The Prop 8 trial continues apace. Yesterday afternoon was particularly interesting. From Courage Campaigns trial tracker:
For example, one letter indicated that the LDS church had identified a volunteer for the campaign in every single zip code. This was a church document that was in the hands of a Prop 8 campaign official, and thus was discoverable. Andy Pugno, the general council for ProtectMarriage.com tried his darnedest to get Judge Walker to exclude it, but failed. From Rick’s liveblog:
Pugno: Objects because document will be revealing.
Judge: Not to make light of this, but the reason people want to produce documents is that they are revealing.
Boutrous: It’s from an outsider to the core group. We are attempting to show the level of coordination with groups that Protect Marriage says were not even affiliated with the campaign.
This is perhaps the most explosive bit of all, from a document between the LDS Church and the campaign:
With respect to Prop. 8 campaign, key talking points will come from campaign, but cautious, strategic, not to take the lead so as to provide plausible deniability or respectable distance so as not to show that church is directly involved.
A word to the wise: if you’re actually interesting in maintaining plausible deniability don’t explicitly mention the desire to do so in your e-mails regarding how to keep plausible deniability. This also brings up an interesting point: while the trial is primarily concerned with the constitutionality of Proposition 8 there are a -lot- of peripheral issues at stake here. For example… So what happens to the LDS church’s 501(c)3 status when it’s revealed before the SCOTUS that they provided substantial support towards a legislative cause?
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