And Now, Federal Charges
Published at 20:17 on 8 June 2023
Time to reiterate a few points I made earlier in the wake of the New York indictment:
- This is still not one of the two most serious things Trump did, crimes that strike at the heart of political democracy, and which therefore are the most critical things to indict Trump over. Yes, mishandling so many classified documents (willingly and deliberately, and then trying to cover it up) is more serious than trying to cover up some hush money payments to a porn star. But it is still not as serious as attempting to tamper with vote counting in Georgia or inciting a fascist putsch at the Capitol, not by a long shot.
- The pending indictment breaks another precedent. An ex-president will soon be indicted over Federal charges. This proves that the Department of Justice is not pulling levers behind the scenes to protect Trump. Well, not quite: I am sure they are still pulling levers behind the scenes, but not enough to completely protect Trump.
- They would, in other words, have indicted anyone other than an ex-president far sooner, over far less convincing evidence.
- Moreover, the broken precedents makes it more likely that another indictment over what happened on 6 January 2021 will come eventually.
What this all means is that when it comes to a trial, they are highly likely to convict, because they have already done Trump the favor of being double super sure that the case against him is ironclad.
And then what? Most likely, house arrest. Sorry, Nice Liberals: the system is not very likely to lock up someone that powerful in a normal prison. Plus, house arrest neatly solves the problem of Secret Service protection, to which all ex-presidents are entitled under the law. It will probably become part of their mission to supervise the conditions of his house arrest, perhaps in conjunction with Federal marshals.