Donald Trump discussion Thread IX (threadbanned users listed in OP)

Nody

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120933325#Comment_120933325

An amendment may be proposed by a two-thirds vote of both Houses of Congress, or, if two-thirds of the States request one, by a convention called for that purpose. The amendment must then be ratified by three-fourths of the State legislatures, or three-fourths of conventions called in each State for ratification.

Taken from whitehouse.gov

Leroy42

Are people convicted of crimes allowed to vote? Taking away someone's right to run in a democracy is a very serious undertaking.

Surely democracy itself is the best control. If a person convicted of a crime is still voted for by the people then that is what the people want.

Nody

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120933387#Comment_120933387

Felony disenfranchisement in the United States is the suspension or withdrawal of voting rights due to the conviction of a criminal offense. The actual class of crimes that results in disenfranchisement vary between jurisdictions, but most commonly classed as felonies, or may be based on a certain period of incarceration or other penalty. In some jurisdictions disfranchisement is permanent, while in others suffrage is restored after a person has served a sentence, or completed parole or probation.[1] Felony disenfranchisement is one among the collateral consequences of criminal conviction and the loss of rights due to conviction for criminal offense.[2] In 2016, 6.1 million individuals were disenfranchised on account of a conviction, 2.47% of voting-age citizens. As of October 2020, it was estimated that 5.1 million voting-age US citizens were disenfranchised for the 2020 presidential election on account of a felony conviction, 1 in 44 citizens.

Above from Wikipedia.

So if convicted of felony crime you can't often vote (and in states such as Florida they make it very hard to regain the right to vote) but you can become the president (and yes, Trump can be become president while in prison because there is no such limitations).

Quin_Dub

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120933412#Comment_120933412

That's the mental part.

In Florida , as a convicted felon he wouldn't be allowed to vote in the Election that he'd be allowed to stand for election in.

On the ballot , but can't cast a ballot.

Utterly crazy...

aloyisious

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120933387#Comment_120933387

Trump would be the very example of why a person convicted of a crime should not be allowed to run for some civil administration jobs, especially the presidency. There's been am amount of discussion on whether or not a president can pardon him/herself, running in combination with the notion of him winning re-election and then stepping aside to allow his V/P take up office and pardon him as a quid pro quo. Trump has done things that other elected officials HAVE gasped at so it can't be said that such an act is outside the bounds of possibility, though whether he would honour such an agreement is doubtful.

@Leroy42... I was watching various news channels last night discussing the Trump indictments and one of the guests stated that the US was not a democracy but a republic. Googling on that produced replies that the US is a Hybrid Representative Democracy and not a pure democracy nor a pure republic.

Quin_Dub

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120933866#Comment_120933866

I'm all for rehabilitation and all of that so there should be a pathway back for people once they have served their time etc.

But if you've been convicted of attempting to pervert the outcome of an election , being able to stand for election again seems more than a little wrong.

aloyisious

I'd like to think that the US GOP voters includes non-emasculated people since Trump took over the party and reckon tonight's court event could indicate yea or nay on that issue. Trump may have holed his defence on the record when he told Mike Pence during the Capitol Hill insurrection bid he orchestrated that Pence was too honest after he told Trump he would carry out his V/P duties in line with the constitution during their recorded phone-call.

It seems Pence wrote down what was said in the conversation when it was still fresh in his mind. That's direct unquestionable evidence of Trump's betrayal of the oath of office to the constitution he took while being sworn into office by the Chief Justice. It'll be up to the jurists to remember what Trump said then and the true evidential nature of what Trump meant when he remarked to Pence about his honesty - translation: what I need right now is a dishonest V/P ready to do as I say and betray his oath of office to the constitution.

political analyst

Why did the Feds not have all these investigations against Trump done and dusted early last year so that charges could've been brought earlier than they actually have been? If they had, it would've ensured that all the federal cases against Trump would be over before the 2024 election. Was it because the Feds became complacent?

political analyst

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120933412#Comment_120933412

The US military would never accept orders from a convicted criminal, i.e. the Nuremberg principles.

bucketybuck

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120931665#Comment_120931665

There isn't going to be a period of normal politics after Trump. The past decade has absolutely shifted the Overton Window and it won't be shifting back just because Trump is gone.

It is now fact that you can lie and commit crimes and still remain in politics, the old consequences no longer apply and going forward a lot of dangerous people are going to take advantage of that fact.

amandstu

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120937276#Comment_120937276

As well as I can say, it was not a foregone conclusion that charges were going to be brought at all.

In the eyes of those who believe Trimp to be egregiously the wrong , an unsuccessful prosecution might do more harm than good even if the dangers of no prosecution were also fraught with risk.

Maybe the imperative was to continue the investigation as long as possible to ensure that as much information as possible was gathered.

If it was thought there was the possibility of a "slam dunk " case, then the time given to preparing it might well seem worthwhile in retrospect.

It has been said that a guilty verdict may sink Trump politically whereas a non guilty verdict may have the opposite effect.

So decisions cannot be taken lightly even if the law says a prosecution may be advisable where there is a reasonable chance of conviction.

In this case the bar is probably a bit higher.

Personally I worry that Trump cultists may lie in order to get on the jury and so prevent a guilty verdict,but then to not prosecute even in the face of that possibility carries its own risk.

robinph

Personally I worry that Trump cultists may lie in order to get on the jury and so prevent a guilty verdict,but then to not prosecute even in the face of that possibility carries its own risk.

Someone that far gone to attempt to do such things would surely already have outed themselves through previous activities or social media postings.

aloyisious

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120937276#Comment_120937276

Because the US justice system is tied up by the rights of the citizen not to self-incriminate and those likely to provide best evidence against Trump were his staff and lawyers who fed him advice and papers that he was still president, though he had lost the election. The investigations had to find a way for federal lawyers to persuade those staff and lawyers to give witness testimony to corroborate, without self-incrimination and jail-time, what Trump's words and actions showed. Due to decisions from the bench, at least one Federal judge displayed a bias toward Trump in the Mar-A-Lago classified documents case.

amandstu

@robinph

"Someone that far gone to attempt to do such things would surely already have outed themselves through previous activities or social media postings."

How confident can we be about that when half the population are prepared to vote for Trump ?(of course,I want that to be true)

aloyisious

Listening to Trump last night when he was at the top of the stairs boarding his plane in Washington after his court hearing "I'm massively ahead of Biden in the polls" made me laugh, bigging himself up when the most optimistic poll for him has them level-pegging. There has to be fine-tuned polling done of all GOP party voters to get a more reliable result than that from Trump's mouth. I doubt if the GOP members kicked off committees because they voted to impeach Trump have vanished from the US.

duploelabs

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120939218#Comment_120939218

Trump will only look at polls that favour him. I'm sure the one he's quoting the poll outside Bubbas bait and tackle shop that has more cigarette butts in his ashtray than Biden’s

aloyisious

If one is to believe Mr Lauro, Trump's defence lawyer, he thinks that when he cross-examines Mike Pence on the stand, Pence will confirm that Trump genuinely believed the election was stolen from him and that, along with the line that some lawyers on Trump's presidential team in the White House advised him the election was stolen from him, will be his defence against the indictments accusing him of interfering with the election and the related charges. Mr Lauro claims that Trump only wanted Pence to delay the certification of the election result until it could be investigated and proven to be fraudulent.

That means that if Pence testifies that Trump did not want a delay but a total refusal by Pence to certify the result, Trump will not be able to counter any further testimony from Pence, should any other former member of Trump's team have contacted him and asked him not to certify the result, or if anyone has made the mistake of contacting Pence in the meantime asking him to change his testimony to assist Trump's defence line.

I'm waiting to see/hear if judge Chutkan sitting on the Washington hearing orders Trump not to say or write about the character of the prosecutor or she herself on his website or elsewhere which tends toward character assassination or deliberate attempt outside the bounds of fair comment to provoke an angry response in order to wreck his trial, regardless of Trumps constitutional rights of free speech. Calling the prosecutor deranged is not fair comment in my book.

mm_surf

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120937699#Comment_120937699

And charges pertaining to the Jan 6th insurrection started March 2021.

M.

aloyisious

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120937595#Comment_120937595

Or as a correspondent to the online media has pointed out, The Republican majority in the senate merely because Trump is listed as a republican chose not to go along with the facts placed before them by the other party. I don't know if it would be worth asking if that majority then would have taken the same decision if the office-holder had been a democrat.

Nody

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120947780#Comment_120947780

I hope they do try to run with that because it's a flawed defence as noted by Legal Eagle's review of the actual charges which relate to conspiracy and even if Trump believed that (which as noted in the video there are multiple witnesses highlighting how Trump appears to confirm he lost) does not matter. Funny thing is a lot of his defences have already been tested in court and been ruled against as part of the insurrection cases...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SbIhNmoZLJQ

Leroy42

What his lawyers say in the media has nothing to do with the actual trial. Just like the show put on regarding the false ballots that we were presented in the weeks after the election, where Trump's lawyers confidently proclaimed that they had plenty of ironclad evidence of election fraud, these interviews are aimed purely at the public.

Trump knows he has very little hope of winning the legal arguments, so like with his attempt to overturn the election, he has to try to get some of the public on his side. And we see that even in this thread. 'The polls show that X% of Americans believe the charges are false' therefore he should be let away with it. As if public opinion has anything to do with the law.

So that is what all this is about. Nothing the lawyers say on these shows will have any impact on the trials, they will simply claim it was a performance, which it is. Trump is banking on the support of the public to get him away from the legal issues he has.

aloyisious

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120948250#Comment_120948250

Nice one Rudy, leaving a voice message to a a US Senator [presumably a Republican] with the specifics of what you want him/her to do and the reason/s you want him/her to do it [on behalf of Trump]. As it's on the indictment sheet against conspirator 1, it's plain that that senator provided the voice recording to the prosecutor naming the person who sent the request and the sender's voice is recognizable & identifiable. Now if only the other conspirators did the same/similar at the request of Trump and the prosecutor has the same clear documented evidence against them as well. One thing the US can be grateful for, is that the 1st in line to succeed the president declined to become a co-conspirator as requested by that president.

aloyisious

Judge Eileen Cannon [of the Florida Federal bench] within the past few hours today has questioned the legality of the CONTINUED use of a Washington DC grand jury in the Mar-A-Lago classified documents case which was before her separately as an obstruction case against Trump.

It's reported in various online media sources that she has formally dismissed the case she was hearing against Trump on Monday [today] and ordered the DOJ to explain the use of the DC jury and asked a co-defendant Walt Nauta to "weigh-in" on the issue.

The Justice Department “shall address the legal propriety of using an out-of-district grand jury proceeding to continue to investigate and/or to seek post-indictment hearings on matters pertinent to the instant indicted matter in this district,” she wrote.

It looks like [on the face of it] Judge Cannon is using her court being tasked to handle the obstruction case as a means to scupper the separate case against Trump in Washington, on the basis that there is a link between the two cases, given she has dismissed the Florida case against Trump.

aloyisious

Fulton County, Georgia, DA Fani Willis may be close to adding a 4th indictment to former president Trump's list. The county has put up barricades on the Court House road, closing it off from traffic.

The defamation case Trump submitted against the woman who is suing him in NY has been dismissed by the court it was submitted to. The Trump case was entered after the woman appeared on CNN discussing her claims against Trump.

Quin_Dub

Trump lawyers claiming that they want to move the Jan 6th case from D.C. to West Virginia so they can have a more "diverse" jury pool is objectively hilarious - West Virginia is 92% white.

When they say "Diverse" what they really mean is "White and voted for Trump".

aloyisious

Regretfully it look's like Trump will be the candidate of choice to represent their party in the 2024 election by GOP members and that he may be the person in charge of international relations with most of the other countries around the world. Still there's many a slip twixt cup and lip.

Quin_Dub

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120956201#Comment_120956201

Trump was always going to be the GOP candidate unless he is legally prevented from doing so.

Thus far , none of the indictments are for crimes that bar him from standing for office although that might change in the future as I don't think that Jack Smith is done yet in terms of charges.

So he will be on the ballot in 14/15 months time - The question is , will anyone that didn't vote for him the last time vote for him then?

It's really really hard to see how they would , but who knows.

amandstu

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120956299#Comment_120956299

Or will less people vote for Biden(or alternative) than last time?

Will it be the economy that counts most?

If the anti Trump field magically dwindled to one ,who might beat him?

Not DeSantis thankfully.He is blessed with a sour personality and so unpopular on a basic level.

Maybe that guy with the Indian name.He has the smarts.

Would the GOP choose him?

Quin_Dub

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120956830#Comment_120956830

Trump on the ballot greatly reduces the "I'm not going to bother voting" risk on the Democrat side I think.

He is a great motivator to get past any potential Biden lethargy or ennui.

Ramaswamy hasn't a hope - He's brown and he doesn't have a "Judeo-Christian heritage" (He's Hindu)- Not a chance the evangelicals pick him.

Nody

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120956830#Comment_120956830

Well GOP candidates also has the issue of Roe vs. Wade to deal with as the Ohio vote has shown is still live and hot issue for people a year later. Basically a majority disagrees with GOP on abortion stance and it's actually helped mobilize as an issue to remove GOP abortion laws that where implemented and Biden has mentioned it as a 2024 issue he'll drive. At the same time for GOP their hardcore voters require that they drive for harsher laws but that's far from a majority support on the issue creating a litimus test of purity again for their candidates.