not sit well with some of the justices. i think that what the public is beginning to see is the fulfillment of trump's narrative. the democrats have done that. it's like the old joke that i'm not paranoid if people are actually out to get me. well, for a lot of folks are saying, maybe he was right. these split screens of multiple jurisdictions is driving home that message. >> martha: amazing. what fascinating times we live in, right? jonathan, thank you. kerri, thank you. ari, great to see you. continuing coverage of this. that is "the story" for now on this friday. breaking news coverage throughout the afternoon. i'll see you back here tonight on "the five." >> neil: it's a big number a staggering number. it's a record number.

we have never seen let alone a former president but anyone in a real estate industry or any industry in new york fined this much. more than $354 million now facing donald trump in a civil case that was 92 pages long and left a lot of questions as to whether it was a hit job. that is the view from trump's legal folks. we're going to start picking apart exactly what happened here. welcome, everybody. i'm neil cavuto. this is "your world." what in the world made this number so big so fast, so confusing and so polarizing? it's a sign of our times. we keep seeing it again and again. but this case has brought up rare nerves and real anger. eric shawn has the latest on what went down and what it means for the trump business empire. eric? >> neil, it's a stained rebuke of former president trump. judge engoron imposing a $364 million fine on the former

president. his sons donald jr. and eric. six million shy of what the attorney general letitia james wanted. the judge said they engaged in a year's long scheme to do banks and others with false financial statements. the former president is now barred from doing business in new york state for three years. the trump companies must be run under a monitor. that means that they would be removed or are to be removed from the control of the trump organization. engoron wrote defendants submitted blatantly false financial data. defendants factored in expert witnesses, denied reality and failed to accepted responsibility or to impose internal controls. the judge ruled that mr. trump boasted being worth billions. that was not based on fact. he said of the former president's brief testimony, overall donald trump rarely responded to the questions asked and he frequently interjected long speeches on issues far

beyond the scope of the trial. his refusal to answer the questions directly or in some cases at all compromised his credibility. the former president, for example, boasted that mar-a-largo is worth a billion or 1.5 billion. the judge said that would require it to be a private residence, which it is not. worth more than 400% more than any other residents in the country. mr. trump claimed that his penthouse apartment, the three story apartment at trump tower there is worth three times than it really is. the judge said mr. trump and his entities with $350 million in fines. sons donald jr. and eric just over $4 million each. the former president has disputed this case saying that he relied on accountants and lawyers. but they -- the judge noted that they were relying on false and fraudulent financial information that they got from the trump companies.

trump's lawyers responding saying the court ignored the law and the facts and signed off on the attorney general's unjustly political crusade about the front running candidate for president of the united states. we expect mr. trump to speak out about this in a few moments from now. it's not over though yet, neil. the defense expected to appeal. that process could take quite some time. quite a lengthy opinion from this judge who saw mr. trump personally testify. he disputed what the president said. neil? >> neil: yeah no, love lost there. thank you very much. eric shawn. we are hearing right now from trump's legal team including alina habba on truth social. this is a bit lengthy. bare with me. this verdict is a manifest in justice, plain and simple. the culmination of a multiyear polit-tilley fueled witch hunt that was designed to take down donald trump before letitia james, the new york attorney

general who ever stepped foot in attorney general's office. countless times and countless hours of testimony to prove that there was no wrong doing, no crime and no victim. given the graves stakes, we trust the appellate division will overturn this verdict. let me make one thing perfectly clear. this is not just about donald trump. if this decision stands, it will serve as a signal to every single american that new york is no longer open for business. others in the trump team have sort of echoed this sentiment that new york is very unfriendly to successful businesses. they will heed what happened to donald trump as a sign that by the grace of god, i don't want anything to do with doing business in the big apple. we have seen many leave new york as a result of high taxes and what they feel is sort of like a liberal agenda. you can play the politics back and forth until the cows come home, this is part of this poll

laterizing atmosphere that i want to go in legally first with john yoo, the former deputy assistant attorney general, the u.c. berkeley law professor, former thomas law clerk. tom dupree also with us. get his view of this. tom, end it with you. the tone and tenor is such that the trump legal team is saying this shall not stand. we're ready to appeal. do they have a case? >> yeah, neil, look. i think they'll have reasonable arguments on appeal. this is obviously a stunning verdict. it's one that the appellate judges will give close attention to. it's a verdict that got national attention. the judge gave 92 pages of find beings that the appellate judges will scrutinize carefully. so look, the trump team lost today. it's not a shock. we knew this is where the judge was going. you'll recall before the trial began. he already announced he concluded that former president trump committed fraud. today's decision wasn't a

surprise. it's obviously a huge number. it's the first battle in what i suspect will be a long war as this case works its way up there the appellate courts in new york state. >> neil: john, my first knee jerk read when this case was brought by the attorney general, was there a damaged party. a party that was screwed financially. no, no and no. i understand that is not the litmus test. if you're talking numbers like this, shouldn't it be a litmus test? >> neil, i think screwed financially should be part of every first year law student's dictionary from now on. this is what really happened here in this decision. this is really interesting. you put your thumb on it. one half of this case is did donald trump intend to defraud and lie. the judge said that even before the trial started. the second part of it, the hard part is the thing that you just

mentioned. who was harmed? how do you get a figure like $350 million when nobody said that they were harmed? that i think is a difficult question. the problem for president trump is going to be this is because of the way new york state wrote the law, this is because of the way new york's higher courts have interpreted the law. they have already allowed these kinds of lawsuits before where people didn't have to be harmed in order to show harm and damages. the problem is it was never a number this big. so i think some of the comments you read there, neil, are correct. we discussed this on your show before. if you're going to start imposing hundreds of millions of dollars of penalties and fines, other businesses will take note and see, gosh what i have said or what have i ever exaggerated, that means i could be put out of business for three years by the attorney general and the courts of new york state? >> neil: you know, guys, when i

look at the particulars of this, what stands out is not across the board but an ignorance of how businesses work and how one person or entity's valuation of a particular probability is obviously at conflict with the one who wants to low ball that property value as much as possible and settle their differences and move on. so when deutsche bank or other banks were involved and chronicling what seemed like high valuations, i did find it interesting the valuation not only of donald trump's trump tower penthouse, but even the case of mar-a-largo with the billion dollar valuation and how it exceeded the national norm, new york is a very expensive city. it's way beyond the national norm. mar-a-largo, you can argue, with that kind of valuation, there's properties around there going for obscene amounts. it is what it is.

one of the hottest real estate markets in the world. i only point that out to show did they kind of reveal maybe their ignorance about business and evaluations and how real estate entities work. in other words, for them to come up with an estimate on their valuations of someone else and do their due diligence as deutsche bank and some of these other entities did and to settle on a middle ground and business went forward and no one lost money. tom, what do you think of that? >> neil, i think you'd make a fine appellate lawyer. that is maybe the most vulnerable aspect of this opinion. the trump defense team can go to the court of appeals and say look, this trial judge fundamentally misunderstood the nature of valuation. that he thought valuations are very concise and that people that value property all will do so within a very, very narrow range. when in fact, it can be

different. you can have 2 professional evaluators looking at the same property and come to two wildly different conclusions. there's not necessarily a fraud going on. could be a different of professional opinion. that's a big theme the trump team going forward in this case as they try to get the verdict overruled. they're going to say this judge didn't understand the nature of the valuation process. he wasn't familiar with how businesses operate, with how people value property and for that reason, you can't sustain this verdverdict. >> neil: john, james office said the banks would have charged trump's businesses more add they had a more accurate accounting of his wealth and demanded that he pay the state back the difference. i'm thinking about myself in these kind of stories. when i applied for my first mortgage and follow up

mortgages, my wife and i could say all sorts of things about our financial position. but they're going to check it out. they're going to check it out merc mercilessly. when i claim my bocce ball set was worth $10 million, they could say wait a minute, cavuto. if donald trump were making egregious exaggerations, they'd capture that in a new york second. i know accountants are some of the most ruthless people on the planet. i mean that in a good way. they know how to check someone's b.s. they checked it. they did business with him. they probably renegotiated some aspects of some of these deals and merrilly wendt on. they didn't lose anything as a result. i know as you both pointed out, that is a different matter when it comes to these type of issues. on appeal, is it credible?

>> neil, you're more scrupulous about your mortgage applications than i was. >> neil: i was shocked that they said yes. that's it. that was a long time ago. >> let's not look at our credit card applications. that would be -- >> neil: there we go. >> i think you have a great point. it plays to and against run the. that's the basic question. why should this trial judge or even the appeals courts substitute their judgment for what is financially reasonable or not rather than these very sophisticated counter parties like deutsche bank and other investment banks. they're not in it to lose money. they're in it to make money. they'd be more careful with that than they would reviewing your mortgage application or my mortgage application. on the other hand, i think this hurts trump in the sense when

regular people hear about the amount, the damages, they'll be shocked. when you explain it the way you just did, neil, why can donald trump lie on his mortgage applications essentially and say that he has assets which are 400% or whatever more than their real value, why should he get away with that when if we did that on our applications, we wouldn't get a mortgage and we'll be in big trouble. >> neil: they did say no on the bocce ball thing. a different story. one of the things that letitia james brought up, she saw $215 million in penalties but ratcheted it up to $360 million. she alleged all of the ill gotten financial gains that filtered down from these financial deceptions. again and again what comes up here, guys, is -- this is coming from the judge himself. ticked off that, you know, donald trump was evasive or

argumentative. so if he had not been as argumentative, if he had not been doing these sessions with the press outside of that courtroom, is the judge intimating, is letitia james intimating that they would have gone lighter on him? that's a little weird. >> yeah. neil, that to me is one of the most interesting aspects of this opinion today. you don't have to read between the lines that closely to see the judge was expressing a lot of personal frustration and resentment of trump. from my perspective, at least i think that does make his decision more vulnerable on appeal than would otherwise have been. in order words, you have to say was this judge able to put aside the frustration that he felt. it's understandable. there's no question that the former president was a handful. but the judge has to put that aside based on the facts and the law. so you have this theme woven throughout his opinion will cause the appellate court to raise a suspicious judicial

eyebrow. >> neil: guys, help me out with the math here. you're good at that. more my turf than the legal stuff. so i'm looking at the 83.3 million judgment stemming from the defamation lawsuit regarding e jean carroll. i'm looking at the $315 million plus penalty. how much does he have to put up for both while he pursues appeals or a second chances in court? john, i'll go to you first on that. >> i'm not an expert on this. i think that he has to post a bond to appeal that is roughly the same amount of the decision. so put the e jean careful case, this case. he's supposed to bond for $300 million. after this decision, after -- who will loan him the money to challenge a decision that says

he lies when he borrows money? if you loan him money -- >> >> neil: by the way, he can't apply for any loans for up to three years. the collateral that he would likely use for the loans is the very real estate that you said you better not touch, use or do anything with. so he's kind of like penniless in that situation. the money that he could tap or collateralize, he can't, right? >> he'd have to look for personal assets, maybe something in florida, maybe he could borrow it from a florida bank. i find $300 million in liquid assets, donald trump would have trouble raising this. here's what i put to you, neil. i think you raised it with your previous question. donald trump pursued a very hostile strategy with the judge. the judge had already said he was going to lose. this was just about how much it was going to cost. i think donald trump made a calculated decision. okay. i'm going to lose anyway.

maybe it will be $300 million. but i'm going to dominate the primary ash waves and so donald trump, you can ask him, like what we're asking with e jean carroll. was it worth $300 million to win the republican primary by dominating the media, by going to the courtrooms, but turning it in the a circus. you knew you were going to lose. but doing that you're going to lose the maximum. now you're stuck. how can he raise the money, post the appeal bond in order to get to the appeals court. >> neil: it is weird. he could to your point, gentlemen, he could seek to secure bonds during the appeals process. much of that would be based on the very properties in question they're claiming that he inflated in the first place. i imagine they're untouchable. i could be wrong. there's this other possibility, i don't know what you think, tom, only him saying the hell with, this i'm moving to florida. elon musk did. musk went to texas.

my point being they're saving a lot of money, you know. there the focus was on state taxes. but the fact of the matter is, can he do something like that? can he say everything i have in new york, guess what? now i'm head quartered in florida. what happens then? or is it after the fact and he can't do that now? >> well, i mean he can still move to florida. in fact, if he's prohibitive from doing business in new york, assuming that sanction stays in place, might make sense moving to florida. i can't imagine the organization didn't have a contingency plan in place for something like this to happen. it was fairly clear the judge was signalling where he was going with this case. i can't imagine it was a surprise to trump that he is barred from doing business in new york. i suspect he's immediately going to run to the appeals court and the ask them to stay that prohibition to allow him to continue doing business in new york while this case is on

appeal. if that fails, you have to imagine there's some contingency plan in place to allow these businesses to continue to operate from outside the confines of new york. >> neil: you mentioned going to the new york court of appeals. john, i know this and shannon bream is reporting that all seven of the judges on the new york court of appeals, the highest be state court, they are appointed by governors to 14-year terms. all the current judges in this judges were appointed by governor cuomo or governor hochul, both democrats. so i don't want to imply that that will make it an uphill battle for donald trump, but i wonder. what do you think? >> i think the precedence, the existing case law is already against trump. i think it's going to be hard for this appeals court to reverse those precedents and say, no, we're going to change the existing law in order to

benefit donald trump. who this trial judge -- this is an important distinction with what appellate courts do and trial courts do. appellate courts are there to settle questions of legal interpretation. the judge, trial judge, judge engoron is a finder of facts. this is a case about the facts. how much money is at stake. which probabilities. important questions like did donald trump lie? you'll notice in the opinion that the judge goes through every witness, every defendant and gives his evaluation of what they were like on the stand, whether he thought they were credible. which is to what really -- to nonlawyers out there, whether he was lying or not. this judge is very careful to make it as factual as possible so that an appeals court, when they look at the decision, it's not going to find a lot to overturn. the only real question is the one you started with. can you impose a $350 million judgment in a fraud case where no counter party, nobody on the

other side of the deal said they were harmed or raise an objection that is more of a legal claim. all of these findings that donald trump was lying, that he committed fraud, those are usually the kind of things that an appeals court doesn't want to touch. >> neil: gentleman, thanks both very much. thanks for educating us with a tik tok on this of what happens now. 30 days to take this up. the highest court -- it's not the supreme court of new york. they would weigh-in on this. you know, seven justices or judges serving 14-year terms. they were all appointed by democratic governors, governor cuomo and now governor hochul. so that does appear to make it an uphill battle. i'm told justice is blind. sometimes she can peek. i want to go to jonathan turley on this. what happens if that court slaps

him down. in other words, jonathan, we get to that point where he's taking it up, urging them to drop this, reverse this. then they say no or refuse to consider any change. then what? >> well, neil, usually these type of state court cases end with the highest state court. the supreme court tends to defer to state law. there are exemptions. the supreme court can occasionally find due process violations in the size of damage awards that happened in the case of bmw. the supreme court took up a case involving punitive damages against bmw for repainting cars without telling owners. the damages were excessive and they with violate the federal contusion. this award is just other worldly.

i do think that the judges on appeal and possibly the supreme court are going to look at this and to what is your basis for imposing over $350 million in damages when there is no apparent victim who lost money. even though this law in new york has been criticized for years, it's been on the books. it's been used. never in this way. so the question is will they take a fresh set of eyes on this one. and possibly hit that award as opposed to the underlying law as problematic. >> neil: so jonathan, what happens in the event that they don't take it up or any of the things you pointed out or worthy of addressing and donald trump gets the republican nomination, elected president in november. this is a civil matter. it's a civil fraud verdict.

would he have any power as president to make it go away? >> no. he wouldn't. if the verdict stands, this is a state judgment, he doesn't have any power to change that. but it is adding obviously to the whole dimension of this election. people are beginning to agree with his long narrative. that he's being pursued, pillar to post. this is a campaign of death by exposure. that could very well factor in. we don't know if he is going to face any type of conviction. even though, this is a choice that most voters don't relish. many people view this as a choice between senility and criminality. that's not something that a lot of folks want to go to the polls to vote on. i think that trump is winning the political argument now with all of these different types of cases. this case, i got to tell you,

when you read it, it seems at points cathartic that the judge is lashing out at trump over his conduct in his courtroom. i had hoped the judge would show a little bit of restraint. these are troubling cases. the case brought by alvin bragg is raw partisan and in my view it's not well-based legally. this was a case brought by someone that ran on a pledge the bag donald trump. now you have this really over the top verdict. at some point, the new york bar is going to have to ask, is this who we are? is this where we have come as one of the oldest bars in the country. because it seems like there's a supplemental code both criminally and civilly for trump. it's going to impact not just

the integrity of their legal system, it will impact their businesses. yeah, this probably could be reduced to don't be trump if you commit any of these violations. but for a lot of businesses, what is viewed as a hostile environment in new york, just got perfectly terrifying. >> neil: you know, you talk about rising to the occasion or rising above the frey. those weren't your words. but i think of judge arthur engoron and particularly petty comments he made about donald trump's behavior, if that's your focus and the you're angry about and you want to voice it, have at it. it's not a church hillian moment for this judge or for that matter, letitia james that made it her goal once she became the new york attorney general to do after donald trump. so there seems to be a little too much zeal for what went down

and these guys' role in it. does it an appeal court take up that type of sentiment or just the attitude of it? >> well, they live in the real world. it's harder to make a judgment on that basis. it's a type of civil selective prosecution type of claim. courts don't like to get into motivations. people in new york frankly are enjoying this too much. there is a real type of release that comes from rage. it's addictive. this opinion unfortunately looks that way. when you look at these numbers, you try to find out where they came from. it's true that he really iron plated this almost 100-page opinion with fact findings. he knows it will be harder on appeal. you have to defer to findings of fact unless they're clearly erroneous on the trial level. when you actually drill down,

there's nothing there. for example, he says, well, if you told the truth, they would have required a higher interest rate. that is pretty damn speculative in my view. the trump organization was notorious for squeezing banks to get the best possible conditions and contracts. i don't think you can assume that they would have done any worse. neil, years ago when i was working for a different network, they found some documents of the trump organization. they had me review it. one of them was a page of how much trump was worth. i looked at the bottom line. it was like clearly twice as much as i thought he could possibly claim his worth. i found one piece of paper. on this long list of properties, there was one entry that basically said, name value, brand value. had like $3 billion. i laughed. raised it with the network. they said isn't that fraud?

i said i don't think it is. he told them that. he said, i'm counting in all of this money because of my brand. the question for businesses, where is the line here? if you don't rely on these figures, these are my estimations, where is the line to convert this to what is a existential fight in a case like this. >> neil: amazing. well-explained, jonathan. jonathan turley is earning his overtime pay today. thanks for that. by the way, this wasn't the only court case. just keeping track of these is like watching planes pile up in la guardia. there's the trump georgia election case. she didn't have to return to the witness stand. that is not over and the lover and all that and the march 25 stormy hush payment jury selection in that that is slated. so many trials so little time. we're going to try to sort them

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>> neil: robert, if we can show the president in east palestine, ohio again. the reason why i'm mentioning that is he is not only addressing a train derailment that happened more than a year ago, but he hopes in meeting with them and people affected by that he can make good on some criticism that at the time he forgot about them. the reason why we're putting this in the context of all the

developments today is he might respond to this whopper of a civil suit against the former president of the united states to the tune of more than $354 million. so he could say something about that or respond to questions on that. bob cusack from the hill with us right now. bob, so many court cases, so little time. one of the things i always think when stepping back from this is all of these court matters, when it appeared including indictments and the like, they have only lifted his poll numbers. this is a different kind of a situation. but it is kind of akin to the e jean carroll thing even though it's substantially more expensive. it's not put a dent in his popularity, hasn't put a dent in his poll numbers. i suspect this won either. there's got to be sort of a nick, nick, nick effect. you keep nicking away at him. what do you think? >> you're right. everything you said is right.

this is not hurt him to this point. but we've been talking about a republican primary. the former president is dominating and will likely win. this trip drip is not good. let's see his poll numbers come spring, early summer. i think going after prosecutors work in a primary, but he has to shift to general election mode and convince independents. i think this is not a great thing for trump. obviously biden has his own issues. independent voters are like where do we go? >> martha: . >> neil: so let me ask you about the impact here. the former president will fight it. he's been posted on truth social, if i can get the latest on that. that this is unfair. both the trial and this decision have diminished public confidence in the integrity of the legal system.

i'm wondering what you think happens now with this. then he gets into he's got to put up all of this money, hes got to counter the claims that he made stuff up. he's been able to do that with his base. he's been able to say that this is all politically driven, that letitia james had this as a goal very early on when she was campaigning for this office. so he has a credible case to make on the political witch hunt here. but there's also that vast independent voter, majority out there that will say there's got to be something there. what do you think? >> yeah, this does coincide nikki haley going after trump this year and saying donald trump is followed by chaos. you'll hear that you've heard it from democrats and president biden. so i think there's a real risk for the president here that obviously he's going to be

appealing every decision and polls show that if he -- recent poll, harvard harris showing, if he's indicted on the january 6th case, biden would go ahead of him. on other counts, not so much. certainly i think in a general election, these legal problems for trump are piling up. they're not good for independents. remember, biden did win independents in 2020. since then, independents have moved away from biden. both trump and biden have a problem with independent voters. >> neil: bob, i think i misquoted something. this is from donald trump himself, truth social. the justice system in new york city and america as a whole, he goes on to say, is under assault by part sandy lawsuited bias judges and prosecutors, racist corrupt a.g., referring to letitia james, has been obsessed with getting trump for years and used crooked new york state

judge engoron to get an illegal judgment against my family and my tremendous business. i helped new york city in the toughest of times. and now it's overrun by violent crime. he goes on to say -- this decision is a complete and total sham that were no victims, no damages, no complaints. only satisfied banks and insurance companies which made a ton of money. great financial statements that didn't include the most valuable asset, the trump brand. buyer beware and do you your own due diligence. the other side was a ridiculous $18 million evaluation of mar-a-largo and an unconstitutional gag order, consumer fraud statute, no injured allowed and a refusal to send this disgusting charade

where would have been put down. i'm going to put down that as a strong maybe. what do you think? >> another subtle statement from the former president. when you're dealing with taking trump's money away, obviously he's fired up with over this. he's fired up from a financial perspective because he's paying an enormous amount in legal fees and some of that is obviously picked up by campaign funds. but on actually paying what he's going to have to pay, he can't do that. so overall, yeah, this is something that we'll hear this rhetoric from trump. he's fired up. i don't think biden should be spiking the ball too much. he's got his own issues. obviously had the special counsel report. so i don't think he's -- spiking the football will help him, but i think that trump really just lashing out at prosecutors, i don't think that's a winning strategy going to the general election. at least as much as he does it. >> neil: does this go further than the donald trump -- the

reason i ask, the justice department has charged that the former fbi informant that claimed that republicans used to bolster these allegations or corrupt bribery scheming including joe biden and hunter biden. that individual is charged on two counts of making false statements to federal authorities. that further more, alexander smirnoff said in two business meetings in 2016 and 17 executives admitted hiring hunter biden. that does seem to be the reading here for chairman comer looking into this, that is a big nothing burger now. your star witness has sort of imploded on you. now what? >> the pressure is on comer and the new speaker, mike johnson who has had a rough stretch as well. listen, with the special

election victory in new york, neil, all it takes the three republicans to say i don't see the evidence to impeach biden. they don't have the votes if everyone shows up. so that's a problem for johnson and comer. comer has said he has other evidence. he has to present it soon. they have a math problem to impeach biden. they had a math problem to i'm beech mayorkas and needed a do-over. let's see if they get the votes after this news now has broken this week. >> neil: it could be early. you know, republicans do have a history of spiking the ball prematurely. botching, for example, what should have been a red wave a couple years back that didn't materialize. so they seem to be stumbling and bumbling their way through this on legislative matters where they're coming up short again and again. now on some of these cases that they thought they had locked down solid and the hunter biden and other investigations might continue, might find other avenues.

it's too soon to say. they're in a world of political hurt right now, aren't they? >> they are. but the one thing that republicans -- it a big thing -- have going for them is the senate map. so democrats are defending their seats. republican incumbents are all but basically safe. they're going to lose west virginia seat. manchin is not running now for president or the senate. so i think senate republicans that kind of blew it in the last cycle have things going their way. honestly, the party that has the best shot to win all three, the white house, the white house and the senate are republicans because of that senate advantage. but democrats have to win the white house and take back the house. maybe they hold the senate. the odds are with republicans right now. >> neil: all right. thanks very much. with us now, the former acting attorney general, matt whitaker, what he makes of this. matt, some are saying this is a pile-on against the former president. it's getting to be an expensive pile-on for the former

president. what do you think? >> it is, neil. it's good to be with you. first of all, that sound you hear are new york companies fleeing to other jurisdictions like elon musk left delaware. you see new york lose a lot of companies. what i think about this case is kind of -- everything has been said. not everybody said it. that's what a federal judge once told me and applies to this as well. you know, it's a fundamental fairness. if the left -- remember, it's only democrats bringing these cases. if it's in fulton county, whether it's in new york, whether it's the special counsel for the biden administration, i think each case is just trying to tie up and bind up take-away president trump's money, take away his time to campaign as he's stuck in court and all of these proceedings. you know, seems fundamentally unfair. the american people should decide this, not the courts and not these judges in these blue

states and blue jurisdictions. >> neil: it's very unlikely -- a couple hours in this past hour think it's a difficult matter to get past seven by appointed governors that were democrats. it would be an uphill battle for trump to get rid of this for the time being. what is your interpretation? >> yeah, my interpretation is simple. you know, you expect the justice system should work. that it shouldn't be based as don jr. said today on your political beliefs and the jurisdiction. so you know, there's some of us that think this system should work. i'm becoming more and more cynical with the day. one of the things that we should watch very carefully, if there were no damages and no basis for really anybody losing any money, what is this $370 million based

upon? what is it tethered to? the law requires that it be related to something tangible. if no one lost any money, nobody was defrauded, where does this damage come from other than just trying to put a big enough number on the scoreboard to put donald trump out of business and to take away his assets. it's just -- again, most ordinary americans in places where i'm from like des moines iowa see it for what it is. just a blue state punishing donald trump for his beliefs. >> neil: it interesting. i want to thank you very much for appearing with us. as he was wrapping up there, i should point out the attorney general letitia james is posting on this case and the decision. she's going to address the press i believe about an hour and 15 minutes from now. she said a massive victory. we won our case about donald trump for engaging in years of

fraud to enrich himself. donald trump jr. and eric trump and executives have to pay over $450 million. trump alan weisselberg is banned from surfacing as a new york company two three years. donald trump jr., eric trump are banned from serving as an officer in any new york corporation for two years. each goes on to explain that they also will have to pay $4 million in fines. each of them. but again, it's too early to tell how that will be sorted out, even if it's sorted out. she will address the press in a little over an hour and 15 minutes from now. >> sandra: you're going to see meantime these quick texts and tweets and xs, whatever you want to call it, going back and forth with mainly those that had accused donald trump of this, that he's libel and he has a big

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>> neil: you know, on any other day this would still be a big story. it certainly was yesterday, news

that special counsel david weiss had charged a former fbi informant with lying about that president joe biden, his son hunter biden's involvement in business dealings with ukrainian energy company known as burisma holdings. that was undercutting a major, major feature of republicans impeachment inquiry into the president. alexander smirnoff is the guy's name, 43 years old, facing charges in connection with lying to the fbi, creating false records. he was arrested yesterday at hearing harry reid international airport in las vegas, arriving from overseas. he has already made his initial court appearance. again, this all in potentially undoes the entire hunter biden case, or at least its most powerful and impactful witness. let's get the latest from david spunt at the justice department over this. >> hi, neil. alexander smirnoff, former fbi informant, made the allegation that joe biden and hunter biden

accepted $5 million each in bribes from associates connected to a ukrainian energy company called murray's mom, where hunter biden once sat on the board. he memorialized the memorialization on what is a fbi 1023 form. republicans for several months last summer up until just weeks ago were continuing to talk about this 1023 form and these allegations. smirnov has been charged with lying about these allegations. he is facing these charges. president biden today at the white house said that he is lying, meaning talking about smirnov. another bit of news from president biden, not only does hunter biden have a special counsel, we have been talking about robert hur, the special counsel that investigated president biden's handling of classified documents. there is this -- robert hur interview with president biden that happened back in october, d critics have been calling for the release of the transcript. they want to see the transcript. house republicans wrote to attorney general merrick garland, asking him to make the transcript available.

we just got first on fox with a letter from a justice department over to capitol hill, basically telling house republicans that doj is committed to working with them but needs to go through the normal process of looking to see if there is an classified information, perhaps, or any other bits of concerns. also, neil, not to bog down people with too much information, will the white house perhaps get involved in claim executive privilege, meaning they will not allow this transcript to be released or possibly allow it to be released, may be redacted. so this attention essentially puts the burden somewhat more on the white house to release the transcript, not the attorney general, not the department of justice. and the white house says that they are considering releasing that transcript, so a busy, busy day for president biden, dealing with two special counsels, one investigating his son, saying that joe biden and hunter biden, those allegations about ukraine and accepting $5 million are false, and also this news that the justice department is working to make this transcript

available, if the white house approves, at the white house has to approve. neil? >> neil: got it, my friend. david spunt on all of that. so this calls for a legal-palouse. we have the marble team of lawyers joining us. katie czajkowski, john dupree, john yoo. first on the aleck under smirnoff stuff, 43 years old, essentially charged with lying. i don't know where this goes from here, but that was the whole enchilada for the case, going after hunter biden beauty was the secret weapon and these ties to burisma that were provable through him. there might be others out there, but it's got to be a big blow, at least to republicans. what do you see? >> absolutely, that information was essentially the crux of the case tying the bidens to burisma, so if that was in fact false, and again, he has just been indicted at this point, he has not been convicted of lying, perhaps he is maintaining that he wasn't lying, but if he was

lying, then that does take a significant portion of that puzzle there. so a connection would have to be drawn in some other way. >> neil: all right, then the separate issue with robert hur, clarified in documents, the president joe biden's handling of these classified documents, he looked at it in the context of an old man who would probably not be fingered by a jury, anyway, he would be a sympathetic figure. the old man references that all of that the white house finds a bit biting and smarting, so i don't how eager they would be to get that released, right? >> well, they have disputed the characterization that biden was essentially not unfit to stand trial legally but that it would be difficult to get an acquittal because of his mental faculties so in order to substantiate the dispute i think they should release those transcripts. obviously they are hesitant to

do so for obvious reasons, i'm sure, but certainly that would be the only way to debunk the claims that hur was mischaracterizing anything or was inappropriately summarizing what happened during those interviews. >> neil: so tom dupree, what if hur's comments were quite sympathetic and quite understanding, the compassionate to the president, that look, he just lost his fastball, he wasn't up to it, but didn't think anything would be proven chasing this, and it is not nearly as damning as it would appear -- embarrassing to the president, may be, but he is off any criminal indictments. >> yeah, and look, i think this transcript is going to come out. i can't imagine it is going to be kept under wraps, there are too many people pushing hard to get it. the biden team says they wanted to get out, i'm not sure i entirely believe them. i think it will further undermine the bidens claim that hur made inappropriate characterizations or characterizations that are inaccurate. i think the transcript will reveal he has some memory

issues, i think the transcript will review that he couldn't remember basic dates and times t i think they put themselves in a box. they attacked the special counsel for a kind of going outside the guard rails on this, including all of these so-called irrelevant digressions, but i think they are going to leave the special counsel with no choice but to put this opinion or put the transcript out in public view and let people decide for themselves what the truth is. >> neil: so real quickly, john yoo, what is the difference between robert hur saying stuff that might be offensive or sound offensive to a president and the comments, you know, judge judge arthur, about donald trump and his behavior in and outside the courtroom? one seems may be sympathetic, depending on who is watching this, and the other a little zealous, but aren't they both come at their core, you know, emotional reactions that two different entities had to two

different cases? >> i actually take both of the statements at face value. i think judge engoron has to explain to the public and to the appeals court why he discounted everything that trump said, where he just didn't find trump believable and when confronted with the fact, trump just didn't have answers. at the same with hur, i think hur has to make that judgment. because without that decision, that biden is well-meaning, elderly, with a bad memory, then you ask, why didn't hur bring the charges? in his report, he lays out exactly the facts that should have pressed for a prosecution. >> neil: yeah. well said. guys come i want to thank you all, such a pressing day with so many legal cases, other than that not much really going on today but the implications of all of this, as they are going to be multiple press conference is planned, fox will cover them all. here is "the five." ♪ ♪ >> dana: hello, everybody.