Trumps DoJ
mickeyrat
Posts: 38,756
Thought this deserved its own discussion....
The Justice Department in the Trump era has repeatedly tasked U.S. attorneys from far-flung offices to parachute into politically explosive cases in Washington, raising concerns among current and former officials that agency leaders are trying to please the president by reviewing and reinvestigating cases in which he is personally or politically invested.
After a tumultuous week for federal law enforcement in which Attorney General William P. Barr declared he could not do his job if the president kept tweeting about criminal cases, and officials revealed they had dropped one politically charged case while adding new prosecutors to others, several current and former officials expressed alarm at what they characterized as a troubling pattern.
“The power to investigate is the power to destroy,” said Gregory A. Brower, a former U.S. attorney and former senior FBI official. The current approach to sensitive cases, he said, “gives the appearance of politics coming into play whenever the president has a perceived political enemy. . . . The ability to simply point to a pending investigation against a person can have devastating effects on that person and can have a potential political benefit to the person orchestrating the investigation.”
[Justice Dept. won’t charge McCabe in false statements probe]
On Friday, prosecutors said they would no longer pursue a criminal case against Andrew McCabe, the former acting FBI director who has long been a target of Trump’s vitriol.
The decision infuriated the president, according to a senior White House official, who like others spoke on the condition of anonymity to detail internal discussions. Trump ranted privately to associates about the announcement, telling one he’s always known McCabe was a “bad guy."
After a tumultuous week for federal law enforcement in which Attorney General William P. Barr declared he could not do his job if the president kept tweeting about criminal cases, and officials revealed they had dropped one politically charged case while adding new prosecutors to others, several current and former officials expressed alarm at what they characterized as a troubling pattern.
“The power to investigate is the power to destroy,” said Gregory A. Brower, a former U.S. attorney and former senior FBI official. The current approach to sensitive cases, he said, “gives the appearance of politics coming into play whenever the president has a perceived political enemy. . . . The ability to simply point to a pending investigation against a person can have devastating effects on that person and can have a potential political benefit to the person orchestrating the investigation.”
[Justice Dept. won’t charge McCabe in false statements probe]
On Friday, prosecutors said they would no longer pursue a criminal case against Andrew McCabe, the former acting FBI director who has long been a target of Trump’s vitriol.
The decision infuriated the president, according to a senior White House official, who like others spoke on the condition of anonymity to detail internal discussions. Trump ranted privately to associates about the announcement, telling one he’s always known McCabe was a “bad guy."
continues...
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you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
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By Katie Benner
WASHINGTON — More than 1,100 former federal prosecutors and Justice Department officials called on Attorney General William P. Barr on Sunday to step down after he intervened last week to lower the Justice Department’s sentencing recommendation for President Trump’s longtime friend Roger J. Stone Jr.
They also urged current government employees to report any signs of unethical behavior at the Justice Department to the agency’s inspector general and to Congress.
“Each of us strongly condemns President Trump’s and Attorney General Barr’s interference in the fair administration of justice,” the former Justice Department lawyers, who came from across the political spectrum, wrote in an open letter on Sunday. Those actions, they said, “require Mr. Barr to resign.”
The sharp denunciation of Mr. Barr underlined the extent of the fallout over the case of Mr. Stone, capping a week that strained the attorney general’s relationship with his rank and file, and with the president himself.
A Justice Department spokeswoman declined to comment.
After prosecutors on Monday recommended a prison sentence of up to nine years for Mr. Stone, who was convicted of obstructing a congressional inquiry, Mr. Trump lashed out at federal law enforcement. Senior officials at the department, including Mr. Barr, overrode the recommendation the next day with a more lenient one, immediately prompting accusations of political interference, and the four lawyers on the Stone case abruptly withdrew in protest.
The Justice Department said the case had not been discussed with anyone at the White House, but that Mr. Trump congratulated Mr. Barr on his decision did little to dispel the perception of political influence. And as the president widened his attacks on law enforcement, Mr. Barr publicly reproached the president, saying that Mr. Trump’s statements undermined him, as well the department.
“I cannot do my job here at the department with a constant background commentary that undercuts me,” Mr. Barr said during a televised interview on Thursday with ABC News.
In the days after the interview, Mr. Trump has been relatively muted. He said on Twitter that he had not asked Mr. Barr to “do anything in a criminal case.” As president, he added, he had “the legal right to do so” but had “so far chosen not to!”
But lawyers across the Justice Department continue to worry about political interference from the president despite public pushback by Mr. Barr, long considered a close ally of Mr. Trump’s.
Protect Democracy, a nonprofit legal group, gathered the signatures from Justice Department alumni and said it would collect more.
In May, Protect Democracy gathered signatures for a letter that said the Mueller report presented enough evidence to charge Mr. Trump with obstruction of justice were that an option. At the close of his investigation, the special counsel Robert S. Mueller III declined to indicate whether Mr. Trump illegally obstructed justice, citing a decades-old department opinion that a sitting president cannot be charged with a crime. That letter was also critical of Mr. Barr.
Even as the lawyers condemned Mr. Barr on Sunday, they said they welcomed his rebuke of Mr. Trump and his assertions that law enforcement must be independent of politics.
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you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
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But Mr. Barr’s “actions in doing the president’s personal bidding unfortunately speak louder than his words,” they said.
The letter comes days after some Democratic senators pressed for Mr. Barr to resign, and after the New York City Bar Association said that it had formally reported the attorney general’s behavior to the Justice Department’s inspector general.
Strikingly, the lawyers called upon current department employees to be on the lookout for future abuses and to be willing to bring oversight to the department.
“Be prepared to report future abuses to the inspector general, the Office of Professional Responsibility, and Congress,” they wrote, and “to refuse to carry out directives that are inconsistent with their oaths of office.”
Prosecutors who currently work at the department should withdraw from cases that involve abuses or political interference, the lawyers said.
As a last resort, they asked Justice Department employees “to resign and report publicly — in a manner consistent with professional ethics — to the American people the reasons for their resignation.”
Katie Benner covers the Justice Department. She was part of a team that won a Pulitzer Prize in 2018 for public service for reporting on workplace sexual harassment issues. @ktbenner
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you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
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https://news.yahoo.com/william-barr-truly-believed-rule-190047288.html
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
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A Justice Department official issued a statement in which he characterized the sentence recommended by the prosecutors on the case as “extreme, excessive and grossly disproportionate.” Additionally, he said the proposed sentence was “not what had been briefed to the Department.”
dismiss, call it a conspiracy, whatever you want. Durham’s grand jury and pending indictments is making waves already.
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-raises-possibility-of-suing-those-involved-in-prosecuting-roger-stone/2020/02/18/238279fc-5250-11ea-9e47-59804be1dcfb_story.html
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https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/mueller-report-attorney-general-william-barr/2020/03/05/3fa7afce-5f2c-11ea-b29b-9db42f7803a7_story.html
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By BETSY WOODRUFF SWAN
03/21/2020 01:01 PM EDT
The Justice Department has quietly asked Congress for the ability to ask chief judges to detain people indefinitely without trial during emergencies — part of a push for new powers that comes as the coronavirus spreads through the United States.
Documents reviewed by POLITICO detail the department’s requests to lawmakers on a host of topics, including the statute of limitations, asylum and the way court hearings are conducted. POLITICO also reviewed and previously reported on documents seeking the authority to extend deadlines on merger reviews and prosecutions.
A Justice Department spokesperson declined to comment on the documents.
The move has tapped into a broader fear among civil liberties advocates and Donald Trump’s critics — that the president will use a moment of crisis to push for controversial policy changes. Already, he has cited the pandemic as a reason for heightening border restrictions and restricting asylum claims. He has also pushed for further tax cuts as the economy withers, arguing that it would soften the financial blow to Americans. And even without policy changes, Trump has vast emergency powers that he could legally deploy right now to try and slow the coronavirus outbreak.
The DOJ requests — which are unlikely to make it through a Democratic-led House — span several stages of the legal process, from initial arrest to how cases are processed and investigated.
The Justice Department seal. | Mark Wilson/Getty Images
In one of the documents, the department proposed that Congress grant the attorney general power to ask the chief judge of any district court to pause court proceedings “whenever the district court is fully or partially closed by virtue of any natural disaster, civil disobedience, or other emergency situation.”
The proposal would also grant those top judges broad authority to pause court proceedings during emergencies. It would apply to “any statutes or rules of procedure otherwise affecting pre-arrest, post-arrest, pre-trial, trial, and post-trial procedures in criminal and juvenile proceedings and all civil process and proceedings,” according to draft legislative language the department shared with Congress. In making the case for the change, the DOJ document wrote that individual judges can currently pause proceedings during emergencies, but that their proposal would make sure all judges in any particular district could handle emergencies “in a consistent manner.”
The request raised eyebrows because of its potential implications for habeas corpus –– the constitutional right to appear before a judge after arrest and seek release.
“Not only would it be a violation of that, but it says ‘affecting pre-arrest,’” said Norman L. Reimer, the executive director of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers. “So that means you could be arrested and never brought before a judge until they decide that the emergency or the civil disobedience is over. I find it absolutely terrifying. Especially in a time of emergency, we should be very careful about granting new powers to the government.”
Reimer said the possibility of chief judges suspending all court rules during an emergency without a clear end in sight was deeply disturbing.
“That is something that should not happen in a democracy,” he said.
The department also asked Congress to pause the statute of limitations for criminal investigations and civil proceedings during national emergencies, “and for one year following the end of the national emergency,” according to the draft legislative text.
Trump recently declared the coronavirus crisis a national emergency.
Another controversial request: The department is looking to change the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure in some cases to expand the use of videoconference hearings, and to let some of those hearings happen without defendants’ consent, according to the draft legislative text.
“Video teleconferencing may be used to conduct an appearance under this rule,” read a draft of potential new language for Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 5(f), crossing out the phrase “if the defendant consents.”
“Video teleconferencing may be used to arraign a defendant,” read draft text of rule 10(c), again striking out the phrase “if the defendant consents.”
Reimer said forcing people to have hearings over video rather than in person would threaten civil liberties.
“If it were with the consent of the accused person it would be fine,” he said. “But if it’s not with the consent of the accused person, it’s a terrible road to go down. We have a right to public trials. People have a right to be present in court.”
The department also wants Congress to change the law to explicitly say that people with Covid-19 –– the illness caused by the novel coronavirus –– are not included among those who may apply for asylum. And the department asked for the same change regarding people who are “subject to a presidential proclamation suspending and limiting the entry of aliens into the United States,” according to the draft legislative language.
Layli Miller-Munro, the CEO of the Tahirih Justice Center, which advocates for women and girls fleeing violence, said the language would block anyone on a presidential travel ban list from seeking asylum in the U.S.
“I think it’s a humanitarian tragedy that fails to recognize that vulnerable people from those countries are among the most persecuted and that protecting them is exactly what the refugee convention was designed to do,” she said.
The asylum request comes as the Trump administration on Friday said that it would begin denying entry to all migrants illegally crossing the U.S. southern border, including those seeking asylum.
“I hope we come out of this with a sense of oneness, interconnectedness,” Miller-Munro said of the coronavirus pandemic. “Borders can’t protect us. Viruses do not care.”
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Like Mickeyrat said, Hell fucking no this fucking Bill Barr wants total population control , even after all this is over he wants to put into place policy that will prevent massive protests, people better wake up to this they want to subdue the population period!
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Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
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another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
By Spencer S. Hsu and Carol D. Leonnig
May 12 at 11:50 PM ET
A U.S. judge put on hold the Justice Department’s move to drop charges against Michael Flynn, saying he expects independent groups and legal experts to argue against the bid to exonerate President Trump’s former national security adviser of lying to the FBI.
U.S. District Judge Emmet G. Sullivan said in an order Tuesday that he expects individuals and organizations will seek to intervene in the politically charged case. Having others weigh in could preface more aggressive steps that the federal judge in Washington could take, including — as many outside observers have called for — holding a hearing to consider what to do.
Sullivan’s order came after the government took the highly irregular step Thursday of reversing its stance on upholding Flynn’s guilty plea.
The action by Sullivan, a veteran 72-year-old jurist with a national reputation for advocating defendants’ rights to full government disclosure of evidence, appears to rule out immediate action on the Justice Department’s decision to reverse course and throw out Flynn’s December 2017 guilty plea.
Sullivan said he will “at the appropriate time” set a schedule for outside parties to argue against the Justice Department’s claims as the government seeks to drop the charges.
Such “friend-of-the court” or “amicus brief[s] should normally be allowed when a party is not represented . . . has an interest in some other case that may be affected . . . [or] has unique information or perspective that can help the court,” Sullivan said.
The judge said he would be a rigorous gatekeeper, adding, “A criminal proceeding is not a free for all.”
A Justice Department spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
In an immediate written response to the court, Flynn’s defense said the order was prompted by a notice Monday from an unspecified group referring to itself as “Watergate Prosecutors” that sought to file arguments in the case.
“No rule allows this filing,” Flynn attorney Sidney Powell objected.
Powell said in the more than two years of Flynn’s prosecution, “This Court has consistently — on twenty-four (24) previous occasions — summarily refused to permit any third party to inject themselves or their views into this case.”
Powell also challenged the constitutionality of Sullivan’s order, saying the courts have no authority to permit a third party to “usurp the role of the government’s counsel” in prosecuting an individual in a criminal case.
“This travesty of justice has already consumed three or more years of an innocent man’s life — and that of his entire family,” Powell wrote. “No further delay should be tolerated or any further expense caused to him and his defense.”
The judge’s ruling appeared to be prompted by a unique request filed one day earlier by the team of Watergate prosecutors who pursued an investigation of President Richard Nixon. They sought to file a friend-of-the-court brief to give their legal arguments against Barr’s unusual reversal of Flynn’s prosecution and said they had a “unique perspective on the need for independent scrutiny and oversight to ensure that crucial decisions about prosecutions of high-ranking government officials are made in the public interest.”
“The integrity of prosecutorial decision making is a cornerstone of the rule of law,” they wrote. “Amici have a special interest in restoring the public trust in prosecutorial decision making and in public confidence in the viability of future independent investigations and prosecutions if the results of such work are likely to be subjected to reversal by transparent political influence.”
Sullivan’s order noted that he was proceeding under a rule of civil procedure that gives judges sole discretion to accept outside arguments. Although there is no parallel criminal rule, the federal appeals court for Washington has ruled external entities in criminal cases can always ask to file an amicus brief, Sullivan said.
Legal experts said the order allows others to file objections to the Justice Department’s move and could open the door for adversarial proceedings in which one or more attorneys argue against the Justice Department. It would also permit, if the judge chooses, requiring both sides to produce evidence and revisit the case for and against Flynn.
In an evidentiary hearing, Sullivan could call witnesses — such as Flynn, his investigators or even prosecutors — to obtain more facts about how the case was handled and why Flynn and agents took the steps they did.
Sullivan has not hesitated to personally question Flynn in court before, as he did during a 2018 hearing, when he rejected a defense motion supported by the government for probation.
Sullivan had said he was not satisfied by the former three-star Army general’s cooperation with special counsel’s probe.
“Arguably, you sold your country out,” Sullivan told Flynn.
Flynn was convicted of lying to investigators about his contacts with Russia’s ambassador about easing U.S. sanctions during Trump’s presidential transition in special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s investigation of interference in the 2016 election.
Flynn had initially repeated that he was guilty of lying, that no one had coerced him to admit his guilt and that he had no intention of taking back that plea. Flynn also said he took responsibility for wrongdoing that also culminated in his firing by Trump for misleading Vice President Pence, White House aides and the public.
[Flynn decision cheered by Trump and the right, as critics decry it as an attack on the rule of law]
After Mueller’s investigation into 2016 campaign interference closed last year, Flynn changed defense teams, began attacking prosecutors and gained Trump’s support, claiming he was entrapped in a partisan FBI and Justice Department conspiracy.
In January, Attorney General William P. Barr tapped Jeff Jensen, the U.S. attorney in St. Louis, to review how the case had been handled. Jensen said publicly last week that he recommended it be dropped. Jensen asserted that newly analyzed FBI reports and communications showed the bureau had no valid basis to question Flynn, so any lies he told were not relevant to a criminal probe.
The Justice Department’s attempts to dismiss the case last week prompted fresh accusations from law enforcement officials and Democrats that the criminal justice system was caving to political pressure from the Trump administration.
Flynn prosecutor Brandon Van Grack, a Mueller team member, quit the case in apparent protest before the Justice Department’s move to drop the charges, while Trump applauded the actions.
Matt Zapotosky contributed to this report.
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
-EV 8/14/93
The distraction they intentionally create is amazing. I hope we are smart enough to get rid of these fucks.
The Golden Age is 2 months away. And guess what….. you’re gonna love it! (teskeinc 11.19.24)
1998: Noblesville; 2003: Noblesville; 2009: EV Nashville, Chicago, Chicago
2010: St Louis, Columbus, Noblesville; 2011: EV Chicago, East Troy, East Troy
2013: London ON, Wrigley; 2014: Cincy, St Louis, Moline (NO CODE)
2016: Lexington, Wrigley #1; 2018: Wrigley, Wrigley, Boston, Boston
2020: Oakland, Oakland: 2021: EV Ohana, Ohana, Ohana, Ohana
2022: Oakland, Oakland, Nashville, Louisville; 2023: Chicago, Chicago, Noblesville
2024: Noblesville, Wrigley, Wrigley, Ohana, Ohana
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/court-asks-retired-judge-to-fight-justice-dept-effort-to-drop-michael-flynn-case-and-examine-if-ex-trump-adviser-committed-perjury/2020/05/13/8c0deb0a-9567-11ea-82b4-c8db161ff6e5_story.html
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Barr: Obama, Biden not under criminal investigation despite Trump's claims https://news.yahoo.com/barr-obama-biden-not-under-162233468.html
"Well, you tell him that I don't talk to suckas."
i guess obamagate is a bridge too far for the gop operatives. attacking a very popular past president is a ludicrous campaign strategy. especially when everything under trump's watch as turned to ashes in their mouth.
"Well, you tell him that I don't talk to suckas."
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
Attorney General William Barr will testify before the House Judiciary Committee tomorrow for the first time. Democrats tried to get him to appear to explain why he had misrepresented what was in Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s Report about Russia’s interference in the 2016 election, but he refused to show up after learning that staff lawyers would be allowed to question him. Then coronavirus slowed down another meeting. Finally, House Judiciary Committee Chair Jerrold Nadler (D-NY) threatened to subpoena him, and he agreed to come in voluntarily.
But not happily.
Tonight, he released a combative opening statement which begins by slamming “the grave abuses involved in the bogus ‘Russiagate’ scandal,” despite the fact that, in December 2019, the Justice Department’s own inspector general, Michael Horowitz, found that the investigation had been initiated properly and without political bias. The Republican-led Senate Intelligence Committee has also unanimously supported the conclusion of the Intelligence Community that Russia attacked the 2016 election to benefit candidate Trump.
The rest of Barr’s opening statement similarly echoed Trump talking points.
The Attorney General of the United States is, of course, not the president’s lawyer. The AG is supposed to be the attorney for the United States, protecting the rule of law. (The office of the president has its own lawyer—the White House Counsel—and the president has his own bevy of personal lawyers.)
Tomorrow, as Barr testifies, a new book about him by Norman Eisen, who served as special counsel to the Judiciary Committee during the impeachment hearings, will come out. It examines how Barr’s misleading summary of Mueller’s report derailed the public inquiry into the relationship between the Trump campaign and Russian operatives, because no one wanted to believe the new Attorney General would “be willing to sacrifice his reputation for the sake of Trump. Now,” Eisen said in an interview with Just Security, “over a year and many lies later, we know much better.” Eisen says that Barr’s summary made Americans believe—incorrectly—that Mueller had exonerated Trump, when in fact, the opposite was the case.
In a piece in Newsweek today, Representative Eric Swalwell (D-CA) expanded on this idea. He noted Barr’s lies about Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s report on Russia’s interference in the 2016 election; his attempts to dismiss the charges against Trump’s former National Security Advisor Michael Flynn and lighten the sentence against Trump’s friend Roger Stone; as well as his firing of the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, Geoffrey Berman… and concluded that Barr has simply taken the place of Michael Cohen as Trump’s fixer.
CNN legal analyst Elie Honig, who spent 8 years as an Assistant U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, wrote today that in Barr's 18 months as Attorney General, he “has done profound and pervasive damage to the Justice Department.” He has undermined its credibility and independence. Honig outlined five issues where Barr has lied in public, including the quite transparent lie that Berman had resigned, which Berman himself promptly contradicted. Honig urges tomorrow’s questioners to ask about them.
It is unlikely that Barr will do more than obfuscate tomorrow. Because Senate Republicans will almost certainly never agree to convict Barr, impeaching him is a stretch, especially since Republicans will instantly insist that it is an election-year ploy. It could well backfire. But there is no doubt that Barr’s behavior is problematic.
Today conservative commentator Tom Nichols noted that Barr has emerged as the de facto leader of the Executive Branch, since Trump is “functionally incapacitated.” It is, Nichols says “a total collapse of constitutional order within the Executive branch” as Barr is using federal law enforcement officers against U.S. citizens. NIchols urges courts, state attorneys general, and state authorities to step into Barr’s way.
Nichols is an advisor to The Lincoln Project, which is hammering on Trump’s mental incapacity to perform the duties of the president. It must be acknowledged that Trump is giving them plenty to work with. Today the New York Times reported on Trump’s announcement that he would be throwing out the first pitch to the New York Yankees on August 15 at Yankee Stadium, an announcement Trump made just an hour before Dr. Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases who has been advising Trump on the pandemic, threw out the first pitch at the opening game between the Yankees and the Washington Nationals.
Someone in the White House leaked that Trump had not been invited to do any such thing, but had made up the event because he was annoyed that Fauci was getting more attention than he was. Then, of course, Trump cancelled the made-up plan with a racist tweet. “Because of my strong focus on the China Virus, including scheduled meetings on Vaccines, our economy and much else, I won’t be able to be in New York to throw out the opening pitch for the [Yankees] on August 15. We will make it later in the season!”
It is fair to say this is not normal behavior for a president.
In tweets today, a day in which coronavirus deaths passed the number of Union Army soldiers killed on battlefields during the Civil War, Trump outlined his plan for reelection. He will try to convince voters to forget about his botching of the pandemic response by insisting that Democrats will usher in an apocalypse.
“The Fake News Media is trying to portray the Portland and Seattle “protesters” as wonderful, sweet and innocent people just out for a little stroll,” he said. “Actually, they are sick and deranged Anarchists & Agitators who our great men & women of Law Enforcement easily control, but who... would destroy our American cities, and worse, if Sleepy Joe Biden, the puppet of the Left, ever won. Markets would crash and cities would burn. Our Country would suffer like never before. We will beat the Virus, soon, and go on to the Golden Age - better than ever before!
It’s an aggressive argument, since of course markets have actually crashed and cities “burned” on his watch, and our country is suffering as never before with an unaddressed pandemic.
The argument that the best way to overcome our current trouble is to trust him with another four years is going to be a hard sell, especially since a report released today in The Guardian notes that a new database of 893 politically motivated terrorist incidents in America since 1994 shows that just one attack that led to a death came from an anti-fascist agitator. In that incident, the single person killed was the perpetrator. In the same period, white supremacists and rightwing extremists have killed at least 329 people.
Once again, the Republican narrative is running into reality. But in this case, Trump has the advantage of having his man at the head of the Department of Justice.
There was, in Barr’s opening statement, a line that jumped out. He wrote that what is happening in Portland, Oregon, where protesters have vandalized a federal courthouse, “is, by any objective measure, an assault on the Government of the United States.”
No, it is not.
The interference of a foreign country in our elections is an assault on the government of the United States. Undermining the rule of law is an assault on the government of the United States. Vandalizing a courthouse does not threaten our nation. It is vandalism that should result in arrests by local police officers, as it has.
That the Attorney General is characterizing local vandalism as an assault on our national government is worrisome. It suggests that, less than four months before an election, he intends to keep sending into Democratic cities federal officers who are loyal to him and his president.
And if it happens, that will be an assault on the government of the United States, for sure.
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
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