Once Trump and co stop committing crimes, we’ll stop needing to define them.
If Sr. doesn’t execute Jr. for treason then that just proves that Sr. is just a Republican shill and is actively trying to destroy America.
Well, yes. But of course “treason,” was never applicable against Clinton either. It’s an accusation with a great emotional component but zero legal grounding.
You’ve got that backwards - Jr is supposed to execute Sr for treason and take his place as President Supreme. Only thusly will he prove that he is destined to make America great again. Next step will be to dissolve the senate and allow the local governors to keep the locals in line.
I hope this was just snark.
Because the process has to work in reverse: the crimes must be defined first, with specificity.
The last remnants of the Old Republic swept away.
Except for those Rebel bases.
all our bases belong to … ?
Pesky Rebel bases.
Fortunately the newly commissioned “Presidential Advisory Commission on Election Integrity” will keep the local systems in line.
Pretty sure this big old world will trundle along without. I am happy to wait for Mueller to say what terms are appropriate.
It was a bit snarky, but you have the order wrong.
Crimes do need to be committed before they can be defined.
the guy who’s inside, killin ur doodz.
I’m pretty sure he meant: The alleged criminal act must be defined first wrt to which law is operative.
Ah. Thanks for that.
But wouldn’t that (and the other semi hypothetical about the Venezuelan model) fall into the specific exception in the law for foreign nationals volunteering their time?
It seems to me that it would have been reasonable to assume going into that meeting that foreign nationals (Russian) intended to provide documentation for the purpose of advancing the campaign. The provision of documents and their bonafides would be the thing of value. If they only provided a volunteer who could speak to some wrongdoing, that seems in the bounds of the law.
I get that there is a high constitutional bar to prohibiting anything like political speech. But I’m having trouble understanding what under your analysis would be prohibited as a “thing of value”.
BTW, Bricker, thank you once again for your sober legal analysis and patience.
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Seconded.
Let me ask: if a foreign intelligence service is attempting to recruit me as an asset, do I have a positive obligation to report that attempt to the FBI? Even if I didn’t cooperate with said foreign intelligence service, would I be committing a crime simply by failing to report the contact?
If the answer to the above question is “yes”, as I have always assumed it was, then Trump Jr’s only defense is asserting that he didn’t realize that was what was going on, and I am guessing there is an orange jumpsuit in his future.
Although not necessarily relevant to this particular legal question, a crucial difference is that in your hypothetical, Clinton would have been providing poor and marginalized people with something they wouldn’t otherwise have had: an opportunity to tell their story to a large audience.
In contrast, if these mysterious, but obviously wealthy and well connected, Russians really had information damaging to Clinton, and their primary motivation was to make that information public, they could simply have sent it to the New York Times, not to the Trump campaign. Even if it could have been shown that the information was gathered by Russian intelligence and sent to the NYT on Putin’s direct order, I don’t think anyone would argue that the NYT was doing anything wrong in following up on the information and, if it checked out, writing stories about it.
The fact that they did, instead, contact the Trump campaign directly and insist on a secret meeting strongly suggests that something more sinister was going on, quite possibly an attempt to entrap Trump et al into committing crimes so that they could be blackmailed in the future.
No: that would be an Ex Post Facto law. The crime, the criminal act, must be defined first; the law must give specific notice as to what conduct is prohibited. And that definition is always construed strictly against the government, so a poorly defined crime that leaves readers uncertain of what acts are prohibited is constitutionally void, for vagueness.
They’re not just volunteering their time. If they go door-to-door or man a phone bank just like other volunteers, sure. But in those hypotheticals they are volunteering information they have: Trump harrassed me; Trump paid me under the table.
That’s a jump. Up until now, I’ve discussed the theory that the information itself was a thing of value.
You’re now offering a slightly different view: that the Russians were going to provide some physical piece of paper and IT was the “thing of value.” But the analysis is the same: the thing is not valuable in and of itself; its value exists because of the information it contains.
The statute’s purpose was to stop monetary contributions from foreign actors, and the “thing of value” is used in dozens of federal statutes to prevent the dodge of “I gave him a block of stocks in Apple, not money,” that would inevitably arise otherwise. It’s true that “thing of value” has been used to cover information in other contexts (I cited a case earlier in which an FBI employee was prosecuted for leaking information about investigations to the Mob).
But in the context of political campaign contributions, the statute would prohibit the Russians from donating $1000, or a block of Apple stock, or a gold Rolex, or a Bitcoin (even though a Bitcoin is arguably information). But when the donated information is both valuable AND of political public interest, the First Amendment will trump (ha!) the statute.
Happy to help! I wish it didn’t get me painted as a Trump supporter. 
I’m not aware of any such positive obligation. So far as I can tell, you’re free to disregard the Russkies or the Chinese and go about your day and never say a word to the FBI.
Why did you assume such an obligation existed?
As you point out: not legally relevant.
That may be the reason you react approvingly to the hypothetical Clinton conduct, but the law in play doesn’t provide exceptions for when the foreign actor is poor and marginalized.
Perhaps. But again, not relevant to the question of a crime committed by Trump Jr at that meeting. It might be they intended to do something else that would be illegal and involve him, and then say, “We own you now.” That’s a well-known technique.