We’ve had people run for President from prison before (Debbs and Larouche), but running for high state or federal office while actually on trial for a felony is, I think, a new thing for the US.
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Is this scenario even possible:
- Trump becomes President
- Trump blocks the federal verdicts (immunity)
- Georgia jury hands down a guilty verdict
- Georgia DA puts a warrant out for the arrest of President Trump as he ignores verdict
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I wonder if Secret Service would have a Constitutional obligation to arrest him?
Presumably any one with an earlier trial date than Trump will try to save their skin at Trump’s expense. Have to think it would be a good tactic to have an earlier date than Trump? Although I appreciate that Trump’s lawyers should have the right to cross-examine at the earlier trials.
Maybe that could be a selling point - “Vote for me and find out what happens when a state DA tries to arrest a sitting president.”
I would expect any guilty verdict to be appealed, and he wouldn’t be imprisoned until after the appeals process is done, which would presumably last longer than his term. For example, Devon Archer (Hunter Biden’s former business partner) was convicted in 2018 and is only now going to start his incarceration.
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Definitely possible. Also possible for the same thing to happen in New York.
We don’t know.
It’s unclear whether a President can pardon himself from federal crimes. Conventional wisdom says “no”, but that might not stop him from trying, prompting a Constitutional crisis that would require the SCOTUS to rule. I think he’d have a greater chance of success by stepping down for a day, and having a cooperative Vice-President, wielding Presidential powers under the 25th Amendment, issue the pardon.
A President probably could exert authority over a federal Attorney General to quash federal charges. Until recently, we would have expected the threat of impeachment by Congress would stay a President’s hand in this regard. However, under the current political climate, I don’t see Congress being able to successfully convict Trump in an impeachment trial (similar to the two impeachments he’s already faced), so that’s unlikely to happen.
The federal Department of Justice does have a policy of declining to indict sitting Presidents because of their interpretation of the Constitution (short version: they say that only Congress has that power). It’s unclear whether that would extend to a prosecution.
Then, moving on to the state cases… if Trump won the election and was sentenced to prison by a state court, I think the only thing that is guaranteed to happen is that the question would be sent to the federal Supreme Court.
There is language in the federal Constitution that constrains the arrest of members of Congress:
…but there is no similar language for a President.
I suspect, given the political polarization in the US, and given that a jury has to be unanimous in rendering a guilty verdict, it’s going to be extremely difficult to get a conviction, which would make all this uncertainty moot.
And as @now_samantha noted, any guilty verdicts will get appealed, and it’s possible that a convict for a non-violent felony wouldn’t be sent to prison until the appeals process is resolved (a process that could take years).
I haven’t seen what the talking heads are saying about Chesebro’s motivations, but I suspect it was either a gambit to put the Georgia DA in a position where the case against that defendant was rushed and easier to defend against, and/or Chesebro’s going to be a sacrifice, so that Trump’s attorneys have a chance to see how the Georgia DA is going to prosecute the case and how juries react to different arguments/evidence.
Trump’s legal team wouldn’t have standing to question anyone during the Chesebro trial, if it is separated from Trump’s trial.
The irony is that trump may stand a better chance of staying out of jail if he were to let another republican get the nomination. that person would probably have a better chance of beating biden and in all likelihood would pardon trump. Of course trump would not, and could not, pursue that strategy.
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One of the talking heads on CNN said that Trump’s lawyers would be able to comment on the testimony at the earlier trials but IANAL. I should know better than to rely upon what I hear on CNN.
I wouldn’t be surprised if members of Trump’s legal team, or representatives of the Trump machine appeared on Fox News, Newsmax, and OANN to comment on testimony during the Chesebro trial, but unless they’re part of the Chesebro defense team (or the prosecution team, although that seems unlikey), they won’t actually be questioning anyone on the stand.
I’ll also note that Sydney Powell has also petitioned for “speedy trial”, and a little bit of Googling points out that another reason for making such requests is that, in Georgia, if you petition for a “speedy trial” and the trial does not start by a certain date (3 November for Chesebro and Powell), you are acquitted of all charges…which might be a very tempting reason to gamble on moving quickly.
(I wonder if, in Georgia criminal trials, it would be a viable defense tactic to bog down the system through pretrial motions practice in an effort to run out the clock.)
I read somewhere that this was part of the reason it took so long for Willis to proceed with indictments. She needed to be ready to roll on short notice if any of the defendants chose to petition for a speedy trial.
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Took a while to read Chesebro as such, and not think it was Cheesebro, as a funny reference to Trump.
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Chesebro is a) from Wisconsin b) gets called the Cheese as a nickname and c) was in the same class at Harvard Law as Elena Kagan and Ron Klain. The writing for this show has jumped the shark.
One additional thought…I suspect that if Trump is convicted, and if that conviction survives appeal, he probably would be sentenced to house arrest.
If he’s President at the time, he can perform his Constitutional duties while confined to the White House grounds. If he’s not President at the time, the Secret Service would probably prefer that he be confined to Mar-a-Lago (not sure whether he’d have free run or be further restricted to private quarters there).
I can’t imagine that we’ll follow Peru’s example of having a prison for Presidents; at the very least I hope we don’t ever need such a thing.
It sounds like Mark Meadows is going to have a difficult time moving his case from State to Federal court. As i understand it the Hatch Act prohibits Federal officials from infulencing in State Elections so it’s going to be very difficult for him to convince a judge that judge that it was part of his official duties to try and change the GA election.
But guess he’s testifying today so we should have a ruling “soonish” I’d imagine by the end of the week at least.
i think his argument is that his official duties were 24/7 in service of the president. as others have ridiculed that, “just following orders”. i suspect that a WH CoS knows more about what is legal and what isn’t (like hatch act and election interference) than genpop, so that defense might not hold. but who knows
Yeah, I’m sure his argument is something along those line. I’m just saying the Law seems to say “sorry buddy but that’s outside your WH duties” so I guess we’ll see which one “wins”
I don’t think Trump would have to serve any kind of prison time while president. His constitutional duties as president would take precedent, and being confined to the white house would certainly restrict his abilities to function as president. i have no idea if the prison time would be waiting for him when he got out. i assume it would be, unless he found some way to get pardoned by the state while he was in office. for federal crimes he would certainly try to pardon himself; i’ve read nobody knows if that is possible.