Megathread, Special Prosecutor Jack Smith Indicted Trump on 3 more felony charges.

outrageousmatter@lemmy.worldmod to politics @lemmy.world – 509 points –
108

You are viewing a single comment

Pretty sure if I shared a classified war plan I would get life in prison. Lock him up.

I’m so over it tbh, they never will

If he isn’t pardoned I think he will spend the rest of his life on house arrest or in prison. These charges are serious, there’s undeniable evidence, and there’s about to be multiple venues so he can’t rely on a judge helping him in every case. Without a pardon his best outcome is being in a mar a lago prison until he dies.

But he’s likely to get a pardon before then.

Hes gonna get a sweetheart plee deal where hes inelligeble to run for office, payd a big fine, and never sees prison. The US already has displayed is had no idea how to punish people like him. They straight up dropped the chages on Matt Gaetz for diddling children, I have no hope for anything real happening to Trump.

Federal pardons issued by the president apply only to federal offenses; they do not apply to state or local offenses or private civil offenses. Federal pardons also do not apply to cases of impeachment. Pardons for state crimes are handled by governors or a state pardon board.

State charges don’t and will never affect presidents while they are in office. Alabama can’t just issue an arrest warrant for Biden. They would if they could. NY and/or GA state will have to wait until after he’s out of office to continue its judicial outcomes, if he wins.

And no senate is going to impeach trump as long as there is a Republican Party.

His best case scenario is he gets elected in '24 and courts are mired in the unprecedented nature of what to do with a commander in chief that is a criminal. You'd think it's simple, but it's really not.

His second best case scenario is that another Republican wins in '24. Even in that case, I have a hard time envisioning how he goes from today where he's like 15 pts ahead but his party acquiesces because of that even though they hate his fucking guts, and he also somehow loses the primary and someone who has enough tolerance for him and the political fallout from a pardon actually goes through with it.

And then there's the problem that even if he's pardoned from the federal crimes, it doesn't extend to the state crimes.

Right now, the likely and not optimal scenario is that he's a very obese nearly 80 year old incontinent man who hasn't seen exercise or vegetable in decades has been mainlining diet coke and mcdonalds the entire time. There is a likelihood that he doesn't see consequence because he doesn't make it that far. This is also why I wouldn't be very worried about '28.

Outside of that, there are public recordings with him virtually confessing to every one of these crimes. Hell, half of them were on TV. So, although I won't be surprised if he somehow rides off into the sunset, it seems unlikely. But anyway, his actual chance at multiple pardons are basically 0.

He won't be pardoned of the Georgia charges. Not a federal court.

Respectfully you’re delusional. Sorry to burst this bubble of yours but disabuse yourself of that dream, you’re only going to be disappointed.

i am not saying the "both sides" shit

but the reason they won't prosecute him properly is because then they all will be prosecuted properly as well when they do crime which they are all doing

Not even sharing, if either of us had taken 1% of the documents Trump had taken and kept them in a publicly accessible area like Trump did, we'd be sitting in a prison cell awaiting trial. We wouldn't be able to travel the country telling people why it's "so unfair" that we were being prosecuted for taking classified documents.

Trump is right that he's being treated differently than other people. Where he's wrong is assuming "differently" means he's being treated harsher than everyone else is treated. Instead, he's being treated with the softest of kid gloves. He was given multiple chances to return the documents, chances that we likely wouldn't have gotten. Had he returned everyone, he likely wouldn't be facing charges in this case. Instead, he tried to keep the documents and impede the investigation. Now, he's facing consequences for his actions while screaming that consequences are unfair for one such as himself.

Be careful what you wish for.
Some other extreme right-wing nutjob was imprisoned after a failed 'coup' about 100 years ago.

That gave him a whole load of martyr rhetoric to play off.

So Trump shouldn't face consequences? He should be allowed to just get away with it to stop him becoming a martyr?

I don't agree with the guy who posted that but I kind of think the US government does. I think Trumps gonna get a sweetheart plea deal because theyre either afraid of his supporters or one of his supporters.

Don't they have to negotiate the plea deal with Smith? Because I don't think he'd play ball on that.

That and you don't offer a plea deal on a slam dunk case. The federal government does not often lose when it brings charges. The info in that indictment should be enough, but if that's the high level of what they have, the evidence presented in court will be wild.

People need to be held accountable for their actions. Right now, politicians and those in powerful positions, such as CEOs of the biggest companies, are given way too much power and influence with a complete lack being held responsible when shit hits the fan. Worst case for most of them is that they but their way out of their problems. It’s pathetic and it shows how the system that was supposed to prevent this shit is broken.

whoa, i just said be careful, not let him off scott free.

but sometimes the social consequences of a legal sytem designed for normal people can become inflammatory when cult leaders get involved. (citation deliberatly withheld - likely apocryphal anyway

all i mean is, if you can find a way to achieve what you want from the punishment, but minimize or otherwise control those risks , it'd be a good idea.

That gave him a whole load of martyr rhetoric to play off.

Only because they let him off easy. He should never have been let anywhere near a political position after his coup attempt. Same for Trump!

true, i dont know anyting about the USA politics.
Would the criminal conviction block politcal office for life?

I'd advise against crucifiction though.

At his age going to prison is very likely a lifetime sentence.

Yeah but he literate and wrote a book with ideas in it (albeit flawed).

Trump has never written a book. He paid other people to write books and slap his name on the cover. I doubt he’s even read the books he claims to have written.

He didn't write shit, he dictated it to Hess. And it is a rambling mess.

If Trump decided to dictate a book to Guilani in jail it would probably have a lot in common with Mein Kampf.

You got me, I've never read it or even recall any excerpts from it, I just assume that he must have been more intelligent than Trump.

Hitler was a hell of a lot younger than Trump though. The shaved orange orangutan is running out of runway for that kind of shit. Hell, as are a lot of his supporters for that matter.

tbf - i dont think it was really youth he needed, it was probably as much the combination of lingering ww1 debt and the wall st crash .

Hopefully theres been stock market crashes recently that people are a bit more resilient and dont get so suggestible.

I think he's only charged with retention/obstruction. No one in recent times has gotten a prison sentence for retention just fines. If you leak or sell classified information that's a different story.

No, they charged him with sharing documents with unauthorized people.

Do you have a source on that? Every news source I look up just shows "willful retention" which is a slap on the wrist offense in recent history.

It’s in the article:

In a 60-page superseding indictment unveiled Thursday, prosecutors also accused Trump of possessing a highly classified war plan that he shared with people lacking security clearances months after his presidency ended.

I just read through the indictment and while he's only charged with retaining those documents they do have evidence he shared some of them with his staff as well. In the transcript he even says "As president, I could have declassified, but now I can't". What an idiot.

It's one big circus. However, we're the clowns cause we keep waiting for the main act to start.

You weren't the supreme commander of the US armed forces ...

Were being the operative word. He was not CiC when he retained or showed off the plan to go to war with Iran, and despite what he (and maybe you) thinks, he doesn't have the power to declassify with his mind.