A cabal of lawyers, legal analysts for the corporate media, and former Deep State officials is colluding on private Zoom calls every Friday to decide how to cover the various lawfare cases against Donald Trump. The existence of the off-the-record meetings was revealed by POLITICO, which described the participants as “united by their dislike of Trump.”
Norman Eisen, a CNN analyst who served as a special counsel and ambassador under Barack Obama, hosts the group. Eisen recently argued Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s “hush money” prosecution of Trump is an “election interference” case.
Only some of his cabal’s regular participants were named:
- Bill Kristol, a pro-war neoconservative who has pushed Chris Christie to endorse Joe Biden for President;
- Laurence Tribe, a liberal constitutional law professor who has linked being pro-left to white supremacy;
- John Dean, a White House counsel under Richard Nixon who pleaded guilty to obstruction of justice after Watergate;
- Karen Agnifilo, a host for the far-left MeidasTouch Network, described as the “front lines” of the Biden White House’s anti-Trump efforts, who worked with Trump prosecutor Jack Smith for years;
- George Conway, a Never Trumper who persuaded E. Jean Carroll to sue the former president. He also co-founded the Lincoln Project alongside John Weaver, alleged to have groomed and harassed multiple young men, including at least one minor;
- Andrew Weissmann, an MSNBC analyst who assisted Robert Mueller’s bogus Trump-Russia investigation as a federal prosecutor;
- Mary McCord, a former Justice Department official who hosts an MSNBC podcast alongside Weissmann;
- Jeffrey Toobin, a cable news legal analyst previously suspended by The New Yorker for exposing his genitals to a colleague on a Zoom call;
- Harry Litman, a Los Angeles Times columnist who served as a U.S. Attorney under Barack Obama;
- Barbara McQuade, an MSNBC contractor who also served as a U.S. Attorney under Barack Obama;
- Joyce White Vance, another MSNBC contractor who served as a U.S. Attorney under Barack Obama;
- Jennifer Rubin, a Washington Post opinion writer;
- Elliot Williams, a CNN commentator and former federal prosecutor;
- Ryan Goodman, a New York University (NYU) law professor;
- Renato Mariotti, a POLITICO contributor and former federal prosecutor;
- Asha Rangappa, an ABC news contributor and former FBI Special Agent;
- Shan Wu, a contributor to the far-left Daily Beast and former federal prosecutor;
- Norman Ornstein, a registered Democrat from Washington, D.C., uniparty think tank, the American Enterprise Institute.
The cabal has occasionally invited special guests to speak with them, including lawyers involved in lawfare efforts against Trump.
One was Roberta Kaplan, who spoke to the group for approximately 30 minutes about her efforts to sue Trump on behalf of E. Jean Carroll. The elderly advice columnist claims the former president raped her in the changing rooms of a busy department store in the 1990s.
The group also hosted J. Michael Luttig, who helped lead the failed campaign to bar Trump from running for the presidency again under the 14th Amendment. POLITICO notes the interaction with Luttig “spread dubious analysis,” with call participants arguing the 14th Amendment efforts had merit despite the fact they “never really had a chance.”
POLITICO notes the group also has strong misgivings about DA Bragg’s highly novel case against Trump in Manhattan. They discuss “whether it should have been brought in the first place” regularly.
