When voters go to the polls in the upcoming presidential election, there's a very good chance Donald Trump supporters will be backing a man who has his criminal cases still unresolved. According to the former chief of the fraud and public corruption section at the U.S. Attorney’s Office, having an election under such circumstances is unthinkable.
"As Richard Nixon might have put it, voters have a right to know whether their candidate is a crook. It can be avoided, but it’s going to require the judiciary to take some extraordinary steps. And whether it happens will be decided by a relative handful of federal jurists — including a number appointed by Mr. Trump himself," Randall D. Eliason writes in The New York Times.
Trump's legal wrangling could push his trials well past next November. If he wins the election, Eliason worries he could "shut down the two federal prosecutions and could probably have the state prosecutions at least postponed while he is in office."
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"Having an election with Mr. Trump on the ballot and his criminal liability for Jan. 6 unresolved could spell disaster for the rule of law. It’s also completely avoidable if the courts — and in particular, the judges who control the schedule — are willing to do what’s necessary: put the resolution of these motions on a fast track to ensure the case can go to trial as scheduled," Eliason writes.
Eliason acknowledges that judges cannot take political considerations into their rulings, but he argues that we're in a special "time of crisis."
"The federal judiciary cannot simply turn a blind eye. It must respond in a way that will enable the political system to address that crisis in a timely manner. This is one of those times."
Read the full op-ed over at The New York Times.
