An indictment is more likely than an arrest, certainly. E.g. he just reports to the DA's office and at some point to court, gets bail, is never imprisoned.
It would be pretty entertaining if he tried to resist even that, stayed in Florida, forced extradition processes or something. But the New York County charge seems small-potatoes enough that he'd be better advised to go through the process and expect at worst a misdemeanor sentence or something he can spin as nothing.
GΓΆtterdΓ€mmerung is popular with Nazis as I understand it.
Yeah, the plausible NYC charge is felony bookkeeping fraud, which is kind of rinky-dink. As I've mentioned, I think highly of Alvin Bragg, so I'm betting that any indictment that comes down will be very well supported, but I'm not sure that anything will.
Do law-people think an indictment is likely this week when the grand jury is taking testimony today? The Tuesday arrest thing was Trump's brain worms, hard to know what factual inputs might have been in play.
It seems the criteria on which it becomes a misdemeanor or felony is if it was in furtherance of another crime, and there will be a fine-toothed comb whether campaign finance violations, being a federal crime, count for this purpose. (Which I can't imagine would be scrutinized if the same question came up over, say, an enhancement to a robbery charge. So it goes.)
4: JMM seems to think there was some notification, and that today's testimony is a last-hour thing at Trump's counsel's request. But brain worms are definitely a possibility.
Bragg doesn't have the nerve to close the deal.
More generally, a political criminal must be undone politically: America made Trump and America must destroy him.
I'm torn, nothing would please me more than to see Trump in prison but I want him to stay out long enough to fuck up DeSantis's shit .
Hey, you don't want "nerve" from prosecutors. You want sober, clear-eyed enforcement of the laws as they exist.
(I am very entertained by the prospect of Costello's testimony; I have a personal connection that makes his presence in the news super amusing.)
Obviously, we all want Jill Hennessey for our prosecutor.
More generally, a political criminal must be undone politically: America made Trump and America must destroy him.
Only Batman can help save us now.
It's worth keeping in mind that being arrested for a charge that he could ikely beat (in the sense of avoiding serious consequences) if he listened to a good lawyer might not mean that he'll listen to a good lawyer instead of calling for riots and Giuliani.
There's evidence that the publicing of the impunitous criminality helped swing both the 2020 and 2022 elections. Not sufficient, but one necessary battlefront among many. DA charges are part of that!
that the publicing of the impunitous criminality
This is going to take me a minute.
For fucks sake, she got married in a ceremony with Giuliani officiating.
It's a shame "impunity" doesn't have a commonly accepted adjectively form; if it did my 13 would be at least a notch or two less pompous.
It's not a common phrase in Spanish, but on my Twitter feed I often see this from I think a graffito found in Argentina: "la impunidad enloquece".
ADJECTIVAL. I continue to struggle with word endings, apparently.
I expect he will be indicted, probably this week, and maybe in several jurisdictions by the end of the year.
But he will never be incarcerated. Too many escape hatches: There will be pre-trial dismissal motions, appealed to the Supreme Court, then maybe a trial, then possibly a conviction, and not impossible that a judge will impose a sentence of incareration, then post-trial appeals, and possibly orders to retry or resentene, which ruligns can also be appealed again. A favorable ruling at any or fhte stages, or s death before conclusion is more likely. Also he could be pardoned by the current Georgia governor, and/or by a future New York governor or US president.
Whether he will be "arrested" is sort of a trick question. Some day he will be told to appear before a court for an arraignment and he will apppear in court before a judge,* who will release him with some easy-to-meet conditions, e.g. no foreign travel, and a bond he can afford. Then he leaves the courtroom and goes back to campaigning. Never any handcuffs or bars. Was he arrested? There's conflicting law on that question, where someone was charged with perjury for saying he was never arrested when he had some variation of that experience. Aslo comes up in libel cases.
*He may try to appeal the order that he appear at the arraignment, and take that to the Supreme Court.
or US president
Not for state charges though.
There are many ways for this to go badly, but I still think it has to be done. The alternative -- the one that Trump himself is pushing -- is that he is above the law and cannot be prosecuted for anything.
Bragg's move (if it actually happens) is consistent with 7.2.
Yeah. And I think now is a good time to run the risk of riots. It's cold.
Meanwhile in the UK, the grotesque Johnson is appearing in front of the parliamentary privileges committee on Wednesday which might suspend him as an MP, and if the suspension is longer than 10 days he might lose his seat as an MP.
The chain of events would be: PPC finds him guilty (very likely) and recommends suspension (quite likely), Commons vote to confirm suspension (very likely), petition in his constituency gets 10% of constituents to sign it (incredibly likely), by-election triggered (automatic), Johnson either loses it (fairly likely) or doesn't stand (unknown).
I'm torn, nothing would please me more than to see Trump in prison but I want him to stay out long enough to fuck up DeSantis's shit .
He can still take DeSantis down with him.
There's some rumblings among nutball-observers that an indictment or an arrest with help Trump considerably against DeSantis.
America isn't going to destroy Trump. Only the Grim Reaper can end this.
25: Correct, but as it helps Trump's chances in the primary it could hurt them in the general!
Seems real but impossible to believe before it happens. Seeing video this morning of them unloading metal barricades to protect the DA's office sure made it seem more real, though.
A lot of the stuff in 19 seems predicated on extra-NYS intervention into NYS law that's simply irrelevant. Trump can't appeal his NYS indictment in Amarillo.
Anyway, if Trump does successfully incite another riot, it's going to be incredibly damaging to the Republican Party regardless, bc nobody with any relevance to the party will say anything bad about Trump, his incitement, or the rioter, or the riots.
In 2020, Rs actually had a pretty good year* outside of POTUS. But since 1/6/21, they've performed badly in almost every election (NJ-Gov/VA-Gov being the big exception). There's no counter-intuitive effect where Trump being indicted and Rs rallying around him is good for their party.
*hard to say how much that was just rubber band from 2018, how much was other factors, exactly what the fundamentals said, etc. But it certainly wasn't a bad election for them
The whole DeSantis wave among the punditry is really misguided. The National Review crowd favors DeSantis, but Trump has demonstrated that nobody gives a fuck about what they think. Republicans don't want a Trump with a thin veneer of respectability. MAGA Republicans* (unlike the writers at the National Review) understand that a Trump with any amount of respectability is an anti-Trump.
(I mean, seriously, the mainstream media won't admit this, but Trump just called for violence in response to his prospective indictment. And his faction loves him for it.)
*I totally failed to grasp the usefulness of this term when Biden started using it. I get it now.
I decided to compare head-to-head polls again, now that there are more post-election (in the 538 database). Not as big a difference as I expected! Nothing certain.
Among registered voters: DeSantis-Biden average margin -1% (45 polls), Trump-Biden margin -1.5% (52 polls)
Among likely voters: DeSantis-Biden margin -0.7% (12 polls), Trump-Biden margin -0.5% (18 polls)
Trump is probably right about that at least.
There's a photo captioned Wednesday morning showing Melania Trump and Pete Davidson holding hands.
I wonder whether this might not be Trump maneuvering DeSantis into the very uncomfortable position of deciding whether to cooperate with New York's extradition request once Trump refuses to appear for arraignment.
Trump is probably right about that at least.
The best part about Trump and DeSantis destroying each other is that they're probably both right about everything they say.
2024: Supreme Court overturns Puerto Rico v. Branstad.
I bet she doesn't swat Pete's hand away.
If Rupert Murdoch is willing to give marriage another chance, who would stand in the way of love?
There's been so little accountability for so long, and so much politicized non-prosecution of what look clearly like crimes among the politically connected, I'm only paying attention if there are actual indictments and court dates.
So both Trump and DeSantis are using the tactic of "My opponent is accused of [goes into detail on allegations]... and the accusations are a sinister plot!"
"White, rich people experiencing a consequence. News at 11:00."
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He had always liked Scythians, rather romantically, perhaps, but then he was more than usually sane and clear-headed over other things.|>
3: πΓΆπ±π±π’π―π‘Γ€πͺπͺπ’π―π²π«π€, pls.
Politico says the indictment might be Wednesday evening.
Once the sealed indictment is delivered to the judge, the DA's office would discuss Trump's surrender with his counsel, according to a court official who, like the others, was granted anonymity to discuss internal planning procedures. If Trump were to not surrender, a warrant would be issued for his arrest.
Whether Trump would be handcuffed is a decision that would be made by the district attorney, the court official said. He would be finger printed and a mug shot would be taken, though he is not expected to be "perp-walked" or paraded before the public in handcuffs, the official said.
I'll take it.
43: So it's continuing to be as good as its beginning?
They would be fools not to walk him. His whole engagement in politics has been founded on images and theatre, making him stumblebum up the courthouse steps with his wrists cuffed like some loser would be very healthy. The people who might make trouble already hate the existence of the US in any normal form, they won't be appeased or something. They can however see the Donald physically humiliated.
You're probably not wrong as a matter of the effect of the political spectacle. But it's really wrong to use law enforcement in an abnormal way -- and perpwalking him for this kind of crime would be abnormal -- for political ends. And I think that's an important enough principle to stick to regardless of whether all sides do. That one seems like a genuinely slippery slope to me.
I agree with LB except that I think the political effect would be a disaster too.
God forbid we break the unwritten rule that white-collar, upper-class criminals are the only ones who get treated with dignity!
Public humiliation is their (Trumpists) hot button and castration anxiety.
51 the way they go on about this or that being shoved down their throats suggests a different anxiety as well
50: If we want to change the treatment of white collar criminals generally, that's fine. If we want to reserve particular illtreatment when we think it will produce a political advantage, that's different.
I don't think starting a tit-for-tat cycle of public humiliation is going to end well when the other side specializes in resentment and admires Putin.
538's politics chats can be a bit hit-or-miss, but this one on the indictment question is pretty good and informative.
Honestly, I will never understand you people who don't let spite and vengeance override your better judgement. C'mon. Take the win and make it bigger.
53: don't white collar criminals ever get paraded in public? Steve Bannon did, I know. Bernie Madoff did. Michael Cohen was perp walked for *literally the same crime that Trump might be indicted for*.
I'm not sure why LB thinks that perp walking Trump would be some massive departure from norms about white collar criminals.
Yeah, I think the norm is that we perp-walk white-collar defendants when their crime is considered particularly heinous.
Michael Cohen was perp walked for *literally the same crime that Trump might be indicted for*.
Looks like Steve Bannon was indeed handcuffed, though.
60: I apologise. The NYT said he was, but obviously that was a lie, because the NYT is a bad newspaper, and I should have known that.
Bannon, though?
Bannon's not really the right comparator, because he's also a politically weighted case. The comparator would be someone who's been indicted for bookkeeping fraud (which is what it looks like the charge will be in NY) without a political aspect. I'm arguing that prosecutors shouldn't treat accused criminals differently on the basis of the political valence of their crimes; Trump and Bannon should get the same treatment (to the extent possible) as an ordinary defendant who committed the same misconduct.
And I could be wrong about what's normal, I'm speaking offhandedly. If bookkeeping fraud defendants get perp-walked into the courthouse in handcuffs as a matter of course, it should absolutely happen to Trump. But he shouldn't get special treatment, positive or negative, for being a political force.
Trump's position is that he is above the law and always has been. A demonstration that he is wrong about that is good for public life.
I don't think an indictment for accounting fraud demonstrates that in any real way.
The key to a perp walk is: 1.) The cops don't like the defendant 2.) There are cameras.* I'm not aware of any other criterion at all, really.
*If a perp walks in the forest and nobody notices, does he make a sound?
66 is kind of correct, except for a key thing: for white collar crimes where there's no expectation of flight, SOP (AFAICT) is for the prosecutor to tell the perp and/or their lawyer to turn themselves in--that's why Cohen wasn't walked. They told him to turn himself in, he did.
If the perp doesn't cooperate--and I'm sure this is where the discretion lies, in deciding what's sufficiently cooperative*--then come the handcuffs and, if there's press, the walk. Bannon I'm sure wanted to be perp-walked for grievance & credibility reasons. Cohen was probably planning a face turn, so he turned himself in.
*frex, I bet that it's common for lawyers to request adjustments to time/date, and whether that's viewed as being uncooperative depends on whether the DA/cops hate the perp
Giuliani, when he was a prosecutor, was notable for weird grandstanding perp walks in cases where they wouldn't be usual. So that's an argument for being unusually unpleasant to Trump. But I still think it's a bad idea.
It is like you guys don't even feel schadenfreude.
I sometimes recollect Four Seasons Total Landscaping when I need to smile for no good reason.
Corcoran has transcribed tapes. Prosecutors want Crime-fraud exception to attorney-client privilege for covering up the classified documents.
Trump apparently wants to be handcuffed in order not to look like a loser
56, 64, 70: you are right! This is really showing up the classic "wouldn't take his own side in a knife fight" liberal weakies round here. See also 57, who is so angry he'd almost say something if the outcome was completely risk free and guaranteed in advance.
The link in 74 is fascinating because it confirms from the horse's mouth a lot of things we thought we knew about Trump - he's obsessed with spectacle and theatre, and specifically, being at the centre of them himself. People like that are notoriously much better at judging what actions will generate drama than they are at judging whether they will come out of the drama looking better or worse.
(In any case I don't see him as a normal candidate or even a normal criminal case but as a threat to the state, like Osama bin Laden.)
75: I thought the most interesting thing from 74 was this: "Trump's advisers have also been unsure whether he actually grasps the enormity of what an indictment might mean for him legally, in part because he has appeared disconnected at times from the recent flurry of activity in New York as the investigation has wrapped up."
Now that could be read as "he's losing his grip on reality", and that's probably how Lowell meant it, but I think it's much more likely that he's completely unconcerned with the actual consequences for him of being arrested and indicted, because he (probably accurately) assumes there won't be any. They're hardly going to put him in prison, and fines don't matter. Pretty much his first action as president-elect was to pay $25m in legally ordered compensation to several thousand victims of his fraudulent university scam.
https://twitter.com/TristanSnell/status/1638358825060163584
Last night: "BREAKING: Potential earthquake coming in Mar-a-Lago documents case. DC Circuit sets unprecedented schedule requiring Trump counsel to submit filing by midnight TONIGHT and then DOJ to reply by 6 a.m. tomorrow morning. Did the court see evidence of national security threats? [...] The explanation that comes to mind is that *something* in the evidence submitted by DOJ has suddenly caused these judges to act with urgency we've never seen before. My bet is that there's an imminent/ongoing threat to national security that has created an emergency."
74: Trump apparently wants to be handcuffed in order not to look like a loser because it turns him on.
Fixt.
75: The outcome is the 2024 election. It's tremendously in doubt. There's no procedural or legal solution to any of this. There might be better or worse legal outcomes, but none is necessary or sufficient.
Tell me more about this "complain a bit in private quietly and hope they eat you last" strategy
I complain publicly and I do GOTV. I don't celebrate in the middle of a fight.
72: Just the other day I was trying to come up with a FSTL joke for this topic, but the only one I had was too easy/obvious to be worthwhile.
77 can't possibly be true.
Like, I'm not counting chickens on the NYS indictment, but I think it's coming. Dramatic, aggressive action on the classified docs? That's an absolute "I'll believe it when I see it."
83: CNN is pretty confident that something major is happening: https://edition.cnn.com/2023/03/21/politics/corcoran-trump-testimony/index.html
83 That schedule is wild enough that clearly something is happening. Why did the Circuit ask for DOJ's response brief at 6 am and not, say noon or 5 pm? I wouldn't jump to the conclusion that it's an actual national security issue -- maybe they wanted to decide the matter before Trump's looming indictment? I don't know why that would be, but I don't know much about any of this.
"Howell ruled that prosecutors met the burden to overcome Trump's right to shield discussions with his lawyers normally protected under attorney-client privilege." That's pretty uncommon, right?
Like, I've worked on privilege issues in cases where my clients had done some definitely wrongful stuff. I have never come within the realm of worrying about the crime-fraud exception in the slightest at all. It is wildly outside of the scope of anything you'd expect to run into in normal litigation.
So is this Trump openly saying, "OK, Corcoran, you've got to tell them X, even though we both know Y is true"? Or is it something more directly criminal, like "OK, Corcoran, I need you to move those illegal files and then forge an affidavit that they were never here"?
I mean, I know you don't know, I'm just trying to figure out if the former would be sufficient, or if action this exceptional implies something more like the latter, ie direct involvement in criming, rather than failure to maintain plausible deniability.
The New York grand jury is not in fact meeting today.
For anyone looking for a little methadone-level schadenfreude, Andrew Tate and his brother have been imprisoned since December and that just got extended.
I think they did met, but only to raise the interest rate and then go home.
Is there an "indict" version of "chimpeach the chimperor"?
Chimpeach the chimperor... Now that is a name I haven't heard in a long time.
It's so darkly funny to think back to W's years, because I totally had this young adult End of History narcissism where I could not believe what was happening, and surely this is the most consequential thing that's ever happened...and now we know how it turned out, and then at some point it became not even recent anymore. All those deaths and the world just keeps unfolding.
I wrote a very little song once with this chorus, "The end, the end! Again, again!"
The appeals court panel also agreed that Trump and his lawyer were sufficiently criming to lose any communication privilege?
I think so. Or maybe it's just that they agreed the initial court didn't fuck up enough that they need to be stopped just now?
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This is the Twitter equivalent of a between-the-legs, off-the-backboard self alley-oop.
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