Hi, #Squidigation fans, Brad has you covered on the latest iteration of Sidney Powell and co putting on their whiteface and red noses and hitting each other with rubber chickens for the amusement of the court.

You may have noticed the courts are not particularly amused
But Brad just gave you the toplines. This Order doesn't really hold back. courtlistener.com/recap/gov.usco…
Some highlights. First, the background: When our gal Sid filed her Wisconsin Squidlet, she simultaneously filed a motion for injunctive relief. Image
What did she want in that motion? She didn't say. It was supposed to be listed in an attached order, but, well ... there are now three certainties, apparently: death, taxes, and Sidney Powell making filing mistakes that would embarrass someone trying to litigate without a lawyer Image
But she didn't just forget to include the attached order or correct the formatting. Image
Gonna skip a paragraph of the order and get back to it in a sec. Because at 3:15 pm, Sid files a "corrected" motion acknowledging the obvious: "oops, we filed a draft"

Even this was done incompetently; it was filed as a motion to amend or correct a court order Image
I'm going to pause here to say something: None of this is normal.

Not the buffoonery, that's normal for Sid. But judges generally do NOT spend paragraphs of their orders writing about the procedural mistakes of counsel, *especially* not filing a withdrawn/corrected pleading or
identifying the wrong "filing event" in the efiling system (when you file documents in Federal Court, you pick from pre-set lists of different types of motions/filings, and whoever filed the second doc picked the wrong one)
It happens - not often, but it happens. Filing a draft ... doesn't really happen, but there's no reason a judge has to comment on it if they don't want to, and usually a judge will not want to.

Judge Pepper here wanted to.
That should tell you something about what the Judiciary thinks about this nonsense, generally. An election challenge that raised real issues wouldn't be getting the same reaction. But the courts are being drafted into a tin-foil hat attack on our country, and they are not pleased
OK, back to the order. The paragraph I skipped? Lays out the rules for what a party needs to do to file a motion for injunctive relief in Federal Court, especially without notice to the other side.

Powell managed to do exactly NONE of the required things Image
Even in her "corrected motion" Powell only certified that she *would* provide notice, not (as required) that she had already done so Image
This time, the motion included a proposed order, which included various relief - but not a hearing or an expedited briefing schedule. And, because of that "I will provide notice" language, the motion still didn't comply with the rule so the Court says "I'm not touching this yet" Image
Also, because you chucklefucks didn't actually ask for an expedited hearing or request a briefing schedule, let alone explain why one was warranted - no, just putting the words "emergency" and "expedited" in your papers isn't enough - the normal schedule applies Image
And finally, Judge Pepper closes with "if you actually want expedited briefing, call me. With opposing counsel on the line, and ask for a date where you can argue about why I should give it to you" Image
Y'all, this is a 4 page order that only has that last little paragraph on the 4th page. But it is dripping with (justified) contempt for Powell, who keeps hitting what we'd think would be professional rock bottom and then calling for jackhammers so she can keep going down
If I got an order like this issued in a case I was on I'd seriously contemplate my life choices and potentially turning in my bar card. I *definitely* would advise my client to find new counsel unhated by the judge.

Powell doesn't have the capacity for that kind of introspection
BTW, for all you disaster tourists who enjoy this for more than just "finding out what's in the papers" go read Mike's thread on this topic. Same substance, different one-liners

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More from @AkivaMCohen

4 Dec
Y'all, I've gotten the filings to date in the #Squidigation appeal in Georgia. Don't have time for a true thread today, but a couple of points of clownery are worth highlighting. You can find the full docs here dropbox.com/sh/uvkqcnvq2on…
First, you may remember that the Eleventh Circuit had some ... concerns ... about whether Team Kraken could actually appeal the Court's order, and directed all parties to address those concerns by December 3
Well, here's the docket entries for those filings. Note the problem? Image
Read 21 tweets
3 Dec
OK, #Squidigation fans, I think we need to talk about the new Wisconsin suit Donald Trump filed - personally - in Federal Court last night. The suit is (as usual) meritless. But it's meritless in new and disturbing ways. This thread will be long

Not, I hope, Seth Abramson long. But will see.

I apologize in advance to my wife, who would very much prefer I be billing time (today's a light day, though) and to my assistant, to whom I owe some administrative stuff this will likely keep me from 😃
First, some background. Trump's suit essentially tries to Federalize the Wisconsin Supreme Court complaint his campaign filed, which we discussed here.
Read 122 tweets
2 Dec
#Squidigation news: @DemocracyDocket has posted the Georgia transcript. So let's do a live read

democracydocket.com/wp-content/upl…
The first 2 pages of transcript are intros/is everyone ok on Zoom. Then we get to this ... which is not a good sign if you're the party asking for the TRO Image
Powell's response is "We'd like you to issue that first draft order that you circulated to the parties and my co-counsel posted to Twitter as though it had been issued"

I paraphrase. But not much. Image
Read 37 tweets
2 Dec
This story is a massive nothing Burger and people should be ashamed to have reported it. This isn't loans going to Trump or businesses

It's loans to businesses that happened to be located in commercial buildings owned by Trump or Kushner businesses
What was the rule supposed to be? That if you were a restaurant located at a trump property you were barred from getting a PPP loan? Is that if you were a business with offices in a Kushner property, you couldn't participate in the program?
This could have been the start of a meaningful story, with more recording. It's possible that some of those loans were pushed through despite not meeting guidelines for the program specifically because of the business addresses. But if so, that's not in this story
Read 5 tweets
2 Dec
@questauthority Going to add a point to your thread here. I'm just going to reply to this tweet rather than the quoted one with the continuation

@questauthority I've litigated this issue, including very very recently. To show good cause you basically have to show that you could not have held the hearing on the TRO within the 10 days provided despite your diligent efforts to hold it on time
@questauthority In that order, Batten is essentially announcing in advance that there are no circumstances where he will agree to extend the TRO. He has already found that their delay of the hearing is not good cause
Read 5 tweets
1 Dec
OK, #squidigation fans. This is a new Wisconsin case not filed by the Krake[n/d] team of Powell and Wood and NOT focusing on wild conspiracy theories. It's a competent and professional filing that raises things that would be real issues ... if you don't understand why they aren't
So buckle up, thread incoming
FYI, this is NOT the Wisconsin version of the squidigation, which Powell's merry band of fuckups appears to have ALSO filed today in Wisconsin, this time after running a spellcheck and investing in those new-fangled "space bars" cc @questauthority democracydocket.com/wp-content/upl…
Read 75 tweets

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