I encourage everyone to read the opinion, at least the fact findings. Because it is absolutely unhinged and insane. There are 11 separate findings of fact as to why Comey needs to see the grand jury materials. Here are some summaries:
Nearly all of the presented evidence relies on search warrants from the Arctic Haze investigation (2019-2020). In the USA, search warrants specify the specific types of evidence to be seized, and the crimes they are searching for. These warrants were for some personal hard drives and email accounts of James Comey's personal friend and attorney, Dan Richman.
The warrants themselves said that the government was to go through the full forensic extractions and pick out data that was relevant to the investigation into classified data mishandling. The rest of the search data was to be thrown out. This was not done.
The warrants said that attorney-client privilege data was to be separated out and thrown out. The first part was done, but not for the Comey-Richman privileged material, and in any case, the full extractions were retained, illegally.
The warrants were to look for evidence of classified data mishandling, not evidence of lying to Congress. You can't just take the data from one warrant and use it on another case. You need to get a new warrant for the new case, which wasn't done. What happened here turns the warrants into "general warrants," which King George III was infamous for using.
The FBI agent (Agent 2) for this case was directed to review raw Cellebrite cell phone extractions, which were not supposed to be retained. While reading this stuff, he noticed that some emails between Comey and Richman appeared to be attorney client privilege material.
Agent 2 passed some information from the Cellebrite to Agent 3 in a memo. Despite being tainted, Agent 3 went ahead and testified to the grand jury anyway.
Halligan told the grand jury that Comey would be required to testify at trial to clarify things. This is absolutely wrong. Comey has the right to "take the fifth" and not testify at trial, and no adverse inference can be drawn if he chooses not to testify.
Halligan suggested to the jury that her burden of proof at trial would something less than "beyond a reasonable doubt." This is also a wrong instruction on the law.
Halligan told the jury that she would have better evidence to present by trial time, and they could consider that promise when deciding whether to indict. This is wrong. The grand jury must make its decision based only on the evidence presented to it.
And finally, the big kicker. There is a reasonable basis to think that the 2-count indictment that this prosecution is based on...the actual charging document...was never actually presented to the grand jury for an up-or-down vote. Instead, we think that the grand jury voted on the 3-count bill, rejecting count 1, and finding probable cause on counts 2 and 3. Then Halligan wrote a new indictment, renumbering 2 and 3 as counts 1 and 2, and got the foreperson to sign that, without holding another vote. This is, in the words of Judge Fitzpatrick, "unknown legal territory." There's no case law on this exact kind of screw-up.
Do these experts also have license plates that say "TRAVELER?". Is admiralty court involved? Does it involve crossing out the "penalty of perjury" line on the 1040 form?
if the autopilot is engaged, you can't physically move the wheels, because it is moving them for you. Press the red button on the steering wheel to disconnect autopilot.
That IAS tape on the left of the sky/ground box is the most important thing on the plane. It's got red bands on the high side and low side that you should stay out of.
if the plane tells you there's a "stall, stall" you need to push the wheels forward to make the nose go down. And keep the speed above that lower red band.
the black button on the wheel is the push-to-talk to talk on the radio, or maybe the internal PA system. Depends how it's set up.
most important: the switch for the "fasten seatbelt" sign is usually on the bottom of the top panel. You can flip it on and off as much as you want. (Older planes will also let you do this with the "no smoking" sign).
There's a federal rule that says that if you can prove that the prosecution is vindictive or selective, then the case is dismissed.
A prosecution is vindictive if it is only happening because of personal animus against the defendant. You have to prove that the animus caused the prosecution, in a legal "but for" sense.
A prosecution is selective if you're getting singled out. That is, if other people in similar circumstances are not getting charged for the same behavior, but you are. For example, Attorney General James alleges that Ken Paxton is also a state Attorney General, and he also has multiple "second homes" with mortgages that he rents out and never visits, but somehow he has not been charged.
James is alleging both vindictive and selective prosecution, but she only has to prove either one or the other to get the case dismissed.
Jackson gets this application because it's from the 1st circuit, and she is assigned to initially handle all shadow docket matters from the 1st circuit. By writing this admin stay, she potentially keeps the full court from stepping in and doing it for her. And this way she gets to set the 48 hour limit. This could cause the whole case to be decided one way or another a lot faster.
The supreme court let the trans passport case sit on the shadow "emergency" docket for 48 days. This stay gives the 1st circuit approx the weekend to make their decision, then the 48 hour deadline puts some oomph on the rest of scotus to make their decision.
If Justice Jackson did nothing, and 5 votes on the court intervened to issue a stay at 1 am, then there would be no 48 hour limit.
I encourage everyone to read the opinion, at least the fact findings. Because it is absolutely unhinged and insane. There are 11 separate findings of fact as to why Comey needs to see the grand jury materials. Here are some summaries: