With the dismissal of the two federal cases against him, President-elect Donald Trump has bypassed some of the most serious legal jeopardy he has faced.

He's now assembling a cabinet to carry out his agenda.

On that and other matters shaping the transition, we turn to the analysis of Brooks and Capehart.

That's New York Times columnist David Brooks and Jonathan

Capehart, Associate Editor for The Washington Post. Gentlemen, so nice to see you. Happy Thanksgiving

day after. David, on the dismissal of these federal cases, on the one hand, the election

cast that die. If he's the sitting president, the DOJ says, we don't prosecute a sitting president,

ergo they go away.

On the other hand, all of this evidence as to what went down leading up to January 6th

and the attempt to overthrow that election, all of that evidence of Mar-a-Lago and the classified documents

in the bathrooms and ballrooms, all of that goes away. And I just wonder how that sits with you.

Yeah, I've thought a lot about that this week. You know, I think in general, obviously no person is

above the law. And in my view, if a sitting president has committed a murder,

extortion, some horrible crime like that, then the precedent that we don't prosecute sitting presidents,

that should be overridden. In this particular case, some of the trials, especially in New York and Georgia,

looked a little political.

Donald Trump ran saying they're attacking me with lawfare.

Kamala Harris talked a lot about the trial, so it was right there in the center of the election.

And 75 million Americans decided it wasn't as qualifying.

And to my view, and I understand there's a danger in putting him sort of above the law, but to me the greater danger is that we use trials as political weapons in the years ahead.

So I think on balance, Jack Smith did the right thing. He was sort of forced in that sense. He had no

choice. But you would have said that January 6th should not have been

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