richest at harvard law school and the author of the case against the democratic house impeaching trump mr dershowitz it's such a honor and such a pleasure talking to you thank you very much for that. well thank you so much as you probably know i voted against president trump i'm a liberal democrat i worked hard to see that hillary clinton would get elected but i'm very much opposed to efforts to remove this president who i voted against by unlawful means whether by invoking the twenty fifth amendment to the constitution which was written for presidents who are incapacitated by medical or psychiatric reasons or whether by impeachment that requires high crimes and misdemeanors so i'm very much in favor not of president trump but in favor of the constitution now when you say that the you're in in favor of the constitution and the civil liberties rather than motivated by any personal sympathies for president trump do people believe you are on is a hard case to make in this day and age in the united states it's

a very hard case to make and people either don't believe me or don't care many friends who are a long long time friends have refused to have anything to do with me they won't go to events that i met because they think i'm taking trump's side you know it reminds me of when i was a young man i was not a communist i was against communists but i took the side of communists who are accused of crimes because of their ideology so good lawyer represents a stands up for the rights of people that they don't necessarily agree with the essence of being a civil libertarian is to defend the rights of everybody regardless of what you personally think of them but many civil libertarians i call fair weather civil libertarians they only support civil liberties when it helps their side ideologically and politically well you know when i was a young woman and studying english i did that by watching all those. america and

criminal law serious and the main take away from all those serious is that you know you have a protest against who says that you have to risk. the law more than you disrespect or dislike what happened to the united states when such a. clear amasses i think such an unambiguous message needs to be renegotiated once again well people are so angry at president trump and so anxious to get rid of him because they disagree so fundamentally with his politics with who is appointed to the supreme court with how he separated families at the border with how he wants to build the war on wants to end the obama medical programs people are so angry at him that they're prepared to do anything include violate the law and violate the constitution to get him out of office and i'm standing up by myself pretty much for the constitution for the rule of law and against many of my old

friends who i agree with politically but can't accept their notion of the ends justify the means because when you establish a president precedent against a president trump it can be used against any president you know when i originally wanted to write my book because against impeaching trump i was going to write the case against impeaching hillary clinton because i thought she would be elected and i thought republicans who were yelling lock her up were going to try to impeach her so i originally wanted to write a book called the case against impeaching hillary clinton but when trump was elected and the democrats moved to impeach him all i did was change the names in the book but the arguments are the same. you mentioned that so many people are extremely angry at donald trump and i can certainly feel that as a russian broadcaster did the amount of abuse we have subjected to is also unbelievable but i would argue that this is what the law is ultimately forced on that principle is that you have the law that should protect people from political

biases and that should guarantee a fair treatment to all do you think donald trump for all his personal flaws is being treated fairly by the moeller investigation no i don't i don't think there should have been a special counsel appointed at all i think this should have been a normal routine investigation what i had proposed was a nonpartisan commission like the commission that was appointed following the nine eleven attack on the world trade center so i called for a nonpartisan expert investigation of whether or not russia tried to influence the election and i think many americans believe there were efforts by at least some in russia to try to influence the election in favor of trump but also to look into allegations about hillary clinton on both sides and to try to come to objective conclusions and make sure that whatever did happen in the two thousand the ninth two thousand and sixteen election would never happen again that would have been much better than appointing a special counsel this when you appoint a special counsel you put

a target on the back of whoever the special counsel subject is in this case president trump and so what the special counsel has done they've arrested and prosecuted lots of people who have nothing to do with any russia collusion just in order to get them to cooperate and in the end i don't think the motor investigation has come up with any proof of any criminal conduct on the part of donald trump but they have certainly made life miserable for people who are close to president trump arrested many of them threaten many of them and indicted many now professor i'm sure the special prosecutor knows the difference between. and there are regional sin that he was appointed to investigate and what you call process crimes do you think this tactic of still on the process crimes on the latter is intentional of course it is of course it is there's no doubt about it and it's not only me saying that the judge who presided over the matter for a case judge ellis said they're not interested in metaphor one of the incident

where they cheated banks or cheated on his taxes they're only interested in squeezing man of war in order to get him to what we call seeing but sometimes people who are squeezed not only sing but they compose they make up stories they elaborate they make their story better because they know the better the story the better the deal they're going to get it's a it's a tactic it's very questionable and one that civil libertarians have generally been opposed to but when it comes to president trump civil libertarians a phone asleep they've disappeared and they've left it essentially to me and i have taken most of the brunt of the criticism for defending president trump against improper and unlawful activities sometimes done by prosecutors but i'm going to continue to do it because my commitment is to the rule of law and to the constitution although i'm a liberal democrat my primary commitment is to my country not to my party professor dershowitz just to clarify if it charge sees prosecutors using defendants as

a means to catch a bigger prey can they do something not to reward this tactic is this kind of moral entrapment by prosecutors permitted under the u.s. law well it's not unlawful but as a criminal defense attorney i use that to my advantage when i defend somebody i say look at this witness you can't trust this witness he was coerced into providing testimony against my client by threats against him by threats against his family by threats against his fortune and sometimes juries are wise enough to see through that tactic and they rule against. prosecution but unfortunately it's not unlawful for prosecutors to selectively pick people to prosecute not because they're interested in them but because they're interested in going after them to get them to testify against the real target it's done commonly in mafia cases it's done commonly in terrorist cases and when it's those cases people don't generally

disagree but when it's done in the context of political crimes or efforts to get after people politically then it raises some very very fundamental questions of due process and fairness well actually if i may i think that is a much broader question than many realize it actually may affect every american because i have a friend in the united states who has absolutely nothing to do with trump but who had the f.b.i. up here on his doorstep at five o'clock in the morning demanding that he implicate somebody else and when he refused them safe grounds as a christian they went full force after him hurting his reputation undermining his business putting a lot of stress on his family without having anything on him why is it permitted to subject people to something like that in a democracy with a strong legal system it shouldn't be it shouldn't be and courts should be very concerned about allowing that but unfortunately it's become

a tactic of law enforcement both by democrats and by republicans and it does result in the conviction of innocent people from time to time and it also results in selective prosecution of people who haven't done anything wrong but just know people who may have done something wrong or know people who the government is interested in going after so i think it's a terrible tactic and it's one that civil libertarians should be concerned about and they are concerned about it except when it involves president trump well i think what many people also don't understand is that while the american legal system is based on the presumption of innocence proving your innocence may be. extremely expansive many people take plea bargains just because they contest for defied given that now even the us president has experienced that do you think it could spark a broader conversation about prosecutorial tactics or in some case prosecutorial impunity and i agree with that and i hope it does one of the great virtues of what's happened now is that conservatives who generally have been on the side of

law enforcement are alert to the fact that there are abuses of law enforcement over ninety percent of people who are charged with federal crimes plead guilty not necessarily because they are guilty but a they can afford to put on a defense and be even more importantly if they plead not guilty and are found guilty they can get ten times ten times the amount of prison than they would get if they pleaded not guilty and so the pressures to plead guilty or enormous and when you add to that threats against family members i have had cases where children of my clients have been threatened unless they turned against their own parents that's just not right and i would hope that after this is over perhaps conservatives and civil libertarians would get together and try to reform the system somewhat and eliminate these unfair or aspects of prosecutorial abuse and prosecutorial threats and i also don't want to sound preachy here because my country russia has major

issues with prosecutorial abuse on the independence of its edition but i think it's much more difficult to build something that you never had as opposed to compromising something that you had to do you have any concerns that in that efforts to get rid of trump the americans may lose something far more valuable reaches the integrity of the legal system that's exactly what i'm concerned about and particularly when liberals and civil libertarians support prosecutorial abuse when the american civil liberties union which is supposed to stand up against abuses supports the search of a lawyer. office michael cohen's office without any real effort to separate out evidence of crime from lawyer client privilege information when the a.c.l.u. favors the prosecution you know that there is a real problem look i would love to see reform both in the united states system and in the russian system i think every great country in the world want to have

a criminal justice reform to make sure that there is fair treatment in the one nine hundred seventy s. i spent time in the former soviet union representing refuseniks and soviet dissidents people like soccer often and sharansky and others and i saw some of the unfairness is of the former soviet system i know some of them have been remedied since the end of the soviet union but not all of them and the united states we had a very effective system of balancing law enforcement and civil liberties and then balance now has been compromised by civil libertarians and liberals failing to criticize prosecutorial abuses because the abuses of being directed against donald trump well you can also say that there is says civil libertarians that using politics over the rule of law but professor dershowitz may have to take a very short break now we'll go back to this discussion in just a few moments states and.

simply a. set up have been miles from the to the independent with that date with. the council of the placenta own up that we were meeting day. with was the sort of my lamb who speculate that me or the now

which jamie has a hunk of. now at the. hill i don't know him for that matter i. see let him make what we have made or the only marriage will have one thing close i gave up because of me as he said when i would. welcome back to worlds apart with alan dershowitz professor fly emeritus at harvard law school professor dershowitz i'm sure you seem to have lines and did new york times about after it so you impeach president trump through the use of the twenty fifth amendment what do you make of it well it was

a terrible terrible abuse of the constitution the constitution provides for impeachment that's a political legal remedy but the twenty fifth amendment was designed for people who had a stroke or a president reagan when he was shot when you're incapacitated when you're unconscious when you're unable to be the president it provides a mechanism for replacing the president with the vice president it was never intended to be used to rid the country of a president who people don't agree with they think may have committed obstruction of justice or collaboration with russia that's not what the twenty fifth amendment was. tended to use and when the justice department itself which is supposed to support the constitution tries to undercut the constitution that raises fundamental questions about the mindset of those who are in charge of enforcing our law while the groundwork for the miller investigation was late in early two thousand and seventeen once the agencies the cia the n.s.a. and the f.b.i.

came out with a report charging that logically if the russian government aspires to your house chances by what they called discrediting secretary clinton and publicly contrasting her unfavorably to trump even if dots was the case it was always tries to influence elections when people who are running who are friendly to the united states are running against people who are unfairly we certainly did that all through central america and south america for many many years we know that obama tried to influence the israeli election against benjamin netanyahu we know that these efforts are made repeatedly they're not criminal they're done by the cia they're done by the k.g.b. the former k.g.b. they're done by and six every intelligence agency in the world sees as part of its function to make sure that elections turn out favorably to the country if they

cross the line into criminality that would be one thing but i've seen no evidence to suggest that certainly no evidence that would suggest that president trump himself had anything to do with any unlawful conduct for me the thing that's most disturbing as an american is that i grew up thinking that america and our legal system was a light unto the world that you know we had our problems we had gratian segregation we had mccarthyism but in recent years the american legal system has been emulated when many of the countries of the former soviet union achieved their independence they look. to the united states they try to build constitutions based on the united states and i'm afraid that the united states is going to lose its credibility around the world and going to have less influence in trying to bring other countries within the rule of law and that would be not only a disaster for the united states it would be a tragedy for the world at large because it's so important for every country in the

world to abide by the rule of law i totally agree with you professor dershowitz you mentioned that we kill leaks a couple of times and i heard you say that the allegations contained in there are still an indictment with regards to he's a legit contacts with the we kill leaks and that weekly it's a legit context or with the russian operatives are as you sad story telling rather than formal charges can you explain the difference for those of us who don't know well the indictment against roger stone tells a big story and it doesn't have to prove it it just says that stone met with this person and that person and it was wiki leaks and there were the russians but he was never charged with that and that's never going to be put on trial in court the jury is never going to have to make a decision about that he was charged simply with crimes process crimes lying crimes and other kinds of crimes but they surrounded those process crimes with story

telling stories may be true they may be force but they'll never be put on trial and they should not be taken seriously but why would the indictments need to be puffed up with these kinds of stories it's not a literary or historical assaye why would these stories be included at all not only there's no necessity to do it it's wrong to do it you should never put anything in an indictment that's not absolutely necessary and has to be proved in court the irony is that one of the people who promoted this kind of what we talk about is talking a diet mincer singing indictments indictments that tell stories. was rudy giuliani when he was the u.s. attorney in the southern district of new york he used to write these very broad indictments against the mafia he would start by saying in one thousand no seven in palermo italy and you can practically hear the music from the godfather playing in the background as he described things that happened one hundred years ago and then

by the end he would say and now more recently this guy conspired with this guy to do something so it's been something that's been going on for a while now and it wasn't done only in the case against donald trump and ironically it was done previously by donald trump's own lawyer but it's wrong no matter who does it it's wrong indictments are simply charging instruments they should simply queues in the smallest amount of space and time possible let them prove that in court beyond a reasonable doubt but people today don't believe in the presumption of innocence if it's directed against trump it must be true it's a little bit like to me to movement if a woman says it it must be true if the same charges were made against hillary clinton people would scream about the presumption of innocence the same people who are presuming guilty would say presumption of innocence and some of the same people who are saying presumption of innocence would say guilty if it were directed against hillary clinton and i call that the shoe on the other foot test you have to

pass the shoe on the other foot test that the sure on the other foot if all of this were being done against hillary clinton with the same people who are supporting these prosecutorial abuses be opposing them if it came to hillary clinton if that's the case they don't pass the shoe on the other foot test and their arguments are hypocritical and shouldn't be given credit i think another category of that is always guilty and it out in the eyes of many in the united states are the russians and i want to specifically ask you about the indictments of the russian individuals including thirteen people who reportedly worked for the so-called troll factory in st petersburg writing comments on social media creating fictional account. behavior is clearly malicious but isn't it blown out of proportion considering that's believe in an era where millions of identity fast fast a rat just aired every day there are massive data leaks don't you think that it is a little bit exaggerated the kind of harm that these individuals did to the

american system well first of all nobody is ever going to have a chance to prove it or disprove it these people are not going to come to america they're going to stay in russia and so all we have is an indictment hanging out there they'll never be an opportunity for muller or his people to prove this indictment or for the people who have been accused to defend themselves i don't believe in indictments that are designed simply to destroy the reputation of people without giving them an opportunity to respond i was opposed when richard nixon was named as an unindicted coconspirator because if you're an unindicted coconspirator you can't defend yourself i feel the same way about the russians who have been indicted there will be no opportunity for them to defend themselves they probably believe that if they came to america and stood trial they couldn't get a fair trial and i think they would probably be right about that so i think you have to put the accusations against the russians in context and remember that

they'll be no trial of these people and no opportunity to disprove these allegations at least one russian may be brought to trial i'm talking about maria buton a russian woman who pled guilty to felony charges of conspiracy to act as an unregistered foreign agent and she's been held in solitary confinement she's been falsely and publicly very publicly accused of being essentially a prostitute of trading sexual favors for influence does this kind of treatment correspond to the gravity of the crime that she stands accused off it doesn't sound like it does that to me it sounds to me like again they're trying to squeeze her they're trying to get heard. divide information against the real targets and they're using tactics that are calculated to make people saying and perhaps compose so i am very concerned as a civil libertarian about the kind of tactic that was used against her against matter for against stone arresting him at six in the morning with a swat team putting him in shackles and then immediately allowing him bail low bail

it was all a show it was all designed to put pressure on him and that's not the way a legal system should operate under the rule of law i think the most troubling aspect of the boot in the case for me is that there is nothing specific that she stands accused off it's essentially about developing an outwork of contacts and speaking in favor and publicly about improving u.s. russian relations and i do it all the time on this television i did that when i was a student at an american university i thought it was generally a good idea to you know be france with another major power. any reason other russians studying or reciting in the united states to be more careful about how they communicate with the american peers and what subjects' they raise in there in an ordinary conversation well it would be a terrible thing if russian students were not permitted full and complete free speech rights the first amendment applies to everybody in the united states i want

to hear from russian students i want to hear what they honestly think i don't want them to be afraid that if they say something they'll be arrested and prosecuted i think it's important for us to communicate with each other it was maybe twenty five years ago when the soviet union still existed but i was internationally internationally televised debate with three russian warriors and three americans and we debated on n.b.c. the legal systems of the two countries and the issues of refuseniks and others and it was a terrific debate and americans benefited from him. everybody listening to the debate benefited from it the russians expressed their view we expressed our view and the ultimate result was people could decide who got the better of the argument that's what should happen under our first amendment whether you're a russian or an american well professor dershowitz i'm looking forward to seeing size debates in the future but for the time being i have to thank you for your time

and for your willingness to engage with me as a russian i hope that has not been codified as in the fans in the united states yet well i enjoyed your questions they were actually and i hope that we can continue to talk to each other and learn from each other i encourage our viewers to keep this conversation going in our social media pages and. same place same time here on worlds apart.

from. the slogans. and good news. much of those who heard something. new will. move. with. who showed you the snoopy you believe it's a good. movie muslim also this go through a few films for go good girls. go to shows look i do assume you love your kiss will the story should go. to start ups to get

to meet until it was the middle of the most dates you look at is with. him just not a chance to just meet them mashed on truck stop the president on it's control has more to come to. those we're producers to go to summer to snoop to come up with new look as good as the girls are with you for your support just to be sure station shouldn't be you should cook door for one who's devoted to the. country has gone into a nihilistic fever best trying to think and they got hit the road and get out the traveling across america to find out what makes america take the charlatans the genius of this precious national american hero this is it we found

a point around which alan would have done something we always are on the margins something. called the culture is really boring because. we're starting last with is going to headed east into the swamp we're going into the belly of the beach and i think i want to leave now doesn't get any more ground zero the earth may be completely different by the end of this john. i mean.

that's from this weekend more tens of thousands of yellow vests activists turned out for a fourteenth consecutive weekend of anti-government protests clashes erupting in the capital further demonstrations are expected later today there were across plus . some of big stories in the wake of haiti gripped by civil unrest with thousands of protesters flooding the streets of the key.