Hello and welcome to Background Briefing, available 247 at background briefing.

I'm me and Masters, and today we'll look into a number of stories and issues in the news.

We'll begin with information emerging that the $175 million bond put up by Don Hanky Jr.,

the bottom-feeding billionaire, who so far has lined Trump's pockets with 400 million,

may have been the result of Trump's lawyers misleading the New York Appeals Court.

Joining us to discuss the ethical duty to present correct information to the court

is Laurie Levinson, who holds the David W. Bircham Chair in Ethical Advocacy

at the Loyola University School of Law.

Prior to joining Loyola Law School, she served for eight years as an assistant United States Attorney in Los Angeles.

She has written widely on criminal law, focusing both on criminal procedure and on the relationship between the law and the media.

Then with Trump's plant in Congress, who outgoing Conservative Republican Congressman Ken Buck refers to as Moscow Marjorie, threatening Speaker Johnson to withhold aid from Ukraine,

we'll examine how adversaries like China and Russia have found a gift in Trump, who divides and weakens America encouraging secession while threatening civil war.

Joining us is Miles Taylor, a national security expert who served as Chief of Staff for Kirsten

Nielsen, the former Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security under the Trump administration,

where he published an anonymous essay in the New York Times, blowing the whistle on presidential

misconduct. He later published the number one national bestseller, a warning,

revealed himself to be the author, and launched a campaign of ex-officials to oppose Donald

Trump's re-election. He worked as an advisor in the George W. Bush administration on Capitol Hill

as a CNN contributor, and is the co-founder of multiple democracy reform groups.

His latest book is Blowback, A Warning to Save Democracy from Trump's Revenge, out today in a new version.

Then finally we'll examine how billionaires who don't pay taxes use their surplus money to buy think tanks and politicians who cut their taxes even further and speak with Michael Gratz, Professor Emeritus at Columbia Law School and EAL Law School.

He is a leading authority on tax politics and policy and served as special counsel and deputy assistant

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