At his press conference, Bragg said that this type of charge based on another offence is very common in their office.
oops
I guess that was a Fraudian slip.
I don’t think there are any appellate decisions regarding whether it’s legally proper or not, for this particular felony crime. That’s what I mean by uncharted.
It’d be easy to fact check if someone had Westlaw or something similar. I don’t have that, though and just going by some experts I listen to, but it is a bit confusing. It’ll clear up in the next few days.
It’s a strong case. I just worry about appeal potential. But thats just me. Bragg isn’t worried.
Very likely, but even if it is true that’s a ‘them’ problem, not an ‘us’ problem. So Donnie Two-scoops get the nomination again and loses bigly again. They should have considered that in 2016 or convicted him in one of his two impeachments.
I expect it’s like “conspiracy to commit murder”. You don’t need the murder to happen, or even to have the conspiracy get far enough for murder to be attempted. If you’re conspiring to commit murder, and taking actions to make it happen, that’s enough. And the “murder” part is important even if no murder happened, because “conspiracy to commit a surprise birthday party” is not yet a crime.
An other way to think of it is that say that someone falsifies some finance documents in the US with the goal of creating a false impression of the business, so that he can con a person in France out of their money.
Even if we say that he did successfully commit a crime against the French victim, the crime happened in France and was under French jurisdiction.
The first degree felony still applies to the falsification of records. There’s no crime other than that being charged by the US prosecutor, because the crime is in another jurisdiction. But, clearly, the goal of the falsification was part of trying to commit some crime.
Maybe the French case doesn’t lead to a conviction, maybe it was discovered in France past their statute of limitation, whatever. It remains that the falsification was undertaken as part of trying to commit a crime. You just have to show that the participants were discussing those crimes as crimes (somewhere) and how this falsification would help to achieve those crimes.
In this case, Trump was trying to commit tax evasion - or help someone else in that effort. That might fall under Federal jurisdiction but it was discussed as a legal obligation by the participants and they committed the falsification to further that Federal crime.
Likewise, he was trying to hide a campaign expense, and all the same applies.
Manhattan can’t control what the Federal government does. They only care that the Federal statutes were discussed and a decision was made to try and break those laws.
I found this NY Times OPINION piece helpful in contextualizing the charges in the indictment (gift link).
With the release of the indictment and accompanying statement of facts, we can now say that there’s nothing novel or weak about this case. The charge of creating false financial records is constantly brought by Mr. Bragg and other New York D.A.s.
The books and records counts laid out in the charging papers against Mr. Trump are the bread and butter of the D.A.’s office. Mr. Trump, who pleaded not guilty to all charges on Tuesday, is the 30th defendant to be indicted on false records charges by Mr. Bragg since he took office just over a year ago, with the D.A. bringing 151 counts under the statute so far. Indeed, the Trump Organization conviction and the Weisselberg plea included business falsification felonies.
While the particulars of Mr. Trump’s case are unique, his behavior is not. Candidates and others have often attempted to skirt the disclosure and dollar limit requirements of campaign finance regulations and falsified records to hide it. Contrary to the protestations of Mr. Trump and his allies, New York prosecutors regularly charge felony violations of the books and records statute — and win convictions — when the crimes covered up were campaign finance violations, resulting in false entries in business records to conceal criminal activity.
that is golden.
MSNBC said he was giving his ‘speech’. They said they would report on it if he said anything truthful or noteworthy. 
See the NYT opinion piece posted above by ShadowFacts:
Does the jury need to be unanimous on all counts? If one count is hung, the others can still go on, correct?
that could happen, but really unlikely given how interconnected the counts are. each payment is a charge, if you find for one you find for all.
I would love a list of those 30 / 150 precedents. It goes a long way to undermine the witch hunt narrative.
We might be talking past each other. I don’t disagree with any of that, but it’s also arguing for one side, and not entirely objective. Also, I think accidentally, ShadowFacts linked to a recent Opinion article from which you qoute, but the hyperlinks in the text took me to a different earlier (pre-indictment) article. That article is helpful.
I don’t disagree that people have been charged with this crime 30 times. None of those however appealed the decision/there is no appellate decision concerning the validity of the felony part of the particular crime Trump is charged with (definitely not whether the “other crime” can be a federal crime). That’s really my only point. There will be lots of motions/arguments about that, as would be very normal for something that has no clarity from the appellate courts.
The opinion piece, and I don’t disagree, speaks to linking crimes together generally. It’s very common, for sure. Tested, tried and true, and all that. In Trump’s crime, you’d want to know for sure what is meant by “another crime” and we don’t know because appellate courts have not clarified what that means - does it mean just NY crimes related to NY stuff (definitely means that, or is it broader to include other jurisdictional crimes regarding other jurisdiction stuff - don’t know).
I think Bragg covered all the scenarios. I think there are three: NY crime about NY stuff (I think this would the taxes); NY crime about federal stuff (NY election laws); and federal crimes about federal stuff (Federal election laws). There are two different potential issues in Trumps case. 1 - linking the “other crime” to a federal crime. 2 - whether NY election laws apply to federal elections (2 is much more favorable legally, and not worth much discussion). I’m assuming 3 - the tax stuff, is ok. Here is what the (pre-indictment) link above says about 1/2:
For starters, it is unclear whether he would cite a federal or state election law violation, or even both. And with either choice, there could be pitfalls.
If [Bragg’s] office uses a federal election violation as the second crime, Mr. Trump’s lawyers could argue that federal law has no place in state court. And if he uses a New York election law violation, the defense could claim that a violation of state law does not apply to a federal election — in this case, the 2016 presidential campaign.
Mr. Bragg’s predecessor, Cyrus R. Vance Jr., grappled with the same issue. Mr. Vance’s prosecutors considered the hush-money case several times — it floated around the office so long that it became known as the “zombie case,” an idea that just wouldn’t die — and examined several secondary crimes Mr. Trump might have been seeking to conceal.
They never ruled out a hush money case, but had concerns that it might be too risky to use a federal election law violation as the second crime. Mr. Vance’s prosecutors feared a judge might find that falsifying business records could be a felony only if it aided or concealed a New York state crime, not a federal one.
Their apprehension stemmed partly from a lack of precedent — the only cases like this had ended in guilty pleas, meaning they were not tested in the courts — as well as from New York law, which suggests that federal crimes are out of bounds for New York prosecutors.
But the election is to select state electors.
Yes, there is no federal election for president. There is a New York State election to choose New York electors. That election is governed by state law. I have no idea how much NY state law regulates spending for that election, but Bragg states that he is relying on that state law.
Federal election laws cover spending for that and the 50 other elections to elect electors.
I have to imagine the other 29 people charged with this crime are also wealthy enough to afford good lawyers. So the fact that none of them chose to appeal suggests that such an appeal would be unlikely to succeed.
Somebody was shown on TV (briefly) waving a big flag that said “FUCK TRUMP AND FUCK YOU FOR VOTING FOR HIM”…which sums it up nicely.