Lawsplainer: Is There Anything Unusual About Judge Curiel’s Orders In The Trump University Case?
Judge Curiel found that plaintiffs had offered admissible evidence creating a genuine dispute about whether Trump “hand-picked” Trump University instructors as he claimed, that they had offered enough evidence to create a dispute about whether Trump was responsible for Trump University advertisements because he reviewed them personally, and that they had offered enough evidence to create a factual dispute about whether plaintiffs relied to their detriment on false representations for which Trump could be held responsible.
.. Look, in the modern political climate I could burn ten thousand words on this and people who support Trump wouldn’t buy it and people who oppose Trump would buy it even if the only word was “dildo.”
.. The point of a class action is to get your individual plaintiffs to represent a huge class of people, so you can prove their individual cases but get damages to cover hundreds or thousands or tens of thousands of people. It’s a huge force multiplier and carries the potential for ruinously gigantic damages
.. Specifically, Judge Curiel ordered that (1) the case would have a separate trial on liability and then a separate trial on damages only if plaintiff prevailed (which defendants generally like because it keeps plaintiffs’ damages sob stories out of trial and keeps the jury from being prejudiced by big damages numbers or by evidence of how much money the defendants have);
.. the best defense (though not necessarily the one that Trump will follow) is that anyone minimally rational would have recognized that all of the Trump University sales patter was puffery, trumpery, and bullshit, the equivalent of saying your coffee shop offers the most amazing coffee in the universe.
.. Trump’s gigantic successes in the Republican primaries demonstrates that many Americans may not share my view that most of what he says is obviously not to be taken seriously.