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--:-- John Bickley: The fallout has been fast and furious since a Georgia grand jury handed down a late night indictment against former President Trump and his allies. The grand jury is really a rubber stamp. What's going to matter is when a judge gets a hold of this and the motions start to throw out parts of the indictment. I'm Daily Wire, Editor-in-Chief John Bickley with Georgia Howe. It's Wednesday, August 16th, and this is Morning Wire. Americans are more in debt now than at any point in history. Consumers are dipping into their savings. They're also taking on more and more debt. We have all the numbers and what they mean for the economy. And new state laws regulating pornography have led major adult content sites to shut off access in some states. And parent groups are celebrating the trend. This is just the beginning of a wave of legislation at the state level, unless and until Congress steps in. How have sites like Pornhub responded?
--:-- Georgia Howe: Thanks for waking up with Morning Wire. Stay tuned. We have the news you need to know.
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--:-- John Bickley: The District Attorney of Fulton County, Georgia, dropped a 95-page indictment Monday night, charging former President Trump and 18 others in a criminal conspiracy to overturn the 2020 election. Prosecutor Fannie Willis brought the charges under Georgia's anti-racketeering law in a move that some legal experts suggest sets a dangerous legal precedent. Daily Wire reporter Tim Pierce is here to discuss some of the legal response to the charges.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Hi, I'm here to discuss the indictment. As we reported, this is a sweeping indictment that wraps together dozens of charges against nearly 20 people and then includes dozens of unnamed and unindicted co-conspirators. What are the merits of this case?
--:-- Georgia Howe: Well, that depends who you ask. According to the Federalist legal correspondent Margo Cleveland, they're few and far between. Here's what she said when Morning Wire asked her about the indictment.
--:-- Margo Cleveland: It's 99% garbage, and the 1% that could be legitimate crimes is buried amongst everything and is very difficult to get a handle on. And that 1% would be lying to the grand jury and lying to the legislature, which is alleged in there, but it's buried amongst everything else. So it's hard to see exactly what those issues are.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Former Alabama U.S. Attorney Joyce Vance has a very different take. She believes Willis does have a compelling case. She says investigators have shown that Trump was the ringleader of a cabal of election fraudsters. Here's what she said on MSNBC.
--:-- Joyce Vance: Instead of finding something specific that was limited to that one phone call, they found this ongoing pattern of conduct reaching across the country. As you begin to look at the allegations it becomes very clear that Donald Trump used fake claims of fraud to try to perpetrate election fraud.
--:-- Georgia Howe: All right, so very different takes there. What the outlook on this case actually going to trial? Will this make it that far? George Washington University law professor Jonathan Turley thinks the case has legs, and it'll stand on threshold questions such as, is this a plausible interpretation of the law? Here's Turley on Fox News.
--:-- Jonathan Turley: It's going to be very hard to get an appellate review to knock this out on threshold questions. Racketeering cases are largely fact cases. And the prosecutors argue, let us prove our case. Let us bring the evidence together. So the chances of this surviving a review are likely quite tight, at least in some form.
--:-- Georgia Howe: RICO cases are different than most criminal trials because instead of prosecutors pinning a specific crime on a defendant, they're really out to prove someone was a member of a group or a criminal enterprise, and that each member was of one mind or intent working towards some illegal goal. When you read through the indictment, Willis throws a lot of otherwise perfectly legal acts into it, such as Trump live-tweeting the election in Georgia. The indictment refers to them as overt acts in furtherance of the conspiracy and are supposed to show a pattern of malicious intent on the part of Trump and the others. That raises some serious questions for Turley in this case.
--:-- Jonathan Turley: It's excessive, and I think it's also dangerous. It essentially criminalizes challenges to elections. There's no sort of limiting principle in this document. You know, they are charging things like the president saying publicly we need to have a recount.
--:-- Georgia Howe: According to Cleveland, proving the intent of Trump's alleged criminal enterprise is where Willis' case is weak. She believes Willis is misreading the facts. The fundamental problem is the assumption that there was an agreement by Trump and others who knew he lost the election to nonetheless install him as president. That premise is wrong. There was no agreement because that was not what the plan was. The plan was to challenge the election results and to show that Joe Biden did not win the election.
--:-- Georgia Howe: All right, so what about Team Trump's strategy? Do we know what his legal approach will be in fighting this? We haven't heard much from his attorneys yet, but Trump said on True Social Tuesday that he intends to hold a press conference next week to lay out a, quote, large, complex, detailed, but irrefutable report on the presidential election fraud which took place in Georgia. He said the report will be a complete exoneration of him and everyone else charged in Willis' indictment. So it looks like he's doubling down on his allegations of fraud in Georgia's election.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Right. Well, we'll see what he has in store next week.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Tim, thanks for joining us. Thanks for having me.
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--:-- Georgia Howe: Coming up, Americans rack up record credit card debt. As the country's national deficit continues to skyrocket, another debt crisis is looming, this time in the private sector. As new data shows, Americans are more in debt now than at any point in history. Here are the stunning numbers and how they're impacting the economy as Daily Wire senior editor Cabot Phillips.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: So we've heard a lot about our national debt and for good reason. It now sits at $32 trillion, a $10 trillion increase in just five years. But private debt is a topic that sometimes goes under the radar, despite the fact that it's going to have immense impacts on the future of our economy. According to the Federal Reserve this week for the first time in our nation history American credit card debt blew past a trillion dollars surging billion in the last two years alone and billion in the last quarter alone. That means that American credit card debt is now larger than the GDP of all but 17 countries on earth. It's hard to wrap your head around.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Yeah, truly impossible to do so. What's behind the sudden surge? Well, a lot of times when people think of credit card debt, they assume people are simply buying big ticket items they can't afford and just taking payments down the road. And while reckless spending habits are playing some role here, the reality is that more Americans are being forced into debt just trying to pay off monthly living expenses.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: As inflation has taken hold of the economy over the last two years, the cost of essential goods has exploded. According to a new report from Moody's this month, for example, the average American family now pays $709 more each month for the same goods they were purchasing back in 2021. About $700 a month. Yeah, just in two years' time.
--:-- Georgia Howe: And keep in mind, around 60% of Americans are living paycheck to paycheck, while 54% say they would not be able to cover an unexpected $400 payment. That means it doesn't take much for the average family to go from the black to the red each month.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: All of those numbers become even more concerning, more bad news, when you remember that debt has accumulated over a period of time when Americans have been exempt from paying off student loans. Those payments will come due once more in the fall, and millions of folks won't be ready. A recent Credit Karma survey showed that 56% of Americans say they'll have to choose between paying off student loans or covering essential monthly expenses once those payments resume. So it's about to get even worse.
--:-- Georgia Howe: So pretty ominous there. We saw similar concerning data from elsewhere in the private sector, the corporate side. Tell us more on that front.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Yeah, it's worth noting corporate America has not been immune to the debt crisis either. In the last 12 months, the volume of corporate debt has grown by 6%, hitting $7.8 trillion, which is another record high. As a result of that debt in the private sector, a growing number of large companies are struggling to stay afloat. So far this year, 55 U.S. firms have defaulted on their debt. Last year, that number was 36. That means we are on pace to see triple the number of American companies defaulting compared to last year.
--:-- Georgia Howe: And according to Bank of America, if the U.S. enters a recession in coming years, they project up to a trillion dollars in defaults on corporate debt.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Yeah, about that. What does all of this debt mean for the economy? Well, it is already having a big impact. As conditions have worsened and more Americans are unable to pay off their loans, big banks are responding by cutting off the flow of money through those loans. That's led to a record-breaking credit crunch. Last quarter saw the steepest decline in lending on record. Essentially, banks are simply worried that borrowers won't be able to pay them back. They're responding by keeping more money on hand or moving it to safer sectors of the economy, which ultimately makes loans even more expensive for borrowers. It is a vicious cycle that unfortunately shows no signs of relenting as long as rates remain high and inflation persists.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Okay, but usually I'd say thanks, but it's a lot of bad news. Not a good report. It's Daily Wire senior editor, Cabot Phillips.
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--:-- Georgia Howe: New age verification laws are causing porn sites to cut off customer access in states like Utah, Mississippi, Arkansas, and Virginia. Many parent groups are calling that a victory. Daily Wire culture reporter Megan Basham is here now to tell us more about the legislative battle over online pornography.
--:-- Megan Basham: So, I think the key that they hit on was that people don't want to hand over their identification to porn sites, which is what these new age verification laws require users to do. And they also put fines in place and make it easier for parents to sue. So Louisiana led the way here. And while Republicans were the driving force behind that bill, it was Democrat Governor John Bel Edwards, who signed it. So I think that goes to the bipartisan popularity of these laws. I spoke to sociologist Brad Wilcox. He's the senior fellow at the Institute for Family Studies, and he had a hand in crafting Utah's law. And he says that their polling, which was done with YouGov, shows that parents across the political spectrum really want to see legislators acting on this issue. About 80 percent of Republican, independent and Democratic parents are looking for measures to help them deal with the challenge of technology, including age verification, you know, not just for porn, but also for social media.
--:-- Georgia Howe: So, for a long time, we've thought we can't do anything to really protect our kids from seeing this stuff. But with this new push, we're seeing a porn hub is shutting down operations in states that are passing these laws. And even when not shutting down operations, we've seen dramatic declines in use of their site as well. So this tells us that there are policies that we can push to do a better job of protecting our kids from the scourge of pornography.
--:-- Megan Basham: Now, to his point, six other states have adopted similar laws. Arkansas, Montana, Mississippi, Utah, Virginia, and Texas. And 16 more have similar legislation pending. And I don't think you see that kind of fast-moving wave building unless, one, the issue is very popular, And two, the legislation is clearly effective. So why don't the online porn vendors just comply with the law? Why are they choosing to cut off access completely to these sites?
--:-- Megan Basham: Well, there's a couple of reasons. So a spokesman for Pornhub, which is the most popular of these sites, said it costs them around 65 cents to process age verification. And that's per instance. And she called that effectively business killing, which I think we could generously call a little bit disingenuous, given that the revenues for online porn sites are estimated to be around $97 billion a year. So it seems like it may have been something of an attempt to wage a PR campaign. Now, if so, they also seem to have overestimated the willingness of their customer base to openly lobby for porn access. And I think that they underestimated just how their decision to cut off access might actually embolden parent groups and others who want to see less porn on the Internet.
--:-- Georgia Howe: I can tell you that, you know, just hopping around social media, I have seen people celebrating the news that Pornhub is withdrawing from their states all over. So are these sites going to just give up without a fight? I mean, this seems like a massive profit loss for them to potentially walk away from 20 plus states.
--:-- Megan Basham: You know, right now, the only thing they're doing is that time-honored route of suing. A trade group that represents a number of sites like Pornhub has filed a lawsuit. And it's saying that age verification violates First Amendment free speech rights. And they do have right now the ACLU standing behind them.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Wow. So it seems like this is shockingly effective legislation. Yeah, for once.
--:-- Megan Basham: All right. Well, Megan, thanks so much for reporting. Anytime.
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--:-- Georgia Howe: That's all the time we've got this morning. Thanks for waking up with us. We'll be back this afternoon with more of the news you need to know.
