Does Trump ever do any jail time? (1 Viewer)

[Optimus Prime]

Everything I've seen and heard says that the split second Donald Trump is no longer president there will be flood of charges waiting for him

And if he resigns and Pence pardons him there are a ton of state charges as an understudy waiting in the wings if the fed charges can't perform

What do you think the likelihood of there being a jail sentence?

In every movie and TV show I've ever seen, in every political thriller I've ever read about a criminal and corrupt president there is ALWAYS some version of;

"We can't do that to the country",

"A trial would tear the country apart",

"For the nation to heal we need to move on" etc.

Would life imitate art?

Even with the charges, even with the proof the charges are true will the powers that be decide, "we can't do that to the country"?

 

[superchuck500]

There we go: not sure if this is reliable yet.

Exclusive: An Informer Told the FBI What Docs Trump Was Hiding, and Where

The FBI's raid on Mar-a-Lago was carried out while Donald Trump was absent in the hope it would be low-profile. The plan was a "spectacular" failure.

www.newsweek.com

What I don't get here is that there is a premise that it would have been possible to pull this off in a "low profile" way and they screwed it up. That's just not accurate - there's no way this could have been done quietly.

But actually, there were no leaks ahead of the operation and by accounts at the scene, the staff all thought the agents were part of the Secret Service team. The agents were there for hours before anyone knew about it and wasn't it Trump that made the first announcement with his big rant?

Did they think there was a way to keep Trump from ranting about it? That's nonsense.

 

[UriUT]

I would think they would know but took the least publicity route. Imagine doing their job with 10s of nut jobs picking and blocking their paths let alone the media storm. This method also lowers the need to know count and reduce chance of leaks. They need to ensure that the files would be preserved. That’s my guess.

Again I lay this on the media. And to some extent to the doj. There needs to be more focus that he isn’t prosecuted because of his position and not vice versa.

 

[UriUT]

Also you reminded me something I’ve been wondering. The fbi arrived early and trump didn’t announce it till they left. That isn’t in character. I would expect an immediate response while the fbi was there. Also his statement was prepared…more than usual.

 

[GrandAdmiral]

Evidently Trump is refusing to answer questions at his deposition in NY, according to the NYT. He’s taking the Fifth. Even though both Don Jr and Ivanka didn’t take the Fifth when they testified recently. Of course he claims it’s because this is a “witch hunt”, lol. That doesn’t mean anything, Don, if you have nothing to hide just tell the truth.

This is from the NYT live coverage:
“Donald J. Trump declined to answer questions from the New York state attorney general’s office on Wednesday, a stunning gamble in a high-stakes legal interview that is likely to determine the course of a civil investigation into his company’s business practices.

In a statement released shortly after the questioning began on Wednesday, Mr. Trump said he would invoke his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination, explaining that he “declined to answer the questions under the rights and privileges afforded to every citizen under the United States Constitution.”

After the deposition began, two sources with knowledge of the matter confirmed that he was refusing to answer questions, citing the Fifth Amendment.”

So he's finally under oath and taking the 5th . . . which he said is what "guilty people do".

Of course, in a civil matter, the opposing side is generally able to get an "adverse inference" when a party witness refuses to answer questions on a 5th Amendment basis. An adverse inference is basically "we can infer that because you didn't answer, what you would have said would have been adverse (bad) to your case."

I think he might be more worried about whatever he says in the civil deposition being handed over to the Manhattan DA for the criminal investigation.

 

[superchuck500]

Ken White also skeptical of what some (including me) have suggested that this was an operation to retrieve the documents (“restorative”) and that there is a more detailed criminal investigation going on.

A seven/post thread that starts here:

 

[TaylorB]

Here's what I think is going on here. Just a personal view and there are a couple of assumptions here that may not turn out to be right.

Trump removes a quantity of material from the White House that (a) he does not own and (b) is classified and contains national security information that he is not entitled to possess after he's no longer president. This has been known for some time now and there have been various complaints about it. We know that in June, a team from the FBI and DOJ went to Mar-a-Lago and looked at what was there.

I suspect that between June and now, the FBI Director and Attorney General determined that it is improper for Trump to have that material and they were going to get it back. I would like to think that they offered to let Trump return it and he declined, but I don't know that to be true.

I don't think there needs to be any charges here if the FBI was able to retrieve what they were after. Yes, it's a crime but Trump wasn't trying to sell or otherwise use the material (as far as we know, if he was, that's different). I think the FBI Director can simply say "Trump had important, classified material of national security interest that he was not legally authorized to have - and that he wrongfully removed from the White House. He refused to return the material so the FBI went to retrieve it."

Seems fairly tidy to me. I don't know if that's what's going on, but I think that all makes sense based on what we do know.

All of this seems plausible to me, including the possibility that the FBI/DOJ was using the warrant without any expectation of bringing charges.

But the puzzle piece that I can't fit neatly into this is why Trump and a team of lawyers wouldn't have simply returned all of the documents after the FBI had demonstrated such a concern over the documents that they flew agents down to Mar-a-Lago seeking their return? Doesn't that make it more likely that Trump perceived that the documents he was keeping from the FBI were valuable enough to him (e.g., they contained evidence of wrongdoing, or were valuable to third parties) to risk hiding them and/or lying about their whereabouts?

I have no idea what they're really after or if charges will result, but I have a hard time thinking there's no criminality here beyond just the refusal to return confidential records. I can't make it make sense that Trump would just keep these documents for no reason.

Edit: hadn't seen the most recent post before I sent this, but it is consistent with my thesis.

 

[Optimus Prime]

guess this can go here
==============
Former Trump strategist Steve Bannon went fully conspiratorial with Alex Jones by claiming the FBI raid on Mar-a-Lago was part of a “deep state” plot to have Donald Trump assassinated or found with incriminating evidence.

Bannon, who was just convicted for contempt of Congress, appeared on InfoWars to continue his rampage against the FBI’s execution of a search warrant on the ex-president’s residence.

“I do not think it’s beyond this administrative state and their deep state apparatus to actually try to work on the assassination of President Trump,” Bannon said. “Everything’s on the table. I think his security should be at the highest it’s ever been, and honestly…I think he should have flown down to Mar a Lago this morning, walked out at noon today, and said ‘Hey, I’m running for President of the United States. Suck on that.'”...........

Bannon Appears on Alex Jones’s Show to Claim FBI is Preparing to Assassinate Trump

 

[FullMonte]

Here's what I think is going on here. Just a personal view and there are a couple of assumptions here that may not turn out to be right.

Trump removes a quantity of material from the White House that (a) he does not own and (b) is classified and contains national security information that he is not entitled to possess after he's no longer president. This has been known for some time now and there have been various complaints about it. We know that in June, a team from the FBI and DOJ went to Mar-a-Lago and looked at what was there.

I suspect that between June and now, the FBI Director and Attorney General determined that it is improper for Trump to have that material and they were going to get it back. I would like to think that they offered to let Trump return it and he declined, but I don't know that to be true.

I don't think there needs to be any charges here if the FBI was able to retrieve what they were after. Yes, it's a crime but Trump wasn't trying to sell or otherwise use the material (as far as we know, if he was, that's different). I think the FBI Director can simply say "Trump had important, classified material of national security interest that he was not legally authorized to have - and that he wrongfully removed from the White House. He refused to return the material so the FBI went to retrieve it."

Seems fairly tidy to me. I don't know if that's what's going on, but I think that all makes sense based on what we do know.

What you describe is essentially what happened back in February (I think it was). Agents from the National Archive went down to Mar-A-Lago and retrieved boxes of items that belonged in the archives. Apparently, some time between that visit and Monday, the National Archives filed a criminal complaint with the DOJ regarding items that were still at Mar-A-Lago. The fact that a criminal referral was made, and the items still were not returned would seem to indicate that Trump's people were not negotiating in good faith.

There are two huge (to me) unanswered questions here:

1) What on Earth could Trump have had at Mar-A-Lago that he did not want to return to the archives and why? As I said in an earlier post, if I was ever contacted and told that I had brought classified material home, I'd be on my way to return it about two seconds after I hung up the phone. So, why didn't Trump want to return these items?

2) What happened over the past month or so that caused the FBI to determine that they could no longer allow discussions about returning the items and that a search warrant needed to be executed? I would think that would only happen if there was reason to believe that the items would be destroyed if a subpoena or something of the like was issued.

 

[UriUT]

Here is another one that is skeptical that it was just retrieval. His reasoning has more to do with using subpoena.

 

[CrowFlies]

the 1978 Presidential Records Act. (In response to the Hillary Clinton email scandal, Trump himself signed a law in 2018 that made it a felony to remove and retain classified documents.)

The act establishes that presidential records are the property of the U.S. government and not a president's private property. Put in place after Watergate to avoid the abuses of the Nixon administration, the law imposes strict penalties for failure to comply. "Whoever, having the custody of any such record, proceeding, map, book, document, paper, or other thing, willfully and unlawfully conceals, removes, mutilates, obliterates, falsifies, or destroys the same, shall be fined" $2,000, up to three years in prison or "shall forfeit his office and be disqualified from holding any office under the United States."

pretty much says it.

 

[CrowFlies]

this move to retrieve gov and WH documents comes after Jones phone comms were turned over.
not before but after.
i doubt this is coincidence.

this sounds like frumpy was bothering Jones-y who's records would indicate how often frump was bugging jones-y. here jones prefers frump just go away.

Alex Jones, January 6 and Text Messages—What We Do Know, What We Don't

Messages sent by Alex Jones over the past two years may end up in the hands of the Jan 6 committee. Newsweek Fact Check looks into the potential fallout.

www.newsweek.com

...
In an interview on NBC in 2017, Jones claimed that while his influence on Trump was "lower than what MSM (mainstream media) has said," he revealed he received phone calls from the president "(to) talk about politics or thank me, things like that."

Jones added he had a "friendly" relationship with the former president, but when asked how many times Trump had called, Jones replied: "I don't want to get into that."
....
....In a leaked video from 2019, Jones said he wished "I never would have f***** met Trump," adding "And it's not that the attacks I've been through, I'm so sick of f****** Donald Trump, man. God, I'm f****** sick of him.

 

[CrowFlies]

this...was 2017....imagine how often frumpy gave him a jingle or a tweet After 2017.

..In an interview on NBC in 2017, Jones claimed that while his influence on Trump...

 

[CrowFlies]

a tweet under 'melania'.....

2hr
I wonder if Melania is the one who dropped the dime on The Furor Chittolino after she saw what awaits her at the golf course?!!

 

[superchuck500]

 

[superchuck500]

pretty much says it.

There is already substantial doubt in the legal buzz that the disqualification from office in the Nixon-era records-crime statute would apply to the offices that the Constitution provides eligibility for (president, VP, Senate and House). A federal statute can’t modify an express constitutional provision.

It still applies to any other federal office (e.g. cabinet, judicial, executive agencies, etc.) - but just not to the ones with eligibility stated in the Constitution. There is caselaw in support, I just haven’t looked at it.

That would be quite a gambit if the purpose was to try to exclude Trump from office. I suppose they could still put his arse in prison and let him run from there like Eugene Debs.

 

[CrowFlies]

bit of digression....anyone see The Daily Show tonite....jordanK out in WI talking to the frumpies at some..cult gathering?
anyone see this?....these people are insane. listen to the crap they talk about,...i dont know how they keep a driver license.....

how does anyone out of this cult listen to this stuff....still talking about JFKJr coming to fix things since hes not dead...now in WI...theyre still talking this crap.

 

[Poison]

I'd like to think Trump does time for keeping records of high-ranking federal employees with potentially fatal shellfish allergies or something. It'd be like nailing Capone for tax evasion.

 

[Bolo]

So according to Brian Entin of News Nation, nothing of value was found in Trumps safe according to his source. I'm in the belief this was more of a fishing expedition than the FBI going in because there was some grandiose treasure trove of stuff that needed to be extracted. All presidents take stuff when they leave the white house for the purposes of their presidential library. From what I understand, these boxes the feds took have been communicated back and forth about in the past. Essentially, it was in dispute and the feds went to extract them but they were absolutely hoping to find some kinda Jan 6. smoking gun. This is a common tactic the FBI uses, have a lukewarm reason to conduct a search, execute it hoping to find something bigger in the process.

Just because they obtained a search warrant to go into his place in Florida doesn't mean they have evidence of a crime.

I would pipedown the excitement because this was so high risk, high reward to the point if it backfires, this will cause catastrophic damage to everyone involved in the DoJ. If there is no earth shattering findings from this search/raid that leads to something bigger, both the Attorney General and FBI director are toast if the Republicans gain back control after the midterms. You would now have basically a super saiyan Trump with infinite fuel of his "They're out to get me" narrative and a super charged base and it may also convince a sector of independents to believe the witch hunt narrative.