Would it be summer on Martha’s Vineyard if defense attorney Alan Dershowitz wasn’t publicly complaining about how he’s treated in Chilmark? This time Dershowitz says he was confronted by fellow Chilmark resident Larry David about his defense of former President Donald Trump and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.
The dustup was first reported by the New York Post’s Page Six, the tabloid’s celebrity-filled gossip column.
Reached by The Times, Dershowitz confirmed the incident: “I was innocently having a cup of coffee on the Chilmark Store porch, and he starts screaming and yelling that I was disgusting because I patted Mike Pompeo on the shoulder.”
Dershowitz said he worked with Pompeo on the Palestine-Israel peace talks, the Abraham accords, and that Pompeo is a former student at Harvard Law School: “I admire Mike Pompeo. I don’t apologize for that.”
The Times has not been able to has not been able to contact Larry David.
Dershowitz defended his work for Trump, saying that it’s about the Constitution, not politics. He reiterated his claims that he voted for Hillary Clinton, Joe Biden, and said he also defended former President Bill Clinton.
“My first trip to Martha’s Vineyard was to help defend Ted Kennedy,” he said, referring to the U.S. senator’s crash at Chappaquiddick that killed Mary Jo Kopechne in 1969. “I have a long history of defending Democrats, but in this case I was defending the Constitution. The Democrats were abusing the Constitution. I defended Donald Trump, and I’m proud of that.”
Larry David is entitled to his opinion, Dershowitz said, but he felt attacked. “Larry might not like it, but we can discuss it. Instead he just yelled and screamed at me in front of everybody. It’s pretty, pretty, pretty sad.”
The scene as it was portrayed by Dershowitz and in the Page 6 piece sounded like a script from David’s popular HBO series, “Curb Your Enthusiasm,” where a gruff David goes on a rant. “I think he confused himself with his character,” Dershowitz said.
Three years ago, Dershowitz famously claimed he was being shunned from the Chilmark social scene as a result of defending Trump. He says the situation has gotten worse, but only in that one Island town. “I had lunch on the [Chilmark Store] porch with a friend, and that day, six people called him and said, ‘Don’t you dare have lunch with Alan Dershowitz. Why are you having lunch with Alan Dershowitz?’” He said the friend told him he was worried he would get shunned.
Dershowitz claims there’s a “cabal” that now targets him and his wife, Carolyn. He claims that despite being a prolific book writer, he can’t get a gig on the Vineyard to speak. “I’ve written 48 books. Since I defended Trump, I haven’t been invited to speak,” he said.
Despite being a media-savvy attorney, Dershowitz said, he doesn’t know who alerted the Post to the altercation: “I didn’t tell anyone. I just told my wife.”
As for his wife, Dershowitz said, this continues to be toughest on her: “My wife didn’t agree with me defending Trump. The cabal has decided they couldn’t deal with her either.”
Dershowitz claims that Larry David’s ex-wife, Laurie David, is behind the shunning of his wife. “She said she saw my wife laugh at a joke Trump told,” Dershowitz said. “I looked back at the tape. She didn’t laugh. She just smiled.”
Laurie David did not immediately respond to an email seeking comment or message left on her cell phone.
Dershowitz said he’s had to defend himself for years — for defending O.J. Simpson, Mike Tyson, and now Trump. “It’s been much worse for her than me,” he said of his wife. “I have thick skin. I’m used to this.”
Asked if his association with Jeffrey Epstein has anything to do with how people feel about him, Dershowitz said, “No, no, no. The whole community was supportive of me on the Epstein thing. Nothing about Epstien has come up. It’s all Trump — 100 percent Trump. The people here, even if they hate me, know me, and know I’ve been totally faithful to my wife, and they know I’ve disproved all the charges and I was just Epstein’s lawyer. Not a single person has mentioned that. Even people who have opposed me on Trump have overtly supported me on the Epstein matter.”
Dershowitz has sued Netflix over the portrayal of his relationship with Epstein. The streaming service is reportedly countersuing Dershowitz.
Dershowitz claims he and his wife face a modern-day McCarthyism on the Vineyard. Ironic, he said, because the likes of Island resident Lillian Hellman faced that back in the day: “But now the hard left is engaged in their own brand of McCarthyism and blaming the lawyer for his client.”
Has any of this made him think twice about living on the Vineyard? Dershowitz says he’s been coming to the Island for 53 years, and will continue to live here.
“It’s made my wife think twice. I have friends who have invited me to move to Edgartown; invited me to move to Nantucket, and invited me to move to the Hamptons,” he said. “I won’t be pushed out. They’ll leave before I do. They’re transients. I’ve spent the plast 18 months here. I’m not going to let a bunch of left-wing McCarthyites chase me away.”
Dershowitz…perpetual victim according to Dershowitz. Dude, your actions have consequences. Get over yourself.
He stands for the Constitution…everyone seems to forget that’s how our government is guided. Not by so 1%’er with a big mouth
As with nearly everything else, Dershowitz’s overweening arrogance and self-regard peremptorily dismiss competing Constitutional interpretations and moral perspectives, especially better-wrought ones that discomfit his supreme, recalcitrant ego.
Love it! That dirtbag deserves it!
I disagree with Alans defense of certain bad characters. When you assist a bad character you just give them more to harm others. Alan enables these bad characters to continue without changing. Color it any way you want but Alan you simply desire notoriety.
I think Mr. David and Mr. Dershowitz both have a propensity to believe that any publicity is good publicity. I don’t think that’s necessarily true on the porch of the Chilmark Store, but then I live in Oak Bluffs, so I’m sure I can’t grasp the intricacies of being shunned, or even screamed at in public. Nor can most people in Chilmark, I’m guessing. Not a news story, MVT -just my opinion. Let’s let off-Island celebrity mags carry this water, take a deep breath and try to get through the rest of this summer.
Amen, Sara! Not newsworthy and most people don’t care.
Larry: Don’t leave the Island. You are one of the smartest, objective, honest, truthful people I have listened to. I don’t know you, but I have listened. If this island had your manners in a presentation and intellectual capacity, we would be a better place in thinking with factualism and honesty. I believe you do not have an ego problem, which is present in our Government today, and causing a situation I really don’t understand, both locally and nationally. Economically and legally, the US is changing in a manner I have not seen before, and we need leaders not seeking only power and wealth.
Dershowitz. You deserve it all. Thanks Larry. I wish I was there.
I dont agree with Dershowitz on most things but he is stalwart in defense of certain principles no matter who they emanate from. He is a man of integrity and conviction. He is incorrect on the McCarthyite claims. The Venona Papers released by the Soviets when the wall came down completely support the claims of Communists in the State Department underminding our country. Harry Dexter White, Alger Hiss, The Rosenbergs (yes Jackie) and numerous others.
Excuse me, are you saying that McCartyism was somehow justified because there were a few spies? Senator McCarthy was a power-mad huckster concocting fabrications as an excuse to persecute anybody even slightly to the left. He performed a political pogrom that was transparently in bad faith and was gladly accepted by a conservative electorate eager to believe absolutely anything bad about their opposition. If this is not your contention then I apologize, but I look forward to the day in the not so distant future when all of the people scared of the Soviets under their bed are no longer in a position to air their views.
Ms Anderson. Respectfully, I am a soviet refugee and have no axe to grind on this one. If you studied the Venona papers you would see that the espionage carried on by the Soviets included hundreds of code named individuals who served in our government in various capacities to undermine the US. The Venona papers documented tha the Roosevelt and Truman governments were rife with soviet spies who reported directly to the Soviet Union. It was not a few commies under the bed. Alger Hiss would have been the Sec of State under Truman had he not been outed by Whittaker Chambers as a spy for the Soviets. Mc Carthy used unsavory tactics but he has largely been vindicated not for the the tactics but for the veracity of his claims. As for being scared of the Soviets, ones reading of history would show the 40 million or so brutally killed by bullet or starvation or pogrom during Stalins days and even later under Kruschev.
Firstly, and again with respect, you are a refugee from the political entity that was targeted by these witch hunts. Of course you have an axe to grind; if you had not, you would have remained. You might want to interrogate your own objectivity.
Secondly, a prolonged espionage campaign between two world powers does not and cannot vindicate McCarthy, a shameless power grabber and drunk, whose baseless accusations were so widespread that they could not help but nab the odd spy or informant, here and there. Really, the only parallel was the political purge perpetrated by the other Joseph –Stalin, himself.
Third, and purely in defense of History: there were famines under the Tsars, before the Soviets took over. And there were famines after. Viewed from nearly a century in hindsight, combining the two when slandering the Soviet system of government seems, in two words, suspiciously convenient. As does justifying the actions of a drunken conspiracy monger in the fifties with
the Holodomor, which ended in 1933. Apples, oranges, and lies.
Ms Anderson, believe what you will. The Venona project was a counterintelligence effort on the part of the US to determine Soviet spying. That project and its findings was affirmed by the Russians after the Soviet Union fell under Gorbachev. The Venona named the names of the spies in our State Department and in other parts of the US government and the list is lengthy. You could look it up. I dont think you want it to be true but it is true. Your senstivity to ”slandering the soviet union” is telling. They deserve to be slandered, Never was there such historical slaughter. Hitlers actions pale by comparison. Mao is a close second.
Do what’s next? You don’t like my taste in music so I shouldn’t go out in public. This is worst than middle school. If people can’t be mature enough to treat EVERYONE with respect maybe they are the ones who should stay home. What happened to this being a place of inclusion.
“inclusion” is a joke. It was an angenda pushed by the Dems to trick sheep into following. I’m by no means a Trump supporter but the Harris administration has pulled the wool over many eyes.
Toni– that respect stuff went out the door on day one of the 2016 campaign when trump took the spotlight. He insulted, ridiculed, mocked and lied about anyone and everyone who dared to say anything he didn’t like. The party of “family values” revealed their true selves and elected the rudest, most obnoxious lying dirtbag to ever run for president.
Then they spent 4 years cheering him on every time he showed disrespect and utter contempt for anyone but his sycophantic enablers. Just think of all the derogatory nicknames he came up with.
Now they assault teachers and threaten school board members for trying to keep school kids safe from a deadly virus. Where was the respect for the “thin blue line” when they stormed the capitol ?
Aretha Franklin is dead, and so is respect —
trump supporters deserve none of it, as they have spent 5 years doing their best to squash anything that even hinted at respect, compassion and maturity.
Alan has a very nice basement , I am sure– He can hide there if he doesn’t like being publicly confronted for his very public opinions.
Toni, why would you think that people should get a pass on political views that quite literally result in loss of human life? It is not the same thing as bad taste. Political decisions have consequences of the utmost importance for all of us, and Americans have a long, storied history of confronting our political foes in the public square.
Poor Dersh. Always the self-proclaimed victim of “McCarthyism” when anyone dares to call him out for being the great defender of depraved men who victimize women. I guess freedom of speech only applies to folks who shower him with the adulation he so desperately craves.
Yeah: who does that sound like?
The real reason Dershowitz won’t leave is he enjoys parading around Lucy Vincent Beach with his clothes off
OMG . I hope that small children don’t see the ugliness of horrible looking Dershowitz clothed or nude. They’d be scarred for life!
I’d be traumatized as an adult.
Nude might rhyme with pulchritude, but not imply it in farbissina punim Dershowitz’s case, especially with respect to his moral character.
Alan– as they said back in the 60’s to the Viet Nam war protestors ” America. love it or leave it”
If you don’t love Chilmark. and Chilmark doesn’t love you , You have options–
Couple of altacockers. 🥸
George, do you not know this common Yiddish expression? It’s used to describe old men as “old farts”. I know I’ve seen the word “fart” on here!
Dear Alan: These idiots are just part of the so-called idiotic “Woke” culture — bigoted idiots and who have not accomplished one meaningful thing in life. Alan: come on over to Edgartown and I’ll be happy to have you as my guest with some other open-minded people that you con’t seem to find in the so-called (hahahaha) “liberal” (hahahahaha) up-island!
I wonder what these same people think now of Biden and Afghanistan’s women and children and friends that we have deserted? Just listen to the foreign press about this hideous debacle!
Come on, now, Jane. You bragged on here that you were boycotting an Edgartown bank for its Black Lives Matter sign. I don’t think Dershowitz is into that mindset. He just likes to kvetch here in Chilmark.
Alan, poor boy! Suck it up and stop whining! You have brought this upon yourself. This is part of the price one pays for narcissism and attention seeking. Your days of so called legal stardom are well past you. You and your buddy, Trumphole are nothing but losers! Perhaps it’s not a bad idea to move to Nantucket, more Trumphole nipples to suck on, like Coach Belichick whose reputation is spiraling down to loser as well.
Dersh and Larry hang out at the Chilmark Store. Just one more reason to avoid that place. I wish the both of them would find some other island to infest.
This is just another reason why I’m leaving after 40 years. When I first washed ashore here in 1981, there were plenty of celebraties on island. And they were here because they wanted to be left alone. And we left them alone. Now we are bombarded with stories of two old has beens trying to stay relivant arguing on the porch of an over priced convenience store and an unfunny comedian kneeling at Beetlbung Corner.
Poor Martha….
I’m no legal scholar but I’m betting that porch-squabbling and soiree-shun jobs are protected activities. Regardless of your political inclinations, the fact that AD would take up the defense of DT despite his wife’s alleged concerns speaks volumes of the true “character” of this man. If family doesn’t come 1st, it’s gotta be all about you…..
When I come to MV all I want to do is escape for 1 week of time that I have saved up all year for to be able to rent a week of peace and beauty. I don’t care what celebrities are here but I do care when they intrude upon my peace. If you need to confront each other, take it to one of your secluded homes on the Island. All I want is to have a muffin and coffee from the CGS in peace for 15 minutes. You don’t have the right to take my hard earned serenity away from me by your bad behavior.
Actually, Sue– we do have the right to non violently confront people in public places.
The concept of civil discourse and respect has been thoroughly exorcised by trump supporting bone heads over the last 5 years.
Sorry you let that conversation ruin your vacation.
I hear they are very respectful of everyone in Texas.
Who gives a rats arse?
Where the hell did I put my tiny violin?
MV, where free speech comes to die.
Our right to free speech is freedom from government repression, not freedom from the criticism of our fellow citizens or the consequences at our jobs. This is very simple to understand if you actually read the constitution, but the ignorant always scuttle back to this old chestnut anytime their despicable views sow what they reap.
Alan Dershowitz conflates narcissism with iconoclasm in trying to rebrand the island idyll Martha’s Whineyard. Well, he’s certainly iconic, in the most rebarbative way!
I guess it was too much to think Dershovitz would have considered representing the interests of Mary Jo Kopechne? Much better ($$$, cha-ching!) to pucker up to the Kennedy posterior, a can’t miss target.
Some great comments and the usual characters are following the usual lines of defending their own. Everyone hates a lawyer until they need one. Larry and the loony left have lost their minds and think their opinion is the only one that counts and if you don’t agree with them there’s something wrong with you. I bet they still think Biden is doing a great job for this country and every day another disaster by this administration.
Yes, Bob, for Trump shared psychotic delusionals, gaslighting is as real as phlogiston was during the 18th Century.
So, it’s the Constitution , stupid.? And how committed was Dershowitz to the Constitutional rights of young women who were trafficked and abused by Epstein even after the deplorable
sentencing deal he worked out for Epstein (home “confinement” during evening and nighttime)
while continuing to work out of an office?. Raping a child is in most cases punishable 40 years to life. Epstein got his money’s worth with Dershowitz.
It’s always amazing to me how islanders can viciously attack just about anybody and everybody that they don’t agree with. It seems to me that the abuse originates from two basic island groups: (1)”Elitists” either swollen head celebrities or wealthy New York type summer (only)residents (you know, Yacht Club types) Or (2) commoner, usually undereducated, wash-a shore types that formed cliques of similar thinking people. Usually these types had (have) no factual basis for their sheep herd like opinions and rants.
The Dershowitz/David comedy is a perfect example. The island elites trample Dershowitz because the longstanding “liberal” does not fit their narrative on some issues and events. My way or the highway type of thinking. The undereducated sheep just follow the herd and blend in as to avoid self embarrassment of not knowing much about what they espouse. The letters to the Times overwhelmingly seem to trash Dershowitz and praise Larry David. The Elites don’t seem to care anymore that Dershowitz is and has been our country’s pre-eminent constitutional lawyer for many decades. The sheep don’t recognize the importance of how many of Americas’ finest lawyers have been trained by Professor Dershowitz while at Harvard Law School for so many years. The insecure and baboonish Larry David is, no doubt, a funny guy but in this case his super liberal, island crowd pleasing shout outs, should not be compared to a man of Alan Dershowitz’s accomplishments and stature
So the line I loved the most in one article was. “Life Long friends… argue over trump at the chilmark store.” So no matter what side of this argument or Political Side you are with the fact that 2 old men who are described as lifelong friends had an argument in public shouldn’t be national news. Who cares. They probably had dinner together that night or the next or at least drinks while the rest of you all sit and complain about rhe left or thw right. Wow is there nothing better to do? Go to the beach or prep for what could be (or not) Bob 2.0
What is Dershowitz’s “stature” in light of his massage sessions with Epstein’s young female massage providers. He admits to getting massaged, but claims (contrary to other assertions) that he left his underwear on. Yuck!
Whenever I hear this stuff about all those Chilmarkers it always reminds me of Maxine Waters and her “Make a Scene Rallies”.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tJCDe7vdFfw&ab_channel=WashingtonPost
Alan Dershowitz is not what the Vineyard needs! Shun him, do not report about him, deprive him of oxygen and he will wither away
What is considered the latest environmentally friendly tar and feathers we could share with Alan? And have you noted the price for Tar lately?
If only there were this much passion for a different Chilmark incident.
So true, Katie. Self-absorbed, privilelged, old white men behaving obnoxiously capture and hold the attention here. A Chilmark racial incident at a daycamp, that people did backflips to defend or say wasn’t racist (!), is no longer on anyone’s radar now that camp is over. There’s no news coverage following up on the report that was supposedly due and is now past due. And the alleged rape of a child, a legal minor, and the procuring and enticing her with alcohol, by a Chilmark 30 year old? It never even made a blip on the public’s outrage meter. Real victims, those damaged and scarred and unable to explain to protest publicly are perhaps too real, too close to the reality of the other Chilmark– the one off the store porch, out of the public eye, and not making a public, stinking stink over one’s own self interests.
Gentlemen, now that Mother Nature’s sideshow Henri appears to be tracking significantly west of the island, you may resume the main feature — your personal contretemps.
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