House Republicans were quick to push out anti-Joe Biden talking points after the special counsel released a report exonerating the president.
The Republican special counsel was a Donald Trump appointee held over from his administration. He was given the job to remove even an appearance of impropriety.
But after the special counsel characterized Biden as a doddering, old fool who could never be convicted, House Republicans proclaimed on social media that no person should be in the Oval Office if they can't manage classified documents.
It's a problem because the leading Republican candidate for president, Trump, is being prosecuted for stealing documents from the White House and refusing to return them even after being subpoenaed.
“A man too incapable of being held accountable for mishandling classified information is certainly unfit for the Oval Office," the House Republicans sent out en masse on social media.
An account identifying the person as a "retired nurse" pointed out the number of times Donald Trump used the phrase "I don't recall" in the statement he gave to special counsel Robert Mueller in the Russia probe. The questionnaire was mocked at the time as the "take-home test" because the questions were given to him to have his lawyers fill out for him.
Shelley Kersey replied to Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA), saying, "Just change President Biden to Donald Trump, and you might finally have a solid argument. Making this ridiculous argument while Trump had to have documents physically taken back shows you don't deserve your position and you're just a Trump lackey."
"Sorry lady. Donald Trump WASN’T president when he took those top secret documents. He lost the election then STOLE the documents on his way out. Then refused to give them back when caught. The real question should be what was he planning to do with them. He’s a danger to the USA," Joie Arraro replied to conservative Jeanine Pirro.
The House Republicans weren't the only ones drawing ridicule. Special counsel Robert Hur did as well for some glaring errors in his report.
National security expert Marcy Wheeler went into detail about the report in a thread on the social media site "X." Among the things she points out is the special counsel's own confusion about the laws around documents.
"If a former VP writes something based on memory that is classified onto a notecard after he leaves Naval Observatory, what does the law say? Because Hur is REALLY squirrely here about timing and it's not in [the] list," she said.
President Biden's attorney, Bob Bauer, put out a statement accusing the special counsel of making things up. Wheeler noted this is a problem, because on page 86 in the "work reflections" section, she says that Hur's footnote seems to be made up.
The bipartisan border deal the Senate spent months working on appears to be all but dead after former President Donald Trumpwhipped Republicans against it, fearful he would lose one of his most potent campaign issues. This leaves Senate Republicans in the position of trying to come up with reasons why they oppose it.
On the Senate floor Thursday evening, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) attempted to do so in an argument with Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (I-AZ), one of the chief negotiators of the deal, reported The Hill's Alex Bolton.
"We've done a half-assed job here trying to secure the border," Graham told Sinema. "No, no, no. This has not been a real effort to find border security in a bipartisan way." He went on to complain that Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) wouldn't allow any amendments to the bill.
But Graham's complaints here are dishonest, revealed Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT), another one of the architects of the bill — because Graham had direct input in its contents throughout the process.
"His top staff were in the room when we negotiated the bill," Murphy posted on X. "We negotiated key provisions directly with him."
The border proposal, which was tied to defense aid for Israel, Ukraine, and Taiwan, was far more conservative than previous bipartisan immigration reform plans. It would require the border be shut down to migrants when daily encounters exceed 5,000, tighten the standards for asylum, and streamline the process to remove migrants who don't qualify for asylum. In return, the bill would raise caps on visas, provide legal representation to unaccompanied migrant children, and make it easier for migrants who pass initial asylum screenings to get work permits.
The judge in the E. Jean Carroll defamation case has taken a step that puts former President Donald Trump on a timer to post bond for the damages, reportedMSNBC legal commentator Lisa Rubin on Thursday.
Carroll sued former President Donald Trump after he called her allegation he raped her in a Manhattan department store a lie, claimed he had no idea who she was, and said she was making it up to sell books. A jury awarded her $83.3 million in the case, which was presided over by Judge Lewis Kaplan.
"Judge Kaplan has at least entered judgment in the second Carroll trial," wrote Rubin on X. "That starts the clock for Trump's post-trial motions and for him to post a bond."
"Specifically, federal rules governing civil cases stay a plaintiff's execution on a judgment for 30 days after the entry of judgment, which effectively means he has 30 days to provide a bond or other security to lengthen that stay pending an appeal," Rubin continued. "Trump also has 28 days after the entry of judgment to move for a new trial or to 'alter or amend' the judgment."
The judgment affirms the award the jury said Carroll deserves.
Former White House adviser Peter Navarro must go to prison despite any pending appeals, a federal judge ruled on Thursday.
In a 12-page ruling, U.S. District Court Judge Amit Mehta denied Navarro's request after he was sentenced to four months in prison for refusing to cooperate with the Jan. 6 Committee.
"In his sentencing memorandum, Defendant requested release pending appeal if the court imposed a term of prison," Mehta wrote. "Defendant raises four grounds to support his motion for release pending appeal. As explained below, because Defendant has not shown that any of those issues will pose a 'substantial question of law' on appeal, his motion is denied."
Mehta said that former President Donald Trump's executive privilege claim "likely will not lead to reversal of his conviction for refusing to appear for testimony." The judge pointed out that Trump was not a sitting president when he invoked executive privilege.
"Thus, even if the former President had invoked privilege, at a minimum, such invocation did not reach testimony pertaining non-official acts," Mehta explained. "Therefore, no authority excused his complete non-appearance before the Select Committee."
"For the foregoing reasons, Defendant’s request for release pending appeal is denied," the ruling concluded. "Unless this Order is stayed or vacated by the D.C. Circuit, Defendant shall report to the designated Bureau of Prisons ('BOP') facility on the date ordered by the BOP."
Alina Habba's performance as Donald Trump's lawyer in his civil cases has been widely panned as incompetent by many legal experts. But according to Wil Saletan writing for The Bulwark, she seems to be very good at her "second job," which is raising money for Trump's political organizations, which she in turn funnels back to herself.
Saletan says that Habba throws herself into politics by repeating Trump's inflammatory buzzwords and claiming his legal setbacks will help him politically.
He also points out that Habba isn't just Trump's lawyer: She's also the general counsel to Trump’s Save America PAC, and she’s a senior adviser to the Trump-aligned Make America Great Again Inc. super PAC, which puts her in a position where she primarily thinks about politics and money.
According to reports, about 84 percent of the money spent by Trump's PACs went to legal fees, of which $6 million went to Habba.
"She’s not just defending a client. She’s also speaking to the donors who are making her rich," Saletan writes. "In fact, a review of fundraising emails shows that the messages she’s delivering sound a lot like the messages these donors are getting from Trump’s solicitation headquarters, the Trump Save America Joint Fundraising Committee."
Salatan contends that Habba doesn't just want money, she wants revenge against Trump's adversaries.
Only a few dozen people, lawyers and court staff included, were on hand in the Denver City and County Building’s Courtroom 209 when a five-day trial in a case known as Anderson v. Griswold began on a cold morning in late October.
Just outside the courtroom, footsteps echoed in the otherwise quiet halls of Denver’s city hall as Jason Miller, a veteran spokesperson for former President Donald Trump, denounced the case as an attempt at “election interference” by a “far-left wacko group.”
A month earlier, six Colorado voters, backed by the nonprofit Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, had
sued Trump and Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold in state court, alleging that the Republican presidential frontrunner’s actions in relation to the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol disqualify him from office under the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Section 3 of the Amendment, ratified in 1868 and enforced in only a handful of cases in the last 150 years, prohibits a person who took an oath to support the Constitution and then “engaged in insurrection” from holding office again.
The plaintiffs sought a court order on Trump’s ballot eligibility under a procedure in Colorado election law typically used to adjudicate disputes over candidate residency requirements or irregularities in party nominating assemblies. Griswold, a Democrat and outspoken Trump critic, took no formal position on the matter, inviting the courts to weigh in first. Local news stations called the lawsuit a “
long shot.”
Fielding questions from reporters ahead of the trial, Miller dismissed the plaintiffs, four of whom are registered Republicans, as “Republicans in name only.” He suggested — highly implausibly, based on recent election results in
increasingly blue Colorado — that Democrats had brought the 14th Amendment challenge in the Centennial State out of fear that Trump could put the state in play in the 2024 election.
“Joe Biden and his billionaire Democratic donors … they go to a Democratic jurisdiction, they try to find themselves a Democrat judge, they try to cause chaos,” Miller said. “Democrats don’t actually have an intention of winning this case.”
Within two months, however, Trump’s legal team would suffer a historic defeat in the Colorado case — not at the hands of a district court judge in liberal Denver, but before the justices of the Colorado Supreme Court. A 4-3 majority of the court sent shockwaves through American politics when it
issued a Dec. 19 decision holding that Trump was ineligible for office under Section 3, and ordering Griswold not to certify his candidacy for the state’s March 5 primary ballot.
The lawsuit’s fast-tracked ascent through the American legal system
will reach its apex Thursday, when the U.S. Supreme Court, which promptly granted Trump’s appeal of the Colorado decision last month, hears oral arguments from Trump’s team, the plaintiffs’ attorneys and Colorado’s solicitor general. Within weeks or even days, the nation’s highest court could issue a precedent-setting ruling on the case, now titled Trump v. Anderson.
Despite remaining neutral on Trump’s eligibility during trial proceedings, Griswold has since said that the Colorado Supreme Court “got it right,” and
says the state’s election laws worked exactly as intended.
“The facts of this case are unprecedented, but the legal mechanism is routine,” lawyers for Griswold wrote in a Jan. 31 U.S. Supreme Court brief. “The dispute was capably and constitutionally handled by the procedures directed by Colorado’s legislature to resolve these precise issues. This Court should affirm and uphold Colorado’s right to exclude from its presidential ballots ineligible insurrectionists.”
Legacy of Jan. 6
Over more than
30 hours of evidentiary hearings held beginning Oct. 30, the trial in Denver’s Courtroom 209 at times closely resembled the proceedings of the House of Representatives’ select Jan. 6 committee, complete with dramatic video exhibits of Trump’s election-denying rhetoric and the mob’s Jan. 6 assault on the Capitol. Members of Congress and law enforcement officers assigned to protect the Capitol testified in graphic detail about the day’s events.
Trump was represented in the Colorado case by Scott Gessler, a former Colorado secretary of state who had himself endorsed debunked conspiracy theories alleging widespread fraud in the 2020 election, during an unsuccessful bid for Colorado Republican Party chair the following year. Trump’s defense in the case
relied extensively on close Trump loyalists and election deniers who had organized or attended pro-Trump “Stop the Steal” events on or prior to Jan. 6, and who used their time on the witness stand to reiterate their beliefs that the election had been stolen or that Antifa had been responsible for the violence on Jan. 6.
In her
Nov. 17 ruling, Judge Sarah B. Wallace wrote that many of the witnesses called by the defense lacked credibility and even showed an “inability to discern conspiracy theory from reality.” Although Wallace ruled that Trump had, in fact, “engaged in insurrection,” she rejected the plaintiffs’ case on the grounds of a legal theory, advanced by a handful of conservative law professors, holding that the president is not one of the “officer(s) of the United States” to which Section 3 applies.
But after granting the plaintiffs’ expedited appeal, the Colorado Supreme Court issued a ruling one month later soundly rejecting the theory, while affirming many of Wallace’s other findings. Its seismic majority opinion was the first of its kind in the nation’s history. It was followed just 10 days later by Maine Secretary of State
Shenna Bellows’ order declaring Trump ineligible on the same grounds. Like the Colorado ruling, Bellows’ order is on hold pending the outcome of U.S. Supreme Court proceedings, meaning that Trump will still appear on both states’ primary ballots.
Both rulings have been the subject of intense criticism — not only from Trump allies, but also from centrist and liberal commentators who worry about the consequences of barring a presidential frontrunner from the ballot. The “political and civic logic” of the Section 3 challenges,
wrote New York Magazine’s Jonathan Chait, “strikes me as dangerous and likely to backfire.” Lawrence Lessig, an influential left-leaning legal scholar, has argued the Supreme Court must unanimously reject the Colorado ruling “to preserve its integrity.”
Trump, who faces multiple criminal indictments over his efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election, has nonetheless remained the overwhelming favorite to win the 2024 Republican nomination since announcing that he would seek the presidency again.
Ilya Somin, a George Mason University law professor who filed an amicus, or friend-of-the-court, brief in support of Trump’s disqualification, spoke during a panel discussion hosted by the conservative Federalist Society on Wednesday and conceded that Section 3 disqualification is a “constraint on democracy, but one that preserves democracy itself.”
“Another way that you can put it is that, if you like to say, as many conservatives do, that we are a republic, not a democracy, Section 3 is one of several aspects of the Constitution that reflects that principle,” Somin said. “(It) reflects some degree of suspicion of unconstrained democracy, which if not limited in certain ways can destroy itself.”
‘The law must stand’
The plaintiffs who brought the case, with help of the liberal nonprofit Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, say the concerns about the “undemocratic” nature of Trump’s potential disqualification have it backwards.
“What could possibly be more undemocratic than failing to enforce the Constitution?” Claudine Schneider, one of the six plaintiffs, said in an interview. “It is undemocratic to lie about the outcome of an election, not to mention to mobilize masses to attack the peaceful transfer of power.”
Before moving to Colorado in the 1990s, Schneider served five terms in Congress as a Republican, representing Rhode Island’s 2nd District during the Reagan and George H.W. Bush administrations. A longtime environmentalist who has regularly endorsed Democratic candidates for president beginning with Barack Obama in 2008, Schneider’s disaffection with the GOP began long before Trump’s election.
But that’s hardly the case for other plaintiffs, including Krista Kafer, a Denver Post columnist who remains a registered Republican and voted for Trump in 2020 — in large part, she said in a recent interview, because of her pro-life views. It’s unlikely, she added, that she will vote for Biden this year.
“I don’t vote for politicians that are not pro-life — or at least act pro-life, in the case of Trump,” Kafer said. “But for me, insurrection and refusing to concede an election and trying to (overturn) an election, to me is a line that cannot be passed.”
“I think this is beautiful,” Schneider said. “It’s a melting pot of different perspectives that have … coalesced into a point of view that the law must stand.”
The legal team representing the plaintiffs, too, hardly resembles the pack of “far-left extremists” described by Jason Miller and other Trump allies. Its lead attorneys are largely well-heeled veterans of white-shoe corporate law firms and clerkships with high-ranking conservative judges. And over the last several months and years, the flurry of scholarly research, law-review articles and amicus briefs pertaining to Section 3 has seen plenty of solidly conservative figures in the legal establishment lend their support to the case for Trump’s disqualification, including Somin and
William Baude, a former clerk to Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts.
Following the submission of more than 3,000 pages of amicus briefs and trial transcripts to the court over the last month, Roberts and the other justices will be asked to wade into legal territory with little settled precedent or relevant case law from the last century and a half. Key issues
expected to be weighed by the court include whether Section 3’s reference to “officer(s) of the United States” includes the president and whether the clause is “self-executing” or requires congressional action to be enforced.
“From my side of the debate, we do have to prevail on several different issues. That obviously is a disadvantage,” said Somin. “The other side need only prevail on one out of about five or six issues.”
Playing politics
Minutes before the trial in Denver District Court began, Miller made a confident prediction.
“This case is going to fail,” he said. “Whether it fails here, whether Judge Wallace does the right thing, or whether this fails when it goes further up, this is going to fail.”
Thursday’s oral arguments come amid a
cloud of doubt and distrust felt by many Americans towards the Supreme Court, especially in the wake of its decision last year to overturn Roe v. Wade and roll back 49 years of federal protections for abortion rights. Republican-appointed justices hold a 6-3 majority on the court, and three of its conservative justices were appointed by Trump himself.
Critics of the court’s politicization seized on a Fox News appearance last month by Alina Habba, an attorney representing Trump, in which Habba predicted the court would rule in Trump’s favor.
“I think it should be a slam dunk in the Supreme Court,”
Habba said. “You know, people like (Justice Brett) Kavanaugh, who the president fought for, who the president went through hell to get into place, he’ll step up.”
Proponents of Trump’s disqualification have called on Justice Clarence Thomas, the court’s longest-serving justice, to recuse himself from the Colorado case. His wife, Ginni Thomas, is a far-right activist who was
closely linked with organizers of pro-Trump “Stop the Steal” efforts in the weeks leading up to the Jan. 6 attack. No recusal by Thomas or any other justice has been noted in any of the court’s orders in the case to date.
Schneider said the case is an opportunity for the court’s Republican-appointed majority to “adhere to what they claim or their guiding conservative principles of originalism, textualism and federalism.”
“Those justices, at this moment in time, are in the spotlight. And they also know that their credibility, according to many polls, is minuscule,” Schneider said. “So I think they are under an enormous amount of pressure to not play politics, or kowtow to the ex-president, but rather do what is right for the good of the country.”
Newsline’s Quentin Young contributed to this report.
Colorado Newsline is part of States Newsroom, a network of news bureaus supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Colorado Newsline maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Quentin Young for questions: info@coloradonewsline.com. Follow Colorado Newsline on Facebook and Twitter.
Now, there’s a legitimate chance Donald Trump could be running for president, or even serving as commander in chief, from behind bars.
Two overriding factors contribute to this bizarre reality.
Firstly, there’s very little — legally speaking — preventing Trump from doing so.
Secondly, Trump himself has offered no indication he’ll step away. To the contrary, he’s as emboldened as ever to run for and win the presidency he lost in 2020.
Thus far, juries have found Trump civilly liable for the sexual abuse and defamation of writer E. Jean Carroll. He’s been ordered to pay more than $88 million combined in damages.
New York Judge Arthur Engoron also found Trump and associates of his business empire liable for fraudulently inflating the value of the Trump Organization’s assets. Determination of damages in the civil fraud trial are expected this month — and could be well into the hundreds of millions of dollars.
And then there's the felony charges: 91 in total across four cases. If convicted, Trump could face significant prison time — totaling more than 700 years combined.
His trials are scheduled in the midst of the Republican presidential primary.
The indictments:
For the first time in U.S. history, a grand jury on June 8, 2023, federally indicted a former president — Trump — on 37 felony counts related to the alleged willful retention of classified documents and conspiracy to conceal them. District Judge Aileen Cannon set trial to begin May 20, but in February, special counsel questioned whether the FBI missed searching some rooms at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence, ABC reported.
Then it happened again on Aug. 1 when Trump was indicted on four separate federal counts related to his alleged efforts to overturn the 2020 election. He was set to be tried starting March 4, but U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan delayed the trial's start as Trump — unsuccessfully, so far — petitioned a federal appeals court to rule that he enjoys presidential immunity from such prosecution.
Trump also faces a criminal trial in Georgia related to election interference in the state, with trial requested for Aug. 5. Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis admitted in February to having a romantic relationship with a special prosecutor overseeing the case but denied any tainting of the case, Raw Story reported.
Separately, Trump is charged in New York with 34 felony counts of falsifying business records in relation to payments the Trump Organization made to adult film actress Stormy Daniels. His trial is slated for March 25.
Such a laundry list of legal woes would seemingly sabotage any politician’s campaign efforts. But the cases haven’t slowed Trump down in his pursuit of a second term as president or slashed his chances — now as good as ever — of winning the 2024 Republican nomination.
Trump, who has handily won in the Republican primaries thus far, is almost certain to become the Republican nominee — and has made it clear he has no intention of dropping out of the race no matter how severe his legal battles become.
“I see no case in which I would do that,” Trump said in June during an appearance on a radio show hosted by political strategist Roger Stone, a longtime confidant. “I just wouldn't do it. I wouldn't do it. I had opportunities in 2016 to do it, and I didn't do it.”
But Allan Lichtman, a professor of history at American University, said campaigning for president and defending himself against criminal charges are two very different endeavors.
“He thinks he can win this case in the court of public opinion, but the truth is, Trump can huff, and Trump can puff, but he can't blow the courthouse down,” Lichtman said. “It’s a very, very different game once you enter a federal courthouse or a state courthouse. You can't just bluster. Anything that you present has to be proven, and you're subject to perjury.”
Still, Trump can continue to run his campaign while facing these charges — and he could even do so from prison in the event he were to be tried, convicted and sentenced before the 2024 election.
“Trump’s legal problems shouldn’t affect his campaign. Many of his supporters believe that he is being treated unfairly, and there is no prohibition against a defendant under indictment or even a convicted felon from serving as president,” said Neama Rahmani, a former assistant U.S. attorney and president of West Coast Trial Lawyers. “Theoretically, Trump could even be president while in prison.”
Indeed, the U.S. Constitution stipulates only that a presidential candidate be a natural-born citizen of the United States, be at least 35 years old and a U.S. resident for 14 years. Trump easily checks all those boxes. And congressional Democrats’ strongest efforts to potentially disqualify Trump from ever again seeking the presidency — convicting him following impeachment trials — failed.
So, what would it take for Trump to run a presidential campaign — or govern the nation — from prison?
Raw Story interviewed historians, legal experts, political operatives and former government leaders who pieced together a playbook for how he could do it — and the peril that he’d face along the way as he stands to secure the GOP nomination ahead of a general election rematch with President Joe Biden in November.
Campaigning from a cell
Each of the charges Trump faces in the classified documents federal indictment carries maximum prison sentences between five and 20 years. Across all four indictments, potential prison time could span hundreds of years.
Being behind bars would, of course, prevent Trump from campaigning in his signature fashion: at big, rowdy MAGA rallies.
But Amani Wells-Onyioha, operations director at Democratic political firm Sole Strategies, envisions Trump still figuring out ways to communicate with potential voters.
“There's no doubt in my mind that he would have some recorded press from the little prison phone. There's no doubt in my mind that he would set up press opportunities whenever he's out on the yard getting his recreational use in, that there would be cameras there,” Wells-Onyioha said. “He would be using every opportunity to campaign. I don't see him stopping at all, and I only see him using this as fuel to make him go harder.”
Keeping up his Truth Social posts from prison might not be such a challenge for Trump, Wells-Onyioha said, as some jails and prisons might allow internet access.
“I do see him using the internet because that's all that he has, and he's great at that already,” Wells-Onyioha said. “He's a huge internet, TV personality type of guy, so it really would just force him to be in a position to do something that he's the best at, which is unfortunate for the country, but as far as he's concerned, I think he thinks that this is political gold for himself.”
Plus, Trump isn’t building a campaign from scratch. His 2024 presidential campaign is flush with staffers. He enjoys the support of super PACs, which may raise and spend unlimited amounts of money on his behalf to promote the former president and attack his opponents.
He also has a roster of high-profile MAGA acolytes — from Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) and Elise Stefanik (R-NY) to Sen. J.D. Vance (R-OH) and South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem — who gladly serve as Trump surrogates.
And save for former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, who remains in the race despite losses in the Iowa caucuses and New Hampshire primary, with dim prospects going forward, Trump has already vanquished his other main GOP challengers, including Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC), former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, former Vice President Mike Pence and businessman Vivek Ramaswamy.
Meanwhile, few politicians are as good as Trump at presenting himself as a victim — he’s single-handedly vaulted the terms “witch hunt,” “deep state,” “hoax” and “fake news” into the contemporary political lexicon. As an inmate, Trump could become a martyr to the MAGA cause.
“You’re obviously handicapped to campaign, but in this electronic age, you can certainly campaign virtually, plus Trump's pretty well known. It’s not like he has to introduce himself to the American people,” Lichtman said.
If not prison, maybe jail
Former President Donald Trump arrives for his arraignment at Manhattan Criminal Court on April 04 in New York City. Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images
Although it seems unlikely Trump will be serving an active prison sentence before the November election, it’s conceivable he could wind up in pretrial confinement of some sort while campaigning.
This, several legal experts said, will depend on Trump himself.
“He has to behave himself during a trial, and that's not beyond the realm of possibility that he'll act up, thinking that somehow he can win over the jury, but that would be a mistake,” said Kevin O’Brien, a former assistant U.S. attorney and partner at Ford O’Brien Landy LLP who specializes in white-collar criminal defense.
His social media antics stand to put him in potential violation of pretrial instructions and release terms, raising the question of whether a judge would dare throw the former president in jail. So far, he’s been fined thousands for violating gag orders.
Brazenly defying a judge’s order or attempting to intimidate witnesses are among the more common ways a defendant can get himself thrown in jail or home confinement before or during his trial.
This isn’t merely conceptual, said Mike Lawlor, a criminal justice professor at the University of New Haven and former member of the Connecticut House of Representatives, who helped lead impeachment hearings against then-Gov. John Rowland, who ultimately pleaded guilty in federal court to political corruption.
Knowing Trump’s penchant for cutting outbursts, Lawlor can envision a judge sanctioning Trump for defying directives. Trump not only has one judge with whom to contend, but several, given the multiple legal actions against him.
“The opportunity to engage in contempt of court or witness tampering or obstruction of justice is fraught at this point. I’m not sure he has the self-control to keep himself from doing something that would get him confined pre-trial,” Lawlor said.
The U.S. House Jan. 6 select committee accused Trump of potential witness tampering, and Lawlor says he’s monitoring similar allegations here, especially because so many of the witnesses are GOP staffers of the former president.
“It’s so easy to imagine a situation where someone could be contacted and intimidated,” Lawlor said. “I think the temptation to do that for a guy like Trump is probably irresistible. I’m not sure his attorneys or the advisors he listens to can stop him from doing so. I don’t rule it out. As I said, it’s unlikely, but I can definitely see it happening.”
Using legal danger to fuel fundraising
The Trump campaign wasted no time in exploiting the indictments to raise money, leaning into a familiar claim that the candidate is a victim of a Democratic witch hunt.
Only one day after news broke about Trump’s first federal indictment, a fundraising appeal built around the charges appeared on the campaign website prominently displayed in a column on the left-hand side of the page, suggesting contribution amounts ranging from $24 to $3,300. The message lays out a bill of particulars with the former president at the center of the persecution narrative, beginning with the apocalyptic opener: “We are watching our Republic DIE before our very eyes.”
Trump Save America, the beneficiary, is a joint fundraising committee for Donald J. Trump for President 2024 and the Save America PAC, which supports Trump.
The fundraising appeal contends that a “witch hunt began when the FBI RAIDED my home and then staged it to look like a made-for-TV crime scene with police sirens and flashing red and blue lights.”
Alluding to his previous indictment in New York state, the appeals continued: “So, after a state prosecutor failed to break us, the Deep State sharpened their attacks and unleashed a FEDERAL prosecutor to TRY and take us down.”
Notwithstanding Trump’s claim, the charges in New York state remain pending, and Jack Smith, the special prosecutor appointed by U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland, was investigating Trump for allegedly mishandling classified documents four months before a grand jury in New Manhattan returned an indictment on the state charges related to the Stormy Daniels affair.
Minutes after the Aug. 1 indictment dropped, Trump started fundraising again, selling "I Stand With Trump" T-shirts featuring the indictment date, and Trump's mugshot from his booking at the Fulton County Jail helped him bring in more than $7 million after the Georgia indictment as he quickly took to selling mugs, shirts and other merchandise with the photo.
At least one prominent surrogate helped retail the fundraising push.
Kari Lake, a fellow election denier who lost her race for governor of Arizona in 2022, joined a Twitter Spaces co-hosted by Dustin Stockton and Jennifer Lynn Lawrence on the night news broke about Trump’s indictment on charges of mishandling classified documents.
Stockton and Lawrence helped organize the rally that provided the springboard for the Jan. 6 insurrection. During her appearance on Stockton and Lawrence’s Twitter Space, Lake, who is now running for U.S. Senate, told more than 1,300 listeners she had just gotten off the phone with Trump shortly after news broke about the indictment on June 8. Lake said it wasn’t enough for Republican voters to just say they stand with Trump or condemn the indictment.
“And if we really stand with him, we need to go to DonaldTrump.com and make a donation tonight,” said Lake, who is herselfpreparing a 2024 U.S. Senate run in Arizona. “Everybody, whether it’s $5, $10, $500 — whatever you can afford. Because if we’re gonna stand with him, we need to put our money where our mouth is tonight.”
The political monetization of Trump’s legal woes grows deeper by the month. Go to Trump’s campaign website and you’ll find several items on sale — a black-and-white ceramic coffee mug is $24 — featuring a fake mugshot of Trump above the words “NOT GUILTY”. Of late, Trump hassuggested that he would “end” his campaign in a deceptive bid to squeeze money from supporters.
The Federal Election Commission, which enforces federal campaign finance laws, would have no grounds to intervene in Trump’s fundraising efforts while facing criminal charges or even time in jail or prison, said Ann Ravel, who served as an FEC commissioner from 2013 to 2017, including one year as the commission’s chairwoman.
Trump's campaign is selling these black-and-white ceramic coffee mugs for $24. (Screen grab)
Trump’s campaign could easily continue sending supporters incessant fundraising emails and text messages in Trump’s name.
“The only problems for him would be if there's failure to disclose, or if people are giving more than the limits, all of the things that are traditional FEC issues, but they don't have the authority to do anything with regard to a person who's been indicted and is still fundraising,” Ravel said. “That in and of itself is not sufficient for the FEC to take any action.”
Lessons of Eugene Debs, incarcerated presidential candidate
Trump wouldn’t be the first candidate to run for president from prison if he were convicted.
In the weeks before the 1920 election, Eugene V. Debs, the Socialist Party candidate for president of the United States and an inmate in federal prison, touched on the significance of the moment.
“Has there ever been anything like it in American history before?” Debs said, as reported by the socialist newspaper Appeal to Reason. “Will there ever be anything like it in American history again? We must impress it upon the people that this scene is symbolic of what has befallen this country.”
There has been one other. Lyndon LaRouche, whom The New Republiccalled “The Godfather of Political Paranoia,” ran from prison in 1992 after being convicted of tax evasion and mail fraud.
His vice presidential running mate, the Rev. James Bevel, did most of the campaigning. This suggests that a jailed Trump could lean heavily on the presence of a charismatic vice presidential candidate — be it someone such as Lake of Arizona, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia or even banished Fox News host Tucker Carlson.
LaRouche received .02% of the popular vote — 26,334.
Debs, who was serving a 10-year sentence for decrying the United States’ involvement in World War I, received 3.4% of the popular vote — 919,799.
He received 6% of the vote as a candidate eight years earlier, in 1912.
While emphasizing that she’s speaking as an individual, Allison Duerk, director of the Eugene V. Debs Museum, located in Debs’ home in Terre Haute, Ind., said she cringes at comparisons between Debs and Trump. In material ways, the two men are polar opposites.
“I bristle at recent casual references to the 1920 campaign — not because they are inaccurate on the surface, but because these two men and their respective projects are diametrically opposed,” she told Raw Story.
Duerk does believe Debs predicted the emergence of American political leaders such as Trump.
Illustration of Eugene Debs while running for president in prison. Indiana State University archives
“Take this quote from the speech that got him locked up,” she said, quoting Debs: “‘In every age it has been the tyrant, the oppressor and the exploiter who has wrapped himself in the cloak of patriotism, or religion, or both to deceive and overawe the people.’"
In an Appeal to Reason article, Debs said he believed in change “but by perfectly peaceful and orderly means.” He added, “Never in my life have I broken a law or advised others to do so.”
Unlike Trump, who nurses grievances daily, the article said of Debs, “Nothing embitters him. Injustice, oppression, persecution, savagery do not embitter him. It is a stirring, an uplifting thing to find a man who has suffered so much and remains so ardent and so pure.”
The U.S. government and the prison warden made small accommodations to Debs’ candidacy. He was, for one, allowed a single written message per week to voters.
“Where Debs had once stormed the country in a verbal torrent,” wrote Ernest Freeberg, author of Democracy’s Prisoner, “he would now have five hundred words a week.”
Debs still had some of the trappings of a political campaign, including a button that had his photo from prison with the words, “For President - Convict No. 9653.” He had printed material that said, “From Atlanta to the White House, 1920,” a reference to his residency inside the Atlanta Federal Penitentiary.
On election night, Debs received the results in the warden’s office and soon conceded the election to President-elect Warren Harding.
In his book Walls and Bars, Debs wrote that the question came up in the room about his potential ability to pardon himself as president — an action over which Trump has reportedly mused.
“We all found some mirth in debating it,” Debs wrote.
Serving as president from prison
If Trump ran a successful campaign from jail or prison, is there anything stopping him from assuming the Oval Office if he were elected president?
“There is nothing in our traditions or the Constitution that prevents someone who is indicted or convicted or, in fact, serving in jail, from also serving as the president,” said Harold Krent, law professor at the Chicago-Kent College of Law, who formerly worked for the Department of Justice. “Does it make any sense? No. But there is no Constitutional disablement from that happening. So, you could think of a scenario in which the case goes to trial, maybe after the primary and results in a prison time with President Trump and then he is inaugurated, and he gets to serve as president from some prison farm somewhere.”
Lichtman said “of course” Trump would just pardon himself of any federal crimes were he reelected president. There’s also the possibility of Trump attempting to preemptively pardon himself, with then-President Gerald Ford’s pardoning of Richard Nixon serving as an imperfect template.
But if Trump is convicted on any state-level charges, where federal pardons do not apply, that’s a different story.
“That's unprecedented, but the pardon power is pretty absolute,” Lichtman. “He can’t pardon himself for the New York case because that’s a state case. If he's convicted in New York, he's stuck. If ... he's convicted in Georgia, he can’t pardon himself from that either, because that's also a state case.”
Trump’s ability to pardon himself is widely debated in the academic community, Krent said.Federal document listing indictment counts against former President Donald Trump. U.S. District Court, Southern District of Florida
“There's no law on the books that says you can't. You just have to reason from the idea of separation of powers and the Constitution or to think that it doesn't make any sense to have one person aggregate or accumulate so much power,” Krent said. “As a constitutional matter, I think that that would be too much of a conflict of interest to be able to pardon yourself.”
Interestingly, the classified documents federal indictment didn’t include counts related to 18 U.S.Code 2071, which deals with the concealment, removal or destruction of government documents. This would disqualify anyone found in violation of the code from running for office, Rahmani said.
“That particular provision was passed after Nixon as a disqualification provision that prevents anyone convicted of it from holding public office,” Rahmani said. “Trump's lawyers would have said that it's unconstitutional because only the Constitution can place limits on who could be president. You can be a felon. You can be in prison and still theoretically be president of the United States.”
The Constitution could be interpreted — ostensibly by the U.S. Supreme Court — that an imprisoned president wouldn’t qualify as capable of carrying out his duties, preventing him from taking the office, Ravel said.
“There's nothing to stop him from becoming president either because the provisions in the Constitution about the presidency and the requirements for presidency don't reflect any concern if a president has been indicted or is in jail,” Ravel said. “Although if he goes to jail, it would create a problem for him because the Constitution does have concerns about the inability to carry out the obligations of the office, which he certainly wouldn't be able to do in jail.”
Specifically, Section 4 of the Constitution’s 25th Amendment potentially empowers Congress to determine — via a two-thirds vote of both chambers — that a president is “unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office” and thereby transfer presidential powers to the vice president.
But if Trump is elected in November, and trials end up taking place after the general election, some of his legal peril could subside — at least at the federal level.
“There's clear Department of Justice memos and policies. It's pretty clear that a sitting president cannot be prosecuted,” Rahmani said.
If Trump won and was convicted but on appeal, he would “probably” still be able to get inaugurated, Krent said.
“The question is whether they would stop the appeal and let him serve out the presidency before it would continue,” Krent said. “Uncharted waters in terms of how this would go. It's gonna affect the primary. It would affect the general election, and it certainly would affect his ability to conduct a presidency.”
Editor’s note: A version of this article was originally published on June 13, 2023, and has been updated to reflect numerous legal and political developments involving Trump.
Judge Cannon appears to be intentionally helping Donald Trump in his criminal case over confidential documents, and it might warrant an appeals court forcing her out, a legal expert said on Wednesday.
Former federal prosecutor Joyce Vance once again raised the issue of Cannon's behavior in the Trump documents case, calling the pattern of delay "disturbing."
"Perhaps we’d view any one of them, on their own, as a judicial aberration. But the pattern of ruling upon ruling that is out of the legal mainstream and results in delay well past the point where this case should have been ready for trial is something that shouldn’t be ignored," Vance wrote on Substack. "Judges should not put their fingers on the scales of justice either for or against a defendant or any other party. Here, it’s impossible to avoid the conclusion that the scales are being tipped."
Vance goes on to say that Judge Cannon has "entered an order in the case that is worth paying attention to" on Tuesday.
"Trump and his Florida co-defendants filed a consolidated motion on January 16, 2024, asking the court to order the government to turn over more discovery to them than it had provided... The Special Counsel filed a response, opposing making information public if it revealed the identity or any personal identifying information of any potential witness for the government, or any transcripts or other documentation of statements or testimony they may have given," Vance wrote. "Most Judges would give serious consideration to protecting this type of information, at least at this stage of the proceedings. Judge Cannon decided to protect some, but not all of it."
Finally, Vance raises the potential solution.
"When Judge Cannon was first assigned this case, we discussed the standards used in the 11th Circuit for determining whether a judge should be recused based on their prior conduct in a case. The argument is not one of personal bias, or even that she should be recused because Trump appointed her. But in rare, extraordinary cases where a judge has made multiple rulings that were without a valid basis in the record, the 11th Circuit has ordered recusal, finding that 'the original judge would have difficulty putting his previous views and findings aside,'" Vance wrote. "Whether they would apply that rule to Cannon remains to be seen. Forced recusals are rare. But at this late date, even if the 11th Circuit were to move quickly, as it has in the past, and force Cannon to step aside, it would take a new judge some time to get up to speed. There are no quick fixes for the damage Judge Cannon has done."
After getting cut down to size as "citizen Trump" by the three-judge appeals panel denying him absolute immunity from committing crimes — former President Donald Trump is pushing false narratives that the ruling weakens the presidency.
During an appearance on MSNBC's "The Last Word" with Lawrence O'Donnell, former federal prosecutor Barbara McQuade explained that nothing that came out to the D.C. Court of Appeals was a "surprise" because they were "simply restating a law, as we have always known it."
Earlier today, Trump beat the innocence drum on Truth Social that the decision (which he has vowed to appeal) does indelible harm to the office.
"If a President does not have Immunity, the Opposing Party, during his/her term in Office, can extort and blackmail the President by saying that, 'if you don’t give us everything we want, we will Indict you for things you did while in Office,' even if everything done was totally Legal and Appropriate," Trump said. "That would be the end of the Presidency, and our Country, as we know it, and is just one of the many Traps there would be for a President without Presidential Immunity."
He then plays judge and jury to decide former presidents Obama, Bush, and "Crooked Joe Biden" are all guilty of something and "would all be in PRISON."
McQuade calls this out as another con by the Don.
"What Donald Trump is doing is engaging in disinformation," she said. "He is suggesting to the public that what the court has done is something very radical, that is now eroding a power that existed before yesterday, and that now, presidents have lost the power to be able to govern in this country without the fear and the chilling effect that it would have to now face some sort of accountability that they did not face before."
Last month, Trump declared on social media that even presidential acts that “CROSS THE LINE” must be given “TOTAL IMMUNITY” from prosecution.
In fact, McQuade points out the obvious that only one person appears to be unable to grasp: that a "president was not above the law, and that they could be charged with crimes."
"Donald Trump is the only one suggesting that this was different, and that this is something new; but for people who don't know better. they will read that, and they will fall for that con."
A tense exchange occurred between CNN's Anderson Cooper and Rep. Dan Crenshaw (R-TX) over Congressional inaction to solve the Southern Border crisis, and it had the lawmaker turning on anybody who doesn't want a bill to be voted through to score political points.
"People on both sides of the aisle applaud you for that," Cooper told the Texas Republican who served the country as a Navy SEAL. "[Trump] has put his thumb on scale on this. I understand activist groups make money off this. He is making money off this. He is running an election. This is perhaps a winning issue for him. He does not want improvement despite all the talk of fentanyl, despite all the talk of national security issues. he doesn't want a deal —"
Cooper then tried again. "Lots of people in the House have said that," he said. "There's Republicans in the House who supported HR.2 who are now saying, 'We don't need any border deal at all, and the only reason is because —"
H.R. 2 is the Republican bill that markedly aimed to change the way the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) would deal with undocumented immigrants and also negotiate with countries critical countries such as El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Mexico when it comes to asylum.
Crenshaw told Cooper those who aren't trying to solve the problem are missing a critical window to hash out a deal.
"They are wrong," he said bluntly. "I disagree with them."
"I disagree with them in conversations today on the floor. I said, 'Look if we didn't need new Border laws, why did we pass HR.2," he said."
He then started to praise Trump's actions during his first term before he was voted out in 2020, such as changing the laws and forging agreements with Mexico and Northern Triangle countries.
"That's what he ended up having to do," said Crenshaw.
He then accused Cooper of baiting him into a verbal beef with the 45th president who remains in the lead to become the GOP candidate to challenge to become the 47th president.
"I know you want me to get into a fight with Trump... I'm not going to do it... We need a Border deal."
President Joe Biden is probably smiling on Wednesday after one of his few challengers for the 2024 Democratic nomination reportedly dropped out of the race.
Self-help and spirituality author Marianne Williamson, who has been challenging Biden for the Democratic presidential nomination, on Thursday reportedly notified her supporters that she was dropping out of the race.
Williamson, who denied similar reports after they surfaced last week, was polling in the single digits in the primaries against the president.
Rep. Ronny Jackson (R-TX) did not take kindly to reports that his fellow right-wing Texas lawmaker, Rep. Chip Roy, could make a move to oust House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) from the gavel, KSDK's Mark Maxwell reported on Wednesday.
“I love Chip Roy, but Chip Roy is a major pain in the ass for all of us a few times,” Jackson told the crowd at a GOP panel held at an American Legion post.
According to Maxwell, Jackson then "Suggest[ed] Roy could use a 'code red' beat down from ‘A Few Good Men.’"
Jackson, who represents the Texas Panhandle and the Wichita Falls area, previously served in a White House physician role under multiple presidents, and was accused of having been frequently intoxicated while in that job, as well as sexually harassing staff, mishandling drugs, and crashing a government vehicle while drunk.
He recently made headlines after he was briefly detained by police for getting into a foul-mouthed screaming match with officers while trying to administer medical aid at a rodeo in Amarillo.
Johnson himself was elected speaker after weeks of chaos following a renegade group of Republicans successfully forcing a vote to remove former Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) from that role.
Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-CO), faced with a difficult election after only winning by hundreds of votes in the previous race, decided to jump ship to a more conservative district on the other side of the state — and according to straw polling, she is unlikely to even get the nomination there.
But whether she finds a new seat to stay in Congress or not, one thing appears to be true: Many of her constituents in Western Colorado are happy to see her go, reported The Independent.
“There are people I know that are Trump supporters that don’t support her, and they started out, like, ‘Yeah, ra, ra, ra,’ and now, they’re just embarrassed – because she just makes a fool out of herself,” said a 40-year-old independent voter in New Castle. “When she comes to public places around here, it’s just not professional.” Another elderly grandmother told the paper, “She’s always in drama here in Rifle and Silt."
"She’s not the most popular person anymore,” that voter reportedly added.
"It’s a common refrain from constituents represented by the 37-year-old new grandmother, who has endured a spectacular rise and fall between her home turf and DC," reported Sheila Flynn. "A Democrat briefly until 2008, she first came to power in a shock 2020 upset, riding a MAGA wave of rural Colorado libertarianism and covid restriction backlash to victory over five-term incumbent Republican Scott Tipton. Boebert tapped into the fringe elements of the right, weaving Christian nationalism and conspiracy theory bait into her unique brand of Trump-tinted braggadocio, and it played well for a time … before she seems to have taken it too far."
Boebert has found herself at the center of multiple dramas in recent years, from a highly public and personal feud with fellow far-right Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA), to an incident in which she was kicked out of a local performance of "Beetlejuice" for publicly groping her date and causing a scene.
Former President Donald Trump arrives for his arraignment at Manhattan Criminal Court on April 04 in New York City. Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images
Trump's campaign is selling these black-and-white ceramic coffee mugs for $24. (Screen grab)
Illustration of Eugene Debs while running for president in prison. Indiana State University archives
Federal document listing indictment counts against former President Donald Trump. U.S. District Court, Southern District of Florida