Jeff Clark: Trump not guilty of insurrection because 'he left office on time'

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Jeff Clark: Trump not guilty of insurrection because 'he left office on time'
Real America's Voice/screen grab

Former United States Assistant Attorney General Jeff Clark argued that Donald Trump could not be guilty of an insurrection because his efforts to stay in office ultimately failed.

During a Thursday interview with right-wing podcaster Steve Bannon, Clark disagreed with a Colorado Supreme Court decision that bars Trump from the state's primary ballot based on Section 3 of the 14th Amendment.

Clark said the 14th Amendment did not apply to Trump because the president and vice president were not explicitly named in the text.

"MSNBC, CNN, they try to portray it as some kind of technicality," he scoffed. "And the trial judge was willing to obey it, but not four out of the seven justices of the Colorado Supreme Court."

ALSO READ: Florida judge’s son is a neo-Nazi patron: data leak

"Their next argument is that, you know, they conclude President Trump committed an insurrection," he continued, noting "dozens and dozens" of pages backing up the court's ruling.

But Clark, who was one of 18 co-defendants charged alongside Trump in the Fulton County racketeering case, insisted that Trump did not meet the qualifications for an insurrectionist.

"But whether someone engaged in an insurrection requires scienter, which is the fancy legal term for the intent, you need to have the intent to try to overthrow the government," Clark opined. "And it's ridiculous to say that President Trump had that intent, because he specifically said — first of all, he left office on time, right?"

"But second, he told people to march peacefully and patriotically down to the Capitol, let their voices be heard," he added. "And so it's ludicrous to imagine that he could ever be found guilty of insurrection, which is why Jack Smith didn't charge him with it."

Watch the video below from Real America's Voice.

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Hilarity as ex-DOJ attorney delves into Trump's secret Mar-a-Lago bathroom stash

A former Justice Department pardon attorney believes President Donald Trump "very likely" has a secret stash in his Mar-a-Lago bathroom.

DOJ whistleblower Liz Oyer made this claim during a Saturday episode of "The Jim Acosta Show" during which she suggested Trump has quietly prepared clemency for people around him in case he suddenly leaves office.

"It is a near certainty that he will pardon broadly his cabinet members, his family members, those advisers who are in good graces with him by the end of the administration," Oyer said. "And I think it's very likely that he has already signed off on some of those pardons just in case something should happen to him before he gets to the end."

She went further by describing where the paperwork might sit, evoking where classified information was found after the end of his first term.

"He may have a desk drawer filled with pardons," she said, "or maybe a banker's box in his bathroom at Mar-a-Lago filled with pardons that he has signed already just in case something happens and in case someone needs them."

The image prompted host Jim Acosta to joke about mounting an expedition for the documents and compare it to "Raiders of the Lost Ark," pitching it as "Raiders of the Lost Pardons."

Oyer argued that Walt Nauta, Trump's aide and valet, "probably knows where the right box is." Nauta was involved in the Mar-a-Lago classified information case, and DOJ special counsel Jack Smith accused him of having incriminating photos on his phone.

The conversation between Oyer and Acosta was tied to a recent '60 Minutes' report on pardon brokers. Oyer described "a real pay-for-play pardon economy where money can buy you a pardon," and cited one man who "paid $600,000 to a pardon broker" but never got the clemency he expected.

She said the process has "become absolute chaos and totally corrupt" for applicants who once did not have to pay. Oyer is suing the DOJ after she was fired for refusing to restore actor Mel Gibson's gun rights, which he lost after a domestic violence conviction.

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Trigger for Trump's raging White House tantrum buried in WaPo report: Analyst

The reason President Donald Trump threw an angry tantrum at journalists and suddenly expelled them from the White House can be found buried within a new report about the midterm elections, a CNN correspondent contends.

Correspondent Jamie Gangel on Saturday shared this hypothesis with her 40,000 followers on X Saturday morning.

"Perhaps this contributed to President Trump’s threat to ban CNN and others," she wrote.

Gangel then shared a Washington Post article detailing Trump's private views on the upcoming election and the effect his war with Iran has had on Republican prospects.

"In interviews and speeches, President Donald Trump has maintained that midterm politics don’t affect his decisions on Iran, that the war has been worth the cost, and that he would do it all over again despite Republicans bracing for defeat in November," the Post reported.

"But in some private conversation with advisers, Trump has signaled that he understands his decisions on the war have contributed to the especially poor political environment his party faces."

The Post's anonymous sources attribute Trump's growing awareness of the political climate to discussions he's had with advisers inside the White House.

"Trump has long dismissed unfavorable polls, fastening his attention on surveys that present him in an artificially positive light," the Post reported. "He often says that negative surveys are fake and not to be believed. Increasingly, however, he has accepted his team’s polling that shows his and his party’s poor standing with voters, his advisers say."

The reason Trump has accepted the polling is the same reason Gangel believes the president lashed out and banned MS NOW, CNN and Politico from the White House.

"Several of Trump’s advisers said they had become 'increasingly blunt' with him, as one put it, and that in recent weeks he was listening to them about the electoral reality the GOP faces," the report states. "It didn’t always translate to a good mood for Trump."


'Ominous' signs that Trump is gearing up to detonate on own appointee flagged by analyst

President Donald Trump is flashing ominous signs that he is gearing up to turn on the Federal Reserve chair he handpicked, an economic analyst warned.

In a Saturday analysis for The Guardian, economics writer Eduardo Porter credited the Federal Reserve under Chairman Kevin Warsh with having "acquitted itself well" through a week of pressure from the White House, but warned "the signs are ominous" that Trump will "turn on Warsh in the way he did on his predecessor, Jerome 'numbskull' Powell."

Porter tracked the widening rift between the president and Kevin Warsh since Trump elevated him to the job. He noted that Warsh presided this week over a unanimous decision to raise interest rates for the first time in three years, a direct rebuff to a president who has spent months demanding cuts.

"Warsh's resolve - raising rates just a few weeks before elections that will determine whether Republicans retain control of Congress - appeared even more resolute in the face of a veiled threat from White House economic adviser Kevin Hassett," Porter wrote, referring to Hassett's saying on Fox that "if you want an independent Fed, then one thing the Fed does is it stays out of the way of elections."

Trump did not take the rate hike quietly, though, Porter noted. Trump "went ballistic" on social media and insisted borrowing costs should sit at 1 percent or lower because the country carries the best credit in the world. Trump also demanded that rates be slashed fast.

The outburst came despite inflation running above the Federal Reserve's target for years and a federal deficit on pace to top 2 trillion dollars, Porter noted.

Porter also saw signs in the gap between Warsh's restraint and the rest of the administration, from sweeping tariffs to a push by Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent to force long-term rates down even as the Fed lifts them. "More clown cars are likely on the way," Porter warned.

He closed on a cautionary note, writing that anyone counting on the Fed chair to steady the economy should know that "holding one's breath may be a bad idea."

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