Exactly. I can see (though not agree with) Trump saying, “If I’m elected, I will tell my AG to bring Hillary up on charges,” or something to that effect.
Saying in so many words he would jail her is truly un-American–as in unconstitutional.
In Texas, firearms are not permitted in polling locations except as carried by uniformed law enforcement officers.
Personally, I’ve never understood the exception. If we, the non-gun-toting public, are supposed to feel comfortable with guns everywhere – the grocery store, mall, restaurant, movie theater, etc. – then why aren’t guns allowed in polling locations? The guns everywhere argument is that we should not feel threatened by the mere presence of a gun. What makes the polling place different?
YES. This is the crux of it, and a point that cannot be made too often. Honestly, I think his worst moments of the debate came when he demanded of Clinton why she hadn’t fixed all of the country’s problems already, because those were the moments that showed the true depth of his cluelessness about how government actually works.
I’m willing to believe he genuinely doesn’t know WHY saying he’d put Clinton in jail is wrong, and that, frankly, scares me more than if he were saying it in full knowledge that it was wrong.
Cognitive dissonance. It isn’t just for breakfast anymore.
Wasn’t it not that long ago that the Republicans were complaining that they were being unfairly targeted in IRS probes? And that was bad!
But now, apparently it is not only fine but desirable that Clinton be locked away without trial as if Trump is Batman and she is the Joker? And no one on the Right has a problem with this?
But the key differences between 1 and 2 are procedural.
If the FBI simply tosses her in jail with no warrant or bail, it’s a violation of her Fourth, Fifth, and Eighth Amendment rights. If a grand jury is presented the case and the relevant law, returns an indictment and Clinton is arrested pursuant thereto, released on bail, and prosecuted as a result, I’m asking what constitutional or statutory barriers are in the way.
I have already made my feelings about the legality of her conduct clear in the thread I started when the news broke: namely, that her conduct was not illegal. I trust that I don’t need to distance myself from Trump fandom or reiterate my belief in Clinton’s lack of criminal liability in every post.
If I were his lawyer I’d make sure the check cleared.
But yeah, I think Trump’s conception of the criminal process runs along the lines of Steve McGarrett muttering, “Book 'im, Danno,” with intermediate steps like indictment and requisite proof being extremely fuzzy.
You are too trusting. If I were his lawyer I would meet him at his bank and have him withdraw cash from his account in front of witnesses and hand it to me. I know his back story.
This is true, but it’s the combination of not knowing, and not caring to learn, what non-magical powers the President has - or even caring to learn that the President’s powers are in fact limited to the non-magical - with a heart that rival’s Nixon’s in its vileness.
If he were a basically decent human being, the notion that Clinton should be locked up wouldn’t cross his mind.
Worth noting that what Richard Parker is referring to is that Nixon’s articles of impeachment literally included misusing executive power by interfering with the IRS, FBI, and DoJ by, among other things, ordering them to act against his personal enemies and interfering with investigations.
You have to wonder if Trump were running against Obama, if he would have uttered a similar threat, promising to deport Obama to his “native Kenya” for being an illegal immigrant and a dangerous Muslim.
There’s no question that it’s charitable in the extreme – indeed, it borders on science fiction.
BUT…
Sure, but I’d be stunned to learn that the prosecution efforts directed at Edward Snowden and Chelsea (then Bradley) Manning were not influenced by the White House in some measure. A general order to target Republicans would be problematic, but a specific order phrased as alt-magical-Trump did (“I am directing the new Attorney General and each US Attorney’s office to review cases in which the FBI has chosen to recommend non-prosecution even when the elements of a federal crime were found to exist, with Secretary Clinton’s being first among many due to the intense publicity surrounding your public statement,”) does not suffer that infirmity. The legal theory underlying the prosecution is a reversal of long practice of reading in motive as an element of the offense.
See, you’re making the assumption that Trump is actually telling the truth, and that when he says he’s going to have Hillary Clinton arrested, he sincerely means it.
That is of course a risible error. You must assume Trump is lying, because he almost always is, and go to the real question; would Trump make money by having Clinton arrested?
The answer is clearly no. There’s no profit in it for him, so he’d lose interest in her. So why is he saying he’d arrest her? To impress his base, so they’ll vote for him, so he can become President and make billions of dollars in bribe money.
Well, “influenced . . . in some measure” is pretty vague. It would be bombshell news if the White House ordered the US Attorney to prosecute Manning or Snowden.
I don’t think that’s correct. Deciding to prosecute someone because of her political beliefs is not distinguishable from deciding to focus resources on prosecuting Republicans, as a First Amendment matter.
Trump’s defense would have to be to challenge the factual premise–i.e., he would argue that he selected her for some reason other than this impermissible reason. I think that would be tough, given what he’s said about it. Moreover, even your version seems to acknowledge that he would be selecting her because of her First Amendment activities rather than in spite of them.
No, no – the selection would be because of Comey’s public statement, not her First Amendment activities. Now, of course it’s true that Comey’s statement was made because of Mrs. Clinton’s highly public profile, which arose in turn because of her First Amendment activities, but there’s an arguable attenuation there.
Indeed, looking at recent prosecutions of people like Tom DeLay, Bob McDonnell, and Rick Perry, it seems safe to hint that they were selected because of political prominence, and indeed all those cases ended up in the appellate courts in prosecutorial ruin – but none for selective prosecution. I can easily imagine a Trump administration prosecution winding down a similar path.