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30 Aug

Legal AF 8/30/2026

The award winning Legal AF Pod helmed by founders Ben Meiselas and Popok keep you informed with riveting commentary about Trump’s illegal oil scheme and Canada successful “kiss our ass” strategy; Trump’s continued efforts to cover up the USS Abraham Lincoln scandal and destroy the independence of the historic Stars and Stripes media outlet; a federal judge standing between the Kennedy Center and a midnight demolition; Katie Phang’s crusading lawsuit against Blanche and the DOJ about the Epstein Documents paying dividends again; a Massachusetts federal judge blocking Trump’s latest attempt to screw with Mail in Ballots using the Postal service; a senior status federal judge denying Trump’s efforts to absolve himself of the 34 felony convictions for paying off a porn star to win an election, and so much more at the intersection of law and politics. Support Our Sponsors: Nobl: Don’t miss NOBL’s biggest Sale of the Year! Head to https://NOBLTravel.com for up to 62% off your entire order! #NOBL #ad Spring Sleep: Thanks to today’s sponsor, Spring Sleep: eXciteOSA is an FDA-cleared, prescription-only device for primary snoring and mild obstructive sleep apnea. Go to https://springsleep.com/legalaf and unlock 20% off with the code LEGALAF Jiyu Skin Care: The Korean skincare brand everyone is talking about. Our listeners get 20% off their entire order by using code LEGALAF at https://Jiyuskin.com #JiYu #ad Magic Spoon: Save $5 OFF your next order when you go to http://magicspoon.com/LEGALAF Become a member of Legal AF YouTube community: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCJgZJZZbnLFPr5GJdCuIwpA/join Learn more about the Popok Firm: https://thepopokfirm.com Subscribe to Legal AF Substack: https://michaelpopok.substack.com/subscribe?coupon=2179cd85 Remember to subscribe to ALL the MeidasTouch Network Podcasts: MeidasTouch: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/meidastouch-podcast Legal AF: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/legal-af Sidebar with Katie Phang: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/sidebar-with-katie-phang/id1886801652 The Parnas Perspective: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-parnas-perspective/id1869165949 The Intersection with Michael Popok: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-intersection-with-michael-popok/id1818863274 MissTrial: https://meidasnews.com/tag/miss-trial The PoliticsGirl Podcast: a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow" ...
31 Aug

Carlos Castaneda's Cult of Witches with Ru Marshall: Fooling Millions and UC Press still sells his books as anthropology

Carlos Castaneda sold more than 10 million books to readers who thought they were buying anthropology. Real fieldwork. A real Yaqui shaman named Don Juan, teaching a real Westerner how to see. None of it happened. Castaneda made it up, and for years almost nobody in the press called him on it. I read all of those books as a teenager. Grew up on them, the way a lot of people my age did, right alongside Kung Fu reruns and books about Gurdjieff my neighbor suggested I read. So, when I heard that Ru Marshall, a nonbinary writer and artist I met years ago at a cult conference, had just published a full biography of the man, I wanted them on the podcast immediately. The book is called American Trickster: The Hidden Lives of Carlos Castaneda, and it took Marshall almost twenty years to write it. Here's the part most casual fans never learn. While Castaneda was cranking out sequels, he was also running an actual cult, a small group of women out of a house in Westwood that he called his witches. That story ends with human remains found in Death Valley. This is a fascinating discussion and will be thought provoking for sure.
6 days ago

Trump and Blanche Sweat as New Document Reveals Quid Pro Quo Behind Maxwell’s Cushy Prison Transfer

Popok reports on the newly released Bureau of Prisons form that shows the causal link between AG Todd Blanche's interview of Ghislane Maxwell and her transfer to the cushy confines of a prison "camp" giving her more access to young woman than before, in exchanbe for her favorable testimony vouching for Trump Subscribe: https://www.youtube.com/@LegalAFMTN?sub_confirmation=1 Become a member of Legal AF YouTube community: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCJgZJZZbnLFPr5GJdCuIwpA/join Become a member of the Legal AF Substack: https://michaelpopok.substack.com/20off Follow Legal AF on Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/legalafmtn.bsky.social Follow Michael Popok on Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/mspopok.bsky.social Subscribe to the Legal AF podcast feed here: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/legal-af-by-meidastouch/id1580828595 Subscribe to the Intersection with Michael Popok podcast feed here: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-intersection-with-michael-popok/id1818863274 Subscribe to Unprecedented with Michael Popok and Dina Doll podcast feed here: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/unprecedented-by-legal-af/id1867023089 Subscribe to Court of History with Sidney Blumenthal and Sean Wilentz podcast feed here: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-court-of-history/id1867022920
17 Aug

Escaping the Moonies, and Rebuilding his Life: Ingo Michehl gave the cult his flute, his country, and six years of his life

Ingo Michehl spent six and a half years as one of the Moonies' most productive fundraisers, selling laser-etched foil pictures out of a Ford Transit van at a twenty-fold markup, sleeping five hours a night, and believing every dollar liberated God's suffering heart. Recruited off a San Francisco street corner at nineteen while visiting America from Germany, he came out the other side with a master's in counseling psychology and a career helping people leave high-control groups, playing music, traveling and working on his dream to make a film that is educational about cult mind control and liberation. LIke Ingo, I too was deceptively recruited by this Korean cult that still has great wealth and influence, including in world politics. He exited when a Chistian shared information with him that contradicted his beliefs in the Moonie ideology of the “Divine Principle.” Ingo was liberated from a mind control cult by a stranger who cared and warmly interacted with him and encouraged him to think for himself. This episode is valuable as so many people are beginning to wake up from their own information silos.
24 Aug

The Problems with America's Family Courts with Karen Winner: A journalist turned lawyer on custody, cronyism, and courts without oversight

A family court judge can reach into your family, single you out by name, and rearrange your life by dinnertime: where your child sleeps tonight, whether you're allowed to see them, whether you're even permitted to raise a concern about your spouse. Karen Winner told me that in the opening minutes of our conversation, and it's the line I keep coming back to. Winner is a journalist turned attorney and the author of Divorced from Justice: The Abuse of Women and Children by Divorce Lawyers and Judges, a book that started as a government investigation and became one of the few serious accountings of how family court actually operates in this country. Winner's path into this work began at the New York City Department of Consumer Affairs, where she investigated financial abuse of women by their own divorce attorneys under commissioner Mark Green. Three women brought her their stories, including Monica Getz, the ex-wife of saxophonist Stan Getz, and Peggy Hammond, ex-wife of blues musician John Hammond Jr. Winner went on to interview roughly a hundred people inside the system, insiders included. One judge pulled her aside in an empty courtroom to whisper how the wealthy get exploited by their own lawyers. The resulting report led to New York's Statement of Client's Rights, one of the first consumer protections written specifically for divorce clients, and still law today. What struck me most was Winner's explanation of judicial discretion. Family court judges, she said, "operate without any checks and balances." They decide behind closed doors, rarely have to explain their reasoning, and face almost no outside scrutiny because the whole apparatus runs at the state level. Custody evaluations compound the problem. Courts routinely appoint psychologists to assess parents, but "there's nobody reviewing the reviewers." Their reports are often sealed from the public and, astonishingly, from the parents whose children's futures depend on them. "It's not fair," Winner said. "It's not democratic. It's Kafka." A small, favored pool of evaluators gets reused case after case, regardless of credentials, because judges default to whoever they already know. That is the same undue influence dynamic I study in destructive cults: a closed information environment where the people affected by a decision have no way to question the process that produced it. When Bandy Lee joined me on this podcast, she described family courts as functioning like "a mini cult," advancing a false narrative that protects the wrong parent while the public stays in the dark.
10 Aug

Escaping Shincheonji, Korea's Covid Cult with Chris Vishoot: A survivor of the Korean doomsday cult on lies, waking up and helping others break free.

Shincheonji recruits through what looks like an ordinary Bible study, and most people who walk through the door have no idea that it is a destructive cult. Chris Vishoot found out only after three and a half years as a devoted member. In 2018, a woman he met on a dating app invited him to what she called an innocent class on scripture. Within a year he was driving an hour each way to an unmarked building in Seattle, sleeping three to four hours a night, and reporting on Bible study students he had once sat beside as a recruit himself. Chris grew up in a Christian household that expected the world to end at any moment. He graduated from the University of Washington with two engineering degrees, and by his mid-twenties he found himself asking a familiar question: is this all there is to life? Two friends had died young, and Chris, an agnostic at the time, was searching for something bigger. That search is exactly what recruiters for the group are trained to find and use. Chris is now one of the more credible Christian ex-Shincheonji voices in the country. He runs Bible Vaccine Center, helps moderate the r/shincheonji subreddit for former members, and works with pastors whose congregations have been infiltrated by recruiters posing as ordinary Christians. In this internationally criticized group, we talked about how he got in, how he got out, and why he now helps other people leave the same group.
19 Aug

Judge Signals Major Epstein Reckoning for Trump

Is DC Fed Judge Sullivan on the verge of granting summary judgment to Katie Phang in her case against AG Blanche and order not only the production of MILLIONS of unseen Epstein documents including those tied to Trump but as importantly assign a former federal judge to serve as special master to review the DOJ’s prior production and ensure the millions of documents are produced properly this time around. Popok, with some insider knowledge from Katie’s lawyer Brendan Ballou, thinks that is exactly what is going to happen next! Smart Credit: Head to https://smartcredit.com/legalaf and start your 7-day trial for just $1. Subscribe: @LegalAFMTN Pre-order the new book from MeidasTouch, WTF America?!: The Way Out of This Hell and Back to Democracy, today: https://bit.ly/wtfamericayoutube Visit https://meidasplus.com for more! Remember to subscribe to ALL the MeidasTouch Network Podcasts: MeidasTouch: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/meidastouch-podcast Legal AF: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/legal-af MissTrial: https://meidasnews.com/tag/miss-trial The PoliticsGirl Podcast: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-politicsgirl-podcast Cult Conversations: The Influence Continuum with Dr. Steve Hassan: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-influence-continuum-with-dr-steven-hassan The Weekend Show: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-weekend-show The Ken Harbaugh Show: https://meidasnews.com/tag/the-ken-harbaugh-show Majority 54: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/majority-54 On Democracy with FP Wellman: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/on-democracy-with-fpwellman Uncovered: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/maga-uncovered
18 Aug

Trump Faces Legal Disaster as His Own Words Are Used Against Him in New Lawsuit

Popok reports on the Breaking News, that ABC, threatened with the loss of its 8 tv station licenses by Trump in retaliation for their coverage of him, have finally found their backbone and sued the Trump Administration first! Subscribe: https://www.youtube.com/@LegalAFMTN?sub_confirmation=1 Become a member of Legal AF YouTube community: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCJgZJZZbnLFPr5GJdCuIwpA/join Become a member of the Legal AF Substack: https://michaelpopok.substack.com/20off Follow Legal AF on Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/legalafmtn.bsky.social Follow Michael Popok on Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/mspopok.bsky.social Subscribe to the Legal AF podcast feed here: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/legal-af-by-meidastouch/id1580828595 Subscribe to the Intersection with Michael Popok podcast feed here: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-intersection-with-michael-popok/id1818863274 Subscribe to Unprecedented with Michael Popok and Dina Doll podcast feed here: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/unprecedented-by-legal-af/id1867023089 Subscribe to Court of History with Sidney Blumenthal and Sean Wilentz podcast feed here: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-court-of-history/id1867022920
3 Aug

The World Mission Society Church of God (WMSCOG) with Anthony Forte: A decade inside the Korean doomsday cult WMSCOG, an arranged marriage, and the exit that followed

Anthony Forte spent more than ten years inside the World Mission Society Church of God, rising from a new recruit stopped on a Queens, NY, sidewalk to a leader who trained others to recruit the way he had been recruited. He joined at 25, during a stretch of his life when he felt behind everyone around him. He stayed through an arranged marriage. He left only after the research he did during the pandemic exposed cracks in a doctrine he had built a decade of his life on. The World Mission Society Church of God, known to researchers in this field as WMSCOG, teaches that Ahn Sahng-hong, a Korean man who died in 1985, was the second coming of Christ, and Zahng Gil-jah is “God the Mother,” a living deity based in South Korea. Members are told they must accept both figures, keep the Sabbath and Passover, tithe, and recruit new members to earn a place in heaven. Anthony rose through recruiting and teaching, eventually overseeing a team of members, before he found his way out. A year into membership, leaders promoted Anthony to team leader and turned the conversation toward marriage. His pastor pushed him toward a Korean member who would need a visa sponsor, framing marriage as a path to greater blessings. The wedding took place in October 2012; the same year the group had told members would mark the end of the world. “I only have two more months on Earth anyway,” Anthony remembered thinking. “Might as well do this big action and please God, so I have a better chance to get into heaven.” He and his wife communicated mostly by text for quite some time, since she spoke little English. “It was very difficult,” he told me, “to marry a stranger.” This is a very insightful interview and of great interest to folks who themselves with involved with a Bible group that claimed to have the “Truth.”
27 Jul

6,000 Images and No Idea It Was a Crime: Clinical psychologist Dr. Mary Riggs Cohen on why autistic people become both the victims and the unwitting offenders of the online world

A person on the autism spectrum leaves a file-sharing program running overnight because they want cartoons or anime. By morning, thousands of images have downloaded onto their hard drive, some of them child sexual abuse material they never chose and, in some cases, never even opened. Months later, the FBI is at the door. A judge stares at the download count and asks how anyone could not understand what they were doing. My guest Dr. Mary Riggs Cohen, spends her working life answering that question in courtrooms across the country. She is a clinical psychologist with thirty years specializing in autism spectrum disorders and has conducted forensic evaluations of autistic defendants since 2009. Her new book, co-written with defense attorney Elizabeth Kelley and digital forensics expert Michele Bush, is Cybercrime and the Autism Spectrum: How the Online World Creates Victims and Offenders. I met Dr. Cohen at the International Academy of Law and Mental Health Congress in Montreal, and I asked her on the show the moment her presentation ended, because so much of what she described maps directly onto the recruitment tactics I have studied for five decades. Dr. Cohen's first point cuts against the instinct to sort people into predators and prey. “Most people on the spectrum are both victimized and offenders at some point,” she told me. Cyberbullying, financial scams, and sexual exploitation run in one direction. Chat rooms that ask for “a picture of a child in your family” run in the other, quietly moving an autistic person into possession of CSAM they may never have sought out. Child sexual abuse material (CSAM) is not “child pornography.” It’s evidence of child sexual abuse—and it’s a crime to create distribute or possess. CSAM includes both real and synthetic content such as images created with artificial intelligence tools. Because many autistic individuals catalog and organize obsessively, agents who search a seized computer often find the material sorted into folders, which reads to an outsider as intent rather than what it frequently is: a hyperfocus trait turned against the person who has it. This is a justice issue and more people need to learn, please.

Ben, Brett and Jordy Meiselas are three brothers with very unique backgrounds! Ben is a top lawyer and Colin Kaepernick’s business partner. Brett is a two-time Emmy award winning video editor from the world of film and television. Jordy, the fan favorite, was an award-winning advertising executive in New York. The brothers' unique approach at covering news by combining hilarious brother banter with an unapologetic support of democracy has earned them millions of supporters in America and across the globe and made them social media icons. The MeidasTouch Podcast combines brotherly love, comedy, news coverage, and deep discussions about supporting our democracy and is the go-to destination for top political leaders who view the podcast as a pivotal stop for their interviews. Join the Meiselas brothers and their loyal following — the self-described MeidasMighty — with new episodes featuring all three brothers released every Tuesday and Friday morning, and breaking news updates every single day! Catch the MeidasTouch Podcast with the brothers LIVE on video every Monday and Thursday night at 8p ET/5p PT on the MeidasTouch YouTube channel!

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Ad-free episodes + exclusive bonus podcasts

Legal AF 8/30/2026

Carlos Castaneda's Cult of Witches with Ru Marshall: Fooling Millions and UC Press still sells his books as anthropology

Trump and Blanche Sweat as New Document Reveals Quid Pro Quo Behind Maxwell’s Cushy Prison Transfer

Escaping the Moonies, and Rebuilding his Life: Ingo Michehl gave the cult his flute, his country, and six years of his life

The Problems with America's Family Courts with Karen Winner: A journalist turned lawyer on custody, cronyism, and courts without oversight

Escaping Shincheonji, Korea's Covid Cult with Chris Vishoot: A survivor of the Korean doomsday cult on lies, waking up and helping others break free.

Judge Signals Major Epstein Reckoning for Trump

Trump Faces Legal Disaster as His Own Words Are Used Against Him in New Lawsuit

The World Mission Society Church of God (WMSCOG) with Anthony Forte: A decade inside the Korean doomsday cult WMSCOG, an arranged marriage, and the exit that followed

6,000 Images and No Idea It Was a Crime: Clinical psychologist Dr. Mary Riggs Cohen on why autistic people become both the victims and the unwitting offenders of the online world

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