i'm joined, as promised by melissa murray, professor of law at nyu. she's an msnbc legal analyst. t of the strict scrutiny podcast. melissa, good to see you. i just want to get through this because i'm sure a lot of people were following it very closely. but there's still a couple of unanswered questions. why did this have to happen to make donald trump a convicted felon? because there were a whole lot of people who thought when he was convicted by a jury of his peers, that was that. and then what is this unconditional discharge mean? right. >> so generally, in the criminal process, it's sentencing that makes a person formally a convicted felon. so in order for donald trump to have that ignominious distinction, this sentencing had to happen. and so it did happen. it was not the sentencing that many individuals who are convicted of these crimes in new york state get. and typically, this kind of charge carries with it the penalty of some jail time or even prison time. >> right. >> donald trump is the only individual since 2014, when the new york times began looking at this, that has

well, here with me to answer that question and others is msnbc legal analyst melissa murray, a law professor being successful here? i need to understand this. >> charles, the question here is the difference between the letter of the law and spirit of the law. if you take these laws on their face, these public accommodations laws, they are clear that you cannot discriminate on the basis of gender. but they weren't thinking about just any kind of gender discrimination. they were thinking about circumstances that kept women out of public life for many, many years. they weren't thinking about ladies night or actual opportunities for women to pool their resources and empower each other. i think what you have here is sort of the difference between a kind of rigid formal equality and a more flexible kind of equity that better striving towards in a more pluralistic society. the difference between discriminating on the basis of gender as a classification and the idea of discriminating against people because of their gender for the purpose of subordinating them. i am not entirely unnerved by the prosp

joining me now is melissa murray, law professor and former clerk prto justice sonia sotomayor, of course, the author of "the trump indictments: the historic charging documents with commentary." also tim miller, host of "the bulwark podcast." thank you for being here lwto respond to this very new and significant developments happening within the last hour. melissa, first, let me get your thoughts on the double whammy lobbed trump's way at denials from conservative courts. how significant are they? >> they're obviously significant. the ruling from the supreme court puts in place -- cements the sentencing that is going to happen and that will make donald trump the first convicted felon to be inaugurated as president. breaking barriers all over the place here. and the other ruling is very significant. i will note the 11th circuit left judge cannon's ruling blocking the release of the report for three days after the decision on appeal, so that means we won't get the release of this until sunday as you noted. merrick garland suggested he was not going to release the mar-a-lago report because t

we are joined by melissa murray and -- professor, happy new year. >> your thoughts?trump does not want to get to the public, there's already a cloud hanging over him, if he goes forward, and is inaugurated, even if there's no sentencing in the hush money trial, he will be the first convicted felon to serve as president and having this hanging over his head is obviously something he doesn't want. the idea -- >> are your eyebrows raised, it's hard to tell us her glasses are so thick. >> they are. we know that judge cannon dismissed the case that the special counsel, that there's no authority for a special counsel and that was appealed to the 11th circuit, so the case is now before the 11th circuit and the judge doesn't have jurisdiction over an and as you said, she issued this order preventing the release of this report by the attorney general and made no distinction about the documents case and the election interference case in the see a case over which she never had jurisdiction because it was always before judge chutkan, and the question is how can she do that -- >>

joining me now is melissa s murray, law professor and former clerk to justice sonia sotomayor, author of "the indictments" and tim miller, host of the wark podcast. thank you for being here and responding to the significant developments in the last hour. the double whammy, denials from conservative courts, how lssignificant are they? >> they're obviously significant. the ruling from the supreme court puts in place the sentencing, cements that sentencing that's going to happen. that will make donald trump the first convicted felon to d be inaugurated as president p. aubreaking barriers all over th brplace here, and the ruling is significant. i will note the 11th circuit left judge cannon's temporary order blocking the release of the report for three days after the decision on appeal, so that means we won't get the release of this until sunday as you noted. merrick garland suggested that he was not going to release the mar-a-lago report because there are two additional defendants there, codefendants of donald trump. that, i odthink, is a little interesting and concerning because it's en

let's turn to melissa murray of nyu law school.ald trump might not be going to jail but this is not the outcome he wanted. does any of this surprise you? >> i'm not really surprised by any of this. it was always going to be an uphill battle for former future president trump to have this trial entirely vacated. judge marchand was always pretty firm that he would not be inked around on this. and alex bragg made really good points about the sanctity of a jury verdict. the fact that 12 individuals came together and unanimously found that donald trump had done these things and is guilty of 34 counts and that his bedrock in our system. i'm not surprised that judge marchand refused the president's arguments but what may be surprising is what will come next. >> judge mershon wrote that the most viable solution is an unconditional discharge. what does that mean? >> an unconditional discharge is essentially that the conviction stands. but we are not imposing any conditions as a condition of his release. there will not be incarceration, punis

joining me now is melissa murray, nyu law professor, msnbc legal analyst and cohost of the strict scrutinyquestion is how can the supreme court even get involved in this. i thought that state cases bore no involvement from the federal government. >> that's not always the case that a state issue has no federal bearing. i mean there may be a federal question here but typically in a situation like this, where there is a criminal case, it is usually the case that the defendant will exhaust his state court remedies before seeking review in federal court . so the question here is why has donald trump leapfrogged over the new york court of appeals, which is the highest court in new york, to go directly to the supreme court, seeking relief there? and again, this may be something that the justices take into account when they review this petition and we will see but you are right. he has received some very favorable treatment from this court, a third of which he has installed hear himself. >> and there is this other little thing that happened. samuel alito acknowledging that he met with trump or spo