Good evening once again. I am Stephanie Ruhl and welcome to the midweek nightcap. It is day 262, if you are counting, of the second Trump administration. And today, former FBI director James Comey entered a plea of not guilty in federal court. He was charged with two counts making a false statement and obstruction of a congressional proceeding.

The charges were brought after a public campaign by the president himself to prosecute him and other political opponents.

Writing on Truth Social last month, we cannot delay any longer.

It is killing our reputation and credibility.

They impeached me twice and indicted me five times over nothing. Justice must be served now

with a whole lot of exclamation points. A trial date has been set for January 5th, but Comey's defense

attorney has signaled that he will move to get this case completely dismissed.

With that, I want to bring in our nightcap.

Paul Reikoff is back, founder and CEO of Independent Veterans of America and hosts of the

Independent Americans podcast.

Dave Weigel is here in person, not just remote reporter for semaphore.

Democratic strategist Joel Payne, who we have not seen in ages, is back.

He was also a senior aid for Hillary

for America and press secretary for former Senator Harry Reid. Also with us, Liz Oyer, former

DOJ pardon attorney and federal public defender. Liz, you know I'm starting with you on this topic.

What sticks out to you about this case and what we saw in court today? Fill us in. Most people

here weren't watching all the

nitty gritty. Yeah, there are so many unusual things about this case that it's hard to know where

to start. I'll start with the fact that the lead prosecutor who got this indictment is a very

inexperienced official who has never prosecuted a case before. So she had to bring in a pair of prosecutors from North

Carolina to sit in the courtroom with her and do the talking at today's hearing. These lawyers

are U.S. attorneys, but they don't even work in the Virginia office where this case is being

...