2mo ago

Judge rules Trump does not have presidential immunity protections in hush money conviction

www.cnn.com Judge rules Trump does not have presidential immunity protections in hush money conviction | CNN Politics

Judge Juan Merchan wrote Monday that Donald Trump’s hush money conviction should not be dismissed because of the Supreme Court’s presidential immunity decision, ruling that the evidence presented by the Manhattan district attorney’s office was not related to Trump’s official actions as president.

17 comments

But what is the consequence?
- Absolutely nothing, they have already said they are not pursuing sentencing during his presidential term, so he is free from all consequences until he dies.
  
  Honest question, what is the GOP going to do when his 4 years is over assuming that he doesn't pull a Putin and just stay in power until usurped or killed. They've gone so far into him as the leader that any challenger is disowned from the party so what happens if they follow the law and he no longer is able to run?
  
  I still maintain that this violates the "speedy trial" guarantee and is therefore illegal
  
  But what about after that? Have any spiritual leaders weighed in on this?
- For the judge? In a few weeks, we’ll find out….
- Nothing really I suspect
- Bad publicity, which for Don is gold.

Makes sense considering many protections don't extend to civil matters, and he wasn't even acting in any sort of governmental role at neither the time of the incident which compelled him to make the payment nor at the time of the payment itself.
The payment happened in October and this may be a shitty analogy but imo it's like someone running a dozen red lights because they're late to a police officer job interview. I mean, it may help them get the job but they're acting as a private citizen and not in any sort of governmental capacity and it'd be absolutely bonkers for them to argue that they should retroactively have any sort of immunity on the basis that they did in fact get the job

And nothing will be done anyways, sooooo...

First, since they've already said they have no further intention of pursuing sentencing, his ruling is just meaningless fluff to feed to people who still want to believe that the rule of law even remotely matters when it comes to Trump.
Second, Trump's ego is all that matters. Most likely, he's still going to demand exoneration either by some kind of act of Congress, executive order, or simply judge-shopping until he finds a judge that will interfere in the case based on the legal theory of because fuck you that's why, possibly followed by having Merchan investigated or brought up on bullshit "election interference", "treason", or "corruption" charges. And probably his daughter too.
- "Hey, that's good. You sure you ain't the smartest guy in the world?"

17 comments