Welcome to the beat, I'm Ari Melber.

Our top story right now is these diverging paths

in accountability for Donald Trump's failed coup

and insurrection.

And that includes some bad news for Trump in the RICO case today where he just lost an effort to

dismiss it a judge rejecting the bizarre legal claim that indicted crimes would be

okay because Trump claims they were his free speech.

Now that's not the actual law.

In fact, plenty of crimes may include people talking,

but the First Amendment does not protect words

used for blatant criminal conduct, fraud, imminent threats as the judge reminded

Trump's lawyers.

Now that new ruling against Trump and that coup case along with the other cases against

Trump and the Jan six plotters does show how on one path in the courts

there are tough prosecutions and punishment for the coup.

It's a court process that has escalated over time after the DOJ was initially slow to go up the line in these cases.

You can come back to me. That's not the right.

Yeah. I'll show you that headline in a few minutes, but what I want to explain is initially you had all of the efforts around Jan 6 slowed down and delayed. They didn't even open an inquiry into the

role of the leader and beneficiary of the plots to overthrow the election,

Donald Trump, the election loser, for over a year. That was until Jack Smith took over.

When Jack Smith took over the DOJ,

then you had of course an acceleration of that process.

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