Did Donald Trump Jr just break the law by meeting with Viktor Orban?

jeffw@lemmy.world to World News@lemmy.world – 280 points –
EXCLUSIVE: Did Donald Trump Jr just break the law by meeting with Viktor Orban?
independent.co.uk
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There, he met with Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and gave a talk entitled “The World According to Donald Trump Jr.,” 

It's incredible that there are people who read that title and decide to go and hear the talk.

Might be good for a few laughs if your internet is down and you lost the all the dice from your board games.

Oh wow. I didn't even know that (the Logan Act and what it means) was a thing. So... Was Dennis Rodman authorized to negotiate with Kim Jong or what was up with that whole thing?

Indeed, not only “an accidental conversation” but an intentional one would fall outside the statute’s scope unless the U.S. citizen’s intent was to affect a foreign government’s policy in a concrete way. Thus, former basketball star Dennis Rodman most likely did not violate the statute when he traveled to North Korea and met with that country’s leader in an effort to promote “peace and love.”

https://www.lawfaremedia.org/article/logan-act-and-its-limits

Holy shit I totally forgot Dennis Rodman was best friends with Kim Jong Un. Id probably be cool with that being authorized, the last thing we need is that little dictator thinking he can grab a rebound.

My impression was that Rodman went there to fawn, not to negotiate.

From the article: "It is unlikely the Department would ever pursue action against anyone using the Logan Act, given no one has been convicted of violating the 1799 law"

End of story.

Why have a law on the books that does absolutely nothing...

Because you don't update the entire law system every year. Some laws were forgotten and no longer in use and that's normal.

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This is the best summary I could come up with:


Donald Trump Jr, four months after being hit with a $4 million fine and a ban on serving as an officer of a New York company for two years, is seeking opportunities elsewhere — namely, Hungary.

There, he met with Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and gave a talk entitled “The World According to Donald Trump Jr.,” an event first reported by Hungarian journalist Szabolcs Panyi.

Trump Jr’s visit focused on discussions about “the future of Hungarian-American relations, the ongoing Russian-Ukrainian war, and opportunities for peace creation,” according to Zoltan Kovacs, spokesperson for Orbán’s office.

“To have the Republicans’ likely candidate taking a position on foreign policy [as it relates to Russia and Ukraine], getting close to actively opposing what the administration is doing, is a worrying situation we ought to be talking about,” Baker told The Independent.

Orbán’s success leading an “authoritarian” government relied on “decapitating” the civil service and replacing it with his extremist allies, which mirrors the Project 2025 strategy, Scheppele told The Independent.

Wes Coopersmith, the Chief of Staff for the Heritage Foundation who oversees Project 2025, previously told The Independent that replacing employees with Republican allies if Trump is elected would be “democratic.”


The original article contains 1,384 words, the summary contains 197 words. Saved 86%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!

God I hate this bot so much. It leaves out important shit all the time. The most important thing of all was left out of this summary, why it's illegal:

“There is an interesting US legal question about whether private citizens can attempt to influence US foreign policy by negotiating with foreign countries,” Scheppele told The Independent. “The Logan Act makes this illegal.”

Specifically, Trump Jr, who does not hold any government office, spoke with Orbán regarding US foreign policy as it relates to Ukraine.

And still 10 people upvoted it. They came in here after seeing Don Jr. may have broken the law, read a summary that didn't explain it and upvoted it.

Fucking shameful.

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