Have you heard the good news? The walls are finally closing in on Donald Trump!
Attorney General Merrick Garland and the feds have Trump cornered, like a fascist rat in a trap! He's going to jail at last, and the goodguys will win in the end because it is the American Way!
Such reactions were triggered by a series of supposed bombshell reports last week. In a much-discussed interview last Tuesday, Attorney General Garland told Lester Holt of NBC News:
We intend to hold everyone, anyone who was criminally responsible for the events surrounding Jan. 6, for any attempt to interfere with the lawful transfer of power from one administration to another, accountable. That's what we do. We don't pay any attention to other issues with respect to that.
Holt tried to press him further, asking whether, if Trump announces another presidential campaign, "that would not change your schedule or how you move forward or don't move forward?"
Garland responded: "I'll say again that we will hold accountable anyone who was criminally responsible for attempting to interfere with the transfer, legitimate, lawful transfer of power from one administration to the next."
In a story that dominated the news for the remainder of the week, and deservedly so, on that same daythe Washington Post reportedthat Garland's Justice Department was in fact "investigating President Donald Trump's actions as part of its criminal probe of efforts to overturn the 2020 election results":
Prosecutors who are questioning witnesses before a grand jury including two top aides to Vice President Mike Pence have asked in recent days about conversations with Trump, his lawyers, and others in his inner circle who sought tosubstitute Trump allies for certified electors from some states Joe Biden won, according to two people familiar with the matter. Both spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss an ongoing investigation.
The prosecutors have asked hours of detailed questions about meetings Trump led in December 2020 and January 2021; hispressure campaign on Penceto overturn the election; and what instructions Trump gave his lawyers and advisers about fake electors and sending electors back to the states, the people said. Some of the questions focused directly on the extent of Trump's involvement in the fake-elector effort led by his outside lawyers,including John Eastman and Rudy Giuliani, these people said.
In a recent conversationwith Salon, Norman Eisen, who served as special counsel to the House Judiciary Committee during Trump's first impeachment, offered these personal insights about Garland's temperament and how it may impact his investigation of Trump:
Garland fears no person. I've known him for years and he is a great American jurist and lawyer. He has said that he's going to follow the evidence where it leads and apply the law without fear or favor. He's going to let the chips fall where they may. I believe him. He's very methodical. He's very deliberate.
There's some element of not bumping into the Jan. 6 committee's work. There are strong norms at work here: You don't stampede into prosecuting a president.
Garland also needed to restore another kind of norm and that was the norm of a properly functioning Department of Justice. He's only a year and a half into his tenure, if even that long. He needed to get things settled down in the DOJ before he made such a momentous move. I have a lot of confidence in Merrick Garland's decision-making.
Of course that is encouraging news. But it pays to be cautious when attempting to decipher what may or may not be happening in the perpetual tempest of the MAGAverse and its leader. The following facts should be kept in mind in any and all discussions about Trump, the law and criminal consequences.
Donald Trump has been declared politically dead many times. He's been involved in thousands of lawsuits and accused of serious crimes and has never faced any serious consequences.
Trump has been declared politically dead on several previous occasions. He has been involved in thousands of lawsuits but has never been charged with a crime nor faced serious consequences for his evident wrongdoing. Hehas also been credibly accused of sexual assault and rape by numerous women without facing criminal charges or any other significant form of accountability.
Mental health professionals have repeatedly warned that Donald Trump is a sociopath (and perhaps a psychopath) with no regard for human decency, the rule of law or other norms and societal limits on his behavior. These pathologies, in a very real sense, are among his greatest strengths as a fascist leader who is plotting his return to power.
Is Donald Trump really at imminent risk of being indicted or prosecuted for his likely or apparent crimes related to the Jan. 6 coup attempt and Capitol attack? In the midst of all that breathless coverage suggesting that the answer was clearly "yes", NBC News offered this important qualification last Wednesday:
The Department of Justice is investigating then-President Donald Trump's actions leading up to the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol as part of its criminal probe of efforts to overturn the 2020 election results, an administration official familiar with the investigation said.
The inquiry is related to the department's broader probe of efforts to overturn the 2020 election results and not a criminal investigation of Trump himself, the official said.
Adding further caution to any narrative that Trump now faces imminent or inevitable prosecution, NBC News further reports that the Department of Justice may lack the resources necessary to properly investigate Trump, his confederates and the larger Jan. 6 coup conspiracy.
It's the "most wide-ranging investigation" in Justice Department history: the unprecedented manhunt forhundredsof rioters who stormed the U.S. Capitolon Donald Trump's behalfon Jan. 6, 2021, and the criminal inquiry into efforts to stop the peaceful transfer of power.
It's also a logistical nightmare.
As cases against Capitol rioters work their way through the court system and a federal grand jury hears testimony aboutTrump's rolein Jan. 6, some federal officials are raising concerns that it could bring the already stretched investigation of Jan. 6 to a breaking point.
In conversations with NBC News in recent months, more than a dozen sources familiar with the sprawling Jan. 6 investigation expressed varying degrees of worry about whether the resources the Justice Department has allocated to the effort are sufficient for such a vast criminal investigation.
This is not the first time that Donald Trump supposedly faced legal peril for his conduct as president. As bestselling crime writer and activist Don Winslow has repeatedly pointed out on social media and elsewhere, over the course of the last six or seven years, Trump has faced numerous damning allegations and serious investigations and has escaped them all.
Trump became the first president to be impeached twice and only the third to be impeached at all and was acquitted at trial in the U.S. Senate on both occasions, suffering little or no long-term damage to his power or popularity within the Republican Party or among his cult followers.
For much of Trump's presidency, the media was obsessed with Robert Mueller's investigation, and kept telling us he would expose a massive web of lies and corruption and bring down the entire Trump regime.
For much of the Trump presidency, the mainstream news media was obsessed with Robert Mueller's investigation of the 2016 presidential campaign, with almost daily TV segments, interviews, reporting and commentary suggesting that Mueller was on the verge of exposing a massive web of treason and corruption that would bring down the entire Trump regime. But "Mueller time" was a bust, and the special counsel's report landed with a damp thud rather than anearth-shattering boom (at least partly due to the intervention of Attorney General Bill Barr).
In fact, Mueller's investigation conclusively showed that Trump's inner circle colluded with Russia, a hostile foreign power, during the 2016 campaign. Trump then obstructed justice on a grand scale to conceal those actions -- and also to hide his own culpability. After Congress did nothing to hold him properly accountable for the Russia scandal, Trump almost immediately tried to pressure Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy into launching a fraudulent investigation of Joe Biden, then the leading Democratic candidate for president. That led to Trump's first impeachment and after he survived that, he moved toward inexorably toward the Jan. 6 coup attempt meant to keep him in office after losing the 2020 election to Biden.
So what will Trump do if Garland finally moves forward with criminal prosecution relating to the Jan. 6 coup attempt? The answer is obvious: As the leading student and protg of right-wing fixer and dirty trickster Roy Cohn, Trump will go on the attack.
He has already previewed his strategy in public. Throughout his presidency, Trump repeatedly said that he possessed "special" or secret executive powers that effectively placed him above the law. He has also repeatedly told his followers that he and they are the victims of a grand conspiracy involving the "deep state," the "liberal media" and the "socialist Democrats." In that context, any and all means of "self-defense," including law-breaking and political violence, are understood to be reasonable and righteous options.
In essence, Donald Trump and his confederates in the Republican-fascist movement seek to hold the American people hostage in order to prevent Garland and the Justice Department from enforcing the law.
In a new Rolling Stone report, Asawin Suebsaeng and Adam Rawnsley describe Trump's legal defense strategy:
"Members of the Trump legal team are quietly preparing, in the event charges are brought," says one person familiar with the situation. "It would be career malpractice not to. Do the [former] president's attorneys believe everything Cassidy [Hutchinson] said? No. Do they think the Department of Justice would be wise to charge him? No. But we've gotten to a point where if you don't think criminal charges are at least somewhat likely, you are not serving the [former] president's best interests.".
In their preparations, Trump's team has discussed strategies that involve shifting blame from Trump to his advisers for the efforts to overturn the election, per the three sources, reflecting a broader push to find afall guy orfall guys. "Trump got some terrible advice from attorneys who, some people would argue, should have or must have known better," says one of the sources with knowledge of recent discussions in Trumpland. "An 'advice of counsel' defense would be a big one."
Other potential strategies include defenses based on the First Amendment and the right to petition the government over a political grievance. Such arguments are viewed internally as potential defenses against charges related tothe "fake elector" scheme.
Trump also seems keenly aware of the blowback that could result from a federal indictment and is telling supporters it could be politically advantageous. Early this year, the former president told fans at a Texas rally that if prosecutors go after him, "we are going to have in this country the biggest protest we have ever had in Washington, D.C., in New York, in Atlanta, and elsewhere."
Trump has repeated versions of that line to confidants and longtime pals, including at casual gatherings this summer, a person with direct knowledge of the matter says. "He says," the source recalls, "it would make the crowd size at [Jan. 6] look small by comparison."
Anticipating such violence, Malcolm Nance, an expert on terrorism, extremism and military intelligence, outlined this scenario in a recent interviewwith mefor Salon:
Trumpism is moving beyond Donald Trump. Trumpism is the embrace of the conspiracy against all of them. I believe that maybe half of them, 40 million or so of his voters, would take to the streets.
I'd say an easy 10 million would come out with arms. Here's the second component of that scenario. Republican governors and state legislatures refuse to do anything about the armed Trumpists. They refuse to bring out the National Guard. They refuse to allow the National Guard to be federalized. Now you're in pre-Civil War 1860 territory.
Here is a scenario from my new book. Terrorists bomb a parade using high-technology drones that are synced together and drop mortar bombs, just like ISIS does. The president of the United States starts getting these reports. It's not one city, it's 10 cities right here in the United States. Armed men are taking over federal armories and National Guardsmen are not stopping them. The president of the United States, in a matter of moments, has to do several things. The president has to federalize state troops. The U.S. military would have to be mobilized to fight state troopers and recalcitrant National Guardsmen who refuse federal orders.
There will be a fiefdom down in Mar-a-Lago. There will be civilians with long rifles. The governor of Florida endorsing them, calling out the state National Guard to resist the president of the United States. This is not as farfetched a scenario as many would like to believe.
It is both premature and irresponsible for the news media and other public voices to treat the prosecution of Donald Trump and his confederates as a fait accompli or an inevitable outcome. It undoubtedly feels good for theprofessional centrists and hope-peddlers to write such stories. Hope-starvedliberals, progressives and Democrats will feel good reading such stories about Trump and his co-conspirators finally getting their just deserts and going to prison for their abundant crimes against democracy, American society and human decency.
It is important to remember that many of the public voices now crowing the loudest about Trump going to jail are the same voices who insisted that Trump was not planning a coup on Jan. 6, that the "institutions" would surely defeat Trump and his movement, that Roe v. Wade would never be overturned, that the Republican Party would eventually get tired of Trump's antics and drive him out, that "moderation" and the "adults in the room" would vanquish evil, and that Robert Mueller was an avenging superhero. At almost every key juncture, these voices have been catastrophically wrong about the extreme peril that Donald Trump, the Republican Party, and the larger neofascist movement represent to America's present and future.
There may be a time to celebrate the downfall of Donald Trump after he is prosecuted, tried, convicted and then sent to prison for a very long time and even then, such celebrations will be premature. Donald Trump is an idea, not a man. The dark political possibilities he symbolizes and made real have empowered the Republican Party to fully embrace fascism and white supremacy. Trump's followers will worship him as a political martyr and figurehead, no matter what happens to him. Trump the man is getting older, and is not immortal. But his most important role is not as president, or even potential dictator for life, but as prototype or proof of concept for an even more dangerous authoritarian leader in the near future.
In fact, Trump could become an even more powerful and compelling figure for the neofascist right, both in America and around the world, if he is prosecuted or imprisoned for his crimes. It is far too early to proclaim that the dark sorcerer is dead. He counts on such proclamations as his pathway to resurrection andrevenge.
Read more
about Donald Trump, past and future
Continue reading here:
Are the "walls closing in" on Donald Trump? Don't hold your breath - Salon
- 'Donald Trump Did This': How to Beat MAGA on Border Security - The Bulwark - April 29th, 2024 [April 29th, 2024]
- Potential Trump running mate JD Vance and Donald Trump Jr. have become so close that they text or talk on a 'nearly ... - Business Insider - April 29th, 2024 [April 29th, 2024]
- Trump Second Term: How the World and U.S. Allies Can Prepare for the Election - Foreign Policy - April 29th, 2024 [April 29th, 2024]
- Poll: Biden and Trump supporters sharply divided by the media they consume - NBC News - April 29th, 2024 [April 29th, 2024]
- Master Calendar of Trump Court Dates: Criminal and Civil Cases - Just Security - April 29th, 2024 [April 29th, 2024]
- Donald Trump's Sleepy, Sleazy Criminal Trial - The New Yorker - April 29th, 2024 [April 29th, 2024]
- Trump, GOP seize on campus protests to depict chaos under Biden - The Washington Post - April 29th, 2024 [April 29th, 2024]
- UK briefing: How Donald Trump plans to survive hush money trial with his campaign intact newsletter - The Guardian - April 29th, 2024 [April 29th, 2024]
- Opinion | We Are Talking About the Manhattan Case Against Trump All Wrong - The New York Times - April 29th, 2024 [April 29th, 2024]
- Election 2024: Biden jokes, Trump still leads and updates from the Sunday shows. - The New York Times - April 29th, 2024 [April 29th, 2024]
- Donald Trump Pans White House Correspondents' Dinner: 'Colin Jost BOMBED' - The Daily Beast - April 29th, 2024 [April 29th, 2024]
- Trump's Trial Could Bring a Rarity: Consequences for His Words - The New York Times - April 29th, 2024 [April 29th, 2024]
- Donald Trump Bemoans Really Bad WHCD, Biden & Colin Jost After All Mock Much Indicted Ex-POTUS - Deadline - April 29th, 2024 [April 29th, 2024]
- The Supreme Court's epic failure in dealing with Trump's cases - The Hill - April 29th, 2024 [April 29th, 2024]
- Donald Trump: In America's most important swing state, a key Biden group wants to hand the presidency to Trump. - Slate - April 29th, 2024 [April 29th, 2024]
- Donald Trump Is Being Ritually Humiliated in Court - The New Yorker - April 29th, 2024 [April 29th, 2024]
- Joe Biden trails Donald Trump in new national poll on 2024 election - USA TODAY - April 29th, 2024 [April 29th, 2024]
- Amid Cases on Abortion and Trump, Roberts Reflects on Supreme Court's Work - The New York Times - April 29th, 2024 [April 29th, 2024]
- Donald Trump Is Used to the Finer Things in Life. At the Courthouse, 'He's Miserable.' - The Wall Street Journal - April 29th, 2024 [April 29th, 2024]
- How Trumps Rhetoric at Rallies Has Escalated - The New York Times - April 29th, 2024 [April 29th, 2024]
- The Supreme Court Appears Poised to Protect the Presidencyand Donald Trump - The New Yorker - April 29th, 2024 [April 29th, 2024]
- The Supreme Court seems divided over Donald Trump's immunity - The Economist - April 29th, 2024 [April 29th, 2024]
- John Dean Says 1 Thing 'Keeping Me On The Edge Of My Seat' In Trump Trial - Yahoo! Voices - April 29th, 2024 [April 29th, 2024]
- Five Moments That Have Defined Donald Trump's Trial So Far - The New York Times - April 29th, 2024 [April 29th, 2024]
- How Trumps trial is playing, politically - The Washington Post - April 29th, 2024 [April 29th, 2024]
- Opinion | The Ukraine aid vote helps, but U.S. allies complacency would be unwise - The Washington Post - April 29th, 2024 [April 29th, 2024]
- Hey, SCOTUS your hypocrisy is showing - The Hill - April 29th, 2024 [April 29th, 2024]
- Bill Barr Is Happy to Debase Himself for Donald Trump Again Mother Jones - Mother Jones - April 29th, 2024 [April 29th, 2024]
- The Supreme Court is likely to place Donald Trump above the law in its immunity case - Vox.com - April 29th, 2024 [April 29th, 2024]
- RFK is openly gunning for Trump voters now and Republicans are starting to worry - Salon - April 29th, 2024 [April 29th, 2024]
- Trump Pushes Immigration Conspiracy Theories and Mass Deportations - The New York Times - February 5th, 2024 [February 5th, 2024]
- Nikki Haley makes surprise appearance on SNL, mocking Donald Trump and Joe Biden - NPR - February 5th, 2024 [February 5th, 2024]
- Trump feud with UAW reaches fever pitch - The Hill - February 5th, 2024 [February 5th, 2024]
- Donald Trump tightens his grip on GOP, bolsters ties with Mike Johnson - USA TODAY - February 5th, 2024 [February 5th, 2024]
- 1/31/24 - 2024 Matchups: Biden Opens Up Lead Over Trump In Head-To-Head, Quinnipiac University National Poll ... - Quinnipiac University Poll - February 5th, 2024 [February 5th, 2024]
- Here's how 2 sentences in the Constitution rose from obscurity to ensnare Donald Trump - Yahoo News - February 5th, 2024 [February 5th, 2024]
- Donald Trump floats tariff of more than 60% on imports from China and denies it would start a trade war - Fortune - February 5th, 2024 [February 5th, 2024]
- Jeffries on House Republicans: Wholly owned subsidiaries of Donald Trump - The Hill - February 5th, 2024 [February 5th, 2024]
- Ex-DOJ Official Says He's 'Now At The Freakout Stage' Over 1 Donald Trump Case - Yahoo News - February 5th, 2024 [February 5th, 2024]
- Nikki Haley to GOP: Let's wait to see if Donald Trump is convicted - USA TODAY - February 5th, 2024 [February 5th, 2024]
- Why Supreme Court appeal will be no 'open mic night' for Donald Trump - USA TODAY - February 5th, 2024 [February 5th, 2024]
- Nikki Haley hits Donald Trump during 'SNL' sketch ahead of SC primary - USA TODAY - February 5th, 2024 [February 5th, 2024]
- Donald Trump's legal fees are draining his campaign funds - The Economist - February 5th, 2024 [February 5th, 2024]
- Donald Trump Mentions These Names When Asked About Vice Presidential Picks - NDTV - February 5th, 2024 [February 5th, 2024]
- Trump's lead over Biden may be smaller than it looks - The Economist - February 5th, 2024 [February 5th, 2024]
- Tory rising star described Donald Trump as 'refreshing' - The Independent - February 5th, 2024 [February 5th, 2024]
- Joe Biden v Donald Trump - where contest will be won and lost - BBC.com - February 5th, 2024 [February 5th, 2024]
- Donald Trump's fed trial on election interference postponed from March - USA TODAY - February 5th, 2024 [February 5th, 2024]
- Inside Trump's growing influence over congressional Republicans - POLITICO - POLITICO - February 5th, 2024 [February 5th, 2024]
- Federal judge postpones Trump's March 4 election interference trial - NPR - February 5th, 2024 [February 5th, 2024]
- Trump Says He Would Not Reappoint Powell as Fed Chair if Elected - Bloomberg - February 5th, 2024 [February 5th, 2024]
- I Prosecuted Donald Trump and Won. Here's How It's Done. - The Daily Beast - February 5th, 2024 [February 5th, 2024]
- Donald Trump Loses London Case Against Ex-MI6 Spy Over Kremlin Dossier - Bloomberg - February 5th, 2024 [February 5th, 2024]
- After Speedy Start, Appeals Court Slows Down on Trump Immunity Decision - The New York Times - February 5th, 2024 [February 5th, 2024]
- Donald Trump and UAW President Shawn Fain exchange barbs: 'Get rid of this dope' - USA TODAY - February 5th, 2024 [February 5th, 2024]
- Donald Trump dispels rumors that he reached out to RFK Jr for VP: Never happened - Fox News - February 5th, 2024 [February 5th, 2024]
- How Donald Trump Got Disqualified From The Ballot And His Entire Candidacy Wound Up Before The Supreme Court - HuffPost - February 5th, 2024 [February 5th, 2024]
- Trump Says Nikki Haley Is Unlikely to Be His Running Mate - The New York Times - January 20th, 2024 [January 20th, 2024]
- Donald Trump Goes From Calm To Indignant In Newly Released Deposition Video Of Civil Fraud Lawsuit - HuffPost - January 20th, 2024 [January 20th, 2024]
- Trump: Haley 'probably ... is not going to be chosen as the vice president' - POLITICO - January 20th, 2024 [January 20th, 2024]
- Trump returns to New Hampshire as primary nears - The Washington Post - January 20th, 2024 [January 20th, 2024]
- Boris Johnson: Trump's return could be 'big win for the world' - POLITICO Europe - January 20th, 2024 [January 20th, 2024]
- Zelenskyy invites Trump to Kyiv POLITICO - POLITICO Europe - January 20th, 2024 [January 20th, 2024]
- 'New Hampshire Is Close to a Make-or-Break for Keeping the Nomination Out of Donald Trump's Hands.' - POLITICO - January 20th, 2024 [January 20th, 2024]
- Trump's pitch in New Hampshire is more about Nikki Haley as he hopes for big win - NPR - January 20th, 2024 [January 20th, 2024]
- Donald Trump's tax cuts would add to American growthand debt - The Economist - January 20th, 2024 [January 20th, 2024]
- Donald Trump's populism is turning off corporate donors - The Economist - January 20th, 2024 [January 20th, 2024]
- Why DeSantis Says Trump's Romp in Iowa Is Actually a Sign of His Weakness - The New York Times - January 20th, 2024 [January 20th, 2024]
- The GOP Is Already Clashing Over Trump's VP Pick - POLITICO - January 20th, 2024 [January 20th, 2024]
- There is still a way to stop Donald Trump but time is running out - The Guardian - January 20th, 2024 [January 20th, 2024]
- The Davos Consensus: Donald Trump Will Win Re-Election - The New York Times - January 20th, 2024 [January 20th, 2024]
- Maine Secretary of State to Appeal Ruling on Her Decision to Exclude Trump From Ballot - The New York Times - January 20th, 2024 [January 20th, 2024]
- Vice President Harris says she's 'scared as heck' that Donald Trump could win - The Associated Press - January 20th, 2024 [January 20th, 2024]
- What is the point of coming second to Donald Trump? - The Economist - January 20th, 2024 [January 20th, 2024]
- Thousands Sign Christian Petition Urging Bishops Not to Back Donald Trump - Newsweek - January 20th, 2024 [January 20th, 2024]
- Why Donald Trump Is Facing E. Jean Carroll in Court a Second Time - The New York Times - January 20th, 2024 [January 20th, 2024]
- Donald Trump Claims He Will Never Allow Creation of CBDC in the US if Reelected - Yahoo Finance - January 20th, 2024 [January 20th, 2024]
- Keller @ Large: What Donald Trump's win in Iowa means for the presidential race - CBS Boston - January 20th, 2024 [January 20th, 2024]
- Donald Trump tries to twist felony charges, lawsuits after Iowa win - USA TODAY - January 20th, 2024 [January 20th, 2024]
- Donald Trump Just Incriminated Himself on Truth Social: Legal Analyst - Newsweek - January 20th, 2024 [January 20th, 2024]