Trump says it was 'my decision' to try to overturn 2020 election results | CNN Politics

kescusay@lemmy.world to politics @lemmy.world – 1057 points – Trump says it was 'my decision' to try to overturn 2020 election results | CNN Politics
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There it is, plain as day. He literally just admitted to his crimes.

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Didn't he also talk about how "all those J6 people were treated very badly" and he would "look into" pardoning Enrique Tarrio and others?

Tarrio was convicted of seditious conspiracy.

18 U.S.C. § 2384 states:

If two or more persons in any State or Territory, or in any place subject to the jurisdiction of the United States, conspire to overthrow, put down, or to destroy by force the Government of the United States, or to levy war against them, or to oppose by force the authority thereof, or by force to prevent, hinder, or delay the execution of any law of the United States, or by force to seize, take, or possess any property of the United States contrary to the authority thereof, they shall each be fined or imprisoned not more than 20 years, or both.

Suggesting the possibility of a pardon for someone convicted of seditious conspiracy is "giving aid or comfort to the enemies [of the US Constitution]."

Trump is ineligible to hold office, per the 14th Amendment, Section Three.

Trump's quote there happened before Tarrio's conviction, otherwise I would love for you to be right.

Edit: my mistake, it did not.

Meet The Press aired less than 24 hours ago, that's where he said this.

TL;DR: Trump's quote there happened after Tarrio's conviction.

Full context:

KRISTEN WELKER:

Let’s talk about potential pardons because a lot of your supporters are wondering about that. Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio was sentenced to 22 years in jail. Now that you know what the sentence is, 22 years in jail, will you give him a pardon?

FMR. PRES. DONALD TRUMP:

Are you ready?

KRISTEN WELKER:

Will you give other Proud Boys a pardon?

FMR. PRES. DONALD TRUMP:

I don’t know him. I never met him. I never heard of him until I started reading this stuff.

KRISTEN WELKER:

Will you pardon him?

FMR. PRES. DONALD TRUMP:

But I want to tell you: He and other people have been treated horribly. Antifa killed people, and those guys didn’t even get tried in many cases.

KRISTEN WELKER:

There’s no evidence Antifa was there.

FMR. PRES. DONALD TRUMP:

They put these guys in jail for 17, 18, and 22 years. They didn’t kill anybody. Some of them never even went into the Capitol. Some of them weren’t even in D.C. And they got a 22- or a 17-year sentence. 16, 18, 15, 22.

KRISTEN WELKER:

Well, more than 1,000 people have been charged, Mr. President.

FMR. PRES. DONALD TRUMP:

Wait a minute. Wait a minute. Yeah. 1,000 people. How many people — let me ask you this. How many people were charged for destroying Portland? How many people were charged for burning down the police precinct and the courthouse in Minneapolis?

KRISTEN WELKER:

Will you give him a pardon? Will you pardon him, though? Will you pardon him?

FMR. PRES. DONALD TRUMP:

I’d certainly look at it. I’d look at that. And I’d look at all the other people that have suffered, the J6 people.

KRISTEN WELKER:

Mr. President, let me ask one final question --

FMR. PRES. DONALD TRUMP:

People — people that went there.

KRISTEN WELKER:

– and let’s move on to foreign policy.

FMR. PRES. DONALD TRUMP:

That didn’t even go into the building have suffered gravely. And you have to say one system of justice, right? You take a look at what’s gone on in Portland. They burned down the city. The city is in shambles to this day. The store owners don’t even rebuild storefronts anymore. They put up two-by-fours.

KRISTEN WELKER:

I want to move on to foreign policy, Mr. President.

FMR. PRES. DONALD TRUMP:

But why do you do that?

KRISTEN WELKER:

Let me just ask you one more question.

FMR. PRES. DONALD TRUMP:

Why do you give me a horrible question and then you don’t let me answer it? You’re off to a bad start, I’m telling you.

KRISTEN WELKER:

Mr. President, I just — I want to make sure we get to talk about foreign policy as well.

FMR. PRES. DONALD TRUMP:

No, but I don’t mind. I have all the time in the world.

KRISTEN WELKER:

You do? Okay.

FMR. PRES. DONALD TRUMP:

I have all the time in the world. Why is it that the people, Antifa people, and very bad people, that burned down Portland, burned down Minneapolis, burned down so much — and New York City, what they did in New York City — and they were barely charged? And, yet, the people in Washington in some cases never even went into the building. They’ve been persecuted. They’ve been persecuted.

KRISTEN WELKER:

Well, the people who were charged on January 6th, some of them were charged with sedition. Some of them were charged for violating the Capitol —

**FMR. PRES. DONALD TRUMP:

And we’ll take a look at everything. But many of these people have been persecuted, what they’ve done to them.**

KRISTEN WELKER:

They — your supporters? Your supporters, you’re talking about?

FMR. PRES. DONALD TRUMP:

And they didn’t do this to the people that burned down — you take a look at Portland. It’s like a burned-down hulk of a city, including the federal courthouse.

KRISTEN WELKER:

Mr. President, if you were re-elected, would you pardon yourself?

Cool cool, my mistake. Thank you for the correction.

(As an aside, for anyone outside of Oregon, fyi, Portland is not burned down. I rode through it last week. It's very much not burned down. It has some problems, but the problems you see on the street are caused by income inequality and lack of free health care, not people with the courage to fight for civil rights.)

I live here and have done so for over 20 years, so thank you for your efforts toward clarity. To further elucidate, the only burning of property during the so-called riots was largely caught on camera from multiple individuals and clearly showed "police" setting fires — not to mention inciting (or attempting to incite) violence. Secondly, it's not a lack of free health care, nor is the solution that simple, but you are correct in that the problem is certainly not those like myself with the courage to fight for my fellow citizens' rights as human beings.

I upvoted you for your retraction - and I appreciate your making me think about it and prove it. When was Tarrio convicted? I had to look it up - Sep 5. Did Welker actually refer to his conviction? I had to look it up - yes.

So, yes, it was "easy" to prove, but I had to do work to prove it, and I am better informed because of it.

For that, you have my sincere thanks.

I literally work like three blocks away from the federal courthouse and everything over there is fine. We have some homeless people that live in the area, and the antifa idiots did destroy a few statues, but other than that it's pretty much back to normal.

Of course normal today means that your downtown has no retail anymore but that's another story.

This exchange is the most absurd thing I've read all year.

Oh man, 60 seconds of this interview and I'm already facepalming. This guy is still full of "just make shit up, doesn't matter if I lie about everything"

Also lovely how he says that he didn't have a disaster in Afghanistan, as he was the one that put all that in motion.

I'm honestly unsure if I want trump back in office. At least if trump comes back we'll destroy the world for sure and just have it done with. Can't say that this timeline is the one I'd like to live in, waiting for loads of wars to start overclimate change while we do nothing to stop it, seeing everyone blame everyone but themselves, and nobody taking responsibility anymore.. fuck this timeline, give the presidency to Trump, hell start world war 2 3 4 3 I think and just kill everybody and make lots of monies

I agree that he ought to be disqualified from holding office per the 14th Amendment, however I doubt it will apply.

U.S. Const. amend. XIV, § 3:

No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.

I've bolded the parts which might apply to Trump.

executive or judicial officer of any State

He was an Executive, but not of any State, so he doesn't meet that condition.

officer of the United States

"Officer of the United States" has an established meaning in the constitution as, essentially, "officers appointed by the President" (with approval from the Senate).

U.S. Const. art. II, § 2, cl. 2:

He shall have Power, by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, to make Treaties, provided two thirds of the Senators present concur; and he shall nominate, and by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, shall appoint Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls, Judges of the supreme Court, and all other Officers of the United States, whose Appointments are not herein otherwise provided for, and which shall be established by Law: but the Congress may by Law vest the Appointment of such inferior Officers, as they think proper, in the President alone, in the Courts of Law, or in the Heads of Departments.

If we take this list to be exhaustive, then Officers must be appointed by the President and are not elected by the public, therefore the President himself is excluded from the definition of "Officers of the United States".

The Supreme Court has followed this reasoning in the past.

United States v. Mouat, 124 U.S. 303 (1888)

Unless a person in the service of the government, therefore, holds his place by virtue of an appointment by the President or of one of the courts of justice or heads of departments authorized by law to make such an appointment, he is not, strictly speaking, an officer of the United States.

And Justice Roberts has used this reasoning more recently.

Free Enterprise Fund v. Public Company Accounting Oversight Bd., 561 U.S. 477 (2010):

The diffusion of power carries with it a diffusion of accountability. The people do not vote for the “Officers of the United States.” Art. II, §2, cl. 2. They instead look to the President to guide the “assistants or deputies … subject to his superintendence.”

And finally

having previously taken an oath

The oath taken by those Congress and Officers of the United States (and all others listed in U.S. Const. amend. XIV, § 3) is a different oath to the one sworn by the President, and it may be argued that the oath U.S. Const. amend. XIV refers to is explicitly that sworn by members of Congress and other Officers, not the Presidential Oath of Office. (Although this to me is the weakest part of the arguement.)

While I completely agree that by any reasonable standard Trump ought to be disqualified from holding office per the 14th Amendment, it is unfortunately not a reasonable standard that he will be held to. It is this Supreme Court's standard.

tl;dr: 14A S3 doesn't apply to a current or former President, because that office is somehow excluded from the list of offices for which an oath must have been taken.

That is such a technical reading, and it seems ridiculous that 14A S3 was written specifically to exclude Presidents, as though they wanted to make sure that an Anti-Constitutional President could hold office again, while making sure to exclude every other single office available to be held, elected or appointed, in the entire rest of the federal government and the entirety of every state government.

And you're right, you fucker. Fuck you for making me know this. I mean that with the utmost respect.

Well lets see how that holds up in court. Some states are filling a law suit saying that because jan 6th trump can't be on ballot. And these suira are mostly Republican filed

It also says to hinder or delay, if that would be taken litteraly then most politicians would be barred from holding office.

... or by force to prevent, hinder, or delay ...

"By force" is the necessary method of hindering or delaying.

Ah yes, another fact-based hipshot from a non-lawyer. Bullseye.