has decided to stand up to them because she pointed out in a post on X that protesters want me to cut all ties with Israel's higher ed institutions, let politics drive investment of our endowment funds, give unaccountable community activists control over the university's budget and defund the campus police.
I say no, no, no, and hell no.
Anyway, Sarah Hubbard is with us.
How are you?
I'm doing great.
Thanks, Sean.
Thanks for having me.
Well, you're a rarity.
I mean, that's not exactly been happening at college campuses around the country very often.
Good for you.
No, we've had enough at the University of Michigan.
We've moved out the encampment.
You know, they started bringing in plywood and chicken wire to reinforce their setup on our campus.
They visited my home last week and, you know, upset my neighbors, upset the children in my neighborhood.
Had 30 protesters marching in a circle around my driveway, out onto the road, banging a drum, using bullhorns, as you mentioned, setting up tents in my lawn, really creating a huge ruckus.
By the way, where the hell are the police?
Well, the police did come, and then they said, okay, leave or get arrested.
And then they left immediately.
So the police did come, but, you know, they just, they came in just before 6 o'clock in the morning.
Some of my colleagues, they came in earlier than that.
And they're lucky, you know, coming to the door of somebody's home in the middle of the night, basically, in some cases when it was still dark out, is really not a good idea.
They could have met a very different result if I hadn't recognized that those are the very same tents that were set up on campus and then moved to my front yard.
So I, you know, let them do their thing for a bit, and then they left.
We cleaned up.
We threw all that stuff out.
But, you know, they really crossed the line there.
It's really too much.
And then, you know, fortifying their encampment and acting like they were going to, you know, camp out on our campus for the rest of the summer was too much.
The University of Michigan is not a campground.
We are not equipped for this.
We are not going to continue with this kind of thing.
And as you mentioned, they upset our commencement.
They interfered with that.
I was at our honors convocation, the only region at our honors convocation where they interfered with that.
We had to end it early because they were overwhelming the crowd.
This is just too much.
Our governor even said today, you know, she doesn't think these people should be going to people's homes.
I mean, that's a place where we agree.
What a vote of confidence because her silence, for the most part, has been pretty deafening during most of this.
Yeah, well, I think now that we're taking action on this, this is going to provide a lot of people more opportunity to speak out and really join us in pushing back on these protesters.
Let me ask you this.
This is an important question.
Do you have the full support of the administration at your school?
We do.
We do.
And it took the administration to move forward and do this today, move the encampment out.
We have been.
Well, why did they wait so long?
Why did they allow a single day to go by without saying, no, it's against campus policy.
You're not allowed to.
Well, it's a great question.
I think we're erring on the side of free speech and saying, okay, students, we have a rich history of protests on our campus.
We're known for that at the University of Michigan.
Students have a voice.
They were talking about things.
You know, they were letting their voice be heard.
And, you know, we did err on the side of free speech, no question, in allowing them to protest.
But they just went too far.
They really did just go too far.
But there are certainly lots of people on our campus, lots of people in the faculty that support the students, lots of people in some of our faculty, or well, you know, teaching unions, not full faculty, but teaching unions that support this group that's protesting.
And so there certainly is a layer of those folks at the university that feel very strongly about their right to protest.
But when you're showing up at my house and you're doing things like this that are silencing others on campus and that create fear for Jewish students on our campus in particular, that's too much.
We had to deal with it.
We let it go a little longer than some, but we've dealt with it and now we're moving on.
All right, quick break more with Sarah Hubbard is the chair of the Board of Regents University of Michigan.
Literally was the target of intimidations that threaten our own home.
By the way, an hour out of campus.
We'll continue with her and we'll get to your calls and Matt Gates on the other side as we continue.
Next, our final information overload.
Now with the chair of the Board of Regents, University of Michigan.
She herself was targeted by these radical protesters and they tried to threaten and intimidate her and go to her home.
I mean, it's unbelievable what's going on around the country and around the world.
What are you going to do now the next time?
Because I assume that we've not heard the end of this.
Is it going to be dealt with immediately moving forward?
Or is this something that they'll allow to go on for a certain period of time and then realize they got to act?
And, you know, the fact that you have such repulsive anti-Semitism on college campuses all around the country, what do you make of that?
Because to me, it's pretty scary.
Very reminiscent of the 1930s to me.
Oh, it's really scary.
And we hear from Jewish stakeholders all the time.
We are bracing for whatever the next time is.
We want to be sure that they can't just come back and set up this encampment somewhere else on campus.
And we're keeping an eye out for that.
We're making sure that our partners and stakeholders around campus that might also be at risk are aware of what's going on.
And hopefully they feel safe as well.
And, you know, we're concerned about what this group is going to try to do when we come back to school in the fall.
And so we're certainly making plans to be sure that this kind of thing can't happen again.
We are holding accountable a number of these students that have been active in these protests.
The Washtenaw County Prosecutor filed charges against four students earlier this week, last week.
And then we've also started a process against a number of others that have been disruptive on campus and were occupied.
Let me ask you a last question.
You ever think the United States of America ever would surrender in the war on terror?
Do you agree with my characterization?
Yeah, I never.
I mean, and I hope we're not surrendering to the war on terror.
No, Joe Biden did.
I didn't.
Understood.
Well, we are moving forward at the university.
We've had enough, and, you know, we just...
Well, good for you.
I don't want to drag into a political fight that's going to get you in trouble because I admire your courage.
I know you're the chair of the Board of Regents, and I don't want to see you have any ramifications from even coming on this show.
But believe me, I have a pretty loud voice.
And if there are, give me a call because I would love to take them on.
Okay?
Thank you.
Yeah, thank you.
I appreciate your help.
I admire your courage.
Sarah Hubbard, thank you.
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