Below is my column in the Hill on the recent focus on obstruction as a possible charge against former President Donald Trump. There is no question that the filings reflect a belief that the Trump team, and potentially Trump himself, engaged in obstructive conduct. That could be an easier case to make than a prosecution for the retention of material, including classified material, at Mar-a-Lago. However, Hillary Clinton’s case will loom large for many Americans in judging the basis for the prosecution, even on obstruction.
Here is the column:
Hillary Clinton recently hawked a line of hats and shirts with a mocking logo — “But her emails.” The taunt was directed at Donald Trump, who faces a real possibility of a criminal charge after the FBI’s search of his Mar-a-Lago residence.
While Clinton considers her prior conduct a subject of mirth, the FBI’s handling of her case will cast a long shadow over any potential prosecution of the former president, including the recent focus on an obstruction charge. There likely would be an assortment of “but her emails” objections to a charge that could have been made as readily against Clinton or her associates.
The appointment of a special master to examine materials seized in the Trump investigation has occupied much of the attention in the past week. Trump’s legal team’s belated request for a special master could help bring greater clarity to the raid’s scope and seizures. Yet it will not likely alter the trajectory of the case, which the Department of Justice (DOJ) has repeatedly stressed is an “active criminal investigation.”
What is notable is the government’s obvious effort to focus public attention on obstruction as a potential crime. Emphasizing obstruction, instead of the improper retention of classified material, could be seen as a way to navigate a political minefield to get to a prosecution. The reason, once again, is Hillary Clinton, who remains a complicating factor in Attorney General Merrick Garland showing the public that this is not about pursuing Trump but enforcing the law.
In its filings in the last two weeks, the most worrisome line for Trump came in the DOJ’s 36-page opposition to a special master’s appointment when it declared that “obstructive conduct occurred” at Mar-a-Lago in the months leading up to the Aug. 8 search. The DOJ also said it “has developed evidence that government records were likely concealed and removed from the Storage Room and that efforts were likely taken to obstruct the government’s investigation.”
Those types of statements never bode well for a target, since they reflect a certain commitment to the prosecutorial path.
The value of shifting toward an obstruction case is that it would reduce the complications of any Trump claims on declassification or executive privilege to remove documents while he remained president. (The three cited statutes do not require classified status for a crime but two deal with the unlawful possession or handling of defense or sensitive information.) Trump has not fully explained how he allegedly declassified all of this material. Under Section 1519, the government can prosecute someone who “knowingly conceals any document with the intent to obstruct” their investigation.
The filings do not indicate that the government has evidence of knowing concealment by Trump, but it cited various representations made by lawyers on his behalf.
Trump might be familiar with such cases because he pardoned Jesse Benton in the final days of his administration. Benton, who managed Ron Paul’s 2012 presidential campaign, was convicted of violating Section 1519 by concealing campaign payments from the Federal Election Commission. Ironically, Trump signed that pardon as his staff was preparing to leave the White House, including having these boxes packed for transport to Mar-a-Lago.
While the released evidence would clearly support a charge of obstruction, it is unclear what acts were knowingly taken and by whom.
A criminal charge of obstruction against Trump would offer certain political benefits for Garland. As previously discussed, the government has routinely elected not to prosecute high-ranking officials for improperly removing classified material or has sought mere misdemeanor charges in the most egregious cases.
Prosecuting Trump for a misdemeanor for possessing or removing classified documents would seem gratuitous, while prosecuting him for a felony would raise questions of biased or selective prosecution. After all, in 2016, Hillary Clinton had not just 113 documents containing classified material but some documents “classified at the Top Secret/Special Access Program level” on her private email servers. (In Trump’s case, the government allegedly found roughly 100 documents in the Mar-a-Lago raid in addition to roughly 150 handed over by the Trump team under an earlier subpoena.)
Clinton’s documents were even more vulnerable to being compromised via her unclassified email account and, according to the FBI, “hostile actors gained access” to some of the information. Yet she was never subjected to a raid, let alone a charge.
Yet, while less glaring as a contradiction than the charges on the possession or handling of classified information, an obstruction charge would allow up to a 20-year sentence and could be brought with misdemeanor charges on the mishandling or retention of classified information.
Thus, an obstruction charge against Trump would be prosecuted in the shadow of Hillary Clinton’s case. In addition to the transfer of top-secret and other classified documents to her private server, Clinton and her staff did not fully cooperate with investigators. During the investigations of her conduct, some of us marveled at the temerity of the Clinton staff in refusing to turn over her emails and other evidence to State Department and DOJ investigators, including laptops holding suspected classified information. The FBI had to cut deals with her aides to secure their cooperation.
Later, more classified material was found on the laptop of former congressman Anthony Weiner (D-N.Y.), who was married to top Clinton aide Huma Abedin — 49,000 emails potentially relevant to the Clinton investigation.
After Congress sought these emails, Clinton’s staff unilaterally destroyed thousands of emails with BleachBit. Clinton was aware that Congress and the State Department were seeking the emails in 2014. Her lawyers turned over about 30,000 work-related emails to the State Department and deleted 33,000 others while insisting they unilaterally deemed them “personal.”
Garland may be able to make a case against Trump and show that it is indeed distinguishable from the Clinton case and others. What has been alleged is undeniably serious, including the alleged failure to comply with an earlier subpoena and false statements. However, Garland must address the legitimate concerns of millions of Americans that the same office involved in past Trump investigations — with documented instances of false or misleading statements — is leading this new effort. There also is the great concern over the Biden administration charging a prior and possibly future political opponent.
Any criminal case should be based not only on unassailable legal theories and facts but on clear consistency with past cases. That case will turn on still undisclosed evidence of what was known about the contents of the boxes found at Mar-a-Lago and how the documents were handled after the Trump team learned of the FBI’s investigation.
With Hillary Clinton selling “But Her Emails” hats at $30 a pop, Merrick Garland will have to explain the prospect of one politician going to jail while the other goes retail.
Jonathan Turley is the Shapiro Professor of Public Interest Law at George Washington University. Follow him on Twitter @JonathanTurley.
Go after Trump over this and not Clinton for her and her staff’s willful obstruction and destruction of evidence….and the fuse is lit……how large the explosion is the question.
The Fool, Merrick Garland, is playing with fire in a room filled with dynamite….this shall not end well.
With Dopey Joe throwing yet more gasoline on that fire with his insane rhetoric that only ratchets up the rage of good decent Americans…..the Democrats have decided to go jogging in a Mine Field.
Ralph, you’re admitting that some Trump supporters are prone to violence; just as we saw on January 6, 2021. You’re response only justifies the comments Biden stated regarding the biggest threat to our democracy.
Ralphie’s all hat & no cattle — a typical MAGAt blowhard. They’re the most common of the species.
Kidrambler:
Democrat voters rioted, looted, committed arson, assaulted and murdered police officers, barged into restaurants and threatened to assault diners unless they pledged loyalty oaths to BLM, seized entire city blocks in Seattle and took control, trapping residents and business owners, keeping first responders out at gunpoint, preventing help from reaching gunshot victims and rape victims. They destroyed black-owned businesses and wrecked grocery stores and pharmacies critical to black neighborhoods. This went on for over a year. Prominent Democrats as high up as Biden and Harris bailed rioters out of jail so they could return to rioting. Many were never charged, and those who were often were diverted to rehabilitation programs. They caused billions of dollars in property damage, and it will be generations before those jobs come back, if they ever do.
On the other hand, one single time Republican voters had a protest that devolved into a riot. There was a massive, peaceful Trump rally that was family friendly and clean. A group of people split off from that, left before the rally ended, and marched to the Capitol to protest election malfeasance. Police waived many of them in and told them just don’t break anything. Most videos are of people grinning and taking selfies like tourists. Of that group, and even smaller group split off, and tried to force their way onto the Senate Floor to protest. That splinter group devolved into a riot that broke a few items and glass. A female, unarmed protestor was shot and killed by police. Most participants were charged with trespassing and illegally parading. A few were charged with destruction of property and interfering with Congress. Totally non violent protestors who took selfies after being let in by police were among those sent to solitary for 9 months.
You look at these two totally unequal events, and you conclude that it’s the Republican Party that’s violent and a threat to the nation? Businesses boarded up ahead of BLM and Antifa rallies, not Republican rallies.
You expect us to disbelieve our own eyes.
No, Karen, we KNOW you view the world through the foggy prism of Trumpism and Fox media lies. Just HOW LONG AGO were the protests over George Floyd’s murder? Where’s the proof that those who rioted were “Democratic voters”? You don’t have any proof–you just made that up. Jan 6th was NOT a “peaceful Trump rally that was family friendly and clean”. It wasn’t a “rally” at all, and wasn’t a protest, either, because there was nothing to “protest”. This was just a mob of people who fell for Trump’s lie about his “landslide victory” being “stolen”. If you actually watched the Jan 6th Committee meetings you would have seen the testimony of the British journalist who was embedded with the Proud Boys and accompanied them on reconnaissance trips before Jan 6th to assay which entrances to the Capitol would be the most-vulnerable so that they could penetrate the building itself, assault, and possibly kill, Mike Pence and Nancy Pelosi and stop Biden’s victory from being certified. They plotted on ways to draw Capitol Police away from one entry point to make others more accessible. They PLANNED to invade the Capitol itself to stop the peaceful transfer of power, all based on a lie. You’ve also totally ignored the antecedent facts: Trump held “Stop the Steal” rallies and told his disciples that his “landslide victory was stolen by fraud”, which was a lie. He exhorted them to come to Washington on Jan 6th, and promised it “would be wild”. This was after he failed to bully Mike Pence into refusing to accept Biden Electoral College votes and Secretaries of State to “find” nonexistent votes, and after 60+ lawsuits failed for lack of evidence. There was NO “election malfeasance”, which was something Trump made up even before Election Day, as all polls predicted he would lose. He said that the “only way” he could lose would be if the election was “stolen”, which ignores all polls showing he set a record for low approval ratings, COVID was out of control, schools, businesses, restaurants and factories were closed down, unemployment set a record and he created the worst economy since the Great Depression. His massive ego and narcissism prevented him from accepting these reasons as to why he was predicted to lose, which is why he just can’t shut up, go away and move on with his life as every previous POTUS candidate who lost has done. Multiple recounts and audits prove that Biden’s victory was clean.
Ashli Babbitt was not a “totally non violent protestor” either. She tried to break into the Speaker’s Lobby, along with other thugs who smashed windows, broke down doors, and battered police officers. She is NOT innocent. Her death is 100% Trump’s fault for spreading the Big Lie. And, NO ONE has been “sent to solitary” for 9 months, a lie you keep repeating. A Judge decides whether bail is to be allowed, and the amount thereof. Some were not eligible for bail due to: outstanding warrants, prior history of flight, long criminal history and other valid reasons.
You speak of “two totally unequal events”, and you are correct about that–The Republican Party sold its soul and conservative bonafides when it allowed Trump to take over leadership–go along with the Big Lie or get primaried, get attacked, get called “RINO”, insulted and abused. Very few Republicans will publcly admit that Trump did validly lose in 2020, although they admit it privately. They won’t speak out against his endless tirade of lies, and the latest caper: stealing NARA documents, lying about it and politicizing the theft for political points and to raise money. You speak of “disbelieving our own eyes”. If your eyes are telling you the drivel you wrote, you need to see an optometrist.
A room of long ‘tailed’ cats in a room full of ‘rockers”.
Biden is the American Nero
Garland should recommend a fine of $50 and close the case. Revenge is never a good legal motive.
Chuckichan, so you’re admitting a misdemeanor occurred? Why are so many jumping to conclusions when the investigation hasn’t reached any conclusions? We know very generally what the FBI found. We don’t yet know precisely how it got there or if any visitors or other inappropriate viewers got to see these confidential, secret or top secret folders. Granted, it looks bad, where are the so-called Maga patriots protecting America first?
And what about all the damage done to NatSec?
They also claim Snowden’s whistle blowing caused a threat to National Security. Yeah, National Security State, not the security to the people. Anytime there’s a claim that national security has been damaged, they can’t ever prove it. Blind trust is worse than propaganda. “Fool me once… shame on you…. The point is you can’t get fooled again.” Lol. Yes you can and those uncritical of their own beliefs are fooling themselves.
@Kidramber,
Uhm… actually it did.
The collection of phone record metadata was a very important program. (Exposed by Snowden)
Simply put, there were no privacy issues surrounding a phone call’s metadata.*
This was found to be true in several SCOTUS decisions going back to cases in the early to mid ’70’s.
There is no expectation of privacy because the phone company required that data in order to complete the calls as well as to bill the customer.
The metadata did not contain any PII information.
That said, and hence the need for the (*)… when you get into modern times, especially with cell phones, you now have more metadata that can be captured when it comes to said phone call. So there may be a future SCOTUS case concerning at what point does the ancillary data capture infringe on one’s right to privacy.
The reason this is important is when you have another terrorist plot and you need to help track/identify the potential bad actors, you can use some basic Data Science to identify potential members of a terrorist cell. If you had an imminent threat or just had an attack… you don’t have time to get and issue multiple warrants to then have them collect the data and then send it to you. Obama further botched it by not challenging it in courts.
(The law was on his side…) Instead he agreed to keep the data at each phone company and separate.
BTW, in doing so… it opened the door to more potential abuse of the data…
This actually is a classic example of where you could have a public data set, joined to a confidential data set where the results are now highly restricted.
-G
No American president has ever spoken in such an openly hostile way about his fellow citizens. But Biden’s divisive language is music to leftist ears. In Biden, they have found an authoritarian who is willing to crush people who disagree with them, or as they put it, “fascists.”
While he may look sleepy and harmless, Biden has proven to be an energetic demagogue from whose mummified lips spews a constant stream of boasts, imprecations, and threats. To listen to Biden talk, the harvest is bountiful and those who do not appreciate the wonderful things Biden has done are ungrateful, blind, or working for the enemy. His crude Dear Leader routine is insulting to the intelligence of voters: he expects praise for passing a climate change law called the Inflation Reduction Act (subtlety not being among the regime’s virtues) that, if anything, will worsen inflation.
Like all tyrants, Biden is an enthusiastic scapegoater. When gas prices shot to record highs, Biden attacked gas station owners. When his outlandish pledge to vanquish COVID with “science” failed, he dehumanized “the unvaccinated” (really, a dog whistle for Trump voters) and declared that “patience” was “wearing thin” with these undesirables. After reality asserted itself and Biden’s “pandemic of the unvaccinated” attack line lost its bite, he turned to characterizing opponents of his partisan “voting rights” agenda as “domestic enemies” and Jim Crow segregationists.
He has governed as if America were a one-party state. As authoritarians often do, he furiously projects his own extremism onto his opponents: pushing “gender-affirming” bodily mutilation on confused, vulnerable children, abortion without limits, open borders, racialist handouts for his supporters, ending fossil fuels, appeasing violent criminals—these things are what comprise Biden’s so-called “moderate” agenda. His student loan smash-and-grab is a finger in the eye of the working-class people whom Biden claims to champion, and a blatantly illegal patronage scheme to boot.
While asserting powers he doesn’t have, he has brazenly ignored his obligation to enforce the immigration laws. The Supreme Court has on a few occasions sought to rein Biden in, and he has fired back by calling the court illegitimate. He has tasked his Justice Department with finding novel ways to force red states to allow abortion, against the consciences and preferences of those states’ voters. While inveighing against “fascism,” he has gone to extraordinary lengths to censor critics, soliciting the assistance of the tech oligarchy that got him elected for this purpose. He has weaponized justice against his political opponents, including Trump, his likely 2024 election rival.
Through it all, of course, he has found more than enough time to moralize about democracy and the rule of law. This was virtually all we heard from Biden on Thursday night. Besides threatening, Biden was tedious and redundant, repeating platitudes about “democracy” and the rule of law over and over. The rhetoric rang hollow, coming from the guy whose party unleashed nationwide “mostly peaceful” fiery anarchy two summers ago after spending four years rejecting the legitimacy of a free and fair election in 2016.
But Biden wasn’t trying to persuade anyone. His speech was a cynical play for the liberal base and the media, who are convinced that “Our Democracy™” belongs to them. They love “Dark Brandon” and his war on the “MAGA crowd,” whom they clearly consider to be illegitimate and beneath contempt.
They believe that anything is justified if it keeps Trump and the “MAGA Republicans” out of power. It’s scary to think what people this self-righteous might do if they are not chastened in November, supposing they can be chastened. After Biden’s speech, how could they accept defeat?
“No American president has ever spoken in such an openly hostile way about his fellow citizens.”
Hahahaha!
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/01/19/upshot/trump-complete-insult-list.html
And that’s just from Trump’s tweets.
As phony as the writer.
Indeed, Trump’s a phony.
You can search the Trump Twitter Archive yourself: https://www.thetrumparchive.com/
You are a phony all the way. This is the sentence you responded to.
“No American president has ever spoken in such an openly hostile way about his fellow citizens.”
These are some of Trumps tweets you wish to compare to Biden’s trash talk.
I am asking for everyone at the U.S. Capitol to remain peaceful. No violence! Remember, WE are the Party of Law & Order – respect the Law and our great men and women in Blue. Thank you!
Please support our Capitol Police and Law Enforcement. They are truly on the side of our Country. Stay peaceful!
A real journalist, Kari Lake, destroys a fake journalist. Bravo
No wonder the Left hates Kari Lake, Republican candidate for Arizona Governor
REPORTER: You said you feel like Joe Biden is dividing the country, but do you feel like Donald Trump is doing the same by falsely telling people that he won the election, when he lost it?
KARI LAKE: How does that divide the country?
Questioning an election where there were obviously problems is dividing the country?
Since when can we not ask questions about our elections? As a journalist for 20 years… since I was 16, and I distinctly remember many people just like you asking a lot of questions about the 2016 election results. And nobody tried to shut you up. nobody tried to tell Hillary Clinton to shut up. nobody tried to tell Kamala Harris when she was questioning the legitimacy of these electronic voting machines to stop.
We have freedom of speech in this country and you of all people should appreciate that, you are supposedly a journalist. You should appreciate that.
So I don’t see how asking questions about an election where there were many problems is dividing the country.
What I do see dividing the country is shutting people down, censoring people, canceling people, and trying to destroy people’s lives when they do ask questions.
Last I heard, we still have the Constitution, but it is hanging by a thread thanks to the work some people in this area have done. We’re going to save that Constitution and bring back freedom of speech, and maybe some day you’ll thank us for that.
There is no evidence or honest basis for questioning the outcome election. Besides that, Trump and his corrupt lawyers exhausted all legal challenges in the courts and were found to be without evidence. Just because someone claims this or that happened doesn’t make it true. Saying the election was a lie, divides voters who simply want to believe it was stolen from rational thinking voters. It also deliberately breaks down the trust people have in our government. You know, the very system Kari Lake wants to be a part of.
139 million registered “allegedly alive ” voters. 75 million for trump. 81 million for joey adolph biden. The math is way off…where are these millions of fake voters…mysteriously all voting for adolph biden in the middle of the night when certain states stopped counting , and gobs of late mail in votes counted…primarily for adolph biden. Well something is afoot here and if you cant see this much you are purposely blinding your spidey senses for partisan garbage.
“139 million registered “allegedly alive ” voters.”
Nope. ~213.8M registered voters across all states + DC: https://worldpopulationreview.com/state-rankings/number-of-registered-voters-by-state (scroll towards the bottom)
“There is no evidence or honest basis for questioning the outcome election.”
Of course there is. Further it happens all the time.
How much of a hypocrite are you ?
We wasted 4 years on ludicrously stupid claims by Clinton that Russian collusion gave the 2016 election to Trump.
Claim made based on fraudulent evidence manufactured by Clinton.
Claims that DOJ/FBI knew were based on a hoax in October 2016.
And yet we wasted years investigating something that even a moron could tell was a hoax.
Putin is not an idiot. He did not want a President that was going to increase US energy production which would come at the expense of Russian power. He did not want a president that was going to push European nations to take the lead in being able to defend themselves. He certainly did not want a US president that was going to give Ukraine weapons rather than just blankets.
“Besides that, Trump and his corrupt lawyers exhausted all legal challenges in the courts”
Correct – the court undermined their own credibility by turning a blind eye to any evidence of fraud.
“were found to be without evidence.”
False, there have been no evidentiary hearings by courts on the election.
“Just because someone claims this or that happened doesn’t make it true.”
Correct – saying that lawless mailin voting did not result in fraud does not make that true.
38 US states have constitutional requirements for secret ballot elections. Several states like PA have constitutional requirements that a person must vote in person. Several Like PA require voting on election day except for constitutionally enumerated reasons. And yet just recently the PA SCOTUS decided that mailin elections were constitutional – despite 3 specific constitutional provisions barring them.
So why is it we are supposed to trust the courts ?
Even those states with long term experience with mailin voting – have error rates far higher than the margin of victory on 2020.
The typical first time mailin ballot is rejected for errors 6% of the time in states that have been doing mailin voting for years.
In the 2020 DEMOCRAT primary the error rate in some places was as high as 25%. Yet in the general election miraculously only 0.25% of mailin ballots were rejected.
There are good reasons for high error rates on mailin ballots. the same reasons that ordinary people manage very little successfully by mail. And this of course ignores the fact that mailin voting defeats most of the checks we have against election fraud. Not only does mailin votin enable mailin voting fraud. But it enables election fraud by election officials.
Of the 6 contested states – there is not one that does not have hundreds of thousands of ballots without legally required chain of custody records. Without mailin voting ballots never leave the control of election officials. The Brennan Center is correct that inperson voting fraud is rare – though they likely underestimate it by an order of magnitude. Regardless, in person voting fraud in secret ballot elections will never amount to more than about 10,000 votes per state.
With in person elections the primary source of election fraud is with election workers. Philadelphia has had multiple convictions for election fraud in every single election cycle for election workers scanning the same batch of ballots over and over.
With in person elections ballots are not supposed to every leave the precinct. Problems with chain of custody are giant red flags of Fraud BY ELECTION WORKERS. Fraud by election workers is automatically rarer in inperson elections – because any large scale fraud will highly likely result in someone getting caught. but the moment ballots leave control of election workers it is impossible to be certain what the cause of chain of custody errors is. Basically mailin voting enables fraud by election workers.
Mailin voting also enables ballot harvesting – which is illegal everywhere in the country except California, though we know it went on large scale in 2020.
Ballot harvesting could be someone getting a ballot for a disabled person and then taking it to the drop box for them.
It also could be operations culling the voter registration records for voters who have not voted in years and producing a ballot from them and delivering it to a dropbox. There is no means to tell the difference.
With mailin voting it is possible to inject hundreds of thousands of fraudulent ballots with a very low probability of getting caught.
The AZ audit found slightly less than 50,000 duplicate votes – instances where a ballot was accepted by the same person more than once. This could be confusion on the part of voters, it could be small time election fraud by voters, or most likely it could be the tip of the iceberg indicating a large scale operation manufacturing ballots for people on voter registration lists who were unlikely to vote.
BTW there was evidence of this in the CA recall election – not enough to tip the election, but when voters show up at the polls to vote and large numbers are told by election officials they have already voted – that i an incredibly strong clue there is a large scale election fraud operation going on.
If you want trustworthy elections, the first thing you must do is follow election laws – as they are written, not as you wish them to be. Legislatures set those laws – not members of the executive branch. The executive must follow the law AS WRITTEN.
And the courts must enforce that – if necescary rejecting ballots that were cast outside the law.
No matter what form of election you have, no matter what the rules are – there is no means to trust the election if the courts are unwilling to reject – possibly large numbers of ballots when the law is not followed scrupulously.
Fraud piggy backs on error and lawlessness. You will have fraud if you do not enforce the law – no matter the cost.
The next thing you must do is end the complexity that masquerades as voter convenience. Every new means of voting you interoduce, By mail, absentee, early voting, each of these introduces more complexity, more error, and more oportuniy for fraud.
it is not possible to conduct a trustworthy mailin election. But it is much much worse if you have a combiniation of mailin, in person, absentee, early voting. ‘the greater the complexity the more error, and the greater the ability of injecting ever larger numbers of ballots.
It is not possible to eliminate fraud in a single day in person secret ballot election. But the scale of that fraud is inherently small.
In PA we still have 275,000 more ballots than people who voted according to records, Almost all those 275K are in Philadelphia and Pittsburgh – really predominantly philadelphia. It is near certain that some part of that is just administrative error.
Though most of the rest of the state has very small if any discrepancies. But it is also possible, even likely that discrepancy is a red flag indicating some form of large scale election fraud.
John, they might have investigated that for four years, but the conclusion was no there there. However, despite unsubstantiated claims of collusion, no one denied Trump won the electoral votes. There was only one stolen election in my voting lifetime. It was the 2000 election which the conservative justices on the US Supreme Court interfered with Florida State rights. After leaving the court, Justice Sandra Day O’Connor admitted it was a mistake by the court. Up until her exception vote to stop the recount, Justice O’Connor would sooner allow an inmate’s execution than interfere with states rights.
“Justice Sandra Day O’Connor admitted it was a mistake by the court.”
Her actual statement was “was certainly controversial.”. A lot of that controversy was over the fact that Gore won the popular vote. I don’t think she ever said it was a mistake.
She said the court should not have taken the case.
But she also said at the same time that the FL courts were F’d up
Essentially what she said was it was Wrong for Scotus to step in (and she may be correct on that).
And it was wrong what the FL courts were doiung – and she was correct on that.
The 2000 election was a mess, but it was not stolen.
The supreme court correctly determined that the FL courts could not unilaterally ignore FL election law.
I would note that the SCOTUS decision in 2000 is in myriads of ways echoed by the many court decisions against Trump in 2020.
I am not sure what I really think about 2000 – except that it was the first proof that we need to do much better regarding elections.
I have heard numerous attorney’s – like Dershowitz who Argued for Gore claim that had the recount continued – Gore would have won. But I have also read journalists and others who claim that a Full Recount of the entire state would have resulted in an even larger Bush win, which is why the Press let go after the SCOTUS decision.
HOWEVER, inarguably the President of the United States was elected by a number of votes that was a tiny fraction of the margin of error. In othrwords it is not possible to know that the win was not just the result of random chance errors. near
That should have been a huge wakeup call.
The 2000 election did result in getting rid of lots of mechanical voting machines and punched card readers.
But it introduced voting terminals – which was a huge mistake. Elections can not have untransparent black boxes.
Regardless, I have been fighting for Voter integrity since 2000.
For better laws, for better transparency. for secure processes.
Acheiving a near absolutely trustworthy election is actually possible. But it has serious requirements.
The eligability of each and every voter must be verifed at the time the cast their vote.
All the requirements for secret ballot elections MUST be met. It is not possible to secure any form of election where the ballot leaves direct government oversight.
The laws regarding the conduct of elections MUST be followed always and to the letter – and if they are not people must be prosecuted and ballots must be tossed.
If there are no consequences to violating election laws, then those laws do not exist and fraud is certain.
The courts can only have the authority to reject or accept election laws as a whole.
Election integrity is a systemic matter, Weaken as single point and the whole system becomes vulnerable.
We can have a great deal of election convenience – early voting, absentee voting, …. BUT all these come at exponential increases in complexity of election laws – and again those laws must be followed near perfectly.
If you want the greatest chance of acheiving election integrity, the simplest election process with the least options followed rigidly is the best hope of transparency.
Every single thing the Left calls “voter supression” is also voter integrity. You can not have infinite choices, great ease of voting and trustworthy elections. All election laws that promote integrity will make voting more difficult.
You beleive that 2000 was stolen. That was NOT the case. There is a small possibility it was erroneously decided.
Regardless, it should have been a wakeup call over how important election integrity is.
Instead we continue to vote in ways that assure we will have more fights over election fraud in the future.
I liked what Scalia had to say at the time. I don’t have the quotes but he said Gore brought the election to the court. It was now in front of the judiciary so Scalia asked who would you want to decide the election, the Florida Courts or the Supreme Court?
The best decision would have been the one 4 justices signed on.
The constitution makes the conduct of federal elections the responsibility of the state legislature, not the courts.
The supreme court has no ability to review this – nor do the Florida courts.
John, a decision had to be made, so the best decision was not available. The choice became the Florida Supreme Court or the US Supreme Court.
Nothing is perfect. ‘Perfect is the enemy of good.’
Getting elections right is incredibly important.
Biden’s rant that there is something evil about questioning elections is stupid.
Lots of people – myself included are still unsure about 2000.
Unlike most on the left, I tend to beleive those stories that a full statewide recount would have expanded Bush’s lead to 800-2000 votes.
But that is still well inside the margin of error for counting – even under the best of circumstances.
At the time I was terrified that one side or the other would start claiming fraud.
There was with absolute certainty thousands of fraudulent votes cast in FL and elsewhere in 2000.
The 2000 election turned me on to election integrity.
While Bush’s HAV got rid of punched cards and mechanical voting machines – which was long overdue.
The Computer voting terminals were a huge mistake.
I would like to see a constitutional amendment requiring Secret Balloting, voter ID, and hand marked paper ballots.
There is an interesting story in GA that has not gained much attention.
Aparently there is video of a GA Republican Election judge allowing computer Techs to image a current GA voting machine.
GA still has the touch screen voting machines an resisted efforts to replace them.
Anyway a Democratic group is suing using this allegation for election fraud to try to get hand marked paper ballots throughout the state.
I absolutely support hand marked paper ballots everywhere – whether democrats or republicans are pushing for them.
With respect to elections I think SCOTUS needs to put its foot down and say that with very few exceptions the courts – federal and state MUST stay out of elections.
That does not prevent hanky panky. It just means that it occurs with people we can vote out of office.
Ultimately the solutions to our election problems are political – legislatures must figure out how to structure elections such that we can trust them.
There is no perfect solution. Madison’s federalist 51, makes it pretty clear that thwarting
government corruption requires eternal vigilance.
You can not pass a law that will make the lawless follow the law.
John, I remember the discussion about why Gore chose the areas he did. Some of the other communities had ballots from service men that hadn’t been counted. He did not want a statewide recount.
It is my beleif that the best evidence show that Bush won FL by more than 800 votes.
That is a tiny fraction of the margin of error and that is a problem that we still have not addressed.
Our elections are Not trustworthy enough for results to be accepted in close elections.
That is a fault of the process, not the voters.
I really do not like rank choice voting. But it is an improvement over court adjudication.
I greatly prefer runnoffs – the faster the better.
regardless, we should not just accept the results of close elections.
Nor should we have holywars in courts that undermine our courts.
We should conduct elections so that they can be trusted.
O’Conner suggested that SCOTUS should not have heard the case.
But she also stated at the same time that the FL courts were clearly screwing up.
I think the correct decision would have been a majority position, that should ALSO apply to 2020.
That the ultimate authority regarding a States Election processes rests with the state legislature (or in some instances congress)
That complies with the constitution.
I would note that there is no PERFECT answer. Many questions of governance have no perfect answer.
Madison identified the problem in Federalist 51.
“If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself.”
There is not a perfect answer to this problem.
Self Government ultimately depends on the ability of those in government to act constitutionally and objectively even when that is against their interests.
We can not have a final authority that will not suffer from the flaw that they are not angels.
The advantage of having the legislature as the final authority is that the legislature was previously elected and clearly represents the will of the people – at the point in time they were elected. Even if the legislature in politically biased, it is still biased towards what was a known reflection fo the will of the majority at one time.
Further that legislature will themselves face re-election and any decision they make will be reviewable by the voters then.
It is not perfect, but it keeps politial corruption in a domain we all accept as political
rather than kicking it to the courts which we desparately need to be divorced from political corruption.
Some Sandra Day O’Conner quotes on the 2000 election:
The ruling “was certainly controversial.”
“The court’s decision rested on federal law … the allegation was that Florida officials were not correctly applying federal law in the counting of the votes. That’s a perfectly OK federal issue. Now, what bothers people about that election is that the popular vote was for Mr. Gore …”
“What the court did was effectively stop the recount procedure,” O’Connor continues: “And you can quibble with that if you wish. It was very late in the electoral process, and the court finally decided there had been error and we put a stop [to the recount].”
“We have a very odd system in this country called an Electoral College. We don’t allow people to vote in presidential elections for the candidates. They vote for electors, who then meet and decide how the electors are going to cast their votes. It’s up to each state in the United States to decide whether it’s the winner take all in the electoral votes.”
O’Connor remarked recounts wouldn’t change the vote and 4 media recounts have different results.
“I understand the frustration because of the popular vote nationwide, but [a change in the process of deciding presidential elections by the Electoral College] would require a change in the constitutional structure, and I suspect the nation isn’t ready to do that,”
A part of what distinguishes the left from most everyone else is utopian thinking.
If you beleive that perfection is acheivable – then you are or should be on the left.
If you do not beleive perfection can be acheived – then you should have nothing at all to do with the left.
Our nation, our constitution, our people are not perfect, nor are they perfectable,
But we can and have improved, and continue – with setbacks to do so.
We constantly here rants from the left regarding elections about voter supression – as if that is the only criteria for an election, and that all other requirements can be acheived, while not ever negatively impacting intentionally or otherwise any group.
If we could assure that there was no fraud or error at all in our elections, but the laws necescary to do so would negatively impact minority voting by 1% – what is the answer ? Elections we can trust, or elections where every group has perfect access to voting ? given that the later – leftist perfectionism is unacheivable, obviously the answer is the former.
But in fact we can not acheive perfect Trust in elections either.
But we MUST acheive extremely high trust in elections – and we must do so over and above all other values, regarding elections.
I am going to address elections again because you are clueless.
It is not the duty of Voters or even candidates to prove that elections are trustworthy.
That is the duty of government.
If voters do not trust elections then government is not legitimate.
We do not have a law criminalizing the hoax that Clinton inflicted on the country with her collusion delusion nonsense.
But we should. She sold a HOAX to the FBI/DOJ
As a result large numbers of democrats beleived the election was not legitimate. Many still do today.
While I have major major problems with the DOJ/FBI/SC investigation of the collusion delusion – we can not conduct a criminal investigation on grounds that rest on a known HOAX – that is an egregious violation of constitutional rights.
At the same time it was absolutely necescary to conduct some type of investigation to assure everyone that the election results were trustworthy.
Such investigation should have been conducted by the house or the senate, or a special commission – like the 9/11 commision, and most of its work should have been done publicly.
Much the same was required after 2020. While the last polls I am aware of found that traditional election fraud was only viewed as likely by a plurality of americans. 79% beleive that malfeasance by the media and social media on the Hunter Biden laptop tipped the election. And as we are now learning – that malfeasance was NOT the consequence of private instituions engaging on censorship on their own, but was driven by the FBI contacting those private institutions and creating false warnings.
That is GOVERNMENT Election Fraud. That SHOULD be more significant than anything TTV has dug up with ballot harvesting.
One of the most sacred requirements of elections is that governments role must be absolutely neutral.
Those in government can not put their fingers on the scales to effect the outcome of elections.
Conductin elections lawlessly divides voters.
Making new rules on the fly in the midst of an election divides voters.
Failing to earn the trust of nearly all voters – divides voters and deligitimizes elections.
It is not and never should be a crime for anyone to challenge he results of any election.
Whether that is Al Gore or Stacy Abrahms, or Maxine Watters, or Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump.
It is BTW not a lie if they beleive it.
But even if they do not – challenging an election is NEVER a crime.
It is something that we should expect with every election.
It is the duty of GOVERNMENT – not those challenging the election to prove they conducted the election such that the results can be trusted.
While NOT by the courts, some of the Claims regarding the 2020 election have atleast partly been refuted.
The Windham NH audit proved there were known flaws in some Election scanners that could and nearly did alter the outcome in a house race. That flaw was present for decades and DVS was aware of it, but it would only have a significant effect if ballots were folded – as mailin ballots are, and only effect those races over the fold. Always resulting in an overvote.
This problem was with near certainty presen throughout NH, and is possibly present throughout the country.
But it did not effect the presidential election.
The GA Cobb county signature audit proved that the error rate in GA was likely 20 times larger than Biden’s margin of victory.
And they mailin ballot fraud rate was likely 2-3 times Biden’s margin of victory.
This result was burried – except that GA is requiring better process in the future.
The AZ audit found that atleast in AZ the clams that DVS equipment was deliberately altering vote counts is false.
AZ found a very large number of errors of various types – with varying probability of fraud. Nearly half of all ballots counted had some error that violated AZ law. Ultimately the scale of the errors, made evaluating fraud impossible.
As and example precinct started photocopying blank ballots when they were running low. As a result they auditors could not say whether ballots that were not officially printed ballots were evidence of fraud or evidence of misconduct by election officials.
The most significant AZ finding was the almost 50K instances where multiple ballots were accepted and counted from the same person. This is fraud, but more importantly it is a strong indicator of fraud much larger than 50K ballots.
It is an indication that large numbers of ballots were being manufactured for unlikely voters and fed into the election.
The AZ audit also found many problems with the DVS equipment – while none implicated errors in the 2020 count, they exposed the possibility of outside election fraud in future elections.
This is just a small sample of what has been found – it does not touch all the actual fraud found in WI involving nursing homes.
It does not cover the video of trucks dropping off boxes of ballots late at night in detroit – with no records of any ballots being received.
There is nothing immoral or unethical about alleging election fraud.
Both parties have alleged fraud constantly, and occasionally been correct.
AGAIN, it is the duty of our government our courts to conduct elections – openly and without fraud such that we will trust the results, and to respond openly to allegations of fraud.
Trust in elections is not a priviledge govenrment is entitled to.
It is something that must be earned – with every election, through lawful and transparent conduct of elections.
And through constant open and rigorous inquiry
In the midst of a pandemic, after a history of some voters standing in line to vote for several hours and sometimes in inclement weather, it was in the interest of democracy to ensure every voter who wanted to vote got to. I’ve been voting by mail in my state for twenty years. If you actually understood how secure ballot envelopes are to be checked against voter rolls, you wouldn’t be so upset. And if you understand how important voting is in our republic and are complaining because a red state enacted special accommodations to ensure their citizens could vote safely, then you’re exactly what Biden spoke of as the biggest threat to our democracy. You only want to count elections in a way that lets you limit which citizens can vote so as to ensure your candidate wins. That’s not an election. That’s the real steal.
“In the midst of a pandemic”
The evidence both now and then is that nothing Government did – including mangle our election laws, had any positive effect on reducing covid. there was no post election spike in Covid among those who voted in person.
All in all out public helth responses to Covid have been significantly net negative – having no positive effect on Covid outcomes, and massively negative effects elsewhere.
Emergencies are constantly used as justification for tyrants and authoritiarians to grab more power.
It will likely take atleast a decade to undo the damage that our emergency responses have done to the rule of law and the integrity of our systems.
“after a history of some voters standing in line to vote for several hours and sometimes in inclement weather”
I have never had to wait more than 5 minutes to vote in my life.
In the US we vote by congressional district, Each state through its own laws subdivides those congressional districts further.
There is no reason at all – except incompetence of local government that every precinct in the US should not have near identical ease of voting. In fact those places with the longest lines should by all factual criteria have the SHORTEST.
A precinct with 10,000 voters in my comunity covers many square miles.
In Detroit, Baltimore, or NYC is covers a few square blocks.
I must drive to a polling place. In the places with the worst problems people can walk.
Unsurprisingly we have the worst voting plroblems in the same places we have the worst and most expensive schools.
The problems you complain about are the consequence of bad local government,
not Covid.
“it was in the interest of democracy to ensure every voter who wanted to vote got to.”
FALSE.
We are not a democracy.
Regardless, the #1 priority for all elections is TRUST, Absent that nothing else matters.
“I’ve been voting by mail in my state for twenty years.”
So ? Election fraud is not and never has been a universal problem.
Fraud will always be highest when and where the stakes are highest, the margins narrowest.
“If you actually understood how secure ballot envelopes are to be checked against voter rolls”
I do, but that is a tiny part of securing an election.
You claim you vote by mail for 20 years.
How do other voters know that no one influenced your vote ?
Does your wife know how you voted ? You kids ? Your neighbor ?
Can other voters know that a party Aparatich – does not matter which party, did not come to your home and either threaten or promise you something in return for your vote ?
Once the ballot is outside the polling place it is not possible to know that the vote was not the product of inducement or coerction.
Clinton claimed that Russian’s influenced Trump voters.
Lets presume that some party actively influenced voters – like say the DNC or RNC, or PACS or foreign governments or neighbors. These are NORMAL and unavoidable and happen in every election.
But the DNC, RNC, nor anyone else can follow you into the voting booth. The “influence” of all others ends just outside the polling place. When you step into a voting booth, your vote is between you and your god.
Your employer can not know how you voted,
Your wife can not know.
No one can know how you voted,
Even if you wanted them to know – you can not prove it.
secret ballot laws and constitutional amendments were enacted because in the 19th century parties and various others were BUYING votes.
If you vote in person – not only can no one buy your vote – but ever single other voter KNOWS – can TRUST, that the votes of others were not BOUGHT.
There is absolutely no means to prevent innumerable forms of inducement or coercion with mailin voting.
It is unconstitutional in most of the country for very good reason.
But does mailin voting result in fraud everywhere all the time ?
Of course not. The larger the fraud required to alter the outcome of an election the harder it is to hide.
In a +5 blue state – the red party would have to swing 5.1% of voters to alter a statewide outcome.
The more Blue or Red a electoral district is the less likely there will be fraud.
The larger the swing you have to produce the more likely you will get caught.
This is why in person fraud is very rare and nearly always occurs in close races for small offices.
But mailin fraud dramatically reduces the odds of getting caught and dramatically increases the size of the swing you can produce without getting noticed.
I highly doubt you know a fraction as much about voting as I do. I have been actively involved in voter integrity issues since 2000.
I have actively studied all forms of voting.
I was actively involved in efforts to get rid of the Bush Computer Voting Terminals.
I do not actually beleive those are a significant vector for Fraud – though they do introduce the opportunity for very large scale fraud by a very small number of people – which is unbeleivably dangerous.
But the primary problem is they are a black box that screams “You MUST Trust me”
Those are destructive or trust.
One of the things those like you do not understand is that election integrity is not merely about preventing actual election fraud – which is quite difficult, it is also about preventing the perception that fraud is possible. That is much harder.
The Bush Voting Terminals had to go – they decrease Trust.
“you wouldn’t be so upset.”
I have been upset about the lack of integrity in our elections for more than 20 years.
And I understand far more about what goes no than you aparently.
“And if you understand how important voting is in our republic”
It is precisely because it is important that it MUST be secure.
” and are complaining because a red state enacted special accommodations to ensure their citizens could vote safely, then you’re exactly what Biden spoke of as the biggest threat to our democracy.”
I am exactly what Biden talked about – though not a MAGA republican.
But I am not the threat to our Republic.
I am the nest hope that things do not get worse.
One thing I can absolutely assure you is that if we continue as we are, the question is not IF there will be an indesputably stolen election, but WHEN.
Things are Much WORSE today than in 2000, But even at the far better election integrity we had prior to 2020,
It was STILL only a question of WHEN.
We have had far more razor thin elections since 2000, than possibly ever before in history.
In 2020 There were thousands of elections across the country decided by less than 1% of the vote.
Each percent closer and election gets the odds of fraud increase exponentially.
The presidential election in 2020 hinged on 45,000 votes in 3 states. That is numbers that could easily be reached by IN PERSON election fraud – the hardest form of fraud possible.
Was there election fraud in 2020 ? Absolutely, there is election fraud in EVERY election.
Was it worse than any elections prior to the 1800’s – with near certainty.
Was it large enough to flip the presidential and other elections ? That is harder to tell, but still highly likely.
TTV makes a compelling case that there was between 250,000 and 800,000 ballots harvested in 6 states,
He does not prove those were votes for Biden, but they likely were. Nor has anyone even looked at where there was significant fraud by Republicans – there are demographic factors that make statewide election fraud harder for Republicans. But still it is possible.
Election integrity is not about which candidate wins.
Further – you are going to have to deal with it eventually.
Absent change that is unlikely the only way we avoid an OBVIOUSLY fraud in some statewide election is if all states have 5 pt or greater margins throughout the state.
We have built a system that is trivial to defraud. If the fraudsters have not already, eventually they will come.
There is zero doubt of that. There is far too much at stake.
Look at the massive amount parties spend on elections. Do you really think that there are not a handful of individual actors that would spend a small portion of that money to guarantee a victory ?
Election integrity is not about which candidate wins.
Further – you are going to have to deal with it eventually.
Absent change that is unlikely the only way we avoid an OBVIOUSLY fraud in some statewide election is if all states have 5 pt or greater margins throughout the state.
We have built a system that is trivial to defraud. If the fraudsters have not already, eventually they will come.
There is zero doubt of that. There is far too much at stake.
Look at the massive amount parties spend on elections. Do you really think that there are not a handful of individual actors that would spend a small portion of that money to guarantee a victory ?
JB
KR – if I was so inclined – I could successfully inject about 250,000 fraudulent votes into any state that has Mailin voting, and unattended ballot dropboxes without surveillance cameras.
With a very high probability of no getting detected, much less personally caught.
This is not at all hard, it can be done by one person, and at relatively low cost.
You wrote about the security measures your state uses to prevent mailin election fraud. I do not know your specific state.
Different schemes of mailin voting are more secure than others. GA, PA, AZ, NV, WI, MI used the least secure means possible.
Or more accurately – their schemes AS IMPLIMENTED were horribly insecure.
If you wish we can have a debate about how to make mailin voting far more secure than it was in 2020 in most states.
That said, if ballots leave the control of election officials, you can and will have some forms of coercion and inducement.
In a properly secure election it is not possible for any other person in the world to know how you voted – even if you want them to.
And you can not ever accomplish that if Ballots leave the control of election officials.
Further if ballots leave control of election officals. you introduce the ability of election officials to inject ballots without getting caught.
Making voting easier is a value, it is not a principle.
Nor is making voting harder inherently bad.
The US is not a direct democracy – no nation on earth is,
Direct democracies are the worst from of government – worse than dictators.
Our current from of government is essentially direct democracy with myriads of impedmients to make voting harder.
The fact that you must vote for representatives – makes it harder for you to influence each and every issue.
The fact that representatives are elected at intervals – makes it harder for you to influence outcomes.
The electoral college, as well as all kinds of other designed in elements of voting in this country are all efforts to diminish individual influence. To make voting harder.
Making voting harder is inherently undemocratic, are not a democracy.
Making voting harder is very important to improving the quality of our government.
It is well known that universally the quality of decisions people make is directly related to what it will cost them personally.
The more work you have to do to vote, the better your choices will be.
If I had the ability to do so, I would make it so that everyone had to vote in person, and that on election day everywhere in the country people had to walk 5 miles to vote through gale winds.
That would result in much better choices.
The easier you make voting the worse the people we elect will be.
The government has been allowed to mutate into a ungovernerable behemouth by virtue of it’s excessive bureacracy. Unless we adhere to the 10th Amendment and shutter most of the DC duplication of State’s Rights, we will never change a thing. Outlaw the government unions as a conflict of interest and cede all power not already established by the original constitution back to the states. Make our elected representatives construct, ready thouroughly ALL legislation to be pased THEMSELVES, not pass it on to a partisan staff member. Until we strangle DC and it’s corrupted body of grifters we are headed for the worst banana republic tyranny.
These would be the rational thinking voters – many of whom still beleive that the 2016 election was stolen ?
These would be the rational thinking voters who think that the Biden’s ongoing corruption in Ukraine and elsewhere was a right wing conspiracy theory ?
These would be the rational voters who beleived that Biden was no going to reduce fracking or halt the Keystone XL ?
These would be the rational voters who think that Biden is competent ?
These would be the rational voters that think we can spend trillions without inflation ?
Who beleive the Inflation reduction act will reduce inflation ?
Who beleive that doubling the number of IRS agents and giving them all guns is only to go after the very rich ?
Who beleive that wiping out a half a trillion in student debt will not increase inflation and increase he cost of college further ?
These are the rational voters who beleive the lowest Labor Force participation rate in 40 years and an alsmot 6% drop in real wages is a the strongest ecconomy ever, and that an 8% increase in real wages and a 2% increase in labor force participation is a bad economy ?
These would be the rational voters who beleive that you can wave a magic wand and change whether you are male or female ?
John, their rationale was just get rid of Trump. You might not like that, but it largely was. 🤔
You are entitled to whatever rationale you want for your vote.
It is error to presume that you know the unexpressed thoughts of other voters.
I have no doubt many voters voted just to get rid of Trump.
They are free to do just that.
And we are all suffering with the consequence.
But that is not the question we are debating
No matter how many people voted legitimately for or against Trump for whatever reasons,
the question is how many fraudulent votes were there.
In PA there are 275K more ballots than people who voted.
Fraud is not the only explanation for that.
But being unable to reconcile the number of ballots with the number of voters is a violation of election laws designed to prevent and detect fraud.
Without a very close match between ballots cast and persons who voted we have a probability of fraud.
Your naivite is so laughable. Read the history of democrat voter fraud and realize that we have good reason to be fearful of non-ID required voting, especially with rogue states such as NY ans CA. Face the facts, you are being duped, very sweetly, of course, based on your underlying humanity, but that is exactly what the left counts on, your willingness to be a “good” person, but only as they define it.
RE:””Read the history of democrat voter fraud and realize that we have good reason to be fearful of non-ID required voting, especially with rogue states such as NY ans CA.”” Agree. Consider the California voters who attested to the fact that when they presented in person to vote, they were advised that they already had. Conservative black writers such as Candace Owens have decried the voter ID issue as one designed to keep the black electorate from ‘leaving the plantation’. I know, from my own professional career of over 40 years, that Medicare, Medicaid and providers of other entitlements require identification by recipients issued either directly from the agency concerned, or from another govt entity, when they present for services. Florida’s DMV will provide a State photo-ID for individuals who do not drive. Said individuals, complexion, age, religious preference, sexual,orientation, place of national origin, or physical or mental challenge nothwithstanding manage to find a way to ‘get there’ and verify who they are when it comes to the aforementioned benefit programs be it health care, or other entitlements. Seek and ye shall find. Only when it comes to Election Day are these then deemed ‘tired, poor, huddled masses, proclaimed by activists to be pathetically unable to fend for themselves. Give me a break!! In Florida, in order to register to vote, you must be able to prove that you are citizen of the United States of America, and a lawful resident of the State, the County, and the State and Congressional Districts,for the period of time proscribed by law.,in which you are entitled to vote, Your either apply for a mail-in ballot and dispose of it under the rules promulgated as such, or appear at the polling place at the proscribed time. When you do so in person, be able to prove you are who you claim to be. All others stay home!
I suspect you are trying to reply to someone else.
I am a vigorous supporter of election integrity.
I prayed to god in May of 2020 that we would not be so stupid as to adopt widespread mailin voting as that nearly guaranteed fraud and a holy war after the election if it was anywhere near close.
1) Americans don’t need “evidence or honest bases” to exercise their 1A rights.
2) If you believe there is no honest basis to question the outcomes, you really haven’t been paying close attention to the individual states’ evidence. Court cases which have occurred (either right before or right after) largely were decided on matters of standing, not evidence. Therefore, it is reasonable for every state in question to understand that evidence- if nothing else to prevent it from happening again.
It’s interesting to me that as this process plays out in various states’ with legislatures tightening up the electoral processes, democrats are doing everything they can to fight theses laws, even ignoring court orders.
Fair minded individuals ask this: why wouldn’t everyone want to assure a secure, lawful election process to bring peace of mind to as many voting citizens as possible? If someone fights these things, including exercising our 1A rights to question problems in the system, what could be their motivation?
The term “election denier” has become a derogatory term- and it’s absolutely ridiculous. Like the terms “semi-fascist” or “ultramaga,”it’s an attempt to “other” people and target them as enemies.
The problem is, in Real-ville, which is outside if the beltway and major metropolitan areas, those terms mean nothing. You could just call us “rotten bananas” and it would have the same effect.
Like good comedy, labels need to be rooted in some everyday truth or lived experience. That’s why many of us hear those things and just laugh.
I’m impressed. Didn’t know she was so quick on her feet. Thanks for posting this.
kidrambler says, “I just hate that pesky Trump,”
“SMOKE ‘IM” – DONALD ROSENBERG
________________________________
IS THE INTERNATIONAL SPY, REAL PRESIDENT DONALD J. TRUMP, GUILTY OF ESPIONAGE?
WILL THE COMMUNISTS (LIBERALS, PROGRESSIVES, SOCIALISTS, DEMOCRATS, RINOS) SENTENCE REAL PRESIDENT DONALD J. TRUMP TO THE ELECTRIC CHAIR???
IS THERE NO LIMIT TO THE JURIS/POLITICAL MADNESS OF THOSE WHO ARE “FUNDAMENTALLY TRANSFORMING” THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA?
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
JULIUS AND ETHEL ROSENBERG (excerpted)
“The USSR and the U.S. were allies during World War II, but the Americans did not share information with, or seek assistance from, the Soviet Union regarding the Manhattan Project. The West was shocked by the speed with which the Soviets were able to stage their first nuclear test, “Joe 1″, on August 29, 1949.[14] However, the head official of the Soviet nuclear project, LAVRENTIY BERIA, used foreign intelligence, which he did not trust by default, only as a third-party check, rather than giving it directly to the design teams, who he did not clear to know about the espionage efforts, and the development was indigenous; considering that the pace of the Soviet program was set primarily by the amount of uranium that it could procure, it is difficult for scholars to judge accurately how much time was saved, if any.[15]”
_____________________________________________________
“Show me the man and I’ll show you the crime.”
– Lavrentiy Beria
_____________
Arrest
In January 1950, the U.S. discovered that Klaus Fuchs, a German refugee theoretical physicist working for the British mission in the Manhattan Project, had given key documents to the Soviets throughout the war. Fuchs identified his courier as American Harry Gold, who was arrested on May 23, 1950.[16]
On June 15, 1950, David Greenglass was arrested by the FBI for espionage and soon confessed to having passed secret information on to the USSR through Gold. He also claimed that his sister Ethel’s husband Julius Rosenberg had convinced David’s wife Ruth to recruit him while visiting him in Albuquerque, New Mexico, in 1944. He said Julius had passed secrets and thus linked him to the Soviet contact agent Anatoli Yakovlev. This connection would be necessary as evidence if there was to be a conviction for espionage of the Rosenbergs.[17][18]
On July 17, 1950, Julius Rosenberg was arrested on suspicion of espionage[19] based on David Greenglass’s confession. On August 11, 1950, Ethel Rosenberg was arrested after testifying before a grand jury (see section, below).[18]
Another conspirator, Morton Sobell, fled with his family to Mexico City after Greenglass was arrested. They took assumed names and he tried to figure out a way to reach Europe without a passport. Abandoning that effort, he returned to Mexico City. He claimed that he was kidnapped by members of the Mexican secret police and driven to the U.S. border, where he was arrested by U.S. forces.[20][21] The U.S. government claimed Sobell was arrested by the Mexican police for bank robbery on August 16, 1950, and extradited the next day to the United States in Laredo, Texas.[21]
Trial and Conviction
In imposing the death penalty, U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York Judge, Irving Kaufman noted that he held the Rosenbergs responsible not only for espionage but also for American deaths in the Korean War:[33]
“I believe your conduct in putting into the hands of the Russians the A-bomb years before our best scientists predicted Russia would perfect the bomb has already caused, in my opinion, the Communist aggression in Korea, with the resultant casualties exceeding 50,000 and who knows but that millions more of innocent people may pay the price of your treason. Indeed, by your betrayal you undoubtedly have altered the course of history to the disadvantage of our country.”
Execution
On June 19, 1953, Julius died after the first electric shock. Ethel’s execution did not go smoothly. After she was given the normal course of three electric shocks, attendants removed the strapping and other equipment only to have doctors determine that Ethel’s heart was still beating. Two more electric shocks were applied, and at the conclusion eyewitnesses reported that smoke rose from her head.[48]
George, I jumped to reply after your first sentence, which you made up in your demented thinking. The rest of your comment therefore was not worth reading. At least it was not worth my time.
“ Any criminal case should be based not only on unassailable legal theories and facts but on clear consistency with past cases.”
Do you mean like the way SCOTUS didn’t do with Roe?
Perhaps they didn’t raid Her because she didn’t have paper documents. Regardless, Merrick Garland was not AG when Hillary’s case was investigated. It’s not his job to consider past offenses by previous FBI leaders. His responsibility is to investigate the serious charges in front of him. I’m not defending HRC. I didn’t vote for her or Trump. Both are manipulative and deceptive. That should have been obvious to anyone who listened closely and who didn’t just grab whatever sound bite or slogan that appealed most to them.
As for Trump supporters who might reject his being prosecuted because Hillary wasn’t… that’s just as good an excuse as anything else they’ll come up with. To them it’s All Hail Donald Trump!
The problem is not convicting Trump without Convicting Clinton for more egregious offenses.
It is that far beyond Trump it is self evident that DOJ/FBI as well as the DC courts and juries – even under Trump are so corrupt and politically biased that justice is ALWAYS determined by your political affiliation not the facts.
We have Garland Wray and the FBI/DOJ ranting about the danger of rigth wing domestic terrorists,
As they hunt down parents objecting to their kids being indoctrinated – or raped at school.
This is not about Trump – it is about the rule of man, rather than the rule of law.
The Supreme Court has reversed itself over 230 times. Correcting past mistakes is consistent. Otherwise, schools would still be segregated. You’re not only ignorant of the behavior of the Supreme Court, but you’re also clearly not much of a thinker, are you?
moses, what SCOTUS did in overturning Roe was to deny women in certain states the same right that women living in other states. In this way, they have forced their own religious ideology upon citizens who don’t share their religious indoctrination. You mention civil rights, but SCOTUS’ Roe decision did the opposite of what civil rights did. Civil Rights made blacks in all states have the same rights as all Americans; rights that certain states were denying them.
So, destroying thousands of emails with BleachBit is not obstruction? It’s mind-boggling that Democrats are so confident in the criminal complicity of their voters that they believe they can get away with this farce. Are they really trying to start a civil war? Because at the point that the opposition no longer feels it has recourse to blind justice, that’s the point when this country blows up. Then it won’t be about right or wrong, but about raw power.
Collusion and machinations are the Democratic Parties cabal. Star chambers, false accusation, draconian law enforcement measures: Tyranny on display. When in the history of the United States have we ever seen this behavior from governmental officials or bureaucrats?
The Democratic Party’s idiomatic language of denial and subterfuge (look over there in particular) we are sinless, all while casting aspersions on their opposition that reflect their own behavior. Repeating that their licentious obfuscations are as true as the day is long, and to never believe you’re lying eyes, while offering trinkets to the blind.
H.G. Wells: ‘The County of the Blind’
“But Nunez advanced with the confident steps of a youth who enter upon life. All the old stories of the lost valley and the Country of the Blind had come back to his mind, and through his thoughts ran this old proverb, as if it were a refrain – In the Country of the Blind the One-Eyes Man is King.”
Unless hillary, hunter and obama are just as investigated, inspected and held to the same standards it is just political theater by a scared prog/left that thought it could bulldoze over most of the legal American citizenry. And last Thursday’s speech surely cemented that concept in our common miind set of just what is comprising the left at this point.
All people are created equal, only some are more equal than others.
“…NO REASONABLE PROSECUTOR WOULD BRING SUCH A CASE…”
BECAUSE IF COMEY HAD INDICTED HILLARY, COMEY WOULD HAVE CONVICTED OBAMA.
SEVEN E-MAIL CHAINS HELD CLASSIFIED TOP SECRET/SPECIAL ACCESS PROGRAM INFORMATION
“SLAM DUNK!”
____________
Statement by FBI Director James B. Comey on the Investigation of Secretary Hillary Clinton’s Use of a Personal E-Mail System
So, first, what we have done:
The investigation began as a referral from the Intelligence Community Inspector General in connection with Secretary Clinton’s use of a personal e-mail server during her time as Secretary of State. The referral focused on whether classified information was transmitted on that personal system.
Our investigation looked at whether there is evidence classified information was improperly stored or transmitted on that personal system, in violation of a federal statute making it a felony to mishandle classified information either intentionally or in a grossly negligent way, or a second statute making it a misdemeanor to knowingly remove classified information from appropriate systems or storage facilities.
…
That’s what we have done. Now let me tell you what we found:
Although we did not find clear evidence that Secretary Clinton or her colleagues intended to violate laws governing the handling of classified information, there is evidence that they were extremely careless in their handling of very sensitive, highly classified information.
For example, seven e-mail chains concern matters that were classified at the Top Secret/Special Access Program level when they were sent and received. These chains involved Secretary Clinton both sending e-mails about those matters and receiving e-mails from others about the same matters. There is evidence to support a conclusion that any reasonable person in Secretary Clinton’s position, or in the position of those government employees with whom she was corresponding about these matters, should have known that an unclassified system was no place for that conversation. In addition to this highly sensitive information, we also found information that was properly classified as Secret by the U.S. Intelligence Community at the time it was discussed on e-mail (that is, excluding the later “up-classified” e-mails).
None of these e-mails should have been on any kind of unclassified system, but their presence is especially concerning because all of these e-mails were housed on unclassified personal servers not even supported by full-time security staff, like those found at Departments and Agencies of the U.S. Government—or even with a commercial service like Gmail.
…
So that’s what we found. Finally, with respect to our recommendation to the Department of Justice:
In our system, the prosecutors make the decisions about whether charges are appropriate based on evidence the FBI has helped collect. Although we don’t normally make public our recommendations to the prosecutors, we frequently make recommendations and engage in productive conversations with prosecutors about what resolution may be appropriate, given the evidence. In this case, given the importance of the matter, I think unusual transparency is in order.
Although there is evidence of potential violations of the statutes regarding the handling of classified information, our judgment is that no reasonable prosecutor would bring such a case.
– FBI National Press Office, July 5, 2016
“BECAUSE IF COMEY HAD INDICTED HILLARY, COMEY WOULD HAVE CONVICTED OBAMA.”
George, if Comey had indicted Hillary, he would have become a victim of Clintinicide.
You mean an “Arkancide” and similar formats like those employed against JFK, MLK, RFK, Oswald, Ferrie, Ruby, Foster, Brown, Parks, Rago, Hastings, Rich, etc., etc., etc.?
The Deep Deep State Swamp knows well how to obtain and retain powerful political offices.
The Deep Deep State Swamp is a continuum focused like a laser on the continuity of corruption.
Don’t forget Seth Rich.
The real issue is “future reforms and deterrents” – the elites rarely get prosecuted but how do we prevent and minimize future abuses like this.
Taxpayers funded a “9/11 Commission” composed of independent experts (to remove politics). Today in 2022, Congress still hasn’t enacted all the Commission’s reforms and recommendations. Why did taxpayers fund the commission?
Why waste tax dollars on show trials if it never results in reforms to prevent future abuses? If we do have reforms, what about lesser ranking officials? Those taking orders were punished severely for far less than the elites did.
ie: John Kiriakou of the CIA, Mike German of the FBI, Thomas Drake of NSA, Chelsea Manning of DOD, Reality Winner of NSA and many others that upheld their Oath of Office.
IF COMEY HAD CHARGED HILLARY, COMEY WOULD HAVE CONVICTED OBAMA
“To protect Obama and Clinton, sanitize the language”
“Throughout Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz’s massive report on the Hillary Clinton email investigation are lots of strange things. One of the weirdest is the extent to which the FBI went to make up words and phrases to disguise reality. An early draft of the 2016 FBI report on the email scandal was reportedly subjected to linguistic surgery to exonerate the former secretary of state, who at the time was the Democratic nominee for president. Clinton was originally found to be “grossly negligent” in using an illegal email server. That legalistic phrase is used by prosecutors to indict for violation of laws governing the wrongful transmission of confidential government documents. Yet the very thought of a likely President Hillary Clinton in court so worried the chief investigator, FBI Director James Comey, that he watered down “grossly negligent” to the mere “extremely careless.” FBI investigators also had concluded that it was “reasonably likely” foreign nations had read Clinton’s unsecured emails. Comey intervened to mask such a likelihood by substituting the more neutral word “possible.”
Former President Barack Obama was found to have improperly communicated with Clinton over her illegal server while she was in a foreign country. Obama had denied that fact by falsely claiming that he never knew of her server until much later, after it was publicized. The FBI hierarchy under Comey tried to hide the embarrassing details of Obama’s conduct. As a result, the FBI deleted Obama’s name from its report. In its place, the FBI inserted the laughable “another senior government official” — as if the president of the United States was just another Washington grandee who had improperly communicated on an illicit email server. According to Comey’s congressional testimony, then-Attorney General Loretta Lynch ordered him not to use the supposedly incriminating noun “investigation” in connection with his investigation of the Clinton emails. Instead, she instructed Comey to use the benign-sounding “matter.” One of the oddest mysteries of the IG report is the FBI’s delay in addressing the fact that disgraced former U.S. Rep. Anthony Weiner had a number of Clinton’s private emails on his unsecured laptop. They were all forwarded to him by his wife, Huma Abedin, an aide to Hillary Clinton. Their Washington-insider marriage had been widely publicized. Yet Comey, the nation’s premier public investigator, claimed he had no idea that Weiner and Abedin were married. Comey would have the inspector general believe that Abedin had forwarded numerous emails from Clinton, some of them classified, to a mere acquaintance. Stranger still, Comey asserted his ignorance of the Weiner-Abedin marriage in an Orwellian manner: “I don’t know that I knew that Weiner was married to Huma Abedin at the time.” Translated, that means Comey claimed that he was not sure at one point that he was sure at another point that Weiner was married to Abedin, at least at the time when the emails came to his attention. Therefore, he did not act as he should have.”
– Chicago Tribune, Jun 21, 2018 (Condensed)
https://justthenews.com/politics-policy/all-things-trump/federal-judge-hands-trump-win-orders-special-master-review?utm_source=breaking&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=newsletter
Federal judge hands Trump win, orders special master to review evidence seized from Mar-a-Lago
Court said the independent master can “manage assertions of privilege and … evaluate claims for return of property.”…
U.S. District Judge Aileen M. Cannon said the independent master can “review the seized property, manage assertions of privilege and make recommendations thereon, and evaluate claims for return of property.”…
Cannon also halted the Justice Department’s review of the materials seized from Mar-a-Lago “pending completion of the special master’s review or further Court order.”
It’s going to be a huge waste of time. It’s not going to change the fact that Trump still faces charges of obstruction and violations of the PRA, and the espionage act.
All this will do is produce an unecessary delay. The FBI already went thru the material. The judge ordering a halt on a process that has already been finished doesn’t make any sense.
I am not interested in the opinions of one who can’t get his facts straight. The appointment of a special master is appropriate, especially where the FBI and justice department are partisan enough to lie on FISA documents and other things.
The special master won’t find anything different than what the FBI did. You can’t get make coherent sentences that’s not a good sign of comprehension skills.
More opinion from one who can’t get the few facts he has straight. Let’s hear a bit of fact and opinion that doesn’t rely on ad homs.
“You can’t get make coherent sentences that’s not a good sign of comprehension skills.”
???????????????????
🙂
I was speaking at S Meyer’s level. I figured he would understand better if I used the same kind of sentence structure he does.
“I meant to do that.”. The old Pee-Wee Herman defense!
Well played, sir!
Your language skills and sentence structure are not bad, but your content and logic are terrible. You put grammatically correct sentences together, but they are almost always meaningless, wrong, contradictory, and don’t make sense. Seldom does one response match with another when the subject matter changes.
Sometimes my sentence structure fails, especially when I do other things while writing, but my content is consistent, logical, and accurate. That is what a blog is for. Discussion of ideas, not sentences put together that are meaningless.
You write good.
I suspect that the DOJ wiil appeal the ruling, not least on the basis of this judge not having jurisdiction when the action was already before another judge, plus the fact that the order doesn’t address the threshold issue of how executive privilege applies against executive inquiry.
So far, though, the DOJ spokesperson only said “The United States is examining the opinion and will consider appropriate next steps in the ongoing litigation.”
The DOJ will decide based on everything they know about the case, and much of that isn’t public.
BarbMcQuade: “Delaying the criminal investigation certainly is something that is concerning, but if they can get this special master appointed quickly and have the review conducted quickly, that could be faster than appealing the order.”
“That pesky rule of law and due process. Every thinkng American KNOWS Trimp is evil. Let’s just skip to the part where we lock him up. K? J!”
*thinking *Trump
Fat fingers- arghhh!
Garland needs to charge for possession of classified material, or admit nothing is classified.
This is nothing but Mueller 2.0
It must be legal, but investigating Trump for having documents the govt claim he cannot have, but not making the charge, and falling back on obstruction of an investigation, that never had cause.
I can see Trump negotiating a guilty plea, no time served. Still running for President, still winning.
“ It must be legal, but investigating Trump for having documents the govt claim he cannot have, but not making the charge, and falling back on obstruction of an investigation, that never had cause.”
The government claim that he had documents he was not supposed to have has been supported by the PRA. It’s clear he violated the law.
“ I can see Trump negotiating a guilty plea, no time served. Still running for President, still winning.”
If he pleads guilty he can’t run for President again. He becomes ineligible once he pleads guilty to violating the espionage act OR any felony charges.
If he pleads guilty he can’t run for President again. He becomes ineligible once he pleads guilty to violating the espionage act OR any felony charges.
The qualifications for President are few, and enumerated.
Get you parting gifts on the way out.
The PRA….I haven’t read the law. I have heard, nothing in the PRA delegates authority to an enity to over rule the President to what is, or is not, a Presidential Record.
If the PRA grants a power to the executive – it grants it to the president.
That is Article II Section 1 of the constitution.
“I haven’t read the law.”
That’s obvious.
The law clearly states “The term “Presidential records” means documentary materials, or any reasonably segregable portion thereof, created or received by the President, the President’s immediate staff, or a unit or individual of the Executive Office of the President whose function is to advise or assist the President, in the course of conducting activities which relate to or have an effect upon the carrying out of the constitutional, statutory, or other official or ceremonial duties of the President. … The United States shall reserve and retain complete ownership, possession, and control of Presidential records …”
You left out what the statute excludes from the term Presidential records. The most important exclusion is for what are considered ‘personal records’. There is no definition of what constitutes a personal record, however, the Supreme Court has held that the former president himself gets to make that determination and that a court may not review the former president’s classification. That means that any records Trump deems to be personal are not covered by the PRA. This is why Obama, and other former presidents, was able to negotiate with the National Archive over which records the former president can maintain at the former president’s post-presidential office. Another important exclusion from the category of presidential records is for copies of records. If the document is a copy, it isn’t a presidential record. This makes sense, because the purpose of the law is to ensure the Archives has access to the documentary evidence of the Presidency. If the Archive has a document, there is no reason to prohibit the former president from having a copy of the document. Similarly excluded are documents produced by federal agencies (broadly defined). The reason for this is because those entities are already required to send copies of those documents to the National Archives. Finally, also excluded from the category of presidential records are classified document produced by the CIA, DIA, FBI, etc. Again, those entities are already supposed to maintain copies of those records, so there’s no reason the former president needs to turn over his copies to the National Archive. (Former presidents maintain their security clearance and are provided with a secure place for keeping and reviewing those documents at taxpayer expense.)
Given all these exclusions from coverage by the PRA, it is highly unlikely that most of what the FBI confiscated was covered by the act. They took things that clearly are NOT covered, such as newspaper and magazine clippings. They took items marked classified, which means that the government already has a copy of the document and it is NOT a presidential record. The took copies of documents given to Trump that were prepared by federal agencies. Which, again, the statute excludes from treatment as a presidential record. Even those records that might be considered a presidential record are only presidential records if Trump doesn’t deem them his personal records. What’s left? Pretty damn little.
“the Supreme Court has held that the former president himself gets to make that determination and that a court may not review the former president’s classification”
You don’t name the ruling where you claim they did this or quote from it. You provide no evidence for your claim.
“If the Archive has a document, there is no reason to prohibit the former president from having a copy of the document.”
Trump no longer has a security clearance. He may not keep NDI or classified info. And it’s up to the Archive, not Trump, to determine whether they already have a copy of something.
“also excluded from the category of presidential records are classified document produced by the CIA, DIA, FBI, etc.”
You assume — without evidence — that all Trump had was copies of things. And again, he lacks the security clearance for what you’ve introduced.
“They took things that clearly are NOT covered, such as newspaper and magazine clippings.”
They were subject to the warrant if intermixed with documents that had classified markings or other presidential docs.
Trump no longer has a security clearance. He may not keep NDI or classified info
Past Presidents retain their Security Clearance
They were subject to the warrant if intermixed with documents that had classified markings or other presidential docs.
The detailed list over the long holiday weekend reveal the FBI far exceeded the almost limitless general warrant. Clothes, Medical records Bank, personal accounting records.
The government now has several legal problems.
Nothing at MAL is classified. Or to put a legal point on it. The Government cannot challenge the Classification status of any records
The PRA is civil, not criminal law. The National Archivist is an employee of the Executive Branch. His determination is superseded by the Presidents determination.
DNI can only be treated as Classified. If not, it is a separate entity, that has no definition. Hence has no defense in court. You can’t violate a law if the Government refuse to tell until after the fact, you were in violation.
This whole debate is a verbal game of whack-a-mole.
The left throws everything in the same bucket and when one notion get put to rest, just pulls out something slightly different, until it to gets proven wrong.
To me it gets down to charging a Past President under the espionage act, that has not been adjudicated. I don’t see SCOTUS allowing such a broad ambiguous law with multiple ambiguous sections holding up under SCOTUS review.
Just to one. Admit the PRA has no part in this debate, remove it from all consideration, then we can move on to next facet.
“Past Presidents retain their Security Clearance”
Actually, neither sitting nor former Presidents have a security clearance (I was wrong about that). They have access to classified documents and NDI while President by virtue of being President, but once they’re out of office, it’s entirely up to the sitting President whether they can continue to access classified documents and NDI. Biden has not cleared Trump for that.
“The detailed list over the long holiday weekend reveal the FBI far exceeded the almost limitless general warrant.”
It didn’t.
“Clothes, Medical records Bank, personal accounting records.”
All mixed in with material that had classified markings, which only underscores Trump’s lack of care with the materials that had classified markings.
‘The Government cannot challenge the Classification status of any records”
For the umpteenth time, none of the alleged crimes depends on the items still being classified. If you’d bothered to read the subpoena that was unsealed, which I already quoted in my 10:49 PM last night, you’d see that Trump was subpoenaed for “Any and all documents or writings in the custody or control of Donald J. Trump and/or the Office of Donald J. Trump bearing classification markings…” That applies regardless of whether the materials had been declassified.
.Actually, neither sitting nor former Presidents have a security clearance (I was wrong about that). They have access to classified documents and NDI while President by virtue of being President, but once they’re out of office, it’s entirely up to the sitting President whether they can continue to access classified documents and NDI. Biden has not cleared Trump for that.”
Finally, ATS, you are at the core of your problem that made you wrong in many instances, including my list of 10. Classified or not, Trump had the security access.
Now, Anonymous the Stupid is trying to weasel out of his ignorance. Biden doesn’t have to provide Trump with the clearance that Trump already has, but can deny him things under Biden’s administration.
You have made yourself look like an utter fool, by not understanding the basics. It took you a long time to figure them out, despite maybe 100 responses to you that directly and indirectly tried to make you realize that.
You have a very thick head.
BTW, Trump received a grand jury subpoena for “Any and all documents or writings in the custody or control of Donald J. Trump and/or the Office of Donald J. Trump bearing classification markings, including but not limited to the following: Top Secret, Secret, Confidential, Top Secret/SI-G/NOFORN/ORCON, Top Secret/SI-G/NOFORN, Top Secret/HCS-O/NOFORN/ORCON, Top Secret/HCS–O/NOFORN, Top Secret/HCS-P/NOFORN/ORCON, Top Secret/HCS-P/NOFORN, Top Secret/TK/NOFORN/ORCON, Top Secret/TK/NOFORN, 1- Secret/NOFORN, Confidential/NOFORN, TS, TS/SAP, TS/SI-G/NF/OC, TS/SI-G/NF, TS/HCS0/NF/OC, TS/HCS-0/NF, TS/HCS-P/NF/OC, TS/HCS-P/NF, TS/HCS-P/SI-G, TS/HCS-P/SI/TK, TS/TK/NF/OC, TS/TK/NF, S/NF, S/FRD, S/NATO, S/SI, C, and C/NF.”
Regardless of what you believe, he was required by law to turn these over in response to the subpoena.
“BTW, Trump received a grand jury subpoena for “Any and all documents or “
ATS, that brings us back to my ten points, John’s fabulous explanations and your inability to stay on track.
Here are my ten points again. You missed the boat last time. You can search John Says points yourself because he did the best job of showing you up and shoving you out the door.
1) There was no valid and legal cause for the raid.
——-
2) Trump’s possession of the documents is legal. Trump has a right of access by law, and his possession of them is lawful despite the three statutes you mention.
3) The statutes are general, while the PRA covers specifics.
4) Morton v. Mancari: PRA trumps the three statutes you mention.
5) White House papers have been treated as personal property. Nixon v. the US
6) The PRA doesn’t state how records of a former president should be turned over to the archivist. That matter is negotiated by the two.
7) The PRA guarantees access for the former President to the records.
8) The PRA does not say that custody of records by a former President is unlawful. No other conditions exist in the warrant that would change the President’s lawful holding of the records.
9) The records available to the former President don’t change depending on classification.
10) In June, the FBI was satisfied with the additional lock.
I wasn’t responding to you, Meyer the Troll Liar, and Turley asks us not to feed trolls, so I won’t indulge you further.
Thank goodness. Thank you.
I understand. You got stuck at #1.
So you respond – violating what you call the feedin the trolls prohibition.
And your response is entirely insult and ad hominem,
serving no purpose at all.
Isn;t that classic trolling ?
If that’s what you believe, then you’re feeding a troll.
I am exposing a troll.
Asked and answered: https://jonathanturley.org/2022/09/01/fbi-faces-criticism-over-release-of-photo-of-classified-documents-on-floor/comment-page-3/#comment-2219939
ATS, you write that the question was “Asked and answered” referring me to a set of previous responses that were wrong.
Much of your work product there and elsewhere was based on the assumption that Trump didn’t have the proper clearance to view classified material. You recently admitted you were wrong and now recognize Trump was in the right despite the vast numbers of your comments trying to defend your errant ideas.
To be more specific. You said “5) Nixon v US is a case involving Walter Nixon” That was the wrong case
You didn’t answer the questions. You bumbled your way through them making mistakes repeatedly. You were wrong throughout.
While you are wrong on the PRA with respect to its content.
more importantly you are wrong with respect to the constitution.
The interpretation YOUR experts keep selling regarding the PRA and classification generally and the espionage act runs afoul of the constitution.
Either that interpretation is incorrect, or those laws are unconstitutional. Most likely the former.
You and they do not seem to grasp you can not change the constitution by passing a law.
Law is constrained by the constitution, not the other way arround.
Andrew MacCarthy raised something regarding the Judges special master order.
Trump’s claims of executive priviledge are still on the table.
The Order did not blanket except that claim of executive priviledge, but it also did not reject it.
MacCarthy was suggesting that DOJ will likely appeal, but that could prove very dangerous.
Trump will PROBABLY not win a claim of executive priviledge, but this is an unsettled area of law, and it is possible that he could.
Contra the left the courts have no really resolves whether an ex-president can claim executive priviledge, whether a current president can waive it for an ex president or whether executive priviledges exists essentially within the executive itself.
There is a small but real possibility that the courts could decide that the documents in Trump’s posession are covered by executive priviledge. That would cover ALL of them, that would mean the entire NARA, Subpeona, Warrant stuff was improper from the start. It would also explain why DOJ/FBI escalated rather than just seeking to get the court to order compliance with the subpeona.
I would note missing from the entire left discussion here is that there is no direct punishment for failing to comply with a subpeona.
Subpeonas are DEMANDS, They are not ORDERS. When the party issuing a subpeona beleives the subpeona was not complied with they go to court and get an ORDER. Failure to comply with a court order has consequences.
The consequence for failing to comply with a subpeona is that a court order will likely result.
If I subpeona a witness to testify or documents to be produced, when I feel that has not happened as demanded, I can not just call up a sheriff and drag the person to court or confiscate the documents I asked for. I must go to court, where a judge will ORDER some form of compliance. In an instance such as this, The judge may well decide to narrow the order.
I would further note that Subpeona’s are issued by lawyers – not courts. A Grand Jury subpeona is written by the prosecutor conducting the grand jury.
This is why enforcing a subpeona requires going to a judge. Attorney’s, prosecutors do not get to unilaterally decide whether a subpeona has been complied with or is legal.
It is likely DOJ/FBI went to the magistrate for a warrant because that was actually EASIER than getting an order to enforce the subpeona. A request to enforce the subpeona would have given Trump’s attorney’s the oportuniy to respond.
Generally in those cases courts split the baby – they do not give either party exactly what they want.
Where a warrant is done without the target getting an oportunity to respond.
“I would note missing from the entire left discussion here is that there is no direct punishment for failing to comply with a subpeona.”
John, this is critical to the issue. There is no criminality involved in Trump’s possession of the documents. He is not obstructing the government because the government could ask for any documents needed for the government to function. However, amost everything he has duplicates the records the government has.
The most fundimental issue – both regarding classified documents and regarding the PRA is Article II, Section 1 or the constitution.
Congress can not pass a law regarding executive powers that bypasses the president.
Congress can not create an executive agency that the president can not fire its head, or order them to do as he wishes.
All executive power in the US comes from the president.
This is specified as the very FIRST clause in the constitution on the Executive.
We can debate whether the constitution is correct, but there is no doubt what it says and if we do not like that – amending the constitution is the only means to change that.
It is arguable that Biden as the current president can undo anything that Trump did as president.
But that can not be done telepathically.
Trump can legitimately presume that any decisions he made as president – whether as orders or by acting are still binding, until he is explicitly notified That Biden has undone them.
It is POSSIBLE that Biden can decide that something Trump considers personal property is government property.
Though I would not bet the courts would side with Biden on that.
It is NOT possible to treat Trump’s possession of Anything from his administration as a crime, without undoing Trump’s claim that something is personal, or declassified AND notifying him of that.
Further the current state of the law suggests that decisions as to what is personal or not, are essentially not reversable – because the are not reviewable by the courts – according to the courts.
“Trump can legitimately presume that any decisions he made as president – whether as orders or by acting are still binding, until he is explicitly notified That Biden has undone them.”
I recently told that to ATS. He wants people to prove Biden didn’t undo certain things. He is off the wall.
He is off the wall in multiple ways.
It is highly unlikely that Biden is actually going to publicly undo certain things Trump has done.
Particularly the declassification of the collusion delusion documents.
My understanding is that he could do that, effective immediately, but then it must be recorded as such. That never happened, according to the media analysts including John Bolton. He can’t declassify them after he leaves office and is no longer president.
“My understanding is that he could do that, effective immediately, but then it must be recorded as such.”
Nope,
“That never happened, according to the media analysts including John Bolton.”
It is highly unlikely that Boulton would have been involved.
First Boulton was only in the WH for a short period.
The NSA has nothing to do with the day to day operation of the whitehouse.
And had absolutely nothing to do with the colusion delusion investigation.
The odds heavily favor the documents in question being collusion delusion related.
“He can’t declassify them after he leaves office and is no longer president.”
Correct, but he did not say that he did. Further he can posess them as ex-president.
There are alot of unique aspects of ex-presidents.
Some of which are not yet legally resolved.
It is nearly impossible for anyone except the president and vice president to have classified documents in their residence without violating the law. But it is commonplace for presidents and vice presidents to have classified documents with them everywhere they go. Almost everything that a president does is “born classified” – that is not unique to the president – it is also true of the Sec State.
Because presidents can have classified material legally in their homes, ex-presidents can have classified material legally in their homes.
Something that is impossible for most anyone else.
Further though most ex-ranking executive officers retain their security clearances – which BTW is not the norm. My TS/SCI clearance was suspended the moment I was out of the employ of the defense contractor I received it through.
Ex-presidents retain an unlimited access clearance that only presidents have – with two caveats.
They can not classify or declassify,
and ONLY the current president can restrict their access.
Biden could completely revoke Trump’s clearance – or limit it. It has been reported that unlike other ex-presidents Trump is not receiving the PDB. Biden can revoke all or part of Trump’s clearance – without notice.
But he can not make Trump’s current posession of classified documents illegal – without informing Trump that his clearance had been revoked.
Finally, for the most part the espionage act does NOT apply to ordinary people – there are exceptions.
But as an example no one in the press has ever been charged much less prosecuted for possessing classified documents.
Even Julian Assange who the US is still trying to extradict is not be charged with possession of classified materials,
But in conspiring to assist Manning in releasing classified materials.
DOJ is explicitly claiming that Assange provided Manning material assistance that allowed Manning to release classified documents that he did not otherwise have.
DOJ should have dropped the Assange case long ago.
Regardless, it is the only instance of a attempted prosecution of a journalist.
it is difficult to impossible to violate the espionage act – without having a security clearance (breaking into a govenrment computer(or office) would be an exception, and an additiona crime)
ex ranking government officials are among the few people who have a security clearance without being part of govenrment or a government contractor.
Trump is still bound to protect classified information. But there is no evidence that he did not.
If he pleads guilty he can’t run for President again. He becomes ineligible once he pleads guilty to violating the espionage act OR any felony charges.
This is simply incorrect. The Constitution sets the requirements for President as being a natural born citizen and being at least 35 years old. That’s it. There is NOTHING in the Constitution that prevents someone convicted of a felony of being elected President. If Trump had been convicted in either of his impeachment trials, the Senate could have barred him from holding office again. He wasn’t convicted and a conviction in any other court cannot prevent him from being elected again. A guilty plea or felony conviction might be a sufficient political burden that he cannot win election again, but it would not be a legal bar his election.
Note, some states have tried adding additional requirements to being elected to the House or Senate. The courts have consistently ruled that the states may not add any restrictions to those already in the Constitution. Sitting members of Congress have been convicted of taking bribes and other frauds while in office, but they were reelected by their constituents. (They felons who were returned to Congress were all Democrats, but you know that already.)
Iowan2, if Trump pulls that off, Harry Houdini will come back from the dead.
Iowan, I have two theories. One is that activists will abuse the power of 3 letter agencies until they eventually convict him of a crime, any crime.
My other theory is that the goal is simply to damage Trump. Biden cannot run on his garbage record. It should be Joe and Hunter Biden under criminal investigation for their pay to play scheme. Activists highly placed in government successfully destabilized Trump’s administration with the Russia hoax. The media successfully portrayed Trump as an anti Semitic racist. They made the ludicrous claim that Trump forwarding a meme that Hillary Clinton, a Christian, belonged in jail was anti Semitic. They edited his Charlottesville speech to give the false impression he commended white supremacists. Trump denounced white supremacy more than any president in history, yet journalists lied and claimed he refused to do so. All of these charges could be refuted within 5 minutes searching for original footage. The fact they were successful means Democrat voters were easily, eagerly led. When presented with exculpatory evidence, these voters would often become angry, resentful, and refuse to change their mind, which meant the pursuit of truth was not their objective. They were conditioned voting soldiers.
Democrats successfully damaged Trump before. I believe they are repeating this play in order to get the Democrat presidential nominee something to hit Trump with. Trump led us to the lowest black unemployment ever recorded. They can’t go after his record, so they have to make him radioactive.
Then, they will move on to the next Republican contender, Ron DeSantis,and on down the line. Scores of women will claim in October they saw DeSantis standing next to the red Solo cups. When they’ve ruined him, and the truth comes out, by January they’ll say it’s in the past. What difference does it make? They won’t face any consequences. Vote by mail will be the law of the land, and auditing voter rolls will be prohibited. It’ll be Chicago politics from the1920s.
If Republicans and Libertarians cannot mount an effective defense that can save candidates from the persecution of Democrats in powerful positions, false reporting by the media, and the avalanche of free marketing in the education system, then we will rapidly devolve into a one party Orwellian state.
No doubt you also believe that Martha Stewart wasn’t convicted of obstruction despite not having been charged with a separate crime. Her time in prison is a collective figment of everyone’s imagination.
Obstruction of an investigation doesn’t require that someone be charged with an underlying crime, just like perjury doesn’t require that someone be charged with an underlying crime.
Perjury is the crime.
One part of the what about Hillary defense JT did not explore (and which could potentially help Trump) is when Comey said something like no reasonable prosecutor would bring a case like this.
All hat and more prattle
Sounds like Mr Turley will be the lead prosecution if asked. One always wonders what side Mr Turley is on… if your a Democrat communist in America you can do what ever you want.
And so has begun the next season of the reality show “Get Trump”, one of the more weaker and most obvious ones yet.
Just another piece of meat to hang on a stick for the TDS public to salivate over for the next several months, and to dirty up Trump and give talking points during his election campaign for president.
Having lost the last dozen really juicy fake and manufactured allegations of the past, they are now scraping the bottom of the barrel to find something — anything — to keep Trump in a state of constant investigation.
It will work in the immediate tense, but will polarize anyone who sat on the fence, and will likely rebound right back onto the FBI and DOJ when the Congress is elected into Republican hands.
Prosecute them both. Or don’t prosecute either. It doesn’t matter either way in the scope of Trump’s troubles. He is likely looking at multiple indictments out of 1/6 and out of Georgia. Is Hillary corrupt? Of course. Is Trump even more corrupt? Absolutely.
That’s what gets me…the double standard. Both or neither, but the way it is, going after Trump and ignoring Hillary’s crimes just smacks of weaponizing the law enforcement agencies against your political opponents. Maybe Trump should have turned them on Hillary while he had the chance. He’s not mean enough or savvy enough to play the political game.