X owner Elon Musk slammed the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office’s highly controversial case against former President Donald Trump this week after the jury returned a guilty verdict. The verdict was the culmination of a weeks-long courtroom battle in which Trump said that he was the target of a “political persecution” as he runs another campaign for a second term in the White House. The former president was found guilty on all 34 charges brought in the hush-money trial. “Great damage was done today to the public’s faith in the American legal system,” Musk posted on X. “If a former President can be criminally convicted over such a trivial matter – motivated by politics, rather than justice – then anyone is at risk of a similar fate.” Musk later responded to author J.K. Rowling on the site after she said that she struggled to “see why it’s a trivial matter if a billionaire falsifies their business records, though, whatever the context.” “In a vacuum, that would be accurate and it would also not matter whe[ther] someone were a ‘billionaire’ or not (there is an implied pejorative in that word),” he said. “However, as I’m sure you’ve observed, judicial resources are limited, often leaving serious crimes, where victims were directly harmed, unprosecuted.” “Yet there is no actual victim in this crime! It is obviously politically motivated, with the goal of undermining democracy by preventing half of America from voting for their preferred candidate,” he continued. “I have never provided financial support, nor have I voted, for Trump. My views on this matter would be the same for any candidate.” He then posted a screenshot of a news report that showed that the prosecuting attorney, Alvin Bragg, who is backed by Democrat megadonor George Soros, downgraded 60% of felony cases in his district last year. “Many of these were violent crimes with victims who will never fully recover,” he wrote. CLICK HERE TO GET THE DAILYWIRE+ APP Many of these were violent crimes with victims who will never fully recover pic.twitter.com/owLLgQGYDE — Elon Musk (@elonmusk) May 31, 2024 CNN’s top legal expert, Elie Honig, a former federal and state prosecutor, slammed the case in a piece on Friday, saying that just because a guilty verdict was returned does not mean justice was administered. “Both of these things can be true at once: The jury did its job, and this case was an ill-conceived, unjustified mess,” he said. “Sure, victory is the great deodorant, but a guilty verdict doesn’t make it all pure and right. Plenty of prosecutors have won plenty of convictions in cases that shouldn’t have been brought in the first place. ‘But they won’ is no defense to a strained, convoluted reach unless the goal is to ‘win,’ now, by any means necessary and worry about the credibility of the case and the fallout later.” In his lengthy piece, Honig noted that the judge in the case broke the law by having donated to a pro-Biden and overtly anti-Trump political operation, the district attorney who brought the case campaigned on getting Trump, the case pushed the outer limits of the law and due process, and numerous aspects of the case were crafted in a special manner just to get Trump. “The charges against Trump are obscure, and nearly entirely unprecedented,” he said. “In fact, no state prosecutor — in New York, or Wyoming, or anywhere — has ever charged federal election laws as a direct or predicate state crime, against anyone, for anything. None. Ever. Even putting aside the specifics of election law, the Manhattan DA itself almost never brings any case in which falsification of business records is the only charge.”

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Discussing the Trump verdict in the second hour of Friday’s CBS Mornings, chief political analyst John Dickerson and CBS Saturday Morning co-host Michelle Miller acted as the unofficial Democratic response to Senator Tom Cotton’s (R-AR) interview from earlier as the partisan journalist (Dickerson) and wife of a far-left activist (Miller) smeared Trump voters as possessed with “cultish behavior” and “dangerous” views supporting a man who will “undermine” the country. Featured co-host Vladimir Duthiers kicked it off with an attempted historical comparison suggesting Republicans are too extreme compared to the 1970s when a chorus of congressional Republicans forced then-President Richard Nixon out.     Dickerson huffed that “politics has changed so much, since” then, chiefly Republicans not respecting democracy because “we saw a test to the electoral system after 2020 when the loser of that race lied, and then some amount of the party rallied behind him” with “an attack on the Capitol” and have still refused to respect “norms.” He then trashed Cotton for denouncing the partisan leanings of Judge Juan Merchan and Manhattan D.A. Alvin Bragg as “very dangerous,” because Cotton and others were “now running down the legal system for the purpose as a way to protect the president.” He predicted such criticism could cause another January 6 and further “undermine” our “system” of governance. Miller then offered her mini-tirade, complaining Trump “has such a strong base, such a supportive community behind him” and that Trump voters — tens of millions of them in size — have an “absolute inability to see him in the ‘do no wrong’ category” and refuse “to say that he has committed any crimes, that he has done anything wrong, he’s a really nice guy.” The wife of former New Orleans Mayor and current National Urban League President Marc Morial (D), Miller showed her partisan colors: “I’m curious, where — where does that — that almost cultish behavior come from?” Dickerson did nothing to push back. He first explained Trump voters back him because “they see him fighting for them” so “intensely and personally” that they see “an attack on the candidate” as “an attack on [them].” With that set, Dickerson added Republicans have a deep-seated problem that dwarfs any problem in the Democratic Party with seeing their political adversaries as “not just wrong, but evil.” The segment closed with Dickerson somewhat gingerly arguing Trump’s lack of character was disqualifying (click “expand”): DICKERSON: This is the most important question coming out of this entire trial is to remember what we’re talking about here in a presidential election. It’s a job interview for a very serious job and even if you believe he was wronged in court, that doesn’t mean he’s right for the presidency. And one of the things that this trial does, like all these legal proceedings, is they are a window into the character of Donald Trump, because people are under oath talking about his character, does he tell the truth? Does he honor his commitments? Is he fair in his dealings? They have to talk about this under oath and facts matter. And so, what does this window into his character show you from this case and from all of these other legal proceedings? And why does character matter in the presidency? Because it’s a job of enormous power, enormous responsibilities, and temptations and if you don’t have character, you succumb to all of that. And why does that matter? Because when you succumb, the stakes are high — in a pandemic, in a national security crisis, and the rest of the country pays the price. So, character is key to the job and this is a window into Donald Trump’s character and the jury decided that he lied, that he did not honor his commitments. Now that may, you may decide as a legal matter is not reason to convict him, but it’s not a reason to elect him to be president of the United States. MILLER: John Dickerson, facts matter. DOKOUPIL: Yeah. That’s good. DUTHIERS: Wow. Brilliant analysis, as always, John. Curiously, Dickerson closed out the show (instead of the usual week-in-review video mashup) and it almost served as a mea culpa by conceding Americans, in fact, think about more than this trial.     Dickerson first had to do some throat-clearing and a more muted denunciation of the people he finds so odious before pivoting to a glance into reality and wondering, “If we spent the energy we’re going to spend talking about this case on economic opportunity in America?” Thankfully, Duthiers had the right response (click “expand”): DICKERSON: The second thing I would say is imagine if we spent the energy we’re going to spend talking about this case on economic opportunity in America. That’s what campaigns are supposed to be about, which is a full, national fight over whether people have a chance in this country, what they need from their government to help them — help lift them. What happened to the American Dream? What is America’s role in the world? Now, this sounds — like like stupid sort of goody-two-shoes stuff, but this is vital because people’s lives are at stake here and the country needs this conversation to take place so that it can put its future in the hands of the right person and the right administration and so, don’t let the election be stolen by these moments as serious as they are and as vital to the character of the people who want the job, don’t let them get hijacked for its entirety for this campaign. DUTHIERS: Because at the end of the day, people will still need to put food on the table, people still need to pay for groceries, put gas in their car — MILLER: Yeah. DUTHIERS: — and pay for education and healthcare, and those are difficult questions to answer. Having, less than an hour earlier, called Americans she personally disagrees with “cultish” in the brain, Miller insisted “people still need to look at their neighbor and still like them or at least deal with them.” Consider taking your own advice. Since he actually talked to Americans of all stripes during his man-on-the-street reports, Dokoupil closed with the right frame of mind: “And live with one another. We have to live with one another. We can’t expel anyone at this point and the — the bottom line is, it is a test for our country. If we pass, we hope we end up stronger.” To see the relevant CBS transcript from May 31, click here.

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled Friday that a free speech lawsuit from the National Rifle Association against a New York state official could move forward. The ruling was written by Justice Sonia Sotomayor, one of the liberal justices of the highest court in the land. 'Government officials have no business using their regulatory authority to blacklist disfavored political groups.'Sotomayor wrote that a New York state official had overstepped her bounds when she used the power of her office to try to dissuade companies against doing business with the NRA after the horrendous Parkland school shooting in 2018. The NRA lawsuit accused Maria T. Vullo, the former superintendent of the New York Department of Financial Services, of infringing on the group's constitutional right of free speech. Under Vullo's leadership, the department had issued two memos, one to financial companies and another to insurance companies, recommending that they "review" their business relationships with the NRA. Sotomayor wrote that government officials were “free to criticize the N.R.A. and pursue the conceded violations of New York insurance law,” but that they could not constitutionally wield state power to “threaten enforcement actions” against companies they regulated in order to “punish or suppress the N.R.A.’s gun-promotion advocacy.”She cited precedent, saying, “Government officials cannot attempt to coerce private parties in order to punish or suppress views that the government disfavors." Initially, a district court ruled on the side of the NRA, but that was reversed by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, which sided with Vullo. The Supreme Court overturned that ruling. The ACLU, which represented the NRA, praised the decision. “Today’s decision confirms that government officials have no business using their regulatory authority to blacklist disfavored political groups,” said David Cole, the group's national legal director. "We represented the NRA before the Supreme Court, arguing that any government attempt to blacklist an advocacy group because of its viewpoint violates the First Amendment — and the highest court in our nation agreed," read a statement from the NRA on social media. The NRA posted an image of all the headlines hailing the decision on social media. "Today, in a stinging rebuke of New York’s 'blacklisting campaign' against the NRA, the Supreme Court unanimously ruled for the NRA in its case against former New York State Department of Financial Services Superintendent Maria T. Vullo," it wrote. Vullo's attorney Neal Katyal only repeated the claim, now refuted by the Supreme Court. “Ms. Vullo did not violate anyone’s First Amendment rights,” he said. The news of the ruling on Thursday had been overshadowed by the guilty verdict handed down by a Manhattan jury against former President Donald Trump. Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

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In the aftermath of former President Donald Trump's conviction on felony charges, one member of his own party is suggesting another Republican candidate in his place would have an easier chance of defeating President Joe Biden in November.