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Right here’s Home Oversight Committee Chair James Comer on Fox News:
I’ll let you know one of many issues that I don’t assume’s been picked up quite a bit that’s going to be an issue: I had two calls yesterday, one from a county lawyer in Kentucky and one from a county lawyer in Tennessee. They have been Republican, clearly, each states are closely Republican. They need to know if there are methods they’ll go after the Bidens now. They’ve opened up a can of worms, they’ve set precedents now that we will’t return on.
The “one of many issues that I don’t assume’s been picked up on quite a bit” half is especially humorous since a lawyer whose agency represents some Trump advisers made precisely this argument in The New York Instances final week, when it was simply as dishonest as it’s coming from Comer. The can of worms is just opened up if you happen to take as a right that Bragg’s prosecution was purely political, and even if you happen to grant that—a massive stretch given the documentation on provide—Bragg is the prosecutor the place Trump did the factor that’s allegedly a criminal offense. How is a neighborhood prosecutor in Kentucky or Tennessee going to tie any Bidens to alleged crimes of their county?
However observe the lack of pretense that that is about something however retaliation. There’s the cursory gesture at remorse that precedents have been set “that we will’t return on,” however that’s in protection of a declare that it is a precedent for issues it’s not a precedent for. Michael Cohen went to jail for his function on this scheme and the Trump Justice Division labored to avert additional investigations. Whether or not Bragg could make the case that what Trump personally did was a violation of New York prison legislation stays to be seen—once more, Trump’s legal professionals may have the possibility to aggressively defend their consumer—however the fees towards Trump are a far cry from a Kentucky county lawyer saying “Can I’m going after the Bidens for … one thing?” (Comer, bear in mind, was whining concerning the lack of prosecution of Beau Biden earlier than Bragg indicting Trump appeared like a severe chance.)
Comer wasn’t the one one making this menace. Showing on Fox Information, former George W. Bush official Ari Fleischer was even more explicit about it as a menace and as retaliation.
“One of many raps towards Donald Trump is that he violates the norms, and in consequence the Democrats had no selection, prosecutors had no selection. However Sean, what’s occurred to Donald Trump is definitely the actual violation of the norms,” Fleischer stated, concerning (and mendacity about) the impeachments of Trump and framing Bragg’s prosecution as wholly political. The implication is that no quantity of wrongdoing by Trump may justify Democrats taking motion towards him—the response to Trump’s actions will at all times be the extra profound violation of norms.
Then Fleischer moved on to the retaliation half.
Right here’s what I hope occurs, Sean. I earnestly hope that conservative prosecutors in rural areas of America indict Invoice Clinton, indict Hillary Clinton, indict Hunter Biden. Their solely method and return to the norms is for one aspect to comprehend in the event that they go too far the opposite will match them. And that isn’t the way in which we settle our disputes in America, they need to be settled on the poll field, not by the courts, however Republicans can’t unilaterally disarm. You’ll be able to’t allow them to attempt to intervene within the 2024 election by doing to Donald Trump what they’re doing. And I say that as someone who will criticize Donald Trump when he goes too far. The Democrats are violating the norms and so they’re particularly doing it by this case, this weak case, in Manhattan.
Invoice Clinton? Hillary Clinton? Republicans are additionally complaining that the crimes Trump is charged with ought to have handed the statute of limitations, however Fleischer desires native prosecutors reaching again to, what, the Nineteen Nineties to get Invoice Clinton? And it appears protected to imagine that if the Justice Division beneath Trump couldn’t discover a technique to “lock her up,” there’s nothing to prosecute Hillary Clinton for. Possibly Hunter Biden went on a bender in a county with a Republican prosecutor someday, however it is a ridiculous thought except you’re solely motivated by revenge—which Fleischer can confidently assume his viewers on Sean Hannity’s present is.
Fleischer, as a Republican of the Karl Rove faculty, additionally is aware of that projection is the way in which to go, accusing Democrats of making an attempt to intervene within the 2024 election to distract from the truth that Trump’s alleged crimes are about an effort to cowl up his sexual encounters till after the 2016 election, and shifting the burden of “violating the norms” from Trump onto Democrats. However we’re not speaking about norms right here. We’re speaking about legal guidelines, and whether or not Trump broke them.
Republicans can’t be allowed to shift the query from the place it belongs—can the Manhattan DA show that Trump broke the legislation and get a jury to convict him?—to those outlandish “can of worms” retaliation schemes. There are sufficient formidable Republican prosecutors on this nation that in the event that they thought they might get a courtroom to permit them to cost Invoice Clinton or Hillary Clinton or Hunter Biden with a criminal offense, they’d have already got accomplished it. This isn’t a severe menace of authorized motion, it’s a media technique, and it’s the media’s job (outdoors of Fox Information, which is clearly pushing it) to make sure that it fails to realize traction.
Our deliberate Ukraine episode should wait, as Donald Trump is being arraigned in New York Metropolis for his function in falsifying data to cover hush cash paid to Stormy Daniels. That is the primary of a possible slew of indictments coming Trump’s method, and we’re right here for a celebration of karmic justice—and to speak about what occurs to the Republican Celebration after this.
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