CAFE Insider 02/11: Bezos, AMI, and TMI

CAFE Insider: Bezos, AMI, and TMI

Supplemental materials and references made in the episode:

• Jeff Bezos’ post in Medium, “No thank you, Mr. Pecker”
• Bezos’ hired investigator, Gavin De Becker, comments on AMI’s possible “political motive” to leak.  
• The extortion statute, 18 U.S.C. 875(d)
• The September 2018 non-prosecution agreement between American Media, Inc. (AMI) and SDNY.
• An interview on ABC’s “This Week” with Elkan Abramowitz, the attorney representing AMI CEO David Pecker. Transcript here.
• An interview on ABC’s “This Week” with Professor Alan Dershowitz. Transcript here.
• Jeffrey Toobin’s analysis in the New Yorker of Gawker’s collapse and its implications for the First Amendment.
• The Daily Beast article reporting that Michael Sanchez, the brother of Bezos’ mistress, Lauren Sanchez, gave the couple’s intimate texts to the National Enquirer.
• Acting Attorney General Matt Whitaker’s testimony before the House Judiciary Committee
• The viral moment from Whitaker’s testimony, where he tells Committee Chairman Jerry Nadler his five minutes are up.
• A Politico article recounting the subpoena standoff between Rep. Nadler and Whitaker.
• Chairman Adam Schiff’s statement on the House Intelligence Committee Investigation and CNN’s report on the announcement and the Committee’s vote to send Mueller transcripts from some 50 interviews it conducted on the Russia investigation.
• Trump’s use of the phrase “presidential harassment” and its origin.
• Trump’s Dr. Seuss-inspired line from the State of the Union, and a Washington Post analysis of Trump’s invocation of Dr. Seuss’s style and rhyme.
• The partially redacted transcript from Paul Manafort’s hearing on 2/4/19.
• A question from a listener, Twitter user @papayapulp, asking Preet and Anne, is it “pled” or “pleaded.”

Thanks for listening to this week’s episode of CAFE Insider. We’ll be back next week. Please email your questions for Preet and Anne to insider@cafe.com

This is the Cafe Insider Podcast. Your hosts are Preet Bharara and Anne Milgram. The producers at Pineapple Street Media are Kat Aaron, Jenna Weiss-Berman and Max Linsky. The executive producer at Cafe is Tamara Sepper. And the Cafe team is Julia Doyle, Calvin Lord, Vinay Basti and Geoff Isenman. Our music is by Andrew Dost.

Thank you for being a part of the Cafe Insider Community.