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THE MAGA PARTY!,,, the GOP is dead, republicans are going down with the dems,, get ready for THE MAGA PARTY lefty's
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2022-02-18 at 8:02 PM UTCGood always eventually triumphs over evil.
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2022-02-18 at 8:30 PM UTCThe following users say it would be alright if the author of this post didn't die in a fire!
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2022-02-18 at 10:35 PM UTCWord has it the Demonrats are desperately looking for a replacement for their shit-the-pants loser of a president, and they're even considering digging Hillary Clinton back up from six feet down in the grave. Can't make this shit up, folks. The final death rattle of the Democrat Party.
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2022-02-19 at 12:43 AM UTC
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2022-02-19 at 6:34 AM UTCNBC News
White House records taken by Trump contained classified information, National Archives confirms
Dareh Gregorian
The National Archives and Records Administration confirmed on Friday that it found classified material among the boxes of White House documents that former President Donald Trump improperly took to Mar-a-Lago.
"NARA has identified items marked as classified national security information within the boxes" that have been returned to the agency from Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort, Archivist David S. Ferriero acknowledged in a letter to the House Committee on Oversight and Reform.
The agency has said that Trump returned 15 boxes of documents that were improperly taken from the White House. Earlier this month, the oversight committee opened an investigation into the records that were taken from the White House by the former president.
Asked by Rep. Carolyn Maloney, D-N.Y., who chairs the oversight committee, if the agency had reported Trump's actions to the U.S. Attorney General's office, Ferriero said: "Because NARA identified classified information in the boxes, NARA staff has been in communication with the Department of Justice."
In a letter to Ferriero, which was sent last week, Maloney said she was “deeply concerned” that the records had not been provided to the agency promptly at the end of the Trump administration. “They appear to have been removed from the White House in violation of the Presidential Records Act (PRA)," Maloney wrote.
The New York Times was first to report that some of the boxes contained classified information, and the Washington Post has reported they included documents marked at the "top secret" level.
In his letter, Ferreiro said the records agency is still in the process of "inventorying the contents of the boxes, which we expect to complete by February 25."
Trump, who routinely blasted Hillary Clinton for allegedly mishandling classified information during the 2016 election, said in a statement Friday he hadn't done anything wrong.
"The National Archives did not 'find' anything, they were given, upon request, Presidential Records in an ordinary and routine process to ensure the preservation of my legacy and in accordance with the Presidential Records Act," he said. "If this was anyone but 'Trump,' there would be no story here."
The Presidential Records Act mandates that all presidential records must be properly preserved by each administration so a complete set of records is transferred to the National Archives at the end of an administration.
The Archives revealed it had recovered the documents in a statement earlier this month, saying that in mid-January it had “arranged for the transport from the Trump Mar-a-Lago property in Florida to the National Archives of 15 boxes that contained Presidential records, following discussions with President Trump’s representatives in 2021.”
In his letter to Maloney, Ferriero said the agency "has asked the representatives of former President Trump to continue to search for any additional Presidential records that have not been transferred to NARA, as required by the Presidential Records Act."
Asked if he was aware of any other records that had not been turned over by the administration, Ferriero said the agency "has identified certain social media records that were not captured and preserved by the Trump Administration."
The agency has also "learned that some White House staff conducted official business using non-official electronic messaging accounts that were not copied or forwarded into their official electronic messaging accounts, as required," he said.
Ferriero said the agency "has already obtained or is in the process of obtaining some of those records," but did not provide any further details. -
2022-02-19 at 6:42 AM UTCWE GOT HIM NOW!
CBS News
Trump can be sued for role in Jan. 6 attack on Capitol, judge rules
Robert Legare
Washington — Former President Donald Trump can be sued for damages incurred during the January 6 attack on the Capitol, "the first-ever presidential transfer of power marred by violence," a federal judge in Washington, D.C., ruled Friday.
In a written opinion that ran over 100 pages, Judge Amit Mehta rejected the former president's claims that he is entitled to broad immunity from multiple lawsuits blaming him for the riot. Mehta reasoned that some of Trump's actions on January 6 were "plausibly words of incitement not protected by the First Amendment" or by presidential immunity.
Democratic Congressman Eric Swalwell of California, two members of the Capitol Police, and a group of House Democrats, led by Congressman Bennie Thompson of Mississippi, have each accused the former president of inciting the insurrection at the Capitol on January 6 in three separate lawsuits.
The suit filed by Swalwell also named Rudy Giuliani, Trump's personal lawyer, Donald Trump Jr., and GOP Congressman Mo Brooks of Alabama. The suit filed by 11 House Democrats alleges Trump, Giuliani and two far-right extremist groups, the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers, conspired to incite a crowd of his supporters to breach the Capitol in order to stop Congress from counting states' electoral votes and reaffirming President Biden's victory in the 2020 presidential election.
Taken together, the lawsuits were filed under a provision of a Reconstruction-era statute known as the Ku Klux Klan Act of 1871, which holds that it is illegal for a group to conspire to prevent federal government officials from carrying out their lawful duties.
They allege Trump and his political allies conspired to prevent Congress from performing the necessary task of certifying the 2020 presidential election and the extremist groups aided in the execution of that conspiracy.
Mehta ruled that many of the claims against Trump, the Oath Keepers, and the Proud Boys may continue in court, but he dismissed the lawsuits filed against Trump Jr. and Giuliani.
Trump argued in court filings and hearings that he has "absolute immunity" from liability in the three civil suits filed against him and claimed his remarks outside the White House before the mob descended on the Capitol were political speech protected by the First Amendment.
During that speech, he urged attendees of the "Save America" rally at the Ellipse to "fight like hell" and march to the Capitol building "to peacefully and patriotically make your voices heard," words referenced multiple times in Mehta's opinion.
The former president contended that in his January 6 speech, he was acting in his capacity as president in an attempt to affect Congress's certification of the Electoral College votes and is therefore not responsible for any of the damage from the rioting that took place after his speech. He was not conspiring to commit a crime, his lawyers argued, but acting as president of the United States.
The judge flatly rejected this claim, writing the fiery speech was not part of the president's official duty — it was focused on keeping him in office for a second term.
Trump used the speech "to complain about perceived cases of election fraud…and to exhort the Vice President to return those certifications to those states to be recertified," Mehta wrote.
Then-Vice President Mike Pence resisted the entreaties of the former president and many other Republicans to reject the certification of the Electoral College votes.
Based on the evidence provided, Mehta said that it is reasonable to assume that when Trump called on his supporters to march the Capitol and "fight like Hell," "he did so with the goal of disrupting lawmakers' efforts to certify the Electoral college votes."
Trump issued a call to action and his supporters responded by breaching the Capitol, the judge said.
Dissecting Trump's speech on the Ellipse, the conditions of its delivery and the rhetoric leading up to it, Mehta reasoned the former president's words "stoked an already inflamed crowd, which had heard for months that the election was stolen."
He concluded that Trump's words were "an implicit call for imminent violence or lawlessness" that are neither protected by presidential immunity nor the First Amendment.
Mehta did, however, reject Swalwell's claim that the former president should be held liable for not exercising his presidential powers to stop the riot.
"Were it otherwise, Presidents routinely would be subject to suit for not doing more or for not acting at all," the judge wrote, while allowing other parts of Swalwell's lawsuit to go forward.
The attorney representing Trump in this lawsuit did not immediately respond to CBS News' request for comment.
As for Rudy Giuliani, Mehta ruled that although Trump's former personal lawyer advocated for "trial by combat" during his own January 6, 2021 speech, he did not issue a call to action.
"There is no allegation that anyone took Giuliani's words as permission to enter the Capitol," the judge wrote, a conclusion he also reached in the case of the president's son, Donald Trump Jr.
The Oath Keepers unsuccessfully contended they should not be held accountable for the riot under that Reconstruction-Era law because Congress was not actually performing its official duty, a claim multiple defendants facing criminal prosecution for their alleged roles in the attack have also made.
"This reading of the Constitution defies common sense," Mehta wrote Friday.
Jon Moseley, an attorney for the Oath Keepers, said he was not surprised by Mehta's order when CBS News informed him of the judge's decision. Moseley did, however, say he hopes the court further consolidates these lawsuits to make them more efficient going forward.
D.C. Attorney General Carl Racine announced last year that his office was also suing the Oath Keepers and Proud Boys on similar legal grounds.
Friday's ruling does not mean the former president has been found responsible for the attack, but that the lawsuits against him can continue in federal court. -
2022-02-19 at 7:08 AM UTCLOCK HIM UP...LOCK HIM UP...
The Washington Post
Opinions | Prosecuting Trump would set a risky precedent. Not prosecuting would be worse.
Opinion by Matthew Dallek
When President Richard Nixon resigned in disgrace, the odds of his standing trial for obstruction of justice seemed high: His actions undermining the Watergate investigation had been tape-recorded, and his part in the coverup led to pressure on the legal system to hold him accountable. In September 1974, however, one month after Nixon left office, his successor, Gerald Ford, pardoned him. Ford later told a congressional subcommittee that the pardon was designed to “shift our attentions from the pursuit of a fallen President to the pursuit of the urgent needs of a rising nation.”
It didn’t — not in the immediate aftermath and, in some ways, not ever. Although views later softened, many Americans at the time saw the pardon as a mistake. Some were livid. One powerful man had essentially condoned the criminality of another. The get-out-of-jail-free card exacerbated public cynicism and deepened the nation’s social fractures. The White House switchboard lit up with calls that ran 8 to 1 against Ford’s action. The New York Times captured some of the liberal rage when it described the pardon as an affront to “the American system of justice.” A president who thought he was doing the right thing had taken justice into his own hands, casting doubt on a bedrock idea: Justice is blind; no one is above the law.
Nearly five decades later, Joe Biden is president, and a pardon for Donald Trump isn’t happening. But whether Trump will eventually be prosecuted for his conduct in the White House is more of a conundrum: If the country crosses this inviolate threshold, all hell will break loose. If we don’t cross it, all hell will break loose. There will be no “shifting our attentions” by advocates of either course. And whichever path the nation follows will have lasting repercussions. One thing is increasingly clear — fear will play a greater role than facts in determining it.
If Trump were indicted, he would become the first former president to stand criminal trial. Prosecutorial threats are multiplying: Bank and tax fraud charges are under consideration in Manhattan. In Fulton County, Ga., a special grand jury is investigating Trump’s interference in the 2020 election. In a Washington courtroom, U.S. District Judge Amit P. Mehta told a convicted Jan. 6 Capitol rioter that he was a pawn in a scheme by more powerful people, and the legal community is debating whether Trump’s seeming incitement of the insurrection has opened him up to criminal charges. The National Archives requested that the Justice Department open an investigation into Trump’s mishandling of top-secret documents that the government recently retrieved from his Florida estate. Trump still faces legal jeopardy for obstructing justice during Robert Mueller’s probe into Russian interference in the 2016 election (remember that one?). During the 2016 campaign, Trump allegedly orchestrated hush-money payments to Stormy Daniels (the charges that landed his handler Michael Cohen in prison referred to Trump as Individual #1). This list is hardly exhaustive and omits the dozen-plus civil lawsuits and civil investigations Trump faces.
In some cases, prosecutors would need to prove “intent” — a high bar. But it isn’t insurmountable; Trump’s words and deeds have demonstrated that his actions tend to be intentional. If an ordinary citizen had pressured Georgia’s secretary of state to “find” votes to overturn the 2020 election; systematically misrepresented the value of his assets to the IRS and banks; funneled money to silence a paramour; or put government documents down a toilet, this person would almost certainly be facing an array of criminal charges. More than a year after he left office, Trump isn’t facing any such thing yet.
The stakes are enormous. The rule of law, the notion that we are all equal under our criminal justice system, is among the noblest of principles but also the ugliest of myths. The question of putting Trump on trial before a jury of his peers is a test for a principle of democracy that has often proved out of reach for most Americans.
Historically, White and wealthy citizens have sometimes managed to avoid the consequences of their criminality. For decades, White mobs lynched and terrorized African Americans with impunity, and this legacy of a racist justice system, separate and unequal, looms over the debate about charging Trump. The system remains deeply unfair, biased against Black people and favoring the wealthy who are able to afford the best lawyers. Nonviolent drug offenses for the poor have resulted in decades-long prison sentences, while hardly any bankers stood trial for reckless and probably illegal activities that helped trigger the 2008 financial crisis.
With Trump in the White House, his friends and allies already had their own system of justice: Trump-loving Dinesh D’Souza (campaign finance violations), Trump-whisperer Roger Stone (witness tampering), Trump’s first national security adviser Michael Flynn (lying to the FBI), Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort (tax fraud) and Trump son-in-law’s father Charles Kushner (tax evasion and witness tampering) are all convicted felons who received pardons from Trump or had their sentences commuted by him. Three of those convictions occurred during Trump’s presidency.
Now this unequal system of justice faces a crossroads. Any decision about prosecuting the former president centers on two conflicting fears: Inaction mocks the nation’s professed ideal that no one sits above the law — and Americans might wonder whether our democracy can survive what amounts to the explicit approval of lawlessness. But prosecuting deposed leaders is the stuff of banana republics.
The fear of the banana republic is hardly an idle one — and here Trump is a central figure, too. He has boasted of his willingness to go that route: In 2016, he ran by pledging that he intended to use the power of federal law enforcement to help his friends and pay back his enemies. His rallies routinely erupted with chants of “lock her up,” directed at his opponent, Hillary Clinton. When as president he told then-FBI Director James Comey that he should be “letting Flynn go,” he was doing as he had promised, using the presidency to try to save an ally from criminal investigation. Trump sees the law and law enforcement as a weapon: He wielded it to protect himself and rout his foes, as when his attorney general William P. Barr ordered the violent breakup of peaceful Black Lives Matter demonstrations near Lafayette Square. Trump has said that if he gets a second term, he would pardon hundreds of violent insurrectionists charged in the attack on the Capitol. More recently, his remarks about the investigation his administration began under special counsel John Durham suggest that he is still game to go after foes by wildly accusing them of crimes. Trump continually mischaracterizes the Durham investigation as having shown that Clinton’s aides “spied” on his campaign and his presidency, and he issued a statement saying that “in a stronger period of time in our country, this crime would have been punishable by death.” This was “treason at the highest level,” he said.
Of course, there’s also an appearance of impropriety when a Democratic elected official investigates Trump, lending a whiff of credence to the notion that politics sway prosecution decisions regardless of which side is doing it. Biden himself, before he was elected (and before Trump committed some of his most egregious misdeeds), said that prosecuting him would be a “very unusual thing and probably not very … good for democracy,” although he also promised to leave any decisions in the hands of the Justice Department. Indicting could trigger violence, spark a cycle of retribution once Republicans take back power, and erode yet another democratic norm.
But the far graver peril in this situation is inaction, a paralyzing refusal to hold Trump criminally liable for his behavior. The country has seen what happens when lawlessness triumphs; when some citizens feel they can do pretty much what they want with impunity. As historian Eric Foner has pointed out, in 1873, in reaction to the election of a biracial government in Colfax, La., a White mob assaulted the county courthouse, murdered a group of African Americans and seized control of the town government without substantial consequences. In 1874, in New Orleans, a white supremacist organization known as the White League tried to topple the state government (U.S. troops at least suppressed this riot). In 1898, long after Reconstruction, armed Whites overturned a duly elected biracial government in Wilmington, N.C. Because there was no law enforcement, no accountability and no consequences, such violence was condoned, sanctioned by the state and some leaders — which thus empowered anti-democratic forces for decades across the Deep South and elsewhere. (One of the impeachment charges against Andrew Johnson said he had fomented post-Civil War white supremacist violence in New Orleans and Memphis.)
Lessons from overseas also paint a bracing picture: Refusing to hold officials accountable for crimes emboldens them. Putting someone above the law is simply unsustainable for any mature democratic system. In the 20th century, Mexico’s long-time ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party refused to prosecute senior officials for corruption, choosing what three political scientists called “stability” in the political system over “accountability” in the legal one, and corruption became endemic. These scholars argue that nations transitioning toward democracy sometimes do better when they don’t prosecute former leaders and instead allow “democracy to take root.”
But the United States claims to be an advanced democracy. The costs of not prosecuting Trump have already been significant — and they’re already grounds for fear. Trump continues to stir up violence; he acts as if he remains untouchable. He praised the anti-public-health trucker convoy that shut down a key bridge linking Detroit to Ontario and has wreaked havoc in Ottawa: “I see they have Trump signs all over the place and I’m proud that they do,” Trump bragged to “Fox & Friends,” before suggesting that the truckers do the same in the United States, an even greater “tinderbox.” Trump’s acolytes take his cue. Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) expressed his hope that the truckers would bring their mayhem inside America’s borders, while the Republican National Committee defended the police-beating armed rioters at the Capitol who sought to block Biden’s electoral certification by Congress as engaged in “legitimate political discourse.”
Although Trump has long sanctioned violence among his supporters — calling white supremacists in Charlottesville “fine people”; ordering the Proud Boys to “stand back and stand by”; urging a crowd to “march” on the Capitol and “fight like hell” to overturn the allegedly stolen election; tweeting “liberate Michigan” to followers a few months before a plot to kidnap and murder the state’s Democratic governor, Gretchen Whitmer, was discovered — the failure to prosecute Trump for any crimes he himself commits empowers him to do it louder.
Writing in the Atlantic, David Frum asked: “Will the politics of violence be accepted in the United States — or will it be punished and discredited?” Trump’s supporters are watching. After years of his burn-it-all-down oratory and above-the-law governance, they are emboldened. Like him, they see themselves as answering to an ideology, not to the laws. Like him, they claim to be fighting for freedom, even if their acts intimidate, harm and harass.
Not prosecuting Trump has already signaled to his supporters that accountability is for suckers. “The warning signs of instability that we have identified in other places are the same signs that, over the past decade, I’ve begun to see on our own soil,” political scientist Barbara Walter wrote in “How Civil Wars Start.” The signs include a hollowing out of institutions, “manipulated to serve the interests of some over others.” Trump’s continued ability to manipulate institutions to serve his interests and his supporters’ interests has eroded yet another democratic norm. “I have an Article II, where I have to the right to do whatever I want as president,” Trump told the conservative organization Turning Point USA when he held the office. Until the criminal justice system stops him, he will continue to believe that.
Ford’s pardon of Nixon was noble in its intentions: He was trying to unite the country, and he expended political capital to issue it, ultimately losing his 1976 campaign largely as a result. And in fact the pardon never rehabilitated Nixon. Unlike Trump, Nixon left office severely weakened. His approval rating stood at 24 percent; comparatively few Americans were clamoring for him to make a comeback bid in 1976, and most Republican officials had abandoned him. He was never invited to another Republican convention. The “big lie” — that Democrats stole the election from Trump — has far more traction now than any Nixon-was-robbed sentiment had then. But Ford’s pardon still did damage: Nixon never had to face a jury, never had to pay for his crimes. In his post-presidency, he published books, made television appearances and consulted with other presidents.
These days, it’s fashionable to say the system worked after Watergate. But that’s not quite right. The system forced the president to resign his office, but it also protected the disgraced ex-president from criminal punishment. In 1974, Americans viewed the pardon as a blow to the rule of law. It’s not too late to learn from Ford’s mistake. -
2022-02-19 at 2:15 PM UTCthe closer we get to busting the cabal the more you seem to find against trump that goes nowhere, but we keep showing truths y'all cant dispute nor can the courts.
we are winning and Y'all are getting ur asses handed to you daily. we are cummin 4 u commie motherfuckers -
2022-02-19 at 2:25 PM UTC
Originally posted by stl1 LOCK HIM UP…LOCK HIM UP…
The Washington Post
Opinions | Prosecuting Trump would set a risky precedent. Not prosecuting would be worse.
Opinion by Matthew Dallek
When President Richard Nixon resigned in disgrace, the odds of his standing trial for obstruction of justice seemed high: His actions undermining the Watergate investigation had been tape-recorded, and his part in the coverup led to pressure on the legal system to hold him accountable. In September 1974, however, one month after Nixon left office, his successor, Gerald Ford, pardoned him. Ford later told a congressional subcommittee that the pardon was designed to “shift our attentions from the pursuit of a fallen President to the pursuit of the urgent needs of a rising nation.”
It didn’t — not in the immediate aftermath and, in some ways, not ever. Although views later softened, many Americans at the time saw the pardon as a mistake. Some were livid. One powerful man had essentially condoned the criminality of another. The get-out-of-jail-free card exacerbated public cynicism and deepened the nation’s social fractures. The White House switchboard lit up with calls that ran 8 to 1 against Ford’s action. The New York Times captured some of the liberal rage when it described the pardon as an affront to “the American system of justice.” A president who thought he was doing the right thing had taken justice into his own hands, casting doubt on a bedrock idea: Justice is blind; no one is above the law.
Nearly five decades later, Joe Biden is president, and a pardon for Donald Trump isn’t happening. But whether Trump will eventually be prosecuted for his conduct in the White House is more of a conundrum: If the country crosses this inviolate threshold, all hell will break loose. If we don’t cross it, all hell will break loose. There will be no “shifting our attentions” by advocates of either course. And whichever path the nation follows will have lasting repercussions. One thing is increasingly clear — fear will play a greater role than facts in determining it.
If Trump were indicted, he would become the first former president to stand criminal trial. Prosecutorial threats are multiplying: Bank and tax fraud charges are under consideration in Manhattan. In Fulton County, Ga., a special grand jury is investigating Trump’s interference in the 2020 election. In a Washington courtroom, U.S. District Judge Amit P. Mehta told a convicted Jan. 6 Capitol rioter that he was a pawn in a scheme by more powerful people, and the legal community is debating whether Trump’s seeming incitement of the insurrection has opened him up to criminal charges. The National Archives requested that the Justice Department open an investigation into Trump’s mishandling of top-secret documents that the government recently retrieved from his Florida estate. Trump still faces legal jeopardy for obstructing justice during Robert Mueller’s probe into Russian interference in the 2016 election (remember that one?). During the 2016 campaign, Trump allegedly orchestrated hush-money payments to Stormy Daniels (the charges that landed his handler Michael Cohen in prison referred to Trump as Individual #1). This list is hardly exhaustive and omits the dozen-plus civil lawsuits and civil investigations Trump faces.
In some cases, prosecutors would need to prove “intent” — a high bar. But it isn’t insurmountable; Trump’s words and deeds have demonstrated that his actions tend to be intentional. If an ordinary citizen had pressured Georgia’s secretary of state to “find” votes to overturn the 2020 election; systematically misrepresented the value of his assets to the IRS and banks; funneled money to silence a paramour; or put government documents down a toilet, this person would almost certainly be facing an array of criminal charges. More than a year after he left office, Trump isn’t facing any such thing yet.
The stakes are enormous. The rule of law, the notion that we are all equal under our criminal justice system, is among the noblest of principles but also the ugliest of myths. The question of putting Trump on trial before a jury of his peers is a test for a principle of democracy that has often proved out of reach for most Americans.
Historically, White and wealthy citizens have sometimes managed to avoid the consequences of their criminality. For decades, White mobs lynched and terrorized African Americans with impunity, and this legacy of a racist justice system, separate and unequal, looms over the debate about charging Trump. The system remains deeply unfair, biased against Black people and favoring the wealthy who are able to afford the best lawyers. Nonviolent drug offenses for the poor have resulted in decades-long prison sentences, while hardly any bankers stood trial for reckless and probably illegal activities that helped trigger the 2008 financial crisis.
With Trump in the White House, his friends and allies already had their own system of justice: Trump-loving Dinesh D’Souza (campaign finance violations), Trump-whisperer Roger Stone (witness tampering), Trump’s first national security adviser Michael Flynn (lying to the FBI), Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort (tax fraud) and Trump son-in-law’s father Charles Kushner (tax evasion and witness tampering) are all convicted felons who received pardons from Trump or had their sentences commuted by him. Three of those convictions occurred during Trump’s presidency.
Now this unequal system of justice faces a crossroads. Any decision about prosecuting the former president centers on two conflicting fears: Inaction mocks the nation’s professed ideal that no one sits above the law — and Americans might wonder whether our democracy can survive what amounts to the explicit approval of lawlessness. But prosecuting deposed leaders is the stuff of banana republics.
The fear of the banana republic is hardly an idle one — and here Trump is a central figure, too. He has boasted of his willingness to go that route: In 2016, he ran by pledging that he intended to use the power of federal law enforcement to help his friends and pay back his enemies. His rallies routinely erupted with chants of “lock her up,” directed at his opponent, Hillary Clinton. When as president he told then-FBI Director James Comey that he should be “letting Flynn go,” he was doing as he had promised, using the presidency to try to save an ally from criminal investigation. Trump sees the law and law enforcement as a weapon: He wielded it to protect himself and rout his foes, as when his attorney general William P. Barr ordered the violent breakup of peaceful Black Lives Matter demonstrations near Lafayette Square. Trump has said that if he gets a second term, he would pardon hundreds of violent insurrectionists charged in the attack on the Capitol. More recently, his remarks about the investigation his administration began under special counsel John Durham suggest that he is still game to go after foes by wildly accusing them of crimes. Trump continually mischaracterizes the Durham investigation as having shown that Clinton’s aides “spied” on his campaign and his presidency, and he issued a statement saying that “in a stronger period of time in our country, this crime would have been punishable by death.” This was “treason at the highest level,” he said.
Of course, there’s also an appearance of impropriety when a Democratic elected official investigates Trump, lending a whiff of credence to the notion that politics sway prosecution decisions regardless of which side is doing it. Biden himself, before he was elected (and before Trump committed some of his most egregious misdeeds), said that prosecuting him would be a “very unusual thing and probably not very … good for democracy,” although he also promised to leave any decisions in the hands of the Justice Department. Indicting could trigger violence, spark a cycle of retribution once Republicans take back power, and erode yet another democratic norm.
But the far graver peril in this situation is inaction, a paralyzing refusal to hold Trump criminally liable for his behavior. The country has seen what happens when lawlessness triumphs; when some citizens feel they can do pretty much what they want with impunity. As historian Eric Foner has pointed out, in 1873, in reaction to the election of a biracial government in Colfax, La., a White mob assaulted the county courthouse, murdered a group of African Americans and seized control of the town government without substantial consequences. In 1874, in New Orleans, a white supremacist organization known as the White League tried to topple the state government (U.S. troops at least suppressed this riot). In 1898, long after Reconstruction, armed Whites overturned a duly elected biracial government in Wilmington, N.C. Because there was no law enforcement, no accountability and no consequences, such violence was condoned, sanctioned by the state and some leaders — which thus empowered anti-democratic forces for decades across the Deep South and elsewhere. (One of the impeachment charges against Andrew Johnson said he had fomented post-Civil War white supremacist violence in New Orleans and Memphis.)
Lessons from overseas also paint a bracing picture: Refusing to hold officials accountable for crimes emboldens them. Putting someone above the law is simply unsustainable for any mature democratic system. In the 20th century, Mexico’s long-time ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party refused to prosecute senior officials for corruption, choosing what three political scientists called “stability” in the political system over “accountability” in the legal one, and corruption became endemic. These scholars argue that nations transitioning toward democracy sometimes do better when they don’t prosecute former leaders and instead allow “democracy to take root.”
But the United States claims to be an advanced democracy. The costs of not prosecuting Trump have already been significant — and they’re already grounds for fear. Trump continues to stir up violence; he acts as if he remains untouchable. He praised the anti-public-health trucker convoy that shut down a key bridge linking Detroit to Ontario and has wreaked havoc in Ottawa: “I see they have Trump signs all over the place and I’m proud that they do,” Trump bragged to “Fox & Friends,” before suggesting that the truckers do the same in the United States, an even greater “tinderbox.” Trump’s acolytes take his cue. Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) expressed his hope that the truckers would bring their mayhem inside America’s borders, while the Republican National Committee defended the police-beating armed rioters at the Capitol who sought to block Biden’s electoral certification by Congress as engaged in “legitimate political discourse.”
Although Trump has long sanctioned violence among his supporters — calling white supremacists in Charlottesville “fine people”; ordering the Proud Boys to “stand back and stand by”; urging a crowd to “march” on the Capitol and “fight like hell” to overturn the allegedly stolen election; tweeting “liberate Michigan” to followers a few months before a plot to kidnap and murder the state’s Democratic governor, Gretchen Whitmer, was discovered — the failure to prosecute Trump for any crimes he himself commits empowers him to do it louder.
Writing in the Atlantic, David Frum asked: “Will the politics of violence be accepted in the United States — or will it be punished and discredited?” Trump’s supporters are watching. After years of his burn-it-all-down oratory and above-the-law governance, they are emboldened. Like him, they see themselves as answering to an ideology, not to the laws. Like him, they claim to be fighting for freedom, even if their acts intimidate, harm and harass.
Not prosecuting Trump has already signaled to his supporters that accountability is for suckers. “The warning signs of instability that we have identified in other places are the same signs that, over the past decade, I’ve begun to see on our own soil,” political scientist Barbara Walter wrote in “How Civil Wars Start.” The signs include a hollowing out of institutions, “manipulated to serve the interests of some over others.” Trump’s continued ability to manipulate institutions to serve his interests and his supporters’ interests has eroded yet another democratic norm. “I have an Article II, where I have to the right to do whatever I want as president,” Trump told the conservative organization Turning Point USA when he held the office. Until the criminal justice system stops him, he will continue to believe that.
Ford’s pardon of Nixon was noble in its intentions: He was trying to unite the country, and he expended political capital to issue it, ultimately losing his 1976 campaign largely as a result. And in fact the pardon never rehabilitated Nixon. Unlike Trump, Nixon left office severely weakened. His approval rating stood at 24 percent; comparatively few Americans were clamoring for him to make a comeback bid in 1976, and most Republican officials had abandoned him. He was never invited to another Republican convention. The “big lie” — that Democrats stole the election from Trump — has far more traction now than any Nixon-was-robbed sentiment had then. But Ford’s pardon still did damage: Nixon never had to face a jury, never had to pay for his crimes. In his post-presidency, he published books, made television appearances and consulted with other presidents.
These days, it’s fashionable to say the system worked after Watergate. But that’s not quite right. The system forced the president to resign his office, but it also protected the disgraced ex-president from criminal punishment. In 1974, Americans viewed the pardon as a blow to the rule of law. It’s not too late to learn from Ford’s mistake.
tl/drThe following users say it would be alright if the author of this post didn't die in a fire! -
2022-02-19 at 3:27 PM UTCLOCK HIM UP...LOCK HIM UP...
CNN
Donald Trump's terrible, horrible, no good, very bad week in court
Analysis by Tierney Sneed
Former President Donald Trump was 0-3 in three high-profile legal battles this week, with new rulings that boosted significant cases his opponents have brought against him.
Perhaps the most significant of all the courtroom defeats suffered recently by Trump was a judge's refusal Friday to dismiss several civil lawsuits filed against him for his alleged role in the January 6 US Capitol attack.
In the 112-page opinion, US District Judge Amit Mehta said that Trump could face trial for his conduct around last year's insurrection.
The ruling was a kicker to a week when attorneys general in Washington, DC, and New York secured victories in their efforts to gather evidence as to whether his businesses broke the law. While Trump continues to wield significant political loyalty and could well be the Republicans' 2024 presidential nominee, the legal turmoil surrounding him shows no signs of slowing.
Exposure for his business
Trump's case for his 2020 election rested on the image created around his supposed business savvy. Now his company is a major source of the legal problems facing the former President.
The week started with a DC Superior Court judge reinstating the Trump Organization as a defendant in DC Attorney General Karl Racine's lawsuit alleging that funds for the 2017 inauguration were misused. After reversing on Monday a prior decision that had dismissed the company from the case, Judge Yvonne Williams also said on Thursday that Racine's office could question the company's ex-Chief Financial Officer Allen Weisselberg in a limited deposition.
Racine alleges that inaugural funds were used to pay off a debt incurred by a hotel room block reserved for Trump Organization employees. He is seeking to recover the nearly $1.1 million that he claims was improperly spent during the inauguration, in violation of DC non-profit law.
Ordered to testify in New York AG's investigation
As Williams was setting a September trial date in Racine's case, a judge more than 200 miles away was hearing Trump's arguments for why he should quash subpoenas in New York Attorney General Letitia James' investigation into the Trump Organization's business practices, arguments the judge would ultimately reject.
James is investigating whether Trump's company misled insurers, lenders and others who relied on its financial statements. Hours after a contentious hearing on Thursday morning, New York Supreme Court Judge Arthur Engoron ordered Trump, as well as his children Ivanka and Donald Trump Jr., to sit for testimony in her civil probe.
The Trumps have signaled they will appeal the order, but if those appeals fail, they could be sitting for depositions in the coming weeks.
Dumped by accountant
In the lead-up to Thursday's hearing, James also revealed, via a Monday evening court filing, that Trump's accounting firm had recently told him that the last 10 years of financial statements the firm prepared for him could no longer be relied upon.
The firm put Trump on notice that other parties that have been relying on the financial materials assembled by Mazars should be made aware that those financial statements are not reliable.
"This is about as calamitous a thing that could happen to a business that you can imagine -- other than getting indicted or going bankrupt," George Conway, conservative lawyer and outspoken Trump critic, told CNN's "AC360" on Monday evening. "And this could lead to going bankrupt."
The Trump Organization tried to spin the firm's statement as a reason that James' investigation should be considered moot.
Engoron called that reasoning "audacious as it is preposterous."
Liability for January 6
Trump is no stranger to litigation around his business. But Friday's ruling allowing three January 6 civil lawsuits filed against him to move forward said his remarks ahead of the assault presented a "one-of-a-kind" case, the judge said, where the First Amendment would not shield him from liability.
"The President's January 6 Rally Speech can reasonably be viewed as a call for collective action," Mehta wrote in his 112-page opinion, adding that the statements were "the essence of civil conspiracy"
Mehta's decision means that Trump could eventually find himself at the defense table at a trial.
Mehta rejected Trump's request that he dismiss two lawsuits brought by Democratic House members, and a third by Capitol Police officers. The plaintiffs are seeking damages for his alleged role in the violence of that day.
While Mehta dismissed other defendants from the cases, he said that it could be plausibly shown that Trump entered into a conspiracy with far-right groups to violently disrupt the certification of the 2020 election results. The judge also rejected Trump's arguments that, as an incumbent president at the time, he is protected by an absolute immunity.
"To deny a President immunity from civil damages is no small step. The court well understands the gravity of its decision. But the alleged facts of this case are without precedent," Mehta wrote.
Trump is expected to appeal the decision. -
2022-02-19 at 4:51 PM UTCNew York Attorney General Letitia James is a known and self-professed ultra-partisan hack for the Demonrat Party. No credibility there whatsoever, folks.The following users say it would be alright if the author of this post didn't die in a fire!
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2022-02-19 at 5:34 PM UTCShe's gonna LOCK HIM UP!
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2022-02-19 at 5:45 PM UTCTRUMP KEEPS WINING and Y'all keep whining
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2022-02-19 at 5:52 PM UTCCNN
Donald Trump's terrible, horrible, no good, very bad week in court
Analysis by Tierney Sneed
"If the article was on video..." -
2022-02-19 at 6:23 PM UTCHey! Anyone want to get stomped on and trampled by a dozen very large horses and then dragged away to the gulag??
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2022-02-19 at 6:45 PM UTCLOCK HIM UP...LOCK HIM UP...
Associated Press
A week of legal setbacks for Trump in Washington, New York
By JILL COLVIN
NEW YORK (AP) — Former President Donald Trump faced one legal setback after another this week as a judge ruled he must sit for a deposition in New York to answer questions about his business practices, his accounting firm declared his financial statements unreliable, another judge rejected his efforts to dismiss conspiracy lawsuits and the National Archives confirmed that he took classified information to Florida as he left White House.
Whatever happens, said Jeffrey Jacobovitz, a Washington lawyer who has been following the investigations, “I think the weeks will get worse for him.”
Here's a look at the flurry of developments:
NATIONAL ARCHIVES SAYS TRUMP TOOK CLASSIFIED DOCUMENTS TO MAR-A-LAGO
In a Friday letter, the National Archives and Records Administration confirmed that classified information was found in 15 boxes of White House records that Trump had brought with him to Mar-a-Lago and turned over last month.
IThe National Archives “identified items marked as classified national security information within the boxes” and “has been in communication with the Department of Justice," they wrote in a letter House Committee on Oversight and Reform. The Archives also confirmed it had received paper records that had been torn up by Trump — some taped together and others left in pieces — and that some White House staff had conducted official business using personal accounts.
While federal law bars the removal of classified documents to unauthorized locations, sitting presidents have broad authority over classification. The Justice Department and FBI have not indicated they will pursue a case.
But David Laufman, the former head of the Justice Department's counterintelligence section who oversaw the investigation into Hillary Clinton for her use of a private email server as secretary of state, tweeted, “It’s hard to imagine that @DOJNatSec is not conducting a criminal investigation into Trump’s stash of classified documents at Mar-a-Lago."
“Even if DOJ ultimately forgoes criminal charges, an investigation is clearly warranted,” he said.
While the Presidential Records Act that oversees the preservation of a president's documents is widely seen to have little enforcement mechanism, David Weinstein, a former federal prosecutor, said: “Taking classified documents is an entirely different ball of wax. And as we've seen in the past, those are what result in actual charges being filed.”
No matter the legal risk, the revelation also exposes Trump to charges of hypocrisy given his relentless attacks on Clinton, his Democratic opponent in the 2016 presidential campaign.
In a statement Friday night, Trump said, “The National Archives did not ‘find’ anything, they were given, upon request, Presidential Records in an ordinary and routine process.”
“If this was anyone but ‘Trump,’ there would be no story here,” he said.
JUDGE REFUSES TO TOSS LAWSUITS AGAINST TRUMP OVER JAN. 6 ATTACK
A federal judge in Washington, D.C., on Friday rejected Trump’s efforts to dismiss conspiracy lawsuits filed by Democratic lawmakers and police officers accusing him of being personally liable for the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol insurrection.
U.S. District Court Judge Amit Mehta said Trump’s words at a rally held before the attack were likely “words of incitement not protected by the First Amendment” and “plausibly” may have led to what happened.
Trump had told his supporters to “Fight like hell" and warned that, if they didn't, "you’re not going to have a country anymore.”
“Only in the most extraordinary circumstances could a court not recognize that the First Amendment protects a President’s speech,” Mehta wrote. “But the court believes this is that case.”
The plaintiffs are seeking financial damages for the physical and emotional injuries they sustained during the insurrection, which Trump has denied inciting.
JUDGE SAYS TRUMP MUST TESTIFY IN NEW YORK LAWSUIT OVER BUSINESS PRACTICES
On Thursday, a judge in New York ruled that Trump must answer questions under oath in the state’s civil investigation into his business practices.
Judge Arthur Engoron ordered Trump and his two eldest children, Ivanka and Donald Trump Jr., to comply with subpoenas issued by New York Attorney General Letitia James and sit for depositions within 21 days. James's lawyers have said they have uncovered evidence that Trump’s company used “fraudulent or misleading” valuations of his golf courses, skyscrapers and other properties to secure loans and tax benefits.
Trump’s lawyers had argued his testimony could be used against him in the criminal investigation into the Trump Organization and its former CFO that's being overseen by the Manhattan district attorney's office.
The ruling is almost certain to be appealed by Trump's lawyers. But if upheld, it could force him to decide whether to answer questions, potentially risking perjuring himself if he lies, or stay silent, citing his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination — something he’s criticized others for doing in the past.
“THERE IS NO CASE!” Trump said in a statement responding to the ruling.
While many legal experts agree the case poses a serious risk to Trump, lawyers who have examined the allegations have said it is not a slam dunk for James and she will face two major hurdles if she brings a suit alleging fraud: proving both an intent to deceive and proving that banks that loaned Trump money were actually fooled.
ACCOUNTING FIRM SAYS TRUMP'S FINANCIAL STATEMENTS AREN'T RELIABLE
In a letter made public in a court filing Monday, the accounting firm that prepared Trump’s annual financial statements said the documents “should no longer be relied upon” after James' office alleged they regularly misstated the value of Trump's assets.
In the letter to the Trump Organization’s lawyer, Mazars USA LLP advised the company to inform anyone who had received the documents not to use them to assess the financial health of the company and the former president. The firm also said it was cutting ties with Trump, its highest-profile client.
Michael Conway, who served as counsel for the House Judiciary Committee in President Richard Nixon's impeachment inquiry, wrote in an NBC News op-ed Thursday that “Mazars’ disavowal of Trump’s financial statements is a turning point in the attorney general’s investigation. The independent accountants who prepared the statements no longer defend them and will likely have to testify why they had a change of heart."
Trump has given his Statement of Financial Condition — a yearly snapshot of his holdings that had been prepared by Mazars based on Trump Organization records — to banks including Deutsche Bank to secure hundreds of millions of dollars worth of loans. Mazars' announcement raises questions about whether other banks would be comfortable loaning money to the Trump Organization.
JUDGE ORDERS EX-TRUMP ORGANIZATION CFO TO SIT FOR DEPOSITION ON INAUGURAL COMMITTEE SPENDING
In a ruling Thursday, a judge said she would allow Allen Weisselberg, the longtime finance chief at Trump’s company, to sit for a limited deposition as part of a lawsuit brought by the District of Columbia attorney general's office that accuses Trump’s inaugural committee of grossly overspending at Trump’s Pennsylvania Avenue hotel to enrich the former president's family.
The Democratic attorney general, Karl Racine, is suing the Trump Organization and the committee that organized Trump's inauguration, alleging they misused nonprofit funds and coordinated with management at the Trump International Hotel and members of the Trump family to arrange events, including spending more than $1 million to book a ballroom at the hotel. Racine has said one of the event’s planners raised concerns about pricing with Trump, Ivanka Trump and Rick Gates, a top campaign official at the time.
The case is scheduled to go to trial in September.
The Manhattan district attorney’s office has already charged Weisselberg and the Trump Organization with tax fraud, alleging he collected more than $1.7 million in off-the-books compensation. The D.C. decision puts additional pressure on Weisselberg, who has pleaded not guilty.
BIDEN ORDERS TRUMP WHITE HOUSE VISITOR LOGS TURNED OVER TO JAN. 6 COMMITTEE
On Wednesday, President Joe Biden ordered the release of Trump White House visitor logs to the House committee investigating Jan. 6, rejecting Trump’s claims of executive privilege once more.
The records show appointment information for individuals who were allowed to enter the White House on the day of the insurrection.
The committee has obtained tens of thousands of records so far as it investigates Trump’s actions on Jan. 6, when he waited hours to tell his supporters to stop the violence and leave the Capitol. Investigators are also interested in the organization and financing of a Washington rally the morning of the riot. Among the unanswered questions is how closely organizers of the rally coordinated with White House officials.
Attorney General Merrick Garland has said the Justice Department remains committed to “holding all January 6th perpetrators, at any level, accountable under law, whether they were present that day or were otherwise criminally responsible for the assault on our democracy.” -
2022-02-19 at 6:46 PM UTC
Originally posted by stl1 LOCK HIM UP…LOCK HIM UP…
Associated Press
A week of legal setbacks for Trump in Washington, New York
By JILL COLVIN
NEW YORK (AP) — Former President Donald Trump faced one legal setback after another this week as a judge ruled he must sit for a deposition in New York to answer questions about his business practices, his accounting firm declared his financial statements unreliable, another judge rejected his efforts to dismiss conspiracy lawsuits and the National Archives confirmed that he took classified information to Florida as he left White House.
Whatever happens, said Jeffrey Jacobovitz, a Washington lawyer who has been following the investigations, “I think the weeks will get worse for him.”
Here's a look at the flurry of developments:
NATIONAL ARCHIVES SAYS TRUMP TOOK CLASSIFIED DOCUMENTS TO MAR-A-LAGO
In a Friday letter, the National Archives and Records Administration confirmed that classified information was found in 15 boxes of White House records that Trump had brought with him to Mar-a-Lago and turned over last month.
IThe National Archives “identified items marked as classified national security information within the boxes” and “has been in communication with the Department of Justice," they wrote in a letter House Committee on Oversight and Reform. The Archives also confirmed it had received paper records that had been torn up by Trump — some taped together and others left in pieces — and that some White House staff had conducted official business using personal accounts.
While federal law bars the removal of classified documents to unauthorized locations, sitting presidents have broad authority over classification. The Justice Department and FBI have not indicated they will pursue a case.
But David Laufman, the former head of the Justice Department's counterintelligence section who oversaw the investigation into Hillary Clinton for her use of a private email server as secretary of state, tweeted, “It’s hard to imagine that @DOJNatSec is not conducting a criminal investigation into Trump’s stash of classified documents at Mar-a-Lago."
“Even if DOJ ultimately forgoes criminal charges, an investigation is clearly warranted,” he said.
While the Presidential Records Act that oversees the preservation of a president's documents is widely seen to have little enforcement mechanism, David Weinstein, a former federal prosecutor, said: “Taking classified documents is an entirely different ball of wax. And as we've seen in the past, those are what result in actual charges being filed.”
No matter the legal risk, the revelation also exposes Trump to charges of hypocrisy given his relentless attacks on Clinton, his Democratic opponent in the 2016 presidential campaign.
In a statement Friday night, Trump said, “The National Archives did not ‘find’ anything, they were given, upon request, Presidential Records in an ordinary and routine process.”
“If this was anyone but ‘Trump,’ there would be no story here,” he said.
JUDGE REFUSES TO TOSS LAWSUITS AGAINST TRUMP OVER JAN. 6 ATTACK
A federal judge in Washington, D.C., on Friday rejected Trump’s efforts to dismiss conspiracy lawsuits filed by Democratic lawmakers and police officers accusing him of being personally liable for the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol insurrection.
U.S. District Court Judge Amit Mehta said Trump’s words at a rally held before the attack were likely “words of incitement not protected by the First Amendment” and “plausibly” may have led to what happened.
Trump had told his supporters to “Fight like hell" and warned that, if they didn't, "you’re not going to have a country anymore.”
“Only in the most extraordinary circumstances could a court not recognize that the First Amendment protects a President’s speech,” Mehta wrote. “But the court believes this is that case.”
The plaintiffs are seeking financial damages for the physical and emotional injuries they sustained during the insurrection, which Trump has denied inciting.
JUDGE SAYS TRUMP MUST TESTIFY IN NEW YORK LAWSUIT OVER BUSINESS PRACTICES
On Thursday, a judge in New York ruled that Trump must answer questions under oath in the state’s civil investigation into his business practices.
Judge Arthur Engoron ordered Trump and his two eldest children, Ivanka and Donald Trump Jr., to comply with subpoenas issued by New York Attorney General Letitia James and sit for depositions within 21 days. James's lawyers have said they have uncovered evidence that Trump’s company used “fraudulent or misleading” valuations of his golf courses, skyscrapers and other properties to secure loans and tax benefits.
Trump’s lawyers had argued his testimony could be used against him in the criminal investigation into the Trump Organization and its former CFO that's being overseen by the Manhattan district attorney's office.
The ruling is almost certain to be appealed by Trump's lawyers. But if upheld, it could force him to decide whether to answer questions, potentially risking perjuring himself if he lies, or stay silent, citing his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination — something he’s criticized others for doing in the past.
“THERE IS NO CASE!” Trump said in a statement responding to the ruling.
While many legal experts agree the case poses a serious risk to Trump, lawyers who have examined the allegations have said it is not a slam dunk for James and she will face two major hurdles if she brings a suit alleging fraud: proving both an intent to deceive and proving that banks that loaned Trump money were actually fooled.
ACCOUNTING FIRM SAYS TRUMP'S FINANCIAL STATEMENTS AREN'T RELIABLE
In a letter made public in a court filing Monday, the accounting firm that prepared Trump’s annual financial statements said the documents “should no longer be relied upon” after James' office alleged they regularly misstated the value of Trump's assets.
In the letter to the Trump Organization’s lawyer, Mazars USA LLP advised the company to inform anyone who had received the documents not to use them to assess the financial health of the company and the former president. The firm also said it was cutting ties with Trump, its highest-profile client.
Michael Conway, who served as counsel for the House Judiciary Committee in President Richard Nixon's impeachment inquiry, wrote in an NBC News op-ed Thursday that “Mazars’ disavowal of Trump’s financial statements is a turning point in the attorney general’s investigation. The independent accountants who prepared the statements no longer defend them and will likely have to testify why they had a change of heart."
Trump has given his Statement of Financial Condition — a yearly snapshot of his holdings that had been prepared by Mazars based on Trump Organization records — to banks including Deutsche Bank to secure hundreds of millions of dollars worth of loans. Mazars' announcement raises questions about whether other banks would be comfortable loaning money to the Trump Organization.
JUDGE ORDERS EX-TRUMP ORGANIZATION CFO TO SIT FOR DEPOSITION ON INAUGURAL COMMITTEE SPENDING
In a ruling Thursday, a judge said she would allow Allen Weisselberg, the longtime finance chief at Trump’s company, to sit for a limited deposition as part of a lawsuit brought by the District of Columbia attorney general's office that accuses Trump’s inaugural committee of grossly overspending at Trump’s Pennsylvania Avenue hotel to enrich the former president's family.
The Democratic attorney general, Karl Racine, is suing the Trump Organization and the committee that organized Trump's inauguration, alleging they misused nonprofit funds and coordinated with management at the Trump International Hotel and members of the Trump family to arrange events, including spending more than $1 million to book a ballroom at the hotel. Racine has said one of the event’s planners raised concerns about pricing with Trump, Ivanka Trump and Rick Gates, a top campaign official at the time.
The case is scheduled to go to trial in September.
The Manhattan district attorney’s office has already charged Weisselberg and the Trump Organization with tax fraud, alleging he collected more than $1.7 million in off-the-books compensation. The D.C. decision puts additional pressure on Weisselberg, who has pleaded not guilty.
BIDEN ORDERS TRUMP WHITE HOUSE VISITOR LOGS TURNED OVER TO JAN. 6 COMMITTEE
On Wednesday, President Joe Biden ordered the release of Trump White House visitor logs to the House committee investigating Jan. 6, rejecting Trump’s claims of executive privilege once more.
The records show appointment information for individuals who were allowed to enter the White House on the day of the insurrection.
The committee has obtained tens of thousands of records so far as it investigates Trump’s actions on Jan. 6, when he waited hours to tell his supporters to stop the violence and leave the Capitol. Investigators are also interested in the organization and financing of a Washington rally the morning of the riot. Among the unanswered questions is how closely organizers of the rally coordinated with White House officials.
Attorney General Merrick Garland has said the Justice Department remains committed to “holding all January 6th perpetrators, at any level, accountable under law, whether they were present that day or were otherwise criminally responsible for the assault on our democracy.”
tl/dr -
2022-02-19 at 7:01 PM UTCWouldn't want to let the facts interfere with your opinion there, would you, Speculum?
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2022-02-19 at 7:03 PM UTC
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2022-02-19 at 8:14 PM UTC
Originally posted by stl1 Wouldn't want to let the facts interfere with your opinion there, would you, Speculum?
In case you missed this...
Originally posted by stl1 Then why does the video show a bag full of parts, whackadoodle?
Originally posted by Speedy Parker Because the element kit does not come fully assembled. It comes with the dryer heating element, a high-limit thermostat, a thermal fuse, a thermal cut off kit, a jumper wire, and screws to fasten the shit together during assembly and prior to installation you know nothing, never did nothing, dumb ass with just two brain cells both fighting for 3rd place.
All for about 40 bucks…
