Note that little word: “may” – it’s entirely within the judge’s discretion, no matter how vociferously a party howls for consolidation. Or separation, for that matter.
There’s a world of legal difference between "shall’ and “may”.
ETA: A judge can choose to hold consolidated pretrial hearings for judicial economy but still order separate evidentiary trials.
You make a compelling case for Ginni Thomas and you read the indictment more closely than I did. If it’s her, color me gobsmacked.
I readily admit a total failure of imagination that any prosecutor would go so far as to indict the wife of a sitting Supreme Court justice, even one as tainted and corrupt as Clarence Thomas. I’d be delighted if you’re right – I just can’t get my head around it!
I can’t and I won’t subscribe just to read it.
But I did Google the headline in case that article was a mirror of a free article, or someone else had a free mirror of it. Nothing.
Instead, I got countless similar headlines from other news outlets. With one exception; none of them have the “inciting the mob” bit.
My WAG is that it’s clickbait. That part is to draw attention from all the other news outlets. (Hey, it worked in your case! 
) The article probably says something along the lines of, “As Donald Trump allegedly incited a mob to attack the Capitol, there was a conspiracy to overturn the election, as this latest indictment claims…”
If a second branch of government is implicated in this plot, if there is any chance that parts of SCOTUS were conspiring with POTUS to overturn the election, we absolutely, 100% need to know that. Maybe it’s just Ginni and they didn’t involve Clarence at all, but its important to address the possibiliry. If Clarence did anything to communicate to the conspirators that he was part of the team and would do his part when it reached SCOTUS, he needs to go to jail.
What’s sad is that we have so many people to choose from to fill Co-Conspirator Slot Number 6.
The New York Times has produced an annotated version of the indictment which helps those of us not intimately familiar with the US courts and laws to understand it.
There’s no giftlink available; can’t tell if it’s paywalled or not.
To reiterate, my comment was not that the Thomases are above scrutiny here, but rather that there’s a better time to pull them into the case. For instance, once Trump has been convicted, we’re no longer looking at the Thomases through the toothless milquetoast rubric of “appearance of impropriety”, but rather as direct involvement with tried-and-convicted felony.
With Smith, I think we also have to allow the possibility that he’s doing something interesting like holding any Thomas involvement close to the vest, and then releasing it when Trump’s challenges start landing in front of SCOTUS. Make Clarence lean all the way into the awkward optics of “I know my wife may have some criminal exposure in this case, but I assure you I can still be impartial in this case.” Then pull back the curtain, release the hounds, rip off the band-aid, etc.
Once you indict a former President of the United States, the spouse of a Supreme Court Justice seems like small potatoes to me.
Even small potatoes can choke you to death if you try to eat them too fast.
I do think it would derail the conviction train.
I don’t know. Trump’s unfitness for the office he held was obvious to me from Day One, so indicting him for obvious crimes that have been in plain view since the day he assumed the office doesn’t seem momentous to me, just long overdue.
I’ve never thought much of Clarence Thomas or his wife, but this is a massive thing for anyone working in the legal field to contemplate. Not that she doesn’t deserve it – she does. But I agree with @Atamasama that to take her on as an unindicted co-conspirator in this indictment seems premature.
Thank you for this, and it didn’t ask for a subscription so I think the NYT is doing it as a public service.
ETA: D’oh! I started reading it and then the screen popped up asking for money. The Times is such a tease!
All you need to know is the Pink Floyd lyrics:
Money
Get away
You get a good job with more pay and you’re okay
Money
It’s a gas
Grab that cash with both hands and make a stash
New car, caviar, four star, daydream
Think I’ll buy me a football team
Money
Get back
I’m alright, Jack, keep your hands off of my stack
Money
It’s a hit
Don’t give me that do goody good bullshit
I’m in the high-fidelity first-class traveling set
And I think I need a Lear jet
Never mind, I tried this in “privacy” mode, and was able to read it.
It’s extremely misleading. It talks about the charges, and talks about Trump inciting a riot. It does not actually list any actual charges related to the riot in the body of the article. It just tries to make you think that the riot was part of this case.
It’s worse than clickbait, it’s flat-out spinning a false narrative. Whoever wrote this should be ashamed of themselves. It’s not journalism.
Sounds great, but what if Thomas essentially says “fuck off” and still refuses to recuse himself? Impeachment and removal is a non-starter. Indict him, too?
He’s clearly unbothered by how his obvious conflicts of interest make him look now, so I doubt that looking even worse will move the needle.
I can’t either, and part of me still thinks it’s going to be some operative no one has ever heard of. I’ve heard other names floated, relatively unknown members of the Trump campaign but most of them are attorneys and I don’t know that the description “political operative” fits any of them - and I don’t think it fits Navarro.
But she seems to fit the “clues”, I just have trouble believing Smith would dare to go there.
And it would also explain why Meadows avoided prosecution ( if indeed he has ), I think he’d have to give up something good to get the kind of deal he appears to have brokered……and this would be something good.
I’ll be surprised if the deal brokered by Smith with Meadows is a total immunity deal. Meadows was in too deep. A plea deal with a reduced sentence, yes. But I can’t see Smith letting him off with zero consequences. Meadows’ role in all this is shameful.
Being dead for some fourteen years I would be surprised, too.
It’s constitutional crises all the way down!
So Trump spent last weekend ranting on his social media…
Any words from him since the indictment came down? He certainly won’t be able to shut his gob for long.
Moreover, why would you need to give Meadows a sweet deal when you have Pence who is angling to be the hero in the history books? Pence knows that his political future is dead for turning against Trump, but he still can be remembered as the guy who helped save democracy. People like him live for this reluctant martyrdom scenario.