President Trump Thread...

[L.T. Fan]

It is hard to imagine a historical parallel to the one-two blows that landed flush on the jaw of President Donald Trump Tuesday afternoon, with the nearly simultaneous announcements of Paul Manafort's convictions and Michael Cohen's guilty pleas.

Taken together, the developments represent a thunderous rebuttal by the criminal justice system on behalf of the rule of law and against the President's attempts to demonize the Department of Justice and FBI.

Both proceedings pose serious legal trouble for the President, but the Cohen plea is the graver and more immediate risk. It put a target directly on the President's back.

Cohen was charged with a series of crimes, including some of the same sort of bank fraud that ensnared Manafort. But it will be counts seven and eight that keep Trump and his lawyers up for many nights.

The conduct laid out in those counts deals directly with Trump's efforts to stop Stormy Daniels and Karen McDougal from speaking about their alleged affairs with him. Indeed, Trump's involvement is partly spelled out in the indictment itself, even though the President was not named, following Justice Department policy.

If, as Cohen says, Trump not only knew about but directed Cohen's conduct, it means that the President would have been nothing less than a co-conspirator in a federal crime. And this crime, far from concerning long past financial misdeeds, would be a felony that then-candidate Trump committed precisely in order to secure election. It is hard to think of a more prototypical high crime or misdemeanor.


More importantly, the Cohen guilty plea anticipates a process, which already has begun, in which Cohen tells what he knows about those crimes, and probably others, to investigators working for the special counsel Robert Mueller, as well as to prosecutors from the Southern District of New York, where the case is pending.

Typically a criminal defendant would already have provided full information to the government before entering a plea. That didn't happen here. It appears as if the Southern District was dissatisfied with the progress of talks and ready to bring charges last week, prompting Cohen to move quickly into an open-book posture.

SDNY, for its part, is able to eliminate any concern about bringing charges too close to an election. And given the likely credibility and trust between SDNY and Cohen's excellent lawyer, Guy Petrillo, a former Criminal Division chief in that office, the parties probably felt sufficiently comfortable with entering the plea now and continuing the cooperation.

The eventual sentence Cohen gets for the crimes to which he pleaded guilty today -- which without cooperation looks to be in the six to eight year range, plenty long for the father of school-age children -- will depend on the information he is able to provide.

And, of course, since the charges are pending in New York, and not with the Mueller probe, Trump is essentially powerless to try to fire his way out of the mess. No matter what action he takes against Mueller, the case against Cohen remains.

He could pardon Cohen, a move probably made much more politically difficult by the conviction of Manafort; it seems quite a stretch to think that he would pardon both. But even a pardon of Cohen will likely not keep Cohen's information about Trump's involvement from coming to light, once he provides it to the federal prosecutors.

That is because he can be immunized by state authorities if they bring charges against him (i.e. they could promise not to prosecute him), and without the possibility of criminal liability, he would lose Fifth Amendment protections and could be compelled to testify. And any lies he might tell in that testimony -- i.e any material variations from the account he provides to the SDNY -- would expose him to perjury.

Deputy US Attorney Robert Khuzami ended his remarks announcing Cohen pleas with an unusual paean to the rule of law and the notion that the criminal justice system stands at the ready to prosecute wrongdoers without fear of favor.

The immediate subject of the remarks was Cohen, but it was a barely concealed reference to the President of the United States, and his offensive campaign to put himself above the law and demonize the criminal justice system. History may mark today as the day that campaign began to crumble.

So a reporter used the term federal crime but didn’t elaborate what the crime or violation is does nothing more than echo what you are having a fit over. Someone needs to spell out what laws were violated by Trump because an accusation will not stand up. There is no need to continue posting reporter conjecture because it doesn’t really pinpoint anything. It’s a mere statement of conjecture.

 

[BipolarFuk]

Good lord you're fucking dense when it comes to your Dear Leader, Comrade.

He pleaded guilty to two counts of illegal campaign contributions related to payments to women.

He made those payments at the direction of your Dear Leader.

If it is a crime for Cohen, why isn't it a crime for Dear Leader?

 

[jsmith6919]

Good lord you're fucking dense when it comes to your Dear Leader, Comrade.

He pleaded guilty to two counts of illegal campaign contributions related to payments to women.

He made those payments at the direction of your Dear Leader.

If it is a crime for Cohen, why isn't it a crime for Dear Leader?

I know you're not looking for a serious answer and just trolling but doing this anyway

 

[Smitty]

Considering that Clinton was a horrendous candidate that many Democrats despised and that Trump basically had to hit an inside straight in Michigan/Ohio/Wisconsin, as well as win by the narrowest of margins in places like PA to win, pretty confident.

The only way I think he wins in 2020 is if the economy is booming at unprecedented levels.

.... which it is doing right now, FWIW.

Not that I really ascribe it to Trump particularly. Though tax cuts are usually very good for the economy.

Now if we could just get spending under control, but that's not as popular, and for a populist who makes his bones sucking up to the common man, that's not something Trump will ever see as appealing.

 

[Smitty]

What's not to like about Uncle Joe?

He may not run, and if he does, he may not win the nomination.

Don't rule out Corey Booker or Elizabeth Warren, who, if they are to be better than Trump, would only be so on the grounds that maybe they haven't committed federal felonies.

 

[Cotton]

And for the record I don't give two fucks about impeachment. That'd take damn near a year anyway and by that point we'd already be in the 2020 election cycle, which he's going to lose anyway.

I only care about this because I find it laughable that so many people are willing to give this buffoon every benefit of the doubt when he's clearly a corrupt moron who only feeds off stoking the darkest sides of human nature.

Don't bet on it.

 

[Cotton]

There hasn't been a President with this much controversy and scandal swirling around in about 50 years so I'm not sure what you mean.

Yes, there's always massive amounts of bullshit going both ways but this is different from your run of the mill political squabbling.

One of the biggest reasons you are seeing all of this swirling around is because about half of it is completely made up by the media. They are grasping at anything they can possibly try to make fathomable to take Trump down. And, it is making them look like idiots and causing the American people to further distrust them.

 

[Cotton]

Let me ask you, what would it take for you to vote for a relatively moderate Democrat over a Republican?

I consider myself truly moderate and independent as far as the two parties go, for example, I preferred Obama over McCain, I slightly preferred Romney to Obama, and I liked Kasich over anybody in 2016, I didn't vote in the general in 2016 because I was pretty disgusted by both choices, but in 2020 I will almost certainly vote Democrat.

At any rate, I'm just curious how far would be too far where you would vote Democrat, or at the very least not vote?

I would have voted for Kasich over Trump.

 

[L.T. Fan]

Good lord you're fucking dense when it comes to your Dear Leader, Comrade.

He pleaded guilty to two counts of illegal campaign contributions related to payments to women.

He made those payments at the direction of your Dear Leader.

If it is a crime for Cohen, why isn't it a crime for Dear Leader?

You need some schooling. Even if a prosecutor files charges for some presumed crime they will still have to litigate it to be guilty of a violation. You are acting like since someone has declared there is a crime that makes it correct and complete. You simply think it’s a done deal just because someone says it’s a crime. It isn’t my mind that doesn’t comprehend it’s your presumptions that are a little short of understanding what it takes to determine a crime has been committed. Now find another article to post that also contains presumptions of a crime violated and a verdict is guilty. No charges have been filed and there isn’t a trial recorded to determine that Trump is guilty.

 

[BipolarFuk]

Evidently our Dear Leader is above the law as everyone is saying a sitting President cannot be indicted. When the fuck did we start electing KINGS for 4 year terms anyway?

Hopefully justice will find this fucking piece of human garbage when he is finally out of office.

 

[jsmith6919]

Evidently our Dear Leader is above the law as everyone is saying a sitting President cannot be indicted. When the fuck did we start electing KINGS for 4 year terms anyway?

Hopefully justice will find this fucking piece of human garbage when he is finally out of office.

The Constitution lays out impeachment guidelines.... take a fucking civics course

 

[BipolarFuk]

The Constitution lays out impeachment guidelines.... take a fucking civics course

Fuck the Constitution.

You commit a crime, you get taken down just like everyone else.

 

[BipolarFuk]

A lawyer representing Michael Cohen, the former longtime fixer and personal attorney for Donald Trump, says his client has information that would be “of interest” to special counsel Robert Mueller and that he would not accept any pardon from the president.

“I can tell you it's my observation that what he knows, that he witnessed, will be of interest to the special counsel,” Cohen’s lawyer, Lanny Davis, told ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos Wednesday on “Good Morning America.”

 

[Rev]

If I could have one wish it would be that when Trump leaves office he could forever own tfhe house that Bipo lives in and becomes his landlord for the remainder of time.


I think he has earned that.

 

[jsmith6919]

A lawyer representing Michael Cohen, the former longtime fixer and personal attorney for Donald Trump, says his client has information that would be “of interest” to special counsel Robert Mueller and that he would not accept any pardon from the president.

“I can tell you it's my observation that what he knows, that he witnessed, will be of interest to the special counsel,” Cohen’s lawyer, Lanny Davis, told ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos Wednesday on “Good Morning America.”

Lanny Davis also setup a gofundme for Cohen and has raised nearly $35k already but I'm sure he's totally not just saying what the #resist crowd want to hear to help this

 

[jsmith6919]

Fuck the Constitution.

You commit a crime, you get taken down just like everyone else.

Yea you need deported

 

[BipolarFuk]

A dark day for Trump. The darkest day for the presidency since Watergate.

A dark day for Trump. The darkest day for the presidency since Watergate.

ANALYSIS: Two of the president's former associates were in court Tuesday. Both guilty of multiple felonies. What happened to draining the swamp?

There hasn't been a darker moment for a president — or for the presidency — since Richard Nixon resigned on the verge of impeachment in 1974.

On Tuesday, Michael Cohen, the president's longtime fixer and former personal lawyer, pleaded guilty to felony crimes that included illegally paying women hush money to help Donald Trump win the presidency in 2016. Most important, he said he did so at Trump's direction.

In other words, Trump cheated to win the White House, according to one of his closest former associates.

Cohen's admissions were so damaging for the president, both legally and politically, that his lawyer Rudy Giuliani could point only to the lack of an indictment directly against Trump as the good news. "There is no allegation of any wrongdoing against the president in the government’s charges against Mr. Cohen," Giuliani said.

Cohen's plea was just one of several punishing blows delivered Tuesday to Trump's narrative that he and his allies came to Washington to "drain the swamp" of corruption. The others: Paul Manafort, the president's onetime campaign chairman, was convicted on eight counts of bank and tax fraud, and Rep. Duncan Hunter, R-Calif., an early endorser of Trump for president, was indicted on federal charges that he violated campaign finance law.

"The president is clearly guilty of high crimes and misdemeanors," New York Times columnist Bret Stephens, a conservative, wrote on Twitter after the Cohen plea. "He should resign his office or be impeached and removed from office." Stephens has been a frequent critic of Trump but had not previously called for his removal.

The allegation that the president not only knew about but directed criminal activity takes the country back to the Nixon days, when the central questions were what the president knew and when he knew it about the cover-up of the Watergate break-in. And the comparisons are sure to fill airwaves across the country in the coming days and weeks.

In 1998, President Bill Clinton was impeached by the House on charges of perjury and obstruction of justice stemming from his affair with Monica Lewinsky. But Clinton was not accused of any underlying crimes as serious as those which Cohen suggests Trump may have committed.

It is possible all of this could have come at a worse time for Trump and his fellow Republicans — it could have happened a week before the midterm elections in November, as the GOP tries to keep control of the House and Senate. But even three months before voters go to the polls is too close for comfort for congressional Republicans.

Regardless of whether Trump is ever charged with anything — and many lawyers argue a president can't be indicted while in office — voters will get to render their verdict on whether Republicans in Congress have done enough to investigate allegations that Trump subverted a free and fair election.

And when they look at the Trump operation, they will see that the president surrounded himself not with "only the best," as he has long claimed, but with several convicted criminals.

In addition to Cohen and Manafort, Trump's national security adviser, Michael Flynn, deputy campaign manager Rick Gates, and campaign adviser George Papadopoulos have all pleaded guilty to felonies. Rep. Chris Collins, R-N.Y., a political ally, has been indicted on charges related to insider trading.

Not everyone in Trump's base is quick to excuse those around him.

"If you do something wrong, there ought to be consequences for it — no matter who you are," said Dan Cooley, a 43-year-old forester from central West Virginia said at a Trump political rally here on Tuesday night, adding that he didn't think the wrongdoing of others reflected poorly on the president himself.

Whatever the case, voters will render the next verdict on Trump and his allies, and they will do so with Tuesday's events fresh in their minds. They will know the president stands accused by his own former fixer of breaking the law to win the White House.

It wasn't just a bad day for Trump, it was a historically awful day for the presidency.

 

[L.T. Fan]

Evidently our Dear Leader is above the law as everyone is saying a sitting President cannot be indicted. When the fuck did we start electing KINGS for 4 year terms anyway?

Hopefully justice will find this fucking piece of human garbage when he is finally out of office.

You have little or no memory. When Did I ever say the President cannot be indicted? I guess when you run out of something to make a racket over you just make it up.

 

[Smitty]

It’s the federal crime I am waiting to hear about. What federal crime was it? Colluding with his attorney to pay off a hooker isn’t a crime so you must be talking about something else.

I don't understand the intricacies of campaign finance laws and whether the ultimate source of the payment matters. It seems to me like paying someone for silence is not a federal crime. When it becomes an illegal campaign contribution seems like it should be whether Cohen used his own money to pay for something for Trump the candidate's benefit. But if Trump repaid or reimbursed that payment, it seems like it's just a matter of when the money hit the account and would be defensible.

But again, I don't know the law on this.

 

[Smitty]

Good lord you're fucking dense when it comes to your Dear Leader, Comrade.

He pleaded guilty to two counts of illegal campaign contributions related to payments to women.

He made those payments at the direction of your Dear Leader.

If it is a crime for Cohen, why isn't it a crime for Dear Leader?

I think what LT is asking, and I am as well, is, What are the elements of an illegal campaign contribution?

Just because Cohen plead guilty to it, doesn't mean that those elements could have been met. Yes, you admit under oath that you committed the crimes when you plead guilty, but as an attorney who has handled criminal work, let me tell you that defendants very often plead guilty to things that DIDN'T actually happen to avoid being prosecuted for other things that DID happen. We have no idea what Cohen's guilty plea offer was. Maybe it was that he plead guilty to those charges in return for not being charged with much more serious additional financial fraud charges, or embezzlement from his trust account or something.