Category: Corruption O’ The Day

What’s Next for Trump? The Facts, and Ways This Could Play Out.

The jury is in. Former president Donald Trump has been convicted on all 34 counts of falsifying business records.

If you thought this country was divided before, we could likely see upheaval like never before. With many seeing this trial as politically motivated by the left to take him off the ballot, what happens next?

First off, he can still run for president.

The Constitution states a candidate must be at least 35 years old, a natural-born U.S. citizen, and a resident in the country for at least 14 years. There is nothing noted about criminal charges.

Can he pardon himself?

No. Because it is a state conviction, he will not be able to pardon himself as president. Presidents only have jurisdiction over federal convictions.

Can any state take him off the ballot?

They did try, but no. The 14th Amendment, which was passed after the Civil War, states that no one who has participated in an insurrection may run for the presidency. While some states have tried to claim this against Trump regarding Jan. 6th, they have been unsuccessful in proving it. He will still be on the ballot, as long as he is the Republican nominee.

How can he serve as president if he is also serving a criminal sentence?

It is expected that due to his age and this being his first conviction, he will not serve prison time. He may be given probation, which would mean he would have to ask permission every time he leaves the state of New York. If sentenced to time in prison, which would undoubtedly be frowned upon as a politically motivated move, he could still actually legally serve as president from behind bars. (Can you believe I just said those words?)

If he is sentenced to prison and wins the election, Trump’s attorneys might argue that sitting presidents can’t be imprisoned, just as Trump has argued that sitting presidents can’t be indicted.

The 25th Amendment also states that the vice president may take over responsibilities temporarily when the president is unable to perform them. Some have speculated that this could come into play if he has to delegate from behind bars.

What about his appeal?

Trump’s team will assuredly appeal. They will have 30 days from the New York verdict to file a notice of appeal and six months to file the full appeal. It is expected any appeals filed will not be resolved before the November election. It is possible that an appeals court would agree to stay Trump’s sentence until after the appeal is adjudicated.

What does this mean?

Regardless of what people think of Trump, most agree this went too far. Time will tell, but already we are seeing a surge in support for the former president. Reports have come in that his donation site crashed momentarily from extremely high traffic.

Those who accused Trump of being a dictator and trying to undermine our country’s laws now have weaponized our judicial system to take out an opponent they weren’t confident could be beat in the polls. The Democrats have started a dangerous war, and the losers are the people of this country. Election interference must not be tolerated. Trump will not give up so easily. We are witnessing another historic moment in our nation’s history. The next months could change everything.

Jonathan Turley Has a Lot to Say About the Trump Verdict

Legal expert Jonathan Turley reacted with strong words to the guilty verdict of former President Donald Trump, who was convicted on all 34 counts at his New York hush money trial after only two days of jury deliberations spanning over nine hours.

“I obviously disagree with this verdict as do many others,” Turley tweeted, saying that he believes that the case will be reversed “eventually” either at the state or federal level. “However,” the George Washington University Law School professor added, “this was the worst expectation for a trial in Manhattan. I am saddened by the result more for the New York legal system than the former president. I had hoped that the jurors might redeem the integrity of a system that has been used for political purposes.”

In an appearance on Fox News, Turley described the strange circumstances surrounding the conviction’s announcement.

Turley, who was there at the time of the verdict’s reading, called it “one of the most bizarre moments” he ever experienced in the courtroom. Judge Juan Merchan had just said the jury had not yet reached a decision and that they’d be dismissed for the day.

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The goobermint didn’t ‘spend’ that money. It’s gone into their pockets via accounting slight of hand trick. Plus they think we’re stupid.

Former NIH Director Admits Government Was Top Source Of Covid Misinformation

Four years ago, U.S. state, local, and federal goverments pushed “social-distancing” policies separating Americans six feet away from other people everywhere they went. Now former National Institute of Health (NIH) Director Francis Collins has admitted no “science or evidence” ever backed these heavy-handed, comprehensive restrictions — another key proof the left’s war on so-called “disinformation” is so dangerous.

A memo National Review obtained, from the Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic, details Collins’ closed-door testimony earlier this year. It reveals that Collins had not seen evidence on March 22, 2020, to support the widely obeyed federal policy when the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) instituted six-foot social distancing rules.

“Do you recall science or evidence that supported the six-foot distance?” Collins was asked.

“I do not,” Collins said. “I did not see evidence, but I’m not sure I would have been shown evidence at that point.”

“Have you seen any evidence since then supporting six feet?”

“No,” Collins responded.

So Collins admits the federal government lacked any scientific basis for this massive social policy it pushed on Americans, including by colluding with Big Tech to shut down public debate about Covid-19 responses. Such debate could have revealed that many Covid policies weren’t backed by good research. Instead, numerous federal officials pressed Google, Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube to shut down skepticism and contrary information it falsely labeled “misinformation” and “disinformation,” including articles from The Federalist.

This censorship effort effectively secured an information monopoly for federal agencies, including the CDC and NIH, to spread false information. As the lawsuit Murthy v. Missouri and other investigations later revealed, these government officials then used their information monopoly gained through accusing others of “misinformation” to spread actual misinformation, including that “social distancing” was scientifically proven necessary to “save lives.”

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Dem. Sponsor Of WA Gun Owner Insurance Mandate Runs For Insurance Commissioner

The Democrat Washington state Senator who earlier this year introduced legislation to require gun owners to obtain liability insurance is now running to become the next insurance commissioner.

State Sen. Patty Kuderer (D-Bellevue), who has consistently supported gun control measures as a lawmaker, said in a campaign announcement,

“As a State Senator, I have been a vocal advocate for issues such as gun safety, voting rights, and women’s health. I have also been a leading voice on healthcare issues in the State Senate, including sponsoring legislation to create a public option for healthcare in Washington. As your next Insurance Commissioner, I will work tirelessly to protect consumers and to hold insurance companies accountable for their actions. I will fight to expand access to affordable healthcare, to promote transparency and fairness in the insurance market, and to ensure that all Washingtonians have access to the coverage they need to stay healthy and secure.”

She goes on to claim she is “committed to working collaboratively with all stakeholders,” although gun owners may not be included in that definition.

But Kuderer will be facing a Senate foil, at least in the primary. State Sen. Phil Fortunato (R-Auburn), an ardent Second Amendment advocate, has also filed for the position. Neither Kuderer or Fortunato would lose their Senate seats this fall.

Kuderer’s measure, Senate Bill 5963, never made it out of committee. She had nine co-sponsors, all Democrats and all whose names are often linked to gun control legislation.

Kuderer is among four Democrats running for the insurance commissioner’s spot. The three others are identified as Chris D. Chung of Tacoma, Bill Boyd of Spokane and John Pestinger of Seattle.

Fortunato also has company from Republican Justin Murta of Snohomish. Two other candidates have filed without stating party preference, Jonathan Hendrix of Seattle and Tim Verzal of Eatonville.

But only one candidate—Kuderer—can be linked to the proposed liability insurance mandate.

Under her bill, any person who owns a firearm would have been compelled to obtain “in full force and effect,” an  insurance policy “covering losses or damages resulting from the accidental or unintentional discharge of the firearm, including but not limited to, death or injury to persons who are not an insured person under the policy and property damage.”

The law would also have required the gun owner to keep valid and current written evidence of the coverage readily available where each firearm was stored.

The law would also have required insurers to ask whether anyone named on the policy owned a firearm and whether it was securely stored.

When Kuderer introduced her bill in January, she was quoted by MyNorthwest.com stating, “This …requirement does not regulate, limit or control the manner or method in which people may keep or bear arms. Instead, it simply says you must have liability insurance.”

KTTH conservative commentator Jason Rantz countered at the time, “This is astonishing. The bill literally regulates and controls both the manner and method in which we may keep and bear arms.”

Sometimes, you wonder if corrupt crap like this isn’t done on purpose, simply to test the opposition’s mental acuity.

Judge Aileen Cannon is a Heroine
She is scheduled on June 21st to hear oral argument on whether special counsel Jack Smith was unconstitutionally appointed

The liberal news media is full of false stories about how Judge Aileen Cannon of the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida has delayed former President Donald Trump’s trial unnecessarily for allegedly mishandling classified documents. But, in fact, the Biden Administration and its Attorney General, Merrick Garland, are themselves to blame for the current delay. Special Counsel Jack Smith claims to be an inferior officer of the United States, but in fact he holds no such office. Smith is a mere employee of the Department of Justice, and he lacks the power to initiate prosecutions. Lucia v. Securities and Exchange Commission, 585 U.S. __ (2018) holds that only officers of the United States can take actions that affect the life, liberty, and property of citizens.

Judge Cannon has asked for oral argument on June 21, 2024 on former President Donald Trump’s motion to dismiss Special Counsel Jack Smith’s indictment on the ground that Smith was unconstitutionally appointed to his current job because he is not an inferior officer. Washington, D.C. super-lawyer, Gene Schaerr, has filed an amicus brief in United States v. Trump on behalf of former Attorney Generals Edwin Meese III and Michael B. Mukasey, as well as me and Professor Gary Lawson, arguing that Jack Smith was unconstitutionally appointed to be an inferior officer, and Judge Cannon has asked Gene Schaerr to participate in the oral argument, which he has agreed to do.

The Appointment Clause of Article II, Section 2 provides that: “the Congress may by Law vest the Appointment of such inferior Officers, as they think proper, in the President alone, in the Courts of Law, or in the Heads of Departments.” Jack Smith claims to be an inferior officer of the United States appointed by the Head of the Justice Department, but he is instead a mere employee.

We argue in our amicus brief that Congress has never by law vested in the Attorney General as the Head of a Department the power to appoint inferior officers even though Congress has explicitly vested that power in the Heads of the Departments of Energy, Health and Human Services, Transportation, and Agriculture. The only power, which Congress has given to the Attorney General is the power to make a sitting U.S. Attorney a Special Counsel with jurisdiction to prosecute cases nationwide and outside his or her home district. Thus, the Delaware U.S. Attorney, David C. Weiss, currently has nationwide jurisdiction to investigate and prosecute Hunter Biden as a Special Counsel, and this appointment is completely constitutional. Similarly, former U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois, Patrick Fitzgerald, was quite legitimately given nationwide jurisdiction to prosecute former Vice President Dick Cheney’s Chief of Staff, Scooter Libby, in Washington, D.C. Fitzgerald got Libby convicted and sentenced to time in jail.

Jack Smith, however, was a private citizen, and not a sitting U.S. Attorney, when Attorney General Merrick Garland named him to be the Special Counsel who would investigate and prosecute Donald Trump. Smith’s appointment as an inferior officer was thus unconstitutional, and therefore the cases against former President Donald Trump, which Smith is prosecuting in Florida and in Washington D.C. must be dismissed. Again, Congress has never by law vested in the Attorney General the power to appoint inferior officers

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Trump Classified Docs Trial Postponed Indefinitely.

On Tuesday, U.S. District Court Judge Aileen Cannon indefinitely postponed Trump’s classified documents trial.

“The Court also determines that finalization of a trial date at this juncture—before resolution of the myriad and interconnected pre-trial and CIPA issues remaining and forthcoming—would be imprudent and inconsistent with the Court’s duty to fully and fairly consider the various pending pre-trial motions before the Court, critical CIPA issues, and additional pretrial and trial preparations necessary to present this case to a jury,” Judge Cannon wrote.

“The Court therefore vacates the current May 20, 2024, trial date (and associated calendar call), to be reset by separate order following resolution of the matters before the Court, consistent with Defendants’ right to due process and the public’s interest in the fair and efficient administration of justice.”

Special Counsel Jack Smith’s classified documents case against former President Donald Trump has been on shaky ground lately. On Friday, Smith’s team admitted to misleading Cannon and tampering with the evidence that had been used as the basis for his case against Trump.

Last month, Cannon unsealed a trove of new documents in the case that also revealed that an FBI agent had testified that the General Services Administration (GSA) was in possession of Trump’s boxes in Virginia before ordering Trump’s team to come get them. The same boxes that the GSA had been holding and ordered Trump’s team to retrieve ended up being the boxes that contained classified markings, raising questions about whether the Biden administration had set up Trump.

“So an entire pallet full of boxes that had been held by GSA somewhere outside of DC is dumped at Mar-a-Lago,” independent journalist Julie Kelly noted. “Apparently these are the boxes that ended up containing papers with ‘classified markings.'”

The Supreme Court also heard oral arguments over Trump’s claims to presidential immunity, which may affect this cause.

Cannon’s decision is a major win for President Trump, who has repeatedly sought to delay the case until after the presidential election in November. In early April, Cannon rejected Trump’s previous attempt to dismiss the case, which he based on the argument that the documents found at his estate were personal records. Trump had filed multiple motions for dismissal back in February, employing various arguments, such as asserting presidential immunity and questioning the legitimacy of Smith’s appointment.

Meanwhile, Joe Biden had classified information that he was never entitled to have stored in boxes in his garage for years but was not charged. In February Special Counsel Robert Hur’s report concluded that Biden “willfully retained and disclosed classified materials after his vice presidency when he was a private citizen” and that his actions “present[ed] serious risks to national security.” However, Hur wouldn’t bring charges against him because Biden “would likely present himself to a jury, as he did during our interview of him, as a sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory.”

Because of this, Hur concluded it would be “difficult to convince a jury that they should convict him […] of a serious felony that requires a mental state of willfulness.” Hur found that Biden’s memory was “significantly limited, both during his recorded interviews with the ghostwriter in 2017 and in his interview with our office in 2023” and that he couldn’t remember the years he was vice president or when his son Beau died.

If the prosecution lied about this, what else did they lie about?

Trump Whodunnit: Prosecutors admit key evidence in document case has been tampered with
Legal experts call revelation a “serious violation” as Jack Smith’s team admits it also misled court.

In a stunning admission, Special Counsel Jack Smith’s team is admitting that key evidence in former President Donald Trump’s classified documents criminal case was altered or manipulated since it was seized by the FBI, and that prosecutors misled the court about it for a period of time.

Legal experts told Just the News the revelation could prove to be a serious problem for prosecutors and a violation of court rules to preserve evidence in the state it was seized.

In a new filing Friday, Smith’s team said that the order of documents in some of the boxes of memos that were seized by the FBI from Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate was altered or jumbled, leaving two different chronologies: one that was digitally scanned and another the physical order in the boxes.

“Since the boxes were seized and stored, appropriate personnel have had access to the boxes for several reasons, including to comply with orders issued by this Court in the civil proceedings noted above, for investigative purposes, and to facilitate the defendants’ review of the boxes,” Smith’s team wrote in a new court filing to U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon.

“There are some boxes where the order of items within that box is not the same as in the associated scans,” the prosecutors wrote.

Smith’s team in a footnote also conceded it had misled the court about the problem by previously declaring that the evidence had remained in the exact state it had been seized.

“The Government acknowledges that this is inconsistent with what Government counsel previously understood and represented to the Court,” the footnote said.

You can read the filing here:

gov.uscourts.flsd_.648653.522.0.pdf

The organization of the documents in storage boxes at Mar-a-Lago is likely to be an important part of Trump‘s defense. His team is expected to argue the documents were stored in the White House in chronological order on the days that Trump received them, and that staff simply boxed them up and sent them to his home without him accessing them or knowing they contained classified information.

Smith’s team tried to downplay the problem and argued it’s not a reason for a delay in Trump’s case.

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Biden Defense Official Says ‘Take All the Guns’, Use National Guard

Confiscate guns

In a recent undercover video released by James O’Keefe, a Department of Defense (DoD) employee, Jason Beck, was recorded discussing the potential use of the National Guard for gun confiscation.

Beck’s assertion that the National Guard would follow orders to confiscate guns prompts questions about the military’s obligation to uphold the Constitution. The tension between obeying lawful orders and respecting individual rights underscores the complexities of military service in a democratic society.

NY Judge: The Second Amendment Doesn’t Exist Here

There’s been a case in New York that I should have been following more closely. Dexter Taylor was a hobby gunsmith. He liked the nature of putting together guns from lawfully purchased parts.

However, the state of New York disapproved of this pastime. They arrested Taylor and, on Monday, he was convicted.

My friend Jeff Charles over at our sister site RedState has been covering this case pretty much from the jump, and in his story from Monday about the sentencing, there was something we had to talk about.

You see, the judge in the case has decided that a certain right of interest to Bearing Arms readers doesn’t actually exist in her state.

From the beginning of Taylor’s trial, it was evident that the court would be biased against the defendant, according to [Taylor’s attorney, Vinoo] Varghese, who explained that two judges presided over his case before the current official, Judge Abena Darkeh, took over.

The judge disrupted Varghese’s opening statement multiple times as he tried to set the stage for Taylor’s defense. Even further, she admonished the defense to refrain from mentioning the Second Amendment during the trial. Varghese told RedState:

She told us, ‘Do not bring the Second Amendment into this courtroom. It doesn’t exist here. So you can’t argue Second Amendment. This is New York.’

Varghese said he had filed the appropriate paperwork to “preserve these arguments for appeal” but that the judge “rejected these arguments, and she went out of her way to limit me.”

The Second Amendment doesn’t exist there? Excuse the hell out of me?

“This is New York?”

This just smacks of “the Aloha spirit” nonsense where some parties seem to think that the Constitution doesn’t actually apply because they really, really don’t like it.

Is the judge in this case, Judge Abena Darkeh, suggesting that the Second Amendment doesn’t apply anywhere she doesn’t approve? What other rights don’t exist in New York under Judge Darkeh’s paradigm? Do defendants not have the right to representation? Is free speech non-existent?

Oh, one might make the case that I’m being ridiculous, but I don’t think I am. Not based on Darkeh’s other actions.

Varghese also tries to take a jury nullification approach. Jury nullification basically means you convince the jury that while a crime might have occurred, the law in question is the real problem. It’s rare, but it’s still a thing. Judges aren’t supposed to encourage it, but they’re not supposed to stop it.

Yet Judge Darkeh did just that. She reportedly warned jurors in such a way as to suggest they could face consequences if they didn’t vote to convict.

So, basically, it feels like Taylor got railroaded and that Darkeh doesn’t actually think people have rights unless she, personally, approves of them.

Yet that’s not how rights work. They exist even if they’re inconvenient. They exist even if you don’t approve of how they’re used.

Varghese says he tried to preserve Darkeh’s comments for appeal and was stymied. However, her comments should still be on the record somewhere. If not, her attitude should be clear from the transcripts.

But either way, Darkeh makes it clear that at least some jurists in New York really don’t think the Second Amendment applies in either their courtroom or the state as a whole.

It’s time they’re disabused of that notion by higher courts.

Police Website Reveals CDC Suppressing Defensive Gun Use Data

According to a report from Law Enforcement Today, recent revelations have exposed the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) for allegedly suppressing data on defensive gun use (DGU). This action has ignited debates over the transparency and potential politicization of the agency’s research on gun policy and public health.

The CDC, which studies various factors contributing to injury and mortality including firearm incidents, has been criticized for omitting defensive gun use statistics from its public communications. Despite commissioning a study from The National Academies’ Institute of Medicine and National Research Council, which recognized DGUs as a “common occurrence,” the CDC chose to exclude these statistics following pressure from gun-control advocates.

Documents obtained via Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests revealed that individuals such as Mark Bryant of the Gun Violence Archive, Devin Hughes of GVPedia, and Po Murray engaged with top CDC officials. They were introduced by the White House and Senator Dick Durbin’s office and pressed the CDC to downplay DGU frequencies, which range from estimates of 60,000 to 2.5 million annually in the U.S.

Mark Bryant was particularly outspoken, vehemently opposing the highest estimates of DGU. He was quoted in correspondence saying, “that statistic needs to be killed, buried, dug up, killed again and buried again. It is highly misleading, used out of context, and holds zero value even as an outlier in honest discussions surrounding DGUs.”

Despite initial reluctance, the CDC ultimately removed references to DGUs from its publications, a move that has been perceived as aligning the agency more with gun-control advocacy groups than with unbiased scientific inquiry. This has raised concerns about the CDC’s commitment to providing comprehensive and unbiased data.

Gary Kleck, professor emeritus at Florida State University’s College of Criminology and Criminal Justice and a long-time researcher of DGUs, criticized the CDC’s actions, suggesting they indicate the agency is a tool of gun-control advocates rather than a neutral body. Kleck, whose research supports at least 760,000 DGUs annually, emphasized the importance of rigorous methodology and empirical evidence in academic research.

This situation highlights the ongoing tension between scientific research and political influence, particularly in the contentious arena of gun policy. Critics argue that the CDC’s actions compromise its credibility as an evidence-based institution and call for greater transparency and accountability in its research practices.

“CDC is just aligning itself with the gun-control advocacy groups. It’s just saying: ‘we are their tool, and we will do their bidding.’ And that’s not what a government agency should do,” Kleck told Eddie Killian, the author of the Law Enforcement Today article.

Woke Soros-Funded Oakland DA Pamela Price Will Face Recall Vote After Nearly 80,000 Signed Petition to Oust Her Over Soaring Crime in Dem-Led City

Progressive Oakland District Attorney Pamela Price is set to face a recall after just 15 months, with a mass movement to get rid of her getting enough signatures over the soaring crime rate in the area.

Alameda County DA Price has been under pressure over the soaring levels of crime in the Bay Area city, with a recall effort she has claimed is ‘financed by billionaires’ and based in ‘hatred and racism’ gaining momentum.

Price herself has taken over $1 million from three political action committees funded by left-wing billionaire George Soros, according to the Washington Times. Continue reading “”

it’s called getting caught grifting

David Hogg Group Hit With Allegations Over Spending Practices and Policies

Gun control activist David Hogg has been hit with allegations over the spending practices of his group Leaders We Deserve PAC. Conservative outlets are reporting that the group spent comparably little on actual candidates as opposed to travel and expenses. His prior counsel is a familiar name in such controversies in Washington: former Clinton campaign general counsel Marc Elias.

Hogg created a group in the aftermath of the 2022 midterm elections to elect Generation Z politicians to offices throughout the country. The group was given favorable national coverage in major media outlets. He explained that contributions would be used to elect young Democrat candidates:

“[We’re] trying to pick them and say, you know, we would like to help you run for office, we’ll supply you with all of the resources that you need and help basically coach you and hold your hand to get there, which is kind of the gap that’s in the space right now, for at least young people at the state legislative level.”

Federal filings reportedly show that year-end 2023, Leaders We Deserve raised over $3 million. That is impressive for its first year in operation.

The conservative sites allege that the group spent “only about $263,000 on its stated mission of electing candidates from Generation Z to office combined with donations to other Democrat Party committees and groups—and instead spent more than $1.4 million on disbursements to themselves for payroll and to political consulting firms and legal fees, in addition to travel and entertainment expenses like hotels, flights, and meals.”

However, it reportedly spent more than $1,314,000 on travel and related expenses while giving $80,000 to the Elias Law Group.

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Proof eco-extremists don’t want to fix the problem, they want to tear down society.

This week, Harvard University has shut down a Bill Gates-funded geoengineering experiment. The controversial Stratospheric Controlled Perturbation Experiment, or SCoPEx, run by professors David Keith and Frank Keutsch, aimed to study the potential future implementation of geoengineering by crop dusting sulphuric acid into our stratosphere. Nice.

Even if you put aside the almost instant validity such an experiment would give to conspiracy theories like chemtrails and HAARP, it still sounds a bit too much, playing with our thin air like that — in an unprecedented, and potentially catastrophic, manner, too.

But let’s not kid ourselves. The plug wasn’t pulled over fears of playing fast and loose with the venusformation of Earth’s atmosphere.

Nor was it due to the Harvard faculty’s occasional (yet frequent) dalliance with plagiarism or concerns over the lack of diversity within the ivory tower.

No, according to the MIT Technology Review, it was something else entirely: “Even studying the possibility of solar geoengineering eases the societal pressure to cut greenhouse gas emissions,” it clarified.

The Harvard Crimson picked up the scent too, noting that “a vocal minority of scientists have voiced concern that [the experiment’s] technology may provide an excuse to reduce pressure to cut emissions.”

And that’s the irony. Fixing “climate change” without destroying capitalism and everything the West stands for does nothing for the revolution.

What a waste of a good crisis!

It turns out, the climate change business thrives on more climate change alarmism. Whodathunk?

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