Republicans won’t kick any one out because they’re a criminal, or a traitor for that matter.
If he does get charged with campaign finance or other crimes, prosecutors could make any plea deal contingent on him resigning from Congress.
I’ve always heard that remark attributed to LBJ as to keeping J. Edgar Hoover as FBI Director, not Eisenhower keeping Nixon on the ticket.
Yeah, much as we may wish it were otherwise, his district is stuck with him unless he can be removed for cause, and lying about your quals to get elected is not going to be seen as cause for removal under the rules.
Zimmerman did, during the campaign, call out Santos for lying. While more lies have come out since the election, lying by campaigning politicians is pretty common. If you expel (the only reliable method to force out) members for lying, about their past, during the campaign, where does it end?
A re-do election is scheduled for next year. I don’t see getting rid of this guy being an emergency.
This plan is illegal. As it should be. Prosecutors shouldn’t be able to make up punishments nowhere found in the statute.
Federal plea bargains are over what the defendant will be convicted of. The punishment is then up to the judge, acting, I hope, in accordance with the law and established sentencing guidelines.
It could be. I read it in one of those “Book of Lists/People’s Almanac” volumes by the Wallechinsky/Wallace family.
That article also quoted Nixon urging Eisenhower to make his decision: “General, the time comes when one has to s**t or get off the pot”. I remember watching Nixon confirming that exchange on “60 Minutes” ca. 1990, with the expletive intact.
Maybe Santos should tell that to McCarthy.
Don’t you know, Santos invented both those expressions.
Honest question:
I have seen many reports of campaign finance rules being broken over the years by numerous politicians on both sides but I honestly cannot bring to mind a single one who was prosecuted for it (civil or criminal).
It just never seems to go anywhere but I’ll be happy to be corrected on this.
I don’t think “illegal” is the right word. A prosecutor could say “plead guilty and resign from Congress and we’ll recommend a 30-day sentence.” Nothing illegal about that. [I don’t see it happening, of course]
I guess you are right that recommending a 30 day sentence, in a federal case, is legal. But I doubt it would influence the judge:
I still think creative punishments, nowhere found in sentencing guidelines, like forced resignation from Congress, is illegal. Not in the sense that the attorneys would go to prison, but in the sense that it goes against what is legally allowed.
As for the prosecutor suggesting that the defendant has to accept a punishment, like losing their place in Congress, as a condition for even getting a plea deal to the judge, I hope this is considered prosecutorial misconduct. .
I found one example
(state court, not federal)
Lawyers for Missouri Gov. Eric Greitens contacted St. Louis prosecutors Saturday, proposing that he would resign from office if Circuit Attorney Kim Gardner would drop a felony charge against him.
That plan came to fruition this week, with the governor’s abrupt announcement Tuesday that he would leave office by the end of the week, and Gardner dropping the computer tampering charge he faced in St. Louis.
A Plea Deal and a Resignation: What Gov. Greitens Got for Giving Up (governing.com)
This is a good example, at least from your POV.
I disagree with what seems to be possible in Missouri (and, I now see, Tennessee, and Maryland and Michigan and New York) and hope it couldn’t happen elsewhere.
Then, I’m generally against plea bagaining.
I was able to find one example from 1982 of a U.S. Congressman resigning as a condition of a plea bargain with federal prosecutors:
How about “return the diamonds and we’ll knock years off your robbery sentence”?
I’m pretty sure it could happen anywhere- after all, if the person does not want to agree to resign or not to run for office in the future or … , they can always refuse to accept the plea bargain and take their chances on a trial on the original charges without an agreed upon sentence. It’s not as though the person resigning isn’t getting any benefit from the bargain.
Yes, you did, and I was guilty of wishful thinking:.
From your link:
I can see feeling that way myself, if someone I had voted for exchanged their office in return for the opportunity to plead guility to releatively minor charges – including, in the Richmond case, marijuana possession.
Such examples show a democratic deficit in the United States. Overturning the verdict of the voters should not be part of the prosecutorial tool chest in a democracy.
I can understand that - but if Richmond is facing up to seven years on his plea, (I assume for the tax evasion) he would have likely gotten at least that much had he been convicted on the original charges. Perhaps he could have remained in office while serving a prison sentence - but he could not have done a good job of representing his constituents from prison.
I may be overly cynical…but do Republicans (or those who would vote Republican) REALLY care?
I mean seriously. Do they even care he lied so much? He’s a Republican. He really does stand for their morality and what they believe in. I am thinking he stands for them and what they want.
Shit…his voters probably admire him for what he has done. Will it cost him a single voter?