--:-- [Theme music fades out]
--:-- Georgia Howe: The NFL is back, and FanDuel's got everything you need to play your game. From same-game parlays to live betting. Right now, new customers bet $5 and get $300 in bonus bets if you win. 21-plus in president select states. 18-plus in Kentucky and Wyoming. Must be first online real money waging. $5 deposit required. Bonus issued is non-withdrawable bonus bets that expire seven days after receipt. Restrictions apply. See full terms at FanDuel.com slash sportsbook. Gambling problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER.
--:-- [Music transitions to a news theme]
--:-- Georgia Howe: Former President Trump's attorneys say securing a $454 million bond is a practical impossibility. The New York attorney general is going to be trying to collect that judgment, could potentially put liens on properties. What options does the former president have and will Trump's real estate assets be seized? I'm Georgia Howe with Daily Wire editor-in-chief John Bickley.
--:-- John Bickley: It's Tuesday, March 19th, and this is Morning Wire.
--:-- Georgia Howe: The Supreme Court heard arguments Monday on a case that pits free speech against disinformation. This isn't about the bully pulpit. This is about a bully and the government really bullying these entities into going along with their view. What effect will the decision have in the run-up to the presidential election? And the speculation surrounding the health of Princess Kate continues to grow. What's the latest on the royal controversy?
--:-- John Bickley: Thanks for listening to Morning Wire. Stay tuned. We have the news you need to know.
--:-- [Music transitions to a commercial break]
--:-- Georgia Howe: And I got to say, it's like running on clouds. They're extremely comfortable. And my once upon a time knee pain is no more. But don't just take my word for it. Use code WIRE for $30 off orders of $150 or more at gdefy.com. That's G-D-E-F-Y.com with promo code WIRE for $30 off your order. Experience the miracle that is GDefy, where comfort meets innovation.
--:-- [Music transitions back to the news theme]
--:-- Georgia Howe: Former President Donald Trump has been unable to make bond after a New York judge leveled a $454 million judgment against him. He has one more week to come up with the money or risk New York Attorney General Letitia James seizing his valuable commercial assets. Here to talk about former President Trump's most pressing financial problem is Daily Wire reporter Tim Pierce.
--:-- Tim Pierce: So, Trump owes nearly half a billion dollars to the state of New York because of this judgment. How's he going to pay it? He may not. Trump's legal team told a court yesterday that Judge Arthur Ingeron's judgment is nearly impossible to pay. Ingeron ordered Trump to pay about $350 million over inflated valuations of his properties that Trump then used to secure favorable loans. With additional interest, the total cost to Trump is more than $450 million.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Since Ingeron delivered the judgment last month, Trump's legal team has contacted about 30 surety companies to make the bond, but none of them would accept real estate as collateral in order to post Trump's bond. And if property isn't an option, Trump doesn't have enough cash, stocks, or other similar assets available.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Now, Trump plans to appeal the judgment, which could mean he only pays a fraction of the total in the end. But in order to make the appeal, Trump needs to prove he has the bond's value in cash, stock, or something similar, and then he must lay those assets aside in an account that the state will take if Ingeron's judgment stands.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Now, it's worth noting that Trump has already put up a roughly million bond in the defamation case brought by E Jean Carroll. And former federal prosecutor Renato Mariotti said on CNN he never seen a judgment even close to this size in a case like this. Essentially, real estate developers refinance properties, sell properties, do what they have to do to get cash.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Now, candidly, I've never been in a case where a real estate developer needed hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of millions. It's only been in the tens of millions, but nonetheless, for those real estate developers, it was a very significant ask, right, to come up with that kind of money. Given what he's already paid, it's not surprising Trump is having trouble coming up with the cash for Engeron.
--:-- Georgia Howe: If that's the case, what are Trump's options? An appellate court could show leniency to Trump enough that he could post a portion of the bond to get to an appeal. An appeals court judge already temporarily loosened some of Engeron's restrictions on Trump, including one that would have blocked Trump from applying for loans in New York.
--:-- Tim Pierce: The case is now in front of a panel of judges for review. Their ruling could come as soon as this week. A recent New York Times analysis found that Trump probably has somewhere close to $350 million in cash. Now, Trump has already posted $92 million for Carroll, but if the Times analysis is accurate, he has some room if the appellate court will let him get away with posting just part of the judgment.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Trump's legal team has asked that he be allowed to post $100 million of the total bond. If that doesn't work out, Trump may be forced into a fire sale of his properties to put up the bond. Now, that would likely be devastating financially. Trump could essentially be forced into selling off properties for a fraction of what they're worth until he has enough money to post bond.
--:-- Tim Pierce: In that case, no matter how the appeals process works out, the former president will likely suffer massive losses.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Sounds like it. So what's the deadline and what's going to happen if he can't hit it? He has to come up with a bond by Monday, March 25th, so next week. If not, New York Attorney General Letitia James has promised to divide up Trump's business empire herself.
--:-- Tim Pierce: If he does not have funds to pay off the judgment, then we will seek, you know, judgment enforcement mechanisms in court and we will ask the judge to seize his assets. Yet another massive financial hit against the former president.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Tim, thanks for reporting.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Thanks for having me.
--:-- Georgia Howe: The Supreme Court on Monday heard oral arguments in Murthy v. Missouri, which has been described as the most important free speech case in our lifetimes. Here to discuss is Daily Wire reporter Amanda Presta-Giacomo.
--:-- Amanda Presta-Giacomo: Yeah, so basically the Supreme Court is deciding on how the government is allowed to interact with social media companies about so-called content moderation or censorship. A lower court found that seven entities in the Biden administration violated the First Amendment by coercing or significantly encouraging social media companies into censorship.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Now, much of the content that was suppressed concerns supposed COVID misinformation that was later proven to be true. There was also the suppression of the Hunter Biden laptop story that was immediately claimed to be Russian disinformation by both the White House and Twitter and other platforms, but later determined to be authentic.
--:-- Amanda Presta-Giacomo: Now, that lower court ruling was appealed by the Biden DOJ to the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, which in September agreed with the lower court and upheld an injunction that limited White House officials and those other government agencies from interacting with these platforms in many cases.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Biden again appealed to the Supreme Court. That injunction was temporarily lifted. And here we are today.
--:-- Amanda Presta-Giacomo: Now, before we go further, we should note that the Daily Wire, along with the Federalist and the state of Texas has filed a similar lawsuit against the State Department. The suit makes specific claims about government attempts to coerce private companies to suppress disfavored speech.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Now, what did we hear during oral arguments? What is each side arguing?
--:-- Amanda Presta-Giacomo: The Biden administration argued that it was merely using its bully pulpits and persuasion with these platforms. They argued that by saying that there was no real threat the plaintiffs could point to. The other side, though, argued that the administration pressured these companies into taking censorship actions by using implicit threats relating to antitrust action or the stripping of Section 230 protections.
--:-- Georgia Howe: There was a standout moment when Justice Samuel Alito referenced that when challenging the administration. And I see that the White House and federal officials are repeatedly saying that Facebook and the federal government should be partners. We're on the same team. Officials are demanding answers. I want an answer. I want it right away. When they're unhappy, they curse them out. There are regular meetings. There is constant pestering of Facebook. And so I thought, you know, the only reason why this is taking place is because the federal government has got Section 230 and antitrust in its pocket. And so it's treating Facebook and these other platforms like their subordinates. Would you do that to the New York Times or the Wall Street Journal or the Associated Press?
--:-- Amanda Presta-Giacomo: Still, though, there did seem to be some skepticism from even the conservative justices about limiting the government's interactions with these platforms. They raised questions about the FBI, for example, flagging threats against public officials or posts that put U.S. troops in harm's way. On the liberal side, it went further than that.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Justice Ketanji Brown-Jackson made waves when she suggested that it was a problem that the First Amendment hamstrings the government's efforts to censor Americans. Some might say that the government actually has a duty to take steps to protect the citizens of this country. And you seem to be suggesting that that duty cannot manifest itself in the government encouraging or even pressuring platforms to take down harmful information. So can you help me? Because I'm really I'm really worried about that.
--:-- Amanda Presta-Giacomo: Overall, did it seem like the court was leaning one way or the other? It's hard to tell. Morning lawyer spoke to author and legal analyst Carrie Savarino about the oral arguments, and she suggested this would be an uphill battle for conservatives. I think this could be a decision that is not as protective of free speech or allows more government interference with free speech than we'd like.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Knowing that at least one of these major entities, that is Twitter slash X, now is more committed to freedom of speech itself and not willing to be bullied by the government. I think that's a huge step forward and is going to make it harder for the government to create a complete lockdown. So we'll see which way the justices end up ruling. Yeah, with major implications for Americans hanging in the balance.
--:-- Amanda Presta-Giacomo: Amanda, thanks for reporting.
--:-- Amanda Presta-Giacomo: You're welcome.
--:-- Georgia Howe: After being out of the public eye for months following surgery, Kate Middleton's well-being has become a matter of widespread speculation. Conspiracy theories reached a fever pitch over the past week after Kensington Palace released a Photoshopped image of the princess. Here with more is Daily Wire culture reporter Megan Basham.
--:-- Megan Basham: So Megan, this went from being a sort of fascinating conspiracy rabbit hole to a very legitimate mainstream mystery. Can you fill us in on the speculation?
--:-- Georgia Howe: Well, you know, I think it started out just kind of as your typical royal watcher gossip. So Kate was scheduled for an abdominal surgery in mid-January, and the palace had announced that she'd be taking a break from royal duties through March, though keep in mind her last public appearance was at Christmas.
--:-- Megan Basham: So some internet rumors grew up out of that. A lot of people wondered why she would need to be out of the public eye for so long. There were questions about why the palace couldn be more specific about her health issues especially given that King Charles announced his cancer diagnosis around that same time.
--:-- Georgia Howe: And then, of course, there's always a natural interest in any departures from normal royal conduct. But I don't think it was something that your average person paid much attention to until the palace decided to release a photo of Kate and her children on Mother's Day, which was March 10th in the UK.
--:-- Megan Basham: So that's when reputable news outlets began to express more interest in Kate's whereabouts because some things in that photo were a little off. And within days, it was confirmed that the photo was in fact manipulated.
--:-- Georgia Howe: So why was it such a big deal if the photo was manipulated? Well, after it had been published, some eagle-eyed internet sleuths noticed some oddities with Charlotte's wrist and George's fingers. Others caught that it looked like the edits were meant to conceal that the kids were in the same outfits the family had been wearing at a charity event way back in 2023.
--:-- Megan Basham: So that led to people speculating that it was actually an amalgamation of photos that had been taken long before Mother's Day. And that understandably led to the question of where is Kate if this wasn't actually a recent photo.
--:-- Georgia Howe: So at that point, the Associated Press and a number of other news agencies like Getty and Reuters took the very rare step of killing the photo. And what that means is they told news outlets that use them as wire services that those outlets should not use the image any longer.
--:-- Megan Basham: The press has extremely strict rules for printing photos. And if there's any sign of tampering, they have to immediately pull them. But what really sent the internet into a frenzy late last week was another photo, a grainy shot of the side of Kate's face in a car with William leaving the palace.
--:-- Georgia Howe: So that photo, which the Daily Mail published on March 11th, does appear to be legitimate, but fans and royal watchers wondered why the princess was turned away, hiding her face rather than acknowledging the press photographers as she usually does.
--:-- Megan Basham: Then over the weekend, The Sun reported that Kate was seen at a local farm stand in Windsor and that she looked, quote, happy and healthy. But bizarrely, no one took any photos at that moment that we know of anyway.
--:-- Georgia Howe: And even stranger, the sun doesn't name the alleged witnesses. Now, TMZ released an exclusive video of her at the farm shop, but amateur sleuths on X immediately had the hashtag NotKate trending.
--:-- Megan Basham: So why doesn't she make a quick appearance just to dispel all of the rumors? Well, that is the big question. Probably the most scandalous theory right now is that Kate and William are in the process of a divorce or going through some marital struggles.
--:-- Georgia Howe: That stems from the as-of-yet unsubstantiated rumor that Prince William has been having an affair with a former friend of Kate's, Rose Hanbury, the Marchioness of Chambly. And then others are saying that they're hearing concerning things about the princess's health, that perhaps the surgery indicated a more serious health crisis.
--:-- Megan Basham: Piers Morgan said he's been hearing alarming things from contacts in the palace, though he didn't elaborate on what exactly they were telling him. But given that this is the lead story in all of the UK papers, it's hard to understand why the palace wouldn't just bring her out momentarily just to end the circus, if nothing else.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Right now, there are some reports that the BBC has been told to be on standby because the palace is going to release some sort of statement in the next few days. But the BBC hasn't confirmed even that.
--:-- Megan Basham: Well, the longer it goes on, the stranger it gets.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Megan, thanks for reporting.
--:-- Megan Basham: Anytime. Thanks for waking up with us. We'll be back this afternoon with more of the news you need to know.
--:-- [Theme music fades in]
