JUST IN: Trump’s ‘Hush Payment’ Trial to Begin Months Before 2024 Presidential Election

Trump will stand trial shortly before the 2024 election for ‘falsifying documents’ when making ‘hush payments’ to porn star Stormy Daniels.

President Trump pleaded not guilty to 34 criminal counts of falsifying business records and conspiracy.

Trump on Tuesday appeared in a New York court via video where Judge Merchan personally issued a protective order to the former president.

Judge Juan Merchan stopped just short of issuing a gag order.

Trump can speak about the case, however, he cannot publicly disclose evidence about the Stormy Daniels case, according to the protective order.

The judge also set a trial date in the hush payment case: March 25, 2024 – just months before the 2024 election.

Fox News reported:

Former President Donald Trump appeared in a New York City virtual court hearing Tuesday, where a judge said Trump will go on trial March 25, 2024 — months before the 2024 presidential election — after he pleaded not guilty in April to 34 counts of falsifying business records related to a 2016 hush money payment.

New York State Supreme Court Judge Juan Merchan imposed the protective order May 8, but stopped short of imposing a gag order. Prosecutors requested the order after Trump criticized Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, Merchan and others.

Trump can speak publicly about the case but can be held in contempt if he uses evidence turned over by prosecutors to target witnesses and anyone else involved in the case.

On Tuesday, he appeared virtually on two big screens next to his attorney, Todd Blanche. During the hearing, Merchan asked Trump if he has a copy of the protective order.

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2023/05/just-trumps-hush-payment-trial-begin-months-before/

NYC professor sacked after holding machete to reporter's throat

The reporter had sought to speak with Rodriguez over a video from Students for Life of America that appeared to show Rodriguez harassing pro-life students at the college who had set up a booth to canvas for their position.

https://justthenews.com/politics-policy/education/nyc-professor-sacked-after-holding-machete-reporters-throat

Kari Lake Announces She Will Continue Fighting Stolen Election Case “to The US SUPREME COURT” – Will Launch “The Largest, Most Extensive Ballot Chasing Operation in Our State’s History”

Kari Lake held her first press conference since her Maricopa County Superior Court trial and the dismissal of her case challenging Maricopa County’s fraudulent mail-in ballot signature verification system earlier today.

Kari Lake and her team teased the announcement of “big news” late last night after Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Peter A. Thompson’s ruling.

Part of Lake’s big announcement dealt with the stolen midterm election, and she vowed to continue fighting her lawsuit all the way to the United States Supreme Court if necessary.

Kari Lake has been fighting against the stolen midterm election since November 8.

The Gateway Pundit reported on days one, two, and three of Lake’s recent trial exposing corruption in Maricopa County’s early voting system.

As The Gateway Pundit previously reported, the Arizona Supreme Court ruled in Lake’s favor on appeal after her first trial challenging voting machine failures at 60% of voting locations targeting Republican voters in Maricopa County. The Supreme Court remanded her signature verification fraud count back to the trial court for further review after it was tossed by the same Judge prior to trial. Maricopa County did not accurately verify tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of mail-in signatures; they couldn’t possibly have.

Despite evidence from Maricopa County’s own data, which shows “approximately 274,000 ballot signatures compared and verified in less than three seconds,” Judge Peter A. Thompson again ruled in favor of Defendants late last night, claiming that “level one and level two signature review did take place in some fashion.”

That’s all it takes. Maricopa County didn’t need to verify signatures accurately or in accordance with the law. They just needed to review signatures “in some fashion,” according to Thompson.

Lake is expected to appeal this ruling all the way to the US Supreme Court, if needed, in the coming days or weeks.

Lake further announced that she and grassroots organizer Merissa Hamilton are “officially launching the largest, most extensive ballot-chasing operation in our state’s history, and frankly, possibly in American history.”

Lake told reporters that her plan is to do this through legal means of registering voters and getting out the vote, not ballot harvesting and dirty tricks like the Democrats and their 2000 Mules operation, but according to the laws of Arizona. Lake said that “pushing the envelope” means “we are not stopping at 50 miles an hour; we’re going 100 miles an hour toward winning the next election.”

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2023/05/just-kari-lake-announces-she-will-continue-fighting/

https://rumble.com/v2pm1ik-kari-lake-announces-she-will-fight-election-case-to-us-supreme-court.html

TikTok Sues Montana Over Ban

According to the company, the ban, which will begin on Jan. 1, 2024, infringes on the First Amendment rights of the company and its users.

TikTok argues that the ban violates federal law, as it encroaches on matters exclusively under federal jurisdiction - in particular, that the US Constitution "vests exclusive authority" over foreign affairs and national security to the US government, not individual states.

Filed in the US District Court in Montana, the company also claims in its lawsuit that the ban violates the Commerce Clause of the US Constitution, which restricts legislation that excessively burdens foreign and interstate commerce.

Montana is the first U.S. state to attempt to ban TikTok for all users. In 2020, former President Donald Trump sought to prevent new downloads of TikTok and the Chinese-owned messaging app WeChat, along with other transactions involving these companies. However, court rulings prevented these bans from being implemented effectively.

TikTok further argues that the state’s ban specifically targets and penalizes TikTok without justifiable reasons, highlighting that it is solely based on punitive grounds. They assert that the state’s concerns regarding TikTok’s data security and content moderation practices are speculative and unsupported.

From the first day of 2024, unless defeated, the ban will mean that anyone living in or visiting Montana will face stiff penalties of up to $10,000 per day if they access TikTok. -Epoch Times

The social media app has a base of more than 150 million Americans, the majority of whom are adults. That said, the app's popularity among teenagers is significant - with 67% of US teenagers between 13 and 17 years old using the app. 16% of them use it almost constantly.

In its lawsuit, TikTok argues that Montana "has enacted these extraordinary and unprecedented measures based on nothing more than unfounded speculation."

"Specifically, the State claims that the government of the People’s Republic of China (“China”) could access data about TikTok users, and that TikTok exposes minors to harmful online content." The company claims Montana's bill "cites nothing to support these allegations" and "ignores the reality" that TikTok "has not shared, and would not share" US user data with the CCP.

The company also said that it "has taken substantial measures to protect the privacy and security of TikTok users, including by storing all U.S. user data by default in the United States and by erecting safeguards to protect U.S. user data. TikTok has also implemented safeguards to foster a safe environment for all users, including teens."

Several Montana TikTok users have filed a lawsuit in federal court seeking to block the ban.

Samantha Alario, Heather DiRocco, Carly Ann Goddard, Alice Held, and Dale Stout argue in their lawsuit that the ban violates their constitutional right to free speech, even if the speech is considered dangerous. They also dispute Montana’s national security justification for the ban. -Epoch Times

"Montana has no authority to enact laws advancing what it believes should be the United States’ foreign policy or its national security interests," reads their lawsuit, "nor may Montana ban an entire forum for communication based on its perceptions that some speech shared through that forum, though protected by the First Amendment, is dangerous."

The plaintiffs argue that it would be just as inappropriate to "ban the Wall Street Journal because of who owns it or the ideas it publishes."

https://www.zerohedge.com/political/tiktok-sues-montana-over-ban

Corporate Media Is Hiding The Real Reason Disney Canceled Its New Florida Investment

Disney scrapped its plan to build a new office complex in Florida that would have cost the company nearly $1 billion. While the move is likely part of an overall cost-cutting plan, the corporate media framed the story as a virtuous rebuke of Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis’ policies.

In The New York Times’ coverage, reporter Brooks Barnes lamented the 2,000 jobs that the Lake Nona region of Florida was set to lose due to Disney’s decision. The project would have re-located mostly high-paid Disney employees from the current California office to a new campus 20 miles from Disney World.

However, Barnes spent the bulk of the article framing the move around Disney’s, as well as the Democrats’ preferred narrative. He blamed the move on DeSantis’ “scorched-earth attempt” to reign in Disney’s foray into left-wing gender politics. He discussed a memo, viewed by the Times, that blamed the “changing business conditions” in Florida for forcing Disney to reconsider further investment in the state.

The memo did not mention DeSantis by name, but it didn’t have to. There was no need for Disney CEO (and prominent Biden supporter) Bob Iger to get his hands dirty and spark another public sparring match with DeSantis. Disney executives let the media do the dirty work for them. Two anonymous sources confirmed to the Times that Disney’s “battle with the governor and his allies in the Florida Legislature figured prominently into Disney’s decision to cancel the Lake Nona project.” That is all the corporate press needed to justify sparking the latest anti-DeSantis narrative.

The narrative is compellingly comprehensive – it hits DeSantis from both the right and left.

On the one hand, it provides another rung in the left-wing narrative that DeSantis is vehemently anti-gay. DeSantis’ “battle” with Disney is fostered purely out of hate for LGBTQ people, while one virtuous company had the will and the power to stand up for what’s right. (RELATED: Did Disney Just Troll The Royal Family?)

This pitch is laughably absurd to anyone not already steeped in the corporate media ecosystem, but it would be wrong to think it’s meant to change any minds. Rather, it serves to sow an intense hatred of DeSantis similar to how the left hates Trump. It will ensure that Democratic turnout is just as galvanized against DeSantis as it would be against Trump, if and when DeSantis faces off against Biden in a general election.

On the other hand, it hit DeSantis from the right by branding him “anti-business.” This conforms to the desired narrative of establishment Republicans who think that unfettered markets are the ultimate good of society. The government has no right to tell corporations what to do, even if those corporations are openly partisan and use their market power to enact policies that harm children. This is the conciliatory, business-friendly view that led to Republican defeats in 2008 and 2012, but again, it would be wrong to think the narrative is meant to scare off any in the conservative base.

https://dailycaller.com/2023/05/23/corporate-media-hiding-real-reason-disney-canceled-new-florida-investment-desantis/

Kentucky Rep: FBI “Don’t Respect Anyone In Congress”

“I think the American people’s patience is running out on this cover-up.”

Kentucky Republican Representative James Comer charged Monday that the FBI’s refusal to turn over documents relating to Joe Biden’s alleged illegal dealings with a foreign national betrays the fact that the Bureau has no respect for anyone in Congress.

Comer, chairman of the House Oversight Committee, made the comments during an appearance on Jesse Watters’ show, noting that lawmakers may have to “hold [the FBI’s] budget hostage until they get new leadership at the FBI or they produce the documents that we want.”

“The FBI refused to turn over the form 1023. We had another meeting where they were very patronizing. I’ve asked for a phone call with Director Wray. We expect to get this document,” Comer urged.

He continued, “Speaker McCarthy had a phone call with Director Wray. He demanded that they turn over this document. This is a very crucial piece of our investigation. And the reason that I think it’s very credible is this claim was made years before anyone knew about these different shell companies. And knew exactly what the Biden family did in countries like Romania and China to get money.”

“What we’re going to have to do in this House is demand that the Senators get our backs, like they are doing as we speak with these debt ceiling negotiations,” Comer asserted, adding “it’s not just this form 1023. We also want to know what classified documents Joe Biden had in his possession because that’s an important part of our investigation.”

Comer further noted that Republicans may attempt to entice the apparent whistleblower within the FBI to go public.

He said “we need to take extreme measures on trying to get this whistleblower to come forward publicly and say what exactly is in this document. Remember this form 1023 is not classified. It’s not a classified document. So this is something that shouldn’t be that hard for the chairman of the house oversight committee to obtain.”

Watters noted “I think the American people’s patience is running out on this cover-up,” adding “we’re getting to the point where I think we need to do a little bit more than demand a phone call with the FBI director.”

https://summit.news/2023/05/23/kentucky-rep-fbi-dont-respect-anyone-in-congress/

Trump’s Lawyers Request Meeting with AG Garland Over Unfair Treatment by Special Counsel

President Trump’s lawyers requested a meeting with US Attorney General Merrick Garland over unfair treatment by Special Counsel Jack Smith.

In a letter sent to Garland, Trump’s lawyers said unlike Joe Biden and his son Hunter, President Trump is “being treated unfairly.”

“We represent Donald J. Trump, the 45′ President of the United States, in the investigation currently being conducted by the Special Counsel’s Office. Unlike President Biden, his son Hunter, and the Biden family, President Trump is being treated unfairly,” the letter states, according to Fox News. No President of the United States has ever, in the history of our country, been baselessly investigated in such an outrageous and unlawful fashion. We request a meeting at your earliest convenience to discuss the ongoing injustice that is being perpetrated by your Special Counsel and his prosecutors.”

Merrick Garland announced he appointed Special Counsel Jack Smith to investigate whether Trump committed crimes shortly after Trump announced his 2024 presidential bid in November.

Jack Smith’s team has been selectively leaking information about the investigations into Trump in an effort to derail his 2024 White House run.

Meanwhile there are zero leaks about the special prosecutor’s investigation into Joe Biden’s stolen classified documents.

Jack Smith is also on a fishing expedition after Robert Mueller (Andrew Weissmann) failed to ‘get Trump’ after a years-long investigation.

Special Counsel Jack Smith’s team of prosecutors subpoenaed records on Trump’s foreign business deals since 2017, according to a leak to the New York Times.

The subpoenas sought information on the Trump Organization’s real estate licensing deals in China, Turkey, France, Saudi Arabia and other foreign countries, according to the NY Times.

According to The Times, Jack Smith subpoenaed the Trump Org’s real estate licensing records to determine whether there is a connection between Trump’s overseas business deals and the presidential records he stored at Mar-a-Lago.

Biden’s Justice Department has nothing on Trump so they are going to try to get him on ‘obstruction’ charges.

Jack Smith is also investigating Trump’s effort to raise money off of ‘false claims of election fraud,’ according to a leak to the Washington Post.

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2023/05/new-trumps-lawyers-request-meeting-ag-garland-unfair/