December 17, 2024: TikTok Files EMERGENCY Request with Supreme Court, Judge REJECTS Trump's Claim for Immunity, Trump SUES Des Moines Polling Firm, Additional Drone THEORIES, and More.
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Welcome back to Unbiased, your favorite source of unbiased news and legal analysis. Welcome back to Unbiased. Today is Tuesday, December 17th, and this is your daily news rundown. After today, we only have two more episodes left in Season 2 of Unbiased, so let's make the most of it. If you haven't yet listened to yesterday's episode and you're not caught up to speed, Season 3 of Unbiased will start Monday, January 6th.

So just make a mental note that there will be no episodes between this Friday and when season three starts back up in January. And now, without further ado, let's get into today's stories. Less than a week after a federal appeals court rejected TikTok and ByteDance's request to pause the enforcement of the TikTok ban, they are now asking the Supreme Court to get involved, something that we all knew was going to happen, but let's talk about it.

As a quick note, throughout this story, you will hear me refer to TikTok as the plaintiff, but just know that TikTok and its parent company, ByteDance, are suing the federal government. I'm just going to refer to both entities as TikTok for the sake of ease.

Now, here's the thing. There are two things that can happen at the Supreme Court, and TikTok will shoot for both. The first TikTok did yesterday, which is ask the Supreme Court to put the appellate court's ruling on hold temporarily while it files its petition for review with the Supreme Court. The second thing is petition the Supreme Court for review. In other words, ask the Supreme Court to take up the case and issue its own decision on the merits.

The first comes first, the second comes second. So TikTok has not yet filed its petition for review. It has only filed that emergency request to block the lower court's ruling. In asking the justices to block the lower court's ruling, TikTok has to prove to the court three things. One, that TikTok is likely to prevail on the merits of the case when and if the Supreme Court hears arguments.

Two, that if the lower court's ruling is not blocked, TikTok will suffer irreparable injury. And three, that the public interest supports blocking the lower court's ruling. If the Supreme Court agrees that TikTok is right on all three counts, they have to temporarily block the lower court's ruling, which in effect puts it on pause until the Supreme Court decides whether or not they are going to take the case.

And TikTok has asked the justices to decide whether they're going to pause the lower court's ruling by January 6th. Remember, the ban goes into effect January 19th. So now that TikTok has asked the Supreme Court to temporarily pause the appellate court's ruling, the Supreme Court can either A, deny TikTok's request and not take any further action until TikTok actually files that petition for review, and B,

B, deny TikTok's request but agree to hear the case and, you know, get it on the calendar for arguments sometime in the next few weeks. C, grant TikTok's request, pause the lower court's ruling, agree to hear the case and get it scheduled for arguments sometime within the next few weeks to the next few months. Or D, grant TikTok's request, wait for TikTok to file a timely petition for review, and

then agree to hear the case and set up for arguments. So there are a few different avenues, you know, that can happen here. If the justices deny TikTok's request for an injunction and refuse to hear the case, it's done. The appellate court's ruling stands the TikTok ban will take effect January 19th.

If the justices ultimately agree to hear the case and set it for arguments, we'll likely see a slight delay as it pertains to the effective date of the ban, just because there may not be enough time between now and January 19th, especially given the holidays for the parties to submit their briefs, justices to hear arguments and then, you know, subsequently write up a decision and release it. So I will, of course, keep you updated as we learn more about what the Supreme Court plans to do with this.

but that is what we have as of now. Now let's talk about Trump's claim for presidential immunity. Judge Mershon, the judge overseeing Trump's falsification of business records case, will not throw out Trump's conviction due to presidential immunity. So as we know, the Supreme Court ruled earlier this year that presidents enjoy some immunity from criminal prosecution. Specifically, the

They enjoy absolute immunity from prosecution stemming from their core constitutional powers. They enjoy presumptive immunity from prosecution stemming from official acts. And they have no immunity for unofficial acts. But the Supreme Court, in issuing that decision, they took it one step further. And they also said that if a president is put on trial for acts which he has no immunity for...

The jury cannot consider evidence related to a president's official acts. The court said allowing evidence of official acts would, quote, "...permit a prosecutor to do indirectly what he cannot do directly, invite the jury to examine acts for which a president is immune from prosecution to nonetheless prove his liability on any charge."

End quote. So keep in mind the basis of Trump's conviction here that Trump, while in office, wrote checks to his former attorney, Michael Cohen, to reimburse him for a payment he made to Stormy Daniels so she wouldn't come forward with a story about an affair she had with Trump years earlier. Those checks were then recorded on the books as a legal retainer. That is where the falsification of business records comes in. It wasn't the paychecks.

that were illegal. It was how they were recorded. So once the Supreme Court's ruling came out, Trump's attorneys tried to get his conviction tossed based on the fact that during trial, prosecutors relied on, as evidence, official acts Trump took as president. And this, they said, is not allowed per the Supreme Court's ruling. Trump's attorneys cited to certain pieces of evidence that, you know, the jury didn't

such as Trump's presidential financial disclosure form, testimony from White House aides, social media posts that Trump made while he was in office, things like that. But last night, Judge Mershon ruled that the evidence received by the jurors was related entirely to unofficial conduct and therefore receives no immunity protections and even any

If some of the evidence was related to official conduct, Marchand says using those acts as evidence of the quote decidedly personal acts of falsifying business records poses no danger of intrusion on the authority and function of the executive branch.

Furthermore, Merchan said that even if prosecutors erroneously introduced evidence that could be challenged under an immunity claim, such an error was harmless in light of the overwhelming evidence of guilt. Now, as for Trump's team, they have since said that this ruling is a quote-unquote direct violation of the Supreme Court's decision on immunity, so it is likely that they will appeal this matter, and of course, as always,

You already know, I will keep you posted on where this goes. In some more Trump news, he has filed a new lawsuit against the Des Moines Register polling firm, its parent company and pollster, J. Ann Selzer, accusing them all of consumer fraud and election interference for publishing a poll three days before the election that showed Harris up by three points in the state. This is despite Trump ultimately winning the state by more than 13 points.

Trump's lawyers say the difference between his win and the poll results constitutes election interfering fiction. So this lawsuit alleges a violation of the Iowa Consumer Fraud Act, which prohibits deceptive advertising. And the lawsuit says that this poll deceived Iowan voters.

The suit further alleges that the polling miss was not a coincidence, but rather intentional. Now, the reality is that under consumer fraud laws, the person or entity being accused of fraud has to know or reasonably know that what they're doing constitutes fraud.

In this case, if the polling entity, the newspaper, and the pollster can show that they relied on real data and numbers in coming to their conclusion, there is no merit to Trump's claims. If they can't back up their numbers with data, that is where they may find themselves in trouble.

The newspaper said, quote,

end quote. Let's take our break here. When we come back, we'll talk about what we've learned about the Wisconsin school shooter, more updates and theories as to what's going on with the drones, and we'll finish with some quick hitters.

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So every year I host this annual Christmas dinner for my entire family. I make filet mignon, mac and cheese, mashed potatoes. You can never have enough carbs, you know, the works. But here's the thing. As much as I love hosting and getting everyone together and making the actual dinner, it's almost like I just completely neglect my own needs for that entire week. And I find myself ordering in for almost every meal. I don't know what it is. Maybe it's the prep, maybe the anticipation. I don't know. But I have made an active effort to change that this year with HelloFresh. So I'm going to show you how I do that.

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Okay, let's talk about what we have learned about the school shooting in Wisconsin since I initially covered this story yesterday. We now know that the shooter was 15-year-old Natalie Rubnow, though she went by Samantha, not Natalie. She was a student at the University of Wisconsin.

She had gone to school that morning and around 10.55 a.m. while inside of a classroom in a study hall of students from mixed grades, she opened fire. The call was made to the police at 10.57 a.m. by a second grade student and the first officer arrived three minutes later. By 11.05, officers said the shooter was down, the gun had been recovered. Though it is important to note the shooter died from an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound, not by the police.

We know that two people have died, a teacher and a student, and that two others are in critical condition. So what was the motive? Well, I will tell you what's been confirmed and what hasn't been confirmed.

An officer has said that information has been gathered by investigators that suggests the shooter had been dealing with problems and expressed some of those problems in writing, which is now being reviewed. Police also said that the motive appears to be a combination of factors, but did not give details as to what those factors might be.

What hasn't been confirmed is an alleged manifesto that was posted to her ex-account the morning of the shooting. She posted a picture from a bathroom stall holding up a hand gesture as well as a link to a Google Doc. However, anyone who's ever shared a Google Doc knows that you have to go in and manually change the privacy settings of the document to make it available to anyone who has access to the link. Without making that change, no one can access the document besides yourself.

So this girl did not make that change. So while the link was public, no one could actually see the document. With that said, she also allegedly sent the document to her boyfriend who was able to access it and has since handed it over to authorities. It's alleged, and when I say alleged, I mean that, but it is alleged that she wrote about her deep hatred for men, no matter their age, and her own strong dislike for her father. She said,

She also allegedly contemplated committing suicide on many occasions, but felt doing it in the way she did it yesterday rather than just killing herself would be better because it would cause mass pain. Again, I stress that all of this is alleged. It was supposedly written in that manifesto, but again, that manifesto has not been confirmed. So one day when and if the manifesto is released, we will talk about this more.

Now let's talk some more about these drones. Last night, I went on a deep dive into the various theories. So let's talk about them. One of the biggest theories right now is that these drones are government drones. Why? One, because if these drones were foreign drones, they would be shot down. There's really no question about that. And two, because this type of effort is too large and too expensive for an average hobbyist civilian.

We have heard from contractors who have worked with the government in the past that this is likely a government effort. The government has not outright denied that it's them, and that's where all signs are pointing. Now, if the government comes out today and says this is not us,

Okay, maybe, but they haven't done that yet. In fact, they issued a joint statement last night, the DHS, FBI, FAA, and DOJ, simply saying that they're investigating the thousands of reports of these drones, but they haven't said it's not them, despite many, many people theorizing that it is. So let's get into it.

If this is the federal government, the question becomes why? Why is the government operating these drones? Here are two of the big theories. One, because some war weapon has been lost somewhere in the tri-state area and these drones are trying to find it. We have a couple of wars going on and the United States is supplying weapons and equipment.

And two, the other theory is that this is actually part of the Advanced Air Mobility Mission, which was an agreement between various federal agencies signed last December. Now, you may hear these theories and think, oh, uh-oh, this podcast is all of a sudden a conspiracy theory podcast. That's not the case. What this podcast is and has always been is an unbiased source of news that encourages you to think critically and differently. What this podcast has never been and will never be is the mainstream media, and I think we're all thankful for that. So,

I don't want to just tell you what the mainstream media is saying about the drones. I want to cover all the bases. Let's go a little bit deeper into each theory, starting with the first one, the lost war weapon. There is a viral video going around on TikTok, and I'll link it in the sources section of this episode so you can watch it for yourself. But essentially, a well-known celebrity is saying that she knows a guy whose father used to work for the Pentagon and NASA and worked with the government on various top secret projects.

The father has apparently been reaching out to people in his life and telling them basically that he would never forgive himself if he didn't tell people the truth behind the drones and that these drones are government drones and could possibly be searching for a lost war weapon. To back this up, he says that the areas that coincide with where the drones have been seen have spiked in radiation and that the reason the government isn't telling us, isn't telling the public, is because they don't want to cause war.

worldwide chaos and make the United States look disorganized and weak. Now, the counter argument there is that the United States has the capability to monitor radioactivity through satellites. So the drones aren't absolutely necessary. Unless, of course, drones are better at picking up radiation than satellites.

Now, the second theory is this. Last December, the U.S. Transportation Command, the Air Mobility Command, the Atlantic County Economic Alliance, and the National Aerospace Research and Technology Park announced the establishment of a testing corridor for unmanned aerial systems, or drones. And that corridor runs between Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst in central Jersey and Dover Air Force Base in Delaware.

This testing corridor is exactly what it sounds like. It's an authorized path for the government to test drone technologies. These testing corridors are not new, by the way. Governor Hochul of New York announced a 50-mile drone corridor in 2018. NASA more recently announced a drone corridor in Virginia. But it begs the question, why not just say that's what it is? That's a seemingly innocent project. And that's what has a lot of people so confused. So these are just some of the theories that are floating around, but...

But of course, I will keep you updated as more develops. And if you're wanting to know more about these drones, I did discuss it in last Thursday's episode in the Rumor Has It segment and then a bit in Monday's episode as well.

Let's now finish with some quick hitters. Donald Trump met with TikTok's CEO, Shou Chu, yesterday at Mar-a-Lago. The meeting obviously comes as TikTok is at risk of being banned here in the United States, as we discussed, so I'm sure that was part of their discussions. When Trump was asked yesterday whether he would seek to prevent the ban from taking effect, he said that he would take a look and that TikTok has a special place in his heart.

Now, as we've discussed, there is only so much Trump can do as president when it comes to the ban. A president cannot unilaterally repeal a law or overturn a court's decision. What he could do is he could try to convince lawmakers to pass another law, either repealing or modifying the ban. But that wouldn't necessarily be easy considering the ban had bipartisan support in the first place.

Another option is if the ban takes effect, he could theoretically direct his DOJ to not enforce the ban against app stores in the United States, which means app stores could still offer the app, but that also comes with its own risks. So I'll dive more into the potential options that Trump has to try to save TikTok once we have a better idea of what the Supreme Court is going to do with it.

Disney has agreed to settle a class action minimum wage lawsuit for $233 million. In 2018, Anaheim, California voters approved a ballot measure that required employers in Disneyland and Anaheim resort zones that had a tax rebate agreement with the city to pay a higher minimum wage. That minimum wage has gone up every year since. It's currently $19.90 an hour. Disney has agreed to settle a class action minimum wage lawsuit for $233 million.

Disneyland sued in 2018, arguing that it doesn't fall under this law because of a decades-old deal it had with the city. Disney ultimately lost that fight, which it had been fighting for the last five years. And in those five years, it hadn't increased the minimum wage in accordance with the measure.

So now that it's lost the legal battle, it has agreed to pay $233 million in back pay to the roughly 50,000 employees that should have seen wage hikes since 2018. And Senate Democrats have introduced a constitutional amendment to abolish the Electoral College. Though it won't pass, here's what you should know.

Advocates of the amendment argue that the electoral college is outdated and that a popular vote would enhance democracy. In other words, the person that gets the most votes from the people wins. End of story. But here's why constitutional amendments almost never make it into the constitution.

To pass, it requires two-thirds of both the House and the Senate, plus three-fourths of the states to ratify it. The odds of 66% of Congress and 75% of the states agreeing to this type of an amendment is almost slim to none.

And a San Francisco tech executive was found guilty of stabbing and murdering fellow tech executive and Cash App founder Bob Lee. Camera footage shows Lee and Nima Momeni leaving Lee's hotel and getting in Momeni's car. They drive out to a secluded area, get out of the car, and video shows Momeni move toward Lee and then drive away in his BMW.

Prosecutors say Momeni killed Lee over the alleged sexual assault of Momeni's sister by an acquaintance of Lee, but defense attorneys argued that Momeni acted in self-defense and didn't realize in the moment that Lee had been killed. Now that Momeni has been found guilty, his sentence will come at a later date.

The FTC finalized a rule today seeking to ban surprise junk fees for live event tickets, hotels, and vacation rentals. Notably, it's not that the fees are going away, but rather consumers can't be surprised by them at checkout. FTC chair said, quote, whatever price you see is the price that you are paying at the end. No more mystery surprise fees at the very end of the process. End quote. The rule takes effect in April 2025.

AccuWeather has released its White Christmas forecast, predicting more U.S. cities can expect a White Christmas this year than last year. To declare a White Christmas, there must be one inch of snow or more on the ground. The regions that are more likely to see a White Christmas include the Great Lakes region and the Ohio Valley.

Cities like Boston, New York City, Philadelphia, and D.C. have a low snow probability, and Midwest cities like Chicago, Minneapolis, Omaha, Denver, and Salt Lake City have a medium snow probability. And finally, New York City Mayor Eric Adams will have to face his bribery charge after a judge denied his request to dismiss it.

Adams was hit in September with a five-count federal indictment, alleging a long-running scheme with the Turkish government. The bribery charge was the most serious of the five charges, and he sought to have it dismissed. But today, the judge said that the concerns Adams has raised will ultimately be up to the jury to decide. His trial is currently scheduled to begin in April.

That is what I have for you today. Thank you so much for being here as always. Have a fantastic night and I will talk to you tomorrow for the second to last episode of season two.

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