Fair enough. What’s the act that prohibits Federal employees from using their offices for personal profit? I seem to recall that Trump had been violating that right and left with his trips to Mar-A-Lago?
What about their staff?
Ummm, they are FUNDRAISING. The promise of those legal challenges is the bait to attract donations. They may not spend all the money they raise. Trump may be able to use some of that money to retire other debts, or make other use of it.
I would love to see Trump directly prosecuted, but that could galvanize his supporters. It would be better to set up a situation where he is shown to have no power. Take the wind out of his sails. In the animal world, this would mean defeat in physical combat against another alpha male. Maybe Robert Greene’s book The 48 Laws of Power will have a scenario that would work.
They already are galvanized. Absolutely nothing moves them off their support for Trump. Democrats need to stop worrying about them and certainly have no reason to placate them.
Yes he should be prosecuted. If, I mean when, he pardons himself let’s go ahead and test whether he can indeed do so. Also should test whether pardons in advance of charges are valid. You could argue that one cannot know whether a pardon is proper without knowing what the accusations are.
This should not be Biden’s decision. He should just defer all such matters to his AG just as the first 44 presidents would have.
I think it’s nuts to say “I know I can’t convict, therefore I can’t prosecute.” Let the prosecutions happen, let the evidence be public, and if the jury can’t convict it’s on them.
If only murderers are getting convicted, I wonder who is filling the jails?
Sure pushing someone is technically a crime, one you are unlikely to be charged with. But the magnitude of the crime has some bearing - beating the crap out of someone is more likely to get you into trouble. Trump didn’t take a buck from petty cash.
As for him not being convicted, are you aware of the large amounts of evidence there is publicly available of his crimes, let alone all that which is in the hands of prosecutors and that which they don’t have access to yet due to Trump’s obstruction. The NY Times reports of his tax returns shows plenty.
That’s not getting a line wrong on a tax return - it is keeping two sets of books and paying employees of the Trump Organization consulting fees which could be deducted.
White collar criminals are hard to convict, true. But Trump has spent so many years thumbing his nose at the law that he thinks he is immune from prosecution. Let’s show him he is wrong.
I meant prosecutions that began when he was in office, for crimes committed before he took office as well as when he was in office.
And I agree with you that prosecuting him for what might be considered crimes done in his official capacity would be a mistake. But given that he refused to distance himself from his companies, crimes committed involving those companies not involving his presidential duties should be prosecutable.
However, given the vast number of offenses, I’m all for prosecutors picking the ones that are easy to explain and which offer a high chance of conviction.
I really hope that trump takes it out of our hands by fleeing to a country with no extradition treaty. I don’t want to see the mess that would ensue from prosecuting him. And I also don’t want to set a precedent that the president is above the law.
You are not going to find 49% of jury candidates in New York being Trump supporters. Trying him in Alabama could be a problem.
I suspect that once you throw away the fanatics (on either side) you’ll find a good pool of people who may doubt the evidence now, but would not if shown it directly, in Trump’s handwriting, for instance.
I’ve been in the jury pool for several capital murder cases, and saying you are against the death penalty is not a good way of getting off.
That works also, because it puts him in the class of Idi Amin, and would make him look like a coward. The question is whether Trump is sane enough to know that he has committed crimes, or whether he thinks his misunderstanding of the law (or scorn of it) gives him a free pass. If that is so, he wouldn’t run because he’d be convinced he’d get off.
A pre-emptive pardon scenario: could a president declare a Purge? “I pre-emptively pardon everyone for any murder committed in Philadelphia during the next 48 hours!” Could a president end all law enforcement? “I pre-emptively pardon anyone convicted of any crime in our country ever again!”
Pretty sure the answer to these is gonna be “nope.” So what are the limits?
Presidential pardons are only for federal laws. So it wouldn’t affect the vast majority of murders.
Fair point! Could governors, then, issue such pardons?
Somehow I don’t think that’s in Cuomo’s plans, even if he can do so.
Well, two months in a very low-security prison, but sure.
He has to know he is facing tough times ahead. Even if he thinks it is all unfair and unjust and he is really totally innocent he has to know the legal actions facing him are only piling up and getting more serious. He has exhausted most legal delaying tactics and his biggest ability to delay…being president…is about to end.
Then add in that he reportedly has $900 million in loans coming due that he almost certainly cannot pay and Deutsche Bank seems to be done with him and is considering seizing his assets.
Unless Trump is really delusional (which he might be) he needs to be looking for an escape hatch which probably means getting out of the country to someplace with no extradition. Otherwise his remaining years on this planet are not going to be fun for him.
There are different categories of pre-emptive pardons to consider. There could be pardons issued for crimes that have not yet occurred, certainly that kind will be rejected by the courts. There could also be pardons for unknown crimes, as Ford issued for Nixon, still an open question about their validity. Then there are pardons for known crimes, not yet charged.
However, I don’t think it’s realistic to require pardons to specify each particular crime that could be charged related to one incident, so some kind of blanket pardon has to be allowed as long as it’s not too broad.
And I don’t think we want prosecutors to be able to hold off on charging crimes until a different executive is in office who would not pardon the offender so pre-emptive pardons for known criminal acts should be allowed as long as they act is specified.
I think you pardon the act and not a specific crime so you get pardoned for jaywalking which covers anything illegal relating to that act and not a pardon each for:
- Crossing against the light
- Obstructing traffic
- Crossing where there is no crosswalk
- Not looking both ways before crossing
There may be a wee bit of a power differential between POTUS and sitcom actress.