Quinta Jurecic and Benjamin Wittes at Lawfare make the rather obvious point that it is precisely the predictability of Roger Stone’s commutation that makes it so corrupt. Why did everyone seem to know this was coming? Because everyone knew that Trump couldn’t afford to have Roger Stone talking about what he did and what he knows about Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election. Since Stone was scheduled to report to prison on July 14, the president couldn’t wait any longer. He had to buy Stone’s continued silence regardless of the price.
This is precisely the type of situation that requires recusal. Stone was convicted of crimes that involved the president. He was found guilty of lying to Congress and intimidating a witness in the furtherance of a coverup that protected the president. Therefore, Trump shouldn’t have touched Stone’s case even with a ten-foot pole because it’s transparent bribery and obstruction of justice. But I always predicted this day would come because I knew Stone would not go to prison for Trump. The deal between them from the beginning was premised on Trump never letting that happen.
The Washington Post editorial board is appropriated appalled, calling this “one of the most nauseating instances of corrupt government favoritism the United States has ever seen.”
The president seems to be doing his best, within the confines of the U.S. constitutional system, to emulate the gangster leadership of Russian President Vladimir Putin, a man whose ruinous reign Mr. Trump has always admired. If the country needed any more evidence, Friday confirmed that the greatest threat to the Republic is the president himself.
No one at the National Review has yet weighed in on this subject, which shows how indifferent the right is to Trump’s criminality. David “Axis of Evil” Frum’s scribblings are no longer welcome over there. He has to take to The Atlantic:
Since Stone himself would have been in no legal jeopardy had he told the truth, the strong inference is that he lied to protect somebody else. Just today, this very day, Stone told the journalist Howard Fineman why he lied and whom he was protecting. “He knows I was under enormous pressure to turn on him. It would have eased my situation considerably. But I didn’t.” You read that, and you blink. As the prominent Trump critic George Conway tweeted: “I mean, even Tony Soprano would have used only a pay phone or burner phone to say something like this.” Stone said it on the record to one of the best-known reporters in Washington. In so many words, he seemed to imply: I could have hurt the president if I’d rolled over on him. I kept my mouth shut. He owes me.
So, yes, anyone who cares to opine on the subject is well aware of what just happened because the motive was completely obvious and therefore predictable. Peter Baker at the New York Times obligingly tells us that this is worse than anything Nixon did, and that’s 100 percent accurate. Tricky Dick wasn’t above delivering large bags of cash, but he didn’t commute the sentences of the people who lied for him. Still, both are examples of bribery, and bribery is one of the few crimes enumerated in the Constitution as warranting impeachment and removal from office.
Nixon’s problem was that he didn’t have a Senate that would look the other way. Trump has folks like Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham who back this decision to the hilt.
Should Nancy Pelosi impeach him again for this? I can think of a long list of reasons why she shouldn’t bother, but I’d rather she did. I’d prefer to give the Republican Party one more chance to convict Trump before they formally make him their nominee in Jacksonville. It’s the magnanimous thing to do, since they must know that his handling of the COVID-19 pandemic is too costly to the country for us to endure. Convicting him is the only way out of the trap they created for themselves, and if they won’t take the gift, then all the more reason for the electorate to exact ruthless vengeance on them in the fall.
I agree. Impeach again. But a question: if a future president gives Stone a full pardon, he could be compelled to testify, no?
Either that or Congress could offer immunity for past lying, while putting him in jeopardy for lying again while under oath.
I don’t agree. The Republicans could wise up and take the gift. No, publicize this to the hilt! Make clear that the Republicans in Congress have made clear they’ll never impeach and dare them to declare otherwise. Make them ride the nuclear missile of their fever dreams into the desolate ground of the America they demanded.
The people of this country are so stupid, Mike Pence could win. A bunch of idiots would believe he was a breath of fresh air and vote to give him a chance. He, like Trump, could ride an inside straight to an electoral college win. No! Fuck that! No!
Agreed. At this stage of the game, everyone has to be focused on winning the Senate with as many seats as possible in order to try to save the country from a huge portion of itself and the entirety of the Republican party. In fact, the deal Pelosi should present to Biden is one where she doesn’t pursue impeachment so as to make it easier for Biden to win in exchange for him agreeing not to just “Move on for the good of the country” without there being criminal investigation of all these bad actors by the DoJ in a Biden administration.
No. If we could get rid of Trump in the next month, there’s the possibility that Pence might get the federal response to the pandemic in order. (Also, he might not.) That’s five months of a better response. We can’t afford to pass that chance up. Republicans deserve whatever misfortunes befall them, but we have to offer them any chance we can to do better. More than politics depends on that.
Based on his objective performance as a governor (and as VP), I think “the possibility” that Pence’s competence and judgement (or that of anyone the Republicans already or would put in place over the next five months managing the response) so slim that it isn’t worth the downside of another four years of a GOP presidency (and Senate, because presumably Pence would be better for the Senate than Trump). Yes, it’s tragic, but IMHO, this is the pandemic train we are on with no chance to change it (via POTUS being convicted in the Senate) before November. The Conservative movement has spent decades getting us to this point, and it needs to run its course.
“It’s the magnanimous thing to do”
Well, you know, fuck that. The republican senate doesn’t deserve another chance to do the right thing, they deserve to be run out of town on a rail. And Trump and his corrupt buddies deserve to be in jail. We’ll see to all that after the election, if there is any justice left in this country.
This should be a slam dunk for impeaching again. Make the Republicans double down on the corruption and contempt for the rule of law.
Fuck being magnanimous to these republicans. They made their bed earlier this year. This just gives them one more chance to snub their noses at us. Maybe they can say so out loud first, like “ we want this asshole gone.”
The vulnerable Republican senators would be put into a desperate box. Voting to acquit twice would seal their fates. Even voting to remove would be disastrous, since the Trump base would abandon them. It would also raise the question of why they needed a second chance to do the right thing when all the evidence was on display earlier in the year. Voting to remove would reek of political expediency in competitive race. Democrats could make hay with the charge that the individual Republican senator was doing this to save their own skin, which has the benefit of being entirely true. Especially if the only R senators voting to remove are the ones in competitive races. People don’t like flip floppers, and the first impeachment generated a lot of flipping and flopping from the Republicans.
I’m surprised at the comments here. Personally I give the chance that the Republicans convict their own president to be 0% regardless of the crime and the evidence. Therein lies the problem with impeachment requiring supermajorities. I’d do away with the process entirely. What’s the point? It’s clear that no president will ever be impeached now that this precedent has been set. There needs to be a different option available but I’m not clear what that is. maybe only requiring majorities of both houses but also a clear majority of supreme court justices? But with caveat that those justices appointed by the indicted president to recuse. I dunno.
I don’t think impeaching him is magnanimous to the Republicans. I think its good politics. I believe there is polling evidence that shows that the last impeachment actually did some damage to his popularity, or at least started its decline, and he was a lot more popular then. His base is starting to fall apart and I think this would accelerate that. People are starting to understand how Trump’s corruption affects them personally due to the pandemic, and this would be one more huge example of corruption. At a minimum it would consume the news cycle for a few weeks and further push independents away from him. No way the Senate would convict, but people in the middle are really starting to hate Trump and voting to acquit would be a tough vote because then your voting to continued four more months of a disastrous pandemic response. “This is a chance to get rid of the guy and get someone competent in there who can handle the pandemic for the next four months” is a pretty powerful media strategy when cases are exploding and people are scared, so a vote to acquit would be really tough on the Republican Senate candidates. And if they actually did convict him it would absolutely destroy their party. Their base would revolt.
The only risk I can see to it is the charge that the House is wasting its time when it should be focusing on the pandemic, but I don’t think that is particularly effective. Trump owns the pandemic and everyone knows it.
Joe
PS I’m a longtime lurker who finally decided to uncloak. Hi everyone.