WHY IS TRUMP NOT IN A JUMP SUIT?

The fear of armageddon becomes more and more evident as Trump, bolstered by his near total control of one of the two USA political parties, trashes every law and value that could stand in his way of him being the President once again in 2024. The former President has made it quite clear that with his Republican cult’s voter suppression techniques, control of the election process and his popularity he will win. If he doesn’t he will seize power as he will claim the election will have been rigged. Such is the influence of the ousted President that the Republican Primaries for 2022 are turning into a battle as to who can be the Trumpiest.

The American conflict has simply become a battle between  democracy and autocracy. As Steve Schmidt, the former Republican operative who was John McCain’s campaign manager, has succinctly explained his reason for joining the Democratic Party - he had become a one issue voter. For him the issue was democracy. 

The assumption that 2024 Presidential election will be between Trump and whoever is for the most part unchallenged. Jay H. Ell believes it won’t happen as the legal challenges Trump faces this time around will eliminate him from being a candidate. Trump has to be aware of this and his bizarre behavior is indicative of the trouble he perceives he is in. In fact he has recognized the futility of hanging around till 2024 as reflected in his statement that if the Republicans don’t expose the 2020 election fraud to install him as President he will instruct them not to vote in the 2022 and 2024 elections. His delusion jives with the frenetic pressure to “audit” the 2020 election results in the swing states that he lost. The “pillow man” among others run around projecting a date, prior to 2024, that Trump will be reinstalled in the WhiteHouse and they are deadly serious. 

IS TRUMP ABOVE THE LAW?

To an objective observer the fact Donald Trump has not been charged with any criminal wrongdoing is an indictment of the American Justice System. Somehow every legal challenge that he has been involved in, and there have been well over four thousand, are somehow "civil" law cases. The fact that before the world he merely resolved with a twenty - five million dollar “settlement” for setting up a dummy university and defrauding  students is mind boggling. Then only a two million dollar fine for using his Charitable Foundation to pay his debts with money others had donated is as earth shattering. Not to mention his flagrant obstruction of justice in the Mueller investigation and more recently the Congressional January 6 congressional investigation. Somehow or another what would be criminal behavior elsewhere is "civil" law in the USA or it is ignored. 

The crime of the century that is hanging out there for all to gawk at and just continues daily is a seditious ongoing coup where Trump plots, conspires, incites and at every mass meeting makes it quite clear that he has not yet conceded the election to Biden as the latter stole it. He is openly defying democracy and in his efforts he is being supported by the Republican Party which he has openly commandeered to be the Donald J Trump cult. He is on a path that by hook or by crook he wlll be the President even before 2024. In fact he told CNN that there is no need to campaign for the 2024 election as he has already won it in spite of the fraud and corruption committed against him. Why is this being allowed to happen? Trump grows bolder and bolder as apparently there are no legal challenges to his outrages. 

One of the central features of a stable democracy is that all are equal before the law. If Trump and his co conspirators can openly defy the rule of law and suffer no consequences than that is yet another step on his hither too unhindered path to forming a dictatorship.

WHY HASN’T  TRUMP BEEN CHARGED YET BY THE DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE?

 President Trump get out of jail status was guaranteed by Attorney General Barr who not only never investigated his crimes he covered them up. As a private citizen he no longer has this protecsia. Even Barr baulked at supporting his Big Lie that the election was stolen from him. 

The culture running through the Biden administration is that in no way America must be made to resemble a banana republic where the opposition is locked up. This attitude has infuriated the Judges presiding over the January 6 insurrectionist trials who again and again have registered dismay at the low level of charges that Biden’s Department of Justice have instituted against those who were basically perpetrating a revolution. All the while Trump and his cult which now extends to all but a few of the Republican legislators are claiming that the violent insurrectionists were peaceful protesters. Trump has even participated in a video conferring martyr status to one of “protestors” who was shot dead by one of the capitol police as she burst through a broken window. This attitude gives us a window through the sentiment running through the Department of Justice’s, (DOJ), thought processes.

If not being a banana republic is what is dictating the DOJ’s decision making they can stop worrying. Trump has already brought the USA half way there. In fact not prosecuting him is exactly what happens in these tin pot dictatorships. Democracies hold their criminal leaders accountable. In France former President Sarkosy was sentenced to a three year prison term two of which were suspended. In Italy former Prime Minister Berlusconi was sentenced to one year’s community service while in South Africa former President Zuma was sentenced to three months and still has to face ongoing prosecutions. In Israel, Former premier Bibi Netanyahu, Trump’s big mate, is on trial as well for a number of charges. In none of these countries have their democratic status been challenged. In fact they have been enhanced. It is also interesting to note that the charges against them all make them appear like choir boys compared to Trump’s charges. 

There also has to be fear that the the mob Trump whipped up on January 6 will look like a picnic party compared to what might happen if he is charged. In fact Trump has already threatened this when he stated that more violence might erupt “posing a tremendous danger to our country". Also there is the fear that his congressional allies might incite violence and prevent the “healing of our country”. The Republican legislators have again and again more than hinted that immunity from accountability is the price for national stability. However the violence dye is already cast and will have to be faced sooner or later. The longer this goes on the bolder Trump will get as will his home grown militia. It will help if the arrested January 6 militia leaders are put away for a long period of time making rioters aware that there are serious consequences to their attempts at a coup.

However the good news is that the Biden Department of Justice need not lead the way against Trump as there is enough going on in the State Judicial system that can see to it that justice is done. The least the DOJ can do is charge those who are referred to them for criminal prosecution for failing to respond to subpoenas to give evidence before the Congressional Committee investigating January 6. 

WHAT IS TRUMP  CURRENTLY BEING CHARGED WITH BOTH CRIMINALLY AND CIVILLY?

Trump is no longer protected by the Presidency and the William Barr Department of Justice which acted as his personal counsel. Trump faces a slew of civil litigation in addition to criminal investigations. 

The civil litigation includes an allegation of defaming a former journalist he allegedly raped as well as a charge of sexual contact by a former contestant of The Apprentice where it is alleged that he had sexual inappropriate conduct with several women. Trump’s deposition has already been ordered in the latter case. He and his children are being sued in a class action suit by number of individuals who alleged they were defrauded into paying for worthless business opportunities. His inaugural committee is being litigated against civilly by the District of Columbia, (DC), for financial irregularities. 

There are four civil cases related to January 6 for instigating the the riot, two by members of Congress and two by the groups of Capitol Police. Then there is the ugly case being brought by his niece Mary Trump who claims that she was defrauded out of her share of her grandfather’s estate. Finally, he is being deposed next week in a case where six protestors claim to have been beaten up by his security as well as his former bodyguard.

It is the criminal stuff that must be striking terror into the former President and spurring him in his manic ongoing determination to become an untouchable autocratic President and maintain that in fact he still is one, While there is no sign that Merrick Garland of the Department of Justice has an ongoing inquiry into Trump there are two states and the District of Columbia, (DC),that are going at it gangbusters. Ironically the probe announced by DC on the instigation of a riot only carries a maximum six month sentence. Where the trouble lies is in New York and Georgia where both the processes are well under way. 

The State of New York has two separate AG offices who have criminal probes where even indictments have already been instituted. The two offices, the Manhattan and the New York State Attorney General’s Office have taken the unusual step of combining resources in this endeavor. Cyrus Vance of Manhattan has being at it forever, the Supreme Court finally granting him access to Trump’s tax records. He has laid criminal charges against Allan Weisselberg, Trump’s long time financial administrator, as well as the Trump Organization. While Trump’s name is all over the show he has not been indicted. As the pressure and risk piles onto Weisselberg pundits believe that it just has to be a matter of time before he makes a deal with the prosecution rather than risk spending a life in prison for a thankless Trump. Vance is also examining the forgiveness of a one hundred and seventy million loan Trump was “gifted” in the building of his Chicago Trump Hotel. 

The New York State Attorney General, Letitia James ,has been at it her investigation for a long time as her probe arose following Trump’s former personal lawyer Michael Cohen conviction nearly three years ago. There Trump was named an unindicted conspirator.

The trail of tax fraud is long and apparently there are millions of pages of discovery. The New York scrutiny obviously represents a serious threat to Trump and it is no secret that a Grand Jury is considering the evidence as to whether to indict him or not. 

However the real existential threat is the ongoings in Fulton County Georgia.

CRIMINAL EXPLORATION IN FULTON COUNTY GEORGIA - THE REAL REAL DEAL

The investigation by the Attorney General of Fulton County Georgia is the one that must make Trump shudder every time he realizes that he is no longer President and faces serious jail time. 

There are two grand juries investigating Trump and his associates in the latter’s attempt to overturn the election result in Georgia. Let alone what is going on in private every day, more and more is flushed out on the ongoing effort of Trump and his associates to overturn the election. With the report from the Senate Judicial Committee, the bipartisan Brookings Institute’s one hundred and seven page report on Trump’s criminal exposure and the bipartisan House Committee broadening probe, most of which is not in the public eye, it becomes more and more evident that there was and is a major conspiracy to reverse the result of the 2020 Presidential election.

While the recorded phone call to Georgia Secretary of State by Trump is the centerpiece of the investigation, there was Lindsay Graham's efforts, Mark Meadows visit to the Georgia election center, Giuliani’s attempt to persuade the Georgia legislators, the pressure on Pence, nine attempts to persuade the Department of Justice to assist him in reversing the Georgia election, a three hour meeting in the Oval Office where Trump wanted to replace Acting Attorney General Rosen with a nonentity in the department who was prepared to do his bidding and of course January 6, are all in the public space as to the effort to criminally reverse an election result,

The potential Georgia charges include criminal solicitation, intentional interference with election duties and conspiracy to commit election fraud - all pretty serious crimes. But what

 Trump has to fear most is being charged under the RICO, (Racketeer Influenced and Corruption Organization) ACT which carries a jail sentence of between five and twenty years and or a fine of up to twenty five million dollars. The ACT Also allows the judge to enforce a prohibition on the defendant(s) from engaging in the same type of industry as the business they were convicted for. 

The RICO ACT was originally brought in to get the mob bosses as it was always difficult to prove intent on the basis of one infraction. The ACT looks at a pattern of behavior by the perpetrator and or his associates to establish guilt. It needs not much imagination to argue that there is a pattern of behavior to Trump’s corrupt purpose, In fact, Jay H. Ell believes, when the House Select Committee is done it will be found to be conspiracy which extends far beyond what is currently known.

Now it just so happens that the Fulton Attorney General Fran Willis has experience in successfully prosecuting under the RICO ACT. She has also hired John Floyd who is the foremost Atlanta litigator on the Georgia RICO ACT which is broader than the original Federal law. Willis has discussed the possibility of charging Trump under this umbrella act which was successful at putting many mob bosses behind bars. 

AT THE END OF THE DAY

Wouldn’t it be poetic justice if legislation to pin down mob bosses is what ultimately brings down Trump?

According to CNN the top Conservative constitutional lawyers have refused to represent Trump in his ongoing criminal fantasy. One of the reasons is that he often doesn’t pay his bills. Trump denied this maintaining that he always pays them if they have done a good job!