{"id":148858,"date":"2026-04-15T14:23:04","date_gmt":"2026-04-15T22:23:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/2026\/04\/15\/democrats-press-trumps-8th-circuit-pick-on-his-independence\/"},"modified":"2026-04-15T14:23:04","modified_gmt":"2026-04-15T22:23:04","slug":"democrats-press-trumps-8th-circuit-pick-on-his-independence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/2026\/04\/15\/democrats-press-trumps-8th-circuit-pick-on-his-independence\/","title":{"rendered":"Democrats Press Trump&#8217;s 8th Circuit Pick on His Independence"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Justin Smith, an attorney at the boutique firm James Otis Law Group, represented Trump in his failed efforts to overturn a 2023 jury verdict finding him liable for sexually assaulting writer E. Jean Carroll in the 1990s.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" align=\"left\" border=\"0\" height=\"1\" width=\"1\" alt=\"\" hspace=\"0\" src=\"https:\/\/feeds.feedblitz.com\/~\/i\/953856479\/0\/law\/legal-news\" title=\"\"><\/p>\n<div><a title=\"Add to FaceBook\" href=\"https:\/\/feeds.feedblitz.com\/_\/2\/953856479\/law\/legal-news\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" width=\"1080\" decoding=\"async\" height=\"20\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/assets.feedblitz.com\/i\/fbshare20.png?fit=1080%2C20&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"\" title=\"\"><\/a>\u00a0<a title=\"Like on Facebook\" href=\"https:\/\/feeds.feedblitz.com\/_\/28\/953856479\/law\/legal-news\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" width=\"1080\" decoding=\"async\" height=\"20\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/assets.feedblitz.com\/i\/fblike20.png?fit=1080%2C20&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"\" title=\"\"><\/a>\u00a0<a title=\"Pin it!\" href=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/feeds.feedblitz.com\/_\/29\/953856479\/law\/legal-news%2Chttps%3A%2F%2Fk2-prod-alm.s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com%2Fbrightspot%2F38%2F86%2F5b343d6c4b16910d56100ce3d668%2Fjustin-smith-3-jpg767x505.jpg?ssl=1\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" width=\"1080\" decoding=\"async\" height=\"20\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/assets.feedblitz.com\/i\/pinterest20.png?fit=1080%2C20&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"\" title=\"\"><\/a>\u00a0<a title=\"Stumble This\" href=\"https:\/\/feeds.feedblitz.com\/_\/12\/953856479\/law\/legal-news\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" width=\"1080\" decoding=\"async\" height=\"20\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/assets.feedblitz.com\/i\/stumble20.png?fit=1080%2C20&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"\" title=\"\"><\/a>\u00a0<a title=\"Post to X.com\" href=\"https:\/\/feeds.feedblitz.com\/_\/24\/953856479\/law\/legal-news\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" width=\"1080\" decoding=\"async\" height=\"20\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/assets.feedblitz.com\/i\/x.png?fit=1080%2C20&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"\" title=\"\"><\/a>\u00a0<a title=\"Subscribe by RSS\" href=\"https:\/\/feeds.feedblitz.com\/_\/20\/953856479\/law\/legal-news\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" width=\"1080\" decoding=\"async\" height=\"20\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/assets.feedblitz.com\/i\/rss20.png?fit=1080%2C20&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"\" title=\"\"><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0<\/div>\n<p>Justin Smith, an attorney at the boutique firm James Otis Law Group, represented Trump in his failed efforts to overturn a 2023 jury verdict finding him liable for sexually assaulting writer E. Jean Carroll in the 1990s.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" align=\"left\" border=\"0\" height=\"1\" width=\"1\" alt=\"\" hspace=\"0\" src=\"https:\/\/feeds.feedblitz.com\/~\/i\/953856479\/0\/law\/legal-news\" title=\"\"><\/p>\n<div><a title=\"Add to FaceBook\" href=\"https:\/\/feeds.feedblitz.com\/_\/2\/953856479\/law\/legal-news\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" width=\"1080\" decoding=\"async\" height=\"20\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/assets.feedblitz.com\/i\/fbshare20.png?fit=1080%2C20&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"\" title=\"\"><\/a>\u00a0<a title=\"Like on Facebook\" href=\"https:\/\/feeds.feedblitz.com\/_\/28\/953856479\/law\/legal-news\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" width=\"1080\" decoding=\"async\" height=\"20\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/assets.feedblitz.com\/i\/fblike20.png?fit=1080%2C20&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"\" title=\"\"><\/a>\u00a0<a title=\"Pin it!\" href=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/feeds.feedblitz.com\/_\/29\/953856479\/law\/legal-news%2Chttps%3A%2F%2Fk2-prod-alm.s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com%2Fbrightspot%2F38%2F86%2F5b343d6c4b16910d56100ce3d668%2Fjustin-smith-3-jpg767x505.jpg?ssl=1\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" width=\"1080\" decoding=\"async\" height=\"20\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/assets.feedblitz.com\/i\/pinterest20.png?fit=1080%2C20&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"\" title=\"\"><\/a>\u00a0<a title=\"Stumble This\" href=\"https:\/\/feeds.feedblitz.com\/_\/12\/953856479\/law\/legal-news\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" width=\"1080\" decoding=\"async\" height=\"20\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/assets.feedblitz.com\/i\/stumble20.png?fit=1080%2C20&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"\" title=\"\"><\/a>\u00a0<a title=\"Post to X.com\" href=\"https:\/\/feeds.feedblitz.com\/_\/24\/953856479\/law\/legal-news\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" width=\"1080\" decoding=\"async\" height=\"20\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/assets.feedblitz.com\/i\/x.png?fit=1080%2C20&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"\" title=\"\"><\/a>\u00a0<a title=\"Subscribe by RSS\" href=\"https:\/\/feeds.feedblitz.com\/_\/20\/953856479\/law\/legal-news\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" width=\"1080\" decoding=\"async\" height=\"20\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/assets.feedblitz.com\/i\/rss20.png?fit=1080%2C20&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"\" title=\"\"><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Justin Smith, an attorney at the boutique firm James Otis Law Group, represented Trump in his failed efforts to overturn a 2023 jury verdict finding him liable for sexually assaulting writer E. Jean Carroll in the 1990s. \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Justin Smith, an attorney at the boutique firm James Otis Law Group, represented Trump in his failed [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":148859,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-148858","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-law-com"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/xira.com\/p\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/legal-news-mbqDdf.jpg?fit=767%2C505&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/148858","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=148858"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/148858\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/148859"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=148858"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=148858"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=148858"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}