In the weeks after the insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, the Department of Justice came up with a plan to cast a wide net in its investigation. This would have involved investigating organizers and others who contributed to the event, according to the New York Times, but the FBI wouldn’t go for it. Why? It would be wrong to arrest people for joining groups or attending rallies or funding trips to attend rallies, but is it against the First Amendment to investigate people? Long-Suffering Federal Judge Amy Berman Jackson released an alleged rioter and had some words in court for him about his behavior once he’s no longer in detention and his religious beliefs. And was it a bad idea for someone arrested to text the group chat about his intentions to destroy his phone? Yikes.

Plus: hearings for President Biden’s first judicial nominees begin, with one name widely believed to be his pick for the next Supreme Court vacancy; Matt Gaetz, public corruption, and medical marijuana; and more demands for now-citizen Donald Trump to testify as part of lawsuits.

We got a remarkably rapid guilty verdict in the trial of former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chuavin this Tuesday, convicted of counts including second degree unintentional murder. Josh Barro and Ken White talk about the verdict plus comments from President Biden and Congresswoman Maxine Waters and if they’ll jeopardize the verdict.

Plus: the first plea deal of the insurrection, Roger Stone’s tax troubles and more.

Josh Barro and Ken White discuss the different way Rudy Giuliani is responding to Dominion Voting Systems’ defamation lawsuit against him. Why might he have taken a different approach from Sidney Powell? Plus: former Rep. Katie Hill sued the Daily Mail under California’s revenge porn statute, and this week a judge threw out the suit and the decision was on an anti-SLAPP motion, so Hill may have to pay for the paper’s legal defense. The Daily Mail had published compromising photos of Hill, which her ex-husband leaked, and the judge said the photos were a “matter of public concern.” Is this a sweeping decision? Hunter Biden’s under investigation and promoting his new book, which Ken thinks is a bad idea, but it turns out his book is pretty boring. Does that make this more okay? (Ken says: No, not really.)

Plus: investigating the Weisselbergs and more legal developments for the people arrested in connection with the U.S. Capitol riot.

Josh Barro and Ken White discuss reports of a federal investigation into Congressman Matt Gaetz. What are the legal issues here? Was it smart for Gaetz to give a prime time interview about it on television? And why was this news apparently leaked? Plus: the Trump campaign set some donors up for recurring donations in a way that was dense and confusing. Is that fraud, and could some donors have a good case to sue the campaign?

Recently, the DC Circuit Court of Appeals set a standard for pretrial detention for those arrested in connection with the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. How’s that working out? Due to a filing error, we know prosecutors might be close to a plea deal with at least one person. Was that accidental filing a major blunder?

For the past three years, All The Presidents’ Lawyers has focused a lot on defamation cases, and there’s an obvious reason for that: former President Trump has been (and still is) the target of defamation cases and he has also invoked or actually used defamation suits as strategy for years.

Remember when Stormy Daniels sued former President Trump, saying he defamed her by calling her accusation that she threatened in a Las Vegas parking lot not to talk about her affair with him a “con job”? Her argument did not hold up in court. Trump’s statement was protected opinion and not a provable statement of fact, and Daniels was ordered to pay his legal fees.

Defamation lawsuits are difficult to win by design: balancing free speech and the need for remedies for damaged reputations is a challenge. But as the years went on, stakes in defamation suits got a lot higher than they were with the “con job” tweet.

Dominion Voting Systems has filed many lawsuits against parties, including Fox News, seeking billions of dollars in damages. They say these media companies and individuals aired wild claims about the voting machine company and these allegations seriously damaged its business interests. But even its defamation suits aren’t a slam dunk.

Special guest RonNell Andersen Jones, an expert in First Amendment, media and defamation law talks with Josh Barro (Ken White is taking this week off the show) about the history of defamation law in the United States, current challenges and scholarship, if defamation suits are just the cost of doing business for media organizations, and more.

Michael Sherwin, who was the acting U.S. attorney in Washington overseeing the prosecution of Capitol rioters, gave a revealing interview to 60 Minutes this week. Its ripple effects in courtrooms and at the Department of Justice were almost immediate. Josh Barro and Ken White talk about that interview and what Sherwin said about the possibility of sedition charges for the rioters and other criminal charges for former President Trump. Plus: Sidney Powell’s lawyers file an interesting motion in response to Dominion Voting Systems’ defamation case against her. It’s not a good look. Plus: how the Biden administration is changing tack on a number of cases before the Supreme Court, Roger Stone, and more.

Government officials believe about 800 rioters entered the building on January 6. About 300 people have been charged and the government expects to charge at least 100 more, according to a recent filing. Is that...good enough? Is that enough for deterrence? Ken White and Josh Barro talk about that, the timeline of evidence collection and charges, and the effort to bring a conspiracy case against the Oathkeepers. Plus: Ken and Josh discuss Jane Mayer’s profile of Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance in The New Yorker and the investigation timeline might match up with his remaining time in office, and more.

Josh Barro and Ken White talk about former President Trump’s efforts to keep Republican groups from using his image to fundraise. Were his cease-and-desist letters performative, or does he actually have a legal argument that his name and image can’t be invoked by party organizations? Plus: Congressman Swalwell sues the president and his associates, a judge in New York threw out a lawsuit from Trump against the New York Times, Fulton County brings in a state RICO expert, a former SDNY prosecutor is looking into Governor Cuomo, and the Capitol rioters are still unhappy with their interactions with the justice system.

Former President Trump spoke at CPAC this past weekend, and it got some people talking (apparently, some of Trump’s advisers included): if he were to run for office again, would it help him with some of his legal issues? Would it make prosecutors more reluctant to sue him? Plus: Fulton County DA will appear in front of a grand jury this week, Michael Cohen’s selling prison jumpsuits as podcast merch, why a Trump appointee is suing the Biden administration, a fancy way of charging someone for f***ing shit up, and more.

The Supreme Court finally declined to block the Manhattan District Attorney’s subpoena for financial records related to Donald Trump and the Trump Organization from his accountants at Mazars LLP. This subpoena is commonly described in the press as giving the DA access to former President Trump’s tax returns, but that shorthand is a little bit misleading. Josh Barro and Ken White what it means, what it means that another prosecutor has been working on the investigation, and what they might be looking into. Also on the show: Dominion Voting Systems sues MyPillow and Mike Lindell, Avenatti and Cohen trade letters and more.