FBI Search and Seizure at Trump's Mar-A-Lago Residence, August 8, 2022, Case Dismissed July 15, 2024

Thread will reopen shortly.

Modnote and a stern one: Do not accuse posters of being a troll outside of the pit. This is not a warning but it is close.

Glenn Kirschner lays out why TFG is going down.

Fuck no! People spend years trying to qualify to work in Antarctica! Stick him in the Regular Arctic, where he might get eaten by a bear after ignoring the advice, “Don’t go outside while a bear is out there.”

Yes, let’s not pollute Antarctica.

No, he can have dessert. But only one scoop, no more.

To expand on what MandaJo wrote, DJT is stubborn and does not react well to typical legal advice. If he listened to the kind of conventional lawyers who advise against risking a jury trial, Donald never would have stolen presidential papers out of the White House.

Also, Trump voters can’t be excluded from a jury. And it’s highly likely that a few of them will be on the panel. Because of that, asking for a jury trial is a far more rational move for Trump than would be typical in the federal system.

Thinking you are going to punish Trump with a unanimous jury trial conviction is as delusional as the idea the an impeachment acquittal would hurt him. We need to stop giving him wins. The Justice Department’s only chance for a criminal conviction is for a misdemeanor where there is no right to a jury trial.

P.S. Also, I find stealing valuable documents from the National Archives to be a clear cut, serious, misdeed. I’m a reader of history, and he is taking away my freedom to read well-researched books on his administration.

It is true in theory many government documents are classified, that this is used a lot, and many thousands of people often have access. So it is hard, in theory, to evaluate things at this point in terms of fairness. It is my belief that the process is legal and done to withstand future scrutiny.

In practice, one would suspect the level of evidence needed to raid a past and possibly future president would be extremely high. This might raise the question of who ratted on Trump, if anyone.

Time will allow a better evaluation of whether this was reasonable, fair or partisan. My suspicion is the alphabet agencies have an even mix of people supporting both parties and as professionals try not to let this get in their way, with various degrees of success. Trump was hardly above suspicion meeting privately with Putin in Helsinki or seemingly bragging without discretion about private matters to visitors at Mar-a-Lago.

And his cell mate gets two.

The thing that has me most curious is what was in those photo albums the feds removed?

Certainly not Russian prostitutes.

I like that idea. It’s even better than the oubliette I was thinking of.

A fine observation from Mr. Maher about how the FBI realised facial recognition was needed to get into the safe, and luckily someone had a rotten pumpkin.

The NY Times talks about the GOP splitting over how to react to this situation.

Here’s the gist:

Publicly, Mr. Trump’s allies continued an aggressive push to portray the former president as a political target while sending urgent-sounding fund-raising appeals to supporters. But privately, some advisers around Mr. Trump, unsure about what the F.B.I. might have recovered, began quietly cautioning fellow Republicans to dial down their statements.

MTG is calling to “Defund the FBI”. Paul Gosar said, “We must destroy the FBI.” Other Republicans have publicly given their support of the FBI, and/or denounced those who have been overly critical.

“As for lawmakers saying otherwise? “Question them, not us.”” Umm, no. As long as you allow those folks to be the face of your party everyone in your party is obligated to answer for them. You know, the same way you guys treat the Democrats.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/armed-trump-supporters-protest-outside-fbi-office-in-phoenix-following-mar-a-lago-raid-reports/ar-AA10DOP8?rt=1&ocid=Win10NewsApp&referrerID=InAppShare

Armed supporters of former President Donald Trump protested outside the FBI office in Phoenix, Arizona, on Saturday, Fox 10 Phoenix reported.

The protest, which took place in the morning, follows the agency’s raid of Trump’s Mar-a-Lago property on Monday.

Outside the FBI office, CNN reported that Trump supporters were carrying handguns and “assault-style weapons.” One protester said they were there to protest the “unlawful search” at the Florida property.

Alarming but not unexpected.

Question: If I was collecting signatures for a Defund the Police petition, should I bring an extra pile of forms?

Perfect.